KAT

PART OF THE REASON WHY KAT WAS SO MOODY THAT DAY AT SCHOOL WAS BECAUSE SHE WAS ON HER PERIOD. Unfortunately, she only found out that second part once she got back home. Sulking on top of her flower-patterened duvet, hot water baby tucked against her stomach underneath her blouse, she was staring into space, ignoring the way her stomach flipped around uncomfortably, partially due to cramps and partially due to Steve Harrington.

Kat's room was the biggest bedroom besides her parents', due to the fact that her mother once had Kat and Nancy share a room when they were younger. That was why her room had two twin beds placed together instead of a big one. Nancy moved into the room next door, however, so Holly slept in the masters' room. It was painted a soft yellow, a project she had done herself in middle school. A plastic headboard curved over her bed, a checkered pink-and-white rug sprawled over the floor. Photo frames were the only decorations on her wall, forming a firm halo around the room's perimeter. A white door led to her and Nancy's shared bathroom, with a blot of blue spray paint from when Mike had accidentally pressed the trigger for his new bottle.

"I have two of the Vanity Fair and one Vogue," Nancy came in, blue eyes shining with eagerness. "And some chocolate and blueberries,"

"Thank youu," Kat murmured, opening a nougat bar, tossing the wrapper away, and letting it dangle out of her mouth while she nibbled at one end like a rabbit. "I'm, like weird and hormonal right now,"

"Yep. I can tell," Nancy said, raising her brows lightly before flopping onto her bed as well after kicking off her inside shoes.

"How was yesterday?" Kat said, stacking two of her pillows behind her back and leaning onto them.

"Good! I got a jasmine tea and a bagel, and we talked about our favorite foods and our hobbies. Did you know Jonathan likes pineapple on pizza?"

"Ew. What?"

"I know, I said it was gross but he didn't listen," Nancy said dramatically, twisting off the end of the nougat bar dangling from Kat's mouth and popping it in her own. 

"Cameron likes fruit on pizza too," Kat scrunched her face in disgust. "Olives, pineapple, bell peppers, all that jazz,"

"Disgusting," Nancy said snootily, opening the Vogue, which sent up a nasty newspaper smell into Kat's room. "How's the Emerson essay comin'?"

"Meh. I don't really like the prompt, and I feel like I'll be better off with it as a non-dream school, y'know? Emerson suits people like you better," Kat said, taking a single blueberry from the bowl and chewing it slowly. Nancy, on the other hand, grabbed a handful and threw her head back to let them roll into her mouth.

"Wha'd you mean, people like me?"

"Leaders, journalists, people who have their life together,"

"Right, I'm not sure I believe the last part," Nancy said.

"Mhm, no, you do," Kat said, adjusting her waistband so the hot water baby would fit better against her skin. "I had an existential crisis today,"

"Oh, no, what happened?" Nancy leaned forward, brows furrowed.

"I'm about to go on a rant," Kat warned

"Let's hear it,"

"Might be emotional,"

"Hit me,"

"Okay," Kat cleared her throat. "Y'know how me and Steve are, like friends now? Yeah, well, yesterday night he drove me to the Middle School playground to like, hang out. And it was actually super fun. But earlier today I was thinking about it, and I just- felt so weird about it. Like, I felt super...vulnerable after and this girl Robin had to help me. It was pretty embarrassing. But like, I really enjoyed hanging out with Steve, but then when I got home and this morning, it just felt weird," Kat finished flatly. 

She'd thought it would've been a long-ass rant, but it turned out to be just a couple sentences. Disappointing. Nancy evidently thought the same.

"So, hanging out with Steve made you feel weird?" she clarified.

"Yeah," Kat said, closing her grey eyes to subdue the migraine.

"Sounds like a crush to me,"

"I'm sorry, what?" Kat sat up, blinking in shock. "Wha'd you just say to me, young lady?"

"I'm ten months younger than you, Kathy," Nancy said noncomically. "And I said what I said,"

"No, no, it wasn't like, a crush type of weird, it was like a vulnerable type of weird,"

"Oh," Nancy said, finally understanding. "Like, uneasy?"

"Yeah,"

"Well, uh, do you want comfort or advice?"

"Advice,"

"If Steve makes you uncomfortable, you don't have to hang out with him anymore-" Nancy began slowly.

"-No, it's not like that, either. I liked hanging out with him, but...I don't like how it made me feel a day afterward. Like, I dunno, I was happy, but then it was like when I thought about it this morning, I made some sorta connection between the playground and- something sad. So that was why," Kat rambled.

"Oh. So Steve isn't the problem?"

"Uh, no- yeah, he kinda is," Kat said, her brain not processing. "Aside from the whole, uneasy feeling type thing, Steve also made me feel kinda weird,"

"Like a crush weird?"

"No, Nancy. Like a- a...pheromone type of weird,"

"That is the literal definition of a 'crush type of weird',"

"Jesus, Nance, I don't have a crush on him," Kat rolled her eyes.

"Whatever you sayyyyy," Nancy trailed off on the y. "Did his hair trap you in his nonexistent spell?"

"Uh, no. And if I did, he'd definitely be caught in my hair's spell and not the other way around," Kat sniffed, puffing up her blowout.

"Mhm. But Kat, maybe this is all part of your Steve crush,"

"Nancy-"

"No, no, hear me out. When I was with Steve, inside I felt completely fine. It was like my mouth was saying words that didn't process through my, like, heart, I guess. But now, when I'm with Jonathan," Nancy smiled a little, thinking of her boyfriend. "It's like part of me is out of my control. I'm vulnerable around him, 'cause I trust him with that part of me, you know what I mean?"

"No, I don't,"

Nancy rolled her clear blue eyes, pursing her lips together as she grabbed another handful of blueberries. "I'm just saying, maybe you feel vulnerable because you trust him and, I dunno, maybe you're not used that,"

"That sounds about right," Kat flipped to lie down on her stomach, swallowing the nougat bar. "I trust you, but you're right in position to smush chocolate in my face, so,"

"Exactly," Nancy tilted her head to the side, eyeing Kat suspiciously. "I am in position,"

"Hmm, you are," Kat said, staring into Nancy's eyes and egging her on to make a move. Yet Nancy was too smart to fall for it, so the staring contest continued until they both broke eye contact at the same time.

"Ugh, no more stuff about boys," Kat pinched the bridge of her nose. "How's life?"

"Well, I basically have no friends," Nancy said bluntly. 

"Tough,"

"Yep. But I'll be alright. I have my boyfriend. And ex-boyfriend. And sister, and a bunch of middle schoolers," Nancy said, rolling onto her back so she could look up at Kat.

"That's a family right there," Kat said jokingly, pinching the tip of her little sister's nose.

Nancy made a face, before flopping back up and smushing a chocolate bar in her face. Luckily, Kat had turned away at the last second, so it mostly got on the apple of her cheeks, weird, thick chocolatey mix smushing over her skin as she yelled in shock. Infuriated, Kat swiped it off (though not completely successfully), and smeared it on Nancy, or more importantly, Nancy's hair, as she knew it would piss her off the most. Indeed, Nancy shrieked in laughter and anger as she rammed her head into Kat's shirt, twisting it about furiously so the chocolate would come off and stain her blouse. 

The two girls continued fighting until their mother called them for dinner, and then they both yelled that they needed a shower, sprinting to the bathroom one after another. Yet after a good few hours of complaining, they all sat at a rectangular table, surrounded by trust and security.

It was the euphoric highs, the earthshaking lows that built it up. The way my mind and body would shatter into a million star-like pieces when it hit the grass, stained with mud. But when it was free, it was glorious. Yet to everyone that I knew, freedom was only at the expense of ownership. I had to belong to somebody else in order to access a false statement of zero burden.

Kat rubbed her eyes as she typed away on her and Nancy's computer, the document titled Purdue Essay 1 blaring holes into her brain. Her clock said it was 12:14, and the quietness of the Wheeler House spoke synonyms. She was pretty sure everybody else was asleep, except for her, working dutifully on her application essays. She was running out of her tea supply- soon she'd have to go downstairs in the dark and pour some more. Thank god Nancy was a deep sleeper- if she wasn't she'd have suffered with Kat the past weeks as the sound of keyboard keys being typed filled the halls for hours every night after Holly and Mike went to bed.

"Kat! Psst, Kat!" Someone said from her window. Kat stood up, worried. Why was somebody outside past midnight? 

She turned around, and was immediately jump-scared by a round, pale face right shmack in her window. A closer look and the red hair, barely distinguishable in the streetlamp light gave away who it was. Kat rushed to the window, quietly but quickly pushing it up, and letting her come in.

"Max! What're you doing here?!" Kat hissed, closing the window to not let the winter air go in. "You'll freeze!"

"It's fine, I biked on my way here so it was warm," Max said, though her teeth chattered faintly. "Um, can I stay here for the night?"

"Uh. Yeah, I mean, sure. But why? What's wrong?" Kat said concernedly, watching the way Max clutched her thin winter coat to herself, probably something from Billy.

"Nothing!" Max said quickly. "I-I'm sorry, just- can I please stay?"

Kat's eyes rounded in suprise and sympathy at the sheer desperation in her voice. She was still a bit cold, she noticed, as Max had both arms wrapped around her waist.

"Yeah- yeah, you don't have to explain. Oh, uh, take this," Kat said, and grabbed the hot water baby from earlier, pressing it onto Max's stomach. "You can take the bed on the left, yeah, that one with the blue pillows,"

"Thanks," Max said through gritted teeth. She clearly looked uncomfortable from whatever happened before, and Kat knew inside that it must've been an act of sheer distress for her to bike to their house at midnight. Nonetheless, Kat knew what it was like to need someone to lean on, so she plumped up the pillows.

"Do you need a shower or jammies? I can get you some hot chocolate,"

"Uh, no, I'm good," Max said, half-smiling as she fidgeted.

"Okay," Kat whispered encouragingly as Max sat on the edge of one of the beds gingerly, as if she was afraid to disrupt anything. Taking off her outer coat, Kat realized Max was already wearing a nightgown underneath, which made the situation a little bit more puzzling. "Well, it's super late; do you want to sleep now? Or talk?"

"Just sleeping is fine," Max said. 

"Okay. You tell me if you need anything else, okay, sweetie?"

"Thanks," Max mumbled, hugging her arms closer around her ribcage as Kat shut off the lamplight, clambering onto her bed. 

Max climbed onto the other bed, so lightly Kat could've thought she was an actualy ninja. She barely made any noise as she shuffled around onto her back. Kat stared at the posters stuck all over her ceiling, wondering about Max and too worried to go to sleep.

"Um," Max said out of the blue and into the darkness, and Kat shifted onto her side so Max could feel that she was paying attention. "I appreciate it, you letting me stay here, it's nothing, just some trouble going on at home,"

Kat's heart sank in sadness. There was no way 'some trouble' would make a child run away and bike for over half a mile wearing pajamas in December wind.

"You can stay here anytime you want, there's no judgment here," Kat said softly in response. "I'll always be here if you need me, and so will Nancy or Mike,"

"Yeah- I get it. Thank you," Max whispered. Some grateful conviction slipped into her voice in the first words, yet she seemed to instinctively hold the emotion from taking over at the end. Kat was all too familiar with that.

"No worries," Kat murmured back, turning over to her back. "It's late, you should get some sleep, Max,"

"Yeah," Max agreed gently, rolling over.

A couple minutes later, Kat heard a faint sniffle come from her left, yet she was too afraid to move in case she would wake the semi-asleep girl. Another ten minutes later, Kat was still lying like a flat pancake on her back, staring into the eyes of Joan Jett as Max clutched Kat's spare quilt over herself, fists scrunching over the fabric. And Kat was reminded of the pure innocence she carried, like a springtime sparrow, unburdened with the harsh cold. Yet Max was no naive sparrow, and carried a greater burden on her shoulders every day compared to Kat. And somehow, Max had found a place of solace in Kat's iciness, or was it ice? No, perhaps Max and all the other people she loved had found a homeland past the snowy walls of the Ice Queen. Somewhere brighter, somewhere warmer, and glimpses of the sunny beaches and seafoam waves were beginning to materialize from the cracks in her bone-cold armor.

━━author's note ━━

this chapter was so sweet and sad too, and writing a steve-free 2000 words was pretty fun! nancy is the realest and max is such a babe, let me sob for a second.

also writing kat's character arc is legit the best i swear i have such a blast when i type of those long-ass paragraphs of contemplation.