KAT

KAT TOOK A LONG SWIG OF WATER, SITTING CROSS-LEGGED ON THE WOODEN FLOOR. People walked by the glass walls, but they didn't care that much. Pawel was looking humorously at her disheveled state.

"It totally isn't fair that you get to work out less than me," Kat sighed, not feeling like she could drink more water even though her throat was still dry.

"Nah, I'm just the showgirl," Pawel said casually, and Kat halted for a brief moment. Now, this was a little rewinding; who among the duo was the actual showgirl? It was a pretty philosophical question.

"Do you know if Spinnet's coming tomorrow?" Kat asked, referring to their boss and manager.

"Yeah, but at my session,"

"Thank god," Kat rolled her eyes. They got along well, but Kat wasn't a fan of the burly man with ginger hair. And it was good that he was coming when it was only Pawel teaching, in the most coveted class not featuring her. 

"Where're you gonna go for lunch?" Pawel asked, leaning against a wooden closet.

"I dunno. I haven't tried the Teppanyaki downstairs, people say it's good,"

"Hm, nice. I might go to the Imperial Panda," Pawel said, the two of them steadily facilitating their small talk.

"That's a good idea," Kat crawled over to a counter and pressed on it to stand up, her legs feeling like jello. "Wanna close for an hour?"

"Sure," Pawel said, grabbing his fanny pack and heading out the door. "Are you coming?"

"Yeah, I just- uh, need to go to the bathroom first," Kat said, taking another swig of ice-cold water.

"Okay. See you soon," Pawel grinned like a Cheshire cat, and closed the glass doors of the Jazzercise behind him.

Kat threw on a cardigan and a pair of denim shorts over her pink tights and blue bodysuit, and after using the bathroom, she took her wallet-sized handbag in one hand, flipping the sign out front to 'CLOSED'. She retreated back to the front desk, a pink high desk that connected to the ground, two white stools at the back. She double-locked the register, flipping the lights off. Finally, she looked up, eager to go to Scoops Ahoy, but her eyes narrowed as she saw two small figures that looked highly suspicious. The two of the barreled into the Jazzercise, out of breath.

"Hey, girls," Kat said, confused but smiling. "Are...you supposed to be here?"

"No," El giggled.

"Oh. Okay," Kat trailed off, debating whether she should give them a pep talk.

"El was feeling down," Max said easily, lounging on the counter as she placed her head on her elbows. "That's why we're here,"

El's round face narrowed in tight frustration, and Kat noticed the Coke in her hands. Kat leaned back against the popcorn walls, crossing her arms.

"What'd Mike do this time?"

"He lied," El said, more sadly than angrily.

"Your Nana isn't sick, right?" Max raised a reddish eyebrow.

"My Nana's dead," Kat furrowed her brows.

"Exactly," Max sighed. "Mike told her that she was sick. Probably because he didn't want to hang out,"

"Yeah," El muttered.

"Ew. I'll talk with him," Kat said, affronted and wondering distantly if this had anything to do with their conversation last night. "I'm sorry about that, El,"

"It's okay," El said determinedly, stealing a questioning glance from Max before her face hardened in determination. "I've got this,"

"Okay, great," Kat said, a bit warily. "You girls need anything else?"

"Right, yeah," Max said, leaning forwards. "Monique isn't working today, so we were wondering if you knew her employee discount at Claire's,"

"Uh, yeah, it's just her phone number, hang on-" Kat opened a drawer and fumbled for the stack of notecards. She took a ballpoint and quickly scribbled out the ten digits. "Here you go,"

"Thanks," the two girls beamed at her, turning heel and scrambling out the Jazzercise doors.

"Have fun!" Kat called behind them, grinning as she closed the drawer, going out the doors herself.

"Kat!" Dustin yelled, leaping like a cheetah out front of the register.

"Oh my god, Dusty!" Kat's smile widened in shock. "Hug me! I thought you weren't gonna be back until tonight!"

"Yeah! Mom overstimated the traffic," Dustin grinned, throwing his small arms around Kat's waist.

"Yeah, she did," Kat said, still processing. "Dude, we've missed you so much!"

"Same," Dustin laughed as he pulled away. "You gotta come over tomorrow; I made some really cool shit at camp!"

"I bet," Kat beamed. "Did you code any robots?"

"Yep. And, I built it from scratch," Dustin said proudly, puffing his little chest out in her direction.

"Collected the materials like a caveman, too," Steve said, coming out of the back room.

Kat felt the tingling feeling of sunlight against tundra in her tummy as her smile grew a bit bigger and shyer.

"Did Max and El stop by?" she asked, sliding over the cold granite counter to Steve's disappointment.

"Yep. Hope Hopper doesn't find out and blame me for not sending 'em home," Steve sighed.

"He won't," Kat reassured him. "What've you guys been up to?"

Dustin and Steve shared a grin, both of them taking on the expression of Mike when he'd break a vase. 

"You wanna tell her?" Dustin snickered, looking at Steve.

"Nah, you tell her,"

"But I wanna do the effects,"

Steve stared at Dustin for a blank moment, before refocusing on Kat.

"Okay, fine," he said, lowering his voice. "Basically, we think Russians are plotting against us and we're tying to translate a message we overheard through Dustin's radio,"

"Dude," Dustin interrupted before Kat could call bullshit. "It's way more than that,"

"Alright, fine! You tell her, then,"

"Okay, okay," Dustin said, looking around in a 360 motion before grabbing Kat's hand. With a few surprised mumbles, Kat got dragged into the back room.

"Robin, cover for me!" Steve called as he scrambled in behind them. 

"Hey-" Robin yelled before the door swung shut and the soundproofness activated.

Dustin led her into the seat like as if she was in a freaking job interview, sitting across from her and leaning his elbows onto the table.

"Okay. So," Dustin said slowly and clearly, as if she was a child. "I leave in June for Camp Knowhere, I get to the campsite,"

"Uh huh," Kat said, knowing whenever Dustin tried to tell a story, he had to start with all the context in chronological order, and got really pissed if anyone tried to interrupt.

"Right! And fast forward a week, and I'm in love,"

"Um, what?" Kat's mind blanked for a second, the internal tape running out into blank plastic spaces in her brain.

"Exactly!" Steve interrupted, leaping down from the counter in a frog pose. "That was my reaction!"

"Wait- Dustin, you're in love?" Kat blinked. "...Why?"

"Wha'd you mean, why?" Dustin leaned back. "I found a woman perfect for me,"

"Ew," Steve scrunched his face.

"Hey. At least I have a girlfriend," Dustin said purposefully, pushing Steve's buttons.

"You little-" Steve raised his index finger.

"Wait, so you got a girlfriend at Camp Knowhere?" Kat interrupted, holding a hand in front of Steve's face.

"Yeah," Dustin grinned slowly, nodding his head up and down in smugness. "Her name's Suzie. With a 'z',"

"I can't believe it," Kat slumped in her chair, mouth slightly ajar and gray eyes pointed at the ceiling. She imagined videogame-playing, childishly-innocent Dustin, being with a girl. Living with a girl, kissing a girl, sleepi- oh, hell no. Disgusting. She kicked the image, down to the fringes of the photo frame, out of her brain, sending it spiraling like an Olympian down to nothingness.

"You better!" Dustin said, crossing his arms like a proud father. "Right, anyways. I built, from scratch, a ham radio tower. Named Cerebro. I was gonna talk to Suzie with it, since she lives in Utah, but then-"

Dustin slammed both hands on the thin metal, causing Kat to jolt in surprise, nearly stubbing her toe on a table leg. Steve pretended to listen in on his dramatics. Dustin lowered his shoulders like a leopard on the prowl.

"-I hear an active Russian transmission. Boom!" He banged his hands yet again, causing Kat to actually stub her toe, though she kept a neutral face for narrative purposes.

"Okay..." Kat said slowly, understanding that Dustin would never have put that much effort into telling her a story if he was lying. "Are you sure it was Russian? What if it was...I dunno, Czech or Bulgarian?"

"We're pretty sure it was Russian," Steve said hesitantly, though sharing a dubious look with Dustin.

"It was," Robin busted in from the outside. "Dingus, get in there,"

"B-But we're not done yet!" Steve stammered in loud shock.

"Sucks to be you. I'm done covering," Robin said, flumping onto a pillow on a counter. 

"Fine," Steve huffed, stomping his way outside again, the door slamming shut a little harder behind him. 

"Kat," Robin grinned at her, setting down a medium cup of Moose Tracks ice cream, complete with caramel drizzle. "Right just now, some guy asked for this but then changed his mind to Peanut Butter after I was done scooping,"

"What a dick," Kat sniffed, though she smiled in glee after seeing her favorite flavor. "Thanks, Robin!"

"No problem. Basically, we've got a sentence down," Robin said, standing above Kat as she pointed at the Russian-English dictionary. "The week is long,"

"Uh..." Kat said, looking between the two. "What?"

"It's clearly a coded message," Dustin said, thrusting both hands onto the table once more. "Once we've got the rest, then we can start de-coding!"

"Alright, then," Kat frowned. "But what comes after the de-coding?"

They looked at her blankly.

"I mean- what are you going to do about the message after?" she clarified slowly.

"We're...gonna track it down? Use its clues to hopefully come in contact with the Russians?" Dustin said, as if she was born yesterday.

"Yes- I know that. And then?"

"Kill 'em," Robin shrugged.

"Oh? Kill the Russians?" Kat raised a brow. "I don't think it's gonna be that easy,"

"It doesn't matter," Dustin sighed in her face. "Maybe this is just coming from a Russian club or something! Either way, you're overplaying it, Kat. This is just a side quest,"

"Okay," Kat bit defensively. "Fine. What's your current step?""

And a jazzercise session and two ice cream sundae's later, it was drilled into Kat's head that she sucked at translation.

"No- the box with the long tail!" Kat said as she tried to keep her focus drilled onto the message and the dictionary at the same time.

"This one?" Robin asked, pointing at a character on the top left hand corner.

"What?" Kat raised her eyes briefly. "Uh, no, the other one, wait-" her attention to the language wavered, a thin wire snapping in a gentle thwip. "Goddamn!"

"Kat, you need to take a break," Steve said, watching as she thudded her head onto the table. 

"I just did," she said drily, directing towards the fact that she'd just taught another class and was tired as hell.

"No- he's right," Dustin said, standing in a similar, arms-crossed pose and looking at Kat concernedly. "You should go outside. Like, take a walk or something,"

"Or," Steve's eyes glinted as the silhouettes of people appeared in the frosted glass window. "You could process your anger on an ice cream scooper,"

"Dude. No," Kat said in ridicule. "I'm not covering for you,"

"Come onnn," Steve said as he slung an arm over a spare bucket. "You're serving food to customers, that's your Starcourt Cinemas dream,"

"Yeah, no. Having people yell at me for scooping the wrong flavor is totally gonna dissappate my angry battery,"

"It's okay," Dustin piped up. "I can go with you, Kat,"

"What?" Steve said, startled at Dustin's interruption.

"I'll go with you. Come on!" He said, now excited, as he zipped through the door, snatching Steve's ice cream scooper. Why was it that Kat only ever had negative mood swings, but all the kids could turn from okay to energetic in a matter of seconds?

"Ugh, fine," Kat said, chucking her pencil and eraser down to follow Dustin.

"It's about time," Erica Sinclair said from the counter. She was surrounded by a ton of other preteen girls, all staring into Kat's skull. "Didn't know you work here now,"

"Yep. I do," Kat nodded her head tiredly. 

"What can we get you?" Dustin said, grinning.

"Let's see, Discount Sailor Man," Erica said, whipping her head around to count the people in her entourage. "We'll have two cookies-and-creams, one strawberry on a cup- not a cone, one mint and one double scoop of coconut and vanilla,"

"You got all that?" Kat asked Dustin vaguely, and he nodded uncertainly. 

"Right, uh," Dustin said, turning around to see the board with price tags. "Carry the five...plus four-fifty....double times fifteen percent...okay, that'll be seven dollars and fifty cents,"

"Pool," Erica said absentmindedly over her shoulder, eyes fixated on Dustin, as one of her friends handed her a ten-dollar bill. "Thanks, Monica. Here's the bill,"

She pressed the thin green paper as it slid down the counter. Kat raised a brow, and slid it into the register. Pulling out two dollars and quarters, she slid them down in the same slow, sly way (though her eyes showed she was dead inside), and watched as Erica handed the money back to her friend. 

"You got the mint?" Dustin muttered to her, grabbing two cones and reaching for the speckled cookies-and-cream.

"Yeah," Kat sighed, and fished out a scooper from the basket nearby. She stuck her entire head into the aquarium-looking ice cream display, vaguely wondering whether her hair could fall into the buckets of goodness. The mint-flavored ice cream was hard to scoop, and during her first attempt, she only got a few flake-looking pieces of green pieces in the spoon. She could feel the girls' judgemental stares zooming in on from outside the glass as the duo messily served them ice cream. Kat only finished scooping the orders once her back felt like it could break in any second and her arm was sorer than any Jazzercise could make it.

"How's it going with you and Steve?" Dustin asked as Erica walked like a supermodel out of the store, laughing with her friends. Kat turned her head, a bit weirded out by the question.

"Uh, we're good. Same as before you left," she said cautiously.

"Huh," Dustin frowned, leaning a head on his chin, which, Kat noticed, and began to take on a few outlines of pale, barely-noticable acne. "'Cause..."

He trailed off, Kat waiting for him to elaborate for a full five seconds.

"'Cause what?" she prompted.

"Nothing! Just- you two seem weird now," Dustin said, closing the register with a whoosh.

"Wha'd you mean?" Kat wrinkled her forehead. 

"You just seem....sorta tense. Like you're okay friends, but you're just..." Dustin adjusted his baseball cap. "Not opening up as much,"

"Oh. I mean, I can get that," Kat said thoughtfully, matching his posture. "We've both been really busy," she laughed at that. "I have college, he needs to worry about college, we work, and babysit all you kids....there isn't as much time,"

"Mhm," Dustin said, as if she'd ticked the wrong answer box. "Yeah, but like...is there something more that's making problems?"

"Uhhh," Kat looked around as if she was picking out a problem she could see. "No? I mean- I appreciate you caring, but-"

"-I just feel like maybe you could talk to him more," Dustin raised his hands defensively. "Not with me or Robin. Just like, a one-on-one conversation, clean up the, uh, electricity,"

"What?"

"No, just-" Dustin said, throwing his head back in frustration. "I think you should talk to him more, I just think that'll do you good,"

"Dustin?"

"Yeah?"

"Your advice-giving skills need some polishing,"

"Okay, okay," Dustin huffed and slouched in his stance. "Just- take it. Please,"

"Fine," Kat said sarcastically, knocking Dustin on the head with the handle of an ice cream scooper. "I will,"

━━author's note ━━

bro i promise yall THE BOOK GETS BETTER FROM HERE

when i say transitions season-to-season are hard to write- theyre super hard and i always feel like my exposition is too dry. prep for some stathryn moments the next chapter, and the ✨plot ✨ kicking in during the chapter after that!