Chapter Text
Max is in a coma, Hawkins is being split open, nobody is responding, everyone is panicking and Will’s head hurts like someone’s bashing it repeatedly with a hammer. All in all? Will is over it. He knows he’s being whiny, he knows that there are bigger problems than a measly headache but it’s just one more smear amid the mess that is Will Byer’s life.
And. He. Is. Over. It.
It doesn’t help that it’s persistent either, the damn thing has been hounding him for a week now and Will thinks that he might actually start bashing his head in if it continues. Maybe he should be more worried about it being a sign of Vecna, but he hasn’t experienced any other symptoms so he’s pretty sure he’s in the clear. On a usual day, Will would be running around helping round up most of the townspeople to try and get everything back in order. Today, however, is one of his rare day offs. (He says day off but it’s really only because the rest of his friends kicked him out since he was, apparently, “working too hard and needed rest”.) Will knows they mean well but it just feels like they’re treating him as something fragile again, like they think he is so easily broken that he can’t even handle working for a few days.
The feeling transports him back to when he was 13 and still getting scared by every small sound and shadow in his general vicinity. It reminds him of the dark, cold and all-consuming grip of a monster too vile for him to comprehend. It reminds him that sometimes he still feels it, snaking up his spine, holding him vulnerable–open to the memories and creatures that have tormented him all his life.
Will breaks off that train of thought, his breaths coming out in short, sharp bursts. (When did that happen? ) His sweat sticks his shirt to his skin, the drying sensation sends a chill through his body and–oh god–it’s too cold and he can’t feel his hands and–
“Will!”
A loud shout shakes Will out of it, his head instantly snaps to the door. The voice rings out in the silence. Will recognizes it. Mike.
All of a sudden, he feels better and worse. It’s almost laughable how the one thing that brings him the most comfort also makes him want to shrivel up in a hole and die. That might just be what he deserves though, karma for the way he is. A coward, reaching out for the affections of someone who isn’t his; a mistake. As wrong as it is, he still welcomes the intrusion giving a small:
“In here!”
in response to Mike’s call.
Another thing that’s been weird lately: the constant hide-and-seek that’s been happening between them. Well, Will’s hiding isn't new but Mike’s seeking is. Mike seems to be able to find him anywhere now, honing in on him the moment he enters a room. The ability reminds him of their youth, when they used to be attached at the hip, but they’re not kids anymore. Mike had stopped looking for him when they turned 14, so can you really blame Will when he finds it strange?
Will looks up as Mike steps through the basement door-Will’s been staying there since they got back, thus remedying the lack of housing problem the Byers have in Hawkins. Walking over, Mike proceeds to then unceremoniously drop himself onto the floor beside Will.
“Whatcha doing?”
Will snorts.
“What does it look like I’m doing?”
“You tell me, cause all I can see is William Byers doing absolutely nothing on this fine day.”
“Yes, it’s so nice out today that there’s a shit-ton smoke in the sky and probable red lightning coming to strike us down.” Will’s mouth curls itself into a smile when he sees Mike’s overdramatic pout.
“Ugh, Willll. Well, since you’ve made it very clear that you don’t want to go outside, what do you want to do then? You can’t just stay inside and look at the ceiling all day.”
“Actually, I can and I will. Genius.”
Mike squawks in mock offence.
“Well excuse me for not wanting my best friend to die from vitamin D deficiency!”
Will huffs out a laugh, then turns towards Mike.
“Mike, I’m not going to die just because I’ve spent one day inside and away from the sun.”
“But what if you do?” Mike whines “What’ll I do then? How will I ever function again without my best friend beside me? With whom else will I play DND and bash on movies with? Oh! The horror!”
“Well you’ll just have to deal with it, won’t you? Also, you’re the only one doing any bashing when we’re watching movies. You just make me listen to you.” Will says with a shit-eating grin.
“No. You most definitely do shit on the movies we watch, in fact, you tear them apart! Friends don’t lie Will!”
Crying out exaggeratedly, Mike sprawls out his lanky limbs before slumping his whole weight onto Will.
“Mike!” Will exclaims as he’s crushed under all 5’10 of the boney, protruding mass that is Micheal Wheeler.
He goes to try and push Mike off, trying not to let Mike know just how comforting he finds having Mike draped all over him. All warm and just Mike. But of course, Mike being Mike, retaliates by going stubbornly limp. Fighting back at all of Will’s efforts of getting him off.
“Mike! You’re crushing me–I swear to god–get off!” Will tries to sound indignant but his held-back laughs win out and Will feels Mike’s lips quirk up in a grin from its place on his neck.
(He is not going to think about that.)
Mike goes to say something but with his head buried against Will it comes out muffled and sounding like “Newor, bwor puck wif me”.
This makes Will laugh harder, his shaking shoulders jab into Mike prompting him to release a little “ow!” and finally get off of Will. He slides down into a heap on the ground in front of him. Mike’s got a big smile on his face and Will has won the battle. Regaining control of himself, his laughter dies down as they stare at each other. Mike has this…expression on his face, eyes sparkling with an emotion Will can’t read. The glance sends a spike of unease through Will, the feeling is accompanied by a muted sadness. It pains Will that there are faces of Mike that he can’t understand immediately now, it reminds him of just how much their relationship has changed from before.
Seemingly sensing the sudden damper on Will’s mood, Mike pushes himself up, eyes filling with concern.
“You okay?” Mike asks gently, in the voice he had reserved for moments like this. The familiar tone wraps around Will, warming his chest. His tensed posture slips, slackening as Mike brings his arms around him.
“Yeah, I’m okay.” Will answers, enjoying the hug from Mike. It’s a rare thing nowadays.
Mike shifts, pulling Will closer to him. Rubbing circles on Will’s back, he asks again. “You sure?” Will gives back a hum of confirmation.
“Okay.” Mike relents, before starting up again.
”Do you want to talk about it? Was that too much? Sorry if I–”
Will cuts Mike off before he gets it into his head that this was his fault. (Even if it sorta, kinda, was.)
“No! Sorry, no, it wasn’t anything you did–it’s just. It’s stupid.” The hand on Will’s back stops its tracing of little shapes and Will panics, thinking he did something wrong. Before he can start apologizing, however, all thoughts fly out of Will’s head when he feels a hand tilting his head up. Mike’s face greets Will as his head is held in place, and there’s barely any space between them and–oh god–it would be so easy to just move up the last couple inches and–
Nope. Nope, not going there, not today. Will takes a bit to banish the various images flashing in his brain and get his brain to function again. Only to realize Mike had started speaking to him.
“–and your feelings aren’t stupid. Okay? So don’t say that, I just want to know. Maybe you don’t want to tell me and I get that! I wouldn’t want to tell me either, because I know that I haven’t been all that great at being your best friend lately but I still care about you. Even if I’ve done a pretty shit job at showing it, and I want to know about your problems even if they’re small–”
“Mike.”
“–so if you’re comfortable and want someone to confide in, well, I’m always here. Not that you have to come to me of course! Just telling you that you can, you know, come to me. Since I’m your best friend, and you’re mine, right? Wait, we are still best friends, right? Sorry if I’m assuming that I’m your best friend, but either way you’re mine and I hope you know that–”
“MIKE!” Will’s voice raises, ignoring how Mike saying that Will was his–best friend you dumbass, he’s just talking about being best friends –made him feel a sharp satisfaction.
Will’s shout of Mike’s name makes his mouth snap shut. Mike leans back just a bit to look at Will, eyes flitting over his face for signs of annoyance. Will just gives him a smile.
“ Yes, Mike you are my best friend, stop worrying about that. Stop calling yourself a shitty friend, you aren’t, you’ve made some mistakes just like the rest of us. I know that I can come to you, you’ve made that clear now, a lot. I do feel comfortable with telling you about my problems, you make me feel safe–” Will watches as Mike gains a very light dusting of pink over his freckles “–it’s just that, this problem is honestly not all that important right now. We’ve got bigger things to worry about and since we’re doing fine now, there’s no reason to dwell.”
Mike’s face still hasn’t lost that peculiar redness when he speaks, brows furrowed a bit.
“Wait, wait, go back. What do you mean ‘since we’re doing fine now’? Was your problem about us? Is that why you don’t want to talk about it with me? I’d think it’s something pretty important if it’s still affecting you and it pertains to our–our friendship.” Mike’s breathing is heavy at the end of it, having spit everything out in one fast breath.
Will notices Mike stumbles a bit at the end, but chooses to think nothing of it. Instead, focusing on the problem at hand; Mike figuring out that Will was still in a funk with their (mostly) repaired friendship.
He doesn’t think that he’s able to face Mike while he explains so he burrows back into Mike’s chest.
“It’s literally not that big of a deal, and it’s nothing that you’ve done! We resolved it already, most of it is just cause I get these pangs of nostalgia when you do something you used to when we were kids. But we aren’t anymore! Kids, that is. I mean, you were right. We had to grow up at some point, and with the whole imminent doom thing going on, I’m glad that we’re doing better now. You and El finally worked it out too! That’s great, you guys deserve it. You don’t need to mess that up cause of me or–“.
Mike shuts him up with a pinch to the arm, Will yelps.
“What’d you do that for?!”
“You weren’t shutting up.”
“Yeah? Well you didn’t need to pinch me!”
Will furiously rubs at the affected area, trying to soothe the sting.
Mike raises an eyebrow, unimpressed.
“I called your name like 12 times. Desperate times call for desperate measures Will.”
Glaring at Mike, Will mutters under his breath while Mike looks at him smugly.
Then his face drops.
“Anyways, sorry about that, if it actually hurts that much. I need to tell you something though.” Mike starts, tone serious. It makes Will freeze, hands ceasing their ministrations on his skin. “El and I broke up, I thought you knew but now I’m not so sure. You said that we “worked it out” and we did! It’s just not in the way you were thinking, probably. It’s better like this though. Speaking of me and El, I went to her with your painting. She said that she had never seen it before, so I got really confused. I figured you didn’t wanna talk about it, and that you probably had a reason for what you did so I never brought it up. With all the chaos and stress, I didn’t want to screw up our recently repaired friendship too, but now seems as good a time as any. Also, when you say we 'don’t need to mess it up cause of you' what did that mean? Well–that doesn’t really matter right now, I just kinda want to know why you lied. Oh, and were the things you said in the van–about–about El needing me and stuff, was that a lie too? I swear I’m not mad–okay maybe a bit–but I just want to know.”
Mike finishes, chest heaving and Will feels it because Mike is still embracing him. He feels a bit fuzzy though, semi-unable to form a coherent sentence. It takes a while for him to process everything before he feels as if he had just gotten an entire bucket of ice-cold water dumped on him. Mike knew. Mike knew about the lies and the painting–holy shit the painting. Will also faintly registers that Mike and El broke up. Wait. MIKE AND EL BROKE UP. Will whips his head around so fast they both hear a crack.
Mike winces as Will starts on fixing his mistake. He makes sure to scooch back a bit, out of Mike’s reach, then wraps his arms around himself. His words come out somewhat strangled sounding, but they’re clear so he’ll still take it as a win.
“Okay right, I-I didn’t lie about the painting, I mean, I did, but I meant every word I said. I’ll get back to that later because I don’t want to deal with that right now and I need to explain everything before I chicken out. Anyways, first off, I’m sorry about you and El breaking up. I’m sure the two of you will get together again though, El loves you Mike. She does need you–“ Mike cuts him off.
“But she doesn’t, Will. Jesus did you not listen to anything I said? It was a mutual agreement and I already said that it’s better this way. We should’ve seen the signs that we weren’t working out way earlier, but we’re past that now. Our relationship is stronger than ever and you don’t need to worry about that. Okay?”
Will nods. “Okay. So moving on, even if it’s not the way we–or I–thought originally, El still needs you, Mike. I hope you know that, and okay, so about the painting–“ Will’s mouth dries up, and he starts fiddling with his fingers. “-I meant it when I said it was all the truth, it’s just that, it’s not El’s feelings but–but–“
Holy shit, okay, this was happening. This is how he’s coming out to Mike, and he can only hope that their friendship can still be salvaged from the ruin this might bring. Will steels himself and pushes onwards, no better time to confess his feelings than the end of the world right?
“–but mine. Those words were from me, I was just using El as a mask since I thought that was what you wanted to hear. You’re my heart, Mike. I’ve been in love with you since 7th Grade, maybe longer. I don’t know, and I’m sorry to bring this up now and I completely get it if you find this–me–disgusting. I know you don’t feel the same, obviously, and I’ll keep my distance after this. Just please don’t bring this up to anyone. But yeah, surprise?”
Will’s voice catches as he chokes on a sob, he hadn’t even realized he started crying. Mike doesn’t say anything, the expanse of silence sat between them, suffocating him. The wait was driving him insane, he was half-expecting Mike to snap out of whatever trance he’d fallen into and leave. Probably going out and never coming back ever again. Going far, far away from Will, which might be worse than just being outright rejected. Mike didn’t get up and run however, he instead lifts a hand to Will’s face. His thumb swipes under Will’s eye, wiping the tears away and Will hears a sharp inhale before Mike speaks.
“Will I–“ Mike never finishes his sentence, his hands abruptly stopping on Will’s face before dropping down.
Startled, Will goes to look up.
“Mike…?”
His eyes widen in horror as he takes in the boy in front of him.
Mike's eyes are white, fully rolled back into his head.
Will can't even begin to make sense of the situation before Mike’s mouth falls open.
Then the screams started.