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Will was afraid of himself.
For any other rational person, their biggest fear would probably be something truly terrifying— say, actually dying. However, after being inches from death himself, Will could say from experience that it was nothing short of underwhelming; the movies really played up the fear factor, because in those seconds between life and death, he had honestly felt no emotion at all. His heartbeat had slowed to a steady thump, and his limbs stopped kicking and clawing at the slick fingers curled around his neck, going limp at his sides. All he had felt was a muted resignation, an uncaring acceptance that this was how he went. This was how things had to be, and there was nothing he could do to change it. There was no drawn-out blinding pain, no slow-motion reel of memories playing through his mind as his consciousness flickered out, and certainly no guardian angel carrying his soul into the sky. It was nothing but a quick fade to black. One moment, he was staring into the maw of a monster, frozen still by both fear and fascination with his imminent demise— the next, there was a sharp squeeze to his windpipe, and his mind went quiet.
At the time, obviously, Will thought dying was the scariest thing that had happened to him. Even if the seconds he had spent at death’s door weren’t scary, the before and after of that moment had definitely been a horrific whirl of heart-racing anxiety. No matter what, nothing could be scarier than a week-long near death experience, right?
It turns out, death could catch up to you more than once.
The threat of the reaper followed him like a burial shroud. Somehow, in the warm land of the living, Will became witness to more monsters than he had been in that cold underworld (the ‘Upside Down’ never caught on in his brain; Will saw it as more of a layer to Hell than just a parallel realm). First came the nighttime nightmares, the shadow creatures that only came out when he had drifted off into dreamland— and then, there were the daytime nightmares. In one blink, the sky would go from cheerful blue to stormy black, and the world would flicker between home and hell.
Everyone assured Will that his waking nightmares were only that— nightmares. According to the scientists that poked and prodded his brain on the weekly, they were only false visions created by his subconscious, a harmless unreality that his brain had created to ‘process his trauma’. Whatever that meant.
The week Will found out that those nightmares were real became the new worst week of his life.
It was like a twisted repeat of his first visit to the hell that was the Upside Down. Once again, Will had been forced to watch, helpless and afraid, as these inhuman beasts rent through flesh. He had heard the sickening snap of bone as they gorged themselves on mutilated corpses, even felt their cold delight as they leaned in for the kill. He had seen more violence and gore than any normal person would witness in their lifetime in the span of only a few bloodsoaked hours.
But worse than the corporeal beasts and their gory rampages was the intangible shadow monster in his mind; not some mass of meaty flesh, but a boundlessly towering being of smoke. It had chased him like a vengeful predator, taunting him through nightmares and its omnipresent hauntings; then, when it tired of its game of cat and mouse, the monster leaned down to take a bite. It had infected him, hooked its phantom claws into every crevice of his body, put parasites in his mind and mouth and made his words into a web of lies. His brain had been hollowed out and filled with smoky haze, blurring reality and dreams, turning once familiar faces into indistinct smudges of color. He was put in the passenger seat of his own body, forced to watch as it wrecked the car of his life.
He should have been glad to be alive, after all these close brushes with death— but sometimes, Will didn’t feel like he was the one who survived. Yes, his heart was still beating and his blood was still flowing, but there was something else running through his veins now, something impossible to see but impossible not to feel. Even though the Mindflayer had been locked away in the Upside Down, Will still felt like a part of it remained stuck in his brain. He was a vacant vessel, the host of a parasite waiting for its inevitable return.
Will was more afraid of himself than the nine-foot tall flesh monsters in Hell because he was worse than a monster. The evil lingering inside of him wasn’t as obvious as s Demogorgon’s claws; it was only noticeable in the gooseflesh on the back of his neck and the slight dilation of his left pupil. So, to any outside observer, he was just like any other boy— and that was what made him worse.
He had been underestimated once, and his words alone had killed dozens of people. If that ever happened again— if that shadow monster got its claws into his brain again, if it tied vines around his tongue and made him hiss lies like a snake, Will knew he would be responsible for the aftermath. He was the Mindflayer’s backdoor into Hawkins, and he had tried to shut himself off, he really had. His last words were meant to be the ones he’d tapped out on the side of a chair, but his friends and family were careless of the consequences of his continued existence, and so the devil inside of him lingered.
If he had just given up and died in the Upside Down, instead of stubbornly clinging on to life, then everyone would be better off— Will was sure of it. He was just one small dot of life in a sea of billions; no one would have missed him for long.
Now, instead of being fondly remembered, Will was feared, and it was all his fault.
Every person who still remained in his life seemed just as scared of Will as he was of himself; their fear was obvious the second he gained consciousness. It was obvious in how Jonathan’s hands shook when he hugged him, how he spoke so softly and slowly, like Will would snap if his voice had even the slightest uptick in volume. He saw how Nancy lingered in the corner of the nondescript room he had been exorcised in, how she gripped the still-hot poker in her hands with such conviction that Will worried she would strike him with it, just to make him feel the amount of pain he had inflicted on everyone else. Even his own mother looked at him with utter terror— though it was only a split second flash in her eyes, right before Will spoke on his own for the first time in days— and he thought that if his own mom could be scared of him, then not a single person would be fully unafraid of him after this night.
His thoughts were confirmed in the weeks after the incident. It’s not like he was outright avoided, of course; all three (four, including Max, and five, including Eleven— who knew monstrous possession could increase your popularity?) of his friends visited his hospital room daily, armed with stacks of comic books and mindless stories about whatever nonsensical drama was going on in school. Will could hear the subtle fear in their words, though; it was obvious in the way they softened their stories, like when Dustin had started to mention a fight that had broken out, and Lucas hastily covered his mouth and hissed “Not cool, dude!”. Then, they looked back at Will with apologetic glances, like they thought he would turn into a crying puddle or raging monster at the mere mention of violence.
Everyone seemed unreasonably terrified of setting him off. And— yeah, maybe he couldn’t even glance at a horror movie right now without being paralyzed by fear, but it wasn’t like Will was fragile. If anything, he was a ticking time bomb, laced with live wires and deadly explosives, because who knew when the Mindflayer would come back? Who could be sure that the gate wouldn’t open again, and Will would be subject to that monster’s vicious whims once again?
His friends were scared of him for the wrong reasons. They shouldn’t be scared of him breaking, they should be scared of something breaking into him. But, as much as he tried to avoid it, Will was selfish— so he fed them rose-tinted versions of the truth, sugarcoating his possession so he wouldn’t seem like that much of a monster. His selfish longing to keep his friends around would probably kill them the next time the Mindflayer came around, and Will knew that it would all be his fault, but he couldn’t bring himself to tell them to leave.
Mike was the only one who knew the truth, but for some reason, he kept the real version of events hidden from the rest of the Party. Will couldn’t understand why Mike wasn’t terrified like the rest of the people who had seen him possessed— why wasn’t he backing away? He should back away, run as far as possible to stay safe from the monster that remained inside Will’s head— but he didn’t, and Will had no idea why. Mike stuck resolutely by his side, redirecting conversations with ease whenever Dustin or Max’s questions got too close to the truth, making Will feel almost normal even as he laid in a sterile hospital bed, IV fluids dripping into his veins.
Will should tell Mike to leave, too— but again, he was selfish. He wanted all of Mike’s attention, all of his gentle care and kind voice and the constant lull of conversation he brought with his visits. He wanted Mike’s presence more than he wanted Mike’s safety, and his treacherous tongue wouldn’t form the words leave, run, get out of here before something happens and I hurt you. Instead, he said stay, please, tell me that story again, come over next Saturday? because he was completely and utterly and inherently selfish.
Maybe this was the Mindflayer’s last gift to his broken mind; a ruinous impulse to keep everyone close despite the risk. Or, maybe, it was a setup for the Mindflayer’s return, so it would only have an easier job of killing his friends.
Why Mike still stuck around confused Will to no end. How could he stay, when he had seen how Will led dozens of soldiers to their death with not even a hint of remorse? How could Mike stay when he saw how Will had thrashed and screamed in the grasp of his own mother, or when he had been seconds away from sending him and all his friends to their deaths? How could Mike stay when Will was a monster?
On one average weekend afternoon (well, as average as any afternoon could be after experiencing interdimensional horrors) the question of why Mike cared so much hung heavy on the tip of his tongue. However, since said Mike Wheeler was currently sprawled out on the Byers’ couch, loudly complaining about the insane pile of homework his English teacher had given him, the question stayed locked up inside his mind.
”I mean, it’s complete bullshit,” Mike said, waving his arms around in indignation. “Half of a five-hundred page book? By Monday? And a two page essay on top of that? This is eighth grade! If middle school is this hard, what the hell am I gonna do in high school?”
Will sat on the opposite end of the couch, curled against the armrest as though if he leaned into the fabric hard enough, he would melt away into the cushions. Though physically he was halfway pinned under the long legs of Mike Wheeler on a ratty sofa, his mind was a thousand miles away, floating in a sea of memories that felt more like waking nightmares. He could hardly look at Mike’s face without flashing back to that day; his horror-stricken look when he realized that Will was not himself, that he was a spy, a traitor— or, later, the teartracks coating his face as he tried to force Will free of the Mindflayer’s control with playground memories. Every time he glanced over at his friend, his sight would blur, and Will would be brought back to the harsh glare of that singular swinging lightbulb illuminating Mike’s face and how panicked eyes were glossy with fear.
Will hadn’t noticed that Mike had gone quiet, leaning forward with a look of concern as he waited for Will’s response. He scrambled to say something that made it sound like he was actually listening to Mike’s words, instead of the torrent of white noise racing through his brain. “I— uh, yeah, that’s so dumb. What book is it, anyway?”
”The Outsiders— Will, I told you this five minutes ago,” said Mike, scooting even closer to where Will was situated on the couch. He looked worried now, his brows furrowing as he looked Will up and down. “Is something up? You really zoned out on me there— I mean, I think I was talking for five minutes straight and you were just staring off at the window.”
Yes, something’s up, you need to leave now before that thing comes back and I seriously hurt you, was what he wanted to say— but that greedy part of his brain that wanted everything to stay the same wouldn’t let the words come out. He wanted Mike to keep coming over and keep entangling their limbs together and spend lazy afternoons reading comics and playing video games, wanted Mike to keep embracing him even though Will knew he shouldn’t want that—
Will knew that what he wanted wasn’t what Mike wanted. His treacherous heart wanted Mike to hold him forever as they shared the feeling of butterflies swooping in their stomachs. He wanted to intertwine their hands and feel Mike’s pulse match his own racing heartbeat, and touch their foreheads together and feel how Mike’s thoughts were laced with as much love as Will held in his wrong, twisted mind— but that would never happen. Will was a mistake and his feelings an error, embedded like a thorn in his DNA, a one-in-a-million chance miscalculation that Mike’s own body could never replicate.
His feelings would always be unreciprocated, and Will could live with that. He’d been living with that fact for a year, since the day he came back from the Upside Down and felt the way his heart did kickflips when Mike looked into his eyes and said, so earnestly and softly, “Will, I missed you”.
The realization that he was in love with Mike instead of just loving him wasn’t even shocking. It was as true of a fact as grass being green, or the sun’s surface resting at a temperature of ten thousand degrees. There was nothing he could do to change the facts— but there was nothing that he could do to make the facts more bearable, either. No matter what, Mike would never love how Will did.
But that didn’t mean Will couldn’t just enjoy Mike’s affection. If Will kept his face still enough, then Mike would never get a hint that their constant embraces sent his brain up in blushing flames— so it was fine! It was fine, completely and utterly fine, to let his best friend cuddle up to him even if he had a stupid heart-racing crush on said best friend. What Mike didn’t know couldn’t hurt him, right? If Will was the only one who had to feel the shame of his selfishness, then that was fine, because he wasn’t hurting anyone else— right?
He and Mike had always been physically close; always interlocking pinkies or arms during walks through the woods, or laying together like parentheses during sleepovers, always choosing seats right next to each other during movie theatre outings— but not like this. It was more than just physical affection now; Mike was protective. Possessive, even— the second he got within arm’s reach of Will, Mike tethered himself to Will and refused to let go. He would cling to Will’s side like he thought Will was liable to blink out of existence if they weren’t constantly glued together.
It was a bit overwhelming, to be honest. Will didn’t know how much more physical contact he could take before his heart just gave up on him and stopped beating entirely—
“Will, did you hear me? Will, hello? Earth to Will?” A hand waved furiously in front of his face, startling Will from his reverie.
Oh. Mike was speaking— god, he must’ve zoned out, again. Will shook himself back to reality and responded, his voice faint and faraway. “Yeah? Sorry, I—“
“Are you okay?” Mike held Will’s shoulders in a vice grip, leaning forward with a look of plain concern. “Did you have a flashback? Or— it’s not a now-memory, is it?”
Mike was just as close to Will’s face as his mom was when he reached out and choked her. The two images overlapped in his mind, and Will could almost feel the hot pulse beating under Mike’s throat. His fingers twitched, and his mind conjured up unbidden the thought of Mike’s eyes wide and bloodshot, breathy coughs spilling from his open mouth—
See, this was why he was so dangerous. The Mindflayer was permanently banished, locked away in the Upside Down, and yet he still thought about things like this. If it was really gone, then why did Will dream about watching his family die at his own hands?
“No, it’s—“ There was no reasonable explanation for Will’s disjointed thoughts; no point in even trying to explain how his brain hopped from being a queer to being a violent murderer. “It’s nothing,” Will finished lamely, avoiding Mike’s worried gaze.
Mike shifted a bit, sitting shoulder-to-shoulder with Will instead of facing him directly. “It’s like you’re barely here, Will. And every day, it just gets worse. I’m not blind—“ he cuts himself off with a laugh, shaky and thick with emotion— “I can tell something is obviously wrong, and I need to fix it because I— I don’t want you to disappear.”
Will wanted to brush him off, say I’m fine, really, but a different set of words spilled from his mouth. “You can’t fix it.”
Will immediately bit his tongue, hoping his words were quiet enough that Mike didn’t hear, but it was too late. ”So it’s not nothing?” Mike teased, the hint of humor in his voice doing nothing to disguise his obvious worry. “Please, Will, I just want to know what’s wrong. Even if it’s not something I can fix, I just want to be there for you— please?”
If you’re there for me, you’ll just end up getting hurt, he thought.
Instead of being honest, Will avoided his question entirely. “Can we just play video games for a bit? I can’t— I don’t feel like talking right now, I— maybe later.” Will hated how he was constantly tripping over his words now, like every sentence was a pain to cough out of his mouth. Nothing felt right anymore— even his voice didn’t sound like his own. Every word was laced with a shaky stutter, tumbling off his lips in a torrent of idiotic word-vomit so sudden that Will wondered if the Mindflayer had come back just to make him sound stupid.
Mike’s expression faltered, pinching into agitated wrinkles on the bridge of his nose (God, Will was going to give him frown lines before they turned twenty). “Fine, but you can’t think I’m gonna do nothing, Will. This is just— well, honestly, it’s the worst I’ve seen you in weeks, and you keep kicking me out for stupid reasons that I know are lies. I mean, you said you had to take Chester to the vet yesterday because he had ‘leg-worms’,” Mike said with an exasperated laugh. “There’s no such thing as leg-worms, Will, it’s called heartworms, and there’s literally not one vet within twenty miles of Hawkins. So if you won’t talk to me, can you at least let me stick around for a bit?”
”I— I don’t—“ Will started to speak, seconds away from warning his friend that this wasn’t a good idea, that he had to keep pushing Mike away because it was the only way to keep him safe— but Mike had already started to talk again, barrelling right over any objections Will could have made.
“We could sleep over,” Mike said, leaning towards Will with wide, puppy-dog eyes, and oh, it was so hard to say no to Mike when he pulled out that pleading gaze (and when he was so close to Will that he was seconds from losing all rational train of thought, but that's besides the point). “Please? It’d be just like old times, we could binge-watch Star Wars and stay up past midnight making a new D&D campaign. Whatever you want, seriously! At least let me take your mind off—“ he waved a hand vaguely in Will’s direction with an apologetic wince— “all this, y’know?”
The idea of a sleepover sent Will into an entirely new wave of panic. There was no way he could let Mike sleep over, not with the kind of nightmares he had; dreams so hauntingly awful he would consistently wake the entire house up with his screams, sending Joyce and Jonathan in a rushed frenzy to his bedroom. He already felt horrible about taking away precious sleep from his mom— who now worked early-morning and night shifts to cover the ever-increasing utility bills— just so she could comfort Will and card her hands through his sweat-slicked hair after he had dreamt about strangling her to death, again. Will could barely manage the well of guilt that pooled in his chest when Jonathan would come to console his brother instead, holding Will close after he had dreamt that Jonathan had turned off the radiators, and Will had broke free of his bindings and—
Will blinked the thought of his nightmares away as he attempted to form an appropriate response that wouldn’t send Mike into another fit of worry. “I— uhm, well. . . yeah, sure. Do you want to go get some spare clothes from your house, or something?”
That was not what he wanted to say. He was supposed to calmly tell Mike no, that he really was fine, but obviously his mouth was disconnected from his brain, or something, because why else would he agree? Now, Mike was really going to see what a complete mess he was. After seeing how he couldn’t even sleep through the night without waking up in tears, Mike would treat Will just like everyone else did— fragile, broken, ruined. Nothing worth loving, much less being friends with.
”Nah, it’s fine,” said Mike, leaning on Will’s shoulder as he fidgeted with the gaming controller in his hands. “I can just wear yours.”
How did Mike not realize that almost every lingering touch and stupid sentence that came from his mouth sounded like flirting? They weren’t kids anymore; at some point, Mike would’ve had to realize that the way he treated Will wasn’t how he treated the rest of his guy friends, and it wasn’t even how he treated El, his supposed crush slash lifelong soulmate (but, to be fair, when Dustin had said that, Mike wrinkled his nose and said no, absolutely not). Did Mike just never get the memo that none of his other friends acted this way? Or, maybe, was it intentional—
No. Will couldn’t allow himself to follow that train of thought; it would only leave him disappointed and miserable. Better to ignore it entirely and assume that Mike’s affection meant nothing more than friendship.
Will nodded, his mind going blank as he tried to think of anything but the soft tickle of Mike’s hair against his neck. “Okay, then— should we play Duck Hunt, or Donkey Kong?”
”Donkey Kong, duh,” Mike said. “I’d rather smash shit than sit around waiting to shoot birds out of the sky.”
Will rolled his eyes as he regrettably stood up to put the game cartridge in the console. “Duck Hunt is fun, and you know it. You’re just impatient.”
”I’m not impatient, just practical. You get so much more enjoyment out of Donkey Kong for much less time, it’s literally what any normal person would choose,” Mike responded, moving to scoot right against Will’s side the second he sat down again. Will took a deep breath to calm his racing heartbeat, and focused on pressing plastic buttons instead of leaning into Mike’s warm presence.
—
The sun had long past slipped under the horizon when Mike realized that maybe he should call his mom to let her know about his whereabouts, instead of letting Mrs. Wheeler fret over another potential case of missing children.
“Dude, she’s gonna kill me!” Mike moaned, flopping over the couch dramatically. He threw an arm over his head and let his head loll over the couch as he continued to fret. “Look. I’m already dead. My mom is killing me with her psychic powers that sense every single bad thing I’ve ever done in my entire life.”
“Oh my god, Mike,” Will said, unable to contain the laughter that bubbled up from Mike’s hilarious and, objectively, excessive amount of panic. “It’ll be fine— your mom has never cared how late you call, as long as you’re staying with us. I think she trusts my mom more than Mr. Wheeler, honestly.”
With an exaggerated sigh, Mike rolled off the couch and trudged to the new rotary phone sitting on the end table (courtesy of the government’s hush-money, of course). He stared at the phone apprehensively for a minute, before dialing his home number with a grimace. Finally, on the third ring, his mom answered the call, and Mike started his hurried speech before Mrs. Wheeler could even begin to ask where he’d been. “Hey, mom— yeah, sorry, I know it’s late, but can I stay over at Will’s tonight? Since it’s already so late and all. . .”
Mike’s voice faded into background noise as Will focused on his main worry of the night; how in the world was he going to prevent himself from having a nightmare, when he’d experienced one almost every night since the Mindflayer had sunk its claws into his brain? Even in a best-case scenario, Will could only just imagine stifling his screams with a pillow before Mike heard— but then Mike would probably ask why Will was going to sleep with a pillow over his head, so that plan fell flat before it could even leave his mind. Sleep on the couch? No, Mike would never let that happen— if anything, Mike would be the one to take the couch, but Will could never kick his best friend out of his room like that. Not sleep at all, maybe pinch himself every time his eyes began to droop? That could work, as long as he rushed Mike out of his house quickly enough to where he wouldn’t notice Will’s unusual tiredness—
Mike’s cheery tone shook Will from his internal anxiety. “Done! I mean, she was definitely mad that I didn’t call her until—” he stopped, cleared his throat, and pitched his voice up in a poor mimicry of Karen Wheeler— “‘eight-o-clock, Michael! You can’t keep disappearing in the dark, I was worried sick,’ but when I mentioned you, she suddenly didn’t care. You’re like magic, Will, seriously.”
”’Keep’ disappearing in the dark? As in, you’ve come home after dark multiple times?” Will said, raising an eyebrow and willing his face to not turn fire-hydrant red at the second flirtatious comment of the night. “Are you having some secret D&D sessions with Dustin and Lucas that I’m not allowed to go to?”
It’s not like he’d be mad if they were; right now, Will was more of a ghost than a teenage boy, so he understood if they wanted to spend some time without him. Will was just a waste of space on their couch when he barely even spoke half the time, and his habit of looking like a deer in headlights all the time was at best unnerving— at worst, the vacantly terrified resting state of his face was downright horrific.
“No way,” Mike said, shaking his head furiously, “of course not! Why would we ever play D&D without our cleric? It’s— well, I’ll tell you about it if you tell me why you’ve been so out of it today.”
Will stiffened. “Later, okay? Let’s read comics, or something. I got two new issues of Batman at the store yesterday, and with how slow you read, we’ll have to start now to finish the first one by midnight.”
“Not fair, you know Batman is my weakness,” said Mike, “but fine, I’ll lay off you for a bit. And we both know that you’re the slow reader, not me! Only one of us needed an extra period to finish the English exam last year, and it definitely wasn’t me.”
Will looked away sheepishly. “You’re just making things up— Mike!” Before he could finish speaking, Mike grabbed hold of his wrist and sprinted down the hallway to Will’s room. Will scrambled to keep his balance, feet scrabbling against the floor as he struggled to remain upright (and struggled to not melt into a puddle from Mike’s fingers brushing against the back of his hand, but that wasn’t important).
Mike kept his hand around Will’s wrist even as he opened the door to Will’s bedroom, and even as he pilfered through his drawers in search of the comics, Mike kept a tight grip on his friend’s wrist. Instead of protesting, Will just let his arm go limp in Mike’s grasp. After the fourth (fifth? sixth? Will had lost count at this point) time Mike had held onto Will like this, he had realized that it was pointless to try and break free; Mike would just cling to him like an annoying koala.
”Come on, where’d you put the comics?” Mike said as he dropped down to look under Will’s bed. His tone was suddenly loud and cheerful— Will could tell that Mike was playing up his excitement as a distraction, but he tried to play along regardless.
”They’re just on my desk,” Will said, tugging Mike up from the floor with a jerk of his captured wrist. “Wow, I am never picking you for my team if we’re in a life-or-death game of I Spy.”
Mike snatched the comics off the table with an embarrassed huff. ”Okay, and when would that scenario ever occur?” He tugged Will onto the bed, and while Mike landed smoothly, Will struggled to fall onto the bed without tumbling directly onto Mike. With a painful twist of his body, Will landed squarely in the middle of the bed instead of sprawling over Mike’s legs. He rubbed his now-sore side with a wince as he sat up next to Mike, making sure to keep a few necessary inches between them so Mike wouldn’t do something stupid like lean on his shoulder, and Will wouldn’t do something stupid like die on the spot.
Will shrugged. ”I don’t know, what if the Mindflayer comes back and it really likes kids games?”
It was just a simple, off-hand comment, but Mike looked angry— furious, even— as he responded. “The Mindflayer will never come back. And I’ll never let it hurt you, no matter what. I promise.” He spoke with such conviction that Will was almost inclined to believe him, and though he was both touched and flustered by the way Mike was suddenly leaning far past his personal space and holding tightly onto his shoulders, Will knew Mike couldn’t keep his promise.
It would come back one day, and it would invade his body again, and Mike would no longer be able to protect Will. How could you protect someone from something you couldn’t even see?
All that Will could get out was a small “Oh,” that lingered in the air for a long moment before he could find words to steer the conversation away from the monster under his skin. “I still wouldn’t want to play I Spy with you in any scenario.”
”Whatever,” Mike huffed. “Come on, let’s just start reading, because the last issue had the worst cliffhanger and I think I’ll die if I don’t get to find out what happens next.” He reached over Will’s arm to flip open the comic, falling silent as his eyes scanned the first page.
For a while, Will was entirely distracted by the endearing look of concentration on Mike’s face, trapped in the struggle of not leaning over and tracing Mike’s faint smile with his finger, or giggling when his eyes widened comically during tense action scenes. Whenever Mike would ask if Will was ready to turn to the next page, he was drawn back to reality for a moment before quickly getting lost in the warmth of Mike’s body pressing against his side once again— he’d definitely have to reread these comics later, because Will had absolutely no idea what was going on. Watching Mike was more interesting than reading the fifty-seventh volume of Batman, anyway (even if his brain screamed at him wrong, wrong, this is wrong, you are wrong, and if he knew what you were thinking, he’d hate you, because how could he not hate something so inherently disgusting?)
But Will would have time for self-hatred later. In this moment, all that mattered was Mike’s soft laughs and whispered commentary, and how his arm was practically resting on Will’s shoulder now, and how Mike let him lean into his arm like a pillow, so soft and comforting that Will could fall asleep sitting up—
He wasn’t supposed to fall asleep.
But it was too late; Will could already feel his eyelids growing heavy as a wave of exhaustion crashed over him. His limbs felt like lead weights, and his head was the worst offender, drooping straight onto Mike’s arm as his consciousness slipped away. Mike’s squawk of indignation at the sudden weight on his arm was the last thing Will heard before his sight blinked away, the mellow light of his room fading to vacant black.
But blissfully dreamless sleep did not often stay that way for Will. All too soon, the comforting darkness behind his eyes disappeared, and a single swinging lightbulb glared in his vision instead.
He was tied tightly to that chair again, stiff and immobile. Will could see those thick tendrils of smoke wrapped around his limbs, tightening around his elbows and cutting off his circulation— why could no one else see them? Why were these faceless blurs gathered around him, staring down with their ghostly brows furrowed in disappointment, or anger, or both— Will couldn’t tell. Everything he saw was fuzzy, like television static, or opening your eyes underwater. Everything was Crayola scribbles and pencil scratches, except for his own body, which was glaringly and obviously real, like a vivid acrylic painting, except all the contrasting colors were in the wrong places. His hands were dark, tinged deep red and dripping with something Will didn’t want to think about, and his face (how could he see his own face?) was ghostly pale, void of shadows except in the dark circles under his eyes. Everyone was abstract, and he was the realism piece that got misplaced in the contemporary museum.
Solid rope twined around his limbs in tandem with the phantom vines creeping up his arms, the rough scrape of his bindings feeling all too real for a dream. After what felt like an eternity, the indistinct blurs moved closer and took the rough outline of three people, unfinished sketches with oil-pastel smears.
As the hazy people crouched down in front of him, they blended together and broke apart again, as though his vision was blinking in and out of focus. They would form into a single fuzzy shape, then split apart into a humanoid hydra. One head leaned forward and came into focus, a pale face framed by blunt bangs that appeared hyper-realistic against his blurred body. Will’s mind could recall Jonathan’s horror-stricken look from that night even in his sleep. His bloodless and terrified face was almost a familiar comfort, but the words that came from his mouth were entirely unfamiliar, spat out with disgusted contempt.
”I can’t love you like this,” he said with a condescending tilt of his head; the other shadows followed suit, necks craning in mock-pity. “I hate that Lonnie was right about you. I thought that he was wrong, that you would grow out of this and man up, but instead, you just gave into it. I can’t call you my brother if you keep acting so weak. God, why can’t you just stand up for yourself? Maybe you wouldn’t have hurt everyone else if you’d just said no a little louder.” He spat out the words like bitter seeds, sticking to his brain like burrs instead of sliding off, because they were true. It was his own fault that the Mindflayer had taken him, because he was the obvious choice; the crybaby, the pathetic victim, the one who wouldn’t fight back. He was easy prey.
A choked sob escaped Will’s mouth as Jonathan backed away, becoming a misty blur in the back of the dark room once again. When the next head of the hydra leaned in, Will couldn’t hold back his ragged gasp at the haunting coldness of her face; his mom looked down at Will as though he was not her son, but a thing to be exterminated. And really, wasn’t that what he was? Sometimes, Will couldn’t tell where his consciousness ended and the Mindflayer’s began— maybe they were one in the same now, and it would simply be a mercy to burn the both of them in one go.
His mom’s dark hair fell in limp sheets around her face, greasy like a film of algae over a lake. Her skin stretched tight over her face, translucent and graying— god, it was like she had been drowned. Will was reminded of the plastic body fished from the quarry, and a sick alternate universe flashed in front of his eyes where his mom was actually crazy, and she threw herself into the lake to be with him—
Before he could continue down that nauseating train of thought, his mom began to speak. “What did I do to deserve a child who turned out so wrong? I tried so hard to raise you right— what happened, honey? What did I do wrong to make you feel like that for a boy?”
And, oh, she hit the nail on the head with that one— it’s something Will wonders himself, on the dark nights he spends screaming into his pillow. Despite all the challenges, his mom was an angel, heaven-sent to love him— so how could she deserve a child whose sins would send him straight to Hell?
Will was sobbing now, but his cries were silent; all he could feel was the dull ache in the back of his throat and hot tears streaming down his face. Somewhere, in the back of his mind, he was begging himself to wake up, just get out, it’s not real— but Will’s subconsciousness held him firmly in place, tethering him to this nightmare with its shadowy tendrils.
The final shadow leaned in, and his dark mop of hair was a dead giveaway that it was Mike standing in front of him before the rest of his features took shape. He was just as dead as Joyce and Jonathan; his eyes were dull, the whites going gray at the edges, and his lips were tinged a ghastly blue at the corners. When he spoke, Will could see anger sparking in his lifeless eyes, turning his dead slate of an expression into a mask of disgusted fury.
”How could you think I wouldn’t find out?” Mike sneered. “Everyone can tell, you know— and if they don’t know now, they’ll figure it out, and then they’ll leave. No one wants to be around people like you, especially not me. If I had known you were—“ he leaned in to Will’s face, dropping his voice to a whispered breath that felt like a cold wind on Will’s cheek— “a dirty queer, I never would’ve become friends with you. You make me sick.”
Will’s heart was gone from his chest at this point, shattered in dull shards on the floor. His dream self lost the energy to cry; instead, he stared at his best friend with an ever-increasing feeling of despair. He’s almost certain that this would be Mike’s reaction in the waking world, too. The immediate hatred and disgust Mike showed was honestly the most positive outcome Will could imagine, and the worst-case scenarios he could dream up were so terrifying that thinking about them outside of his subconscious nightmares sent him into hours-long dazes of nauseated panic.
Mike backed away, and the repulsed curl of his lip faded into a dark smudge as his hazy body blurred together with his mom and brother’s obscured outlines. They spoke in unison, each of their different tones overlapping to create one voice, muddled together in a discordant hiss. “Maybe it is good that he chose you. Now, we can remember you as someone good instead of the sick man you would’ve grown up to be.”
Will wanted to agree, to scream please, let it kill me so I don’t have to feel like this forever— but the monster in his brain had other plans. It jerked his arms forward, breaking them free of their flimsy bindings. The rope hit the ground with a faint thud, barely audible against the blood rushing in his ears. In one swift motion, too smooth and calculated to come from his own shaky limbs, the Mindflayer reached forward and curled Will’s hand around the vague outline of a throat. Under his tight grip, the shadowy image of a person became real— but instead of wrenching his hand away, Will dug blunt nails into that milky, bloodless skin. When the Mindflayer tugged his gaze upwards, he was met with his mom’s horrified expression; eyes bulging and wide, popped blood vessels like starbursts gathering in the corners, mouth open in a silent scream. Her face in that real-life moment when the Mindflayer made his attack his own mom haunted Will even in the depths of his subconscious.
Will blinked, and her face flickered into shadow for a moment, before changing entirely. Now, it was Jonathan dying under his hand, his expression less clear but just as disturbing— but this time, he could hear his brother’s ragged screams piercing through his ears. The Mindflayer twined its phantom limbs tighter around Will’s wrist, made him squeeze harder and harder until Will could see thin streams of blood trickling from the crescent-shaped indents his nails made in Jonathan’s neck—
His brother’s screams changed, becoming an indistinct wail that could have belonged to any one of his friends. The face in front of him started to blink in and out of shadow, changing into vague caricatures of his friends; the wild curls of Dustin’s hair, then Max’s ginger eyebrows, upturned in fear, El’s doe-brown eyes glossy with tears, then Lucas’s teeth grit together in pain. Then, for a while, the face lingered in the shape of Bob’s, his eyes dull and mouth frozen open, dripping dark blood down his broken jaw.
From far away, there was a faint voice, repeating wake up, wake up, wake up— but Will was stuck. He stared, unable to scream, into Bob’s dead gaze— until his face disappeared, fading into fuzzy shadows for a moment, before forming back into someone solid, someone with a mop of black hair and a smattering of freckles across the bridge of his nose, someone who looked at Will with utter betrayal and nauseating shock as Will pushed his fingers forcefully against Mike’s windpipe— Mike, it was Mike, keening a wordless cry but not struggling in Will’s grasp, he was killing Mike, he was killing Mike, Will was going to kill his best friend—
A voice that sounded like Mike rang out through the darkness, barely audible against the shrill screams that echoed through the room. “Will, wake up! Please, come on, it’s okay, it’s just a dream, just wake up, wake up—“
The cold skin of Mike’s throat faded away in Will’s grasp, turning into wispy smoke filtering through the gaps between his fingers. Mike was gone now, and his hands were empty, but Will could still hear screaming, and— oh, that was him screaming, wasn’t it? Even as the dark scene around him disappeared, and his eyes truly fluttered open and took in the soft lamplight of his bedroom, Will was still screaming, scraping his throat raw with ragged cries.
Will shot up from the sweat-soaked pillow he had been laying on. Blankets fell off his chest and pooled in a thick pile around his knees. For a wild moment, he thought they were the vines twining around his legs again, and he scrambled to push them off, kicking his feet out to shove them away. He hunched over himself, hands scrabbling for something to hold, something to make sure that this was real instead of another dream. All he found were thin bedsheets, sticky with someone’s sweat— was that Will’s? It couldn’t have been, because how could he have turned the sheets damp when he felt so cold? Shivers wracked his body, sending icy shudders through his arms, pocked with bumpy gooseflesh— he was so cold, why was he so cold, why did it feel like the Mindflayer was crawling under his skin again, turning hot blood to ice—
A hand curled around his shoulder, scalding against his freezing skin. When Will turned around to see who was holding him, he came face-to-face with Mike; not the angry, lifeless Mike of his dream, but the real Mike, his cheeks flushed with flowing blood and shining eyes wide with concern. “Will! Will, it’s okay, you’re awake, you’re safe, please— please stop screaming, Will, it’s okay, you’re okay—“
Will looked up from the fabric bunched in his shaking hands to meet Mike’s eyes. Mike leaned in closer, snaking his arm behind Will’s back in a gentle embrace. Slowly, his cries stopped, exchanged for shaky, gasping breaths— though Will couldn’t seem to take in enough air, no matter how deeply he inhaled.
“Will,” Mike said, shaking his shoulder slightly, “you’re alright. It was just a nightmare, okay? Just— come here.” Mike tugged Will closer with his free hand, wrapping him up in a tight hug. At this point, Will had no energy to worry about the fact that his face was literally buried in Mike’s chest, or how he was probably getting Mike’s shirt wet with countless tears; all Will could think about was his gratitude that Mike was alive, that he was holding Will close instead of pushing him away. At that moment, Will was just glad that Mike was still here.
They stayed like this for a while; Mike tracing small circles across Will’s spine as he trembled in Mike’s arms, weak cries muffled by the fabric of Mike’s tee-shirt. Later, once Will’s trembling shoulders had stilled and his hiccuping sobs turned to quiet whimpers, Mike dropped his hands to Will’s waist and moved his body into a sitting position. By now, the terrified haze in Will’s mind had cleared just enough to realize just how close he and Mike were— and once that thought crossed his mind, a vivid blush became permanently fixed to his face. For once, Will was almost thankful to have had a nightmare; now, at least, he had something to blame his flustered expression on.
Mike still had an arm wrapped around Will’s side and a hand firmly pressed against his back. “Are you okay now?” His voice was soft, calming Will’s racing heart one beat at a time.
”I—“ Will choked back an oncoming sob. “Yeah, I guess.”
Mike narrowed his eyes. “Bullshit.” His tone was light, teasing but gentle. “You’re still crying— and, earlier, you were screaming for a whole minute before I was able to wake you up. I thought I’d just have to pour water on you or something, because I kept shaking you and you wouldn’t—“ Mike cut himself off with a shaky inhale, as though he was trying to hold back his own tears. “You wouldn’t wake up, Will. I was so scared.”
“I’m sorry,” Will said, his voice a raspy whisper, “for scaring you.”
”How about this?” Mike said, a playful smile flashing on his face. “You tell me what your dream was about, and I’ll accept your apology.”
”I— I don’t—“ He scrambled for something to say, stuttering for a moment before he remembered Mike’s slip-up; how he had mentioned his nighttime disappearances and froze when Will questioned him on it— “Well, maybe I will, if you tell me where you keep ‘disappearing to’ first.” Almost proud of his quick evasion, he squirmed out of Mike’s grasp and crossed his arms with a small smirk. Their playful banter almost distracted Will from the monster raging inside his mind, the one sending up images of his friends’ broken bodies unbidden— almost. When he looked at Mike, the thought of his eyes going glassy and unseeing still lurked in Will’s subconscious, a stain he could never scrub away.
Mike gave an exaggerated groan, rolling his eyes with feigned annoyance. “Knew I shouldn’t have mentioned that. I can never get anything past you, I swear. Oh— what if I showed you, instead? It’s nice to watch the sun rise there, and it’ll come up soon, since it’s already, like, five-thirty.”
He swung his legs off the bed and walked to the door. It took a moment for Will to register what exactly Mike had said, but when he did, he was more than a bit concerned. “You’ve been sneaking out all alone in the dark? Why?” Will was alarmed by Mike’s disregard for his own safety; now, all he could imagine was a Demogorgon creeping out from the woods, snatching Mike away like it had done to Will not so long ago—
Mike stopped in his tracks, turning around to face Will with an apologetic look. “Shit— of course you wouldn’t want to go out in the dark, I didn’t even think. I’ve just done it so often I’m used to it, I guess. And I bring some defense, usually, so I’m never that scared.”
”No, now you’ve made me so curious I couldn’t not go— and what ‘defense?’ Is there something in your backpack that I should know about?” Will responded, raising an eyebrow.
Mike shrugged. “It’s just one of my dad’s hunting knives, and some pepper spray I borrowed from Nancy. I’ve never actually had to use it.”
“Wow, I feel so protected.” Will carefully pushed his bedroom door ajar, leaving it just barely cracked so the hinges wouldn’t creak and wake someone up. He was halfway down the hall when he noticed that Mike was still standing in Will’s room instead of following him out of the house. “Hey, this was your idea, so come on, or I’m gonna wander off in the dark with no idea where I’m going.”
Mike looked up, suddenly alarmed. “Okay, okay, I’m coming— but we don’t have to do this if you don’t want to. It’s really not that big of a deal, I can just tell you.”
”No, I want to see— it sounds kind of cool, honestly, to sneak out to some secret place,” Will said.
Mike looked away sheepishly, his face slightly flushed even under the pale moonlight illuminating the hallway. “I mean, it’s not that awesome, or secret. It’s just— it’s quiet there, and I like that. Though, to be honest, I’ve always wanted to do those average dumb teenager things— like sneaking out, or going to a huge rager party or something. I know it’s kind of dumb, I just. . . want to do normal ‘bad’ things sometimes, instead of all the weird bad things we’ve had to do, you know?”
For a while, Will didn’t respond, letting Mike’s rhetorical question linger in the cold air. Instead, he gingerly opened the spare drawer to grab a flashlight, then shut it with equal care to not make any unnecessary noise. When he looked up, Mike was already opening the front door, sliding open the deadbolt lock before opening the door just an inch and carefully slipping outside. From the crack in the door, Will could see Mike moving his hand in a beckoning gesture, and Will scrambled to sneak out with him before his mom or brother noticed the unreasonable amount of noise coming from the living room at five in the morning.
Will had nearly forgotten about what Mike had said by the time he had hopped onto his bike. Without warning, Mike slipped behind Will on his bike seat, and said, practically whispering in his ear, “Sometimes, I wish things could just go back to normal. I wish my biggest problem was getting yelled at for staying up too late, instead of. . . all of this.” He gestured to the vast expanse of darkness that stretched out in front of them, illuminated only by the faint pinpricks of streetlights.
“Yeah, I know,” Will said.
He was about to continue talking when Mike grabbed onto his shoulders and gave them a slight shake, and said, at a much louder volume that made Will nearly fall off his seat, “Come on, getaway driver— start pedaling!”
In an attempt to ignore the way Mike’s hands were planted firmly in the curves where Will’s shoulders met his neck, Will focused on not crashing into anything as he pedaled through the dark— before realizing that he had no idea where they were going. “You’re gonna have to give me directions, Mike, since for some reason you decided that you wanted to leech off me instead of biking there yourself.”
“I didn’t bring my bike, remember?” said Mike, now resting his head on Will’s shoulder. Will silently thanked the night sky for concealing the bright blush creeping down his neck— though, if the moonlight had been just a bit brighter, Will might’ve been able to see the flush in Mike’s face, too. “My mom drove me here— oh, yeah, directions— uh, you’re gonna want to keep going straight, then there’s a little path through the woods just before you get to Dustin’s house. I’ll point it out when we’re close.”
Will frowned, because if he was being honest, he had no memory of how or when Mike got to his house, just that one minute he wasn’t there, and the next, he was. “Sorry. It’s just— sometimes, all the hours in a day blur into one big mess in my head, and I can’t remember anything except that at one point, I must’ve woken up, and eventually, I must’ve gone to sleep. It’s like—“ Will cut himself off with a humorless laugh— “like I’m still going crazy, even though the Mindflayer’s gone.”
“I feel like that too, sometimes,” Mike said quietly. “We can still go crazy together.”
This time, the smile that crossed Will’s face was genuine. “Yeah. Crazy together, right?”
”Yeah.” Mike nodded into his shoulder, sending a shiver down Will’s spine like the beating of butterfly wings. They rode in silence for a while, Mike’s grip growing tighter and tighter on his shoulders, until Mike tapped Will urgently and yelled “Okay, now turn left here, where that flickering street lamp is—“
”Mike, I’ll just run right into a tree!”
”No, it’ll be fine, I swear, just let me—“ Mike wrapped his hands around the handlebars, overlapping with Will’s own, and yanked the bike off the road— Will might have screamed a bit, but that was something he would forever deny. They careened into the woods as Will shut his eyes tightly, preparing for the pain of slamming face-first into a tree, but it never came. When he opened his eyes, they were biking down a thin dirt path with seemingly no end in sight.
”Are you taking me into the woods to hide my body or something?” Will said, his voice far too squeaky from the still-present fear for his life he had experienced just moments prior.
Mike laughed and squeezed Will’s hand on the handlebars. “Or something, yeah.”
Eventually, the woods thinned out into a few sparse trees, revealing a rocky clearing that abruptly dropped off into a steep cliff. Will thought for a moment, wondering what exactly was so special about some clearing in the forest, until he realized it was the quarry— the quarry. The quarry where his plastic body had been found, floating silently on the still lake and covered with the soft fuzz of algae. It was the place where the idea of Will Byers as a living person should have ended, the moment where everyone should have said he’s gone, it’s over, stop the search, pack it up and go home. It was the place where he should have stayed dead.
Mike slipped off the bike and walked towards a fallen tree, then sat down and nestled himself in a fork between two branches. Silently, Will followed, slipping into the nook besides Mike and promptly ignoring the warmth of their thighs pressing together. The faint glow of moonlight turned Mike into an angelic painting, something ethereal and captivating. Will struggled to pull his eyes away from the shine of his soft hair and the silver glow of his skin— but eventually, his gaze fell to Mike’s shifting frown and twisting hands, and Will was drawn from his reverie by Mike’s obvious discomfort.
Before Will could begin to speak, Mike let out a subdued sigh. “Sometimes, my mind just starts. . . spinning. I don’t know how else to explain it— like, these really horrible thoughts keep coming really fast, and I can’t get them to stop, and then my heart starts spinning too and I feel like I’m going to die, or throw up, or something. Do you get that?”
”Yeah,” Will said, “all the time— or like when you’re falling in a dream, you know? Like the moment where your heart starts to beat so fast it hurts, but you still can’t wake up.”
Mike nodded. “Just like that, yeah. One time, it was really bad, and I just needed something to do so I could stop thinking so much, so I climbed out my window in the middle of the night and just started running. I didn’t even realize I had run to the quarry until I opened my eyes, and I was at the edge of the cliff— but when I looked over the edge, everything went quiet.” Mike looked away, glancing towards the quarry’s edge with a wistful stare. “At least until I remembered that I had school and I had to walk all the way back home before my parents woke up. But— ever since then, I’ve been coming here whenever I feel bad, instead of curling up into a ball and screaming, or whatever. It helps— my mom might think I’m sneaking out to be a part of a delinquent gang, though.”
Will looked around the starlit clearing, taking in the looming towers of tree trunks with branches crossed like thick shields, and the sloping hills that concealed the quarry from the rest of the dense woods. “It feels so private,” he said, “like you have your own little space to just be yourself. And I like the sound of the waves crashing against the rock— it’s peaceful. I see why you like it here.”
”I like sharing it with you, too,” Mike said with a small smile. “It can be our private space now, but please don’t let your mom know I’m influencing you into sneaking out, or she’ll probably throw me into the quarry.” Suddenly, his smile widened into a mischievous grin, and he said with a barely-contained smirk, “Now, I told you what I was hiding, so you have to tell me about your dream— I mean, you don’t have to, I just wanted to know so I could try to make you feel better, because you still seem a little shaken up— but if you don’t want to share, it’s okay!”
Will stiffened. For a moment, he was quiet; the only sound was the subtle rustle of fabric against his trembling hands. “If I tell you,” he said, shaky and unsure, “you might hate me.”
“What?” Mike looked offended, almost. “You couldn’t do anything to make me hate you— sorry, Will, but you’re stuck with me. Even if you, like, have dreams about killing me with hammers or something.”
“You’re not far off,” Will said dryly. “It’s more like— every time I dream, the Mindflayer is always back inside me, and it makes me see bad things and then it makes me do bad things— to everyone. To you, sometimes.”
Mike laid a hand on Will’s own trembling palm and gave him a gentle squeeze. “Hey, it’s just a dream, right? I know the real you wouldn’t want to hurt me.”
Will wrenched his hand away. He didn’t deserve Mike’s comfort, not when all he could see behind his eyes was the skin of Mike’s neck, bruised and raw in Will’s grasp, and how his face went white and the spark in his eyes dulled—
“Sometimes it feels like I do,” Will said faintly. “I look at you, and sometimes all I can see is your—“ he cut himself off to swallow the emotion building thickly in his throat. “I see me doing bad things even though I don’t want to do them, and then I dream about them, too, and it just makes me feel like more of a monster. Like I’m going to end up hurting you, even if I don’t want to— but what if I do want to? What if part of the Mindflayer is still in me, and it’s so mixed up in my own brain that one day, I’ll hurt someone, and I’ll want to hurt them?”
”Will, you don’t—“ Mike stopped himself before turning to face Will directly, setting both hands on his shoulders. “The Mindflayer is gone. It can’t make you do things like that anymore.”
Will shook Mike’s hands off with a humorless laugh. “That’s what everyone thinks, but it’s not true. I can always feel it— yeah, maybe the Mindflayer’s locked away now, but it won’t stay there forever. When it comes back, everyone will trust me again and they’ll end up dying, and it’ll be all my fault because I just couldn’t get any of you to understand. You don’t get it, Mike. I was a monster to begin with, and that’s why it chose me over anyone else. It knew I was the easiest target.” He stood up, ready to walk away before he could speak any more. Mike’s wounded gaze made Will want to turn back and console him, but he couldn’t do that without also tripping over his own words and spilling his guts entirely.
”Are you insane?” Mike said— he was standing too now, moving towards Will as he backed away. “You’re not a monster, Will, you’re the kindest person I’ve met in my life. You’re the best person I’ve met in my life.”
”No, Mike, I know this. There’s something wrong with me, and my brain knows it too, because every night it fucking torments me with you.”
Mike’s jaw dropped, and he spluttered for a moment, utterly confused. “W-what do you mean? Is there something I did that hurt you? Just tell me, please— I don’t want to hurt you, I’ll make it right—“
”No, Mike,” Will sighed, the end trailing off in a frustrated snarl, “it’s not your fault, it’s mine. It’s the disgusting part of my brain that can’t stop thinking about— about—“ He couldn’t make the final words come out; they stalled in his throat, too cowardly to come out and spill the sickening truth.
Mike marched up towards Will, who had been steadily retreating, seconds away from hopping on his bike and hiding out in the woods for the rest of his life. Before Will could get away, Mike caught his wrist in a firm grip and held him there, putting their back-and-forth battle at a sudden standstill.
”Tell me,” he said imploringly. “Nothing you could say would stop me from being your friend, I promise— just tell me. Please.”
Will was ensnared in Mike’s strong hold and pleading gaze, and though a small part of him felt suffocated by his overbearing presence, the louder, traitorous part of his brain felt safe in his grasp. The selfish animal in his mind wanted to lean into Mike’s hand, hold him close and spill his guts, damn the consequences— but he couldn’t. He couldn’t say anything at all, actually; he needed to kick and twist and scream and run as far away as possible, before the words started to spill out and the truth was laid out in nauseating word-vomit.
He couldn’t speak, shouldn’t speak— but Will found his voice anyway, words ringing out clear in the still air. “I have a lot of dreams,” he said, far too loudly, why was he so loud, he shouldn’t be talking at all— “about you. Sometimes they’ll have other people, too, like my mom or our friends, but they’re not always there. You are, though. And in every dream, you die, and it’s my fault. Sometimes, a Demogorgon rips you to pieces, and I just stand there and watch. Sometimes, I rip you to pieces. I end up with my hands around your neck, or a gun to your head— every time, just when I think I’m about to wake up, the gun goes off or my grip gets too tight, and the life just drains from your face. Every night, I go to sleep, and I watch you die, and then I wake up, and I’m still watching you die— even when I’m awake, the dream stays in the back of my brain. I look at you, and all I can see behind my eyes is your dead body. Don’t you think—“ Will stopped to take in a ragged breath, then choked out a dry laugh on his exhale, “that could make a guy a little out of it? It’s kind of hard to be a person when all I can think about is killing my friends.”
To Will’s surprise, Mike kept his hand firmly on Will’s wrist. He looked Will dead in the eye, and there was a notable absence of fear in his gaze— there he went again, with his astonishing lack of self-preservation instincts. “I know you, Will. You’re the kindest, most selfless, forgiving person I’ve ever known. You trap spiders to set them free outside instead of killing them. And remember that one day, when that bird ran into your window and broke its wing? You swaddled it up in a towel and hid it in your room, then you biked to the library in the freezing cold to look for books on bird care. Any other person would have just left it out there to die, but you could never do that, because you could never intentionally hurt anyone. You’re not dangerous— the Mindflayer is. It’s not your fault that the Mindflayer possessed you, and it wouldn’t be your fault if it used you to kill me, because it wouldn’t be you.”
“Selfless.” Will spat out the word with a humorless laugh. “You don’t even know how selfish I am. I could kill you, but I still can’t get myself to push you away. I think I’d rather have one more hug from you and then have to watch you die than never see you again— and if that’s not selfish, I don’t know what is. I hide everything important from you just so you’ll stay my friend, because I’d disgust you if you knew that—“ Will stopped talking. He had to stop getting so close to the truth, or it would destroy him.
”That what, Will?” Mike said; he sounded angry now, desperately furious. “Do you not hear what I’m saying? I’ll say it a million times if I have to— nothing will make me leave you. Nothing.”
The sparkling tears in Mike’s eyes must’ve fried Will’s brain, because every damning truth he had tried to hold back fell from his mouth, spilling out in a torrent of shaky syllables.
”Well, since you want to know so badly, it’s that I’m a queer— but I’m pretty sure that was obvious.”
If Mike had looked confused before, he was entirely lost now. For a long moment, he just stared at Will, mouth open in a silent question. When he spoke, he sounded small, unsure of himself. “No, Will, it was not obvious.”
”Well, you know now.” Will said. For some reason, he was standing still, not wrenching his arm away from Mike and running like he should. He was entirely frozen; a deer in headlights, waiting for the car to barrel over him and put an end to his misery. “Is this enough to make you leave?”
Mike looked like he was rearranging his entire worldview in his head and having a minor breakdown simultaneously. In spite of the shifting expression of shock and confusion plastered all over his face, his words were soft and sure. “I’ve stayed by your side when everyone else thought you were dead, Will. This is nothing— it’s just a part of you, right?” He paused, then muttered, “A part I didn’t notice for nine years, somehow, but whatever. The point isn’t that I’m dense and can never figure out anything about anyone. The point is I— I love you, and nothing will ever change that.”
Will froze. I love you, I love you, I love you— the words repeated over and over in his brain, a broken record catching on scratched static. It was exactly what he wanted to hear, and yet it crushed him entirely, tearing his fragile heart in two because Mike would never love him like that. Mike meant well, he always did— but he never knew when to leave something alone. He would keep comforting Will, keep handing him sweet affection until the air was so thick with Mike’s love that he choked on it, and he would never understand why his love hurt Will more than it healed unless he came clean. He had to rip off the bandaid— because, sometimes, you had to let a wound bleed before it could heal.
“You can’t say that,” Will said.
Maybe he should have been more clear, because Mike seemed to have no idea what Will was talking about. He pursed his lips into a confused frown, then slowly said, “Say what? That I’m dense? That I care about you? That I love—“
”Yes, that you love me!” Will yelled. He couldn’t lower his voice, for some reason. He almost sounded angry, which was a shock to even his own ears— where did this anger come from? He didn’t want to be mad at Mike, but his tone stayed resentful, heedless of his conscious emotions. “You can’t— you shouldn’t say that, because I can never say it back and mean the same thing. There’s a difference. You love me, and I’m in love with you.”
Mike wavered like a leaf caught in the wind. Will could physically see his knees wobble, as though his body was about to buckle forwards and float away on the breeze. As he began to tilt sideways, Mike caught himself on a nearby tree trunk. His shoulders trembled violently as he balanced his weight against the rough bark.
Will kept speaking, forcing the urge to sweep Mike upright into a tight hug to the back of his mind. “It’s not like I wanted you to know, but I don’t know how else to make you see sense. I’m dangerous, Mike, and god, if I have to make you hate me to realize that, then so be it— but before you go, can I at least tell you the moment I knew?” He paused for a moment to blink back tears, then continued.
“It was the first time I saw you after coming back from the Upside Down. You shoved open the door, and the second you saw me, your face just lit up into this huge smile, and you laughed so hard I thought you had gone crazy from one week without me. You ran over to my bed, leaving Dustin and Lucas in the dust, and basically fell on top of me— but I didn’t care, because you were warm and solid and real. You weren’t a disembodied voice echoing from the real world, or a blurry image in my mind— you were real, and that was all that mattered. You pressed your head to my chest, and I didn’t realize it at the time, but you were listening for my heartbeat, weren’t you? You stayed like that for a second, but it felt like forever— then, you lifted your head up just an inch, and whispered in my ear ‘I missed you’. And I looked into your eyes, and they were wet and teary and so infuriatingly pretty, and you felt like the only important thing in the world at the moment and the thought just clicked into place. I’m in love with him. It made perfect sense at the time, but now, nothing makes sense anymore.”
Mike was still leaning against the tree, but he had stopped shaking; instead, he was entirely still. His mouth was hanging open, frozen in obvious shock, and his eyes were sparkling with an emotion Will couldn’t place.
Will took Mike’s silence as an opportunity to push Mike further away. “You don’t have to just stand there, you can leave, it’s okay. You don’t have to say anything if you don’t want to, or you can yell at me as long as you want, just— just leave. Please.”
“I’m not—“ Mike paused for a moment. He was almost as breathless as Will was despite not speaking a word, and he looked so confused that Will wondered for a moment if he had somehow spent the last few minutes speaking in another language. “I’m not leaving, so you can stop asking me to. I’m just. . . processing. Give me a second.”
The ‘second’ that passed felt like forever. It was like the end of the day in elementary school, on the occasions that his mom would arrive late to dismissal; in the few minutes that passed without her beetle-green car driving by, Will was entirely convinced that his mom had forgotten him entirely. He had resigned himself to his fate of forever wandering the streets as a homeless boy, never to see his mom again— until she had abruptly walked out from the parking lot, and Will burst into relieved tears at the sight of her, and Joyce asked why in the world are you crying, honey? I was only two minutes late, and he realized that maybe, just maybe, he had overexaggerated the situation.
In the few seconds Mike was silent, Will was utterly convinced that he would never see Mike Wheeler again. Despite the fact that he had literally said the opposite, Will was already certain that Mike was moments away from walking off into the woods. After the third second of silence had ticked by, he had already come to terms with the Mike-shaped hole that would be left in his heart.
But since it was already over, why couldn’t he allow himself a moment to look at Mike one last time, and commit his features to memory before he disappeared from Will’s life forever? He took Mike in, raking his gaze over his former friend from top to bottom; his hair, inky black, the edges glowing like a fuzzy halo as the sun slowly rose behind his head. His eyes, with deep brown irises swallowed by wide pupils. His lips— disgust rose in Will’s throat like tepid bile, but this was his last chance, so he let his eyes linger anyway. His shoulders, blanketed by a soft navy jacket, threadbare at the cuffs.
Will’s gaze was traveling over Mike’s worn jeans when he heard it. It was Mike’s voice, all right, but it couldn’t have been him, because he was— he said—
“I think I’m in love with you too.”
Did his heart just stop? Did he die from sudden organ failure, and was this some after-death hallucination, a vision conjured up from the depths of his subconscious to slow his heart rate as he passed away? He pinched himself, hard. The ground remained solid, and the sun continued to steadily rise.
”I mean, no— I know, now. Sorry, I just— I never thought about it like that before. Not, like— it’s not like I didn’t know gay people existed! I just— I thought it only happened to movie characters or celebrities, like David Bowie or something. I didn’t think I could— but I guess I am, and it makes total sense.” Mike was staring directly at Will, and now, Will could put a name to the emotion sparkling in his friends eyes; it was love. It was love, and it had always been love— how had he been so blind, all this time?
Will spoke, slow and uneasy. “Are you serious?”
”Dead serious,” Mike said, nodding with utter conviction. “Like, you know how everyone says that love makes you feel like you have butterflies floating around in your stomach? I never got that, because I thought oh, but I have butterflies all over when I hang out with Will, don’t you just feel that with all your friends? I don’t know how I didn’t figure out sooner, because I felt exactly like how they described love in the movies and somehow, the idea that maybe it was because I was in love didn’t come through. I mean, I understand if this freaks you out, considering I literally just realized I loved you two minutes ago, but—“
”You’re in love with me,” Will said, almost to himself. “You actually—“
Mike groaned, placing a hand to his head in exasperation. He set his hands on Will’s shoulders and shook him gently— and wow, how had they gotten so close together without Will even noticing? “Yes, Will! I love you, and I’m not leaving you, even if you think I should because you’re ‘selfish’ or ‘dangerous’ or whatever, because you’re not. You’d rather never see me again than see me dead, and if that’s not selfless, I don’t know what is. There’s nothing wrong about you, and there’s especially nothing wrong about loving me— if anything, I think it’s right.”
”It’s not, though,” Will said. “It’s wrong, and it is dangerous, and you— it could get you killed, Mike.”
”You’re worth it,” Mike responded, a hushed murmur against Will’s ear. They were practically pressed against each other now; Mike was quickly closing the distance between them, and Will’s heart was speeding up in giddy anticipation, though he wasn’t exactly sure what Mike was doing. Will watched, awestruck, as Mike’s hand drifted from Will’s shoulder and up to his face, cupping the underside of his jaw. On instinct, he leaned into the touch with a small smile— then, suddenly, Mike’s eyes widened like he was shocked awake from a daydream, and he blushed so furiously that Will could see red dusting the tips of his ears.
”I— uhm,” Mike stammered out, his face turning an even brighter red, somehow. “I just realized that I really want to kiss you now. But if you don’t want to, that’s totally okay! You don’t have to—”
It was a scene taken straight from a daydream, something he would fleetingly imagine before cutting himself off seconds before their lips actually touched— except this time, it was real, and Will didn’t want to make it stop. “Of course I want to kiss you.”
Mike nodded shakily, then leaned in. Will was absolutely frozen. He was still somewhat convinced that the second they closed the gap that he would wake up again, alone in his bed, but Mike more than made up for Will’s lack of movement. He took a small step forward and carefully tugged Will’s face forwards, then tilted his own head slightly and—
Their first kiss was the end of a thunderstorm; that singular moment when the rain dissipates, and the sun finally reappears to envelop the world in hazy yellow light. Will was caught in those sunbeams now, warmth blooming in his chest and chasing away the shivering cold that he’d once thought permanently stuck to his skin. The storm had broken, and the torrents of rain were only puddles under his feet, harmless now that he had the sun wrapped in his arms.
Mike was gentle. He stroked a careful thumb over Will’s face, right under his tightly shut eyes, then paused and let his finger rest on his temple. His lips ghosted over Will’s, a soft brush that took his breath away yet encompassed him in a tender feeling of peace. Far too quickly, it was over— or at least, that was what Will thought, until Mike gave him a sappy grin just inches from Will’s face and pushed their mouths together again.
He realized, in the second that Mike pulled away before giving him another kiss, this time slowly sweet with another hand pressed against the small of Will’s back, that loving Mike really was right. How could something claimed to be so wrong feel this perfect?
Minutes passed just like this, trading saccharine kisses as the warmth in Will’s chest grew steadily hotter, until the cold that had previously permeated his every waking moment felt like a distant memory. Eventually, Mike finally pulled away, looking at a faraway spot over Will’s shoulder. Will sighed at the loss of contact, leaning onto Mike’s shoulder and basking in the subtle heat radiating from his coat.
Faintly, Will heard Mike mutter something right above his ear. “Shit, we missed the sunrise.”
Will turned around. Across the quarry, the sun hung above the horizon surrounded by a pale pinkish-orange smear, blurring together like an oil-pastel spill at the bottom of the blue sky. When he looked down, Will could see the deep waters of the quarry lit aflame, reflecting the soft fiery colors of the sunrise in its dark surface. It was beautiful, of course, but it was worth missing for Mike; after all, the sun would always rise again.
“We can just come back here another time,” Will responded.
”You want that?” Mike said, unsure. “Like, I didn’t just totally screw up our friendship by kissing you, right? It was okay?”
Will laughed, a smile breaking out on his face. Happiness— an emotion that felt like a rarity, nowadays— filled his heart, chasing away the last of the lingering chill under his skin. “‘Okay’ is one way to put it. I think I’d go with perfect, or life-changing, maybe. But yeah, it was okay.”
Mike breathed a sigh of relief. “I hope you know that this means you’re stuck with me now. I wasn’t leaving to begin with, and I’m definitely not after— oh, shit.”
Will watched as Mike’s face fell into a look of utter horror. “What? Is something wrong?”
”The sun,” Mike breathed out, his eyes wide, “is up. Like, way past up. Your mom is also probably way past up, and we left your door wide open, and—“
”Shit,” Will agreed. Without another word, they ran to Will’s bike and hopped on. Will pedaled furiously through the woods, and Mike clung to his shoulders, and whispered in his ear “We are so screwed,” and Will groaned in agreement— but he’d take being grounded for a month over losing this moment.
As he sped through the neighborhood, shoulders going numb from the way Mike’s fingers dug into his arms and wind tousling his hair into a disheveled mess, Will couldn’t have been happier. Finally, he could stop running, stop pushing everyone away and just lean into their love— because maybe, just maybe, Will wasn’t the monster he’d thought himself to be.