POSSIBLY COMMITTING FRAUD
June 29th, 1985
⏰ 9:15 am, 📍Hawkins, Indiana
༺♥༻ Stephanie is usually home alone on Sundays.
Steve's working, her parents are working, and Stephanie?
She has the whole house to herself.
That means, watching as much TV as she wants, eating whatever she wants, and most importantly: leaving the house whenever she wants.
But today, she's going to stay home and watch a movie.
Maybe it's one of Steve's tapes.
Maybe it's Fast Times.
Maybe Stephanie will pause and stare at a certain point.
What part?
It's up for imagination.
As Stephanie gets settled on the couch and begins the movie, the phone rings. "Damn," Stephanie sighs, while reaching for the phone.
As soon as she hears the voice on the other end she didn't mind having to pause her movie.
It's Max.
"Hey, Steph! Are you busy?" her voice comes through from the other end.
"Nope. I'm watching a movie right now. Why?" Stephanie asks, pressing play and hoping Max won't hear it.
"Oh, cool. What movie?"
"Uh...Fa-Footloose!" Stephanie mouths a string of swear words at her slip up. "I'm watching Footloose."
"Come to my house. Serious boy drama," Max whispers.
"Uhh, okay?" Stephanie is obviously confused, then realizes that maybe it has to do with Lucas. "I'll bike to your house."
"Okay, hurry. El's here." Max hangs up the phone.
El?
Stephanie jumps off the couch and walks out the front door to her bike, which was stashed behind a bush from the day before.
She gets on her bike and starts the journey to Max's house.
————
༺♥༻ "And then he said he—he missed me. And then he just hung up."
Max paces around her room. "He's a piece of shit."
"You don't say," Stephanie mumbles to herself, feeling the glare from El while looking through Max's comics.
El looks hurt. "What?"
Max continues pacing. "Mike doesn't have jackshit to do today, and his Nana obviously isn't sick." Max stops pacing and looks El in the eyes. "I guarantee you, him and Lucas are playing Atari right now."
El leans forward. "But friends don't lie."
"Yeah, well, boyfriends lie," Max says, her expression becomes more serious. "All the time."
"Lucas never seemed like the lying type." Stephanie looks up from her comic. "Have you had more boyfriends?"
Max doesn't answer and instead give Stephanie an embarrassed smile and looks away.
"Maxine Mayfield!"
Max runs up to jokingly hit Stephanie, but Stephanie guards herself with her arms.
Then the phone rings. Max doesn't get up to answer it. "That's another thing. You're going to stop calling him." Max sits on the bed next to El. "You're going to ignore his calls. As far as you're concerned, he doesn't exist."
"Doesn't exist?" El repeats, leaning closer.
Max nods her head. "He treated you like garbage."
Max touches El's hands. "You're gonna treat him like garbage. Give him a taste of his own medicine."
Stephanie stopped focusing on what Max was saying and focuses on Max's hands on El's.
She only refocused when Max and El jump off the bed and Max turns around and yells, "Come on, Steph!"
————
༺♥༻ The trio walks into the flooding mall and El is awestruck. She does a turn taking in all the new sights of bright patterned colors, and lights around the pillars.
Stephanie sees people making out or getting a little too close to each other for the comfort of probably everyone in the mall.
"So, what should we do first?" Max asks while jumping off the bottom stair, holding hands with Stephanie.
El looks at Max, confused.
"What, you've never been shopping before, have you?" Stephanie asks, giving a puzzled look.
El shakes her head no.
Max looks around the mall, peering in each fast food shop. "Well, then I guess we're just gonna have to try everything."
The brunette gives a small smile at Max before she gets pulled away by Stephanie to a store. "Come on!"
Stephanie grabs both Max and El's hands as she leads the group into one of the most popular stores, which people are flowing in and out of, The Gap.
Eleven leads the group, looking at each piece of clothing, touching everything she walks by.
Stephanie and Max follow behind El, holding hands.
El stops to stare at a mannequin wearing a scarf and posing. "Do you like that?" Max asks.
"How do I know...what I like?"
"You just try things on." Max looks around the store. "Until you find something that feels like you."
"Like me?" El repeats.
"Yeah." Stephanie inches closer towards Max. "Not Hopper. Not Mike. You."
After hearing this, El takes almost every type of clothing in the store.
Stephanie watches El basically run through the store, until she becomes out of sight and the only obvious thing is the extent of hand-holding between her and Max.
"How are we supposed to pay for all this?" Stephanie asks, pulling away from Max's hand and looking at her in the eye.
Max doesn't say anything and instead pulls something out of her pocket. A credit card? "I took it from Billy," Max laughs, twirling the card in her fingers. "He'll be so mad if he finds out, but then again I don't really care."
"Isn't that, like, identity fraud?" Stephanie asks through clenched teeth, trying not to attract attention.
Max shrugs. "Probably."
Stephanie and Max laugh together until El comes up to the girls with a pile of clothes in her arms.
"Woah, El," Stephanie chuckles.
Max runs over to one of the fitting rooms and holds the curtain open for El to get in fast so she doesn't drop everything on the floor.
After a while, El comes out of the fitting room, in a brightly colored outfit with yellow pants, a blue shirt, and red suspenders. She looks at herself in the mirror that covers the wall ceiling to floor, taking in the new look.
Stephanie runs over to a shelf to grab a yellow beret. She hands it to El who puts it over her forehead and eyes, but Max fixes it and repositions it onto her head.
After admiring her new look, El runs back into the fitting room to try on the next outfit.
El comes out of the fitting room in a matching white skirt and shirt with colorful paint splatter designs. She walks up to the mirror and Max gives El the options of a yellow or red belt.
El looks at Stephanie for her opinion. "Yellow. Definitely."
She takes the yellow belt and after a few minutes of struggling, she finally gets it on and starts to spin around while looking at herself in the mirror.
Max encourages it by spinning El around until she looses her balance and falls into Stephanie's arms.
While El is trying on her next outfit, Max and Stephanie go over to a nearby sunglasses rack, and start trying on all the sunglasses they see. Once they're on opposite sides of the rack, they couldn't see each other. Stephanie says from through the rack, "I found these super cool ones, Max."
"Okay, so did I." Max looks at herself in the small mirror attached to the spinning rack. "Show each other at the same time, okay?"
"Okay."
"One. Two. Three."
Both girls jump out from their spots to look at the sunglasses the other found, only to see that they both are wearing the same pair.
After sharing a few laughs Stephanie takes Max's hand. "Well, I guess it was meant to be."
By this time, El found about five outfits she wanted, Max paid for their things. Sunglasses, trendy clothes, and a matching scrunchie for all three girls.
They walk out of the store, arms linked. Heading to their next destination, Flash Studio.
The girls run into the room to find every accessory imaginable. Jackets, hats, gloves, bracelets, necklaces. Stephanie runs to a rack and starts putting on everything she sees. Apparently starting a trend, the other girls do the same.
They run in front of a paint splattered backdrop and start posing.
"Yes! Work it Girls!" the photographer encourages while taking multiple pictures.
After a few photos and funny poses, all three girls are almost doubled over in laughter. The photographer points back to the dressing room. "Wardrobe change! Thank you!"
The girls run back where they came from, throwing off their current clothes and putting new ones on. They run back out to the background and start posing again.
"Shake it. Shake it out for me." The photographer mimes messing his hair.
The three shake out their hair with their hands while the photographer takes more photos.
After more pictures, laughing, and most importantly, paying.
After running around the two tiered mall, Stephanie, Max, and Eleven found themselves holding El's hand while she tries to walk in high heels.
After succeeding in about three steps, El trips over her own feet and falls to the floor, despite having support on each side. El's laughs made Max and Stephanie laugh even harder. They were probably being too loud because Stephanie notices a few of the self appointed 'popular girls' are giving them the biggest glare ever.
Stacy.
Oh, shit.
Stephanie had a crush on Stacy back in first grade. Well, not a crush. Just taking every opportunity to be partners with her or sit next to her when they got to sit on the floor. So, more just a mild...infatuation.
Obviously after Dustin told the party about the stunt Stacy pulled at the snowball, Stephanie's first grade love changed into her eighth (and ninth) grade hate.
Stephanie decided to give an equally as intense glare back at the girls. Most particularly, Stacy.
Stephanie swore she saw Stacy stare at her for a good thirty seconds before scoffing and turning back around to refocus on her heels.
The girls go back to laughing before Stephanie notices Stacy and her friends walk out of the store.
Stephanie grabs Max and Eleven's hands while following the 'popular crowd' to the food court. "Come on. I have an idea."
The girls stay quiet and inconspicuous while they follow Stacy and her friends to the Orange Julius shop. Stephanie and Max put on their sunglasses for extra incognito.
After watching Stacy buy her drinks and start talking to a guy who looks to be about sixteen, Stephanie instructs El to explode Stacy's drink.
Max pulls Stephanie aside. "Why?"
"Why not?" Stephanie shrugs.
Stephanie laughs and looks above El's head, who's hiding behind a pillar.
El focuses in on Stacy so much that Stephanie could hear a vibration from El's powers.
After a second, Stacy's cup explodes all over her and her friends, probably leaving them sticky the rest of their outing.
The girls laugh at the damage El made as they run to Scoops Ahoy, their last store of the day.
"See? What'd we tell you?" Max runs while holding both El and Stephanie's hands. "There's more to life than stupid boys."
El and Stephanie chime in on the 'stupid boy' part. More specifically Stephanie, as she wants nor has any desire to be dependent on a boy. Ever.
The girls run into the ice cream shop while Stephanie silently hopes Robin is at the counter partly because her costumer service skills are impeccable compared to Steve's, and Stephanie thinks that Robin is no doubt one of the coolest people ever.
Despite Stephanie's wishes, it's Steve at the counter. Stephanie decides to order for the girls. "Hi, can we have one strawberry cone, vanilla with sprinkles, and a..."
Steve taps his fingers on the counter impatiently.
"And a..." Stephanie repeats, studying the menu like she hasn't gotten ice cream from here almost a million times.
"Oh! A mint chocolate chip...Please." Stephanie gives a small smile because she's pretty proud of how much Steve got annoyed in only thirty seconds.
"Yeah, okay." Steve goes to scoop Stephanie ice cream but he puts in a bowl.
"Can I have that in a cone?" Stephanie asks, making Steve take the ice cream out of the bowl and into a cone, sighing loudly the whole time.
After he makes the rest of the ice creams, Robin opens the sliding window to the back room and says something to Steve that Stephanie couldn't quite make out based on the distance.
Steve had been turned away for too long for Maxs liking so she rings the bell over and over again until Steve turns around. "Okay, here you go, you got a strawberry and then a vanilla with sprinkles, and a mint chocolate chip." Steve hands each kid their ice cream as they simultaneously thank Steve for his scooping skills.
"Wait a second. Are you even allowed to be here?" Steve asks El.
The girls share a look before laughing and turning away to get to their bus home.
Pushing through the double doors of the mall, Max eyes Stephanie's ice cream. "Do you wanna trade?"
Without answering, they switch their cones and become content once again until Max's smile drops. "Oh, you've gotta be shitting me."
"What?" Stephanie looks around until her eyes fall on none other than Lucas, Mike, and Will grabbing their bikes from the bike rack.
Max leads the two other girls, taking charge. "Isn't this a nice surprise."
Mike drops his bike probably out of pure shock. "What are you doing here?" He points his finger at El with each word.
"Shopping." El says, staring directly at Mike.
Stephanie offers El a high-five for her badass comment and El accepts the offer, still staring at Mike.
"This is her new style." Max gestures to the new outfit El bought and is wearing from The Gap. "What do you think?"
"What's wrong with you guys?" Mike lowers his voice while whisper yelling at Max and Stephanie. "You know she's not allowed to be here."
"What is she, your little pet?" Max says, crossing her arms.
"Yeah." El looks back at Mike. "Am I your pet?" She repeats Max.
"What? No!" Mike uses his hands to emphasize his words.
"Then why do you treat me like garbage?" El asks, quoting Max from earlier. "You said Nana was sick."
"She is. She is sick." Mike stutters through his answer, looking at Lucas for help.
"Yeah-sick...she's sick." Lucas finally catches on. "She's super sick. That's why we're here, actually."
"Yeah-yeah, we're shopping. Not for us, but for her, for Nana." Mike says, sounding like he's trying to convince himself more than anyone else. "Also, we're here to get a gift for you. Just, we couldn't find anything that suited you and I only have, like, $3.50, so it's hard." Mike rambles on.
"Super hard." Lucas emphasizes.
Well, that's what she said.
"You lie." El states. "Why do you lie?"
The bus stops at the curb and El watched as it slows to a stop before she takes a step forward to Mike. "I dump your ass." She says, walking away before Mike could get an answer in.
As the girls sit down in the bus, Max and Stephanie both offer a high-five to El, which she accepts, laughing. Proud of her achievement.
As the bus pulls out of the parking lot, El asks, "Would you guys want to come to my house?"
"Of course I do." Stephanie says, taking another lick of her ice cream.
"Yeah sure." Max puts her sunglasses back on as they sit in comfortable silence the rest of the way home.
༺♥༻
YAYYYY CHAPTER 20!!!
1. idk why this took so long to write?
2. stephanie is my idol i love her
3. they shared ice cream.
4. THEY CHOSE THE SAME SUNGLASSES?!?!?!?!!!?
4/19/23