Chapter Text
Two weeks. Two weeks since Eleven disappeared, two weeks since she saved the lives of three boys, and countless others, two weeks since Michael Wheeler’s heart had been shattered. She was dead, at least, that’s what everyone said, except for two people: Mike and Hopper. Each had their own reasons for believing that she was alive. One couldn’t even bear the thought of her being dead, of never seeing her again. One blamed himself for her disappearance, he did everything wrong, he saved one life just to endanger another. One was helpless, depressed, confused, angry, hurt. One knew that she was out there somewhere.
Hopper had hope, he had a good reason for it too. He built a box, a shrine, if you would call it that, to her, he put food in it, including Eggos, because the Wheeler kid said that it was her favorite thing to eat. Until, he went back to it the next week to replace the food, and the previous food was missing, it could’ve been a wild animal, but a part of him told himself that it was her.
Mike was ‘coping’, which consisted of him sulking in his room at night, crying, wishing for her to come back. None of these left a good impression on his parents, who never even met this girl, the girl who broke their son’s heart. Nancy tried to help comfort Mike, she was the only one who could get through to him, he shut everyone else out, he thought she was the only one who could even begin to understand what he was going through, she lost someone too, but at least she had closure, she knew Barbara was dead, he didn’t know if El was dead, or if she wasn’t, he didn’t even know where to begin to search for her.
The Sunday exactly two weeks from Eleven’s disappearance, something strange happened, or more accurately, didn’t happen. Hopper went back to the box in the woods to refill it with food, but when he got to the box, it was full, nothing had been touched. It didn’t settle right with him, he went off to start searching every corner of the woods by instinct. Six hours later and he found nothing, he was sure he had double-checked everything in a five-mile radius. With a bad feeling in his gut, he left for home, something was wrong, he just didn’t know what it was.
The following Monday Mike reluctantly got up for school, he didn’t want to go, he didn’t want to spend any waking hour not searching for her, he felt as if it was his fault for her being out there, for him not find her soon enough, if she was even still alive. But if he didn’t show up for school his parents would never let him out of the house again, so his hands were tied. There was no school for the previous two weeks for necessary repairs.
Once he got to school, he immediately spotted Dustin at the bike rack, there was no sign of Will, which was to be expected, everyone seemed to want to know what happened to him, per the public, he died and came back to life.
“Hey? Have you seen Will?” Asked Mike curiously
“He just went to his locker with his entourage behind him.” Replied Dustin eagerly
It felt odd, it didn’t really feel like the first day of school, he couldn’t walk around the hallways without remembering the fight two weeks ago, and he could barely keep himself together in science class, everything about the school reminded him of her. He couldn’t pay attention to any of his classes, something that had never happened to him before. He barely knew that the bell rang to go home, he was stuck in his head.
When Mike got home he rushed up to his room, not wanting any ‘How was your first day? Did you get any homework?’ talk from his mom, he didn’t really talk to his parent much anymore, he shut most of his social life out, he tried to be as normal around his friends as possible, be everyone could see that deep down, he was hurting. Besides, he had twice the amount of homework to od because of the two-week vacation, surely his parents couldn’t blame him for that.
At around eight in the evening he finished his homework, he couldn’t really focus for most of it, his mind was distracted on someone else. His eyelids suddenly got very heavy and he decided to go to sleep.
Six hours later, he woke in a cold sweat, crying out her name. On the outside, the public appearance of Mike barely changed. On the inside, there was his whole entire mind to be afraid of, when every he closed his eyes he would just replay that moment, that moment of losing her. The nightmares, they were worse, he would find her just to lose her again, or to watch her die, every night, the day was grief and sadness, the night was pain and turmoil.
Nancy rushed into his room to try and help him, to calm him down, she also had nightmares, about the Demogorgon, about Barbara. But those happened occasionally, Mike had them every night, and she didn’t know what to do, how she could help, she felt useless, useless to help her little brother who had experienced so much in such little time.
“Mike, Mike listen to me, I’m here, everything is ok, you’re here.” Nancy said reassuringly
“I-It was her, I-I could’ve saved her, it was my fault, she’s gone and I can’t do anything.” Said Mike, failing to hold his tears in.
“No, Mike, listen to me, none of this is your fault, she saved you, she made her choice, she wouldn’t want to see you like this.”
She felt bad for him, there was nothing he could do, he blamed himself when he could do nothing. She tried to get to fall back to sleep, but it didn’t work, he was up until his alarm said he had to get up.
When he got up, the phone rang, he went to go answer it considering he thought he was the only one up. When he picked it up, he heard the voice of the chief.
“Who is this?” Asked Hopper
“This is me, Mike.” Mike said groggily
“I need you to get down here as soon as possible.” Hopper said hurriedly
“Why? What is it? I have school soon.” Said Mike, confused
“Something I should’ve told you a week ago.”