Chapter Text
Mike had left not long after Dustin’s mom had arrived, heading to his own house to get a backpack to then ride to Will’s.
Him and Dustin had silently agreed to him going alone to Will both for possibly confessing reasons and so Dustin could keep Lucas preoccupied.
He paused when he got to his room. He shook his head and grabbed the pack of hidden letters, putting them in the backpack along with his walkie and keys to the house.
On his ride over to the Bylers he started plotting how to tell El, so he could keep his mind off of Will for a bit.
There wasn't a single scenario he could imagine in which El yelled at him or something of the sort but he could definitely picture her walking away from him, all disgusted.
He was so deep in thought, he almost crashed his bike against a tree... now that would've been embarrassing to explain.
Nonetheless, he kept biking and soon enough he reached his destination.
He took a shaky breath and mounted off of his bike, chaining it to part of the fence.
He then walked up to the door and knocked.
In a matter of minutes, the door swung open. Jonathan standing in front of him. Not who he wanted but probably for the best, that way he didn't have to explain to Will why he needed a second alone with El (and he was certainly glad it wasn't Hopper).
"Uh, hi, Mike. I didn't know you were coming over," he moved aside and Mike walked in.
"Hey, yeah, Will asked if I could come since he's on house arrest."
Jonathan rolled his eyes, "Yeah, don't get me started. He gave us a heart attack this morning."
"I bet."
"Well, uh, go ahead. He's in his room."
"Actually, before I see him there's... there's something I need to go over with El first. It's for a... school thing, so," he trailed off.
"Right," the look he gave Mike told him the older boy knew it was a lie. "She's in the backyard."
"Cool, thanks."
He headed towards the back door in the kitchen and immediately spotted her.
It seemed like she was trying to plant some flowers but he wasn't sure she was succeeding, at least from the looks of it.
"Hey, El!"
She raised her head and smiled when she noticed him, "Mike! Hi! How are you? What are you doing here?"
"I'm good, thanks. I'm here to- well, I was actually here to see Will but I wanted to see you first 'cause there's something I wanted to tell you."
She tilted her head in confusion, "Okay?"
He walked up to her and crouched so he was at her same level, "Nice, uh, farming. Or maybe just planting, I guess. But yeah, uh, looks... good."
She gave him a look that instantly reminded him of Will, "Friends don't lie."
He chuckled, "Right, sorry. Yeah, no, that looks kinda bad, El."
"It does," they both laughed. "I'm still new at this. Joyce and dad say it takes time."
He nodded, "Of course. Most things do."
She kept gardening, "What did you want to tell me?"
"Well, uh, I was talking to the boys before, except for Will and I'll tell him too but thought I'd tell you first. So, uh, like I did with them, I guess I'll just rip off the band-aid an-"
"Rip off the band-aid?" She repeated and looked him up and down, "Did you get hurt? I don't see any band-aid."
"Wha- oh, no, sorry. It's an expression. I'm fine. Ripping off a band-aid just means not beating around the bush?"
She opened her mouth but he interjected her, "Which I now realise is another expression you probably haven't heard of."
She shook her head.
“There’s also this song? From like ten years ago? AC/DC?”
She shook her head again.
"Right, okay. The first one-"
"Ripping the band-aid."
"Ripping off the band-aid, yes, means like... when you know something is going to be painful so you try to get it done quickly so as to not let the hurt continue for a long period of time. If you try to get a band-aid off slowly, it'll hurt. But if you rip it quickly-"
"It will still hurt but less," she smiled.
"Exactly! And beating around the bush means, uh, okay so, when you beat around a bush you're doing the opposite. You're basically prolonging something that could be done faster."
"Why?"
"Well, when someone does that it means they're usually too afraid or uncomfortable saying or doing something quickly and directly so they try to do it slowly and not so directly but that ends up making it more awkward and longer and therefore kinda worst."
"Oh, okay," she nodded. "Don't do that."
"Yeah, no, so," he cleared his throat, "here it goes, I guess."
She waited.
"You can," he gestured to the ground, "go back to gardening while we talk, if you want."
"Cool," she turned away and started working again.
The whole scene reminded him a bit of when he just sits and watches Will drawing.
The more he thought about it, the more it all made sense.
He still found El really pretty, and she randomly shared a lot of traits with Will (brown eyes, brunettes, kind smile), but looking at her now... even with the sun shining on the two of them and painting her silhouette golden... it just didn't give him butterflies in the stomach.
Not like the time they were cleaning Hop's cabin and he was talking to Will and by some random luck, Will happened to sit himself in front of the window right where the sun was shining and it looked like he was sunlight itself, rays radiating off of him.
"I like Will."
Remembering the conversation with Lucas, he quickly added, "Romantically. As in, I have a crush on him. I just wanted you to know. Dustin and Lucas also know."
She stopped gardening and turned to him, "You like Will."
He awkwardly nodded, "I do. A lot."
She didn't seem angry but he couldn't quite place the emotion on her face.
"I think that's why- no, I know it's why I was such a bad boyfriend. At first I think I did have a bit of a childish crush on you, and at the same time I had one on Will, but the one for you was... smaller, less intense and I think a lot of it had to do with the fact that, well, you reminded me of him and you arrived right as he had gone missing."
"The pieces just fit together. But then, I got all confused and started mixing up the two crushes I had because the one on Will was stronger and more intense and even longer but it was also... incredibly scary and I didn't admit, not even to myself, what it was."
He sighed and looked up at the calming blue sky.
"But you, you were the safe option, so I tried to aim for you while simultaneously wanting for you to be more like Will and hiding myself from you when your differences from Will were highlighted."
He lowered his head again, "Like with D&D, I wanted you to be our mage but you don't even like the game so I stopped wanting to play it or I'd play it once you left and wouldn't tell you about it."
"Look," He fiddled with a loose leaf, "I'm not saying that justifies how I treated both you and Will. It doesn't. But I wanted to explain how... why it all happened the way it did."
"Oh."
"Yeah."
"I'm- I am not mad, Mike. You can look at me."
"I- I know, I mean, I figured. You're a good person. But it's alright if this is a bit... weird for you."
"It is. It's- feelings can be really complicated, I learned that a while back and I talked about it with Joyce and dad. Mostly with Joyce."
"Right, yeah."
"I think, I think there was a part of me that liked you too but never... mostly never how I should have liked my boyfriend. I liked being saved, when we met, and I liked doing the saving after. I liked- I liked the idea I had of you, what I wanted you to be like because of tv."
Something that hadn't changed after all that time was that she still really liked rom-coms and romantic novels and girl magazines and really just anything remotely romantic.
He thought it was cute and endearing but he just couldn't relate.
"I wanted to feel normal. You helped. And sometimes you didn't. But Mike I-I was never in love with you. The small part of me that liked you for you, it left, long ago."
"Yeah, same, for me... well, if I'm being fully honest, I think the Snow Ball was when I started realising I wasn't feeling that way for you anymore, so I tried to make it up by spending all of our free time together."
She looked to the side in thought, "I think I felt it when I started hanging out with Max more. I started understanding that a lot of the time, I liked the idea of tv boyfriends more than my own."
He cracked a joke, "To be fair, it's not easy being compared to a famous hot and rich Hollywood actor."
She laughed, "I know. I still prefer Ralph Macchio."
He laughed too, "Thanks."
They quieted down again.
"I simply said it was weird because-"
"Will's a boy?" He grimaced.
"Uh? No, why?"
"Forget it, go ahead. Finish what you started saying."
"It is a bit weird, I suppose. Will's my brother now. But you have known him for longer than I have and for longer than you've known me and I believe you when you say you like him."
She placed a hand on his shoulder, "Treat him well. He deserves someone to take care of him."
He nodded, "He does. And I will, if he'll let me."
She smiled, "Good. And good luck."
He got up, "Thanks. I'll uh-" he pointed towards the door, "I'll go talk with him now."
"Fingers crossed," she beamed.
"Yeah," he chuckled.
"See? I also know expressions."
He smiled, "Right. Thanks again."
He waved and headed inside.
He muttered to himself a small, “Okay, you got this,” for reassurance and then knocked on Will’s door.
"Come in!"
He let himself in and closed the door to have some privacy.
(Hoping Jonathan wouldn't barge in as he usually did whenever they closed the door to Will's room).
The place looked a lot tidier than last time he had been there. Maybe their sleepover and talk had done Will some good, after all. Or maybe Joyce had just gotten really angry.
"Where's Dustin?"
"What? Oh, yeah, no. Long story. Well, maybe not that long actually. I'll get to it in a sec, just-" he sighed, "can I sit?"
Will nodded, "Of course."
He dropped his backpack on the floor and sat on the edge of the bed, Will following suit.
"I did tell him. And he has a plan, or well, not really a plan but he wants to head to the library as soon as it opens on Monday and he hopes he'll find something there, if it wasn't destroyed by, you know..."
"Yeah... uh, maybe we could try a library out of town too? I guess we'd have to tell Jonathan or your sister or maybe Steve and Robin but I mean, at some point we have to tell them anyway, so," he shrugged.
"Yeah, that's a good idea! I'll tell Dustin later. But um, yeah, so, he's actually not here because you said to not tell Lucas yet but he kinda showed up when I was at Dustin's place."
"Oh, so, how far along did you get? With the story."
"I told him everything, don't worry, but we couldn't both leave to come here what with Lucas being there too, so he stayed with him and I came alone."
"At least you were able to tell him."
"Yeah."
"So, what did he say? Besides the library thing?"
"Oh, uh, not much really? I told him that I couldn't explain the whole thing really well so you'd show him your drawings and maybe he'd be able to figure out something that way."
"Right," he briefly got up to get the drawings from a drawer in his desk and then sat back down, handing them to Mike, "here. I don't know what you'll be able to make out from them, they're pretty messy."
He stared at the drawings, one by one.
He tried turning them in multiple directions and even putting them together in specific ways like they were puzzle pieces but nothing groundbreaking was coming out. They just looked like messy dark abstracts for the most part.
There was only one drawing that seemed clearer. He could tell it was definitely Max, she looked like she was grimacing or maybe in the midst of saying something, which matched with what Will had told him.
In a few of the other drawings he could pick out some parts of Max, a bit of her hair, a close up of her mouth, half of her left eye, but surrounding those parts was pure and total chaos.
Each sheet of paper felt connected to the other but he couldn't figure out the pattern; yet he was sure there was one, just like Max's drawings of Vecna's red dimension and Will’s drawings of the Mind Flayer’s vines and tunnels.
“I don’t know,” he shook his head and handed the drawings back to their owner, “it doesn't make any sense."
"I told you."
"So, what do we do now?"
"Beats me. I guess we just... wait for Dustin to go to the library, well, I should probably go too but you should stay to cover for the two of us. You know, in case El and Lucas get suspicious."
"Right."
"Then, if we don't find anything, which... to be honest... is probably the case given the library's condition, I mean they still haven't even finished rebuilding half of it, then we'll tell someone with a car and we'll drive out to the closest and biggest library there is."
"If we tell Nancy maybe she could look at Emerson's too. I mean, I know it's far from here so we're most likely to find something in the Indiana area but it's a fancy college library, they have way more resources than normal ones do and her spring break's over in a few days."
"Then it's decided. Still, I'll keep trying to draw this thing out. Maybe one of these nights it'll seem neater, I don't know."
"Let's hope. Just... be careful. I mean, I know it's like a dream and all but... we're all scared for Max, as we should be, but I think we should also be scared for you. You seem to always have a target on your back."
Will's eyes widened, "Uh, yeah, I'll- I'll be safe." His tone softened, "Don't worry."
He blushed, "Right, good."
"Anyway, thanks for coming here. I'm basically not allowed outside of the house for like a week, except for school of course."
Mike snorted, "In your rebel phase, I see."
"Yeah, right," he chuckled. "But yeah, I guess I don't usually get grounded." He nudged Mike and smirked, "That's more your thing, isn't it?"
"What can I say?" He grinned, "I'm a free spirit. I need to let my wings loose."
"You're an idiot is what you are," he laughed.
Mike smiled, "Yeah, suppose I am." He painfully turned his gaze away from Will and cleared his throat, "Hey, um, I-uh, I actually wanted to tell you something too."
"Oh, what is it?"
"Well," he angled himself towards Will and was about to speak again when the other boy interrupted him.
"What happened there?" He pointed to Mike's shoulder, making the boy look down and notice a stain of dirt on his shirt.
"Ah, shit, El must've done that when we were talking before. I forgot she was wearing those dirty gardening gloves, I guess she forgot too."
He tried to get a bit of dirt off but it was no use and he rolled his eyes, "wanna bet my mom's gonna make me wash this by hand when I get home?"
"Oh, you talked to El before."
Mike looked up again and for some reason, he started feeling exposed, "Uh, yeah, I mean, we talk and... stuff. Like, we're friends."
"I know," Will quickly added, "But, you know, if you wanna talk about it, that's cool with me. You're already here anyway."
"Talk about it?" He furrowed his brows, "Talk about what?"
"You know..." he trailed off and pointed to his friend's dirty shirt.
"Okay, so, mom will definitely not be pleased but she's not gonna kick me out for getting a shirt a bit dirty."
Will rolled his eyes, "No, not that. I mean... you know."
"I really don't," he insisted.
"Mike! The whole thing with El. It's fine, okay. Look, you don't have to talk about it if you don't want to but I'm here for you. If you feel weird with me now 'cause of her being family... that makes sense but you can still tell me this stuff."
"Will, exactly just what are you talking about? The thing with El? What thing with El?"
"Okay, fine," he grumbled, "you don't wanna talk about it, cool. No need to get defensive."
"I literally have no idea what you're talking about. I-" it suddenly dawned on him, "wait. Do you mean..."
He shook his head, "I'm sorry, are you implying I still have a thing for El? Or vice versa?"
Will raised his shoulder and gave him a look that said: isn't it obvious?
"Will, I am, in no way, getting back together with El or whatever the hell you think happened in the, like, five minutes I talked to her before coming to you."
He scoffed and continued, "That is so not what- it's not at all even close to what happened. We just talked. Like friends. Because we are."
"Yeah, we're dealing with a whole bunch of shit from Henry again and we're getting ready for whatever's coming and the first thing you do on the day we're supposed to talk about it is go up to El first and then come deal with the situation."
"Are you- are you mad at me? Because I talked to El?"
"I'm not mad at you!" The boy blushed when he realised he had raised his voice. He looked around and spoke in a lower tone, "I'm not mad at that."
"Then what are you mad at?"
"I'm mad at always having to play couple's therapist or divorce lawyer with you two,” he stressed.
“So, sorry if I asked what was going on when the first thing you do is go talk to El when we have this whole situation to deal with," he grumbled.
"Maybe I just wanted to get ahead of it and deal with the incoming drama now rather than later, when we're in the midst of trying to save the world again."
The boy crossed his arms, "You know, priorities and all."
"Are you jealous or something?"
Will visibly tensed at that and Mike studied him, pensively.
"Because if you are, that's kinda hypocritical of you."
Will's head quickly snapped towards him, clearly offended, "What? Hypocritical?"
"Yeah. Hypocritical."
"How so?" He challenged.
"Because I have been trying to get your attention for like two full semesters and you've barely even noticed me. I mean," he gestured around, "all you do is pay attention to El!"
He dropped his hands, "And okay, I get it. She's your sister, she doesn't have any friends outside of the Party, she's new with like... life in general and she struggles with school. I get all of that."
He continued, "What I don't get is why you can't be more..."
"More what?"
"More fair, I don't know. We used to pair up everytime we needed partners for something and now you always pair up with her, not even doing a fifty-fifty thing. You always pick her.”
He raised his chin, “So yeah, if you're complaining about me going to El first and talking to her for less than ten minutes... yeah, I think that's hypocritical."
"That's- that's different! She's my sister."
"So? I'm your friend. Your best friend."
"Yeah and you can also take care of yourself."
"What and El can't? She has literal superpowers, she’s not this helpless little girl. You, Max and Nancy definitely made sure to make that clear to me when I was the overbearing one."
"This is different.”
Mike raised an eyebrow.
“At school she doesn’t have superpowers. There she's just a normal, but kinda weird, girl who's only friends with a bunch of guys, one of whom her new brother. That's literally- it's not good socially and she doesn't know how to navigate it."
"I kn-"
"Now that Troy and James mostly leave me alone and the girls don't make fun of us anymore-"
Mike muttered, "that's one way of putting it."
"Now that they're somewhat nice… I can try to help her blend in a bit, or at least stand out a tad less."
"Look," he let out a breath, "Jonathan always says that being a freak is the best and that being normal's boring and I know he has a point but we also have two more years of high school and she dreads every single day because she can't manage to fit in."
Will sighed and frowned, "I'm not saying it's fair, having to change yourself to fit in or at the very least not get made fun of, 'cause it's not. But... what can you do, at the end of the day?"
His tone sounded painfully defeated... and personal.
It reminded Mike of a similar conversation they had almost exactly a year ago.
"So, yeah, sorry if I didn't make you my number one priority but you can handle that. Besides, you do the exact same thing whenever you're back in El mode."
Mike chuckled but it held no humor, "El mode? Yeah, I guess I get what you mean. But for the record, I haven't been in," he made air quotes, "El mode since we broke up and I figured out something really important."
Will looked at him skeptically but with curiosity, "Oh, yeah? Which is?"
"I never really liked her that much.”
Will gaped, “I- what?”
“Romantically, that is,” he clarified.
Will still looked incredibly confused.
“Sure, I had a crush on her, a bit, when she first came around but it wasn't anything serious. It was kids' stuff. I just... wanted it to be more than that because I wanted the safety and stability that would bring me, so I tried to force a relationship."
He looked around the room, eyes lingering on Will's many drawings, "It was easy with her also trying to force it. But it wasn't easy in the sense of actually having to go through with it."
He turned back to his friend, "I don't know if you get what I mean?"
He didn't wait for a reply.
"It was safe and easy but also not easy at all because it's just not what I wanted and she didn't want it either. We were both forcing ourselves for different reasons."
He rubbed the back of his neck, "I thought you two might've talked about it but I guess not, maybe it's more something she'd like to tell Max."
"As for me, well, there is one really specific reason why I didn't tell you. Why I just let things end and that was that. No explanation to you or the guys."
"The reason?"
He picked up his backpack and opened it, pulling out the stack of letters. He then dropped the backpack again and gestured for Will to take the letters.
"Here."
They boy eyed them for a second before taking them, "What ar-"
The question got lost in the air as he noticed who the letters were addressed to.
The boy looked at his friend again and Mike nodded, silently signaling to him that he should read them.
"Why-" he took off the rubber band holding them together and started flipping through them, "why did you never..."
"Send them?"
"Yeah, Mike. What... what does this even mean?" Will sighed, "I'm so confused right now."
Mike snorted, "Yeah, sorry about that."
He pointed to the first one, "They're not in any specific order so you can just start reading them like that."
"Are you sure?"
"Go ahead. It'll explain... some of it, I think."
"Some?"
"And then I'll explain the rest."
The boy started reading out loud, "Dear, Will..."
It took them a while, there were quite a few of them, but most of them were thankfully short and eventually they got to the last one.
"That's it," he rotated it around but there was nothing in the back. He turned to Mike, "I don't get it. I really don't. What…? Where you afraid I'd- I don't know, make fun of you?"
Will tilted his head as if to underline the point, "For telling me stuff? Mike, I was begging for you to tell me anything! Hell, a stupid Hawkin's weather report would've been appreciated."
Mike grimaced, "I know. And I am sorry. But... there's a reason why I didn't send the letters and it's the same reason I didn't tell you anything regarding the breakup with El."
He was hoping the letters would give him away so he didn't have to actually say anything out loud, he had completely forgotten to try to write a quick speech or letter beforehand just in case, but maybe they were too innocent for that.
In his opinion, the intentions were as clear as day. It's why he was so terrified of sending them. It's why he had to hide them as best as he could so he wouldn't risk his family finding out.
Will didn't quite catch that though.
"You really can't put two and two together, huh?"
Will fiddled with the letters and shrugged.
Mike nodded and took a deep breath, "Alright, then."
He took the letters from Will's hands and placed them gently behind them, on the bed.
Will remained silent but he looked at Mike expectantly.
"I just- before I-" he briefly closed his eyes.
When he reopened them, he looked straight into Will's, "It's okay if this isn't what you want, and you can tell me and we can forget this whole thing happened in the first place, but..."
He inched closer, placing his hands on Will's cheeks, which immediately turned hot as the boy's eyes widened.
Mike took a second to absorb the moment and then he slowly started leaning in as he whispered, "There's something I wanna try..."
He paused when he felt the ghost of Will's lips on his, eyes closed and breaths mingling.
He was giving Will time to pull away... but he didn't move a finger.
Mike took that as a good sign and hastily pushed forward.
The kiss had been quick and chaste, a short but tender meeting of their lips, and in a moment it was over.
Mike opened his eyes and pulled away, dropping his hands, not wanting to push his luck.
Will was slower but he eventually opened his eyes again too and stared at his friend.
Not saying a word.
Afraid of having misinterpreted everything, of hope having clouded his judgement, Mike was about to apologise when...
... he was unexpectedly pulled forward, making their lips crash together again.
The kiss was initially clumsy but Mike reacted quickly enough and tried to guide Will, who enthusiastically let him.
He forgot about everything else and simply kept kissing the other boy.
He was so caught up that he had forgotten about their placement and when he pushed forward-
"Mike!" Will let out something halfway between a shriek and a laugh.
"Uh?" He opened his eyes and looked around. Finally, he noticed Will was on the verge of falling from the bed, so he scooted back and made space for the other boy, "Sorry, didn't realise."
Will moved away from the corner of the bed, "It's okay." He grinned, "You were busy."
Mike laughed, "Yeah, I was."
They settled down for a moment, catching their breaths, smiling.
"So..."
"So..." Mike repeated.
"I got it now. The reason."
"Yeah, I sure hope so," Mike laughed. "And what do you think?"
"Mmm, I don't know, I think the presentation could've been better," he teased.
"Rude!" Mike playfully shoved him back.
"On a more serious note... this actually explains quite a bit about you," he blushed and added, "about us."
"It does, doesn't it?"
"Yeah, like those posters," he snickered and Mike turned crimson.
"Shut up," he muttered.
"Yeah, I mean, the ones your mom made you take off... those made sense. One time Lucas showed me the ones he has under his bed," he wrinkled his nose, "not really my type in case that wasn’t clear by now."
Mike laughed at that.
"But the... other ones, I thought those were a bit weird. For a straight guy, anyway."
Mike tensed up, "Yeah, um, about that-"
"You're not straight?" Interjected Will. "Sort of figured, now," he chuckled.
"Right, yeah, but, actually... I- I don't know if this is gonna be a problem? I hope not but- I kinda, okay so, do you know David Bowie?"
Will looked at him as if he had grown a second head, "Uh, yes, Mike. I know David Bowie. Wha- oh, wait, are you bisexual?"
Mike started playing with the hem of his shirt, "Uh, I mean, I guess. I- I don't know, Dustin said- Dustin actually called it, if you can believe it. And we got to talking and him and Lucas explained the Bowie thing, um, yeah."
Will smiled softly, "Cool."
"Yeah?"
"Yeah."
Mike relaxed, "Cool."
"But what do you mean Dustin called it? As in, he was expecting this?" He gestured between them.
"When I went over to tell him about everything, he started talking about being there for me and supporting me either way and I was really confused but then I finished telling him everything and he made a comment."
"What type of comment?"
"One about us. Or, well, me. About how I- how I like being your first pick."
"Ah, I see."
"Yeah."
"So," Will looked to the side awkwardly, "what... where does that leave us?"
Mike could see the question hidden underneath it.
"I don't know about you but on my part? I definitely do not have a thing for El, I definitely have a thing for you and I definitely have always had a thing for you. I was just... too scared and in denial to act on it or even admit it to myself. And you…?"
"Always had a thing for you, still have a thing for you and will probably always have a thing for you," he smiled and Mike let out a sigh of relief.
"I acted like I hated all that romance talk only because I knew I couldn't have it with you and... you were the only person I could envision any romantic fantasy with. It's not that I hate roses and chocolates and all of that."
Mike grabbed his hands, "Then good thing you were wrong about that."
"Yeah," he squeezed back.
Timidly, "So... am I safe to assume this makes us, you know, boyfriends? Like, boyfriend and boyfriend."
Will bit his lip as he failed to suppress a smile, "That would be an accurate assumption."
Mike grinned, "Great, cool, awesome, so awesome, actual-"
Will pressed forward and kissed him again, although softer and shorter this time, "You do ramble a lot."
"Yeah, no, definitely. Totally need to work on that, you should actually keep up that tactic. I think it could help."
Will laughed, "Really?"
"Absolut-mmpf," he got cut off again by a kiss, "see? Working already."
They kept playing around until they heard a car pull up and Will shoved Mike away, making the boy almost fall off the bed.
"What the heck?" He moped.
"Mom and Hop," he tried to brush Mike's messy hair with his hands, "they went to get groceries, they must be back already."
"Shit!" Mike frantically tried to straighten his shirt.
The irony.
"Kids! We're home!"
“Come help us with the bags,” Hopper called out.
The two boys looked at each other, silently wondering what to do, but Hopper's voice called out again, "Why is Jonathan the only one helping out?"
Will smoothed his clothes and hair as well, then nodded, "We're good. It's fine. Let's just..." he pointed to the door and they walked towards the house's entrance.
"Mike? Hi, honey."
"Uh, hello Mrs- uh Joyce," he then faced the man and nodded, "Hop."
"Great, two extra hands," he gestured for the two of them to follow him up to the car and they went along. "Where's El?"
Mike looked behind for a second, "Uh, she was outside when I got here. Trying to plant some flowers, I think. I don't know if she's still doing that."
He handed the boys a few bags and closed the trunk of the car, "What were you two up to?"
Mike tried not to blush but it was futile, he just hoped the man wouldn't think much of it; after all, Mike had never stopped behaving awkwardly around him.
"Not much," jumped in Will. "You know, D&D planning, stuff like that."
Hop hummed, "That so?"
"Yep."
"Yeah, I-uh, I should probably get going soon."
They walked in and deposited the bags on the kitchen table, along with the ones Joyce and Jonathan had brought in.
"Oh, it's alright, you can stay. As long as it's okay with your mom," the woman glared at Will as she said that part and the boy smiled sheepishly, rubbing his neck.
"No, it's fine, really. I have to go finish my chores anyway."
"Too bad, well, maybe next time."
"Yeah," he nodded and smiled politely. "I'll just grab my backpack."
"I'll walk with you."
They re-entered Will's room and he slung his backpack over his shoulder.
"What about the letters?"
"Keep them. They were always meant for you."
Will smiled and they walked up to the entrance again.
"Hey, about," Mike glanced towards the hall and lowered his voice, "that situation... it'll be okay. We'll figure it out."
He grabbed Will's hand, "Together."
Will beamed, "Together."