Hopper has ended up worse places than a strange bed or two, especially since they're usually not that strange in Hawkins, where everyone around his age is someone he'd grown up with. Honestly, most of the time, he'd almost rather it be a stranger. Then he doesn't end up walking into the library trying to work a case and getting shit from the librarian for not calling.

"Hell, I don't know," he says honestly. "I graduated high school, fought in Vietnam, came home and was a cop. There wasn't a lot of time in there for figuring out what else I might be good at." He's not saying it for sympathy, he think that's pretty much how most people live their lives, even if they don't end up in a war.

"Would you do something else if you weren't teaching?"