Chapter Text
It didn’t take long for Mike to realize Will was gone.
He was trying so hard to convince Lucas that letting this random girl into the party was a mistake. That it would upset this careful balance they’ve upheld, that he’d spent years meticulously crafting, that had survived arguments and arduous campaigns and monsters from other dimensions. This wonderful combination that they’d achieved, this perfectly compatible group of heroes, that Lucas was now trying to destroy. It was perfect, he wanted to scream, they didn’t need anyone else. Why couldn’t he understand?
And yes, maybe he had let El into the party, but it made sense. It had been narratively necessary! She was a hero, she had saved Will, she had literal superpowers Lucas, which was inarguably so much cooler than just being good at videogames, and Oh my god, it's not because I like her, you’re just mad I’m right!
And Will had agreed to letting her come with them! He’d agreed, and he hadn't even checked with Mike, which wasn't fair because they told each other everything, and so yeah, maybe Mike wasn’t too happy with him at that moment, with any of them, so he’d left him to go catch up with Lucas.
And then he'd snapped at him, too, and Mike couldn't pinpoint when it had become the norm for them, but soon they were arguing again, and he just wouldn't listen. Dustin was looking at Mike like he was stupid, and this girl was giving him a nasty look, as if he was the one acting out of line, and he couldn’t believe that all of them were okay with ruining the best night of the year, all because of some stupid girl. It couldn't have been more than a minute or two before he’d turned back to Will for support and was met with nothing but empty air.
His heart seized up, and he found himself suddenly cold, immobile. Lucas was still talking, but Mike’s fight had flown out of him.
“Will?”
He scanned his surroundings quickly, dread coiling in his stomach. Will was nowhere to be seen.
“Mike! Are you even listening -”
But he stopped short when he realized. Mike turned back around to face the three, finding two terrified expressions he was sure mirrored his own. The girl’s brow furrowed.
“Im sure he’s around here somewhere,” She started, slowly, confused at their drastic reaction. “Maybe he went to the next house-”
But Mike was already moving, and he felt Lucas and Dustin behind him.
“Will!”
“Will, where’d you-”
“Will!”
Now this girl was yelling too, and Mike was angry, so angry, because she had no idea what Will being gone actually meant, and now she was here with them, calling for Will, acting like she cared or knew anything about him at all, and Mike turned around, he wanted to scream-
“Mike!”
Mike stopped in his tracks. Cold fear coursed through his body. Will.
He forgot all about the girl. “Will, I'm here! Where are you?”
He swerved, scanning the faces of the delighted trick or treaters, but Will wasn’t among them. They were back in front of the house, standing in front of the enormous driveway.
“Mike!”
If Will wasn’t here, why did it sound like he was right next to him?
Mike’s feet felt unsteady, breath catching in his throat. How could he have been so stupid? He’d been doing so well, making sure Will was never farther than a bump of the knee, than an arm swung around his shoulders, always there, always okay, always real. Why did he brush him off, when he knew there was always a risk, when it was his job to keep him safe?
He knew, from extensive recess conversations and quiet confessions late in the safety of the Wheelers’ basement, that Will hated the doting. He couldn’t stand the way that Joyce never let him go on bike rides with them anymore, or the way Jonathan gripped his shoulder a little too tightly sometimes, like he was trying to prove to himself that Will was still there, still sitting in front of him. Mike made himself swear to never treat Will differently, to not lose his mind whenever Will was teased in the hallways, to wait ten minutes before radioing when he would get picked up, both moping over their failed attempt at a sleepover.
But he never knew what he’d say if Will got upset over Mike inching their desks closer during science. Or if he’d notice the glares Mike would shoot at anyone who approached their little table during lunch, regardless of what their intentions may be. And he could never really tell his Mother why exactly he had to stare at his walkie for ten minutes before picking it up to call Will, to make sure he got home, images of otherworldly monsters and flipped cars playing behind his eyes. Maybe he was cautious, but it worked. Will was safe. He stayed.
But not tonight.
“Mike, hey, Mike!”
Dustin was shaking his shoulder. Mike snapped out of it.
“Over there, next to the house, there's a path-”
His gaze snapped to a small walkway, inconspicuous, leading behind the garage and out of sight. A hiding spot.
He was already moving, pushing past trick or treaters. Mike’s breath quickened.
“Hey, slow down-”
Mike wasn’t sure why she’d kept up with them, but it didn’t matter, because they turned the corner, and Mike could breathe.
Will was here. He was curled up on the ground, eyes wide and confused, but he was here.
He didn’t look up. He was trembling, staring straight ahead, face white. The worry came flooding back.
Mike reached out, grabbed him by the shoulder, and Will jumped. He was looking at him now, eyes huge and brown in the dark. Terrified.
Mike’s chest ached. “Will, what's wrong? I couldn’t find you, are you hurt?”
Lucas and Dustin stumbled in behind him, the girl still with them.
“Holy shit-”
“Is he okay?”
“I don’t know,” Mike mumbled. Will looked away from them. His breaths were coming out in short bursts, and he whimpered quietly.
Mike hauled Will to his feet. His breaths were beginning to lengthen, and the shaking wasn’t as violent, but it was clear that it was the end of his night.
Later, Mike wouldn’t be able to explain why he refused Lucas’s help. Why he wouldn’t let any of them touch Will, hardly look at him, before taking him back to his basement. He didn’t understand the way the girl looked at him and he didn’t like it, like she was trying to pry him open.
The truth is he didn’t give much thought to it - there wasn’t any reason to. He didn’t know why it hurt to see Will like that, trembling and terrified. Why it hurt almost physically.
But it didn’t matter, because Will was here, and he was walking, and breathing, and he was letting Mike ramble on and on about how it didn’t even matter they were done trick or treating, he was bored anyway, no Will, seriously, and there was plenty of candy for them to eat, and maybe they could even watch Ghostbusters tonight, if his Mom hadn’t returned it yet.
It didn’t matter, because Will was here.
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Will was leaving.
Or, more accurately, he was moving. It wasn’t until the middle of the movie when he finally blurted it out, and the silence that followed was deafening.
“California?” Dustin finally spoke. They were having their annual Saturday movie night, the first since Starcourt mall “burned down”. Secretly, Mike was worried none of them would show up. It was weird, now, meeting up altogether. Dustin and Lucas sat together on one side, while Max and El had sat together in the corner the whole time, hands intertwined, neither entirely tuned in to the conversation. Sure, Mike supposes that's fair, but he can’t get over the perpetual feeling of, of wrongness that had recently infected the party.
Because this isn’t how the summer was supposed to go. They were done with the upside down. This was supposed to be their last hurrah before high school, one final chance to be stupid and carefree, together, before the school year began.
Except they wouldn’t be together.
Because Will and El were leaving. Will told them everything, the movie entirely forgotten. Ms. Byers had introduced the prospect of a move a week ago, but Will had thought it was a throwaway idea, something she’d said in her grief-induced haze. He’d cast a guilty look over at El, but she didn’t notice. She didn’t seem to be paying attention at all, just sitting and staring, letting Max tap out steady rhythms against her palm.
He should be sitting with her, Mike realized guilty. He should be the one holding her hand instead of Max, comforting her, checking up on her. They hadn’t even spoken about what happened, not in any real way. Have any of them? How could Mike have prepared for something like this? How do you comfort your girlfriend, who has done nothing but suffer her whole life, about the death of her father, when she won’t even talk to you? And Mike is trying. He’d sat through conversations with his Mom about loss, he’d read those little columns in magazines about what to say, what to do, but nothing helped. They were in this tense, weird gray area Mike didn’t know to navigate. It’d never been so hard to talk to her before, and Mike wishes none of this had ever happened, but not for the right reasons. He wished it never happened so that he didn’t have to learn how to live with it, so that the party could have normal, happy movie nights again, so that they could just be kids and watch trashy movies and listen to bad music and kiss even though they didn’t really know how. He just wanted things to be normal.
And he didn’t think it was possible, but he’s yet again been thrown for another loop, one that's somehow even bigger than interdimensional monsters and a girlfriend in mourning.
Because Will is leaving. He’s still talking, telling the group about how his Mom got this job as a telemarketer, about how El would be living with them, how they’d leave at the end of the summer and start their freshman year in Lenora, California. How they haven’t figured out the logistics of El’s schooling, undecided between attempting to homeschool her or throw her headfirst into the sad reality of public school. Will half-heartedly brushed at his eyes, trying and nearly failing to hold back his tears, and Mike didn’t blame him. He wanted to scream. He wanted to curl up and cry and scream and scream and scream because this wasn’t how it was supposed to go. They were going to go into high school as a party, and it would be hard and it would suck but it wouldn’t matter because they’d be together.
He and Will would be together. They’ve always been. Whenever he’d been cruelly reminded of the fact that soon they’d be enduring the horrors of Hawkins Highschool, whenever he’d stay up late into the night, horrified by Dustin’s gruesome depictions of what happened to nerdy, awkward kids like them, he was never truly afraid. In the back of his head, he was always able to reassure himself, because he knew deep down that even if he had absolutely nobody, he’d have Will.
But was that even true anymore? He could count on one hand the amount of sleepovers he's had with Will this summer. The amount of times they’ve actually hung out with one another, one-on-one. How long has it been since they blew away a day together, just reading, talking and laughing? Summers used to blur, the only constants being sleep and food and Will.
Mike can’t remember the last time they’ve had a real conversation. Except, he winces inwardly, that night.
When Will had left. When Mike had made him feel so unwanted, so stupid and childish, that he’d just got up and left.
Thinking about it reminds him of the pit in his stomach, the black hole in his chest that's been growing since this summer started. He remembered the cold fear he had felt when Will wouldn’t answer the door, rain pelting the ground around him and Lucas as they desperately tried to see inside, an old terror resurfacing in both of them, before they thought to try Castle Byers. Or what used to be Castle Byers. Mike glances up at Will now, watching him sniffle. He’d finished talking and the whole party sat there, dumfounded. He never did think to ask Will what happened that night.
Suddenly, Max laughed. She laughed long, so long, and so hard it looked painful. She laughed and laughed and Mike and the others just watched, watched while her face contorted and suddenly these horrible sobs escaped her, her chest heaving with the effort. They sat in shock before they finally moved, starting with El, who curled into Max, holding her tighter, while her own tears began to escape. Lucas moved next, getting up and crossing the room, enveloping them both in his arms, lightly cooing and trying to comfort them, but he was trembling, and then everyone lost it. The anguish and stress and fear and grief finally came billowing out, and it shook the group in waves.
They had done so well maintaining their careful balance. They protected this false pretense that everything was fine and normal, because what else was there to do? They pretended that family members weren’t dead and that monsters weren’t real and that their biggest fears were getting grounded on Friday nights. But there was only so much pretending they could do. Because now two of their own were moving across the country and nothing would ever be the same and maybe this is what finally broke Mike because he just sat there and sobbed, sobbed because out of everything that had happened to them, out of monsters and death and alternate dimensions, the thought of them all being separated was the worst.
Later, the sobs turned to laughs and all of them were bunched up on the floor, clinging to each other as if the world was ending again, and Mike was dizzy and warm and his head hurt the way heads do after a particularly violent amount of crying. They were all embarrassed and tired and never quite looking directly at each other, but they were together, and they were laughing, and they were alive. Tomorrow, they would go to the Byers and help them begin to pack. But tonight, they were talking and giggling in the basement, and for now, that was enough.
Somehow, throughout the past half hour, Mike had ended up splayed on top of Will on the couch. This wasn’t an uncommon position for him to occupy, per se, some might even say it was expected, but it hadn’t happened in a while. (Really, it hadn’t happened since Mike and El became a “thing”, but Mike didn’t care to entertain that line of thought, not when this was the first time in months that he felt like he was breathing, although he couldn't say the same for Will, who frequently readjusted but didn’t have enough sense to push him off.) Their friends had all situated themselves similarly, with Lucas on the other end of the couch, Max and El at his feet, Dustin engaging them all in an analysis of the movie they’d watched, (having been the one paying the most attention), his head leaned on the couch close to where Will’s hand rested. It was close, cozy, though he knew none of them would ever say it out loud. He listened to the vibrations of Will’s chest when he laughed, and if he ignored their puffy eyes and tear- streaked faces, he might have been able to pretend this was any other movie night.
They can all pretend that their sorrowful moans when Jonathan comes to pick Will and El up aren’t rooted in truth. Mike can get up as slowly and grudgingly as he wants, complaining and moping the whole time, but it won’t change the fact that Will has to go. When the party filters out slowly over the course of the next half hour, Mike knows he will see them again, he will see them tomorrow, but it still has an air of finality that scares him. Something about today makes him think that even though he knows they will be together again, it won’t feel like this.
He can keep pretending, even when they leave, that there isn’t this confusing, indescribable pain in his body, in his arms and chest, that's been almost throbbing ever since he got up and let Will leave. He can go to sleep that night and pretend it's not still there, insistent, terrifying. It's confusing, and it's scary, and it makes him feel like crying all over again, but this time he doesn’t have the privilege of company. This time Mike is alone.
He falls asleep.
It still hurts when he wakes up.
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In retrospect, yelling at his parents and leaving the dinner table wasn’t going to help convince them to let him go.
Unfortunately, stomping up the stairs and slamming his door did make him feel better, and the convincing hadn’t been going quite as planned anyway.
Mike just didn't understand. He’d done more than his fair share of chores around the house, biked Holly to school every morning, had stayed up studying and begged his teacher to round his Spanish grade to a B, and had waited for the perfect moment to bring up winter break again. All for his mother to shut it down without a second thought.
“I just don’t understand-”
“Michael. Christmas is a family holiday. I don’t want you flying halfway across the country all by yourself-”
“I wouldn’t be by myself! It's just a few hours alone in the air, the Byers would be there to pick me up. And Nancy’s going, anyway! Nance, tell her-”
He’d turned to his sister, shocked that she hadn’t already spoken up. Maybe his reason wasn’t convincing enough - Their parents didn’t know about El, and his mom believed that “Will’s going to want to spend time with his own family, dear, you’d only be intruding” Which is also just not true, because he had been specifically invited by both El and Will to visit them over break, but Mike knows they could both be swayed by Nancy’s much better excuse of going to see her boyfriend.
But she didn’t look up. She was busy slowly pushing around the food on her plate , the circles under her eyes betraying her exhaustion.
“I’m not going, Mike,” She finally replied. “I’ve already talked to Jonathan. I’m too busy at work to go on vacation.”
“Oh come on!” Mike could not believe this. He knew damn well she’d spend break holed up in her room anyway. And now Mom was nodding sympathetically and shooting him a look that he knew meant the conversation was over and Dad hadn’t even looked up this whole time and Mike was just so done because none of them could ever understand and they didn’t try to anyway.
“You all suck.” He announced, standing up and ignoring his mother’s affronted gasp, marching over to the staircase while Nancy groaned and his mother called him back. He knew that this would come back to bite him, and that it didn’t help his case in the slightest, but he was just so angry.
The worst part, he realized, when he finally collapsed on his bed, the satisfaction of his dramatic exit having faded, was that he was afraid his mom was right. He eyed his desk guilty, the most recent unfinished letter to Will sitting delicately in the lamplight, mocking him. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d even spoken to Will. Everything he heard about his life was second-hand from the little sections El included in each of her letters, tidbits about Jonathan and Will’s lives. He was painting now more often than drawing, and had discovered some new bands that El could always hear through the walls, and he’d frequently go on long walks on his own, a luxury he hadn’t had in Hawkins, where he wasn’t allowed to go to the end of his driveway by himself.
And Mike wanted to know all these things, wanted to know them from Will firsthand. He wanted to know what songs Will was listening to now and why he liked specific lyrics and wanted to see his newest works because he knew they’d be fantastic, and he wondered if Will would let him accompany him on these walks and wondered what must be so troubling to him for that he’d need to take so much time to himself anyway. He wanted to know and he didn’t because he never reached out.
The worst part is that he’s trying. He’ll wait on the phone for the line to open for hours to no avail, and he knows that Joyce has this new job, but does she seriously ever have like, a lunch break or something, and he’ll sit at his desk for even longer, trying to conjure up what he could possibly say to Will, and for whatever reason it's just so hard, which is awful because it was never hard to talk to Will. In fact, talking to Will is the easiest, most natural thing Mike’s ever done.
So why can’t he just send a goddamn letter?
Mike curls up on his bed, fisting his hands in his hair. It's brushing past his ears now, and he knows it's driving his mom and Nancy equally crazy, but he couldn’t care to cut it. He’s been almost revelling in their discomfort recently, as terrible as that is, feeling an odd thrill every time one of them casts a disproving look at his outfit or comments on the state of his room. It's the same feeling he gets during Hellfire meetings, how the other members look at him approvingly now instead of the pitying, amused glances they used to share with each other upon his arrival. He likes it, and he likes the conspiratory looks Eddie shoots at him in the hallway, and the way he feels part of something for the first time in a while.
He wonders if Will’s found something like that in California. Maybe, during the time Mike spent neglecting contact, he’d found a group of people, and maybe that's why he’s listening to cool new music and going out on his own. Maybe the paintings are for these new friends, new friends that talk to him and take interest in his life and are there for him, like Mike is currently failing to be. He doesn’t understand why he feels physically sick when thinking about these potential new friends of Will’s, because that isn’t right. He cares about Will and he wants him to be happy, so he should be glad if Will’s found people like him, people he likes and can relate to more than Mike. Maybe Will really would prefer if Mike didn’t visit. Why would he wanna see his poor excuse for a “best friend”, when he could occupy himself with newer, cooler, better ones.
Mike realizes, distantly, that he's doing that thing that Dustin commented on, where he dramatizes and tortures himself with scenarios that aren’t real, but it is really so far-fetched? Is it ridiculous to think that in the four months since he and Will had properly spoken, he might have moved on? The jealousy sinks into his stomach, where it's become comfortable recently, nestled neatly next to the guilt.
Mike turns his head to stare at the letter again. Maybe, he could make it up, somehow. Do something to repair the damage he’d done these past four months, or at least something to apologize.
He gets up and walks over to his desk, determined. He stares down the letter before crumpiling it up, tossing it with all the other failed attempts from this week. He will never figure out what exactly to say to Will, he realizes. And one attempt at correspondence won’t excuse a lack of it for months.
He spins in his chair, pondering. Holly has put on a cassette in her room, and he can hear her jumping around, giggling and talking to herself. He blows through his lips and spins in his chair again, groaning when he hits his head on a shelf, before his gaze lands on the piles of letters El had sent him, the adoring “Love, El” ‘s visible from here.
The guilt comes back. He’s not sure, entirely, why he won’t write it. Why it feels, not wrong, necessarily, but incorrect. Like he's lying, which is a thought that scares him, because what does feeling like a liar when he tells his girlfriend he loves her mean about their relationship? Sighing, Mike picks up the letters and flips through them, the curly, messy purple handwriting adorning each page. Under the pile, he can spot the two letters with the small, messy green print he’d grown accustomed to over the years. He smiles, flooded with memories of the back of their 5th grade English classroom, where Will would complain endlessly about his big, blocky writing in comparison to Mike's neat, slanted capitals. Though his words shrunk over the years, Will was never quite able to achieve the same precision in his writing that he had in his drawings. Mike never minded. He’d joke about being the only person besides Joyce Byers who was fluent in Will’s hieroglyphics.
The two letters from Will were written about a month apart. The first one was from their first week in Lenora, Will claiming to have written it on top of an unopened cardboard box in his new room. He told Mike about his plans to paint the room yellow just like his old one, and had asked how the beginning of the school year had gone for him. He’d expressed his anxiety about starting fresh at a new school, and his excitement about the record store he was planning to visit with Jonathan after spotting it while driving through downtown. It was simple, and plain, but it filled Mike with an all consuming affection for his best friend, who was terrified to begin again somewhere else but was giving it his all, and it made Mike feel so, so guilty for not being there for Will to rely on, to confide in about his fears and what he was interested in and any new experiences he’d had. Mike was suddenly overcome with fear that he’d never truly be able to repair what he’d broken.
The second letter was from two months ago. In it Will had expressed that he hoped Mike was having a good first semester, and that he’d love to hear about it if Mike ever had the time to write. (This hit Mike the hardest of all, because what evil otherworldly being had forced him into a timeline where Will Byers believed that Mike didn’t have the time, or the desire, to talk to him?) He’d included anecdotes about his favorite class, (Art) and his favorite teacher, (English, which had surprised both of them), and thoughts about possibly attending the art club after school in order to have access to better supplies for his pieces. Doodles of swords and little creatures lined the margins. He talked about the bands he’d recently discovered, with names like The Cure and New Order, and how he’d gotten some new cassettes as a consolation gift from his mother. He’d ended this letter like every other; just his name, Will, in small round letters, with a little smile. Mike felt sick to his stomach.
This was who he was ignoring. Who he had left hanging, for months. His best friend, who was reaching out, sharing his new life with him, because that's what best friends did. What normal best friends did. Mike seriously needed to fix this.
It hit him, suddenly, what he could do for Will. He flipped back through all the letters, carefully making note of every band mentioned, by both Will and El, that Will had been enjoying recently. By the time he was done he had a grand total of seven different artists, more than enough for what he set out to achieve.
Over the course of the next few weeks, Mike rooted around in his room, the basement, the living room, anywhere he could think of, to find some extra dollars, and nearly every afternoon was spent in the singular record store they had in Hawkins, hunting. They had a section reserved in the front of the store for cassettes, and he spent days searching, deciding between albums; when he came up empty, he learned to request certain artists, and soon he had compiled a collection for The Ultimate Christmas Gift. He spent another week listening to them all, picking out his favorite songs, either by lyrics or instrumentals, and tediously recording them and transferring them to a blank tape. By the end of his endeavour it was January, so he decided to re-brand as The Ultimate Gift, removing the specification. He was finally done. His masterpiece: a tape filled with Will Byers’s newly favorite artists, proudly titled For Will, with songs specifically picked out by Mike. It was something to show he cared about Will's life, cared about what he was interested in and what he had to say, and most of all, that he was sorry.
(In his excitement, Mike Wheeler had completely glossed over the implications of the two
seemingly innocent words he had mindlessly scribbled on the outside of the gift, which were, of course, “Love, Mike.”)
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It was ridiculously loud in the gymnasium, and Mike had an urge to shove his head between his knees and squeeze, anything to stop the insistent pounding in his skull. He couldn't remember the last time he slept through the night, plagued by dreams that emerged in bursts. An attack of raindrops on a green raincoat in the summer. The halls of a hospital, sterile lights flickering. The delicate petals of a tulip, flowering into the shape of a demogorgon's mouth. A sharp, desperate scream wretched from someone's throat. The sharp point of a long, bony finger sliding across smooth skin.
Unfortunately, pep assemblies waited and cared for no one. The crowd let out another mind-rupturing shriek as the basketball team finally entered the scene. Dustin and Max perked up where they were seated on either side of him, Dustin snapping his notebook of what looked like mindless scribbles shut while Max scoffed and readjusted her walkman. Mike knew it was performative, though, the way she rolled her eyes and slouched, prevented from leaning back by the hoards of highschoolers seated behind them. He could see the way her eyes tracked Lucas on the court, who sent them a happy, embarrassed wave from where he trailed the rest of the team.
Mike sighed. The rally continued on, different clubs and sports teams convening in the center for maybe fifteen seconds, doing some sort of odd huddle or group cheer before taking the walk of shame back to the bleachers, sending tentative waves to their friends in the audience, or, in the case of one student, releasing a loud “whoop!” before cartwheeling back to their teammates. It was all so stupid, especially since Mike knew they’d most likely have another “spring-send off” for the basketball team a few weeks from now, assuming they won this next game.
He watched Dustin’s leg bounce out of the corner of his eye. They both had their Hellfire shirts on, pumped for the last session before the finale of Eddie’s big campaign. Mike knew, guiltily, that they were both praying on the Tigers’ downfall at the next game; If they won, it would mean they’d have to break the news to Eddie that Lucas didn’t plan to play at the final meeting. Mike cringed inwardly at the thought. He knew none of them wanted to disappoint Eddie, and that this game was the championship game, Mike! I’m sure Eddie will understand! or whatever his excuse was, but he couldn’t help feeling a twinge of betrayal.
Max resumed her angsty, slouched position as soon as Lucas was out of sight, and Dustin returned to whatever abstract calculations awaited him in his mess of a notebook.
A sudden movement across the gymnasium caught Mike’s eye. The basketball team was stirring up some sort of chant again, and the members had gotten up, hyping up the crowd while their overly-blonde captain spewed unintelligible inspiring bullshit into the microphone. Lucas was hidden behind them, being shoved around in a way that made Mike’s stomach coil. He watched as number 22 lightly grabbed an embarrassed teammate by the shoulder, pushing him to face the crowd, and holy shit, what?—
For the briefest, most fleeting moment, Mike felt his heart catapult straight into his chest; he knew that mousy brown haircut, knew the way it curled lightly at the ends, and he practically had that clumsy, shy smile memorized after ten years of making a fool of himself so that he might see it — for a second the whole word stopped, before the noise of the gymnasium abruptly rushed back at him.
Mike blinked twice, hard, before the mirage fell away. The boy laughed loudly before waving to the crowd, following his friends back to their seats after making a few rounds around the gymnasium once more, the pep rally finally coming to a close. He was too tall, Mike realized, and his hair swooped in this odd, unfamiliar way, and his nose was too small and his eyebrows too light and his eyes—
Mike sighed, burrowing his face in his hands, embarrassed, but he continued to watch the boy through the cracks between his fingers, contemplative. He almost laughed at his misjudgment. Will would never be caught dead playing basketball, let alone jump around like a lunatic in front of his whole school. He wouldn’t wear that silly uniform, with the shorts cut high and the shirt that looked way too tight to be comfortable. And of course he didn’t have arms like that, ones that looked about the size of two of Mike’s side by side, and his legs were longer than the boy’s, whose entire calf flexed whenever he jumped on one of his friends backs, whose thighs was shiny with sweat—
“Mike!”
Dustin elbowed him sharply in his side, snapping him out of his haze. Mike flushed, confused.
“Hey, they’ve been wrapping up for like, five minutes now! Let’s get out of here man, its gross-”
Max once again tried to dissect him with her mind while Mike valiantly ignored her, instead choosing to stand up, maybe a bit too fast. “Yeah, for sure. Gross.” He bumbled, swallowing hard. “It’s hot in here.” He added intelligently, face still burning, holding on to Dustin's backpack while they navigated the crowd.
The thick envelope burned a hole through his navy blue Jansport.
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There was a damp, growing stain on the surface of the envelope where Mike’s hands rested, clasped sweatily. He’d spent the four and a half hours between Indianapolis and Los Angeles startling awake with every shift of the plane, and had nearly been sick off of the complementary trail mix offered to him periodically. Every time he shifted, his leg brushed the bouquet of flowers carefully nestled between his feet, and he cursed Max for the upteenth time that flight, chilly in his touristy getup that she insisted was “the look” in California. The man next to him had his head tilted uncomfortably close, snoring into Mike’s ear obnoxiously, and Mike decided that he’d bike to Lenora next time, walk, even - anything to avoid getting on a plane ever again.
The envelope. Its presence had haunted Mike for the last four months. He could see the two evenly punched holes of the cassette through the flimsy paper of the envelope he’d carefully selected months ago. God, months ago. What was supposed to be Will’s Christmas gift had spent weeks accumulating dust, getting beaten and soft at the edges , while occupying the pocket of his Jansport, the top drawer of his desk, even his gym locker one unfortunate Tuesday. He never sent it.
Mike couldn’t really explain why. In his haste the morning after the gift's completion, he’d forgotten to snatch a stamp from his mom before biking to the post office. That was his only good excuse. He’d even stood right of the collection box on the corner of his street on several occasions, willing himself to open the shoot and drop the small parcel in. But he never did. Why?
Why, indeed. Now he was on a flight to his doom, where he’d have to face his best friend after being essentially radio silent for eighteen months. It wasn’t as if he hadn’t tried. He’d spent hours listening to a busy line, silently pleading across two thousand miles for someone, anyone to pick up, even if it meant he’d have to face the quiet intensity of Jonathan Byers. But nobody ever did, and he once again was starting to wonder if Will even wanted to see him.
It didn’t help that things had become - weird - about Will. It confused Mike, because it couldn’t have been something Will had done, considering they hadn’t spoken, let alone seen each other for so long. Maybe weird wasn’t the right word. It didn’t feel weird, just different.
Different principally because Will wasn’t there. He wasn’t there when the teacher said to get into groups of two for a project, even though Mike still instinctively scanned the classroom for his familiar shaggy haircut, nor was he across the table, shooting private smiles while their new party listened on, entranced by Eddie’s immersive worldbuilding. Even so, the thing that struck Mike most of all was that whenever these moments happened, whenever Will was mentioned even in passing, Mike would suddenly find it hard to swallow. A low, squirming feeling would begin developing in his gut before spreading through his bloodstream, catapulting his heart into his throat. It was so bad that when Mike’s history teacher casually pulled down a map halfway through the class period, Mike had felt faint with the abrupt rush of nausea from the mere sight of the state of California.
Which was ridiculous. It was ridiculous to have such an intense, involuntary reaction to anything that reminded him of his (former?) best friend. Worst of all, it wasn’t even a bad feeling. It wasn’t the deep, cold paralysis one felt when faced with otherworldly horrors, nor the building queasiness that came with a few too many kernels of buttery popcorn. It was, in a way, exciting, though it made Mike feel sick for reasons he couldn’t quite explain. He found himself almost seeking the feeling out, praying someone would bring up the Byers in conversation, loitering in the art hallway after Hellfire and guessing what Will would think of every painting.
But it was also different in a way that Mike couldn’t completely explain away with the newfound physical distance between them. No, it was different in the way that his mind drifted during class, occupied with wonders of how the sun felt two thousand miles away. Different because sometimes he couldn’t think of what to say to El, but when he’d imagine Will reading the letter over the shoulder, all of the sudden the words began to flow.
Different because at night he was haunted - no, plagued - by dreams. They weren’t the nightmares he was used to, and whenever he awoke he almost wished he could explain the weird, not entirely unpleasant churning is his gut with interdimensional horrors. He could never remember the dreams, not clearly, but they always started the same. It would be dark in his room, so dark he would only see the faint outline of his pale hand against the comforter. It would be hot, almost overwhelmingly so, and he’d try to get up but instead find his blankets tightly wrapped around his feet, trapping him. When he would instinctively turn his head to the side he’d be met with the source of the warmth, and its presence would make its way on top of him, enveloping him until he was surrounded by it, its smell, its warm breath. Sometimes he wouldn’t turn, knowing what was beside him. It didn’t stop it from lingering there, mocking him, as if it too was wondering if he would give in.
But it wasn’t this heat that he was so unnerved by. No, it was the fact that sometimes, instead of turning his head and being met with the darkness, he’d be met by the faint outline of big, round eyes peering up at him, and when the presence inevitably surrounded him, he’d reach out and feel the all-too familiar brush of short, overgrown hair, hear the breathing he’s had memorized for years.
And that was what scared him now. Because he was convinced that the moment he stepped off this plane, he would once again be met with those eyes, and that they’d be able to see it on him, the atrocities his brain committed during the earliest hours of the morning. What these atrocities were exactly Mike couldn’t explain. All he knew was that although he didn't understand the coiling in his stomach and heat in his face when he woke up, he knew they were not things one should be feeling about his oldest friend. In a way that made Mike sick to even consider, it felt like a betrayal.
He could’ve sent the gift whenever he wanted. He could’ve asked his mom to visit the post office for more stamps or gone himself, he could’ve double checked in his dads office, he could’ve taken a slight detour on his morning bike ride to school any number of times, but he didn’t. It was for the same reason that a little part of him was glad that his parents hadn’t let him cross the country for Christmas a few months ago.
The moment he meets the eyes of the boy who’d he’d shared nearly every breath of the last 10 years with for the first time in 18 months, Will will know exactly what Mike has been thinking, unconsciously or not. He will see it on him the same way he would’ve seen it on the gift if he’d sent it, or the same way he would’ve understood any of the number of letters shoved into the cardboard shoebox in the top corner of Mike’s closet. He will see him and be disgusted, embarrassed by the fact that his “best friend” of 10 years could misconstrue his kindness and sensitivity into something so, so-
The man leaning dangerously close to Mike’s shoulder startled awake as the flight attendants announced the plane’s descent. The smell of their combined sweat contributed to the sick feeling coiling in Mike’s stomach. No, Will wasn’t cruel. He was understanding and patient and empathetic at heart. He would never call Mike on anything he knew wasn’t meant to be shared.
But Mike didn’t trust himself. He didn’t trust himself to not just lay down and let Will see it, all of it, everything Mike’s brain conjured late into the night, every mid class thought spiral, every memory that sat lodged in his throat. He wanted to let him dissect him the way they had with the frogs in sixth grade, peeling the skin back and gagging at the way the insides spilled out. He wanted Will to see it all, to let him gently stitch Mike back together in the way that they always had for each other, and tell Mike its okay and that he didn’t understand but obviously Mike didn’t understand it either so it was no use to dwell and Mike would be able to breathe for the first time in 18 months, maybe longer.
Following a very sudden succession of movements, Mike is finally off that dreadful plane, hands fisted tightly around the straps of his backpack. The itch caused by the tag of his shitty yellow polo is festering into a rash into the back of his neck while his glasses continuously slide down his nose, and Mike is busy cursing Max and her entire cursed lineage before he's finally, finally greeted by the familiar sight of mousy brown hair.
He doesn’t even have to think about the way he throws his arms up when El darts over to him, eyes wide and teeth bared in a smile bigger than he's ever seen before his view is quickly obstructed by her arms around him. He’s dizzy with happiness because she's finally here and safe; the quiet sense of comfort he’d taken for granted last summer returns to him. Her hair has gotten so long and she smells like sweet apple shampoo and something that strikes him as foreign but oddly familiar, and she's laughing and crushing her flowers and he missed her so much.
For a beautiful second Mike thinks that maybe he’s got it all wrong. Maybe it really was just that the distance had confused him, jumbling his thoughts and feelings. Because he was happy now, no doubt about it. He was happy, and she looked pretty in her new hairstyle and outfit, and she smelled nice and her skin was soft where her hands grazed his forearms, and this could work.
But still, like a stupidly costumed yellow sunflower, he inevitably turned his head to the right.
Will. Mike was flooded with an endearment so potent he was surprised he didn’t collapse right there on the sticky airport floor. He was looking at him with his massive eyes and sheepish smile and awkward stoop to his posture, he was taller and suddenly fitting Jonathan’s clothes. He was tan and freckled and wearing cuffed sleeves, hair fussed like he’d been running his hands through it - and it was short, only brushing the tips of his eyebrows, thicker and darker than Mike was used to. So different yet undoubtedly himself.
But he remembered himself all too quickly. Mike could feel it now, that low coiling in his stomach, the heat in the tips of his fingers that sent a warm thrum coursing through his veins that reached the rest of his terribly clothed frame, the same feeling he woke up gasping with every night. Because Will was looking at him, and he was different, but still so achingly familiar, from the way he bounced on the balls of his feet to the way his bony hands grasped together around-
Around?
A painting.
Nestled securely between his palms was a neatly rolled up canvas in his hands, pressed hard against the side of his chest like it belonged there, a vital organ that had fallen out of place. Mike remembered now. Remembered one of the throwaway lines from a letter not so long ago so acutely he could almost see the scrawled words out in front of him. Will was painting. For a girl.
A girl.
A girl who he deemed important enough to spend hours thinking about, whose image colored every stroke on that canvas. A girl significant enough to have him clutching that paper like it was a part of him. A girl.
Mike was totally and irrefragably fucked.