Hawkins High School's most popular guy, Steve (Joe Keery), has his sights set on romancing Mike's older sister, Nancy (Natalia Dyer). She resists him at first, until he invites her to a pool party at his house one night. She brings along her stick-in-the-mud friend Barb (Shannon Purser) but soon ditches her to hook up with Steve upstairs. Jonathan is in the woods taking photos of them (yeah, not creepy at all . . . ) and manages to catch the Demogorgon appearing next to Barb after she cuts her finger (it can smell blood). It drags her, screaming, into the shadowy realm where it lives. Nancy tells her mom that Barb has vanished just like Will, and the town starts to take an interest in what's going on (although mostly everyone just ignores the plight of poor Barb; rude).
Because Jonathan can't catch a break, Nancy finds his creepy photos from that night. After getting pushed around by Steve (who is clearly threatened by Jonathan's obvious crush on Nancy), Nancy sees the Demogorgon in the photo with Barb. Together the teenagers start their own hunt for whatever took both Barb and Will.
