There's a sharp tick, tick, ticking of a clock somewhere down the darkened hallway. It's a staccato beat that keeps up with the rhythm of Hopper's heart. There's a creaking of a chair, and then a curtain of tangled brunette in his field of vision. He lifts his heavy brow and meets Joyce's eyes warily.

"Hey, there they are." She continues to lean forward and gently snags the cigarette that dangles loosely between his pursed lips. "I almost forgot that they were blue." She takes a deep pull from the stolen prize, and Hopper cants his head as he listens to the paper of the Camels audibly burn then disperse into flakes of ash. They fall to the tabletop, and Hopper's only half surprised that they don't sound like bombshells when they land. Neither party makes a move to brush them off.

She slowly exhales the smoke through her nostrils, and it curls around her thick hair as it rises. He expects her to hand the cigarette back, but she turns toward the table and puts it out in the ceramic ashtray by her elbow instead. He can physically feel the deep "v" carve itself in between his furrowing brow, but before he can say anything, she's extending her hand out to him. He looks down at the offered appendage in an exhausted daze but takes it without question anyway.

"C'mon," she says softly. "El's cleaned up and taken care of. Let me take care of you now."

Hopper relents to being tugged down the hall without a word of protest. He doubts he'd be able to form words in his mind, much less speak aloud, with how hard his head is throbbing. Joyce gently pulls him into the bathroom, and he winces when she turns the light on. She notices and gives him a sympathetic smile as she flicks it back off.

"We can make do without."

The space is cramped with Hopper's larger frame stuffed into it, but Joyce manages to get him to sit atop the closed toilet seat without too much shuffling around. He stares blankly at the plastic shower curtain before him, as she grabs something out of his line of sight. He listens as the faucet is turned on, then off, and suddenly Joyce's wide-eyed expression of concern is before him again.

The dried blood around his nostrils peels when he questioningly croaks: "El?"

"She's fine," she assures him. He doesn't think that's the first time she's answered that question. There's a washcloth being pressed against his mouth, scrubbed underneath his nose, and dabbed at his earlobes. It's warm and soothing, and he feels himself leaning into it. "Almost done." There are dark, purple smudges underneath his half-lidded eyes, and he almost swears that's what she's trying to wipe away next until he realizes that the droplets of water there aren't from the cloth. "It'll be okay," she whispers.

It's okay. It's okay. It's okay.

It's not. It's not. It's not.

He presses the thumb of his right hand into his left eye, digging the appendage into the giving flesh as if the pressure would ease the ache behind it. It doesn't. So, he lowers his head and unintentionally nudges Joyce's stomach with the crown of it. She threads a damp hand through the disheveled waves of his hair and keeps it there when he doesn't object.

She stands there for a moment longer, silently offering whatever comfort he wanted to soak from her mere presence before carefully pulling away. She gives him a wobbly smile that he doesn't see and moves to run the washcloth underneath the tap once more. When she returns, she's crouching in front of him.

"This might sting," she says apologetically. It does, whatever she's wiping over and under his exposed feet, but it's soothed when she follows it with the warm cloth. "Okay," she rises and offers him a tentative smile. "Can you stand?"

He didn't realize his mouth was already agape until he closes it to wet his chapped lips with his tongue. He nods in affirmation in lieu of speaking and allows her to steady him when he moves. The room spins less than it did earlier, but he still finds himself tilting to the side.

"Whoa there, Hop." She bodily pushes herself underneath his sweat-soaked armpit but doesn't complain at the feeling. "I'm here."

Together, they exit into the hall and shuffle towards her bedroom. In the doorway, Hopper hesitates, and she doesn't push. It takes a minute before he urges them forward again, and she simply follows. When they reach her bed, he's nudged until the back of his legs hit the mattress, and he sits heavily on the edge. The springs squeak in protest, but the frame doesn't collapse, and it's a minor miracle that Joyce silently celebrates within herself.

"You can stay here for as long as you'd like," she says as she walks back towards the door. "There's some water on the table there, and I'll be out here if you need anything. Get some rest, Hop."

"Stay."

"What?"

He's already lying on his side, but he's facing her, and he's looking at her like he's just seeing her for the first time since she opened the door to him that morning. He feels as if there's this great pressure pushing down on his weary body, and that if he can only soak in her buoyant company for just another moment that he may just be able to keep afloat a while longer.

So, he manages to repeat in a voice suddenly too thick, "Please. Stay."

It's out of character for him, he realizes. He doesn't normally plead, doesn't usually beg, and definitely doesn't allow himself to be vulnerable in front of others. He doesn't know if he's just feeling emotionally flayed, scrubbed raw and lay bare before her, or if he's just so exhausted that he can't seem to stop the words from slipping past his cracked lips, but he finds himself saying it again: "Stay."

She doesn't call him out on it, and he's grateful to her for it. He thinks she might've any other day. In fact, he knows so, but instead, she gives him an understanding yet tender smile and crosses the room until she's by his side. She guardedly lies next to him, her back to his front, but isn't able to relax her body against his. This is different. This isn't the norm. This isn't the grin-and-bare it style they've settled into since the Upside Down.

This is intimate.

This is-

"Okay?"

"What?" her reply is breathy in her befuddlement. She's tense with anxiety and confusion.

"Is this okay?" he's thrown his arm over her midriff, and the solid weight of it is more comfortable than it has any right to be.

"Yeah," she closes her eyes and tries to match her breathing to his. It takes several minutes, but eventually, she can feel herself relaxing in his hold. She thinks that maybe this doesn't have to be weird. This doesn't have to mean anything more than a friend comforting another friend. It doesn't.

"It doesn't always end up in death."

She stiffens and realizes too late that she's the one that said it.

She's the one that made it weird.

The cold tip of his nose is pressing against her neck. His slow huffs of breath are tickling the wisps of hair at the base, and she can feel his thick drawl when he sluggishly replies: "Yeah."

He gets why she'd think that. It didn't for her. Not with Will.

It did for Sara.

It could have for Eleven.

Hell, after last night? It still could.

He closes his eyes and feels his breath evening out until they're nothing more than soft, steady puffs of hot air against the nape of her exposed neck.

"Yeah, it does."

The End.

Please Review.