( Sunday, February 24th 1985 )
DROPPING Max home yesterday, Julie found out she lived on Cherry Lane, which seemed comical for a girl with red hair, and it saved her the remembering the next day round. She simply turned up at her doorstep with a slim shoebox full of cassettes.
Before she left, she put all her mixes to one side, but she took the lot of her cassette collection: Kate Bush; Missing Persons; Babe Ruth; The Bangles; X; Romeo Void. All of it. Then she drove straight here.
Cherry Lane was a quiet one, even with the Ratt song playing at full blast on the other side of the yellow front door.
She had patiently waited for some sort of response to come of ringing the doorbell, and what came had full eyebrows, a chiselled face, big sweaty arms on full display, a mullet and one dangling silver earring hanging from a left earlobe.
Billy Hargrove.
Anything with a pulse at Hawkins High knew who he was. The new kid from California that guys wanted to be and girls wanted to be with.
Julie had never seen him this up close before, but the sweat drenching his white muscle vest was far from a sight to behold.
The pure hatred on his face dissipated the moment he swung open the door, face to face with a blue-eyed brunette in a striped button down, a tweed waistcoat, denim flares and high brown boots.
His shameless once over her body as he raised his wrist to the upper doorframe, made her raise an eyebrow. He extended his lips into a smirk.
"Hi," he said. There was a rasp to his voice that reminded her of eighty-year-olds that lived a long life of chain smoking.
"Hey," she said awkwardly. "I'm here to see Max."
His widening grin teased his straight pearly teeth. "Who's asking?"
"Julie. I dropped her off here yesterday."
"Julie," he repeated, testing it on his tongue. "That's a pretty name."
"Can you at least try to not make my friend barf? Jeez." Max marched up to the door from behind Billy. "I've got it." She was dressed in a blue ringer shirt and some jeans, her hair in two plaits on either side of her chest like Julie's had been the day before.
Contrastingly, Julie's hair was half-pinned back today instead, falling in waves on her back and on her shoulders.
Billy gave her a final once over before stepping aside, lifting his hands in surrender at either side of his head and walking away.
Max was red hot with embarrassment. "I'm sorry about that, come in."
Julie was led to Max's bedroom under the watchful blue eyes of Billy as he prepared himself to lift the barbell he kept in the living room.
Julie was relieved to close the door behind her. "I didn't know Billy's your brother."
"Not biologically, thank god," Max grouches, making Julie laugh through her nose. "My mom married his dad and now I'm forced to pretend that we share DNA for the rest of my sorry life."
Julie joined her on her double bed, keeping the shoebox close to herself on her lap. "Well, according to Steve's black eye he's pretty charming."
"He told you about that?"
"Yeah. He gave the guy quite the shiner, I had to ask."
Max sighed. "Such a jerk."
"Then let's forget about him and you open this instead." Julie held out the shoebox like it was Pandora's box.
Max obliged. "Jesus," she exhales at the sight inside. "I can pick anything I want?"
"It's all yours."
Max's eyes looked like they were on the verge of falling out of her head. "What? Really?"
"Yeah," Julie nods. "Really."
"Julie, that's really sweet, but I couldn't," Max says, trying to give it back.
But Julie wouldn't let her, pushing the box forward. "You can and you will."
"But it's so much." Max eyed the heap of cassettes looking back at her-a good thirty at least. "Why?"
"I'm going to college soon and that means socialising and focusing, so if borrowing means they mysteriously go missing under your bed or in the back of your closet, there's no harm done."
Max eyed Julie's warmth and sincerity, not wholly convinced. "Cross your heart?"
"And hope to die."
Then giving her no warning, Max wrapped her arms around Julie's neck tight, knocking the wind out of her. "Thank you, thank you, thank you."
Sitting in Steve's BMW filled with Billy Joel's voice, Julie waited for him to finish his peanut butter and jelly sandwich.
It was his lunch break and Julie headed straight to her mother's flower shop after leaving Max to her musical deep dive for the rest of the day. Julie pledged to let her go through her vinyls next later in the summer, even though Max already had a massive collection of her own that widely impressed her.
"Okay, are you done getting crumbs everywhere?" Julie asked jadedly as Steve propped the last bite of his sandwich his mouth.
"This is why I always say my car because you always have something to say about the crumbs," he responds with his mouth still full.
"It's not my fault you eat like a toddler still teething," she cringed, half-smiling all the while. "Now, are you done?"
"What's the rush?" He dusted his hands against each other, swallowing down.
"I need you to close your eyes and hold out your hands."
"Okay." Steve shut his eyes immediately and turned himself in his seat just enough that he could hold open his palms in front of her.
"Just like that?" she paused. "You're not scared I'm going to put jello on them or something?"
"Are you going to put jello on them?"
"No."
"Then I trust you."
She observed him as he stayed still and silent patiently. It was unlike him, but she disregarded the thought, diving into her purse instead and took out the Charity Ball cassette and the mix she had made him three nights ago. She slowly lowered them onto his hands.
And lowered them.
And lowered them.
Before she swiftly pulled them away.
She looked between his palms cupped together like he was a child trying to catch raindrops in his hand. Then she looked at his face.
She gnawed on the inside of his cheek.
"Jules, you still with me?" he asks.
She hummed affirmatively.
"Good to know."
Her heart was thumping in her chest and she wasn't sure why.
Then, with his eyes still closed, Steve rose one of his hands and blindly reached for Julie's face. Her heartbeat halted.
"What are you doing?" she asks bemusedly.
"Trying to get a feel of your face to make sure my Julie hasn't been kidnapped and replaced by someone else posing as her."
She kept the cassettes in one hand to pull his hand down, but his lips only widened with an amused smile. "Quit being a doofus."
"There she is."
"Just... hands down. Please."
"Sorry," he complies, still smiling.
Tentatively, she placed the cassettes in his open hands. "Okay. Open them now."
Steve opened one eye first. Then the other. "It's not King Crimson."
"No, only ladies men own King Crimson cassettes," she remarks wryly.
But Steve was too flattered to care, smiling at her handwriting. "You made me a mixtape?"
She hummed a yes, nodding. "It took forever to record because my Pink Floyd cassette's been a little dicey lately, but I don't know. I used my mom's dual cassette deck. It should be okay-I hope."
"No one's ever made me a mixtape before," he said softly, making her smile.
"Well, now they have."
He looked up at her. "Thanks, Jules."
"Always, man. I feel a little bit like the musical Santa or something. I gave a bunch of my tapes to Max earlier."
"That's nice of you."
"It's nothing," she waves off. "But when I got there, Max's brother answers the door."
Steve's face darkened. "If he said anything to you I'll kill him."
"No, he only flirted with me until Max showed up and rescued me," Julie teases lightly.
Steve's eyebrows rose. "Did you flirt back?"
"Why in the hell would I do that?" She sounded completely offended.
"I don't know, because you have a thing for mullets."
"And I also have a thing for standards. The guy beats the shit out of my friend and you think I'd wanna bone him?"
"Okay, he didn't beat the shit out of me, that's a bit of an exaggeration. I got in a few punches. Good ones, too."
"I don't doubt it, kiddo-"
"To me it's sound a lot like you do when I'm levelling with you right now."
"The point is there was no mutual flirtation so you can pipe it down. Sheesh."
Steve sighs, running a hand through his hair. "I didn't mean to lose it, it's just he's a dick and no offence but you've had a thing for dicks in the past."
"Dick singular."
"Whatever. You deserve better than that either way," he says sincerely. "You know, just a good, cool guy."
"Well, let me know when you find him."
Then she opened the car door and left, not letting Steve getting a word in even if he tried.
He didn't. He was too busy trying to prepare himself to say the words on the tip of his tongue. But he was forced to swallow them down, missing yet another golden opportunity to come clean about his feelings.
He rolled his eyes and gathered up his keys to head into the flower shop.
The hanging bell jingled upon his entry, but neither Eileen behind the counter nor Julie in front of it with her back facing the door barely blinked his way.
"The wait's just making me anxious," Julie mumbled.
"Well, patience is a virtue. And whatever the outcome, we'll work through it," Eileen reassured warmly.
Steve couldn't pin point what it was that they were talking about, but didn't ask. He had clearly heard the tail end of the conversation for a reason.
As he rounded the counter, Eileen flashed him a smile. "Enjoy your PB and J, Steve?"
He halted with his confusion. "Yeah, how'd you..." Until a thought ignited in his head. "Did Julie tell you I have a crumbs problem?"
"No, you have a little peanut butter on your face," Eileen tells him, pointing to the right outer corner of her lip.
Steve glanced at Julie who'd been forcibly smiling at the counter directly.
"Thank you, Eileen," he wiped the peanut butter away, "for actually having the decency to tell me."
"No problem, honey."
Steve slipped past the orange beads out back, and Julie's eyes followed him.
"You're terrible," Eileen says.
"I didn't see it," Julie lies.