Work Text:
November 4, 1993
And you live the best goddamn life you can.
And you live the best goddamn life you can.
Mike Wheeler was not living the best goddamn life he could. He was sure Hopper would be disappointed if he told him the truth about that.
At 22, Mike was still moping around in the Wheeler basement when he wasn’t neurotically running the Hawkins Blockbuster for his manager. He was already starting to get sick of Jurassic Park, and Mike’s movie hyperfixations never died down easily.
It was a crisp night in early November, the streets of Hawkins red like they were under Vecna’s curse, and Mike checked out Dead Poets Society after his shift. He caressed the VHS cover and thought about his best friends, who had all moved on from their hometown long ago.
Hey, Mike. I got the zoology internship in Australia. Isn’t that cool?! That’s over the summer, then it’s off to grad school down south - did I mention I got into Vanderbilt? This son of a bitch is ONE SMART COOKIE!! Oh, and tonight I’m going to a metal concert with some friends. Maybe I’ll see some cute girls - or maybe I’ll just spend the whole night wishing Eddie was there.
Hey Mike. Shadowing in the ER has me exhausted tonight. It’s no shadow walk - I’m basically shadow running - but I think I finally found something I’m passionate about. I might train as a paramedic or go to med school. I just love taking care of people… because I couldn’t do anything to save Max, Patrick, Will, Joshua, all those kids. It feels empowering, knowing I can make a difference. Speaking of differences, tomorrow’s the night I’m finally going to make Max my fiancé! We’ll get dinner and drive around a little and that’s when I’ll do it: when it’s just us in a junkyard, like the moment I realized I was in love with her all those years ago.
Don’t shit your pants, Wheeler. I have big news: I’m gonna be a sports psychologist! I got the job, and work starts next week. Lucas won’t have to do any of the heavy lifting when we pay for the wedding now that I’m employed. I hope you can come to our wedding, Mike. I wonder who you’ll bring.
Hi, Mike! How are you? Are you still writing stories? Life is funny sometimes, how it surprises you in exactly the same way a good campaign does. I never thought I’d be going back out to California, but today I got a job offer in San Francisco. Basically my dream job offer, actually. There’s a whole new world for artists in cloudless California. They’re getting really good at drawing on computers out there. Sounds cool, but I’d love to illustrate books, too, and stay here in New York City. I don’t know…I’m sure I’ll figure it out. My boyfriend - we’ve been together for six months now! - is taking me out to dinner tonight. We’re getting pizza, and I’m gonna ask him what he thinks. I feel so lucky to be with him. He’s obsessed with me!
Still nothing from El at all. Mike had accepted that she was gone, and that even if she did manage to make it out, if she reached out one day, he had to move on without her.
Mike glanced down at the Dead Poets Society VHS. The last movie he and Will had seen together in the summer of 1989. If he had been a little braver that day…
Mike wondered what Will would think now, if he knew the truth.
Hey, Will. I’m getting dinner with Nancy tonight downtown. That’s about it.
Mike was also going to counseling once a week. Max had insisted on it when she first reached out after Mike started college. He’d spent the past few years “unpacking” his “grief, trauma, repressed emotions, and hypervigilant narcissism”, and now, he was at a point where he realized just how much he’d hurt El and Will as a teenager. He wanted to make a change, for himself, but he didn’t know how to start.
The storyteller needed to exit his dark night of the soul, and as he got dressed to see his sister, he could feel that his aha moment was right around the corner.
***
“So,” said Nancy, folding her fingers together on top of the table. “What have you been up to?”
“Work,” said Mike. He glanced at his feet.
Nancy pursed her lips.
“Have you considered applying for a real job? A career career?”
Mike nodded.
“Of course I have, Nance!” he groaned. “But nobody wants me and my English degree. My pursuit of editing gigs in Hawkins looks like it’s gonna be limited to the middle school yearbook.”
“No shit, Sherlock!” Nancy exclaimed.
Mike was taken aback.
“You’re a mess, Michael,” Nancy continued. “A Turnbow-sized big fat hot mess.”
Mike sipped his water, then slugged back his red wine.
Nancy rambled on.
“You look like our deadbeat dad, you mope around in the basement like our deadbeat dad, and you kiss boys when you’re drunk at parties…”
“Nancy!” Mike groaned. His face flushed.
“…but you won’t let yourself kiss a boy sober,” Nancy finished. She’d lowered her voice to a whisper.
“What?!” Mike seethed. “Nancy, you’re being ridiculous.”
“Wheelers lose their self-restraint when they’re drunk,” Nancy muttered with a smirk. “You should know this by now.”
Suddenly afraid of his wine, Mike took the moment of silence to guzzle down his water.
“Look at me,” said Nancy, determination in her eyes. Mike looked up sheepishly.
“Look me dead in the eyes, Mike,” she commanded.
Mike did.
Nancy reached out and plucked Mike’s glasses off his face.
There they were. Her brother’s puppy dog eyes. The ones she’d been dazzled by since she was four years old.
“Where did my baby brother go?” Nancy demanded.
Mike couldn’t meet Nancy’s eyes. She was sounding uncomfortably like his mother.
“Sources are telling me he was abducted by aliens,” said Nancy, with an exasperated tone.
Mike chuckled. He tried to snatch back his glasses, but Nancy was quick to dodge his attempt.
“You are not your father, Mike Wheeler,” Nancy said firmly.
Mike swallowed, nodded.
“You are brave, and loyal, and kind, and dramatic, too fucking dramatic, but never too much, not for anyone who loves you. You’re science-smart like Mom and English-smart like me and quiet when you’re at school but loud when you’re with your friends. You don’t care about the rules, not if they’re getting in between you and someone you love. You’re beautiful, handsome. Better looking than you’ll ever believe you are. But most importantly, you remind me what having a big heart looks like. Because behind your graffitied walls, you have a bigger heart than anybody I know.”
Nancy reached out to touch Mike’s shoulder, but Mike flinched away. She sighed.
“I know what it’s like to lose someone, Mike,” Nancy said. “To lose a friend. To lose someone you loved.”
Mike looked up. He finally made eye contact with his sister again.
“I know it’s easier to distract yourself from the pain and just blend in and be like everyone else because everyone else looks so happy, right?”
Mike nodded.
“You want to do what everyone else is doing because maybe, just maybe, if you do what everyone else does, you can be happy like everyone else, too.”
Yeah, Mike thought to himself. He hung his head.
“But that’s bullshit, Mike,” Nancy continued. “Because the truth is, nobody is happy. Everyone hurts one way or another. If it doesn’t look that way, that’s because they’re pretending. But when you…when you pretend, you just lose who you really are. You become your role in the film you’re acting in. And then one day you wake up, and you realize how goddamn miserable you are because of the choices you made when you weren’t being yourself. And you’re not truly happy because you aren’t truly yourself anymore, and you’ve built a life for yourself that you don’t even want. A bullshit life.”
Nancy’s words pierced Mike, like an arrow to the heart.
“But the good thing is, you still have time,” Nancy finished. “You’re still young. And if you look in the mirror now, you can still change your ways. But I can’t make you make that change, Mike. You have to do it for yourself. Okay?”
Mike nodded, sniffled. He looked Nancy dead in the eyes.
“Okay.”
Nancy laughed.
“First off, you’re in your early twenties,” Nancy said. “You’ve got to stop dressing like you’re having a mid-life crisis.”
Mike laughed weakly.
“I mean it!” Nancy exclaimed. “I would’ve let you get that orange Mohawk if I had foresight because it’s better than…whatever this is.”
Mike groaned. “Nance…”
“Let me fix your hair for you,” Nancy insisted.
She had a playful look in her eyes, so Mike couldn’t say no.
Nancy slid into Mike’s side of the booth and shook the mousse out of Mike’s hair. She fluffed and fluffed, despite Mike’s fidgeting, until his hair wasn’t parted down the side anymore. Then she unbuttoned Mike’s rugby shirt.
“Finally,” Nancy sighed, sliding back into her side of the booth.
“Finally what?!” Mike asked, amused.
Nancy paused for dramatic effect.
“The aliens brought my brother back to me!” she crowed.
Mike and Nancy burst into a fit of giggles for the first time in years, and shortly after, the waitress came with their food.
The pieces all started clicking together in Mike’s head that night. The painting on his wall.
Mike popped in his Purple Rain cassette and grabbed the Oscar Wilde book he was almost finished rereading.
The bookmark he’d been using fell out onto his lap. A folded piece of stationary with rainbows and handwriting that wasn’t his.
It was that letter El had sent him, back when she lived in California.
Mike unfolded the letter.
Will is painting a lot.
Maybe it is for a girl. I think there is someone he likes.
Will is painting a lot, but he won’t show me what he’s working on.
But he won’t show me what he’s working on.
El hadn’t had any idea what the painting was even a painting of.
Maybe she had been lying, keeping it a surprise, but she hadn’t latched onto D&D like the rest of Mike’s friends had.
Besides, Will had told Mike what a commission was: a specific request for a new piece of artwork. He was doing them all the time to make a little money in college, while he applied for a real career.
If El had commissioned the painting, she would know exactly what the painting was about. And she hadn’t brought it up to Mike once, except as something Will made.
Holy shit.
Holy shit.
It was Will who saw Mike as the heart of the party. Will who was scared of losing Mike. Will who believed in Mike’s ability to hold the whole party together.
Will’s feelings were the feelings Mike had fallen in love with on the drive to Nevada.
Will, who had always been everything Mike had ever wanted, even though Mike was just realizing that now.
Holy shit.
Mike was going to call Will himself, but the phone rang before he could press any buttons.
“Hey!”
“Oh, hi, Mike!” Will chirped.
Will was laying on his bed in his New York apartment, fidgeting with his necklace. He had Jaws socks on his feet and the newest R.E.M. cassette playing softly in his stereo.
“What’s up, man?” Mike asked. He sat back in his writer’s chair by his desk. Watched the leaves fall from his window.
Will sighed.
“It didn’t work out again,” said Will. “With boys.”
Mike blinked. “That sucks.”
Will hummed solemnly.
“I liked Evan,” Will continued. “I really did, but…”
“But what?” Mike pressed gently.
“He asked me…he asked me why I never talked about my childhood,” Will explained. “And I didn’t want to lie to him, Mike. I can’t lie to someone and live a happy life with them. Because they deserve to know the truth. Besides, that was your rule, right? Friends don’t lie.”
Mike chuckled. “Yeah. They don’t.”
Mike paused.
“Well then, why couldn’t you tell Evan the truth?”
Will shut his eyes.
“Because he could never understand,” Will confessed. “No one can. Not the way you used to.”
Mike’s heart fluttered. It was a butterfly breaking free of its cocoon.
“So you broke up with him?” Mike asked.
Will nodded, but Mike didn’t see it.
“I told him we both deserve better, and I might be moving anyways, and that was that,” Will said. “I just… ripped off the band-aid. And Evan’s fine, we’re fine, it’s going to be fine. That was September. It’s been a few weeks since then.”
Mike swallowed. He held the phone close to his chest.
“And I think I just called you tonight because, fuck, I miss you, Mike,” Will finished.
“I miss you too, Will,” Mike said.
“Maybe we’ll see each other over the holidays,” said Will. “Lucas and Max told me they might want to go back to Hawkins. We could come down, too, stay with you guys.”
Mike smiled. He thought about sophomore year of high school, when the Byers were bunking with his family.
“That would be cool,” Mike said. “At least with me.”
“Cool,” said Will, and Mike could hear him smiling through the phone.
Mike sighed. He had a lot to think about tonight.
“Good night, Will,” he said, in that soft Will tone still instinctive to Mike.
“Good night, Mike,” Will replied.
Will clicked off his cellular, plugged it into its port. “Everybody Hurts” by R.E.M. started playing on his stereo. Will rolled over on his bed, fidgeted with his necklace.
Will was supposed to be free.
He was happy that he didn’t have to clean up Mike Wheeler’s shit anymore.
Stupid. So stupid.
So yeah, El needs you, Mike. And she always will.
So why was the boy inside of Will still wanting for something he knew he couldn’t have?
Why couldn’t he talk to anyone the way he could talk to Mike? Mike made it so easy for Will to talk to him, to be with him.
Why was Will still yearning for a love that had come and gone? A love that never was and never would be? What made him think Mike could ever come back around?
Something had to be possessing him. That hadn’t happened in years.
To win Will Byers’ heart, you had to romance him, to walk inside his hopeless-romantic Adidas. You had to be charming, use your nerdy interests and sensitive side to cut to his heart, and then you had to ask him out on a date. Because Will Byers didn’t do casual flings. If Will wanted you, he wanted you for the rest of our lives.
So Mike picked a few yellow wildflowers and thought about all the ways he might sweep Will off his feet.
On Friday morning, Mike drove downtown to the barber shop and asked for a haircut. With his hair washed, conditioned, and styled, no ridiculous side part to be found, and his bag in the back, he drove to Indianapolis, blasting Butthole Surfers the whole way west.
At the airport, he asked for the next available flight to New York City.
Will was in his favorite bar, Conformity, trying to forget about dating, to forget how shitty and difficult finding other gay guys he liked was. It was Friday night, and he was supposed to be having fun. He was trying to talk to his friends, about their plans for the holidays, how he and Jonathan would drive down to Montauk for Thanksgiving to share a turkey with their mom and Hopper, how Jonathan would put on a Swing Set cassette and it would be just like when he was a kid. Will thought about not drinking anymore tonight, ordering some popcorn, and playing the table Pac-Man by himself, how it would be just like the Hawkins arcade, but without his best friends.
Will went to order the popcorn, but then “Linger” by The Cranberries started playing, and Will spotted the boy of his dreams and nightmares across the bar.
Mike fucking Wheeler.
Giving the bartender’s shoulder a squeeze and laughing with him, which meant 1. Mike wasn’t homophobic, that’s not why he became less touchy with Will, and 2. Mike was here, he knew about this gay bar, and since Will had never told him the address or the name, that meant he must be here to find other gay guys.
Will could hear his friends gossiping about him in his peripheral.
“Look at Byers. He’s gone.”
“He’s found his next snack.”
“Final girl found his next victim.”
“Snack? Victim? You mean the next boy whose world is about to be rocked by Will and his hopelessly romantic heart!”
“Evan was cooler. This guy’s a scrawny dork.”
“Let Will have his little kiki!”
This Mike Wheeler wasn’t the dweeby loser who wore vampire fangs that Will left in Hawkins. This Mike had cute glasses and fluffy hair that didn’t look like his dad’s and a wool sweater, the kind he wore when they were younger. He had a smile on his face and the light in his eyes was back and he had a few colorful wildflowers from Hawkins in the pocket of his black jeans.
Will knew he shouldn’t catch feelings, not for Mike, who had broken his heart over and over again. But it was too late. His tummy was already turning, heart racing, legs wobbling. He was five years old all over again.
Of course Will made his way across the bar to Mike. He was drawn to Mike Wheeler like they were opposite magnetic poles.
“Hi,” Will breathed.
Mike brushed popcorn dust off his pants. He had painted his bitten nails black, Will noticed. Will sat down next to him, and Mike brushed Will’s knee.
“Oh. Hey.”
Mike looked Will up and down, eagerly, like a puppy dog. Goddammit, the puppy-dog shtick was part of Mike’s charm.
“You look great, Will,” Mike rambled. His brown eyes were bright, as if there were LED lightbulbs behind them.
“So do you,” said Will half-heartedly, sitting down on the barstool beside Mike.
“No, I’m serious,” Mike continued. He bumped Will’s elbows, caressed them. “Your bangs, your gold earrings, your eyeliner - I mean, you’re getting better than me! - your leather jacket, your Vans, it’s just - wow. You’re like, a level 19 Will The Wise.”
Mike was flirting with him. Mike Wheeler was flirting with Will and giving him signals and flirting in the unbearably nerdy way he flirts and it didn’t make any sense to Will.
Will crossed his arms over his chest.
“What are you doing here, Mike?”
Mike paused. He reached over and put his foot on top of Will’s.
“I was hoping- maybe we could spend the weekend together?” Mike asked sheepishly.
Will stared at Mike blankly. Inside, Will’s heart was stirring. One look at Mike Wheeler’s puppy-dog eyes and he was a kid falling in love with those eyes all over again. Don’t keep giving yourself false hope, Will told himself. It’s no use.
Mike Wheeler is a dipshit and an asshole. He isn’t like you at all.
Mike rambled on. “I don’t know, I just- I miss us.”
He paused.
“I miss what we used to have. Don’t you?”
Nip it in the bud before he can.
“We’re friends, Mike,” Will snapped. “Best friends.”
Before Mike could respond, Will slid off his barstool and walked away.
“I have to go to the bathroom,” Will declared. He made a point out of elbowing Mike on his way to the sticker-coated wooden doors in the back of the bar.
The strobe lights on the dance floor were throbbing. “What’s Up?” by 4 Non Blondes remixed to a Eurodance beat was pulsing pink and brown.
Mike knew he had to follow Will - it was now or never. He grabbed Will by the wrist.
“Well, I want to be more than best friends,” he declared.
Will turned around, a forlorn expression on his face.
“You can’t just use me to replace Jane, Mike,” Will sighed.
“But-“
“I know I look like her, but I’m not her, and you can’t have me if I’m just going to be second to her in your mind forever. I’m done with that shit, Mike. I’m done with that shit.”
Will turned and walked away. But fuck, Mike wasn’t going to give up that easily. He was going to charm the sorcerer who’d bewitched him heart, body, and soul if it was the last thing he did.
“It was never about El!” Mike shouted.
That got Will’s attention.
“I loved El, of course I did,” Mike continued. “But I fell in love with you, Will.”
Will’s heart tumbled, repetitive, perfect backflips, like a gymnast on the uneven bars.
“I don’t think I follow,” he said.
“The painting,” said Mike. “El never commissioned it.”
Will’s hands dropped to his side. He stepped closer to Mike.
“That day, in the van… that’s when I fell in love for the first time,” Mike explained. “I fell in love with everything you told me, and I thought it was El who… saw me as the heart of the party. And I thought, for some reason, Jesus, I wish it was Will who was giving me this beautiful painting, from his heart, just for me, like his butcher paper paintings from kindergarten. And I thought Jesus, why can’t I just love El when she loved me so much. But it was you, Will. It was always you.”
Tears rolled down Will’s cheeks. Mike was telling Will everything he had ever wanted to hear, and the part of Will that had shouldered every one of Mike’s burdens, plus the thousands of his own burdens, only to get his heart broken, cast as the role of friend in Mike’s life, didn’t want to believe Mike. But another part of him did. The lights were pulsing every color of the rainbow and the kid inside Will who wore hand-me-down flannels and a homemade wizard’s hat wanted to believe that Michael Theodore Wheeler was finally confessing his feelings to him.
“Yeah?” said Will weakly.
“Yeah,” Mike replied.
Will sighed. Crossed his arms.
”Well, I’m flattered, Mike,” said Will in that snarky deadpan way of his.
Mike stood there, mouth agape, stunned, and Will started walking away towards the dance floor. Mike composed himself.
“Do you wanna go on a date?” Mike asked.
Will froze.
Do you wanna be friends?
And goddammit, Mike Wheeler had wormed his way back into Will’s heart with that line.
Will brushed Mike’s shoulder.
“Mike-“ he started.
“The paladin wishes to break this slow spell over him and Will The Wise,” Mike said softly. “The Philter of Love he drank with the Mage has worn off. He remembers that he has a divine bond with his sorcerer-cleric. The paladin knows he has broken his oath, and he must ask the innately powerful cleric for absolution. So they can break the slow spell together.”
Mike reached into his pocket, pulled out his little bouquet of yellow flowers, and handed them to Will.
Will accepted them. He was grinning, but his eyes were wet with tears.
“Sir Michael casts a love charm on Will The Wise,” Mike continued. “He asks the sorcerer to kindly join him in Central Park tomorrow for biking or roller skating and maybe a movie afterwards.”
Will blinked. Mike took Will’s hand and kissed it gently in that dorky way of his.
Will rolled his eyes. “Of course I’ll go on a date with you, Sir Michael!”
Mike grabbed both of Will’s hands. His eyes were alight.
“Really?”
Will pressed a hand to Mike’s chest, as if to stop him.
“ONLY if you take responsibility for all of your fuckups,” Will commanded.
Mike nodded vigorously.
“And you talk to your mom and sisters and Hop and a counselor about your issues instead of dumping them all on me.”
“Yes, of course-“
“-AND you take me out on more dates,” Will continued. “We don’t just make out.”
“Agreed,” said Mike. “Making out is overrated.”
“Yeah.”
Will paused.
“And you pay at least half of the time, even though you’re broke so it’s hard,” said Will. “You might want to get a real grown-up job.”
“Okay, fine!” Mike laughed.
A comfortable silence settled between the boys.
“So…”
“I have one more condition, Michael,” Will said firmly.
Mike looked up at Will expectantly. Will had that effect on Mike; he made Mike wise up, want to be better.
“Tell me,” said Mike. “Tell me.”
Will sighed.
“You understand that I can leave you at any time,” Will said. “And if you fuck up hard enough, I will leave. You will lose me. And this time, it’ll be for good. Forever. No apologies accepted.”
Mike’s Adam’s apple bobbed up and down. He broke eye contact with Will.
“You’re gonna have to work hard to keep me, but since we both want this, I’m in. Cool?”
“Cool.”
Will let out an exhale, a freeing one.
“Then I guess Will the Wise grants Sir Michael absolution,” Will said. He didn’t bother to hide the smile on his face.
Will extended his hand, and Mike shook it. Then Mike took Will by surprise and twirled him around to the beat of the DJ’s remix of “Friday I’m In Love”. Will raised their joined hands and twirled Mike around, too. At least he tried, because Mike was tall and all lanky limbs.
When they broke apart, Will looked around. Everyone was cheering and dancing around him. The bar felt too noisy, as it tended to feel for Will after a while.
“Wanna…talk somewhere else?” Will asked.
“Sure,” Mike said.
“I have a favorite diner me and my friends like to hit up when we’re hung over,” said Will. “Bars suck anyways. Best part of the night is going home.”
So they left Conformity, holding hands so as not to lose each other in the crowd. Once Will dragged Mike onto the busy streets of New York, he dropped Mike’s hand, and they were walking side by side.
“Oh my god,” Will laughed. “Oh my fucking god. Mike.”
A smile escaped Mike’s lips.
“What?”
“You came all the way here,” Will gushed. “To New York City, to my favorite bar, just to ask me out on a date?”
Mike blushed.
“I want you in my life, Will,” he confessed. “I-I want you in my life because you make me a better Mike and I want to live the best goddamn life I can. And I know I hurt you in the past, and I don’t blame you if you don’t want this, but I will spend every day of the rest of my life doing my best to make you happy, Will. I’ll prove to you that I want you. Because losing you again… that would kill me.”
Will shot Mike a wet smile.
“You’re lucky I want you in my life too, Michael,” said Will.
“Seems like a pretty cool life,” Mike mused. “You and your friends going out every week all dressed up like cartoons-“
Will gasped playfully. He pinched Mike’s forearm.
“Asshole!” he crowed.
“I’m serious!” Mike laughed. His voice softened in the way it always did for Will. “I’d love to try it sometime.”
“Yeah?”
“Yeah.”
Mike and Will crossed the street. Mike’s eyes darted to Will’s lips every other second as they made their way to the diner. Will noticed, and his face went red with blush.
On the dark corner of an avenue, Mike paused.
“Can I- can I kiss you?” he blurted out.
Will nodded. “Yeah.”
Mike pulled Will in by his jacket, and Will wrapped his arms around Mike’s neck, and they locked lips, and Will was home. Home. Home.
It was everything he’d been waiting for since he was twelve. Since before he could read.
As for Mike, he had found his happy ending. With Will. It has always been with Will. Even better, because Mike had written it himself. He’d finally been brave enough to let himself be happy.
Mike and Will pulled apart. Laughs escaped their breaths.
Words that they didn’t have to say hung in the air: I love you, I love you, I love you.
Mike looked up at Will and smiled. He reached up and messed with Will’s curtain bangs until he recognized his best friend.
There he is, thought Mike. My Will.
“You know, I like your new bangs,” said Mike. “But I like your hair when it looks like you, too.”
Will laughed. “Yeah?”
“Yeah. You would look good with three piercings, by the way.”
“Michael!”
When they stumbled into the diner, Mike glanced at Will.
“Milkshakes on me!” Mike crowed.
Will shook his head. “No, it’s fine, Mike, I can-“
Mike cut Will off. “You didn’t get one at Rink-O-Mania, remember? Spring break? ‘86? When I went to order, I forgot to ask you what milkshake you wanted.”
Will snorted, smiled. “It’s fine.”
“They tasted like shit anyway,” said Mike.
“Yeah?”
“Yeah.”
Will ordered a strawberry milkshake and Mike got a vanilla one. An old croon tune played on the jukebox:
Seems like old times
Having you to walk with
Seems like old times
Having you to talk with
And it's still a thrill, just to have my arms around you
Still the thrill, that it was the day I found you
They slid into a booth and they sat beside each other, on the same side, and Mike put his arm around Will’s waist to pull Will closer, and Will thought it was the best thing in the world to sit on the same side of a booth with the boy he loved because he had never done that with any of his dates or boyfriends before.
Mike and Will talked there for so long, they didn’t know when the night ended and the morning began.
On November 6, 1993, Mike Wheeler surprised Will Byers with tickets to opening night of a new Broadway show called Cyrano: The Musical while they were on their first date in Central Park.
Mike then asked Will if he wanted to be his boyfriend.
And Will said yes.
Will said yes.
It was the best thing both Will and Mike have ever done.