the monster and the superhero

✧

A knife dug between the shoulder blades of the girl. The dagger had torn past her skin and made her bleed. Beads of blood rolled down her back, painting her skin crimson while her eyes shed tears of betrayal.

Then, there was a second knife.

Another traitor.

By the time the third knife hit, she couldn't find it in herself to cry any more tears. They didn't deserve it anyway.

Besides, Rue Newby had no more tears left to cry.

She had spent them all silently crying in the bathroom of an airplane, which wasn't how Rue had planned her Sunday morning to go. But then again, when had her life ever gone the way she wanted it to be?

Somehow, the already fucked up life had brought her back to the last place she wanted to be in; Hawkins, Indiana.

For the sake of her old friends, Rue tried. She tried her hardest not to seem hurt to be there. Rue tried to be optimistic even if it had only lasted an hour. She pretended she didn't despise every damned second she spent in that town. Because Rue missed them, she did it for them. She missed Steve, Dustin, Nancy, Robin, Lucas, and even Max. Rue missed Max, and when Rue saw her again, Rue felt the heavy weight of Ember Edwards' lips and kisses. They burned her skin to the point she could feel it in her bones.

Despite that, Rue missed all of them. So she tried to be the person they once knew. Rue tried to be the girl she left behind in Hawkins to die. She tried to be fourteen again.

But all that only reminded Rue why she had changed in the first place. It reminded her why she had built those walls in the first place, locking away that person she used to be.

Now, Rue had knives dug into her back. All of them wielded by people she trusted and loved.

How could they?

How dare they?

Rue once again had tried to bite her tongue to stop herself from imploding on all of them. She tried to bite back remarks she could never take back and words that were sharp enough to hurt and wreck what little friendship remained. Rue bit her tongue so hard it bled along with the wounds on her back.

Dr. Monroe had always informed Rue that when she felt powerful emotions, particularly rage, they would be explosive. Rue didn't understand what her therapist meant at the moment, but the woman explained that Rue's past of suppressing emotions was finally catching up with her. The bottle had been overflowing with years of despair and wrath, and it was now cracking. Rue had developed a mental short circuit as a trauma response after the bottle finally shattered months ago. Hence, Rue couldn't hold back her rage for long before snapping.

Dr. Monroe had prescribed Xanax along with her antidepressants to prevent her temper tantrums, but Rue stopped taking them weeks ago after realizing they did nothing but make her numb. Rue didn't want to be numb; she wanted to feel something, anything. That was most likely why she eventually went to marijuana.

But she was sober now, with no prescription medication or weed in her system. And if Rue had to listen to Steve Harrington and Dustin Henderson try to apologize to her any longer as they waited for Max Mayfield to return, she was seconds away from losing her mind.

Rue hadn't spoken since the group parted ways with Nancy Wheeler, and it had set everyone in the car on edge as she seethed in silence. Rue wouldn't look at them with anything but loathing, and she wouldn't speak to them. No apology would make her forgive them. She will never forgive them.

Rue's furious silence told the two boys in the front seats all they needed to know, which was why they had been going back and forth outlining what they had done wrong, why it was terrible, and what terrible friends they were.

Rue knew they were probably expecting her to forgive and forget like she used to, but her refusal to acknowledge their existence frightened them. Dustin and Steve realized they weren't making any progress, and Dustin exhaled hard, nervously, almost afraid.

Rue Newby has always been painstakingly forgiving. If you had done something wrong to her, a simple apology would have solved all of your worries. People have always taken advantage of her generosity, of her kindness. It wasn't just strangers or random people at school. Rue witnessed her friends doing it as well. Rue noticed she had forgiven El and Max almost too quickly after they embarrassed her in front of everyone in the Starcourt food court. She had forgiven El for breaking promises and lying too many times. And there had been countless more times. Rue had grown tired of people stepping all over her, and she vowed to herself that it would never happen again.

Rue didn't think she could ever forgive them for bringing her back to her worst nightmares and lying about it. She would never forgive them for using her. Rue believed she might hate them forever.

The realization made her stomach twist and turn, and bile taunted her throat. Rue couldn't believe she was thinking of her friends this way, people she thought of as her found family.

Dustin's words had made their way to the back of her mind. His voice a pleading, desperate, and ashamed. He felt terrible, but Rue felt worse. She was angry; at him; at herself; at everyone and the whole damn world.

She knew it would have been reasonable to listen to what else he had to say. Perhaps she should have been concerned about the ruthless slaughter of teenagers left and right. Maybe she should care that monsters were returning and everyone was in danger. Perhaps she should care that she was the only one who could genuinely stop Vecna. But she couldn't bring herself to because the scorching sense of being used, righteous anger, and embarrassment were like venom creeping up her spine, and she hated it. Rue couldn't stand it.

And she wasn't going to listen to Dustin say another word about how bad he felt because she already knew. They were all feeling awful and guilty, but she didn't care.

Rue pulled at the door handle, fingers clumsy as she pushed the door open, silently thankful Steve left it unlocked so she could make her escape. Rue clambered out of the car, ignoring Dustin's startled shouts and Steve calling her name after she slammed the door shut.

Rue took off down the street, turning the corner as soon as she saw it, and didn't stop running until she was many blocks away from the car.

The air was crisp, and the sun was about an hour away from setting. Rue didn't know where she was running to, but she knew she couldn't sit in that car any longer without wanting to explode. The knives in her back seemed like they were twisting in her skin, burrowing deeper until they reached the bone.

Rue noticed a house down the street in the suburban neighbourhood with eerily similar pink roses around the front yard. Rue's nose caught the aroma of the flowers as she strolled down the sidewalk. It was Old Mrs. Wilson's house, Rue's front door neighbour from when she lived with her father.

The weight of Rue's Walkman was heavy as she peered at the pink roses over Mrs. Wilson's wooden white fence. When Rue glanced up at the house's porch, she half expected to see the old woman sitting in her old reclining chair with her friends, sipping tea and gossiping about the small town. Rue was surprised to find the woman, not in her chair, and she wondered whether Mrs. Wilson had finally kicked the bucket.

Rue held her breath as she turned on her heels and saw the house across the street. Her old home, the one she shared with her father for the short time they lived together. There was a bitter feeling crawling up her throat once she noticed the new owners had painted the outside of the house white instead of keeping it brown.

There was a buzz underneath her fingertips.

The last memory Rue had of the house was after the funeral when her new family had helped her move out. Rue frowned as she thought about her dad's promise, one he failed to keep.

Things are going to get better now.

Rue had trusted him with every fibre of her being. Sure, there were better moments, but every time Rue felt better, she believed it would last forever, but it didn't. It never did. And it never will.

Since the day Emilia Davis died, 'better' was only temporary.

Rue wished she had tried harder to convince Joyce to let her stay. She wished she had even gone against her morals and somehow twist Joyce's thoughts to let her stay. Rue wished she had listened to Will and El as they argued with her while she packed her bags.

But there was something that kept her from staying. That invisible string and its tugging became unbearable. The eerie feeling of someone watching her felt like tiny spiders crawling up her spine, and at the end of it all, it always traced back to Hawkins. That something was here, in the cursed town, and it wouldn't even let her rest across the country.

The buzz under the pads of her fingers turned into a burning itch.

Whatever the something was, the energy it thrashed with felt magnetic, and she felt it the minute Steve Harrington's car drove past the old 'Welcome To Hawkins!' sign. The string tugged harder when they drove past certain streets, and it tugged its hardest while she had been at the trailer park.

The something felt almost suffocating and stretched through her mind like a tumour.

Though, it wasn't all bad. With it came a sense of knowledge. A sense of comfort. Rue had this strange feeling that if she followed where the string tugged, she would find all answers she wished to know.

A hand landed on her shoulder, and Rue flinched as it squeezed her gently. When she turned to see who it was, she was surprised to see that man again. He was tall, blond and piercing blue eyes. He still wore the same white uniform, and Rue guessed the blood on it should have put her off or questioned it. And maybe it scared her the first time she saw him, but it no longer did.

A part of Rue told her that she should have continued to take the meds Dr. Monroe prescribed.

He practically towered over her, his hands behind his back. "I feel your anger," he says, his voice oddly comforting. When Rue tilts her head at him, clearly confused, he smiles. "You have the curiosity of your mother, Ruth Davis. I can't say I've missed Emilia, but she's definitely had an influence in my life."

Rue feels as if the wind had been knocked out of her chest. She flinched at the mention of her mother, and the name co-align with her first. But she still can't find herself mustering up anything to say.

"I know you must be confused, but you must understand," He says, his brows furrowing in the slightest as he drops his hand from her shoulder. He stares at her as if he knows her. As if they share an understanding. "I am not your enemy."

"Are you... are you real?" Rue finds herself asking because her mind seems to blank out in a way it never had before. "Like, are you in my head or... are you the something?"

He smiles at her as if her question was amusing. "Don't you fret. I am real." He speaks slowly. His voice has a rasp, and it is barely above a whisper. "I have been trying to get a hold of you for a long time. Too long. And when I did, you were gone. But now, you've found your way back. Back home. Now, you might not be as powerful as... someone I used to know, but that isn't something I can't fix. You will help me get my vengeance. You have the ability to tear them apart."

Rue was startled when she heard a car scream to a halt and turned around to see Steve Harrington scrambling out of his car, his eyes wide and anxious as he called her name.

Rue glanced back at the man, hoping for another chance to ask him, wanting to understand what he meant, but he was gone, leaving her alone on the pavement in front of her father's old house.

Rue was left with even more questions than she had before. But the sting under her fingertips had gone away.

The sun became orange, the sky went pink, the air became cooler, and the birds fled. The living room light in her old house was turned on, and she could see a family of three gathered on the couch, a mom and dad and their child, who didn't appear to be older than five, through the large window. Rue felt as if she were seeing through a window into what may have been, and tears welled up in her eyes as painful thorns of jealousy encircled her frail heart.

"Rue," she heard Steve call, his voice was panicked, and his hair had turned into a messy flop on his head. "You can't keep running away. It's scaring the shit outta me. It took so long to find you, you know. If Max hadn't come back as soon as you left, we wouldn't have had a damned clue where you ran off to..."

The young adult trailed off once he realized where he was and the house they stood before. Steve inched closer to Rue, who had wrapped her arms around herself desperately as a pathetic excuse for a hug.

Rue sucked in a sharp breath and stopped him from saying anything else. "They painted it," She whispered, finally speaking to him or anyone from the group since Nancy had left with Robin. Rue's voice was quiet and broken, and she chewed on her lower lip to stop herself from crying. "I think it looked better brown. Now, it looks like Mike Wheeler's house. It's smaller but... still."

It took Steve a long minute to understand she was talking about her old home. And the tears in her eyes had fallen when she turned to face him. "Rue... I'm so sorry."

For a moment, Rue wanted to run into his arms and cry into his chest. She wanted to sob and scream and tell him to take her home. Rue wanted to go home, to be with Jonathan and Joyce, to apologize to Will and El and tell them they were right. She wanted to go home to her family. She wanted to fight with El and Will over who gets to wear Jonathan's old flannel and watch another stupid episode of Miami Vice against her will because El forced the whole house.

Instead, she stood there, helplessly holding onto herself as she let her pain bubble up and simmer into a rage. "How could you, Steve?" She asked, and she wiped away the tears from her face. "Why didn't you tell me the truth? Why did you lead me on with lies, and how long were you going to let me believe the lies? Hmm? And why would you think... Why would any of you think I want to do this? To help you, to help fight more of these monsters?"

Steve tried to speak, but Rue cut him off.

"Don't tell me the 'because it's the right thing to do' bullshit. I'm not a fucking superhero, all right? I'm sorry if I sound insensitive for an empath, but someone has to look after me. Someone has to care about my feelings. And clearly, none of you do."

"We care."

He did. He does. Steve was honest as he spoke for everyone, and Rue knew it as his words bounced against her skull. Even then, a bitter, selfish part of Rue pushed her to deny it.

"No. No, you don't."

"Rue-"

"No, because if you did care, you would have told me the truth from the start. And you didn't. None of you did. Because none of you care."

Steve didn't respond. He looked down at his shoes and closed his eyes. His hair fell over his face while he shook his head softly. The spring breeze grew colder when he looked up at Rue again, and she noticed trails of tears on his cheeks before he let out a low breath. "Rue," He started to say, his voice cracking as it pained him to ask her, "Please, get in the car. We can talk about this later."

Rue scoffed softly. "Later?" she echoed, her face hardening in disbelief. She pushed her hair out of her face as it blew with the wind, and in the corner of her eye, she spotted Dustin and Max standing next to the car, listening to the whole conversation.

The two shared guilty glances before getting in the car, pretending like they haven't heard anything after getting caught.

Rue's mood only turned sour at that, and she let out a bitter laugh, "Because you care that much, right?" she shot at Steve, words as sharp as the knives sticking from her back, "You care so much that you want to talk about it later than now."

The most painful aspect of betrayal is when it comes from someone you care about. People you consider to be family. That was what made the pain unbearable; when the knife was stabbed into your back by the people you least expect it from. When someone you trust betrays you.

And sure, they felt bad. They felt terrible. Rue knew that and she didn't have to be an empath to know it, but their guilt couldn't fix the trust they'd broken.

Rue wondered whether she was being too harsh on them, too petty, as she got back into the car, pulling her headphones over her ears to avoid whatever they said. Rue understood why they did it, why they came to her for help. Max claimed that they were scared and didn't know where else to turn. Vecna had them all on edge, and Max could have said more, but Rue had left before she could finish explaining herself.

Even once she realized where they came from, a selfish part of Rue reminded her that the only reason they phoned was that they needed someone to rely on, someone who could help them defeat Vecna. They called her not because they missed her, or because they wanted to spend time with her. She was their knight in shining armour, and they most likely never saw her as anything else.

That's not true, Rue told herself. She was more than that, and they knew it. They saw her as more than some shield to protect them from evil.

Max Mayfield's eyes eating into Rue's skin couldn't be ignored, no matter how loud Rue turned up the volume on her Walkman. The drums of Stevie Nicks' Edge of Seventeen couldn't help Rue ignore the red-haired girl's searing gaze.

Rue had to bite her tongue to keep from spewing out words she would say to Angela or Ember's sister back in Lenora Hills. Rue kept staring out the window at the darkening sky, hoping Max would get bored and eventually look away.

Max was still staring at Rue when her mixtape ended, and she had to sit there rewinding it, and it grated on her nerves. Rue sighed and pressed the heels of her palms against her eyes "What? What exactly is it? Do you want to take a picture or something?"