✵

. She felt extremely uncomfortable with Jonathan in the room, and in Nancy's bed no less. When it came to 2am without a wink of sleep, she had huffed and grabbed her pillow and blanket, tramping downstairs to the basement to sleep there instead.

The basement was in complete disarray, almost trashed, but she was too tired to look more into it and fell asleep quickly on the couch, ignoring the carnage.

The second that morning light broke, however, she sneaked back upstairs before the rest of the house was awake. Ringo had waited hours now to lay into her cousin and Jonathan over their current situation, and was willing to sit on the chair in Nancy's room until they woke up. She stared at them pointedly, contemplating the speech she would give.

It didn't take them long to wake up after she sat down, probably feeling her piercing gaze on them. Nancy was the first to stir, with Jonathan following quickly after. She turned over in the bed, meeting Jonathan's tired eyes - the two of them shared a small smile, unaware of the hostile blonde mere metres away.

"I'm going to give you five minutes," Ringo's voice sounded out, causing them both to gasp in shock and shoot up in bed, absolutely mortified at seeing her sitting, staring at them. "Five minutes to get over your morning wood, and then you're going to get the hell out."

Jonathan nodded frantically, nervous by her presence and the fact he was caught in Nancy's bed. It certainly looked bad, but it was completely innocent.

"No, Ringo, you don't understand-" Nancy tried to explain, but Ringo was having none of it.

"I knew you two had something going on, I knew it," Ringo complained, looking back and forth between the two. "The longing stares in the hallway, the 'I need to be there for Jonathan'. And hey, I'm not judging. But you should probably know, Steve seen you two in bed. Yeah, Steve. Your boyfriend, remember him?"

"Oh my god," Nancy whispered, her face reddening instantly as she cupped her forehead in horror. "But we didn't do anything! I swear! He was just... comforting me!"

"Ah yes," Ringo rolled her eyes stubbornly, waving her hands about as she spoke, "you see I, personally, would call getting a coffee, or having a long chat or just hanging out appropriate methods of comforting. Not sharing a bed."

"Why are you even defending Steve?" Nancy's tone changed from desperate to accusatory, she flung the blankets back off her body and climbed out of bed. "A month ago you absolutely hated him, and now you're yelling at me, your own cousin, for him?"

"He's my friend, Nancy," Ringo bit back defensively, "except our friendship doesn't involve climbing into bed together!"

"We didn't sleep together!" Nancy whisper-shouted, conscious that her room wasn't soundproof. "And even if we had, all you ever do is preach about 'embracing my sexuality', so stop being a hypocrite!"

Jonathan looked even more embarrassed as the conversation went on, awkwardly slipping out of bed and adjusting his clothes.

"Embracing your sexuality does not involve cheating on your partner! I couldn't give a shit if you fucked Jonathan six ways from Sunday but you're not that type of person that would hurt others, Nancy!"

"Nancy," Jonathan cut in, his eyes pleadingly looking at her. "Just tell her."

"Yes, Nancy," Ringo whirled back around to face her cousin, still sitting lazily in the chair. "Do tell!"

"Fine!" Nancy hissed in annoyance, moving to sit at the bottom of her bed. Jonathan followed suit, sitting next to her for support. Ringo narrowed her eyes, they looked like a married couple telling their child important news.

"There's this... this thing.." Nancy began, her defensive stature had suddenly broke down and she looked strangely sad. "It's... it's like a monster. We think that it... took Will and Barb."

"What do you mean?" Ringo asked disbelievingly. Nancy looked to Jonathan urgently, giving him a look that prompted him to take over.

"It started with the pictures I took, that night..." he trailed off awkwardly, Ringo looked away, not wanting to be reminded of the incident. "In one of the pictures I took of Barb, there was this- this thing in the background."

"Remember I told the police that there was something there when I went back the next day?" Nancy added, Ringo nodding in remembrance. "Well... last night we went to the woods, where I saw it. And I... went somewhere..."

"Where?" Ringo pressed, looking back and forth between the two for any sign of lying.

"I don't know- it was like, it was like the woods but it was dark. And it was cold. And that thing lived there. It was feeding on this animal..." Nancy looked absolutely traumatised, but Ringo still appeared apprehensive. "I guess if it feeds on things then... Will and Barb-"

"Hey," Jonathan turned to her, comfortingly placing his hand on her arm. Ringo watched the interaction curiously. "My mom said she talked to Will, alright? If he's alive there's a chance Barbara is too."

Ringo's eyes were wide, silently, she mouthed the words 'what the fuck' to herself. If Will was alive, who did they bury yesterday?

"But that means she's trapped in that place!" Nancy argued, her eyes wide with terror.

"Alright, back the hell up," Ringo intervened, absolutely baffled at this moment. "I need more details than that. I need to know what's going on."

Jonathan took over and explained everything they knew so far to Ringo. The entire tale was horrifying, but she was particularly shocked when he happened to mention that Will was, in fact, not dead.

"Alright, then," Ringo stood up, clapping her hands once and reaching for her shoes by the door.

"What are you doing?" Nancy pried confusedly.

"We're going to go kill a demon," she shrugged, nestling her coat over her shoulders with a determined expression on her face.

"So you believe us?"

"I figured you wouldn't lie about Will and Barb," Ringo smiled softly, "and there's very little chance that you, Joyce and Jonathan have all gone batshit at the same time. And I've seen Alien, I'm ready to go Sigourney Weaver on this motherfucker."

"Wait, just wait a second," Nancy stopped her, thinking to herself. "I seen it feed on that deer, so it's a predator right? And it hunts alone, and at night, like a bear. Remember Barb cut herself at Steve's party? And last night, the deer.."

"It was bleeding too," Jonathan finished for her.

"Wait a sec," Nancy fished a book out from underneath her bed, flipping through the pages quickly.

"Damn, I'm glad my periods not due for another two weeks then," Ringo commented as she waited for Nancy's reveal, earning weird looks from the other two.

"Okay, look," Nancy stopped at a page, "sharks can detect blood in one parts per million. And they can smell it from a quarter mile away."

"What the hell?" Ringo muttered, "I used to go swimming at the beach all the time. Jesus Christ, why doesn't no one tell me this crap?

"So you're saying it can detect blood?" Jonathan ignored Ringo's blabbering.

"It's just a theory."

"But we can test it, and that way if it comes, we'll be ready."

"Have we completely ruled out the possibility that this is Steve without his hair gel?" Ringo tilted her head, earning eye rolls once again.

As they sneaked out the window using the route that Steve had shown Ringo last night - she immediately made a mental note to call him later, a gleam of red and silver caught her eye in the neighbours yard.

Ringo's head turned in that direction, spotting an axe burrowed into a stump of a tree, stray logs beside it indicating that it was being used for chopping wood.

Upon noticing that the car in the owners driveway was gone, Ringo sprinted over to retrieve it, ignoring the complaints of her cousin and friend behind her. Lifting it from its place with some force, she ran back, giddily laughing, towards the group, hoping Jonathan's car was nearby so that she wouldn't look strange walking around with an axe.

✵

Ringo sighed as she opened Jonathan's car door, clambering out of it quickly and being sure to leave her axe hiding beneath a blanket in the back seat.

She had chosen to wait in the car while Nancy and Jonathan went inside the weapons store, a decision she now came to regret. Ringo leaned against the side of the car and shuffled through her pockets, beaming when she located a couple of quarters.

The blonde marched down the street to the nearby convenience store, determined to buy a couple of cokes for what was sure to be a long night ahead. As she waited in line to pay, the small ding of the bell above the door caught her attention, in walking Jessica.

"Hey!" She beamed brightly, not having seen her friend in days. Jessica knew full well about the situation with Daniel however, they still stayed in contact over the phone.

"Hi girl," she returned her smile, approaching her as Ringo set the cokes down on the counter. "How you doing?"

"I'm good, and you?"

"Good, good. Hey, who's ass are we kicking over the slut shaming of your cousin?" She raised her eyebrows, confusing the other teenager entirely.

"What are you talking about?" Ringo asked, pocketing the change the clerk gave to her and grabbing the handles of her plastic bag.

"Oh my god," Jessica looked guilty for revealing the incident, "you haven't seen it?"

"Seen what, Jess?" Ringo pried, suddenly feeling slightly worried.

"The movie theatre..." Jessica trailed off regrettably. Ringo narrowed her eyes and stalked out of the store abruptly, her eyes fixed on the building across the street.

And sure enough, there it was. The words 'Nancy The Slut Wheeler' scrawled messily on the board next to a movie title, the same movie she had seen with Steve the night before.

The sound of laughter emanating from the alleyway met her ears, and Ringo sighed furiously, marching off in that direction immediately. She was absolutely seething with anger, her protectiveness of those that she cared about was one of her defining traits.

As she walked down, she immediately made out the figures of Tommy, Carol and Steve, the former of the three spraying something else on a wall, which indicated that he was the perpetrator.

The fact that Steve had obviously been somewhat involved had pissed her off even more.

"You're dead, Tommy!" Ringo shouted, tossing her bag of cokes to the ground and starting to run towards him.

"Hey!" Steve pushed forward and grabbed her, his arm wrapping around her waist and pulling her backwards, away from his friend.

"Get the hell off me!" She bellowed, shoving his arm away from her. "Who's side are you on?"

"Damn," Carol whistled, shoving her hands in her pockets and looking Ringo up and down, "Ashford was right. You are a psycho!"

"Stop it, Carol," Steve told her off, causing Ringo's eyes to narrow, not at all flattered by the gesture.

"What, so you can defend me but not your own girlfriend?" Ringo hissed angrily at him.

"Why don't you lay off, Ringo?" He fired back, looking bored all of a sudden, which only further infuriated her.

"Why are you doing this?" She dropped her voice lower, so the others couldn't hear. "We were friends, you know how much that word hurt me so why would you say it about Nancy?"

"Exactly. We were friends, and you're defending her. You saw what I saw last night," his voice was quieter too, but his tone still harsh none the less.

"But nothing even happened! He was just comforting her!"

"Yeah, I'm sure he was doing a lot of comforting," he rolled his eyes sarcastically.

"Harrington?" Tommy cut in, looking at the two of them with an expression of disgust. "Are you gonna get rid of her or what?"

Ringo turned back to look at Steve, raising her eyebrow in challenge.

"Go on then. Get rid of me."

Steve's mouth opened and closed as he tried to figure out what to say, looking back and forth between Tommy and Ringo, both of which he was now close to. He felt conflicted - Tommy had been his best friend since elementary, and if he didn't get rid of Ringo now then he would be teased relentlessly for it. On the other hand, Ringo was one of the most genuine people he had ever met, if he told her to go away now, that friendship would be severed entirely. He knew Ringo well enough to know she would hold a grudge against him.

"Why don't I make the decision easy for you?" She muttered quietly, her expression blank and eyes cold as she turned and walked back up the alleyway, grabbing her bag along the way.

"But, wait," Carol called with a cheeky grin, "you never told us, is being a slut genetic then?"

Steve squeezed his eyes shut when Ringo stopped in her step, her body freezing completely, Carol only grinned wider at the reaction she received.

As she turned around slowly, Steve could see that she was visibly shaking with anger. It reminded him of her display at the game a few nights before.

Reaching into her plastic bag, Ringo brought out a can of Coke and began to step closer and closer to the group once more. When she stopped in front of the redhead, she quickly brought the can forward and opened the tab, tossing it up so it's sticky contents coated Carol's hair, face and clothes.

"What the hell!" She squealed, holding her arms up to block the drink. When the cans contents emptied, the blonde crunched the can inside her hand and tossed it mockingly at Carol's head, hitting against it with a soft 'ding' and falling to the ground.

"Okay, that's it!" Carol shouted, her joking manner completely dissipated as she shot forward and reached for the top of Ringo's head, gripping her hair between her fingers tightly.

"Woah, stop, stop!" Steve shouted, trying to get in between the two and dodge Ringo's legs that would continuously kick out at Carol. "Tommy, for god's sake, can you help?!"

"Nah, I'm enjoying this," he beamed, leaning back against the wall and watching the scene unfold.

Carol had a firm grip on her hair, but Ringo wasn't letting up, kicking at her legs hard enough to bruise her and swinging her arms around to bash against her arms.

After finally being able to separate the two girls, both huffing and panting from the altercation, Ringo turned around and stormed off down the alleyway, marching past Nancy who was now on her way towards.

He sighed at the coming altercation, his gaze drifting to the blonde who disappeared in the distance, a sense of guilt filling him. His own girlfriend was on her way to possibly hit him, or dump him, and all he could think about was the fact he had lost a friend he had actually trusted.