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"What are colors mama?" Mike asks, louder than he meant to. He's been thinking about it all day and he's nervous. His mom smiles at him, and sits down next to him at the table, taking the box of crayons off the table.
"You know how things look different?" His mom says gently, pulling some crayons out of the box. Mike nods, everything is different. His mom holds the three crayons, "Well, there are different colors that make them look even more different."
Mike's eyes go wide, "Even more different?!"
His mom laughs, "Yes. You can't see them yet, but this is Red."
Red is bright, it's a loud color his mom explains. She walks through blue, and yellow, and Mike squints at them, trying to imagine them being even more different than they already are.
"I like this one." He declares, grabbing the brown and green crayon. He thinks Will's eyes are these colors mixed together, and he tells his Mom. His mom laughs, "Okay baby."
"When do you think we'll see colors?" Will whispered, "Is it going to make everything less bright?"
They're in middle school and no one can see colors. Mike kind of hopes color change how bright everyone's clothes are, because right now they're all mismatched. He hopes Will will ever tell him if he wears mismatch clothes like that.
"I don't know." Mike replies honestly, "My mom said colors make everything more, whatever that means."
Will snorts, "My mom said the same thing, but it makes her sad to talk about colors."
Mike nods, looping an arm over Will's shoulder to pull him closer. He knows of course. Will's parents were soulmates, or at least they used to be, before his dad starting drinking, and swearing and throwing things, calling Will all kinds of disgusting names that Mike had never heard anyone say, and he had to ask Nancy to explain, and Nancy went white and made him promise never to say those words, before she explained them, and Mike had felt sick. Will has told Mike before, his mom woke up one day and realized she couldn't see colors anymore, and made his dad leave. Now Will's mom wears mismatched clothes sometimes too, but no one says anything. Will offered to help his mom pick her clothes one time, but Joyce had just smiled sadly and said, "That's helpful of you baby but you can't see colors either."
"How are we supposed to find this stupid stained glass window when we can't see fucking colors?" Dustin demanded, slamming his hands down on the table. Steve cleared his throat, "Uh. I can see color, but uh, I've never seen that design before."
"I have," Will offers, quietly. Mike has him tucked against his side, Will's been freezing lately, wearing multiple jackets and shivering all the time, and Mike will do anything he can to warm him up.
"It's in those fancy old houses," Will offers, when everyone looks at him, torn away from where they'd been shouting questions at Steve, asking him what color they're eyes were, hair, clothes, shoelaces, the sky.
"Well duh," Dustin says, "But there's the same stain glass design in every house, we won't know without Steve there to spot the colors."
"When did you start seeing colors?" Mike asks Steve curiously. Funnily enough, Steve seems to be watching him and Will curiously, eyes narrowed. Steve's eyebrows pinch and then smooth out again, "Last night."
"Is brown your favorite color?" Will asks quietly, "I think it'll be my favorite."
Steve's eyebrows surge upwards, "Uh, I like red, but brown is....brown is good too."
"We don't have time for this!" Nancy reminds, herding them all outside, "Steve gets shotgun, he needs to be able to see the stained glass."
They handle Vecna as best they can with only Steve able to see colors. It's actually not a big deal. The big deal comes later, when they're frantically trying to use the various devices in the back of the SQWK van, with Steve driving and none of the buttons labelled. None of the buttons are labelled because both Steve and Robin can see colors, and they're usually the only ones in the van, and labels hadn't really been a priority with everything going on.
"HIT THE RED ONE!!" Steve is shouting from the front.
"I DONT KNOW WHAT THAT IS" Dustin screeches. They're closing in on the demo, but if they can't fire the tracker, it does them no good. Will frowns, Dustin should be able to see the loud glowing button.
"It's four to the right, no the left, FUCK!" Steve can't remember and track the demo at the same time. They're running out of time.
"Move," Will nudges Dustin to the side, "This one."
He hits the button that he's pretty sure is red. The van is silent.
"You can see colors?" Jonathan asked, voice quiet. Will shakes his head, "No, I just know that the loud one is red."
"The loud one?" Dustin sounds completely lost, "what?"
"You know," Will gestures, and Mike jumps in to help, "Yes, the really bright one, not as bright as the sun one though, I always forget what that one is."
"Yellow," Will supplies, he remembers that one.
"You guys can see color," Nancy breathes out, "And you didn't think to mention it?"
"We can't see color." Mike says, making a face, "Mom said colors are vision changes. My vision hasn't changed."
Steve has finally slowed the car to a stop and he turns around to see the situation in the back, "Oh good, we're finally addressing this."
"You knew?!"" Nancy shrieked, "And you didn't say anything?!"
Steve snorted, "I didn't realize they didn't know they couldn't see colors until like a week ago."
"What?" Will and Mike ask in unison.
"What color is this?" Nancy asks, holding up her jacket.
"Pink," Mike says automatically, Nancy's had the same jacket for years, even though it has ink stains on the sleeves, he's surprised she hasn't done anything about them.
"How long have you known her sweater was pink?" Steve asks from the front seat. Mike's eyebrows scrunch together, "Since she got it. It matched her teddy bear, and mom said that was pink too."
Nancy's face goes pink at that statement.
"Mike." She hisses, "That's private."
Mike throws his hands up, "You asked!"
"Holy shit." Dustin breathes out, "holy shit holy shit holy shit."
"When did you first see the sky change color?" Jonathan asks, on a one track mind to figure this out. The sky change is a popular first question, Mike guesses it would be hard to miss the sky becoming more. Will frowns, "when me and Mike were swinging."
"In kindergarten?!" Everyone yelps, except Steve, who obviously doesn't know that story.
"Yeah," Mike says, "Why is everyone acting like this is a big deal, we know the sky is blue, but we can't see blue?"
"Mike." Nancy sounds like she's getting frustrated now, "Which of this buttons is blue?"
"That one," Mike points at it. Nancy says this next part very slow, "Mike. Every single one of these buttons looks exactly the same to me."
"That's the blue one," Steve supplies, craning his neck to see the one Mike is pointing at.
"oh." Will breathes out, grabbing Mike's hand, "Oh my god."
Mike squeezes his hand back, "What?"
"We're soulmates," Will whispers, "I think we've been seeing colors this whole time."
Oh.
"Oh thank god." Mike rushes out.
"What do you mean thank god?!" Nancy screeches. Mike exhales a sigh of relief, "Mom keep saying everything would get brighter when we saw colors, I can't handle any brighter. Just looking at Dustin gives me a headache."
"Don't even get me started on El," Will chuckles.
"I HAVE TO TELL THE OTHERS," Dustin realizes in a rush, scrambling for the walkie. Steve clears his throat, catching the pairs attention while Nancy, Dustin and Jonathan continue to panic, "congrats you two."
"You didn't say anything?" Will asks, frowning. Steve shrugged, "I thought you knew. Your outfits are never loud. Everyone has at least one really loud outfit, except you two. Now I know why."
"We're soulmates," Mike realizes again. He hasn't let go out Will's hand. Will beams, "Crazy together right?"
Mike grins back, "crazy together."