HOPPER’S CABIN
HAWKINS, INDIANA
The dusk gathered outside along with the snow as Hopper busied himself in the kitchen. He’d been talking a long time, and he and El both needed a break. She’d protested when he stopped the story, but her eyes had lit up at the mention of her favorite snack—no, favorite food, period.
It was time for Eggos.
“Serpent…black.”
Hopper glanced over his shoulder. Stretching her legs, El had moved back to the den, and was now sitting cross-legged on the floor, facing him.
“What does it mean?”
Hopper gathered the prepared Eggos onto a plate and, pouring a fresh mug of coffee, headed back to the table. El stood and made her way over.
“Who’s telling this story?” he asked, placing the big plate of waffles in the middle of the table before returning to the kitchen to fetch smaller plates. When he came back, El had already gotten started on her first one. He slid the small plate underneath her hands.
“Questions are good,” said El, through her mouthful.
“Hey, manners, young lady.” Hopper slid a hot waffle onto his own plate. “And yes, questions are good. But so is patience.”
“Leroy said it.” El frowned. “And Lisa.”
Hopper picked up his fork, then paused as he looked across the table.
“You want to do this now?”
El looked at him, but said nothing. Instead she just narrowed her eyes a little.
Hopper put his cutlery down. “Okay, yes, they both said it. And actually, I did notice when Leroy said it in the interview, but once we figured out the thing about the task force, it didn’t seem that important. I told Delgado about Lisa at the birthday party, and what Leroy had said, and she thought it might have been a lyric from a song, or something from TV. It’s like sometimes when you hear a new word for what you think is the first time, and then suddenly you hear it everywhere.”
El just continued to look at him, her jaw moving as she chewed her food. Hopper sighed.
Okay, bad example.
“Anyway,” said Hopper, returning his attention to the hot waffle in front of him. “Yes, I did notice it, but we didn’t put it all together until later.”
El stopped chewing. She swallowed, then let her jaw hang open.
Hopper frowned. “What?”
“Until later?”
“Well…”
“A serpent is a snake?”
Hopper nodded.
“A viper is a snake too.”
“That’s right.”
“Serpent…viper…snakes!” El waved her hands, her eyes wide.
Hopper only lifted an eyebrow.
El sighed again in deep frustration. “They all go together.”
“Who?”
“Leroy, Lisa, Vipers…the third one.”
“Third one? You mean Special Agent Jacob Hoeler.”
El nodded eagerly.
Hopper took another quick bite and drank some coffee. He reached over and plucked a napkin from the open packet on the side of the table, and cleaned his hands.
El almost seemed excited. Was El taking the story in? Did she understand what had really happened, all those years ago? It was a difficult question and Hopper wasn’t sure he had the answer. El was smart, and would certainly grow up into a capable woman. Of that, he had no doubt.
But her upbringing in the care—if you could call it that—of Dr. Brenner had introduced some…well, wrinkles. In some ways El was old beyond her years. In others, she was less mature than other girls her age.
Not that Hopper had much experience with that.
“Yes, Jacob Hoeler,” he said again, emphasizing the name, unsure if it was important that he should. But there was a danger here of trivializing the story. This was no fantasy, no bedtime fairy tale.
It was the truth—at least as far as he knew it.
“Just be patient, and you’ll find out,” he said.
El frowned and narrowed her eyes, but didn’t delay in getting started on Eggo number three.
The pair ate in silence for a few minutes.
“It was strange,” said El.
“What was?”
“The captain knew…” She looked up. “…the card.”
Hopper smiled. He gestured to El with his fork.
“That’s good, kid. Good attention to detail. Yes, the captain did know about the card—Leroy had been waving it around as soon as he came into the precinct. The officer who called the captain mentioned it, so the captain picked me. He didn’t tell me why, not even in private, because he knew he had to keep himself out of it. He didn’t like the case being taken away from the department any more than we did, but in his position, he couldn’t say anything. And remember, he didn’t know anything about the task force either, not until Delgado and I had figured it out. But he filled me in later with what had happened.”
El nodded, apparently satisfied, and went on eating.
Then she asked, “Is your job dangerous?”
Hopper frowned. “It can be, yes.”
“You stop people…murders.”
“Stopping people before they commit a murder is difficult. Normally the job is to find out who committed the murder after it happened.” Hopper shrugged. “Not always. The card homicides were a special case—when you have what they call a serial killer, there’s a chance they will keep on killing until they are stopped. So yes, in those cases you’re trying to stop them from killing again. But those cases are rare. Most detectives never have a case like that.”
“You look for bad people.”
“Absolutely.”
“Bad people hurt you.” El looked at him like she was expecting more.
Hopper wasn’t sure he had anything more. Her question was so simple, but the answer was…complicated. He sighed.
“Yes,” he said, “being a cop means dealing with bad people and dangerous situations. It’s part of the job, but it’s not the only part. I help people too. You know that. I helped you.”
He paused, the realization dawning that…Was this the first time El had really stopped to consider his life? His job?
More important: how those two things involved her. Not just in the past, dealing with the Demogorgon and the Mind Flayer. But now, going forward, how his job and his life would impact her in the future they would share together.
The future we will share together.
Hopper blinked a tear out of his eye as he looked at his adopted daughter, whose whole life had been, until recently, ruled by fear and pain.
El lifted the empty glass by her plate and held it out to Hopper. He smiled, took the glass without a word, and got up and went back to the kitchen. A few moments later he returned to the table with the glass full of Kool-Aid.
El took a drink, then set the glass down. “Dangerous job…”
Hopper lifted his eyebrows, watching as El slowly pieced together the logic of her next question. It was remarkable, to see her figure out what should have been simple concepts for a girl of her age but which she had never before had to wrap her head around. Not for the first time, Hopper silently cursed Brenner, but…she was getting better. Hopper could see that. And while he was doing his best to teach her, he knew her improvement would be even more profound once she was properly integrated back into the real world.
But that was something to worry about some other time. Right now, El winced, like she was in pain, as she searched for the right words.
El shook her head. “Wanted to be a cop…” she said, trying to come at the problem from a different angle.
Then it clicked for Hopper. It was like one of those word games, linking two different statements together to come up with a third logical conclusion. He smiled and sat back.
“So if being a cop is dangerous,” he said, “and I wanted to be a cop, why would I want a job that was dangerous?”
At that, El nodded and relaxed, her confusion—her frustration—evaporating in an instant. She had another sip of drink, her whole demeanor calm and collected as she waited for an answer. Of course, danger wasn’t something that fazed her at all—Hopper knew that, and he also knew her response to danger was partly due to her upbringing and partly because she could…well, protect herself.
But perhaps now, with this story, she was beginning to understand that other people sometimes had to put themselves in danger, deliberately.
She’s learning, she’s learning.
“Well, yeah,” said Hopper, “the job can be dangerous, but I didn’t choose to become a cop because it was dangerous. I chose to become a cop so I could help people. Protect people. Sure, there are bad people out there, but remember, there are good people too. And good people can do good things if they really want to. Even if that means getting into a little bit of danger. But that’s why I knew I wanted to be a cop. Because I had the experience and the skills to handle that danger while I did as much good as I could.”
El looked into his eyes as the seconds stretched on. Then she nodded and finished her drink.
“And remember,” he said. “The story ends okay. I’m here, right? So I was okay. Now, are you okay? Do you want me to keep going?”
El smiled, and nodded, and this time, pushed her empty plate forward.
Hopper grinned.
“Coming right up.”