Archive of Our Own

A/N:

I'm having a TIME! Between my two jobs and the unfortunate mice situation in my apartment, things have been a little hectic. I'm still working on a bunch of longer WIPS but, in the meantime, I thought I'd start a completely different fic because that's totally what you should do when you already have eight open google docs tabs on your computer.

This was supposed to be a 5k one shot and instead it's almost 20k. Who's surprised? Not me. Moderation is nothing but a Florence and the Machine song to me.

Also, for any of those who are curious where the inspo for this fic came from, it's loosely based off of that one scene in Amazing Spider-Man 2 when Peter tells Gwen all the endearing things she’s not allowed to do anymore so that he can finally get over her after their breakup.

Anyways! This was not edited whatsover so if there's any egregious mistakes, blame my FBI agent in my computer for not catching them.

Enjoy :)

Will was nervous to bring it up to Mike. He didn’t want to. He knew that it’d be beyond humiliating for him and probably a little embarrassing for Mike too, but they’d promised each other that there would be no more secrets between them and that included lies by omission.

So, while the others were still laughing and talking downstairs, Will slipped away, following Mike up the steps into the kitchen where he was currently raiding the cabinets for more snacks. 

Mike looked over his shoulder at the sound of Will’s footsteps, his face breaking out into a small, unconscious smile when he realized who it was. 

“Oh, perfect. I was hoping it’d be you. Look what I found.” Mike turned around fully, offering something up to WIll in his outstretched hand. It was a Reese's peanut butter cup. Will had to resist the urge to pinch his nose in frustration. This was the exact problem Will had come upstairs to talk to Mike about.

“Mike,” Will said tiredly, hating the way the smile instantly slid off Mike’s face, his eyes flitting nervously like he was trying to rack his brain for what he’d done wrong. Against his better judgment, Will softened, stepping closer and giving Mike a strained but, hopefully, comforting smile. “Can we talk for a second?”

“Yeah.” Mike realized his hand was still extended, holding the Reese’s cup, and awkwardly lowered it, clearing his throat. “Um, yeah. What’s up?”

“You know how we said we wouldn’t keep secrets from each other anymore?”

"Uh, yeah. Mhm.”

“And you know that I… have a crush on you.”

Mike’s eyes widened before he looked away, shifting restlessly on his feet. Will held back a grimace. He’d known that this was going to be awkward. Mike didn’t want to talk about this anymore than Will did. It was embarrassing and clearly made both of them miserable. It’d be so much easier if Will could just get over himself and move on, but that was what he was trying to do here. He was trying to move on. Mike just kept making it so damn difficult.

“I know,” Mike finally said quietly, still refusing to look at Will.

“Right. I know this isn’t ideal for you. And I’m not trying to, like, shove my feelings in your face or anything. I’m trying to move on. But I can’t do that when you’re acting like this.”

The shock was enough to have Mike’s eyes snapping back to Will, his mouth pulling down in a confused frown. “What? Acting like what?”

Will rolled his eyes. “Come on, Mike. I understand you not knowing before but you know now. You know I like you. You know what… touching you means to me.”

Will watched as an awkward flush crept up Mike’s cheeks. He looked like a deer caught in headlights, his eyes wide and his expression flustered as if he didn’t know what to do with Will’s words, as if he didn’t understand them at all. “W-What do you mean? I—We’re friends, Will. I’m not allowed to touch you anymore?”

“I didn’t say that,” Will said, “I’m just saying sometimes you touch me differently, in a not so friendly way, and it’s confusing.”

“What?” Mike balked. “No, I don’t.”

Will shot Mike a deadpan look. “Yes, you do, and I know it’s friendly for you, but you have to understand that for someone who’s… who likes boys, it means something different. And maybe it’d be fine if you touched the other guys the same way or, hell, even Max, but you don't, it's just me.”

“Will, what are you talking about?” Mike demanded. 

Will tried not to let his frustration show. He had to remind himself that Mike was looking at it all through a different lens. Romance wasn’t a thought in his mind when it came to Will, so obviously he wasn’t desperate looking for signs and signals like Will was. But still. He had a brain. Why was this such a difficult concept for him to grasp?

“You literally hooked our ankles together under the table while we were playing DnD,” Will said. Then, just in case Mike tried to deny this too, he added, “While you were telling us about the enchanted vines in the woods, you grabbed my foot and tangled our feet together. You kept them there for a full minute. I was the one who had to pull away!”

“I—Well—It was just—” Mike spluttered, his face turning even redder, if that was possible. “I was just joking around. I didn’t meant to—”

“I know you didn’t mean to,” Will said on a sigh, “But you get why you can’t do that with me, right? You can do that with Lucas or Dustin, but with me it’s different. We need to have some sort of boundaries, things that are off-limits, just until I’m finally over you, okay?”

Mike was still gaping at him, and Will wasn’t sure if it was because he was still processing Will’s reaction to the ankle touching or if he was caught off guard by Will’s sudden request.

“Off-limits?” Mike echoed after a moment.

“Yeah,” Will said, “You know, like things that might accidentally give me the wrong impression. I mean, obviously I know you don’t mean them like that. I’m not stupid. But I think it’ll be easier for me to move on if you aren’t constantly being so…”

“Annoying?”

“Endearing,” Will finished before he snorted, shooting Mike a look, “By all means, please be more annoying, it might help speed along the process.”

Mike didn’t seem to hear the joke though, his mind still lingering on the first part of Will’s speech. “You think I’m endearing?”

Will let out a self-deprecating laugh. “You are kidding, right? Mike, what the hell do you think having a crush on someone means? And even if I didn’t have a crush on you, we’re best friends. There’s loads of things that you do that I find endearing.”

Mike continued to stare at Will like he’d never seen him before, which was, unfortunately, also a bit endearing, if only because Mike’s mouth was already a little too large for his face and when it hung open like that it made him look silly and—dare Will say it—cute. 

“Wait.” Mike shook his head, his mouth finally falling shut for a second as he swallowed. “What exactly do I do that you find endearing?”

“Well.” Will took another step forward, close enough to be within arm’s reach without crowding Mike’s space. Then, he reached forward, snatching the Reese’s cup out of Mike’s hand, waving it around as evidence. “This right here is definitely on the list. Remembering my favorite candy and offering me some? That’s definitely endearing.”

“Oh,” Mike said weakly, “Sorry.”

Will shrugged. “It’s okay. Just make sure you don’t do it again.”

He was mostly joking now. The candy thing was a little less problematic than the touching thing. The candy thing was just Mike being a good friend, and Will couldn’t exactly ask Mike to stop doing everything he liked about him because that’d basically be like asking Mike to stop breathing. But, he was trying to take his humor where he could get it, so he looked down at the candy bar, shaking his head in mock disapproval.

Mike snorted. “So, basically, what you’re saying is you want me to stop being nice to you?”

Will looked up at him and smiled. “Yeah, basically.”

Mike cracked a smile, the tension he’d been carrying since the start of their conversation finally easing from his shoulders. “But that’s ridiculous. I don’t want you to start hating me.”

“Hmm. Would it make you feel better if I told you I already do—secretly? I’ve actually been planning your demise for years and this is all a ruse to throw you off my scent.”

“How in the world would that make me feel better?” Mike guffawed, “Now I feel like I should check my cup downstairs for traces of rat poison or something.”

“It won’t be in your cup,” Will said with a cheeky smile, “I’m planning to put it in your popcorn when we watch a movie later, that way there’s more plausible deniability. If it was just in your cup, then it’d be obvious who my target was. The popcorn leaves more room for ambiguity.”

Mike snickered. “Your mind is actually really disturbing, you know that? I almost want to believe you.”

“Sleep with one eye open,” Will sing-songed, laying it on extra thick, just because he loved the way Mike’s skin scrunched up around his eyes when he laughed. It was such a beautiful sight. And Will really needed to get a grip. He was trying to get over Mike Wheeler here, not fall more in love with him.

Will turned away from Mike, bounding back down the steps, trying not to look like he was running away.

Later that night, as they all gathered around the small tv in the basement, snuggled up under blankets, sandwiched together on the couch and on the floor, Will accidentally caught Mike’s eye just as Dustin handed him a bowl of popcorn from the stack he was handing out to everyone.

“There’s no poison in this, is there?” Mike said loudly.

Dustin grumbled something about being ungrateful, shoving the bowl into Mike’s chest, forcing him to grab hold of it, but Mike didn’t pay him any mind, a wide smile spreading across his face as he continued to hold Will’s gaze.

That was another thing Will would have to tell Mike was off-limits later—the way Mike smiled at him from across a room whenever the two of them shared in an inside joke. It made Will feel all warm and pleased inside. It made him feel proud, like he alone knew Mike better than anyone else. Because even though Mike was sitting on the couch, his arm wrapped casually around El’s shoulders, his attention and his fond smile were all for Will.

The next time Will’s unfortunate crush came up, they were all out for ice cream. They’d just finished spending the afternoon at the pool, and Lucas had suggested that they deserved a treat for burning off so much energy in the water. Will was pretty sure Lucas had been the only one doing anything that resembled hard physical activity, swimming laps in between their games of chicken and marco polo, but he wasn’t one to turn down an opportunity to eat ice cream, so he wisely kept his mouth shut.

After waiting in line and finally getting their ice cream, the group made their way over to a park across the street, where they sat in the shade of a tree, happily licking their cones. Well, everyone else was licking their cones. Dustin was biting his like a heathen.

While everyone was distracted by the heated debate between Max and Dustin about the proper way to eat ice cream, Will felt Mike lean into his space. He turned to look at him, raising his eyebrows in question.

“Can I help you?” Will asked with a slight smile at the mischievous look in Mike’s eyes. He knew from that look that Mike was up to something, he just didn’t know what yet.

Mike didn’t respond with words though. He just leaned even farther forward, wrapping his hand around Will’s, maintaining eye contact as he took a long slurp of Will’s strawberry ice cream.

Will knew the appropriate response was to cry in mock outrage, maybe demand some of Mike’s ice cream in retribution. But Mike was a fast eater and had already finished his own cone. And Will couldn’t say anything to defend himself because his mouth was suddenly bone dry and his mind was occupied with the way Mike was staring up at him through his lashes, his eyes dark, almost inviting, as if teasing Will to do something reckless like lean closer and—

Will blinked rapidly. “Mike,” he said hoarsely, making sure he spoke low enough that the others couldn’t hear him, “You can’t—”

Mike tilted his head as if confused. Then, he leaned in again, taking another lick of Will’s ice cream, a smirk creeping up on his face as if he thought himself clever for catching Will off guard.

Will pouted, jutting his chin out in irritation as he pulled the ice cream cone closer towards his chest. “Mike, you’re not allowed to do that.”

“Or what? Are you going to report me to the ice cream police?”

“No,” Will huffed, “I mean, you can’t just grab my hand and lick my ice cream like that. It’s, um, I’m a little—” Will lowered his voice even more, whispering an embarrassed, “Flustered.”

“Flustered?” Mike said. Then, it finally seemed to register for him—how close they were, the way his hand was still covering Will’s, the way he was hunched over, making himself smaller just so that he could look up at Will. Mike backed away instantly, his hand falling off of Will’s, landing in his own lap. “S-Sorry. Was that, um, did you really like that? I mean—sorry. But did you really?”

“Oh, I’m sorry, was I not supposed to react to that?” Will hissed incredulously, “You have your crush tongue something five inches from your face and tell me you don’t get flustered too!”

“Wha—Will!”

“What?” Will defended, “You started it! I’m just being honest!”

“Well, you don’t have to say it like that!” Mike said, his face flushing a dark red color, even his neck and ears were red. Will wished he could tell Mike off for doing that too—because red really was a good color on him—but he knew that wouldn’t be playing fair. “I wasn’t trying to be sexy!”

“Well, then try harder,” Will said, not thinking about the words before they left his mouth. 

Mike stared at him. “Wait, you actually think I’m—”

“We’re done. We’re done talking about this,” Will decided, standing up on shaky feet. He spared one last look at Mike who was staring up at him with a wondering, shocked expression before turning to the group and announcing loudly, “I’m gonna go get more napkins. My cone is dripping all over me.”

“Well, maybe if you were a faster eater, that wouldn’t be a problem,” Max said with a smirk, breaking away from her conversation with Dustin. “You take forever to finish things.”

“You know a faster way to eat ice cream,” Dustin piped up and suddenly they were thrown back into the debate about the proper way to eat ice cream that had only just died down.

Will rolled his eyes at his friends before he began to make the trek across the grass, back towards the little hut across the road. Only a few seconds later, he heard the telltale sounds of jogging footsteps catching up to him. Will tried not to feed into the idea that the universe was out to get him as he bent his head down and began to lick at the parts where the cone was starting to drip onto his hand.

“Will,” Mike said, falling into step beside him. 

Will hummed. He didn’t want to be mad at Mike, and he really wasn’t. He was just frustrated that this was still a thing. They’d defeated the Upside Down months ago. Everything was back to normal. They should all be happy. Will shouldn’t still be feeling twinges in his chest every time he looked across their group of friends at Mike. Deep down though, he’d always known that getting over Mike was going to be hard. Mike was his best friend. They knew everything about each other, shared everything. They just fit so well somehow. And every time Will tried to think of his ideal partner, it always lined up point for point to Mike.

Will looked down at his ice cream cone, watching as it dripped down onto his hand. It gave him an idea for a painting—a kind of optical illusion where the drips of ice cream turned into tears. He bent down, licking away the stray drops, trying not to think about how melodramatic he was being over an ice cream cone. Then, he looked sideways at Mike, waiting for him to say something. 

“Yeah, okay,” Mike said, “I can see how that looks now.”

“What?” 

Mike gestured vaguely to the ice cream. “You with that. Now I’m—ugh, why did you put it into my head, Will?”

“Sorry,” Will smiled, unapologetic. 

“You’re just—” 

Will took another lick of the ice cream. He genuinely wasn’t trying to be weird or anything. He just hated the feeling of the sticky ice cream residue getting on his knuckles. 

“Will!” Mike admonished. 

“It’s dripping, Mike! What do you want me to do about it?” Will laughed. This time, when he bent down, he took an intentionally loud slurp that had Mike spluttering. 

“Okay, that’s it. You’re done. Give me that.” Mike took the cone out of Will’s hand and threw it away into a nearby trash can, half of it still uneaten. 

“Hey!” Will protested, “I wasn’t done with that!”

“Yes, you were.”

“You owe me another ice cream,” Will pouted, shooting Mike a glare. 

Mike rolled his eyes. “I’ll buy you anything you like. Just not ice cream.”

Will grinned. “A popsicle then?”

Mike snorted. “God, shut up,” he said, shoving Will’s shoulder as he shook his head. “You’re so annoying, you know that?”

“Annoying? Or endearing?”

Mike shot Will a warning look that Will ignored, laughing into his hand. 

Eventually, they came to an agreement that Mike would buy Will a thing of fries from the shop next to the ice cream shop as an apology for throwing away his ice cream cone. They ate them on the bench in front of the shop at Mike’s insistence that if they went back to the others with the fries they’d eat them all. Will knew he was right and he certainly was far from minding the quality time with Mike, even if it was bad for his crush. 

When they got down to the last of their fries, Mike took two out of the basket, turning away from Will. When he turned back, the fries were stuck in his mouth like vampire teeth. 

“Time to die, Sorcerer,” Mike joked, lowering his voice and wiggling his fingers at Will. Then, an idea struck him and, through the fries in his mouth, he added, “Wait, give me the ketchup.”

Will kept the ketchup out of reach from Mike, knowing what he wanted to do. “No.”

“Will,” Mike whined, “I want to use it as blood.”

“I know. And absolutely not. I think you’re traumatizing that little kid over there,” Will said, gesturing with his head to the little boy who was walking out of the shop with his mom, watching them with wide eyes. 

“Mwah ha ha, I’m going to suck your blood,” Mike said in a thick, rather ambiguous accent. Will rolled his eyes, shoving Mike’s face away until Mike finally unstuck the fries, grinning broadly. 

“You’re so weird,” Will complained. 

Mike shrugged, munching on his prop teeth. “Just trying to help.”

“Help how?” Will said incredulously. 

“If I’m weird, maybe it’ll help you get over me,” Mike said, shooting Will an amused look. Will’s heart clenched. It was fine when he mentioned it, but when Mike did, it sounded almost cruel. 

Will cleared his throat. “Right, well, I don’t think that’s going to work.”

Mike raised his eyebrows. “Why not?”

“Because,” Will said, avoiding his gaze, “I like when you’re dorky.”

“What?”

“I mean, don’t get me wrong, the vampire bit is definitely growing stale, but it’s not like—I don’t know. It doesn’t bother me. I think you’re funny. And I like when you goof around with me. You don’t do that with everyone. It makes me feel special, I guess.”

Mike was silent beside him. Will had definitely made it weird. Instead of looking over at Mike to see what kind of face he was making, Will stood up, taking the empty basket of fries with him. 

“Um, we should probably head back. The others are probably wondering where we went.”

Will didn’t wait for an answer as he walked over to the nearest trash can and dumped the fries basket into the receptacle. When he came back to Mike’s side, he kept his eyes trained on his shoes, waiting until Mike stood up. Then, they began to walk back across the street towards the park where the others were still lounging around and talking. 

When they finally got within shouting distance, Dustin said, “Where have you guys been? You’ve been gone forever!”

“It was, like, ten minutes,” Will said, rolling his eyes. 

“Actually,” Lucas said, checking his watch, “You were gone for almost half an hour.”

Will blinked. “We were?” He looked over at Mike, but Mike’s eyes were trained somewhere else, expression unreadable. Will turned back to the group. “Oh. Sorry. I didn’t realize. Did you guys want to go back to Mike’s now?”

“I’m ready,” Max said. 

“Could we play that board game again?” El said as they all got up from the grass and began to collect their things. 

“Which one?” Lucas asked. 

Will accidentally bumped into Mike as he turned around to head towards the car, not realizing how close the two of them had been standing. “Oh, my bad.” Will stopped short when he saw how distracted Mike looked, his head bent low and his eyes unfocused. Actually, now that he thought about it, Will didn’t think Mike had talked since they’d finished their fries. He frowned, gently grabbing Mike’s shoulder, getting him to look up at him. “Hey, you okay?”

Mike’s eyes flitted between both of Will’s eyes before dropping lower, his gaze turning dazed again. Finally, Mike licked his lips, nodding jerkily and looking Will in the eyes again. “Yeah. Fine.”

“Are you sure?”

Mike gave him a weak smile. “Totally.”

A couple of days later found Will in Mike's bedroom, reading a comic.

“Will, what do you think?”

“What?” Will said, who hadn’t been paying attention to whatever debate Dustin and Lucas had been having, too engrossed in his reading. 

They’d all made plans to hang out, just the four of them, since they hadn’t done so in a while. Usually, it was two or three of them together or them plus the girls. It’d been a long time since it was just them four. Will was pretty sure it’d been Dustin’s idea, or maybe Mike’s, but then Mike had radioed them that morning, telling them that he couldn’t go to the arcade because he was feeling sick. 

Instead of going without him, the three friends had decided to change their plans and go to Mike’s house instead, keeping him company by his sick bed as they read comics and chatted.

It was a lot more mundane then the exciting day at the arcade that they had planned, but Will had been enjoying himself. It wasn’t often that they hung out in Mike’s bedroom, preferring to stay in the basement where most of the games and the DnD table were, but there was something undeniably comforting about Mike’s room. When Will was inside it, it almost felt like being wrapped up in a hug from Mike. Sitting in someone’s bedroom, to Will, always felt akin to sitting in a room inside their heart, and there was no one’s heart Will cared about more than Mike’s. 

Poor Mike hadn’t really been all that lucid today, falling in and out of sleep, but Will could tell he appreciated having them here, his mouth quirking up in a smile every time they got especially rowdy, even if he was too tired to open his eyes. It was adorable, and with his bed head making his hair look especially messy, curls falling in disarray all around his face, Will felt like his heart was in danger of exploding in his chest every time he looked at him. So, Will was dutifully reading, trying not to look over at him. 

“I said,” Dustin said pointedly, “Who do you think is hotter? Wonder Woman or Scarlet Witch?”

Will snorted. “What?”

“Will doesn’t like girls,” Mike mumbled, his face half-smushed into his pillow, his eyes still closed. 

Will, who was sitting on the end of his bed, looked over at Mike with a skeptical but amused smile. Then, he looked over at Dustin and Lucas, a little nervous. It wasn’t like he thought they were going to make fun of him or anything. They knew he was gay. But they didn’t really talk about it. Sometimes, Will was afraid they didn’t talk about it because it made Dustin and Lucas uncomfortable. 

Luckily though, Dustin and Lucas looked rather unfazed. Dustin even rolled his eyes, shooting Mike a ‘duh’ look. 

“Yeah, that’s why we were asking him. He’s like the control group, you know? Because he can answer unbiasedly,” Dustin said. 

“Well, in that case, I like Scarlet Witch’s costume better. So I’d say her.”

“But Linda Carter, man!” Lucas protested. 

“Her lasso of truth is cool but the rest of her costume is so bland. The Scarlet Witch design is more unique. And she just has better story lines.”

“That’s so not true!” Lucas argued.

“Yes, it is.”

“Ugh, whatever, Man. That’s not even what we were talking about! We were asking who is cuter!”

“You’re just mad because he didn’t agree with you,” Dustin said. 

“I’m mad because you’re both wrong,” Lucas said, “Wonder Woman is way better than Scarlet Witch.”

As the boys continued to argue, Will looked over and saw Mike crooking his fingers, his half-lidded eyes trained on Will, sleepy and yet somehow still burning with intensity, though perhaps that was only Will’s feelings misinterpreting things. Mike was just so beautiful like this—unguarded in his bed. It made Will think about what it’d be like to wake up next to him every morning, and then, Will thought about the fact that he couldn’t, never would. The left side of Mike’s bed belonged to El, not him. She would be the one who had the privilege of waking up beside him every morning. She would get the bedhead and the soft skin, warmed from being under the covers. She would get that look that Mike is giving him now—open and vulnerable and oh so heartbreaking for how much it made Will ache.

Will swallowed, scooting closer to Mike, maybe only a foot or so.

Mike frowned, dissatisfied, kicking his foot under the cover so that it bumped against Will’s hip. Then, he made a sound in the back of his throat that Will was only able to interpret because he knew Mike so well. ‘Come here’, it said, ‘Get closer to me’.

After a beat, Will sighed and shuffled closer until he was sat near the head of the bed by Mike’s hip. His body was still angled away, his legs hanging off the side of the bed, but his face was turned sideways, looking down at Mike expectantly as if to say, ‘Here I am. Now what?’

Mike hummed contently as if satisfied by this new arrangement, as if Will sitting so far away before had been bothering him. Will tried not to think about the fact that Mike didn’t seem to mind that Lucas and Dustin were sprawled out on the floor, nowhere near him either. 

“Did you need something?” Will asked, “Is your headache back? I think it’s been enough time now. You could take some more Tylenol.”

“No,” Mike mumbled, rolling his head from side to side on his pillow, “No, I wan’ta ask you’n.”

“What?”

“Wanna ask you something,” Mike repeated. He looked like he was moments from falling asleep again, but there was a strange determination in his eyes, like whatever he was about to say was really important to him.

“Sure. Anything,” Will said with a wry smile, “You know I don’t have any secrets from you, Mike.”

“D’you think ‘m hotter?”

Will frowned. He raised up his hand to feel the back of Mike’s forehead. “No, you feel the same to me. Why? Do you feel feverish?”

“Nn,” Mike said in protest, “‘m I hotter than Wonder W’m’n.”

The last word was muffled as he closed his lips too soon, almost as if his energy had died halfway through and he couldn’t find it in himself to finish. Man, he was really out of it.

Will’s eyes widened. “What?”

Mike blinked a couple of times, like he was trying to rouse himself, before looking Will in the eyes imploringly. 

Oh, he was serious. He actually wanted Will to answer the question. As if it wasn’t obvious already. Will was a gay man. And besides that, Mike knew how he felt about him. So why did he want to hear Will say it?

“Of course… Of course I think you’re hotter than Wonder Woman,” Will said haltingly, “You’re hotter than Scarlet Witch too.”

“Whoa,” Mike said quietly.

Despite his confusion over this whole conversation, Will couldn’t help but laugh a little at that. “Is that surprising?”

Mike nodded his head.

“Well, it shouldn’t be. You’re really handsome. I think you’re better looking than most people, to be honest.” That was probably a little too honest. Will shouldn’t have said that. Mike probably didn’t want to hear that, even if it was true. Even if it was an ego boost, hearing that from your totally platonic best friend was probably weird. Will cleared his throat. “Um, sorry. Sorry, I don’t know why I said that.”

“D’you mean it?” Mike slurred, looking at Will through his lashes.

Will looked away, ashamed. “Yeah,” he admitted quietly.

Mike hummed. “Good.”

Will’s eyes snapped back to Mike, but his eyes were already closed again, his mouth open in a soft ‘o’. Will squirmed. That was just in his head, right? Mike hadn’t actually said that. 

“Hey.”

Will looked over at Dustin who was getting to his feet, gesturing over to the bedroom door where Lucas was standing, loitering in the open doorway.

“Is Mike asleep?”

“Um, yeah. I think so.”

“Do you wanna get something to eat?”

“Are we leaving to go somewhere?” Will asked, hesitant to leave Mike behind without first telling him that they were going.

“Just over to Lucas’s house,” Dustin said, “His mom made some casserole. Come on. We’ll be back before Mike even wakes up.”

“Uh, yeah. Okay, sure. Just give me a sec,” Will said.

“Well, we’re not waiting for you. Just meet us there. You know where it is,” Dustin said, following Lucas out of the room.

Will snorted, shaking his head in disbelief. Some friends they were. Of course, Lucas’s house was only a few lawns over. Will was pretty sure he could manage to get there on his own. 

Will got to his feet, picking up a loose leaf piece of paper and shoving it into the comic he was reading before closing it and setting it on Mike’s dresser. He turned to go, thinking that he might be able to catch up to Lucas and Dustin before they were even out the door, when a noise came from Mike’s bed, making him halt and turn back.

Mike was shifting, getting comfortable under the covers. He gave a little sniffle that had Will’s heart nosediving in his chest. He was so cute. Unable to help himself, Will walked back over to the bed.

“Mike,” he said quietly. When Mike didn’t respond, Will reached up without thinking, brushing a hand through Mike’s fringe. Mike’s eyes fluttered open. The second he caught sight of Will’s face, he broke out into a grin.

“Will,” he breathed.

“Hi,” Will said with a fond smile, “We’re just going over to Lucas’s house for lunch but we'll be back soon, okay?”

“Huh?”

Will chuckled. “Just sleep Mike.”

“You’re leaving?” Mike pouted, having only just processed Will’s words.

“I’ll be back,” Will promised, petting his hair again, “Just try to get some rest, okay?”

“D’wan’you’ta’go,” Mike mumbled, nuzzling into Will’s hand. Will’s heart was pounding in his chest. His whole body felt hot. He never should have touched Mike. He should have left when he had the chance. He should stop wanting Mike so much, but of course he didn’t do any of those things. He couldn’t.

“Mike, I have to. I’m hungry. I can’t stay here forever, you know.”

“Please…”

“Please what?” Will said.

“Please stay forever.”

“Mike,” Will said brokenly, pulling his hand out of Mike’s hair, feeling the sudden whine from Mike deep in his chest, “You can’t say stuff like that. It’s… It’s off-limits, okay?”

Mike made a confused noise, blinking dazedly up at Will.

Frustrated, Will grabbed Mike’s face with both hands, looking at him seriously, while Mike stared at him with something that only half-resembled lucidity.

“You know I’d do anything for you, Mike. So don’t ask me to do something if you don’t mean it. Because I… I would,” Will choked out. He was sure that he wouldn’t be this honest or pathetic if Mike were actually in his right mind, but he felt protected under the cover of Mike’s brain fog. At worst, Mike would vaguely remember this moment, at best, he’d forget it entirely. 

“Then… what’s the problem?” Mike slurred, looking up at Will in confusion, “I wan’you’ta stay.”

“Because it’s different. Okay? It just is.”

Mike made a noise in the back of his throat, clearly not getting it. 

Will felt something in him knock loose—a restraint that had been previously holding him back, keeping him from burdening Mike with all of his unwanted feelings—but now Will needed him to know. He needed Mike to understand, just this once, what he truly felt. 

“I want you, Mike,” Will admitted, “And not just as a friend.”

It wasn’t played for a joke or delivered with a coy smile. For once, Will let himself be wholly and completely honest. He could hear the strain in his voice. He was sure his face was broken wide open, letting Mike see all of his longing without any shy, self-deprecating smile to hide the ache. It hurt—all this wanting—and for once, Will just wanted Mike to see it. 

This wasn’t a passing fade or a silly little hallway crush. He’d been in love with Mike for years. Mike was probably the love of his life, always would be, because even if Will did manage to fall in love again, he knew deep down there was no real getting over Mike. There was no escaping this thing that had burrowed in his chest, in his bones, probably tattooed across his soul. Will Byers loved Mike Wheeler. 

Will let out a shuddery breath as he stared into Mike’s eyes, his grip gentle, almost feather-like as he held Mike’s face, not knowing if he was allowed to do this. 

Will had spent years practicing restraint. Even now, he was careful not to give into the violence of his emotions—the urge to grip Mike like a lifeline, to hold too tightly, to claim—because Mike wasn’t his.  But he couldn’t hold himself back completely. So he touched Mike as gently as he dared and stared into his face with an obvious, self-destructive want. 

Will watched as Mike stared back at him, his brow furrowed slightly like he didn’t understand what he was seeing. Will’s hand twitched on Mike’s face, his thumb wanting to drag across Mike’s cheekbone, but that would be too much. It was already too much. 

Will wanted Mike. But Mike didn’t want him. Will had to stop. He had to accept the truth of the matter. He and Mike were friends, and that was all they’d ever be. 

 Will tore himself away from Mike before rushing out of the room and out of the house. His heart was still pounding a million miles an hour as he hit the open air. He took a deep breath, trying to steady himself, trying not to feel pathetic and awful and hurt for loving someone who could never love him back—someone so lovely and wonderful as his best friend in the whole world. It could be worse. He could be a soldier in Afghanistan. He could be bleeding out in a field somewhere sandy and dark. Instead, it just felt like he was bleeding out. He’d be okay. He’d be fine. He just had to get over Mike.

Yeah, right. 

When they got back from lunch at the Sinclairs’, Will hung back as Lucas and Dustin entered Mike’s room first. He assumed that Mike would probably be asleep, but just in case he wasn’t and he remembered Will’s temporary breakdown from early, Will wanted to put as much distance between them as he could.

Mike wasn’t in his room though. A quick locating shout from Lucas, brought them to the upstairs bathroom down the hall where they found Mike looking a lot more lucid than the last time they’d seen him. Unfortunately, he looked a lot sicker, sitting on the tiled floor, hunched over the toilet, a rather unfortunate smell wafting from the bowl, telling them what he’d been up to while they’d been away.

When they entered, Mike looked up, immediately locking eyes with Will. Will felt his pulse jump as Mike continued to stare at him with wide eyes. It was like he was looking at a ghost, which was ironic. Given how pale Mike himself looked right now, he might as well have been translucent. 

He looked like he was in bad shape. The skin under his eyes was red and puffy—Will knew Mike had a habit of crying every time he threw up—and his chest was heaving up and down so rapidly it looked like he’d just finished running a marathon. There was also something wild about his expression. He looked off-kiltered, like the sudden sickness had caught him by surprise, leaving him reeling.

“Man, you look like shit,” Dustin observed.

Mike’s eyes flicked to him for a moment. He let out a raspy ‘yeah’ that grated Will’s own throat with how sore it sounded. Then, his eyes were flitting back over to Will, as if they’d never left. He was staring at him strangely. Will didn’t know what to call it, but it unnerved him. If he didn’t know better, he would say Mike looked like he was having some sort of panic attack.

“Um, are you okay?” Will said awkwardly.

Lucas snorted. “I’m gonna go with no. Seriously, Man. Do you need us to get you some meds or something? Or, like, an ambulance?”

“Shut up,” Mike said before adding, “Maybe some more Tylenol.”

Once the meds had been administered and the three of them had seen Mike safely back to his bed, they bid him a farewell, knowing that now that Mike had taken a turn for the worse, they should probably give him the space to rest—or puke—in peace.

Will made sure to keep his head down, not sparing Mike a final look as they all filed out of the bedroom.

Over the next couple of days, Will heard very little from Mike. According to Jonathan, who’d been over to the Wheelers’ house to see Nancy, Mike was still recovering from whatever sickness that’d hit him. He didn’t have a fever and he’d stopped puking, but Jonathan said that he wasn’t eating and when he’d seen him in the hallway on the way to the bathroom once, it’d looked like Mike hadn’t been sleeping either. 

On Saturday, Will came home from work, kicking off his shoes and stumbling through the house, rubbing tiredly at his eye. He was just thinking about taking a nap, when he stopped short at the sight of Mike sitting on El’s bed through the crack in the door to her bedroom. 

He blinked, surprised given that Mike had been MIA for a full week. Then, his stomach turned as he realized. Of course Mike had gone to see El the second he’d gotten better. He’d probably missed her. She was his girlfriend after all. It still stung that he hadn’t thought to radio Will and tell him he was okay.

Will swallowed. For a second, he debated saying hi, but Mike and El looked like they were deep in conversation, and Will didn’t want to interrupt. So, he slunk away, crashing on his own bed and falling asleep. 

He woke up naturally a few hours later, the rays of sundown streaming in through his window. He’d just sat up when there was a knock on his door. His mom poked her head in to tell him that dinner was ready. 

Will told her he’d be there in a minute before changing out of his jeans into a pair of shorts. He couldn’t believe he’d actually fallen asleep like that. Jeans were so uncomfortable to sleep in. He had red lines on his waist from where the waistband of his pants had dug into his skin. He frowned, rubbing at the marks before pulling his shirt down and padding out of his room.

He yawned, covering his mouth as he entered the kitchen.

“Don’t tell me you’re still tired,” his mom said. She set the bowl of green beans she’d been carrying down on the counter before walking over to him. She raised a hand to brush the fringe out of his face. “Your hair’s so messy, honey. Did you sleep next to a blowdryer?” she laughed, making a face.

Will scrunched his nose, copying her expression as he lightly batted her hand away. “Very funny.”

“You know if work is too much for you, you can always cut back on your hours. I’m an assistant manager now. If it’s about spending money, you can always ask,” his mom said shyly. 

Will knew his mom had always felt guilty about not having much money. She was his mom. She wanted to provide for him, and she did in the ways that mattered, but Will had always known he’d have to pay his own way in life. It wasn’t something that had ever bothered him. It just felt like a fact of life.

“It’s alright, mom,” Will said, giving her a reassuring smile, “It’s really not that bad. It was my own fault. I stayed up way too late last night doing that movie marathon with Jonathan.”

“Oh, so that’s what that giggling was about,” his mom said, raising her eyebrows with a smirk.

Will grinned. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

He tried to reach for a green bean, but his mom picked up a rag from the counter, lightly swatting at his butt. “Wh—Please, mom!” Will whined as his mom boxed him out so that he couldn’t reach the food. “I’m so hungry!”

“Then, you can sit down and eat dinner with the rest of us like a respectable gentleman,” his mom said.

“Gentleman?” Will made a face.

“You know what I mean, Will,” his mom said, exasperated, “Now, go sit down next to Mike while I go see where Jonathan’s got to.”

Will blinked, only just now registering the two people sitting at the dining table just through the open doorway. El was staring off into space, a pensive frown on her face, but Mike was looking right at him, wearing a strangely unreadable expression.

Will cleared his throat, looking back at his mom just in time to see her disappear down the hall towards the bedrooms. Left with no other choice, Will turned back, walking into the dining room and slipping into the seat at the head of the table next to Mike. He cleared his throat again. There was an awkwardness to the silence for some reason. Will didn’t know why but he could sense it from the way Mike and El refused to look at each other.

Maybe they’d gotten into another fight.

Wanting to defuse the tension, Will shot Mike a friendly smile and said, “You look better.”

Mike choked, his eyes darting nervously over at El before he looked back at Will. “What?”

“I said you look better,” Will repeated, “Or, at least, you don’t look like you’re going to keel over at any moment. Did your mom finally make you drink the tea?”

Mrs. Wheeler had—what she claimed to be—a cure-all tea. She wouldn’t tell anyone what she put in it, but it smelled atrocious and tasted even worse. Will had had it once back when he’d had a bad fever when he was eight. He’d hated every second of it, but, unfortunately, it had worked like a charm. 

Mike had never had the tea himself. He staunchly refused to even so much as smell the cup. He claimed that he had an oversensitive nose, and the tea would only make him more sick, but that didn’t stop Mrs. Wheeler from trying to force it down his throat any time he felt the least bit poorly.

In accordance with expectation, Mike instantly recoiled in disgust. “God, no. I poured it down the sink when she wasn’t looking.”

Will laughed. “She’s going to find out eventually, Mike.”

“She can ground me for the rest of the summer for all I care,” Mike said flippantly, “I’m not drinking literal poison.”

Will rolled his eyes. “Okay, it’s not poison. If you’d just try it, you’d see—”

“I would rather die.”

“Oh my god, Mike, you’re so dramatic,” Will laughed.

Mike smirked, his eyes lighting up as he took in Will’s delighted expression, but a moment later, he looked away, his demeanor becoming subdued again.

Will felt like he’d suddenly been left in the lurch. He didn’t understand what had happened for Mike to suddenly clam up. Was it something Will had done? Should he not have teased Mike like that? But that didn’t make sense. Will always teased him, and Mike had clearly been okay with it not even two seconds ago. More than that, Mike had seemed to be reveling in making Will laugh. So, what had changed?

Will gaped awkwardly. He felt the absurd need to apologize, though for what he couldn’t say.

“Um, El, what did you do today?” Will said finally, desperate to fill the overwhelming silence, “Did you and Mike have fun?”

He immediately inwardly cringed. God, he hoped that didn’t come across as bitter. Sure, he was a little bitter that Mike had wanted to hang out with El instead of him, but he didn’t want them to know that. 

“Yeah,” El said blandly, “We… talked.”

Will didn’t have to be a genius like Dustin to put two and two together. Mike and El had obviously spent most of the day making out and were too embarrassed to say it outright, which Will was more than fine with. He didn’t need to hear about the love of his life kissing someone else. He’d already suffered enough misery and humiliation to last a lifetime, thank you very much.

“That’s nice,” Will managed to squeak out despite the fact that it felt like his throat was closing up. It was fine. Mike and El were allowed to be in love. They didn’t need to consult his feelings on the matter. Though Will did wonder if it was ever strange for Mike—to know how Will felt about him. He was the only one who’d figured it out. Even Lucas and Dustin didn’t know it was Mike that had been Will’s crush during his coming out speech. El definitely didn’t know. Will would probably die of embarrassment if she ever found out. Not to mention he’d feel extremely guilty for crushing on her boyfriend, though, in all fairness, he had liked Mike before he and El had ever met.

Will looked over at Mike, trying to gauge if Mike felt anything like remorse for Will’s difficult circumstances, but, for once, Mike didn’t seem to notice him at all, his eyes focused on the table in front of him like the wood grain was the most fascinating thing he’d ever seen.

Luckily, at that moment, his mom and Jonathan came into the dining room, filling the silence with their bickering. Will instantly relaxed as Jonathan took the seat on the other side of him.

“I understand your college applications are important to you, but so is eating,” Joyce was saying. She went to take her seat, but the second her butt touched the cushion, she shot up again. “Oh, the green beans! I forgot about the green beans!”

As she hurried into the kitchen to grab the green beans, Jonathan turned to look at Will, rolling his eyes with an amused smile.

“Welcome to the land of the living. How’re your applications going,” Will asked smugly.

Jonathan’s smile slipped off his face as he sent Will a glare. “You won’t be so cheeky when you’re the one crying over your personal essay.”

“I’m not going to cry because I’m not a total wimp like you are,” Will scoffed, “They’re college applications, Jonathan, not life or death.”

“That’s funny. Can I record you saying that for posterity’s sake when you’re totally eating your words a year from now?” 

“Boys. Come on. No more college talk, okay?” Joyce reprimanded as she set the green beans down on the table in front of them and sank into the chair next to Jonathan. “We’re having a nice family dinner.”

“Hop’s not even here,” Will pointed out, because as awkward as it was, he was technically a part of their little family unit now.

“Okay. So, it’s not all of us, but we’re still family.”

“Mike’s not.”

Will stilled at El’s words. So did everyone else around the table. She hadn’t said it meanly. She said it like she was just correcting a statement. But her words, despite the truth of them, felt false and needlessly cruel. Will looked at Mike out of the corner of his eye to see him looking down at the table still, his ears a bright red color, embarrassed at being called out so blatantly when he wasn’t even a part of the conversation.

Will felt the sudden need to defend him, but his mom beat him to it.

“Well,” she said, sounding a little off her guard, “I suppose not technically, but, Mike’s always been an honorary Byers in my book. He has been ever since Will brought him home from school.” At this, Joyce turned to Jonathan with a conspiratorial smile. “Do you remember that? Will was so excited. He dragged Mike all over the house, showing him every little thing. He even started giving him the history of our fireplace!”

Jonathan chuckled. “It was a very thorough house tour.”

“You know,” Joyce said thoughtfully, “I thought for a moment there that he might have a future career in real estate. But I guess he was just excited. I’ve never seen Will open up that quickly with anyone, but he was like a motormouth that day. Even after you left, Mike, he—”

“Okay, Mom, we get it,” Will said tightly. He was embarrassed, not just for himself, but for his past self too. 

Mike had been his first real friend. Before him, Will had always felt alone. Even though he knew Jonathan and his mom loved him, they had always seemed like they had their own lives, just staple pieces in Will’s life—important, most definitely, but steady enough that he’d been able to take them for granted when he was younger. Mike had always been different. Meeting Mike was like a flashing meteor, and suddenly, Will’s whole life had exploded—in a good way. Because after meeting Mike, Will made friends, he developed hobbies, created core memories, even fell in love. While a part of him knew that probably would have happened with or without Mike, Will couldn’t help but feel like here, in this reality, all of those things had happened because of Mike.

In truth, Will’s life hadn’t truly started until the day he met Mike, and here is mom was, discussing it over the dinner table like it was a funny joke rather than what it really was—a shameful, pathetic truth.

Because while Will’s life had started the day he met Mike, Mike’s hadn’t started until he met El.

Will cleared his throat as he pushed down the familiar hurt and tried to deflect with a joke. “You’re starting to sound like Great Aunt Linda, Mom, when she comes around and asks Jonathan and I if we remember playing in her pool when we were toddlers.”

“Are you trying to tell me I’m old?” Joyce said with narrowed eyes. Then, she asked. “You really don’t remember?”

Will smiled and shrugged—a lie by omission. He did remember. Of course he did. It’d be hard to forget one of the best days of his life, but admitting to that would be admitting to a lot more, so in this instance, he let his mom draw the wrong conclusions.

“I remember.”

The words shocked Will, mostly because of who they were coming from. Will looked over at Mike, his brow furrowed in confusion. Mike couldn’t be serious. He didn’t actually remember. He was just saying that to make his mom feel better.

“1943,” Mike said.

“What?” Will asked.

Mike’s eyes darted over to him before looking away, his gaze trained somewhere vaguely in between Jonathan and Joyce’s shoulders.

“The chimney. It was built in 1943. You said it was wide enough to fit two of you, so we tried to test the theory by climbing inside, but your mom stopped us before we could.”

“Oh my gosh, you did!” Joyce cried, as if just remembering that detail herself, “I remember, I turned away for two seconds to check on the food cooking on the stove, and suddenly, there the two of you were, trying to climb past the grate! I nearly had a heart attack.”

Mike gave her a fond smile that looked genuine but didn’t quite meet his eyes. Then, he looked back at Will. Will didn’t know how to read his expression. For the first time ever, it seemed that he and Mike were operating on different wave lengths.

Unsure of himself, Will shot Mike a nervous half-smile.

Mike just continued to stare at him, his eyes flitting all over Will’s face like he was drinking him in. Will didn’t know what to make of that either, so he just turned away.

Eventually, he was drawn into a conversation with Jonathan about their respective summer jobs and he was able to—at least partially—tune out the unnatural silence that still hung over the left side of the table.

After dinner, Will helped his mom with the dishes while Jonathan took out the trash. El took Mike back to her room, and Will didn’t see either of them for the next couple of hours.

Will tried to distract himself by suggesting to Jonathan that they watch another movie. They were sitting in the living room, halfway through Halloween, when Mike finally emerged from El’s room. He stopped short when he saw them before giving an awkward wave and telling them that he was going home now. Jonathan nodded and told him to get home safe, but Will couldn’t answer back, frozen with indecision.

It wasn’t until Mike had put his shoes on and walked out the front door, that Will finally moved.

“Where are you going,” Jonathan asked.

“Just—uh, I’ll be back. Just a minute,” Will stuttered as he walked over to the front door, “You can keep watching.”

He opened the door and stepped out into the evening air, the door shutting with a soft click behind him. He saw Mike walking away towards where his bike was lying out on the front lawn.

“Mike!” Will chased after him, a little out of breath when he reached him though he hadn’t even run that far. He was pretty sure that was Mike’s fault. He felt unreasonably nervous for some reason, even though it was just Mike, his best friend. It shouldn’t have been weird or nerve-racking to talk to him, but it kind of was. 

Mike turned, looking at him with wide eyes, as if this was the last thing he’d expected. 

“Will? What’s wrong? Are you okay?”

“I, um, just came to ask you the same thing actually,” Will said with a smile. 

Mike blinked. “What?”

“I haven’t seen you in a week, Mike. I thought you were still slowly wasting in your bed. Forgive me for being a little curious and wanting to make sure you’re alright.”

“Oh,” Mike said, “Sorry. I’m fine now.”

“Are you?” Will frowned. Mike still looked a little paler than normal. His posture was incredibly slumped too. Not his usual bad posture, but something else, something like a bone-deep exhausted resting on his shoulders. 

Will took a step closer, tilting his head as he met Mike’s gaze. 

“Have you been sleeping?”

Mike shifted, his eyes darting away then back to Will again. “Yeah.”

It was such an obvious lie that Will couldn’t help but laugh. “Mike,” he said in fond exasperation, “Come on. You can tell me. What’s wrong?”

For a moment, Mike didn’t say anything. 

“Is it… about El? Did the two of you have another fight?” Will asked tentatively. When Mike didn’t immediately negate the statement, Will took another step forward until they were almost toe-to-toe. He ducked his head, catching Mike’s avoidant gaze. “Hey, it’s okay. I’m sure you guys will work it out. You always do.”

At that, Mike’s head snapped up. He stared at Will with unmasked incredulity. “What are you doing?”

“What do you mean?”

“Why are you defending us? Why do you always do that? Don’t you… want us to break up?”

“What?” Will exclaimed, “Why would I want that?”

“Because…” Mike said pointedly. When Wil still didn’t seem to get it, he added, “Doesn’t it hurt to see me with her? Wouldn’t it be easier on you if we broke up?”

Will’s breath caught. He pinched his lips, letting Mike’s words sink in before he spoke. “You don’t have to worry about that, Mike, okay? I’m fine. And you don’t have to stop confiding in me just because you know how I feel now. I want to help. I like helping you.”

Mike shook his head. “No, that’s not what I asked. I asked what you want. Do you want me and El to break up?”

It was a trick question obviously—one with no right answer. 

“No,” Will said slowly, “I don’t.”

Mike frowned, confused. “Why not?”

“Because I like El. She deserves the best and, well,” Will gave him a wry smile, “That’s kinda you. And you deserve to be loved. I would never try to take that away from you.”

“But what if I wasn’t with El?” Mike said with a strange desperation, “What would you do?”

Will gaped at him. What kind of question was that? Was Mike having some kind of crisis? Had he met someone else—some girl that’d caught his eye?

Will frowned heavily. “Mike, I doubt you’re going to find better than El. She’s… she’s amazing. You don’t want to throw that away for another random girl. No one will be able to understand you like El does, to understand what you’ve gone through. Don’t take that for granted.”

“I’m not—god, I’m not interested in some other girl,” Mike said frustratedly, “You’re not listening to me.”

“Well, you’re not making any sense,” Will fired back, equally as frustrated. 

“You don’t make any sense!” Mike said before running a hand anxiously through his hair. “Like, seriously, Will. You’re so… so confusing it drives me crazy sometimes.”

Will crossed his arms over his chest. “Well, that sounds like your problem.”

Mike looked at him for a long moment, eyes wide. Then, inexplicably, he barked out a laugh. 

Will’s arms dropped. “What?”

Mike shook his head, still grinning.

“What?” Will whined. 

“Stop being funny while I’m trying to be mad at you.”

“I’m not trying to be funny.”

“Well, you are.”

“Well, you can’t smile at me like that while I’m trying to be mad at you,” Will shot back, “Do you know how distracting it is?”

“Distracting?” Mike echoed. 

“Irritating,” Will corrected, but it was already too late. Mike knew what he meant. He knew Will found his smile distracting. “Look, Mike, you don’t have to tell me what’s going on. I just—I hope you know you can talk to me. I would never want you to feel like you had to hide or—or protect yourself from me.”

“And I don’t want you to feel like you have to protect me from you.”

Will’s eyes shot up to look at Mike. “What?”

“I mean, that’s what you were doing before, right? That’s why you didn’t tell me about how you felt,” Mike said. He looked pensive for a moment before adding, “I guess you’re kind of still doing it. That’s what all your rules are about. You say it’s because you’re trying to get over me, but I don’t think that’s really the truth. I think you’re trying to build this wall or something—between us.” Mike frowned as if just realizing how true his words sounded. “That’s it, isn’t it? You’re holding back. You’re keeping me at arm’s distance on purpose. How did I not see it until now? Have you been doing that this whole time?”

“I’m not keeping my distance,” Will frowned, “We spend almost every day together.”

“But you are holding back.”

Will rolled his eyes. “I’m not holding back anything you’d want.”

Mike stared at him. He didn’t move, or perhaps he moved in many small ways—a spasm in his eyebrow, a parting of the mouth, a shifting of weight, a flex of his hand against his leg—but even then, even when he didn’t say a word, Will got the impression that something had shifted between them. It was there in Mike’s eyes—a glimmer that hadn’t been there before. 

Will left out a soft sigh. “I should let you go. Your mom will be worried if you don’t get home soon.”

“Right.” Mike looked down at his shoes. “Right, yeah.”

“But, um,” Will hesitated, feeling suddenly shy for some reason, “If you’re not doing anything tomorrow, we could hang out? We could go to the arcade with Dustin and Lucas like we said we would last week before you got sick. If you want.”

Mike brightened. “Yeah. That sounds like fun.”

“Yeah?”

Mike nodded, smiling. “Yeah, totally. I’ll radio the guys when I get home.”

“Cool.” Will smiled, “So… talk to you later?”

“Yeah.”

Mike grabbed his bike, sending Will a little wave over his shoulder as he rode away. 

Will slipped back into the house, passing Jonathan in the living room as he went to his bedroom to grab his walkie talkie and turn it on. Technically, there was no reason for him to be on call with them. Mike would relay their plan to Dustin and Lucas and they’d either say they were available or they wouldn’t. But if they did say yes, Will wanted to be there when they planned out the details. And, maybe, there was a small part of him that just liked hearing Mike’s voice through the radio. 

As soon as they entered the arcade, Will and Lucas exchanged a look before the two of them took off sprinting towards the open air hockey table. 

Mike and Dustin moved at a much slower place, looking amused as Will and Lucas took their places opposite each other. 

Now, Will wouldn’t say he’s the most competitive person ever, but he didn’t like to lose either, especially when it meant that Lucas got to brag about being the ‘air hockey master’ for the last three weeks. It was annoying, and Will was eager to put him in his place. 

“Ready to lose to the hockey master,” Lucas taunted. 

“Are you going to talk smack or are you going to play,” Will asked as Mike moved to slot the puck into the opening in the middle for them. 

“Who says I can’t do both?”

The disk slipped onto the table, and Will jerked forward, knocking it into Lucas’s goal before he even realized the game had started. Will shot Lucas a smug smile. “You can certainly try.”

“Mike!” Lucas complained, “You can’t help him! That’s cheating!”

“He wasn’t helping me. It’s not his fault you were too busy bragging to pay attention,” Will said, though he wouldn’t have put it past Mike to have noticed Lucas’s inattention and done it on purpose. Just to mess with Lucas, Will looked over at Mike and winked as if thanking him for the assist. 

“See! What was that?” Lucas exclaimed, gesturing angrily between the two of them, “Dustin, please tell me you saw that.”

“Listen, Lucas, if you’re too scared to play me—”

“No,” Lucas said immediately, pulling the puck out of his goal, “Shut up. I’m ready this time.”

He slid the puck into the slot, and they were off again. The time there was a rally, back and forth, the disk flying between their strikers until finally, Lucas managed a lucky shot against Will. 

Lucas cheered. 

Will glared at him. Then, he startled when he felt Mike come up beside him, hovering near his shoulder. 

“Come on, Will. You can do better than that.”

Will turned his glare on Mike, trying not to notice the way they were standing only a foot apart, the heat of Mike’s chest just behind his shoulder tangible and distracting. 

“Is that supposed to be encouraging?” Will questioned. 

“Yeah. Is it working?”

Will smiled, bemused. “Not really.”

“Well, then what do you suggest I do—to make you feel encouraged?” Mike asked. He was smiling as well, just a small thing at the corner of his mouth, like he was trying not to but couldn’t resist. He was, again, really close. For a dizzying moment, Will almost shifted his weight, almost leaned, almost thought a thought he should never think. 

Will blinked several times, reorienting himself, returning to reality where he was playing air hockey in a public arcade and his best friend had asked him a question. 

Will grinned. He leaned in towards Mike’s ear as his eyes flicked over to Lucas and he whispered, “You could pull his pants down.”

Mike chuckled. “Now that would definitely be cheating.”

Will pulled back and pouted at him. “So, does that mean you won’t?”

Mike laughed. They were still close, and he sounded a little breathless, wearing a smile wider than the joke probably called for. He’d always found Will ridiculously funny, which Will appreciated. He thought Mike was funny too. It was usually just that no one else agreed with them. 

“Hey!” Lucas called out, “Stop strategizing with your lackey and put the puck in!”

Will and Mike pulled their heads apart. Will sent Lucas another glare, but Mike looked unbothered by the accusation, even going so far as to pat Will on the shoulder before moving just two steps out of reach, leaning casually on the side of the table.

“Unbelievable,” Lucas muttered. 

“Dude,” Dustin snorted, “You’re fighting a losing battle if you think Mike is gonna side with you over Will.”

“We’re not supposed to have favorites in the party,” Lucas told Mike. 

Mike just smirked at him, giving a little shrug as if to say ‘I can’t help that I like Will so much better all of you’, or at least that’s how Will was choosing to interpret it. 

After the hockey match, where Will had won by exactly one point, the four of them went on to the next game. Then, the next. Dustin and Mike liked strategy games, the kind you had to play over and over again until you finally figured out the right way to pass a level. Despite being a rather abysmal athlete, Mike had pretty quick fingers so he was both good at and enjoyed the games that required copious amounts of button mashing too. They had to physically drag Lucas away from the basketball shooting game at one point, pausing their endless running around from game to game to grab two large baskets of fries at the concessions’ stand. 

After they’d acquired their food, they all slumped down at an open table in the corner of the eatery. Lucas and Dustin sat on one side of the table, sharing a basket of fries while Mike and Will sat on the other side with theirs. It was a rule they’d come up with a while ago that Mike and Will always had to get a separate basket from the others because they both had a habit of squirting squiggly lines of ketchup all over their fries—Will like it was some sort of artistic masterpiece, and Mike like the fries were a gang of aliens that had destroyed his home planet and he was finally exacting his revenge. 

“Gah, Mike!” Will whined when Mike got a little too overzealous with the squirt bottle and ketchup flew up, nearly hitting him in the eye. 

“Sorry,” Mike giggled, picking up a napkin and shoving it in Will’s face. 

Will spluttered, batting at the napkin and Mike’s hand. “What are you doing?”

“I’m helping!”

“No, you’re not!”

“Yes, I am! I was giving you a napkin!”

“You mean, trying to force-feed me a napkin,” Will said, wanting to keep up his annoyed facade, but the second he made eye-contact with Mike he couldn’t help but break out into a wide grin. 

Mike smiled back before, suddenly, he jolted, his mouth dropping open in delight as he turned to look across the table. “You know who used to eat napkins.”

“Wheeler, I swear to god,” Lucas groused. 

“Do you remember that?” Mike asked Will, laughing, “In first grade, he used to—”

“Okay, enough!” Lucas whined. 

“Wait, dude, seriously?” Dustin said, turning to Lucas, “You used to eat paper?”

“No!” Lucas said at the same time Mike and Will both said, “Yes.”

“What are we even talking about?” Lucas shouted, “You two literally have the worst taste in food!”

“No, we don’t,” Mike said. 

“We have the best taste,” Will said. 

“And only correct opinions.”

“Exactly.”

“I’m so sick of you guys,” Lucas muttered, digging into his fries and biting off a piece angrily. 

After the arcade, none of them were ready for the fun to be over so without really discussing it, they ended up in Mike’s basement, watching movies until, one-by-one, they started to drop off into sleep. Dustin was first, followed by Lucas, then Mike. Will wasn’t too far off either, his eyes drooping and falling closed for extended periods of time only to flutter back open, his gaze latching onto Mike’s sleeping form on the other side of the couch. 

It was one of the rare moments that Will allowed himself to truly look at him, to stare at Mike with all the usually repressed longing that he felt in his chest everyday. Will could feel, when he next opened his eyes, how his gaze softened, how his eyes became wide and his pupils dilated, trying to drink in as much as Mike as he could. 

He was sleeping a bit like a plank, his legs extended and tangling with Will’s while his arms laid out at his sides, his head smushed in the crook between the arm rest and the back of the couch. His hair was longer now, not quite as long as it had been back when Will had first seen him again in California, but enough so that his curls became wild and untamed, curving around his face and the nape of his neck. His bangs were longer now too, dipping into his eyes, one strand even touched the bridge of his nose, and Will had to fight the urge to close the distance between them and push it back away from his face. 

There was something so comforting about looking at Mike. Sometimes he was so distracted by his attraction to Mike, Will forgot just how much he adored who Mike was at his core. Moments like this though, he couldn’t help but be bowled over by the overwhelming feeling of fondness that rose up in him. 

The human being sleeping across from him on the couch, with his slightly parted lips and his chest rising and falling in short, unconscious breaths was the same human that had been by Will’s side since he was five years old, the same human that Will had the infinite fortune to call his best friend. 

It amazed him sometimes that Mike was a real person and not just some wild fantasy his own mind had conjured up. Because if he had to come up with his ideal person, it would be Mike, every part of him, all of his little quirks, every freckle on his pointed nose, every eyelash that touched his sharp cheekbones. 

Speaking of which, Will watched as those same eyelashes fluttered open, Mike’s face scrunching for a moment before his gaze inevitably landed on Will. Usually, this would be the part where Will shrunk away and pretended like he hadn’t been staring, but he felt too lazy to do so now, when the basement was warm and his head was stuck in a fuzzy haze. 

Mike moved his foot to hit softly against Will’s thigh. “You’re staring,” he murmured with a slight smile. 

Will hummed, nodding his head. 

“Why?”

Will’s lips twitched. “You know why.”

Mike smiled like he was pleased with this response, turning his head and snuggling deeper into the couch. His socked-foot was still pressed up against Will’s thigh, and Will was slowly losing his mind about it. 

“You’re not going to ask me to stop?” The question slipped out of Will’s mouth without him thinking about it. Realistically, he knew he shouldn’t push his luck. Mike was being generous by not making a big deal about his obvious crush. Most friends would react worse, would be uncomfortable and push him away. But Mike hadn’t done that. If anything, lately, Mike had been the one pushing to be closer, encouraging all of Will’s worst urges to ask for more and more. 

“Mmh?” Mike said, not bothering to open his eyes, “No, I don’t mind.”

“You don’t mind?”

“I like it.” Mike’s smile grew. “It’s like you’re my guardian angel.”

Will continued to stare at Mike for a long while after that. Eventually, Mike’s breaths evened out again, soft and gentle, like there was no place he felt safer than here in this basement, under Will’s possessive gaze. 

Just then, Will realized there was something terribly wrong with his plan to get over Mike, because while he could ask Mike to stop crossing the line between friends and more, Will couldn’t help himself from crossing the line every once in a while, sometimes accidentally, sometimes with terrifying, agonizing awareness, and Mike would never do anything to stop him. He would always let Will into his space, always make room for him in his life, his heart, his home, and Will would only continue to fall harder for him. 

After this revelation, Will’s new plan to get over Mike was implemented the very next day. Despite it being a Sunday and him and Mike having unofficial standing plans to hang out every Sunday, Will made sure to fill out his entire day with long overdue chores and quality time with his mom. 

Mike called midday to ask if he could come over, and Will had told him that he couldn’t, making sure to keep his voice light and the phone call short, lest Mike’s voice make him cave and give the plan up altogether. 

Will could do this. He just had to be strong. 

One month. He’d set the goal of one month of not giving himself a single inch. He wouldn’t ignore Mike of course, but he wouldn’t let himself hang out with Mike one-on-one, wouldn’t touch him, and definitely wouldn’t look into his deep, brown eyes which always had the unfortunate effect of drawing him in. If he could do this, if he could stop himself from crossing the line for one whole month, Will was convinced he could get over Mike, or his feelings would at least subside into something that didn’t feel quite so all-encompassing. 

On day three, Will was sure Mike had started to notice something was different. They were in the high school cafeteria, and when Will went to sit next to Dustin for the second day in a row, Mike had shot Will a look like he’d just killed a puppy in front of him. Will ducked his head, taking a bite out of his Sloppy Joe like this was all normal and the four feet of space between him and Mike didn’t bother him. 

Day five, Will told the party he had a headache and couldn’t go to the movies with them because he knew that he and Mike usually shared a box of popcorn and reece’s pieces and he knew that if their hands brushed in that darkened theater and Mike looked over at him with that sheepish smile he usually gave him when it happened, all of Will’s hard-earned progress would be lost. 

By the next Monday, it’d been five days since Will had last looked Mike in the eyes. The next Wednesday, Will dodged a pat on the back from Mike and while he didn’t look over at him, he saw in his periphery how Mike’s hand clenched and his whole body tensed. 

After that, things got a lot harder. By the second week, both Will and Mike seemed to be in a perpetually bad mood. For his part, Will shut down. He got quieter. He talked less and less until whole conversations seemed to pass him by as he stared off into the distance during group hangouts, trying to ignore the ache in his chest that told him he missed Mike, despite the knowledge that Mike was sitting right there, less than ten feet away. 

Mike went in the opposite direction. He seemed to become more and more energetic by the day, shifting constantly, picking fights with Lucas and Dustin and especially Max. 

During one particularly explosive fight between the two of them, Max had whirled suddenly on Will and spat, “Are you gonna say something?”

Will, who hadn’t been paying attention, looked at her, wide-eyed. “What?”

It wasn’t that he wasn’t miserable because he was. He absolutely was. But Will was convinced that if he could just get through this month, things would become easier, he would stop needing Mike so much, which was important because it really couldn’t be healthy to rely on one person so much for your happiness. At least, that’s what Will told himself. 

He was still miserable. 

On day fourteen of keeping his distance from Mike, Mr. Clarke asked Will to help him clean up the hallway bulletin board after school. Will, who felt unbelievably exhausted lately, didn’t really feel like it, but Mr. Clarke’s eyes had turned desperate and frazzled when Will hadn’t immediately responded, and Will had given in. 

So after the last bell had rung, instead of heading out to his bike out front, he headed to Mr. Clarke’s class to get the de-stapler from him. Then, he went out to the bulletin board littered with flyers and got to work.

Ten minutes in, Will nicked his finger with a staple. He swore, dropping the offending flyer and sucking up the dab of blood that’d appeared on his pointer finger. 

Absurdly, Will felt the urge to cry. It wasn’t about the staple, not really. It was everything else. It was the awful, swirly pit of irritation in his gut, his annoyance with the world, with the way his eyes suddenly felt hot, with the fact that it’d been over two weeks now and all Will wanted was—

“Hey.”

Will looked up, and, suddenly, the breath was knocked out of him because there was Mike, as if Will had somehow thought him into existence. 

He was so caught off-guard by Mike’s unexpected appearance that he forgot to avoid his eyes and instead made direct eye-contact, staring up at Mike with a pitiful amount of longing and sorrow. 

Mike’s face immediately fell and before Will knew it, Mike was crouched next to him, his large, warm hands grasping onto both of Will’s shoulders, squeezing gently. 

“Hey. Hey, Will. Are you okay?”

“Y-Yeah. ‘M fine.” He didn’t sound convincing at all but Will was determined not to show weakness. He looked away from Mike, hiding his injured hand behind his back as he stood. “I’m just gonna—”

“Will, stop.” Mike’s hands were on him again, and Will’s already shaky resolve was cracking in two. 

“Mike, I have to—” Mike wasn’t even the one to stop him this time. Will’s voice just gave out. He looked over at the bulletin board, not really seeing it as he blinked back tears. He took a shaky breath. 

This was stupid. He was stupid. 

“What are you trying to do?” Mike said, his voice suddenly different. It was no longer the soft, vulnerable cadence of before, which Will usually adored but at this moment found to be too grating on his already fraying nerves. Instead, it was serious and to the point, not unlike a soldier awaiting orders—or a paladin waiting on his cleric.

“I don’t need your help, Mike,” Will hissed before he could stop himself. It was a lie. He needed Mike. He wanted him. He just wished that he could stop.

“Alright, fine. You don’t need me,” Mike said bitterly, “But do you want my help?”

“No.”

“No?” Mike didn’t sound like he believed him.

“I… I don’t know. I’m just—I’m trying to de-clutter this stupid bulletin board,” Will said, gesturing to the board in question with a frustrated wave of his hand.

“Did Mr. Clarke ask you to?”

“Yeah. I was just… trying to be helpful. I didn’t actually want to do it. And now it’s just pissing me off, so…” Will shook his head. He was fine. This was fine. 

“You could always tell him you changed your mind.” Off Will’s deadpan look, Mike added, “Or I could tell him something came up and you have to go. I can even stay behind and finish it for you.”

“No. It’s not about the board, Mike.”

“I know it isn’t. But the sooner you get this done, the sooner we can talk.”

Will startled. “What?”

Mike raised his eyebrows. “You’ve been ignoring me for weeks, Will.”

Will shifted uncomfortably. “I was giving you space. I still don’t understand how you can be so comfortable about me liking you. I mean, we can still be friends of course, but I don’t know if we can be… best friends.”

Mike said nothing for a moment. There was a deep frown etched onto his face, but his mouth didn’t open. If anything, it seemed to be pinched shut.

Finally, Mike unclenched his jaw, swiveling around to face the bulletin board as he said, “I can use the de-stapler if you want to start taking out all of the flyers stuck with thumb tacks. There’s about an even amount of both, so the work would be split fairly.”

Will held back his first response which was to point out how splitting the work at all was unfair considering that Mike hadn’t been the one to volunteer his help. Then again, this right now was sort of his way of volunteering help, and Will knew a tense conversation was waiting for him when this was over either way, so he might as well get it over quickly.

He handed Mike the de-stapler before setting to work on his half of the board, pulling off flyers and putting them in a haphazard stack on the floor. The two of them worked silently and efficiently until, finally, the board was clear again.

Will picked up the stack of papers before walking over and dumping them in the trash. Then, he poked his head into Mr. Clarke’s classroom to tell him he was done.

Mr. Clarke thanked him and the two traded goodbyes before Will walked back out into the hall to find Mike leaning against the wall next to the now-empty bulletin board, waiting for him. 

The second their eyes met, Will’s breath caught. That was the second time today Will had accidentally caught his gaze. After weeks of doing so well, Will was slipping. 

He struggled to move his feet, falling into step with Mike as they made their way out of the school. 

When they reached their bikes, Mike gave Will a weak smirk and said, “Mine or yours?”

It sounded like a bad pickup line, and from the expression on his face, Mike knew it. 

Will let out a puff of air. A laugh. A sigh. It was hard to say. “Yours.”

If they were really doing this, Will wanted the option to run. Of course, that assumed that Mike wouldn’t chase after him just to finish the conversation, which he very well might. Mike was stubborn like that. God help Will, he kind of preferred it that way even if it did end up screwing him over from time to time. Because Mike was persistent, and Will had a hard time saying no to him. 

Which was how they ended up in the Wheelers’ basement. Mike immediately sat down on the couch as if expecting to get right to business, but Will was too keyed up to sit down just yet. He walked around the room idly, letting his hand drag over the table then the shelf where their DnD books sat along with several photo albums that Will knew contained far more pictures of him than was probably appropriate for someone who wasn’t technically a member of the Wheeler family. His finger had just skimmed over another binder—thick and nearly falling apart at the seams with how many things were stuffed inside it and had what looked to be a drawing by Will at age seven sticking out of it—when Mike’s voice finally broke the silence. 

“Will.”

It was all he needed to say. Will’s head immediately snapped to look over at him before deflating. He let out a heavy sigh, lingering for a moment by the bookcase before walking over and sitting next to Mike on the couch. There was at least a foot of space between their thighs. Will wondered if Mike noticed, if he cared at all. 

“You’ve been avoiding me,” Mike said bluntly. 

Will fiddled with his hands in his lap, refusing to look over at him. “Well… yeah.”

“Why?” Mike said, and he definitely sounded offended. Will could understand that. He’d feel the same in Mike’s shoes. In fact, he had been in Mike’s shoes before and Will had felt awful every time it felt like he was slipping out of Mike’s focus. 

“I’m sorry,” Will said, “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to make you feel bad. It’s not that I don’t want to hang out with you…”

He spared a look over at Mike who was watching him in bemusement. 

“Right. I kind of figured that wasn’t the reason.”

“Yeah.”

“But you’re still avoiding me.”

Will said nothing. What could he say? Mike already knew the truth. He knew that Will liked him more than he should. He knew Will was trying to stop. He probably knew by now that Will couldn’t. So why did he want to sit here and talk about it?

“Earlier, at the school,” Mike said slowly, “You said you don’t want to be best friends anymore.”

Will winced. 

“Did you mean it?”

“I… I don’t know,” Will said quietly, “Maybe?”

“Because of your crush on me,” Mike said. It wasn’t said like a question, but Will knew it was one. Mike was trying to do what he always did—he was trying to make things better for Will. He was trying to understand. But that was the thing. 

If Will were asked to explain his feelings for Mike, he didn’t think he’d be able to. Sure, he could list things that Mike did that he found endearing, he could name every beauty, cite every funny quip, but it still wouldn’t be enough. Because no one could truly understand what it was like to love Mike Wheeler, not like Will who had known and loved him for practically their entire lives. Even if Mike never felt the same, Will had always been comforted by the knowledge that his Mike—the one that made him feel seen and safe and loved, the one Will knew inside and out, who he had shared a million private moments and charged looks and inside jokes with—well, that was all his. His love for Mike was like a possession, a box of cherished memories no one could ever take away from him.

A feeling like that wasn’t just a silly school crush. 

“It’s not a crush,” Will said. 

“Oh.”

It was a small word, but there was a lot conveyed in that ‘oh’.

“Alright,” Mike said, “Alright, fine.”

It sounded like he’d made a decision about something. There was a strange heat to his voice. He sounded determined, maybe even a little angry. 

“But if we’re really going to do this, I have some ground rules too,” Mike said sharply. 

Will shrank in on himself, refusing to look over at Mike as he nodded meekly. “Sure. Whatever you—”

“You can’t mention how much you like me anymore,” Mike said, and Will felt his heart drop. 

It was the exact reaction he’d always feared from Mike. He’d made Mike uncomfortable with his feelings. Mike was asking—no, ordering—him to pack himself away again, to shove it all down and keep his mouth shut. And Will would. Of course, he would. He’d do anything for Mike. But oh god did it hurt. 

“You can’t point out all the things about me that you find endearing. And you can’t call me handsome or pretty or—or any of that stuff. And you can’t choose me to be on your team first for games.”

Will had to admit the last request was a little bizarre, not really in line with the rest of them, but he was too heartbroken to comprehend anything except how this was probably the worst moment of his life.

But obviously the universe couldn’t give Will a break even then. Because Mike wasn’t done. 

“You’ve also got to find a new way to tie your shoes.”

“My—What?” Will said, forgetting he was supposed to be avoiding Mike as he turned and shot him an incredulous look. “How I tie my shoes?”

“Yeah. With the bunny loops,” Mike says with a casual shrug, “I think it’s cute, which is, you know, not very platonic of me, so you need to stop that.”

Will stared at Mike, bug-eyed. “Mike,” he said slowly, “I don’t think you really understand… This is about me. I’m the one who can’t keep things platonic.”

“Right. And I’m saying you can’t tie your shoes with bunny loops anymore. Can’t I have some boundaries too?”

“Um…” Will didn’t know what to say. “Sure. I mean, I guess, but I think you’re missing the—”

“Also, no more letting our hands brush in the theater when we both reach for the popcorn.”

Will’s breath hitched. So Mike had noticed that too. “I’m sorry,” Will said, a little mortified, “I don’t mean to. It just sort of happens.”

“Right. Well, you’ve just gotta be more careful going forward. Oh!” Mike said, as if suddenly remembering something, “You also can’t do that thing where you gently scratch my back when we hug.”

“What? I don’t do that!”

“You kind of do,” Mike said.

Will felt his face go red hot. He hadn’t even realized. “Oh. Um. Sorry?”

“It’s okay,” Mike said breezily, “Oh, you also can’t do that thing where you scrunch your nose when you smile. Every time you do it’s like the image gets seared into my brain and then I can’t think about anything else for the rest of the day.”

“Mike…” Will said breathlessly, “What do you…”

“And you can stand to be a little meaner. You’re just, like, so nice. Too nice almost. Especially to me. And no more coming over to my house to make eggs while I try to fight the coffee maker.”

“Mike, I’ve—I haven’t made eggs for you since we lived together. And that was months ago. I’ve never, like, come over to your house just to make breakfast with you.”

“Yeah, well, I’m just trying to cover all the bases, you know. Like if you wanted to or thought about doing something like that, don’t. Because it’s kind of domestic, right? At least, whenever I think about it, it is. It makes me think about what it’d be like if we were to live together when we get older. You know, like outside of our parents’ houses. In our own place.”

“Our own… Mike, have you actually thought about us living together in the future?” Will asked. He felt unraveled. He genuinely felt like he was coming apart at the seams and he didn’t even know what was happening. Why was Mike saying all this stuff? Why was he acting like he was the one with the problem of wanting too much?

“Y-Yeah,” Mike said, most of his earlier bravado slipping away as he leveled Will with a shy look. “I guess I have. I mean, I know I have. A lot actually. It sounds… nice.”

“It sounds nice?” Will echoed.

“Yeah.

“Living with me?”

“Yeah. I mean, it worked out well the first time, right? And—I don’t know. I guess I just miss having you around all the time. Like, I know I see you at school and we basically hang out all the time. But I liked when we were under the same roof, where I could just show up in your room and ask you to hang out. Or I got to see you in the morning when you first woke up and you’d be all sleepy and your hair would be a mess and you’d make eggs because you’re the best at making eggs. God, Will, I really miss your eggs. I miss you.”

“You miss me?”

Mike huffed. “Are you just going to repeat everything I say?”

“Well—wh—I’m sorry! This is a lot to process, Mike!” Will defended, “I’m not—I’m not even sure I know what you’re trying to tell me right now!”

“I’m trying to tell you that I’ve thought about it—about us!”

Will froze. He actually stopped breathing. His entire body felt like it’d just been dealt a large electric shock. 

What?

“What do you mean you’ve thought about us?” Will said, his voice low and unsteady.

“I mean,” Mike groaned, looking away, embarrassed, “I mean I’ve thought about it, Will. All of it. The stuff we do now and, um, the dating stuff too. You know, like holding hands and kissing and—well, you’ve never really mentioned whether or not you want kids. So, I guess I wondered about that too. If you’d want kids and—”

“Are you insane?” Will said, bolting up from the couch, “Mike, why are you thinking about whether or not I want kids?”

“It’s not weird!” Mike pouted. It was definitely, one hundred percent weird. “That’s like a normal adult question! And if we were going to be living together, in this hypothetical scenario, I was just curious whether or not we’d be living with a kid too. Because I was sort of thinking we could get a dog. But certain dog breeds don’t really work well with children so—”

“No, stop.” Will held up a hand, silencing him. “You can’t—You can’t just plan our entire future together without even consulting me, Mike! Did you ever stop to think that if I did have kids, it’d be with, you know, my partner? And in that case I probably wouldn’t be living with you!”

Mike frowned. “But why would you have a partner if you like me?”

“Because!” Will said, a bit hysterically, “I’m trying to not like you anymore, Mike! That’s the entire point about all of this! I’m trying to get over you!”

“But what if I don’t want you to get over me?”

“Mike. Jesus, Mike. You have a girlfriend. You’re literally dating El. Why do you care—”

“No, I’m not.”

Will stopped short. “What?”

“I’m not dating El. We broke up.”

“Wh—” Will swallowed, staring down at Mike with wide eyes. “When did you break up?”

“Um, the last time I was over at your house?”

“But—what? Mike, that was weeks ago.”

“I know.”

“Why didn’t you tell me?”

“I did. At least, I tried to. But you said you didn’t care.”

“I definitely never said that.”

“I asked you what you’d do if El and I broke up!”

“That’s not the same thing!” Will cried, “So—So what? El dumps you and suddenly you want to be with me? Why? Because you know I’m a safe bet?”

“Safe bet?” Mike said incredulously. Now it was his turn to leap off of the couch, crowding into Will’s space with an angry expression. “Will, there’s nothing safe about you! You’re honestly so confusing some days I’m not even sure you really like me!”

“Shut up,” Will scoffed.

“I”m serious! When you first admitted you liked me, you compared me to some jerk Robin liked back in freshman year of high school. You basically told everyone that you barely liked me and were already over it,” Mike said, “And you’ve always been super supportive of me and El’s relationship and—and months go by! Months! And you don’t say anything. So of course I assumed you’d just moved on. But then—geez, Will, you just totally ambushed me in the kitchen that night. You told me that you still liked me, like I was supposed to know that! Like it was obvious or something!”

“It was obvious,” Will said.

“Well, not to me!” Mike exclaimed, “And then… then you kept bringing it up. You kept mentioning things that you liked about me, and I guess it was the first time I really believed it. Because before it just felt like a joke. Or I thought maybe you just liked how I looked but you didn’t actually like me. But then you were saying all of these things and I realized… you actually like me.”

Will stared at Mike, unable to fathom that he had actually thought that way, actually believed Will’s feelings had run so shallow when, in reality, they were so much more than that.

“Not only that,” Mike said quietly, meeting Will’s gaze head-on. “You told me you wanted me. Do you remember that? When I was sick, you held my face, and you said it. And I feel like it changed… everything.”

Will tried to take a step back, feeling too overwhelmed, but Mike reached out, snagging his wrist, gentle but firm, keeping him place, keeping him close.

“I thought about nothing but you for days,” Mike admitted, “I couldn’t eat. I couldn’t sleep. I had to re-think my entire life because I didn’t even know having you was a possibility. Because, like, I’d thought about it—of course I had—but I didn’t actually stop to consider that it could be real. That we could actually… happen. Then, when I figured that out, I knew I had to break up with El. And then I did. And I was going to tell you. I wanted to talk to you about all of it, but then you started ignoring me and pulling away. And you… you’ve always made it sound like wanting me was such a hardship. So… now I guess I’m not so sure.”

When Mike finished his speech, it ended on a flat note. His voice wavered, sounding raw and hurt. It was the first time Will realized how much power he held over Mike, that he could hurt Mike the same way Mike had accidentally hurt him in the past. It was horrifying and a bit thrilling.

Mike cared.

Mike wanted him.

“I know I probably sound insane,” Mike started, “I mean, I basically admitted that I’ve planned our whole future together, but I want you to know that you have a choice, obviously. Even if you do like me or want to date me, you can break up with me at any time. You’re not, like, obligated to stay with me.”

Will raised his eyebrows. “What about you?”

“What about me?”

“I’ve liked you for a long time, Mike. Years, in fact. What makes you so sure you won’t grow bored first and want to leave me?”

Mike scrunched his nose like he was offended by the question. “That’s literally the most stupid thing I’ve ever heard.”

Will giggled. “I’m just saying! It could happen!”

“No, it literally couldn’t.”

“Mike—”

“Will, I meant it when I told you I wanted to be with you forever.”

Will’s smile faltered as he stared at Mike with wide eyes, perhaps only just now considering the gravity of what they were saying.

Mike wanted to be with him… forever.

“Mike,” Will said, “Are you… asking me out?”

Mike snorted, pulling Will in closer before grabbing him by the hips and reeling him in all the way. Their breaths mingled, and Will felt his knees go weak at the adoring smile that crept its way on to Mike’s face as he looked at him.

“Maybe,” Mike said with a smirk, “Depends on what your answer is.”

Will beamed. “Y-Yeah, okay.”

“Yeah?” Mike lit up, even if he’d already expected Will would say yes.

“Yeah,” Will repeated, “Except, I have one condition.”

“Hmm?” Mike smiled, his face inching closer to Will’s, “What’s that?”

Will smiled back, his hands squeezing Mike’s biceps. “If we date, we’re not allowed to break up. Ever. It’s off-limits.”

Mike’s smile widened, his eyes twinkling with mirth and affection. “Okay,” he breathed, “I can work with that.”

Then, he pulled Will in for a long-awaited kiss.

A/N:

"I miss clouds. I miss you." is out

"I miss your eggs. I miss you" is in