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Mike is spending the last urgent summer days with Will in Hawkins. He’s also writing in college. Somehow, these two things are always happening at once.
Or, ‘Funny how there’s a face underneath my face.’
- Language:
- English
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- 104,916
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- 22/22
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Bookmarked by vertiginous
28 May 2026
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"Mike, come on," Will says, his smile still mid-bloom. "You don't think that's a little weird?"
"No," Mike says simply. "Why would that be weird?"
"Because I'm—" Will gestures vaguely to himself. "Gay. And you're…"
Will trails off, stopping himself, as if it just occurred to him that he could be wrong about the way he planned to answer that sentence. Mike isn't sure how he'd answer it either.
High, he thinks. Will is gay and I am high.
OR
The party does MDMA and Mike can't stop touching Will.
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Rec 180
Mystery Work
Part of stfuterfs
Summary
This is part of an ongoing challenge and will be revealed soon!
Bookmarked by vertiginous
07 May 2026
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ELITE, EXTREMELY UNDER-HYPED SLOWBURN. RUN DON'T WALK (and once you get there, SAVOR) (unlike me who devoured the first 6 chapters in essentially one sitting whooops)
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Art School Confidential by cyclogenesis (addictedkitten)
Fandoms: Stranger Things (TV 2016)
20 Feb 2026
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In which Mike moves to Indianapolis after his first semester of college, rents the apartment next door to Will, and gets a job as a nude model in Will’s life drawing class, and then Will has to deal with all of that. (This is an ongoing process.) Featuring a domesticity speedrun, life in a university district in the early 1990s, mutual care-taking behaviors, baffling vegetables, Mike wearing a shirt with a kitten on it, and The Cure haunting the narrative.
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An early flight, candles in a stack of pancakes, and a box of Reese’s Pieces.
Mike Wheeler has a plan to make Will’s nineteenth birthday perfect--if he can just stop being an idiot long enough to say the words.
or;
Will gets surprised, romanced and spoiled all day by a flustered Mike Wheeler.
Series
- Part 1 of Icing on the cake
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r/DnD
u/MWpaladin commented on “Can’t tell the difference between sorcerers and…” posted by u/LionsandTigers7 on r/DnDu/MWpaladin: Are you an actual idiot? Sorcerers and wizards are hardly even comparable. It’s not ‘the same thing’ in the slightest. A sorcerer’s magic doesn’t even come from a book of spells, their powers are INNATE. Maybe go back to third fucking grade before you ever try and DM a campaign of your own. Jesus Christ. Another important differentiation to note is… [expand]
Or: a long, very long, retrospective of Mike’s reddit history.
- Language:
- English
- Words:
- 15,577
- Chapters:
- 1/1
- Comments:
- 888
- Kudos:
- 6,436
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- 1,721
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Bookmarked by vertiginous
05 Mar 2026
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fuck off this is so funny
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Mike is waiting for Will in the basement, a look of suspicious, nervous excitement on his face. He cleared the table and laid out upon it are two card games.
"Now, I know you’ll resist," Mike blurts out, stepping toward him. "But I think this will be good. For both of us! For when we... you know,” Mike trails off, “When we get partners.”
Will scoffs, stepping closer to inspect the titles.
Spill or Sip and Truth, Dare, or Strip.
Or: Mike suggests a spicy card game to help Will loosen up before college. It works a little too well, and suddenly they’re gambling with unresolved feelings, and clothes, that were meant to stay in place.
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Mike’s mouth is warm.
Warm, and a little chapped, and pressing against his with an uncertainty that makes something in Will’s chest ache. He should pull away. He knows this. He knows it in the same way he knows not to touch a hot stove, not to stare too long, not to let himself imagine impossible things. His body seems uninterested in logic, though, and he supposes he can’t blame himself, not really.
Mike shifts slightly, trying to figure out what to do with his limbs. His lips move against Will’s with more intention, and Will’s breath stutters out of him in a way that is deeply embarrassing and entirely involuntary.
Oh, his brain supplies unhelpfully.
It’s something he’s imagined countless times before, kissing Mike Wheeler. He imagines it so often, in fact, that he cannot even recall the first time he imagined it. It’s an ever-present fantasy, always lurking in the back of his mind.
And yet, despite his thorough experience in imagining this moment, he somehow never imagined it quite like this.
Or: Five times it doesn't mean anything, and one time it finally does.
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don't know what to do (when i'm like this) by liveandfall
Fandoms: Stranger Things (TV 2016)
17 Dec 2025
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He shouldn't have let Max goad them into doing this. He should have shut the whole operation down the moment he saw her share a smirk with El when they were still out at the diner, innocently eating shitty waffles and soggy fries. He should have never agreed to let everyone come back here, he should have never let Robin and Steve pawn them off a twelve-pack of disgusting Sam Adams, and he should have never, ever let Dustin put his empty bottle in the middle of the circle they were sat in, comfortably buzzed and basking in normalcy.
But Mike had let them.
Mike Wheeler finds heaven in a boy who’s been to hell and back.
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It's 1992, and Mike and Will are juniors in college and living together in a tiny NYC apartment. Life is great. It's everything Mike could ever want: his best friend, an incredible city, and the world at his fingertips. The only problem? He's in love with said best friend and has no idea how he could ever tell him.
Luckily for him, he's presented with an opportunity to get much closer to him every Friday night, as long as he promises not to get all weird after. How hard could that be?
Or: Mike and Will become friends with benefits and the universe laughs because they're both ridiculously in love with each other.
Series
- Part 1 of Nirvana
- Language:
- English
- Words:
- 71,098
- Chapters:
- 5/5
- Comments:
- 1,250
- Kudos:
- 9,416
- Bookmarks:
- 2,501
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- 208,807
Bookmarked by vertiginous
23 Feb 2026
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this fic has taken over my brain
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Twenty-two years after leaving, Will travels back to Hawkins to face his past. Only Mike now lives there, too.
Or, ‘He might as well have carved 'Mike' into his thigh. It would have been more honest.’
- Language:
- English
- Words:
- 65,525
- Chapters:
- 15/15
- Comments:
- 2,495
- Kudos:
- 2,703
- Bookmarks:
- 1,005
- Hits:
- 57,526
Bookmarked by vertiginous
10 Feb 2026
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just gorgeously written, mature, literary fanfic. I don't even LIKE 2nd chance romance and yet here I am. Nbd
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Set immediately after the end of "The Rightside Up." Mike comes to terms with the tragedy that is growing up; Will calls him up to meet for a rooftop conversation.
Or: After resigning himself to a life of loneliness, Mike learns that he was Will's crush.
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Summary
“That’s not my favorite.”
“Oh.” Will blinks. “What is?”
Mike’s tongue darts out to wet his lower lip. “O negative.” Will feels a flush move across his entire body. His magic hums inside of him, excited. His fingers twitch against the carton. Maybe Will was wrong, maybe this is different than having a favorite kind of pizza. More personal. O negative sits differently in Will’s head than double black olives with extra cheese does. More intimate.
“Oh.” Will blinks again. And maybe O negative sits differently in Will’s head, because it also flows through his veins. He feels obligated to tell Mike. “I’m O negative.”
Mike’s pupils widen again. “I know.” His voice is low, gravelly.
Will’s breath hitches again. “You know?” He flinches when Mike’s fingers graze his, peeling the carton out of Will’s hand.
Mike takes a deep breath. “I can smell it.”
Or, five times that Will offered Mike his blood and the one time that Mike accepted.
Series
- Part 1 of take me as you please | vampwise
- Language:
- English
- Words:
- 16,845
- Chapters:
- 1/1
- Comments:
- 222
- Kudos:
- 3,977
- Bookmarks:
- 1,063
- Hits:
- 32,333
Bookmarked by vertiginous
25 Jan 2026
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pop punk vampire mike wheeler, i will love you til the day i die
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In which Mike just doesn’t think it’s right that Will doesn’t get to experiment with a guy, but luckily Mike’s a guy, and a good friend, so. Featuring closet hookups, hickeys, really good cuddles in the midst of all the sexual experimentation, sneaking around, a canon-typical amount of boys crying, the Painting Lie!!!, conversations about feelings that don’t actually address any of the important feelings (until they do, and then ohh boy), and the happy ending that they goddamn deserved.
Takes place during the eighteen month time gap before they all graduate, then continues past the ending of the finale.
- Language:
- English
- Words:
- 19,892
- Chapters:
- 1/1
- Comments:
- 254
- Kudos:
- 1,388
- Bookmarks:
- 325
- Hits:
- 17,304
Bookmarked by vertiginous
13 Jan 2026
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will forever have a place on my byler mt rushmore
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Mike pushes into his hands, but Will keeps him still.
"Ask again," he says. Because he's greedy, and he wants Mike to want him.
He stares at Will's mouth. "Please."
"Again."
El is gone.
Will tries to figure out how to move on in New York, and Mike follows him. Their apartment is haunted not by ghosts, but by the two of them.
Or: Catastrophically traumatized boys cling to each other and accidentally figure out how to be close—too close—while moving through their grief.
Series
- Part 1 of Supervoid (& Will’s Letter to El)
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“Okay,” Mike echoes. “So, I was – thinking. We should sleep together.”
Will, for some reason, still looks lost, but he looks cute – sweet, like that, pink cheeks and eyes wide and glossy and the slight furrow of his eyebrows like Mike has given him something outlandish.
“I,” he starts, “don’t understand.”
Mike proposes a sleepover.
Unsurprisingly, no sleeping is done.Series
- Part 7 of one-scene
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Will's injured after a Demogorgon attack, and Mike insists on patching him up. It should be simple—clean the wound, wrap the bandage, done. But Mike's hands keep lingering, and the air between them feels heavier with every touch. They've been walking this line for months, finding excuses to be close without ever crossing it. Maybe it's time to stop pretending.
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To be fair, Will’s costume is great, now that Mike knows what it is. And, okay, wait-
“Oh, this is so good. This is so good.” Max points at Mike, wheezing. “Because you’re dressed as-”
Will’s still looking straight up at the sky. The length of his neck is very, very flushed. Mike can feel his entire face going redder than Vader’s lightsaber. He clenches his hands into tiny little fists, and says, around a groan: “I’m not Han Solo, guys.”
In which Lucas has a thing for Bowie, Will has a thing for Han Solo, Mike has a thing for Will, and El should never be allowed to watch Star Wars again.
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put your lips close to mine, as long as they don't touch by lumism
Fandoms: Stranger Things (TV 2016)
17 May 2023
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“Well, I don't know,” Mike says. This is exactly what he had practised in the mirror earlier– except now he has to say it with the sudden certainty that this is all a very bad idea. “I guess I thought that a kiss would be a good bucket list item, or whatever."
Will looks at him for a few seconds. His gaze is calculating, and almost curious. But then he just shakes his head dismissively, and looks away.
“Yeah, I guess,” he agrees. “It’s not like there’s anyone to kiss here, though."
Mike almost laughs at that. Yeah, right.
He knows of at least two other people who would be down to kiss Will, if he asked them to. He selfishly keeps this to himself- because he doesn’t want Will to kiss anybody else, and because he doesn’t want to explain why, exactly, he has been keeping such close track of his best friend's romantic prospects.
“I mean,” he says instead, with a shrug. “I’m here."
It's the end of the world. Mike thinks that he and Will should kiss about it.
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The Byers’ new house is closer to Mike’s.
This is a Development.
Mike sees Will on the weekends. Mike sees Will on occasional school nights. Mike sees Will like he’s living with them again, stuffed into Mike’s back pocket, comfortably, reliably close.
Turns out, this is a problem.
.
or: Will is lovely, and Mike is in love. Maybe. Probably. Definitely.