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Even before he got taken to the Upside Down, Will would often (fleetingly, guiltily) think about what his first kiss would be like, and who it would be with. Every Christmas season, when snow would drift to the ground like stardust, and lights were strung everywhere, and there was mistletoe hung in every doorway, he would have this short-lived dream, this momentary what if?
What if, on their race up the basement stairs, he and Mike got caught under one of those doorways? And what if Mike looked at him in that sweet way that he does, and pressed a soft, blushing kiss to his cheek?
The thought always caused Will’s face to explode into flames whenever he thought about it, even for a second. Usually this was at night, when he could curl up like a burrito in his blanket and bury his face in his pillow, feeling a moment away from screaming, though he’s not entirely sure why.
If he’s feeling particularly brazen, sometimes this dream Mike murmurs a “Merry Christmas, Will,” before planting the smallest peck against his mouth instead, and that…that is an entirely different beast to handle. An explosion of butterflies in his belly, a swooping sensation in his chest, like going down a hill too fast on his bike. The feeling that he wants to be sick, but also that he wants to live like this forever.
And then, shame. A deep, creeping coil of shame, sharp like barbed wire. The echoes of his Dad’s words in his head.
Fag.
Queer.
And what would his Dad say if he knew he thought about kissing Mike Wheeler?
So, he keeps this beautiful mistletoe dream locked up as tight as he can, until it morphs into something else.
The year of the Mind Flayer is a difficult one, and not just because he’s possessed. He likes to blame Mike, honestly. Sure, his friendship makes some things easier, but it makes everything harder at the same time too.
An arm around his shoulder at the arcade.
A hand pressed gently on top of his.
“Crazy together.”
Will feels ready to crawl out of his skin. His dreams used to be daydreams, but now they’re in his actual sleeping dreams too. He crawls into bed expecting nightmares, and instead is confronted by Mike.
Well, maybe confronted isn’t the right word.
In this particular reoccurring dream, they’re on a ferris wheel in the middle of the quarry, a tiny island keeping them from sinking into the water. The sky is the neon technicolor of sunset, covered in clouds that remind Will of fresh cotton candy. He and Mike are at the highest point of the wheel, the only riders, pressed together tight in the small seat. Way down below, their friends are at the base, having a spaghetti fight.
Will is happy here.
Gently, Mike places a hand over his.
“Good?” he asks.
Will nods. In the fading light of the day, Mike is cast in a rainbow of color, and it makes his freckles stand out even more, looking all the world like he’s been brushed by the cosmos, and then Will realizes that he wants. He wants to kiss Mike.
And then he does.
He wakes up the moment their lips touch every time, confused and frustrated, but also flustered and embarrassed, because why does this keep happening?
Mike is never going to kiss him on a ferris wheel in front of all their friends.
Mike is never going to kiss him at all.
But he wants, and he keeps wanting. Even as his friends start getting girlfriends. Through growth spurts that leave Mike tall and lean, and Lucas muscular, and Dustin broad (why is Will still the smallest, that’s not fair), through all of this change, he still wants.
And then, it happens.
The most horrible thing.
“It’s not my fault you don’t like girls!”
Will wants the ground to swallow him up. He wants to disappear back into the Upside Down. He wants to evaporate from the world entirely, to stop existing. It’s every nightmare he’s ever had, come true.
He can’t even really hear what Mike says next over the chanting of Troy and his Dad his head.
Queer. Fag. Fairy.
Has Mike known this whole time? He pictures him laughing with Dustin and Lucas, saying mean, horrible things. Things that sound like the kids in school.
But, they wouldn’t do that, would they? They’re friends. Sure, they haven’t much acted like it this summer, but, they’re still friends, right?
When Will rides off into the rain, his traitorous brain rewrites the scene to something else. Another what if that will never be.
“It’s okay that you don’t like girls,” Mike says, taking Will’s hand in his.
Will bikes harder, rain pounding against his face and body, threatening to knock him sideways.
“You know I’ll always care about you right?”
Will stops the thought there, because it hurts so much and he feels,
“So stupid,” he mutters to himself.
Things get minorly better between him and Mike after Starcourt, but packing up to move to Lenora immediately after kind of puts a damper on everything.
He told himself with the destruction of Castle Byers that he’d let go of his feelings for Mike, but when his best friend wraps him up in full body hug by the moving van, Will’s heart still swells and leaps up inside his throat.
He feels like the world’s biggest idiot.
Will spends the long drive to California contemplating. Sometimes so hard that his mother gets worried.
Then he gets to his new house and his new room and his new school and he contemplates some more. He makes zero friends, he starts painting, he doesn’t really hear from anyone back home, and still, he thinks. He thinks hard.
El says that he’s acting weird, and maybe he is, but figuring out how long you’ve had a crush on your best friend, and accepting that you’re gay, and deciding that your same best friend might be the love of your life? Well, these things take time.
It all comes to a head when Mike visits for spring break. After the disastrous roller rink incident, Mike and El’s subsequent break up, and El’s quest to get her superpowers back, they are on house arrest. To say that Mike is moping would be an understatement.
He goes from one room to the next, sighing, flopping, huffing. Will finds this both endearing and annoying.
“Mike,” he says, as the lanky boy sprawls in his room. “Everything’s going to be okay.”
“You don’t know that,” He replies, indignant.
“You’re right, I don’t, but I still believe it.”
Mike sighs, then stands to start rifling through Will’s stuff. It’s something he’s always done, ever since they were kids. He loves going through Will’s drawings and notebooks, seeing what doodles he can find.
“Hey, this is cool,” he says, holding up a drawing that Will completed the week before.
“Thanks.”
Will likes this, the familiarity of it. He kind of hopes Mike will find something he likes enough to want to take home. He used to always do that—take Will’s drawings. His basement used to be plastered with them, sketches dating all the way back to Kindergarten.
“I still have your drawings, you know?” Mike says, unprompted, almost as if he was reading Will’s mind.
“Huh?”
“Your drawings. I still have them. They’re in a binder in my room.”
Will’s heart flutters.
“O-oh.”
“Yeah. We play D&D at the school now, so Mom had me kind of clean up the basement, but there was no way I was getting rid of everything.”
Will feels a heat crawling up the back of his neck and can’t help but look at his knees.
“Hey, what about this?”
When he looks up, Mike’s holding it.
The painting.
“Oh that’s…!”
But he’s already got it unrolled, gazing at it, mouth open.
“Will…”
The next thing he knows, Will’s choking up, suffocating on his own breath and tears because this is not how it was supposed to go. He was supposed to be brave, give it as a gift along with his whole heart. Mike wasn’t just supposed to find it.
“Will? Will what’s wrong?!” Mike goes from awe to alarmed, dropping the painting on the ground along with all of Will’s feelings. “Was I not supposed to look? I’m sorry! You brought it to the airport, so I thought it was okay!”
He makes his way over to him, throwing an arm over his shoulder as he sits down.
Will lets out a miserable sound.
“It is okay,” he almost wails. “It was for you anyway.”
“For me? You really painted that for me?”
“Yes, I’m sorry!”
Mike lets out a startled laugh.
“Why are you sorry?! Will that’s the best thing I’ve ever seen you do.”
Will buries his face in his hands.
“Thanks, I worked really hard on it.”
“Then why are you crying?” Mike sounds bemused.
“I was supposed to…but now I’m…I’m scared…and I don’t know if I can…” he says miserably.
“Supposed to what?”
Will looks up then, all tear stained and splotchy red, and sees Mike as if he’s looking at him for the first time. His hair has gotten so long since they left Hawkins. And he’s grown so tall. But all his freckles are still the same. He still looks at Will with the same soft, kind eyes, the same gentle uptilt to his mouth.
He loves him. God, Will loves him. It hits him with so much force that it hurts, like a shove or punch and all of a sudden, the words are just falling out of him.
“I don’t like girls,” he says, sounding so much braver than he feels. “I don’t think I ever did. Or ever could. What everyone always said about me is true. Troy, Dad. I’ve been so scared that everyone will treat me differently, or not want to be around me anymore but—” he breaks off to heave a deep sob, because these words hurt but at the same time, they’re so freeing. “I can’t change who I am, Mike.”
And Mike, bless him, rubs a soothing circle between his shoulder blades.
“Nobody wants you to change, Will. We love you just the way you are.”
Will immediately breaks down in tears again, grasping blindly for Mike’s hand.
“Look at me, Will.”
He looks. Mike looks solemn and serious, but also soft.
“I love you just the way you are.”
And he presses a kiss to his cheek, a fleeting, gentle thing.
Will swears his heart stops. His tears don’t, but his heart does. He’s looking in Mike’s eyes, and he’s not sure what he sees, but there’s something there, and the air feels thick and heavy, almost like there’s a thunderstorm brewing in the air.
That’s when it happens. Finally. After years of dreaming, and wishing and hoping, Mike kisses him. Just leans in and presses his lips to his as if they belong there.
Will’s world explodes. And he’s still fucking crying because it’s all so perfect.
Mike’s lips are a delicate but still a bit chapped, and he’s kissing Will again, and again, opening his mouth to lick at his lower lip. There’s a hand on his face, and Will’s hands are in Mike’s hair as Will opens himself up to be devoured.
“You’re perfect,” Mike murmurs between kisses. “You’re perfect and I love you.”
“I love you too. You have no idea.”
“Awesome. So how do I stop these then?”
Mike starts kissing up his cheeks where his tears are leaving tracks and Will breaks out in a fit of giggles.
“I can’t help it!” He says with a sniff. “I’m just so happy!”
And he is. For the first time in a long time, Will is well and truly happy.