Chapter Text
Pizza boxes, pop cans, and uno cards were scattered all across the room—Mike too, limbs splayed over the couch with his arm slung over his eyes from the punishing light. The tiny sounds of Will saying bye to Lucas and Dustin seemed to scream through his ears to his pounding head.
Will crept back down the stairs, each creak slamming its way into Mike’s head.
Eventually, he could tell Will paused near his position on the couch. Sluggishly, he lowered his arm from his face. The light in the room was dim, but it pressed his eyes like a hand he couldn’t push away.
Will looked down at Mike, his eyebrows furrowed and pressed together tightly.
“Do you want me to get you anything?”
Mike mumbled a ‘no.’
The only thing he wanted was to sleep in his bed, in his dark, silent room. But simultaneously, all he wanted was to stay by Will’s side. It was like he was making up for lost time by being attached to Will the last few weeks. He was happy for his best friend to be back, with him, in his basement.
He almost said it—the words sat on his tongue, heavy and stupid. Come upstairs. Sleep where it’s quiet and comfortable. But he swallowed them down with the ache of his head.
Will sat on the floor next to the couch, a silent anchor for Mike.
Mike appreciated his presence — and that he didn’t try tidying the mess Lucas and Dustin’s visit had left behind. He didn’t mind it, temporarily, at least. He’d endured longer and worse stretches of gross, dirty basement while Will had lived in Lenora. Rarely did he have the motivation to clean up typically, but during that time, there was nothing he wanted to do other than lay in his bed. Even Hellfire had become something he did begrudgingly, dragging himself to the club room after school when all he wanted to do was climb back into the comfort of his bed.
With Will returning from Lenora, he’d found himself lifted out of that hole he’d dug for himself — though, it was less a hole and more a nest in his bed, a little home which brought him solace.
Mike was unsure how long he laid on the couch, disassociated, willing away his headache. But Will never left his side.
When he eventually cracked open his eyes, his senses coming back from a not-quite sleep, not-quite awakeness, he heard the scribbling of a pencil on paper next to him. He propped himself up onto his elbows to see over Will’s shoulder.
He was sketching absentmindedly, little drawings of fantasy scenes, or his DnD character, the cleric of the party. It was strange, seeing Will like this again. Knees drawn up, notebook in his lap, quietly drawing like nothing ever changed.
Will suddenly stopped drawing and covered the notebook with this arm, craning his head to face Mike behind him.
Like Will, Mike startled, snapping his head backwards. He’d been mere inches away from their noses knocking. He looked away from Will.
“Um- Why’d you hide them?” His voice cracked in the middle of the question, too loud in the silent basement.
Will closed the notebook and set it down on the table. He too didn’t try to look at the other, preferring to stare at the notebook. “They’re not good.”
“I love your drawings!” Mike said instantly. “They’re–They are great. You’ve never drawn anything not good… ever.”
Will’s face bloomed with scarlet, not that Mike was looking out of the corner of his eye, of course. He didn’t answer immediately. His pencil rolled off the table and clattered on the floor.
Mike winced at the sound. Too loud. Too obvious.
“What time is it?” With the subject change, Mike cleared his throat. He was eager to reroute the conversation and lighten the mood.
“It’s 9:30, you were out for an hour and a half. Is your head better now?”
It was. The sharp hammer slamming into Mike’s head had softened to a dull heartbeat in the background. Maybe because Will was still there beside him. He’d never say that out loud though.
Instead, he just answered Will’s question with a yes. He wanted to show he was appreciative of his presence but the words to do so were jumbled in his head, useless.
Will stood up, slowly and carefully. Mike watched. He was concerned when he saw Will jolt and wince. It made Mike scramble to sit up, concern painting his brow and the downturn of his lips.
“Are you okay?”
Will righted himself and stood up fully. “Yeah, yeah. Just—sore.”
Sore?
“From what?” Mike asked.
Will hesitated, glancing away from Mike. “The couch.”
“Oh.” Mike blinked, “Right. The couch. Killer couch.”
He didn’t want Will to be uncomfortable while staying with him. If he was in pain from the couch, surely he was unhappy with the whole ordeal of staying with the Wheelers. He was probably jealous of Joyce and Jonathan—who got to sleep in actual beds, in the guest room and with Nancy respectively.
He wanted to tell will that he was sorry — that he’d fix it somehow, make it better — but the words caught in his throat, coming out of his mouth a simple;
“Me too, from sleeping on the floor the last few nights.”
Will blinked at him, and Mike was sure he’d somehow said the wrong thing.
“You should sleep in your bed,” Will said finally, bluntly. It struck Mike in the chest a little, insinuating that Will didn’t appreciate his company. He must’ve seen this in the sag of Mike’s shoulders because he continued rapidly, “Not that— I’ve really liked you being down here with me, just not at the expense of your shoulders and hips and back being in pain. Better one of us not be sore.”
“Well, better both of us not be sore.”
Mike’s voice softened, careful, like a hand hovering before touching.
Will’s eyes met his. For a second, Mike thought he might say something — but he just exhaled through his nose, a ghost of laughter.
“The sleeping arrangements are terrible, I get it,” He said softly, “Next time we can flip a coin.”
Mike smiled, his heart beating a little too fast, “Yeah, or…” He hesitated, but kept looking into Will’s eyes. “You should just take my bed. It isn’t fair you’ve slept on the couch for the last 3 weeks.”
Will’s lips parted (Mike wasn’t looking), like he wanted to argue, like he wasn’t sure if he should, but all that came out was, “I’m fine down here.”
“Yeah, I know.” Mike said quickly, “You don’t have to be, though.”
Heavy silence pressed between them.The light from the tiny basement window had dimmed to gold.
“It’s okay.” Will busied himself by beginning to grab some nearby pieces of trash, “You should be able to sleep in your bed.”
Mike wanted to insist, pull Will upstairs to his bedroom and finally have just one good night of sleep. That was all he wanted, truly, no ulterior motives, a good night of sleep. For the both of them.
However, he let go of the subject and watched as Will gathered garbage littered around the room.
After a minute or two of watching Will, he realized he should probably help. He began tidying the uno cards from the party’s game earlier, the one that resulted with him lying on the couch with a headache.
Once the basement looked like it’s normal self once again, Will and Mike sat down next to each other on the couch. The presence of Will’s warm body heat next to Mike’s made him feel an indescribable amount of comfort. He felt safe, despite everything happening outside of this basement right now, Mike felt safe next to Will.
“That was the longest game of uno I’ve ever played.”
It took Mike the briefest second to catch up, “I wanted to kill Dustin.”
Will laughed, warmly. “I could tell!” He smiled faintly, “I thought you were going to throw the entire deck of cards at him.”
Mike groaned, scrubbing his hand over his face in frustration, “He wouldn’t stop laughing and making jokes, he thinks he’s hilarious.”
“Yeah, he was really enjoying his jokes about you and—El.” Will tapered off at the end, seemingly unsure if he should’ve brought it up.
Mike froze for a second, then let out a sharp laugh, “Yeah, I guess–I mean, whatever. It was stupid.”
It was stupid.
He didn’t understand why Dustin cared so much. Every time he laughed at his own joke about El and Mike, it struck a core in Mike’s chest.
It shook him.
But only because it was crazy how invested Dustin seemed to be in their “falling out”, as Dustin worded it one time. Absolutely ridiculous.
It was the same lack of understanding he felt when he came to Will, his best friend, about El and each and every time, Will scrambled to pick up the broken pieces of he and El’s relationship and tape them back together.
El and Mike’s relationship was a broken vase assembled nicely together with Will’s tape.
Will tilted his head, “You seemed kind of–”
“No, I didn’t.” They both looked away from each other, painfully aware of how sharp Mike’s response was. “It’s just… Dustin doesn’t know what he’s talking about. It’s a cheap shot to make. I hate that he thinks he knows everything. He doesn’t. He doesn’t.”
Will nodded slowly, watching Mike. “Still… it got to you.”
“No, it didn’t.” Mike said, too fast, too flat. He tried again, quieter, “There’s nothing to poke fun at with me and El, we just–she just needs time. There’s nothing wrong with that.”
“There’s not.” Will confirmed. There was a moment of silence between them before finally, he murmured, “You don’t need to explain yourself to me.”
Mike’s shoulders loosened a little. “I’m not.”
“Okay.”
Will leaned back, his mouth twitched like he wanted to smirk. As if he knew something Mike didn’t. Mike almost said something, but Will spoke up first.
“Are you hungry?”
Mike never ate any of the pizza the boys had ordered, his head had already begun to hurt when they arrived and it killed his appetite.
“A little.” Then, after a pause: “You?”
“A little,” Will repeated Mike’s response. “I’m pretty sure your parents are already asleep, it’s been silent upstairs. I…” He trailed off, Mike thought he saw a touch of pink on the tips of his ears—it was there if you knew to look. “I’m scared to go up there, I don’t want to make noise and upset them…”
“Upset them? They love you!”
Will pulled at his sleeve, “They haven’t been the most… welcoming.”
Mike furrowed his eyebrows. To him, his parents had been incredibly welcoming to the Byers. He and Nancy had to literally beg their parents to let the Byers stay with them, but they’ve been great hosts. As far as he could tell.
“Oh my god! Not to say that I’m not more than grateful that we can even stay with you guys. I mean, seriously, I am forever in debt to your mom.” Will blurted, frantically panicking like he’d genuinely said something wrong.
“No, no, it’s okay. I guess I just don’t understand?”
Will looked away for a minute, and Mike thought he might change the topic, but slowly he said, “I’ve heard them talking… a few times. Ted is getting impatient with everything going on—which is totally fair! I just understand this is a bit of a burden during such a chaotic time like this and I don’t want to make it harder for them.”
Mike wrinkled his nose, he didn’t care what Ted Wheeler thought, “They’ll live.” He stood up and outstretched his hand for Will to grab, “Let’s go.”
Will hesitated a moment, but he grabbed Mike’s hands and yanked himself upwards.
Mike didn’t move an inch. Neither did Will.
After a beat, Will’s eyebrows raised up like he remembered what was happening, he pulled his hand free.
“Do you guys still have Hot Pockets?”
Mike cleared his throat, like he could dislodge something stuck in there, “Yeah, yeah. I think so.”
They climbed the stairs together.
The kitchen was dimly lit from the moon, silvering the counters. It was warm and cozy with Will by his side.
Mike opened the freezer, pulling out three frozen Hot Pockets. Will leaned against the counter. It was quiet, Mike could hear the buzzing and sounds of crickets outside, the soft breathing of Will, and the dull whirring of the fridge. It was peaceful.
Peace felt like an unnatural taste on Mike’s tongue. How could things be peaceful right now? Everything was going to hell. It unsettled Mike, the thought of this quiet shared moment with Will while Vecna must be somewhere, plotting, planning, getting ready for his next move.
Mike shook the thought from his head and grabbed a plate, carefully and slowly so as to not make much noise, and placed the Hot Pockets on it. He set it down into the microwave, both of them winced at the beeping as he hit the buttons, loud and blaring through the quiet house. The whirring filled the room, Mike met Will’s uneasy smile.
Will looked away, towards the front door while they silently waited for their food. Mike’s gaze lingered on Will, the curve of his jaw and the subtle hook of his nose. The faint light blurred the edges of Will’s face.
Mike still felt shaken from his conversation with Will about El. Everything about El made him feel lost and on edge. The truth was, he wasn’t sure he wanted to fix things with her.
But, over and over again, Will urged Mike to right things with Eleven. To fix things–like he wanted things to go back to how they were the summer before he moved. Mike looked back at the summer now with a twist in his stomach, the fighting between himself and Will clawed up his insides. He’d never apologized, properly, for that summer either. He never apologized to Eleven either, for anything really.
The thought of things going back to normal with El filled Mike’s mouth with a gross distaste. He’d already thought up ways things between him and El could change in their relationship, but even a changing of boundaries or how they were together didn’t feel right. He couldn’t shake the feeling that El wasn’t who he wanted anymore.
Will turned, looking past Mike at the microwave, Mike didn’t think to look away. Will crossed the kitchen to him, he didn’t move.
Will leaned in, his hand going behind Mike—the air between them thinned.
The click of the microwave being opened barely reached Mike’s ears.
Mike froze, he could feel Will’s breath, warm and close. He parted his lips to say something but Will breathed;
“It was about to go off.”
“Right,” Mike wasn’t looking at Will’s eyes, but he thinks they were on his. His were elsewhere. Lower region of Will’s face.
Suddenly, there was creaking from the stairs and Nancy whisper-yelling through the downstairs, “Mike, is that you?” The sound cracked through the silence.
Just as quickly as Will had crossed the kitchen to Mike, they scattered like mice.
Mike coughed and grabbed the plate from the microwave—too hot—it clattered onto the counter, loud enough to make his heart start back up.
Nancy turned down the stairs into the kitchen, “Hey, Will.”
“Hi, Nance,” He attempted to smile at her but even in the dim lighting, Mike could tell he was red.
What was that?
What just happened in his kitchen?
Methodically, Nancy looked between the two of them, eyebrows drawn tightly together and squinted eyes. Mike made a face at her, unsure why she was staring at him like an unsolved puzzle.
“Is something wrong?” He asked finally.
Nancy shook her head, giving up on staring holes through them, “No, nothing. I heard noise down here and thought it was late and wanted… to make sure you were okay?”
“The sound of the microwave puts you on edge?” Mike said, monotone.
She rolled her eyes at him, “Everything puts me on edge now, Mike. You’re one to talk, whenever anyone slightly nudges you you freak out.”
Mike relented, because she was right. Everyone was on edge.
Will broke the silent tension between them, “We were just getting a snack.”
“Okay. Are you okay, Will? Jonathan is worried about you.”
Mike wasn’t sure, but the question felt layered, but he wasn’t sure with what. He watched Will look at Nancy and he could tell that Will understood. He looked to the ground. He wanted to smack his head to get it to work, to get gears turning.
“Yeah. Yeah, I’m okay.”
Nancy nodded, smiling. “Okay.”
Mike grabbed the plate again, cooled now, “Well, it’s late, food’s getting cold. Thanks, Nance.”
The food was not getting cold, he could feel the heat and see the steam from it as he picked it up. He hated feeling like a weird outsider, why were Will and his sister having a shared moment? That wasn’t normal.
Mike tugged Will by his wrist to the basement door. Nancy didn’t try saying anything else, and Will followed him down the stairs.
When they reached the bottom of the stairs, Mike beelined for the couch, setting the plate down on the coffee table a little too loud, a little too harshly.
Will stood at the bottom of the stairs like he didn’t know how to fit into the room anymore. He didn’t look at Mike.
“Uh… do you want the pepperoni one or the cheese?”
“The—the pepperoni.”
Why were things weird between them suddenly? They’d just been conversing and joking and fine.
Was it the sharpness of Mike’s tone when Will started talking about El? Was it the closeness of the two in the kitchen?
It wasn’t even a big deal. Nothing was a big deal. Will was just stopping the microwave from blaring through his sleeping house.
But then why was his heart still pounding?
Finally, Will came over and sat down on the couch. He didn’t sit on the opposite end, but he didn’t sit next to Mike either. Sitting as far as possible would be too obvious. Sitting right next to Mike would be—what would it be? It wouldn’t be weird, nothing is weird.
Best friends sit next to each other.
Will grabbed the pepperoni Hot Pocket.
They ate in silence, broken only by the soft sound of either boy blowing on their respective Hot Pockets to cool it down. Mike made a point to keep his eyes away from Will, to not look at his hands, or mouth. Or the way he hovered awkwardly, still.
Will was always seemingly awkwardly fit into his body. He looked like he never knew where to put his hands, or how to position his body.
But, as Mike thought about it more, he realized he was wrong. Will wasn’t innately awkward. Mike could observe Will hanging out with Lucas and Dustin, or Jonathan, and he looked like he fit in perfectly. He laughed at the right time, he spoke openly, he looked comfortable.
When Will was with Mike, in the last year, at least, Will didn’t do those things. His voice cracked and his hands fidgeted and he sure as hell didn’t look comfortable.
Mike looked at Will now, his shoulders hunched, he leaned forward, almost caving in on himself. Like making himself smaller.
Mike frowned.
What was it about him that made Will uncomfortable like that? He was his best friend, he should be at ease around him.
He searched his brain frantically for what was different about him, that could make Will awkward and uncomfortable. But no matter how much he rattled his brain, he couldn’t find the answer.
They were meant to be a team again, at least that's what he told Will back in Lenora. Best friends.
They sure as hell weren’t acting like it. Will was distant.
With having not spoken to El in weeks, Will acting weird and far off, Mike was losing it. If he had neither his girlfriend nor his best friend, how could he hold the party together as the heart?
Occasionally, when Mike would lie awake at night with the hard floor poking into his back and the even breathing of Will next to him on the couch, his mind would be ridden with guilt. Regret. Confusion.
There was so much he didn’t understand. So much his brain couldn’t possibly untangle, no matter how many nights after Will had moved to Lenora he’d lay silently still alone in the basement or pace back and forth, he couldn’t figure out how to solve it.
He hardly even knew what it was.
He’d begin with making lists in his head, what was he guilty about? What did he regret? And what confused him.
He was always guilty that he’d said those things to Will that night in the rain and the things he said, or didn’t say, to El in Lenora, and now back in Hawkins. He felt guilty about all the thoughts and fantasies he’s drawn up without El. A happy future where El wasn’t his girlfriend.
He’d frequently regret not helping El more in Lenora, because if he had then maybe she wouldn’t have been taken again. He regretted not sending those letters to Will. He always regretted everything he never said. Things he wasn’t brave enough to do.
Under the confused list, nearly everything was there.
But in moments like these, in the dark of the basement or the coldness of his bed, he thought back to what Will told him in the van that day. It made the roar in his brain settle into a quiet hum.
He was the heart.
Everyone needed him.
He was needed.