Jim Hopper

Carnivals. Autumn carnivals, those are a thing he remembers from his youth, from his years with Sara, the sort of thing most kids like being taken to, and so without giving it a lot of thought, Hopper takes a Saturday off work, checks with Lucy to make sure she's free, too, then plans a whole day of it.

It's only once all the planning is done and the tickets are bought -- wristbands for all of them, so they can go on unlimited rides and play unlimited games -- that he realizes this is the sort of thing Beverly might want to do with her friends instead of a couple of adults. Looking down at the wristbands, he frowns at them, trying to figure out what to do, then shrugs. If she wants to go with her friends, he'll give her the wristbands to give to Eddie and Peter or something.

But when he floats the idea by her, she doesn't even ask to go with her friends and her boyfriend instead, there's not even a flicker of something that suggests she doesn't think it's a good idea. Hopper feels pretty damn good about that.

The weather the day of is nice. Still warm, warmer than it likely would've been in New York, and he arranges for Lucy to meet them at their apartment as he gets their stuff together. He's got some cash to buy dinner or any snacks they might want, plus a beer for himself a little later and wine for Lucy if she wants it, and he's holding Beverly's jacket by the door, waiting for her to finish getting ready.

This is the most normal thing he's done in a long damn time and he's really looking forward to it.

Jim Hopper is not an easy man to rattle.

He's seen shit. He was in Vietnam, he'd been a cop in New York, he lost his daughter, his family, he'd fought a damn monster and an evil lab while trying to save a bunch of kids, and that's all before being flung into this weird city he can't leave and where technology and time have both jumped forward thirty years. All of that, he thinks, is the sort of stuff that prepares a person to deal well with more weird stuff when it's flung their way.

But somehow he wasn't prepared for this.

He's sitting on the front stoop of the Bramford Building and he thinks he has plans to meet someone, but he feels like he's a million miles away. When getting his mail out of the box not ten minutes earlier, he'd shuffled through it all, most of it fliers for useless nonsense he's never going to buy and one envelope addressed to Former Resident. He was puzzling over that when he'd realized the next envelope was addressed directly to him.

It's official looking. Like it's come from the government. Or maybe some kind of lab.

He tears into it hurriedly and when the doctored birth certificate slips out, Hopper stares at the names for a long moment before he finds himself sinking down to the stairs. This was the plan all along. This was what he was going to ask Owens to provide him if he and Eleven made it out of that pit alive. A birth certificate that made him Eleven's father, something that couldn't be challenged, something no one would ever question. A way to give her a real life. A real family.

There's her name. Jane Hopper. His last name, his full name listed as her father. Theresa Ives listed as her mother.

He doesn't know what to think. His hand is shaking a little and Hopper pulls the birth certificate close, holding it against his chest with his eyes closed.

Apparently in 2018, it's impossible to find anywhere that allows you to smoke inside. He could quit, like half the people he meets these days suggests he do, but Hopper doesn't really like the idea of giving up the one thing that's still familiar to him in this weird city.

He's not even a cop anymore. He could be. At least, he's pretty sure he could be, but this place seems to fall somewhere between New York and Hawkins when it comes to the level of crime he'd be facing and Hopper honestly isn't sure if he's ready to take a step back in New York's direction. Hawkins had been weird in recent years, yeah, but somehow facing down a bunch of monsters with heads full of teeth where their faces should be just doesn't seem as daunting as returning to cases of assault and murder and rape and abuse.

Shit like that's exhausting. New York had just about wrung every last little bit of good out of him and he can think of a lot better things to do with his time than going back to being a cop.

Like smoking. And drinking. And maybe taking a few pills to ease the pain. He hasn't, not yet, but he thinks about it every day. The only thing that keeps him from going back there right now is the thought that Eleven might show up here someday and he'd hate for her to see him like that, his eyes glazed over, just this side of high on whatever pain pills he was able to find. It had been fucked up before, but at least before there hadn't been a kid to worry about. The fact that there hadn't been was what took him to the pills in the first place, but now there is again. There's Eleven.

Maybe some other kids, too.

So right now he's huddled outside a bar, the collar of his Hawkins PD coat turned up against the cold wind, smoking the last cigarette in the pack he'd bought the day before. He's going through them too fast, but there's not much else here to distract him.

Another beer maybe. It's probably too early to get drunk, but just one more won't kill him. He takes one last drag from his cigarette before crushing it against the heel of his boot, then turns back toward the bar and nearly walks straight into someone.

"Shit, sorry," he says, lifting his hand to her shoulder to steady her.