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The small, glistening bell on the front counter of the Scoops Ahoy dinged delicately twice, beckoning Max to the customer as she flicked her braided hair over her shoulder. However, in place of the usual customer, was Will Byers in his branded shirt and cap on. In his arms were three large pizza boxes, stacked up to his chin.
"For Mike...?" he whispered, voice barely audible.
Max rolled her eyes and turned to the back of the Scoops Ahoy, calling out for her colleague and friend (sometimes enemy), "Hey, dingus! He's here!"
There was the clank of something metal slamming against the floor and Mike returned a hoarse response, "Coming!"
Max rolled her eyes once again and turned back to Will. She looked him up and down, not in a flirtatious manner but to nitpick ways to annoy Mike as much as possible or, alternatively, embarass him.
"Turn your hat around," she said.
"What?"
She reached up and grabbed the brim of his cap, spinning it around backward like a surfer would wear it. Will furrowed his brow, not sure about the change but aware that arguing with Max was a death sentence. At the same time as she pulled her arm back behind the counter and tried to look as inconspicuous as possible, Mike came tumbling out, tossing his hat back through the door and onto the floor.
Already embarrassed, he picked up an ice cream scoop and failed to flip it in his hands, barely holding himself back from running out of the mall entirely.
"Mike..." Will murdered, placing the three pizzas on the counter. Mike glanced over, trying to looked shocked, but his 'try' was worse than a complete avoidance of any attempt to do so. He dug the scoop into the strawberry tub and strolled over, every movement manufactured to impress Will whilst appearing (and failing) to be natural. Max stood back, offering a wide gesture to welcome Mike to the stage.
"Are these...mine?" Mike said, as if he hasn't ordered them twenty minutes ago, "I'll...I'll take that as a yes. Do you want to stay for a slice?"
Will glanced down and shook his head, "I mean, I would but, you know...we're working."
Max stepped forward, placing both hands on the counter, "Oh, come on, Will. You're all Mike talks about nowadays. Mike this, Mike that. He drones on a bit, did you know that? God, it's a bloody shock I haven't ditched this place the amount he yabbers on about you."
Mike's jaw dropped and his cheeks turned rosy, "I do not!"
Max cupped her hand around her mouth and whispered loudly, making sure Mike could hear, "That's a lie. He's obsessed with you, Byers."
"Shush, Max!"
"It's the truth, Wheeler."
"Nuh uh, no it's not. Stop interfering and sling some ice cream, okay?" Flustered and embarrassed, Mike started to shuffle back to the back, running his hands through his thick black hair.
Before he was through the door, Max continued, "Are you sure you don't want to sling it for Will, Mike? I'm sure he-"
Will butted in, "Mike, it's really fine. I don't-"
"He would love some ice cream out here, is what he said. So, come on over Wheeler, and keep your hat on; company policy."
Begrudgingly, Mike turned around and wandered back to the counter, leaving his little sailor's hat behind. Max wasn't about to let it slide, not for a second.
"Hat," she corrected.
Groaning, he picked it up and pushed it down on his head and adjusted it to his liking, not that he could ever like it. Even more begrudgingly than at first, he returned to the counter and picked up the scoop.
"I'll leave you two love birds be," Max said, "And I love the hat, Wheeler. You look like a real dork."
She dissapeared into the back, laughing under her breath.
Will and Mike stood in awkward silence for a moment, not sure what to say as the pizzas blew off steam next to them, "So..." Mike trailed off, "What flavour?"
"No, Mike, I'm really-"
Mike wanted to impress Will, as stupid as it was. They were...well...dating, though they hadn't labelled it yet but he was still pretty sure they were dating. That's what people did when they were dating someone, right? Try and impress someone. In between stupid makeout sessions and fighting creeps with God complexes, he never really got to understand what a relationship actually was about with El. He knew that they showed care and affection and looked after them, but that was sort of his limitation when it came to dating knowledge.
"I'll pay for it, Will," Mike offered, flustered and now blushing profusely, "Just this once, though. Don't come expecting free Scoops every time you pop over."
Will hesitated, placing his hands in his pockets.
"Okay, just this once. I'll have...hmm? What do you think?"
Mike didn't have a clue. He barely ate the ice cream because he was so stuffed from the two or three pizzas he ordered a day just to see Will's face over and over. Today was a particularly desperate day; these were his third, fourth and fifth pizzas of the door.
"Strawberry," he said, only because it was the one he had the scoop lodged into.
Will nodded, "I'll have a scoop of strawberry then," he decided.
Mike nodded, moving his head to the beat of the music in the mall. He rolled a big scoop of strawberry and dropped into a cone, pressing it into place. He stuck the scoop back into the ice cream and handed the cone to Will.
"That's, well, on me."
Will smiled, nodded (and, though Mike might've imagined it, blushed) and turned to leave with the ice cream.
"Will-"
Will swivelled, still smiling with that cheesy grin of his. He had a little moustache of ice cream on his upper lip.
"Do I like dorky with this hat on?" Mike asked adjusting the hat a little.
Will laughed, "Of course you do, Mike, but who cares? I think it's kind of hot, you know?"
"You do?"
"Yeah, I do," Will began out of the Scoops Ahoy again, licking occasionally at the ice cream, "Don't let that get to your head now, Wheeler."
Mike felt a swarm of butterflies flutter in his stomach, a warm feeling igniting a fuzzy sensation around his body like a comfy warmth travelling from his heart out to his chest, then into his arms, then into his hands and finally into his finger tips. His face burned hot, wanting - needing - Will's soft lips against his.
He choked out some words, "Will-I..."
Good fucking job, Wheeler. Choke when it matters the most.
"Yeah?" Will says, somehow calm.
How can he be so calm? How is he...HOW!
Mike shook his head, redirecting his gaze down to the counter, "Don't worry, actually. I'll see you later, alright?"
"Alright, bye."
Once Will was out of sight, Mike slumped against the wall behind him, rubbing his eyes and temples in regret and acknowledgment of how absolutely shit he was at flirting, no matter how hard he tried and how much Max tutored him.
Speaking of Max, she had just slid open the window separating the back from the counter area and now had her head out next to Mike, grinning from ear to ear. In her hand she had a whiteboard with a familiar tally.
On one side was 'mike doesn't suck' with a whopping zero tallies.
On the other side was 'mike's a loser' with at least a dozen tallies and probably more. Taking the cap off between her teeth, she scribbled two more tallies onto the latter side, humming a soft yet mocking tune under her breath.
"I can't wait to tell Nance about this, Wheeler," Max jested, "Oh, she'll find it hilarious."
Mike went red in the cheeks again, not from embarrassment but from a suppressed anger, "You wouldn't dare, Max, because I swear on my life that if you say a word to anyone, let alone Nancy, I will tell them about the time I caught you and Lucas making out in the cinema bathroom."
Max's smile dropped and she bit her lip, "Now, Wheeler, I'm sure we can figure something out."
"I'm sure we can."
Ding. It was the bell on the counter. Mike turned around and, in front of him, now without his hat on, was Will, nervously smiling.
Nervous? Will was nervous? What was going on? Oh, shit...Mike hadn't paid for the pizza. Was it that? Oh God, that would be so embarrassing.
"Mike," he said, swallowing a lump in his throat, "Can I talk to you about something in the back?"
Mike's eyes opened wide and (after a few seconds of stunned silence trying to comprehend what was happening) he nodded and opened the divider in the counter. The two of them headed into the back and Will stayed close to Mike's side and...oh my God!...reached for Mike's hand, holding it loosely in his.
Max rolled her eyes as Mike entered but, when Will followed, her jaw nearly dropped before she blinked hard and locked in.
"Well, I'll be damned," she muttered, taking the whiteboard pen out again, "Maybe you aren't such a loser after all, Wheeler."
MIKE'S A LOSER
卌卌卌III
MIKE DOESN'T SUCK
I
It was a start, at least.