Chapter Text
“Will! Will, wake up!”
Will awoke with a gasp. He blinked blearily up at Mike, who still had his hands on the curve of his left hip from shaking the other boy. Mike looked at his hand and blushed before pulling away.
“What?”
Mike stared at him with wide eyes.
“Do you hear that?”
Will went still for a second, trying to pick up on whatever had alerted Mike. Then, it hit him. The sound of something softly thumping against the wall of their hotel room was accompanied by hushed moans and grunts.
“Gross, Mike. Did you really just wake me up to listen to some random couple having sex?”
Mike shook his head frantically.
“Listen!”
Will furrowed his brows together for a second before they went lax and his eyes went wide, all traces of sleep gone.
“Is that…”
He trailed off, not needing to complete the thought. It was. It absolutely was.
The wall the noises were coming from was the wall Will, Mike, and Dustin were sharing not with some random couple, but with Eddie.
Eddie Munson.
Will had always been a little wary of Eddie Munson. From that day when he invited them to sit with him at lunch, Will had always been a little less than trusting of the older boy.
Why would such a scary-looking senior want to sit with a bunch of dorky freshmen?
And yeah, Will had eased up on him a little when he realized his appearance was a subculture thing. In a short time, that had ended up being shoved right back into his face when Munson responded to a casual comment on the kind of music Joni listened to by going on a rant about how punks were the scum of the earth.
Munson was scary, and loud, and kind of mean.
Two weeks into sitting with Eddie and his friends at lunch, Will watched in horror as Max’s brother pinned Eddie to one of the cafeteria walls, hissing something at the metalhead that Will couldn't catch. Eddie had responded by throwing his head back and laughing, before doubling over at the impact of Billy suddenly sucker-punching him in the stomach. A hush fell over the cafeteria as their fellow students had watched on, anticipating Eddie falling into a graceless heap on the floor.
Instead of giving the people what they wanted, Eddie had straightened up, looked Billy in the eyes, and clocked him in the jaw so hard he immediately crumpled to the floor. Eddie hadn't hesitated to follow him down, straddling the other boy as he laid into him. When Mr. Joe, the janitor, finally managed to haul Eddie off of Billy, he didn't make it easy on the old man. He went kicking and screaming, a dazed look in his eyes and a vicious snarl on his lips.
Billy hadn't been seen back at the school for a week, and when he did return, Will couldn't help but notice the chunk of skin missing from his face. It was the exact shape of one of the ears of Eddie’s gaudy pig ring.
And if the rumors were to be believed, the fight was over nothing other than the fact that Billy thought Eddie had overcharged him for coke.
So yeah. Munson was a scary, loud, mean, drug-dealing berserker. And he just so happened to also run Hawkins High’s DnD club.
So Will had to spend time with him. It didn't help that Mike and Dustin looked at the older boy like he was the coolest thing since Cheez Whiz.
He’d spent three whole years dealing with the moony stares they followed him around with. It made Will see the appeal of the library so much more. Especially after Jane and Mike had broken up permanently and Mike had pouted for a solid month.
He didn't like Eddie that much, and he definitely didn't like him enough to defend him, so at least some weight was taken off his shoulders when his mom responded to the news of his multiple failures to graduate with pity rather than disgust or righteous parental anger about the kind of company her son was keeping.
Hopper was another story though, on account of the vandalism and the drugs and the one time he’d caught Eddie with his head up a cheerleader’s skirt in the back of his van in the high school parking lot.
Will didn't think of Eddie’s sex life for a few reasons. Firstly, why would he? He was just some random guy whose table he sat at at lunchtime. Secondly, he didn’t want to. Once, while visiting Max with Jane, Will had the unfortunate luck of looking through Eddie’s window across the street and having his gaze be met with the sight of Gareth handcuffed to Eddie’s bed, completely naked. Gareth had a limp at school the next day.
Will tried not to think about it.
This was worse. This was so much worse.
This was not knowing something he’d rather not know about his DM.
This was looking his best friend in the eyes and realizing he could hear his DM having sex with Dustin’s mom.
Dustin’s mom, who had jumped on the chance to chaperone the boys along with Eddie on this trip to Indy despite having vocally and vehemently denounced Comic-Con as ‘a nerd circus’ that she wouldn't be caught dead attending.
Dustin’s mom, who had been blushing anytime Eddie smiled at her for a few months now.
Dustin’s mom, who was in the middle of divorcing Mike’s brother after catching him in bed with Will’s big sister.
Dustin’s mom, who let out a squeal as the rhythmic thumping suddenly picked up a frantic pace.
Mike and Will’s eyes flew to Dustin’s sleeping face. Both boys deflated in relief at the realization that he had fallen asleep with his earbuds in again.
The sharp sound of skin hitting skin came through the wall and Will shuddered.
This was hell.