Chapter Text
March 21st, 2000
Three things.
Eddie Munson isn’t much of a scholar, but he knows three things:
- If you bust a tire on the way to work, you’re gonna be late.
- You can’t trust a 1993 Nissan Sentra for shit, apparently.
- He needs coffee.
One of these is a problem he can fix, he thinks, headed on foot to the diner half a block from where his dejected-looking, three wheeled vehicle slumps against the curb. Maybe there's even the chance at a phone call if Louise has started her shift and he’s charming enough this morning. When you’re late to work three times in as many weeks, your boss starts saying things about getting your ass out and deadbeats and kneecaps and hoping your trailer burns down.
So, you know.
Hopefully he can buy some time with that phone call before Al buys gasoline and matches.
Chrissy is seated at her kitchen table, holding a pen over a piece of paper. The pen hasn’t moved for at least the last five minutes.
What do you say about someone who made your life hell for 32 years? How do you break the ice there, she thinks, laughing. It’s not all that funny, but what can you do but laugh?
“My mother,” she thinks. Okay. Now there are two words written on the page. My mother what? My mother was horrible, controlling and obsessed with my weight for some reason? My mother had a lot of unaddressed psychological issues that could have been dealt with in therapy, but how could you even suggest that Chrissy you ungrateful child why do you attack me every chance you get?
Chrissy sighs and puts a heavy black line through the only two words on the page. Underneath, she starts again with the words, “Laura Cunningham.”
Her father drifts quietly into the kitchen behind her, unnoticed until he starts running water to fill the coffee carafe. He crosses to the kitchen table and lays a hand softly on her shoulder.
“Sweetheart,” says Philip Cunningham. It’s not a question, or a greeting, really. Just a statement.
Chrissy turns halfway and gives him a half-smile. “Hi, Dad.”
“I know it’s tough. Your mother…” he begins.
The rest of the sentence hangs unspoken in the air between them.
Yes, I know, thinks Chrissy. My mother.
“Well, plenty of time until tomorrow,” her father says.
There’s not much chance of charming anyone this morning, as it turns out.
For one, Eddie knows he’s not exactly radiating nice guy vibes this morning. He’s tired, he’s pissed, and he’s dressed in a dirty flannel with Wayne’s old blue jacket thrown on top. He also knows from a brief look in the mirror that he was up way too late which, okay yes, was stupid. He can see himself through the eyes of everyone inside Benny’s diner, and he’s not the prettiest sight.
The flat tire seems like the price he’s destined to pay for getting drunk last night.
For another, there’s no sign of Louise behind the counter, who actually likes him in all his Eddieness. In her place is Florence, who he once — once! — made the mistake of calling “Flo”’and winking, on his first shift at Benny’s. Florence is a pinched-face woman in her mid-60s who is not, as it turns out, a Flo.
She hates Eddie. Phone call denied.
He settles for a quick cup of coffee standing at the counter, and is trying his best to think of creative ways not to lose his job. The truth, a flat tire? Trailer flood. Alien abduction. Hit by a bus. Al’s not going to give a shit about any of those. He’s known Eddie for most of his life, unfortunately, ever since he’d owned his old van and was a regular patron of Al’s Auto Body Repair. If anything, he’s been warning Eddie to bring the car in for regular service for probably months now.
“A ‘93 Nissan Sentra’s a piece of shit, kid,” Al has said just about every other day. Leaving aside the kid part, thinks 34-year-old Eddie, he’s actually right.
“Munson!” calls Benny from behind the grill. He makes a friendly gesture somewhere between a quick wave and a salute.
“You here to get your old job back?” Benny asks, like it’s a joke.
Honestly not a bad idea.
Eddie laughs once, raises his mug to the cook. “Maybe tomorrow.” He turns on his heel and exits.
Guess it’s the bus, then.
On his way through the parking lot, Eddie passes near an older man in a checked cap, who gives him a quick second look. Yeah, okay, he knows he’s not very pretty this morning. He should have at least shaved. Eddie ducks his head slightly.
“Scuse me?” The old man touches his the bottom of his nose. “You got a little somethin’, fella.”
Eddie mumbles thanks, touching a finger under his own nose. There’s a spot of blood. Nosebleed.
“That’s weird,” he says.
In the same moment, the number 7 bus cuts the corner too closely on Ash Street, over-corrects and jumps the curb directly next to Eddie.
After that, it’s all black.
Chrissy’s feet slap the pavement rhythmically in purple and neon green trimmed sneakers. There aren’t enough hills in Hawkins. Indiana is flat , she remembers now. Chasing the aerobic high of a long, sweaty run, Chrissy plans to run at least seven miles. Hills or no hills.
She still has nothing written on the piece of paper that she’s supposed to turn into a eulogy for her mother. Maybe it will magically write itself while she’s out.
Chrissy hasn’t been back to Hawkins more than twice since she finally left home at twenty-one. She might have come back more often, if she had been interested in hearing lots more about her weight.
Her wedding (inadequate).
Her hair (why so short?).
Her lack of children (you don’t have forever, you know)
Her divorce (oh, Chrissy).
Chrissy picks up the pace, pounding the asphalt beneath her sneakers like she’s trying to punish it for being flat. Cincinnati has plenty of hills. Every run sends her heart rate soaring in a much more satisfying way.
Maybe she’ll do eight miles today.
Her feet start to turn left on Ash but there’s a screaming siren rounding the corner, so she pushes onward and turns right on Cooper instead.
There’s the movie theater where she had her first date with Jason Carver. There’s the coffee shop that used to be a retro soda shop where she and the cheer team would gather and giggle at the 50s decor after practice. She always ordered a milkshake and never drank more than a sip. There’s the park bench where Jason first convinced her to let him go under her shirt, after their junior prom. And there’s the street corner where she broke up with him for the first time after their senior prom. Before she took him back. Again and again, and a third time.
Back inside her family’s house, Chrissy sits back down at the piece of paper with her mother’s eulogy on it and writes a pile of lies on it. A wonderful woman, loved by the community. A member of the church, a donor to all kinds of causes. A wife, a mother, a role model. The kind of things everyone always writes after someone has died. Maybe they’re never true.
Chrissy runs the shower as hot as her skin can stand it. She’s scrubbing the sweat vigorously off her skin, as well as every thought from her little run down memory lane. A single drop of blood drops unnoticed into the foam of soap on her leg. Reaching for the shampoo, she twists on slippery feet and one ankle crumples beneath her. Chrissy falls sideways towards the side of the tub before she even has time to make a sound, and she’s gone almost as soon as her head hits the edge.