After fully opening the door to her own bedroom and watching Mike dump the coins out of her piggy bank and onto her bed, Nancy asked him, "What the hell are you doing?"

After quickly looking over at his sister with wide eyes, Mike told her, "I'll pay you back!"

Then he shoved two handfuls of coins into his pockets before running out of her room as he yelled, "Bye!"

While running after her youngest brother, Nancy yelled, "Mike! Mike! Get back here!"

While the two siblings ran down the stairs and through the kitchen, Ted said to them, "Hey. No running in the house."

Then Karen asked them, "What is going on?"

While completely disregarding either of their parents, the two siblings continued to run through the house before Mike had eventually grabbed his Mike and started to run it out of the garage as Nancy yelled, "Mike! Mike!"

It wasn't until after Mike had gotten onto his bike and started to ride away from the house that Nancy came to an abrupt halt and yelled, "Asshole!"

After throwing up both of her arms, she turned around and started to quickly walk back to the house.

It was only when she was about to quickly walk back through the garage that she stopped when she heard a chuckle.

She turned her head to see Matthew staring over at her with a smirk on his face and a lit cigarette hanging out of his mouth.

With a scoff, she said to him, "Shut up, Matt."

His smirk only widened and his eyes had widened up a bit, while he raised both of his middle fingers up at her, to which she responded with yet another scoff before she quickly walked back through the garage and headed up to her room to get what remained of her coins back inside of her piggy bank.

With a lit cigarette hanging out of his mouth and his walkman loudly playing Metallica's Fade To Black, Matthew Wheeler was sitting outside of Hawkins High School with his eyes closed and a slightly irritated look on his face.

Just ten months ago, Matthew thought that he'd have a somewhat peaceful sophomore year where he didn't have to see a certain metalhead that made his heartbeat faster than it should and who made him feel nervous whenever seeing said metalhead or having some sort of an interaction with him.

But unfortunately for Matthew, Eddie Munson had in fact not graduated.

Instead, he had to repeat his senior year for reasons unknown to Matthew.

And it was because of Eddie having to repeat his senior year that Matthew would sit outside of the school and not make any attempt to head into the school until his first class of the day had already started so that he wouldn't have to risk the chance of seeing the very metalhead that had gotten him to be so angry and so on edge since their last interaction eleven months ago now.

Although if Matthew was going to be completely honest, he didn't know what made him angrier.

The fact that El had disappeared almost a year ago now with no traces left of her, or that his last interaction with Eddie resulted in his face becoming a bright red color and risking the chance of letting his former drug dealer know that he had feelings for him.

Feelings that— as far as the majority of Hawkins was concerned— were forbidden.

So, he made a point of avoiding Eddie Munson.

If he saw Eddie in the hallways, Matthew would turn around and walk in the opposite direction, even if it meant that he was late to his next class.

And sometimes if he was especially angry at himself for feeling the way he did about Eddie, he would get into fights with whoever looked at him wrong.

Although his way of going about things was wrong to anyone that wasn't Matthew, it was something normal to him.

He didn't know if it was just a result of being raised by his parents and the lack of care that they had for one another or if it was something else entirely, but Matthew had a tendency of getting really, really angry when he felt something that was either something he'd never felt before or something that he rarely felt.

And for a little over a year now, Matthew felt nothing but anger towards himself for feeling the way he did for not only the labeled freak of the school and the metalhead that didn't dress or act like everyone else in the school seemed to act, but also because of the fact that he seemed to have an attraction towards the repeating senior of the school.

And he knew that he couldn't tell anyone about it because if he did, then he would be given even more shit by his classmates and maybe end up getting disowned by his own parents.

And the last thing he needed was another major problem being thrown at him, so he kept quiet on the matter and simply had his drawings of Eddie hidden deep in his room in a spot that only he knew about and that no one in his family could accidentally stumble across.

Because the last thing he needed was anyone asking him why he only seemed to repeatedly work on the drawing of Eddie Munson, but no one else.

With a raise of his eyebrows, he took the cigarette out of his mouth and let out a sigh.

Unknowingly to him though, a teenage girl with red hair was sitting in front of him and staring at him and was starting to cough when the smoke was blown into her face.

It wasn't until he felt a slight kick to one of his legs that he quickly opened his eyes to see a red-headed girl he'd never seen before staring at him with a scrunched up nose and a frown on her face.

Without taking off his headphones, he said to the girl, "Go away."

Instead of doing as he said, the girl simply sat there and continued to stare at him.

While the intro to Metallica's Trapped Under Ice started to play on his walkman, Matthew quickly took off his headphones before he asked the girl, "What part of 'go away' are you just not fucking understanding?" When she only shrugged in response, he asked her, "What the fuck do you want?"

It was then that the girl asked him, "Do you have another cigarette on you?"

With an eyebrow raised, he asked her, "You smoke?" When she only nodded her head, he said to her, "Yeah fucking right."

With her eyebrows furrowed, she asked him, "What makes you think that I don't smoke?"

With a raise of his eyebrows, he replied, "Maybe because you started to cough as soon as that smoke hit your face."

She retorted, "Well, maybe I just don't like it when someone blows their fucking smoke in my face. You ever think of that?"

Matthew only chuckled to himself before he pulled out an unlit cigarette and handed it to her.

After taking the cigarette from him, she put it in her mouth and simply took out her own lighter and lit it for herself.

And while she sat there with the now lit cigarette hanging out of her mouth, Matthew simply eyed her as he listened to the faint sound of Metallica's Escape starting to play on his walkman.

When she took out her own cigarette and blew the smoke into his face, he asked her, "What happened to you not liking it when someone blows smoke in your face?"

With a shrug of her shoulders, she told him, "I'm a hypocrite." When he only chuckled to himself, she asked him, "You go to school here, right?"

With a nod of his head, he said, "Yep."

After watching him put his own cigarette back into his mouth, she asked him, "What's your name?" When he only raised an eyebrow at her, she told him, "Only reason I'm asking is 'cause I'm new here to Hawkins."

After a moment of silence, he said, "Matt." When she only tilted her head at him, he told her, "Full name's Matthew, but I go by Matt. What about you?"

In turn, she said to him, "Valerie, but I mostly go by Val."

He replied, "Oh, yeah? Does anyone actually call you Val, or is that just a thing you like to tell people?"

When she only shrugged in response, he shook his head to himself before he turned to the school when he heard the sound of the bell ringing from inside of the school.

Then he got up from where he was sitting and tossed his lit cigarette onto the ground and put it out with his shoe before he said to her, "I'll see you around, Val."

With a nod of her head, she said to him, "See you around, Matt."

After seeing her brother standing in front of his open locker with his headphones on and yet another one of his rock songs loudly playing on his walkman, Nancy quickly made her way over towards Matthew with Steve Harrington close behind her.

It wasn't until she was standing just beside her brother that she said to him, "Hey, Matt." When Matthew didn't glance over at her, she said, "Matt?"

When he still didn't look over at her, she took his headphones off of his head, which got him to sigh and mutter to himself, "Jesus Christ. Is having a minute of peace too much to fucking ask?" Then he turned to Nancy and asked her, "What the hell do you want?"

Nancy asked him, "Hey, did you get an invite to, uh, Tina's party?"

With a shake of his head, he replied, "No. Why the hell would I? I don't even talk to Tina." When she only sighed to herself, he told her, "Besides, even if I did, it's not like I would've gone, anyway. In case you forgot, I hate just about everyone at this school. So, what makes you think I'd want to go to some fucking party that Tina's throwing?"

She told him, "I was just wondering. Besides, I was gonna see if you'd want to come with me to get yourself out of the house." When he only rolled his eyes, she quietly said to him, "I mean, after everything that happened last year, I'd think that you'd want to get out of the house and take your mind off of it."

He replied, "Well, I don't. So, are we done now? I have much better things to do than to talk to you about some fucking party that Tina's throwing." When she didn't respond, he slammed his locker door shut and said to her, "Great."

Then he turned his back on her and started to walk away from her with his headphones back on top of his head.

And while he left his sister and her boyfriend behind, a red-headed girl he met briefly before his first class of the day had started was watching as he quickly walked away from his sister with a scowl on his face and his eyes narrowed.

While eating the food on her plate, Karen said to Mike, "After dinner, I want you to pick out your toys for the yard sale."

Mike replied, "Fine."

Karen told him, "Two boxes' worth."

Mike asked her, "Two boxes?"

Karen said to him, "You heard me."

Mike replied, "I'm fine with you giving away a couple, but the other ones have way too much emotional value."

In turn, Karen said to him, "Emotional value?"

While eating the food on his plate, Ted told Mike, "They're hunks of plastic, Michael."

While Matthew only snorted to himself, Mike said to Karen, "You already took away my Atari."

With a shake of her head, Karen replied, "If you didn't wanna lose more toys, you shouldn't have stolen from Nancy."

Mike told her, "I didn't steal. I borrowed."

Karen asked him, "Oh, and you didn't curse out Mr. Kowalski last week either, right? Or plagiarized that essay? Or graffiti the bathroom stall? Or what about the times that you've been stealing money from your father?"

Mike replied, "Everyone graffitis the bathroom stall. And about stealing money from dad? I never did it. So I don't know why you guys keep thinking I'm stealing money from him."

While Matthew only smirked to himself from where he was sitting between Ted and Mike, Ted asked his youngest son, "So if your friend jumps off a cliff, you're gonna jump, too?"

While Mike only blinked to himself, Karen said to him, "Look, we know you've had a hard year, Michael. But we've been patient. This isn't strike one. This isn't even strike three."

Then Ted told him, "It's strike twenty. You're on the bench, son. And if it'd been my coach, you'd be lucky to still be on the team."

While gesturing towards Matthew, Mike asked them, "And what about Matt? He smokes all the time and drinks and does whatever the hell he wants, so why doesn't he get stuff taken from him, too?"

Just when Karen was about to say something to him, she suddenly stopped when Ted said, "Because, Michael, your brother gets good grades and doesn't plagiarize essays or graffiti bathroom walls."

With a scoff, Mike replied, "But he gets into fights all the time!"

With a knife pointed at his youngest son, Ted told him, "But he also wins those fights, and that's what really matters here. Your brother knows how to win a fight, while you just know how to get yourself benched from your own actions."

After a moment of the mother and youngest son just silently staring at Ted with their eyebrows furrowed and just shaking their heads at him, Karen shook her head yet again and turned to Mike before she told him, "Two boxes. Two."

Mike glanced over at Matthew, who still had that same smirk on his face and now had his eyebrows raised at Mike, before he shook his head to himself and harshly stabbed at his plate with his fork with a frown on his face.