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Mike's hands sweated around the folded piece of paper he held in his hands as he sat through graduation. It felt like he had a rock in his hand that was going to drag him straight to hell as he tried to tell himself that everything was going to be okay. Hopper was right and this was the best thing for him to do to truly move on and accept what happened.
Ever since his talk with Hopper, this had been eating at him. Eleven died so he could be happy, so everyone could be happy so why was he actively doing everything to prevent himself from being happy? What does it matter now? He's gone through things that would've killed or ruined so many people and came out unscathed, what could possibly happen that could be worse than that?
He knows he won't lose any of his friends, they'll still love him. They still will care about him but Mike still couldn't help but feel like he wanted to cry because of how scared he was. But he had to, Mike had to do this no matter how this turned out because he needed to move on. Mike could not stay here feeling like this for the rest of his life. It didn't matter how far he traveled or how long he went without talking to people because that part of Hawkins will always be there to haunt him.
Mike's learned how that turns out and he hated it. He didn't want to go back to it so he had to let go of it.
Nobody could tell how off Mike felt and how sick he was, at least nobody said anything. Nobody said anything until Mike was left alone with Will next to the bleachers after disappearing into the school to retrieve a memory. Will noticed how pale Mike looked, how sweaty he was, and how he continuously rubbed his hands against his pants to stop them from sweating. Of course he noticed, he knew something wasn't right.
"Doing okay?" Will questioned as he and Mike walked slowly side by side as if time didn't exist and they didn't need to be anywhere but here with each other.
Mike snapped out of his thoughts as he turned his head to look at his best friend. He figured now was a better time to do this than any other time, he couldn't stop thinking about that stupid letter in his pocket and he needed to clear his mind now. They were alone as well so it was perfect, he'd be stupid not to take this opportunity to do so. "Yeah, I just—" Mike started as he shook his head before looking down. "I just…have something I need to give to you." The black-haired male murmured as he stopped in his pace causing the brunette beside him to halt as well and turn to stare at his friend with interest and slight concern.
Mike's hands disappeared under his golden gown to dig into the pocket of his jeans to pull out a small folded piece of paper that's crinkled with age. Biting his lip, Mike glanced up from the note to Will. "It's really old…it's just this letter I wrote when you were in California, I never sent it but I want you to read it now. To move on." Mike said feeling his heart pump fast against his chest as he handed the note over to Will's hands with his shaky pale one.
"Why didn't you send it?" Will questioned as he began to unfold the note while Mike watched painfully. He reread the note in the bathroom before this moment, he was shaking when he did. It was his first time reading it since he wrote it that fall because he was so embarrassed by it.
With a shaky breath, Mike stared at his friend as he began to read the letter. "I never meant to. I wrote it to say all the things I couldn't say out loud…which was everything." Mike admitted as he glanced away from Will as he feared his reaction to the words written on the crumpled paper. "It's why I never sent you letters. There was nothing that I wanted you to know." Mike finished looking back up at Will waiting for him to finish reading the letter.
Will's hands tighten around the sides of the letter as he looks up at his friend with eyes that hold hesitance and yearning. Mike knew what that expression meant, he knew which part Will had gotten to. "You…loved me?" Mike has never heard those words out loud. Those words felt like they'd kill him because for a long time, he thought they would. He thought those feelings would kill him everyday because it's all he could think about.
There's silence between them as they stare at each other feeling things they were trying to push away since they were much smaller. "I still do. I always have…even if it didn't seem like it." Mike said with a sigh deciding that there was no going back from here. He's been wanting to say something since that talk with Will at the squawk those months ago because he felt validated but he was scared, too scared.
Mike was tired of being scared all the time. "That summer before you left for California…I-I was such an asshole to you because I knew deep down that…that I was different and I was so scared because I didn't know why I felt like that." Mike continued. He had been waiting so long to just say something about it because it's like it trapped him from being happy. It's why he was so happy when Will came out to them because he didn't feel alone anymore.
Mike felt so trapped because he felt like he was alone, nobody would understand why he hated kissing Eleven but continued doing it, he thought. He felt disgusting. "It wasn't until the day you left that I knew what that feeling was because seeing you leave hurt me more than seeing El leave." Mike said with cracks in his voice as he stares at his friend with watery eyes just full of tears ready to drop onto his cheeks.
Mike cried so hard that day because he felt horrible. What kind of boy cries harder about his best friend leaving than his girlfriend? He tried to convince himself that it was okay and friendships are that serious but he knew that it didn't hurt him because they were friends. It hurt him because he couldn't imagine a world without Will and the last time he had to live in that world, he was at his worst.
That night they found Will's 'body', he hugged his Mom and cried like the baby he was and when Mike got home from watching the Byers move out, he hugged his Mom and just cried silently with a pout. It felt the same as that night and it's like he was there again but it was different, too different now because he knew why being without Will hurt him so badly.
"I hated myself for it, I thought I was wrong." Mike said with a sniffle as Will stared at him with his own teary eyes and crinkled nose ready to begin running with sobs. "I thought everyone would hate me too, I thought you would so I never called and rarely wrote because I wanted to get over it—over you." Mike said swallowing thickly as tears began to run down the apples of his freckled cheeks. He looked down at his beat-up converse with a bite of his lip as he tried not to sob. Looking back up with a sigh, he shook his head in the slightest as he stared at his best friend, the love of his life. "I…I could never call you because hearing your voice would've meant more to me than it should've and I wrote that because Mom said if I talked to you that I'd feel better but I…couldn't." Mike said with a sniffle and a soft sob from his throat.
Will stepped forward in the slightest and looked at Mike with a solemn expression. He hated that Mike was talking about himself that way because Will spent so many years of his life feeling the same thing and telling people and realizing it wasn't the truth was the best thing he could've ever done. Even if it broke him that Mike was right there hearing it too. "You're not wrong, Mike. I know all of those feelings and none of it means that there's anything wrong with you. Nobody would hate you, they didn't hate me." Will said softly before reaching his hand out to grab hold of Mike's wrist and hold it in his hand for comfort.
"You deserve to be happy, Mike." Everyone's been telling Mike that but it's never felt like realistic thing for him until today. He never felt like he could be happy until he had realized that he needed to be happy, even if he couldn't imagine it for himself—he had to try because there were so many people who couldn't try.
"Hopper told me that today too and it made me come here because I thought about what he said. Eleven dying doesn't mean I have to be stuck in the time she was here, she died so we all could be happy and live our lives." Mike said staring at Will through his long eyelashes with his head tilted down in an effort to hide how wet his face was with tears. "I wanted to say something when you first spoke at the Squawk, I planned to do it when everything was over but then…she just…was gone." Mike said blankly staring at a spot in the grass as he remembered the moment he watched Eleven disappear forever.
Forever stuck in time and forever Eleven, never being able to just be Jane. Mike felt so guilty afterward, he couldn't talk to Will after watching his girlfriend die. It was so wrong, she spent her last moments with him and here he was planning to admit his feeling for his best friend? He was a horrible person and he spiraled again but Mike was tired of drowning in his own issues, he was tired of running and still getting caught. The violence had ended and the Upside Down was gone but Mike was still stuck as a fourteen year old in a relationship he didn't want to be in because he was so scared. Eleven died so everything could be over, so he wanted everything to be over.
"I just…I couldn't after it, I felt horrible but I want to be happy, Will." Mike said looking up and smiling at his friend who returned the expression. "Eleven wanted me to be happy and I don't want her death to feel like a waste—to me at least." The curly-haired male said with a slight shrug of his shoulders as he stared at Will who just smiled at him.
Mike hadn't known exactly when the switch in his brain had gone off that made him stop punishing everyone else for his own feelings but he knew what made it go off. That painting. It reminded him that even if he felt alone, he wasn't and even if no one knew about that part of him, he still had people who cared about him and he wanted to keep those people. He wanted to keep Will, whether the boy returned the feelings or not.
Mike decided he'd rather be around Will and hate himself rather than push Will away until he had nothing to even look forward to thinking about. He hadn't imagined he would've ever told Will and thought he'd stay friends with Will forever without ever saying anything but all of those nights he spent just staring at Will lurking around his house wondering a life where it was just them in the house, their house, made him realize that he couldn't spend the rest of his life day-dreaming and crying. He had to get over it.
"You can be happy, Mike." Will said creeping closer to Mike making Mike's cheeks glow a light pink. As Will grew closer to him, Mike froze as he refused to move. Will's hand moved faster than Mike could see it and came to the back of his neck and their lips met. It felt more ethereal than Mike could've ever anticipated. He always wondered what kissing Will would feel like, he knew it would feel wonderful but never like this.
Mike felt so warm in his chest as his hands desperately grabbed at Will's chubby cheeks as they kissed passionately. Bodies rocking against each other and it felt like fireworks were exploding between them with every deepening kiss and every swipe of a tongue. The soaking smell of the Byers home filled Mike's nostrils as they were closer than they had ever been before. Black curls meshed with the straight strands of brown as tears spread across Mike's fingertips from Will's face.
Soft plump lips smack against smaller chapped ones as tongues swipe between mouths gently but strongly, yearningly.
The two break apart and lean their foreheads against each other with heavy breathing. They stare at each other with messy hair and their graduation caps tilted and crooked. "Do you…want to be my boyfriend?" Mike asked hesitantly between his heavy attempts at getting air, his chest rising and falling rapidly as his lips dried from his breathing. Anxiety and adrenaline in his dark brown eyes that were pools that Will was getting lost in like a daze.
Will grinned widely. "Yes, I do." He said with a excited sigh and a chuckle. Mike laughed as well in the nerdy boyish way that he did making Will burst out into the giggles that he was trying to hold back.
"Yeah?"
"Yeah."
The two boys let out exhausted laughs as they held onto each others faces before pressing their lips against each others again, desperately this time. Mike leaned against the side of the bleachers that were empty by now as Will leaned against his lanky body, leaves crunching under his blue sneakers.
Mike never thought this would happen, he thought it was just a fantasy and at one point, he thought it was a nightmare. He thought he was so tainted for wanting it, for expecting it and he beat himself and everyone else up about it but it paid off. Mike felt so dirty before, he felt so dirty for this gentle sin of his that he saw every time he looked into the mirror or into those green eyes of the Byers boy. Now, he felt clean. Cleaner than he had ever felt in his entire life.
The childish innocence he once had shared with Will of how they felt about each other had now blossomed into something that felt so pure and romantic that it seemed unbelievable that this was the feeling he had once perceived would never set him free.
That stupid letter held the key to every issue he had with himself and the world but it's not like there was anything special in there like the sand from the playground they met at, it was just his words. His written true thoughts that he should've spoken out. Mike just needed to stop being so damn scared of everything to get the happiness that everyone claimed he had deserved.
"Mike! Will! Where have you guys run off to!?" The shout of his sister makes Mike back away from Will and hit his head against the metal of the bleachers earning a groan of pain. He lets out a sigh of annoyance that he was being interrupted.
Will backed away as he looked around for Nancy not wanting to get caught making out at graduation. "Did you not tell her we were going to see memories?" He questioned looking back at Mike as if his lips had not been on his just a second ago but Mike could not recover so fast.
Mike Wheeler stood there awkwardly with his legs bent from the need to move whilst kissing, hand rubbing a spot on his head with red under the freckles spread across his face. Will smiled at the sight. "No? I didn't think she'd care." Mike muttered as they began to walk back to where the crowd was. Will scoffed at Mike's words as he shook his head disapprovingly.
The pair walked into their mothers and Nancy looking around for them and were immediately attacked with hugs before they could even blink. They had forgotten this town isn't exactly known for kids being totally safe. "God Mike, you scare me." Karen said hugging Mike's head into her shoulder as he let out a chuckle whilst hugging her but he couldn't help but look over to see Will hugging Joyce, both of the towering over their mothers showing just how much they had grown over the years.
Will blinked over at Mike and smiled as sweet as sugar. Mike felt like he'd have a heart attack if he kept looking so he directed his eyes elsewhere, to Will's hand that held the letter that had been folded back up. A grin crawled on Mike's face at the sight.
That letter used to be the worst of him, his most insecure and a side he'd never show anyone and he hated it but he kept it—he never knew why he kept it but Mike was glad he did because he didn't think he'd ever have the courage to say anything as meaningful as the words on that page that were decorated with his salty tear stains. There were new tear stains but they wouldn't be reminders of pain that Mike experienced in his life, it'd be a reminder that he's not wrong. He never was.
That's something Mike thought he'd never say and he always wanted to. Mike had everything he ever wanted, he just needed to stop being so fucking scared.
I won't make this formal because I don't want to send this letter, I just have so many feelings and things I want to tell you but I can't because I'm too scared. I think I love you, Will. No, I know that I do and I hate myself so much for it, I really do. I don't want you to hate me so I won't tell you this ever.
I don't want anyone to hate me, especially not Eleven but I can't help it. I really can't and it eats me alive everyday because I can't stop thinking about how different everything feels because you're not here with me. Hawkins isn't home anymore, I don't feel normal here because I hate that you're not with me and I can't just play DnD with you. I regret so much not playing it with you over the summer, I'm so sorry. I really am. I miss you so much and I hate that I was such an asshole in the last months I had with you.
I'm being a dick now because I'm not talking to you but I can't stand it. The thought of you speaking to me, hearing your voice or your thoughts makes me sick because I want it. It makes me feel so disgusting and like I'm dirty. Mom and Nancy told me if I talked to you I might feel better but I can't do it, I'm too scared of myself. I'm scared of you too. You make me feel like I'm right and there's nothing wrong with me even though I know there is; you treat me like a person Will.
I want you home more than anything, please come back to me but I won't ever tell you that because you're not mine. You can't ever be mine, it's not supposed to happen and I feel crazy that I want it to. I know you don't feel the same way but I'd like to believe you do and you're as crazy as I am. I meant what I said on Halloween, crazy together.
El says you've been painting and I really want to see them, I want to ask her if she'll take pictures to show me but I won't. After this letter, I'll do what I always do. Try to forget about you and ignore how I feel but I think by now, if you were ever reading this which you won't, you would know that it doesn't work. I wish it did, I wish I didn't love you. I wish I wasn't devoted to you and that you were the only thing I could see in my future if I was ever happy. Lots of people say wishes don't come true but I remember when they found your body and I wished for it to not be real and to go away, it came true. Maybe this one will come true. Then I can finally get over you.
love, paladin.