eggos | (no subject)

El has been a little out of sorts since her memories dropped into her mind. It’s hard, remembering so much, when so much of it is so sad and makes her so angry. Shopping with Max had been one of her favorite things in Hawkins, before everything had gone bad again. It won’t be the same without her here, but maybe she can pretend, for a little while. So she goes out now. She assures Hop and Beverly that she’ll be okay — she’s just going to get a few things for Dustin the Cat — and heads out to Darrow’s mall.

It isn’t like Starcourt at all, but it’s becoming familiar and comforting in its own right. She heads to a clothing store first, to get herself a new shirt. She pretends it doesn’t hurt to see a small photo studio between two shops, and frowns at a clothing rack, quiet and introspective.

She’s still browsing the clothes half an hour later, no closer to buying anything as she combs through her memories of shopping with one of her best friends, when she sees Chrissy. It feels sudden and impossible, but of course it isn’t either of those things. Chrissy would naturally be out at the mall, along with the hundreds of other people wandering through the corridors. Just as natural would be to see her in a clothing store for young women. But for some reason, it feels like a surprise to see her now.

There she is, smiling, expectant, open. Pretty. El’s always thought Chrissy is so pretty. But now, a new face flashes in front of her.

This one is not pretty.

This one is contorted into permanent terror. Her empty eye sockets drip blood like tears, and she is slack-jawed in the most literal and horrific sense of the word. For a heartstopping moment, Eleven sees Chrissy as she looked in the photograph that she didn’t remember the first time they met, and a sob wrenches from her throat.

“Chrissy,” she whimpers, and lunges for her, clutching her in a tight hug.

Does she know? Does she remember, too? Like everyone else from Hawkins, has she been three steps ahead of Eleven the entire time? Or is this going to be a nightmarish shock to her, just like it was to El? She isn’t sure how to ask. So she just holds her, and cries for this friend she’d never had the chance to save.

Threaded | Flat

Chrissy has never admitted it to anyone, but she kind of hates the mall. She spent all of her last summer in Hawkins at Starcourt, of course, along with everyone else in her social circle, until it burned down, yet another small-town tragedy for the record books. But it bothered her then, and it bothers her now, the ever-present reminders of her own inadequacies, mannequins that look like she wishes she looked and model-perfect photoshoots and reflective surfaces seemingly everywhere, the mingled, overpowering smells of the food court and other food kiosks everywhere. It's like something out of her worst nightmares, or it would have been, before her nightmares took on a whole new level of terrifying back home.

There are only so many options for places to shop, though, and it's at least more convenient to have everything in one place. So she's here, in search of a couple new things to wear as the weather gets cooler, the walk out to the boardwalk for work bound to be turning brisk soon. She even manages not to be too unhappy about it, if only because it's easier to try sweaters on over her t-shirt than to have to go back into a fitting room and stare at her own reflection.

Distracted, she doesn't notice El in the store at first, isn't even aware of her presence until suddenly El is rushing over to her, distraught. "Whoa, hey," she says, soft and surprised, arms instinctively wrapping around her friend in turn, confused though she might be. "El? What's wrong?"