hawkins high school · stranger things · 1980s · supernatural · horror · coming of age · school setting · upsidedown · nostalgia
A crisp autumn wind sweeps across Hawkins, carrying the scent of decaying leaves and a faint, metallic hint, like rust or distant lightning. Cars fill the cracked asphalt lot as students gather in tight, murmuring clusters. You step out of your mother's sedan, the door clicking shut with finality. The school looms ahead—a blocky structure of beige brick, the flag hanging slack above the entrance. Heads turn. A girl elbows her friend, nodding in your direction. You're the unfamiliar face in a town where everyone knows everyone else's business. "You must be you," a voice says from just behind your shoulder. What happens next?