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The following morning Mia, Steve and Dustin walked the trail in the woods to the old junkyard where they were supposed to meet Lucas, carrying a bucket of meat each and also a tin of gasoline.

They'd concluded after realising Dart had escaped, that he was most definitely a baby Demogorgon. Mia wasn't too happy to hear that part, but she'd already suspected that Dart had something to do with the Upside Down anyways. So thanks to Dustin's genius preteen brain, the three of them came up with a new plan to lure Dart out of wherever he was hiding and–hopefully–catch him for good this time. From there...well, Mia had no clue.

Right now, she was too busy learning the real reason why Dustin had insisted on keeping Dart.

"Alright, so let me get this straight," Steve said, dropping pieces of meat from his bucket onto the ground. "You kept something you knew was probably dangerous, to impress a girl who...you just met?"

"That's grossly oversimplifying things." Dustin replied.

"Is it?" Mia interjected.

"I mean, why would a girl like some nasty slug anyways?"

"An interdimensional slug? Because it's awesome." Dustin said.

Steve stopped walking and looked at Mia then, who also stopped walking and furrowed her eyebrows.

"What?"

"You're a girl–"

"I'm amazed you noticed."

"Did you like it?" He asked, ignoring her sarcasm.

"It was gross, yeah, but also kinda cool," she admitted. "Well, you know, until it ate our cat and then tried to eat us."

Steve rolled his eyes. The three resumed walking as Mia asked, "wait, Dustin, how come you never told me about this girl?"

"I didn't think you'd care." Dustin said matter-of-factly.

"What? Of course I care!"

"Well, sorry..." he shrugged. "I guess I thought Dart would impress her, but obviously not."

"Have you told this girl you like her?" Mia questioned.

"No!" Dustin exclaimed, his voice cracking slightly. "Why would I do that?"

She rolled her eyes. "Dustin, how is she going to know that you like her if you don't say anything?"

"Yeah, look dude, even if she thought it was cool–which she didn't–I just...I don't know, I just feel like you're trying way too hard." Steve interjected.

"Well, not everyone can have your perfect hair, alright?"

"It's not about the hair, man. The key with girls is just...acting like you don't care."

Mia restrained herself from commenting as she trailed behind the two boys while Steve talked about sexual tension–or "electricity" as he called it–and compared the feeling to the beginning of a storm. Mia wondered how Dustin was buying any of it, or how any girl at school fell for him this way.

Then she remembered how she started feeling about him after he gave her a ride home from the library last week and decided it was better she didn't judge others.

"What type is Nancy?" Dustin asked, pulling Mia from her thoughts.

"Nancy's different than the other girls." Steve said.

"Yeah, she seems pretty special, I guess."

"Yeah, she is."

Mia felt her heart twinge at the way Steve spoke about Nancy, but she brushed the feeling off and kept her eyes down, throwing her pieces of meat on the ground.

"How's your bucket lookin?" Steve asked, suddenly appearing beside Mia.

"Its about half empty. You?"

"Pretty much the same."

"Cool."

Say something, Mia...before it gets anymore awkward...

"Thank you," she said.

"For what?" Steve asked.

"For helping. And for giving Dustin advice–even if it is the dumbest advice I've ever heard."

"I'll have you know what I told him has worked on many of the ladies." He said proudly.

"But not on Nancy, right? Cause she's different."

He went quiet. Mia immediately felt guilty.

"Sorry, I didn't mean for that to sound like it did."

"No, it's okay." Steve said quietly. "It's just, uh, still fresh is all."

"Well, whatever happened between you guys at Tina's party, it's her loss."

Steve stifled a laugh. "Yeah, I guess."

The two teens walked in silence for a while before Steve spoke again.

"You and Dustin seem to make one hell of a team."

Mia chuckled and looked up from the ground at her brother. "He can be a lot sometimes, and I wanna kick his ass for it, but if anything happened to him I don't know what I would do. I don't know if I could say the same about him, though."

"What? Mia, are you kidding? His eyes literally lit up when he talked about how you hit Dart and sent him flying into that shelter yesterday."

"Maybe so, but my brother also thinks you're the best thing since sliced bread." Mia said.

Steve smiled smugly. "Oh, you think so?"

"Mhmm," she nodded.

"And what about you?" He asked curiously.

"I think you're an idiot, so there's a balance."

"Ouch."

"You also give terrible advice about girls, which further proves to me you don't actually know anything about women, and the only reason girls go for you is because you're charming and have good hair."

Steve smirked. "I think you're just jealous."

She scoffed. "Jealous of what? Your inability to say anything that doesn't sound like complete and utter bullshit?"

"The fact that Dustin thinks I'm more awesome than you." Steve stated confidently.

Mia rolled her eyes. "I am not jealous. You've just got a big head."

"It's okay if you don't want to admit it. I won't judge you."

"I'm not jealous of you, Harrington."

"Whatever you say, Henderson."

Mia ignored him, and tried to fight the smile creeping it's way onto her face.

"So you think I have good hair?" Steve asked after a moment.

"Oh my god..." Mia groaned, laughing quietly before they went back to walking in a comfortable silence.

"Fabergé." Steve said out of nowhere.

"What?" The Henderson siblings questioned together.

"It's Fabergé Organics." Steve clarified. Mia realised he was talking about hair products. "Use the shampoo and conditioner, and when your hair's damp–not wet, okay? Damp...you do four puffs of the Farrah Fawcett Spray."

Mia snorted and Dustin chuckled. "Farrah Fawcett spray?"

"Yeah. You tell anyone I just told you that and your ass is grass." Steve threatened weakly. "You're dead, Henderson. Understand?"

"Yup." Dustin agreed.

"You too, Mia."

"Oh, don't worry. I won't tell a soul."

"Farrah Fawcett, really?" Dustin asked.

"She's hot."

"Yeah."

"God," Mia scoffed. "you're both idiots." 

She walked ahead of the boys, wondering why she thought this would be more interesting than seeing a movie with Carmody.

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