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hogwartsandhawkins · 2 years ago

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Prove Me Wrong

Chapter 8: Restless Hearts Sleep Alone Tonight

If you need to catch up, here's the masterlist

Summary: Billy's not one to let people in, but Jess isn't one to give up.

Warnings: Aftermath of abuse. Billy being Billy. Angst for 2 seconds and then flufffff. Billy pushing reader/Jess away, saying awful things. Swearing. Let me know if I missed anything! Also, again not proofread, and I wrote this in a day so... yeah

Word Count: 4.5K

Author's Note: You may notice I recently started a taglist! There's only a few people on it so far but if you'd like to be part of it just let me know. I'm excited that I have people actually showing interest in my writing but it also makes me super nervous?? Like if my writing is hot garbage one day it would have been no biggie before, but now I have people looking forward to my writing? So much pressure!! But as always, I hope you guys like it

Billy looked up from Jess’s driveway to her bedroom window. He was still able to see light shine from her room, hoping this indicated that she was still awake. He flicked his cigarette to the ground and used his boot to ensure it was no longer lit while he began looking for a way up, there just had to be a way up. As he searched, he contemplated going back, turning around and climbing through his own bedroom window, or entering his car one last time and calling it a night. But once he saw her shadow walk past her window through her sheer drapes, his courage from the parking lot resurfaced. He glanced at the garage door and found the Logan’s garbage bin placed against the brick wall that sounded the door, right under one of their outdoor lights, practically begging to be used by him.

I can work with that.

Billy, ever so silently, rolled the bin across the driveway, securing it in the corner wall right under Jess’s window, and jumped effortlessly up on the lid, praying to whoever would listen that it didn’t crumple under his weight. It caved in slightly creating a loud thunk, causing him to freeze, hoping that the downstairs window he was now crouched by didn’t belong to the master bedroom. When no other sounds were made, Billy slowly began to straighten his body, reaching for the gutters as he began placing his feet on the white quoins, which allowed him to steady himself until he was able to lift himself over and land on the hip of the first story roof. He was now level with Jess’s bedroom, trying to again work up the courage to knock.

Come on, Hargrove, this ain’t the first time. After hyping himself up, he lightly tapped on the window.

Jess heard a soft rapping against her bay window, but chose to ignore it, as she assumed it was just the wind picking up as it usually did this time of year. It wasn’t until there was a more deliberate three strikes against it that she decided to leave her bed and sit on the cushioned ledge right by her window and draw back her curtains.

“JESUS CHRI- Billy??” Jess about jumped out of her skin when she saw someone right outside, causing Billy to smirk at the face she made, favoring the left side of his mouth. He pointed upwards with his thumb, asking her to open up so he could climb in. “What are you doing here?!” Her voice was a raised whisper, and when Billy realized this, he looked down at his feet and back to her.

“Shit, are your parents down there?” He began pointing below him to the room he was standing above as Jess shook her head.

“No, but still. Why are you here?”

“What, you were serious when you said you didn’t want me sneaking over once in a while?” He was giving her a playful smile now, still attempting to not move his cut too much, afraid it would split open even more and become worse. However, his eyes did not match the gamesome look the rest of his face was attempting to display, and Jess recognized this. She also recognized the redness of the left side of his mouth and the scab that accompanied it.

“What happened?”

“Are you gonna invite me in or no?” He attempted to avoid this question, not wanting to answer right now. He didn’t even know how to answer. What he didn’t realize then was that he no longer needed to. Jess didn’t know everything, but she was able to watch his expression change. She saw the way his smile dropped as he sucked the inside of his cheek. She saw the way he began to fidget with his knuckles, which did not have a single scratch or bruise on them. And she saw his eyes change from repressed to what Jess has seen before, but never on Billy Hargrove, bad boy of Hawkins High. She remembers seeing this same exact gloss over Steve’s eyes the night of Halloween. Billy reminded Jess a lot of Steve in that moment, the way he still tried to laugh off his emotions, but his eyes would always warn Jess to back off, to leave it alone. He was in pain but refused to admit it, just like Steve.

“Billy… what-“

“It’s freezing out here you know.”

Jess nodded slowly, facing downward now, and moved out of the way, allowing him to climb through the window frame, but when he remained still, Jess looked back at him, not understanding why he had yet to move.

“I need you to actually tell me to come inside, Jess.”

“What are you, a vampire or something.”

“Nah, just a gentleman.”

“Oh really?” Billy’s eyes matched his smile this time, eyeing Jess as she continued to look at him with doubt. “Hurry up, Hargrove, you’re letting the cold in.” He did what he was told, closing the windowpane when he pulled himself to the other side of it. He stood by the bay bench, shuffling awkwardly as if he wasn’t just in her room hours before, as if he hasn’t been in her room nearly every day the past five days. “I’ll be right back. Stay here. And be quiet.”

Jess left to retrieve the small first-aid kit her parents bought for her upstairs bathroom “in case of emergencies,” they always said. She opened it to try and take what she thought would help when everything began to spill out, bandages, trauma gauze, and what looked to be popsicle sticks, so she stuffed it back in and zipped it back up, then proceeded back to her room, first aid kit in hand.

“Do you think you need ice or som- What are you doing?”

Billy was now in her “step-in” closet. Well, not really in, considering she had yet to clean it up from the last time she tore it apart. He had the tattered black box in his hand and was beginning to open it when Jess’s voice caused him to halt. “What? Is there something interesting in here Logan?”

“You are unbelievable.” She threw the kit on her bed and reached for the box when Billy pulled it away slightly.

“Now you have to tell me.”

“It’s nothing you’ll find interesting, Hargrove. Now give it.” He began to set the box in her hands, but as he pulled his hands away from it, he took the top with him and peered in.

“The hell is all that?”

“Yeah, gentleman my ass.” She grabbed the top back from Billy and placed it back on top, then maneuvered around the haphazardly thrown equipment and clothes to put the box back on the shelf, farther from the closet door this time.

“Honestly thought you were more organized.”

“Go sit,” she ordered Billy onto her bed, moving her physics homework out of the way and back into her bag. She figured it would have to wait till her free period tomorrow. She looked at the clock to see how late it was, and when she saw that it was close to midnight, she began to wonder what could have caused him to turn up here so late, being reminded back to the cut she had seen earlier. She looked back at his face, which had contorted into a self-satisfied expression as if he was proud to have caused her to be annoyed just earlier, but then fell away when she continued to gaze back at him with concern. She reached back for the first aid kit, thumbing it nervously, looking away only briefly before meeting his eyes again.

“Billy, what hap-“

Billy’s strained chuckle cut her off, “Geez, don’t worry about it. You should see the other guy anyway.” That labored smile made a return, but this time he made it a point to look anywhere but her, worried that she would catch on to what she already had. Jess glanced back at his unscathed knuckles. Billy noticed this, noticed the way her breath hitched, and became testy. “You know what, forget it.” He began to gather the jacket he shed while she was gone and walked toward the window again, “Didn’t know you were such a buzzkill.”

“Billy-“

“Jesus, WHAT? You think I snuck up to your room in the middle of the night to fucking talk? Here I thought your little innocent bullshit was just an act, but you are fucking clueless. So, I’m gonna help you out and be honest with you, Jess, since no one else seems to be. No guy is hanging around you because he likes your personality, alright?” At the end of his lashing out, his heart broke. He was sure he just ruined everything, whatever their “everything” was at this point, friends, cordial English partners, he wasn’t sure, but whatever it was, he knew it was gone. He clenched his jaw and turned away beginning to reopen the windowpane and descend back into the cold, but just as he started, his reflection bounced off the window like a mirror, which showed the tears threatening to spill for the second time tonight.

Jess should have been hurt by his crude “confession”, hell, she should have been seething, ordering him to leave even if he already planned to, but his reflection betrayed everything that was just thrown at her. For the first time, Jess Logan was able to see through his awful demeanor for what it was. In Billy’s words, it was bullshit.

It was her turn to stop him from leaving, grabbing him by the elbow bend as he did to her this morning, making an effort to get through to him one last time. Please don’t cause a scene. Please don’t wake my parents. Billy froze when he felt the softness of her touch on his arm. His blood turned to ice, the only warmth radiating from her hand, and he slowly felt that warmth spread back through the rest of his arm, reaching his chest, his face, his ears. He looked up at her ceiling, attempting to force the tears back where they came from.

“You know you can tell-“

“Stop.”

“It doesn’t even have to be me, if something hap-“

“Jess. Fucking drop it. For fucks sake. Why are you like this?!” He raised his voice slightly before dropping it again, remembering why they were whispering in the first place. “What the hell is wrong with you?” He still was refusing to look at her, scared of what she would think of him if she saw him in this state.

“Billy… you don’t have to tell me, we don’t have to talk about it anymore… but… please, just don’t lie to me, because…” she wasn’t sure whether to keep going, but something inside her implored her to continue, “Because friends don’t lie.”

Jess still had a hold on Billy’s arm as he turned his head back to finally face her. The look of pure confusion was etched throughout his features. His eyebrows were harshly furrowed, eyes squinting as to hold in what remained of his tears. His mouth was agape, attempting to twitch downward in a frown, but constantly raising itself back up as Billy attempted to speak.

When he couldn’t find the words, Jess continued. “If you still want to go,” she then let his arm go, fingers brushing his wrist as she did so, “then go. Just know, I won’t tell anyone.”

Finding the nerve to finally speak up, Billy now turned the rest of his body to face her, eyes now locked with hers. “Why?”

“Well, did you mean it?” She choked over her words, which she began beating herself up for but stopped when she heard his sudden response.

“No.” He whispered, breaking eye contact, now staring at her peach carpet.

“Well okay then.” She then walked back over to the other side of the bed, where she had left the first aid kit, and began to open it back up, random items spilling onto her comforter. “I knew it, since I have an amazingpersonality and all.” A gentle smile slowly formed on her lips as she continued to rummage through the mess, attempting to ease their stand-off with humor. Instead of smiling back, he looked at her work with saddened eyes, unable to comprehend the kindness he was receiving after such vile things came out of his mouth.

“Jess…”

“Hmm?” She didn’t look up from the pile at first, still trying to figure out what everything was, but when she didn’t hear a response she searched for him in her room, seeing that he was again looking at her with the same foreign softness he had Sunday afternoon.

“I’m sorry…” This was the second apology of the night for him, but the only one he truly meant. And God did he mean it. Every fiber of his being wanted to give her the elaborate apology she deserved, that he never thought about her like that, never would think of her like that. That he knew she had an amazing personality, just like she said. He wanted to let her know that she didn’t deserve any of that and that he didn’t deserve any of this. He didn’t deserve her grace, didn’t deserve being stopped gently, being assured that he could still stay.

But Billy Hargrove doesn’t do that, does he?

No. He pushes people away and is painfully aware he will eventually do that with Jess. But for the time being, he is just grateful today wasn’t that day.

“I know.” She drops the individually wrapped rubber gloves as she accepts his apology. “let’s just… pretend it never happened, okay?” When he shamefully nods, she begins to look back at what was already sprawled on her bed. “Why is there so much stuff?” Billy is now looking over all the items as well, equally bewildered by all the items kept in such a small case.

“Jesus Logan. I have a cut, I’m not dying.” He joked softly, still nervously shuffling next to her, still uncomfortable about being allowed to joke with her after he tried to convince her she was nothing more than a booty call tonight, after he lied that he didn’t just scale her brick walls just to see her again tonight, to just talk with her.

“Yeah, well, I didn’t pack it so-“

“You sure about that? It’s kinda looking like your closet.” This earns Billy an elbow to the ribs, which eases his discomfort slightly.

“Well if you weren’t so nosey, you wouldn’t have had to see all that.”

Billy lingered there for a moment, using the opportunity to take her earlier statement to heart. “It goes both ways, by the way,” when Jess gave him the look of confusion that he anticipated, he quickly carried on, “Your ‘friends don’t lie’ spiel.”

“What do you mean?”

Billy let out a sigh, exasperated by the fact she still attempted to play dumb. “I knew something was wrong this morning, and you kept saying ‘nothing’. Isn’t that lying, Logan?”

“Okay,” she sighed as well, now realizing she would have to reason with him, “How about this. How about, ifwe’re going to be friends, we promise not to lie to each other anymore, but, if the other says they don’t want to talk about it, we have to respect that. Deal?”

“I can work with that… So-“

“I don’t want to talk about it.”

Billy threw his hands up in surrender. “Alright then.” He looked around the room as she picked up a small bottle of what looked to be Neosporin. “What about that black box, what was up with that?”

“I don’t wanna talk about it.”

“Okay, new rule, you can’t just say you don’t wanna talk about everything I bring up.”

She harshly exhaled through her nose, reading the back of the bottle as she did so. “You’ll just make fun of me. Or worse, tell everyone and then they’ll make fun of me.”

Billy shrugged “You’ve been keeping some of my secrets, I’ll keep some of yours.”

“Dungeons and Dragons,” Jess put simply.

“What?”

“The game, Dungeons and Dragons. I used to play, and that stuff was stuff I would use to play it.”

“Isn’t that the shit ‘the freak’ Munson plays in his weird little club?”

“Yeah, well, me and ‘the freak’ Munson used to play together. So I’d appreciate it if you’d use his real name.” He mulled over her request and came to the realization that he didn’t even remember the guy’s first name.

“What is it?”

“Hmm?”

“His name.”

This question took Jess by surprise, that someone knew what everyone called him, but didn’t even know hisname, the name he preferred. She sometimes wondered if it was the same way with her, whether people forgot all about Jess, and that she was replaced by the prude.

She smiled wistfully at the thought of just his name. “Eddie. It’s Eddie.” She began looking around her room, realizing that her main light was still on, which would come across odd to her parents if they happened to leave their room, look up the stairs, and see light pouring out from under her door. “I have to turn off the light if you’re gonna stay up here.” She walked over to the switch and flipped it down, then tottered to her nightstand on the side by the window, brushing passed Billy in the dark, her hand resting on his chest only for a second to ensure they didn’t bump each other. Billy then heard the clink of the pull switch, and the room was no longer dark. Her room had a much softer glow now without the harsh white that came from her ceiling fan. This glow seemed to bounce off her skin as well, her long hair casting shadows on her lightly tanned skin. Her brown eyes were now a shade of honey. This was the first time Billy had ever seen her like this, and it made him want to stay this way forever. It felt intimate to him, making his stomach do somersaults at just the sight of her.

She began walking toward him again in order to reach the side of the bed with the overabundance of medical supplies. “So, I think we could just put this on your lip maybe, though I don’t really know if it should go near your mouth…” She turned over the small bottle of Neosporin again, checking the warning label. When she couldn’t find anything warning against it, she ordered him to sit again and began applying some on the tip of her middle finger before looking back at Billy. “Oh… Wait… Sorry did you want to do it?”

Billy’s mouth downturned from thought and began to shake his head, meeting her gaze when he answered, “No.”

“Oh-okay.” She shuffled closer to where he was sitting, and carefully, slowly, leaned in. Her finger glided along his bottom lip effortlessly. She made sure not to get too close to where his lips part, considering the Neosporin may not taste very good. Billy took this opportunity to study her face intently, as it has never been so close to his before. Jess was too engrossed in her current task to take notice of his eyes worshipping the entirety of her features.

When she was finally finished, she stepped back to look at her work. “Oh wait, should we have given you ice first? Do you still want some?”

“Probably. You not gonna wake up your parents if you go down there?”

“I’ll be quiet. You stay here. And stay out of my stuff this time.”

“Wait- Jess.” Billy now had a hold of her hand, which caused her to look down at his grasp before looking back up at him. The saddened apologetic look on his face already told her what he planned on saying.

“Billy, I said don’t worry about it. You’re okay.” He nods at this, still hard to accept that they’re just moving on, just like that. “I’ll be right back.” He lets go of her hand so she can leave the room one last time. When she comes back, she has a frozen bag of peas in one hand, and a napkin that’s wrapped around something else in the other.

Billy was still sitting in the same spot that she left him in, implying that he had listened to her. When she handed the bag of peas to him, he instantly placed it on the lower part of his face, feeling the throbbing from his lip subside.

Jess walked to the other side of the bed, the side closest to the window, and sat down. Even though she hardly ever slept on this side, she decided it would be fine to sit here while she had company. Billy realized he had yet to take off his boots, and kicked them off with force, too lazy to untie them. He then through his right foot on the mattress, leaving his left leg dangling as he backed up against her headboard. Jess then revealed three brownies underneath the napkin she had brought in and placed them in between the two of them.

“Damn, Logan, I should fight with you more often.”

“Excuse you?” She began to pull the bottom napkin closer to her, dragging the baked goods with her.

“I’m joking, Jess.” He sighed before giving her one last apology, “It won’t happen again.”

“That’s what I thought, Hargrove.” She handed over one of the brownies as she took one for herself, sliding the third back over, this time closer to Billy as he bit into the one handed to him.

“My mom used to bake a lot. When I was younger.” Jess looked over at Billy silently. He had never talked about his mom before. She knew he had one, and that Susan wasn’t her, but that was the extent of her knowledge.

“Oh yeah? Does she still bake?” She asked innocently, taking a bite of her own brownie afterward.

“I don’t know.” He slid his back down her headboard slightly, taking another bite. “I haven’t seen her in about 7 years.” She nodded at this confession, not wanting to say or ask anything out of line, waiting for him to continue his thoughts. “So what is that whole dragons game about?” She took this question as a sign he was done talking about himself and decided it was best to move on.

“It’s kinda complicated honestly. You basically make a character, and you play with a group of people, and one person is the one in charge of telling a story. It could be anything. Eddie was normally the dm- the storyteller person.”

“Why’d you have so many fuckin papers?”

They continued like this, talking about random things that popped up in Billy’s head, Jess occasionally taking the lead in the conversation. But Billy seemed to be far more interested in her life, in her hobbies, than in telling Jess anything about himself. It was now completely dark in her room, both of their eyes already having adjusted to the lack of light. Once Jess answered Billy’s question on where she would move if she could, the answer being somewhere on the East Coast, she thought, Billy teased her, saying she didn’t know what she was missing out on, that the West Coast was far better and he’d have to take her one day, something that he accidentally let slip, but felt no need to take it back as he intended on doing so.

“Well, have you ever been to the East Coast?

He began to shake his head, finishing up the last brownie, “Don’t need to, I already know California is where to be.” Once he was done chewing his last bite, he turned to her, ��Have you ever been?”

“Nope.”

“Then how do you know you’d want to live there?”

“Pictures.”

“Pictures?”

“Yeah, pictures. Why?”

He began to shake his head, smiling in disbelief as he did so, “If that’s all it takes, I got a whole album of pictures I took living in California. Bet I could change your mind.” When she didn’t answer, only rolling her eyes in response, he asked another question, “Have you ever seen California?”

“In movies and stuff.”

Again, he smiled in disbelief, “Fuckin movies.”

The thought of movies made Jess remember something important, “OH!” She said many levels above the whispering they were just at, making Billy jump back in surprise.

“Jesus, Jess, you trying to wake up your folks?”

“Sorry! Sorry, I just remembered, we’re getting a new TV for downstairs, a bigger one I guess, according to … my dad, and guess who gets the smaller one in her bedroom?”

Billy began to look around her room. Though he couldn’t see as well as when the lights were on, he was still able to see enough. “Where the hell are you gonna put it?”

“I dunno, but it’s for sure coming in here. They already promised me this one after they put the last one in the basement.”

“Wait, you’re going to have three TVs in your house?”

“To be fair, the one in the basement is really, really old.”

“Whatever you say, princess. What time is it?” He grabbed his watch that was now laying on Jess’s left nightstand and then leaned in toward Jess slightly in order to use the moonlight to see his watch. “Jesus.”

“What?”

“It’s 3:47.”

“Oh god, Billy I need to be asleep!”

“Yeah yeah.” He grabbed the pillow he was resting on. “Can I take this to the ground?”

“Oh, uh,” She had forgotten that he was most likely going to sleep here eventually, considering he was in no mood to go back home, but she felt strange about him having to sleep on the floor. “Sure, and here…” She left the bed as well, flipping on the light from her closet, causing her eyes to squint, and grabbed an extra blanket that was, thankfully, secured on the top shelf and not thrown on the floor.

He took it from her, smiling at her, letting his right side tick up further than his left. “Goodnight, gorgeous.”

The nickname gave Jess goosebumps this time around. She had heard it many times before, for the past five days he’s at least said it a dozen times, but never like that. She assured herself that she was imagining it, that he was still being sarcastic as he said it, but she still allowed herself to smile sweetly back at him, blushing lightly, hoping the darkness of her room masked it. They continued to look at each other, as she twiddled with her thumbs in front of her, Billy grasping at the softness of the blanket that was just handed to him.

“Good night, Billy.”

@nix-rose @fandom-princess-forevermore @ooo---hazelgrimm---ooo @axionn

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