Chapter Text
Usually, Mike would be excited for the start of June. June used to mean that school is finally letting out, and Mike can spend all of his days and nights with the party for three whole months. This summer is a bit different though.
Technically, today was their last day of school, but ever since spring break school hasn’t been as serious. Teachers barely hand out assignments, and a bunch of classrooms were joined together to make up for all the teachers and students who chose to leave Hawkins.
Mike checks his watch: 3:00. El should be back from her training by now. Instead of biking home he decides to visit her. They haven’t gotten to see each other much in the past months since spring break. It seems like they keep just missing each other when Mike comes over, she’s training with Hopper, when she’s in the hospital visiting Max, he’s at school. A terrible part of Mike has been okay with not seeing her as often. Ever since California things haven’t been the same between them.
Mike dismounts from his bike and lays it down on Hopper's porch before knocking the special knock only people in the party know. The door unlocks and Mike enters to find El sitting on the couch watching a black and white rerun.
He approaches the couch and plops down next to her, “Hey.”
“Hello Mike,” she responds distantly. She’s been quieter ever since returning to Hawkins but today she looks even more devastated.
“Are you okay?” He asks her softly. He’s asking her this to see if he can try and comfort her, but Mike is painfully aware that whenever he tries to fix things they end up ten times worse.
El sighs. “Today has been three months since…since it all happened. And nothing has changed, Max is still asleep, we can’t find Henry, the government is looking for me, and we have no way of stopping them.”
“I know, and I know that all of this sucks, but it’s like Hop said we just have to wait it out a few months, keep doing crawls and that will lead us to Vecna and figure out how to wake Max up. We’ve defeated him before; all he needs is one final blow.” Mike says, trying to be encouraging. He knows how hard El is working—how hard they’re all working—and he isn’t trying to put any more stress on her, just boost morale.
El still seems discouraged. She stares into her lap, “That’s—that’s what everyone is telling me, but you were not there in Vecna’s mind. You don’t know the way he thinks or feels.”
Mike nods enthusiastically, “Which is exactly why we need you. We lost before because we were all separated, but with everyone here in Hawkins we can kill him this time.” She looks up at him with a hint of hopefulness in her eyes so Mike keeps going, “You’ll be able to do it this time; I know you can because…because” he trails off trying to think of a good enough compliment, of something that a perfect boyfriend would say.
“Because I am a superhero? Or because you love me?” El asks. Mike looks up at her, surprised by the blunt question. All hope is gone from her expression; it’s faded to a distant sadness.
Panic stirs in Mike’s chest, “I-I,” he stammers.
“I don’t understand why it can not be both.” She doesn’t seem angry or disgusted with him, just slightly disappointed, and in some ways that’s worse.
“I-it is. I do,” Mike insists, barely able to choke the words out.
El gives him a knowing look. “Friends don’t lie, Mike.”
Guilt seeps into his chest. He knows she’s right. He knows that he’s dug himself too deep this time and there’s no use in lying or pretending his way out of it. El is offering him an olive branch: to tell the truth, to admit the ways that he’s fucked up.
“I do love you,” Mike says slowly, “Just not the way you want to be loved.” He exhales shakily, avoiding looking into her eyes.
“I know. It is okay,” El says simply.
Mike furrows his eyebrows with surprise. Whenever he pictured their breakup (not that he had ever done that before) he imagined a confrontation, a fight, tears, apologies. But El seemed like she had already accepted this fact months ago. How can she be so calm about it?
“It’s not though,” Mike hastily points out. “I knew that we weren’t right for each other, but I just forced the relationship to keep going, and I thought that if I told you the truth then I would lose you again, and—”
“You won’t lose me, Mike. Besides, we're better this way. As friends,” El declares, lacing her fingers through Mike’s.
“You’re right,” he says and they just sit there for a moment. Hand in hand, shoulder to shoulder. It’s the first time they’ve been on the same page about something in a long time.
Mike huffs out a self-deprecating laugh, “So much for me being the heart.” He watches as El’s face scrunches in confusion.
“What?”
“Like the painting,” Mike explains, “How you said I was the heart of the party, the leader.”
El slowly shook her head. “I did not say that. Are you talking about Will’s painting?” Mike nods. “He wouldn’t show me that painting. I do not know what it was about.”
The realization hits Mike like a slap to the face: Will lied. More importantly Will lied to him.
“Oh, you-you’re right,” Mike stammers along trying to smile, “I remembered it wrong. Never mind.”
El opens her mouth like she might say something but then thinks better of it and leans back against the couch.
Mike’s mind races. So Will had just made that up, all of it to make him feel better? Had he actually meant any of it? Or if El wasn’t the one Will was talking about, could he—could he have been talking about his own feelings? But why would he lie, why wouldn’t he just tell Mike the truth like he always did, like he used to.
The questions kept coming while he spent the next hour watching tv with El, eating his Mom’s overcooked meatloaf at the dinner table, and as he tried (and failed) to fall asleep.
One thing was clear though: he was going to need to find a way to figure out the truth. He was going to need to talk with Will.