Chapter Text
It's been happening for a while, he'll walk into the house and go directly up the stairs or down to the basement, barely acknowledging his mother and going out into the world only when absolutely mandatory. If she really thinks about it widely - grossly, it's been happening for years, early into his teenage years she'd been as distressed as she was unsurprised, after what had been going on, between Will disappearing and that girl, she knew he was affected, he’d need some time, as did Nancy. But now it's like systematic, he’ll come in; lock himself in his room or the basement, and only emerge when called- maybe not even then.
She’d only gotten to find an intimacy she’d long hoped for with her daughter when she’d reached 18, 16 year old Nancy used to treat her like all of Karen's friends with daughters say they act at that age, they all talk about the leave me alones and the slammed bedroom doors, but it stung hard in Karen's gut to know only her best friend got to see the little things, the popular boys, the stupid mistakes, the tiny wounds, meanwhile Karen got the Nancy trying so hard to be perfect, perfect because the home Karen had made wasn't a good enough place to let the flaws show, perfect in the hopes that Karen will eventually rip her eyes off her and let her be, let her live.
She knew it was her fault, she’d shown a distrust towards her children that she’d built on fearing she’d lose them both. She’d made a habit of walking into their bedrooms without knocking, going as far as breaking in, asking more questions than they needed and setting rules and curfews; follow-up questions waved off, until it brought them both over the edge. Since the winter of 83' there was something reigning the ambience, something had changed so drastically in the grey of her daughter's eyes, or the shadow under them. Like the smiles her son never gives her anymore, like the eyebags and the hood he took a whole year to stop wearing on a day-to-day basis. Like the raising frequency of Mike and Nancy's fights ever since, and the impact on Mike and Nancy's trust, something secret, something sacred, something like a string that kept them together.
One summer day in '85 she’d seen Nancy walk in a few hours earlier than her schedule should have permitted, carton box packed to the top in her arms. "Hey! You’re home early” she’d cheered as her daughter rushed towards the stairs.
“Yeah. Light day” she could hear her voice quivering as Nancy walked out of sight. She stood in front of her door, knocked and called her name, and even reached for the doorknob when she got no response, but her hand flinched at a flash of her own mistake's backlash. She slid her hand away and crossed her arms, and with a last sigh she walked away. Maybe this was a good time to realise talking was a choice for Nancy to make, maybe she shouldn’t force it. After all, that had never worked.
This time, she heard the door open behind her, when she turned around Nancy was looking at her, eyes puffy and red, making Karen’s stomach flip. And suddenly she was telling her everything, how she was trying and failing to have a voice that people would hear, that people would pay to read. And the thought of it hit Karen like a truck. The thought of it tasted so familiar to Karen.
Karen's always dreamed of a bigger life, always wanted to go big. But she didn’t exactly have a supporting audience, she’d always been told, in this case, the safe choice was the right choice. She’d tried to ignore it, deminish it, get past it and do what she wanted, she had, but there was no way she could deny today that she’d given up eventually. She’d set to work hard to do what everyone said she should; marry a man with wealth, build up a family, learn every family member's favorite recipe in the cookbook by heart, and wait patiently for everyone's lives to take place around you. Nothing could go wrong if you go for the safe choice, nothing could go wrong.
And she longs too many days to count, for the things she could have done differently years and years back, the things that would have made her a merrier woman today. And yet no matter what path she traces in her imagination, she can't picture a life where she doesn't have her children with her and feels an urge as pure. So, now she’s telling her daughter what she has to hear, telling her to do what Karen didn't, to show everyone what she’s made of, to show she’s capable of going further than that bunch of men ever could. Holding Nancy in her arms, giving her the warmth she hopes she'll accept this time.
It was all about realizing it was her children’s choice to go to her, chasing after them and breaking into their privacy be damned. But that had affected Michael in different ways than it did Nancy. She’d found a whole new trusting stage in Nancy, she’d sit in front of her and look her in the eye like once and for all she knew she could break, she could burst, she could tear, and her mother would listen, her mother would understand. And until then, her mother would wait. And she’d think to herself, their right to freedom was precious.
Her son, however...
She's grown a habit of closely watching her kids, and her son is a particular kid, always has been. He's tense when not fidgety, often talks a mile a minute, lacks most of the average patience, even for a kid, and a lower control of his own snaps, he paces back and forth so much he might as well pace up the walls.
But there was something else now. Something new, as he's been growing into an older teen. It's something in the look in his eyes or, the tone of his voice, maybe. And, yes, she is aware of puberty and the changes that come with it, she is aware of how every kid takes an unpleasant tone with their parents, their mothers especially, as they grow into their teen years, but she's also not stupid, and she knows, far too well, that her kids are not normal kids. As the kids Karen's friends are raising fear for monsters under the bed, Karen's kids fear for things of which Karen has never been able to hear, only getting the shadows under their eyes and the weight that goes unchecked, no matter how much Karen whishes to know more, know better. So yes, Karen knows what kids do, far bigger a reason to know something about her kids is different. Something about Nancy was and stays different. And something about Mike is very, very different.
There was something heavy leaning on his words whenever they had an argument, she could tell, he was holding something back, a cry so shrill she could see right through him and it pained her to the core.
Now he was 15 years old and she was still sure he was keeping more secrets than every word he ever said to her. It's not like she was to blame for thinking that way, the story was repeating itself and worst if possible. Not knowing anything about her son until it's absolutely impossible to not know was a famous tale as old as time in this residence.
It’s not like she hadn’t tried to talk to him, she’d asked how he was, what he felt like doing, she’d even tried to do stuff with him, watch a movie, get him to the market with her and Holly, but he was always ‘fine’, ‘busy’ or ‘not feeling like it’.
And as heart-on-his-sleeve as he was, he put much effort into staying obscure, so evidently, he never said anything to her about whether or not there was something keeping him awake, so the long silence left quite a lot of room for Karen's overexerted imagination.
The night a 12 year old Michael walked in the house with the look in his face torn, right after watching the newsman annouce an anonymous dead body, sobbing like he was just 4 years old all over again, she’d walked up to him, hesitant, and he’d stretched his arms out to her, and she’d hugged him and felt him holding onto her like he could fall at any moment.
After what had been going on, especially with the girl he'd been hiding for a whole week in the same home she lived in, she’d started looking at Michael differently, if he could hide a completely unknown kid in her same house, he could definitely hide whatever his head had going on.
It only took losing reach of him for a day, to realise for good, that losing her kids would be the end of her. When she saw him, sitting on the edge of an open ambulance truck, as she hugged him as tight as she possibly could, she found herself realizing, now more than ever, that she’d give her life for them. Her entire life.
When he’d walked in the day his best friend was moving to a completely different state, with a look on his face that she couldn’t quite put a name to, and hugged her tight, she could finally see from close that whatever he was holding back was only aching further and he knew. She was worried, above all, she was worried. She loved her children more than she could put to words. She knew there was a missing trust between them, something that made Michael walk in the house and hide, vaguely waving his hand in her direction as a greeting. Ted hardly reacted, but it meant everything to Karen.
-
"You would cry too if it happened to you" she sings to the radio, beating the bowl of eggs she's got wrapped in her left arm, balancing her body's weight from one foot to the other, pacing behind the counter. It's early in the morning, when the light shines bright and white, and the kids are still locked behind their bedroom doors, when Ted is still showering and Karen still hasn't eaten. She turns to the stove and grabs the pan handle, "Why was he holding her hand, when he's supposed to be mine?" she pours the bowl into the pan, nodding and tilting her head. A few minutes, when Lesley Gore coming through the radio turns into Paul Anka, she starts hearing doors open and close upstairs, followed by footsteps coming down the stairs.
She turns her head from the saucepan and sees her daughter approaching with a newspaper in her hand, a grey sweater and pair of black jeans. She smiles when she catches sight of her hair, her very own gorgeous reminder of them getting their hair done together at the beauty salon every now and then. “Morning, Nance” she beams and turns her head back to the pan to finish off the scrambled eggs. Meanwhile, Nancy sits at the kitchen table and makes a hold of a glass cup from the tray on the centre of the table, before helping herself to Karen’s fresh squeezed juice.
Karen switches off the stove and turns to fill the empty plates on the kitchen counter and watches Nancy scratch and write over a paragraph in the newspaper. She smiles as she thinks back to when Nancy only did this things when she shut herself in her room, and now she really was comfortable enough to work around her mother.
She gives Nancy her plate, sneaking glances at the archway, impatiently waiting for Michael to eventually appear turning from the stairs to the kitchen archway.
When Nancy finishes her plate and walks up to the sink Karen beats her to it with a simper, she waves her off to begin her day outside and gives her a kiss on the cheek. Nancy disappears hurriedly from the kitchen with a ‘Bye!’ as Karen finishes washing up what Nancy just used to eat.
“Hey” she turns so fast she feels her neck muscle pull painfully, she winces lightly, running her wet fingers across her nape. The first thing she notices is a thick shoulder-long black mane she’d recognize anywhere. “Morning, Mike” He's already dressed, a long-sleeved blue shirt with his sleeves rolled up, the dark pair of green jeans he wore yesterday and the black and white converse he keeps wearing, with his backpack hanging from his shoulder. He seems in a rush, so she makes herself speak before he vanishes for the rest of the day.
She stops in front of him with a now full plate and he sits down, dropping his backpack next to his chair, "Put your head on..." nothing but the radio is heard as she places the plate in front of him on the table. "My shoulder" sings Paul Anka one last time, when he just grabs the fork and starts eating, Karen tries to look anywhere but him and her eyes fall on the syrup on the counter, she remembers how Mike used to pour it all over his eggs and smiles, turning her head down to the counter, she sneaks a glance at him and frowns slightly; he's eating with a nauseous look on his face that specially shows everytime he opens his mouth for another bite, like he's making a excessive effort to take it in.
The last vocals fade out into the presenter as she re-organizes the fruit bowl in the center of the kitchen isle, back to doing literally anything but staring at him and most likely scaring him away.
“How did you sleep?” she asks.
“Fine.” He speaks, dropping the fork on the plate before standing up. "...coming to one of our classics..." she faintly hears the presenter speaking as she swallows a sigh.
“Anything good happening today?” she stops him and reaches onto his plate when he grabs it to make his way to the sink. Nancy Sinatra starts singing in the background, "You keep saying, you got something for me..."
He raises his eyebrows and gives her the plate before turning around and taking his backpack from the ground, as he slides it on he replies, “No, just the usual.”
“Right well, have a good day, honey” she calls, leaving the plate on the sink, when she turns her head to find him he's already opening the front door.
“Thanks.” She barely hears him answer before stepping out and shutting the door behind himself, she sighs as a wave of emptiness takes over the whole room. She washes off what's left and her hand lingers on the knob when she turns off the water tab, she subconsciously lets out a shaky breath. She dries her hands and turns away from the sink.
"One of these days these boots are gonna walk all over you" the radio stays emitting, as Karen digs her elbow into the counter and smashes her cheek against her fist.
-
She'd started to miss Mike’s friends coming over, Lucas, Dustin, Max, and Will, of course, Will wasn’t here anymore, so that made it his other three friends that came around and hung out in his basement. But it happened much less often lately, if at all, maybe it was just a busy time, they're still studying after all, or maybe it was Will being gone for good. Or maybe, whatever had Mike pulling away from her, had him pulling away from his friends too. But she misses the noise Mike used to cause in the house too often lately. So when she crosses the hallway and actually hears the sound of the TV screen from downstairs if not their voices downstairs, yelling, just talking, and sometimes laughing, she feels the essence of their house is inching back to life.
So when she hears the door to the basement open seconds before closing again in the pure silence of the house, she turns her head up from the counter, to see Michael approaching the archway.
She hadn’t gone to bed at all yet, she’d been hesitant to leave the scenery completely until the morning, a hunch she called it. So she set herself to a deep dive cleaning of the kitchen, even if she found herself without much to clean if not overclean.
Michael waking up that late in the night and wandering about the house might have been her hunch.
Their eyes meet once he reaches the archway, neither looks less wide-eye surprised than the other about finding each other at this hour. “Michael?” she speaks slowly stopping her ministration, hand clutching onto the sponge she’d been scrubbing on the counter.
His face goes back to the apathetic look she's starting to get used to, “Hey” he mutters.
“Are you okay?” she asks.
“Yeah, just, y’know, awake”
She nods. “I could make you a glass of milk, if you want-”
He cuts in, “I’m not 12, mom” he scrunches his face, head jerking back like he's just had the stupidest thing be said to him, he drops himself on a stool in front of the large kitchen counter in the centre. He lays one arm on the counter, while he runs his fingers from his other hand through his hair, stopping when his hand reaches his nape and leaving it there for a few moments.
“Forgive me for dreaming.” She rolls her eyes. “How about a glass of water, then?” She offers, already putting the scrub aside and pulling off her yellow gloves, before rinsing her hands and approaching the cupboard with glasses.
“Sure” he sighs, and forgive a woman for fearing but he sounds a little like he's hoping that'll shut her up.
Karen grabs a glass and fills it up with water, she closes the sink and turns towards him, lending it to him. He mutters a ‘thanks’ while making a hold of it. She crosses her hands on the counter and thinks for a few seconds as he takes a long sip, before asking “When’s the last time we saw a movie?”
He frowns, undoubtedly confused “I don’t know, a while?”
“We should watch something” she says, “One of these days.”
He opens his mouth and closes it again after a few seconds, hesitating. A few moments later, he finally says “You know Labyrinth?”
“What?”
“Labyrinth. Came out last year. It’s not too bad.” He says, nonchalant.
“Maybe we should watch it.” She beams.
He purses his lips for a few seconds, “I already watched it. But you can watch it. It’s on the shelf in the living room, Nancy rented it a while ago.”
“Oh” she mutters, her face falling. That's such a ridiculous excuse it's stupid. She knows her son better than he apparently thinks she does, Michael will rewatch anything he likes as many times as he can, until it wears him out completely. She knows they have a distance, but it's starting to seem like he's deliberately avoiding her. Her specifically.
“Right. Labyrinth, is it?” she asks before the silence gets too heavy.
“Hm” he nods calmly, “Will loves that movie. Won’t stop talking about it.” He brings the glass to his lips again and keeps talking only when the glass is on the counter again. “It’s this girl, who travels through this huge maze to find her baby brother, her being the one who sent him there in the first place." He shakes his head, blinking a few times. "It’s all fantasy and David Bowie”
“Hmm, I don’t know if that’s my kind of movie.” She says, undeniably resentful, crossing her arms on the counter.
He raises his eyebrows, tired. "Yeah, I figured" he says, eyes closed as he runs his index and middle finger pressed together across his right eyebrow, “I mean it’s not that big a deal? But it’s fine. It’s the music he likes, I guess. Bowie’s like one of his favorite singers ever” He rolls his eyes, sluggish, he really does look very tired but he seems to be finding the energy to talk just fine all of a sudden, it's not until he's standing up and wishing her a good night that she thinks his face looks a little redder.
-
When he's perched over the couch with his arms crossed, with Lucas sitting - or rather laying over and across the armchair near the couch, his legs hanging from one armrest and his back resting against the one opposite to it, and Max sitting on the carpet, leaning her back against the front of the same armchair, her arm on the cushion, bumping against Lucas’ hip. When Dustin's practically snuggling on the other corner of the couch Mike is sitting on, with his back against the armrest and his arm resting over the backrest and his head lazily turned to the TV. With the four of them looking towards the TV, matter-of-fact (about two and a half meters away from them) where the movie's playing, (a movie that Mike stopped paying attention to about half an hour ago) that's a Friday night in his world.
It's comforting. Though, somehow not as much as it used to be, most especially without Will and El around. Either way, something about it made him feel out of place. Like he shouldn't actually be enjoying this. But it's just as well, that familiar feeling of remorse doesn't really limit itself to movie nights. The past few months have been unbearable moreso than relieving.
After dragging it for years, he thought finally acknowledging himself in a way he hadn't let himself think about would fix things. Only he realised how not thinking about it had helped him go on up until now, however controversial his response to it had been. The truth staring back at him did nothing for him, when he first admitted it he felt nothing different than before, but then slowly, he started feeling worst, somehow. He's always been pretty frenzied, moodswinging from one phase to another, trying to guide and care for everyone but him, driven by an anxietal urge that he knew was bordering out of the ordinary. But admitting he's not growing into what he was originally supposed to be was like, all of a sudden it was true, all of a sudden it was real. All of a sudden, he couldn't reach that state of separating himself from it enough to move without it. The daily reminder that he wasn’t like his friends, like his parents. It's great, really, now he's wide awake too many nights to count and it's like he's alert or something to that effect, like he fears if he falls asleep someone will actually, genuniely manage to crawl into his head and figure out everything going trough it. It's a whole thing, whatever. Good news is if someone breaks in he'll probably hear it.
It's like he hates everything somehow, he hates his favorite songs, he hates his favorite movies, he feels out of place anywhere other than his basement, or his room if he's feling a little wild. Everything feels like it's gonna instantly give him away the second he's outside so, easy, he stays inside. He's scared, but he's also disappointed; he hasn't stopped moving in bumpy circles since he was thirteen.
Icing on the cake; finding calm after the storm is a myth, if the storm is to end at all that is. Whenever he laughs a little too hard he pictures too much of it. The night where Will went missing after leaving his house, the mental picture of the Demogorgon taking all of Will, the Demogorgon - in the flesh, with its long arms and merciless craving for blood. The night El sacrificed herself to it, the last time he saw her for almost an entire, terrible year. Will's screams, Will's episodes, Will slowly fading away, faster and faster, pulling away from everyone, from Mike. The nauseous feeling in his stomach and the fear crippling in his chest when El went to close the gate, in that place. The Mind Flayer, the melting flesh and bones, the arms, the mouth. He still feels it in the pit of his headaches. He still sees it, when he closes his eyes for too long, he sees all of it - Like snapshots of a camera one after the other. Blood, Will, El, more blood, the Mind Flayer, the Demogorgon, the lab, Bob, the vines, even more blood. Every bit of it. He still thinks of it. He still dreams of it. He still worries he also dreamed the night they stopped it, that he'll wake up and everybody will be dead. He'll step into the bathroom every now and then, wash his pale face three times, look in the mirror and remember. Over and over again. 'It's over. It's over now. They're all safe. It's gone. It's gone.' But it doesn't feel over, and he's not alone, they've all seen it, they all still remember it, but Mike's never been one to do the leaning rather than be the one to lean on, so it kind of just, sits there and rots.
Feeling a knot forming in his stomach, he remembers the last time they played D&D in his basement was decades ago. Things have changed. Will and El being miles away had made D&D sessions in his basement less and less frequent, the Hellfire club was one thing, the basement - where Mike, Lucas, Dustin and Will had played D&D campaigns of 10, 15, 20 hours – was another. Even a year later the effect had persisted. Not one of the 4 left in Hawkins felt like going back to every tradition they’d had back then, without Will and El in the picture.
The basement, the same place where he took El in the very first night they met and gave her his home, his safety. The eggos she’d grown to love, that he’d push into his pocket and present to her as soon as he had the chance. Every night he called her, holding the supercom like, maybe, just maybe, clutching it harder would make it more possible. Will. And the movie nights they shared together, the long talks until 3am and the low talks when they'd take a little longer to fall asleep than everyone else. Every single drawing Will had ever given him, that he’d hang in this same basement walls or save inside the binder he’d made just for this, the binder he still kept inside his drawer and had gone through more times than he cared to admit ever since Will had left. The Halloween night of ’84, where Will had shown Mike a trust that he really hoped Will still held onto - just like Mike still holds onto Will’s teary eyes and bright, fragile smile vivid in his head, and their fights, the big fights and the thick after-feeling in his throat were quite as vivid. He'd give a lot to see Will in the flesh again.
Things have changed.
When he goes upstairs - sometime after midnight - after his sixth attempt to ‘fucking. fall. asleep’ and finds his mother in the kitchen, he realizes just how much things changed. He figures she remembers (even better than he does) the hours he’d spend rambling to her, about his favorite comics, about Star Wars, about his last campaign, about Will. Now everything is different, and he could blame her, he could make this easy and blame her, he could turn around and tell himself mom fucking sucks, but he can't blame her for not understanding, for not seeing something he's hiding. He could've sat there and told her everything and let her cry and freak out if he wanted to, but he didn't, and he shouldn't. So, he drifts apart from her for the good reasons; if they're not that close then everything, whatever it was, would be easier for the both of them. He dreads just the thought of talking to her about it, he doesn't want to see her face when she finally reads the truth on his, he has enough picturing her face in his head, her face of shock, of disappointment, going through him like a dagger to the stomach.
He has no idea how long he’d been talking to her that night or about what entirely, he can distinguish certain parts, like the look on her face when he’d rejected watching Labyrinth with her, and the resentment in her eyes and the fiddling of her fingers. It doesn't matter, he thinks when he sees her face fall as he stands up, it doesn't matter.
-
She's clutching onto the steering wheel, counting to ten over and over again to slow down her breathing. Driving all the way to Hawkins High, not 10 minutes after she'd been called by the principal, with the petition to pick up her son from the principal's office and 'address his behavior' after he had to be manhadled off a classmate. She presses her foot a little harder on the accelerator and tilts her head down, her eyes glued to the speeding road.
She's been counting every second until she gets there before she parks and gets out of the car in a matter of seconds, barely looking back as she presses the car doors lock button on her keys and runs towards the school. The last time she'd walked through these halls she'd been in a parent-teacher conference for Mike last year, before the summer break.
Now she's walking towards the waiting room for the principal's office, holding her hands against her stomach a little too tightly. She reaches for the door handle, pushes, and stops dead - first thing she sees; Michael, sitting on one of the chairs, hands together between his spread legs, running his thumb over his knuckles that look a little too red. He looks up when he hears the door opening, his lip is cut and there's something reddening under one mildly swollen eye. She breaths in and out heavy, looking right into his eyes and hoping - for once - that he realizes how disappointed she is. He looks back down to the ground and she looks around to find a boy sitting across the room, with a similarly screwed-with aspect, he looked mad, however unapologetic. She walked in fully and closed the door behind herself.
A door opens right as hers closes and she turns her head to see the principal coming out, "Mrs. Wheeler," he speaks, "I'm glad you could make it. Now, if you wouldn't you mind?" he makes a gesture with his hand for them to walk into the office. Michael stands up like he's carrying a 100kg backpack on his shoulders with a sigh and she starts walking directly towards the door.
It's not like she hadn't figured that much the moment she'd seen him, but to have to hear about it from the principal made this feel almost surreal. Of course, progress had ups and downs, but whatever this was only seemed to be going down, down, down. She watches Mike fixated on the ground as the principal, outraged, paces back and forth behind his desk, talking about the boy his son had gotten on a fight with, as he talks about how the surrounding witnesses had described the situation, how Mike had spun on the spot and punched Marcus Walker right on the face, how - wait, what? "Excuse me." she cuts in and he stops to look at her, raising his eyebrows, "I'm very sorry to interrupt but I find it hard to believe that there's no source for this." She rests both her hands on the table, "For as long as I've known him, my son's never gotten into fights for fun. For... no reason whatsoever."
"Then perhaps you should ask yourself how much you really know your son." he crosses his arms.
And there it is. Like a kick right on the stomach, the one thing she's been fearing to think. And she's ashamed, she's standing in front of her son's principal after he gave a kid a black eye and she's so ashamed. Feeling like she's only getting smaller as every second passes, and the principal goes on; "...talking back to teachers, insubordination, inappropiate language..." and on, "...skipping class...vandalism of school property..." her hands are tightly crossed over her lap as the principal lists the problems they've already had in the past as problems that are starting to trail onto the present. She wordlessly lets him finish his lecture, before she agrees to hoping this doesn't have to repeat itself again. When the principal expresses his concern for this situation never getting any better, Karen makes sure to establish; "I beg of you, sir. I've always been very proud of the effort my son puts into his studies. Please have some faith."
"I have faith to spare, ma'am. And I've spared a lot of it on Mr. Wheeler," he says, turning his head to Mike. Karen swallows and turns her head to Mike, who's still looking down at the ground, launched over his chair rather than sat, hips almost on the edge, without adding anything.
"Mike." she calls, firmly.
"Huh?" he looks back up, passively raising his eyebrows, "Oh, uh. Yeah." and looking down again.
The principal fixates on him for a good minute before he nods, "I'm willing to spare more of it," Karen smiles- "after a week of suspension" Karen's mouth falls agape and Mike, ever so slowly, lifts his head.
"Sir-" she starts.
"Consequences are not a faint bark here, Mrs. Wheeler." he cuts in, sitting down. "And your son could do with a reminder." he grabs a pen, turns it upside down and hits the thrust tube against the table to open it, grabbing an empty suspension notice template from a pile in an open drawer. "One week is the perfect amount of time for your son to reflect on whether he's willing to become a decent, if not exemplary, student in this High School"
Karen's hands are shaking on her lap, her legs are tightly pressed together as she forcefully rubs her ankle against her other foot, anxiously. She watches him starting to write, and swallows, knowing there's no chance for the principal to cave, knowing she's walking out of this room with her son suspended. "I'll be willing to hear if your son reaches a result, next Tuesday" he says, only looking up from the paper when he states next Tuesday, to reinforce it.
Karen looks down, breathes in, and speaks; "Yes, sir. I'll see to it." she turns her head to Mike, whose shoulders are hunched forwards, as he glares a hole into the ground.
"Good," he says, signing the bottom swiftly, and lifting the pen off the paper. He takes the piece of paper and hands it over to Karen, who reaches for it like she'll get burnt if she goes too fast. The principal stands up, to which Karen and Mike mimic him, as quiet as he is, his face has always been very emotive, and rather than looking surprised, gleeful or ashamed, Mike looks pale with ire, bemused somehow. Like justice turned every which way but his. The principal walks them out of his office, and once they step out, Karen moves with shame, a few steps ahead of Mike.
They don't talk a single word. Not when they're out of the principal's hallway, not when they get in the car, not when she drives them home with no sound other than the wheels of the car against the road, of the wind muffled by the car windows. Not when she parks the car in front of their house. Not until she unlocks the front door and walks in, followed by him.
"Mike," she says, turning to him as she takes off his jacket and hangs it up. He digs his hands in his pockets, raising his eyebrows and staring at the ceiling, "What the hell is this, Michael?"
"What?" he turns to her, raising his eyebrows.
She purses her lips tight and yanks the suspension notice off her coat pocket "This!" she shouts. "You punched a classmate! You could've broken his nose! Look at yourself! You're still bleeding!" she waves towards his face, "You're suspended, for God's sake!" she screams, amazed.
"FUCK!" he curses loudly, startling her. She jerks her head back and he starts walking, fast, stomping up the stairs. "Michael!" she calls, following him before the door to his bedroom can slam on her face, she pushes the door far from the frame with both her hands, and watches him; he's sliding off his backpack from his shoulders, down his arms, pacing back and forth in front of his bed.
"You're doing it again!"
"Doing what?" he screams. Waving his arm in the air and crushing the hanging strap of his backpack with the other.
"Shutting everyone out." She answers and he scoffs, turning around and throwing his backpack onto the bed, "Getting angry at everything, at everyone!" She opens and closes her mouth. Two beats. She sighs. "Making everything seem so- negative!"
"Jesus!" he shouts, spinning back to her, and she jerks her head back in surprise. "I'm sorry," he speaks, shoulders lifting and inch, head moving ever-so-slightly, there's a palpable sarcasm in the undertone of his words that makes her throat hurt, "Happy?" he asks, arching an eyebrow.
She raises her eyebrows, "Wh-" she gasps out, before saying "What's gotten into you, Michael?" feeling a lump growing thicker in her throat.
He scoffs, bringing his fingers to his temples, stretching the corners of his eyebrows upwards with his fingerpads, groaning, he drops his arms to his sides and shakes his head; "Why do you care?" and he spits it like it's worthless to even think about.
"I'm your mother!" and he laughs. He laughs. It's dry and wry, but it's real; he doesn't take her seriously anymore, does he? He really is genuinely trying to rile her up. She can feel her insides twisting like a vault handle as it echoes into silence, she's mad, she's raging mad that he's answering like this, that he's not explaining why, that he's not doing anything other than just bark back at her. But she can't lie to him the way she's lying to herself, if she can't lie to a fucking principal, she can't lie to Mike. When was the last time she'd seen her son for what he was, when was the last time she'd made her son feel home after all this years. She takes a step closer to him and, instantly, he takes a step back; his back's straightening, he's tensing up. It's like he doesn't even want it anymore, and wants her to know that. Her hands are shaking and she's certain her legs are starting to falter.
"Anything else?" he asks in a bemused, almost exasperated manner, shoulders lump and a bored look on his face.
She sighs, frustrated. She's mad that he's acting this way, she's anguished by not being the mother she promised her mother she'd be, she's desperate as the days bleed onto each other and they stay here, walking in circles; so she licks her lips and turns her head to Mike's window, breathing in deeply. "You know what?" she says, narrowing her eyes lightly. "That's it." she turns back to him.
"What?" he sighs.
"YOU'RE GROUNDED!" she shouts, her voice so loud it sounds rasp. And she doesn't like her voice sounding this way, especially not when she's talking to any of her children, but enough is enough. If she doesn't do anything about this things are probably just going to get worst and worst as they go. He barely even talks to her anymore, perhaps the only way you can have someone hear you from miles away, after all, is screaming.
He scoffs. Again. Turning his head up to the ceiling before looking back down at her; "FINE!" he yells back at her so loud it hurts, before turning around again, walking towards his bed.
She shakes her head in disbelief and turns around to walk away. She turns back to him to grab the handle of the door, pressing her other hand against the door frame, and with one last hesitant look she steps out, leaving Mike standing in the middle of his room.
Once the door is closed she leans back against it, tilting her head up to rest it against the door, closing her eyes in a loud sigh. She's trying, she is, but it'd been years since the last time walking around this house didn't feel like wandering between strangers.
-
2 hours earlier
"I'm sorry, can you repeat that?" Dustin asks, as they walk out of the entrance to Hawkins High.
"That's the third time you've said that sentence, I'm not doing this again" Lucas grunts.
Mike groans, exhausted, "Please don't"
"You asked!" he yells, tunring his head to Mike and shooting a hand forwards.
Mike nods, raising his eyebrows at Lucas, "Which I deeply regret"
"You know what, I'm done" he waves his hands, jerking his head back.
"Look at it this way," Mike offers, "you're the major of the matter. Okay? No one understands but you. If we really, really, reaally" he drags out, "were to need to know what a goaltending is, you are our one and only voice of reason. It's a win-win situation."
"Oh, my god. It's not a goaltending. It's just goaltending. It's a vio-"
"Will Byers or something, I don't know." Someone's talking right behind them, loud enough to cut Lucas off. Lucas eyes over his shoulder before sharing a look with Mike.
"Zombie Boy?" That's another voice, it's higher-pitched but rougher, and earns a hum of understanding from an entirely different person. Mike hears a chuckle that makes his eyebrows twitch.
"Wait. What'd you say happened?"
"I don't know. Moved out?" He mumbles. Mike closes his hands in fists, pressing hard enough to feel a knuckle crack. "Died, hopefully"
There's a loud snort followed by "Probably got himself killed."
The guy behind Mike chuckles and Mike's head buzzes painfully, "'M telling you. Long overdue for that gay freak to take a hit"
It all happens too fast. He blinks twice and he's turning around, fist thrown in the air, crashing against the guy's face long before he realizes he actually snapped. There's a general noise from the crowd getting louder and louder and Mike's head is seriously starting to ache.
"MIKE!" Dustin yells, but he doesn't hear it. He does, but he doesn't.
"HEY, WHAT THE FUCK?!" Some dude around them is already screaming and Mike can't grow to care in the slightest. His fists are closed so tight he can feel the pulse of his heartbeat in the tip of his fingers. There's this flash to when he was 12 years old, to Troy tumbling to the ground and the fury turning around his stomach making him want to throw up. The mere reminder of it only makes things worst. Now swallowing through gritted teeth, glaring a hole into Marcus Walker's face, feels harder than pushing through a crowd.
"WHAT THE HELL'S THE MATTER WITH YOU?" Walker still has the nerve to scream back at him, after what he said.
"ME? WHAT THE FUCK IS WRONG WITH YOU, YOU SON OF A BITCH?!" Mike's screaming. So hard it hurts.
He's standing up and before Mike can even tell he's getting punched right on the nose. "FIGHT!" someone screams somewhere in the crowd and the crowd somehow gets louder and bigger at once, and this time nothing here's strong enough to stop it, not even a force like that of El's, and a part of him, deep down, is glad. Glad that he gets to let it out with nothing other than Marcus and his burning blood pumping. His nose is bleeding and his blood is boiling when he barely recovers and it's happening, that thing he's been holding back for months is suddenly becoming a bleeding red nose on the face of a guy with the kind of nerve Mike wants annihilated.
Every scream in the crowd, every punch, every pull, every rolling around the ground, just makes his head lighter, buzzier, messier. Maybe it's the fact that Will's not even here, that Will's finally far away from the rotting shithole that is this town and all the people that've ever called him anything, and this vest-wearing jackass still has the filthy nerve to speak ill of him that makes Mike want Marcus' nose broken, and maybe it's the urging anger he's been burying down for this long what's keeping him standing, wanting to keep going until one of them falls- No. Until Marcus falls, right here, in front of the school entrance for everyone to see. The fourth time his back hits the ground is when he's pretty sure he's lost most of his senses. "Shit. MIKE!" That's... That's Lucas. It's all noise, everyone's screaming, chanting, rounding them as a crowd that only gets larger, and the buzzing in his head is too hard to distinguish different sounds. It's too loud.
The second they roll over again and Mike is on top of Marcus, Lucas and Dustin grab both of his arms, pulling up and backward as two guys simultaneously do the same with Marcus.
"WHAT IN THE NAME OF HELL IS GOING ON IN HERE?!" An older voice makes an entrance far too late, pushing through the people around, it's a teacher. He can't really tell who, everything keeps blurring in and out.
-
He's sitting on the chair, across the room, as far away as he possibly can from Marcus. He's holding a tissue right under his nose to wipe off the last stain of blood under his nostril, with some luck his mother won't even know he had a nosebleed in the first place and won't think it was that bad- if it wasn't for Marcus' three cuts all over his face and Mike's eye that's stinging a little too much to look as perfect as he kind of hopes it looks, his plan would actually work.
To be honest, to be really honest, he doesn't even regret it. Mainly because, god, that guy deserved it. After everything Will'd been through, after all of it, hearing people still say the same shit, even after he's finally moved away from this shithole, stung even more. It just felt good. Like emptying a large bucket full of water, letting the water pour out like a waterfall, loud and hard, and if he could go back, man would he do it again. Over and over again.
He stands up, clutching onto the tissue. He wipes his nose with his free hand and turns it in front of him to check if it's stained. It isn't, so he throws out the tissue and sits back down with a sigh. He looks around, Marcus is leaning back looking almost bored, dickhead doesn't even look like he's sorry for any of it-
The door opens and the sound of it unlocking is almost worst for Mike's headache than the conversation that the person that just walked in means. He watches his mother look down at him with a face he hasn't seen in a while, if not ever. He feels something twist in the pit of his stomach, he doesn't need this right now, he really really doesn't.
-
This actually, really never ever happens. Karen, Ted and Mike sitting on the living room, watching a movie on a rainy Wednesday afternoon, a ray of the greyish light from outside slipping in through the small space between the closed curtains from the window behind them in the sofa- yeah no, this never happens. Mike's sitting on the armchair, having purposefully avoided sitting on the same couch as them. He's jiggling his leg, his hands crossed; repeatedly tapping his fingerpads from one hand against the knuckles on his other hand. Impatient, she thinks.
It's been a relatively lazy day. Michael had been in his room for the most of it (she'd let it be only because he had somewhat made an effort to do what she asked for the past few days), and Nancy had been all over the place, she’d been out for a few hours, tidying up her room and getting herself ready, walking in and out of the washroom. It wasn’t until she came down for a few minutes, as the afternoon came, wrapped in a pink towel robe and slippers, drying her hair with a white towel, that she told her mother she was meeting a few friends from the school’s newspaper for the night. So Karen would only be making dinner for four tonight.
When Michael comes back up for a glass of water, she knows he’d intended to do the same thing he always did and disappear for the rest of the night, with some luck appearing for dinner. But Karen stops him before he walks away. “Michael, we’re watching a movie playing on the TV, why don’t you join us for a bit?"
He bites his bottom lip and opens his mouth, already shaking his head. But Ted speaks over him. “Come on, Michael. Least you can do after what's happened, and you're grounded, it's your mother's choice unless you want another week” he's saying, and any other day she would’ve said it was fine, Michael could leave if he wanted. But she doesn't today, selfishly hoping he‘ll join. Plus, he is grounded.
Michael turns his head, biting his tongue. He looks to the side and sighs, when he looks back at them he forces a smile that's literally a nauseous grimace, “Yeah” so he sits on the edge of the armchair nearest to the archway, one hand on his lap, as he bites the nail on his thumb from the other, ready to zoom away the moment he finds his chance.
She hasn't been paying a lot of attention to the TV, not necessarily until they find themselves watching a scene from the movie, with a singer whose name she’d failed to catch. It's a man, his hair's almost touching his shoulders, combed. He's wearing makeup, a bright purple eyeshadow and a black eyeliner, enganged in a heated, unambiguous stage-chroeo with another man, this one shirtless, muscular and heavily masculine. She raises her eyebrows, she’s seen this a few times, but all times she can count with the fingers on just one hand, it really isn’t something you see on your every day. She didn't think much of it, and given that it's not something that often comes up in conversation, she also didn't think very often about it.
Hearing a light chuckle to her side, she realizes she's not the only one whose attention's been called by this. She sees Ted, amused, smiling lightly for a few seconds. Her eyes move up a little far behind, she sees Mike. He's staring a Ted like he's waiting for something. His hands are clasped tightly over his lap, and he's jiggling his leg quickly; if she focuses really hard she can hear the faint squeak and ruffling of his seat as his leg rushes up and down. Why are you so tense? She wonders.
She turns back to the screen, absently watching the singer, pushing down the urge to over-analyse her son again. He obviously doesn't like it, Karen, you need to stop.
She focuses on the singer, she didn’t really see it often, and she could understand why it raised a few flags for some people, even she thought it was a little weird, maybe not her cup of tea. But it's fine? It's not like it's any of her business. She ignores the faint thought (I mean she can barely hear it, It's not even a problem!) in the back of her head that- admires it. Is Mike thinking about it too? No. Leave it. What purple shade is it? Don't look at him. Is it violet? Leave him alone. Actually maybe it's lilac. She only realises she's been biting at her bottom lip when she starts tasting bloody on the tip of her tongue, she hisses, raising two fingers to her lip.
Tentatively, she sneaks a look towards Mike, but turns her head fully towards him when she sees the look on him; his eyes are shut tight, his hands are clasping ever so hard they're turning yellow and he's shaking both his legs anxiously, it's like he's doing even worst all of a sudden, he's breathing way too fast and he's practically squirming on the edge of his seat. Is he having an anxiety attack? What is she supposed to do? If she stays here he's gonna get worst, if she asks him he's gonna get mad.
He quickly grabs onto the armrests and stands up from his seat at the speed of light, in a manner so stressed the armchair tumbles a few inches back loudly against the carpet, startling both her and Ted, especially her, who quickly tenses up. "I have to," he starts, "I have to finish something, it's-" he says, trailing off without finishing, shifting his weight from one foot to the other, hoping no one asks where he's trying to get with that sentence. Ted opens his mouth, Karen assumes he's going to counter against it so she places a hand on his arm, "Let him go," she whispers.
Ted hums looking back from Karen to the TV “Come downstairs when dinner’s ready” he calls as Michael hurriedly walks. She hears his stomping up the stairs, seconds before the door to what she assumes is his bedroom opens and slams shut after a moment.
-
He locks and unlocks the door to lock it again three times, desperately trying to reinforce the fact that there's a locked door standing between him and the rest of his family. He starts pacing back and forth, his heart is beating fast, thudding so hard he can feel it hitting against his chest. He breathes in and hitches in his throat once, he tries again and his breath skips again, 'Fuck!' he mouths before walking up to the table and grabbing onto the edge, balancing back and forth. He breathes in, feeling his oxygen only get halfway up to his lungs, he shakes his head and tries again, and again. And again, until his breath reaches up and up to his lungs, but if feels dry, extremely hard and it doesn't work when he tries to do it again. He almost panics. What if he dies or something? He feels like he's dying. He feels lightheaded, too.
He tries closing his mouth and breathing through his nose but he feels muffled and it only gets worst, his mouth falls open and he exhales loudly like he's been holding in the air he's fighting to feel in the first place. He feels the strength on his hands faltering, coming back and going away, and he's starting to freak out. He turns around, desperate for the motion to rush some air onto him. He throws his head back, frowning. Breathe, he thinks, sucking air in through gritted teeth and pulling his jaw down to breathe in. Breathe, he thinks, chest heaving, shoulders moving up and down, face contorting.
He turns only an inch around to bang at the table. Walking away and towards the bed, sitting and then sliding back. He lays on his side, piled-up anger blasting in his head, he covers his ears tightly, vainly trying to stop the ringing. He feels his head ache. Stop it, fuck! Stop it. His knees are curling up, pulling towards his chest, his back is hunching forwards, his head between his hands, covering his ears so hard they're starting to hurt.
This isn’t fair, not fair, not nearly. He's angry. Angry at his dad for not saying what he must have wanted to say. Angry at himself for getting himself suspended, grounded, and with no choice but to sit and publicly watch his problems chase him everywhere, even through a 22 inch screen. Angry at his mom for sitting there, speechless, like she's not thinking what everyone else thinks, like she's not still wondering how his son's such a head-scratching failure. Angry at himself for being so riled up for fucking nothing!
He didn't want to break, but in a way, he did. He was doing a particularly good job at putting his problems aside when he was around people, so he might have been able to handle it, but the anticipation of hearing a snarky comment that would hit right where it burnt, the expecting to hear something following his father's chuckle that never actually comes, it made it so much harder. He wanted to snap at the silence, he wanted to scream "I know what you think. I know what you all think. What you think of them. And what you'd think of me." But he couldn't, could he. He breathes in and out, still troubled like he's fighting to swim up to the shore. And fuck! This isn't fucking fair. It took two seconds to realise, just like magic, his head had been doing the work for his dad instead. Clutching at his own shoulders, hissing through his ears. You can't run away forever.
He's shaking, ok the bed is not fucking working, he stands up again, shuffling out of the bed and walking up to the window, banging his hands against the glass to slide it open, his hands slip and he brings them to the window frame instead, desperation crawling up his stomach urgently, it's too hot, there's no air in this room, there's no air, he unlocks the window handle and slides the frame open, there's no air. The second the window's open enough for him to fit he bends forward, feeling a rush of fresh air as he exhales and then breathes in through his mouth, loud and messy. He lets out a tearless cry of frustration or relief as he feels himself catching up, his hands are still shaking when he starts breathing properly, he still can't really get the air to reach his lungs every time he breathes in, but he doesn't feel like he's actually dying anymore. His hand clutching onto the window frame drops on the windowsill and his shoulders fall. He turns around and slides down, until he falls sat on the ground, knees bent in front of his chest. He closes his eyes, sweating and breathing like he's run five miles, letting the scratching noise fade out on its own time.
You didn't die. He thinks. You can do this.
-
Two days had past since. Ever since Michael hadn’t spoken a single word, it’s not like he had been talking out of his mind lately but there was a heavy silence following him now. Ted had waved it off when she talked to him about it in bed, her legs under the cover and her back against the headrest. ‘He’s a kid, Karen. Kids do this stuff.' She'd thrown her head back and sighed. Her stomach drops as she practically feels the chains to this damned circumstance making her wrists burn.
For the most part, Mike had been essentially respectful, but significantly quiet. Unmotivated. And Karen was dying to know what button she was missing.
She jumps, one, two, three times to reach for a cup pushed a little too far into the cupborad, she hears steps behind and turns to see Mike walking perpendicularly past the arch, without looking in her direction. "Mike, Mike, Mike" he stops, and turns his head, before turning around entirely when he sees her. "What's up?"
"Can you reach this for me?" she says, pointing to the glass.
"Sure" he says, walking towards her, rounding the counter and stepping behind her, she steps aside and lets him reach out, he's always been quite tall, too tall for certain doors but perfectly tall to reach things barely needing to tip-toe at all. He grabs the glass and slides it out before pulling it out entirely, he hands it to her and moves to leave, before Karen stops him;
"Were you off somewhere around?"
He shrugs, "No, not really"
"So, could you stay? It's not like you have anywhere to go outside either" she says, and it sounds quite petty when she thinks twice of it, but well, it's too late to not say it now and if he's annoyed he's doing a pretty good job at hiding it. He raises his eyebrows and exhales, rounding the counter and pressing his hands against the top to sit on the stool behind. "Yeah" he says, at last.
Just because he doesn't say it, doesn't mean she can't see the exhaustion of running in circles, between being suspended and grounded, feeling a little like he got the same consequence twice. But there's only one way he can learn, and Karen loves Mike from the bottom of her heart, but there's a limit she has to draw on Mike's attitude, as much as it hurts. For as long as he acts, seemingly without caring; "I know it's been quite a time, Mike. But think of it this way, there's three more days to go" she tries.
"Yeah, I know" he says, shaking his head like he wasn't really thinking about it. It's honestly much less believable than his first attempt at sounding like he's fine with staying here instead of locked up upstairs. She sighs, grabbing the pot of sun-dried tomatoes she'd taken out a few moments before Mike appeared, "From every mistake there's something to be learned" she says as she tries to open it every way she knows, with her bare hands, banging it against the edge of the counter, with the towel folded beside her, "from every mistake there's a chance to grow" she continues, pretending she's not fighting for her life.
Mike clicks his tongue, folding an arm over the counter and pressing his elbow on it while lending out his hand, "Here, let me"
She grunts as she lets go from the lid that she'd been trying so hard to drag open she'd been turning red; "Thank you" she exhales, quite literally out of breath.
He drapes his fingers around the lid, "He was talking about Will" and after four seconds, opens it with a loud pop. Karen purses her lips and reaches out, indignant as Mike grins for a few seconds.
"Who?" she asks at his earlier sentence.
"Marcus Walker" and Karen's mouth falls open in the shape of an 'Oh'.
"He was - saying things about him" he darts his tongue over his bottom lip, "It was rancid"
"Oh, Michael" she breathes, her shoulders falling like a weight's suddenly pulling from below. Mike frowns, shutting his eyes hard and tilting his head down and to the side just a tad. Like he's revisiting it all over again; "He had no shame, and it was driving me crazy"
"Why didn't you say any of this, in the office?" is all Karen can muster at first.
"It wouldn't work. I mean, it's Marcus Walker, trying to blame him is quite the lost cause, mom, you were there. Plus Lucas and Dustin said they both told the principal that they heard exactly what Marcus had said, they both said the same thing but, you know what, the principal might as well have not even asked them about it because he brushed it off as them trying to protect my looking for trouble. If Marcus wasn't a Walker, maybe their equal testament would've been a hell of a lot more taken into a count than it was"
"I know." she nods, "It's just, it all makes more sense now, than it did before" she starts, hands wrapped around the pot, "you were protecting Will"
He swallows, going red in the face as he lets his head fall. He clears his throat, "Yeah- well," he starts, voice cracking straight away; "I'm sorry I lied, or, hid the whole, uh, thing" he looks up, "I know I've been pretty dumb, lately, and I'm sorry"
"Don't be" she says, and she bends forward, gliding her hand over the counter, across to reach Mike's folded arm, curling her fingers around it, and stroking his skin there with her thumb. "You're so strong, Mike. You put up with a lot. I'm proud of you sticking up for the people you love, but I need you to tell me the truth about this things, Michael, not hide them"
"I know, I'm sorry"
"Don't apologise for this" she stares directly at him and watches him stare back, he nods, seeming a little anxious, and looks back down. She gets the message that he needs a minute of space, that this is hitting too close to where it stings to the touch, so she pulls back and breathes, calmly. She slowly changes the topic to what she's making for dinner, and whether he'd like anything else, to if he can go upstairs and tell Nancy when dinner's close to done and take Holly downstairs in the way, he nods and hums and even tells her it smells good. After a while of silence, she turns to look at him, leaning against the counter where the stove is. "That book you mentioned last week. Why don't you borrow it from the library tomorrow?" she offers, tentatively.
"I mean, it might not even be that big a deal" he says, shrugging one shoulder, carelessly. "Plus, I'm grounded" he mumbles, raising his eyebrows, staring at his watch strap, hand turned palm up.
"Not anymore" she beams.
"What?" he lifts his head to her, frowning.
"As of tonight, you're not grounded. You can use tomorrow's Saturday and Sunday to rent that movie, or to catch up with Lucas, Dustin and Max, or to rot in the basement if that's really what you want" she says, waving her arm before letting it fall on the counter again, shaking her head and rolling her eyes. Mike chuckles.
"I-" he starts, "Thank you"
"You've done a lot of thinking the past few days" she pulls her lips forwards, nodding, and she's only half-joking; "It's been a lot, this past few months, I know it. And I don't want you here locked up for lashing out at the last drop" she watches him press his lips together, like he's wondering whether or not to say something. As he opens his mouth; she waits, something urgent bubbling up, feeling closer to home than ever. Mike presses his lips back together and then she sees his adam's apple moving again as he tenses up, and starts nodding, "Yeah, uh... thank you" is all he ends up saying.
Karen's shoulders fall.