Chapter Text
Mike can remember the exact moment his life began to unravel.
He and Will were at the grocery store doing their usual weekly shop, which generally involved a lot of Mike scuffling around the aisles like a lurking menace - and Will reading ingredients lists and consulting his small weekly meal planner like his life depended on it.
It also involved a lot of comfortable bickering over what exactly would constitute the treats for that week.
They both had very set tastes going back to childhood, and for the most part they stuck within those parameters. Reese's Pieces, Milk Duds, popcorn and those hideous fake cheese flavoured poufs that Mike inhaled almost entirely within ten minutes of arriving back at their shared apartment.
But, every so often, Will would pause in the aisle... his eyes roaming over the back of a package or bag, lips moving silently as he read the contents description.
Sometimes those mysterious packages would end up in the basket - and other times they would be shoved back on the shelf with a delicate wrinkle of Will's nose.
Mike liked to watch him in those moments, when Will was lost in discovering some potential new taste explosion. The way his eyes lit up if he read something that he deemed interesting enough to move backwards to the basket - or the way his eyes darkened, cueing the little nose thing before the package was discarded.
He had almost got to the point that he could tell from Will's eyes what the final answer was going to be, and when he saw the little gleam that day when Will was staring at a small bag of lollipops.. he knew they were going in the basket.
In hindsight, he should have put a stop to it.
He'd intervened before - like when Will was adamant the last few times they'd tried pickled onion flavoured things and hated it, shouldn't mean not trying another. Because yes... it should.
But he didn't intervene, and the package of lollipops entered the basket, and then came back to their apartment.
That was where the trouble began.
Unpacking the groceries in the kitchen, Will left the small bag on the counter. Once he was finished putting everything away, he turned the bag over in his hands a few times before opening it and offering Mike a bright red lollipop from within.
Mike took it and ripped the wrapper off, discarding it next to him on the couch. Then he caught Will's eye and saw the disapproving glare at the offending wrapper. Sighing, he pulled himself off the couch and took the wrapper to the trash, dropping it in theatrically.
"Happy?" He asked in a very put upon voice.
Will just gave him a look.
"It's not hard to keep the apartment tidy Mike, we don't all want to live like rats in a dumpster."
Mike's lips twitched. He knew that was a thinly veiled jab at the state of his bedroom, and to be honest he didn't care for it.
His room was a mess. He liked it that way. Everything was organised... well, he knew where everything was. For the most part. And if sometimes he had a full Wheeler crash out because something had decided to hide itself in an inconvenient spot - that didn't mean he needed to clean the entire room to stop it from happening.
But they did have a rule - implemented after about three weeks of living together - that said Mike's room mess had to stay behind the borders of Mike's room. The shared areas were to be kept clean.
He was actually okay with that, because in all honestly it was nice to walk across a room without stepping on or tripping over something. But sometimes it was annoying that Will couldn't have even a single piece of trash anywhere for even a minute without commenting on it.
They were surprisingly - for two people who had been friends for fifteen years - not the most suited at being room mates.
Apart from being polar opposites on the whole clean vs mess situation, their social lives were also very different.
They both spent time with the other members of the Party - Dustin and Lucas shared a dorm room together nearby, and Max and El had a tiny studio apartment a few blocks over. Most weekends were spent in one of their places - watching movies or drinking.
But Mike also had another very active part of his social life.
Since arriving at college Mike had discovered for the first time that he was attractive to girls. Like, really attractive. They didn't seem to mind that he was a nerd, or that he wasn't all muscles and tanned skin. On the contrary... his tall, pale, angular frame and floppy dark curls seemed to inspire gothic type fantasies in them.
At first Mike had been way out of his depth, panicking whenever he was flirted with and complaining to Will about how intense the girls were being. But eventually, at a frat party after far too many drinks, Mike had lost his virginity.
After that it had all changed.
Will had silently supported his panic in the beginning, and since he was still extremely shy and guarded around people he didn't know, he had seemed happy to just keep spending his weekends with Mike or their other friends.
Now, Mike still came to most things the Party organised but sometimes he would leave before the movie finished. Or he would arrive late, his clothing dishevelled as if he'd just fallen out of someone's bed. Which he generally had.
Occasionally he would bring girls back to the apartment, vanishing into the depths of his room and emerging a few hours later looking pale and exhausted. Most of the time however, he would stay over at their places. Apart from the mess in his room having disgusted a few potential bed mates, he'd also noticed that Will became quiet and withdrawn when he bought girls home.
He didn't want to make Will uncomfortable in his own home, so he simply went and did his business elsewhere.
Most girls lasted a week, two tops. He'd had one girl who had made it to the month mark but that was only because he discovered she didn't have a gag reflex. Unfortunately she also had a terrible personality, and after a month of attempting to shut her up by sticking his cock in her mouth, Mike broke up with her.
Will on the other hand kept mainly to himself. He had a full scholarship to college, but it meant keeping his grades up. So he spent a lot of time painting in his room or sketching on the couch.
It wasn't like he didn't have people interested, he did. Will just seemed unbothered about exploring any of the possible offers that were extended.
Mike had tried talking to him about it once or twice - and Will had shut the conversation down quickly.
"I'm not interested Mike," he said with a slight scowl on his face, "I know it's old fashioned but I want to actually know someone before I do anything like that with them."
"Well how are you going to get to know anyone if you don't ever go out anywhere - or say yes to any dates?" Mike asked incredulously.
"It's not your problem," Will replied calmly. "I'm perfectly happy as I am."
So Mike had shrugged. If Will wanted to stay a virgin for his entire life then that was his decision. Mike however, was making up for years of insecurity and being bullied about his looks. He knew it was kinda gross to be sleeping around the way he was, but he was being safe - and it made him feel better about himself. So he kept doing it.
Crunching the last of his lollipop, he got up again and crossed the room to throw the stick in the trash. Instinctively he looked for Will, to see if he'd notice the amazing effort Mike was putting in to keep the flat clean as requested - but Will was leaning over the counter, lollipop lodged firmly in his cheeks like a squirrel, reading the inside of the packet intently.
"I thought all the information you normally read is on the back of those," Mike observed, craning his head to look inside the package. "Don't tell me I'm gonna have to wait for you to read all the insides of things at the store now too?"
Will rolled his eyes, turning slightly towards Mike. The lollipop in his mouth casually flicking to the other cheek.
"There's a contest on the inside," Will informed him, his cheeks hollowing as he sucked in to stop the lollipop dislodging when he spoke.
Mike's eyes were drawn to it.
Then he realised he was staring and snapped out of it.
"What?" He asked stupidly, his eyes snapping back to the lollipop as it pushed out further inside Will's cheek.
"A contest," Will replied slowly, "If I send off this barcode with my details on the back of an envelope I could win a lifetimes supply of these."
At that Mike's head jerked up, wrenching his eyes from Will's mouth.
"What the fuck would you do with a lifetimes supply of lollipops," he asked, snickering.
Will shrugged. "Eat them I guess?" He said, his eyes going back to the contest information.
Mike shook his head at the idea, already moving back to the couch to turn the TV on.
He forgot all about the contest until the day a few weeks later when he returned home and found the entire entranceway to the apartment completely full of boxes.
Frowning, he looked down the hall a little. The boxes were stacked about five high and god knows how many deep all the way around the door, with just enough room for him to get to the keyhole.
As soon as he put his key in the door, the door swung open from the inside and he was greeted by a very flustered looking Will.
"What the fuck is all this?" Mike asked in confusion.
Will looked sheepishly down the hall, then shifted his feet back and forth a few times.
"Uh... remember that contest I was gonna enter?"
Mike gave him a blank look, his brain unable to work out what the fuck ton of boxes in the hallway had to do with a contest.
Then Will opened the door a bit further, and Mike's mouth fell open.
The entire living room area was also full of boxes.
"What the fuck?" Mike repeated, still completely lost.
"The lollipops," Will admitted. His eyes darting around and refusing to meet Mike's.
Slow realisation dawned on Mike, and his eyes widened.
"You won a lifetime supply of lollipops....." he said slowly, his eyes roaming over the boxes before coming back to rest on Will's rather pink looking face. "And they delivered them all in one go?"
A grimace like smile cracked across Will's face. "Uh... yeah. Pretty much."
Mike continued standing in the doorway, his eyes cataloging the boxes as he went.
"How many fucking boxes are there Will? It looks like at least... I dunno, thirty?"
"Fifty two," Will whispered, his grimace like smile peeling back to show his teeth.
"Fifty fucking two boxes of lollipops?!" Mike screeched, "Are you insane? What the fuck are we going to do with that many lollipops.... and don't you dare say eat them either!"
"I don't know," Will huffed, his sheepishness giving way to irritation. "But I've never won anything before so how about a little 'yay, how cool Will, congratulations' instead of standing on the doorstep shrieking like a fishwife."
Mike stared at him, his mouth still slightly open in shock.
"Where the fuck are we going to put them all Will?"
Will sighed. "I was about to start figuring that out. Look, come inside at least - the boxes will be okay out there for a little longer."
Mike's eyebrows raised, "What... you're worried someone might steal some?" He shook his head as he walked into the apartment, "We should be so lucky," he muttered, gazing around at the teetering piles through the house.
"Okay," Will said briskly once he'd shut the front door, "I say we smoke a joint to take the edge off, and then we can work this all out."
Mike blinked.
"Your solution to the five hundred boxes of lollipops is to get stoned..."
"Fifty two Mike. And yes... you're a little cranky so I think getting stoned is the perfect idea."
Mike's lips thinned for a second, then he relaxed and shrugged.
"Okay then. But you're rolling."
"Already done," Will said grinning, pulling an expertly rolled joint out from behind his back.
They sat in the window and passed it backwards and forwards, their gaze constantly returning to the mountain of boxes occupying their small apartment.
"Fine... so now we're stoned. And we still have ninety seven thousand boxes in our house."
"Fifty two," Will corrected calmly, "And I think I have an idea."
Mike raised his eyebrows as he watched Will stub out the end of the joint.
"We can probably unpack quite a few into the kitchen cupboards we don't use, plus there is space in the entranceway closet," Will said, his eyes unfocused as he thought.
Snorting, Mike moved over to the boxes and started measuring them with his hands.
"That might account for five boxes if we're lucky - what about the other four hundred?"
Will fixed him with a glare.
"Fifty two Mike, and the rest of them... I dunno, maybe they'll fit in my room?"
Mike rolled his eyes. "Fine, I'll start unpacking as many boxes as I can in the kitchen, you move what you can into your room, then we can deal with Mount Everest outside."
Finally he got a Will smile. Shaking his head again at the insanity of the situation, he went and got a knife and slit open the first box. Inside were a lot of packets of lollipops. Like enough to feed an army type of thing.
Opening cupboards and stuffing the packets in, he quickly realised that even with the amount of empty shelves available, he was possibly only going to be able to unpack two boxes in the kitchen.
Once the kitchen was literally overflowing, he moved into the living room again, grabbing a box and heading for the hallway closet. When he opened it however, he saw Will had already shoved three boxes inside and there was no more room.
The front door was wide open, and so was Will's bedroom door, so he stuck his head in.
Will was standing in what used to be the middle of his very neat and organised room, looking completely overwhelmed.
Boxes were everywhere. Stacked in piles along each wall and then moving out to the centre of the room. There was a small path leading from the door to Will, then to his easel next to the window.
Mike stifled a laugh, he could see by the look on Will's face that he was getting close to panicking.
"Uh... how's it going in here?" He said, trying to wipe the smirk off his face.
Will's head whipped around and he glared at him. "How the fuck do you think it's going?"
Sighing, Mike looked around the room. There was space for another box or two on top of the piles but Will obviously couldn't reach up that high. So he came into the room and grabbed a box, reaching up easily and pushing it into place.
"We can fit more in here Will, it's okay. I'll help."
He saw the panic recede a little on Will's face, which drove him on quickly. Before long he'd cleared a large space on the floor and made a nice wall of boxes along the wall up to the roof.
"Is this all of them now?" He asked, turning around from the last box as it slid into place.
Will blushed. "I haven't bought the ones in from outside yet..." he admitted quietly.
"Fuck," Mike muttered looking around. The massive pile outside were not going to fit in here unless they could stack them properly - preferably not around the furniture.
Then he had a sudden brilliant idea - he could probably blame the weed for it, or the fucking lollipops... but either way, it flashed into his brain and straight out of his mouth.
"How about if you move into my room and we can just fill this room up completely?"
Will blinked.
"I'm sorry, what?"
Mike shrugged, "We don't have anywhere else to put them for now, so it makes sense."
Will continued to stare at him, a strange look creeping over his face.
"You want me to... share your bed Mike?" He asked with a slightly strangled voice.
Mike frowned, "What? No," he laughed then, shaking his head. "My room. If we move your bed out of here it will free up that entire side of the room. We can definitely fit all the boxes in then if we stack them all to the roof."
"Oh," Will said, an unreadable expression crossing his features. "But your room is disgusting. How would we fit my bed in there with all the mess?"
Mike shrugged again, "I'll clean it," he said easily. "You've been bitching at me to do it for weeks, so this way you get what you wanted."
Will hummed uncertainly.
"Look, it's up to you. But either you move your bed into my room, or we're leaving the mountain of boxes outside to fend for themselves. At least until the landlord gets wind of it - then we could be in trouble."
His eyebrowed creased as Will thought about it. Finally he sighed, throwing his hands up.
"Fine. But you've got to clean first - I'm not setting foot in that room until you do."
Mike grinned, "Fair enough - I'll go get started."
Heading to the kitchen he grabbed rubbish bags, then went back to his room. An hour of determined effort later, he could see the floor for the first time in weeks.
There was a knock at the door and Will's head popped around the corner, a lollipop stick poking out of his pursed lips.
He looked around the room, then gave Mike a smile. "Looks a lot better," he said, a little slurp escaping as the lollipop moved in his mouth. Using his tongue he poked it firmly into his cheek.
Mike's eyes drifted to it, then down to Will's lips, stained slightly red from the lolly.
"Almost ready to help me move my bed?" Will asked, the stick bobbing between his lips.
Mike's eyes tracked it's movement, then he blinked. Suddenly realising Will was waiting for an answer.
"Uh, yeah sure. We can do that now if you want."
He lurched up from the bed where he'd been sorting his laundry and followed Will back towards his room. He noticed a lot more boxes in the living room as he went through, Will had obviously been bringing in the ones from outside.
When they got into Will's room, Will hesitated, turning to him again.
"Are you sure about this Mike? What about... what about privacy - I mean what if you want to have a girl over or something?"
Laughing, Mike moved towards his bed. "I don't bring girls here anymore, my room was too messy. I'll just stay at theirs if I want to do that."
"Okay then, what if I annoy you - or you annoy me? It's not like we will have our own rooms to escape to anymore."
Mike turned around and stared at him. "Will, we've shared rooms plenty of times. It'll be like - just think of it like a long sleepover or something. Like when we were kids. It'll be fun, I promise. And if we get sick of each other we have the living room, or we can go visit one of our friends."
Will didn't look a hundred percent convinced, but the reality of the boxes meant he didn't really have a choice in the end.
"Fine, let's do it," he decided, moving over to grab the other end of the mattress.
It took them rather a long time to move the mattress and then the bed frame. Trying to maneuver it through the piles of boxes in the living room was hard enough, but doing it stoned was a whole different ball game.
Eventually they got it in, pushing Will's bed up against the wall parallel to Mike's.
"There isn't a lot of room between the beds Mike," Will huffed, his head craning around the space.
Flopping onto his own bed Mike looked around. "Nah, it'll be fine. Lucas and Dustin share a dorm room and they don't have much more space than this."
Will tilted his head, then obviously had to concede Mike had a point. He flopped down onto his bed, another lollipop magically appearing in his mouth.
Rhythmic slurping sounds came from his bed as he stared at the ceiling, moving the lollipop around in his mouth.
Mike lifted his head up and stared at him. "Another lollipop?" He asked with raised eyebrows.
"How else do you expect me to get through them all," Will huffed in return.
Laying back down and turning his head towards Will, Mike watched the stick bob around in his mouth. Every minute or so he would reach up and grab the stick, pulling it to the front of his mouth and slurping to get rid of the built up saliva.
Then Will turned his head and Mike quickly looked away, his heart beating a little faster than usual.
"Should we smoke another joint and finish the rest of these boxes?" Will suggested.
Nodding, Mike got up, making sure to keep his eyes off the stupid fucking lollipop.
It was easier said that done though.
Sitting in the window a few minutes later, sharing the joint, Mike found himself transfixed once more by the small red globe. Every time Mike passed the joint over, Will would pull it out of his mouth with a little popping sound, take a few drags, then slurp it back past his pursed lips.
His lips which were all red and shiny and sticky looking.
Fuck.
Mike turned his head towards the window, his heart positively racing now and a slight tightness starting to build in his groin.
It was totally understandable really. He hadn't been laid that week - and Will's lips were looking good simply because Mike was thinking about lips wrapping around a certain part of himself. It wasn't weird or strange.
Sure, the little slurping noises were vaguely pornographic if you closed your eyes, and the way Will's cheeks hollowed out when he sucked on it tightly made Mike's chest a little tight... but it was fine.
Totally fine.
Spoiler alert - It was not fine.