Lily sat up in bed, eyes shut tightly to keep out the rays of sunlight that streamed in through the window, and she reached up a hand to rub groggily at her eyes before forcing them open. On the other side of the room, Max's bed lay empty, the sheets rumpled from where Nick had lay the night before, though neither of the girls could say they'd had the pleasure of getting a good night's sleep, as they'd become accustomed to over the past week.
The clock sitting on top of Lily's dresser read that it was shortly past eight, and as she crossed the room to peek out the window, she caught sight of Nick across the field, where the shredded remains of the Munson family trailer lay scattered on the ground as she dug through the items in what used to be the family's kitchen. Quickly pulling on a sweatshirt and a pair of jeans, Lily left the bedroom, getting a pot of coffee ready in the kitchen and lacing up her sneakers to join her friend outside before Wayne was set to meet them at any minute.
It was warm for a spring Indiana morning, though the breeze made Lily cross her arms over her chest as she walked towards the wreckage. Already, Nick had made a small pile of salvageable things from the kitchen, though littering the ground were an endless amount of glass shards from Wayne's shattered mug collection, comprised of presents Eddie and Nick had given him for birthdays, Father's Days, and Christmases over the years.
The damage from the gate had begun in the living room, where Chrissy's body had been found, and spread outwards, in the direction of town. The pile of mattresses they'd left on the floor had disintegrated, the singed edges little more than a pile of ash at the edges of the cracked earth. While the other half of the trailer hadn't been split open, the accompanying earthquake had left little to be desired, broken glass from the mugs and other personal artifacts lining what remained of the floors along with splintered wood and jagged metal ends. While, the last time she'd seen the gate it had been red and covered in vines on the ceiling, it was gone, appearing as nothing more than jagged cracks splitting the earth, as if they could go on all the way down to the center of the world.
Just another tragedy to befall the cursed town of Hawkins, Indiana.
"Good morning," Lily called out to Nick, who was crouched over a pile of rubble, dusting off an old lampshade in an attempt to see if it was salvageable.
"Morning," Nick called back over her shoulder, dusting off her palms onto her jeans as she stood back up. "I wanted to start in here, so I had an idea of what we were working with before Wayne got here. I left you Eddie's room, figured you should be the one to see what you can save in there."
Lily nodded, turning to the other half of the trailer, where the roof still remained intact, though as if it were holding on for dear life. She stepped over the rubble and glass as she moved through the halls, stopping to pick up a broken picture frame that lay on the floor, depicting a photograph of Wayne and the kids at a carnival when they were young, Eddie no more than eleven as he flashed the camera a cheesy smile, Nick's nearly identical except for a couple missing baby teeth. Wayne stood between the kids, a proud grin on his face as they each brandished a goldfish in a bag, no doubt a winning prize from one of the games. Lily pulled the photograph from the frame, dusting it off and placing it in the pocket of her sweatshirt as she pushed open the door to Eddie's room, bracing herself for the worst.
Eddie Munson was no stranger to a messy bedroom, but Lily was fairly certain that, at one point in time, his floor had been visible. Cassette tapes were strewn across the floor from the bins that had been upturned in their attempts to save Nancy from Vecna, made worse by the earthquake as they'd been thrown from his bed frame onto the floor. His acoustic guitar lay crushed into splintering pieces under a fallen amp, though where his electric guitar sat in a pile of broken glass from his mirror, aside from a couple broken strings, it appeared mostly untouched.
"Alright, sweetheart," Lily murmured, gently lifting the instrument and inspecting it for any further damage. "Let's get you out of here, shall we? He'll be so excited to see you later."
Lily pushed the door open leading to the porch as she set the guitar down on the couch, beginning a pile of things she could salvage from Eddie's room as tires sounded against the gravel road, and she looked up to see Wayne's rusty pickup truck come into view as he parked in his usual spot. He climbed out of the vehicle, looking up at his home with devastated eyes, and Nick ran to greet him, throwing her arms around her uncle as she hugged him tightly.
"Hi Wayne," Lily greeted once he and Nick had broken apart, and he stepped closer to the wreckage to inspect what they had already salvaged. "There's coffee over at my place, if you'd like any. Help yourself."
"Thank you, darlin'." Wayne said, nodding. "How's it lookin' in there?"
"His guitar survived." she assured him. "The acoustic one didn't, and there's a lot to go through, but we'll get what we can."
Wayne nodded as he followed Lily back in through the door, peeking into both of the kids' bedrooms with a stoic expression before making his way back to the kitchen. Lily grabbed a garbage bag, moving towards the splinters still making up Eddie's dresser, to pack up his clothing before moving onto his closets.
By the time they'd decided to call it a day, packing what they could fit into Wayne's truck and Lily's trailer, it was nearly lunch time, causing the three of them to stop for sandwiches and drinks at the local 7-Eleven on their way to the hospital. Wayne and Nick rode in his truck and Lily drove Eddie's van, which Robin, Sarah, Debbie, and Steve had tracked down the night before after getting a vague description from a heavily medicated Eddie about its whereabouts.
Lily arrived at the hospital first, grabbing her drink from the cup holder and slamming the door shut. When she reached Eddie's room, she could hear laughter traveling into the hallways, and peeked her head inside to see him and Dustin deep in conversation. Eddie seemed much more alert than the night before, his eyes bright as he laughed at whatever Dustin was saying. She knocked lightly against the door, pulling the attention of the two boys over to her as she watched them with a smile.
"Hi," she said, walking in and taking a seat next to Eddie, leaning over and kissing him swiftly on the cheek.
"Hey," Eddie said, his gaze quickly moving to Dustin before back to Lily. "Henderson, shield your eyes, you got mad at us last time."
Dustin's eyes shut tightly in disgust as Eddie leaned over to kiss Lily, a gagging sound echoing throughout the room accompanied by the scraping of his chair against the linoleum floor as he quickly stood up, forcing the two teenagers apart.
"Nope," Dustin said. "I'm gonna go find Steve, you guys are gross. Bye."
"Bye," Lily and Eddie chorused as he left the room, the redhead beginning to chuckle, reaching up to take a sip of her drink.
"Whatcha got there?" Eddie asked, his eyes narrowing in the direction of the cup.
"This?" she asked, holding up the cup and shaking it softly, and he nodded. "Just Hi-C, we stopped for lunch on the way here."
"Want to share some with your handsome, yet heroically injured boyfriend?" Eddie asked, batting his eyelashes dramatically in her direction.
Lily smirked. "So you're my boyfriend now, huh?" she asked, holding up the drink in front of him so the straw rested in front of his mouth.
"I would hope so," he said, leaning forward to take a drink. "We've already said 'I love you,' and everything."
Lily smiled, leaning forward and kissing him quickly again. "I want to go check in on Max, see how she's doing." she asked. "I'll see you in a little while, okay?"
"Take your time, Mayfield." Eddie assured her, and she nodded, rising from her chair and exiting the room.
Lily's shoes trekked down the familiar pathway, as they had every few hours over the past two days while she swapped between spending time with Eddie and checking in on Max. It killed her to see the look in Lucas's eyes when he continued to tell her there was no change, that they both knew all too well that there may never be an improvement in her condition. But for that moment, all they could do was talk to her, and let her know they were there for her, whether she could actually hear them or not.
However, it wasn't only Lucas and Erica in Max's room, sitting on chairs where Lucas had been reading from the latest Stephen King novel, as she had grown accustomed to, but instead now the younger two Sinclair siblings stood facing five new figures in the room, their backs facing Lily.
At the soft scuffing sound of her sneakers against the linoleum, Mike, Will, Jonathan, Nancy, and Eleven turned to face Lily, and she was unable to miss the way their eyes lingered on her, unsure how to proceed with the news about her sister, or even how to act around her after the way she'd treated them all the last time she'd seen any of them, aside from El, who she hadn't seen since the night at Starcourt Mall.
"Lily," Jonathan was the first to speak up, pulling her into a hug.
She hadn't seen either of the Byers boys since their move to California, on their last day of school at Hawkins High that past fall. Not that she had spoken to either of them while they'd still been classmates of hers, as she'd been too busy beginning to craft her perfect cheerleader facade, but she'd remembered the unfortunate run-in she'd had with Jonathan at a party, when he'd tried to talk to her and assure her that their friends still cared about her, but she'd simply shrugged him off and kept moving.
"Hi," she said, her voice barely more than a whisper as she hugged him back. "It's good to see you guys safe."
"Lily," Eleven said, and Lily looked over at the young girl, seeing her eyes bright with unshed tears. "I-I'm so sorry," she stammered.
"Thank you," Lily said, giving El a sad smile in return.
"How's Eddie?" Mike asked, before nervously reaching up to scratch the back of his neck. "Nancy mentioned he'd gotten hurt, I don't know if you've seen him at all."
Lily chuckled softly. "He's actually doing pretty well. Would you like to see him?"
Mike nodded. "Can I?"
"Sure thing," Lily said, gesturing for them to follow her.
Lily led them back down the linoleum hallway, sure that her shoes would wear a path through the flooring by the time she was done spending her days in the dim lighting of Hawkins Memorial. The others followed close behind her, El staying close by Mike's side with the hood of her sweatshirt pulled up over her head.
"He's got a lot of bandages, from the bites." Lily explained to Mike as they walked, the boy nodding intently at her words. "He's on a lot of painkillers, too, so he might be a bit spacey, but neither of us are strangers to how spacey he is on a normal day, so that part should be nothing new. Also, uhm, don't mention the handcuffs..." she trailed off nervously.
"Handcuffs?" Jonathan asked.
"Hawkins PD still thinks Eddie's their number one suspect for all of Vecna's killings." Lily explained. "It's bullshit, I know, but they've got Eddie handcuffed to the bed so he can't escape. Not that he's in any condition to, which I made very well known to Chief Powell, but that man's not exactly my number one fan right now."
Lily knocked lightly on Eddie's door before pushing it open to reveal Steve, Dustin, and Nick now sitting in chairs at one side of the bed. Eddie lay perched on top of the bed as he had when she'd left only a few minutes prior, his knees brought up as much as he could manage to rest a notebook against them while he scribbled away with a pencil, conversing with the two of them while he continued his work, his eyes trained on the paper. However, at the sound of the door opening, he looked up in their direction, his eyes softening as they landed on Lily.
"Back so soon," he mused, closing the notebook and setting it on the side table. "To what do I owe the pleasure?"
"Found a couple stray visitors." she said simply, moving further into the room to reveal the others standing behind her.
"Wheeler!" Eddie exclaimed excitedly, his eyes landing on Mike before they moved over to where Will and Jonathan waited at the end of the group. "Byers, you're here, too? All the way from California? Wow, you guys sure know how to make a man feel special." As he greeted their friends, Lily took her usual seat next to his bed, and Eddie leaned forward, kissing her softly. "Hi," he said with a grin.
"Hi," she said, only to be cut off by a strangled sound coming from Mike.
"I, but she-" his voice faltered as he looked back and forth between Eddie and Lily, at a loss for words. "I was gone for one week, what the fuck did I miss?"
At Mike's confused words, Eleven started to giggle, wrapping her arms around her boyfriend's shoulders, and Eddie's gaze softened as he finally noticed the girl standing next to his friend, though his eyebrows pinched together slightly.
"I don't think I know you." Eddie said, glancing over quickly at Lily. "I don't know this child, do I?"
"I'm El," she said softly.
"Munson, this is that girl we were telling you about." Steve explained. "The one with the superpowers."
"Superpowers, huh?" Eddie asked, Lily reaching forward to take his hand and lace their fingers together, and he squeezed her hand softly in response. "I heard they're gone, though, right?"
"They were," El confirmed, though her eyes landed on the empty cup of Jell-O that sat on the end table next to Eddie's notebook, and Lily watched as the cup floated through the air before landing in the garbage can.
"Whoa," Eddie mused, his eyes still staring at where the cup now lay sitting in the plastic garbage bag. "We've got a real life Mage. That's pretty metal, I won't lie. What are you doing wasting your time with Wheeler?"
"Hey!" Mike protested as El began to laugh harder. "Can we get back to the subject matter at hand, please? Seven days ago the two of you hated each other." he said, gesturing to Eddie and Lily.
"I don't know what you're talking about." Lily said nonchalantly, fighting a grin as she glanced over at Eddie.
Eddie shook his head. "I never hated her," he explained simply. "We just lost each other for a little while, that's all."
"So does this mean you're rejoining Hellfire?" Mike asked hopefully. "I mean, I know this semester's campaign already ended, and you're graduating this year, but you could always still come to the club's hangout nights."
"I'm gonna need a new shirt." she said simply. "Not naming any names, but somebody bled all over mine while I was saving his life."
"I told you I was sorry," Eddie grumbled sheepishly, trying to hide his grin.
"But yeah," Lily nodded, looking back over at Mike. "I'd love to rejoin."
As the friends continued to chat, Lily watched as Eddie picked the notebook back up, flipping to a page where he went back to his drawing, his body now angled away from Lily so the contents of the page weren't visible. Her eyebrows narrowed toward the boy as he conversed with Mike, the two swapping tales from the past few days and how awesome of a campaign it would make one day, but he didn't seem to notice, his eyes moving back and forth between Mike and the page in front of him.
Lily leaned back in her chair as the rest of the group bid them goodbye, Steve, Dustin, and Nick in search of dinner and the others heading back to scope out the damage of Chief Hopper's old cabin in the woods, leaving the two alone, and as she attempted to peer over Eddie's shoulder, he moved the paper further from view, causing her to let out a sigh.
"Someone's nosy," Eddie mused without looking up from the paper, where he continued to draw with his tongue poking through his teeth in concentration.
"What is it?" she asked. "Why can't I see it?"
"Like I say, patience is a virtue, Mayfield." Eddie chided, shaking his head. "But you're in luck. I'm just about done." Eddie kept the notebook open as he finally set down his pencil, passing her the book. "My Hellfire campaigns are great, they've always been, but the group was really missing something this year. Or, should I say, someone."
Lily looked down at the paper to see a character sketched across its surface. She was tall, with long hair flowing freely around her and an even longer set of robes. Her features were sharp, ears turned up in a point at the very edges, and she held a staff in her right hand, nearly as tall as her with a glowing orb at the top.
"Hellfire's nothing without Lillian Wildfire," Eddie said.
Lily began to smile warmly, all of the fond memories coming back to her of the nights she used to spend in the drama room with Nick and the boys, and the days leading up to the sessions theorizing about how they were going to go, or attempting to plan out moves in advance that Eddie wouldn't see coming. All the nights that made her who she was, and no amount of pretending to blend in with the popular crowd and putting on a cheer uniform ever could have changed that.
"It's beautiful, Eds." she said, looking down at the picture in amazement. "You've been working on this all day?"
"Yeah, I started it this morning while Henderson was keeping me company, when you guys were out at the trailer." he grimaced slightly. "Do I even want to know about all the damage there?"
"Nick and Wayne managed to salvage some stuff from the kitchen, but that end of the trailer was mostly a lost cause." she explained. "Your room mostly just had earthquake damage, the gate didn't spread in that direction, thankfully. One of your amps crushed your acoustic, but your electric will be good as new with a couple new strings." Eddie nodded in understanding. "I saved this, though." she said, reaching into her pocket to pull out the photograph and passing it to him. "Thought you might like to have it in here."
Eddie's eyes filled with unshed tears as he studied the picture, tracing over it with his thumbs. "This was right after Wayne took us in." he said, sniffling softly. "He took us to the county fair for the day, two weeks after we moved in. Since my dad got arrested, it was the first time Nick and I felt like we were part of an actual family. That was the day I swore to myself I'd never wind up like him. A lot of good that did me now, right?" he chuckled humorlessly, his gaze moving over to the handcuff securing him to the bed, where he continued to stare at the piece of metal. "Going to jail for murder. I ended up exactly like him."
"Eddie?" Lily asked, attempting to get the boy's attention, but he simply shook his head, still staring down at the handcuff. "Eddie, can you look at me, please?"
Lily could tell by the slight shake of his shoulders that Eddie had started to cry, but he made no movement to look back at her, avoiding her gaze.
"Edward Joseph, look at me." she said firmly, and he slowly moved to look up at her, a stray tear falling from his eye as he watched her with a defeated expression. She reached for his free hand that wasn't holding onto the photograph, lacing their fingers together, and breathed a small sigh of relief when he didn't immediately pull away. "Am I like my mom?" she asked.
"What?" he asked, furrowing his eyebrows together.
"Am I like my mom?" she asked.
"N-no," he stammered, quickly shaking his head. "You're nothing like her. You don't drink, don't smoke. You're getting out of this town."
"And you are nothing like him." she insisted. "You never killed anyone, and you never would. You're not a killer, you're the boy who gave up his entire lunch just to make sure my little sister wouldn't go hungry."
"You remembered that?" Eddie asked in disbelief. "Lily, it was just a bag of pretzels."
"And because of you, she had something to eat that day." Lily repeated. "We are going to find a way to prove that you're innocent and then you and I are going to graduate and get the hell out of her, like we planned. Do you trust me?"
"With my life," he said without hesitation.
"Then I'm going to need you to trust that I'm going to get you out of this." she said.
Eddie began to nod as a soft knock sounded at the door. The two of them turned to the doorway, expecting to see Nick, Steve, and Dustin back, or one of the nurses making their rounds, but instead two familiar faces stepped inside. Lily hadn't seen Joyce Byers in months, since shortly after Starcourt when she'd stopped by Melvald's General Store to pick up a prescription for her mother, but she still held the same warm expression as she had all those months ago.
Behind her, Lily saw a ghost.
Chief Jim Hopper was a lot thinner than she'd remembered the last time she saw him at Starcourt Mall, the night he died in their attempts to close the gate to the Upside Down. His head was completely shaved, devoid of all hair and the mustache he'd been sporting the summer of 1985, and instead of his police uniform, he wore a flannel and jeans.
"You see him too, right?" Eddie whispered to Lily, and she nodded. "Did we really die back there, or are my meds too strong, because he's dead, right?"
"Good evening, Mr. Munson," Hopper spoke up, nodding in the direction of the two teenagers. "Miss Mayfield,"
"Hi, Chief," they chorused.
"How did you..?" Lily asked, unable to look away from the man they had all believed to be dead the past seven months.
"It's a long story," Hopper assured her. "I'll spare you the details, they aren't exactly pretty. We just got back, and we heard about your problem, Eddie. Seems like you've gotten yourself in quite a bit of trouble while I've been gone."
"Let's just say this chief isn't so eager to look the other way like you have all these years, Hop." Eddie chuckled humorlessly. "I didn't kill those people, I promise."
Hopper nodded. "We know you didn't, kid. That's actually why we're here. I've got a couple friends that work for the government, and they think we can make this all go away."
Eddie and Lily exchanged a look. "So you mean you can..?" Lily trailed off, looking back at Hopper as he began to nod.
"Don't you worry, Eddie. We're going to get your name cleared in no time."