The New Girl

chapter forty

chapter forty - july, 1985

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"Does that hurt?"

It was about ten minutes later and the pain in Alex and Eleven's legs had settled down a little bit while they waited for the others to come back. Max had gone off to find Lucas and Will, leaving three of them alone.

"Uh, not bad," Eleven said as Alex nodded.

"I'm not throwing up anymore," she joked, "so it should be good."

"You're both gonna have an awesome scar," he said as the two girls smiled and then looked at each other. "You'll look even more badass."

"Bitchin'," Eleven said as Alex smiled.

"Bitchin'," she said smiling

"Yeah, bitchin'," Mike said as Alex smiled at him and sighed as she looked down. "Alex?"

"Hmm?" the blonde asked, looking up at him.

"I've been meaning to tell you something," he said as she nodded. "It's just, being broken up, it's been hard."

They heard a distorted radio chatter coming from Mike's walkie-talkie and the three of them looked at it.

"And, I like that you and El and Max are all good friends. It's just, I was jealous at first, and, and angry," he said as she looked at him and nodded. "And that's why I said all that stupid stuff. And it's like I wanted you all to myself. And now I realize how unfair that is. And selfish. And, like. . . . I'm sorry. I just, like, I've never felt like this, you know, with anyone before, and," he let out a sigh as Alex felt her heart rising with hope, "you know, they do say it makes you crazy." Alex furrowed her eyebrows.

"What makes you crazy?" she asked tilting her head to the right slightly.

"You never," he began lowering his voice, "you never heard that term. . . . you know, like the phrase, like. . . . "blank makes you crazy," like the word. . . .?" Alex knew exactly what he was talking about, but she wanted to hear him say it.

"Girlfriends?" she asked, pretending to be confused as Mike shook his head.

"No, no, no, no," he said, "not, not girlfriends."

"Boyfriends, Eleven said, who was genuinely confused and wanted to understand what he was saying.

"No!" Mike said, "no, no, not boyfriends either. It's like- It's like a feeling or. . . .?"

"A feeling?" Alex asked, finding all of this very amusing.

"Yeah," Mike said as the blonde looked at him, "like something. . . . like, old people say it to each other sometimes."

"Old people?" Eleven asked, not understanding at all.

"Yeah, "Mike said as Alex kept pretending to be confused, "what I wanna say is. . . . that I just. . . ." a small hopeful smile appeared on Alex's face as she looked at Mike, "I know that I. . . ." but he was cut off by someone speaking on the radio.

"I repeat. . . . this is a code red!" All three of them snapped their heads to the walkie-talkie.

"Is that. . . .?" Alex asked as Mike sprung up and ran towards the walkie-talkie.

"Dustin?" Mike asked as Alex beamed.

"Mike?" Dustin called back.

"Dustin!" Mike yelled back happily.

"Mike!" Dustin said just as happily. "Oh, my God, you have to listen. I know I've been MIA, and I'm sorry, it's not because I'm mad. I mean, I actually was mad, but it's also because I was trapped underground in a secret Russian base." But the three of them couldn't understand what he was saying as he was speaking extremely quickly and the radio kept cutting off.