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hopper

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Hopper kept his promise, just like he always does: he'd found somewhere private, somewhere that didn't belong to anyone, to let El practice her powers. The trick is that there aren't a large amount of heavy objects here, and that's what she'd wanted the junkyard for: there were plenty of heavy things to test and exercise the limits of what she can do.

Here, there's just rocks.

There are a lot of them, though, scattered all around the area and extending into a sort of natural pier into the water. Further towards the dunes, two or three trees are half buried in the sand, like they'd drifted up on the surf decades ago. She bites her lip, then looks at Hop.

"I can move the rocks?" she asks. She'd been learning in science class about ecosystems and where and how creatures make homes in specific places. Does he know about them? Had he looked into it already?

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Hopper reaches down as well, his fingers hooking on what looks to be a gold necklace. It's tarnished and scratched, but he's pretty sure it's real gold and he turns it over in his hands before looking at Eleven.

"Shit, kid," he says with a laugh. "I'm pretty sure this is real."

The idea of it being pirate treasure is fucking absurd, but so is this whole goddamn place.

He touches the necklace, so El grabs the mug and turns it over in her hands. It feels surprisingly heavy, crusted slightly with sand that had leaked into the crate, probably before the moisture made it swell shut. The inside is musty and a little dirty, too, but otherwise empty. She sets it aside and reaches in again, this time to grab a handful of tangled bracelets. Some of them have sparkling gems and some are simple chains with shaped charms.

"What do we do with it?" she asks. "Who does it belong to?" Like the junkyard, she thinks that probably they won't be allowed to keep any of this, because even if it's been abandoned here, it might still belong to someone else.

"Damned if I know," he answers. "It looks old, like it hasn't been touched in a long time."

Hopper isn't sure what to do with it. Anyone else would just take the whole damn box and he's tempted to do the same, but he's also got an impressionable kid right here in front of him and it's his responsibility to teach her right from wrong.

"We should take it in to the station," he says. "See if there's been anything reported lost."

It feels special, and interesting, and fun that they've found this, them, without help or a map or anything. It was purely luck, but it's still theirs, a moment they'll have forever.

Even if she does feel a little sad that Hop wants to turn it in to the police station. She takes a picture of it with her phone, and a picture of the hole it came out of, and then says, "Okay," and tries hard not to sound disappointed.

She knows it's the right thing, even if it isn't fun.

"Chances are low someone's reported this lost," Hopper says. "I dunno all the legalities surrounding this kinda thing, but I figure we might get to keep it in the end."

He's not really sure how that works, he'll have to ask someone else at the station, but that's how it happens in movies. It's kind of stupid, Hopper thinking about how things are done in movies when he's a detective himself, but he works in homicide, not lost treasure.

"But we should make sure, first," El says, "so we're not accidentally stealing." The idea that they might get to keep a buried treasure excites her, and she's not even sure why. She's not sure what they'd do with it, if they're supposed to clean it and keep it, or sell it for money. Part of her doesn't want to ever get rid of it, even if it meant having more money afterwards.

Even though Hopper could probably use money, and if El had more money, she could buy more clothes and magazines.

"I want to take a picture of it," she decides. Because if she's never going to see it again, she wants to be able to prove to herself, outside of her memory, that it exists.

"Take a bunch," he encourages. "I'm gonna want to see what we gave up if it never comes back."

Somehow, though, he's got this weird sense it will. He doesn't know why, but maybe for once in his life, he feels like he's actually lucky. Maybe they both are.

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