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The festive school dance, The Snow Ball, was currently being held at Hawkins Middle. The Christmas decors swayed with the students as they slow-danced to the beat. Will sat alone upset. He was asked earlier to dance with a girl, Will had fun but he couldn't keep his eyes off Mike and now he’s sulking as he watches from the distant. Soft music was playing through the speakers and the gym was scattered with sparkling lights that almost seemed magical. It was already the second song so the seniors took over the dance floor.
Mike and El were sitting together holding hands looking at each other fondly. Dustin, Lucas, and Max were playing around the table served with food, Will chuckles at the sight of both boys trying to impress Max. He wanted to go to his friends but he always feels out-of-place, his face falls into a frown. Ever since the Upside Down Will feels himself being pulled away from the group, it was lonely and now he’s actually alone. Will turns his head to the photo booth considering going to where Jonathan was but he didn’t want to be a bother.
He was different from the others and they didn’t understand him. ‘Mike did!’ The boy thought to himself ‘but only for a while.’ He sinks again.
Falling in love with Mike was easy but Will admitting it to himself that he is in love with Mike was the hard part.
Will kept himself distracted with a piece of paper and a pen. Today was supposed to be fun and sitting alone in a corner table was not fun at all. It wasn’t snowing outside but his time in the upside down made him sensitive to the cold, he shivers.
“Hey ZB!”
A voice calls out, Will looks up and realized that the girl he was dancing earlier was walking towards him with a drink in hand. Will ignored the nickname earlier but now he shows it in his face that he was upset.
The girl’s teasing smile left her face and instead was replaced by worry “Woah, hey sorry you must be really uncomfortable about me calling you that huh.” She said nervously.
Will smiles letting out a chuckle “Yeah but I mean I guess it’s fine if you mean it in a good way?” he suggested trying to ease the mood.
She blinks and lets out an amused laugh “Alright Zombie Boy!” Will flinches a bit startled by the sudden raise of her voice “The truth is I didn’t really catch your name?” she confesses. “I’m Emilia Charlotte, people call me Emma, Em, or Char. Whatever floats your boat!” Will squints his eyes showing a puzzled look on his face “What about you?” the girl pipes up.
“Uhm I’m…” he paused titling his head quizzically “Will?”
“Will?” she hums and gestures for him to continue.
“William Jacob Byers, I prefer people just calling me Will though.” Will didn’t need to add the middle part but he let it out and now a look of surprise crossed her face. “You don’t look like a Jacob, that’s strange.” Emma snickered. “Yeah, I guess so.” Will goes along with it laughing too.
“Why did you ask me to dance if you didn’t know who I was?” Will asked.
Emma blows a raspberry for whatever reason as she answers “I mean I do know you,” she spins her finger around as she explains “you’re terrible nicknames have been all over the school, sorry about that.”
Will nods understanding. He paused as he thought for moment and peered intently at the girl. Emma stands awkwardly sipping the drink in her hand. “Hey Emma,” Will starts “I think I’ve seen you before…” he mumbles.
She beams “Yeah!” Emma exclaims before covering her mouth realizing she was being too loud. She clears her throats starting over again “It’s a small town but yeah you have seen me.” She chuckles “I actually sit two seats behind you,” she puts up 2 fingers and waved them around explaining “I thought you were really cool.” Will takes notice of the way the girl talks, she moves her hands around trying to prove her point, Will often uses meaningless movements like flicking and waving his hands when he gestures to someone too so he found it interesting knowing that he wasn’t the only one.
“Oh.” Will grins a little embarrassed.
“But your other friend keeps glaring at me for some reason.” She adds finding it funny. “It’s like whenever I look at you he’s always giving me a death stare.”
“You mean Mike?” Will lets out a noise of surprise, his eyes wide and face red. He’s seen Mike pout a lot when he wasn’t around but glaring at random people? Surely he has his reason right? ‘Mike was glaring at Emma because she was staring at me.’ As if realizing something Will he jerked his head to where Mike was. ‘Was Mike Jealous?’
“Mhm-hmm.” She nods.
“What?” Will snaps back to reality.
“Your friend, Mike, he looks like he’s always in a bad mood.”
Will laughs nervously “Oh, yeah, but he isn’t always like that.”
Emma shrugs, she plops down and sat on the chair across Will “Is this seat taken?” she lets out a quiet laughter.
“Well yeah, since you already took it.” Will shakes his head laughing.
They stayed quiet after and just listened to the music that echoed through the large room. Will enjoyed Emma’s company, it felt good not being alone. Although Will was just drawing and staying silent, Emma didn’t seem to mind to be in Will’s company either. Will lingered more into the thought of why Emma asked Will to dance, Will goes with the obvious one. ‘She likes me’ He frowns knowing that he can’t return her feelings.
Will sighs.
He tried to like a girl, he really tried to, but he just doesn’t see them that way. He’s gay. Liking boys doesn’t make him disgusting. Will likes boys and he’s okay with that, he’s learned to accept that it’s not something he should feel bad about.
“Hey, I really enjoyed dancing with you earlier” Will says, that was half a lie, he couldn’t even pay attention to the song as he was staring at Mike.
“Yeah?”
Will nods giving her a soft smile, Emma leans more into her chair relaxing “I was actually really nervous earlier.” She sighs relieved her awkwardness has been expressed.
A blush crept up to her face as she laughs, “I enjoyed it too.”
“I’m sorry.” Will says looking down, Emma looks at Will curiously surprised by the sudden apology “I know you think I’m cool but I don’t really feel the same way, you must’ve asked me to dance to get to know me huh.” The girl blinks still pretty lost but she soon caught on she gasped “OH!” she laughs waving her hands around “No, no! You got it all wrong!”
“Huh?” Will’s face went red in embarrassment “So you don’t like me?” Will cringes hearing himself. It was weird. “Actually I do!” she exclaims.
“What?” he mutters confused “But only in, I guess, admiration, like I’m your fan! Really the only reason I asked you to dance is because I found ‘Zombie Boy’ Interesting.” She admits clearly happy that she got to dance with the boy.
The boy lets out a nervous chuckle “I was really intrigued by the subject, like how you revived or whatever because people saw you get buried so what was that about? Still though the bullying sucked.” Emma huffs out “Sorry about that, I can’t believe they made fun of you for being alive.” She hisses.
“Yeah, the bullying only got worse after I came back, the bullies have always went after us before that, there was one time where we had to run to the forest to hide from them. It almost felt like a war zone.” Will puts his head on the table and covered himself with his arms “Wasn’t a fun one.”
Emma hums understanding, looking out to the dance floor she could see one of the bullies pushing people around. They really can’t have regular fun, huh?
It was silent again and Will was a bit relieved. Emma glances to the boy from time to time, she couldn’t properly read his expression, he looked sad and tried but he also looked angry. Emma didn’t mean to bring up a bad memory from Will but she forgot that ‘Zombie Boy’ was a name used to make fun of him.
Emma blows a raspberry once more and caught Will’s attention. “I’m not like other girls.” She shrugs.
Will furrows his brows, the girl raises her arms and points to herself “I’m weird.” She explains.
“Weird? How?” Will sits up and looks at her feeling bad that she thinks of herself that way. “I’m into creepy pasta and scary mysterious things, was it not obvious?” Emma laughs and emphasizes on the fact that she found the dead ‘interesting’.
“Oh.”
The girl nods and folds her arms. Will gives her a soft smile in hopes to give her reassurance. He turns to look somewhere else and Emma noticed the reaction as she drops her head “Sorry you must be disturbed by the fact that I like uncanny and weird stuff.”
Will turns back to the girl alarmed “No, you’re cool! Really cool!”
“There’s nothing wrong with liking creepy zombie stuff.” Will laughs softly.
“Yeah?”
“Yeah! And you shouldn’t like things just because someone told you to.” The words rolled off Will’s tongue smoothly from the familiarity. He smiles to himself.
Emma nods “I mean yeah but I never really had proper friends because of it. I’m the weirdo.” Her hands flayed around again expressing her weirdness through the random movements. She laughs to herself trying to cheer herself up.
Will sighs and looks over to his brother again “You know my brother says that being a freak or a weirdo is the best.” The girl had her mouth open “W-What?” she laughs finding it funny. Will looks back to girl and puts on a grin “You’re a weirdo,” he says calmly “I’m a freak.”
He stands up for a while just for show and to prove his point “It’s okay to be weird and freaky, we wouldn’t want to be normal and just be like everyone else right?” Emma shrugs closing her eyes agreeing.
“We’d rather be friends with Zombie Boy, Freak, Weirdo, and Creepy Mysterious than a boring nobody.” Will rolled his eyes jokingly.
Emma stands up as well “I like your brother! I find him ‘interesting’! Might ask him to a dance next!” She giggles and Will does too.
Will and Emma both sat back down and they watch as the hoard of people slowly shrink, it was almost the end of the dance and everyone else went to sit down, go home, or just mess around and play games. Will surprised himself with how he managed to continue a conversation with Emma.
Emma hums to the song playing which was ‘Everybody Wants to Rule the World’ then she turns to Will to speak again “I asked you to dance because of ‘Zombie Boy’ but were you thinking of asking someone to a dance?”
Will turns his gaze to Emma and then to where Mike was, he frowns “I mean…yeah…maybe.” He trails off. He hadn’t realize that his friends have been enjoying the rest of the dance without him. He shakes his head, it was kind of his fault that he just sat there the whole time but he feels a little upset that not even one of them decide to approach Will and invite him to whatever the others were up to.
“Do you like this person?” Emma coos.
Will doesn’t say a word and just kept his eyes on Mike.
She gasp “You do! Who is it? You should ask her to dance!” she suggest, jumping in excitement.
“No, I don’t think I can.” Will waved his hands around as a no.
“I know it’s scary and nerve-racking but trust me! Come on before the songs end!” She encourages. Will didn’t really think of It as scary, he spent his free time earlier trying to build up his confidence to ask Mike, he was sure Mike would be okay with it anyway, they always used to partner up and sometimes it was Mike who demanded to be with Will. He was already a pretty decent dancer the only reason he didn’t get to ask Mike was because of Eleven and because there were too many people.
“You’ll be fine!”
“No it’s not like that.”
“Oh?”
“People might think I’m weird for doing it. Everyone’s gonna laugh at me and… they like someone else.” Will looks down and fidgets with his hands. He wasn’t expecting Emma to understand what he was talking about but Emma took her time thinking about it and she got to a conclusion.
“Is it a boy?”
Will jumps and quickly turns to the girl. “What?”
She had a calm expression on her face as she asked again “Do you like boys?”
“I-Is this because the bullies call me a f-fag…” he shuts his eyes as he mutters the last word of the sentence.
Emma panicked and immediately apologizes “Oh no! I would never use that against you, sorry it seemed that way!”
Will puts his head down afraid of the girl’s reaction.
His heart pounded against his chest he spoke quietly “What made you say that if it wasn’t because of the rumors or the bullies?” he didn’t know what Emma would do with the information but Will let it out without thinking and now he’s either gonna get found out by the school or Emma would keep quiet. The girl seemed trust worthy but good people can sometimes be bad.
“Well it’s more of a speculation, I mean with how Mike was clingy with you and the way you look at him.” She says softly making sure not to sound rude in anyway, Will cautiously looks up, he calms when he saw the expression on the girl’s face. It was warm and welcoming. Will felt his stomach jolt and feel accepted “You’re very observant…” Will states relieved. “Thank you!” Emma laughs quietly.
“Aren’t you disgusted?” Will asks with a sad smile.
“Are you kidding me? Of course not!” she puts her hands on the table “Especially after the talk we had earlier why would I think of you as revolting?” Will felt overwhelmed by the amount of acceptance he felt. “Y-Yeah thanks.”
“You don’t really need to thank me for anything it’s just basic human decency.” Emma sighs as she placed her head on the table mumbling “Maybe, I don’t know, I feel like I kind of relate…” she closed her eyes not saying anything else.
Will’s eyes went wide “What?”
Emma pushes herself off the table startled “Sorry I talk too much!” she looks around nervously “Do you want to go back to your friends?” her face twitched as she tried to avoid the subject. Will takes a moment, he looks at his friends and then to Emma, he smiles shaking his head “Nuh-uh I wanna hear what you have to say.” he affirms.
Emma stayed silent unsure of what to stay but she smiled to herself. She hasn’t opened up to anyone about her feelings yet. It took a while for her to even tell her friends she liked things that girls don’t usually like. Once she found out about Zombie Boy she thought he was really cool and it gave her a kind of confidence that made her understand herself.
“Alright.” She whispered “Well, there’s this girl…”
Before long, the music fades and people start to leave the gym. Will glanced over to his brother who was already taking down the decorations from the photo booth and placing them in a box. Nancy was helping too, while Lucas and Dustin were running around the gym now that there was less people. Emma was rambling about a girl in her class that really caught her eyes, she also explained that she might like both girls and boys but when she was talking about the girl she said that she felt different on both. When she sees a boy she only thinks of them as interesting or cool, but when she sees a girl it makes her heart flutter. Will listened to her and even told her a bit about himself too.
“Hey Will!” the boy turns to see Mike running towards him “El already went home and your mom said that she’d take us all home, we’re all waiting let’s go?” Will melts from Mike’s soft voice, he nods. “Although I think we all have to squeeze in the back!” Mike giggles.
“That doesn’t sound like a bad thing!”
“For you it doesn’t! You’ll be sitting shot gun!” he argues. Will whines “Ah what? I wanna sit with you guys!”
“I don’t know if we would fit.”
“I spent the whole time sitting here alone. I’m sitting with you guys.” He pouts reminding Mike that he’s been forgotten the whole time, Mike panics “Oh Shoot! Sorry Will! It’s just that El and I were catching up.” He explains.
Will stands up and laughs at Mike “It’s fine Mike I was just messing with you, and I’m pretty sure we’d fit.” Mike smiles hearing Will laugh.
Emma stands up and fixes her dress “I’ll be going too.” She mentions, Mike turns to look at the girl and he almost immediately let his smile drop. Will waves goodbye to the girl “Bye, thanks for today! It was really fun talking to you” Mike furrows his brows and groans.
Letting himself show a smile to the girl “Thank you for taking care of Will random girl, do you mind if I take Will now?” Mike bowed while gesturing for Emma to ‘go away’.
Emma can only hum in agreement “Bye ZB!” she leaves the two as she was smiling to herself.
Mike and Will walked next to each other as they leave the building “ZB?” he states annoyed. “Zombie Boy.” Will mutters. Mike has worry all over his face again “Wait I thought that was a bad thing?” he wonders concerned.
“Don’t worry she means well.” Will smiles softly. Mike nods mouth agape “Oh, that’s good then.”
Dustin and Lucas ran to them, Dustin’s hair was already all over the place while Lucas was a smiling mess. “Hey Will I saw you laugh with the pretty girl earlier! What were you talking about?” Lucas teases.
“Nothing really-“
“Do you like her? Is she your girlfriend now?” Dustin asked, the last part almost sounded annoyed.
“No Dustin.” Will laughs nervously.
“Yeah that’d be pretty weird, she just danced with him, and they don’t know each other!” Mike argues defensive. Will turns his gaze to the boy next to him “Mike she said you glare at her every time she stares at me.”
Max comes out of nowhere and ran to them “Aww is Mikey all clingy to his bestie?” she mocks.
Mike turns red “Shut up! I just thought she was making fun of him!” the others laugh at him as he explained himself, Will couldn’t help but blush a little as well.
“She’s cool Mike.” Will states.
The taller boy looks at Will with soft eyes and then glares at the others “Yeah, but I’m NOT adding another girl in the party.” He debates while giving the others looks.
Max rose her eyebrow “And what’s wrong with that?!” she exclaims “Yeah, what is it with you and your hatred to girls?” Lucas snickers covering his mouth with his hand.
“Shut up Lucas!” Mike snapped annoyed punching his shoulder, to which Lucas grunts and pushes Mike back. “It’s not hate, it’s just dislike I don’t know!” Lucas rolls his eyes “Same thing!”
“Besides we have too many people in our party anyway.” He scoffs.
“Yeah but what’s it gotta do with a girl?” Max retorts.
“I wasn’t even gonna invite her to the party anyway Mike. “ Will sighs.
“Just drop it please, guys your bickering is making me TIRED.” Dustin groans loudly and brushes both his hand on his face expressing his annoyance.