Chapter Text
“Hey dad?”
Mike looks up from his book, his glasses slipping down his face a little as he sees his daughter recording him. There’s a grin on her face. His eyes flit down to her phone camera then back up to her.
“Hm?” He hums, urging her to go on.
“I’m so hungry I could eat William Byers.”
Mike’s eyebrows shoot up, and a million memories flash in his mind. He feels as though time freezes. He drops his book, and takes off his reading glasses to fully address his kid.
“Where’d you hear that name?”
His daughter, Willow, looks to the side for a second, suddenly feeling as though she stepped on a landmine. She laughs, half amused and half nervous.
“…I saw it in one of your yearbooks from when you were in high school. You guys had a lot of pictures together and he signed it?”
“Oh.” He says. Spacing out for just a moment, thinking of those years. Those odd, regretful years.
“I was in love with him.”
Willow’s mouth drops open. She looks astonished that her father would be in love with a man. Though, she doesn’t really know the full extent of why her parents divorced she supposes.
“What?! No way, what happened?” She moves to sit next to her dad, the phone still recording.
Mike grimaces for a moment, looking down at his hands before looking back at Willow. She notices how his face changes. It’s less defended.
It’s sad.
“We’d known each other since kindergarten. Him and I had become really good friends, bonding over being outcasts, dungeons and dragons, nerdy shit like that.” Mike starts, his tone sounding bright before it shifts once again.
“We went through a lot together. He went through a lot. He had gone missing when we were twelve, and wasn’t found for a whole week.” He puts his book to the side, realizing that Willow would figure him out one day. Whether it was today or one far in the future. Will’s always found a way to haunt him like that.
Willow’s face has changed completely. She’s still recording, which he finds odd, but he notices how sincere her face is.
“That incident really pushed us together, and I guess our closeness scared me. I ended up actually pushing myself to start dating this girl, Jane. She was amazing, really. Something special. But I couldn’t even say I loved her. She didn’t deserve that. Not with what she’d gone through, too.” Mike’s heart squeezes with hurt, and regret with what he’d done to Eleven.
“It wouldn’t have been as bad if I had just.. accepted what I was afraid of. Being gay during that time was so scary that I hurt other people in the process. The worst part is that Will showed me a way out. He came out to us when the… when it felt like the world was ending. And he was loved. Of course he was. But I couldn’t do what he did. Well, I could, but I felt like I couldn’t. My biggest regret will always be never telling him the truth.” Mike’s voice softened in that last sentence, like he’s saying it to himself. Or someone that isn’t there.
Willow finally puts her phone down, realizing that she doesn’t need to expose her father’s whole love life for a trend.
“..Did something happen to him? Why did you stop talking?”
Mike smiles softly. There’s not much real peace behind it.
“Time happened. We drifted, he met someone. I met your mother. I hurt her, too. I’m sorry I haven’t told you, honey.”
“It’s okay, dad.” She jumps in. It’s odd, he thinks. How she empathizes so fiercely, just like Will would.
He’ll truly never get away from the sound of the man that loved him.