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No one ever misses a chance to remind Mike of how inattentive he is.
Inattentive in class, drifting off halfway through a lecture. Inattentive with time, forgetting the exact minute the potatoes are supposed to go out of the oven until the kitchen smells faintly burnt. Inattentive with his belongings, with the things he constantly loses and then swears were right there a second ago. Everyone is always pointing it out, always circling back to the same conclusion: sometimes, it seems like Mike just doesn’t pay attention to anything at all.
What no one ever seems to notice, though, is that Mike does pay attention. To one thing, and one thing only.
Because it isn’t true that Mike is incapable of focusing. He simply chooses where his attention goes and where it doesn’t, and that’s a very different thing.
It’s the excuse he uses every time someone points a finger at him, every time Lucas tells him it’s not normal to forget their carefully planned D&D campaign, every time Dustin reminds him, again, to charge the walkie-talkie batteries, every time Jonathan sighs heavily and tells him to stop stealing his shirts because they’re not “communal property,” no matter how comfortable Mike claims they are.
Mike doesn’t really care, not that much, anyway. Let them think he’s careless. Let them roll their eyes and shake their heads and file him away as the distracted one, the forgetful one, the boy whose mind is always somewhere else.
What matters, what really matters, is that they never notice the one thing he is always watching. Not now. Not ever.
Even though it’s getting harder to hide. Mike realizes it on an ordinary day, sometime during the week leading up to Christmas, the first one they will spend together after… everything.
After the terrible year they’ve survived. After they finally came back to Hawkins. After the quarantine began. After the Byers moved into the Wheeler house.
After he and El stopped being together, too.
The truth is, it happened by accident. Mike hadn’t planned it, hadn’t rehearsed it in his head the way he rehearses everything else that scares him. And yet, every time he thinks about El being the one to break things off, he thanks God for it.
Because the truth, an uglier one, one he doesn’t particularly like looking at, is that Mike never would have had the courage to leave El on his own. Not even if his feelings had grown thin and fragile, stretched into something that looked like love but wasn’t quite honest anymore.
Not even if staying was hurting both of them in ways neither of them knew how to name.
So when El came to him one random day in October, her smile tired and her eyes heavy with something unspoken, Mike didn’t protest much.
“I’m really sorry, Mike,” El had said softly, her fingers brushing his cheekbone with careful tenderness.
Mike had only nodded. He’d stayed quiet, silently celebrating, and that makes him an asshole, he knows that. He carries the guilt with him, even now.
El left because she wasn’t entirely sure she wanted to be with him while the world was quite literally at war with itself. Because she wasn’t entirely sure about her own feelings anymore. Mike, of course, didn’t get angry. He couldn’t. Because neither was he.
Or rather, he was very sure of one thing: he didn’t love El. Not like that. Not anymore.
If loving her means caring for her deeply, feeling an endless gratitude for the way she’s saved his life more times than he can count, for always standing by him… for bringing Will back, then yes, maybe he does love her in that way.
And that, unfortunately, brings him right back to the real problem.
No one seems to have noticed the one thing Mike pays painful, relentless attention to: Will Byers.
And he prays, God he really does, that no one ever will. But fate, as it turns out, has never been on Mike Wheeler’s side.
That’s why, slowly, Mike’s personal descent into hell begins.
He can’t quite pinpoint when it happens, or how exactly Will becomes friends with Robin Buckley, or why, but it does. And somehow, she slips into their lives, into his life, in a way that feels almost intrusive. Irritating, even.
Robin has this way of inserting herself into conversations, of lingering a second too long, of seeing things.
Seeing right through him.
Mike feels observed in ways he’s never been before, which only makes him more awkward than usual, more obvious and more clumsy, and that really doesn’t help, considering that being around Will lately already makes him feel like he’s constantly balancing on the edge of a razor blade. Like one wrong move could slice him right open.
Because Will laughs at one of his dumb jokes and Mike feels heat rush to his face, his cheeks betraying him instantly. Because he offers, far too eagerly, to bake cookies with Will, only to burn every single batch because he keeps getting distracted, staring like an idiot at Will’s profile as he laughs with Holly, bright and carefree and completely unaware of the damage he’s causing.
Because Mike keeps finding pathetic little excuses to touch him: brushing imaginary flour off Will’s sleeve, steadying his wrist when he reaches for a pan, nudging his knee under the table and pretending it was an accident.
It never ends well.
It never does.
Will, thankfully, has no idea what intentions hide behind each gesture, but he still manages to fluster Mike anyway, smiling too warmly, thanking him too sincerely, leaning in without realizing what it does to him. And Robin always seems to be there at the worst possible moments, sharp-eyed and alert, watching them like she’s piecing together a puzzle.
Mike starts to think she might have a thing for Will.
Which would be… questionable, considering the age difference.
The real issue, though, is that she’s always around, at least whenever Will is. It makes Mike realize they haven’t really been alone in a long time. Not that it would change much; Mike can barely bring himself to look Will in the eyes lately. And the fact that Robin is also friends with Nancy only makes everything worse. So much worse.
Having Robin around doesn’t help. It makes everything tighter, louder, more unbearable.
And Mike absolutely cannot imagine surviving the entire Christmas break with her constantly there. No, thank you.
“So, uh—yeah,” Mike starts one morning, grasping desperately for an excuse, any excuse, to have Will to himself, at least for a few hours.
He absentmindedly stirs his cereal into a soggy mess, milk sloshing dangerously close to the rim. “What if we went to the mall to buy some presents? I’m so behind, and your taste is—” he hesitates, then blurts it out anyway, “—it’s the best.”
He’s been bad at stopping himself lately when it comes to complimenting Will. Will, as always, misses the implication entirely.
Will looks up at him, smiling brightly. “Sure!” he chirps, taking a big bite of his grilled cheese. Mike smiles back, genuine and relieved, already on the verge of victory, when Will speaks again.
“Is it okay if Robin comes with us?” he asks softly.
For just a second, the smile slips off Mike’s face. He recovers quickly, schooling his expression into something neutral. “It’s okay,” he says at last, immediately choking on his milk.
It is absolutely not okay. But Mike doesn’t dare say that out loud. He never would. After all, the last thing he wants is to hurt Will.
So Mike swallows the ache lodged painfully in his throat, forces himself not to roll his eyes when Robin knocks on the Wheeler’s front door half an hour later, and settles for greeting her with a stiff, polite nod.
“Everything okay?” he asks quietly, tugging his coat closer around himself as he waits for Will to come downstairs.
Robin beams at him, all teeth and energy, the kind of smile that feels slightly invasive if you’re not in the mood for it, which Mike very much isn’t. And then she starts talking. Immediately. That, too, is something Mike finds deeply irritating.
“Oh yeah, totally fine. Also, you know, I was saying to Will the other day that we should totally go back to the video store, but we were already planning on going to the mall for gifts, but then, like, I wasn’t sure because we could do both, but—”
She’s still going when footsteps thump down the stairs.
“Here I am!” Will announces brightly, appearing in the hallway with flushed cheeks and his scarf only half wrapped. He gives Robin a quick, easy hug to which Mike looks away on instinct. He’s already had enough of the two of them, and they’re not even at the mall yet.
A few hours later, Mike knows, he knows, this was a terrible idea.
Robin and Will do nothing but laugh, whisper to each other, wander off together between shops, leaving Mike to trail half a step behind them like an afterthought. And because Mike Wheeler is nothing if not stubborn, he slides into a silent, ridiculous competition with Robin for Will’s attention.
He insists on carrying Will’s bags. He offers his opinion on every single gift Will picks up. He positions himself closer, always closer, whenever they stop walking.
At one point, Will laughs at something Robin says and leans into her shoulder, and Mike immediately responds by launching into an overly animated explanation of why a particular comic book is objectively superior, gesturing wildly until Will looks back at him.
Robin doesn’t seem fully aware of what he’s doing, at least not openly, but Mike catches it. The quick glance. The way she bites back a smile. The soft snort she lets out every time Mike makes a complete spectacle of himself.
Jealousy has always been one of Mike’s worst traits. He just never realized it before. Or maybe, he thinks bitterly, he’s just never been jealous like this. Not of El. Not ever. This is new, and it’s sharp, almost humiliating.
“I’m starving,” Will groans around lunchtime, rubbing his stomach dramatically. Mike sees his opening and lunges for it before Robin can get there first.
“We could go to that little diner near the record store,” he blurts out. “You like it there, and they don’t overcook the fries like most places you say do.” It’s subtle, slipped in without him even meaning to, but he looks at Robin while saying all of that, like to prove he knows what Will likes.
Will, predictably, doesn’t catch it. “Oh! Yeah, I do,” Will says easily, smiling at him. “That sounds nice.” Mike barely has time to enjoy the small victory before he realizes Robin is staring at him.
Not confused. Not surprised. Amused.
She raises an eyebrow, just slightly, like she’s filing something away for later. Mike clears his throat, suddenly very aware of how close he’s standing to Will, how warm his arm feels through his coat.
“Yeah,” he says, forcing a casual shrug. “Thought you’d like it.” Will smiles again and Robin follows them both, eyes sharp, steps light, like she knows exactly how this is going to end.
And Mike? Mike has the sinking feeling that things are only going to get worse.
As soon as they step outside the mall, Robin has the brilliant idea of suggesting a long walk to the diner. Will lights up immediately, nodding enthusiastically, already turning in that direction. Mike… not so much.
He swallows the complaint that almost slips past his lips and tightens his grip on the shopping bags he insisted on carrying for Will, the paper handles digging into his palms. When he looks up, he catches that same little smirk on Robin’s face, the knowing one, and suddenly he feels oddly challenged by it.
Fine, then.
He clenches his jaw against the biting cold. It’s the kind of cold that settles into your bones, the kind that promises snow sooner rather than later. Mike is sure it’ll snow this winter. A lot. He forces a smile whenever Robin and Will glance back to make sure he’s still following, nodding along like everything is perfectly fine.
It isn’t.
As they walk toward the diner, side by side, their shoulders brushing, Mike finds himself lagging just enough to watch them without being obvious. Will gestures animatedly as he talks, breath puffing white in the air. Robin leans in to hear him better, laughing softly, her hands tucked into her coat sleeves.
And the thought creeps in, unwanted and vile: what if they’re seeing each other?
What if this, this ease and this closeness, isn’t new at all?
The idea makes his stomach churn. It feels wrong in a way he can’t properly explain, like swallowing something rotten without realizing it. He hates himself for even thinking it. He hates Robin for existing in Will’s orbit at all. He hates the way his chest tightens as he watches them walk ahead of him, perfectly in sync.
By the time they reach the crosswalk just outside the diner, Mike has had enough. The light is red. Cars rush past, tires hissing against wet asphalt. Mike seizes the moment.
“It’s really cold, isn’t it?” he says casually, glancing around like the thought just occurred to him.
Robin’s head turns slightly in his direction, her expression sharpening, like she knows he’s about to say something painfully, catastrophically Mike Wheeler.
“Aren’t you cold, Will?” Mike keeps going, studying his face. “You’re always cold.”
Will’s nose is red. His cheeks are pink from the wind. Mike doesn’t even wait for an answer.
“Here—give me your hands,” he says quickly, already holding his own out toward Will. “I’ll warm them.”
He looks at Will a second too intensely, like this matters far more than it should. Robin snorts quietly.
“Oh, thanks, Mike,” Will says, flustered. “I’m okay, but maybe—” he fumbles with his coat pockets, distracted, searching for something, finally pulling out a pair of blue gloves.
“You might need these. You can have mine.”
Mike freezes. He stares at Will.
Then at the gloves. Then past Will, at Robin, who is very clearly fighting for her life not to laugh.
“Thanks,” Mike mutters, mortified, accepting the gloves like they might bite him.
The traffic light mercifully turns green. They step off the curb, and Mike exhales shakily, certain that if they’d stayed there another second, he might have actually died of embarrassment right there in the street.
He slips the gloves on just to not look dumb, even if he feels dumb. They’re warm. They smell faintly like Will and that somehow makes everything worse and Mike swallows his frustration yet again. Because this is their day. And he doesn’t want anyone to ruin it, not even now, especially now, no matter how hard it’s becoming.
Lunch is… tolerable. Barely.
They slide into a booth by the window, the heater rattling somewhere overhead. Mike ends up sitting next to Will, of course, he maneuvers it so naturally it almost feels accidental. When the waitress brings water, Mike reaches for the glass without thinking and pours it for Will, careful and precise, watching the level rise. He doesn’t even notice Robin’s glass sitting empty until she clears her throat pointedly.
“Oh—sorry,” Mike mutters, flushing, passing the pitcher across the table.
Will doesn’t seem to notice anything strange. He never does. He thanks Mike with a small smile and takes a sip, eyes soft, shoulders relaxing now that they’re warm and inside. Mike watches that, too. Watches everything.
He pushes Will’s fries closer when they arrive, nudges the ketchup toward him, automatically hands him a napkin when he spills a drop of soda on the table. It’s instinctive, thoughtless in the way habits are. Robin observes it all in silence, chin propped on her hand, expression unreadable.
At some point, towards the end of their lunch, she leans back and sighs.
“I hate to break up the cozy little vibe,” she says lightly, checking her watch, “but I’ve gotta head to work. Steve will literally never let me hear the end of it if I’m late again.”
Relief hits Mike so hard it almost makes him dizzy.
They stand outside the diner a few minutes later, breath fogging the air again. Robin shrugs on her jacket and looks between the two of them, her gaze lingering just a fraction longer on Mike.
“You guys have fun, okay?” she says, smile sharp and knowing. Then, as she passes Mike, she adds quietly, just for him, “Try not to make it too obvious next time.”
Mike stiffens.
“What?” he blurts, but she’s already walking away, lifting a hand in a casual wave, completely unbothered. Will watches her go, confused but unconcerned. “She’s… something,” he says with a small laugh.
Mike swallows. “Yeah,” he manages.
The walk home is quieter. The cold has settled deeper now, the sky already darkening even though it’s barely afternoon. When they step into the Wheeler house, it feels like crossing some invisible threshold, like the noise, the tension, the constant awareness finally ease off his shoulders.
For the first time all day, it’s just them.
Mike hangs up his coat, glancing at Will as he toes off his shoes in the hallway, humming softly a Christmas song under his breath. Mike lets himself breathe. At least here, he thinks, hopeful and a little desperate, we can be alone.
Will disappears into the basement for a few seconds, calling back that he’s managed to get ketchup all over his hoodie. Mike waits until the door clicks shut before he moves.
He doesn’t even fully realize what he’s doing at first, only that his body seems to act on instinct. He drifts toward the hallway, peeks into the living room, listens. The house answers him with silence.
No Joyce moving around upstairs, no Jonathan’s music bleeding through the walls, no Nancy’s voice on the phone. Just the soft hum of the refrigerator, the faint tick of the clock above the stairs. Mike checks anyway. He always checks. He glances toward the front door, the kitchen, the staircase. Empty. They, indeed, are alone.
The knowledge settles into him, loosening something tight in his chest, even as it makes his pulse pick up. He barely has time to process it before Will’s door opens again.
“Bad news,” Will says, reappearing in the hallway, tugging self-consciously at the hem of his T-shirt. “I threw all my hoodies in the wash. I don’t have a single clean one.”
Mike doesn’t stop to think. Thinking would ruin it. “You can wear one of mine,” he says immediately, already turning toward his room. “They—uh. They look better on you anyway.”
It slips out, unguarded and honest in a way he immediately regrets.
Will just blinks at him, completely missing what Mike has handed him on a silver platter. “Oh,” he says, relieved. “Thanks. That’d actually be really nice.”
Mike grabs the first hoodie he sees, soft and a bit oversized, worn thin at the cuffs from years of nervous tugging, and hands it over without meeting Will’s eyes. When Will pulls it on, the sleeves swallow his hands, the fabric hanging loose on his frame. Mike’s stomach flips unpleasantly. He tells himself not to stare.
He fails.
They spend the rest of the afternoon in the basement, where the air isn’t that cooler and the light softer, filtered through the small windows near the ceiling. The heater hums unevenly. A blanket lies half-folded on the couch. Outside, the sky dulls to a flat winter gray, threatening snow.
Mike suggests sitting on the floor, he doesn’t even know why, but Will does not complain.
He settles between Mike’s legs without hesitation, back resting lightly against his chest as if it’s the most natural thing in the world. He opens a comic book, knees drawn up, occasionally leaning back a little more when he laughs at a panel or points something out.
Mike stays very still.
He’s hyperaware of everything: the warmth seeping through layers of fabric, the faint smell of laundry detergent mixed with something unmistakably Will, the way Will’s shoulders rise and fall with each breath. He keeps his hands on his own knees, knuckles white with restraint, afraid that if he lets himself move even an inch closer, something irreversible might happen.
For a brief, fragile moment, he lets himself believe this could be it. That the holidays might pass like this, quiet and uncomplicated.
Will laughs under his breath at something in the comic book, the sound small and private, like it’s meant only for him. He leans closer, angling the page so Mike can see it too.
“Robin told me about this part,” Will says easily, like it’s nothing. “She said it was her favorite.” Mike stares at the page for half a second too long, then looks away.
Of course she did.
Robin. Always Robin.
He tilts his head back against the couch and exhales through his nose, eyes flicking up to the ceiling in a gesture Will doesn’t notice. He feels ridiculous for the irritation curling in his chest, sharp and uninvited, but it doesn’t go away. It just sits there, heavy and stubborn.
He knows Robin is funny. Smart. Easy to like. He knows she and Will might make sense together on paper, the kind of sense that makes people assume things without asking. And Mike hates that he notices how often they end up side by side, how comfortable Will seems around her, how freely he laughs.
He hates that it bothers him this much.
So when the question slips out of his mouth, unplanned and poorly worded, it almost feels inevitable. “So,” Mike says, clearing his throat, trying to sound casual and failing spectacularly. “You two… are you, uh—like, together or something?”
The words hang there, fragile and slightly scandalous. Will freezes.
Just for a moment, barely noticeable, his breath stutters, his shoulders going tense. Then he lets out a small, nervous laugh, quick and defensive. “What? No,” Will says immediately. “Me and Robin? No, we’re just friends.”
He turns toward Mike then, twisting awkwardly. It’s not comfortable, not really, but Mike doesn’t back away. He notices things instead: the faint flush creeping up Will’s cheeks, the way his fingers grip the comic just a little too tightly.
Mike frowns. “Are you sure?” he presses, because he’s always been bad at letting things go. “I mean, there wouldn’t be anything wrong with it.”
Will shakes his head, more firmly this time. “No. I don’t like her,” he says, voice steady now. “We’re not together.”
There’s a pause.
“I’m interested in someone else.”
He drops his gaze immediately, like he regrets saying even that much. He goes back to the comic, except he isn’t reading anymore, just staring at the page, unmoving. Mike’s stomach sinks.
Someone else.
The rest of the afternoon becomes a slow, grinding torture. Mike tries to act normal, he really tries, but his mind won’t stop racing. Every time Will smiles at himself, every time he drifts off mid-conversation, Mike wonders if that is the person Will is thinking about.
He asks questions. Too many. Who is it? Do I know them? Are they good to you? Will answers none of them. He shrugs, dodges, smiles in that maddeningly gentle way that makes it impossible to tell whether he’s hiding something or simply protecting it.
By evening, Mike is exhausted. And somehow, things only get worse over the following days.
Because now Mike isn’t just jealous of Robin, he’s competing with a ghost. An invisible someone who exists only in Will’s heart, and who Mike is absolutely certain is better than him in every possible way.
It’s embarrassing. He knows it is. Still, he can’t stop.
During the Christmas break, his behavior borders on obvious. He sits too close during movie nights, shoulders brushing, knees knocking. He volunteers to walk Will to Robin’s house, even when it’s completely unnecessary. He reacts a little too sharply when anyone else talks over Will or steals his attention, he puffs when someone jokes about Will liking someone.
Will doesn’t seem to notice.
Robin does.
Sometimes Mike catches her staring at him with a knowing look, during board games, during late-night conversations, during moments when Mike forgets himself and looks at Will like the rest of the room has faded out. She never says anything. Just tilts her head, thoughtful, like she’s filing the information away.
At night, Mike lies awake staring at the ceiling, replaying conversations, inventing worst-case scenarios. He imagines Will laughing with someone else, confiding in them, touching them the way Mike wishes he could. By the time a week before Christmas rolls around, Mike finally stops asking questions.
Mostly.
He tells himself he’s accepted it. That he’s learned to yearn quietly, from a distance.
It’s a lie.
But he keeps contradicting himself. Like during the small holiday movie night, surrounded by friends and half-empty mugs of hot chocolate, when he slips up again. He rests his hand on Will’s knee without thinking as Will laughs at something Lucas says, his hand slinging absentmindedly up towards Will’s thigh. He freezes only when he sees Lucas gaze drifting towards his hand, questioning.
He pulls back immediately. “Sorry,” Mike mutters, face burning, at no one in particular. “I—uh—I need water.” He escapes to the kitchen before anyone can say anything. Of course, Robin follows him.
“Mike, are you okay?” Robin’s voice is lower than usual when she asks it, almost careful, and that alone is enough to make Mike flinch. He nearly drops the bowl of cookies he’s holding; it tilts dangerously in his hands before he steadies it with a sharp breath.
“Yeah—yeah, I’m fine,” he says too quickly, forcing a smile that feels stiff on his face. “Why wouldn’t I be? Uh—want a cookie?” He holds the bowl out toward her like a peace offering, like a distraction, like if she takes one then this conversation can end right here.
Robin doesn’t move, she just looks at him. Really looks at him, in that unnervingly perceptive way of hers, head tilted slightly to the side, eyes narrowing not with suspicion but with focus. The silence stretches, thick and heavy, until Mike feels it pressing against his ribs. Then she speaks.
“Do you like Will?” Her voice is quiet, almost gentle, but it hits him like a punch to the chest.
Mike panics. “What? No— I mean—” he stammers immediately, words tripping over each other as his brain scrambles for an exit. He laughs, weak and unconvincing. “That’s—that’s not—why would you even—”
Robin raises a hand, stopping him mid-spiral. “It’s okay,” she says softly. “Really. There’s nothing wrong with it.”
That’s what does it.
The lack of judgment. The calm certainty. The way she’s not teasing him, not pushing, not cornering him, just offering him space. Mike falters, his denial losing momentum. He looks down at the cookies, then carefully sets the bowl on the counter like he needs both hands free just to exist in this moment.
“…Is it that obvious?” he asks finally, exhaling as if the truth has been sitting in his lungs all along. Robin lets out a quiet laugh and shakes her head.
“Not exactly,” she admits. “But it kind of becomes obvious when you’re acting like you’re in a full-blown war with me to win Will’s attention. Don’t you think?”
Mike’s face heats instantly.
“I’m not— I mean, I didn’t—” he tries to argue, but the words fall apart before they can even form properly. He rubs the back of his neck, mortified. “Okay, maybe a little. But I didn’t mean to. It just—happened.”
Robin’s expression softens. “Listen,” she says, leaning back against the counter. “I’m going to give you some advice, even if you hate me or something.”
That only makes him feel worse. In the last five minutes alone, he’s managed to embarrass himself in more ways than he can count.
“I think you should talk to him,” she continues. “Tell him how you feel.” Mike shakes his head immediately, the answer instinctive. “No. No, I can’t,” he says. “He doesn’t feel the same way. And he already said he’s interested in someone else— I don’t want to ruin things. I don’t want to lose him.”
Robin stares at him for a moment, thoughtful, like she’s weighing something. Then she smiles, knowing and almost fond.
“Mike,” she says, “you never really know how something’s going to turn out until you try.” He swallows, heart pounding. “Do it,” she adds gently. “You never know what destiny has in store for you.”
And somehow, the way she says it makes it sound less like a cliché, and more like a promise. Like she knows something that Mike doesn’t.
Mike spends the following week thinking about Robin’s words.
They lodge themselves somewhere deep in his chest and refuse to leave. He lies awake at night staring at the ceiling of his room, watching the shadows stretch and shrink as cars pass outside, replaying the same thoughts over and over again until they blur together.
During the day, he’s restless, distracted, permanently on edge. He snaps at Dustin, almost gets into a real argument with him, when Dustin insists they have to start a new D&D campaign before the holidays end.
“I don’t have time right now,” Mike says, sharper than he means to. Dustin blinks at him, offended. “You literally have nothing but time.”
And that’s the problem. Mike does have time. Too much of it. He just can’t explain that his mind is completely somewhere else, stuck on a single person, looping endlessly.
Will, of course, keeps being Will.
Which means he keeps smiling at Mike like it’s the easiest thing in the world. Keeps pulling him into conversations, into shared jokes, into moments that feel soft and familiar and somehow dangerous all at once. He keeps frustrating Mike in that gentle, unintentional way of his: asking him to help with a sketch, leaning too close on the couch, laughing at things Mike says like they actually matter. Every interaction makes Mike’s head spin a little more.
And still, he says nothing. Because he doesn’t have the courage to do it, because he would never have the guts to face rejection, because he would never allow his stupid, inconvenient feelings to ruin the friendship he has with Will.
By the time Christmas Eve arrives, Mike hasn’t found the courage to confess anything at all. The house is loud and warm and full, voices drifting from downstairs, the smell of food already thick in the air, but Mike is hiding out in his room when Will knocks softly on the door and calls his name.
“Mike? Can I come in?”
When Mike opens the door, he’s not prepared. Will is standing there in a ridiculous Christmas sweater, bright red and patterned with something aggressively festive and it should be stupid. It should be embarrassing. Instead, it makes him look unbearably adorable. Mike feels his brain short-circuit on the spot. Even Will’s cheeks are flushed, almost as if they were mirroring his appearance and the whole situation.
“Uh—yeah,” Mike manages. “Yeah, come in.”
Will shifts awkwardly, as if holding back a secret he hasn’t yet dared to confess. Mike feels the same; he can’t stay still, blurts out apologies for the mess into his room, which only makes things more mortifying, because this is Will, and Will has seen worse, for heaven’s sake. Still, Mike wants to appear composed, even if he feels like a walking mess.
In his flustered state, he barely notices how nervous Will is, the little roll he’s holding, or how much effort Will is putting into starting the conversation.
He doesn’t truly see any of it until he finally summons the courage to meet Will’s eyes.
“I wanted to give this to you before dinner, so that—” Will starts, avoiding Mike’s gaze. “So it’s just the two of us.” His words are quiet, almost shy, and for some inexplicable reason, a spark of hope flickers in Mike’s chest.
Will stretches out the roll toward him, and Mike understands immediately what it is: a painting. He takes it slowly, hands trembling, because Will made another one just for him, on top of the one El had commissioned, and Will rarely paints for anyone anymore.
Mike unrolls it carefully, his breath catching as the image comes into view, his eyes wide with curiosity and trepidation; his fingers trembling. And then his heart stops. He’s staring… at himself.
But not as he’s ever seen himself. Calm, radiant, almost glowing in a way Mike has never felt.
He traces the lines of his own face in the painting, the lips slightly chapped, the brown eyes exactly the shade of his own, as though Will spent days mixing the color just right.
“This is… incredible, Will. You’re incredible,” Mike whispers, still fixated on the painting. For the first time, he feels seen in a way only Will could manage through his art. “That… well, I mean, it’s the subject that’s incredible—” Will stammers, tripping over words, and for once it’s Mike who doesn’t understand. He doesn’t yet grasp what Will really means.
Then realization blooms, filling Mike’s chest with a strange, tender pride.
“This is… how you see me?” he asks softly, lifting his eyes to meet Will’s. Only then does he notice the trembling, the glistening in Will’s eyes, the rapid shaking of his head that sends strands of hair across his face.
Mike can’t form coherent words; he stammers incomprehensibly, alternating between the painting and Will. And in that moment, he falls harder, not just for the painting, but for the boy standing in front of him. Will sees him. Really sees him.
And Mike can’t help but let it slip, the words escape before his mind can stop them.
“I like you—” he blurts, too fast for proper articulation, so fast Will barely registers it.
“I like you, Will Byers. And this… this is the most precious thing anyone’s ever given me. And it’s okay if you don’t feel the same,” he continues, still stumbling over his own words. Then, without giving Will a chance to respond or reject him, he reaches forward and pulls him into a bone-crushing hug.
Nothing resists him. No curses, no recoiling, no confusion, just Will, pressing closer, holding tight as if this were the first real embrace they’ve shared in years.
“You’re so stupid,” Will whispers, breath warm against Mike’s neck, seeming on the verge of a confession himself.
“God, Lucas is right when he says you’re oblivious.”
“What?” Mike murmurs, unwilling to pull away, not yet. There is a moment of silence. “I like you too,” Will admits softly, a small laugh breaking the tension, and Mike’s shock is palpable.
“How? I mean… I—” Mike mumbles into his shoulder, dumbfounded. How could Will Byers feel the same way in a universe that seems forgotten by God?
“So… you were talking about me when—” realization strikes Mike, weeks earlier, in the basement. Will tightens the embrace, nodding against his neck. “Yeah, it’s weird you didn’t pick up on it, but… I mean, I didn’t too.” Will trails off, leaving the thought unfinished.
Mike relaxes slightly in the hug. “Robin knows, doesn’t she?” he asks, almost rhetorical. Will just hugs him tighter.
Christmas dinner passes with them pressed together at the table, a detail no one notices; Mike quietly entwines his pinky with Will’s under the table. No one seems to notice Will’s goofy, adoring smiles, or the quiet laughter they share between courses, the little bathroom breaks they take together, returning with slightly messy hair and flushed cheeks.
No one, that is, except Robin. Sitting across from them, tossing a glance their way between chatter with Nancy, her expression soft and knowing.
What Robin doesn’t know is that Mike and Will share their first, awkward kiss under the mistletoe placed above the bathroom door. Their stolen kisses become the excuse for those bathroom breaks, each time returning more flustered, cheeks too red, hair slightly tousled, hearts racing.
What Robin doesn’t know is that, in the cramped privacy of the bathroom, they end up pressed forehead to forehead, each frozen in hesitation, both desperate to make the first move but unwilling to surrender.
What she doesn’t know is that the second time they slip away, it’s Will who goes for it, daringly using his tongue first. Mike is caught completely off guard, stumbling back just slightly, and in his surprise, he bumps his head against the closed door. The sharp knock echoes softly, but neither of them cares, too absorbed in each other.
What Robin can’t imagine is that by the third time they retreat to the bathroom, the intensity of their fumbling passion pops the first button of Will’s shirt. Mike is too frantic, too consumed by the heat of the moment, to realize that maybe this isn’t quite the appropriate moment to trail kisses along Will’s neck. His clumsy eagerness, though, only makes Will laugh quietly, a soft sound that makes Mike’s heart race even faster.
She also doesn’t know that after dessert, they disappear once more, seeking the secluded quiet of the bathroom. Lucas stares at them with a subtle suspicion, muttering something that only Robin seems to grasp, but Mike and Will are oblivious, lost entirely in their private world.
Inside, Will giggles, squirming slightly because Mike’s hands are freezing beneath his sweater. But Mike, stubborn and teasing, refuses to pull away, his fingers curling insistently until his hands are warmed.
And then Mike kisses him again, longer this time, deeper, tasting faintly of the rich chocolate tart they had for dessert. Will’s lips are warm, insistent, and somehow perfectly sweet, a flavor that etches itself into Mike’s memory.
And no one notices, no one even suspects. Not Robin, not Lucas, not a single soul.
But then, how could they? After all, it’s not just Mike who seems to drift through life without paying attention.
❄ ❄ ❄