Chapter Text
So far, Hawkin’s, Indiana, had been a nightmare. Not that Lenora, California, wasn’t also a nightmare. Will Byers was wondering if there was any place that he could go where somebody like him could fit in. It wasn’t like he was out to anybody, and at this point, he probably never would be. Apparently, there was just something about Will that made him a target. Maybe it was because he liked to wear bright colors, maybe the way he walked, the fact that he liked art, or the fact that he was quiet and kept to himself.
Either way, moving to a small, mostly conservative town in the middle of Indiana didn’t make him any less of a target despite what his mother had been hoping.
The opposite, actually.
It had never been worse.
The first time Will met Mike Wheeler was in the hallway by his locker between classes. Will tried to disappear, he really did. He tried to make himself smaller so that people would hopefully just pass by without giving him a second thought. Sometimes it worked, sometimes it didn’t.
Today was one of the days when it didn’t.
“Get out of the way, fairy,” came the increasingly familiar voices of one of the usual suspects. Once he heard the voice, Will flinched, already bracing for impact. Sure enough, there was a hand on his back, shoving him forward towards the lockers. Will tried to ignore it. To not engage and just hope they’d go away. It was one of the jocks that he never bothered to learn the name of, but he was sure it was something like Brad or Chad or Andy.
“Are you ignoring me? You think you’re too good to talk to me, fairy boy?” Will let out a small accidental yelp of surprise when he was being pulled back by the collar of his shirt.
“Hey! Dipshit!” An unfamiliar voice shouted from down the hallway. “Do you ever shut the hell up? I can hear your grating ass voice from across the school.”
“Mind your fucking business, Wheeler.”
Will felt the release of his collar as the jocks attention turned toward the third party. Will looked over at him, too. The boy was tall, but lanky. Skinny in a way like he grew too fast and didn’t know what to do with his limbs. He carried himself well, though. Black jeans, a black and white shirt that said Hellfire Club on it, and dark curly hair that came to the bottom of his neck. It contrasted perfectly with his pale skin. He was gorgeous. Will looked down at the ground, not wanting to be caught blushing in this current situation. That was absolutely the worst thing that could happen.
“Why don’t you get lost. Don’t you have some balls to go play with?” The taller boy came up to Will and threw an arm over his shoulder. “Let’s get to class,” he said, leading Will away from the jocks.
“Is he your boyfriend now, Wheeler?” the jock shouted after them. Will flinched, expecting him to remove his arm from around his shoulders. He learned when he was young that insinuating that you were gay was one of the worst insults you could receive.
The other boy didn’t let go of him, though. Instead, he used his free hand to reach back and flip them off. “Why? Jealous? Don’t worry, your mom still likes you. She told me last night.”
The taller boy seemed to know that this was going to piss them off because he suddenly slipped his arm from Will’s shoulders and grabbed his hand. “Run,” he said, taking off, pulling Will with him. Will wished he had a bit more notice than that as he clumsily ran behind the boy, letting his hand pull him wherever he wanted. He had just met this guy, but was already willing to follow him anywhere.
“In here,” the boy pulled him into an empty classroom, letting the door close behind them. They both stood there for a moment, silently trying to catch their breath and listen for their pursuers. Once they heard footsteps running by, Will let out a sigh of relief.
“Did you see his stupid, ugly face?” the other boy started laughing. It was a nice sound. Will thought he might want to hear it again. It was then that Will realized they were still holding hands, and he quickly pulled his hand back.
“Um… thank you. For that. You didn’t have to do that,” Will twisted his hands together nervously. “I’m Will, by the way. Will Byers.”
“Eh, don’t worry about it. Those guys are pieces of shit. Don’t let them get to you. All their neanderthal brains know is to try and prove they don’t have tiny dicks by picking on people they don’t deem cool enough. Since they don’t like you, it probably means you're pretty cool. I’m Mike.”
Mike.
His name was Mike.
His name was Mike, and he thought he was cool.
His name was Mike, and he thought he was cool, and he had Will’s heart thudding in his chest.
How dumb. The first handsome guy to pay Will a little bit of attention, and he was ready to give Mike whatever he could ever want. He was ready to follow him anywhere. He felt pathetic.
In the closer space, Will could see now that he had a bunch of freckles that covered his nose and cheeks. His nails were painted black, but were chipped, and looked like Mike bit them. He also smelled faintly of cigarette smoke.
“Kissed by angels.” The words were out of Will’s mouth before he could even stop them.
“What?” Mike tilted his head to the side in confusion, reminding Will of a curious puppy.
“Uh, sorry. Your freckles. They, um, they say that freckles are where angels have kissed you.” God, he was so lame.
Mike smiled at him, though. Will blinked a few times, sure that he was imagining the red tint that was now behind the said freckles.
“Scary,” Mike responded. “What angels are sneaking into my bedroom and giving me kisses at night?” he chuckled, making Will smile in response.
The two boys stood there grinning at each other for probably a beat too long. “Uh,” Mike finally broke the silence. “D&D. Have you heard of it?”
“Oh, uh, yeah. I mean, kind of. I, uh, hung out in the classroom where some guys played at my old school. I never played myself, but it looked pretty cool.” Will left out the part where he would stay in that classroom after school, while his mom thought he was doing an extracurricular. The D&D players were the nicest to Will. They left each other alone, and Will just worked on homework, listening in on their campaigns. Occasionally, he would find himself doodling some of the character descriptions in the corner of his paper.
“Cool,” Mike nodded. “My friends and I, we have a group. It’s called Hellfire,” he pointed to his shirt. “But our one friend can’t make it. He plays basketball. We’re looking for someone to fill in after school. Interested?”
“Yes.”
Will probably answered too quickly, but it went back to him already willing to follow Mike anywhere.
“Cool,” Mike smiled, clearly pleased by his answer.
“Cool,” Will responded, matching his smile.
“So… meet me outside after school? I park my bike in the back by the track. Are you okay meeting me there?”
“Yeah, of course, I’ll be there.”
“Cool.”
“Cool.”
“Okay,” Mike let out a small chuckle, a grin frozen on his face. “I’ll see you later then?”
“Yeah,” Will’s own lips quirked into a smile. Probably the first genuine one since he had been here. “I’ll see you later.”
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The school days usually felt too long. Normally, it was because Will just wanted to get out of here, go home, and lock himself in his room to paint. Today, though, he was actually looking forward to something.
It was the last class of the day, and Will’s eyes kept darting to the clock on the wall. It had crossed his mind a couple of times that he was going to be walking into a trap. Some kind of cruel prank. It wouldn’t be the first time it had happened. Mike seemed genuine, though. He had no reason to come up and defend him.
Will was pulled from his thoughts when he heard some girls laughing nearby. He turned his head and saw them looking in his direction, whispering to each other. He didn’t need to know what they were saying to know what they were saying. It was going to be something about the way that he dressed, or his hair, or his mannerisms. Will had heard it all before, and he had stopped letting people know they got to him. With an inaudible sigh, he turned his head forward again and looked down at the paper he had just been doodling on instead of taking notes. This class couldn’t end fast enough.
As soon as the bell rang, Will grabbed his stuff and was out of the class before most people had even registered that it was over. Between classes, earlier, Will had used the payphone to call home and let his mom know that he would be late to hang out with a new friend. She seemed both relieved and worried, which, given what happened in California, was understandable. Will didn’t want to think about it, though. He was tired of being known as that guy
Maybe he shouldn’t go immediately to meet Mike. He would look too eager, especially if he showed up before Mike. To waste time, Will went to his locker, slowly putting things back in. Should he leave his backpack or take it? Would Mike think he was lame if he brought a backpack? If he didn’t, it might get stuck here at school, and he wouldn’t be able to do his homework.
Ugh, he was overthinking this.
Closing his locker, he slipped his backpack onto his back and slowly started walking towards where he was meant to meet Mike. As Will approached the exit, he started to get nervous. What if Mike never showed up? This was all some prank to embarrass him while he and his friends watched from afar and laughed at him, waiting for someone who wasn’t going to show up. Unfortunately, despite this being a real possibility, Will would still wait.
The track wasn’t somewhere that Will visited often, but he knew where it was, and he knew there were some bike racks back there, so that’s the direction he headed in. As he turned the corner behind the school, Will let out an audible sigh of relief.
Mike was there. He was sitting on the ground, back up against the brick wall. His long, pale fingers held a cigarette to his lips before slowly breathing out a cloud of smoke, face visibly relaxing. His backpack was sat on the floor next to him. Mike’s look and vibe were everything Will wasn’t.
He was stunning.
He would hate you if he knew you were having these thoughts about him.
Quickly, he made sure his clothes were straight and patted his hair down before making his way over. Will could only hope that he appeared as casual as he tried, because he was dying inside.
Mike must have heard the footsteps approaching on the gravel because he suddenly looked up at him, fear in his eyes that he was going to be caught smoking by staff. When he realized it was Will, a smile broke out on his face. He didn’t want to be delusional, but it almost looked like his face lit up.
“Hey! You came!”
“Yeah, of course. You invited me.” Will inwardly cringed at how eager he sounded.
“I have some bad news,” Mike said, pulling the cigarette to his lips again. Will’s eyes watched the way his lips formed around it. “D&D ended up getting cancelled tonight after everything anyway.”
“Oh,” Will responded, trying to keep the disappointment from his voice. So much for the chance to hang out with Mike. Maybe he could just hang around school until later so his mom wouldn’t get that look on her face.
“Yeah, so annoying. I’ll let you know when the next one is, though, if you still want to come.”
“Yeah,” Will smiled. “I’d like that.” Now he wasn’t entirely sure what to do. Was he supposed to walk away? Will pursed his lips and kicked at the gravel a bit. “Well, I guess I’ll see you around then?”
Mike’s big brown eyes looked over to him as he blew out a puff of smoke. He looked tired. “Do you wanna sit next to me and hang out for a minute?"
“Sure. Yeah. Definitely.” Pull it together, Will. He’s going to think you’re desperate.
He was desperate.
Still, he made his way over, putting his backpack down carefully next to Mike’s, which had obviously been just tossed aside there.
When he sat down, Will accidentally ended up sitting a bit closer to Mike than he had intended. Mike didn’t seem to notice or mind, though, and he thought it would be too awkward to shift over now.
“Sorry, I’ll put this out so that you don’t have to smell it,” Mike said in reference to the cigarette.
“It’s okay. I don’t mind.”
Despite Will saying this, Mike snuffed it out on the wall and shoved it into the pocket of his jeans. He noticed that Mike’s hands were shaking as he pulled his sleeves down over his palms.
“You’re new here, right?”
“Yeah, I’ve been here two and a half weeks now,” Will nodded, pulling his knees up to his chest and putting his hands on top of them since he couldn’t figure out what to do with them. “I moved from California.”
“To Hawkins?” he let out a surprised huff of a laugh. “Why the fuck would you move to this hellhole?”
Will shrugged his shoulders. “Long story, but my mom grew up here, so she decided maybe this would be a better place for us.”
“And has it been?”
Turning his head to look at Mike, he smiled. “Absolutely not.” Will sighed, looking forward again. “I’m trying to make it work, though. Or at least pretend like I am. I feel bad that my mom and brother are always worried and stressed about me.
“Well, maybe it’s not too late to turn it around,” Mike said, leaning over and nudging Will’s shoulder with his own.
Will looked down into his lap, smiling as he felt his face heat up and something akin to hope blossom in his chest for the first time in a long time. Hope was dangerous. “Yeah… maybe,” he said, looking up and smiling at the other boy.
“What about you? Have you been here your whole life?” Will asked suddenly, not wanting the conversation to die. He desperately didn’t want to mess up an opportunity to have a first friend.
“Born and raised,” Mike responded with a sigh.
Apparently, they both had stories they deemed were too much for a first hangout.
“That just means I can be your perfect tour guide, right?” Mike had quickly added.
“Really? I’d like that. A lot.”
“Cool.”
“Cool,” Will smiled.
Will and Mike sat there for a while getting to know each other, talking about anything and everything. Despite having completely different vibes and styles, they had a lot in common. They loved the same movies, comics, and snacks. Mike learned that Will loved drawing and painting, and Will learned that Mike loved to write. Mike promised to show Will the arcade in town and the secret to getting a high score in Galaga.
When Will glanced at his watch, two hours had already passed.
Looking over at Mike, he noticed that his head was pressed back against the wall, eyes closed.
“Are you alright?” Will asked, a hint of concern in his voice.
“Yeah, sorry.” Mike opened his eyes, picking his head up. “I didn’t really sleep last night. Got into it with my dad and ended up leaving the house.”
“All night? Where did you go?”
Mike shrugged nonchalantly. “Just walked around. I considered going to my friend Lucas’s house. He lives close by, but it was late, and I knew they would look for me there. So, I just kind of wandered.”
“Isn’t that dangerous?”
“It’s Indiana. What’s going to be out there?”
“I don’t know,” Will shrugged. “Maybe a scary monster lurking in the woods?”
“Yeah. Maybe.” Mike leaned his head back against the wall and was silent for a moment. “Sometimes the monsters are in our own home, though.”
Will knew that. Will knew that better than anyone. Will had grown up with his own monster in his house. He reached over and grabbed his backpack, opening it up and pulling out a pen and his notebook. Mike was looking at him curiously as he scribbled something on a piece of paper. “Here,” he ripped the page out and handed it to him. “I know you don’t know me very well, but it’s my phone number and address. If you ever need somewhere to go… it’s just my mom and brother. They won’t mind. Even if it’s the middle of the night. My window is at the back of the house, right above the hose. You can knock on it, and I’ll answer. I’m a light sleeper.”
Mike looked at the piece of paper, and Will worried that maybe that was a weird thing to offer to someone he had just met.
“This is… really cool of you. You’re amazing, Will Byers,” Mike looked over at him with a smile that made Will’s heart melt.
Yeah, he was screwed.
Mike carefully folded the paper like it was something precious to him and slipped it into the pocket opposite the one he had put the cigarette in.
“It seems pretty silly to ask this now, but… do you want to be friends?” Mike asked.
Will smiled widely, nodding with excitement.
“Cool,” Mike responded, nudging his shoulder.
“Cool,” Will smiled, nudging him back.