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Screams and flashing lights overwhelm Will’s senses as they’re dragged out of the truck.
Everyone is panicking as they’re running from or getting dragged by the military in all different directions. He loses sight of his mother first and then his brother. Even though Mike isn’t in his line of sight, Will hears him over everyone else.
Will would recognize Mike’s voice in any dimension.
Everyone is forced up against the truck, machine guns pointed at their backs. Running isn’t an option; not if they don’t want to end up as Swiss cheese. Will’s palms are flat against it, looking around to make sure that his friends are okay.
That’s when he sees it.
“Jane,” he breathes.
No one has noticed yet. His sister is standing at the gate between their world and the Upside Down with a pained expression on her face. She locks eyes with Will and gives him a deeply apologetic look.
No, Will thinks. Not like this.
“JANE!”
That’s Hopper. His bellow rips through the MAC-Z, momentarily quieting the noise as everyone turns to see what is happening. Then, pandemonium.
Several people try running toward Jane with no success. They are outnumbered, but there is also so much confusion and panic. The kind of panic that makes you feel weak and rooted to the spot when what you really want is to draw every last bit of inner strength.
The good news is, Will knows all about inner strength. He also knows how to use perceived weaknesses to his advantage.
He lets out a scream and falls to the ground. There’s movement around him as the guards start shouting nonsense, not sure what to do as he writhes and yells in agony.
“Will!”
He isn’t sure who shouts it, but there’s more than one voice calling his name.
“He needs help!”
Mike. That voice belongs to Mike. He just hopes that Mike doesn’t hate him for what Will is about to do next. His eyes open a fraction, checking to see who is around him. Will notices fewer people are there than before.
Now, or never.
Will bolts to his feet. Before anyone can register what’s happening, he takes off at a flying run toward the gate. He almost doesn’t make it, too. Will hears a shout and feels a hand clamping down on his hoodie, until …
Nothingness.
Will lands on his hands and knees. The “ground” in The Void splashes around him. He gasps and looks up in surprise. That’s when he sees Jane in the distance and starts running toward her in a blind panic.
“Don’t do this,” Will begs as he gets closer. His sister meets him halfway with tears in her eyes. “This isn’t how it’s supposed to end. This isn’t right.”
“I have to Will,” Jane says, voice thick with emotion. “It’s the only way.”
“That’s bullshit,” Will says. He ignores how she flinches and squeezes her shoulders. “Killing yourself isn’t a solution.”
“I’m not … That’s not what this is,” Jane says. It’s not just her eyes that are full of pain now. Every part of her seems to carry it. An unspoken, unacknowledged burden. “It’s a sacrifice.”
“It’s a pattern.” Jane stares at him. “You’ve been told your whole life you’re only good for two things: what you can do and who you can be for other people. Labeling this as noble doesn’t mean it is. It doesn’t end the abuse.”
“They will continue to hunt me,” Jane says, severely. She wipes under eyes and focuses intently on him. “You know this. It will put everyone in danger. I won’t let them hurt anyone else.”
“I need you …” Jane releases a shuddery breath. Imploringly, she continues, “I need you to help the others understand my choice.”
“I can’t do that.”
“Will,” Jane begs. “I know it doesn’t make sense right now —”
“You’re wrong.”
“Wh-What?”
“You’re wrong,” Will says, matter-of-factly. “Being here … seeing you standing on the edge of a decision you can’t come back from …” Will gives her a heart-wrenching look. “I’ve felt a version of what you’re feeling right now.”
Jane sucks in a harsh breath, which tells Will that she does understand. She knows reframing her suicide mission as a “sacrifice” is the one thing that can make it slightly, but not completely, more palatable for their friends and family.
For everyone watching.
“In Lenora?” Jane asks. Will raises his eyebrows. “You were … so quiet. Withdrawn.”
“It was bad then,” Will confesses. “But those feelings built up for years. To the point where it felt like I couldn’t hear my own voice anymore. All I could hear was my father’s or people at school or all the people around Hawkins who never stopped calling me Zombie Boy.”
“They lie,” Jane says, fervently.
“So does this one.”
Will presses a finger to his sister’s temple. She closes her eyes, but not before a tear falls.
“Don’t …” Will’s voice cracks. “Don’t let them turn you into a statistic.”
Eyes still closed, Jane whispers:
“A, what?”
Will tries to swallow the lump in his throat.
“A number.” Jane’s eyes snap open. “Brenner did that to you once. Kay can try all she wants to do it again, but she’s a pale imitation. Once you escaped that lab, you broke their hold over you. You stopped being ‘Eleven’ and became your own person. Someone who loves and hates and hurts and has dreams.”
“Dreams,” Jane whispers. It’s more to herself than to Will. “What should I be dreaming?”
“That’s the best part,” Will insists. “It can be anything. The more you live and see new things, the more there is to imagine for yourself.”
“I …” Jane clears her throat. “I used to dream about having a family.” She reaches down and squeezes his hands. “I had that. I never thanked them all.”
“You have that,” Will corrects. “And there’s plenty of time to thank us, even though we’ll all say the same thing: We were lucky to find you. Please don’t make us say goodbye.”
“I didn’t …” Jane releases a shuddery breath. “I didn’t bring you in here to make me feel guilty.”
Will opens his mouth to respond, but Jane presses onward.
“I know me being gone will hurt you and Jonathan,” Jane says. “I know that my dad has already lost one daughter, and he and Joyce deserve to be happy. Not picking up the pieces.”
“And Mike.” Jane sniffs before blinking several times. “We may not be … us … not like we were, but I know him. I know he will blame himself for making the bomb. He will believe he killed me.”
“I’m not asking you to live to prove him wrong,” Will says. These next words matter. “Living for anyone else isn’t enough.”
“But I thought …”
“We need you to survive,” Will says, simply. “But you need to want to live for yourself. For all of the better days, because there will be better days. Take it from someone who’s walked through his own share of rain showers.”
Will never grew up religious by any stretch, but he prays to whomever might be listening that his words reach Jane. That his sister doesn’t reject them or, worse, ignore them.
Will has never liked football either, but he recognizes a Hail Mary pass when he sees one.
“You brought me home. Twice.” Deep, brown eyes meet hazel ones. “It’s my turn.”
There it is. The shift behind Jane’s eyes. She hugs him tight, which he immediately reciprocates. Will’s heart feels like it might burst out of his throat.
“Okay.” Will tenses in the embrace. “I will come home.”
He pulls back, not quite letting go of her.
“You promise?” Will checks. Warily, he adds, “Swear on something that matters.”
Without missing a beat, Jane replies:
“Us.” Then, “Our family.”
***
Will flies up and backwards, blinking as the MAC-Z re-materializes around him.
“Let him go!” he hears several voices shout. “Let him —!”
Will’s head whips around toward the gate.
It’s empty.
Where’d she go? Will thinks, desperately. Where …?
“She’s getting away!” Dr. Kay shouts. “Get —!”
She never gets the opportunity to finish her order. Not before the sound of a new SWAT team arriving fills their ears. A SWAT team led by none other than …
“Dr. Owens?”
It’s Will’s mother who says it, disbelievingly, from somewhere nearby. Will is stunned, himself, not sure how the doctor’s timing was that impeccable or who even called him. All he knows is that Owens has Jane by his side. That, and they’re flanked by their own armed guards.
“Your rank is impressive, Major General,” Owens says, dryly. “But it only extends so far.”
“Shouldn’t you be dead?” Hopper shouts.
Wryly, Owens replies:
“Eleventh-hour surprise.” Glancing at Jane, he adds, “If you’ll excuse the pun.”
She stares back at him, unmoved.
“Can you protect us?” Jane asks. “For real, this time?”
Owens’ expression shifts. Straightening his back and squaring his shoulders, he nods resolutely before glancing at the gate to the Upside Down. Everyone’s eyes drift there as well, watching as there’s a blinding flash of light. Debris starts flying on the other side of the gate.
Faster and faster, and then …
A terrible noise. Not unlike the sound of a train screeching on tracks. The wind picks up quicker and quicker on the other side of the portal and …
Silence.
***
True to his word, Owens eventually gives Jane the ultimate gift.
A normal life.
“It’s all gone?” Dustin says. “All of it?”
The six teenagers are sitting in the Wheelers’ basement. Incidentally, the one part of the house that didn’t need any restoration after the Demogorgon attack. Will thinks that is oddly symbolic, especially since darkness touched every other corner of their childhood or adolescence.
Just not here. Not the place where they found a way to understand the stakes.
Where he and his friends feel safest.
“All of it,” Jane confirms. She gives him a playful smile. “Don’t ask me to levitate anything.”
Mike and Lucas look from Jane to Dustin, grinning at the embarrassed look on their friend’s face. Will and Max exchange uncomprehending looks.
“Don’t bring that up,” Dustin groans. “That Millennium Falcon was a fair test.”
“Did it feel weird?” Max interjects. Jane looks at her. “Being an …”
Max suddenly looks uncomfortable. Jane tilts her head, recognition dawning on her face.
“Experiment?” Jane clarifies. Max looks apologetic. “No. I gave him permission.”
Will locks eyes with his sister. He offers her a proud smile that she returns.
Owens did come through for Jane, but it wasn’t simple or painless. In the almost two years since she last saw him for The Nina Project, Owens was hard at work on a new assignment. One that he saw a need for, even if it put his own life and career at risk.
Owens wasn’t even sure if Jane would agree to it.
In short, Owens explained to their family that what he was proposing wasn’t much different from intraoperative blood salvage. That process, he had said, was a technique used to collect, wash, filter, and reinfuse a patient’s own blood.
It is typically done when blood is lost during surgery, reducing a need for donor blood while also minimizing transfusion risks.
“I’m convinced that it will continue growing in popularity as we leave this decade and enter the next,” Owens says. “Especially if it means minimizing a widespread fear surrounding a certain acquired immunodeficiency disorder.”
That hardly filled Will with hope. If anything, he mostly felt foreboding. But he chose not to focus on that remark when there were more immediate concerns on all of their minds.
“Is. It. Safe?”
That comes from Hopper. Before Owens can answer, Will’s mother asks:
“Have you tested it on anyone before?” She gives Owens a searching look. “Humans?”
“The general process is extremely safe,” Owens replies. That doesn’t inspire reassurance. “But I don’t exactly have people lining up, like Eleven, who possess —”
“Jane,” Will says, sharply. Owens pauses. “Her name is Jane.”
He feels a hand squeeze his shoulder. Looking to his right, he glances down slightly and sees Jane is looking directly at the doctor.
“Did Papa tell you?” Jane asks. Owens waits. “That he infected people with Henry’s blood?”
“Not explicitly,” Owens says. “But I never quite believed that exposure to drug experiments could result in this degree of … otherworldly power. I suspected it ran, literally, through your veins. Not simply a result of chemical testing conducted on your mother.”
“Why did you work on this?” Jane asks next. “Why are you helping me now?”
“Because you did your part, and then some,” Owens says, pragmatically. “You saved the world, and it very nearly cost you your life.”
Jane grips Will’s shoulder tighter. He places his own hand over hers and squeezes it.
Owen’s next words are as profound as they are true.
“It’s time you get to live it.”
“Do you miss them?” Lucas asks. “The powers.”
Jane shrugs, leaning back against the couch.
“I notice their absence more than I miss them. Does that make sense?”
Will and Max nod, but he sees uncertainty on the other three boys’ faces. Jane looks to him for assistance, and Will is more than happy to oblige.
“When this thing … anything,” Will clarifies, “defines you and how you understand yourself, it …”
Now it’s his turn to struggle for the right words.
“Takes up oxygen?” Max finishes. The siblings look at her. “Now it’s like you can breathe?”
“Yes,” Jane exhales, unintentionally emphasizing Max’s point. “So much of my powers involved me hurting people or fighting for our survival.”
“I don’t want to do that anymore,” she continues. “I don’t want to give the military or the government other ways to hurt people.”
Resignedly, Dustin says, “They’ll find new ways.”
Jane nods, unperturbed.
“Not with mine or Henry’s blood.”
“Are we ever gonna talk about it?” Mike interjects. “What Will stopped you from doing?”
“Mike,” Will says, sharply.
“I’m okay, Will.”
Will looks at Jane, but her eyes are fixed on Mike.
“I know I hurt all of you. Not just by almost …” She swallows. “Killing myself.” Dustin and Lucas flinch while Max’s eyes get glassy. Mike remains stoic. “I lied about the plan. The one thing that we are never supposed to do.”
Friends don’t lie.
“I don’t understand how you could’ve gone through with that,” Mike says. “How you could have made that choice. You were there. Standing on the edge, almost gone forever.”
“So were you.”
Mike’s eyes widen, not just in disbelief but with sheer confusion.
“What are you talking about?” Mike demands. “I wasn’t anywhere near —”
“Not last November,” Jane interrupts. “You stepped off the cliff. For a friend.”
Will watches as the color drains from Mike’s face. Lucas and Max exchange a look of confusion, but when Will turns to look at the final member of their group …
“Dustin?” Will says, warily. “What is it? What’s wrong?”
Unlike Mike, who looks as though there is no blood left in his face, Dustin looks faintly green. A look passes between the two of them, which causes Max to snap.
“Will someone explain what the hell is going on?” Max demands.
Dustin opens his mouth, but no words leave it. He looks helplessly at Mike.
“You never told them?”
Jane’s voice is quiet.
“To do, what? Upset them?” Mike hisses. “I was twelve. I was scared. I didn’t see any other way to prevent those assholes from hurting Dustin.”
“I know,” Jane says, pointedly. “I understand.”
Will watches as Mike’s shoulders sag. He leans forward, covering his eyes with his right palm.
“It was those assholes. Troy and James.”
Mike’s voice is barely above a whisper. Just loud enough to hear over the hum of the heating that keeps the basement comfortable on a cold, February night. The rest of the Party doesn’t speak as they wait for him to continue.
“He tracked us down after he pissed himself in front of the whole school,” Mike says. “He wanted revenge and chased me and Dustin to the quarry.”
You stepped off the cliff. For a friend.
There’s the ringing again. The one that Will heard in the MAC-Z, cut through only by Mike’s voice in the distance. He doesn’t want to hear more despite knowing that they need to hear whatever Mike is about to tell them.
Some things shouldn’t be left up to interpretation.
“Troy grabbed Dustin and had a knife. He wanted to know how we made him piss himself,” Mike says. His hand hasn’t left his face. He hasn’t even moved an inch. “When Dustin told him about El — Jane’s powers, he didn’t believe him.”
“He said he’d cut out my teeth unless Mike jumped.” All of them, except for Mike, look at Dustin. There are tears shining in his eyes. “I … I begged him not to do it. He jumped on ‘one.’”
Will rises from his chair and paces to the other side of the basement. He isn’t sure if the others keep talking. All he knows is that his chest rises and falls, and it feels as if his lungs are on fire. Like he might never draw another breath of air for as long as he lives.
At this rate, it feels like he might not live past this reckoning.
Timidly, a voice calls out:
“Will?”
Mike.
There’s a pained noise, which Will only realizes retroactively came from him.
“Will, I …”
Will lets out a grunt and holds out a hand, silently begging Mike not to finish his thought.
“Just … give me a minute,” Will rasps.
The irony isn’t lost on Will. It doesn’t escape his notice whatsoever that Mike, the person that he fought hardest to return from the Upside Down to, almost wasn’t there anymore. It hurts to even consider the possibility now, but it would have destroyed that younger version of Will.
Will has loved Mike for most of his life. Long before he had a name for it or was willing to accept the absolute truth of it. Loving Mike was like breathing, and he is still deeply entrenched in those feelings. How could he not be?
It’s Mike.
“Keep going.” Will’s back is facing the others. “I’m listening.”
“He didn’t even fall halfway down,” Dustin manages to say. “We ran over to the edge, and he was just floating there. Like he was mid-belly-flop.”
Will’s face twists at the cavalier description. His head shakes minutely and tries to focus.
“It wasn’t until after he was pulled back up and landed on the ground that we saw it,” Dustin continues. “Jane, walking toward us, with her nose bleeding. Then, she broke Troy’s arm.”
Will places a hand on a nearby shelf, using it to support most of his body weight. His arm trembles from the effort, but he’s trying to redirect everything that he feels right now. How painfully his jaw aches from holding back tears of grief and anger.
Grief at what the bullies drove Mike to do. Anger at those same bullies, but also a rage at how matter-of-factly the whole situation was laid out for them. Like any part of it is normal. Mike did not know that Jane would be there to save him.
He went through with it.
“Was this when I went off on my own to search for Will?” Lucas asks.
No one responds, so Will assumes that Mike or Dustin nodded.
“There.” Mike’s voice sounds wrecked. “Are you happy now?”
“Don’t talk to her that way,” Max snaps before anyone else can respond.
“Don’t tell me how to —”
“ENOUGH.” The basement goes quiet. Jane releases a breath. “Just stop it.”
“I didn’t bring this up to hurt you. Or anyone,” Jane continues. “You asked me how I made that choice. That story demonstrates that you understand, even if you refuse to see it. Anyone can be pushed far enough if they think they are protecting someone or the people they love.”
“If we are lucky …” Jane sighs again. “Someone is there to pull us back from the edge. I pulled you back, and I am so glad I could. Just like I am grateful Will reached out to me.”
Will turns around. He looks at Jane, but he can barely see her through his blurred vision.
“So grateful,” she emphasizes.
Will presses the heels of his palms hard into his eyes.
“You spoke to one another?” Max whispers. “In The Void?”
“Yes,” Jane confirms. “Unless Will shares it, the conversation will stay between us.”
There’s a tug in Will’s chest.
It’s different from how Will has always felt when Jonathan protects him, but it’s as close to that sensation as anyone has gotten before. Maybe it’s because Will knows Jane isn’t protective of him and his feelings out of any sense of duty.
Jane isn’t older than him. She hasn’t seen him go through all the stages of life. She isn’t attuned to the grief and trauma of the Byers brothers’ childhoods. Not even a little bit.
But she has her own trauma. She’s finally beginning to confront her demons, and it takes time. The one thing that she never had the luxury of before November of 1987. The two siblings are more alike than most people realize, or will ever understand, and that’s fine. Will knows how to reach Jane when the situation calls for it most.
Just like Jane has proven, more than once, that she can reach Will.
“We should get going before it gets later,” Lucas tells Max, who nods in agreement.
“Are you still sleeping over?” Max asks.
Jane nods wordlessly, lifting herself from the sofa.
“I gotta get going, too,” Dustin says next. “Harrington’s working on a new cover letter for some job and wants me to proofread the draft.”
“Not Robin?” Max says, conversationally. “Aren’t they, like, a package deal?”
“Not this time, apparently.”
“Will?”
The brunette looks over toward the group, immediately finding Mike’s eyes.
Like there was ever any doubt.
“Can you stay?” Mike asks. Quickly, he adds, “To talk?”
Will finds himself nodding, lowering his gaze as the others start gathering their belongings. They start trickling out, one-by-one, voices low to match the somber tone left behind by the story. The only person who stops near Will on the way out is his sister.
She opens her arms, and he accepts the hug.
“Sorry,” Will murmurs in her ear.
“Why?”
“I … I made that about me back there.”
Jane pulls back. Her hands are firm on his biceps as she looks him square in the eye. It’s truly spooky how much she resembles his mother. Then, she leans forward to whisper in Will’s ear.
“You love him.” Will tenses. “Don’t push him away.”
Will opens his mouth to respond — how, he doesn’t know — but Jane’s hands fall back to her sides. She glances once more at her former boyfriend before walking up the stairs after Max.
Then, there were two.
***
“Here.”
Will blinks and looks up in surprise. Mike had followed the others upstairs to lock the front door after they left. Now, in his hand, is a glass of water and two ibuprofen.
“You always get a headache after crying,” Mike explains when Will stares at the proffered items. “This should help.”
Quietly, Will accepts both and says, “Thanks.”
Once he swallows the pills, he looks at Mike. The other teen still stands there and looks out of place in his own basement. Will barely resists the urge to sigh. He slides over so that Mike can sit beside him on the sofa.
Mike does sit, but he still looks uneasy.
“I can go,” Will offers.
“No,” Mike says, hastily. “Sorry, I … I do want to talk. I just don’t know what to say.”
“Me neither,” Will replies. His eyes burn in the corners. “I hate that fucking quarry.”
He feels Mike’s gaze on him. When he looks, he sees some surprise on Mike’s face. Eventually, the other teen nods in agreement.
“It’s where we thought we lost you.” Mike suddenly shakes his head. “I thought I lost you.”
“You kept looking,” Will points out. “They didn’t trick you.”
“At first, they did.” Mike tugs at his cuticles. “And … even when we kept looking, it was all I could think about as I looked down there. How, if somehow we were wrong about everything, maybe it would be the last thing that linked us.”
The cuticles are starting to bleed, which makes Will’s next move instinctive. He reaches out and takes Mike’s left hand so that it cannot abuse his right one anymore. Will is about to set it down beside Mike’s leg and release it when Mike flips it so that his palm faces upward.
There’s a mutually soft but distinct intake of breath as Mike intwines their fingers.
“I’m right here,” Will reminds him.
“I know.” Mike’s thumb grazes the back of Will’s hand. “It’s the only reason I still am.”
Will is about to protest when Mike clarifies his previous words.
“You saved my life,” Mike says. “From the Demogorgon in the MAC-Z.”
“That’s … only partly true.” Will’s mouth suddenly feels dry. “None of this would’ve been possible if you hadn’t asked if I wanted to be friends that day.”
“And you said, ‘Yes.’”
Chuckling slightly, Will replies, “Pretty sure I just nodded. I don’t remember a lot, but I remember it took a while before I felt comfortable talking to anyone. Even my best friend.”
“I understood,” Mike says, perhaps not appreciating the layers of that statement.
The pressure of his palm against Will’s is grounding, but it also makes Will feel sort of …
“If we’re both going crazy, then we’ll go crazy together, right?”
“Yeah,” Will chuckles, eyes shining bright. “Crazy together.”
“You said you thought about me while you were up there,” Will says, cautiously. Mike nods. “You need to know, Jane was thinking of all of us.” Mike looks intently at him. “Before she got out, she knew what the fall-out would be. Including how it would make you feel like you making the bomb would be the reason she’s dead.”
Candidly, Mike replies, “I don’t know if that helps or makes it worse.”
“Maybe neither. It contextualizes,” Will offers. “This wasn’t … She didn’t reach that point lightly, but that’s the point. No one ever does. That’s why we need to be there for each other, before it gets that bad.”
“I didn’t even see it.” Mike shakes his head, but his hand stays wrapped around Will’s. “I’ve had so many blindspots, and I didn’t have a damn clue.”
“Do you think we know everything going on in your head?” Will challenges him.
“I …” Mike falters.
He looks down at their hands. That’s an answer, as far as Will is concerned.
“I had no idea about what you told us tonight or how it affected you,” Will says. “And you were right about one thing. It was always going to hurt. Just the thought of coming back to a world with no Mike Wheeler … is the worst idea imaginable. Even with you right here, right now.”
“Can I ask you something?” Will asks next. Mike nods, looking slightly faint. “Is it just that you didn’t want to hurt us? Or did you convince yourself that it would matter less since you were protecting Dustin? That we’d’ve all done the same.”
“You would have,” Mike insists.
“That’s not an answer.”
“I … I don’t know,” Mike says, frustrated. “There wasn’t time to think, so I acted. It didn’t feel brave. It felt like the only thing left to do. I …” His voice catches. “Everything was so bad. I’d failed. I couldn’t find you, I took it out on Jane, Lucas wasn’t talking to me. And I keep failing, and … and …”
Will doesn’t let go of Mike’s hand as he pulls him into a tight embrace. He hears Mike’s breath rattle as Mike buries his face in Will’s neck. Will rubs gentle, calming circles into the younger teen’s back. It takes a little while, but it eventually seems to have an effect.
“It matters,” Will whispers. “That’s why it was so hard for me to hear it.”
“Sorry I made you cry,” Mike mumbles into his skin.
Will smiles slightly, feeling Mike’s warmth seep into him.
“Don’t flatter yourself,” Will teases, lightly. “You know from firsthand experience that lots of things make me cry. Not just when it’s about someone I …”
Will trails off, realizing what he was about to say. So must Mike, because his grip tightens on Will’s hand right as the latter tries to retract it. Better he do it than Mike recoil in disgust.
Mike lifts his head off Will’s shoulder and leans back so that their eyes meet. Mike’s eyes are slightly bloodshot, but more alert as they search Will’s.
“Someone you, what, Will?” Mike presses. “How does that end?”
Will looks desperately at him, yet all he sees is earnestness.
“Mike …”
Will’s heart leaps to his throat when he sees Mike’s eyes dart to his lips. When Mike looks back up again, his cheeks are slightly pinker than before. Like he knows that he was caught. All of a sudden, it feels like enough.
The part of himself that Will has tried to kill — his feelings for Mike — feels like enough.
Not sure what to expect, Will finishes his previous sentence with:
“… Someone I love.”
The words were coaxed out of him and linger there, arriving like waves do when they crash onto a shoreline and leave behind a foamy residue. Will leans slightly backwards, watching his words make their mark like footprints do on wet sand.
Or like Mike’s handprint on his heart.
“These people you love,” Mike begins. Will waits with baited breath. “What if they feel the same, but they … only started seeing things clearly? Their brain is playing catch-up to their heart, and they’re not sure if they’re too late or if that’s not fair to the person they love.”
A tear rolls down Will’s cheek. Mike brushes it aside with his free thumb, making Will’s lower lip wobble. He’s dreamed of this exact moment for years. He’s wondered where it could happen, if it would happen, and he always hoped against hope that it would be in his favorite place.
Him and Mike in the basement. Just like the beginning.
“It’s not a sprint,” Will says. He clears his throat. “It … Some people know sooner than others. That doesn’t make one better or worse.”
“Just smarter?” Mike jokes with a self-effacing smile. “Sorry, force of habit,” he quickly says. “I’m trying not to puke.”
That. That candor is hopelessly endearing to Will. It’s what he missed most about Mike the last few years. The locked-away version of Mike’s personality was always banging against the door to be let out. The emotions and feelings that were once so instinctive for Mike, buried under the rubble of grief and trauma and self-imposed expectations.
Not to mention what the world expects of him.
Will’s eyes dart down to Mike’s lips. The lower one is bitten raw, caught between Mike’s teeth until a tongue instinctively emerges and glides across it. Will smiles and looks up at Mike. He finds the other boy smiling shyly, but there’s hope in his eyes.
“It’s not too late,” Will promises.
Closing the distance between them, Will leans forward with more courage than he thought was possible of himself. His lips slot with Mike’s and everything just …
Uncoils.
The fear. The stress. The unknown about how they feel and what their futures might hold. There is so much for them to discover about each other and themselves, but none of it feels scary right now. Not when Mike whimpers against his lips and slots a hand into Will’s hair.
Will pulls Mike closer by his waist. His eyes open in shock when Mike licks his lips, gasping in surprise. His toes curl and his eyes close tight again when Mike licks into his mouth. All of his senses are a-light, his brain chanting one thing. A name.
Mike. Mike. Mike.
As their heads rotate in sync for a better angle, Will unexpectedly moans:
“Mike.”
Out. Loud.
They both pull back, faces flushed and Will feeling like he might explode from embarrassment. He groans and presses his forehead against Mike’s shoulder. He feels Mike’s body shaking in amusement, his hand rubbing Will’s back.
“God, I love you.”
Will isn’t sure what possesses him to say it. Maybe it’s a deflection. Maybe he’s just so mortified by how he responded to Mike kissing him — his first kiss! — that he isn’t thinking clearly or with any filter.
“I prefer ‘Will.’”
There’s a beat of silence. Then, sharp laughter. Mike guides Will back so that he can look him in the eye, his own dancing with amusement and adoration. He presses a chaste kiss to Will’s lips, next to Will’s left check, then Will’s nose and, finally, Will’s forehead.
Will is slightly cross-eyed, staring back at Mike with a dazed expression when Mike presses their foreheads together. Their breaths mingle and, despite the proximity not helping to clear Will’s head, he can focus on one important thing.
“I love you, too.” Mike pulls back slightly, looking at him with a degree of uncertainty. “For a long time. So much that it hurt.”
“But not anymore?” Mike asks, hesitantly. “The hurting, I mean.”
Pausing briefly to find the words, Will replies:
“It’s overwhelming.” His smile is soft. “I don’t see that changing as long as you’re around.”
As long as you’re mine, and I’m yours.
“Well,” Mike says, matter-of-factly. He strokes Will’s left cheek with his thumb. “Looks like you’re stuck with me anyway. Until you get sick of me.”
Will shakes his head fondly with a response already on the tip of his tongue.
“Not possible.”
Blinding smiles illuminate their slice of sanctuary.