LOVE IS PATIENT, LOVE IS KIND.
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STARCROSSED (book one).
°• CHAPTER ELEVEN •°
" YOU USED TO TELL ME THE
STARS HAVE STORIES. "
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trigger warning from your local boring author: the end of this chapter contains a lot of violence, slurs, and physical assault. i don't mean to spoil anything but i wouldn't want a topic i write to have a horrible affect on any of my readers. please skip the last chapter separator with a star if any of this is triggering to you - and you can always message me if you need to talk. love u guys, i'll talk more at the end of the chapter!
ELIJAH WOLFHART REALLY FUCKED UP. Correction - he was the definition of fucked up. It took him longer than it should have to realize there was really something wrong with him. Mentally, he had to have been on the same level as his mother. There had been so many days that he struggled to get out of bed which then soon led to his grades plummeting faster than a sinking ship. The darkness over the boat held more secrets than the stars. He knew they were secretly in disguise of the Demogorgon, watching, waiting for the perfect moment to strike. He felt like a passenger that had jumped overboard to save themselves. It then filled Elijah's lungs with water, burned like flames in his chest, and no matter how deep he sunk, he just wouldn't die.
It started the morning of October 29th, 1984. Two nights before Halloween. Nevaeh had been home for nearly two months now. She was just starting to feel comfortable again. The Wolfhart siblings were horrified of the dark but they were grateful Tobia didn't ask questions about their refusal to shut the lights off when it was late. There was a night that the power had gone out due to some awful storm that ended up waking Elijah.
He was draped in a sheet of sweat that soaked through his clothes. Elijah's eyes, unsettled, locked on his window. He watched it light up every few minutes with a bolt of lighting and flinched at every clap, so loud he swore it shook the walls. The flicker of lights reminded Elijah of the string of Christmas lights in the Byers house. The noise, it was as loud as the roar the awful monster made followed by gunshots. He couldn't move. The darkness had blinded him before swallowing him whole and rendered him of shifting a single limb.
There was no blocking it out. There was no running.
Elijah had suddenly sat straight when he thought the air had finally been sucked out of his lungs and left a terrifying emptiness that couldn't be filled. There was a creak outside of his door. It was so quiet he would have missed it if he hadn't nearly been killed by a monster before. Elijah kicked his blanket off and bolted like a flash to where he kept his handy, wooden baseball bat hidden next to his dresser.
His trembling fingers curled around the handle. Flashes of thunder would flicker through the window and illuminate the stone-cold expression crossing his face. Elijah refused to give that thing a second chance to come back and kill him. He wouldn't go down without a fight.
The door of his bedroom opened with an even louder creak. It must have been drawn to the sound as Elijah takes a few steps forward and watches in the split second of horror it takes to realize it wasn't even a foot away from him, could take a bite out of him at any second, drag him to the Upside Down -
He swung the bat without thinking.
It cracks against the wall as Nevaeh ducked with a shout of surprise, her arms crossing to shield her head.
Elijah realized what he's done as it slowly processed before him and sunk in. He snaps out of whatever daze he was in. His hands were clenched so tight that they started to shake before loosening and dropping the weapon completely. It clatters against the floor. A few minutes must have passed by as the two locked horrified eyes.
Nevaeh was just using the bathroom. She must not have been able to sleep. And Elijah nearly crushed her skull because he thought she was the Demogorgon returning.
He had to close his eyes when tears start to burn. Panic and something much more awful formed. Elijah could barely stammer out, "I'm - I - I'm so, sor-sorry," seconds before he burst into sobs. He didn't know if it's because the adrenaline of fear died down or that he nearly killed Nevaeh. Maybe it was both. But Elijah can't stop the storm.
Nevaeh didn't speak. Elijah had a hunch she can't. She was so shaken up that he feels her arms trembling when she draped them around his shoulders wordlessly. He falls apart in the forgiving embrace he didn't deserve.
That night, sobbing into Nevaeh's shoulder with the fear of the Demogorgon and the fact that he nearly killed his sister, Elijah has no choice but to face the truth: that there was sincerely something wrong with him. He was one fucked up individual. He could blame that on the mental stability.
The tension doesn't fade the next morning or the one after. It's not that Nevaeh hasn't forgiven her brother. She's told him so, reassured him again and again that it was an accident, and she knows he'd never do anything to harm her. It's that Elijah hadn't forgiven himself.
He can't. Elijah can't possibly just let it go as she did.
The cereal tastes like cement, heavy, nasty, and difficult to chew as it rests on Elijah's tongue. It's hard to choke down and he wants to spit it out. The milk and plain, circled pieces of food would spew across the table with the words I'm so sorry all over again even though it was over. He'll never do it again. He already hid the baseball bat in a closet so he wouldn't have to try and grab it the next time he was afraid. The real challenge was hiding the hole in the wall from Tobia with a framed family picture and then would come when Elijah would be ready to forgive himself.
"You used to tell me the stars have stories." Elijah slowly lifts his head at Nevaeh's word. She speaks quietly, unbothered, dragging a spoon through her oatmeal. The smoke from the hot breakfast caresses her already flushed cheeks and warms them further. "You would tell me them too before I went to bed. I'd get so excited." Nevaeh smiled so her pink cheeks looked full. She mimics the sweet, childlike tone she used to have, "Eli, tell me about the stars. I want to know more about the stars."
Elijah can physically feel his stomach churn. He forcefully swallows the cereal that turns into a heavy lump in the midst of his throat. "Nevaeh - "
"Then you would tell me the stars have stories for us," Nevaeh spoke over him, "for Elijah and Nevaeh Wolfhart. And although I don't know what those stories will tell, that you just can't erase them or change your fate when it's already been written." The spoon fell in the bowl with a soft splat and she leans forward. "I don't know if my addiction was some - some fucked up mess the stars wrote, but I survived it anyway. It had a happy ending, right? And you didn't mean to almost hit me with a bat. You were afraid, okay? I already forgave you... So did the stars, the ones that wrote your story."
The boy with his head in the stars has to pause and swallow them. And it burns as they shred Elijah's throat, burn inside of his stomach as they try to tear their way out, just for the painful process to start all over again. "I can't," he whispers. Elijah has to let his gaze fall to the table so he doesn't see the way Nevaeh frowns. "I could've killed you. I... I need help, Nevaeh."
"We can get you some," Nevaeh promises. "Listen, just - just come with me when I see Doctor Owens again. You won't have to make up shit for some psychiatrist, alright?
Hawkins Lab is the last place Elijah wanted to go after Nevaeh spent almost a year inside, healing.
It wasn't that Nevaeh didn't heal well herself there. It was that the thought of recovering from something so traumatic that started even before the Demogorgon ate its way into his life. Elijah's been in survival mode for so long that he doesn't know who he was before. It's hard to find yourself again when you're a long road of damage even if you don't have a map.
The tension between them almost feels back to normal as Elijah drives them to school. Classes, grades, schoolwork - they don't wait for no man. It sucks that his have dropped, even in Science. Too much has been trying to scramble his brain. He's given up trying to remain hopeful even when Nevaeh did. These were the small directions that guided him through this damaged map.
Too bad he couldn't get lost finding school. Elijah feels a sense of dread every time he comes across that stupid building. It's becoming tied to too many bad memories that he already struggles to add much more to.
Nevaeh has her sneakers pressed onto the dashboard, a notebook balanced on her knees as she studied the scribbled words, nibbling on the pink eraser of a pencil. "You should really focus less on Science and maybe more on History. I can help you with it. We have to raise that D to at least a C."
"Why?" Elijah asked with a scoff.
The notebook snapped shut. "You kidding me?" Nevaeh unbuckled and shifted in the passenger seat. "You're getting into college, you dumbass. You're going to major in - in some stupid science program, okay, and then go to the moon. So raise - " A hard hit is delivered to Elijah's shoulder with the notebook's cover, "Your - " Another smack, "Stupid - " Elijah yelps this time, "Grades!"
"Okay, okay!" Elijah snatches the book out of her hand before it could be used as a weapon again. "God. I didn't know you were trying that hard to get rid of me."
Nevaeh uses her hand this time to shove at Elijah's shoulder. "For a smart guy, you're so, so stupid." She huffs. "Do not let this small-minded town keep you here forever."
She's prepared to eat their words when they find out just how much more this already small-minded down is going to become. A distant roar of an engine rips across the parking lot and a blue Camaro comes into Elijah's view. He frowns at the speed the driver is taking and would've flipped the asshole off if he wasn't drawn to glance out the car window as the other parks not too far away. It's still a little close for Elijah's liking.
It's obvious the driver intended to put on a show the second he pulled into the school's parking lot. He's dramatically opening his door, sticking a leg out, and planting a biker boot directly into the gravel. Elijah doesn't exactly know what to feel when a guy who so painfully looks like an asshole but is also really hot all at the same time reveals himself. He flicks a dead cigarette away as he turns his head, cocking it to show a sculpted jawline, and a dark gaze scanning the audience he drew in. Elijah almost misses a small, red-haired girl that kicks herself away on a skateboard.
"New guy," Elijah mumbles. He rolls his eyes as the guy takes off after a huge, unneeded entrance. "Douchebag."
"Hm," Nevaeh hums. Elijah's head snaps towards her. She has her eyebrows raised, a mischievous glimmer in her eyes. "I don't know. He's definitely - "
A wave of protection washes over Elijah. He thrusts a threatening finger in Nevaeh's direction. "Don't even think about it," he warns.
His sister falls into a fit of giggles as they exit Elijah's car. Nevaeh tries to keep up with him as he rushes to try and block out anything that has to do with his baby sister finding another guy attractive. "Come on!" She teases. "I didn't say anything!"
"No more men!" Elijah pleads without glancing back. He hates that the stupid face of Shane Lewis pops into his mind and has to imagine punching it away again. He doesn't know if there'll ever be a man good enough for her.
"Okay." Nevaeh shrugs as she finally caught up with him. They were out of earshot, a few yards from the school's entrance when she asks, "What about girls?" While fiddling with the hem of her dark purple sweater.
Elijah stopped in his tracks. Nevaeh almost ran into his shoulder. He stares back at her unreadable expression that held nothing but a warm smile. He didn't know what questions to ask after being caught so off guard. It's hard to tell if she's messing with him or not. But Elijah, who would love this girl regardless if she was attracted to men, women, or both, smiles back and throws his arm over her shoulder as they walk into school together.
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It wasn't that Elijah didn't want to leave Hawkins for a better life, for a nicer school, a degree that he knows he deserves. He just needs to find where the right direction was to take the first step. It was hard enough to focus on tests, homework, and schoolwork in general without remembering what happened. Elijah can't block the Demogorgon out of his head. The awful screams, the way its face could open up, how it would kill and maim anything alive. How it was Barb and Eleven. How it was almost him. How it was almost Jonathan, Nancy, Will, Nevaeh, Steve...
And it's ridiculous. Elijah knows it. And yet, every time he tries to focus on the words in his History textbook with his fingers curled into the knots of his hair, all his mind can do is wander into the waves of fear. He questions, what if it's still out there? What if there's more? Because Elijah, who let Nancy shoot that thing in the back as many times as it took to get its hungry attention off of Jonathan, knew it'd be pissed. And it'd be looking for him. All of them.
Elijah knows he's bombed yet another lesson as soon as the bell rings. He doesn't know if the sigh that follows is heavy with sorrow or shakey with relief as he shuts his textbook and stuffs it into the backpack hanging on his chair. It's heavy enough as it dangles on his shoulder, but whatever. Elijah's too tired. It's a miracle he's still on a pair of wobbling legs that carry him out of the classroom and into the school halls slowly filling with more students as they pour out of their ended classes.
His eyes almost immediately pick out two of the bunch. It's too easy with their shared trauma and all. Jonathan and Nancy leave the door opposite to him and almost run into a preppy girl named Tina who greets her and hands her a bright, orange piece of paper. "Hey, be there, Nancy."
Jonathan greets Elijah as Nancy quickly scans what he assumes is an invitation. "Hey, thanks! But could I get a few more?"
"Sure." She passes Nancy a thin stack.
Nancy catches up with the boys and shoves the first flyer into Jonathan's chest, "you and - " she hits Elijah's stomach with the other, "you are coming to this."
He lifts the paper and reads over it. It's a shitty, cheesy invitation to a Halloween party. The ghost drawn on it is probably the only, cute inviting sketch on it. Elijah is already planning to crumple it into a ball and shove it in the trash.
"Come and get sheet faced," Jonathan reads aloud. He laughs. "No, I'm not."
"Count me out too." Elijah starts to crumple it, but Nancy's hand shot out to stop him.
She exclaims as they turn a corner, "I can't let you both sit all alone on Halloween - that's just... Not acceptable!"
Elijah stares back as if Nancy lost her mind. "Are you kidding? You're talking to the outcast and the queer, you think we'd actually be invited to a bash like this?"
"Yeah," Jonathan agrees. "Besides we're not going to be alone so you can relax. We're going trick-or-treating with Will."
Halloween was a special holiday to Elijah. Or, it was, before discovering monsters were real. He still attempts to hold onto the special memories the day had. The nights he would take Nevaeh trick-or-treating, who would always be dressed in something sweet or adorable, clutching her big brother's hand when an asshole with a much scarier mask would get too close. Then they would spend all night trading candy from their pillowcases while watching a movie that was scary enough to make Nevaeh screech but not enough to give her nightmares. Elijah cherished things like that. He didn't want to ruin it with a screwed up party he wouldn't even have fun at after everything that already happened.
"All night?" Nancy points out.
Jonathan shrugs. "Yeah."
"No, no way. You're gonna drop Eli off by 8 who's going to watch some shitty horror movie and eat gross, buttery popcorn, then listen to the Talking Heads and reading Vonnegut or something," Nancy argues.
"Sounds like a nice night."
Elijah shot his hand in the air, exclaiming, "Word!" And Jonathan slaps his hand.
"Boys are so stupid," Nancy decides with a roll of her eyes. She stops and turns to her locker. "Come on. I mean, who knows. You guys might even, like, meet someone."
There hasn't been a minute between the strong friendship Elijah and Jonathan had where he had any romantic feelings for his best friend. But he still throws his arm over his shoulders, pressing a kiss to Jonathan's cheek with a loud smack, and declaring, "Nah, he's mine."
The giggles that escape Nancy's lips at the sight turns into a screech when none other than Steve Harrington himself charges at her, lifts her in his arms, and twirls with a laugh. He eases her onto her feet and exchange a few words about how much Steve missed her that seemed too private for Elijah to listen too. He casted a bit of an awkward glance to Jonathan. He knows immediately his best friend is hurt at the sight.
It's awful to watch someone you love be in love with someone else.
Steve is squeezing Nancy in an embrace when he asks, "How's my favorite, most gorgeous person on this planet?"
"Oh," Nancy begins as she blushes, "I'm fine - "
"I was talking to Elijah."
Elijah rolls his eyes. Steve is too caught up laughing in between kissing Nancy all over again to notice. Elijah hates it. They're not best friends, not the way they used to be, but the rift between them has started to thin. He didn't hate him anymore than he loved him. It's hard for him to tell what he felt towards Steve who would make every attempt to put a smile on Elijah's face and try to go back to what they had before the incident. Nothing has worked so far.
"Nice to see you too, Steve," is all he utters. But then Elijah notices his real best friend, the one who stuck by him when nearly all of Hawkins turned against him, who didn't only want to be there for the good times, was gone. He felt a small spark of panic until he turns his head and notices Jonathan was only walking off, placing as much distance as he could between himself and the couple before them.
"Hey, Jonathan, wait up!" Elijah calls. He only nods to Nancy before he parts and breaks into a short sprint to catch up. "I get it's hard. I'm sorry," he sympathizes once they're alone.
"Don't be," Jonathan dismisses. His eyes tell the truth of his sadness even when his lips twist into a smile. "I just want her to be happy."
Eyes follow the pair as Elijah locks him arm through Jonathan's to guide him while they walk but after everything, it's easy to ignore. Elijah's much more busy comforting someone who means a lot to him. "You know I love Nance - and I support woman in making their own choices - but for the record... She's missing out."
The smile on Jonathan's face grows a little bigger and becomes a tad less sad. It's a start. "Yeah? Am I your type then?" He tries to joke back.
Elijah laughs. "I don't have a type. I just think... Being with a girl is gross. I know what I like." He shrugs before coming to a pit stop, Jonathan following. He pulls his arm back to raise his hands, cup Jonathan's cheeks and pulls him into a kiss in the midst of the school.
It's more comical than anything. Jonathan's attractive and Elijah knows now he has really soft lips, for sure, with an even kinder personality that's impossible not to love. And Elijah does love him. He loves Jonathan like he loves Nancy. There's nothing romantic about it. If there was, he'd feel the same way he had the times he kissed Steve, the way it felt as if fireworks from the 4th of July went off in his bloodstream. It'd be like plucking the stars out of the sky and kissing them. That's how he know his type isn't Jonathan Byers.
They part and Jonathan looks less confused and more curious. "And?" He prompts.
"And my type isn't you." Elijah laughs again and pats his cheek one last time. He gives his final input as they walk to their next class like nothing ever happened. Like the world wasn't watching stars being written.
They were just two pathetic fools, shooting stars in the sky, chasing after something that isn't even there.
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A boy with his head lost past the clouds and stuck in the stars doesn't notice the world turning around him while he feels everything deeply. He allows everything to keep spinning when gravity gives up and lets every blow hit, hard. It's so hard to tell how badly it hurts when all of your emotions become one. Elijah Wolfhart is terrified of monsters. He's so pathetically in love with Steve that every time he sees him with Nancy it's like a sharp slap to the face. He's worried about everyone around him, those he cares so much about. Some days Elijah forgets to worry about himself when there is something sincerely wrong in his fucked up mind.
His sister has been trying to be more active in after school activities. Elijah thinks Nevaeh's joined some creative arts club to help her keep her mind off of everything else so he's supposed to run back to school in a little over an hour to give her a ride home unless she calls him again to let him know she's getting a ride home. Elijah is grabbing his bookbag from the backseat after parking his car in the driveway when he feels the same chill he got when he first saw the Demogorgon. It brings an awful sting that crawls up his spine until he shivers, so cool that goosebumps scatter across the back of his neck.
Elijah doesn't know if he's going to hit someone he cares about again, but he's prepared to go down with a fight when he spun on his heel. He doesn't know if his luck is good or shitty when he comes so close to Shane Lewis's face that their noses nearly touch.
His fear and panic that started to mix finally slow, but is replaced with anger when Elijah spat, "What the fuck do you want?"
"I'm tired of you, Wolfhart." Lewis's face is twisted in anger and it only makes the nose now crooked from Elijah breaking it curve further. Elijah scowls back. "If you think you can live in Hawkins, strut with you new boyfriend - "
"Are you jealous?" Elijah furiously barks with an even more bitter laugh. "Want to work your way through the Wolfhart's? I'm sorry, baby, crooked nose bitches who can't take a hit aren't my type."
Elijah knows he messed up the second the words left his mouth and they're suddenly not alone. Lewis didn't show up at his house with the intentions of facing him alone and Elijah finds this out when their violent game extends into three against one. Two others he recognizes from his school, two boys he knows the faces and names of, two he never thought had a problem with him, had seized an arm each to pin against Elijah's own car.
He struggles like hell. It's no use and when has it ever been fucking fair to have three men against one in a fight?
The thought makes alarms go off in Elijah's head and a whole different level of fear settle in. It doesn't help he's being restrained and no matter how hard he tries to rip away, kick his legs, strain his muscles, he won't be able to run away from the real monsters who disguise themselves as humans. Elijah didn't think he could ever have been one to hide in the closet the second he found out he was gay. He couldn't hide who he was. He just didn't think of the consequences until they've stood in his face.
Elijah is visibly shaking when he sneers, "If you think you can beat the fag out of me, do it."
"Maybe we will. Maybe you'll get lucky and it'll work, Wolfhart." Lewis faked a hit and lunges, causing Elijah to flinch, but he only grabs his collar. "And then maybe your boyfriend Byers, the other one you molested, will get the same treatment, huh?"
He doesn't see the fist coming his way until it's too late and Lewis struck Elijah in the face. It's nothing but a poor bitch hit that barely causes a bruise and makes some blood pool in his mouth. He puckers his lips and spits the second it processes that Jonathan could be their next target because of their stupid, harmless kiss. The crimson liquid splatters across Lewis's face.
"He's not even gay. He likes girls, you pathetic fucking wannabe." Elijah swipes his blood stained tongue across his lower lip. He stops fighting and becomes as compliant as Lewis wants because the idea of Jonathan taking this pain instead is too much. It's why he kept Steve's secret for longer than he should've. Elijah never wanted anyone to suffer the same ways he had.
Elijah can bear it as long as they don't have to. He glares at Lewis and spat one last time, "Go fuck your father."
It's not that Elijah didn't stand much of a chance or that he can't hold his ground. It's that he doesn't make a move when Lewis punches him again, again, and again, finally knocking him off his feet because if he's their only target - he can live with that. He couldn't if something happened to someone he cared about. Elijah smacks off the sidewalk, hard, and pain welcomes him like a second skin. Blood pools from the corner of his mouth as he curls, arms crossed above his head to shield at least one part of his already throbbing body and protect it from every hit, every kick.
It takes two horrible kicks to the ribs from the fag beaters that finally makes Elijah cry out in pain. He splutters and shakes through it, gasping for air like the wind had been knocked out of him. There's nothing else that can cause the storm in his mind other than...
Orion's Belt, he thinks through the sob that breaks free. They don't hear Elijah's thoughts but they still mock the sound and laugh with more slurs and hits thrown his way. Cassiopeia. Ursa Major. Ursa Minor. He cries out again at the unbearable pain that seems to explode more than once. Cepheus. Perseus.
They leave him there when they're done. Elijah, covered in forming bruises and drying blood, lowers his arms across his aching stomach, rolls onto his side, and sobs again. His temple presses against the concrete stained with his own blood. Elijah lays there in so much pain that he could hardly move and only lay there, pathetically sobbing, with the horrible realization that the stars did write his story.
And he's already caught a glimpse of the ending.
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author's note:
writing this chapter made me tear up at every part. i love writing elijah's story so much. HE HAS SO MUCH OF ME IN HIM AND HE HAS MY WHOLE HEART. anyways i'll try to break this up a bit.
again i feel like this went unnoticed but i'm doing all my power to portray something i experience myself but have never written about especially in a different time. elijah suffers from bipolar disorder which causes delusions, hallucinations, and a need for adrenaline especially after something traumatic that could send you into a manic episode. his horror with himself for almost hurting nevaeh and realizing he needs help breaks my heart so much :( i just love him.
can we all collectively say ... BISEXUAL NEVAEH
and ... I AM NOT A FAN OF BILLY HARGROVE. check out my jonathan fic magnets if you're anti billy
oh and the second half?? steve's subtle flirting?? wink wonk. oh and elijah kissing jonathan was nothing but platonic. just bros being bros. he just thought it'd be funny although i, personally, have considered making this a byers fic more times than i should have. can't blame me.
i definitely didn't want to spoil the ending of this chapter with the trigger warning but i also knew i had to post it just incase. please understand it was NOT anything romantic. no one can or will save eli, he's doing it himself, and these things happen in life. reality is horrible and these things shouldn't happen, but they do, and worst of all, there can be no consequences. which is bullshit but again, reality. anyways fuck shane lewis.
i think that's it. thank you guys sm for reading this far. i'm really excited for act two and so happy we got this ball rolling!
- koda
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