The next morning, Jackylen was awoken by her house phone ringing uncontrollably. She groaned as she fumbled out of bed, to head downstairs to pick up the phone.
"Hello Dotson residents," she said.
"Hey Jackylen," the voice said on the other line.
"Oh hey Nancy, what's up?"
"Hi, I was wondering if you could give me a ride to school. Barb was supposed to take me but she hasn't shown up yet," she explained.
"Oh that's not a problem," she said, whipping sleet from her eyes. "Just give me about ten to fifteen minutes."
"Okay great... thank you."
"Yeah no problem Nance really... see you in a bit," Jackylen said, hanging up the dark blue trimline 210 corded phone.
Jackylen drowsily dragged herself back upstairs to get ready. Since she didn't have lots of time, she threw on an red oversized hoodie, shorts, and converse. For the last five minutes, she spent on her makeup, trying to get rid of the look of the hangover and the bags under her eyes.
She headed downstairs with her backpack, heading down to the car. She put the keys into the ignition and backed out of the gravel driveway. She didn't make it far since Nancy only lived across the street. She honked the horn as loud as she could, signifying that she was ready to pick Nancy up.
After some time of honking, Nancy finally got out of the house, holding books to her chest. As she opened the passenger door, and got in, Jackylen started to speed off.
"Really Nancy?" Jackylen said, looking from her friend to the open road.
"Jackylen. I need to tell you something," Nancy confessed. Jackylen looked over concerningly.
"No!" Jackylen said, hearing the information that Nancy told her about last night. With Steve Harrington.
"Oh yes!" She replied. She layed back in the seat, gazing around the open road. "Oh Jackie, it was so amazing. And he was so nice and he let me borrow his hoodie when I went home."
"Is it his favorite hoodie?" Jackylen said, taking a quick glance at Nancy.
"It's one of his only hoodies," Nancy explained. Jackylen took all the information that her friend had told her.
"Wow... Nance, that's great."
"You know the only thing I'm worried about is him telling people," she said.
"Why? Hasn't he like... slept with every girl in the school practically?"
"How did you know that?"
"Overheard some girl in Mrs. Marston's class."
"AP English?"
"That's the one."
"Do you know who it was? Or why did they say it?"
"Well it was a blonde girl talking to her best friend and I'm pretty sure she overheard Harrington asking you to the party at his house. She seemed pretty pissed to me though..."
"Shit..." Nancy said under her breath.
After a while of silence, the two girls had reached school. The two girls walked through the orange and green stripe halls, trying to keep a low profile. Nancy kept on looking around, examining the people passing by. The anxiety of people staring at her made her stomach drop, making her feel like she wanted to throw up.
"Nance... everything alright?" Jackylen whispered. Jackylen could hear her friend swallow the words trapped in her mouth.
"It seems like everyone is staring at me," she whispers back.
"No one is staring at you," Jackylen tried to convince her. "I'm staring at you because I'm talking to you but no one else is. There's no reason to."
Both the girls were approaching they're locker and started to put some books they didn't need inside. Then out of nowhere the boy from the parking lot came over.
"Hey," he said, opening Nancy's locker door more which made her jump.
"Hey," Nancy replied, laughing very nervously.
"Is everything okay?" Steve tried to ask the jittery girl.
"Yeah! Yeah totally," she replied. "It's just... I feel like everyone's... staring at me."
"Oh... I didn't... I didn't tell anyone," he tried to explain.
"I know. Of course not."
"What about Tommy and Carol?" Jackylen pointed out, closing her locker, now standing next to Nancy.
"You're being paranoid," Steve told Nancy. Then he looked over at the pink brunette. "And why do you care?"
"Not that it occurs to you jackass, but I care about Nancy," Jackylen said, in a rather sassy attitude.
"Jackie..." Nancy whispered.
"What!?"
"I'm so sorry about her," Nancy apologized.
"No it's good how you look out for each other," Steve said. "And it's cute," he whispered to Nancy. "I had a good time."
"Yeah. Me too," Nancy replied. Without a single thought in Steve Harrington's mind, he leaned forward and started to kiss the Wheeler girl, as Jackylen looked away in disgust.
"Get a room you too," Jackylen gagged, making the two pull apart.
Nancy and Jackylen headed towards their first class of the day. As they sat down, they realized Barb's seat was empty. The girls asked around, but people either told them that they should have known, or that they didn't know who she was.
After the first few classes of the day, Nancy wanted to go have lunch with Steve, Tommy, and Carol. But Jackylen decided that she was just gonna go get a few things done instead of having lunch with the four. Jackylen decided to stop at home before her last class of the day to drop off all of the school stuff.
She was planning to hang up posters for her side business. She already had all the posters printed, but she didn't want to carry around a bag she didn't need for the rest of the day. And since they were taking a quiz in their AP World History class, she figured she didn't need anything but a pencil and her brain.
As started to drop off her backpack against the old couch as she heard a crash. She quickly started to run to the crashing sound, in the kitchen. He saw her father standing over the sink, full of dishes with his hand bleeding.
"Dad..." she said, trying to stay calm.
"I thought I told you to wash the dishes last night," he said sternly. As the words flowed out of his mouth, she realized of the fast she was assigned to do.
"I'm so sorry," she said. "I was at the Will Byers memorial at my school all of last night..." the girl lied.
"Bullshit!" Her father yelled, throwing a mug at the girl. The yellow mug smashed into a hundred pieces, nearly the girl's head, but a piece nicking the side of her right cheek, causing it to bleed.
"Get the dishes done after school or you're dead," he told the girl, as he left the room, taking away his cold presence.