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Mike underestimated how much he didn’t just miss El and Will, but also the strange comfort of Jonathan Byers. The now tainted smoky air about him always reminds him of when he was his favorite version of himself. Something had shifted, though, Mike knew this. Mike knew this when he glanced up in the back of the van and was met with a stern look from Will’s older brother. Mike knew this when they got back to Hawkins and Jonathan shoved past him in Hopper’s cabin. Mike knew this when at breakfast every morning since the Byers started living with the Wheelers, Jonathan never said anything to him unless it was strictly business.
And now, Mike knew he wasn’t as young as he was before, he was mature now. But some part of him missed when Jonathan would loom over his shoulder and ask him questions about things he liked, about his day. About him.
Nancy never did that for Mike when they were young, not before November 6th, 1983. Jonathan was so close to him that Mike considered him family. He would never tell him that, though.
Not even when Jonathan curled his arms around Mike’s taller frame and held the shaking boy, completely at a loss for what to do.
Mike’s never felt so alone, even with the crowded house and being back at school again.
Will had been giving him the cold shoulder, not dissimilar to when they were skating at Rink O’ Mania just months before. Only, now Mike was never around El, in fact, she had broken things off with him recently.
Like a wooden table warping and splitting, Mike’s writer's brain thought. It was only a matter of time until it was un-usable. Until they had to throw it out.
Some selfish part of Mike saw it as if he were losing El, when in all actuality, he sees it now as if he’s finally gaining her. Like, he sees her more clearly than he ever had before. That guilt crushes him and sends a bitter taste to his mouth, he tries to swallow it.
Swallow it along with the swirling whirlpool that is; “But, I thought you said I was your heart.”
El tilts her head, her gentle let-him-down-easy gaze shifting into confusion.
“I did not say this, Mike?”
Mike’s eyebrows crease and he pulls his head back and shakes it slightly to refute her.
“Yes, you did! Well, not directly, but to Will, the painting! The, the painting you had him paint for me, because you need me and you always have and always will and,”
“Mike.”
He purses his lips and looks up at her, her expression has shifted, but Mike can’t read it. Honestly, has he ever been able to read her?
“What painting?”
His heart, ironically enough, dropped to his stomach. Because even if in the moment he should have been thinking about how this means El doesn’t need him, El doesn’t think he’s the heart, El didn’t say all those things about, much less ever think them, the only thing Mike can think about is that Will lied to him.
“W..Will’s painting,” her expression, again, changes, this time her eyebrows lift and immediately shrink down. As if she’s pieced something together, but has left Mike out of it.
“In the van, he said you commissioned it for me.”
In a gentle voice, “No, Mike. I have not comm…ission’d any paintings of Will’s.”
Mike forces the spit in his mouth down, and he bites at his lower lip. The only image he can think of is Will’s watery eyes, his shoulder against his own when he reached over to point at the painting. The painting. The painting that made Mike feel like himself again, that made him believe in whatever frayed ends of a relationship he and El had. Why would Will just lie to him? Why would Will ever lie to him? Will lied to him.
A sob shook his body, he pressed his face deeper into Jonathan’s shoulder, bringing a hand to tug at his own hair. His annoyingly long hair that he couldn’t bring himself to cut. Not yet. Not when that meant cutting him off. He felt Jonathan burn circles into his back, and he wishes he didn’t feel so comforted. He guesses the Byers just naturally have that quality to them.
From Jonathan’s support and him always briefing his story ideas for English class, to Joyce bending down on one knee to clean a scrape on the knee with one hand, while the other held Mike’s face as he cried. He sat on the stairs to the Byers’ house, feeling small and pathetic as he cried and let Joyce comfort him, stupid and selfish until–, Will’s hand on his own.
The Byers were exceptionally great at comforting, but Joyce and Jonathan were no match for how, with a single touch, Will had tamed Mike’s nerves. Lassoed his lungs with a smile, and that aching bud in his chest had no choice but to grow. Grow in the direction of the sunlight, which had always been a bright, golden yellow.
Jonathan cleared his throat and Mike could feel his stance grow more relaxed.
“Uhm…Mike,..” Mike squeezed his eyes shut. He wishes Jon would just hold him and not say anything, but ever the natural inquirer, he spoke on. He unraveled his arms from around Mike and stepped back, forcing Mike to wipe his tears.
“Mike, what’s, uh. What’s going on?” A hand rests on his shoulder and makes him want to fall to the floor.
He sniffles and places a hand up to his forehead to shield his eyes from Jonathan.
“ ‘s nothing.”
A scoff. “Bull, c’mon, Mike, the last time I’ve seen you cry was when we moved away almost two years ago. Talk to me.”
He swung his hand down from his forehead and locked eyes with Jonathan, his vision blurred.
“Why should I?! You and Will haven’t exactly made yourselves available, you know?!”
“And Will?”
Mike takes in a breath too big for his body and looks down, the tears well up again. Right, the reason Mike was crying in the first place; Will.
Jonathan had been walking back downstairs from a nightly visit to Nancy’s room, when walking past Mike’s room he could’ve sworn he heard the faintest of sniffles. He’s not usually one to pry, but the door was cracked, and a glow from a lamp was illuminating the open space. He stopped in his tracks and peered as much as he could into the boy’s room without opening the door further.
Mike was sitting on the floor, binder in his lap, shaky hands flipping through pages. Jonathan squinted and he felt his heart soften. They were Will’s drawings, an abundance of them, actually. Jeez, where did this kid get his hands on all of these? He thinks he probably has more than Joyce.
Another heartbreaking sniffle, followed by a small whimper. Jonathan hasn’t seen Mike this vulnerable, not even when he was younger than he is now. He struggled with what to do next, he could always just go back downstairs and act like nothing happened. He isn’t sure he could live with that, honestly.
Here lately, Mike had really pissed him off. Both Jane and Will slain through their hearts by his sword of deflection. Jonathan thinks he should stick to the sword he wields as a paladin, instead. He’d been rather avoidant of the boy, why in the world would he want to speak to Mike outside of Upside Down nonsense? He can hardly stomach when he catches Will sketching him in his sketchbook.
He sighs and pushes the door open, and
“What do you mean Will isn’t available?”
Despite his best attempts, the gate on the dam has been broken and the water pressure is too much for Mike to hold back by himself.
“He, he’s just been so distant. I..I” his eyelashes feel wet when he blinks, he swallows thickly. “I miss him.” His voice cracks when he whispers, like it’s something he shouldn’t say. He’s looking down like it’s something he’s shying away from, but Jonathan’s hand on his shoulder is firm and a reminder that he isn’t able to turn away and hightail it out of here.
Jonathan lets the air settle between them and sighs quietly, not quiet enough, it seems, as Mike’s head lifts to meet Jonathan’s careful gaze.
“He misses you, too.” He lifts his hand off of Mike’s shoulder and pats it once, twice, and turns towards his bedroom door. He knows if he says anything more, he’s just going to ruin whatever opening up Mike had just done.
“Jonathan,”
He turned around, hand on the doorknob.
“Yea, Mike?”
His lips quiver and his eyes flicker to his desk.
“Can you help me with something? Just, just before you go back to bed, please?”
He’s unsure if Mike’s ever been this polite with him before, so he just nods.
And so he finds himself in the shared bathroom between Nancy and Mike’s room that all the Wheeler siblings use. Mike’s torso is bent over the bathtub and his hair is sopping wet. Chunks of hair swirl down the drain, and with a tap on the shoulder, he whips his head up and stands to look in the mirror. He smiles and turns around to look at Jonathan. It gives the Byers boy a wave of nostalgia. He smiles, too, and even though it wasn’t his hair that was cut that day, it felt like he, too, was severing some of himself off.
2
The stairs creak with a familiar weight that Mike recognizes as Will’s. A sound he’s begun to get used to, a sound he’s begun to look forward to every morning. Particularly, he’s feeling extra excited to see Will today. Will, the boy who Jonathan said “missed him too”. A smile finds itself on his face already, and the door to the basement hasn’t even opened yet.
“G’morningWilldidyousleepok?” It all comes out in one breath, and Will’s sleepy expression very slowly shifts into one of confusion.
“Huh?”
Mike feels his heart constrict inside of his chest, this feeling felt impossibly unbearable.
“G- uh, good morning!” He paces his words this time, and offers a wide and lively smile.
Will smiles softly and quirks an eyebrow upwards. His eyes wander up to his hair. Right. His hair.
“Oh, uhm. Good morning.” He looks down at the floor and Mike wonders if he did something wrong, but the smile on Will’s face that doesn't truly disappear all through breakfast gives him some reassurance.
“Your hair looks good.”
Mike softens, and his posture melts forward.
“Thanks.”
This year’s autumn in Hawkins was definitely not like any other they were used to. Not like how Mike likes to remember this season. Quarantined and cold, cold Upside Down debris floating in the air every now and then. The amount of debris and chill he felt went down daily, as the military were actively patching all of the gaping gaps all across town.
Because of this, Mike spent most of his days holed up in his room reading and rereading comics, continuing to avoid a certain best friend of his. Best friend? Best friends didn’t act like this. At least, Will and Mike never did.
“Micheal! If you wanted a haircut you should have told me so.” Karen said across the table, swirling her coffee with a spoon. Jonathan discreetly glanced up and gave Mike a sideways smirk. Mike smiled to himself.
“Honestly,” Here came Ted’s voice. “It looks much better than the shoulder-length hair.”
“Or a bright orange mohawk.” Nancy murmured.
Will snorted halfway into a sip of his orange juice. Mike shot a glare at both of them, and Will muttered a small “sorry” through a laugh.
Mike felt like his heart was a windchime, and Will, with every smile, kept brushing his hands through it. Disrupting the stillness of it, creating a melody Mike tried so hard to tune out.
“Hey, Will, wait up!” Mike scrambled behind Will, who was heading downstairs to the basement, to do exactly what Mike does all day. Holed up in the basement, listening to mixtapes Jon made for him, drawing and avoiding Mike like the plague. Like if he so much as breathed the same air Mike did, he was scared he'd tear through the plaster he'd put up between them, just how he wanted to tear through that damn painting Mike had hung on his wall.
The painting Mike loved more than himself.
Will stopped in his tracks and turned to look at the Wheeler boy, and pursed his lips ever so slightly. Those lips, Mike thought, were pink porcelain he was dying to run his fingers over. Just to touch, just to feel, just for a second. His fingers twitched and he swallowed hard, forcing himself to look back into Will’s eyes. Oh, gosh, how long was he staring at his lips this time?
“Do you wanna, uh, hang out? In my room?”
“You're sure?”
“Of course!! Why wouldn't I be?! C’mon!” He shrugged towards the stairs.
Will smiled and brought a hand up to his hair. His hair, which was shaggy and in between the typical bowl cut and something Mike’s never seen on him before. But he would beg to have him grow it out until all the straight ends were rough and wild.
“Let me get my stuff, ok?”
Will turned to speed down the stairs and grab his Walkman and drawing materials. He returned to a waiting Mike, and followed him up the stairs.
Mike wasn't sure how long it had been since they had gotten comfortable. Will sat leaned up against his bed on the floor, sketching something with one headphone on, the other off to hear around him. Mike was sprawled out on his bed “reading” some of the older X-Men comics he had, but to be honest he was really just watching Will.
The silence was killing him, but he was scared if he spoke, he would kill the silence.
The boy in front of him had been stuck to the roof of his mind all the time lately, keeping him up at night with worry, and now he finally had the guts to be in the same room with him, and he wasn't saying anything? Was he some kind of idiot?
“Will,”
It felt like the world stuttered and lunged to a stop.
He cleared his throat, and watched as the boy at the side of his bed shifted his headphones all the way down around his neck, covering a small mole.
“Hm?”
He didn't turn around. Mike takes it as mercy.
“I’ve missed you.”
Will closed his sketchbook.
“I…missed you, too, Mike,” He inhaled tightly. “A lot.”
Mike’s tone went under and turned hushed, delicate, honey-covered.
“Why haven't you said anything?”
Will seemed to curl in on himself, all while remaining in the same sitting position. Mike shut his comic and shimmied down the bed to be right behind where Will was sitting on the floor. He placed a hand on his shoulder, so gently it was as if a ghost were touching him.
“I..I don't know, Mike, can we not..?”
“Not what? Talk? No! It's all I've wanted to do for like, the past year and a half!! Is talk to you!! But, in Lenora, the phone lines were always so damn busy, and when I went to see you,”
“And Jane,”
“Whatever, it didn't feel right. Now you're back in Hawkins and it feels like, like,”
“Mike.”
“Like I'm losing you all over again.”
His grip on his shoulder had grown impossibly tight, but Will just craned his neck a certain way to lock eyes with Mike.
Best friends don't lose each other.
Best friends don't know the placement of every mole on their friends’ bodies, or the paintings that form in their eyes when they don't know you're looking.
“You’re not…losing me, Mike. You never did,”
“Oh, bullshit!!”
Will closed his eyes and put a shaky hand on Mike’s to steady himself, and swiveled to face him fully.
“It's not bullshit, Mike, you could never lose me. Okay? We’re fine.”
“No!! This isn't fair, you can't just turn this around and just say it's fine when it's not. Like the painting.”
Mike felt Will’s shoulders stiffen underneath his grip, he watched as his jaw clenched and unclenched. His eyes flickered down to his lap, and then hesitantly back up at Mike. Mike, whose eyes were a war, welling up with tears, and despite his trembling he kept his hand firm.
“T..the painting? What..about it?”
Mike almost jumped off the bed and crushed Will into a hug the way his voice sounded. So brittle, and light, how Mike thinks the clouds would sound if they could talk.
“You lied,” Will’s face cringed immediately, “No, it's- it's ok, shit, I'm sorry.”
“No, no, Mike, I'm sorry.” Will's lower lip shook, and he swallowed wetly.
“I, I just thought, that..if it came from her, you'd like it more. The day was supposed to be just about you two. I figured that if I said it was from Jane, you'd listen..and you'd realize those things about yourself.”
Will sniffled, and chuckled silently.
“Stupid, huh?”
Mike moved the hand on Will’s shoulder to cup his cheek, shaking his head.
“No, it's not. I..just,” He smiled. He felt like his chest was floating high above his head, and like a rock was sitting in his throat. “I just wish you told me everything was from you from the beginning. El broke up with me.”
Will’s eyebrows quirked up, then down into a concerned crease.
“I'm okay.” Mike said, reading his expression clearly.
“I think that, if you'd just been honest,” He inhaled slowly. “It would've meant more to me than it did coming from El.” He stared into Will’s eyes, and looked down to where his hand was sitting on his cheek. He rubbed his thumb against it, watching as beautiful, green eyes widened and irises like Venus grew.
“Mike..” His voice was steady now.
“That's messed up, right? It meant more coming from my best friend than from my girlfriend. But, I think that's how it's always been, really.” Mike laughed and sniffled, his vision doubling from the water welling up in his eyes.
Will watched, biting on his lower lip.
Mike moved his hand up to leaf through Will’s hair.
“I missed you more than anything, or anyone else, Will. I'm sorry for being a dick.”
He smiled as the brunet laughed.
“I'm sorry, too, Mike.”
Mike leaned down to wrap his arms around Will’s entire frame, drinking in the shampoo that Mike uses, but underneath there was still something so Will, that had him hooked.
“Do you want to sleep in my room tonight, instead?”
Will’s knee brushed against Mike’s under the dining table, sending static to his brain.
He stopped chewing to glance over at Mike, perplexed.
“No, it's alright. The basement is cozy enough.”
“Since when have you started lying so much? It's cold and dusty down there, you're staying in my room.”
There was no arguing after showers were taken and Mike waited in his room for Will to be done.
He was particularly excited about Will sleeping up here with him, it reminded him of when they had sleepovers like this all the time. Just the two of them, before Lucas or Dustin had moved to Hawkins. Just when it was Mike and Will, and Will and Mike. When their worlds revolved around each other only.
Mike wants that feeling back, of just having Will to himself. He pushes that thought to the back of his head. He loves his friends, but Will is different. He doesn't know how, but he just is. He guesses it's just because they're best friends.
The closet door swings open with a quiet bang, and Mike drops to his knees digging through hampers.
A buzzing memory of him and Will sleeping on the floor together, huddled together underneath a blue and yellow polka-dot sheet flashed through his mind.
He dug to the bottom and pulled it out. It was much smaller than he remembered.
He remembered jumping up to his knees and throwing the sheet as high in the air as he could and scrambling down to the carpet to see if he could make it under in time. All while Will rolled around and giggled, cheering him on.
He smiled, and tugged the sheet onto the mattress on the floor, along with a big, blue blanket for Will.
He didn't bother to close the closet door.
Just in case Will needed any extra blankets, of course.
A knock on the door startled Mike, he jumped up from the floor and ran to open the door.
There was Will, hair wet and tousled, in Mike’s pjs.
“Hi.”
“Hi.”
He moved over and closed the door behind Will, who stood at the end of the floor mattress.
“Oh my gosh, Mike, where did you find that?” His lips were upturned into a wide smile.
“Just in with my sheets..brings back memories, right?”
“Yeah, no kidding!” Will dropped to the mattress, and Mike shuffled to his bed.
“Do you want the light on?” Mike whispered, eyes droopy, peering down at Will, who laid on his side facing Mike. His eyes fluttered open, his eyelashes fireflies.
“No, it's ok.”
A beat of silence after the light shut off.
“Thank you, Mike."
“Hm. Yea. Anythin’ for you.” He mumbled, lazily flopping a hand down right in front of Will’s face. He inched his hand down until he found Will’s, which was resting right in front of his chest. He linked their pinkies with a small squeeze. He smirked sleepily.
“G’nignt, Will.”
“G-good night…good night, Mike.”
And that night, Mike was so sure he had never slept better in his entire life. Will really did make everything better.
His sun, so warm and soft, like a bunny.
Just like a bunny, he decides.
A brown bunny with a pink nose that fits in the palm of your hand.
That was Will.
That was his Will.