Chapter Text
Will should have known when he was walking down to the beach that he would have to battle the wind when sketching. After the fifth time it had grabbed his page, forcing him to pin it down, crinkling it, he gives up with a sigh. He carefully shuts the notebook and sets it to his side, pencil case laid on top. In the distance he can see El and his mother, feet skirting the shoreline to prevent their shoes from getting wet. He knows from experience the water is freezing this time of year, and it’s no fun walking home with wet shoes.
A smile curls at the corners of his mouth as he watches his mom straighten from a crouch and wave something overhead, animated and excited as El runs over. He can’t make out their words from this distance, the crashing of the waves and the whispering of the wind distorting their voices, but he can hear their tone, happy and energetic. He closes his eyes and falls back into the sun-warmed sand, his puffy coat letting out a breath of its own when crushed against the ground. He rests his hands on his chest as he takes a deep breath and lets it go. His muscles ease and his mind clears as he listens to the rhythmic sound of the waves dancing over the sand. Now that he’s not fighting the wind over his sketchbook paper, the breeze feels nice whispering over his skin, carting through his hair like a friendly touch.
When he turns his head there’s a field to his left, patches of sand bleeding into grass, browned from winter hibernation. The sound of the ocean has shifted behind him now, the previously clear sky crowded with large, fluffy clouds. Mike is sitting next to him, arms draped over his legs in that effortlessly lithe way of his, leaning towards Will. His eyebrows are furrowed, mouth pinched with a look of confusion. Will’s chest swells, his fingers twitch with an unsettled want. He turns his upper body towards Mike, propping himself up on an elbow, the sand shifting under his arm. Despite the sun being in front of him just a moment ago, now it’s behind Mike, bathing him like a blessing, catching in his hair, wrapping around his figure, making him glow.
The real Mike is back in Hawkins, thousands of miles away, and Will hasn’t seen him in six months. He knows this must be one of his strange, lucid dreams that he’s been having lately.
The sand shifts under his body as he draws closer to Dream Mike, leaning more weight on his right arm to see his friend’s face better. He lets himself look in a way he never would allow in real life, eyes soaking in the features of Mike’s face, the curve of his body, the length of his shoulders. He’s sharp and soft at the same time. Will feels that fluttering in his chest he always gets when he’s close to Mike, feelings that he keeps locked away, like a bird in a too small cage constantly fluttering against it’s confines, bruising itself with every stir and flap of it’s wings.
Mike’s brow is still furrowed as his eyes dart around, looking from Will to presumably the ocean behind him, to the grass underneath Mike’s crossed legs. He shifts forward, closer, making Will’s heart beat double. Mike opens his mouth, lips forming what seems to be Will’s name, but suddenly the dream falls away and it’s another voice he hears calling from above, “Will.”
When he opens his eyes he’s lying on his back again, nothing but sand underneath him, a clear sky above. El is kneeling next to him, her hands clasped together and her face expectant as she hovers over him for a second before falling back on her knees. He sits up, smiling, which only encourages her own smile. Next to her is the wicker basket his mom bought her for her treasure collection, a mix of shells and smaller drift wood piled inside.
“Find something good?” he asks. She lifts her cupped hands, palms parting, revealing her latest treasure – a small piece of sea glass, rounded at the edges from friction and time.
“Purple!” he says, and her smile sparks into something pure sunshine as she repeats, excitement dancing in her voice. “Purple!”
On her desk at home is a mix of sea glass arranged by color. Since they first started this tradition to scour the beach for trinkets she’s been trying to collect every color to complete a rainbow, and purple has been especially vexing considering there’s two shades of purple in the rainbow, Will. This is the first time she’s found one.
He picks up the piece, turning it in the light and taking note of its slight curve, like it had been part of a rounded object before it broke off and became its own life. Her face lights as he holds it up to the sun, making it glow.
Her smiles come so easy these days. It’s this place; people are weird here, and they carry their weirdness like a badge. No one looks down on El for her idiosyncrasies, or the way she seems to whisper-shout everything, or the way she doesn’t know anything about pop culture. Mrs. Wellex, who owns one of those touristy shops that sell obnoxious souvenirs with the word Oregon splashed all over them, sells the keychains El makes out of the beach items she finds, giving her the first taste of having her own money to spend the way she wants. The art pencils in his case were a Christmas present from her.
“It’s beautiful, El,” he says, handing it back. Something is tickling inside his noise and he sniffs.
“Yes,” she affirms, carefully placing it in the center of her basket. “I only need to find a darker purple and it will be complete.”
A small laugh bounces out of his chest at the seriousness of her voice. “Red, orange, yellow, green, blue, purple. Most people would consider that a complete rainbow.”
“R.O.G.B.I.V,” she lists. “I will find darker purple as well.” She has it in her head that Newton’s rainbow is the official rainbow.
After a pause he lowers his voice and says with complete seriousness, “Our search continues then.” It has the intended effect of making her smile, and something warm blooms inside his chest.
Suddenly El’s smile drops and she starts to reach out towards his face before she seemingly changes her mind. She shuffles around and pulls out a pack of tissues she keeps in the pocket of her overalls. While freeing one from the plastic wrapper she mutters, “Your nose.”
Will sniffs again, taking the tissue to press under his nose. The tissue comes away with a small smear of blood soaked into it. “Oh.”
The corners of her lips have folded down, her body going still, hesitant, as concern enters her eyes like a mist coming over a sunny morning. It’s a silly reaction over a simple bloody nose, and he tilts his head, about to ask what’s wrong when a shadow settles over them. He looks up to see his mom, hands on her hips and a pleased expression on her face. “You two gonna just sit over here while I do all the searching?”
El’s face lights up once more, and she explains, “Joyce found the purple.”
“I found the purple!” his mom repeats proudly. Will folds over the bloody tissue as he smiles up at her, wiping his nose to see if it’s still bleeding. It is. Noticing this his mom collapses down next to them, reaching out and tilting his head back while examining his face, as if that will do anything.
“Got into a fight with a seagull,” he says and El snorts.
His mom tuts but lets him go. “You used to get such bad bloody noses when you were a little kid. I had to keep a bottle of club soda stocked up in the house at all times to wash the stains out of your shirts.”
“I was fighting a lot of seagulls behind your back,” he tells her, deadpan.
This elicits a small laugh from El and a shake of his mom’s head. “More like roughhousing with Jonathan.”
Will shrugs, neither confirming nor denying.
“We should go,” his mom says finally, huffing and groaning as she gets to her feet. “End our search on a high note. Plus that lasagna takes an hour to bake.”
“Okay,” El says, springing up much more nimble than their mom had. Will grabs his notebook and pencil case as they turn back to the direction of their house, a step behind the girls as his mom talks about garlic bread and salad dressing. He wedges the tissue up his nostrils to stop any errant blood, breathing through his mouth, not worried about looking weird out here where no one seems to care.
+
+
That night as he’s brushing his teeth, Will remembers he never did his daily drawing. He fetches his sketchbook from where where he’d left it on the table by the front door and brings it up to his bedroom, taking a moment to brush off the sand still clinging to it over his trash. The book opens to the crinkled paper he’d been trying to sketch the shoreline on, the figures of his mom and El barely marked out. He runs his finger over the wrinkled texture before turning the page and grabbing one of his art pencils. He’s got nothing specific in mind so he starts to draw a few random curved lines while his thoughts drifts.
The image of Mike lit up in the sun materializes in his mind, but not from the dream he had earlier. Six months ago, Mike in the summer sun talking to El while Will waited his turn to say goodbye over by Hopper’s truck. He can’t help but poke at the memory, even though it’s like poking at a deep tissue bruise, agonizing and hurtful. He’d stood there practicing what he would say to Mike when he came over, how they’d write, or call, or how Will would visit when he could. Foolish. That past year they had drifted apart, Mike becoming increasingly closed off. But Will hadn’t wanted to give up on their friendship. Never. Even at long distance. It had survived California, it could survive this. When Mike had stomped over, leaving a teary eyed El behind, Will’s heart rate had doubled, tripled. His fingers had twitched as his side, a half fantasy of hugging Mike goodbye forming in his mind before he could dismiss it. But Mike had walked right by, not even looking at him once, muttering an angry have a nice life before moving past. Will had silently fallen apart in the passenger seat of his mom’s car, keeping his head turned away so she wouldn’t see. Fourteen years of friendship and that’s how it ended.
Will’s hand has gone still, pencil resting just above the paper. He needs to stop thinking about Mike. He’d been so good at burying him these last few months. Even now it makes his chest tight and the back of his throat burn.
He takes a deep breath and lets it out in one big whoosh before looking down at the strange shapes he’s managed to mark on the paper. It looks a little like an asian styled dragon, the long noodle-ly kind, so he decides that’s what it will be, drawing knobby clawed hands and curved horns on top of its head. He starts detailing out scales when he decides he wants to give it bird wings, marking in some straight flight feathers before going back and detailing smaller, softer ones at the bend of the wings. He sketches fluffy down feathers around its neck while he’s at it, and changes its nose from lizard nostrils into more of a beak-like thing. Finished, he takes a moment to look it over. The thing looks like it doesn’t know if it wants to be a bird or a lizard, but there’s something about its quirkiness that makes his mouth twitch upwards. Satisfied, he closes his notebook and sets it on his dresser.
He’s already feeling a pull to sleep, his body sluggish, so he reads until his eyes start to droop before clicking off his light and settling on his side. Then he’s licking his paws before dragging them over his long, black ears. He shuffles forward, looking up at his burrow, admiring how cavernous the place is with roots twisting through the walls. He looks down at the fur of his paws, midnight black, and wonders am I the Black Rabbit? with a quick twist of cold anxiety in his chest. He brings death, doesn’t he? Suddenly his body starts to sway back and forth, the whole world rocking. He looks down at his five fingered, pale hands resting in his lap. When he looks up he’s sitting on a train bench, gently rocking with the movement of it moving and realizes with a feeling like he’s surfacing from under water this is a dream.
Mike is sat opposite him, leaning forward, elbows resting on his knees as he looks at Will with a confused frown. “You were just a rabbit.”
Will notes the crinkle between his eyebrows, his downturned lips and feels his own lips curving up at the side, amused. “So?”
“So?” Mike asks. “That’s all you’re gonna say? So?”
“I can be a rabbit if I want.” He glances out the window and sees the landscape is nothing but gray, muted shapes passing by.
“Earlier,” Mike says, confused. “When I was asleep in the field, you brought the beach with you.”
Will can tell this isn’t a usual dream, it’s one of his strange dreams. The intense ones that seem extremely realistic. Usually he’s alone in them, unless they’re the nightmare variety filled with Vecna’s voice and monsters crawling out of the shadows.
“You don’t seem to be phased by any of this,” Mike says. He’s frowning, always frowning. He’d been like that back in Hawkins, like he’d slowly lost his happiness. It used to drive Will mad, wishing he could help Mike find his way back to joy.
Will sits back in his seat, offering, “It’s my dream.”
Mike stares at him, clearly waiting for more. He’s wearing the same red and blue sweater he always used to when they were kids, only this one is bigger, fit for an adult. He even has the Spider-Man sneakers with the red and black webbing he wore everyday when he was ten. When Will remains silent, he asks, “Why is it your dream?”
“Of course it’s my dream.”
Mike straightens, squinting at him suspiciously. “This is the train I would take to see my grandma when I was a kid. Why would you be dreaming about that?” There’s a surprisingly defensive tone in his voice.
“I don’t know,” Will says, honestly. Dreams are just weird, why does it matter if they’re on a train?
“This has to be mine,” Mike says, crossing his arms and leaning back with his chin tilted up, as if he’s won some kind of argument.
Will knows this is his dream, can feel it down to his core. He looks back out the window, tilting his head as he imagines the landscape becoming more solid. The gray nothing ripples like a pond getting a stone thrown into it, and then the gray is replaced with rolling green hills, a glimmering river cutting across the land. “I’ve been having these strange dreams that I can control.” He gestures to the window. Mike turns his head but his eyes remain narrowed. Staring out the window for a moment his expression flickers, mouth getting more firm as he goes still like he’s concentrating. After a few more seconds he sighs and drops his hands into his lap, looking back at Will with his bottom lip starting to stick out. “Okay, why can’t I change it?”
“Because,” Will says with an amused smile. “It’s my dream.”
“If it’s your dream, why am I here?” Mike says sharply.
“I don’t know. I dream about you a lot.” It’s true. Mike might not have been making any appearances in his Strange Dreams until now, but he’s not a stranger to Will’s regular dreams. Has been since he was little. Probably Will’s subconscious trying to process all the intense feelings he’s been having about his friend all his life.
Mike’s eyes flick away again, throat bobbing with a swallow and Will admires his profile as he waits him out. It’s kind of freeing, interacting with this Dream Mike. In real life, especially towards the end, he’d always had to be so careful, so closed off. There was something wrong with their relationship and he didn’t know what had happened. Will thought maybe Mike had figured out too much, was uncomfortable with how Will felt about him, so Will had doubled down on never touching him, never looking at him too long, hiding himself from Mike in a way he didn’t use to. Doing his best to make things normal normal normal and not make Mike uncomfortable. But even that didn’t seem to be enough to help the distance between them grow.
Have a nice life.
“Unless you’ve been on this train, this has to be my dream,” Mike counters, stubborn. “Everything is just how I remember it.”
Will looks around at the red carpeted bench seats, the silver colored isle, the rivets around the metal window frames. It’s probably just a train he saw in a movie or something. How do you convince a dream that it’s not real? Everything in here is from Will’s mind.
He leans forward, taking in Mike’s face again, even though it still sends a pang through his chest. “You’re probably my subconscious, taken on the form of my best friend.”
Mike’s eyebrows furrow again. “I’m not- why would your subconscious take on the form of me?”
He shrugs. “I always felt safest with Mike.” Mike does a slow blink that he does when something has surprised him, and Will has to give his subconscious credit for having Mike’s mannerisms down so well. “What does that mean?”
Will thinks it’s pretty self explanatory, but he contemplates for a moment before he says, “When I was young, and things got bad – like with Lonnie or whatever– I would go to Mike’s house. We’d sit on his bed and read comics with our shoulders pressed together and my anxiety would slowly die down, and I’d feel safe.” Mike always felt like home.
Mike swallows and his eyes flick to the side for a moment before looking back. “I’m not your subconscious,” he says, then pauses for a moment, shoulders hitching before straightening again in a way that Mike used to do when he was determined to make a point. “This could be… both our dream? I don’t know why you have more control over it, but maybe it’s because you’re doing… you know.” He waves his hands around for emphasis.
Will has no idea what he means. “Dreaming?”
Mike scowls. “Like making this place. Like a mind palace or whatever.”
The back of Will’s neck goes stiff, muscles tightening. It feels like being fully submerged into ice water. “This isn’t a mind palace,” he says, voice flat, distant. “I couldn’t- when the Upside Down collapsed, my link to the hive mind died.”
Mike is quiet for another moment. “But this is… weird. I know I’m the one dreaming, but. You seem so. Real.”
Will shakes his head. This is definitely one of the weirder dreams he’s had recently. “Dreams are weird,” he says, more to himself than Mike.
“That’s not what I…” Mike trails off before bending forward and running his hands through his hair. Will starts to look away, before remembering he can watch the way Mike’s fingers card through his hair if he wants. Watch his pale digits part the dark locks and feel something flutter in his chest, fingers twitching. It’s just a dream, there’s no harm. The real Mike is thousands of miles away.
When Mike looks up, getting that determined look on his face again Will interrupts before he can start. “El checked. To see if I still had any connections, any powers. I didn’t. I don’t.”
Mike’s face gets a pinched look Will can’t quite decipher. Maybe disappointment.
“She checked, multiple times,” Will defends. “Sometimes I’d have nightmares, like-” he pauses, swallows, collects himself before continuing, “Anyway. She checked when I woke up. No powers. No unwanted connections to hive minds.”
Mike looks unconvinced. “Okay,” he says, voice dripping with skepticism. An awkward moment of silence passes over them like a slow moving cloud blocking out the sun. Mike just keeps staring at him with that squint in his eyes and tight mouth like he doesn’t think it’s okay at all. Will can’t help but feel his metaphorical hackles go up. “What? Why are you looking at me like that?”
Mike’s eyes flick away. “I’m not looking at you like anything.”
“You absolutely are.”
“I’m not even looking at you!” Mike says to the wall to his right.
Restless energy is starting to make Will feel like his body is buzzing unpleasantly. Like a beehive is trapped in his torso. “But you’re still doing that- expression.”
“What are you talking about, this is just my face,” Mike says, turning back to Will and waving his hands around it as if to emphasize the fact. “What are you accusing me of?”
The beehive has suddenly turned into something boiling inside Will, and he doesn’t even know where the feelings are coming from. Maybe it’s all the months of holding back with the real Mike, all the times he was good and normal normal normal. He feels like his thoughts are slipping away from him, coming back hot and wrong. For the real Mike he would hold it all down, stay silent, but this is just a dream so why hold back? “If you’ve got something to say, then just say it.”
Mike chews on his bottom lip for a moment.. “It wouldn’t be so bad, would it? If you still had your powers?”
A strong, bitter taste erupts at the back of Will’s throat. “Of course. Of course you’d say that. Because the only time I impressed Mike was when I had those awful powers.”
Mike’s eyes go wide as he sits up straighter. “That’s not true, Will. You know that’s not true! I find plenty about you to be impressive.”
No. The real Mike didn’t think that. Will smiles sadly at him, the feeling in his chest turning cold. “He couldn’t even stand me in the end.”
“Stop talking like I’m not…” Mike runs his hands through his hair again, gripping the roots for a second before letting go. “You don’t understand.”
Again, with the real life Mike, Will would let this go, wouldn’t push. He’d keep it all bottled up and change the subject. Maybe that’s the point of this dream, a way for him to let everything out. The thing is, Will did understand perfectly clear. “You’re wrong. He invited me to a movie last may.” The words sit heavy between them. Mike’s gaze darts to the window, jaw tightening as he suddenly avoids Will’s eyes to watch the passing green landscape. “I waited outside the theater for him, even when he was late. For an hour. Then I worked myself into a panic that something had happened, some kind of emergency.”
“Stop,” Mike says quietly, still not looking at him. Will ignores him. Why not confront Dream Mike with this? He won’t ever get to do it with the real Mike. “I went over to his house and his mom said he was up in his room reading comics.” Had been all afternoon, apparently. She had offered to go get him for Will and then seemed upset when he’d turned her down. He remembers feeling like he wanted the world to swallow him whole as he stood there while she tried to talk him into staying. Remembered trying to hide how mortified he was in front of her as his stomach rolled and his chest filled with a simultaneously hot and cold feeling. “All week I was so excited. We hadn’t hung out one on one in weeks.” He’d bought a new shirt, a navy blue one he thought Mike might like because he once said that was totally your color, Will. He wanted to look nice for him. “And he didn’t even remember.” Something twists in his stomach, painful and unpleasant. By the end Will had meant so little to him.
Have a nice life.
Mike is quiet for a few ticks before he says, barely audible. “It wasn’t that I forgot. I’m sorry. I didn’t think it would matter to you.”
Will’s eyebrows craw into his hair line as he says, “It wouldn’t matter? To be stood up by my best friend?”
“You didn’t actually want to hang out with me!” Mike shouts suddenly, which is ludicrous. Will clenches his hands into fists. This was a mistake. He needs to stop trying to argue with a pretend Mike in his dream because it’ll drive him to actual madness.
Mike shrinks back after his outburst, suddenly looking more contrite. “Look, I can’t talk about this. And I don’t want to fight. Can we just… not?”
Will looks at him, his fallen expression, watches as he rocks with the motion of the train. His voice is flat as he asks, “Should we just sit in silence until I wake up?”
If possible, Mike looks even more unhappy about this suggestion. “I don’t really get what’s happening, but why don’t we just, uh. Be Dream Will. And Dream Mike. And leave the outside world out of it?”
The train continues to sway them back and forth. If he concentrates, he can hear the chug of the engine, the mechanics of the wheels on the tracks. He sighs and considers Mike’s words. He doesn’t want to fight, either. He never wants to fight with Mike. In a weird way, he feels like he’s mourning his friend and the idea of spending a moment with him without the past weighing him down does sound weirdly appealing. A way to say goodbye to Mike and find peace, even just experienced in a dream.
“Okay, sure,” he settles. “Dream Will and Dream Mike.”
“Okay,” Mike says, and then a very long, very awkward silence follows where Will sits there and listens to the sound of the train and Mike’s eyes dart around, not seeming to focus on anything.
“Oh-kay,” Mike finally says, eyes still flicking away whenever they get too close to connecting with Will’s. “So what do you want to do with Dream Mike?” he asks, and despite the years of Will carefully controlling how he’s allowed to think of Mike, it’s a kick to the heart. An errant thrum of want rushing through him, a quick flash in his mind of lips– he rains it in before it can go any further than that. It’s his turn to look away, eyes focusing on the metal rivets of the window frame as he shrugs.
More awkward silence.
It sits between them like a stone. Like a stalagmite growing larger with every drop of quietness. They used to sit in comfortable silence forever as kids and he feels a sudden longing for those days. Will turns his focus to the window, concentrating. The rolling green hills outside ripple and then become fields of flowers instead, like the ones he saw on the Party’s post card from Amsterdam. Dustin had wrote that they were sad to report since it was winter they were not able to see the flowers, but hoped to come back in the spring sometime.
“You got their postcard?” Mike asks, and Will tilts his head towards him in an affirming way. After another long pause Mike seems to deflate with a sigh and says, sounding miserable, “This is awkward.”
The ridiculously fallen expression on his face makes Will’s lips twitch up at the corners as he fights back a sudden warm feeling. Mike seems encouraged by this, rolling his shoulders back in a way that seems like he’s building himself up for something. He stills, looks Will right in the eyes, then glances away as if he’s lost his nerve. Just like the real-life Mike. A moment later he asks, almost timidly, “How have you been?”
A small part of Will wants to be a dick and answer with fine but he has to remind himself that Mike is just his subconscious, so really he’d just be being a dick to himself. The truth is; Bad. I feel like I came back wrong when I was twelve and grew into something more twisted every year. But he keeps that to himself, as always. Instead he says, “I’m okay.” Mike keeps looking at him in an encouraging way so he continues, “I’m enjoying college. My figure drawing teacher is really awesome but my English teacher sucks.”
Mike perks up. “What’s wrong with them?”
Will takes on a pretentious voice as he says, “Students these days are practically illiterate. It’s such a waist of time teaching them. Why, I’ve written multiple papers and gotten multiple awards, it’s so beneath me to enter a classroom.”
Without missing a beat Mike says, “Oh yes, all the awards,” in the same mocking voice which makes Will laugh. Mike seems energized by this, shifting to face Will more head on. A beat passes but his expression doesn’t change so Will continues, “On Fridays El and I go to the beach after work.”
“That’s why you brought the ocean to my nap,” Mike says. “How is El?”
Will ignores the pang in his chest at the memories of real life Mike only ever wanting to talk about El. He’s the one that brought her up. “She’s really good. Mom and Hopper couldn’t have found a better place. She’s made a tone of friends.” Mike frowns, looks down, looks out the window, before looking back. “That’s. Uh. Good.”
Will’s lips twitch. “She’s been going through a book phase, trying to read everything we did in school growing up. Her latest favorite is Watership Down. I’ve been rereading it so we can talk about it.”
“The mystery of why you were a rabbit is solved,” Mike says and Will smiles. “Remember Dustin was really obsessed with it?”
“He called us on our walkie talkies as soon as he was done, insisting we immediately get a copy.”
Mike offers a proper smile at that. “And when none of us did he brought his book to us one at a time. Practically hovered over our shoulder while we read.”
Will’s smile is fond. “Probably tainted my first read through because of that. It’s a lot different reading it as an adult.”
“I got it after you,” Mike says. His feet have been slowly creeping across towards Will’s, and now they’re close enough to tap against his shoes. It’s something Mike used to do to people, always poking and prodding and bumping into them. It annoyed a lot people but Will had never minded. He’s almost surprised to feel that Mike is solid in the dream. “I remember you drew a bunny in blue crayon on the back page.”
Will hums, trying to think of it but drawing a blank. Must be something his subconscious still remembers.
“It was good,” Mike’s smile twists a bit, his expression shifting in a way Will can’t read. “I wanted to tear it out and keep it.”
Is that something child Will wanted to do? Keep his drawing? It was probably for Dustin. “I don’t remember,” Will confesses.
Mike’s quiet for another moment before he tilts his head down, looking towards their touching feet with what seems like unfocused eyes. “I used to imagine myself getting up in the morning and getting on a flight to Oregon.” The non sequitur throws Will. Mike continues, “You know, show up and. You know. Just- talk to her or whatever.”
Right. Mike’s gone back to thinking about El. Will keeps his face neutral as Mike glances up at him. It’s not like he’s unique in having feelings for someone who doesn’t return them, it’s a tail as old as time. He just wishes it didn’t make him feel like he’s this misshapen wrongness in the world, wanting these things. He readjusts in his seat as an excuse to pull his feet away slightly, so they’re no longer touching.
“I’d think about it at night, as I was going to bed,” Mike says, eyes still distant. “I’d have this… conviction that tomorrow was the day I was going to do it, go to the airport and fly out. Picture it happing in my mind. Then morning would come and I just… wouldn’t.”
Will hums in that way he does to show he’s listening, even though he doesn’t know what to say.
“I’ve kind of given up on doing it, though.” Mike’s voice has gone quiet, barely audible over the train sounds.
There’s a tightness around Will’s ribcage that makes him cross his arms, pressing his fingers into his upper arms. He turns his head to towards the window. The real Mike wouldn’t ever give up on El. No doubt Mike will show up one day. He’ll come home and see Mike there, winning El over again. Watch them tenderly smile at each other, love each other. And he’ll put aside his own feelings to be happy for them, like he always does, because he loves them and wants them to be happy, even if it feels like a knife in his gut.
“My dad would love it if I did it, though. He thinks I’m waisting my life.” Mike’s gaze is still unfocused, lost. “Always telling me ‘if you want to win over the person you love, you gotta make a big gesture’.”
Will hums again before turning his attention fully out the window. He doesn’t want to talk about this anymore. The bright yellows and whites of the flowers outside pop against the green grass and he lets his eyes unfocused as he takes them in. He thinks of the half bird, half reptile dragon he drew and suddenly there’s a mass forming on the flowerbeds, body long and slender. Feathered wings spring from its back and it takes flight, gracefully coasting for a moment before landing by the river bank. It leans over to take a drink of water, the downy feathers around its neck dancing slow and hypnotic, like they’re underwater.
“A Will Byer’s creation if I ever saw one,” Mike says, breaking a silence Will hadn’t even realized had been blanketing them for some time. He glances over to see Mike’s eyes focused once more, now looking out the window.
“I drew it earlier,” he offers with a wry smile. Mike glances at him before looking back.
“How come you’re able to manipulate the dream so easily?”
Will drops his head to rest on the back of the train bench, looking up at the slightly rounded ceiling of the car. “I don’t know. It’s not usually this easy. A lot of times I’m stuck in a nightmare and just too scared to control it. A while ago I had a dream where I was being squeezed by tentacles so tightly it felt like my bones were shattering, breaking my body into a mess.” Even though he knew he was dreaming, the fear had taken over his mind, making it hard to think, hard to act. It had been so real, smelling like rot and decay, the veins cold and slimy against his skin. The pain had been real, too. “I guess the nice dreams are easier to control.”
When he lifts his head Mike’s eyes are wide and mouth slightly parted, horrified and concerned. He’d thought he could just talk about it with his subconscious, who already knew all this, but apparently when it’s in Mike’s form it acts like Mike. It makes Will’s throat feel tight. Makes him think about when their lives were woven together and they did everything together, and Mike cared about him back. He can’t stand it.
“Will… Do you-“
“We should do something,” Will interrupts, needing to get that look off of MIke’s face. For a moment it seems as if Mike isn’t going to let it go, leaning forward, mouth parting. Then, probably because of Will’s pleading face, his eyes flick to his shoes and then back up before he says, “Okay, what?”
What indeed. His mind spins, mouth suddenly feeling like it’s been glued shut, no ideas come to him. Then without realizing what’s happening the train car shifts, walls sliding away from them, the roof becoming transparent and suddenly they’re outside. The sky’s gone dark with stars burning across it. The air is warm, like the earth had been baked in the summer sun and the heat still lingers even at night. Mike lets out an oomph while falling back, the bench from the train disappearing beneath him. In front of them is an unlit campfire, behind them a cabin.
“Hopper’s cabin?” Mike says, getting to his feet and looking around. Propped up on a vertical log is Jonathan’s boom box, playing Micheal Jackson. Around the fire pit is a mix of different lawn chairs and stools. Will’s heart clenches in his chest as the muscles in the back of his neck go tense.
This isn’t a place, it’s a memory.
The night of the farewell party for him and El. Mike had told them he was coming, and Will spent the whole night – in between laughing and joking, and saying goodbye to everyone – with his eyes skirting around, looking for the looming figure of Mike. The last they had seen each other before that had been at one of the Party’s get togethers in Dustin’s basement and Mike had come late, responded to Will’s smile with a grimace then avoided his eyes the rest of the time. There had been panic in the back of Will’s head, thinking he knows how you feel about him. He’s too uncomfortable to even want to be in the same room as you. Will had looked at the farewell party as a chance to talk to him, to make sure everything was okay, that it was going to be okay. Even after everyone else left Will had stayed outside, hoping Mike might still show up late. Told his mom he just wanted to enjoy the night air while he stood out under the stars, listening to the boombox with the volume set low, waiting for Mike like a dog waiting for it’s master to come home. He never came. And then, two days later, have a nice life.
“It’s kind of dark,” Mike mumbles, bringing Will out of his reminiscing. Mike has squatted down next to the fire pit with a frown pinching his lips. Time After Time comes onto the boom box.
Will doesn’t want to be here, suddenly wondering if he could purge Mike from his mind and not face these buried emotions anymore. He wishes he had stayed a rabbit and never realized he was dreaming, never had to face the ghost of his friendship. He wants to go somewhere else but his mind is spinning too much to focus and his body is still too tightly locked up to even move.
Suddenly there’s a flash of light and Will jerks back in surprise as Mike lets out a shout of victory. In the pit now burns a fire, large and glowing, lighting up the area, dancing with a bright glow.
“I did it!” Mike says, waving his hands around with a grin on his face. The breath gets knocked clear out of Will’s lungs as he takes in the happy expression, framed by the glow of the flickering light. It’s been a long time since he’d seen Mike so happy. “See, I told you it’s my dream, too.”
“Okay,” Will says, his ability to think flying out his ears. It’s kind of unfair that Dream Mike would have the same power to make him lose his higher brain functions when he saw him like this, radiant and full of life. Will wants to capture the moment forever in a painting, etch it into a mountain. Cup it into his palms and press it into his chest to keep it forever, even if it’s not really Mike.
“Why Hopper’s cabin?” Mike asks, his smile dimming and becoming more contemplative. Unfortunately Will’s brain is still circulating around outside his head like a circling bee and not inside where it could help him think. He responds, “Party.” A one word, idiot answer.
When Mike cocks his head in even more confusion, Will finally snaps out of it, shaking himself mentally and even a little physically. “I mean,” he says. “I was thinking we could have a party.” Okay maybe he didn’t fully snap out of it. He doesn’t want to explain how this is a memory he doesn’t want to face so instead he rambles on, “I guess it was stupid because I don’t know how to conjure food or other people and so this is really lame, sorry.” He needs to stop talking. “At least there’s music?”
Seconds stretch out between them. Another awkward silence.
Mike stares at him for a moment more before suddenly shifting and jerking and doing the silliest dance he’s ever seen, arms waving and feet kicking, but with his face still completely serious. It’s so unexpected that it startles a laugh out of Will, and he watches as Mike’s face cracks from the flat expression and brightens back into something happy. And then it just snowballs from there, and Will is doubled over, laughing like an idiot, it wasn’t even that funny, but tears spring to his eyes as relief bleeds away and the laughter bounces out of his chest uncontrolled.
Mike presses closer, close enough to reach out and touch if Will wants, and it helps sooth the maniac laughter into something more hiccup-y and then just a smile that hurts his cheeks. Mike is looking at him like he used to, when they could just be happy together, simple and free with no complications.
“I miss you so much,” Will says through a sigh, through his heart breaking a little in his chest.
Mike’s face crumples, lips pulled down and eyes gone dim. A strange expression, like a mix between dejection and anger and sadness take over. Will steps back, startled. It’s just like it was toward the end in Hawkins, when he would see these glimpses of rage behind Mike’s eyes and he never understood if they were directed at him or the world at large. This one is definitely directed at him.
When he speaks Mike’s voice is low and harsh. “You left me.”
Will blinks, and when he opens his eyes he’s staring up at the ceiling of his bedroom, his alarm clock chiming to his left. He reaches blindly to turn it off before settling back, pressing the palms of his hands into his eyes while he gives himself a moment. What a dream. Why couldn’t it have ended a few minutes earlier, when Mike was smiling like sunshine in a summer sky, instead of glaring at Will with scathing anger? He tries to bring forth the way Mike had looked with the campfire flickering over his happy face, eyes squinted, shoulders relaxed, but it slips away and is replaced with that look of cold fury. He gives himself a moment to wallow before he throws the covers off and sits on the edge of his bed, letting himself wake up the rest of the way. He sniffles and realizes his bloody nose from yesterday is back. He tilts his head back as he gets up and blindly reaches for the tissues on his desk.
Standing there he tries to shake off the dream but can’t. He feels a little like something is scratching at the back of his spine, like the little claws of a mouse running up and down his back. He waits until his nose stops bleeding before he gets going, pulling out his clothes from his dresser. Wallowing in bed all day isn’t going to help.
He’s quiet in the bathroom, in the hallway, on the way down the stairs. It’s his mom’s only day to sleep in so he doesn’t want to wake her. When he’s lacing up his running shoes he remembers he left his portable cassette player up in his room and curses under his breath before sneaking back up as quietly as possible, skipping the creaking step.
Outside the air is crisp, the cold of winter still heavy and cloaking the land. He might not have gone for a run on a normal day, but after the dream he wants to clear his head. It’s a habit he picked up when he first moved here, not being able to sleep in the new environment, his mind spinning and spinning and never stoping. He’d lie awake at night as every shadow twisted towards him, every whisper of wind was Vecna’s voice. He’d originally gone for a run one evening in hopes of tiring himself out, wanting to pass out from exhaustion. Out on the concrete sidewalk he became a machine, a creature of rhythmic footfalls, steady inhales and exhales. It blanked his mind for a time, gave him a reprieve of all the constant thoughts and anxieties grinding away in the back of his head. After that it became habit in the mornings, letting his mind be free as he set his body on autopilot. It wasn’t a fix all, but it did help him settle, find a moment of peace before the day. Of course once winter hit the runs had died down to only sometimes, Will not exactly enjoying the cold.
At the corner of the Gas-n-Go he pauses for a moment, feeling the bitting wind on his face as he fumbles to flip his tape over to the other side before crossing the street. He’s got about six mixed tapes he uses for his runs, filled with recommendations from Jonathan when he calls every once in a while. If he brought the one that includes dramatic ballads from Pat Benatar and Phil Colins today that’s no one else’s business but his own.
As Will turns down Fourth street, It’s A Heartache blasting in his ears, he’s slapped in the face by another very unpleasant gust of wind. He’s starting to think maybe he should get a treadmill for this time of year. The cold is too much of a distraction to loose himself in the run and a stray thought starts circling.
Maybe he’ll write Mike.
He could send a quick note, ask him how he’s been. Will knows secondhand from what Nancy has told Jonathan, Mike’s going to college and majoring in English. He could ask about that. See if Mike responds. He could tell Mike he misses him. Misses the way he laughs, the way his eyes would crinkle-
Will stops in his tracks and bends over as soundless laughter bounces out of his chest while the back of his eyes feel hot. What is he doing, going down this road again? Stupid. What does he think is going to happen? Dear Mike. I dreamed about how silly you could be sometimes. I dreamed about your smile and how much I like it more than anyone else’s. PS. Hope this doesn’t make you feel uncomfortable.
Why does he do this to himself? He needs to let Mike go. He needs to move on, find someone else. Why can’t he?
He picks up his run again, determined to blank his mind. Despite his body warming up to a proper sweat, the cold keeps soaking his skin, his hands, his feet, and it feels like a thousand little mouths bitting at his face. He’s never been good at staying too long in the cold since his childhood. There’s nothing for it in the end, his feet slow and his shoulders slump and suddenly he just can’t find the motivation to go on. He turns back towards home.
When he comes up on their street he can see Hopper’s truck now in the driveway. He’s quiet as he slips his keys into the lock but once he steps inside he hears metal clanging from the kitchen along with Hopper’s deep baritone voice mixed with his mom’s softer one. No need to be quiet anymore.
He kicks off his shoes and toes them over towards the wall before making his way to the kitchen. He spots El first, sitting at the table while hugging one knee. His mother is by the coffee machine in her robe and Hopper is starting up the stove, still in his uniform.
“Morning Will,” his mom says when she spots him. She reaches out until he steps over to her where she kisses his temple even though he knows it must be a little sweaty. He mumbles a good morning back.
“Just in time,” Hopper says. “I’m making us a proper breakfast.”
“Great,” Will says, glancing over to see the carton of eggs on the counter. “I’m just gonna grab a quick shower.”
“Quick,” Hopper says, pointing a spatula at him. “We’ll eat your bacon if you’re too slow.”
It’s not until the hot water is rolling down his back that Will takes a breath and finally feels like he’s getting a hold of himself. This is just a Mike Blip. He’s had them before, and they always pass. It just sucks because it feels like his heart is being newly ripped out, like he’s freshly loosing Mike.
When Will comes back down his hair is dripping onto the back of his neck. El has moved over to the toaster, buttering the first round as the second batch cooks. His mother is putting silverware at their places of the table while Hopper plates the eggs, bacon already evenly divided amongst them. When Will goes to help El divvy the buttered toast onto the plates she gives him a quick look and Will immediately understand his mission, going over to the sink to get a drink of water and coincidently pins Hopper for a moment so he’s facing the living room. Hopper’s in the middle of one of his rants, saying to his mom, “A bowl of cereal isn’t a proper meal. Kids these days eat way too much sugar.” And Will gives him his best guileless smile as he watches out of the corner of his eye El float the bottle of syrup from the pantry over and drizzle maple syrup over his and her bacon, just like they like. When he sits down his mom gives him an unimpressed look over the mug of her coffee as she sips it, but doesn’t rat them out. Will has to bite his cheek to keep a laugh in as he watches El float the bottle of syrup back onto the shelf, right behind Hopper’s head. He shares a glance with his sister and sees the sparkle in her eye as he takes a bite of his bacon at the same time as her.
+
After the Upside Down collapsed El was gone, dead, and people couldn’t say her name without a haunted look entering everyone’s eyes. It was bittersweet, victory and loss. Will didn’t tell anyone when he slept that night and dreamt of nothing but blackness and the sound of her tear filled voice calling out for them. Mike! Hopper! Can anyone hear me? And the thing was Will could, but it was as if he was trapped in stone, unable to move, unable to breathe, holding him no matter how much he fought.
It happened the next night, her going through the whole list of everyone’s name over and over again, desperate, crying. It was as if he could pinpoint where she was in the vast darkness, but couldn’t get to her. He woke up in crying, sobbing, angry and helpless, unable to tell Jonathan who he’d also woke what was wrong. On the third night he fought against his restraints as hard as he could, trying to shake, trying to vibrate, and this time something shifted, just so, like a flicker of his pinky finger. It was the smallest movement, but it seemed to be enough to crumble the stone encasing him, enough to give him a voice as he finally called back, Eleven!
She screamed his name, and he knew they were somehow shifting closer, his voice getting stronger as he called back, and the next thing he knew he’d woken up with her reaching for him through a dimensional rift in the Weeler’s basement. He’d jumped up, stumbling on his fold-out couch, blinking back the tears in his eyes, every part of his body shaking as he grabbed her, hands locked tight. Johnathan must have been so confused but it didn’t stop him from jumping up from his own makeshift bed, and together they managed to pull her back into their world.
She’d still been wearing the same clothes she’d died in, dusty and torn. They sobbed, clinging to each other on the bed, Jonathan looking on in disbelief as he ran his hands through his hair. She’d whispered to him, voice broken, you heard me. I didn’t think anyone would hear me. The thought of what would have happened to her if he hadn’t heard, if he had failed to break free and call out to her still haunts him to this day.
Nancy had come down the stairs first, rifle raised until she took in the scene with absolute shock and wonder. Mike had been at her heels, and stood frozen before walking over as if possessed, unblinking. Will had been right there, pinned to the back of couch as Mike had touched her face so tenderly, Will’s heart breaking and swelling with joy at the same time. His expression was pure awe, like someone had brought the sun back into Mike’s world after years of only darkness.
Will’s mom and Hopper had come not long after, called at some point by Jonathan. They came in sleep clothes and tears in their eyes. When asked where she had been El couldn’t explain it. She said she was skirting the darkness, calling for them, and finally found Will.
After that, the Strange Dreams started.