Hawkins, Indiana was pleasantly boring, so boring kids would make up pretend mysterious murders with stuffed toys in their backyards while the sun glared down on their backs and touched their skin with redness. The murder of Mr. Rabbit and the disappearance of Miss Barbie. It was all fun make believe, until one late afternoon, Marigold Lonsdale really did become the mystery to solve.

1982 had been another dry, hot and never ending summer. Three teenage girls had taken to the dead grass to hide from the hot sun, licking on melting ice-blocks in the shade of a lone maple tree in the field behind the Lonsdale house. The field backed up to the woods and was a place their mother frowned upon, hating when her two daughters hung out too close to the woods, always too cautious about certain dangers that might occur.

"Anybody got any napkins? I've dribbled all down my front."

Napkins were tossed in the teenager's direction, the warm breeze flushing her cheeks. "That stuff stains, you know? Your mother is going to flip her shit."

Dottie Fields was frowning with the comment from one of her two best friends, Marigold Lonsdale, the eldest daughter. She had met the two Lonsdale sisters when she was only eight years old, their mothers bumping shoulders in the grocery store. They had all been fast friends naturally, it was quite easy forming friendships when the idea of social stigma didn't touch your mind and because they were just children at the time. With the passing years though, the idea that the Lonsdale girls were friends with one of the only black girls in town was something mothers gossiped about at book club, including their own dear mother.

"Fiddlesticks," Dottie hummed out, smearing the red sticky syrup around her faded denim overalls for a short moment before a wicked smile shined on her face. Already, she was forgetting how her mother would indeed be upset with her carelessness and continued licking her ice-block. "Did you hear Steve Harrington is throwing a party tomorrow night?"

That caught Daisy Lonsdale's attention, her blonde hair combed away from her eyes as she doodled in her sketchbook. "Steve, huh?" The younger girl was giggling, elbowing her sister in the ribs who only rolled her eyes. "Didn't you kiss him last week down by the community pool?"

Dottie gasped with the news, "You didn't tell me that!"

Marigold shrugged her thin shoulders, yanking at some dry grass and deciding to weave the dead grass into an ugly flower crown, made from stringy grass and weeds. "A girl doesn't kiss and tell," She was playing coy, enjoying how her best friends fawned over her tiny confession. "Mind you, he's the only cute boy in Hawkins. So, there isn't much of an option. Only if we lived in the city."

The enchanting city miles and miles away was something young Marigold thought about quite a bit these days, growing too bored in a dead-end town like Hawkins. She had brought up the idea of running away to explore new places with practically everyone in town. Daisy protested against the idea, saying they couldn't possibly leave their mother and aunt alone while they sought out something greater. But deep down, Daisy wanted something more too, just like her older sister but didn't dare go looking for it.

"Only if we lived in the city, you say that nearly everyday, Mari." Dottie was saying with an echoing laugh.

Marigold sent her a strange little look, "One day, we'll leave this dead-end town." she said harshly, her blonde curls tight and her eyes clear with dreams. "Trust me, when I leave Hawkins, I'm never coming back. I won't be stuck in a dead-end town destiny."

"Hawkins isn't that bad," Dottie pointed out.

That was like a curse word, Marigold shooting her a troubled look and pegging her half made flower crown at her friend, shocked with the confession. In her mind, Hawkins really was that bad and sometimes, it felt like her bones would stop growing just so she never out grew the town. The older Lonsdale daughter dreamt of leaving her hometown and never looking back one day, something she would do with one last dying breath. "I won't die in Hawkins, trust me." Marigold noted seriously, her eyes skimming the treetops of the woods, wondering just how long she would have to run through them to reach the state line. "If it's the last thing I ever do."

***

Sweat stuck to Daisy's skin as she fanned out on the living room floor, a cold towel pressed to her forehead as she chomped on ice from the freezer. Her lovely, but slightly crazy aunt, Beatrice Lonsdale sat at the dining table, watching the nightly news on their second hand television set, while fanning herself down with a paper fan. The television screen flickered every so often, sometimes static filled the room, but it was something each woman in the house had grown used to.

"This is so unfair," A shirking had started up in the kitchen, Daisy barely looking up from her position on the floor, her sketch book by her side and her pants rolled up to allow her skin to breathe a little more in the hot sticky air. "It's not like I'm asking to fly across the country. I only want to drive to Dallas for a concert with some friends."

Aunt Beatrice shuffled in her chair to spy her younger sister and her daughter, both huddled in the tiny kitchen auguring away, something that happened all too often. "I'm not allowing my sixteen year old daughter to drive down to Texas with some boy I know nothing about, for some concert where anything could happen. We're talking drugs, rock and roll, groupies...absolutely not, Marigold."

"It's not just some concert mum, it's the Mirage Tour, it's Fleetwood Mac!" Marigold was shouting, not taking a simple no as her final answer. She had been saving her allowance for two months already to see Fleetwood Mac in September with Steve Harrington and his friends and she was not about to let her mother turn her down. "This is the best thing that could happen to me, mum. I can't miss this concert."

Molly Lonsdale didn't even look away from pulling out the roast from the oven, a little tired with hearing this nonsense from her daughter. "You're not going," Marigold curled her fists, hating her mother more than she ever had in that very moment. "You'll just have to wait until this, Mac Fleetingwoods comes to Hawkins."

That was the last straw, Marigold letting out a frustrated cry, not even bothering to correct her mother on the title of the British band before storming out of the kitchen, her blonde curls bouncing behind her. Before she reached the staircase, she paused and circled back to her mother, ready for another argument.

Now, with the loud racket, Daisy was paying attention too. "They won't come to Hawkins, because Hawkins is the worst town in the world and I would rather die tonight than spend one more minute here with you. God, I hate you." Marigold shouted, her lungs on fire.

"Hold your tongue," Molly Lonsdale hissed, tossing down her tea towel, but Marigold was already gone from the kitchen, storming up the staircase without a look at her younger sister and aunt who had witnessed the entire thing, both now silent. "Marigold, get back down here!"

The three Lonsdale women heard the slam of a door, the sound echoing through the house, but the silence didn't last for much longer because music blared from upstairs, drowning out the crickets from outside and the odd hoots from owls.

Daisy went back to drawing, Molly Lonsdale went back to preparing dinner, while Aunt Beatrice rocked back in her dining chair, her eyes glued to the far windows where twilight bled into the sky. "A storm's coming." she muttered, but Daisy ignored her, knowing the lady spoke about nonsense half the time and since the air was so dry, a heatwave rocking through Hawkins, there wouldn't be a storm tonight.

No storm did occur that night while the Lonsdale household slept, but something else did indeed happen when the moonlight shone brightly and the monsters of the night crept from the shadows. That was the night Marigold Lonsdale went missing, a dry and thankless night in July 1982.