(CW: Vance talks about their past trauma.)
"Bruce, wait!" You stumbled after the black-haired boy as he stomped away from you, wishing nothing but to be alone right now.
"Y/N! Just leave me alone!" Bruce yelled out, stopping you in your tracks by placing his hands on your shoulders.
"I don't need you in my ears right now, okay? So please, just go!" Bruce forcibly shooed you away as you just stood there and watched as he slammed the door right in your face.
You frowned, picking at the skin of your fingers. Did you upset him that bad? What are you going to do?
You walked away like a kicked puppy, walking up to Billy's room to go and mope with him, until a cracked door caught your eye, it was Vance's.
You looked through the crack to see him playing with a deck of cards. He shuffled them over and over, a scowl permanent on his face.
"If you're going to watch me, you might as well enter my room, dipshit." Vance spoke after a while, you jumped out of your hiding spot, cracking the door open farther, with a somewhat guilty look on your face.
"What, Bruce kicked you out?" Vance smirked, a teasing tone to his voice. You looked at him with a confused look before nodding, "how'd you know?" You closed his door, leaving a small crack, since you were unsure if Vance wanted it closed all the way.
You walked towards Vance as he dealed his cards.
Solitaire, you recognized. "You wanna play?" Vance saw your gaze on the cards as he finished his set up.
"Am I allowed?" You asked, scooting closer to Vance and his desk. "Yeah, just don't fuck them up, my cards are special." Vance looked at you with a warning glance.
"Why are you in my room?" Vance asked, grabbing hold of a queen of hearts and placing it on a king of spades.
"I just, I saw it was opened, and then went to close it, when I saw you playing with your cards." You flipped the cards open left by the queen of hearts, a two of spades, you place it on the three of diamonds.
"Is that it? That's all you wanted?" Vance rose his eyebrow at you, before playing his move. "Well, I thought about what you said, and I haven't really talked to you," you completed one column, making Vance nod and move your completed deck to another side to open the rest of the cards.
"You don't need to be buddy buddy with all of us, you know.." Vance looked at you with a smirk, "The other kids at our school fucking hate our guts, and honestly I fucking hate them too." The blonde shook with laughter, his blonde curls bobbing with him.
"So Robin and Finn tell me." you play along, laughing along with him.
"Why do the kids hate you so much anyway?" You pull an ace from the deck, placing it on the top.
"What, nobody told you?" Vance turned to you with a surprised look. "Told me what?" You tilt your head, a little confused.
"Holy shit," Vance turned to you and completely forgot about the deck of cards on his desk. "You're telling me those fucking idiots never told you?" Vance grabbed hold of your shoulders, squeezing you closer to him.
"Uh, depends on what you think they didn't tell me?" You shrugged, trying to finish your solitaire game.
"No, forget those stupid cards, c'mere." Vance pulled you to his bed. "Since nobody else wants to tell you, I will." Vance leans back on his headboard.
"It was summer of '78, we'd all just started middle school, around this time we didn't really know each other," Vance watched you, making sure you were listening.
And you were, you looked at him with a smile, nodding, signalling for him to continue.
"There was this piece of shit, he'd kidnap kids and we were some of the kids he just had to kidnap." Vance continued, playing with some of the rings on his hands.
You noticed that he was somewhat anxious, you realized that Vance wasn't the type to show his "weak" side, being more nonchalant and unbothered when it clearly bothered him to talk about it.
"You don't have to talk about it, if you don't want to, I can tell you don't want to." You maintained eye contact with the blonde, his blue eyes were glossed over, Vance just huffed and shook his head.
"No, you deserve to know, especially if you're going to do that love shit with any of the boys." Vance teased, trying to get your attention off of him, which worked.
"What? Is it that obvious?" Your hands reached up to your face as if embarrassed.
"it's not, you just make it obvious, idiot." Vance flicked you on the forehead, earning an 'Ouch!' From you.
"Anyways, back to what I was telling," Vance looked out of his window, licking his lips. "We met each other in that stupid fucker's basement, and he did some fucked up shit to us." Vance shook his head in denial.
The blonde wouldn't like to admit it, just like the other boys, but what happened down in the basement would always haunt him and the others.
No matter how much they want that man to disappear out of their lives, he's always going to be in their nightmares.
And Vance Hopper wasn't one for that, he opted on staying up for the first few weeks of the aftermath, he refused to sleep, developing insane insomnia.
He remembers when his episodic insomnia had kept him up when Robin had dragged you and Finney up to the roof.
He felt weird listening in onto your conversation, but he couldn't help it.
Vance still refuses to sleep to this day, he struggles, and the bags under his eyes are getting darker every night he decides to stay up.
"I can't even fucking sleep because of him, I just, fuck.." Vance couldn't speak, his rage and anger returning from the past to come and manifest in him once again.
You frowned, watching as Vance let his fury and frustration consume him once again, gripping his comforter close to him, as if it could offer some comfort, and his face scrunching up as you watched the blonde's chest compress slowly to hyperventilating.
You sat closer to him, testing your waters by gently tapping the tips of your fingers against his palm, seeing if he was okay with physical contact.
Vance didn't seem to flinch, still stuck in that spaced out, scrunched and tensed position. You decided to push, placing your hand on his shaking ones.
"You're okay, you're not there anymore." You whispered softly, making eye contact with him. His eyes were filled with nothing but regret and emotionalized 'what if's' running between the blue tint of his eyes.
"Vance, you're in a completely different country, he doesn't get to control you here." You gripped his hand tight in your hold, watching as he slowly calmed, still maintaining his eye contact.
"Fuck, I fucking hate him, he's a monster, I was thirteen, we were fucking young—" the blonde ran his free hand through his curls, you refused to make any big moves, making sure not to trigger Vance's response.
"I know," You mumbled, unable to say anything but just validate his feelings, unsure of what to tell him. Vance clenched his fists, before looking up and blinking his tears away.
He let out a big huff before looking back down at you, his eyebrows furrowing, "were you fucking laughing at me?" He gritted out, you shook your head frantically.
"No, I would never laugh at you, I'm not that kind of person." You sincerely told him, removing your hand from his palm as he quickly retracted it.
"Don't fucking pity me either, I don't need your sympathy, if I can survive that son of a bitch, you're a fucking walk in the park, you get me?" Vance pointed at you, threatening you.
You nodded your head, upset. You made the conclusion that Vance wasn't the type to show his emotions to almost everyone, he refused to lower his guard and that made him threatening to anyone who he came across or caught eye contact with.
"Do you, want to tell me something else?.." You tried to converse, unsure how to continue after his emotional breakdown.
"Robin told me, you had a pinball machine, back home?.." you tried to use the information Robin had told you during his stories to try and get closer to Vance.
"Bruce too, he teased you with it remember?" You looked down at your hands, nervous. "If, what you wanted to tell me was too much, you can tell me about the good things?" You suggested, looking at him glare at you.
"Yeah, I've got a pinball machine." He sneered, leaning aggressively back on his headboard, making his bed shake a bit.
"I named her Darlene, because I used to have a girlfriend, she loved the name darlin' , so I took off from there." Vance's jaw clenched and unclenched, his gaze straying away from you and down to his hands.
"You named the pinball machine after your ex-girlfriend?" You laughed softly, making Vance nod his head. "Yeah, I wasn't into the dating bullcrap until her so, I didn't know what the fuck to do." Vance scoffed jokingly with you.
"She moved though, all the way to New Orleans, I tried to send her letters, but I stopped because," Vance smiled subtly, "she wrote that she found another dude, and that I find someone else besides her."
You looked at the fond look in Vance's eyes, making the connection that he genuinely loved this girl.
"You must've loved her lots," You smile softly, looking at him with sympathy and a soft gaze. "She was, I guess, okay," You tilt your head, confused by what he meant.
"I met her before everything, so she's pretty much a memory now." Vance shrugged, fiddling with his bracelets.
A silence overcame the both of you, it was comfortable and warm, expected by the close talk you had.
You were okay with him not telling you much because it was just taking small steps towards friendship all this time.
Vance continued glancing at you, looking at the way you just stayed silent and continued looking out the window with him, it was now sunset, Korea's nights were a little late than that of America's.
the last of the sun shone red's and pink's into Vance's room and he watched as your eyes reflected the same colours. He felt himself being drawn to you.
Vance always thought that the boys were overreacting, he remembered when you were off in another classroom studying while they were in their classroom, the boys decided to talk about you.
Vance somewhat listened, mostly making fun of the other four boys in his mind.
"No way, you like Y/N too!" Robin gasped, pointing at Bruce.
Billy groaned in annoyance before leaning back on his seat. "First off, Bruce, you get enough girls at our school, give us a break!" The paperboy kicked Bruce's seat to make him jump.
"honestly," Robin scoffed, faked punching him like a punching bag. "The only time I like someone is when you like them too." Finney agreed, verbally nodding with a 'mhm, mhm.'
"How's that my fault?" Bruce laughed, looking over to Robin who had his arms crossed. "I can't really stop who I like now, can I?" The black-haired boy teased his friends.
"Actually, yeah, you can." Finney retorted, "I can't believe you all, besides Vance, likes them!" The dirty blonde threw his hands in the air, groaning.
Vance's gaze stayed on you as you turned to him, "are you okay?" You tilted your head, asking sincerely. "Yeah, was just thinking." Vance shook his head, looking away from you.
It was silent once again, now you and Vance had no idea what to talk about. Feeling like you've overstayed, you decided to stand up and start walking to the door.
"Well, I'm going to go, I hope you feel a little better, Vance." You give him one last smile, patting the back of his hand before starting to leave.
Vance stood up right after you, following you to his door. He walked towards you, his steps somewhat fast and rushed.
You felt the thuds of his fast steps towards you with your feet, confused, you turned over to him.
When suddenly, his lips were on yours. You stepped back, shocked, with Vance stepping forward to support you.
Your eyes fluttered close, his lips on yours made your stomach tingle. His arm held your waist and his free hand held your cheek.
You could feel Vance's pulse on your cheek, feeling his racing heartbeat, it pumped so fast that you could swear you would hear it.
After a few moments, you pulled away, feeling flustered and needing the air. You quickly covered your lips with the tips of your fingers, not wanting the warmth of Vance's lips leaving so quickly.
"Uh, fuck..sorry." Vance rubbed the back of his necks before looking around and avoiding your gaze, stepping back to give you space.
Your hand instinctively held your stomach, wrapping around it. "Uh, don't- don't worry about it," you shook your head, looking up at Vance shyly.
"I liked it.." You admitted, before turning around, refusing to see his face. "See you later, Vance." You spoke, before rushing outside.
Vance was left standing in the middle of his room as he watched you rush out of his room like a frightened rabbit.
He watched as you quickly closed his door shut after leaving. Vance finally let the moment sink in, he ran his hand over his face.
Holy shit, he just fucking kissed you.
Vance sighed loudly, sitting back on his bed, the blonde felt the faint pressure of your lips on his, still hung up on how soft your lips felt on his.
He felt like a school-girl with a crush, his stomach flipping. He felt stupid, his cheeks were reddened, looking into the mirror to see his stupid grin through his hand.
"Jesus fucking Christ." Vance shook his head, covering his face with his hands.
You had rushed out of Vance's room, closing his door quickly. You didn't want to be confronted so you turned quickly, with the intention of going back to your room.
When you made a small 'Oof!' Looking at what you bumped into, you see it was Billy, looking down at you with a red face.
"Billy?" You voiced, seeing him with a nervous and shocked look on his face.
You were stumped for a bit, unsure on why he was that way before you flinched, remembering how you didn't close the door all the way.
"Don't tell me.." you started, looking straight into Billy's forest green eyes. "You saw Vance and I kiss, didn't you.." you pointed your fingers at him accusingly.
Billy physically deflated, nodding and looking like a kicked puppy.
You sighed, face palming, still on adrenaline from your kiss with Vance,
"Are you freaking kidding me?"
END OF CHAPTER 13.