Archive of Our Own

Phase One - The Start of Something New

Mike Wheeler’s honestly quite embarrassing mental downfall begins at an arts department party that he has no interest in being at.

Max had dragged him to this karaoke bar in Starcourt mall to go to some get-together for the students in the music, drama, and art clubs. Unfortunately, Mike falls within that group of students, and Max’s best friend is the host, so he was practically peer pressured into going.

There are a number of faces in the room he recognizes, the most familiar being Jane “El” Hopper, Max’s best friend and the host of the party. She’s pretty much what everyone thinks of when they think of the school’s drama club. Though Mike doesn’t know all too much about her, she seems nice enough.

However, this party doesn’t interest Mike. It’s hardly even a party, it’s an intimate get-together, as El had called it, but either way he’d rather be at home right now, doing — he doesn’t know what. Just not this. It’s a Friday evening and he’s spending his free time sitting in the corner of some karaoke room, feeling very, very bored.

Max and Lucas seem to be having a good time, though. At some point in the night they had gotten up to sing Boston’s More Than a Feeling, which was admittedly kind of entertaining.

Plus, they, like, know people. They’ve been off talking to El and her brother and other people and hitting it off with art students and singing songs and whatever while Mike doesn’t care. They come to pester him to go up and have some fun every ten minutes.

Mike doesn’t take their advice, because there’s only so much to do at this kind of thing. He can get up and sing, which sounds fun on paper, but he isn’t fond of the idea of making a room full of people who he barely knows sit and watch him sing some song for three minutes, because he worries he’ll bore them. Or, he can go and talk to some new people, which he compulsively, obsessively, can’t be bothered to do.

So, he sits and orders snacks every once in a while and dramatically sighs while talking to himself about how much he wishes he was at home right now. It’s his fault for even joining his school’s stupid band. If he hadn’t cared about doing a “fun extracurricular activity” during Freshman year, he wouldn’t be here right now. He would be at home, doing something cool.

It’s about nine in the evening, he’s been trapped in this box for about two hours, and Max and Lucas are on their way towards Mike’s corner of the room as El and the drama club’s Dustin Henderson’s duet of Suddenly Seymour from Little Shop of Horrors comes to a close.

Mike groans a little when he sees Max and Lucas come his way. Now, don’t get him wrong, he loves Max and Lucas — they’re his only friends; his bassist and his drummer — but this is about to be their seventh time telling Mike to stop being such a Negative Nancy and sing, talk to people, whatever.

“Are you having fun there?” Max asks sarcastically, crossing her arms.

“No.” Mike answers blandly, leaning back in his seat as the song ends and El gives Dustin a celebratory high-five.

“You should—”

“—Do something,” Mike finishes Lucas’s sentence, “I know.”

In an effort to not repeat the same conversation for the millionth time, he turns his attention to the screen at the front of the room, where El is having a conversation with a familiar boy. He seems to be choosing a song, wearing a shy sort of smile and standing awkwardly in front of the screen.

“You haven’t sung all night, Will,” Mike hears El say, “pick a song you like. I know — you could duet with someone. People love you. I’m sure anyone would jump at the chance to sing with you.”

At this point, Mike isn’t quite listening to his friends, because he finds himself a little more interested in eavesdropping on this conversation between two people he doesn’t really know.

“The Cure?” El guesses, and smiles. Mike likes The Cure. Well, maybe he’s cosplaying as a fan of them more than anything, because he’s only heard, like, three of their songs, but they’re three really good songs.

“Are you sure I should sing?” The boy asks, touching a hand to be back of his neck. “I mean, I’m fine just talking to people.”

“You could do with having some more fun, you know,” El complains, “I know you’ll like karaoke when you try it. You’re a performer. And you could meet someone new with a duet.”

“I have plenty of friends here.”

“Yes, but,” El tries to think of an argument, “not everyone. This get-together is so the arts department can get to know each other! Like, you know Max and Lucas, but what about their guitarist? Mike? I think he’s the lead singer, too. Max says that he’s really annoying, but she thinks you’d like him.”

Mike flinches when he hears his name mentioned in the conversation, and he shoots Max a dirty look when he hears that she tells El that he’s “really annoying”, which is perfectly timed with Max’s irritated “Are you even listening to us?”, to which he is not.

“I guess,” Mike’s attention fully turns back to the boy El’s talking to, “but Max says that about everyone.” There’s a pause in which neither of them say anything. “Okay, fine, I’ll sing. I’ve got a song picked out now.”

The conversation seems to end and Mike turns his attention back to Lucas and Max, who are still grilling him about something or other.

His focus on his friends only lasts for a couple seconds before El grabs the hand of the boy next to her and holds it up in the air, a beaming smile on her face.

“Who wants to sing with Will?” She calls to the room. “This is his debut song of the night, and it’s a duet!”

There are a couple of hands, and Mike is in the process of sinking back into his seat and turning his brain off when Max’s voice rings out from next to him.

“Mike’ll do it!”

“What?” Mike asks, because he did not, in any way, say that he would do that.

“Yeah, Mike really wants to,” Lucas adds, grabbing Mike by the shoulders and forcefully lifting him up from his seat.

“I did not say that—” Mike tries, but he’s already being pushed toward the front of the room by Lucas and Max.

“Great!” El grins. “Mike, get up here!”

“Actually, I’m — I’m,” Mike tries again, “I’m recovering from a sore throat, so—”

“You’ve been saying that for a month.” Lucas calls Mike out on something undeniably true, pushing him towards El.

He tries desperately to get out of his situation, but everyone in the room is staring at him and the boy at the front has an expectant gaze on him, and he feels as though he can’t exactly avoid it. He hates the smug looks on his friends’ faces.

With a little bit of a closer look at him, Mike now recognizes the boy as Will Byers. He’s El’s brother, another member of the drama club, and a classmate of Mike’s. If Mike remembers correctly, he’s also in the art club, though Mike has never seen his artwork. In other words, Will’s pretty popular within the school’s arts department, and Mike’s just some guy, which makes Mike kind of nervous.

Because Will seems nice, too, and he’s got top grades in Mike’s classes. Plus, he’s, like, kind of cute. Conventionally attractive, even.

And, once again, Mike’s just some guy. He’s some idiot who quite frankly doesn’t want to be here right now, facing yet another round of peer pressure, this time to sing karaoke with Will Byers.

However, it’s just Mike’s luck that the backing track to the song starts up and El, Max and Lucas sit down to watch them as they awkwardly stand in front of them.

“Someday you might thank us for this,” Max says, her tone edging on smug as she moves away to sit down.

Will hands Mike a microphone and offers a nervous smile.

“Sorry about this,” he starts over the music, “I told my sister she didn’t have to.”

“No, don’t worry,” Mike puts on his most polite smile possible, because it’s comforting and also a little endearing that Will’s a bit nervous. “Uh, The Cure?”

“Yeah,” Will’s smile brightens a little, “I’m a big fan.”

“Awesome,” Mike says, like a dumbass, but he doesn’t quite get to start lying through his teeth and saying “me too” before they actually have to start singing.

In all truth, singing a duet of something originally sung by one person is harder than romantic comedy movies make it seem.

That combined with the fact that singing such a love song as Just Like Heaven with Will Byers, probably the most popular boy involved with the school’s arts department, is undoubtedly very nerve wracking, the whole situation is quite ironically making Mike kind of dizzy.

Will is a good singer. Mike would imagine that he is, or else he wouldn’t have gotten cast as lead in last year’s winter musical, but it’s still just a little shocking to Mike. Maybe it’s because Will looks — good, he’s just a bit tense and he keeps adjusting his jacket and it might be a trick of the dim lighting, but his face is kind of flushed — and he seems to get over his nervousness a bit when El starts cheering for him.

It’s cool. It’s so cool that Mike almost forgets to sing when he comes in on the second verse. He’s also a little hesitant at first, but then he realizes that he and Will sound, like, really good together.

Okay, he could be flattering himself a little, but he thinks that Will thinks it too because they’re both far more confident when they start singing together.

Sparks are flying, or something. Perhaps it’s sort of romantic, because Mike finds himself having a lot more fun than he should singing with a stranger while his friends and said stranger’s sister are all watching them, cheering them on. But it’s fun.

It’s way more fun than Mike had thought because the two have a surprisingly good karaoke rendition of the song, and a smile starts forcibly making its way onto Mike’s face. And Will is smiling, too, which is good. Great, even. And his eyes are sort of shining and he starts to care more about the song than adjusting his jacket and — he’s actually really pretty, is what Mike realizes.

Well, he had already known that, but now he’s even more aware of it. Will’s a good singer, and he’s looking at Mike, and all of it’s kind of twisting things around for Mike. In a good way or a bad way, he doesn’t quite know right now.

People love them, too. There are a couple woos from people Mike would assume are Will’s friends, and they even get some applause when the song ends. It’s pretty cool, because Mike’s sang in front of people before, but never with someone else. Never with someone else so pretty.

Okay, maybe he should stop thinking about how pretty Will is right now, because he imagines that should be the least of his concerns. However, it’s not, because the song ends and Will smiles at Mike and takes a little bow as a joke and about half of Mike’s thoughts are all discussing the fact that Will is very pretty.

Mike finds himself taking a bow too, though it probably looks a lot goofier on him because he’s not a stage performer, but it makes Will laugh. So, a win?

“It’s about time you stopped looking so miserable,” Lucas offers Mike a high five, and Mike realizes he’s probably smiling like an idiot right now.

“You guys killed it!” El comments, wrapping Will in a hug in celebration. “I told you karaoke would be fun.”

“Yeah, it was—” Will glances in Mike’s direction, “it was more fun than I had thought it would be.”

“This could be the start of something new, guys,” Max has another smug look that Mike doesn’t quite like, “I’m getting back up there. You two should go talk.”

Mike exchanges a look with Will, who doesn’t seem opposed to the idea. However, neither of them have time to be opposed to the idea before El is pushing them over to a table at the side of the room.

Journey’s Don’t Stop Believin’ starts up as Mike takes a seat at the table, Will shuffling in across from him.

“So…” Will starts, still smiling. “Mike, is it?”

“Yes. And you’re Will?”

“Yeah. You’re in the music club, aren’t you? Lucas and Max’s band?” Will crosses his arms and places them on the table, leaning forward a little, and his hair falls into his eyes.

“Uh-huh. I play guitar.” Mike attempts to add the next part nonchalantly, for whatever reason. “And I sing.”

“I could tell.” Will laughs, and Mike thinks he flushes at the compliment. “Well, I know that you’re really good. I went with El to watch you guys perform at the music club’s winter showcase.”

“Oh, yeah,” Mike tries to recall that day, “I think I remember seeing you there.”

“Well, you’re an awesome singer,” Will says, “and it’s even more awesome that you like The Cure.”

“I only know a couple of their songs,” Mike admits, “but I can play Boys Don’t Cry on guitar. With minimal complaining about how much barre chords hurt my fingers.”

“Really?” Will laughs. “I’d love to hear that.”

Now, maybe Mike is reading too far into it, but Will saying that implies that he would want to hear Mike play guitar, which implies that he would want to talk to Mike again. Hang out, maybe. Mike shouldn’t get too ahead of himself, because this is their first conversation, but that’s what it’s sounding like to him.

And from there, the two, surprisingly or unsurprisingly, completely hit it off. Well, they don’t exactly talk for long, but they get along really well.

Will is just as nice as he seems, actually, and he laughs at every dumb joke Mike makes and the painful amount of times Mike says something stupid or awkward. And, has Mike mentioned that Will is really pretty? Because it’s a very present thought in his mind.

Maybe Mike isn’t exactly good with talking to new people, but Will is welcoming and he makes Mike laugh and Mike thinks that he already might be ever so slightly attracted to Will. Maybe. That’s not a thought he has the time to unpack right now.

The point is, he has a pretty good conversation with the guy, and he starts thinking that he doesn’t entirely regret showing up to this stupid get-together in the first place, though the first two hours were miserable.

Because he’s having fun, sitting at a table to the side and talking to Will, and he wonders if they can become, like, friends. Mike only has two friends, and they’re also friends with Will and his sister, so it would technically make sense to befriend Will, right?

Also, he just really wants an excuse to maybe get closer to him, because he undoubtedly interests Mike and he’s also super cool. And nice. And pretty. Maybe he’s attracted to Will a little bit. Whatever. He can think about that over the weekend.

It’s not long before it’s ten o’clock, and people are leaving the room and the last song of the night fades out. Time flies, or something, because he could swear Will has only been smiling at him and sharing an anecdote about his brother Jonathan for about two minutes.

“Will!” El calls from the other side of the room, walking over to grab Will by the arm and drag him up from his seat. “We’re going now.”

“Really?” Will asks, looking up at El sort of puzzled. “Well, it was nice meeting you, Mike.”

“Oh, uh— yeah.” Mike responds brilliantly, before deciding to be a little bold. “I’ll talk to you — Monday?”

“Yeah.” Will smiles, giving Mike an unexplainable surge of butterflies. “Talk to you on Monday.”

El links her arm with Will and waves goodbye over her shoulder, leading him out as Max and Lucas wait for Mike to get up.

“So,” Max begins, “do you still regret coming here?”

“Or are you glad you got to chat it up with Will Byers?” Lucas adds, his grin matching with Max’s.

Mike doesn’t respond, however, because he’s too busy following Will with his eyes as he disappears from the room, still feeling dazzled.

So, call it a complete descent into madness or call it falling in love, but whatever it is begins that day.

Unfortunately, Mike’s entire weekend is entirely consumed by the singular stupid interaction that he had with some guy on Friday.

One thing that should be known about Mike is that he’s pathetic, and also a loser, so his weekend consisted of pacing the floor of his room and feverishly talking to himself rather than doing something productive.

He has come to one conclusion since Friday — he is a little infatuated with Will.

In a way, he finds it sort of impossible not to be, given that he thinks that he and Will had something along the lines of instant chemistry when they sang together, and Will didn’t seem to be repulsed by the very concept of Mike Wheeler, and Will’s kind and down-to-earth and charming and Mike has decided that he’s far cuter than just “kind of cute”.

Of course, Mike doesn’t think his brief attraction will surpass the point of a hallway crush, because they’ve talked a grand total of once and it’s not like he actually wants to date him or whatever, and he’s positive it will go away within a couple weeks. Days, even. He wants to get to know Will, more than anything, and he imagines that he’ll get over his crush as he gets to know Will more. However, his infatuation does come with a couple unfortunate side effects, as romantic feelings usually do, because they suck.

So, there’s that, and then there’s— nothing else. Now that he’s actually thinking about it, stupid karaoke night on Friday night might have been all that was actually present in Mike’s mind over the weekend, which is troubling.

It’s pretty much expected from Mike when the prospect of going to school on Monday has him very mentally drained, as he’s experienced two days of pure filler after the most exciting hour of his March.

He hopes that during the day he can sneak another glance at Will, talk to him maybe. He’s been trying to replicate Will’s face in his mind the entire weekend, which is difficult because he had never really paid a great deal of attention to him before Friday, so he’s only left with a few frames of him in his mind. If he could draw right now, he’d probably be making doodles of Will’s face and shit.

Actually, Will can draw, can’t he? He’s in the art club. Mike wonders what Will’s drawings would look like.

He wonders if Will draws, like, comics or something. Comics are pretty nerdy, to be fair, but Will’s a theater kid, which is also nerdy. Are musicals and plays a different brand of nerdy to comic books? Mike doesn’t know.

Whatever. That’s a mental cartwheel he doesn’t have time to perform on a Monday. Plus, he actually has to spend his Monday getting work done with his band, because he is in that. Everyone in the arts clubs is expected to meet in the auditorium during free period today.

It’s probably another showcase. There’s always a showcase, to promote the music club or get people to buy tickets for the school musical or to show off sculptures, or something. They haven’t done one since the winter showcase in December, which Will was apparently at. This is probably a spring showcase, given the time of year.

The strange part is, it’s never an “all the arts clubs” thing. Usually it’s just the bands, sometimes a separate one for the drama club, most of the time they just host art competitions for the art club and call it a day. So, Mike doesn’t quite know why, if this is a showcase, the whole arts department has to meet for it.

But he isn’t exactly in a position to question it, and questioning it is something he just so can’t be bothered to do right about now. The thing that’s really on the forefront of his mind is that Will is probably going to be there.

Mike is tired, and his brain is barely working, and he hates his stupid school building, but it’s soon enough that free period rolls around and he meets up with Max and Lucas to go to the auditorium.

This time, he recognizes quite a lot of faces in the auditorium, as they’re all just the faces that were at the karaoke bar on Friday. Max, Lucas and Mike file into a few seats in front of the stage while exchanging theories on what this meeting is going to be about.

Mike is only really present in his conversation with his friends for a couple minutes, before Will Byers and El Hopper walk into the room. Like an idiot, Mike feels himself kind of smile a little bit when he turns his head to see Will, making him quickly have to turn his head back to Max and Lucas and look normal. He thinks he succeeds in doing that.

“Hey, guys,” El’s voice brings Mike’s friends out of their conversation, shifting the attention to her as she stands over them.

“What’s up, El,” Lucas says casually, before adding, “Will.”

“Do you guys wanna sit with us?” Max offers, gesturing to the empty seat beside her.

El accepts the offer cheerfully and shuffles past Mike’s and Lucas’s seat to sit down, and Mike expects Will to follow her and sit next to her. However, Will decides to sit down in the empty seat next to Mike.

Okay. No big deal. At all. Ever. Just Will Byers going out of his way to sit next to Mike Wheeler when he could have just followed his sister and called it a day. Cool.

Very cool.

Mike feels like an idiot. His face is burning at something so mind numbingly simple, which is embarrassing. He should say something.

“Hi, um—” Mike begins, already fumbling his words and hoping he doesn’t look like a buffoon right now, “hey, Will.”

“Hi.” Will smiles, his voice sweet and warm and easy and— Mike hates how he can already feel reality slip away from him after Will says one word. It’s not his fault that Will has a sweet smile and a voice that’s pleasing to the ears, and he’s somehow wasting all that on Mike.

A pause. Neither of them really know what to say.

“So…” Mike tries, attempting not to focus too much on the fact that Will is sitting next to him, and he’s sort of leaning in so he can hear Mike over the room’s chatter. “What do you think this is about?”

“Well, I thought it was a showcase, but…” Will starts, “I don’t know why all the arts clubs would be here for that.”

“That’s exactly what I was thinking!” Mike tries not to sound too excited about that, because that would be weird, but he thinks it’s pretty nifty that they had the same thought.

“Really?” To Mike’s surprise and relief, Will’s eyes seem to light up. “Woah. We’re, like, on the same wavelength.”

Unfortunately, Mike is far too excited about that comment. Because — it seems kind of self-explanatory. This is the Will Byers, making jokes about their “wavelength”. That’s super nifty.

“Yeah!” Mike semi-exclaims, before attempting to calm himself down because that is probably a normal comment to make as a joke towards an acquaintance and Mike is being totally weird about it. “Well, we’ll find out soon enough.”

“True.” Will purses his lips and nods.

There’s another silence between them, and Mike feels like he’s about to go limp.

This is actually a really unfortunate situation to be in, because he’s sitting next to Will Byers, without an inkling of what to say or how to get a conversation going, and he feels his face burning itself off of his skull as he desperately tries to pretend he isn’t nervous.

He’s very nervous.

Should he say something else? Like, pathetically attempt to start a conversation? But he doesn’t want to seem annoying. Mike isn’t saying anything because he’s nervous and he’s forgotten what the basic structure of a sentence looks like, but what if Will isn’t saying anything because he doesn’t want to talk to Mike? Mike wouldn’t blame him. He sucks.

Still, that’s not an ideal outcome. What if Will’s thinking the same thing and he’s worried that Mike doesn’t like him because he’s not saying anything?

Alright — well now Mike’s just flattering himself. He’s positive Will is, like, normal, and his insides aren’t going all mushy because of the idea of conversing with someone he has talked to one time.

He sneaks a glance at Will. As usual, he looks great. Mike imagines he probably doesn’t have to try. He probably just wakes up with near perfect hair, throws on a pretty yellow shirt and calls it a day or something. He probably sings into a hairbrush in the mirror when he gets ready in the morning.

That thought had no right to show up in Mike’s head, but it’s kind of adorable and it now has no intentions to leave Mike’s head.

The good news is, his situation is made a little less excruciating when the drama teacher shows up, and starts explaining what exactly is going on.

As it turns out, Will and Mike were correct. Apparently, this year’s spring showcase will be a joint event for every club involved with the arts, in an effort to raise money for the school’s arts department.

This is, of course, not something Mike really wants to do, but he’s in his stupid band and he has his stupid friends and he guesses that singing on stage is fun, or whatever.

The whole gist is that the showcase is a month from now, and all the art students will create a spring-themed piece of artwork, and the music club’s bands will sing two songs each, and the drama club will perform four scenes from the school’s current play, whatever, whatever.

Mike can’t say he’s fully listening, because he is literally sitting next to Will Byers, which would distract anyone with sense. He’s really cute.

Plus, even though this showcase is slightly different, he’s still done enough to basically know what he’s doing. Max, Lucas and him just need to learn and perform two new songs by next month. Easy. He can afford to sneak a few glances at Will.

It feels like the teacher’s nothingburger speech goes on for forever, and by the time she steps off the stage, Mike’s brain is totally turned off. He basically knows what he’s doing.

As expected, everyone has the rest of their free period to brainstorm what they’re doing, and then it’s just practice.

And practice. And Will Byers. Right, he’s still thinking about Will, who’s still sitting next to him and smiling like nothing in the world matters.

“Alright!” El jumps up, dusting herself off with a grin. “We probably have to go meet up with the rest of the drama club now.”

“Uh, yeah.” Will agrees, and Mike’s eyes follow Will as he stands up. Their interaction was a little more short-lived than he would have liked, but they aren’t necessarily from the same club.

“But, maybe we’ll come by the music room after school.” El adds, glancing between Will and Mike. “Since we’re all friends now. Maybe we’ll bring Dustin.”

Mike would like that, because that sounds like an excuse to spend some extra time getting to know Will, which is always welcome.

“Totally,” Will grins, preparing to leave with El. “See you guys around, then.”

“Bye!” El waves cheerfully, linking an arm with Will again and making their way to the row of seats in the auditorium that seem to have been claimed by the drama club.

Mike’s eyes are still following Will, and he doesn’t even realize that Max and Lucas have already said bye while Mike’s busy forgetting how to breathe.

“Oh, uh — bye.” Mike blurts, though they’re long gone and probably can’t hear him. “Will. Guys.”

Mike’s utter humiliation and pain and misery is met with a laugh of amusement from Max and Lucas.

“Nice one, Romeo,” Lucas teases, punching Mike on the shoulder. “Smooth.”

“Yeah, okay, shut up.” Mike crosses his arms, and his face is maybe hotter than it should be.

“So, what’s that about?” Lucas presses, and Mike decides he doesn’t like this game anymore. “Such a delayed response? You seem nervous.”

“Please,” Max rolls her eyes, and Mike hates how she probably knows exactly what’s going on. “He’s obviously crushing on Will.”

“No, I’m not!” Mike says, a little too defensively, because he knows for a fact that he is.

“You’re blushing so hard right now.” Lucas points out, clearly amused by Mike Wheeler’s stupid feelings. It is a serious bruise to his ego that his only friends figured it out so quickly.

“And you should have seen your face when he sat next to you just now.” Max adds, chuckling slightly. “Your head was about to explode.”

“Your head was about to explode,” Mike retorts, knowing that Max is right and his comeback sucks, so everything is bad right now.

“Dude, it’s fine,” Lucas makes an attempt at reassuring him, “we’re totally supportive, and open to hearing every detail of how this happened.”

“There are no details,” Mike huffs, “it all just kinda happened. We’ve talked like once. It probably won’t last for long.”

“Whatever you say, man.” Max shares a look with Lucas, and suddenly something between them is funny.

Mike hates his friends.

He turns his head to glance at Will, who’s talking with the art club, and everyone is smiling and laughing, probably at Will’s effortless charm.

He turns his head back to Max and Lucas, who are still making fun of Mike and in the process of trying to give him “dating advice” for when Will and El come to music after school. However, as has been established, Mike has no interest in dating Will, because he’s simply infatuated.

That being said, his head might still explode.

This totally sucks.

Mike’s friends figured out his stupid crush embarrassingly easily, and they have done nothing but terrorize him about it for the whole damn day.

And unfortunately, he sits with them in a lot of classes, so a decent chunk of his subjects today were Max and Lucas giggling and whispering whatever they could possibly think of about Will Byers until steam was practically coming out of Mike’s ears.

In all fairness, Mike would totally do this to them if the roles were reversed, but he can’t because he’s constantly taunted by the reminder that they are quite literally dating each other, which not only makes Mike the third wheel but it also makes him the only one who gets made fun of like this.

In other words, Mike is already just about sick of his feelings and completely ready to get rid of his infatuation with Will already.

As Mike has established, he can probably achieve this by becoming Will’s friend. Of course, he just really wants to get to know someone like Will, but he’s fairly sure that his throwaway attraction will go away with it.

And, believe him, Mike cannot wait for it to go away.

Who was going to tell him that having a crush was such a nightmare? He’s going through a hell of a lot of emotional turmoil over a pretty boy he’s talked to twice.

It’s about to be three times, just now, because three familiar faces appear at the door of one of the music practice rooms just as he’s attempting to practise a new song.

Mike had kind of prepared himself for this scenario, because El had warned them earlier today, but Mike is greeted by El, Will, and their friend Dustin Henderson when Max signals for them to enter the room.

El’s chipper as usual, waving and shutting the door behind her as Will and Dustin smile politely but don’t exactly look like they know what to do with themselves.

“Hi guys,” El greets, “I said we might come by, so here we are.”

“What’s up,” Max looks up from her bass guitar, “you here to see what this part of the music club’s doing for the showcase?”

It’s supposed to be two songs each, and they’re just looking at songs they can do right now, so Mike imagines that Max and Lucas will just explain that while chatting with the other three as Mike twiddles his thumbs and tries not to stare at Will.

Surprisingly, that doesn’t turn out to be exactly what happens when El pulls Dustin into a conversation with Lucas and Max about the showcase and Will walks to the table where Mike is sitting and props himself up next to Mike.

Mike doesn’t know Will’s fascination with him, because of their lack of interactions and Mike’s overall lack of being an interesting or likeable person, and Mike would like to say that he isn’t complaining, but he’s definitely complaining that he’s totally forgotten how to breathe by this point.

It’s fine, because this is a chance to get a little closer to Will. Plus, if Mike starts embarrassing himself too much, he can just turn to the other four and turn whatever conversation they’re having into a group discussion.

“Hi, Mike.” Will smiles, and Mike already feels stupid.

“Hi— Hey,” Mike pauses for an awkward second, “Will.”

Mike is approximately three seconds into this conversation and he’s already fumbled his stupid bag. Awesome.

“So, uh, what’cha working on?” Will gestures to Mike’s guitar. “For the showcase.”

“Oh, um— We’re just trying things out right now,” Mike replies after zoning out for a second, “We have a couple of songs and seeing what works.”

“Cool,” Will’s grin brightens, and his voice feels like something corny — like sunshine — and Mike’s already coming up with the lines to an embarrassing poem about Will’s smile.

A pause.

“But, uh, how about you?” Mike tries to keep the conversation going. “What are the drama and art clubs doing?”

“Well, the drama club’s doing a few scenes from our current play,” Will pulls a script out of his backpack and flips through the pages, “there’s one focused on me and my character’s love interest, which is cool.”

“That’s— that’s cool, yeah. Really cool.” Mike replies brilliantly, skimming over the highlighted lines on the script’s pages and trying to fight off his internal jealousy of whoever gets to play Will Byers’ love interest. Should Mike join the drama club?

“As for the art club,” Will puts the script back in his bag, “it’s just an individual piece based on spring. I’m thinking of doing a painting.”

“A painting is awesome,” Mike averts his gaze, because he finds himself with a lack of a response, “I bet your art’s great. Even though I haven’t seen it.”

“Maybe I’ll show you one day,” Will chuckles, and Mike can’t tell if he’s joking or not but even the proposition is going to be his reason to get out of bed tomorrow. “My sister says I’m really good, I just don’t like saying it because it makes me feel egotistical.”

“I get that,” Mike absently picks a string on his guitar, “it’s weirder to compliment yourself.”

Mike doesn’t like the amount of pauses in the conversation and the rate at which his heart is beating, but he’s brought sort of back to his surroundings by the sound of Max playing some kind of bassline.

The playing catches Will’s attention too, and Lucas follows with something on his drums and Mike assumes that they’re just showing Dustin and El the type of things they play.

Will’s eyes dart over to Mike’s guitar.

“Remember on Friday,” Will looks just a little nervous, “when you said you could play Boys Don’t Cry?”

“I do,” Mike is, if it’s even possible, about ten times more nervous than he just was, because he thinks he knows what Will is implying. “Do you want me to play it?”

“Yes,” Will sighs, presumably of relief, “I was really hoping I wouldn’t have to ask, so thanks.”

Immediately, Mike kind of wishes that he had just played dumb and not signed up to do this, because God forbid he makes a mistake while playing to Will Byers, but Will’s watching in sort of anticipation and the other four in the room are still chatting about instruments and whatnot so Mike thinks he might be fine.

Mike doesn’t think himself cool and accomplished enough to play the riff without making an egregious amount of mistakes in front of Will, so he opts for the chords, which are less cool but still recognizable.

What throws him off is when Will starts singing along, which really shouldn’t be as shocking to Mike as it is, but Mike is hyper aware of every single one of his surroundings and trying desperately not to keel over and die.

He’s only at the second verse when he hears the chatter in the background fade out. El and Dustin and Max and Lucas are staring, Mike can feel it. He should have definitely expected that when he decided to play a song in a relatively small practice room with four other people, but it’s still not amazing.

The room is eerily silent aside from the music and Mike keeps losing his focus when he sneaks a glance at Will’s relaxed expression and — gosh, barre chords hurt — and Will sounds really pretty. And looks really pretty. And everyone is staring. And Will is really pretty.

Mike thinks he’s doing well, but he can’t even enjoy it, because he’s embarrassed, and he can only feel his stupid crush on Will intensify instead of doing the opposite, which he does not like.

The last time Mike checked, the song isn’t supposed to be ten minutes, but that’s what it feels like when he finally finishes the song, and his face burns as he’s met with a round of applause.

“You guys are great together,” Dustin gives Will a high five, “do you play music together often?”

“Not really,” Will admits, fidgeting with his hands, “I guess we’re just naturals.”

“Yeah,” Mike laughs, sharing a look with Will before going back to focusing on a crack in the wall out of sheer embarrassment.

He doesn’t quite know why he’s so embarrassed, because his friends seem to be praising him and Will, but it’s just — embarrassing. It is, okay?

Especially Lucas and Max, who are looking at Mike in a knowing way and trying to make fun of him in subtle ways, and Mike hates them so much.

At one point, they start trying to request songs for Will and Mike to sing together, which Mike quickly shuts down before he melts into a puddle.

“Thanks,” Will looks away, fidgeting with the collar of his shirt, “for playing. It was great, because I just really like that song.”

“Thanks for singing along,” Mike feels a little at ease at Will’s possible awkwardness, “It was really cool.”

Mike shifts a little where he sits, and the other four fade back into conversation, but Will stays on the table, sort of watching Mike and making him very nervous.

“So, um—” Will begins after a beat, “tell me about the showcase. What do you think you want to do for your songs?”

Mike’s a little caught off guard by Will’s attempt to start a new conversation, and he can’t help but mentally pump his fist and fight back a grin at the implication that Will wants to talk to him.

“Right, so,” Mike runs a hand through his hair, “I’m not totally sure yet. We have one I liked right now but I think we’re still trying to figure out how well it goes without the synth—”

All of a sudden, Mike finds himself rambling, and he finds Will wearing an intent expression, nodding and “yeah”ing, making attempts to keep the conversation going when Mike worries he’s being annoying.

Are these the beginnings of friendship? Possibly. It feels like it. Mike can never gage when to call someone a friend or if they’re still acquaintances or something, but this is friendship-y.

That’s great, because that means that if things go like this, Mike’s due to get over his crush soon.

He can, like, feel his attraction going away the more he talks to Will.

So it turns out that was a fucking lie.

Mike’s absolute delusion had clouded his mind in one stupid moment, and he has come to the conclusion that his crush on Will is still present.

In fact, he thinks it might be worse.

It’s now Thursday, and Mike has been through three torturous days of his stupid school and lessons that he’s not been listening to, and almost constant run-ins with Will.

Well, maybe constant isn’t the word, he might have talked to him about three more times, but those three times have been incredibly detrimental to his health, as he feels like he’s even more far gone than he was before, which is embarrassing.

Mike can barely even hold a conversation with Will, and every single one of them aggressively paints Mike as a loser, and they all last about two minutes each. What Mike has learned about himself is that he’s an embarrassing person.

He’s also learned that he might be somewhat befriending Will, to an extent. That’s great, but it’s not solving his feelings.

Unfortunately, Will is still gorgeous and he’s still super cool and kind and he still laughs that laugh whenever Mike does something humiliating that makes Mike think that Will isn’t exactly put off by him. And, even more unfortunately, Mike is still attracted to that.

Mike has learned a couple things about Will from their short run-ins dotted around the halls and the drama classrooms. It isn’t much, but he knows that another band he’s into is The Clash — credit to his older brother Jonathan — and he knows that Will won a local art competition in Freshman year.

The latter is interesting to Mike, because he wonders if Will’s art is on, like, display or something. There are a lot of displays in the school that Mike has never cared to look at before.

It’s no surprise that Will’s won competitions, because he’s sure his art is great, and he would be lying to say he isn’t sort of dying to see it, which makes him subconsciously on the lookout for art competition displays for about the whole day.

The song for the arts showcase is going well, or something. He isn’t really thinking about the arts showcase recently, which is probably something he should be concerned about.

This isn’t about the showcase. It’s about Will.

Mike buries his face in his hands and silently begs for his stupid last class to be over. All he can think about is some guy that he met less than a week ago. Some incredibly charming, kind, and attractive guy, but some guy nonetheless.

After what’s basically forever, Mike’s freed from his stupid class and heads for the music room, but not without taking a detour down the corridor with most of the art classrooms, in hopes of seeing something up on the walls.

Fortunately, there’s a display that he’s never spared a second glance that catches his attention. A swirl of blues and yellows on a canvas hung up on the wall.

Mike stops in his tracks to observe, his eyes darting to the writing displayed underneath the canvas. And — there it is — Will Byers, 9th Grade, Hawkins High annual art competition 1st place winner. Mike looks back at the painting.

It’s no wonder that Will’s art is up on the school’s walls, opposite some random art classroom for every student to get lost in. It’s something of a starry sky. If Mike were to compare it to anything, it would be that painting by Van Gogh, except this one is a hundred times cooler.

Maybe Mike isn’t Shakespeare or anything, and maybe he isn’t great at describing paintings, but he’s stuck staring for a solid couple minutes. Mike loves the stars. Everyone knows the night sky is cool as fuck. Somehow, Will makes it look exactly how it does in real life, with just some acrylic paints and a canvas. Mike can’t even bother himself with counting the amount of tiny stars overlooking what seems to be a village, trying to pick apart every single detail.

To put it short, Will’s art, just like the rest of him, is nothing short of mesmerizing. Mike was expecting this, but he’s still kind of in disbelief that this guy can sing, act, and paint, while also being super hot and the kindest person ever.

“It isn’t my best work, but I’m still proud of it,” Mike is reeled out of his starry painting world by the sound of a familiar voice, and he almost faints when he catches sight of Will, standing next to him and offering a slight smirk.

“Oh my god, hi, Will, uh—” Mike stammers in slight surprise, because Will just caught Mike practically oohing and ahhing at his painting and he’s wearing the most endeared smirk ever and Mike is being sent into overdrive. “Did you paint this?”

Dumb question, dumb question, absolutely stupid question. Mike is only left to feel like a total dumbass at the way his stupid brain works. Obviously Will painted that, or else it wouldn’t have his fucking name basically plastered all over it.

“Well, I mean, it does say my name under it,” Will’s expression grows a tiny bit more smug, his amusement presenting itself as sarcasm. “So, yeah.”

“Right. Dumb question. Sorry.” Mike flushes and Will laughs just a little bit, not bothering to leave and go to wherever he needs to be. “You’re, uh— it’s really good. You’re very talented.”

“Thank you,” Will’s sarcastic smile melts into a more genuine one; a brighter one, meanwhile Mike’s face melts off of his skull.

“It’s seriously great,” Mike continues, as if Will didn’t hear him the first time. “I mean— I would know. I’m a huge art guy. Very artistic person. So— this is pretty cool.”

Mike is only really left wondering what possessed him to say that as Will laughs again. He notices that Will laughs a lot, which is a good sign? Does it make Mike funny or an idiot? Either way, Will does have a nice laugh, so it can’t be bad.

“Well, if that’s true, I could always show you more of my art,” Will offers, fidgeting with his hands. “Like, you could come to the art room after school sometime. Or, um, or something like that. If— if you’re interested, that is. I’m not sure I have any masterpieces or anything.”

“I’m sure you do.” Mike says quickly, because he almost went into psychosis because of some painting on the wall. “I would love to. If you want. Like, if you have better things to do then it’s fine—”

“If I didn’t want to then I wouldn’t have offered in the first place, Mike,” Will breathes another laugh through his words, and Mike feels incredibly embarrassed, while trying his best not to focus on the way his name sounds in Will’s voice.

“Right. Sorry.” Mike does something humiliatingly close to finger guns, and tries his absolute best to shut himself up.

“You’re cute, Mike,” Will grins, and Mike almost dies.

Or maybe he does die. He might be dead, actually, because Will Byers just called Mike “cute”. Does that count as flirting? He supposes “cute” is a far better word than “embarrassing”, but it causes a whole new problem because there are ten thousand implications behind such a compliment and Mike can’t even begin to pick apart which one Will means.

But also, he’s the one who thinks Will is cute. Using that kind of word to refer to Mike is big, right? Unless he’s grossly overdramatizing the situation, this is definitely some kind of achievement.

Mike’s head spends far too long spinning and his face is far too hot while trying to process the compliment, because he hasn’t even begun to think of how to respond to it. Does he say it back? No, obviously. That’s absurd. In what world would Mike ever be enough of an idiot to—

“Thanks,” Mike begins awkwardly, “you’re cute too.”

Today is the day that Mike finally curls up and dies, because he thinks he might be the most humiliating person of all time. It’s endearing when Will calls someone cute, but it’s probably totally weird when Mike does it and now they’ll never be friends and Mike will be confined to his stupid feelings until the end of time.

“Thank you,” surprisingly, Will’s voice is unwaveringly sincere, and Mike comes to the conclusion that Will is just a nice person who sees “cute” as a regular old compliment. “If you come to that classroom after school tomorrow, I could show you one of my old pieces that I keep here.”

Will points down the hall to a classroom they’re standing directly opposite to, and all Mike can do is nod, because apparently Will still wants to hang out with Mike.

In all fairness, Mike probably shouldn’t flatter himself about something like this, because Will makes good art and it makes sense that he wants to show people, so Mike isn’t entirely sure this makes them friends. He’s sure that dozens of people have seen Will’s paintings.

“Well, I’ve probably kept you too long,” Will begins abruptly, “I bet you have band practice to get to.”

“Oh— yeah, I do.” Mike stares for a second, before he regains consciousness and realizes the conversation is ending. “Bye.”

“See you tomorrow, Mike.” Will walks out of the virtually empty halls with a wave, and Mike is mesmerized.

See you tomorrow. Maybe Mike’s crossed the line of overthinking and gone into straight delusion, but that seems on the friend end of sign-offs. That means something. Maybe. It means that Mike is almost free, because his heart is racing and his face is melting and he wants his stupid feelings gone.

Having a crush is nothing like the movies make it seem. He thought it was all big and spectacular and giggling and kicking his feet, but he’s actually just embarrassed and totally delusional. It’s not exactly fun.

Plus, he’s probably super late for practice, and Lucas and Max are probably going to scold him and then they’re going to interrogate him and then they’ll notice that he’s still kind of dazed and then they’ll bring up Will and then they won’t shut up.

They never do.

So, there are romantic implications behind the word “cute”, right?

Yeah, that’s right— Mike has decided not to let this go and be normal about it.

He almost considered asking Lucas and Max about it, but he decided that they’re for desperate times. And there shouldn’t be desperate times, because Mike is due to be over his crush soon, but just unless he truly goes insane.

But, when someone calls another person cute, in a lot of situations it’s a form of flirting.

Well, sometimes it’s sarcasm or mockery, which would be horrible if those were Will’s intentions, so Mike would like to think that isn’t the case, but is that a normal compliment between people?

The idea of Will flirting opens up a whole new can of worms, because why would Will want to date Mike? They hardly know each other, aside from maybe being friends. Mike has established that he has no interest in actually dating Will, but if Will asked him out, he wouldn’t say no.

Who would he be to reject Will Byers? Wait— why is he even considering this? Will isn’t going to ask him out. Unless he is. No, he isn’t. He sees “cute” as a regular thing to say. Unless he doesn’t.

God. He feels himself starting to go insane.

Phase Two - A Canvas, a “Date”, and Something of a Meltdown

The good news is, he gets through Friday in one piece, which is sort of to his surprise.

Friday’s boring. Friday’s always boring, because he gets screwed over in terms of his classes. They all suck.

There’s one upside to his Friday classes — however, depending on how one sees it, it’s actually a horrific downside — Will is in most of them.

Typically, Mike wouldn’t talk to Will in class, because their relationship isn’t like that, but it turns out that their friendship has received an upgrade, because of Will’s relentless and honesty quite strange fascination with Mike as a person.

It’s some lesson between the morning and lunch, Mike’s mind is still kind of preoccupied and fueled by an embarrassing lack of sleep, so he can’t bring himself to care. Physics or something. Physics is on the better side of school subjects, so he doesn’t quite want to die as much as he does in some other classes.

A good thing about physics is that their teacher always manages to be at least a little late, so Mike gets about five minutes of laying his head on his desk and humming tunes until class has to start.

Will is in class. Well, duh, most people are, but when Mike walks in, people are doing whatever and Will is sitting at his desk near the front, his head down and he seems to be drawing something in a sketchbook or something.

Mike allows himself to stare for just a moment, but he can’t be bothered to drive himself crazy quite yet, so he plans to make a b-line for his desk and slam his head down dramatically.

His plans are interrupted when Will looks up.

“Morning, Mike,” Will smiles as Mike makes his way past his desk, and Mike stops dead in his tracks.

The fact that they’ve moved to good mornings definitely indicates that they’re friends now, correct? Hell, Mike doesn’t even say good morning to his own friends half the time.

So, if his math is correct, he should be totally not attracted to Will anymore.

Surprise — his math isn’t correct, because he’s overcome with the same nervousness and all the rest of his stupid feelings when Will looks up from his sketchbook and grins. Like sunshine.

As it turns out, becoming friends with Will is not going to solve all of his problems instantly, as he had hoped it would. He probably needs to wait it out just a little bit.

“Morning,” Mike nods, his eyes darting down to Will’s sketchbook, and he really wants to ask what he’s drawing, but he fears they aren’t like that yet.

Mike thinks the conversation is over, and it would be if he didn’t catch panels on Will’s paper. It’s pretty obscured by Will’s arm in the way, covering up the drawing at such an angle that Mike considers that he’s embarrassed and doesn’t want Mike seeing his drawings, which is totally valid and respectable from an artist and Mike just needs to go to his desk because he has no reason to ask any follow-ups and—

“Are you drawing a comic strip?” Mike points down to the sketchbook before he can stop himself, because obviously Will loves being interrogated about what he’s drawing when he was just trying to exchange polite greetings with a friend (acquaintance?) and it is quite literally none of Mike’s business.

“Oh— yeah, I am,” Will’s face flushes a little, probably because of his utter humiliation, because Mike is the most inconsiderate man alive and Will is going to be totally put off and he’s never going to want to hang out with Mike again. “I mean, I’ve only really storyboarded it, but…”

Will moves his arm a bit, and Mike catches a glimpse of sketched panels and speech bubbles, and basic outlines of people, but nothing in super fine details.

“Awesome,” Mike says, because he thinks that the fact that Will is that type of nerd is awesome, “I love comics.”

“You do?” Will’s eyes light up, sort of. Mike thinks it’s cute.

“Yeah.” Mike nods again. “It’s really cool that you draw them.”

Mike wonders what Will draws his comics about. What was on the page was only storyboarded, and Mike doesn’t have a clue what will actually be going on when Will adds the details. He wonders just how nerdy the contents of the drawing are.

“Thanks,” Will averts his gaze, and their stupid teacher decides to ruin the moment and show up. “Um, I’ll see you after school, Mike.”

“Right. After school. Art room.” Mike confirms awkwardly, as if all of that wasn’t implied. “See you.”

Mike decides to leave and go to his desk before he can do anything too harmful to his health, feeling just a tiny bit giddy, because he shares a surprising amount of interests with Will, which is really cool. He can’t help but keep wondering about Will. He can’t help but keep wanting to get to know things about him.

He can’t help but wonder if learning about Will is actually going to get rid of his feelings, because he can only feel his chest get tighter and his head spin faster.

Is that bad?

It’s probably bad, because he might be thinking about Will even more than before, which is concerning for a multitude of reasons.

The school day is fine, it’s pretty normal, and the end of the day is good because he gets to go talk to Will outside of school time.

It’s just looking at some artwork, but it still counts as something, and Mike will consider it a win.

Mike is pretty unfamiliar with the part of the school that the art classroom’s in, not because he doesn’t go there but because he can’t be bothered to remember anything about it, but he remembers the classroom that Will was pointing to yesterday.

There are a couple of other people in the room, presumably all art club students who are working on their showcase pieces.

Those people aren’t important, however. The important part of this situation is Will, who’s sitting at a desk, head down and focused on his sketchbook.

Mike definitely feels a little out of place in such a room, as someone who can’t draw for shit, but no one really bats an eye at his entrance, aside from Will.

“Hi,” Will’s face lights up upon seeing Mike, sort of. Can Mike say that? He feels like he’s painting himself in a little too flattering of a light.

“Hey,” Mike raises a hand in a pathetic attempt to wave, trying not to look at Will’s sketchbook and start asking questions that are none of his business.

There’s a slight pause between them. As it turns out, there’s no comfortable and non-awkward way to just say “hey I came here for the art so you should show me now”, so they opt for saying nothing, which isn’t much less awkward. Will closes his sketchbook and stands up, leading Mike over to a picture on the wall.

“Well, this one’s on display,” Will clears his throat, looking just a little nervous, “I painted this for the club in Sophomore year. I was trying to do more scenic paintings.”

Will gestures to a canvas on the wall, a sunset view over a beach, which somehow includes every single shade on the color wheel and effortlessly makes it work. It’s, like, ethereal, how much Will’s art makes Mike feel like he’s actually on the beach watching a sunset, though he’s never been to a beach before.

The painting is surrounded by other pieces of art work, lame flyers, and one of those corny posters that says “it’s called artwork, not art easy” or something to that effect, but Will’s painting in specific is what really stands out.

Maybe he’s slightly biased, but he thinks that Will’s paintings are just as neat as the rest of him, having seen two paintings of his and now a certified self-proclaimed Will Byers art connoisseur.

He stares for a little too long, so he quickly turns back to Will to spit out a verbal reaction, but sees a somewhat negative expression on Will’s face.

“What’s up?” Mike asks, even though it’s probably not his business, because he worries he’s done something wrong.

“Oh, nothing, just—” Will sighs and fidgets with his hands. “This painting is nice, but I totally botched the blending around here, so it’s always kind of hard to look at.”

Will points to a spot on the painting just under where the sun is painted, and it looks completely normal. It’s probably because Mike has an untrained eye, but it’s just as perfect as the rest of the painting for him.

“It looks fine to me.” Mike tilts his head.

“That’s what everyone says,” Will laughs a little, “I think it’s all in my head, but I still don’t like it.”

At this moment, Mike Wheeler, the smartest man alive, decides it would be a good idea to give Will some words of reassurance, so Will knows that he’s literally the best at art that any person has ever been, and Mike would know.

“Well, your art doesn’t have to be perfect,” Mike starts a sentence without knowing where it’s going, “I mean, didn’t the Mona Lisa have no eyebrows?”

For some reason, that was what he came up with, but he thinks it works when Will laughs that really nice laugh of his.

“I guess,” Will smiles, “but I think it’s a bit of a stretch to compare my work to the Mona Lisa.”

“Right,” Mike learns from his mistake quickly, “yours is way better.”

Will laughs again.

“Are you serious?” He looks kind of incredulous, for some reason. Mike wonders if that’s an outlandish thing to say in the art community. Do they worship the Mona Lisa?

“Well, yeah,” Mike tries to prove his seriousness, “well, maybe it’s because I’m not an artist or anything, but I’d much rather look at this than some lady without eyebrows. You’ve got serious talent, man.”

Mike hopes he’s being enough of a hype man for Will’s liking, because he completely means it, and he also wants Will to like him, and he also wants Will to know that his art is awesome and that Mike hardly remembers what the Mona Lisa even looks like.

“I like you, Mike,” Will says after a pause, breaking into a grin.

So this is what Cupid’s arrow feels like, because something definitely goes through his heart at this moment.

He hopes that his face isn’t too red, because Will just said four simple words, with a totally normal meaning behind them, but — you don’t understand — Will just confirmed that he isn’t repulsed by Mike, with a bright grin and a face that’s flushed just a little bit and his voice—

Despite the fact that he’s already established this, Mike needs another moment to say that he is smitten.

He can’t think straight for about two seconds, as his heartrate spikes and Will’s words, which were definitely normal words, replay about seven times before he can get a response out.

Returning the compliment worked yesterday, so that’s his angle for this time around as well.

“I like you too,” Mike pauses. His throat is dry. “Will.”

“I’m glad.”

For a second too long, Mike allows himself to completely space out, before someone else in the classroom bumps into his shoulder by mistake and pulls him back into the real world.

“Do you have practice that you need to get to?” Will asks, shoving his hands into his pockets.

“Max and Lucas can live without me,” Mike takes a second to think, “I told them I would be here. Do you have rehearsals?”

“They’re not doing my scene,” Will responds.

In other words, neither of them have any reason to leave the art room, meaning that they’re stuck together for the rest of the after school club hour. Whether that’s amazing or Mike’s going to die, he doesn’t know.

“Well, we have the rest of the hour.” Mike starts, looking around.

“I am working on my painting for the showcase,” Will starts, “if you’re interested in seeing it. If you want. I don’t expect you to want to just watch me paint for the rest of the hour—”

“I would love to.” Mike interrupts, because that sounds like a dream come true.

“Really?” Will blinks. Mike nods. “Okay. I’ll go get it, then. It’s somewhere in this room.”

It takes a few seconds, but Will returns to Mike with a canvas and a paint palette, filled with greens, whites, and pinks.

Mike stands around sort of cluelessly and very awkwardly as Will places the canvas on his easel and pulls up a stool in front of it.

“You can get a chair and sit next to me,” Will offers, gesturing toward the space next to him.

After a few seconds of awkwardly walking around the classroom and trying not to disturb anyone else’s artwork, he grabs a chair from a desk and pulls it next to Will, who’s already blending colors and doing whatever artists do.

Mike gets a look at the canvas. The painting is nowhere near finished, but what has been painted looks really good, as usual. Mike’s guess would be cherry blossoms, or something like that.

“We’re supposed to do a spring-themed piece of artwork,” Will explains, “so I’m painting cherry blossoms. Jane’s obsessed with them right now — she really wants to go to Japan — so I guess I’m painting this for her.”

“That’s really cool,” Mike smiles, “I bet it’s gonna look great when it’s finished. I’m excited for the showcase.”

“I’m excited, too,” Will continues in the conversation while painting, and Mike thinks wow, he can multitask too, and he’s only even more enamoured with Will than he’s been for the past week. “Speaking of, how’s your band doing?”

“We’ve decided on our songs,” Mike announces proudly, “I think.”

“Awesome,” Will grins and laughs a little, “I’m looking forward to hearing it.”

Maybe Mike could do without the pressure of Will Byers being excited to hear his stupid songs at the stupid spring showcase, but it’s kind of nice to know that Will has faith in him.

There isn’t much talking for the rest of the hour, Mike is mainly zoned out and watching Will paint, and he thinks that his focus is really cool and also cute, but he feels like just sitting next to Will and watching him paint colorful trees for the better part of an hour is some sort of an achievement in terms of their friendship.

He feels like they’re closer, now, but he also feels like he’s fallen just a little bit harder.

Mike Wheeler hates Wednesdays.

As far as he’s aware, there is no particular reason for this, aside from the fact that he thinks it’s a day that sucks.

In all fairness, Saturday is really the only one that doesn’t generally suck, but Wednesday sucks the most.

This Wednesday isn’t much different, because his classes are atrocious as usual, but he thinks that at least band practice goes pretty smoothly, until the end when Max and Lucas start talking, which is almost never good.

“So, how are things with Will Byers?” Lucas asks, hoisting his backpack over his shoulders. Mike groans.

Because, God forbid Mike goes more than two seconds without thinking about Will.

In case an update is needed, Mike has concluded that he is gone. Will has taken up about half of Mike’s headspace at this point, which is embarrassing given that they’re just barely hitting the mark of friends.

The two haven’t had any notable interactions in the past days, but they’ve exchanged good mornings and the such, which has to be a good sign.

“Yes, that,” Max pipes up, “the other day El told me that Will told her that you told him that his paintings are really good.”

“So?” Mike attempts to shut down the conversation, because he already feels his face heating up. “Everyone thinks that. His paintings are objectively good.”

“The name “Mona Lisa” was mentioned.” Max clarifies, and Mike’s perhaps more embarrassed about that than he’s in his right to be.

“Shoot your shot, man,” Lucas laughs, “do you think he likes you?”

“How the hell am I supposed to know that?” Mike huffs, getting ready to leave the music room as soon as possible.

“I don’t know,” Lucas shrugs his shoulders as if that’s any help, “there have gotta be, like, signals or something.”

“Signals?”

“You’re an idiot, Mike,” Max chimes in rather bluntly, and Mike doesn’t exactly think it was called for. “When someone likes you, there are always signs.”

“Well I don’t know the signs,” Mike crosses his arms, “I’m not smart in this department.”

“You’re not smart in any department.” And again, Mike thinks that Max didn’t quite have to say that, because it hurts his ego.

“Has he done anything that’s given you a…” Lucas gestures to nothing in particular, trying to find the word. He settles on “vibe?”

Mike wonders if he should bring up that time that is literally always on his mind in which Will called him cute, but he doesn’t know if that’s an existential crisis he wants to have right about now.

But at the same time, that’s about his only useful “signal”, and he doesn’t want his friends to think that Will doesn’t like him at all because they already think he’s enough of a loser.

“I don’t know,” Mike says for what feels like the nth time, “I mean, he called me cute last week, if that’s enough of a vibe for you.” Mike cringes at himself when he says it out loud.

“Seriously?” Max looks so shocked that Mike thinks she’s kind of insulting him. “Why?”

Mike decides to ignore that question, and he turns to Lucas, who looks surprised in more of a polite way, and he’s kind of grinning.

“What did you say?” He asks, and Mike’s already cringing at the thought of his response.

“I said it back.” Mike says perhaps a little more quietly than he had intended, because his limited knowledge on romance seriously has him questioning whether or not that’s the most humiliating thing on the planet.

Max starts laughing. That can’t be good.

“What?” Mike is aware of how red his face is going. “What’s wrong with that? He thanked me, so I think it was a win. I think he just sees it as a regular compliment. Like when El gets a new outfit and you call it cute, something like that.”

Plus, Will is cute, but Mike would rather die than say that to his friends. He’s reluctant to tell them about this in the first place. In an ideal world, they wouldn’t know that he has a thing for Will at all.

“I don’t think so,” Lucas says, “you know there’s a ninety percent chance he was flirting with you.”

“And why would he do that?” Mike immediately acts defensive about it, because that has been one of his many dilemmas for the past week, and he doesn’t need to start thinking about it again.

“Because he might like you, man,” Lucas makes it seem like the most obvious thing in the world.

“He wouldn’t,” Mike shoots the possibility down, because, as he has mentioned, he doesn’t need to think about all that right now.

“Yeah, Lucas, he definitely wouldn’t.” Max agrees, but in a way that it feels more like an insult.

Lucas scoffs, and Mike rushes to leave the room before the conversation can pick back up, fastening his backpack over his shoulders and deflating because he finally gets to leave his stupid school building after a particularly long Wednesday.

Max and Lucas follow him into the hall, having what Mike would assume is a debate on just how gay The Great Gatsby is, and Mike is just about to switch his brain off when — just his luck — the Hopper-Byers siblings just happen to be taking a leisurely stroll through the hall on the way out of the building, flicking through their scripts and talking about some scene with Dustin Henderson.

Mike decides to try and stay out of their line of sight, which ultimately fails because Lucas and Max end up joining the three in front of them, because they’re friends or whatever, causing El to notice Mike’s presence.

In the end, it’s actually really awkward, because it turns out that the five he’s trailing behind wants him to join them on their walk out of the school building, which seems quite pointless given that the door is in sight, so they all end up stopping and waiting for him to catch up so they can walk in a pack of six like they’re beer cans or something.

“Hi, Mike,” Will smiles at Mike as he awkwardly shoves himself into the group, and exactly what Mike feared would happen, happens — his brain stops working.

It takes a solid few seconds for him to process Will’s words, and he chokes out an abrupt and perhaps too loud response just before Will can ask if he’s okay.

“Thank you,” Mike responds like the wordsmith he is, before realizing that he is a giant idiot. “Shit, I mean — hi.”

“Hello,” Will says again, this time accompanied by a laugh that seems surprisingly amused for a guy who just witnessed the most embarrassing thing a living human has ever said, ever.

And, Mike isn’t sure whether this is the best thing to happen to him or the worst, but Mike ends up taking so long to respond to a “hi” that they’re out of the door already, and Will is getting pulled away from the group by El just as he looked like he was about to say something else.

Dustin follows Will and El, as Lucas and Max head whichever way they’re going, and Lucas pulls Mike out of his incoming shame spiral when he calls over a “bye”, walking ahead and linking his arm with Max’s.

“Oh, uh, bye, guys,” Mike manages, adjusting his backpack straps.

“Thank you,” Max doesn’t miss a beat with her stupid smug tone, and Mike needs to take a second to stand still and die as Lucas and Max walk off, clearly thrilled with themselves and giggling like five-year-olds.

Mike has a lot to internally panic about for the next couple days.

If there’s any day that Mike doesn’t hate, it’s Saturday.

That has already been established — plus, literally everyone likes Saturday — but he feels as though it wouldn’t hurt to mention it again, because Saturdays are godsent and no day will ever come close to its glory.

However, this Saturday isn’t as elite as most, as he only actually gets to sleep in until eleven, before his mom drags him out of the bliss of his bed to take Holly to some karaoke party at the mall.

Karaoke party sounds familiar, is what he thinks, and he hopes to God that Holly doesn’t end up singing The Cure with someone she hardly knows because she is far too young to feel her sanity slip away from her with each passing day.

Speaking of, Mike is not cured. He is worse. All he does these days is stare at Will and act like an idiot.

What’s worse is that he worries that the situation is escalating. By that he means he worries that he might want to, you know, date Will.

Such a thought is terrifying to Mike, because that idea means that his feelings are here to stay, which is weird and uncomfortable and driving him nuts, and it also means that he’ll be stuck with unresolved feelings forever because he doesn’t think he would take money to ask Will out after every interaction they’ve ever had is a humiliation ritual for him.

To put it short, he is gone. He is real far gone. But, he’s totally unwilling to do anything about it, so everything actually sucks and society is crumbling and humanity is doomed and he’s going to die alone. In a pit. Of something super lame like natural causes.

So, in a nutshell, this particular Saturday sucks, and he decides that he’s going to take Holly to the stupid karaoke place where everything bad in Mike’s life has ever happened, and then go home and pass out until it’s time to go back to the stupid mall and pick her up.

Such plans are interrupted after after Holly goes to meet up with a boy Mike recognizes as Erica Sinclair’s arch nemesis, Derek Turnbow, and a bunch of other kids Mike hasn’t remembered the names of, and he’s about to go home when he sees that Starcourt’s token nerd store that’s in pretty much every mall is having a sale on comics.

Mike is an idiot, which has been established on more occasions than is good for his ego, but he isn’t stupid enough to walk out of the mall after noticing that the super cool store that sells all the nerd shit that he was bullied in middle school for liking is having a sale on comic books.

Mike Wheeler is broke, though that is his own fault — he’s been wanting to get a job at Scoops Ahoy for the free ice cream but he’s procrastinating his application for reasons of overall laziness and the fact that he thinks it would be cooler as a summer job — so sales are always welcome and comics are always in his budget.

He digs around his jacket pocket for his wallet, and he has it, so he decides that he can spare a few minutes to be unreasonably ecstatic about the sale, take an extensive look around the store and ultimately buy nothing.

Should I Stay or Should I Go by The Clash is playing in the store, and it’s relatively busy, considering that it’s one in the afternoon on a Saturday, and the first thing Mike thinks is, Will probably likes this song, a thought he immediately tries to get rid of before he starts thinking about Will too much.

Turns out, not thinking about Will too much isn’t an option, because Mike immediately notices a familiar head of messy brown hair and a pretty yellow sweater flicking through the issues that are on sale in the comic corner of the store and humming the song that’s blasting through the speakers.

If Mike has realized anything over the past week or two, it’s that he has crappy luck.

Obviously, he likes Will, so naturally he wants Will to like him, and Will is shopping for comic books, which is common ground between them and makes Mike very happy, so Mike should, in theory, talk to him.

But, that idea is a lot more nerve wracking than it ought to be. He’s nervous at the thought of starting a conversation and it goes horribly wrong.

Or worse — he’s actually just staring at a guy who looks eerily like Will right now, and he’s going to try and start a conversation with a total stranger and humiliate himself and then die alone.

Yeah, no. He isn’t going to talk to him. As much he would like to, he is risking too much for a Saturday afternoon where he could be in bed and not thinking about the possibilities of what could turn out to be the low point of his life.

“Mike?”

Mike freezes when he hears a voice come from behind him, and he feels as though he’s just activated an unskippable cutscene.

He turns around in an effort to seem like he had no idea that Will was here, and that he’s so surprised at this awesome coinky-dink that definitely has zero chance of ruining his life forever.

Okay, maybe he’s exaggerating it, just a little. When he turns around, Will looks happy to see him, which is most definitely a win. All he needs to do is act normal from here. Will’s brushing his hair out of his eyes and fixing his sweater over his shirt and— fuck, he looks pretty. Mike worries he might already be failing at the whole “acting normal” thing with just one look at Will.

“Oh, hey—” Mike averts his gaze in an attempt to make himself feel a little more normal. “—I, um, I wasn’t expecting to see you here.”

“Yeah, me neither.” Will agrees, and there’s a pause. “Are you— are you here for the sale?”

Will gestures to the yellow sign promoting the sale that’s looming over the comic shelf, and Mike’s eyes flicker to the sign and then back to Will before he processes what Will says.

“Yeah, I am.” Mike nods. “You?”

“Yeah.” Will confirms. “I mean, I remember you saying that you liked comics, but I wasn’t expecting to see you here. It’s really nice to see you.”

Mike feels a tugging in his chest at the sentence. Will Byers thinks it’s nice to see Mike, of all people. Mike’s life might turn out to be great if he just plays it cool and doesn’t do anything that he’ll gain a school-wide nickname for.

“Thank you,” Mike starts, “it’s nice to see you too.”

An awkward pause. Will turns back to checking out the shelf, his fingers running down the spines of every volume of every semi-familiar comic series.

Mike wants to say something more. By the looks of his own delusion, it seems as though Will does too.

“So, um…” Mike decides to be bold and start a conversation, though he’s already worried that he’s being totally annoying and that Will isn’t interested in him at all. “What brings you here?”

Okay. Dumb question. What, can people not be at the mall on a Saturday afternoon out of their own free will anymore?

“Well, my sister’s out with Dustin,” Will explains, turning his head back to Mike. “Something like a date. She asked me to tag along because apparently Dustin knows how to get free ice cream from Scoops Ahoy—”

“Erica Sinclair?” Mike interjects, instantly regretting it when he realizes how rude and inconsiderate it was to have the audacity to interrupt someone who’s way too good to even be talking to him right now, and Will’s going to think he’s a total loser and never want to talk to him again.

“—Yeah.” Much to Mike’s surprise, Will’s grin brightens, and Mike’s chest feels a bit looser. “Well, I left after we got the ice cream because I didn’t want to be a third wheel. And then I saw the sale and now I’m here, I guess.”

“I see.” Mike nods, like an idiot.

He sort of wants to tell Will a similar anecdote as to how he ended up here, but Will didn’t exactly ask and Mike will probably come off as really annoying about it. Plus, it’s not like it’s interesting.

“But what about you?” Will throws the question back. “Why are you here? Sorry— that sounds rude. I mean, just, you know, the same thing you asked me.”

Well now Will‘s asked, and Mike found him to be quite endearing about it. For whatever strange reason, he doesn’t know if he’s more or less nervous than before.

“Nothing interesting,” Mike shrugs, “I took my little sister to a party at that karaoke place, and that’s pretty much it.”

Mike notices that he’s a very dry person.

“Karaoke party?” Will smirks, and Mike smirks back, his face sort of flushed. “Um, I didn’t know you have a little sister. That’s cool.”

“Yeah, I guess.” Mike isn’t sure what kind of response a sentence like that requires, so he decides to just start bullshitting and hope for the best. “Her name’s Holly.”

“Cool,” Will’s smile softens.

“Cool.” Mike agrees, trying to put himself more at ease by mirroring Will’s smile that just seems so effortless and pretty and soft and comforting and everything else that’s nice. Mike isn’t sure he’s capable of smiling like that.

Mike drops his probably crooked smile after a second of somewhat awkward silence, as Will looks as if he’s still searching for what to say. Mike is a little flattered that Will is still attempting to keep the conversation going.

“Are you planning to buy anything?” Will gestures to the shelf, picking up a familiar issue of a comic Mike’s into and flicking through the pages. Sci-fi. Nerd crap. It’s a series Mike used to be totally obsessed with, and he tries to swallow his excitement when he sees Will holding it.

“Not really,” Mike admits, “I like to look at sales, but I never really buy anything unless it’s something I’ve been actively looking for.”

“I’m the same,” Will nods, “the idea of a sale is fun, but I never really get anything.”

“Definitely.” Mike agrees, before pointing to the volume in Will’s hands. “I, uh, I love that series."

He worries that saying “love” is coming off a little too strong, but “like” also seemed a little too nonchalant for his liking in the moment, so he figures he’ll just be a tiny bit unreasonably embarrassed either way.

“Really?” Will’s eyes light up a little, and Mike feels like an idiot for the way he smiles so instinctively. “I remember redrawing panels from this thing when I was, like, ten.” Another pause. “You’re— you’re into sci-fi?”

“Totally,” Mike nods, “it’s one of my favorite genres.”

Will’s grin widens, throwing a quick “me too” in Mike’s direction before sliding the comic back onto the shelf and fully turning around to face Mike. For whatever reason. Mike’s heart rate accelerates.

“So, you don’t have anything you need to be doing, right?” Will averts his gaze, fidgeting with his hands a little. Mike wonders what’s making him nervous.

“Not really,” Mike responds, “I don’t have to get my sister for ages.”

“Well, I’m not doing anything either, so…” Will pulls his eyes towards Mike to make brief eye contact, before immediately darting elsewhere in the room. “Do you wanna get, like, coffee or something? At the place nearby.”

Mike blinks for a second. He is instantly about ten times more nervous than he just was.

Now, he needs to get one thing straight — he’s aware that getting coffee together is a totally regular thing between friends, and doesn’t need to be read as romantic under any circumstances.

However, he still thinks he has at least a little bit of a right to totally freak out about the prospect of getting coffee with Will Byers, because that could technically be somewhat slightly kind of read as a date if put under an ultra-specific, ultra-delusional and totally desperate lens.

He knows the idea goes against the laws of physics, but sue him if he wants to sort of think of getting coffee with the person he likes as something of a date.

“Of course,” he says abruptly, because he worries he zoned out for a second too long and he doesn’t want Will Byers thinking that he would ever turn down such an offer.

“Great,” Will’s previously anxious face seems to relax and settle back into that smile of his. “Do you wanna go now?”

“Yeah. definitely.” Mike shoves his hands in his pockets and tries not to jump up and down with glee, though he imagines that his burning face shows that he wants to.

“Okay, then,” Will stands still for a second, before finally moving as Mike follows him out of the store.

The good news is, the mall’s token lame coffee shop isn’t too far away from the token lame nerd store, so the relatively silent walk between the two isn’t excruciating.

The coffee shop is slow-jamming jazz tunes in the background, somewhat busy and filled with indistinct chatter. It’s pretty easy to find a table for two in the corner, and Mike’s delusional mind desperately wants to make this situation more romantic than it needs to be, for the sake of his own happiness.

“Do you have a usual order at this place?” Will asks casually, glancing at one of the menus of the table.

Mike considers if saying that he takes coffee black will make him seem cooler and more appealing, but he also fears he’ll look borderline stupid if he ends up trying to drink black coffee in a conversation with Will Byers, because his distaste for it will be obvious.

“I guess,” Mike shrugs, “I’m not too fancy. Iced coffee. Caramel. Pretty much just that.”

“Fair,” Will purses his lips and nods, and Mike is just about to throw the question back when Will starts speaking again. “Do you want to go up to the counter and order?”

Mike nods, a little awkwardly, and finds out that Will enjoys hot coffee, which Mike was honestly beginning to forget was a concept. However, that’s totally something, because he doesn’t know the coffee orders of either of his established friends, so this probably means that he’s totally close with Will now.

“Okay, so there’s one for Will and…” The entirely too enthusiastic employee points to Mike and tries to remember his name from previous times he’s been here. “Lucas.”

“Uh-huh.” Mike nods, because he kind of forgot about that whole thing and now he’s a little embarrassed.

“Lucas?” Will lowers his voice once the two turn around, confusion evident on his face.

“Oh, yeah,” Mike tries to play off his unreasonable awkwardness, “a while back, Lucas and I swapped names.”

“Why?” Will looks sort of amused, which must be a good thing.

“No reason,” Mike shrugs, “we thought it would be funny.”

Will laughs. Mike decides to go with the conclusion that Will doesn’t think Mike is stupid, even if his idea of amusement is faking his name to a random barista.

“Speaking of Lucas,” Will makes a segway, “how are things going? With the band, and stuff.”

“Standard.” Mike slides into his seat and drums his fingers on the table. “The songs for the showcase are going well, and practice is always fun. More fun than analyzing poetry, I guess.”

“Definitely,” Will agrees, “I think a lot of things are more fun than analyzing poetry.”

“I know, right,” Mike throws his head back, “I mean, English is my favorite subject and everything, but sometimes it makes itself really hard to like.”

“English is your favorite subject?” Will looks mildly surprised, and Mike can’t blame him, because the narrative writing aspect of it is really the only thing holding the subject together for him.

“Something like that,” Mike grins, “I mostly just like to write stories. It’s kind of my dream to be a novelist.”

“Seriously?” Will’s face lights up, and Mike feels his insides turning into goo. “That’s awesome. Well— my dream is to be a comic artist, so who knows? Maybe I’ll, like, illustrate one of your stories one day.”

“Yeah,” Mike lets out a laugh, because it’s his only response to such a hypothetical that doesn’t involve combusting into flames. The very idea of Will making such a proposition has Mike thinking about everything else possible, creating a story together, moving out to New York, maybe sharing an apartment, living in a domestic harmony where Will does all the cooking and Mike does whatever he’s lucky enough to be good at— it’s a dream come true and an utter delusion.

“So, have you written any stories yet?” Will rests his elbows on the table and leans forward. “Any concepts?”

“Well, I guess I have something,” Mike hesitates for a second, because he’s still wary that Will’s too cool for nerd shit, though every interaction Mike has ever had with him has said the exact opposite. “It’s kind of embarrassing to say out loud, I based it largely on Dungeons and Dragons.”

“You like D&D?” Will leans even further forward, and his pupils might as well be morphing into sparkles.

“Yes, I do,” Mike tries to hold back a grin, because he really likes how similar he is with Will, because he imagines it makes his chances of Will liking him infinitely higher.

“Tell me all about your story,” Will quickly clears his throat and attempts to regain his composure, which Mike finds stupidly endearing. “If you— if you want.”

Mike stops fighting his grin and fidgets with his thumbs as he catches the barista bringing their coffees out in his peripherals.

“Well, it starts in a town kind of like this one…”

To the surprise of a grand total of zero people, Will is a fantastic listener. He constantly looks attentive and nods and asks follow-ups and Mike finds it really cool because he’s never really met someone interested enough in his writing before, he typically talks to himself about his own genius while frantically walking in circles around his room.

“Do you want to order another coffee, Mike?” Will finds a gap at some point in the conversation to interject with his question, running his fingers down his empty cup as Mike mindlessly fidgets with his straw, twirling it around the inside of the coffee cup.

“Sure,” Mike is just a tiny bit restless, because he has no idea how long he’s been harping on for, and he kind of cringes at parts when he says them out loud, but Will’s interest is unwavering and the proposal for more coffee definitely kind of implies that Will is interested in staying for longer.

Will waits for a beat, probably sensing that Mike wants to say something else. Mostly, he wants to say that he’s kind of embarrassed how in his own world he’s been, because Will is a saint for not being obviously bored right now. Then again, Mike has learned that he is very easily embarrassed.

“Man, I— I talk a lot, huh?” Mike attempts to make a joke out of it, his self awareness making his face feel hotter.

“Yeah, but it’s nice,” Will absently twists a loose tuft of hair around his fingers, “I like hearing your thoughts.”

Is it possible for Cupid to shoot a man twice? Mike feels his chest get all warm and stupid, because Will looks so soft and genuine, leaning over the table as if he’s never said anything more sincere in his life.

“Thank you,” Mike manages, standing up from his seat and looking away in a feeble attempt to hide how hard he must be blushing right now, at such a simple and non-romantic statement.

Mike tries to gain his composure and not look like a buffoon, which he achieves by saying nothing and standing around until Will finally gestures for them to walk up to the counter.

“You know what, this place is overpriced as hell.” Will observes, eyes flickering between Mike and the counter, where someone is absolutely thrilled about his thirty-seven-dollar coffee, or some ridiculous price like that.

“Agreed,” Mike nods, because he lost seven dollars to an iced coffee without nearly enough caramel, knowing damn well that he’s about to buy another one. “I mean, what could they possibly put in there that makes it so expensive? Gold flakes or something?”

“Do you think they sprinkle truffle shavings onto their coffee?” Will adds, grinning.

“I bet their caramel is liquid gold,” El’s voice rings out into the shop, and Mike is unreasonably scared by the appearance of El at the shop’s entrance and the add-on to their lame joke. “Fancy seeing you here, Mike.”

Mike hadn’t known that “fancy seeing you here” is a phrase that people actually use in real life, but El’s a theater kid so she makes it seem cool enough.

“Nice seeing you guys here,” Dustin, who’s standing next to El and adjusting his jacket, offers a smile.

“El!” Will meets her at the entrance of the store, and Mike follows. “I’m just getting some coffee with Mike.”

“Do you mind if we join you?” El proposes, and Mike doesn’t know if he should be sad that his alone time with Will is over or relieved that more people can ease the tension.

“Well, I don’t know if you mind, Jane,” Will begins, his smirk and playful tone suggesting that he’s kind of joking around, “I’m kind of on a date right now, so…”

Time stops.

On a what right now?

Again, Will seemed like he was joking around, so that’s a possibility, but that doesn’t change the fact that he used the word “date” regardless.

A date.

Mike isn’t even listening to what’s happening anymore. He hears El say something about the existence of a double date, her voice muffled and her face blurred.

This could mean something. Date can be a platonic term, Mike knows that. But at the same time, literally everything is platonic if you think hard enough about it. The idea of what Will would be implying if he were to be using it romantically is a hundred times more panic-inducing. Is Will into Mike?

“Is that okay with you, Mike?” Will’s voice pulls Mike from the small dot on the I in time and space that he got himself stuck in, though Mike doesn’t really know what Will is asking.

“Yeah.” Mike nods absentmindedly, his brain too focused on a certain word beginning with D and rhyming with crate to really know or care about the context of this situation.

As far as he’s aware, he’s being led by the other three to a booth that can fit four, and he tries desperately to bring himself back into the present situation.

He can think about this later.

Fuck. He needs to consult Lucas and Max about this.

Mike really, really really did not want to resort to willingly talking about his feelings to Max and Lucas, but he fears it can’t be avoided now.

It sucks, really, because they take literally every opportunity to make fun of him for it, and he’s also been painfully insistent that nothing’s going to happen and that he’ll get over Will soon enough, so it’s humiliating having to crawl back to them on his hands and knees and ask them for romantic advice.

They think they’re so high and mighty for being a happy couple in a loving relationship and not total idiots who can hardly figure out their own feelings and are so awkward it hurts.

Mike could definitely just not ask them for their advice, which would preserve his pride and his dignity, but destroy basically everything else.

To no one’s surprise, Mike can’t even go a day after something so tiny and thoughtless as using the word “date” to describe getting coffee together without feeling his sanity slip through his fingers, because there are two implications to such a statement.

Number one — Will is a naturally affectionate person who sees “date” as a word to be interchangeable with “hanging out”. Would probably explain why he called Mike cute (an adjective that lies more on the romantic side of the platonic-romantic spectrum, depending on the context) so casually. He most likely also sees hand-holding and cheek kisses as platonic unless explicitly stated that they aren’t in a given context.

Pros of this possible outcome: literally nothing.

Cons of this possible outcome: causes a lot of panic for Mike because he’ll probably spend his entire friendship with Will misreading platonic acts. And also, Will straight-up doesn’t like Mike back in this scenario.

So, that one isn’t fun, but there is one more outcome to this situation.

Number two — Will Byers is, by some miracle, totally into Mike Wheeler, and has been trying to hint at his feelings without stating them outright, with tons of undeserved affection, and he used “date” with the exact meaning that Mike would assume it has.

Pros of this possible outcome: Will likes Mike back. Thrilling. Amazing. They hold hands and skip into the sunset together and Mike never has to be confused about their relationship ever again.

Cons of this possible outcome: literally nothing.

In other words, there’s a really good outcome and a really bad outcome, and Mike has no clue how to figure out what’s actually happening.

And, before anyone says he can just ask Will — no he can’t. Asking your crush how they feel about you straight-up has never worked out for anyone in the history of the universe and Mike is sick of people pretending that it has.

So, his next-best option is to ask his two whole friends, explain the situation in as little detail as possible and hope to God that they know enough about Will Byers to give Mike a definitive answer. Then, Mike will stop panicking, Will will totally make a move on him one day and then they’ll hold hands and fly into the sun together on a rainbow.

Now that Mike thinks of it, it’s perfect. As much as he doesn’t like saying anything good about Max and Lucas, he’s ninety eight percent sure that they’re smarter than him, especially when it comes to this type of thing, and they were probably born right next to the Hopper-Byers siblings or something, so they’ll probably solve all of Mike’s problems.

Unfortunately, Mike thinks he can hardly wait to get advice on this, which makes him feel like a total loser, and he feels a little insane about it.

As is typical for Mike’s life, the end of Monday comes around as slowly as possible.

He could have talked to them at lunch, but he was probably going to yell and he does not need the entire student body knowing about his giant crush on Will Byers, so he instead spent all of lunch picking at his food and listening to whatever Lucas and Max were talking about, he already forgot.

It’s when the day’s over that he attempts to make it to the music room as fast as possible, breaking what feels like a speed limit down the halls because his stupid teacher let him out of his stupid class late like she owns the place. The audacity of some people sometimes is crazy.

Lucas and Max are already in the practice room when he gets there, because they’re always earlier than him.

Actually, this works well, because he would feel like kind of a dingus if he had to sit around and wait for them to show up and then explain his situation. He thinks that would ruin his flow.

Mike throws the door open with every bit of drama in his body, seeing Lucas and Max simply minding their own business and waiting for Mike.

“Max!” Mike begins, catching Max’s attention and stepping into the room as he slams the door shut behind him. “This is a hypothetical. Asking for a friend. Have you ever been on a date with El?”

He sort of knows that he’s blown his own cover when he says asking for a “friend”, because Max and Lucas know damn well that he doesn’t have any more of those. Except maybe Will, but this is about him, so he doesn’t count.

“No, not really,” Max shrugs, “we hang out, but we never call it that.”

“Lucas,” Lucas’s head snaps up from his drumsticks when Mike says his name, “have you ever been on a date with Dustin?”

“No?” Lucas replies, like it’s super duper obvious.

“Okay,” Mike pulls up a chair next to where they’re sitting, “do you think that dates can be platonic?”

“Yeah,” Max answers, “but friends don’t usually do that. I mean, I don’t get why you would when you could just say hanging out. It’s unnecessarily confusing.”

“Why are you asking us this?” Lucas looks incredulous, but it takes a few seconds for him to catch on to the situation, which is evident in the smirk that grows on his face. “Oh. What did Will Byers do?”

See, this is the worst part, because he can’t even attempt to deny that this is about Will Byers, since he’s willingly going to them for advice about him. It’s humiliating.

“Well, I ran into him at the mall on Saturday,” Mike explains, his face turning redder, “and he invited me to get coffee with him, so we did—”

“At the place they call you Lucas?” Max interjects, and Mike nods.

“And then we encountered Dustin and El, and then El asked to join us,” Mike leans back in his chair, “and then Will made a joke that he was on a date right now.”

The looks on Max and Lucas’s faces are far too joyful for Mike’s liking.

“Oh, I see,” Max looks annoyingly smug. “So, he’s into you?”

“Well, that’s my problem.” Mike continues. “I don’t know if that means anything to him, because a date can be between friends.”

“Yes, but…” Lucas provides a counter argument. “This is the same guy who thinks you’re cute, which isn’t something anyone’s ever thought about you. I think he likes you, man.”

“But I don’t know that!” Mike sinks into his seat.

For some reason, this is exactly what he wanted to hear, but his panic has not disappeared. In fact, it’s worse. It’s almost as if he doesn’t want to accept a definitive answer from people who aren’t Will.

“Well then, what did you want us to do?” Max huffs, crossing her arms.

“Analyze Will’s behavior and tell me if I have a romantic shot with him.” Mike says simply, because he really isn’t asking much of them.

“What behavior?” Lucas asks. “You tell us the bare minimum of every interaction you have with him.”

Okay — fair.

“And we’ve literally already told you that he obviously likes you.” Max adds, which is, again, fair.

“But we don’t know that,” Mike decides to go in circles and refuse to confront his actual problem in a logical but slightly uncomfortable manner, the Wheeler special.

“Then ask him,” Lucas offers, as if it’s the easiest thing to do in the history of everything that’s ever been done. “The only person who knows how Will feels about you is Will.”

“I can’t do that.” Mike objects, because why would he ever ask Will how he feels? It’s established that he is very against doing that.

“Then why do you want our help?” Max asks. “You won’t accept our answer, but you won’t ask Will yourself. If it bothers you that much, just tell him how you feel.”

“No.” Mike objects immediately, because the idea’s kind of making him uneasy. “We’re finally out of the acquaintance-zone. I can’t ruin that now.”

“You know, Mike,” Lucas starts, “you obviously just don’t want to confront your problem. You’re too scared of talking about it with Will, so you come to us, but you don’t really want our help. You just want an excuse not to solve your issue logically.”

Now, obviously, that is not true, and Lucas clearly isn’t the sharpest tool in the shed, but something about that hits a little too close to home.

“That isn’t true,” Mike objects, and he sinks so far into his seat that he might just slide onto the floor. “Because I really like Will, but I can’t risk telling him.”

“Fine.” Max shrugs her shoulders again. “Don’t try to clear anything up. That’s great if you just never want to date him.”

Mike is no stranger to inspiration to ask people out. Make a move, shoot your shot, because they’ll never say yes if you don’t.

Over these past few weeks, he’s realized that definitely doesn’t work on him. He really does not want to do that, but also really does not want to not do that, get it?

It’s kind of occurring to Mike that he’s come to Max and Lucas for advice, and he’s just not taking it.

“But I like Will so much…” Mike groans, burying his face in his hands. He’s going in circles. Saying the same things over and over as a strange and ineffective way of deflecting. “This guy’s making me crazy.”

“No, you’re crazy,” Max corrects bluntly.

“You already were,” Lucas adds, “and then you met a guy.”

Okay, harsh, but he doesn’t feel particularly inclined to say that they’re wrong.

Maybe Mike is crazy. Perhaps he’s a total nut case, and meeting Will has just helped him realize that. That wouldn’t shock him at all.

Maybe he should ask Will how he feels about him, maybe tell Will his own feelings. Perhaps Lucas and Max are right, and Mike will only ever be satisfied with the answer that Will gives him.

Who knows? He might just do that.

“Okay, you’re giving me a headache,” Max declares, “let’s practise now. Solve your shit later. Will obviously likes you.”

Max stands up from her seat, followed by Lucas, while Mike only sinks further into his.

He’s sure now that he’s losing his mind.

Phase Three - The Interruption Trope

After some careful evaluation, Mike has decided that he is definitely not going to talk to Will about his feelings. Because, well, it’s a terrible idea. The worst one that’s been generated all year, probably.

Max and Lucas don’t know jackshit about dating, so Mike is prepared to either wait until Will does something or do what he does with all of his medical issues — ignore it until it goes away.

Mike thinks that Will is the coolest person on Earth, and he would hate to destroy his hard-earned friendship with him over some lame feelings that he can still get over if he ignores them for long enough.

So, that’s what Mike has been attempting to do for about three days, and it is killing him. The man has been through three whole days of pain and misery, and a trigonometry lesson. He fucking hates trigonometry, which makes him even more mad about his whole situation.

He’s been doing okay in terms of interactions with Will, which is good, but anything could go wrong and his chest feels unbearably tight whenever they talk.

Today, Will only has a little bit of free time after school. Mike knows this because of a conversation he had with Will earlier today in the halls, in which Will casually mentioned that he can’t stick around for the full hour after school because he and El need to go somewhere. Mike wasn’t listening when Will said exactly what he and El needed to be doing, because he was totally zoned out and staring, so he hopes that Will will repeat it sometime today.

Honestly, he respects Will for the hustle of still staying after school when he only has thirty minutes, because Mike knows damn well he’d take any excuse to just go straight home.

Anyway, this is a significant detail in Mike’s life because Will saying this does kind of imply that he would spend those thirty minutes with Mike, so Mike can warn Lucas and Max that he won’t be at practice for half an hour, and then they’ll finally be able to ride off into the sunset together.

Well, maybe Mike is getting a little ahead of himself here, because Will does like to share little anecdotes about his life, but Will and Mike are, like, friends now, so he would like to believe that there is an implication behind this statement.

Mike Wheeler is also always right, as someone who has never made a documented bad decision, and this is revealed at the very end of the school day.

The first surprise comes when Mike walks out of his last stupid class, which he hates, and Will seems to be walking over, presumably to meet Mike at the door.

Okay — maybe Mike shouldn’t assume that, because he doesn’t want to flatter himself too much and be disappointed when Will is actually meeting someone else in the class — like when you wave back at someone who was actually waving to the person behind you.

However, everything in life is good because Will does have intentions to talk to Mike, as is made clear when he weaves his way through the crowded halls and stops in front of Mike at the door.

“Mike,” Will starts, stepping a little closer to Mike in an effort not to get caught in the crowd. Mike holds his breath. “Can I ask you a favor?”

“Sure.” Mike tries to say nonchalantly, but he thinks his voice cracks just a little.

Will Byers likes and trusts Mike enough as a person to ask him for favors. Mike feels as though he’s just leveled up.

“You know that I can’t stay here for long,” Will begins to explain, “but I’m not so confident about my lines for the scene I’m doing in the showcase.”

Mike pauses for thought for a second, because, and he knows this because of his extreme attentiveness and awesome listening skills, but he remembers one of his first ever conversations with Will in which he mentioned that this was supposed to be with his love interest.

“But the girl who’s playing the other character in my scene is absent today.” Will continues, and Mike’s body is suddenly on fire, because he thinks he might know what Will is going to ask. “And everyone else in the drama club is doing their scenes, so can you help me practise my lines?”

Obviously, Mike is not in his right to say no to this request in the slightest, and he wouldn’t dream of it when his idea of this is getting to play boyfriend to Will Byers, but that very idea makes him incredibly nervous.

“Of course.” Mike nods and attempts to un-red his face, however one achieves that. “Do you want to use one of the music practice rooms? I think there’s one free this afternoon.”

“Yeah, I was gonna ask— if that’s okay with those in the music club,” Will looks away and locks his fingers together. The crowd in the hall has cleared up ever so slightly now.

A pause.

“So, shall we go?” Will asks, after a second of Mike being an idiot and not saying anything.

“Oh, yeah, that.” Mike mentally slaps himself awake. “Yeah, let’s go.”

Will takes his backpack off of his shoulders as they walk, bringing it in front of him and unzipping it to retrieve his script.

“I had never heard of this play before, actually,” Will starts, keeping a hold on his script and throwing his backpack back onto his shoulders. “I quite like it, actually. It’s a small cast, because we’re a small club, and I think it does well with its characters.”

Mike notices that Will asks a lot of questions about Mike, which he really likes. Asking a question is a sign that he’s interested, but the more Mike thinks about that, the more he worries that he doesn’t ask enough questions to seem interested in Will, and decides to take his opportunity.

“What about your scene?” Mike asks, before thinking he wasn’t exactly being clear enough. “Like, what’s it about?”

“Well, I think it’s one of the final scenes in the play,” Will recalls, “love confession, pretty much. Actually, it follows an earlier scene between the two main characters where their feelings are almost confessed, but the play uses the interruption trope.”

“Interruption trope, huh…” Mike repeats, trying not to let on that Will has just mentioned something that Mike feels unreasonably strongly about.

Mike fucking hates the interruption trope. As a writer himself, he knows a lot of tropes he uses in writing and a lot of tropes he wants far away from his writing, and the interruption trope falls into the latter.

It’s infuriating for no reason other than suspense or drawing out the story. Like — that didn’t have to happen, and it hardly ever happens in real life.

In all fairness, Mike can’t really know about that second take because of the lack of romantic situations he’s ever been in, but he’s been in some so it still counts. If it means anything, Mike had a girlfriend in middle school to prove that he wasn’t gay — which evidently did not work — and in the whole two weeks that they were together, they never had someone walk into the room at an inconvenient time.

Will’s opened up the whole Pandora’s box in Mike’s brain now, because such a harmless trope makes Mike’s blood boil to a pointless degree. It’s just annoying. He doesn’t like it.

The two are approaching the free practice room, and Mike doesn’t want to be thinking about the fact that he’s going to reenact a love confession scene with Will.

“Man, I hate the interruption trope,” Mike sighs, because he decides that he should let Will know at least a little bit of his opinion on it.

“I get that,” Will nods, “it’s annoying.”

A quick silence.

“But, in all truth, I’m kind of nervous about my scene of the showcase,” Will scratches his head in what looks like embarrassment, “because I’ve never really done romantic scenes before, and we’re supposed to, like, kiss at the end…”

Mike’s throat is kind of closing up.

“And it’s a high school, so they might rewrite it, but our drama teacher says she hasn’t decided if she wants to change it or not.” Will continue, his face slightly red. “And it makes me really nervous because I’ve never kissed anyone before.”

Mike stops dead in his tracks. His reaction is more visceral than makes him look normal, and the few people left in the hall pass a weird glance in his direction.

“Never?” Mike says incredulously, and a little too loudly, before calming himself down. He realizes he needs to correct himself, because he doesn’t want Will to think that Mike’s surprised because Will isn’t cool for not having a first kiss yet or whatever. That’s bullshit. “I mean— sorry— I’m just a little surprised that no one’s kissed you yet. I mean, you’re so—”

Mike has kind of boxed himself in here, because it turns out that telling the truth involves slightly giving away that he thinks that Will is too irresistible to have not been kissed yet.

“—Attractive.” Is what Mike settles on, a word which he instantly regrets when he says it out loud, because, gosh, he’s an idiot. “And nice.” He adds, as if that makes it any better. Nice is also a weak adjective.

The two are standing still in the middle of the hall, and Mike feels every inch of his skin burning up as Will’s face forms a smile. It’s a teasing smile, kind of, more of the end of a smirk, but still as gentle and warm as any other time he smiles. God, that’s cheesy.

“Mike Wheeler, are you flirting with me?” Will raises an eyebrow, and Mike doesn’t think it’s possible for his face to get any hotter.

There’s good news to this, is that Will’s smiling all nice and he looks just kind of smug, which means that the idea isn’t repulsive to him, though Mike wasn’t necessarily trying to flirt.

He’s obviously joking, which doesn’t really point to Will liking Mike, but it also doesn’t mean that he doesn’t like him. The fact that he’s even joking about such a thing in the first place is a great sign, so Mike decides to attempt to play it cool. Joke right back.

“Depends,” Mike tries to mirror Will’s smirk, but he might look stupid, “are you into it?”

According to Mike’s calculations, Will is going to respond to this with another joke, but if he reads far enough into it, it could possibly say something about Will’s actual feelings.

“Maybe”, Will replies, drawing out the first syllable and continuing his walk over to the practice room as Mike follows him hopelessly, feeling at least a little good because that wasn’t a no.

The practice room is empty, as is expected, and Will follows Mike into the room. The first thing Will does after he shuts the door is pull down the blind that covers the little window on the door, and all of Mike’s nervousness comes bubbling back up at once.

“Okay, so…” Will flicks through his script and folds it back when he reaches a page near the end, handing it to Mike. “If you could read the lines that aren’t highlighted, and prompt me if I forget one of mine.”

Mike skims through the lines on the page and swallows. He’s seen the word “love” at least three times. The stage directions seem horrifically romantic too. If Mike had to act this out in a whole auditorium with someone he barely knew, he thinks he would die. Actors are the bravest of our society.

Will pauses for a second. It looks like there’s one more thing he wants to say.

“Actually,” his face flushes, “could you help me act this out too? Just so I remember the staging. It’s not too much, just follow my lead and read the stage directions.”

Unfortunately, a music practice room has got to be in the top ten lamest places to die, but Mike figures that he absolutely cannot be alive after what Will just said.

He gets that Will's an actor, and that he needs to remember his shit so that the showcase doesn’t go horribly wrong, but Mike worries that he might explode like a hamster in a microwave if he has to declare his love with Will while seemingly uncomfortably close to his face.

On one hand, this is kind of amazing, but it still kind of makes Mike want to vomit, because he doesn’t even know if Will likes him.

As is the case with everything Will has ever asked Mike, he wouldn’t say no in his wildest dreams. This time, he’s at risk of a heart attack.

Will takes a deep breath in, and he looks to be calming some sort of nerves, before he says the first line of the scene and Mike has to get into character quickly.

Mike doesn’t know that much about acting, but he knows that it’s really similar to writing, or something like that. Like, he’s heard that all actors are writers to some degree.

He doesn’t have to play this character, because he doesn’t know anything about Lucinda, and Will won’t be expecting a non-actor to give an award-winning performance when helping Will practice his lines, but it also irks him when people are dry, so he tries to do as much as he can.

Mike tries to piece together what happens in the scene as they act it. Something about a misunderstanding, an interruption. Mike’s guess is that this is some kind of star-crossed lovers thing? They always are in plays.

Davey and Lucinda probably play on opposing sports teams, or something like that. Mike doesn’t really know why he’s focused at all on the plot of this play.

Unsurprisingly, Will can act. Mike can see why he gets the roles he does, because he’s good at it, and he certainly has that slight dramatic flare. He probably has the most interesting D&D campaigns.

What’s even more impressive is that Will is dead serious through all the cheesy ass lines exchanged in this stupid scene. Mike would keel over if he had to act this on a stage with a straight face. The only reason he isn’t cracking up right now is that he’s too nervous at the fact that he’s doing this with Will to think of how painful saying these lines has got to be.

Will steps closer. Mike is under orders to follow his lead, so he takes a step in as well. Mike would guess they’re maybe eight inches away from each other, and he can see that stepping closer again is a later stage direction.

However, he can cross the bridge when he gets to it, because he is about one line from the first time in this scene that the L-word makes an appearance from Will. Mike isn’t ready. This is already far too romantic.

“I love you.”

The words ring out into the room, and Mike freezes for a second at hearing them in Will’s voice, though he had known it was coming.

Sadly, Mike is overly corny, and he’s an idiot, and he is far too hung up on that for a good five seconds. He forgets to read his next line off of the script, which is just a little more embarrassing.

Speaking of forgetting lines, Will has said all of his lines perfectly so far. They’re only about halfway into the scene, but Will doesn’t look like he’s been struggling with his lines at all.

That being said, Mike would expect no less from him, since he’s such a dedicated worker and probably has an amazing memory, but Mike wonders if his confidence is just a little low and he needs some reassurance that he knows what he’s doing. That makes perfect sense to Mike, so he decides not to dwell on it.

Rather, he decides to dwell on what Will just said, though not saying it to Mike, it definitely did something to Mike’s organs, and he’s already losing his ability to think straight, in both ways.

Mike looks down at the script. A stage direction. DAVEY and LUCINDA step closer once more.

This stupid script is actually going to be the death of him, because when he says that their noses might as well be touching, he means it. Also, Mike really doesn’t like the aesthetic of the names being capitalized all the time in the stage directions. It makes him yell them in his head, which seriously throws him off.

It’s kind of strange, because Will has the next line, but he doesn’t seem to be saying it. It’s like he’s forgotten he has any more lines in the scenes entirely. Mike wonders if this is what Will was talking about.

But it’s even more strange because Will’s, like, breathing on Mike, and Mike swears he breaks character. There’s this strange, spaced-out look in his eyes and his face is a little more on the pinker side. For a few seconds, the room is silent.

Will glances down for a split second. Mike wonders where he’s looking.

“You’re pretty,” and Will’s voice is barely a whisper, but he clamps his mouth shut immediately after saying it, with a look resemblant to instant regret.

Mike doesn’t really get why Will has such a look on his face, especially since he didn’t even finish his sentence.

“I’m pretty what?” Mike prompts Will to continue, tilting his head in slight confusion.

Rather than continuing, however, Will’s face contorts to match Mike’s puzzled expression. He takes a step back, and Mike feels like he can breathe just a little bit more.

It takes a second for what looks like realization to make its way onto Will’s face, and he breathes out an airy laugh, his face flushing redder.

“No— I meant that you’re pretty.” Will tries to explain, and Mike is still a little confused. “Like, handsome. Attractive.”

“Oh.” Mike feels a mix of embarrassment and flattery. “Oh. Well, um— thank you. I think— I think you’re pretty too.”

Mike thinks it’s pretty pathetic that all he ever does is say the compliment back, but he thinks that this is a win in terms of Will possibly liking him back, right? Maybe he’s delusional, but there is at least a seventy percent chance an interaction like that means something.

“Sorry, where was I…” Will attempts to get back in character, stepping towards Mike once more, and Mike holds his breath.

Maybe, Mike should concentrate on the script. Like, the scene. Because, after all, they’re simply practicing a scene, so he shouldn’t read this as overly romantic and get his hopes up. He should probably make sure that he gets through the scene alive, because Will probably won’t benefit from his stand-in scene partner dropping dead in the middle of their reading.

He hasn’t even begun to think about the fact that Will has a total of thirty minutes to spend, and they’ve probably used five minutes maximum, so they’re either going to have to do this multiple times or spend the rest of their time trying to act normal.

Whether it’s good news or bad news, Will says basically all of the L-words in this scene, which means that Mike doesn’t have to worry about saying it, but it means that he does have to worry about hearing it. If he hears Will talking about their forbidden love or whatever one more time he might just shrivel up like he’s in a dehydrator.

Lucinda seems to actually be dry as fuck, which makes Mike’s life a whole lot easier, but he doesn’t know how much better it is that all the overly romantic shit is left to Will.

The scene, as most love confession scenes do, ends with a kiss.

Most high school productions typically make the characters hug or something stupid that doesn’t really fit the vibe, and some are bold enough to have them kiss, so it really just depends on what Will’s drama teacher decides. However, since this is a practice, the absolute logical choice is to leave it there.

But it’s a tiny bit awkward.

Mike reads the final stage direction, as Will continues to stare. They’re still rather close. Mike would definitely not turn down the opportunity to kiss Will as practice for potentially having to do it in the real scene if Will were to ask, but Will wouldn’t do that.

What’s throwing Mike for a loop is why they’re just standing there.

Mike clears his throat.

“It says here that they’re supposed to kiss.” He points out, and he doesn’t really know what he’s doing, because, no shit, Sherlock, Will obviously knows that.

“Yeah.” Will nods. He isn’t moving away. “I mean, I might want to prepare in case I have to do it for the show.”

That isn’t a no. That isn’t a no.

“Right,” Mike swallows, “I understand that.”

This situation is putting Mike’s nerves through the roof, because he obviously wants to kiss Will. Like, really badly. He hadn’t actually realized how much he wanted such a thing until now. The idea is terrifying, but Will should have long since moved away and said the scene is over.

“I think it might be helpful to try before the showcase,” Will considers, “just to see what it’s like.”

The silence in the room is loud. Mike swears that a pin actually drops. Will is implying something that Mike never thought Will would imply in his wildest dreams.

This is for a scene, so Mike might not ever get this chance again. He needs to take this opportunity now.

“So…” Mike starts, and his throat is unexpectedly dry. “Shall we?”

Once again, Will nods, nerves riddling his face.

“We shall.”

At this point, Mike is half-convinced that he’s dreaming. This can’t be happening. A rush of what feels like joy and anxiety comes over him at once. He can hear his heart pounding.

He wonders if he should be doing this. This is going to be Will’s first kiss. Is Mike stealing that from him?

Mike, for one, hated his. It was just a girl he didn’t like. He never got a proper first kiss. Is it going to be the same thing with Will?

Will hasn’t explicitly stated that he likes Mike yet. As far as either of them are concerned, this is for the scene and the scene entirely. Is that fair?

To be fair, Will didn’t have to do this by any means, which has to be something of a good sign. Whatever. Mike doesn’t even have the time to think about that right now, because he’s already tilting his head and Will’s eyes are drifting shut and he can feel Will’s hands move to his waist and oh God—

A knock on the door.

Will and Mike practically jump away from each other in surprise, instantly separating themselves and leaving Mike’s heart racing.

Jane fucking Hopper’s voice comes muffled from the other side of the door.

“Will? Are you in here?” She calls. “I think you said you’d probably be in a practice room.”

There’s a pause between her call and Will’s response. Will and Mike exchange a look, and Mike isn’t sure what the look is supposed to mean anymore.

“Um, yeah, I’m here,” Will calls back, his face unbelievably red and his voice cracking ever so slightly in a way that’s kind of cute. “Come in.”

El cracks the door open and sticks her head through the opening, glancing between the two.

“Apparently, we need to leave early,” El explains, “so I’ve come to get you.”

Will looks at Mike again, and there’s something of disappointment on his face.

“Hi, Mike.” El adds, and Mike gives her an incredibly awkward wave, one that’s trying not to say I just almost made out with your brother.

“Seriously?” Will sighs, and takes the script from Mike’s hands. “Okay, I was just practicing my lines with Mike.”

El steps fully into the room.

“Oh, your scene with Jenny for the showcase?” She asks innocently, before her facial expression shifts, and she looks as if she realized something. “Oh, your scene with Jenny for the showcase?” She repeats, but this time sounding way more smug about it, as if she’s teasing him or something. She glances between him and Mike again with the same smug look on her face. “Am I interrupting something?”

Mike desperately wants to say yes and tell her to get out, but instead he sighs and waves a bye to Will.

“Sorry, Mike,” Will starts, “I hadn’t realized I would need to go so early. Hopefully we can pick this up again sometime.”

Translation: let’s totally kiss later, or something like that. Mike is way too in his head about it now.

“Bye, Mike!” El calls, ushering Will out of the room as he shoves his script into his backpack and calls a “see you later” to Mike as he leaves with El and shuts the door behind him. Mike doesn’t even have the time to say bye back. He collapses into the nearest chair.

Mike Wheeler has just gotten interruption troped.

If there’s one thing in this world that Mike loathes doing, it’s admitting that Max and Lucas are right.

That being said, Will has been doing some undeniably romantic shit recently, that could totally be seen as some form of flirting, and Mike has no clue if that means anything or not.

He also has no way of knowing unless he asks Will, which he doesn’t really want to do.

However, yesterday, they literally almost kissed each other, and Mike has come to terms with the fact that he does, in fact, need to tell Will exactly how he feels.

Because he wants to kiss Will for real, and he also wants to not panic about the implications behind every interaction they have, but the downside to this is that he could still get rejected, and that Max and Lucas already told him to confess back when he was too stubborn to accept logical help, so now he looks like an idiot for actually doing it.

But, he actually thinks now that his feelings are more important than his pride, which is a disgusting thing to have to say, and he doubts that his chances are zero, and he feels like his liver will start violently failing if he doesn’t shoot his shot and confess his feelings as soon as possible.

He likes Will so much that it’s killing him, and he wants an answer to his huge question, and he wants it from Will.

The downside is that this has taken over his entire life and he feels himself start to lose his marbles just a bit more with every passing second.

Having a crush should come with a warning label that it will destroy your life and drive you completely nuts. This past few weeks has seen nothing short of the psychological unraveling of Mike Wheeler because he sang with a guy one time. Karaoke parties are an oddly humbling experience.

But there are also layers to the whole almost-kiss thing, something that he thought about briefly in the moment, because Will has literally never kissed anyone before, ever.

Obviously, Mike thinks that’s beyond shocking, because look at him, but a first kiss is in the top ten most important and relevant things in life as a teenager and Mike would hate to rob Will of that.

Plus, it’s Mike. Mike sucks. He probably sucks at kissing, too. If Will doesn’t actually have feelings for Mike, he just absolutely wasted one big thing about teenage life on some loser, to practice lines in a play.

Then again, Will offered, which is the part that has Mike really stuck. That does imply that it’s something Will wants, at least a little bit, right?

Mike is sick of going in circles. He realizes that the reason that this is such a big deal for him is because he wants his first ever kiss with Will to be for real, and for Will to know that.

He likes Will a lot. Like, so much. Like, so much that it’s pretty much caused his downfall. So — and he’s entering hypothetical territory here now — if Will were to like him back, Will would probably also want to do such a thing for real.

And, the idea of kissing Will and then never talking about it again because it was just for a scene makes Mike want to choke himself.

Call it his moral compass and amazing consideration for the thoughts and feelings of other people, but if he’s to have the honor of being the first person to ever kiss Will, he wants Will to know it’s legit.

So, in a way, Mike is kind of glad that they got interrupted yesterday, because he might have regretted actually going through with it.

As much as Mike likes to play victim to the universe’s cruel shenanigans, sometimes things actually do work out in his life, as he has been presented with a chance to say something before he regrets it.

And he needs to say it as soon as possible.

Mike wakes up early this morning, because he’s never really done a full confession of actual feelings to anyone, and he definitely doesn’t want to do it, and he needs to wait a couple months to tell Lucas and Max in hopes that they’ll have forgotten that they’re the ones that gave him the advice to do such a thing in due time and Mike will look like the smart and capable one in the band.

How do people usually do this? He could ask Lucas — no he couldn’t. He cannot prance around looking for advice right now.

All he really needs to do is scavenge deep into his brain, because he thinks his frontal lobe is developed enough to have an idea of what to do in this type of situation.

He decides to write a script. Stupid, definitely, but it’s never a bad thing to know exactly what to say. The trouble is that he’ll probably have to memorize it before he confesses, because he’ll look like a moron if he reads from a piece of paper during what’s supposed to be the biggest moment of his life since he was born.

But it’s fine. He’s capable of memorizing speeches, he thinks. It probably won’t even be a speech. Just a couple sentences. He’ll hardly even need it.

He needs to leave for school in about ten minutes, and his bacon in the kitchen is probably getting cold, but that doesn’t stop him from putting mechanical pencil to spiral notebook paper and trying to write something down.

Something about how he likes Will. He should probably add several “really”s before he says “like”, because he thinks that’s a seduction trick, or something.

It doesn’t have to be poetry, or anything — and he’s glad about that, because he sucks at poetry. The idea of writing it is fun, but he can’t rhyme, and poems that don’t rhyme really aren’t that cool, and he has no flow whatsoever, so he’s actually just a fucking loser when it comes to poetry.

Whatever. Poetry isn’t the point. A lot of love confessions are simple. In fact, saying that he really likes Will is probably all he needs.

He could mention the whole almost-kiss thing, and his entire thought process, but he doesn’t think Will needs to know that, especially since it didn’t really affect the moment, and the fact that he seems far more invested in Will’s first kiss than Will is is kind of embarrassing.

What else could he talk about? Should he say why he’s confessing? It’s an amalgamation of a lot of weird things, actually. Maybe he should say that he thought he had a shot because it feels like Will’s been kind of flirting with him. Or is that presumptuous? Probably. Should he ask Will about the date thing, or can that be left in the past? He thinks it’s a little embarrassing that it’s such a big deal to him, so probably not.

He thinks that a lot of his feelings are just a little too embarrassing.

After many minutes of wracking his brain for ideas and answers, he finally stands up from his bed and proudly reads out his fully finished script.

“Will, I really, really, really, like you.” He holds the piece in paper in front of him, grinning in half-satisfaction. The good thing is, he doesn’t think it’s too much to memorize.

Perfect. He’ll just do something classy like ask Will to meet him after school, maybe in a practice room again, if any are free, and then have his big moment.

Hopefully, Will won’t reject him. It seems decently enough like Will likes him back, and both Lucas and Max think so even with Mike giving them limited details on all of their interactions, but you never really know with these types of things.

That alone makes Mike nervous.

Turns out, the whole thing actually makes him nervous, which was kind of expected from him. It wasn’t long ago that he thought he wasn’t interested in dating Will. Now, the idea of dating Will seems to be the most relevant idea in the world.

Also, it’s Friday, and everything is more relevant than the lessons he has on Fridays.

The upside is that he has physics, a class which Will is in, so he figures he can talk to Will about meeting after school then.

Wait — crap. He actually needs to work on his stupid songs for the stupid showcase.

Change of plans, he asks Will to meet him after after school, because Will probably has practice, too.

So, he’ll ask Will to meet him in a free practice room after the after school hour, and hope that they’ll be able to stick around for long enough before a teacher tries to terminate them.

Maybe school isn’t the most optimal setting for this kind of thing, but he can’t ask Will to meet him outside of school, because Mike fears they’re not on that level yet.

It’s stupid, he knows, but Mike thinks you have to know someone for at least a year before you can proceed to the next step of asking each other to hang out after school. It’s just far too awkward at this stage.

It’s fine. A practice room is fine. The teachers never check them, anyway.

What’s problematic is that the idea of just asking Will to meet up is actually, like, quite ominous. His idea is just to ask Will to meet him in a practice room after school, but, like, why? Is it kind of creepy? Hopefully not.

Whatever. It’ll work itself out. Mike has enough to worry about.

As is typical, Mike is one of the last people in the classroom. He doesn’t know how he manages it so much, but he’s somehow always just barely on time to all of his classes. He’s not sure how it works.

This time, the first step of his grand master plan is to be the one to say good morning to Will first, which will greatly improve his quality of life and their relationship status.

“Good morning, Will,” Mike greets when he reaches Will’s desk, immediately feeling super cool and amazing about himself, because he even went so far as to refer to Will by name, which isn’t something he does too much because he’s still in that weird stage where he’s always a little anxious that Will somehow isn’t his name.

“Morning,” Will’s smile brightens, and he looks up from the page of his sketchbook.

“So, um…” Mike begins, looking off to the side. “After school today… Well, not like after, like after after, because we both have practice after school, but after that, could you meet me in a practice room? The same one from yesterday.” He’s already cringing at his own words. “It’s nothing huge, just— just something about the showcase.”

Okay, weak excuse. That one’s actually an ego bruiser, because Mike considers himself to be a pretty good liar half the time. This time just seems to be the other half.

“Oh, yeah, sure,” Will nods, with all the sincerity in the world and a smile still on his face. “Thanks for telling me.”

“No problem.” Mike says, before awkwardly walking away to his own desk. “See you… Then.”

“See you,” Will calls back, and Mike’s a little humiliated but also a little charmed, as he often is around Will.

He’s already doubting himself, because, man, is just meeting up and confessing too cliché? With all the cool ways that people get together nowadays, he feels like it’s kind of boring. Whatever, he’s done it now. Too late to cancel.

He’ll just have to see how this plays out.

Band practice could have been a lot more fun than it is, but Mike’s guitar is out of tune and his month-old sore throat has somehow manifested itself back into existence and he also plans not to tell Lucas and Max about his grand master plan right now, which kind of means he doesn’t even get to rant to his two best and only friends in the whole wide world, which kind of sucks.

It’s not like they would be kind about it, they would ruthlessly make fun of him, but that’s better than Mike having to keep his mouth shut because doing that is torture.

He can tell them soon enough, when this all blows over, because he is not telling them if Will rejects him. He’s taking that shit to his grave.

Their songs for the showcase are basically done, too, so the entire thing was finishing touches and restraining himself from talking about the interesting thing in his life right now, because he has too much pride.

The most interesting part of practice is when it ends, actually. Mike only really needs to move to the practice room next door, so it isn’t much of a walk, but El Hopper, who is always at the scene of the crime, is taking a detour through music for some reason.

“Hey, El.” Max waves, dragging Lucas out the room to meet El where she walks, clearly walking towards Mike.

“Hi, guys,” El throws a wave right back, “you guys can go ahead and meet me outside. I need to talk to Mike.”

Suddenly, Mike is nervous, and Max and Lucas look sort of confused, to which Mike doesn’t blame them, but they walk off anyway, leaving Mike with a double dose of nerves, because he doesn’t know what El would possibly want to do with him.

“Okay, I’m gonna ask you a question, and you need to answer honestly, got it?” El lowers her voice, and Mike really doesn’t like the ominous opening. What kind of question could she possibly be asking?

“Yeah,” Mike nods, because he feels like that’s the only possible response. El’s, like, kind of scary.

“Do you have a thing for my brother?” El’s previously serious expression turns up into a grin, and Mike’s chest tightens.

Does everyone know? Maybe Mike needs to get better at concealing feelings, because he seems to be quite obvious. He won’t be surprised if Dustin Henderson sniffs it out by tomorrow.

“It’s fine if you do, by the way,” El adds after Mike takes too long to respond, “I’m just wondering.”

“How did you know?” Is what Mike settles on, because he doesn’t want to admit it to her, but he also kind of promised that he’d be honest and he knows not to break a promise, he’s not an animal.

“You could say I’m something of a romantic expert,” El says in such a way that Mike can’t tell if he should take that seriously or not, “I figured it out.”

Mike discovers that he might not be that good at hiding things.

“Why are you asking, then?” Mike tilts his head, because he kind of wants to know what such a conversation could possibly be about.

“No reason, really,” El shrugs, “but, I thought it would be worth knowing to you that I think he definitely likes you too, so you should tell him. That’s really all I came by to say.”

“You came by to encourage me to confess my feelings?” Mike asks, sort of incredulous, because she could have done that, like, yesterday. She’s a little late to that party.

Mike won’t tell her that, though, because he wouldn’t want her to feel bad.

“Pretty much,” El states simply, “I think you would make a good couple. Plus, I like to encourage.”

“Well…” Mike attempts to decide on an appropriate response. “Thanks.”

“You’re welcome,” El nods, “I’ll be on my way now. I just really wanted to say that.”

That was, like, a really weird interaction, but he appreciates the sentiment of El’s support. Mike was kind of paranoid that El secretly hates Mike and is actually plotting against him to make sure that he never talks to Will again, but she doesn’t seem to have given that impression just now, which is a win.

Who knows? Maybe El is his next friend, or something.

But that’s not really important right now, because he’s just caught sight of the jacket that Will was wearing today in the hall, so Mike rushes into the practice room so as to not look like an idiot who was waiting for Will outside, for whatever.

He has about twenty seconds to mentally prepare. He pulls his folded-up A5 piece of lined paper from his pocket, reading over and reviewing his script. It seems easy enough to remember. This is going to be fine. No it’s not. He’s only just noticed how chapped he is right now, and he also isn’t a responsible person whatsoever, so he doesn’t just so happen to carry chapstick with him either. Does this put the kiss on hold?

He’ll cross that bridge when he gets to it. The door is opening. It’s Will, obviously.

“Hi, Mike,” Will waves and shuts the door behind him, as Mike moves over to pull the blind down. He’s making himself nervous now.

“Hey,” Mike tries to be nonchalant, but he thinks that his voice might have cracked three times while saying a one-syllable word.

“You said you needed to say something about the showcase?” Will asks innocently, and Mike tries to pull a segway out of his ass. His heart is racing.

“Actually, I lied about that.” Mike decides to cut to the chase, because dilly-dallying isn’t going to get him anywhere in a life-or-death situation such as a confession of feelings. “I just needed an excuse to get you here. The truth is…”

Will looks a little confused, and he stands in anticipation for Mike to continue.

He’s trying to continue, he really is, but he’s searching for the next thing to say, and—

Shit. His mind has drawn a blank. He’s forgotten his stupid script.

At this point, he goes to his secret plan B for every possible situation — just start saying shit and hope for the best.

“Well, the truth is that I feel kind of stupid about it now, because it is totally boring and cliché now that I think about it, and I thought about that but then I thought that it would be fine but now you’re right here and I think I just need to say how much I like you,” Mike should stop talking now, “it’s a lot. And originally I wasn’t going to tell you because I thought I would get over it but then Lucas and Max told me to say something and I hate taking their stupid advice but it felt like the right thing to do yesterday and— when I say like I mean romantically by the way — and—”

Will seems to try to interject, but for whatever reason, Mike keeps going.

“And I figured that you may like me a little too, but I realize that sounds dumb now, but I thought that when you said I was cute you like, you know, and that’s such a weird thing to be hung up on because you hardly even remember it and I don’t know if you think that dates are platonic or not and I mean the signs were there but they could be read differently and made me really confused and then—”

“Mike—”

“And then yesterday happened, and I’ve been thinking about the fact that you’ve, like, never been kissed before, and even though I think that’s insane, I didn’t want to take that if we were just practicing lines because obviously I think that you’re gorgeous and I think that kissing you would be pretty nifty but I would rather do it for real and I wanted you to know that because I think it would be less nifty if our first ever kiss wasn’t actually about us liking each other, you know—”

“Mike.” Will’s voice snaps Mike out of his nightmarish word vomit, and Mike is relieved to see the soft amusement on Will’s face, because he feels like a massive idiot. What happened to his script? “Breathe. It’s fine.”

A pause. Mike is giving an agonizing couple seconds to marinate in his utter humiliation. Will speaks once more.

“You can kiss me now if you want.”

Mike blinks. Will’s face is red. Mike can hardly process it for a second, but this is a win.

Yes, this means that Will is into Mike, doesn’t it?

However, Mike is incredibly nervous. With Will Byers, his voice all soft and moving his hair out of his eyes, standing right in front of him, it’s impossible not to be nervous, because all the pressure of giving Will Byers the best first kiss possible is on Mike.

“Are you sure? I mean, I’m super chapped right now so I don’t know if it’ll be any good— do you have any lip balm?”

“Mike!” Will decides to cut Mike off before he can continue to spew more garbage, but Will’s face softens and he lets out a light laugh. “I want you to kiss me.”

“Are you—”

“Yes.”

Mike stares for a second. He takes a step closer, trying not to get in the way of any instrument cases on the floor. He’s aware of how hot he is right now, but Will doesn’t look any colder either. His throat is dry. He’s nervous.

Will also steps closer. Mike can feel his breath.

This scene, as most love confession scenes do, ends with a kiss.

Mike squeezes his eyes shut, trying to rid himself of his nerves as he leans as far forward as he can before his mouth is met with Will’s.

Will pulls Mike in by the waist, and Mike is already dangerously close to stumbling over and ruining everything as he does so. He moves a hand up to cup Will’s face, and — wow, Will’s face is warm — before he has a mild panic about what to do with his other hand, deciding now to leave it at his side.

For someone who’s allegedly totally new to this, Will seems to be a natural at kissing, and he makes Mike feel like a total novice, as Mike tries to keep his balance and not die. Everything feels like it’s on fire.

Will leans even further forward, his fingers twirling around the drawstring of Mike’s jacket, and Mike begins to relax a little. Because, while he has every single right to be freaking out, it’s kind of pointless when the coolest and kindest and most beautiful man who has ever walked this Earth is kissing him, and he doesn’t seem to hate it.

Mike moves his other hand up to the other side of Will’s face, lightly touching loose strands of hair, which is something he feels like he’s always wanted to do. He presses a little further and tries not to think about anything except for what’s happening right now. He thinks he succeeds at that.

Neither of them say anything for a few seconds after Mike pulls away, Mike just stares at Will’s flushed-out face, his mouth more specifically.

“Thank you,” is what Mike ends up breaking the silence with, because he’s a genius, and it makes Will laugh, until Mike’s laughing too, exchanging breathless laughter as their faces remain close.

“It was my pleasure,” Will grins, slowly taking a step away, but not breaking physical contact with Mike.

“And sorry,” Mike adds, “for the ramble. I originally was just going to tell you that I liked you, but I got nervous and went on a tangent about all the embarrassing details.”

“Don’t worry,” Will laughs again, “if it helps, I think it was cute.”

Mike pauses for a second, and he can’t help but break into a grin.

“Actually, that does help.”

Mike Wheeler hates Sundays, especially when this is the Sunday right before he has to spend his precious Monday afternoon doing some lame arts showcase.

It’s not that he thinks he’ll do bad. His songs are fine, great actually, but he so can’t be bothered. The only person getting him through it is Will, who’s currently in his room and trying to retrieve a canvas.

“Okay, I’ve got it!” Will calls from the other room, and Mike sinks into the Byers family’s couch as Will’s mom offers Mike a ride home for the seventh time.

After a few seconds, Will emerges, holding a canvas with the back facing Mike.

“You finally get to see the finished work.” Will takes his spot next to Mike on the couch, turning the canvas around so Mike can see the painting in all of its glory.

It’s beautiful. It’s been a couple weeks since Mike has seen it, back when it was still a work in progress, but now it’s an insanely pretty painting of a cherry blossom tree in the street, with the cherry blossoms falling onto a nearby car.

As is unsurprising for anything painted by the one and only Will Byers, it’s mesmerizing.

“So, what do you think?” Will asks, an expectant hope in his eyes. The painting is pretty, but Will’s prettier.

“It’s amazing,” Mike answers, “like, if this was a competition rather than a showcase, you’d definitely win. The ten people who come to see this thing are gonna love you.”

“It’ll be more than ten,” Will laughs, “but they’re gonna love you too.”

“But they’ll love you especially because you’re in two clubs,” Mike points out. “And you’re pretty.”

“I’m pretty what?” Will asks, and Mike groans when he sees that adorably smug look on Will’s face, because apparently when Mike does something stupid, the people in his life are programmed to never let him live it down.

“Okay, you can’t say that,” Mike laughs, “I was nervous.”

“Sure,” Will rolls his eyes, setting the canvas down on the floor and shuffling closer to Mike until their shoulders touch. “By the way, I think now’s the perfect time to confess that they were never gonna make me kiss Jenny in that scene.”

“Seriously?” Mike’s face drops, but he’s kind of amused.

“Yeah, we always had it changed to a hug,” Will says casually, “I was messing with you.”

“Well, it worked,” Mike feigns annoyance, and Will grins. Once again, Will shuffles closer.

There’s nothing interesting on the TV, just a canvas on the floor and a Joyce that keeps moving in and out of rooms in the house, and Will, and Mike, and Mike could not be happier.

“Also, El wants to do another karaoke thing next weekend,” Will says after a few seconds, “just us six this time.”

Mike thinks that karaoke parties will haunt him for the rest of time.

“I mean, if you insist…” Mike huffs, trying and failing to fight back a smile.

If it means being with Will Byers, Mike is just fine with being a little insane.