Chapter Text
It’s been just over a year since the earth opened up beneath the town of Hawkins. When the rifts formed, panic washed over the town in waves. Some fled, others took to the streets to proclaim The End Times, and still others just sat in disbelief, unable to peel away from their televisions and radios for fear of missing a crucial update.
What the citizens of Hawkins did not know was that those monumental cracks threatening to swallow the world were by far the least terrifying thing that could have happened that day. Only a few people were privy to the fact that the curse over Hawkins had at last come to an end.
Will still thinks about the aftermath, the memories coming to him time and time again whenever he forgets to find a distraction. He remembers the sudden silence, a stillness that had not been granted to him for as long as he could recall. For the first time since that fateful night he rode his bike out into the woods and didn’t return, he felt truly, blissfully alone in his mind. No sensation of being watched, no goosebumps on the back of his neck, and no connection to the evil that lived beneath Hawkins. Vecna was gone. The Mindflayer and the demogorgons had vanished. For once, Will could breathe.
But as soon as that relief took hold, so too did a twinge of guilt. He and his friends were all beaten and bruised to some degree, whether those marks appeared on skin or somewhere less tangible. Max had to be rushed to the hospital, barely clinging to life. Even now, her vision hasn’t fully returned.
And El- she nearly had it the worst out of all of them. The miles between her and Vecna had not spared her from the consequences of their final stand-off. She had pushed herself to her limit and beyond, and since that night her powers have been in a state of disrepair. She spent most of the following months, justifiably, sulking.
As for his own scars, Will tries to dance around the topic whenever it’s brought up. His mom and Jonathan have learned to stop prodding, and Mike and the others were more than willing to accommodate when Will said he didn’t want to talk about all the upside down shit anymore. After all, it’s in the past now. Isn’t it?
He avoids the cold at all costs, but who really enjoys freezing their butt off anyways? And sure, sometimes he lays awake in bed at night, unable to drift off to sleep as he becomes hyper-focused on the rhythm of his own heart and the mechanical effort of breathing, but insomnia is hardly a unique issue to have. All in all, Will is doing perfectly fine. Things are normal now, so he can be normal too. Is normal, he corrects himself.
And yet, as Will sits in his room, staring at the blank pages of his sketchbook in front of him, some part of him admits that nothing is quite the same.
Even his room is different. The new Byers’ family residence was an upgrade from their previous house, all things considered, but it didn’t quite feel like home yet. It was too sterile, not quite lived-in. When his mom had broken the news about the new house, Will had tried to act excited to leave the Wheeler’s basement, but he couldn’t shake the feeling that he had lost something he had wanted to hold on to.
But whatever, it wasn’t like he couldn’t still go to Mike's whenever he felt like it. As gusts of wind rattle the bare branches of the dogwood tree outside his window, Will rotates his pencil between his fingers. His thumb skates over the rough divots where he had absentmindedly bit into the soft wood the day prior, yellow paint flaking off and sticking to his skin. He had just received the new sketchbook as an early birthday gift from Jonathan, and he had taken it to Mike’s to show him while they hung out in his basement with the others.
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Will had arrived at least half an hour before Dustin and Lucas. “On time is late,” he said to Mike, mostly because Mike had once told him how annoying that phrase was. Will bit back a grin as Mike gave a dramatic eye-roll before ushering him down the stairs.
They sat on the couch, facing each other. Will hoisted his legs up to sit cross-legged, while Mike leaned over to see Will’s latest acquisition. Their knees bumped slightly, denim brushing against denim. Will swallowed lightly, trying to keep his eyes on the sketchbook.
“Woah, that’s like- a million pages. You could fit so much awesome shit in there!” A smile tugged at Mike’s lips as he reached out to prod the leatherbound cover.
“Yeah, it’ll be great. I mean, not that copier paper isn’t just fine, but this feels a little more… I don’t know, like, professional, I guess?”
Will had once mentioned offhandedly to Mike that he was thinking about going to school for art someday, but in the same breath he asked him not to mention it to Dustin and Lucas. He wasn’t sure why, just that it felt like a tenuous, far-off idea. It was one of those thoughts that he kept for himself when he needed something to abate the uncertainty of what lay ahead of them, back in their days of always wondering what monster would be coming for them next.
Sharing his “maybe someday” plans with Mike felt a bit too much like a confession, like he was admitting that he needed something to keep himself tethered. Like he wasn’t strong enough to stay grounded on his own. But Mike didn’t see it that way- he was always supportive, overly-gracious. He seemed thrilled at the idea, complimenting Will’s artistic abilities in a variety of ways that Will was certain he did not merit.
Still, Mike’s exuberance was always infectious. Will had felt himself lulled into smiles and laughter despite his most valiant attempts at self-deprecation. And so, when Mike asked Will to draw something for him in his new book yesterday, Will was more than happy to oblige.
“So, what’s going on the first page?”
“I- I can’t think of something right off the bat,” Will laughed. The slightest bit of heat had begun to creep into his cheeks, and he looked down in an attempt to hide any hint of redness from Mike’s line of sight.
“Easy, just draw like a dragon or something. You always do great dragons. Oh! Or maybe a knight, or a wizard, like Will the Wise.” Mike rattled off ideas in quick succession, admittedly all within Will’s usual repertoire.
“Okay, okay, I get it. My drawings are just soooo predictable.” Will raised his eyebrows and held up a palm in mock offense.
“Wha- wait I didn’t mean to imply…” Mike looked genuinely concerned that he’d offended Will, but fortunately for him, Will was a bad actor. Barely a moment passed before the corner of his mouth twitched and a suppressed noise escaped his lips. Within seconds this devolved into full-blown hysterics between the two of them, limbs colliding as they rocked forward.
“So not fair!” Mike light-heartedly shoved Will, his hand leaving Will with a buzzing sensation on his shoulder long after it drew away. “You know I’m awful with words, you can’t just let me think I said something stupid when you know I didn’t mean anything by it.”
“Fine, I’ll back off.” It was taking an increasing amount of effort for Will to keep his hands steady and his breathing in check. “It’s just so easy to… ruffle your feathers. You’re worse than Jonathan sometimes, and he once went on a thirty minute rant to the guy at the record store who implied that The Clash’s last album was ‘mediocre’ at best.”
“Well, to be fair…” Mike shrugged.
“Oh my god, do not let him hear you say that. At least not when I’m around, I can’t sit through that lecture again.”
“Cross my heart and hope to die. Trust me, I’ve dealt with my share of Jonathan’s very opinionated music rants when he comes over.”
Thoroughly distracted by the tangent their conversation had taken, Will had almost forgotten about the sketchbook in front of him. Mike was rattling off something about how he was pretty sure Nancy was just pretending to like The Clash for Jonathan’s sake as Will stared down at the blank page. Slowly, he started to tune out Mike’s words. The contentment that had bubbled up so readily at being in Mike’s presence was beginning to wane.
Will always had ideas for art, at least before. Even during all the crazy shit they had endured, art was an escape. He made countless drawings in the months after he was wrenched from the mind flayer’s grasp in a desperate attempt to prove to himself that his will was still his own. But this past year, something just felt… wrong.
It was like this visual noise lingered in front of his eyes, like the television static El used to focus her powers, except Will’s own abilities felt stagnant. Whenever graphite met paper, his arm just seemed to freeze. Each time he swore it would be different, that a bit of art block is normal. Normal like everything else should be now. But once again, here in Mike’s basement, Will was at a loss.
As if from a distance, at the very edges of his awareness, Will heard his name.
“Will?”
The white pages filled Will’s vision, and he could taste something bitter in his mouth.
“Hey, Will?”
All of a sudden, Will jolted back to reality. Mike’s hand was back on his shoulder, and he was looking at him with his brow knit together in obvious concern. His voice was gentler now, saying, “Will? Are you okay? You seemed kinda zoned out there.”
For a moment, Will couldn’t say anything. He realized that he had been biting into his pencil, the taste of chemically-treated wood and paint still lingering on his tongue. He spat out a few flecks of yellow and wiped them away. Gross. It was a habit he never used to suffer from, but lately it was like some ball of tension within him was trying to work its way out. He often found himself chewing his pencil, picking at the skin around his nails, biting the inside of his cheek so hard that it left a lingering metallic taste. It would always be minutes at least until he even realized what he was doing.
Will met Mike’s gaze. He cleared his throat, trying to situate himself. He was just in Mike’s basement, that was all. He was with Mike, on the couch in the basement. Nothing was happening. Everything was normal.
“Sorry… I- I don’t know. I mean, yeah, I’m okay. I think I just started daydreaming or something. You know, thinking of something to draw.”
Mike, to his credit, did not look entirely convinced.
“Are you sure?” He frowned. “Because you-”
To Will’s relief, it was then that the door to the basement swung open. Dustin and Lucas came clambering down the stairs, Dustin clutching something mysteriously hidden beneath his jacket, and Lucas doing a precarious balancing act with various snacks and drinks.
“Alllllright guys, who’s ready for the ultimate power struggle in a forgotten land?” Dustin grinned, showing off the glint of his braces as he revealed the colorfully-illustrated box he had been carrying with him. Will took the out immediately.
“Oh hell yeah, Dragon Master! I thought you lost the pieces a couple of years ago?”
“Technically, yes. However! I figured that since the little plastic crystals already kinda look like candy, we could just replace them with M&M’s. Plus, then the winner gets to eat them all.”
Will nodded in agreement as the two came to sit around the couch. Lucas tossed the soda cans and chips onto the table as Dustin tore open a package of game-piece-substitute candy. They started chattering, and Will tried to settle back into normalcy. When he turned to look back at Mike for a moment, he saw that there was still an odd look ghosted across his face.
Will raised an eyebrow, and Mike parted his lips like he was about to say something before closing his mouth just as quickly. He seemed to shake it off, and he jumped into the conversation with Dustin.
Once again, everything was as it should be. Mike, Lucas, Dustin, and Will were together, having fun just like old times. They were moving on- moving forward. So why does Will feel stuck?
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Now, the already blustering wind is picking up steadily. Will finally stops twirling the gross, chewed up pencil and tosses it onto his desk. It clatters against the wood before rolling onto the floor. Will does not try to pick it up. He sighs, shutting the cover of his sketchbook carefully despite his mind screaming at him to slam it. It wouldn’t help anything, but Will feels like something has to interrupt the nothingness of it all- the blank white nothing of pages he can’t bring himself to fill. The static nothing of his mind when he tries to focus on the thing that used to bring him so much joy.
He breathes in. Holds the air. Exhales. Repeats. He stares up at the popcorn ceilings above his new bed, in the room that he hasn’t quite been able to think of as his own yet. Somehow, for those first few months after coming back from California when he lived in Mike’s basement, Will felt more at home than he does now. Maybe he just needs to give it time.
Will closes his eyes and thinks back to those months. Mike’s bleary-eyed face first thing in the morning. The absolutely ridiculous way he would yawn in the middle of a spoonful of cornflakes, cereal threatening to spill all over Mrs. Wheeler’s freshly laundered tablecloths. Mike’s head resting on his shoulder as they both fell asleep reading comics on the floor of his room.
It’s not perfect, but it’s something. Will feels his shoulders relax and his eyelids grow heavy. He doesn’t need to try to pick up the sketchbook again, at least not tonight. For now, he feels like he can finally rest. And so he does, letting sleep take him as he imagines that he is in a different house, a different room. It’s okay. He thinks to himself. Maybe tomorrow will be different. And I’ll be back to normal.