THEY'D decided on taking Steve's car, or Steve had, and once they were in and having waved a goodbye to Eve's aunt on the porch, they reversed off the drive.
"Is it always like that?" Steve asked, a sloppy and untrained grin on his face. Evelyn laughed as she spoke, cringing.
"Yeah, I'm sorry if it's too much." Steve shook his head insisting it wasn't and he meant it. It was an addictive feeling to be loved: to feel carefree and wanted; to feel safe and relaxed enough to be goofy and stupid. It was then he realised Evelyn had broke through his usual attire whenever she was around, so he cleared his throat and tried again. He wanted to get this stupid lizard and then go and see Nancy, he told himself. And that's all he wanted.
Once they were back with Dustin, everyone but Evelyn in their clothes from the night before, they found themselves walking down the old train tracks running through Hawkins. They all had matching yellow rubber gloves covering their hands and a dirty white bucket full of diced meat chunks. They made a trail with it. Dustin and Steve seemed to branch off behind Eve, but Evelyn was humming the songs that were playing on the radio that morning to herself, and hadn't minded at all.
"Alright, so let me get this straight. You kept something you knew was probably dangerous in order to impress a girl who-who you just met?"
"Okay, that's grossly oversimplying things." Dustin said as he threw some meat on the trail Eve had started to create.
"Why would some girl like some nasty slug anyway?"
"An inter-dimensional slug? Because it's awesome?" Evelyn chuckled to herself and shook her head. If this were real, even though it were crazy, Eve still didn't understand why Dustin would keep some alien anyway.
"Well even if she thought it was cool - which she didn't - I... I don't know I just feel like you're trying way too hard, man."
"Well not everyone can have your perfect hair, alright?"
"It's not about the hair." Steve put his hand between them, "the clue with girls is just acting like you don't care."
"Even if you do?" Steve nodded.
"Yeah exactly. Drives them nuts." He found himself looking at Evelyn when he was trying to think.
"Then you just wait," He said snapping his full attention back to Dustin, knocking his arm with a lowered voice. Both looking to check Evelyn can't hear. "Till you feel it."
"Feel what?"
"It's like before its gonna storm, you know? You can't see it but you can feel it like this..uh...electricity?"
"Oh, like in the electromagnetic field, when the clouds in the atmosphere-"
"No, no, no. Like a-like a sexual electricity." Dustin stopped.
"Oh!"
"You feel that," Steve said added, "and then you make your move."
"So that's when you kiss her?"
"Whoa, slow down Romeo," Steve shook his head with a handful of beef chunks in one hand. "Sure, okay. Some girls, they want you to be aggresive you know? Strong, hot and heavy like a lion. But others you gotta be slow, you gotta be stealthy, like uh, like a ninja."
"What type is Nancy?"
"Nancy's different" Steve said quickly, "She's different from the other girls."
"Yeah, She seems pretty special I guess."
"Yeah, she is."
"But this girls special too you know? There's just something about her."
"Hey, hey hey." Evelyn heard Steve's Cortez's squeak against the metal beneath their feet, meaning he must have stopped.
"What?"
"You're not falling in love with this girl are you?"
"No," Dustin shook his head, "No."
"Okay, good. Don't. She's only gonna break your heart and you're too young for that shit." With Evelyn's bucket half empty and the boy's basically still full as they spoke, she laughed and turned around. Both of them looked up, having thought she couldn't hear them the entire time and chuckling she shouted back at them.
"You guys are full of so much shit." She carried on walking down the line, giggling to herself and Dustin's face was pink knowing she had heard.
"I mean... what about- what about Evelyn?" Steve scowled.
"What about her?" Dustin shrugged watching as the girl wondered ahead of them, happily dropping chunks of cow on the road accepting Dustin's alien's accusations and wanting to help, even though they were insane.
"She's cool-I mean, she's like, nice. I guess she's pretty special too." Steve shrugged, telling himself he hadn't thought about it.
"Yeah-I guess she is. But it doesn't matter." But then the silence set between them and after a few minutes Steve said, "Faberge"
"What?" And Steve pointed to his hair.
"It's Faberga Organics. Use the shampoo and conditioner and when your hairs damp, not wet, use four pumps of the Farrah faucet spray."
"Ferrah faucet spray?" He was chuckling.
"Yeah, and you tell anyone I told you that your ass is grass your dead Henderson, you understand?" He was nodding as Steve pointed to him with cubes of meat dangling in his face. Evelyn's attention was here and there but then her wondering eyes looked at the trees around them and she frowned. The sight was always so unnatural, both the boys attention naturally snapped to her even though neither had been looking in her direction; full of worry.
"God." She said, turning back to catch their eyes. "Look at the trees." She nodded at one just off their route, it's bark black and crawling with maggots. Something told her the day was just going to get stranger and it was time she stopped questioning it. But she couldn't help it. "What's wrong with them?" Steve shook his head as they caught up to her.
"Nothing, nothing. Don't- Don't worry about it." And Evelyn looked down to see a small yellow flag. She shrugged and carried on their journey. When their buckets were empty, they arrived at a clearing of abandoned vechiles and an old faded school bus. Evelyn giggled when Steve nodded.
"Oh yeah," he said, "This will do just fine". Eve looked to Dustin, and they both chuckled. As they wondered down the path, they heard a new voice shout towards them.
"I said medium-well!" It was Lucas with his bike and Max at his side. Steve squinted and turned to Dustin.
"Who's that?" But when he didn't answer and both teenagers turned to look at the boy who couldn't take his eyes off the red head walking towards them, Evelyn's heart warmed and she whispered and nudged Steve's arm.
"That's Max."
Dustin ended up taking Lucas to the side and Evelyn heard their not-so-secret conversation from behind their chosen car.
"You told her!"
"You wanted to tell her too!"
"Yeah but I didn't," Dustin said, "Because we all agreed not to tell her and look for Dart."
"You told Evelyn!" Hearing her name, Steve cast his eyes curiously towards the rotting red car they sat behind and caught eyes with Eve, who was looking too. She rolled her eyes and scoffed but then Steve walked forward and slammed on the bonnet with his bat, making both boys jump.
"Hey, Dickheads!" Evelyn rolled her eyes and shook her head at his mannerism. "Why is it the only one whose helping me is this random girl?" Evelyn shot Steve a look that scolded him as they boys jumped up, moaning.
"Jesus, Okay."
"We loose light in forty minutes. Let's go." And he beckons them over. They were swearing at Steve and as Evelyn beckoned them nicely, they headed to her instead. "Unbelievable." She lifted her eyebrows at the man who was shaking his head looking at the kids and then up at the blonde. He shouted at them once more. "Let's go, I said." They looked at Evelyn and she shrugged looking at them apologetically.
"He's kinda right, guys. " They sighed louder and stormed to the bus. Evelyn looked to Steve and chuckled.
"Assholes!"