Stranger Things

by A. R. Capetta

  “Hello there!” Bob says. This man has more than the usual amount of cheerfulness. He’s short, portly, and practically glowing just from the daily joy of working at Radio Shack. It doesn’t look like he’s pasted the smile on for corporate reasons, though. His buoyant manner seems genuine.

  “Can I talk to the manager or the owner?” I ask, looking around for someone with an air of obnoxious and probably unearned authority. I don’t actually want to deal with management, but I’m not making the same mistake this time—getting off to what seems like a promising start only to get dramatically shut down by the person in charge.

  “You definitely can,” he says, leaning over the counter conspiratorially, “because you already are!”

  My eyes widen with suspicious wonder. How can a person like this—so unspoiled by the shittiness of the world—actually exist? I can’t tell if he would become my absolute favorite or if he would wear my patience down to nothing in a single shift.

  “I’m looking for a job,” I announce. “I heard from Joyce over at Melvald’s—”

  “Joyce?” Bob tugs nervously at the collar of his polo. “Mentioned me? Oh, that’s…that’s nice.”

  Okay. Not going to touch that.

  “Actually, she just said the store needs some extra help. I’d love to work…here.” I have to muscle out the last word.

  “What makes you the next great Shacker?” Bob asks. Then he hastens to add, “That’s not an official name for our employees, just a fun little thing I came up with.”

  “I know all about CoCo2, Radio Shack’s new color computer,” I lie through my teeth. I’ve literally just said everything I know about CoCo2 in one sentence.

  “Oh, we love CoCo around here,” Bob confirms, pointing to a corner of the store (which seems to consist mostly of nooks and corners in a way that defies normal Euclidean geometry), and a display devoted entirely to the CoCo computer line. “But we’re so much more than that. Any kind of radio or electronic need? We can fill it. Morning, noon, or night? Well, we’re only open until six, but you get the spirit of the thing.”

  “Got it. After this Friday, I can work absolutely any day. Any shift.” I wince in anticipation of the next bit. “Well, I have to go to school, but any shift after that.”

  “Whoa! I love the go-get-’em attitude, but not so fast. What components do you need to build a simple crystal radio?” he fires off, suddenly serious and intent.

  “A…um…crystal? And a radio.”

  “What brand walkie-talkie would you recommend to an enthusiastic amateur versus a parent looking for a kiddo’s birthday gift?”

  “The nicer one?”

  “If a customer asks you for help and you’re already with another customer on the phone, do you hang up and call back, ask the customer in the store to wait, or ask another employee for backup?”

  “Can I go with D, all of the above?” I try, already knowing that I’ve tanked the pop quiz portion of my interview. At this point I’m dangling from a thin thread of hope. If I can make Bob laugh, maybe he’ll want to keep me around.

  “Hmmm.” A frown, which looks entirely new to his features, settles in. “I’m afraid you don’t have the right base knowledge to work here. But if you want to study up on transistors and come back in the future, I’ll be here.”

  I don’t have time for that. It’s way too late to add Electronics to the list of languages I need to learn right now.

  “Listen here…what was your name again?” Bob asks.

  I perk up, thinking he might be about to change his mind. “Robin. I’m Robin.”

  “You’ll find your place, Robin.” Oh. We’ve reached the platitudes portion of the proceedings. I start to walk away, thinking he’s done, but then he launches back into it, and I loop back around to the counter. “You’ll find your place and the people who need you the most, and when you do, you’ll just know. It’ll fill this great big hole inside of you, this gaping spot that maybe you didn’t know about until all of a sudden, it’s gone. Just like that.” He snaps dramatically. At this point, it feels like music should be swelling in the background. “And you’re more than gainfully employed. You’re…well, you’re more or less home.”

  I can’t imagine the place I work as a teenager being anything other than a pit stop on the road to somewhere better. And Bob Newby’s motivational speeches aren’t exactly the stuff of legend. Maybe I dodged a bullet with this one.

  “Um. Thanks?”

  I push my way back out into the late-November afternoon. The gray sidewalk is the same color as the sky. Dead leaves scud around in the wind, over the street, and into the gutters, where they stir restlessly. I watch my shoes—black patent leather, not something I would normally wear—beat a path down the side of Main Street.

  My parents are planning on picking me up at the far end, down by the Hawkins Diner, in half an hour. Stores are starting to close for the night, their holiday lights adorning otherwise lifeless windows. There are handwritten signs about being closed for Thanksgiving on some doors, while others just take it for granted and flip to the looping red script of Closed signs.

  I’m running out of time and running into bad weather. Flurries are coming down thick and white. “I’m not ready for this,” I murmur. “So just stop it, okay?” But the sky spits on me like it’s been waiting for this opportunity all year. I didn’t have a coat to match my Very Adult interview outfit, just the same puffy one that I’ve had since eighth grade. I thought it would ruin the effect so I insisted I was warm enough without one. Now I’m shivering, and the last few résumés in my hand are getting wet from the snow and the ink is running down the pages like Tam’s mascara ran down her face as she cried over Steve Harrington.

  I fixed that, though.

  I can fix this, too.

  Across the street, the yellowish marquee bulbs of the movie theater draw me in, like a fly to honey. I wait for a car to pass—and slosh icy water onto my painstakingly chosen clothes—before crossing the street. The marquee itself gives me some relief from the snow, but inside it looks much warmer, with the red velvet benches and steaming popcorn machine.

  I storm inside and stamp off snow.

  “You’re between shows,” the twentyish girl at the ticket counter calls to me. “Want to buy a ticket for the next one? We’ve got A Christmas Story, and Terms of Endearment for the late show.”

  I look around, feeling desperate and hopeful all at once.

  “Are you hiring?” I ask on a whim.

  “Are you kidding? We’re always hiring. One of the concession workers just told off a customer for asking for a layer of butter between every scoop of popcorn. You can have his job. If you’re any good and you stick around for more than a month, you can work your way up to cleaning the floors and ripping the ends off ticket stubs.”

  “Sounds glamorous,” I deadpan.

  “That’s Hollywood for you,” she deadpans right back. “You want to get started?”

  “Right now?” I ask, the vague promise of a paycheck finally starting to solidify into dollars and cents.

  She shrugs. “Like I said, we’re playing two more shows tonight. Terms of Endearment is a big draw for bored moms. A Christmas Story brings in folks who are home for the holidays but can’t stand looking directly at their family members’ faces. For each show, I’m making popcorn and filling enormous cups with pop and dealing with little kids who can’t decide if they want Milk Duds or Jujubes and taking tickets, which means a lot of pileups.”

  “Do you have a phone?” I ask.

  “Sure thing,” she says, pointing to the other end of the lobby.

  I walk the parquet floor, passing posters for The Outsiders, The Big Chill, Flashdance, Trading Places, Return of the Jedi, and The Dead Zone.

  I get a slight thrill at the idea of absorbing so many movies by osmosis, just by being here every day
. The single theater in Hawkins, with its reliance on big studio releases, might not play the movies that I love best—classics and foreign films and art-house cinema that we have to wait an extra year to get on video in Hawkins after the movies are released in tiny flyspeck theaters in major cities—but filmmaking draws me in, no matter what. It’s a sort of language, and I love languages. This one is made up of visual symbols and subtle looks, framing choices and music cues, sharp dialogue and deep subtext. It’s an orchestration of meaning and emotion. A way to say something that the world needs to hear. And even though I’m building up excitement to travel in person, this gives me a way to constantly leave Hawkins for the rest of this year without having to set a foot over the town line.

  Slotting a quarter in the pay phone, I pick up the receiver on its squishy metal wire and call home. When Dad picks up, I find myself breathlessly telling him that I found a job and I can start right away. “Can you pick me up after the late show?”

  I hear him sigh.

  “I know it’s late, but—”

  “I’m proud of you, Robin,” he says out of nowhere.

  “Because I’m joining the rat race?” I say with a heavy dose of sarcasm.

  “Because you’re getting out there.”

  “Oh,” I say, still startled by his reaction. “Yeah. It feels good.”

  But I can’t help wondering what he’ll say when getting out there also means leaving on a jet plane.

  When I hang up, I turn around and find the girl from the ticket counter waiting for me, a bright-red polo gripped in one hand. With a start, I realize that she’s twentyish and already in charge of hiring (and probably firing) people. Maybe I really can work my way up if I stick around. “My name is Keri with a K at the beginning, one R in the middle, and an I at the end, but I put Carry on my nametag because it confuses people. What do you want on yours?”

  NOVEMBER 25, 1983

  By Friday, I’ve already worked two shifts with Keri at the movie theater and taken home a whopping forty dollars. (I make four dollars an hour, which is over minimum wage, but the need to repay my two polos and a Milky Way that I ate instead of Thanksgiving dinner chomped through my first paycheck like Pac-Man on his very urgent way to a ghost.) But even with a little bit of money put away, the idea of leaving Hawkins is becoming real.

  Which makes it easier to get through one last day of marching between rounds of high school boys ritualistically knocking into each other.

  I’m standing on the sidelines, wearing a uniform that has by this point gathered an entire season’s worth of sweat in the creases. Some people have theirs dry-cleaned every week, but I’m not spending a single penny of my newly garnered wages on this abomination of tassels and buttons. Did I mention the feathery hat? It’s called a shako, and it makes me look like one of those horses that pull a fancy carriage. Honestly, those horses probably have more dignity. I can’t wait to get out of here, away from all of this.

  Though there is one moment today that I’m looking forward to.

  We’re debuting a new song (we always do a special number just for the final game of the season), and despite my best attempts at not caring about any of this, I jitter with excitement as I run over the fingering one more time.

  It’s a great distraction from the ever-present Odd Squad.

  “Hey, Robin,” Kate says for maybe the fortieth time today.

  “Sorry,” I say. “I’m going over something.”

  Kate sighs. She knows I don’t want to talk to her. As far as I can tell from their flirting levels, she’s still dating Dash.

  “Robin?” Kate tugs at my elbow.

  “Wow. Look that play,” I say vacantly, pointing at the football game.

  I have no idea what play they just ran. But the crowd is cheering and Steve Harrington is out on the field acting like a gleeful ass, so something must have gone well.

  He seems to be really enjoying his moment. He snaps up to standing, throws the ball, does some kind of ill-advised dance. He’s giving himself over to football as if his life, or at least his popularity, depends on it.

  I watch the crowd love him, wildly, collectively. I can’t help hating them for it. I close my eyes, mutter French verbs, and dream about a beautiful day when I’m in a place where school sports don’t take on the combined fervor of battle and religion.

  “Go, Hawkins!” most of the band shouts, pumping their instruments into the air.

  “Whatever,” Wendy DeWan mutters. “I can’t believe they’re even having the game this year.”

  “I know,” Milton says.

  It’s a pretty common opinion among the band, and one I happen to agree with. In light of how weird this fall was, shouldn’t we cancel this bacchanal and spend our time at home, glad that the little kid who recently disappeared is back? Grateful that whatever dark abyss we were all teetering on seems to have receded into the distance?

  Shouldn’t that be enough?

  But people want to celebrate the return of normal to Hawkins. They want to throw it a parade and sprinkle it liberally with confetti. And what says “celebrate American normalcy” better than a mediocre sports team, a halfway decent marching band, and a few cheerleaders high on pep like it’s the new drug of choice? What better mascot for “normal” can they find than Steve Harrington, his smile absurdly wide and his mane roughed up by the late autumn wind?

  Here’s the thing. I don’t want to go back to normal.

  Not that I want anything bad to happen—and definitely not to kids like Will Byers. But there’s absolutely no version of Hawkins that I want to revert to. Normal was killing me, and everybody here wants to shake its hand.

  I wish I could tell Milton any or all of these thoughts. Normally I would just lean over and start spewing sarcasm like a broken spigot. I would tell him about my job, too, and all the money I’m going to hoard for Operation Croissant. All the museums it will pay for to wash the taste of this travesty of a cultural experience out of our mouths. But Milton and I haven’t talked in a week. It feels like the silence at the end of a record. It feels like static where my favorite broadcast used to be.

  It feels like crap. And I’m getting tired of it.

  But Milton’s standing next to Wendy, and they actually seem to be hitting it off. She magically looks good even in her marching band uniform—even the universally unflattering shako. Milton is making her laugh. He laughs, too, his low, not-at-all-awful laugh, and I remember why we’re suffering this stupid socially mandated distance. Milton is falling for Wendy. No matter how cynical I feel sometimes, I can’t seem to begrudge him that.

  I want Milton to be happy. Not just suffering through an adolescence in Hawkins with me.

  Really, actually happy.

  A whistle blows and teams head off the field—ours at a dejected jog. No matter how well that one play went, we’re losing. We’re always losing.

  It’s the marching band’s job to get the crowd excited again. A Sisyphean effort, if you ask me. Any amount of excitement we gain will be immediately lost the next time our team fumbles a touchdown or misses a field goal.

  But we march out there anyway, the frigid afternoon knifing us over and over. I can feel it through my woolen outfit. The Odd Squad takes its place at the far left corner of the field for our first march. I can’t remember what it’s officially called (everyone in band just calls it “Sousa’s a Loser”), but if Milton asked, I would bet ten of the dollars I just made that it has “America” in the title somewhere. It’s jangly and jingoistic and awful.

  The crowd loves it.

  We play two and a half more songs like that, tracing all sorts of complex formations over the field. This whole elaborate process, which for years has made little to no sense in my brain, suddenly reminds me of the Nazca Lines in Peru. They created enormous shapes in the fields that could only be understood from the sky above. They ca
n even be seen from space. How do I spell HELP in a way that any friendly aliens watching us would understand?

  My legs go numb. My mellophone and I are on autopilot. The truth is that a lot of pieces have extended rests for my instrument, so for a lot of this show I’m doing my best knees-up and nothing else.

  The Odd Squad sails through a formation where we make an X across the field, nearly brushing shoulders with the Sexophone Squad. (Not their actual name, of course, because Miss Genovese vetoes it every year, but it’s what they call themselves anyway. For official purposes, they’re known simply as S squad.)

  Despite myself, I start to get excited.

  In a few seconds, we’re about to debut our new song.

  Halfway through the last scheduled march, we break out of the expected formation and leave behind the Sousa. Instead of an old, pompous song, “Total Eclipse of the Heart” blares from our instruments, pouring forth from our half-frozen fingers and my mostly thawed heart. I still can’t believe we’re actually doing this.

  It was my idea.

  Half of the band creates a heart shape, while the other becomes a crescent moon, sweeping across the field and pushing the heart to the side. It works perfectly, just the way we practiced it.

  People in the crowd are on their feet to get a better view. I can even see Milton’s mom hoisting the family’s beloved and brand-new Sony Betamovie BMC-100 onto her shoulder. It’s big, chunky, and gray, and it’s capturing every second of this to be remembered for the rest of time. (Or at least for as long as people use Betamax.) Milton’s mom and little sister wave at the Odd Squad, like we’re all still friends.

  Bonded and unbreakable. An atom, like Kate always called us. It takes a lot to break an atom—it takes high-speed and high-energy particle smashing. And that’s exactly what happened to us. Sophomore year (not to mention Dash’s stupid, selfish face trying to kiss mine out of nowhere) smashed us apart.

  “Do you hear that?” Kate shouts during one of the rare rests for the trumpets. “They love it!”