Lucas Sinclair and Max Mayfield began as a middle school fling that no one truly expected to last. But they did. Despite all odds, they did.

…

JANUARY 1985

The first time they ever hung out alone - truly alone, without any other members of the party or any creepy back-room-of-the-arcade tactics - was just a few weeks after the snowball.

She had kissed him then, under the blue and silver streamers of the cheesy school dance, and though things had quickly returned to normal for them, Lucas could not help but remember the way his heart fluttered at her touch and his cheeks ached at the end of the night from the non-stop smiling.

"Hey, Max!" called Lucas in the hallway one Friday. The final bell had just rung and he had caught her just before she left through the school's side doors.

She turned at the shout of her name. "Hey, stalker," she greeted, but the word was no longer harsh in her mouth. Rather, it was light and happy and affectionate.

He caught up to her quickly as she waited for him by the exit. "I just was wondering," he started slowly, breathlessly, before his next sentence came all at once as if it were one long word. "Do-you-wanna-go-to-the-arcade-with-me?"

"Today?" she asked, and he nodded eagerly.

She wanted to say yes, but the moment her mouth opened to form the word, something - someone - poked the back of her mind.

Looking out the glass windows of the school doors, she saw the familiar blue Camaro parked outside. Even after she had stabbed him in the neck with a sedative and threatened his sex life with a nail-covered baseball bat, she was still terrified of her stepbrother. Even more so now than she had been before. Because she had given him motive. She had poked the beast and it was ready to bite back. There was no doubt in her mind that he would as soon as she gave him the opportunity.

Lucas wore a crestfallen expression as he followed her gaze. "That's okay, Max, maybe some other -"

"Meet me there at six?" she said suddenly, before she had even conjured an escape plan in her head from the home she called Hell. Before she allowed herself to change her mind, she turned back to him and smiled softly before exiting the building and running off toward Billy's car, leaving a heart-eyed Lucas behind.

He was beyond excited. He had been saving his quarters from shoveling the snow from Old Man Humphry's driveway for a month now in hopes that he would be able to beat one of Max's high scores just to watch her take back her top spot.

No one else in the party was going. Mike was at Holly's winter ballet recital, Will was having an mandatory family night, Dustin was off taking bad advice from Steve Harrington, and El was back in hiding. So it was just Lucas and Max. Max and Lucas. Together. Alone.

But it was not a date. Or was it?

Either way, he biked to meet her as fast as his legs would carry him even though he had left his house fifteen minutes too early. To his surprise, Max was already there, waiting outside for him. Her nose was pink from the cold and her expression was sullen, but she instinctively lit up when she saw Lucas and it made his heart leap.

"You're early," he said.

"So are you," she retorted. "Let's go inside, I'm freezing."

Watching her play was mesmerizing. Dig Dug was her favorite, because it was the one she was best at. Her hands moved at lightning speed and her eyes narrowed at the screen in concentration. She beat her own top score, then beat it again, but still cursed and kicked the machine when she inevitably lost.

"783,500 points?! That's mental..." Lucas exclaimed as she entered in her name: MADMAX.

"I'm trying to get to 800,000," she boasted before stepping aside to let Lucas take a shot.

"Come on, there's no way I'm ever gonna beat you," he told her.

"Maybe... but if you knock Dustin out of second place, he'll be totally pissed," she said with a sly smile.

He narrowed his gaze and felt his face spread into a grin. Instead of arguing with each other, they were scheming together, and for Lucas it just felt right. "I like the way you think, MadMax."

It took him four tries to get it, but eventually he did. "680,784," Lucas announced pridefully as he claimed second place, bumping Dustin down to third.

"Nice work, stalker!" Max congratulated, going in for a high-five. He brought this hand to meet hers in midair, but before he could drop it, she caught and held onto it. "Let's go check out Centipede," she said, turning and leading Lucas hand in hand through the arcade.

He was grateful that she was too busy watching where she was walking to look back and see the goofy grin that plastered itself to his face.

…

They had started holding hands a lot. Whether it was under the table at lunch or under the blanket they shared while watching movies in the Wheelers' basement, their hands always seemed to find each other whenever they could be subtle about it.

…

It had not been a date. Or had it?

The idea tugged at Max's mind for weeks before she broke and finally reached out for help. She called JJ, her best and only friend from California. She had known him since she was four and trusted the kid with her life.

Her mom and step dad were nowhere to be found and Billy had run off to go buy beer and cigarettes, giving Max just enough alone time to make such a dire phone call.

JJ picked up on the fourth ring. "Hello?"

"How do you know if it's a date?" asked Max, cutting to the chase.

"Let me guess," he started, and she could hear his smile over the phone. "Lucas?"

She rolled her eyes even though he was not there to see. "Yes, Lucas. Who else?"

"You're such a girl sometimes, Max," JJ teased.

"Shut up," Max retorted, unable to think of a better comeback. She was embarrassed enough as it was. "And answer the question. How do I know if it was a date?"

"I don't know. Ask him?" he said as if it were the most obvious answer in the world, which it probably was. Max knew immediately that it was the exact advice she would give to anyone else in her situation, but in a way it made things even less helpful.

"JJ," she warned.

"Alright, alright. Sorry," he huffed. "Was it just the two of you?"

"Yes."

"What did you do?"

"We went to the arcade… played games, ate snacks…"

"Did he pay?"

"Yes, but only -"

"But nothing. It was a date."

"But -"

"But nothing, Max," JJ insisted. "And if you don't believe me then ask him yourself. Better yet, ask him out on another date directly. Show him how it's done."

"You know I can't do that," Max said softly, twirling the phone cord around her finger. God, maybe she really was such a girl sometimes. She dropped the cord and shoved her hand into her pocket.

"Why not? You said you kissed him and he didn't projectile vomit over you, so I'd say you have a pretty good shot, Mayfield."

At that, Max laughed. And in that laughter, she realized JJ was right. Why the hell not? She decided she would ask him on Monday for a real date, one she did not need to question the validity of.

But when Monday came, she chickened out. It took her until Wednesday to work up enough confidence, and once she finally had a plan in place, she reminded herself not to come off as intimidating. At that, she failed miserably.

Max approached Lucas at his locker in between sixth and seventh period.

"Hey, Lucas," she greeted, her tone coming of slightly aggressive in an attempt to mask her nerves. She kicked herself mentally.

Not wanting him to think she was mad at him, she quickly slipped fingers between his, something they had never done so blatantly or publicly before, and Max immediately knew it had probably only made the situation worse for both of them. She kicked herself mentally again.

"Uh… hey, Max," said Lucas. A smile flickered across his lips but his wide eyes told her that she had completely caught him off guard.

"What are you doing Saturday?" she asked quickly, trying to keep her tone as neutral as possible.

"Saturday? I, uh, I-I'm not sure. The party's probably doing something if you wanna come. Why? What's up?" he asked skeptically.

She realized how tightly she was gripping his hand and decided to release it, grabbing onto each of her backpack straps instead. "I want you to take me out," she said, slightly too aggressively once more. "On a date," she added, almost forgetting her whole reason for asking - or maybe more like demanding - in the first place.

'So smooth,' she thought to herself while grimacing internally.

When Lucas' mouth dropped open slightly as he processed her words, Max felt her heart begin sinking. "Unless… you don't want to."

"No! No," he assured her quickly. "I want to. I definitely want to."

It was not until she relaxed under his words that Max realized how much tension she had been holding in the first place.

A smile tugged at the corner of Lucas' mouth as he closed his locker. "I'll let you know where to meet me," he said much more slowly, though his statement sounded like a question.

"Cool," Max said in a softened voice, holding back a grin of her own.

"Cool," Lucas agreed.

And then before she could embarrass herself any further, she walked away toward her next class.

…

Saturday came, and Lucas took her to Nice Slice, his favorite pizza place, on Main Street. He got there extra early, but Max, once again, was already waiting outside.

"You're super early," he commented, opening the door for the freezing California girl.

"So are you."

They sat in a booth near the back for hours, eating pepperoni pizza and drinking Coca-Cola's as they talked and laughed and bantered. It felt easy and natural and right. After the week of alternate dimensions and near death experiences they had survived together, they were both a bit surprised at just how normal their conversations could be.

Lucas told her tales of Dustin and Mike and Will as kids, and Max told him stories of summers with her dad on the beach. They fought over whether or not pineapple was a good pizza topping and if there are people who actually use the word 'tubular'. Lucas told her about some of the ways Erica likes to mess with him, and Max told him about the rare occasions that she will hear Billy singing Cyndi Lauper in the shower when he thinks no one else is home.

At that, Lucas laughed so hard that soda came out of his nose, causing Max to erupt into her own fit of giggles.

"Okay now that was totally tubular," she told him in between chuckles.

Lucas thought he should feel embarrassed, but for whatever reason he did not. Max was not laughing at him, she was laughing with him, and Lucas decided then that it was the best sound he had ever heard.

…

"Can I walk you home?" Lucas asked after he and Max had been told the pizza place would be closing in fifteen minutes. January left Hawkins road's icy - too icy for Max to skate - and since she did not live far, she had decided to walk to Nice Slice.

Max blinked at him a few times and Lucas prepared to have his offer turned down because of her evil step brother. "You can walk me to the end of my street," she suggested instead.

Lucas' stomach flipped at the idea of getting to spend more time with Max, though it was a feeling he was beginning to get used to. "Cool."

"Cool," she agreed, sliding out of the booth.

When they got outside, it was snowing. Immediately, Max shivered and crossed her arms over her chest as a defense against the cold, but Lucas did not miss the way her eyes danced around, watching the gentle snow fall with a child-like admiration.

"You know, before this year I'd never seen snow before," Max admitted.

Lucas nodded to himself from his spot crouched on the ground, already packing together the perfect snowball, though she did not seem to notice. "So you've never had a snowball fight?" he asked, standing up and backing away from the redhead to find the perfect throwing distance.

Her head snapped toward him, eyes wild with betrayment. "You wouldn't."

He would. And he did. Lucas threw the snowball with a well-practiced angle and trajectory. She held her hands up in defense and squealed when it exploded against her shoulder.

Immediately, she crouched down and attempted to form one herself, to no avail. It fell apart in her hands. She tried again. "I thought this was supposed to be easy."

"It is easy."

"Then tell me how to do it!"

"Why should I share my battle tactics with the enemy?"

The white flakes clung to the copper waves that veiled her face, but Lucas did not need to see her eyes to know that she was rolling them at him. "Would you stop being a complete loser for, like, five seconds and come help me?"

Lucas complied, bending down next to her and picking up snow from the ground. "You have to pack it as tight as you can… like this," he demonstrated, creating a second snowball before smashing it against her knee and helping Max with her own.

"Like that?" she asked.

"Yeah! Yeah, but you want to twist it almost... Like that... Jesus, Max, your hands are freezing."

They stood together and Max smashed her first ever snowball on Lucas' shoulder with a satisfied grin before he took her hands in both of his own and started blowing warm breaths onto them.

"Californians," he sighed as he began rubbing her fingers between his palms, warming her with heat from friction and his own body temperature. "They're all cold blooded."

She raised an eyebrow at him. "How many other Californians have you met?"

"I don't need to have met them, it's just scientific fact."

She rolled her eyes but moved to lace her fingers through his, stuffing her other hand in her coat pocket. She began pulling him in the direction of the street he promised to walk her to the end of. "Come on, stalker."

They walked together, hand in hand, as a comfortable silence washed over them. He looked to her and she looked to him, smiling softly before turning her face toward the ground.

And just like that, Lucas Sinclair knew that he hopelessly and unequivocally hers.

A/N: Hi, loves! Recently, I've been inspired to write for Lucas and Max. When it comes to characters, Lucas is top three for me, and Max is a solid runner up who I absolutely adore. I think they work really well together. Lucas is intelligent, responsible, loyal, and makes Max feel safe and included, while Max tries to be tough as nails but is honestly terrified of Billy and softens around Lucas. They are two amazing characters and I'm so excited to write for them.

This will be a life spanning collection of one shots about the pair, which will jump around their timeline. Thank you so much for reading, and I hope you stick around and enjoy!

DISCLAIMER: Sadly, I am not secretly a Duffer brother. In no way am I affiliated with Netflix or Stranger Things.