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Summary
It's been three months since Will Byers moved into his dad's debilitated apartment. Five months since his mom went bankrupt after paying for rehab. Now he's spending his days trying desperately to fit in, kicking around a soccer ball with his new friends and walking on eggshells around his perpetually piss-drunk father. At night, he sketches under the glow of his flashlight, then stuffs the paper under his mattress and does it all over again. His life becomes suffocating, but routine--that is, until Mike Wheeler moves in next door.
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Mike Wheeler hasn't seen Will Byers since fifth grade. Still, he remembers that day on the swings, remembers their old D&D campaigns and the pillow forts they made every sleepover. Only now, back in Hawkins, he remembers the rest--the jeering, the name-calling, the sharp shoves whenever he dared undress in the boys' locker room. It's worse this time round, so Mike's decides that playing hooky and taking up his mom's cigarette addiction sound like a much better alternative. And so does being a bad influence on Will Byers, apparently.