Chapter Text
Mike’s knee has been pressed against his for the past forty-five minutes.
Neither of them has mentioned it, though he supposes there’s not much to say. They’re cramped, is all, crowded around the makeshift bonfire, Lucas and Max on one side and Mike and him on the other.
It’s a pitiful excuse for a fire, in all honesty. The flame keeps struggling, burning low, and there’s so much smoke it’s starting to make his eyes sting. They probably would’ve had more success if any of them were Boy Scouts as kids. Or if Dustin were here. Alas, none of them were Scouts, and Dustin is off who-knows-where doing who-knows-what with Steve, so they’ve been made to improvise.
He’s the only one who seems to notice or care about the dwindling fire. Across the way, Lucas and Max are rather preoccupied, murmuring to each other before breaking into giggles.
Behind them, some Hot 100 song is blaring from the boombox Lucas lugged out. The Bangles, maybe? Whatever it is, it’s making his head hurt, the bass rattling the ground.
They’re all starting to veer past tipsy, just shy of genuinely intoxicated. It was nice at first, the beer making his brain pleasantly fuzzy and his limbs lighter than usual, but now it’s more of a nuisance than anything. He’s never been a very happy drunk. He’s never been one for drinking at all, really, but the others like it, and he doesn’t particularly want to be the odd one out if he can avoid it, so here he is.
Lucas and Max are both clingy drunks. It had been a surprise the first time they all drank together, armed with a bottle of cheap vodka from Steve for Dustin’s birthday, but in retrospect, it makes sense. Or maybe he’s just gotten used to it. Either way, they’re all over each other, their heads tipped together and her legs slung over his lap.
It makes him feel like a third wheel, which is ridiculous, considering Mike’s here too. Right here, in fact. Has he mentioned how close Mike is sitting?
It’s hot out, spring already giving way to summer. Between the fire, the alcohol, and Mike’s inescapable body heat, Will’s half-afraid he might melt into a puddle of sweat and Will-goo at any given moment. He narrowly avoids this fate, despite all odds, but he’s still hyperaware of the warmth at his side, creeping under his skin.
It’s radiating from Mike’s very being, concentrated where their thighs are squished together. They’re probably sitting closer than strictly necessary, now that he thinks about it, but he can’t find it in himself to draw attention to it. Mike doesn’t seem to mind anyway, blissfully sliding two more marshmallows onto his skewer.
“So I have this idea for a new campaign, but I can’t figure out if it’s good or not. Or if it even makes any sense—”
The thing is, for all that Lucas and Max get clingy when they drink, Mike gets talkative.
“—but what if the whole Party starts out under some kind of spell? Like, we’re all just going through the motions, and everything is a little too perfect—”
More so than usual, anyway. He’s always been a chatterbox, happy to prattle on to anyone who’ll listen, but it’s even worse when he’s buzzed. Or better, depending on who you ask.
“—and we figure out that we’re actually being controlled by this evil wizard who has us in a trance so that he can use our bodies to—”
He can’t help but find it endearing. There’s very little about Mike that he doesn’t find endearing, no matter how hard he tries.
“—but then, stay with me here, it turns out that even that’s part of a rouse, and the whole thing is being secretly orchestrated by these two twin warlocks who are controlling everything, like in the Wizard of Oz—”
It’s nostalgic, he thinks.
The way Mike barely seems to breathe between sentences, hopping from one idea to the next like he’s afraid he’ll lose his train of thought if he slows down. Most of it doesn’t even matter; he talks about his next campaign for a while, and then goes on a tangent about a movie he watched with Holly last week. It eventually circles back to the campaign again, picking apart mechanics he hasn’t finalized yet, arguing with himself over details he’ll probably change anyway.
Will lets it all wash over him. He doesn’t need to catch every detail, and he doesn’t try. It’s enough to just listen.
It pokes at the sentimental part of him. Sitting criss-cross applesauce on Mike’s bedroom floor, a mess of dice and figurines scattered between them. Mike leaning forward, eyes bright, hands a blur as he talks, spinning entire worlds out of thin air. Will would sit there for hours, chin in his hands, just watching. Letting himself get carried along wherever Mike wanted to go.
Back then, it felt like magic. It still kind of does, if he’s honest with himself. A storyteller, through and through.
He feels tired all of a sudden. The cicadas have already moved in for the season, and their incessant chirping makes it feel later than it actually is. He lets himself lean back, hands flat against the dirt, and look up at the night sky. The trees partially obstruct it, but he can still see the crescent moon poking through the branches.
It’s gonna be one of those nights.
Those nights. They’re becoming more frequent now that school’s out and graduation’s done with, all of them left to their own devices for three more months before everything changes for good.
The thing about those nights is that they should be great, in theory. And they are. All or most of them together, laughing like they’re kids again. Not a worry in the world past who’s gonna pack up the cooler or whose place they’re crashing at for the night.
It’s those nights, nights like these, that make him sit back and think: This is it. This is what he’s going to remember.
It always hits him in these random moments, smack in the middle of an otherwise innocuous night. He’ll be laughing at something Mike said, watching Lucas shove at Max while she pretends to be annoyed, and it feels like he’s already looking back on it. Like it’s over, and he’s already missing it.
It reminds him of that one ABBA song that always makes his mom tear up when it comes on the radio. Like the very best parts are slipping through his fingers, and he has to work to capture every detail in his mind’s eye. It’s not unlike the feeling of impending doom, like they’re all seconds—or months—away from total catastrophe.
Three months and four days, to be exact. In three months and four days, he’s going to pack his entire life up in the trunk of his mom’s old Ford Pinto, cram himself into the passenger seat, and set off for New York City to meet Jonathan. It’s a very thorough plan.
Step 1: Move to New York. Step 2: Start art school. Step 3: ???.
Which is to say he has no idea what he’s doing. He has concepts of a plan, or at least concepts of how a plan should go. But every time he tries to imagine it, tries to imagine a version of himself away from Hawkins and all of its ghosts for good, he comes up empty.
“Hey. Hey.” A nudge to his knee. “Will.”
He blinks himself out of his reverie, eyes darting up to Mike’s face. Mike peers down at him, eyebrows raised.
“Have you been listening at all?” Mike asks lightly. His voice is hushed, like they’re sharing a secret over the crackling of the fire.
“Yeah,” he lies, matching his whisper. “Of course.”
Mike doesn’t look like he quite believes him, but he doesn’t push. Instead, he holds out his hand, seeming very proud of himself.
“Your s’more, good sir,” he announces. His British accent is horrible. “Just how you like it. Double chocolate, extra toasty.”
Will eyes him warily. “Why are you British?”
“Why aren’t you taking the s’more?”
Will rolls his eyes but is otherwise unable to hold back his fond smile. He gives in and takes the offered s’more.
“You don’t have to keep making these for me,” he says, talking through a mouthful of marshmallow. It’s perfect. “I can do it myself.”
“Uh, yes, I do.” Mike furrows his brow. He’s already lost the British accent. “You hate getting close to the fire.”
Warmth spreads through his chest, hotter than anything the fire could drum up. He can feel it from his fingers to his toes.
He stuffs the rest of the s’more in his mouth in lieu of an answer. Mike beams at him as he gets to work, sticking another round of marshmallows onto his skewer.
That’s the other thing about those nights. The Mike thing. Or, well, the not being able to stop thinking about Mike thing.
If he’s being honest, there are a plethora of reasons his half-baked life plan is doomed to fail. The Mike thing is just the most apparent.
It’s stupid. Embarrassing, even, how much of the whole thing hinges on the one, singular detail he can’t seem to account for. He tries, sometimes, to imagine it properly—to picture a version of his life where Mike is just a voice over the phone, or a name signed in a letter. Someone he used to know. It just never seems to stick.
Because what does that even look like? Now that he has him back, he can’t imagine a version of his life without Mike in it. A version of his life where Mike isn’t there, talking too much and too fast, dragging him into whatever stupid idea he’s come up with next. Where there isn’t a constant, familiar presence at his side, warm and solid and—
Will swallows, licking the remaining chocolate from the corner of his mouth. He picks his abandoned beer up out of the dirt and takes a long swig, wincing. Tastes like piss.
It’s like trying to build a house without a foundation and just hoping it won’t collapse in on itself. Except the house is on the beach, and it’s hurricane season, and there’s a storm surge warning coming over the radio. It eventually floods floor to ceiling and gets washed away with the tide. Doomed to fail, like he said.
He thinks back to Lenora and how his entire life felt like it had been reduced to a pile of rubble without Mike. If El hadn’t been there, he wouldn't have survived it. Now that she’s gone, there’s no way he could handle losing Mike, too.
He likes to think of his love for Mike as something that grew up alongside them. It feels more poetic that way, less like the stubborn and hopeless thing it actually is. But it’s true. He’s always loved Mike. It’s changed shape over the years, sure, but he’s always loved him just the same.
He can ignore it sometimes. He can tell himself that time will heal it over into something manageable, something that fits more neatly into the life he’s trying to build for himself. But even in those moments, there’s a part of him that knows better. Trying to imagine a version of himself that doesn’t love Mike is like trying to imagine living a life without oxygen. Inconceivable, pointless, vain, etc.
There’s no Will without Mike. Simple as that.
Wordlessly, Mike hands him another s’more, double chocolate, extra toasty. He waits for him to take a bite before he starts talking again, leaning down to whisper directly into his ear this time:
“How long before they make up some half-assed excuse to go make out in Lucas’s car?”
He looks back across the fire to find Lucas and Max somehow closer than before, practically canoodling right there on the forest floor. Another gulp of piss-beer.
“Ten minutes, at most,” he whispers back.
“Ambitious.” Will can feel Mike’s grin against the shell of his ear. He barely holds back a shiver. “I give ‘em five.”
They share a grin, both of them bursting into a fit of tipsy giggles.
“Wanna share with the class, Wheeler?” Max’s voice cuts through the billowing smoke.
Mike pulls back, but not nearly as far as he probably should. He shrugs. “Nothing.”
Lucas grins. “Yeah, sure looks like nothing.”
“Mind your business,” Mike shoots back, waving him off with his skewer.
“You’re sitting three feet away from us,” Max points out. “Everything you do is our business.”
Will ducks his head, hiding his smile behind another bite of s’more, though it does little to stop the warmth creeping up his neck. He can still feel the ghost of Mike’s breath against his ear.
“Okay, fine,” Mike says, leaning back. “We’re just placing bets.”
“Bets? On what?”
Mike glances sideways at Will, eyes bright and conspiratorial. “How long before you ditch us.”
Lucas makes an affronted noise. “Uh, hello. Rude.”
“Realistic,” Mike counters. He gestures at Max draped over his lap. “You’re already halfway out the door.”
“We can’t help that we’re so in love,” Max coos exaggeratedly, grabbing Lucas’s face and making kissy faces in the air. “Don’t be bitter.”
“Bitter?” Mike squawks. Leave it to Max to know just how to get on Mike’s nerves. Pot, meet kettle, and all that.
“If the shoe fits.”
Mike flails so dramatically that Will has to dodge his stray skewer. He meets Lucas’s eye across the fire, and they share a solemn look of camaraderie.
“I’m simply acknowledging that you two are, like, point five seconds away from sucking each other’s faces off! I’m using my eyes!”
Max screws her face up. “Don’t be gross.”
“Me?” Mike exclaims. “You guys have been all over each other all night!”
“God forbid,” Lucas says flatly.
Max hums, entirely unbothered, and tucks herself in closer anyway. Lucas says something under his breath that makes her snort, their heads knocking together.
“See? This is exactly what I’m talking about.”
Max grins wolfishly. “You’re just jealous,” she sing-songs.
“I’m not jealous.” Mike scowls. “Get real.”
“What are you, then?”
“Being subjected to medieval torture.”
Will downs the rest of his beer in one go.
“Then stop watching!”
“I can’t help it!”
“Creep,” Max accuses.
“Victim,” Mike corrects.
Will looks down at his hands. The chocolate’s started to melt, sticky on his fingers. Absently, he brings his hand up to his mouth and licks it off.
When he looks up, Lucas and Max are back to their canoodling. Mike, on the other hand, is eerily silent.
He glances to his side, startled to find Mike’s eyes already on him. Or, more specifically, his mouth.
“Do I have chocolate all over my face?” How humiliating.
"Uh, no.” Mike shakes his head, swallowing. “No, sorry. I was just… um, do you want another s’more?”
Oh, he’s too sweet. Will finds himself agreeing automatically, just to see Mike’s pleased smile again.
Mike busies himself with that, going back to his rambling. The heat from the fire is making his skin flush a nice shade of pink. “Seriously, though,” he’s saying, “it is pretty gross.”
“Mm,” Will hums noncommittally. Hands now clean, he leans back again, gazing up at the moon.
“Like, good for them. They deserve to be happy or whatever. But we’re right here, you know?”
Just to provoke him, Will asks, “What do you mean?”
Mike gestures wildly. “Look at them!”
Will follows his line of sight, even though he doesn’t need to. Lucas says something into the space between the two of them, and Max smiles a soft smile meant just for him. They share a sweet-looking kiss.
Will averts his eyes, feeling like an intruder. He watches Mike methodically roast his marshmallow instead, turning it in perfect intervals.
“Yeah,” he whispers. “Gross.”
He gets it. Lucas and Max have been more affectionate lately, and he can’t blame them. They survived the end of the world, high school is finally over, and they’re about to start their lives together in Boston. He’s sure he’d be just as bad—if not worse—in their position. Still, it is a lot.
He doesn’t mind it for the reasons Mike does, though. Mike can be kind of childish about the whole thing, like a kid sticking his tongue out at his parents kissing. It’s different for Will.
Will would kill to have that. To have someone to be gross with.
His head starts to feel overly full and cottony the more he thinks about it. He probably shouldn’t have finished that last beer so fast. Or the one before that.
He risks another glance at Mike. He looks ethereal in the glow of the fire. It casts his pale skin in this orangey, pinkish hue, painting him like a sunset. He’s laser-focused on making Will’s s’more, tongue sticking out. It makes a swarm of butterflies erupt in Will’s stomach.
Mike is too good to him. Too thoughtful, too attentive. He always has been, in his own Mike way, but it’s only grown more pronounced in the aftermath of everything, now that he doesn’t have El to fret over.
Suddenly, the butterflies feel more like a rolling tide.
He stands abruptly on shaky legs, his stomach turning.
“Will?” Mike looks up, alarmed, free hand shooting out to try and steady him. In the background, Will hears Lucas and Max’s murmuring go quiet.
Will waves his hands, backing up. He feels green.
“Will?” Lucas asks. “You good, man?”
No, he's not. He’s about to hurl. He’s about to grab Mike Wheeler and plant a fat kiss right on his lips, and then throw himself into the fire.
“Sorry,” he croaks. He needs to get out of here before he blows chunks. Or, worse, bursts into drunken tears. “I need to piss.”
With that, he stumbles away, ignoring the concerned voices of his friends behind him.
☁︎☁︎☁︎
After narrowly avoiding multiple tripping hazards, he finds himself on the shore of Lover’s Lake.
The lake stretches out in front of him, dark and glassy under the weak spill of moonlight. The water’s calm tonight, barely crashing against the rocky shore. It feels antithetical to the storm waging in his chest, but it makes for a pretty sight.
The sounds of the others have faded completely, leaving nothing but the soft push and pull of the lake. The air is cooler over here, too. It helps a little, but not enough to fully bring him back into himself. The beer is still weighing down his limbs, making him feel sluggish.
He lets out a long breath and keeps walking until his shoes hit the edge of damp sand, where the ground changes texture under him.
Lover’s Lake. Ironic, he thinks, looking out at the water. He steps closer still, until the small waves are brushing up against his sneakers and the sand turns to gravel.
He and Lover’s Lake have a long and somewhat tumultuous history. As a kid, he used to come here with Jonathan and Mike to splash around in his floaties and chow down on turkey sandwiches. Now, after all the crap with the tunnels and the Upside Down, he’ll admit his memories are less than fond. They’re trying to change that, though. They’ve been coming out here when they can, taking advantage of the early summer weather to dive off the abandoned docks and burn themselves to a crisp. It’s been… fun.
He’s never really paid attention to the name. It’s a bit of a double entendre, he knows. The lake’s just as much named for its distinctive heart shape as it is for its reputation, long known as the pilgrimage site for Hawkins’ young and horny. Not that Will has any experience with that.
He snorts under his breath, nudging a loose stone into the water with the toe of his shoe. The ripples spread out in uneven rings, distorting the reflection of the moon.
He knows he’s bitter. It’s not a proud feeling. It’s kind of awful, actually, like bile rising up his throat.
What does he have to be bitter about, anyway?
He’s alive. He’s alive, and Jonathan’s alive, and his mom is alive, and all of them somehow made it out the other side of everything horrible that’s happened to them.
Not everyone had been so lucky.
He’s alive, and he’s okay, most of the time. He should be grateful. Instead, he’s out here drowning his sorrows in piss-beer and feeling bad for himself. All because stupid Mike Wheeler doesn’t like him back.
He presses his lips together, watching the water lap at the shore. It sounds so small when he thinks of it like that. Petty, even. It shouldn’t even register on the scale of things that actually matter. But it matters to him. It matters so much.
People died, and he’s… what? Sad? Jealous? Over something he’s always known was a shot in the dark? Over his dead sister’s ex-boyfriend?
He feels like he might be sick again. Shakily, he plops down onto the rocky shore, letting the lake water soak through his jeans.
It’s not like Mike’s even done anything wrong. He’s oblivious, maybe. Thoughtless, sometimes, sure. But he’s good, and kind, and so painfully devoted that Will can’t bring himself to be mad about anything he does for long.
Distractedly, he picks up a stray rock, rolling it in his palm. It’s jagged, sharp edges digging into his skin, but he doesn’t mind the sting.
He was supposed to be over this by now. He promised himself, when everything went down, that he wasn’t going to entertain this anymore. He was going to tear it out by the roots and leave nothing behind but churned-up dirt, killing it off in one fell swoop.
Except it doesn’t work like that. Not when it’s already grown around everything else he has.
He used to imagine how it would feel to be rid of it once and for all. A pesky weed pulled clean from soft soil.
He squeezes the rock in his hand, relishing in the burn. Then, in a fit of temper, he chucks it into the water, watching it sink. He’s heaving, chest rising and falling too fast.
It’s never felt like that, not even close. Honestly, trying to get over Mike has always felt more like digging. Getting dirt under his nails and still not being able to find the end of it, no matter how hard he pulls. There’s always more of it just beneath the surface, always something still holding on for dear life, too tangled up in everything else to uproot without taking part of himself with it.
He picks up another stone, this one round and smooth. It still stings when he rolls it in his palm, pressing into the cuts left by the last one. He throws it sidearm this time, watching it skip over the surface of the water.
He doesn’t even realize he’s crying until he tastes the salt. Hot tears run down his cheeks, blurring his vision. More bile. Another stone. Plop, plop, plop.
He might be the worst person in the world, he thinks. Like, the actual most evil person alive. The most selfish, at least.
God. This is why he hates drinking. Bile. Stone. Plop, plop, plop.
He doesn’t know how long he’s out there, silently sobbing and mindlessly tossing rocks across the water. Eventually, he feels less like he’s about to puke and more like he’s going to freeze to death. He briefly contemplates going back to the fire, if only to get his stuff and go home, but a rustle from the trees beats him to it.
“Will!”
Jesus. He hastily wipes his eyes, as if it’s going to do anything about the blotchy, tear-streaked mess of his face.
“Hey!” Mike’s voice is closer now, gravel crunching under his shoes as he jogs the last few steps down to the shore. “There you are. Dude, you just, like, took off. Are you okay?”
Will sniffs hard, scrubbing at his face again for good measure before he risks looking up. “Yeah. Yeah, I’m fine. Sorry,” he snuffles, cursing the way his voice cracks halfway through.
Mike stops a few feet in front of him, obviously not sure whether he’s allowed to come closer or not. “Yeah, you look it,” he says wryly.
The water laps at the shore. Will shrugs, staring resolutely at the lake instead of at him. “Just needed some air.”
“Okay…” Mike trails off, kicking at the gravel. “Cool. Yeah. Air’s good.”
There’s the sound of shifting rocks, and then Mike is sitting down next to him, close enough that their shoulders brush.
For a long moment, neither of them says anything. The silence stretches, filled only by the slosh of the water.
“You’re gonna get hypothermia or something,” Mike says eventually, glancing down at Will’s soaked jeans. “You’re literally sitting in the lake.”
Will lets out a weak laugh. “It’s not that cold.”
“It’s pretty cold,” Mike argues, cracking a small smile. “I’m sitting in it too.”
Will shrugs.
Mike nudges his knee lightly with his own. “You’re shivering, Will.”
He goes to argue, but he’s shivering again before he has a chance. Damn.
Before Will can protest, Mike tugs at the hem of his sweater, pulling it up and over his head in one quick motion.
“What are you…?”
“Put this on,” Mike says, holding it out to him.
Will stares at it for a second, then up at Mike, sitting there in just his t-shirt.
“I’m fine,” Will says weakly.
“Dude,” Mike snorts, pushing the sweater closer. “You’re shaking. C’mon.”
“Mike.”
“Will.” His tone brooks no argument.
Will exhales shakily, shoulders slumping as he relents, taking the sweater from him.
“Thanks,” he mutters, not quite meeting Mike’s eyes as he pulls it over his head, the sleeves a little too long, the collar stretching awkwardly around his shoulders.
Mike watches him the whole time. “Better?” he asks.
Will nods. “Yeah,” he whispers. “Yeah, it’s—it’s good.”
Mike hums, satisfied, and shifts back a little, bracing his hands behind him in the gravel.
“Now,” he says. “Tell me what’s going on?”
Will sighs, picking up another stone. He and Mike both watch it plop, plop, plop across the lake. “Nothing.”
“Will.”
“I said I’m fine.”
Mike lets out a slow breath through his nose, obviously trying very hard not to get frustrated. “Okay, but you’re obviously not.”
“Wow, really?” Will laughs, his own frustration bubbling over in his chest before he can stomp it down. Mike just never knows when to quit. “What gave it away?”
Mike blinks at him, taken aback.
“Sorry!” Will squeaks immediately, guilt flaring hot in his chest. What’s gotten into him? “Sorry, I didn’t mean—”
“It’s okay,” Mike interrupts, mouth screwed up sympathetically. “You’re drunk, Will. I get it.”
“Yeah,” Will admits. Just like that, the anger’s given way to sadness, and he feels like crying all over again. “I am.”
Mike shifts closer. “Did something happen?” he asks. “With Max and Lucas, or…?”
“No.” Will shakes his head. “No, they’re fine.”
“Okay,” Mike says quietly. “Then what?”
It’s a valiant effort to keep everything from spilling out then and there. He drags his feet for a moment, unsure where to start, before settling on:
“I guess things have just been weird lately.”
Mike frowns. “Weird how?”
Will shrugs, picking at the hem of Mike’s sweater sleeve. “Just… us. I guess.”
“Us?” Mike sounds surprised.
“Yeah,” Will laughs, embarrassed. “I mean, we’ve been hanging out a lot.”
They have. They’re all pairing off, now that school’s finally over. Lucas and Max, inseparable. Dustin with Steve, wherever the hell they are at any given moment. Jonathan already gone, building something new in New York.
And Mike, stuck with him.
“Yeah,” Mike agrees. When Will looks over, he’s worrying his bottom lip between his teeth. “I thought it was good. You know, us hanging out again.”
“It is!” Will insists, waving his hands. “It’s really good. Really good.”
It’s been amazing, actually. If he closes his eyes, it’s almost like they’re kids again. Mike the Brave and Will the Wise, best friends forever. Nothing bad has ever happened to them.
But then he remembers all it took to get here, and all they lost in the process. Who they lost, and who he’s stealing from. It’s a gut-wrenching kind of guilt.
“I don’t see the problem, then,” Mike admits.
“That is the problem!”
Mike looks so earnestly confused. “How?”
“Because… because…” he stammers, and then slumps, frustrated. “I don’t know. It feels like I finally have you back.”
Mike’s brows pinch together. Will wants to kiss him so bad. He digs his nails into the cuts on his palm instead.
“And I shouldn’t,” he continues, words picking up speed now that they’ve started. He sounds a little like he’s crying. “I don’t deserve that. Not like this.”
“What are you talking about?”
Will laughs, almost hysterically. “You know what I mean, Mike!”
“I don’t,” Mike says helplessly. “You have to explain it to me.”
“Mike,” he pleads. He’s crying in earnest, now, vision blurring again. He hates drinking. He hates Mike, he thinks. He hates himself.
Silently, Mike wraps an arm around his shoulders, tucking him into his side. He shushes him, rubbing circles on his back until Will’s calmed down some, sniffling against his chest.
“Do you remember that day back at the Squawk?” Will whispers once he finds his words, still blinking rapidly. “Before… you know.”
Mike’s hand slows to a stop on the small of his back. “Yeah,” he murmurs. His voice has gone cautious, and Will doesn’t know what that means. “‘Course I do.”
He takes a deep breath, then rips off the band-aid. “I lied.”
An understatement, probably, but it’ll have to do.
“You… lied?”
“Yeah.” He nods into Mike’s chest. “I lied.”
Mike nudges at his chin, coaxing him to look up. He’s even more devastating in the moonlight than he was by the fire. “What do you mean?”
“I never really got over you.” Will laughs, a hollow sound. “Um. You were never just a crush, or whatever.”
Mike goes stock-still next to him.
“I mean, the rest was obviously true,” Will clarifies quickly, “I don’t like girls. And, uh, I know you aren’t like me. And trust me, I’ve tried so, so hard to get over it. Like, so hard. I tried to just turn it off. Like it was a switch, and I could just decide I didn’t feel like that anymore, and that would be the end of it. But it doesn’t work like that, it never—”
“Hey, hey,” Mike cuts in, a hand coming up to cradle the back of Will’s head. “Slow down.”
“I can’t!” Will shakes his head jerkily. “I can’t. It keeps getting worse, and you’re always here now, and you’re so nice to me, and you sit too close, and you give me your stupid sweater, and I don’t know what to do, Mike.”
Mike lets him talk, going back to rubbing circles into his back.
Will swallows hard. “I’m trying so hard not to mess anything up. I know you don’t feel the same, and that’s fine. It’s fine! I just don’t know what to do. I finally have my best friend back, and here I am… taking advantage of you. And not only that, I’m taking her place!”
“Will,” Mike’s voice is firm now. He pulls back just enough to look at him properly. “Hey. Look at me.”
He doesn’t want to, but he does anyway. Mike’s still beautiful, even with his brow furrowed and his bottom lip jutted out, looking oddly close to tears himself.
“You’re not taking anyone’s place, Will.”
He couldn’t if he tried, Will thinks bitterly. Not in the way he really wants. God, he’s the worst.
“I know,” he whispers. “I know that logically, but it still feels like I’m benefiting from it, or something. And that makes me feel awful.”
Mike makes a wounded noise.
“It hurts,” Will confesses, the alcohol stripping away his usual filter. “Like, all the time. It hurts so bad, and I don’t know how to make it stop.”
Mike’s gaze softens. “Will…”
“We’re all leaving soon,” Will croaks, mind racing now. “It’s only a few months now. I’m moving to New York, and I’m going to have to start over completely, and I’m gonna have gone my entire life without ever even…”
He laughs weakly, scrubbing at his face with the sleeve of Mike’s sweater.
Mike tilts his head. “Without ever even what?”
Will runs a hand through his hair, feeling unmoored. He picks up a rock and puts it back down.
His voice wobbles, “I’ve never even been kissed, Mike.”
“Oh, Will,” Mike murmurs. His voice is too soft. It makes that bile-y, bitter feeling rise up his throat again, makes him want to push back. “There are plenty of people our age who haven’t had their first kiss.”
“Yeah, okay,” Will snorts. “Says the guy who has.”
There’s a smile in Mike’s voice. “Well, now you’re just being difficult.”
Another rock. He tosses this one, watching it skim the water. Then he untangles himself from Mike’s arms, ignoring his protests, and stands.
“I’m serious, Mike,” he huffs. He’s pacing now, gravel crunching underfoot. “I mean, just for a second, can you put yourself in my shoes? Imagine how it feels to watch everyone you know fall in love while you just sit on the sidelines?”
Mike blinks, the humor falling from his face. He stands, too, but Will doesn’t look him in the face, can’t bear to see the pity there.
“I just don’t think it’ll ever happen for me,” he admits, sneakers sloshing in the shallow water. Jesus, he sounds like a child. “The love thing.”
“What?” Mike asks incredulously. He grabs Will’s arms, forcing him to stay put. “You can’t be serious.”
“Do I look like I’m joking?”
Mike laughs. “Will. Will. Come on. Do you hear yourself?”
He bristles. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
“It means you’re eighteen years old,” Mike emphasizes, bending down until he’s eye level. “You have your entire life to swap spit with all the hottest guys New York has to offer. And you have plenty of people who love you.”
“You know it’s not the same.” He's gotten snot all over Mike’s sweater, which is mortifying, but he wrenches his arm out of Mike's hold to wipe his face anyway. “I know I have people who love me. Mom, Jonathan. Hopper. You guys. And it means so much to me. But I… I want…”
“I know,” Mike murmurs. “And you deserve everything you want. Everything. You know that, don’t you?”
Lots of bile. Bitter and hot and furious, all of a sudden. He’s gonna find the biggest rock on the shore and use it to bash in Mike’s perfect face. He’s gonna flop on his stomach and drown himself in the five inches of water they’re standing in.
In a feat of stellar self-control, he does neither of these things. “Why are you so nice to me?” he whimpers instead, well-aware of how pathetic he sounds.
He doesn’t understand it. How Mike can see him like this, snot-faced and sullen, airing out years-old grievances, and still treat him so kindly.
“Why would I be anything but nice to you?” Mike sounds amused, almost, running his thumb up and down Will’s wrists.
“Because it makes me feel stupid,” he says feebly, unable to meet his eye.
“What? How?”
“You say all these nice things to me, you do all this stuff you don’t do for anyone else. Even now,” he hiccups, “you’re still being so nice. It makes me feel stupid.”
“Hey. You are not stupid,” Mike insists vehemently. He hesitates, then reaches up and wipes a tear from Will’s cheek. “You’re drunk, Will. Not stupid.”
Will sniffles again, finally meeting his gaze. It only makes it worse, tears spilling over faster than Mike can brush them away.
Mike’s face is unbearably tender. His eyes are wide and glassy, his mouth pulled into a soft frown. It makes Will’s heart hurt.
“But I always feel like this,” he says miserably. “All the time.”
“Will…”
“I do,” he insists, voice wavering. “It’s all the time. It doesn’t go away.”
Mike looks helpless, mouth hanging open.
“What do you need from me?” he asks eventually, sounding desperate. “How can I help?”
And that’s when Will gets an idea. A terrible, horrible, no good, very bad idea. He knows he shouldn’t. He shouldn’t, but he does anyway.
“Would you kiss me?” he asks, voice small. His pulse roars in his ears.
For a long moment, Mike just stares at him, stunned. Finally, he chokes out a bewildered, “What?”
More bile. Still, he doubles down. “Just once,” he reasons. “Just so I can know how it feels. So I have something to remember.”
Mike’s hand stills on his cheek, cupping his face. It takes everything in him not to lean into the touch. “I don’t know if that’s a good idea.”
“Please,” Will whispers. He thought he was above begging, but he’s learning a lot of new things about himself tonight. Including his apparent inability to hold his liquor. “So I can finally get over this.”
“Will, you’re drunk,” Mike says, shaking his head. “Really drunk. I can’t… this isn’t…”
More bile. A lot of bile, actually, bubbling up the back of his throat. Just one kiss. All he needs is one kiss, and then he can put this behind him.
“I won’t tell anyone,” he pleads. “We can pretend it never even happened.”
Mike exhales shakily, like the air’s been knocked out of his lungs. His thumb brushes just beneath Will’s eye, catching the moisture there. “You don’t want that,” he says, but there’s no conviction to it. “Not like this.”
“I do,” Will insists, even as his stomach lurches again. “I really do. I need something to make it stop.”
Mike hesitates, gaze flickering up and down uncertainly.
“Will…” he gulps.
Will’s breath hitches, and Mike’s eyes fall to his mouth again. He finds himself instinctively leaning up, heart in his throat. Then he gags.
“Oh, God,” he splutters, shoving at Mike’s chest.
He staggers backwards into the bushes, hand flying to his mouth. Heaving loudly, he bowls over, bracing his hands on his wet jeans.
Without further ceremony, he pukes all over his shoes.