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[takecourage]

Her hands are trembling, a little, when she takes her phone out of her pocket. Kavinsky's altoids tin is still stuffed in the back pocket of her jeans, and she's still thinking about getting high. Eddie had refused to smoke a joint with her and, at the time, she'd been pissed but, now, she actually thinks she likes him more because of it. It would have been really easy, she figures. Kavinsky's dream weed is easily the best she's ever smoked.

She keeps thinking about the pills. She doesn't even know what all of them are, but she keeps picturing him rolling them between his fingers, all shapes and sizes and colours of the rainbow, any one of them enough to make her fly. She thinks Danny would probably let her get away with a joint - she doesn't think he'd be as quick to forgive the pills, though.

She fires off a text as she walks.

Need help. Coming over.

She doesn't wait for him to reply before she sets off in the direction of the town house, her hands thrust deep into the pockets of her coat. If he's not home, she'll just sit on the stoop and wait.

Comments

[something_incredible]

He doesn't like the text. It doesn't sit well with him, makes his stomach feel like he's swallowed a damn rock, and he frowns down at his phone for a long time, trying to figure out what to say. Ultimately, he just sends back, Im here, still bad with texting and punctuation, but Alex won't care.

Then he grabs a coat, because it's started getting colder, and he heads out to sit on the front stoop and smoke while he waits for her.

Maybe he should have gone to meet her, but he's not sure where she's coming from, and maybe she needs the walk anyway. Needs a few minutes alone before she says to him whatever it is she needs to say.

[takecourage]

A mixture of things, shame and relief mostly, flood through Alex's slight frame when she sees him, sitting on the stoop, a cigarette between his fingers. She thinks of the look on Eddie's face when she'd asked him to get high with her, the cigarette smouldering between his fingers. She climbs the steps and sits down heavily beside Hopper, her hands still shoved into her pockets. The corners of the tin dig into the meet of her ass as she sits on. Fitting, maybe, that she'd can't even pretend to forget that it's there.

"I nearly fucked up," she says.

[something_incredible]

"Okay," he says, nodding as he takes another drag from his smoke and then holds it toward Alex. "But you didn't."

She'd tell him if she had, he thinks. She wouldn't be here if she had. But she is. She'd texted, she's here, and she's being honest. Hopper doesn't know much about being a proper sponsor, he'd kind of given up on the whole AA thing, he'd felt uncomfortable with it, but he knows that's why Alex is here.

At least to a point.

[takecourage]

"I didn't," she says, like she's trying to reassure herself. "I...Kavinsky's gone." She doesn't think that Hopper and Kav know each other, but Hopper's definitely heard her say his name before. "I found his..." Her mouth twinges. "He used to hook me up, when I was still self-medicating. I found his tin, where he kept his pills and shit, and...Jesus, Hop, I was so fucking tempted."

A muscle in her jaw ticks.

[something_incredible]

"Kid, I'm tempted almost every day," Hopper answers, which is true. Some days are worse than others, but there are more days than not where he looks too long at a bar or a liquor store, days when he thinks about how damn good a double whiskey would taste after a long, hard interrogation.

"You're gonna be tempted again," he says. "But you didn't do it. That's the thing that matters most."

He pauses, then asks, "You still got that tin?"

[takecourage]

"Yeah," she says, shifting her weight and feeling it dig into her. She takes another drag on the cigarette. "I just...thought he'd always be here." She rubs her eye with a knuckle. "My friend wouldn't get high with me. That's pretty much all that stopped me. Not Danny. Not Edie. The fact that he looked at me like I was a total asshole."

[something_incredible]

Hopper snorts softly and says, "I don't know who this friend is, but I think I owe him a thank you. I think you might, too."

Even if it had felt shitty in the moment, sometimes that's what they need. He remembers the way Steve had looked at him not so long ago when he'd said he needed a beer, and that had mostly been in jest. It had felt really shitty, seeing that look in Steve's eyes, and it had given him clarity.

[takecourage]

"Eddie," she says, chewing on the corner of her fingernail for a moment. "Yeah, I owe him a thank you. And an apology. I was kind of an asshole to him." She sighs and shifts her ass, taking the tin out of her pocket and cracking it open. Even though she smoked one of Kavinsky's cigarettes earlier, there's still three there, tucked in with the joints and the pills. She huffs a laugh. "Dream shit."

[something_incredible]

Christ, Hopper hopes she's not talking about Eddie Munson. Steve had said something about that little punk being in Darrow, but Hopper hasn't run into him and he prefers it that way. At the moment, though, it doesn't matter. Hopper lets that part go.

He looks at the tin, though, then at Alex. "Are you gonna keep that?"

[takecourage]

"I don't know," she admits because, right now, honesty feels like the best policy. "We're taking the cats, so it's not all that I've got left of him, but..." She takes out one of the cigarettes and slips it between her lips. "It's so him, you know?"

[something_incredible]

"Sure," Hopper says, even though he doesn't really know. He hadn't known Kavinsky at all, he'd sort of figured he wouldn't really like the guy, and what Alex is telling him now doesn't give him any reason to change his mind.

"You can keep the tin without the pills," he suggests.

[takecourage]

"Yeah," says Alex, patting her pockets, looking for her lighter, the cigarette still between her lips. "I'm pretty sure Danny will kick my ass if I walk in the house with all of these fucking pills." She glances up, a smirk just tugging the corner of her lips. "Metaphorically. Don't worry."

[something_incredible]

"I figured," Hopper says as he produces his lighter for Alex. He and Danny are very different people, but he knows enough about the guy to know he's good. Good for Alex, good to Alex, good to their kid. Those are the things that matter.

Besides, he's pretty sure Danny knows Hopper would kill him and put his body somewhere no one would ever find it if he hurt Alex.

"You wanna go inside after your cigarette and dump the pills in the toilet?" he asks.

[takecourage]

Alex takes the lighter and bends her head, cupping her hand around the cigarette until she's got it lit. She takes a drag, inhaling the scent of cloves that she thinks of as inherently Kavinsky. She thinks about it for a moment, and then she nods.

"Think that's probably for the best. Danny doesn't get too squirrely about weed, but the pills..." She shrugs. "We definitely don't mix well."

[something_incredible]

Hopper nods as well and says, "Alright then."

He thinks it's for the best, not letting her take the pills home, but he doesn't want to act like a cop, even though he is. It's more important she get rid of them herself, no matter how much he wants to grab the tin and flush everything himself.

Cop or not, Hopper knows he's got no leg to stand on. He's taken plenty of pills himself.

"I think that's the best thing to do," he says.

[takecourage]

"Yeah, I think you're right," says Alex, worrying her thumbnail with her teeth for a minute. "I don't know...if I've ever told you how I started. Len started hooking me up when I was fourteen because I didn't see grays when I was high." Her mouth tightens. "I keep watching Edie in case I get a sign that she can see them too. I...Fuck, Hop, I don't want that for her."

[something_incredible]

"But if it happens, you know how to make it better for her," he points out. "And it's not with the shit in that tin."

Her ex, he sounds like a piece of shit, and Hopper thinks she knows that well by now. She doesn't need someone like that in her life, someone who thinks the only way to help is to get her high.

"Your kid's got you for a mom," he says. "You're not gonna let her take that on alone if it happens."

[takecourage]

"I never even told my mom what was happening," she says. "I didn't think she'd believe me." Her jaw tightens. "When I was thirteen it...I..." She's never told anyone but Darlington this, and it sticks in her throat for a minute. "I was raped. By a grey? Kind of. I don't...I think it counts." She scrubs her hand over her face. "Can we get rid of these now, please? I don't fucking want them."

[something_incredible]

Hopper's stomach turns over and he looks sharply at Alex.

"It fucking counts," he says. Anything that's not consensual, anything she didn't want, it counts. It makes him think of Beverly, too, of what her father did to her, and Hopper hates this world sometimes. This world that takes so much from its girls and women without asking. It makes him sick.

"Come on," he says as he stands and holds his hand out to her. "Let's get rid of this shit."

[takecourage]

"You're one of like, two people who I've told that ever, so..." She pushes her straight heir back from her face and then she takes his hand and lets him haul her to her feet. "Thanks for this, Hop. I know you didn't ask for a total fuck-up to parent, but here I am anyway."

[something_incredible]

Bev might have said the same thing, or El, depending on the day, and Hopper would never make them feel like this isn't exactly where he wants to be. He does the same now, fixing Alex with a stern look.

"A fuck up of a parent seems like the right man for the job," he says. "Let's get inside."

[takecourage]

It's a stretch, because he's way taller than her, but Alex leans up and presses a kiss to his bearded cheek.

"Okay," she says. "Let's go flush this shit and then I am probably going to need another cigarette or three."

[something_incredible]

Hopper smiles a little and rests his hand on Alex's shoulder when she stretches up. All those years ago, losing Sara, he'd thought this part of his life was over, but it turns out there are a few kids who still need him.

"Even if you don't have any, I'm willing to bet we can find Bev's stash," he says. "She thinks she's sneakier than she is."

[takecourage]

"This thing is kind of magic," she says, holding the tin up. She knows that Hopper's seen enough weird shit in his time that he might just accept that. "He dreamed it. So I can get rid of the pills, but I'm pretty sure there are always going to be cigarettes in it. Which...they're fucking good cigarettes, so..." She shrugs, sniffs a little tearily. "Silver linings and shit."

[something_incredible]

"Long as it's just the cigarettes," he answers, a little wary as he looks at the tin now. It isn't the magic that bothers him, but the idea that Alex might open that thing two days from now and find it full of pills again.

He heads for the bathroom on the main floor, then flips on the light and steps aside to give Alex room to do what she needs.