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it's a beautiful day outside.
Birds are singing, flowers are blooming...
On days like these, queerbaiters like you… should be out fishing!
Another poor fish is reeled in, flapping at the end of the rod, gasping, pathetic. It starts to cry. And really, it’s not the fish’s fault. It’s not to blame for falling for the lure, for believing that maybe, this time, the slowburn queer romance was real. What would a fan be without faith?
But its queerbaiters have no God.
“Just the perfect weather ,” Ross says, smug, squinting at the water. The water is bubbling with fish. “Would be a shame to waste it.”
“I know, right?” Matt grins. “Look how hard they’re biting.”
Of course it is the prime time; It’s right after the Stranger Things finale aired, and the water is busier than ever.
Hours of queerfishing go by... The water churns, buckets are filled one by one. Netflix scurries around the boat like rats on deck, swapping out the full buckets for empty ones, desperate for more engagement, more advertising, more more more.
Still, the men aren’t satisfied, they fish and fish and fish. No catch is ever enough, there’s always another audience to bleed dry.
Eventually, Matt reaches for more bait, and finds himself left with no lure. Damn, I underestimated the Byler Hope post-Volume 2, he thinks.
“Hey, Ross,” Matt says, patting down his vest. “You got any spare queerbait? I ran out.”
Ross smiles and opens the inside of his jacket.
“You know damn well I do, bro,” he says. “Take your pick.”
Matt peers inside, lips pursed. The sheer abundance of queerbait in their arsenal gives him the luxury of choice--parallels, symbolism, soundtrack picks and set designs, scripts, shared looks, nuanced lines and ambiguous references... Everything a queerbaiter needs, they've got it.
“Alright,” Matt shrugs. “Just pass me the Creelby parallels.”
“I got you, man.”
He casts the bait and hooks a fan who’d seen the play, who walked out of the theater with expectations. Matt doesn’t even look before tossing the crying fish into the bucket, laughing under his breath at the thought that they believed it would mean something in the end.
It won’t even matter plot-wise. Nothing was referenced in the finale. That’s what makes the fish meat even more delicious.
“Damn,” Ross says, reeling in yet another fish with the Painting bait. “They just keep coming for this one.”
“More than I thought,” Matt snorts. “They think it’s something crazy.”
“Well,” Ross grins, “at least now they can’t say the Painting didn’t pay off, huh?”
The brothers burst into laughter---then cackle even harder as another poor soul is dragged aboard. This one even bought the Mike Funko Pop holding the painting, believing it meant something bigger. Maybe the perfect setup for a confession scene from Will to Mike; hell, even if it had ended in rejection, at least it would’ve been for Will.
But it never was, and now the painting is about as meaningful as the Season 5 script itself; nothing in it to take away from.
“Look at this queerfish!” Ross cackles. “It thinks it’ll still be addressed!”
He laughs harder, along with Matt, who wipes a tear off his face, "We have two hours, fucking dumbass! You think we're gonna waste time on that?!"
"Yeah, what're we, gay?"
Then he turns toward the back of the boat, where the duo who haven’t said a word sit in silence.
"Speaking of gay..."
“...you boys having fun?”
Finn and Noah glance at each other.
“Uh, yeah,” Finn says, eyes darting to the side. “Sure. Fun.”
“Bet you two would’ve loved to be making out instead, eh?” Shawn calls from the other boat, already reeling in another fish with his very own I Am Not Okay With This bait. “Thanks for making it so easy! Now fish, boys, fish! This is all thanks to your performances! We’re eating good tonight!”
“It’ll be your last meal!” a queerfish screams from the bucket.
Shawn throws his head back and cackles.
“Then I’ll make sure to enjoy it,” he says. “You do too! Oh, wait--” He reels his rod again. "You can't, 'cause you just got queerbaited, nerd! Try not reading into things we told you to read into next time, fucking delusional piece of useless shit!"
“Yeah, who gives a fuck what fags want anyway?”
“Not me!”
"Not me either!"
“Come on, guys, fish! Noah, get your ‘I filmed with Finn the most’ bait. They love that one!”
Noah glances at Finn and quietly takes out the bait. Their NDAs are the only reason they’re on this boat at all. And Shawn is right--if they had a choice, they’d rather be gay in their trailers.
Finn meets Noah’s gaze, and as always, his eyes slip, just for a second, to Noah’s lips.
The reaction is immediate, and a flood of fish leaps willingly onto the boat, the sudden weight making it lurch and creak.
“Yes, Finn!” Shawn and the Duffers yell in unison. “This one always gets them right back on the line!”
Finn and Noah bite their tongues and cast their baits--some of them without even being told. Just standing across from each other on set is enough to set off the looks anyway. Acting’s never been easier!
“Glad we upped you guys being gay on camera!” Shawn calls out again. He's obsessed with Foah. “Honestly, saved us a lot of energy from doing crack and shitting in the writers’ room.”
In the distance lies the sea of the general audience. The water there is peaceful, still, fish going about their day, uncaring of the chaos on this side of the waters; a sea made of tears and built-up hopes. But really, it’s all a carefully constructed trap, with only one goal: to haul the queerfish into the hold.
And so, the ten-year-long setup of an epic queerbait culminates in one of the most successful queerfishing operations of all time.
THE END