Work Text:
April 1988
Mike sighs and puts his pen down on the pages filled with messy scrawl that he was just working on, looking up from his desk and studying the painting hung above it. The painting. The painting that had caused so much misunderstanding, so much heartache, so much greatness in the long run. He analyzes every gentle brush stroke and the way that the colours blend together seamlessly on the canvas, like he hasn’t done this hundreds of times before. He spins his desk chair around slowly to face into the room, making sure it doesn’t emit the loud squeak that it’s known for, as he faces towards the bed.
The bed where Will sleeps soundly, snug under Mike’s thick blue quilt and bathed in the soft golden light of Mike’s bedside lamp. Will’s eyelashes cast a soft shadow across his cheeks as he sleeps, his chestnut hair spilling softly over his forehead. His lips are parted slightly and he cradles his own face with one hand against the pillow. Mike’s pillow. He breathes deeply; soundly. He looks peaceful; safe.
Mike thinks about the boy in his bed; how they got here. He thinks back to before everything happened, before 1983. Before the world opened up and tried to swallow them whole, before they lost so many people, before Will was ever taken. Mike smiles slightly as he recalls asking Will to be his friend on the playground all those years ago, their first sleepover, the first time that they ever played D&D. I would do it all again for you. Mike would walk through anything for Will; has walked through everything with Will.
November 13th, 1987
When Will showed up on his door step after everything had ended, Mike never thought they would end up where they did. Will had knocked softly on the basement door just before midnight, exactly one week after they had saved the world, and scarred their own forever. Mike had been laying on the old couch, some movie he had seen a thousand times droning in the background; he wasn’t paying attention to it though. His head was full of everything else. Mike had barely slept since before everything hit the fan more than a week ago, and when he did sleep, his dreams were full of horrors. He often woke up in a cold sweat, heart pounding furiously in his chest, lungs screaming for air. It was better not to sleep. So instead of sleep, his mind raced. He was pulled out of his deep spiral by the sound of three quiet raps against the basement door.
Mike could only fathom one person showing up at all hours of the night, and that was Will. So when he opened the door and spotted the shorter boy tucked into a thick jacket against the cold, feet shuffling nervously against the stoop, Mike wasn't all that surprised. He stepped aside to let Will into the basement without a word before closing the door behind them.
They hadn’t talked much at all since everything ended - Mike hadn’t really talked to anyone. As soon as the military were done questioning - interrogating - them on that horrific night, Mike had retreated back to the Wheeler basement and stayed there. Lucas had tried to convince him to stay at his house down the street, since almost everything but the basement at the Wheeler’s was still trashed from the demo attack and repairs hadn’t started yet, but the basement was the only safe space Mike felt he still had; so he had declined. For the first few days his walkie had buzzed to life numerous times with Lucas’ or Dustin’s voice, asking Mike to come join everyone else at Hopper’s cabin - to just be together in the aftermath, but when Mike stayed silent in response, eventually the walkie went silent too.
So Mike was a little surprised to see someone from the Party standing before him, especially so late at night, but not at all surprised that it was Will. Because of course they would send Will, they all assumed that he would be able to talk some sense into Mike - he was almost positive of that fact. Did they know about their conversation on the tower? Did they know that Mike had broken his own heart by not saying what he really wanted to in those moments? Probably not. The two boys had barely spoken since that conversation. Will had attempted to stick close to Mike as the military police ripped everyone away from each other for questioning; he had heard Will yelling out for him, and fighting against their hold for fear of being separated from his best friend. Mike had simply let the two men holding him lead him away to a sterile white room with blindingly bright lights. He had answered all their questions in a monotone voice, not looking up from his dirt and blood soaked hands as he spoke. When they had released him, he hadn’t even looked for Will - hadn’t looked for anyone, he had briefly nodded at Nancy, who was sitting in a chair waiting for the others down the hall, and kept walking, ignoring her pleading calls for him to just hold on a minute. He walked all the way across town and into the basement of their ruined home, and there he stayed.
Mike stared at the other boy in front of him, not sure how to form any meaningful words after his week of solitude. Will wrung his hands together nervously as he took in Mike’s disheveled appearance. They stood like that for what felt like forever before Will broke the silence, asking Mike where he’d been the past week, concern in his voice. Mike just shrugged non-committally and sat back down on the couch, head in his hands. He heard the sounds of Will taking off his coat, but didn’t raise his head to acknowledge it. As he pressed his palms into his eyes he felt the couch dip slightly as Will sat close beside him, close enough that their knees knocked together lightly. He felt Will’s feather light touch against his shoulderblade, attempting to provide some comfort for the obviously distressed boy beside him. Mike didn’t move away, he simply let the warmth of Will’s gentle hand radiate into his soul, sighing heavily. Mike turned his head to look at Will fully for the first time since before their world had shattered. He took in the boy’s haunted hazel eyes, the way they searched Mike’s own, unspoken questions and concern brimming under the surface. He took in the tight set of his lips, pressed together as if he was forcing himself to not break the silence, giving Mike time to gather himself. Mike took in how much weight Will had lost in only seven days - how dark the bags were under his eyes like he hadn’t been sleeping either. Mike was so wrapped up in his own inner turmoil that he hadn’t thought of how everyone else had been coping - he had assumed that since they had all been together that they were managing better than him. He was mistaken. Will looked like hell.
“Will.” Mike finally breathed, a sob catching in his throat.
The other boy didn’t say a word - he didn’t need to - he simply pulled Mike against his chest and into the crook of his shoulder, holding the now tearful boy tightly against himself. Mike let out a shudder that was accompanied by another sob as he clutched tightly at Will’s shirt. Will held Mike impossibly closer as he sobbed into him, rubbing his back gently and whispering soft words into Mike’s dark hair.
Finally, finally Mike let himself feel. He let everything he had been keeping tucked deeply inside himself bubble to the surface and spill out in his tears - years of built up emotions pooling to the surface. Mike cried over Will being taken in ‘83 when he didn’t know if he would ever see his best friend again. His tears fell over all the ways he had treated both El and Will so poorly after they moved away - even before they moved away if he thinks hard enough about it. He cried over that fucking painting and how even though he knew it didn’t come from El, he never said anything to either of them about it. He let the tears fall for his parents, for his little sister, for his friends, for himself - his pain, his trauma. A ripping sob shook them both as he contemplated the fact that he built the bomb that killed El. She had died not knowing Mike’s truth because he was too cowardly to admit it to himself, let alone anyone else. He cried over still being alive, because deep down he wondered if he even deserved the life he’d get to live now. He let himself just feel whatever reared its ugly head and eventually the monsters stopped coming - at least for a while.
Slowly, Mike came back to himself. His tears petered out slowly, and the whole time Will continued his steady rhythm against Mike’s back, as his gentle words continued to spill from between his lips. After Mike stopped crying, they stayed holding each other for a long moment before Mike finally pulled back to look at Will again. He saw the faint trail of Will’s own tears down his cheeks, and the soggy spot by his collar where his shirt had caught Mike’s.
“I’m sorry.” Mike whispered as his eyes fell to the old threadbare carpet at his feet; embarrassed by his outburst of tears, but exhausted from holding it all inside for so long.
“Mike, you don’t have to apologize for having feelings. Are you okay? Everyone’s been worried about you - I’ve been worried about you.” Will shifted slightly beside him, angling to try to catch Mike’s eyes.
Silence fell around them again as Mike worked to speak, still not looking at the other boy. Will let him take his time - always so patient with him. Suddenly, the thought that had been plaguing Mike most erupted from him without warning, “I killed her…I killed her and I didn’t even have the guts to be honest before I did.” Guilt bubbled up into Mike’s chest and caught in his throat.
“Mike,” Will’s voice was full of raw emotion, so full of empathy and understanding, “Mike you didn’t kill her. She knew what she was doing. And it–it’s devastating and so hard to make sense of it, but you didn’t know that would happen. You didn’t do anything the rest of us wouldn’t have done.”
“You don’t understand - I know about the painting.” Those words spilled out of Mike before he could stop them. He looked towards Will with a pleading and desperate look in his eyes.
Wil looked back at him with a look of pure horror and anxiety on his face, mouth opening and closing aimlessly as he struggled to form words, but Mike didn’t let him find the time; if he stopped to think about what he was saying he might never speak again, so he surged on, “I know that she didn’t ask you to paint it, I know you painted it for me. I think I’ve pieced together why you lied to me about it, and I understand why you thought you had to do that, but…you should have been honest with me about it, Will.”
“I–”
“The painting never sat right in my head, it just didn’t make sense - she hated D&D, and when I asked her about it once she didn’t seem to know what I was talking about and brushed it off, I thought she was just being coy about it so I dropped it. But what you said at the Squawk last week, I pieced it all together after that.” Mike paused for breath before continuing on again, “Your words in the van, at the pizza place, I thought I had to love her, Will, I thought that’s what I was supposed to do. I thought I had to say those things to her when she was fighting Vecna; I didn’t know I had another option, but I–I never loved her. I mean, of course I loved her, but I never really loved her like that,” he emphasized the word, “and I knew that long before you said anything last week, and even before NINA and the van. I should have been honest with her long ago, and I wasn’t.” His voice cracked as more tears spilled from his eyes. ”I couldn’t even tell her in those last minutes. I just kept thinking ‘Why me? Why not anyone else?’ you know? Because I didn’t deserve those last minutes with her because I lied to her right up until the fucking end…
“Because I love you, Will; not her.” Will sucked in a sharp, shaky breath at the confession, but Mike didn’t stop talking, “It’s always been you, but I just didn’t know that’s what it was for so long. Then I started to understand how I really feel about you, and I shoved it down because my dad always told me to marry a ‘nice girl’, and how was I having these feelings for my best friend - my best friend who’s a boy? The feelings that I should have about my girlfriend. And I couldn’t fathom that you could ever feel the same way about me anyway.”
“Mike, I–” Will went to respond, but Mike still wasn’t done.
“When you–in the Squawk, when you told everyone, I’m sorry that I didn’t get up to hug you sooner, Will. I should have been the first one to your side, but I stopped functioning when I realized that you could feel the same way about me, and that you had, at some point, felt the same way.
“On the tower, I just–I wanted to tell you so badly how I feel, and when I opened my mouth to tell you, that stupid bullshit line about ‘best friends’ came out instead. Besides, what does it even matter? You made it clear that I was ‘just a crush’ anyway, so–”
Will cuts him off quickly, “I lied.”
“You what?” Mike asked incredulously, eyes dancing across Will’s face trying to understand.
“I lied before, at the Squawk, about it just being a crush because…I thought you were–I never thought you’d be able to love me back, Mike. I didn’t know how you felt. I had no idea.”
“Wait-what?” Mike’s eyebrows shot up to meet his messy mop of hair, his eyes still searched Will’s face for more clarification before the other boy continued to speak.
“I meant every word I said to you in that van, I never lied about those feelings, I just wasn’t honest about who those feelings came from. I love you, Mike. I think I always have. I’m–Mike I’m so sorry that I ever made you feel like you had to say those things to her, that was never my intention. I thought you really felt those things, I didn’t–I didn’t realize that I was pushing you into a lie; a lie you felt you had to carry all this time. I’m so sorry.” Tears were falling freely down Will’s cheeks at this point, and Mike reached up to brush them away gently with the pads of his thumbs.
Mike softly cradled Will’s face between his palms, wiping away any falling tears, trying to wrap his head around Will’s words; around the fact that Will loved him too. “We should have just been honest with each other from the beginning; I’m sorry too.”
They looked into each other’s eyes and Mike could see the pain in Will’s, but also the relief of finally speaking the truth - he wondered if his eyes expressed the same. In case they didn’t, he said it again, “I love you, Will. So much.”
“I love you too.” Will stated factually, with a small smile. Mike brushed Will’s hair out of his eyes and leaned their foreheads together. They stayed like that, wrapped in each other for a long time.
Eventually the two boys ended up slumped against each other sleepily, exhausted from everything; from their emotional conversation, from their lack of sleep, from the last four years of heartache and trauma. Will’s head was settled onto Mike’s shoulder, and Mike’s cheek rested against the top of Will’s silky soft hair while their fingers sat laced together on Will’s thigh.
“Will?” Mike whispered softly into the other boy’s hair.
Will hummed lightly in response, barely awake anymore.
“I’m gonna grab a heavier blanket than the one on the back of the couch here, I’ll be right back, okay?” Mike dislodged himself from Will slowly, and stood to cross the basement to grab a thick blue quilt off a chair, knowing how much Will hates the cold. As he did so, Will slumped further into the couch, sliding sideways until his head was against the cushioned arm, and he tucked his legs up until he was laying along the couch looking peaceful for the first time in…weeks; he sighed with contentment as he did so, face relaxed as he breathed in the scent of Mike all around him.
Mike grabbed the quilt and a pillow before he turned back to the couch, the couch that contained the most beautiful person Mike had ever seen. Will laid with his hair spilling over his forehead, shirt still damp around the collar where it had caught Mike’s tears. Mike couldn’t believe this boy loved him too. Their admission to each other didn’t take away the pain or the feelings of guilt that still festered in Mike’s chest surrounding El, but it dulled the hurt just slightly; made it easier to manage knowing one weight was lifted from his shoulders.
Mike crossed back to Will and gently lifted his head from the arm of the couch to slide the pillow under it before throwing the blanket over him and pulling it up to his chin. Will smiled faintly in his sleepy state and burrowed deeper into the quilt. Mike ran his knuckles across Will’s cheek gently, smiling through his ever present grief when he remembered the words Will had spoken: I love you too, Mike. I think I always have. Mike made to move towards Will’s mattress, where it still sat in the corner on the floor from where he had been sleeping last week before they vacated the house, when the other boy’s hand reached out from under the quilt to grab at Mike’s sleeve.
“No, don’t leave again.” Will whispered, his eyes opened slowly to catch Mike’s own with a look of pure desperation.
Mike felt his heart surge in his chest as he replied to the beautiful sleepy boy, “I’m not going anywhere, Will. I was just moving to the mattress.”
“No! Here–stay here. Please.” Will pleaded as he shifted slightly against the back of the couch, making as much room as he could for Mike to lay down beside him. “Please?” Will asked again as he saw Mike hesitate.
Without another thought, Mike slipped down under the quilt and fit himself clumsily into the tight space beside Will. He tucked the shorter boy’s head under his chin and wrapped his arms around him, to pull him in close. Will giggled quietly and inched as close as he could. Mike planted a soft kiss on the top of Will’s head and closed his eyes, breathing him in. He thought about how he never could have fathomed being tucked against Will so tightly, so safe. This entire night felt like a fever dream, but Mike wasn’t going to complain about the outcome. There was still a lot that they would have to work through in order to come out the other side, but they could work together now, as a team; just like Mike had hoped for in Lenora all that time ago.
After that night in the basement, Will had taken Mike back to the cabin to stay with them, refusing to let him stay in that basement by himself anymore. Mike didn’t complain, simply grabbed Will’s hand tightly in his own and let him lead the way. Mrs. Byers welcomed Mike into their home with open arms and relieved tears in her eyes, voice heavy with sincerity as she told him how happy she was to have him stay with them. Hopper even gave him a brief, awkward hug upon his arrival - Mike was welcome there, as long as he needed.
He and Will spent every single moment together; Mike never let Will out of his sight, and Will was more than happy to oblige that - where Will was, so was Mike. The two boys began rebuilding what they had lost throughout the last few years, forging a new foundation on which to begin growing, healing, loving - together.
The Party came to the cabin every day for the first few weeks - everyone preferred to be together in their grief; it was easier together than alone. Often at least one of them was crying and everyone's hearts were heavy with sorrow, but at moments they found themselves laughing and reminiscing fondly together too. No one batted an eye the first time that Mike tucked Will closely into his side and planted a soft kiss to the top of the shorter boy’s head after Will and Max had begun tearing up while sharing memories of their summer at Star Court; almost as if the Party had been waiting for Mike to do just such a thing the entire time.
In the months after, Mike slowly started to come back to himself. He began eating routinely again; something he hadn’t noticed he’d stopped doing until Mrs. Byers put three square meals a day in front of him. He found those horrible, racing thoughts not so overwhelming, more easily managed. Mike moved back in with his family after the renovations and repairs were finally complete, and he and Will shuffled back and forth together from the Wheeler's to the Byers’ haphazardly.
Mike would still wake up at night, sweating and gasping for air as his nightmares tried to envelop him, and Will would be there to hold him close and whisper sweet nothings into his ear. When Will awoke from his own nightmares, jolting upright in bed with a scream on his tongue, Mike would pull him ever closer, brush his hair off his face, and sooth Will back to sleep. Things would never be the same, but at least they had each other. The wounds would continue to heal, and they would get through - together.
April 1988
Back in Mike’s room, Will sighs in his sleep and sinks lower into the blanket, only his hair poking out the top now. Mike pulls himself from his reverie and stands slowly, stretching his back after the long stint in his desk chair, before slipping off his thick knitted sweater and stepping across the room to his bed. He pulls the covers back and slinks into Will's side of the bed, since the sleeping boy had rolled to Mike’s side before he was even fully unconscious. Mike sighs happily as he reaches out to pull Will against his chest. Will emits a small breath and contented sigh as he relaxes into Mike, not waking. Mike plants a soft kiss to the back of Will’s neck and closes his eyes.
He can sleep soundly here.