Third Person POV
Meanwhile, in normal Hawkins, morning had finally arrived.
After a sleepless night spent twisting and turning, wondering what had happened to Will Byers, life continued.
For most people, anyway.
People went to work. Children went to school. Shops opened. Cars passed through the streets.
Hawkins kept moving.
But Will's family and friends couldn't move with it.
Especially in the Sinclair household, where they were about to receive another piece of bad news.
They still had to get up and somehow face another day.
Lucas sat up in bed, staring out of the window without the energy to do much else.
Charles dragged himself up to get ready for work, while Sue headed downstairs to make breakfast.
She barely made it out of her bedroom before she stopped.
There was a piece of paper lying in front of her door.
Sue frowned.
For a second, she simply stared at it.
Then she bent down and picked it up.
Sue unfolded the paper.
Her confusion only grew when she recognised the handwriting.
Her daughter Erica's.
Mom, Dad, Lucas,
Don't hate me when you read this, and please try not to panic.
Sue's stomach dropped.
Nothing good had ever followed the words please don't panic.
Her eyes immediately moved faster across the page.
Mom, I'm sorry, but I lied. I can't just sit here and do nothing. I need to go and try to find Will.
Sue stopped breathing.
No.
She read the sentence again.
Then again.
As though somehow the words might change if she looked at them enough times.
They didn't.
"Charles!"
Her voice came out sharper than she'd intended.
Footsteps immediately sounded from down the hallway.
"What?"
Sue didn't answer.
She was already reading again.
I know the police and the search parties are already looking all over Hawkins, and I know one more person searching the same places they've already searched isn't going to make much of a difference.
Charles appeared from the bathroom, still getting dressed for work.
"What happened?"
Sue held up the letter.
"It's Erica."
That was enough.
Charles crossed the hallway immediately.
"What about Erica?"
Sue continued reading. She couldn't explain right now. She needed to know what had happened to her little girl.
Tears blurred her vision, staining the page as they fell.
The police officer said they think it's possible Will might have gone to see his dad in Indianapolis, so that's one place I'm going to try.
"What does that mean?" Charles asked.
Sue shook her head.
She didn't know.
She didn't understand any of this.
There's somewhere else I want to check too. Will mentioned to me once that there was a singer he really liked who was going to be doing a show a few states away. He wanted to go, but he didn't want to ask his mom because it was too expensive. The show is in a couple of days, so I want to check there too.
Charles took the letter from her.
His eyes raced over the page.
"What the hell?"
"Keep reading."
I know it's a shot in the dark. That's why I'm going myself instead of telling the police. If I'm wrong and Will isn't there, I don't want them wasting time and people checking something that might lead nowhere when they could still be looking for him.
Charles's face changed.
"She went herself?"
Sue looked towards Erica's bedroom.
Then she moved.
"Erica?"
She crossed the hallway and grabbed the handle.
It didn't turn.
Sue frowned and tried again.
Locked.
"Erica?"
She knocked hard.
No answer.
"Erica, open the door."
Silence.
Charles came up behind her.
"Erica!"
Still nothing.
Sue's stomach twisted.
The letter suddenly felt much heavier in her hand.
Charles tried the handle himself, as though it might somehow work for him.
It didn't.
He knocked again.
Harder this time.
"Erica! Don't do this! Come out so we can talk! Erica!"
"She's probably not in there," Sue whispered through her tears.
She didn't know that.
Not for certain.
But the letter in her hand said enough.
The door remained stubbornly closed.
Deep down, they both knew their daughter wasn't on the other side.
But knowing and accepting were two very different things.
Maybe she was still asleep. Maybe she had her Walkman on and couldn't hear them. Maybe this was some horrible prank Erica had thought would be funny, or some ridiculous plan she'd come up with before changing her mind and crawling back into bed.
Anything.
They would have believed anything if it meant opening that door and finding their daughter still inside.
Charles took a few steps back, gave himself a running start towards the door, and threw his full weight against it.
Again.
Again.
And again.
Another door opened.
All the noise pulled Lucas out of his trance, and he went to see what was going on.
"What are you yelling about?"
He then saw the panic in his parents' eyes as they tried to break into his sister's bedroom.
"What happened?" he asked, extremely concerned.
His father ignored him, continuing to throw himself against the door.
"Erica left," Sue explained to her son while sobbing.
Silence.
"What?"
For a moment, Lucas couldn't comprehend what was going on.
"She went looking for Will," she explained, indicating the letter in her hand.
"What?!" Lucas shouted.
His genius little sister had apparently come up with the brilliant idea of going God knew where to look for Will.
Alone.
At ten years old.
What neither of them knew was that someone was in there.
Just not Erica.
Eleven stood completely still in the middle of the bedroom.
Her eyes were fixed on the door.
BANG. BANG. BANG.
She flinched.
The man's voice came through the wood.
Erica's father.
Eleven knew that much.
Erica had explained who everyone in the house was. Who to avoid. When to stay quiet. What to do if somebody came too close.
Most importantly, she had told Eleven not to let anyone see her.
Another bang shook the door.
Eleven backed away.
Erica wasn't here.
She hadn't come back.
She had promised she would.
But Eleven knew promises didn't always mean people came back.
Papa had made promises too.
Her eyes moved towards the window.
The ladder.
Erica had shown it to her before leaving.
If someone came into the room, Eleven wasn't supposed to use the hallway.
She was supposed to leave there.
Eleven looked back at the locked door.
The voices were getting louder.
They were going to look for Erica.
And eventually, they would manage to open that door.
Eleven pulled the hood Erica had given her over her head and immediately ran. In her panic, she forgot to grab the bag that Erica had prepared for her.
Eleven pushed the window open carefully and looked down.
The rope ladder hung against the side of the house.
For a moment, she hesitated.
Outside meant being seen.
Outside meant people.
Outside meant the bad men could find her.
But staying meant risking Erica's family finding her.
Erica had trusted her.
But Erica wasn't here.
Eleven couldn't explain. Couldn't tell them about the secret. Couldn't risk them calling someone.
The bad men might come.
She had to go.
She climbed onto the windowsill.
She looked down. It was really high, and she was afraid to fall, but she had no other choice. They could come in at any time and find her.
Eleven put one foot onto the ladder.
Then the other.
She climbed down.
Slowly.
Quietly.
Her hands tightened around the rope with every step.
As soon as her feet hit the ground, she ran.
And the room was empty once more.
At that moment, Charles strode towards the door one last time, aiming a kick at the lock. The wood groaned, splintering under the sudden impact as the lock gave way with a sharp crack, sending the door swinging wide into the room.
They all rushed inside at once, desperately searching for any sign of their missing family member.
"Erica!"
Nothing.
They knew what the letter said. They knew she was probably already gone.
But knowing and accepting were still two very different things.
So they searched anyway.
Desperately.
Charles dropped to his knees and looked under the bed. Lucas threw open the wardrobe, pushing clothes aside as though Erica might somehow be hiding behind them. Sue opened the chest, then drawers, then anything else large enough for even the slightest possibility that her daughter could be there.
"Erica!"
Nothing.
They tore through the room, making a complete mess of it in their desperate attempt to prove the letter wrong.
Maybe she was hiding.
Maybe she'd changed her mind.
Maybe she was still here.
Anything.
But Erica wasn't under the bed. She wasn't inside the wardrobe. She wasn't in the chest or anywhere else in that bedroom.
She was gone.
Lucas was the first to notice the open window.
"Wait."
He rushed towards it and looked outside.
The rope ladder was still hanging from the windowsill, stretching all the way down to the ground.
His stomach dropped.
"She used a ladder."
Sue looked up.
"What?"
Lucas pointed towards it.
"That's how she got out."
None of them had any reason to think otherwise.
They couldn't have known that Erica had climbed down that same ladder hours ago.
Or that, only seconds before they broke through the door, Eleven had followed the exact same escape route.
That was it.
The final piece of hope that Erica might somehow still be somewhere inside the house disappeared.
Sue's knees buckled and she fell to the floor, sobbing desperately and hugging the letter close to her chest.
Lucas gave her a hug, not knowing what to do while struggling to hold back his tears.
Charles snatched the letter from his wife, refusing to give up.
"I didn't finish reading. Yeah, we didn't. Maybe there are some clues in her room and in the letter so we can find her before she gets too far," Charles said, trying to convince himself as if that would make a difference.
Maybe he went to Indianapolis, maybe he tried to get to the show, or maybe I'm completely wrong about both and something happened to him. But I can't just sit here doing nothing when there's even a tiny chance I might find him.
Please try not to worry too much. I have a plan, and I have a safe ride with a relative of someone I know.
"Who?!" Charles demanded of thin air, as if the universe would tell him the answer and help him find his daughter.
His hold on the letter tightened as the edges began to crumple.
He read the last words in the letter.
I'll be careful. I promise I'll come home.
I'll be gone for a week at most.
I love you guys.
Erica
For several seconds, nobody said anything.
"Dad, I think we need to call the police," Lucas suggested. He was a child himself, but he was trying to stay strong for his parents, who were crumbling apart with worry. He couldn't make them worry about another child right now.
He looked around Erica's room.
What the hell was she thinking?
Will was missing, and now his stupid little sister had decided the best solution was to go missing too.
Because apparently being the smartest person in the family didn't stop her from being an idiot.
And she hadn't even told him.
That bothered him more than he wanted it to.
He was her brother.
Sure, they fought. A lot. Erica annoyed the hell out of him on a daily basis, and sometimes he genuinely wondered if her entire purpose in life was to make him more difficult.
But she was still his little sister.
And now she was gone.
Just like Will.
Lucas swallowed hard and tightened his arms around his mother.
He wanted Will back.
He wanted Erica back.
He wanted yesterday back.
But right now, his mom was crying in his arms, his dad was desperately searching a letter for answers that weren't there, and Lucas had no idea how to fix any of it.
He couldn't fall apart too.
Somehow, everything had gone wrong in less than two days.
Yesterday, Will Byers had disappeared.
And now Erica Sinclair was gone too, looking for him.
Inside the house, that was all anyone could think about.
Which was why none of them noticed the small figure disappearing from behind the house into the nearby woods, out of sight.