Work Text:
It’s too hot in the bar.
The air is stifled and muggy, weighed down with cheap cologne and secondhand smoke. Will can feel the sweat pooling on his skin, far too sticky and warm for mid-October in New York. The pure number of bodies has raised the average temperature of the room to an unbearable degree, and Will is currently regretting every choice that led him here. He should have worn a looser shirt, one that didn’t cling to his body every time he moved. Maybe one with sleeves he didn’t have to push up to his elbows. Hell, he should have just stayed home.
Will wasn’t a huge fan of going out. Clubbing, drinking, partying, all the things that he was supposed to love as a trashy college student never really held much appeal. He always felt like an alien observer, standing on the sidelines, removed. Watching people lose themselves in the rush of adrenaline. He guesses that for the normal person, strangers and strange drugs are the closest thing you can get to the rush of a life-or-death situation, but having known what it’s like to fight for survival, Will vastly prefers staying in and ordering shitty Chinese takeout.
Will was only even out tonight because, for once, being somewhere quiet with his own thoughts seemed more daunting than overpaying for watered-down drinks and trashy music.
His on again off again thing with Carlton had come to a definite end, a sort of awkward agreement between the two that they would be better off ‘just friends’ (though Will suspected the whole friends thing was more of a meaningless platitude than an actual suggestion).
Carlton was... nice. He was sweet and pretty, and they had enough in common. He laughed at the right times and said the right things, didn’t press Will too hard about his past. Will felt the same way about him as he did about a nice-smelling soap. Enjoyable, but unnecessary. There was a disconnect between them that no number of cute dates and platitudes was going to erase.
His roommate was worried about him wallowing over his breakup, and he was a bit, but not for the reasons she thought.
He’d been spread out on the shitty secondhand couch in their apartment, picking at the cigarette burns littering the corduroy (allowing himself a bit of self-pity, trying to come to terms with the fact he’s not built for love), when Amelia came ambling in, shoving a flyer in his face. It was some graphic design monstrosity about a goth night in a bar in Greenwich, and suddenly she was forcing him into something presentable and pushing him out the door before he could even process what was happening.
They had stood out in the rain for far too long, helping the already drunk people next to them memorize the birthdays on their obviously fake IDs, watching assholes throw empty bottles in the street.
Will had already wanted to leave by the time the bouncer halfheartedly checked their licenses, and now, after waiting far too long for cheap liquor, he’s been long ready to go home. Amelia had stayed with him for the first couple of minutes, but eventually she was off in the corner, mooning over some girl with far too much eyeliner and a shitload of poorly done stick and pokes.
Amelia reminded him vaguely of Jane, in a way that hurt if he thought about it for too long. They met in an intro to drawing class freshman year. Amelia was set on becoming a cartoonist at the time. She told everyone she was going to be the next Alison Bechdel, only to decide her true calling was journalism. By the next month, she had switched to a major in Russian.
Sometimes, when Amelia laughs or tries (and fails) to make a corny joke or pun, Will can’t help but think that his sister would act like her if she got the chance to grow up. He thinks Jane would have liked New York. Liked who he turned out to be. Liked his shitty apartment and his paint-covered clothes, liked the drawings he makes and the music he blasts when he’s crunching to get an assignment done. Or maybe he’s just projecting.
The bartender shoves a drink at him, and Will is snapped out of his morbid thoughts. So much for trying to be distracted. Will wonders whether the Chinese place next to his apartment is still open and debates about how long he should wait before he can tell Amelia he gave it a good try.
He’s probably comically out of place right now, his scowl and pensive attitude best suited for a shitty dive bar in the East Village, next to off duty-security guards and middle-aged burnouts. He shoves down a few crumpled dollar bills, downs the cheap liquor, and taps the dented wood counter for another. The bartender rolls his eyes and fills up his glass again. It’s a seven and seven, the same his father used to guzzle down. He tries not to think too much about what that means.
“It’s kind of hot in here, no?”
A guy yells at Will over the music, bumping their elbows, giving him a small smirk. He’s attractive, honey brown eyes and a crooked nose from what was most likely a years-old fracture that never healed right, the type of guy whose confidence is offset by enough ungainliness to keep you from thinking he’s an asshole.
Like Will, he also seems like he doesn’t belong, unassuming aura and kind smile, contrasting with the goth music and dark pine wood all around them.
“What?” Will heard him fine the first time, but he just wasn’t sure he was who the comment was addressed to. After a long life of growing up unpopular and painfully awkward interactions, Will has learned to never assume someone is talking to him. They usually aren’t.
The guy leans in a little closer, likely thinking the bar is too loud. His breath ghosts over Will's cheek.
“It’s- It’s hot in here. All the people packed in and stuff. And they definitely have the heat turned way up this time of year.”
Will huffs out a laugh and takes a sip of his drink. It seems stronger than the first one somehow. “I should have worn a different shirt. I started sweating through this one before I could even get inside.”
The guy’s eyes drag over his torso. “I think you look just fine.”
“Yeah?”
“Yeah.”
It took Will a long time to tell when someone was interested in him. It wasn’t until the second time a girl threw a drink at him for ‘leading her on’ that he realized people weren’t just being friendly when they came up to him and asked for his number, or where he got those pants, or if he liked the music playing.
Amelia forced him to take a crash course on picking up signals (the crash course was a whiteboard in the living room and a lot of yelling), and now he’s left a lot less confused when someone gets up and annoyed in the middle of a conversation.
“One of my roommates kinda dragged me here. She told me I need to stop moping around the apartment, that it was ‘bringing down’ the vibe of the place. Me and my sort of. Um. boyfriend broke up.”
A segment of the crash-course was to try to drop in the fact that he’s gay, but he still feels the rush of adrenaline any time it passes his lips. Part of him is still expecting someone from his hometown to pop out of the woodwork and call him a fairy, or spit some other outdated and overused term for homosexuality that Will has heard a hundred times before. It took him a long time to even say the word ‘gay’ without it feeling like a sin.
“Remind me to thank your roommate.” The guy glances at his lips. “I’m not the only one who feels out of place anymore.”
Will awkwardly smiles, looking towards his hands, trying to pretend he knows how to do this.
“Good thing we found each other then.”
He eventually learns that the guy's name is Damien, and he’s a mechanic, only a few years older than Will. They talk for a bit, mostly nothing, anecdotes about their life, surface-level stuff. Enough to make them less than strangers, not enough to make them actually connected. Damien could be lying through his teeth, but he’s warm and solid, so the noise of the bar becomes less abrasive, and Will starts to forget why he wanted to leave.
Damien buys him another drink after he finishes his second, burning Will's throat when he knocks it back. Will’s cheeks flush, and he leans into Damien's side, laughing at what he assumes are the right times, eyes lidded as their noses press together.
Will’s moderately tipsy by the time he gets dragged to the dance floor by two hands in his belt loops, a song by The Sisters of Mercy booming through the speakers, bass shaking the walls and vibrating through the floorboards. Will puts his hands on Damien's hips while the lighter in Will's front pocket digs into Damien's thigh. Their chests flush together, and he feels the heat get trapped between them.
Rough denim under his palms and music pounding in his head, it’s easy to forget the things rattling around in his brain.
Will always freaked out when hands started wandering with Carlton, too, in his own head to be able to enjoy himself. He had to practically black out to ‘go all the way,’ until all he could focus on was feeling his ex-boyfriend's skin on his own, instead of thinking about toxic ash, coughing up sludge, or the sickening smell of hospital antiseptics. Until he could forget who he was and the implications of having a body, just the way he felt and the way he could make someone else feel. Until the name Henry was nothing more than a long-forgotten daydream, miles away and years between the things Will likes to pretend didn’t happen. He ended up zoning out halfway through anyway, letting his mind wander somewhere far away and much safer.
When the next song starts, something electronic and dark that Will doesn’t recognize, he doesn’t think, tilting his head and leaning forward, lips meeting softly. Sighing into the kiss, he lets himself get lost in the sensation of broad hands on his neck and mouths moving in tandem. He closes his eyes and loses himself in the repetitive action, his brain fuzzy, and his limbs loose and warm.
Damiens is a good enough kisser (according to Will’s albeit limited experience), and he’s just drunk enough to pretend that pushing forward and parting his lips in the middle of a public space is a good idea. He’s convinced himself of much stupider things.
Damien moves down to his neck, and Will grips his spiky hair like a lifeline, breathing in and out. Right now, Will can pretend he’s someone else, that his body isn’t his own, that he’s normal and desirable. Damien doesn’t even know his last name, much less any of the shit keeping him separated from everyone he knows.
Will can pretend the breakup with Carlton wasn’t a long time coming, that no one runs and splits once they realize how deeply he gets attached and how much he has to hide. Under the dim lights and heavy atmosphere, he’ll lie to himself and ignore that he’s going home to a cold bed and a mirror he can barely look into.
If Damien wanted to take him home, Will would probably say yes. He’s tired of being responsible and considerate, of the fear of being found out. He knows shit like this is how boys like him get sick, but he’s lived his whole life trying desperately to be responsible. For once in his life, he wants to be reckless and wild. He’s earned that much. He’s so goddamn tired of pretending that trying to keep himself safe makes a difference.
When Damien hits his pulse point, alternating between kissing softly and teasing his skin between his teeth, Will’s eyes flutter open, choking on his breath and pulling the other man closer. Out of it, Will scans the room, looking at the drunk patrons, mind far away and barely processing the environment around him.
Across the bar, in between intertwined couples and tipsy college kids, he sees a familiar pale face and freezes, bile rising in his throat.
Mike Wheeler stands frozen in the crowd, mouth agape, staring directly at Will. Like a deer in the headlights, his eyes flicker to Damien, then to Will, then he bolts towards the door.
Will starts to hyperventilate, eyes still tracking Mike as he leaves, and Damien starts to pull away, sensing something wrong.
Will's hands drop from Damien’s hair, hands shaking and mouth moving faster than his brain.
“I-um, I have to leave. I saw- I just need to uh go.”
Damien looks dejected, and Will doesn’t really blame him. It’s easy to jump to a less-than-savory conclusion, Will practically jumping away from him after they got to second base in the middle of a bar. He can’t afford to care what the guy he’s known for less than an hour thinks of him. They both knew what this was. Will is a warm body and not much else.
Will turns away and rushes across the room towards the stairs, trying to calm his nerves and convince himself that everything is fine. Perhaps he’s drunker than he thought, and he just hallucinated his former best friend. Mike is supposed to be 780 miles away in Indiana anyway, and New York is too big a city for them to accidentally encounter each other like this.
As he rushes up the stairs and pushes out the door, Will is met with the cold polluted night air, drizzling rain dusting his clothes. The crowd to get in has died down, and now only a few stragglers remain outside the entrance, blowing nicotine and pot smoke into the night air.
There’s scaffolding across the street, and next to the hot steam coming up from the manhole, stands one Mike Wheeler. Mike is hyperventilating, eyes pointed towards the sky. He looks real and tangible, soft grey sweater and round glasses, making him look like a poor imitation of his father. Will’s not sure how to feel about the fact that he isn’t a hallucination.
Will jaywalks across the street, barely looking to see if cars are coming, and steps up onto the curb to meet Mike. He narrowly misses a puddle and has to actively stop himself from tucking tail and running somewhere far, far away. Somewhere with no pretty boys he used to love, who know how rotten he is deep down.
“Mike?”
Mike looks into Will’s eyes, fear painted plainly across his face.
“I- Hello.” Mike’s response is stilted. As if he’s not the one who showed up randomly in New York after almost two years of dropped calls and unanswered letters.
Will wraps his arms around his torso to fight the chill of the wind, and maybe subconsciously to guard himself. He’s not really sure from what, because Mike couldn’t throw a punch if his life depended on it.
“What are you, um. Doing here.”
Mike deflates, blinking slowly, almost vaguely ashamed. Will rushes to clarify, stumbling over his words. “Not that it’s y’know, not good to see you. It’s just um…. unexpected."
“I just…”
Mike is a stark contrast to the scene around them. He’s too posh, too… nice. Even getting wet from the rain and kicking at the loose gravel, Mike’s too pristine for a place like this. He doesn’t belong in the life Will has carved out for himself.
“You just…”
“I needed to talk to you, Will. I needed to- you’re just the only- I needed to talk to you.”
“What?” Will chuckles, something so comically absurd about the situation he finds himself in.
“Fuck, this was stupid. I’m sorry. I should have- I’m sorry I uh, interrupted you. I’ll go. I’ll go.” Mike talks like he’s trying to convince himself of the words he’s saying, clenching his jaw before starting to turn away.
Will grabs his arm before he can think, not wanting Mike to go but not having a reason to keep him here. Not one that isn’t purely selfish anyway.
“It’s ok. Just... stay. You can stay.”
Will lets go of his arm, and Mike practically flinches. He’ll pretend it’s because Mike is cold and scared, and not because of the ACT UP posters hung up behind them, or the stud in Will's right ear, or the flush still present in his kiss-bitten lips. Any of the things that point towards the truth, Will had spent his whole life in Hawkins trying to suppress.
A car rushes past. Someone drops a glass bottle, and it shatters on the sidewalk. Mike fiddles with the bottom of his sweater and looks at a hole in the pavement.
Awkward silence.
It’s a fifteen-hour bus ride from Indiana State. Will knows this. He’s had to stop himself from buying a bus ticket to Terra Haute more times than he can count. He asks anyway, in a half-hearted attempt to do anything other than just stand and stare. Better than asking Mike any actual questions and having him shut down.
“So was it a long ride from-”
“I’m failing my creative writing course.”
Mike stares at Will, like this explains why he is here, standing on the crumbling sidewalk listening to distant ambulance sirens and meaningless drunken chatter.
“Aren’t you an English writing major? I think that would be your, y’know… bread and butter.”
“No, I- it’s just I- um. Fuck.” Mike runs his hands through his hair, tugging at his black curls and seeming vaguely constipated in lieu of an intelligible response.
“Was that guy your boyfriend?”
Oh good. They aren’t going to ignore it and pretend Mike didn’t see Will playing tonsil hockey with a complete stranger.
“Uhm.”
Mike looks more terrified asking about his former best friend’s gay relationships than when he fought an interdimensional psychic being at 17. Will bites back a humorless laugh.
“Fuck sorry. I didn’t mean to like pry or anything. Or interrupt your uh. Forget th-”
“No, it’s fine. We only just met. No boyfriend for me right now.”
Will hates how this whole thing makes him seem. Like meeting random men in a bar and dragging them towards him is a regular habit or something. The last time they had spoken, Will hadn’t even had his first kiss yet, still too nervous and uncomfortable in his own skin to imagine letting someone else in. Not that he ever ended up letting anyone in after all—at least not in any way that matters.
“No uh... Girlfriend for me, either. Well, not either obviously, but um.”
Will stares at the graffiti-covered plywood, slowly sobering up more than he’d like. Standing there and listening to the cars speed by, Will tries to break the silence. Tries to hand Mike a fucked-up olive branch based on shared trauma and avoidance of acknowledging their grief.
“Kind of hard when you can’t tell anyone about your life from ages twelve through seventeen. Every time I try to tell a gu- tell someone I’m from Hawkins, it’s five minutes of ‘that Hawkins? The quarantined one from the news?’ It’s like-”
“Like no one gets it.”
The ‘except you’ goes unsaid.
Will can’t tell if the olive branch in Mike’s hands is dying out or holding on for dear life. Maybe both. Maybe neither.
Mike nods hesitantly.
Will’s going to have to explain himself to Amelia tomorrow, no doubt be bombarded with questions he doesn’t particularly want to answer.
‘No, yeah, I was totally having a good time and hopefully going to hook up with some stranger and forget that I’m probably going to die alone. It’s just I was just sort of interrupted by my former best friend/gay awakening, who never left Indiana and hasn’t talked to me in two years!’
It had taken some truly awful vodka and a fair bit of needling on their kitchen floor before he started stumbling over stories of teenage William Byers and his unrequited love. It really wasn’t that funny, but finally being able to complain to someone who gets it had left Will giggling like a schoolgirl on the linoleum. The vodka probably didn’t hurt either. They shared a sort of solidarity, similar to the one he shared with Robin in another life, Amelia having also fallen for her best friend in a small town that was no stranger to kids like them ending up dead or ‘missing’.
Maybe this whole night is some sort of bad dream, and he actually just fell asleep on the sofa watching Jerry Springer. Maybe one of his roommates is about to come wake him up so they can go get a Tall Boy and try to feed the pigeons. Maybe he never left Hawkins, and the past three years have been a hallucination.
“You said you came to see me. Here in New York. But um. Did you follow me to the bar or...?”
“Nancy gave me the number of your apartment.” Nancy no doubt got the number from Jonathan, who would probably jump off a cliff if Nancy asked him to. He’s not sure if it’s some sort of trauma bond, but Jonathan’s devotion to Nancy leaves Will baffled every time Jon tries to talk about it.
“I called, and some guy picked up? Gave me the address of a bar you were at. And. Um.” Mike pauses, dancing around the part of the story he’s clearly uncomfortable with. “Y’know, you should really talk to him about giving out your personal information? I could have been a murderer, or-or a stalker, or like a million other creepy things.”
“He’s uh. New.”
The truth is, New York is getting more expensive, and to afford the shitty two-bedroom with water damage and a broken fire escape, Amelia and Will have taken to letting stragglers crash on their couch for a bit of cash.
It’s definitely a violation of their lease.
Right now, it’s a barista from the coffee shop where they sometimes study. He’s nice enough, and an astronomical improvement from the inspiring guitarist who stole Will’s emergency Xanax from the bathroom, or the actress who would stay in character for days without breaking.
“But that’s why I’m here. At a, uh…Goth Night,” Mike says, goth night like it’s a foreign word, as if a shitty gay bar on the brink of foreclosure is some strange, unknown country. Considering where Mike lives, it might be. “And then I came in, and paid the cover charge, and sweat through my sweater.” Mike pauses. “Saw you... And. Uhm. Him.”
Mike’s breath hitches, and he seems to shrink into himself. He and Will are standing next to each other, but they’ve never been farther apart. They’re practically strangers, aren’t they? Both thinking of each other in the context of people who no longer exist.
Mike couldn’t look at him without seeing the Upside Down, and Will couldn’t look at Mike without seeing love he’ll never have.
Will grabs a pack of cigarettes from his back pocket and his lighter from his front to keep his hand from doing something stupid like reaching out and touching Mike again. Run his fingers in soothing circles along his shoulder blades, some childish urge left over from lovestruck daydreams. Drag his thumb across his cheek. Feel the freckles under his fingerprints.
But Mike and Will stopped touching long before they stopped calling and writing. Somewhere between an ashamed, teary ‘I don’t like girls’ and a NYU acceptance letter, even things as small as arm taps turned into clenched jaws and fists, trying to ignore the elephant in the room.
“You smoke?” Mike’s staring at him with what seems like shock, unable to grasp the idea that Will Byers might do something a little reckless and indulgent. Will thought tonight’s earlier events would have taught him that already.
“Sometimes. Relaxes me.” He puts the end to his lips and gives a shrug, smiling and guarding the lighter from the wind. It’s a Camel, unfiltered, the same kind his mom used to buy back home. He only really took up smoking after a guy from his studio art class offered him a cigarette, watching him have a panic attack on the steps of the library.
The smoke makes it harder to focus on the overwhelming dread that tends to take over his body at inopportune times. It also gives him an excuse to leave social situations when he gets too overwhelmed.
“I didn’t know that.”
Will watches the paper catch fire and takes a long drag, breathing in and blowing the smoke out towards the street, slipping the dented lighter back into his pocket.
“You don’t know a lot of things about me.” It comes out harsher than he wants, but Will’s tired of apologizing for simply existing.
“I’m sorry. I- I want to know you again. I want us to be like we used to.”
Under the moonlight and the shadows from the construction, Mike almost looks like how Will remembers him. Angular, pale, and boyishly wide-eyed, Mike is a mirror of the 15-year-old version of himself Will had spent hours studying.
He vaguely remembers the summer after eighth grade when he had to hide sketchbooks filled with freckles and dark brown eyes, terrified that someone would find out the depths of his adoration.
What he was.
Some days, Mike would look at him so softly, and Will would think that he knew. Like he could see through him and into the depths of his heart, see the hole in the shape of one Mike Wheeler, the truth of who he really was.
Will eventually grew up and realized that he wasn’t in one of those romance books his mother used to pretend not to read, but he was instead a gay kid in the middle of buttfuck Indiana, in love with the guy dating his sister. It would be funny if it wasn’t so tragic. Hope is a dangerous thing. Will had to learn that years ago.
Is that what Mike wants? Wants Will to act like he used to? Giving him his hopeless undivided attention with absolutely no reciprocation? If Mike wants someone to trail him around, dote on him, and boost his ego relentlessly, he can adopt a dog.
“We’re not 16 anymore, Mike.”
“I-I know. I should have called. I should have asked more and tried harder. I shouldn’t have let us…I miss you.”
“Well…” Will shrugs and takes another drag of his cig, avoiding Mike’s eyes like the plague, letting the nicotine calm his head. Maybe if he takes enough deep breaths and pretends everything is fine, he won’t run away and pretend this night never happened. Or even worse, fall back into his old habits, forgiving Mike at every turn, dropping to his feet and letting himself be the oh-so-helpful relationship counselor and unbothersome doormat.
“I’m not like you. You know that, right? I’m not like- I can’t just go out and… and be myself like that.”
Mike is so goddamn oblivious. “It hasn’t been easy for me. You of all people should know that.”
Mike’s face contorts into something offended. Almost hurt.
“What is that supposed to mean?”
Fuck.
Too far. Too close to the truth. Shut it down, Byers.
“I just mean you know what it was like for me growing up.”
“I-I lived through it too man.”
Mike is thinking about the Upside-Down. Will is thinking about Lonnie Byers’s fondness for Jack Daniels and lecturing Will on his failure to ‘be a man.’ About Ted Wheeler listening to Christian radio broadcasts at full volume in the living room, and ‘the right way to do things.’ About coming out to Amelia and begging her not to tell anyone, that he’ll leave her alone and not bother her ever again.
“The stakes weren’t exactly the same for us.”
Mike doesn’t reply to that. He starts picking at his cuticles and taking deep breaths instead.
“It- it was a romance assignment. The reason I’m failing my class, I mean. Like we had to write a romance story with a focus on internal monologue, and I- I couldn’t do it. Like I could do it, but it was all wrong.”
Will flicks ash onto the pavement, resisting the urge to pinch his nose and yell at Mike to get to the point.
“It was the wrong words, the wrong pictures. Like putting on a shirt that shrunk weirdly in the wash that fits all weird and suffocates you. The characters were flat on the page, and none of the words matched what I wanted to- wanted them to feel. I just couldn’t do it anymore.” Mike chokes out the word ‘anymore’ like it physically hurts, wrenching out some meaning Will doesn’t quite understand.
“I’m sure-”
“My professor told me I write love clinically. Without- without emotion. Asked me to draw from my own personal experiences. And I- I tried so hard. I sat there and stared at my typewriter. I read how my classmates wrote about love, and I tried to connect the dots. But something was still… I wasn’t thinking the way I needed to. The way I was supposed to.”
“Supposed to?” Will speaks before he can properly plan out his words, still not completely sober, and trying to figure out what Mike is trying to say.
Mike ignores him.
“I still have that painting you made me. The one with the dragon. Do you remember? Y-you made it when you lived in California.”
Will had tried desperately to forget his truly awful, misguided attempts at romance. Painstakingly painting a portrait of Mike with a heart front and center, claiming it was from Mike’s girlfriend had to go in some sort of unrequited crush hall of fame.
“It originally hung up above my bed in my dorm, but, uh, I put it in front of my desk when I moved.”
“Bu-”
“I have an old typewriter I use. I got it at a garage sale a few years back. And I sit at it to write. So, I sat at that goddamn typewriter and tried to write a shitty fucking love story and stared at that painting.”
Mike’s started pacing now, nonsense falling out of his lips. Will wants to grab him and shake him, yell at him to spit out whatever he’s been dancing around. Replacing feelings with metaphors was cute when they were teenagers, and Will wore rose-tinted glasses, but now he’s just tired. Maybe he can just stand here and finish his cigarette, and Mike will eventually tire himself out.
“My professor told me to base my writing on real-life experience. She- she asked if I had ever had a girlfriend before? Said to put my feelings about her, about El, onto that character. I mean, obviously, she didn’t know El’s name. But-”
“Her name was Jane.”
Mike stops pacing.
Jane was probably one of the things that pushed them apart the most. She would have despised that she caused some sort of divide between them, and Will hates himself for it. It would be easy to say he was jealous of her relationship with Mike, that he wishes Mike would get over her death to focus on him, but it’s the complete opposite. Will just wished Mike would mourn her the way she deserved.
Jane wasn’t some sort of mythic superhero, a character from a comic book coming to save everyone–she was a terrified teenage girl who killed herself before she ever got to truly live.
When Mike had first brought up the whole idea that Jane survived and was out there somewhere, Will assumed it was a sweet story, nothing he actually believed. A comfort. But then Mike would refuse to accept the truth. His sophomore year, a friend of Will’s took an intro to psych class and told him about the ‘stages of grief.’ Mike took years to leave denial. By the time the last remaining embers of their friendship died out, Mike had only started to accept that she wasn’t coming back.
Mike could at least call her the right name. Not the one that was the result of the abuse that ended up killing her, but the one given to her by a loving mother.
“Fuck. Yeah, right. Sorry.”
“It’s fine.”
Will blows smoke into the street and runs the toe of one of sneakers against the concrete, scuffing it up.
Mike starts bouncing back and forth on his heels, some sort of excess energy desperately trying to escape.
“Um. I just- I just meant that I was trying to remember how I felt with her. I don’t- I don’t have any relationship experience outside of that. College hasn’t been exactly… not that I didn’t, um, try. It was just wrong, I guess. I wasn’t feeling the way I was… meant to. I guess.”
“I don’t- I don’t understand. Why did you need to talk to me? Why did you come to New York? We’re not friends. We’re barely…” Will is exhausted. He’s tried to forget and move on from Hawkins. From the things that were done to him and the things he was forced to survive. Jonathan occasionally tries to talk to him, throwing around words like ‘compartmentalization’ and ‘trauma response,’ but watching the rats scurry through the gutters, all Will knows is he’s far too old for the kind of codependency Mike brings.
“I just don’t know what I can do for you. I can’t-”
“I wrote about you.”
What.
“What?”
“For the assignment. The… romance assignment. I wrote about you, Will.”
Will freezes, clenching his jaw, trying to tamp down the panic in his throat.
“I don’t understand. I don’t- what are you saying?”
Mike avoids his eyes, staring off into the distance at something behind Will’s shoulder.
“I stared at my typewriter in my bedroom. Alone. I’m always alone, I guess. And I stared at that painting. Your painting. You- You called me the heart once. And I started to just think. About us. About the way. The way you. Um. Made me feel. It was never.. Jane. No matter how hard I wanted it to be. God, Will. It was never Jane.”
Oh.
Oh.
There it is again. That stupid, dangerous hope. The thing Will has learned to keep under lock and key in the back of his brain. The thing that would kill him if given the chance. Over half a decade later and more than enough lifetimes lived, Will suddenly feels like that lovesick 15-year-old, wide-eyed and wearing his heart on his sleeve.
“You’re being mean, Mike.” Will takes a deep breath and tries to compose himself. “Why are you doing this. Just tell me I’m reading this wrong. You can't… You’re not…don’t do this. Don’t do this to me. Please. You can’t be this cruel.”
Will needs to get out of here, but his feet remain frozen on the sidewalk, forced to bear the weight of the words Mike is stabbing him with. Mike has stopped his incessant fidgeting now, looking right at Will. Stripping him down to his bones. There’s some sort of pain in someone being aware of all his deepest secrets, of those wide brown eyes staring into his soul. The terrifying ordeal of being known.
Mike seems to ignore Will's pleas. “I write you letters. Did you know that? That’s a stupid question. Obviously, you didn’t. I never- I never sent them. But I write you letters. I wrote them when you moved to Lenora, and I write them now. They sit in a box in my room and rot away because they- they spelled out what I was afraid of. What you figured out years ago. What was between us that we couldn’t ever say, couldn’t ever place. And I was too late. I’m always too fucking late for you.”
Mike is almost crying now. He was always a pretty crier. Maybe Will’s just biased.
Will wants Mike to shut up now. He wants to beg him to please stop talking. Stop saying what Will spent most of his formative years daydreaming about, about what he tried to leave years ago in the Midwest, buried under rotten leaves and memories of friendships that blurred the lines between platonic and romantic. The things he thinks about late at night when no one can see him, no one can laugh at Will Byers, the boy who never grew into real man.
He can feel the tears welling up behind his eyes. His face is heating up, and he’s about to break, lay all his cards on the table, where he can’t protect himself or hide how he feels.
“Michael…”
He drops his cigarette, stomping it out with his foot, and presses his palms against his eyelids. He wants to go back to the anger he’s conditioned himself to feel; it’s so much easier than heartbreak and endless ‘what if’s. Hating Mike and hating how he used to feel—how he still feels (as much as he hates to admit it)---is how Will survived the loneliness. Kept himself from lying in bed and choking on his own emotions.
“I messed up, and you always forgave me. I stared at that fucking piece of paper, and I realized I was turning into my father. I was going to fucking die pretending to ignore who I was, playing the role of someone I hated. I thought about you when I wrote. I thought about the way you used to look at me, the way I used to look at you. I realized I wasn’t broken, I was just forcing myself to be someone I wasn’t ever going to be.”
Will drops his hands to look at Mike, fingers twitching at his sides. “You’re not b-”
“I love you. I always loved you. You know that, right? You have to know that.”
Tears start to fall down Will's face. He’s stone cold sober again, hazy smoke and handsome mechanics who don’t know he’s damaged goods now long forgotten.
“I didn’t know that. Fuck. How could I have known that? You stopped touching me. You stopped talking to me. What was I supposed to think?”
Mike clenches and unclenches his fists, looking at Will far too kindly for comfort.
“You’re so much braver than me. You used to call me brave, but I’m not. I’m a coward. I hid from what I was, and I let you leave. You’ll always be better than me. You’re interesting and special and quirky with your art degree and your New York apartment. Just- just let me down easy, okay? I don’t expect you to feel the same anymore, or at all. I know I’m years too late, and I know this is selfish, and I know you hate m-”
Will rushes forward and kisses him.
Mike freezes.
It’s not necessarily a good kiss. It’s more of an aggressive smashing of their faces together. They’re both crying, and the angle is all wrong. Mike’s glasses are digging into Will's cheeks while Will is gripping Mike's face like a lifeline, begging him to understand all the things Will can’t bring himself to say out loud.
Mike continues to stand stock still, not reciprocating.
Will comes to his senses and sharply pulls back. He’s so fucking stupid. He must have misunderstood Mike. Got lost in his own daydreams and unrealistic desires.
No one would ever fucking love Will in the light. Love the boy with the scars and the things he can’t ever talk about. He should have just accepted that boys like him only get loved in the dark. That he’d settle down with someone who knew enough not to ask questions, knowing that deep down there’s something wrong with Will, but never digging too deep or learning too much.
“Oh my god. I’m so sorry. Mike, I’m so sorry, Jesus Christ please-“
Mike grabs him by the shirt and yanks him towards him again. Will’s thoughts come to a halt. He wants to ask questions, and he wants to try and untangle the mess Mike dumped at his feet, but Mike kisses like he’s dying for it, leaning in and gasping like he’s drowning.
Will is just a man, and the boy he could never really stop loving is licking the inside of mouth and yanking his hair.
Will chases after Mike, pushing him back into the metal column behind them, crowding into his space and trapping him despite Mike still being a couple of inches taller. As they grip onto each other, Will is kissed like he’s never been before.
Mike adjusts to hold Will’s neck softly, and something changes. Will tilts his head and loosens his grip into a soft caress, and Mike whimpers softly. The noise around them fades, and Will feels nothing but love. Mike holds him like he’s precious, like he deserves care. Maybe under the crass graffiti and cover of night, Will can start to believe him.
They pull away slowly, lips shiny and wet, thumbs running circles gently across wind-chilled skin. Holding each other, scared that if they let go, one of them might fade away.
“I love you. Of-of course I love you.” Will starts sobbing and takes a watery deep breath, struggling to get the confession out. “I always did. I-I always did. even when I wasn’t supposed to.”
Will sniffles and searches Mike's face for some sort of regret or hatred. He finds only… wonder. God, he looks both so young and so old. He’s a collage of every version of himself Will has ever loved, all meshed together and looking at Will like he hung the moon.
Mike’s twelve and holding Will's hand, protecting him from the ash and shadows coming to take him over. He’s fifteen and pressing his knees against Will's in a cramped van, pretending they aren’t headed for a crash collision. He’s seventeen and smiling softly at Will, Indiana sunlight running through his hair and freckles blooming on his nose. Mike's twenty-one with blotchy red cheeks, saying all the things Will convinced himself he would never hear.
A wave of fear washes over Will. Boys like him don’t get happy endings. They wind up dead, or they wind up alone. Mike crossing state lines to randomly confess his love is too… perfect. It’s not the type of thing that happens to Will. It's something for TV and movies. Something out of reach.
“Please just tell me this is real. I can’t- Please.” He’s still holding onto Mike's face.
“What? I-”
“No one has ever… Just please tell me this is real. That I’m not dreaming or I didn’t drink too much again and pass out. That I’m not going to wake up alone.”
Mike looks heartbroken. His glasses are crooked on his face, his eyes watery and huge, lips kiss-bitten and bruised.
“Of course it’s real. You don’t- you shouldn’t have had to….” He pauses, seeming to search for the right words. Will holds his breath, still waiting for everything to turn sour. “I won’t leave. Long-term I mean. We can finish up school, and we can get an apartment and do all the shit we’re supposed to.”
“I mean…Are you sure?”
“I’ve never really been sure of anything. You should probably be throwing me to the curb for all I’ve done, and- and I’m sorry. For making you wait. I’ll probably spend my whole life trying to make it up to you. But I’m sure of this, Will. I’m sure of, y’know… You. Us.”
Will’s resolve breaks, and he pulls Mike into a bone-crushing hug. God, he forgot how skinny Mike was. He tucks his nose into Mike’s collarbone and pretends like he doesn’t find comfort in the smell of hair gel and Irish Spring.
“You’re wrong, y’know.” The comment comes out a little muffled against the other boy's sweater.
“About making you wait? Cause I’m pretty sure like sixteen ye-”
“No. No, not about that.” Will laughs. It comes out kind of wet and melancholic. “About you being brave. You are. Brave, I mean. It’s not easy to do this sort of thing.”
Mike holds Will's shoulders and rubs circles into his back. “Realize I’m a homosexual at twenty one? Something I should have probably figured out when I dreamed about Harrison Ford every night at fifteen?”
Will had an equal amount of awkward fantasies about Dave Gahan. There’s something comforting about knowing Mike was going through the same amount of embarrassing gay teenage experiences.
Maybe one day he’ll tell Mike about the time he shoplifted a trashy ‘Teen Idol’ magazine from the drug store because it had shirtless Rob Lowe on the cover, and how Jonathan found it later that summer hidden under the mattress in the Wheeler’s basement (Will blamed it on Nancy, stuttering through excuses red in the face while Jonathan pretended to believe him. Jon brought it up a couple of years ago, and in return, Will threatened to tell Nancy about how he used to scratch out the eyes in yearbook photos of Steve Harrington).
“You said it. Not me.”
Mike grins sheepishly. “Well, Harrison Ford and you. Obviously.”
Will steps away from Mike to look him in the face, but still keeps his hands on Mike’s shoulders.
“Even when my mom used to give me that god-awful bowl cut? The one she used actual mixing bowls for?”
Mike shrugs. “Well…Y’know, I always liked Ringo Starr.”
Will gives him a genuine smile. Something it feels like Will hasn’t done in years. It doesn’t matter that his cheeks are red and blotchy, that he’s still crying a bit, that his hair is sweaty, or that there will be things he can never talk about and fears he can never vocalize—Mike loves him regardless.
“Oh my god, shut up.”
Instead of giving Mike the satisfaction that he used to think about him too, spending afternoons imagining the way Mike's curls would feel under his fingertips (there were a concerning number of dreams about pulling them and watching Mike gasp), Will just leans in and kisses him again. He could probably get addicted to the sensation.
Mike cradles his skull, all assurance and love. It feels like coming home. A home that Will never knew existed, but now isn’t sure how he ever lived without.
He and Mike will pull apart eventually, realizing they’re probably breaking some sort of public decency laws, and take the subway heading towards Will's apartment (He’ll try to show Mike how to jump the turnstiles, and Mike will subsequently topple over and scrape his knee somehow). They’ll both be looking at each other, pretending they aren’t, lovesick and hopeful; the city, somehow saturated and colorful even under the early morning drizzle.
Both boys will have to learn how to be in a relationship with someone they can actually love, stumbling through petty fights and memories they wish they didn’t share. It’s almost poetic that they have each other, both too fucked up for anyone else. Weeks from now, they’ll have to actually make a decision about their future. Mike is still living in Indiana, and Will would rather die than move back there, but they’ll figure it out. They always do. Though tonight belongs to sleepy daydreams and quiet comfort.
Amelia will eventually come home, holding her high heels in one hand and shoving the door open with the other. She’ll check in Will's room, hoping he got home safe, last seeing him bust out of the bar like he’d seen a ghost. He’ll be wrapped around a boy she vaguely recognizes from faded photographs and mindless sketches, clothes still on, lying peacefully on top of the twin bed’s covers. She’ll watch as Will pulls him closer and buries his nose in the black-haired boy's neck, something between them she can’t quite place. Real. Pure?
Who knows. Maybe people like them do get happy endings after all.