Chapter Text
The burn was cancelled.
That should’ve meant relief. Something unclenching. A night where the air didn’t feel like it was waiting to bite.
Instead, it felt like a hand lifting—not letting go, not leaving—just hovering. Paused on purpose. Like whoever was holding the knife smiled and said, Later.
Will sat on the basement steps in the Wheeler house and tried to make his body believe the difference.
He stared at the edge of the lowest stair until his eyes wanted to cross. The wood was worn smooth where feet had passed over it for years—Mike’s feet, Dustin’s, Lucas’s, Nancy’s. A thousand normal moments pressed into pine.
Will wanted that to mean something. Wanted it to mean this was still safe.
He counted small things because counting kept his mind from sliding sideways.
One: the seam of his jeans under his thumb.
Two: the faint, constant hum in the walls—like a TV left on in another room, even when nothing was on.
Three: the sting when he pressed his thumbnail into the soft edge of his nail until it hurt.
Pain was honest. Pain didn’t whisper in his ear.
Behind him, the basement had become their space in the way a place became yours when you lived out of bags long enough.
Two mattresses, awkward around a support beam, like the room refused to fully cooperate with comfort. Blankets that started folded and ended as piles. Jonathan’s duffel half-open and never fully unpacked, like unpacking was an invitation to the universe. Will’s backpack shoved under a chair where he could reach it fast.
Go-bag energy without anyone saying go-bag.
His sketchbook lay on the floor beside his mattress, cover bent at the corner. Pencil in the spiral like a needle waiting for a vein.
He didn’t draw to make art anymore.
He drew because moving graphite across paper proved his hands still belonged to him.
Upstairs, the Wheeler house performed normal in muffled pieces.
Cabinets. Running water. Holly’s bright kid-voice, too young to understand that adults were scheduling the end of the world like a dentist appointment. Ted Wheeler’s distant, meaningless “mm-hm,” like a sound effect more than a person. Karen’s footsteps in the kitchen, quick and capable.
Will listened the way you listened for thunder even when the sky looked clear.
The basement light buzzed once.
Will didn’t look up. He told himself it was nothing. He told himself he was being stupid. He told himself—
Footsteps on the stairs.
Not loud. Not trying to be quiet. Just… careful.
Jonathan.
Jonathan had gotten good at arriving in Will’s space without turning it into a whole thing. No dramatic voice. No “what’s wrong?” like a spotlight. Just presence. A steady weight in the air that didn’t demand anything from Will’s face.
A piece of paper tapped Will’s shoulder.
Will took it between two fingers like it could burn.
He didn’t have to look at the handwriting to know who it was. Hopper wrote like he fought the page into obedience. Every letter a clenched jaw.
Will unfolded it carefully, as if opening it would change the words.
BURN: CANCELLED
Underneath, a list of rules—because adults loved rules the way kids loved spells.
Stand down. Stay ready. No travel after dark. Check-in 8pm. Reschedule.
Will’s eyes snagged on the last word.
“Reschedule,” he read out loud. His voice came out flat. Too even.
The absurdity hung in the air like a joke nobody could afford.
Jonathan leaned against the wall, arms crossed, exhaustion sitting on his shoulders like a jacket he couldn’t take off. “Cool,” he said. “Yeah. I’ll just… pencil in the apocalypse for next week.”
Will’s mouth tried to laugh and failed halfway. A breath escaped him that could’ve been humor in a different life.
Jonathan watched him with that sharpness he had now. Not panic. Not pity. Just attention—the kind that said I’m not missing it again.
“You okay?” Jonathan asked quietly.
Will nodded automatically.
He didn’t even think about it. The nod happened like a reflex. Okay was the default setting. Okay meant other people didn’t change their faces. Okay meant less questions.
Jonathan didn’t argue. Didn’t say you don’t look okay, even though Will knew he could. Jonathan’s restraint was new, and sometimes it felt like the most brutal kindness.
“Dustin and Lucas are coming over,” Jonathan said. “Mike said he’d do movie night. Or… try.”
Will’s chest did that flip that wasn’t excitement and wasn’t dread. A mix of anticipation and nausea.
Normal wasn’t a place anymore. It was a performance. Something you did with your voice and your body so the people you loved could pretend their lives weren’t built on top of a crack in reality.
Will stood too fast, like motion could outrun feeling. He turned and started touching things.
Straightening a blanket that didn’t need straightening.
Pushing a pillow into a sharper corner.
Stacking comic books that weren’t even his, aligning their edges like clean lines meant a clean world.
Jonathan’s eyes tracked him.
“You don’t have to do that,” Jonathan said gently.
Will didn’t look up. “I’m not doing anything.”
Jonathan’s mouth pulled into the smallest, fondest wince. “Yeah,” he said. “You’re just… being Will.”
The words landed like a hand on his shoulder: affectionate, accurate, and somehow devastating.
Will hated that his coping had become a pattern someone could name.
Jonathan pushed off the wall. “You want me down here while they’re here?”
Will’s whole body screamed yes.
Yes meant shield. Yes meant someone between him and Mike’s attention. Yes meant not being alone with the part of himself that lit up when Mike walked into a room.
But Will forced his face into something casual. “No. It’s just a movie.”
Jonathan hesitated, eyes searching Will’s like he could read the lie and choose whether to challenge it.
He chose not to.
“Okay,” Jonathan said. “I’ll be upstairs. I’ll be… around.”
Will nodded, throat tight with words he didn’t say.
Jonathan took one step up, then paused.
“And Will?” he said.
Will looked up.
Jonathan’s voice softened. “If you need me, you don’t have to make it a big thing. You can just—”
“I know,” Will cut in, quick. Too quick. Because if Jonathan gave him permission out loud, the shell holding him together might crack.
Jonathan nodded like he understood exactly what had just happened. “Okay.”
He disappeared upstairs into the warmer part of the house.
Will stood alone in the basement and listened.
Bikes on gravel outside. Voices—Dustin loud enough to be heard through the foundation, Lucas quieter, tired at the edges. The sound hit Will’s chest like relief and grief at the same time.
Proof they were still here.
Proof they were still trying.
The front door opened upstairs.
Karen’s polite-bright voice: “Shoes off, boys, please—Holly’s been—”
“Mrs. Wheeler!” Dustin declared theatrically. “I would never disrespect your home.”
Holly giggled. Ted offered his distant “mm-hm.”
Then footsteps at the top of the basement stairs.
Will tensed without meaning to. Like his body knew before his brain did.
Mike appeared in the stairwell.
For a second, he was just a silhouette against the upstairs light. Hoodie. Hair slightly messier than usual like he’d run his hands through it too many times and lost. He came down like he belonged there.
Like this was still his basement kingdom, and not Will’s borrowed shelter.
He paused when he saw Will.
Not dramatic. Not a full stop. Just a fraction of a beat too long.
Enough that Will felt it like pressure.
“Hey,” Mike said.
“Hey,” Will answered.
He tried to make the word mean normal. Tried to make it not mean I think about you when I shouldn’t. Not mean I’m scared you can see me.
Mike’s eyes flicked over him, quick. A scan. Protective in a way Mike probably didn’t even know he was doing.
Will hated that Mike noticed things.
He hated, too, the part of him that warmed under it.
Mike cleared his throat. “So, uh… Dustin picked the movie.”
From behind him, Dustin’s voice boomed down the stairs. “I DID. And if Mike tries to complain, I will remind him he thought The Dark Crystal was ‘too scary’ when we were nine.”
“It was scary,” Mike snapped back automatically, but the edge softened fast, because the truth was: it had been scary, and he’d been embarrassed, and Will had laughed and then sat closer to him anyway.
Lucas came down last, slower than the others. He looked… older than he was. Not in a cool way. In a tired way. Like grief had weight and he’d been carrying it too long.
“Hey,” Lucas said, voice quiet.
“Hey,” Will said, and held his gaze a second longer than usual—an unspoken I see you.
Lucas’s mouth tightened. Acknowledgment returned without words.
Dustin flopped onto the couch like bones were optional. “Okay, seating arrangement—”
Mike patted the cushion beside him without thinking. “Here.”
It was automatic. Normal.
Will’s breath caught so hard it startled him. His body heated like someone had turned a dial.
He sat.
Not too close. Not too far. Close enough that the space between them felt alive.
Dustin eyed them immediately. “Are you two gonna fuse into one person or are we starting the movie?”
“Starting,” Mike said too quickly. He stood. “Popcorn.”
“Since when do you make popcorn?” Dustin demanded.
Mike flipped him off and disappeared upstairs.
The basement changed the second Mike left, like the air lost a layer of charge.
Dustin filled it with noise on instinct—complaining about the tape, theorizing about the plot of a movie he hadn’t seen, doing impressions that were more confidence than accuracy. Will laughed in the right places. He was good at present. Good at making his face behave.
Lucas sat on the floor, knees up, hands clasped loosely around them. Quiet in the way people got when they were trying not to say something true.
Will’s eyes drifted to the wall.
An old drawing was taped there—his. Stick figures. A dragon. A castle. “THE PARTY” in kid handwriting.
His stomach tightened.
That drawing used to feel like proof. Proof of existence.
Now it felt like a museum exhibit. Evidence of a version of Will that existed before words became knives and feelings became secrets.
Nostalgia wasn’t comfort anymore.
It was a blade.
Upstairs, the microwave beeped.
Karen’s voice floated down: “Michael, be careful—”
“I know, Mom!” Mike yelled back, a little too sharp, sounding no different from when they were then softer, “I know.”
He came back down carrying a bowl of popcorn too big for one person, hands pink like he’d burned them. He dropped onto the couch beside Will.
This time, their shoulders brushed.
Just a touch. Nothing. Not romantic, not dramatic—just bodies existing.
Will’s skin lit up like a match.
His breath went shallow. He went still like movement might make it worse.
Mike didn’t pull away. Didn’t lean in.
He just existed, and Will had to survive it.
The TV flashed blue, then brighter, the title card blooming across the basement wall.
“No,” Dustin said immediately. “Absolutely not. Look at that lighting. That’s villain lighting.”
“It’s not villain lighting,” Mike said, offended on principle. “It’s cinematic.”
Dustin glanced at Will like they were sharing a courtroom. “He just said cinematic.”
Lucas, eyes still on the screen, murmured, “If we die, I want it on record I didn’t pick the movie.”
Mike huffed a laugh, short and surprised. The sound should’ve had a second one beside it—Max would’ve said something sharp.
The space where her laugh belonged sat heavy anyway.
For a few minutes, they almost reached something like normal.
On-screen, the monster lurched out of fog like it had practiced in a mirror—too dramatic, too many teeth.
Dustin leaned forward, disgusted. “Why is it… moist?”
Will laughed—sharp and real.
Mike turned like the sound yanked him. His face softened, just for a second.
“There,” Mike said quietly, like he was relieved the laugh existed.
Will blinked. “What?”
“Nothing,” Mike said too fast, and grabbed popcorn like it could save him.
The movie kept running, but the night drifted into conversation anyway because what they were really doing was trying to keep the world from swallowing them.
Dustin started talking about crawls like they were chores. Like you could casually mention the end of the world the way you mentioned homework.
Dustin grabbed a fistful of popcorn. “Okay, real talk: we should get punch cards. Congratulations, you survived five near deaths—the sixth one’s free.”
Nobody laughed.
Dustin’s grin flickered. “…Too soon.”
Lucas swallowed, eyes still on the screen. “They moved her bed today.”
Dustin’s hand paused mid-popcorn. “Why?”
“Closer to the window,” Lucas said flatly. “Like sunlight’s gonna argue with… whatever did that.”
Mike’s voice went careful. “Did she—”
“No.” Lucas didn’t let him finish. “No changes.”
Lucas kept going anyway, like if he stopped the words would choke him.
Will felt Mike go still beside him.
“I read to her,” Lucas said. “Same book. Same chapter. I don’t even know if—” He swallowed. “I keep thinking maybe today’s the day something changes. And then it doesn’t.”
Dustin’s noise disappeared completely. “She’s still…?” he asked, unable to finish.
“Still here,” Lucas said, and his mouth twisted. “Technically.”
The word sat wrong in the air.
Will felt that familiar pressure behind his eyes, like something tapping on the inside of his skull. Max had become loud to his senses in a way he couldn’t explain. Not present. Not gone. Just… close. Like a wall you could hear breathing behind.
He hesitated. The cost of speaking was always unclear until after you paid it.
“I—” Will started, then forced himself to keep going. “Sometimes when I think about her it feels like… pressure. Like knocking.”
Lucas’s head snapped toward him. “You feel something?”
“Not like a promise,” Will said quickly. “Not like I know anything. Just… she doesn’t feel as far away as she should.”
Lucas stared at him for a second, hope and fear fighting on his face. Then he nodded slowly, careful, like he was taking the fragile thread and wrapping it around himself without pulling.
“That’s… still something,” Lucas said.
Dustin nodded too, swallowing hard. “Yeah. Yeah, that’s something.”
Mike didn’t say anything. He was watching Will now—openly. Not judgment. Not suspicion. Concern, and something else underneath it that Will didn’t want to name.
Will shifted under the weight of it, suddenly hyper-aware of how close they were sitting, how Mike’s arm kept brushing his through the thin fabric of his hoodie.
The movie played on, ignored.
Eventually Dustin clapped his hands once—sharp, loud, like he could knock the heaviness off the ceiling.
“Okay!” he announced, sitting forward so suddenly popcorn scattered across his lap. “This is officially Too Sad For Movie Night. We need a reset. A dumb game. Something that reboots the vibe.”
Lucas didn’t even look up from where he’d been picking at a loose thread on his hoodie sleeve. “No.”
“Truth or Dare,” Dustin said instantly, like it had been waiting behind his teeth.
Mike let out a short laugh through his nose. “That always goes bad.”
“It goes great, Mike,” Dustin corrected, offended. “And this time—new rule. No trauma questions.”
Lucas snorted, quiet. “That’s not a rule. That’s a lie.”
Dustin pointed at him like thank you for proving my point. “Excuse you. It is a rule because I’m declaring it.”
Mike glanced at Will, then away too quickly, like eye contact itself could count as a question. “We all know you can’t help yourself.”
“I can help myself,” Dustin insisted, then immediately failed and leaned in, eyes glittering. “Okay, fine. I can help myself for like… ten minutes. Which is enough. We’ll do speed rounds. Fast. Light. Idiotic.”
Lucas dragged his gaze off the TV. His face said this is stupid, but his voice was too tired to argue properly. “How do we even—”
“I have a die,” Dustin said, triumphantly producing it like a magician. It was one of their old D&D dice, scuffed and familiar, and seeing it made something in Will’s chest ache in a way that wasn’t sharp enough to show.
Mike stared at the die. “Of course you do.”
“Of course I do,” Dustin repeated, like Mike had just complimented him. He held it out in the middle of the couch like it was sacred. “Odds, truth. Evens, dare. You roll for yourself. No vetoes unless it’s, like, illegal.”
Lucas deadpanned, “Everything you think is funny is illegal.”
“Thank you for the support,” Dustin said brightly. “We’re starting now.”
He rolled the die dramatically. It clacked against the coffee table, spun, then landed.
“Ha!” Dustin crowed. “Evens. Dare. Give me something.”
Mike was already shaking his head. “Don’t say—”
Dustin pointed at Mike with the authority of a man issuing a warrant. “Dare: do your best impression of your mom when she catches you creeping down here at two in the morning.”
Mike’s face went red immediately. “That’s—why would you—”
“Because it’s accurate,” Dustin said. “Because it’s art. Because we deserve this.”
Will’s mouth twitched before he could stop it. Lucas’s eyes flicked to Will’s expression like he’d been checking for signs of life.
Mike dragged a hand down his face like he was preparing to die. Then he straightened, cleared his throat, and pitched his voice up in a scandalized, whisper-y hiss.
“Michael Theodore Wheeler,” he said, staring into the middle distance like he could see Karen in front of him, “why are you creeping around like a raccoon?”
Dustin exploded into laughter—full-body, wheezing, ugly joy. Will snorted, startled by the sound of himself. Even Lucas’s mouth tugged, quick and reluctant.
Mike, encouraged by the reaction in spite of himself, kept going.
“If you’re going to summon Satan in my basement, you will do it at a reasonable hour,” he added, waving an imaginary dish towel like it was a weapon.
Dustin slapped the couch. “YES. YES. That’s her!”
Lucas, voice dry, said, “She’s nicer than mine. Mine would’ve just killed me.”
Mike collapsed back against the couch, half laughing, half mortified. “Happy?”
“Ecstatic,” Dustin said, wiping his eyes. “Okay, my turn is complete. I’m a genius. Moving on.”
He shoved the die toward Lucas. “Roll.”
Lucas stared at it like it was a live grenade. “Why do I have to—”
“Because you’re here,” Dustin said, like that explained everything.
Lucas rolled. The die clacked, spun, landed.
“Oooh,” Dustin said, peering. “Odds. Truth.”
Lucas’s shoulders tightened like he’d expected that. “Fine. Ask.”
Dustin opened his mouth—then visibly remembered his own rule. His grin faltered for half a second.
Mike watched him with a warning look that said don’t.
Will watched Lucas, because Lucas was a raw nerve right now, and any wrong question could set him off like a tripwire.
Dustin recovered with a dramatic inhale. “Okay. Dumb question.” He pointed at Lucas’s hair. “Worst haircut you’ve ever had.”
Lucas blinked, like his brain had been braced for something else. “That’s the question?”
“Yup.”
Lucas exhaled, almost a laugh. “When my mom tried to cut it when I was, like, six and she gave me this… uneven bowl thing.”
Dustin gasped theatrically. “Oh my god. A bowl cut.”
All eyes go to Will who, of course, is the bowl cut king. Lucas swiftly saves Will from the insult to the haircut he's had since forever.
“Not even a good bowl cut,” Lucas said, and there was a tiny lightness in his voice that Will clung to. “Like she used a bowl that was cracked.”
Mike nodded solemnly. “That’s tragic.”
Lucas glanced at Mike, the corner of his mouth lifting. “What about you? Your hair’s doing… whatever that is right now.”
Mike’s hand flew up automatically, defensive. “My hair is fine.”
Dustin leaned in, deadly serious. “No. Your hair is in a committed relationship with humidity.”
Will laughed again and it startled him the way the first one had. Mike’s head turned toward the sound. His eyes stayed on Will a beat too long.
Will felt the attention like a heat source. Like an exposed wire.
Then Mike looked away shoving popcorn into his mouth.
Dustin shoved the die toward Will. “Okay. Will, Roll.”
Will’s fingers touched the die and his stomach did that stupid flip it always did when he became the center of anything. He rolled anyway.
It landed.
“Evens,” Dustin declared. “Dare.”
Will exhaled. Dares were easier than truths. Dares meant you did a thing and it was over. Truths lingered.
Dustin’s grin went feral. “Okay. Dare: do your best Hopper impression.”
Will frowned. “That’s not a dare. That’s just—you want me to insult Hopper.”
“It’s not insulting,” Dustin said, lying. “It’s honoring. Like a tribute.”
Lucas muttered, “A tribute that’ll get us murdered if he finds out.”
Will straightened his shoulders, pulled his voice down into a gravelly register, and tried to summon every single time Hopper had looked like he’d rather be anywhere else than dealing with them.
He stared at the TV like it was personally offending him.
“Jesus Christ,” Will said, flat and exhausted. “I leave you alone for five minutes and you turn my town into—” He waved vaguely. “—a circus.”
Dustin cackled immediately. Mike laughed hard.
Will kept going, because once the first laugh happened, it was easier.
“No. No. Absolutely not. You’re not—” Will jabbed an imaginary finger toward Dustin. “—you’re not building a radio tower on government property. Again.”
Dustin doubled over. “AGAIN—”
Lucas, finally smiling for real, said, “Okay, that was… scary accurate.”
Will’s chest warmed at that—at Lucas smiling. At the basement feeling, for just a second, like the old basement.
Mike’s shoulder bumped his again as he laughed, and Will had to keep his face neutral so nobody could see how much that tiny contact did to him.
Mike’s laughing felt like sunlight in a room that hadn’t had windows.
Dustin wiped his eyes, breathless. “Okay, okay—new rule. You’re not allowed to be that good at it. That’s cheating.”
Mike pointed at Will, grin still stuck on his face. “He’s been watching Hopper longer than any of us. He has… reference material.”
Dustin rolled the die again for himself because of course he did.
“Oooh, odds,” he announced. “Truth.”
Mike leaned back, wary. “Remember the rule.”
“I remember the rule,” Dustin said quickly. “I’m literally the one who made the rule.”
Lucas said, under his breath, “That’s what worries me.”
Dustin ignored him and turned, slowly, toward Will—like he was intentionally giving the moment weight, but trying not to make it heavy.
For a second, his expression softened. Not pity. Not panic. Just… gentleness. Like he was offering something instead of taking it.
Will’s heart thudded once, hard enough that he felt it in his throat.
“Okay, Will,” Dustin said quietly. “Truth.”
Will forced his voice to stay steady. “Okay.”
Dustin’s smile flickered—small, careful. “Do you miss… before... everything went to shit?”
Will stared at his hands. “Yeah,” he said. Simple. True. “I do.”
The room held its breath.
Dustin hesitated, then asked softly, “And when it happens—when you feel weird—do you want people to help or… do you want to be left alone?”
Will’s throat tightened.
He could feel Mike beside him, still as a held breath.
Will chose his words like stepping across broken glass.
“Talking helps,” Will said. “Normal talking. And… staying. I think staying helps.”
Mike’s shoulders dropped a fraction like that mattered. Like he’d been waiting for permission.
After that, Dustin kept the game lighter on purpose. He could do that when he wanted to—steer the room away from a cliff.
Later, when Dustin checked the time, he announced with exaggerated seriousness that he was “morally obligated” to leave before Karen Wheeler decided to interrogate him about his “career goals.”
Lucas stood, pulling his jacket on. He hesitated in front of Will, then squeezed his shoulder once—quick and solid.
“Text me later?” Lucas said.
Will nodded. “Yeah.”
Lucas’s eyes flicked to Mike, then back to Will. Something wordless passed there. Lucas didn’t say it, but it was obvious: Don’t let him mess this up.
Dustin waved like a lunatic and bounded up the stairs.
The basement door clicked shut.
The quiet that followed wasn’t peaceful.
It was too big.
Mike didn’t restart the movie. The screen glowed blue and irrelevant.
They sat there for a moment, not quite looking at each other, the silence stretching thin.
Mike broke it first.
“Do you… want to keep playing?” he asked, quiet. “Truth or Dare. Just us.”
Will’s stomach flipped. He nodded anyway, because refusing would’ve felt like making a statement, and he didn’t know what statement he could survive tonight.
“Okay,” he said.
The die rested between them on the cushion, suddenly very small.
Mike picked it up, rolled it once. It bounced, landed.
“Okay,” he said, like he was narrating his own breathing. “Truth.”
Will swallowed. “Truth.”
Mike stared at the number longer than necessary, then frowned at it like it had betrayed him. “What’s your—” He stopped. Restarted. “What’s your least-hated movie snack?”
Will blinked. “What?”
Mike’s ears went pink immediately. “I’m trying to not—make it weird.”
That did it. Will’s mouth lifted despite himself. “Twizzlers.”
Mike nodded with absolute seriousness. “Okay. Got it. Twizzlers.” He set the die down carefully. “Important information.”
Will huffed a quiet laugh. The sound surprised him. It didn’t hurt to make it.
They sat like that for a second, the TV still playing muted nonsense in the background. The die stayed between them, untouched.
Mike rubbed his thumb along one edge of it. “You can—” He stopped. Took a breath. “You can tell me if you don’t want to answer something. I won’t… do the Dustin thing.”
Will glanced at him. “The Dustin thing?”
Mike’s mouth twitched. “Pushing until someone bleeds.”
Will nodded. That was fair. “Okay.”
Mike rolled again. Slower this time. The die clacked once and settled.
“Truth,” he said quietly.
Will felt his shoulders tense anyway. “Okay.”
Mike didn’t look at the die now. He looked at the floor. “When it happens,” he said, careful. “Your episodes. What do they feel like?”
Will hesitated. He stared at his hands like they might answer for him. “Like… everything gets too loud and too quiet at the same time.”
Mike nodded, absorbing it.
“And heavy,” Will added. “Like gravity turns up. Or like I’m underwater.”
“Does anything help?” Mike asked. Not demanding. Just there.
Will thought about it. About Jonathan’s voice. About counting. About pain. About music. About Mike — and how complicated that was.
“Talking,” he said finally. “Normal talking. Staying… present. I guess.”
Mike’s fingers tightened on the die. “Okay.”
They let that sit.
Will picked the die up himself this time, rolled it once out of obligation. It landed.
“Truth,” he said.
Mike laughed under his breath. “Figures.”
Will tilted his head. “What do you miss about Hawkins?”
Mike blinked, clearly not expecting that. He leaned back, eyes tracking the ceiling like the answer was written there.
“Honestly?” he said. “It feels… empty now. Like someone scooped the middle out and forgot to put anything back.”
Will nodded slowly. That made sense.
Mike swallowed. “It’s stupid, but sometimes I think I hear you. Like—your bike. Or you yelling at Dustin. And then I remember you’re not… here.”
The words landed soft and heavy at the same time.
“I’m sorry,” Will said automatically.
Mike shook his head. “No. Don’t—don’t do that.” He exhaled. “That wasn’t… a guilt thing. Just… a thing.”
The die rolled between Mike’s fingers again and again, not being used. Just something to keep his hands busy.
“Can I ask you something?” Mike said finally.
Will felt it before he heard it — the shift. His body braced anyway. “Okay.”
Mike’s voice dropped, not dramatic. Just real. “Something… specific.”
Will nodded once. “Okay.”
Mike swallowed. His voice softened in that way it did when he was trying not to sound like he was begging.
“The fight,” Mike said quietly. “At my house. In the rain.”
Will’s chest constricted so hard it hurt.
“What about it?” Will managed.
Mike stared at the die like it had answers. “I keep thinking about it,” he said. “Not because—I know I was an asshole. I know. But… you looked at me like I wasn’t… me.”
Will’s fingers curled into the blanket.
Mike kept going, words stumbling a little like he was scared of them too.
“I said something stupid. I said something I shouldn’t have said. And you—” He exhaled. “You looked like I’d… killed something.”
Will almost laughed, sharp and bitter. You did.
But he couldn’t say that. Not really. Not the real reason.
Mike’s voice dropped further. “Why did it hurt you so much?”
Because you were right, Will thought. Because you saw me without seeing me. Because you put the thing I’m terrified of into words like it was a joke. Because it proved you could hurt me by accident, which meant you could destroy me on purpose if you ever knew.
Will’s mouth went dry.
He chose the safest truth he could carry.
“Because… it felt like you didn’t want me,” Will said, and hated how small it sounded.
Mike’s head snapped up. “That’s not—”
Will’s eyes flicked to him, panic rising. “It felt like you were… moving on. And I was still—” He stopped. The rest of the sentence was too dangerous.
Mike’s face softened, something raw there. “I was scared,” he admitted. “Everything was changing and I didn’t know where I fit anymore. And you were looking at me like… like I was already gone.”
Will’s vision blurred.
This was too close. This was exactly the kind of moment Vecna liked to hover behind—patient, listening.
Before Will could decide whether to speak or run, Karen’s voice floated down from upstairs, bright and tired.
“Boys? It’s late. Keep it down, okay? We’re heading to bed.”
“Okay, Mom!” Mike called back quickly, the moment collapsing like a house of cards.
Footsteps overhead. A door closing. The world snapping back into being a normal house pretending nothing was wrong.
The basement felt cold again.
Will stood abruptly. “We should—uh. Stop. I’m tired.”
Mike blinked, thrown. “Will—”
“I just… don’t feel like playing anymore,” Will said too fast. He hated how it sounded. Hated himself more for starting it.
Mike stood too. “Okay,” he said quickly, trying not to show how much it stung. “Okay. I’ll go.”
He hesitated like he wanted to say something else.
Then he didn’t.
“Night,” Mike said.
“Night,” Will echoed.
Mike climbed the stairs.
Will listened to his steps fade and tried to tell himself it was fine. It was just a weird moment. It was late. It was—
The basement went quiet.
Not peaceful quiet.
The kind that waited.
Will sat back down, knees pulled to his chest. He tried to breathe through it. Tried to shove everything back into the place he kept things that were too dangerous to look at directly.
The feeling didn’t leave.
It waited.
The air shifted first.
Not colder exactly.
Wrong.
The hum in the walls deepened, stretched low, like something tuning itself to the frequency of his fear.
The shadows along the edges of the room thickened, pulling inward like the dark wanted to be closer.
Will’s heart slammed against his ribs.
No, he thought. Not again. Not now. Please.
His breath stuttered. His limbs felt heavy, like someone turned the gravity up.
The walls turned black, air filled with spores.
And the thought slid into his mind like it belonged there.
Your secret makes you unlovable.
The hum in the walls dropped lower, like the house was tuning itself.
He heard a voice that he knew very well, dark and gravelly pressed into his thoughts anyway: Unlovable.
“Stop,” Will whispered out loud, like saying it could make it real enough to fight.
Will’s eyes squeezed shut. His thumbnail dug into his skin hard enough to sting.
Pain. Honest. Real.
But the pressure kept building.
That’s why he left.
That’s why he’ll leave again.
You can’t be saved from being you.
“No,” Will whispered. His voice sounded far away.
His vision tunneled. The basement tilted.
Footsteps on the stairs.
“Hey, Will?” Jonathan’s voice—halfway down already. “I saw Mike go up and I was wondering—”
Jonathan froze.
Will was sitting perfectly still, eyes unfocused but straight ahead, breath fast and wrong.
Jonathan moved instantly.
Not panicked. Not loud. Just fast and certain.
He took the last steps two at a time and dropped in front of Will, blocking the rest of the room from view.
“Hey,” Jonathan said firmly. “Look at me.”
Will’s eyes jerked but didn’t lock.
Jonathan kept his hands visible, palms open. “You’re here. You’re in the basement. Can you feel the floor under you?”
Suddenly the room went back to normal, no more vines, no more spores, and the voice went away. Back in the real world.
Will swallowed. A tiny nod.
Jonathan grabbed the blanket and wrapped it around Will’s shoulders, snug and grounding like a cocoon. “Good. Okay. Breathe with me. In.”
Will’s breath hitched.
“Out,” Jonathan said, steady as a metronome.
Will followed, shaky, clinging to the sound of Jonathan’s voice like a rope to pull him out of the water.
The pressure didn’t vanish.
It never did.
But it loosened enough that Will didn’t feel like he was about to fall through the floor.
“I’ve got you,” Jonathan said quietly, like it was a fact.
Movement at the top of the stairs.
“Will?” Mike’s voice, tight and scared.
Jonathan didn’t look away from Will right away. He lowered his voice even more, just for Will.
“I’m going to get you tea,” Jonathan murmured. “The warm kind you like. I’ll be right back. Stay right here, okay?”
Will nodded, eyes fixed on the blanket, too in shock to acknowledge Mike.
Jonathan stood and went up the stairs.
Mike was there, hovering at the doorway like he didn’t know what to do with his hands.
“I heard—” Mike started, voice cracking. “Is he—what’s happening?”
Jonathan kept his tone controlled. “He’s not up for questions.”
“Tell me what to do,” Mike said, voice rough. “Just—tell me what helps.”
Jonathan didn’t soften. “What helps is you backing up.”
Mike swallowed. “I care about him.”
Jonathan nodded once. “I know you do.”
That made Mike flinch anyway, like being understood didn’t stop him from feeling guilty.
Mike tried to look past Jonathan down the stairs. “Will? Do you want me to—”
Will curled inward on the mattress, eyes fixed on the blanket like it was the only solid thing in the room. He couldn’t handle Mike’s voice right now. Not without it turning into something worse.
Jonathan shifted to block Mike’s line of sight.
“Not tonight,” Jonathan said, voice firm. “He needs quiet. He needs space.”
Mike’s jaw clenched. “He said talking helps.”
“Not like this,” Jonathan said. “Not with you pushing. Let him breathe. Right now, you talking is not helping. You understand?”
Mike’s face tightened like he wanted to protest and couldn’t find the right words.
Jonathan turned toward the kitchen without waiting. He poured hot water, made tea the way Joyce made tea—like ritual, like care made physical.
Mike lingered behind him like he didn’t know where to put his hands, like standing still might be the only way not to break something, helpless.
“I’m sorry,” Mike said quietly, like the words hurt. “I just—when I heard him— you—”
“What matters, is him coming down from it. Not you needing answers right this second.”
Mike flinched again. “It matters that I know how to help.”
Jonathan finally looked at him—direct, unblinking. “Then help by not making it harder.”
Mike swallowed hard. “Okay.”
Jonathan carried the mug back down.
Mike followed a step, then stopped at the top of the stairs like there was an invisible line he wasn’t sure he was allowed to cross.
Jonathan didn’t ask him to leave. He didn’t have to.
The boundary was the boundary.
He went down alone.
Will’s hands trembled when Jonathan guided the mug into them. The warmth soaked into his fingers like a slow spell.
“You’re safe,” Jonathan said. “You’re here.”
Will’s mouth did what it always did.
“I’m fine,” he lied.
Jonathan didn’t argue.
He just sat beside him on the floor, shoulder near Will’s, not touching unless Will leaned. Presence without interrogation.
Above them, the house slept.
Holly laughed once in her dreams.
Ted’s snore started and stopped.
Normal noises tried to paper over the truth.
Will stared at the surface of the tea, watching the steam curl and vanish.
The fear didn’t leave.
It waited.
And somewhere in the quiet space between what Will wanted and what he was terrified to say, Vecna pressed—patient, precise—because he didn’t have to invent anything new.
He only had to use what was already there.
End of Chapter 1