Elijah Brooks's life is turned upside down when his best friend Will Byers goes missing one night. Teaming up with an unlikely group of friends, Eli finds himself transforming from a quiet bookworm to a courageous adventurer willing to do anything f...
Oops! This image does not follow our content guidelines. To continue publishing, please remove it or upload a different image.
ON WEDNESDAY, JUNE 19th, 1985,ALAN BROOKS got into his freshly polished car that morning, drove past the state line, and disappeared without a word to his family.
By Thursday, June 20th, the news had slithered across the town like underground vines as everyone began to accumulate their own theories on where the doctor had gone. Townsfolk declared him missing, but his family, well aware of his aloof behavior and his frequent drives without warning, established he was just on another unannounced trip and would return home. And now, more than a week later, on June 28th, Alan Brooks had not reappeared in the dark shutters and white pillars of the Brooks home.
But rumors had surfaced that his only son, Elijah Brooks, had come home instead.
And Mike Wheeler was a complete and uncontrollable mess.
Everyone's spirits had been dampened by Eli's departure from Hawkins, even Rene Campbell, who always engaged in sour banter with the boy rather than friendlier exchanges. But as the days bled by, everyone began to gradually adjust to the Eli-shaped hole imprinted on their party.
Everyone except Mike. All because he couldn't stop thinking about that night, two warm bodies eclipsed behind the middle school bleachers, lips pressed together as The Police played from the speakers. He couldn't stop breaking over the questions that racked his brain everyday, questions of what could've happened if Timothy Tucker hadn't chosen to throw away his cup of punch in that moment. If he hadn't chosen to scream his discovery to everyone he knew.
It was the first fight Mike had gotten into. A few nasty words, one strategically aimed blow to the jaw, and a hand cast later, Timothy Tucker started avoiding the raven-haired boy like the plague. But Timothy's broken jaw had done nothing but cost the Wheelers a furious amount of savings and worsen Mike's reputation with his school.
Because they all knew who he was now. Nobody would forget the Snowball kiss. Mike especially. He could only be grateful that his parents weren't involved in the school enough to know, to hear the gossip and the truth.
Even with Corey Hart's romantic anthem Never Surrender softly wavering from El's radio, Mike couldn't rip his concentration away from the fact that people had been talking about Eli Brooks coming home. Finally, after six miserable months in Philadelphia with his aunt, and after attending a merciless Catholic private school.
During those first couple of weeks, Eli called. A lot. He would complain to Mike about the school uniforms, going to mass, and how the kids would rather sing Jesus songs than go outside. Mike had become his outlet, a safe blanket he could wrap around him at night and whisper all his secrets to. It created a beacon of hope for Mike, one that promised he would eventually come home and they could continue whatever story that kiss had started.
