Archive of Our Own

Mike wakes up with remnants of uneasy distress sticking to his gums and the back of his teeth. He rubs his eyes, tries to remember the no doubt ridiculous dream he’d had — right. He’d been standing in line at the grocery shop down the street with one of his classmates from his creative writing class, Annette, and Max of all people. Max, arms crossed, weight on her left leg, hair thrown into a long ponytail, wouldn’t stop nagging him about getting some specific kind of sour candy he’d never heard of because they were supposed to have a movie night in his basement. Mike only wanted to get Reese's Pieces because there was an entire aisle of them and they were all on sale, and anyway, Will really liked those.

“Will doesn’t even live here anymore, he’s in New York.” argued Max, but Mike was sure he’d seen him in Castle Byers yesterday, they’d eaten plums together.

“That’s not true!” he’d said, limbs jittery with urgency. He and Max and Annette had been holding up the line for like an hour now, just to argue over candy, and oh. Oh no.

Will is coming today. Will is coming today.

“Holy shit!” utters Mike, shooting up in his bed, and he has the sense, just then, to regret it - it being his entire life, maybe.

So, here’s the story: during summer break, Johnny, Mike’s roommate and friend of a friend of Nancy’s, had proudly announced that he would be going to Germany - Berlin to be exact - which meant that Mike needed to find someone else to live with. Really, Mike wasn’t exactly unhappy about it. Not that Johnny was a shitty roommate - he was cool most of the time, but he always had loud sex with girls he brought home from dates or parties and Mike could literally feel the dull thuds of the headboard hitting the wall between their rooms when he tried to study – not to mention it made Mike awkwardly aware of how stale his own dating life was. And he constantly had his annoying frat-type friends over who had the decency to not utter it out loud, but Mike could tell they thought he was kind of weird for being into DnD. So yeah, Mike wasn’t exactly unhappy about it.

The only problem was that Johnny hadn’t left him much of a timeframe to work with. It would be a few weeks at most, before Johnny would be on his merry way to Europe and Mike would be stuck with rent twice the amount of what he normally paid.

“I don’t wanna room with a total stranger,” Mike had complained to Dustin over the phone, free hand gesticulating vaguely in the air. “What if I get stuck with a total dickhead?”

“You could just say no if their vibe is like, off.” Dustin had spoken pragmatically through a mouthful of what Mike guessed was an apple judging from the crunchy-mushy sounds his mouth made. He grimaced.

"Dude, stop chewing in my ear."

Dustin smacked three times into the phone, the sounds wet and gross and purposeful and oh Mike could kill him with his bare hands.

"Sorry," he said airily, not sorry at all. Mike rolled his eyes, dropped it with a long-suffering, exhaled "Ugh, whatever".

Back to my problems.

"What if someone moves in and they're totally fine at first and then two months in I found out that they, I don’t know, cut their toenails with the kitchen scissors or something?”

"Gross. Like, without washing them after?"

“It doesn’t matter, this is a total hypothetical scenario. But for the sake of my argument, yeah.”

There’d been a brief lull in conversation, the silence filled by the sound of shuffling and ruffling, as if Dustin was lying on his bed, changing his position to a more comfortable one.

“You know, Will’s in New York.” he finally said, and Mike's expression dropped.

"Yeah. I know."

He knew all too well, in fact. He’d spent the last year hoping he wouldn’t randomly run into him on the street or god forbid – another party (the party incident still makes Mike want to curl up and fucking die). They don’t attend the same college - Mike is at NYU and Will is at Guttman Community College, which at the very least meant he couldn’t possibly bump into him on campus.

“Last I heard he was looking for a new place to stay because his roommate’s moving in with his girlfriend? I know you guys are like, kinda weird right now,”

Understatement of the year, supplied Mike’s brain helpfully.

“But at least he’s not some freak stranger?”

“Yeah…” Mike had said, already tuning out the conversation. There was no way. No way.

(But, said a voice that was vaguely Dustin-sounding, You know Will, you know he'd be the objectively perfect roommate - considerate, respectful, quiet - and remember, you are desperate!

But, a smaller part of him had whispered, a voice that sounded wholly like himself, maybe, maybe this is your chance to make up for everything. Maybe this right here, is your chance to fix everything you fucked up.)

“What makes you think he’d agree to room with me?” Mike had asked after another brief lull in the conversation. Dustin laughed, short-lived, not quite bitter but not quite happy.

“I didn’t say that. But it’s worth a try?”

Dustin had rattled off Will’s number, and Mike had stalled for a week before dialing it. Some other guy had picked up, presumably the roommate, before he’d finally gotten Will on the line who told him he would think about it, which Mike had interpreted as a solid “no”.

He’d heard back from Will after another a week: “Hey, is that offer still on the table?”, and Mike reserved the tiny part of his brain that wasn’t utterly stuck on the thought of living with Will Byers, to distantly marvel at the fact that it took them two weeks in total to make two phone calls.

“I’m so stupid,” grumbles Mike now while he haphazardly does the dishes he’d left in the sink overnight.

By noon, Mike is pacing around. The restless anxiety he’d felt from waking up has grown heads like some Thessalhydra. He considers calling Dustin again, tell him how much he regrets it because clearly he isn’t ready to see Will again, he even considers calling Max because her appearance in his dream, irritating as it was, kind of made him miss her and her honest to god, brutal advice, but by the time he’s at the phone, punching in the first digits of her number, he’s interrupted by a few knocks on his front door.

Fuck, thinks Mike, followed up by a resolute “Okay. Okay.”

He can do this. It’s just Will, it shouldn't be as difficult as he’s making it out to be.

(But the problem is that it’s "just Will". Will, who he has spent years avoiding. Will, who he still feels like he knows, deep to the core, despite having no idea of how he takes his coffee or if he even drinks coffee, because it’s Will and he likes Reese's Pieces and he hates the cold and he’s the best artist Mike has ever known and Mike saw him at that one party, in the kitchen, hands and feet fidgety, a tell Mike could recognize anywhere, and if they’d been younger Mike would’ve instantly pulled him away from the party with an arm around his shoulder and a promise of going home to read comics on his lips, but at eighteen, fresh out of high school, some small-town boy in the big city, Mike had turned around before he'd known it, pushed his way out of the kitchen and had a frankly pathetic panic attack in the bathroom-

He’s thinking about the party incident again. Small shake of his head. Okay. You can do this. How hard can it be?)

They don’t exchange hugs when Mike opens the door with a slightly breathless, faux casual "Hey Will" and Will steps inside - "Hi" - but Mike distinctly notes all the most obvious ways Will has changed, and the ways he has remained the same.

Same: his preference for flannels – he’s wearing a blue-blackish one over a graphic t-shirt. Same: his eyes are still big and doe-like, still kind. Different: he’s taller than he remembers him to be (— he hadn’t gotten a very good luck at him the last time he’d seen him because he'd been too busy freaking the fuck out). He’s quite tall actually, in a way that makes it look like he has grown into it; shoulders broad and wide and nothing like the small boy who was always looking up at everyone else. Mike still has a few inches on him though. Different: there are more edges to him now, his jaw, his shoulders. There had always been something about Will that had looked soft, even when he started filling out, when his voice became deeper than any of Mike's other friends, and the softness is still there, but his features are sharper.

“Erm,” says Mike eloquently. “You look good.”

Will blinks, clears his throat. “Thanks. You too.”

It isn’t before Will is inside Mike’s two-bedroom apartment for the first time that Mike realizes a part of him had expected the world to implode as soon as he stepped past the threshold, as if Will’s presence in Mike’s apartment would trigger some sort of ancient curse or something. This is the first home - of Mike’s, that is - that Will is a total stranger to. Will doesn’t know where the bathroom is, or what cupboard the plates and bowls are stacked in, or what posters hang on Mike’s bedroom wall. He doesn’t know that Mike has miraculously managed to keep the one houseplant alive for months now after many failed attempts, he doesn’t know which books are like brand new and which books contain his uneven lines and his notes scrawled in the margins, spines all cracked from wear and tear, which books have been loved.

The world doesn’t implode. But it’s a strangely sobering feeling, having this person who used to know everything about him, who used to practically live in his house, look at the wall decorations and the furniture with none of that age-old familiarity.

Mike shows him around, not that there’s much to show at all. Will nods and hums at all his comments (“Bathroom,” “This is the kitchen, it’s pretty small,” “This is your room- I-I mean uhm, if you decide to move in, that is. Yeah.”).

“So,” starts Mike awkwardly as he watches Will survey the empty space. He leans his back against the wall. “You attend Guttman, right?”

Will lets out a nervous chuckle. “Yeah. Uhm, I’m starting my second year.”

“Cool.” says Mike, stretching out the syllables.

“Yeah. Cool.”

The silence stretches on. Will turns away to look out the window, figets with his hands, and Mike allows himself to think about the mortifying party incident, and it’s that more than anything that convinces him that he wants this to work. God, he wants this to work. He clears his throat, wracks his brain trying to think of something to say to break the silence.

“Do you- do you like it there?”

Will turns to him. Mike looks at some spot over Will’s shoulder. “Yeah, I guess? I’m taking a few art courses which was all I really wanted to do.”

“Oh, cool!”

He’s repeating himself, he knows this. Absently, he wonders how he ever let this happen. He hopes he isn’t imagining the almost pitiying look in Will’s face. “I mean, it’s really cool that you’re doing what you’ve always wanted to do.”

“Thanks, Mike. And, uhm, same goes for you.”

“Me?”

“Yeah,” Will lets out another nervous laugh, with a little shrug. “English and Creative Writing, right? El told me.”

Mike feels a flush beginning to spread from his neck, and he brings up a hand, rubs it, tries to bring it down with sheer force of will. “Right. Thanks.”

Mike and El had broken up in their sophomore year - long distance hadn’t worked out for them. Their letters grew shorter and increasingly more impersonal, and when El and Will had visited Hawkins over spring break that year, they’d called it quits - in the Wheelers' basement no less. As if they were going full-circle.

Secretly, Mike had wondered whether they would’ve drifted apart regardless of the physical distance – they’d met at twelve and jumped into a relationship at thirteen based entirely on the shared trauma of their experiences and little else and what childhood relationships lasted anyways? But all’s well that ends well or however the saying goes – he and El are still close friends. They keep tabs on each other semi-regularly, and Mike doesn’t think they could become anything less after everything they’d experienced together.

(But then again, it had happened with Will, and had you asked Mike ten years ago he would’ve thought that was impossible, that nothing in the world could ever make him and Will stop being friends, and he would’ve been wrong.)

By the front door, Mike watches Will slip on his sneakers, once again expecting a polite rejection, a sorry, but I don't think this is going to work, and Mike is already practicing his reply in his head, no worries man, hope you find something else buzzing on the tip of his tongue, but Will cuts through his trail of thought like light cutting through the clouds.

“So, when can I move in?” he asks. Mike blinks at him, the practiced careless smile fading in lieu of a confused frown.

“Oh,” he says dumbly. Then, “Oh! Um well, any time you want, really.”

Will nods.

“Okay,” he says. “Like within this week? It’s just uhm, my living situation isn’t ideal right now so I’m kinda desperate I guess.”

“Yeah, yeah, anything you want!” Mike hurries to say, cringes internally as soon as the words have left his mouth. Way to seem like a huge fucking loser.

"Cool," says Will, amusement tugging at the corner of his lips, and Mike parrots it lamely.

After Will has left, Mike goes back to bed, face first, drained like a deflated balloon. “So stupid.” he grumbles into his pillow.

Within the week, Mike helps hauling Will’s belongings from his dorm, but there isn’t much - a little furniture, his clothes which can all fit in one moving box, his art supplies and sketchbooks of which there are an overwhelming amount (Will shrugs sheepishly when Mike shoots him a look that borders on teasing, albeit hesitantly so, like opening an old, unused door) and a few knickknacks.

Will’s roommate, the one who had picked up the phone, is nice enough. James, med-student, Will let’s him know.

“It’s, uhm. He’s moving in with his girlfriend, Teresa. She’s really nice. And also, I’ve been wanting to move out for a while now? You know how I get really bad nightmares about… well, yeah, you know. And I have insomnia. It’s just kinda inconvenient. It’s like, now I’m the shitty roommate because he can’t sleep. I figured it would be easier for both of us if I just moved out, you know?” he says as they’re loading boxes into the back of Mike’s car. Scrambling, he adds: “Not that I wanna unload all of my nightly terrors onto you, it’s just. You get it, right? Like, you were there, you know what happened already. I don’t need to, like, vaguely explain stuff to you without trying not to sound batshit insane. It’s just… easier.”

And Mike knows he will never understand what it was like for Will, that week he was trapped in The Upside Down or everything that happened afterwards, but he gets them too, sometimes. The nightmares, the flashing images of teeth and blood and the crunch of bones. The occasional sleepless nights. So Mike nods in quiet understanding, tells him not to worry about it, and allows himself the small victory of being on the receiving end of one of Will’s grateful smiles.

This can work. They’ll make it work.

It’s late summer, slow and sticky and hot, and Will tries to make himself as invisible as possible. He’s rarely in the living room, opting for his room when he isn’t in class or at one of his two parttime jobs. He’s neat, like Mike had thought he’d be - unlike Mike who tends to be too in his head, too discracted to remember it, and Johnny who simply doesn’t care enough to do it, Will always cleans up after himself, as if he doesn’t wish to leave a single trace of him in the shared space of the apartment.

And he’s avoiding Mike. Which is fine. It's understandable. Mike has after all been avoiding Will for a very long time. It’s just sort of awkward when they’re living together and all. It’s weird to hang out in the living room or by the kitchen table over when he knows Will is doing… something - drawing or studying or reading or whatever - right behind the closed door of his room. Or maybe he’s just sleeping. Mike knows he doesn’t sleep much at night at least – Will told him as much, and he hears him sometimes, waking from a nightmare.

But Mike doesn’t mind. It’s fine. The apartment is entirely silent and it’s fine. Except he’s been meaning to invite some of his friends from class over to work on a group project, and it would be sort of dickish of him to not let Will know - Johnny did this sometimes and it annoyed the hell out of Mike - so two weeks into their housing arrangement, when Will arrives home from class, Mike is at the kitchen table, nose buried in a boring (and completely ridiculous, in Mike's opinion) Freudian analysis of Dracula he’s supposed to read for tomorrow, waiting for him.

His first few hey dudes go unnoticed because Will has headphones on.

“Will?” he calls, louder this time, and Will startles a little before he turns his attention to Mike who has stuck his head into the entryway.

“Oh. Hi Mike.” he says, lowering the headphones so they’re hanging around his neck and turning off his Walkman. “What’s up?”

“Is it okay with you if I have some friends over on Friday? We’re just gonna work on a group project?”

There’s a small frown on Will’s face, and Mike immediately begins to backtrack. “I mean, it’s totally fine if you’re not okay with it, we can just go somewhere else-”

“Why wouldn’t I be okay with it?” asks Will as he shrugs off his windbreaker, hangs it on the coatrack. Mike pauses, unsure of what to say. “I don’t mind.”

“You don’t?”

“No? I uhm, I was just surprised you asked. You live here, so, like. You can do whatever you want.”

“Well, so do you.” Mike points out. Will blinks, seems to consider his words, and it hits Mike then that maybe Will feels like an interloper of some sort. Johnny’s replacement. Mike hadn’t exactly been the most welcoming roommate, he knows that, but he’d thought Will had wanted to avoid him. He'd thought Will had wanted to see as little to him as possible, but maybe he'd just inadvertently pushed him away. Again. Guilt gnaws at him, and god, Mike feels like he can never do anything right when it comes to Will. “You live here just as much as I do.” he says, hoping Will gets the message.

Will sends him a small smile, and Mike finds himself mirroring it, gaze following Will's hand which reaches up to scratch his upper arm.

“Okay,” he says, finally. “I still don’t mind, though. But thanks for asking. I appreciate it.”

“No problem dude,” says Mike, about to go back to the kitchen table when he stops himself, forces himself to ask before he can overthink it. “You could, I don’t know, join us?”

“Your friends?”

“Yeah, not with the group work, obviously. But I was thinking we could watch a movie after or something, and you could, like, hang out with us?”

There’s a brief silence, and Mike watches Will chew on his bottom lip. Something familiar festers in him and it tastes like acidy regret. “Or actually, never mind–”

“I have a shift on Friday so I’ll probably be home late anyways,” he says, tone heavy with sheepish apology. “Maybe we could watch a movie together another time?”

His voice is softer now, hesitant. He’s avoiding Mike’s gaze, fiddling with his Walkman. Mike nods and nods and nods and wonders if he means with Mike’s friends or just the two of them. He isn’t sure which one he prefers.

“Yeah, yeah, another time. Cool.”

Friday, Will arrives home while Mike and his classmates, Annette and Charlie, are halfway through The Silence of the Lambs. Mike is seated on the couch between them, having slid so far down in a way that can’t possibly be healthy for his back. He perks up at the sound of the door opening and closing.

“Hey Will!” he says when Will steps in, clearly about to beeline into his room. He’s dressed in a plain white t-shirt and a pair of jeans, a tote bag slung over one shoulder, hair ruffled like a tired little kid.

“Hi,” he says quietly, sending Charlie and Annette a quick wave.

“This is my roommate,” Mike tells them. “The new one, I mean. Johnny’s in Berlin.”

Shortly after, Will disappears into his room, but not before shooting Mike another small smile and a quiet see you tomorrow.

Saturday, after dusting off the apartment, he and Will watch Dead Poets Society. Just the two of them, on opposite ends of the couch, and none of Mike’s other friends. Mike makes popcorn on the stove and divides them into two bowls. They’re silent through most of the film, and it isn’t the same - when they were younger they’d make offhand comments about the movie, or they’d crack jokes, or they’d get distracted and start talking about whatever happened to be on their minds, like the newest Wolverine issue or their ongoing DnD campaign while the movie faded into the background - but it’s nice. And it’s better than glancing at Will’s closed bedroom door.

With early autumn comes winds of change and Will, back into Mike’s life, at least that’s how it feels like. He starts to spend more time outside of his room; Mike finds him at the kitchen table sometimes, reading for his classes, or throwing some food together in the kitchen – he has stopped asking what things are placed in what cupboards. Their arrangement is still leaning more towards the nature of two people living under the same roof, rather than two people living together; they rarely eat together, and they never really talk, not like they used to. Mike imagines this must be how it would be if he lived with, say, Nancy. It’s all how was class and how was work and not much else. But one time, Mike arrives home from class, completely spent, and finds Will fast asleep on the couch, and he is hit by an odd wave of domesticity at the sight of Will’s cheek pressed against the armrest and one of his arms dangling over the couch. He’d fallen asleep watching television, so Mike turns it off for him and goes into his room, closing the door as quietly as he can.

They have established a few unspoken rules, some of them carried over from Mike living with Johnny and Will living with his previous roommate. But most of them are new, shaped by the two of them. Things like:

• Having one or two friends over unannounced is fine, but they check in with the other if there are three or more.
• Always lock the front door.
• Mike is in charge of watering his own plant, but Will will remind him to do it when he senses it has been too long.
• Every other Saturday they clean the apartment and watch a movie together – Will gets to pick in the beginning of the month, Mike gets to pick in the middle.
• They do not enter each others’ rooms.
• Mike pretends he doesn’t hear Will pace around at night after a particularly bad nightmare.

They eventually adjust the plant rule when Will stumbles through the door with a very miserable looking houseplant in his arms. Mike had been quick to learn that Will took advantage of his jobs at the supermarket and the café he works at to the fullest – as soon as he’d become comfortable enough with taking up space in the apartment, he’d started sneaking things from his workplaces that were supposed to be trashed. “Technically, I’m not supposed to, but it’s getting thrown out anyways,” he’d told him after coming back home with a paper bag filled to the brim with pastries.

Still, the things he brings home tend to be edible. The plant looked two seconds away from its death.

“They were gonna throw it out,” he explains while Mike stares, brow frowned in confusion.

“Then why did you take it?”

Will shoots him a look that lets Mike know he thinks he’s being particularly daft. “Because they were gonna throw it out? It’s perfectly salvageable, Mike, it just needs water.”

He puts it next to Mike’s singular plant in the window sill, and Mike watches him water it with his own water bottle - they don’t have a watering can - his frown deepening.

“I’ll water it.” Will rolls his eyes, sensing Mike’s thinly veiled skepticism coming off of him in waves. “You literally don’t need to do anything.”

Mike’s frown melts, is replaced by a timid smile he finds he can’t push down when Will prods at the soil in Mike's plant before tipping the remaining water into the pot.

One Tuesday in mid-September, Will comes home from his shift with a batch of apples. Mike, by the kitchen table, looks up from the assignment for one of his creative writing courses, to see Will dump two of them into the trash and keep the rest, rinsing them under the tap and patting them dry with a clean dishtowel.

“Catch,” Will tells him, throwing him a glistening, damp apple, and Mike lets out a startled yelp, fingers scrambling, dropping his pen to catch the apple which slips out of his hands, lands on the table, rolls and lands on the floor with a dull thud. Will’s full-bodied laughter makes it extremely hard for Mike to scowl at him, although he tries his utmost.

"Quit it, you know I'm like, the least athletic person ever," he sulks, picks up the fallen apple where it lies at his feet. He swears he hears his back crack at least twice when he straightens up again.

"People change."

"Well, not me."

"Good to know you're the exact same person you were five years ago," says Will through a snort, and it isn't a jab, Mike can tell, but he feels it still, years worth of guilt weighing on his shoulders. He swallows, avoids Will's gaze, wets his lips. The voice, the one that sounds like himself, is whispering, telling him now's your chance to fix things, knocks insistently on his door.

"Not the exact same person," he mumbles lamely into the wooden table, nervously rolling the apple between his hands until it's warm. "For one, I'm not as much of an asshole."

He lifts his gaze to see Will softening, and it's like watching butter melt.

"Hey, you were just a kid. It's okay."

Mike shakes his head, puts the apple away, looks intently up at Will. "No! No. We were all kids, and I’m the only one who was… like- like that. I mean, I was like, going through stuff, but I shouldn’t have let you take the fall for it. I was such an asshole to you. I’m sorry.”

Will pulls out a chair to sit down across from Mike - they're both too tall to avoid their knees knocking against each other under the table - face open and honest and so very Will, and something in Mike aches. He'd wasted years pushing Will away from him, and an additional few years avoiding him, and yet, here he is, at the kitchen table Johnny gave Mike, which he inadvertently has come to think of as his and Will's - theirs - and Will is watching Mike with none of the resentment he knows he deserves.

"I'm sorry about everything. The stupid fights and ignoring you and pushing you away and- just everything. I should've been there for you through all those years like, like an actual friend, instead of..." he trails off, voice losing its steam. "Instead of wallowing in self-pity," he adds a little awkwardly. You know, kind of like I'm doing right now.

He isn't sure where he's going with this apology at all. He should've been better prepared, written a script maybe. He looks back down at his fingers which have found a grove in the wooden table; rubs his pointer finger over it like an itch.

Will puts a hand on Mike's forearm and his touch burns, even through the fabric of Mike's shirt. He tries to catch Mike's gaze, and frankly, Mike has never been good at resisting Will; he looks at him, and only then does Will speak.

"Don't blame yourself for... for us growing apart. I didn't exactly reach out to you or anything either. I could've easily called you or written to you, but I didn't, and that one's on me, okay?"

Oh, but it isn't okay, it isn't.

"Will you stop being so... so..." So willing to defend me. Will has always been so kind, so gentle, so quick to let things go, and Mike wishes he wouldn't sometimes. He wishes he'd make it hard for Mike, for once. He wishes he'd scrutinize him, tell him it isn't good enough.

"So?" asks Will, as if attempting to coax an answer out of Mike.

"Forgiving," says Mike, and hates the way he can't conceal the tenderness that coats the syllables. Will has always been so good, too good.

"I can acknowledge that you were a dipshit and still forgive you, Mike. " says Will, and Mike isn't sure whether or not he's imagining the tinge of warm affection in his voice. "You're here now, apologizing, which speaks volumes."

Mike doesn't know what to say do that, except a lame "Oh."

"And I mean it when I say you can't blame yourself for everything." adds Will. "Communication is a two-way street, you know? It's just as much my fault. And I'm sorry. For not calling or reaching out."

They're silent for a long minute, and Mike thinks about the painting fifteen year-old Will had given him when he'd visited Lenora during freshman year, how they hadn't spoken for nearly a year because Mike had been scared, how he'd let his hurt and his fear fester. He'd ignored him, pretended he didn't care when all he had ever done was care too much, while Will had done that. Bared his soul and created something beautiful, and he'd given it to Mike because that was who he was, and god, no matter what Will tells him, Mike knows he'll spend the rest of his life making up for how he'd treated Will. Not because he believes Will secretly holds a grudge but because he wants to. Because Will refuses to grow resentful where others would've. Because Will deserves someone who treats him with that same softness.

"You're really shitty at accepting apologies, by the way, has anyone ever told you that?" Mike asks gently, and Will offers him a small grin bordering just on this side of cheeky.

"Not that I recall, no."

"Well you are."

"Can't be good at everything."

And Mike cuts up the apples because Will insists they'll go bad soon. Ironically, he feels much lighter while they eat themselves full on them over a game of UNO which should've been boring with just two players but isn't because whenever Mike is about to win Will pulls a stack four out of his sleeve while pretending he always had it on his hand and Mike is too amazed to call him out on the fact that he's cheating, obviously so.

October rolls around and in between classes and work and make-shift dinners, Will grows a little more quiet, subdued, and Will has always been on the quieter side but this kind of silence is different. It's the Anniversary Effect revving it's engine; the ghost of pulsating, writhing vines and the old smell of rot beginning to take ahold of him by the neck, and although Will’s episodes back when they were children had been due to a literal possession, the Anniversary Effect is a very real thing. Mike knows better than anyone, because Max spends every fourth of July alone, because Nancy spends the first week of November sullen and moody, because Will start to cave in on himself, make himself smaller as soon as the weather starts to get colder.

Mike hates it, always has; this thing it does to Will.

Most days he acts like normal, but some days are bad. On those days, he retreats into his room to draw or lie in his bed, and Mike can't help but imagine himself back in the old Byers household, Will drawing obsessively, blue and purple staining his fingertips and forearms like bruises, and it makes him feel like a child again, utterly helpless. He tries to make it easier for Will in subtle ways: brews coffee every morning, makes sure to ask Will whether he needs something whenever he goes grocery shopping, casually attempts to convince Will to let up on some of his shifts when he can tell he isn't feeling well. He doesn't tiptoe around him, tries not to be overbearing or overstep because he knows how much Will hates it, even though Mike kind of wants to forbid him from using his Walkman like some overprotective parent because the angry rock music Will plugs into his ears to drown out everything else is so loud Mike can hear the muted instrumentals, and he's genuinely worried that Will is gonna go deaf before he hits forty.

Will doesn't remark on Mike's behavior (who is convinced he's definitely overcompensating), but he sends him tired but grateful smiles over his morning coffee, considers whenever Mike suggests he calls in sick for work and listens when Mike half-jokingly reminds him to take care of his eardrums, so overall Mike considers his endeavors a success.

They watch a lot of movies during this time - putting on a movie is easy, it doesn't take much from either of them. They make a too long list of horror movies and only watch about a quarter of them. They watch Friday the 13th and Jaws (which Mike insists isn’t a horror movie, but it is Will’s turn to pick and he argues wholeheartedly for the opposite) and Mike doesn't let Will know, but he neglects an assignment so they can watch The Texas Chainsaw Massacre 1 and 2, and it's easy. They exchange comments and they bicker and during The Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2, Mike glances away from the movie to look at Will because Leatherface reminds him of an old inside joke with the Party that he can no longer remember the source of, only to discover Will has dozed off. It isn't surprising; he knows Will's nights tend to be sleepless, especially at this time of year. He gently shakes him awake, convinces him to go to bed with a soft mutter.

Towards the end of October they decide to tackle all the Aliens films in one night, and Mike loves how Will is so full of life, all clever quips and cracked half-grins and eyerolls and references to ridiculous inside jokes, his eyes meeting Mike's and crinkling at the corners - today is good. Really good.

Something is different about it too. They’re sitting closer together than they normally do. It’s purely coincidental, really. Mike goes to the bathroom, and when he comes back he sits down closer to the middle of the couch, instead of sitting leaned up against the armrest. It’s not like it’s a big couch, a few inches barely makes any difference. But then, halfway through the second movie, Will gets up to get a glass of water, and when he comes back he also sits down closer to the middle of the couch, so now they’re sitting right next to each other, shoulders brushing and suddenly it’s all Mike can think about – how close they are.

He no longer has any idea of what is happening in the movie, every single part of his brain is weirdly aware of his limbs and the points of contact between him and Will. He sneaks a glance at Will who’s watching the television, seemingly completely unaffected by the fact that their thighs are mere inches apart.

He feels ridiculous. This is completely ridiculous. They’re almost done with the sequel when Will turns to him, brows furrowed in light concern.

“You okay?”

Mike bounces his foot, he’s restless, jittery. “Yeah,” he says and is mortified to discover it comes out sounding a little breathless. God, he needs to pull it together, he can't ruin this.

“You sure? You seem kinda tense,” Will points out, sounding entirely unconvinced. Mike avoids his inquiring gaze.

“Yeah, I think maybe I’ve just been sitting down for too long?”

Mike feigns going to the bathroom again, and paces around in the admittedly extremely small space. Be normal, cool, he tells himself, shaking out his stiff hands and fingers. Today is good, really good, and he cannot ruin it by being all... whatever the fuck this is. By freaking out for no reason, because this is all too familiar to Mike, he recognizes this, and the last time he'd coped by doing what he does best: he'd run away. Mike thinks it might be the worst thing he has ever done, and now that Will is back in his life, now that he has forgiven him, Mike can't ever imagine going back to living his life without him. He can't lose Will again, he can't push him away again.

"Pull it together, Wheeler,” he mutters, rubbing his face with his hands. He flushes the toilet and washes his hands before leaving the bathroom. The living room is empty, but the door leading out to the balcony is cracked open and Mike can see the vague outline of Will, forearms resting on the railing. He takes a nervous breath, cracks open the door a tad more, steps outside. The chilly air slips in through his cracks, settles under his bones, his ribs, and he shoves his hands into the pocket of his hoodie.

Normal, he reminds himself again before greeting Will with a quiet hey, quiet in that way nightly conversations tend to be. Will glances over his shoulder, a lit cigarette dangling between two fingers.

"Hey."

Mike sits down on the garden chair pushed up against the brick wall, doesn’t follow the cigarette between Will’s fingers as he raises it to his mouth and takes a drag.

“When did you start smoking?” he asks, and its curious. Mike’s dad is an avid smoker, and Mike has always disliked it – but that had more to do with the fact that Ted never seemed to care about whether or not he was blowing cigarette smoke into Mike’s face while he was talking to him. He doesn’t mind when Will smokes.

A cloud of cigarette smoke leaves Will’s lips and coils into the air, his forearm lands back on the railing. He hums, as if he’s trying to remember. “I think it was in my senior year? It was like, stress relief. Why, do you disapprove?”

He’s teasing, mouth cracked in a tiny grin, and Mike feels heat spread from his neck, barely feels the chilly night air anymore. “No, no, not at all. I guess I just didn’t expect it?”

Will nods a little absently. “Yeah, I’d see why you’d think that. I mean, you know I used to hate when my mom smoked inside. It smelled like shit. But, I don't know, it’s like a family habit. In whatever other form it takes.” Will rolls his eyes and Mike assumes he must be thinking of Jonathan.

“And, uhm, the smell is kinda nostalgic? It reminds me of my mom,” he adds, and the tips of his ears are red as if he’s embarrassed, and Mike thinks about how Will used to wrinkle his nose in distaste when Joyce smoked by the dinner table while he and Mike were reading comics. Mom, he’d whine, the vowel drawn out and childish, resolutely pushing her away when she tried to hug him with a lit cigarette in one hand, and the memory prods at something soft and mushy in Mike’s brain.

“We should get back to the movie,” says Will, and Mike hums in agreement even though he has no idea where they are in the film.

They watch the last fifteen minutes of the sequel with their shoulders and elbows brushing, and Mike tries his utmost not to sneak sideways glances at Will, to be cool and normal. He fails half the time.

“One more?” asks Will, the smell of cigarette smoke lingering, and Mike nods wordlessly. Twenty minutes into the third movie, Will’s head starts to slide onto Mike’s shoulder, hair tickling his jaw, and Mike holds his breath while Will’s breaths even out.

“Will?” he mutters. He gets no reply. He hesitates for a short moment, before making up his mind. Instead of shaking him awake, instead of gently urging him to go to sleep like he usually does, he awkwardly maneuvers Will’s solid limbs onto the couch so he’s lying down, stiffens when Will mumbles something about wanting to watch the rest of the movie.

“Another time, yeah?”

“Another time.” mumbles Will sleepily, rolling over on his side. Mike covers Will with a blanket, tucks him in like a child and hopes against all hope that Will won’t mention this in the morning, this strange moment of domesticity.

(He doesn’t – he doesn’t get the chance to because he’s leaving for an 8am class and Mike won’t have to leave before ten. But when he wakes at nine, he finds a cold cup of tea on the kitchen table. It's licorice root, Mike's favorite.)

A week leading up to Halloween, Charlie invites Mike to a Halloween party at a his friend's frat house. When he grimaces at the thought of attending a frat house party he rolls his eyes and tells him: “Live a little, Wheeler. All you do is study, it’s exhausting.”

Mike brow furrows in indignation. That isn't true at all. “I have interests,” he says. He likes to read and write and play Nintendo and occasionally he joins a DnD campaign at NYU’s DnD club and he even plays the electric guitar, although he doesn’t do it while Will is home because he’s weirdly embarrassed about it.

“Bring your roommate if that makes you feel better.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Mike splutters, indignation only growing, cheeks warming at the implications. That isn't true either. He doesn’t need Will to make him “feel better”. He doesn’t.

“I don’t know, you said you were longtime friends, right? I know large crowds make you kinda antsy,” he shrugs. “I just thought it’d make it easier for you.”

“So Will’s like, invited? He doesn’t even attend NYU.”

“Who cares, he seems cool enough.”

And so, on Halloween, Mike and Will pull up in front of Charlie's friend's frat house. Mike puts the car in park, and they share a glance. Truthfully, Mike hadn’t expected Will to want to come. In fact, he’d counted on it, so he could’ve used it as an excuse to not attend either, but Will had shrugged, uhm, okay, and Mike had felt obligated to attend as well.

The music is loud, even from Mike’s car. Mike hasn’t attended many of these large parties during his first year at college - in fact, he’d only been at two: the one where he had seen Will and had proceeded to spiral into a panic attack and another one with Johnny who he had barely known back then. He’d gotten black-out drunk and had spent the following day being miserable and cranky (and homesick, so so homesick) enough to never feel like repeating the experience again.

He guesses he just doesn’t have a great track record when it comes to college parties.

“Do you see him?” he yells over the music while they weave their way through the house, trying to avoid bumping into anyone. “Charlie, I mean.”

“I, uhm, can’t remember what he looks like.” Will says into Mike’s ear, tone sheepish and apologetic. “Sorry.”

“Don’t be,” says Mike through a laugh, feels his nerves loosen up.

They spend the first half hour or so attached at the hip. In the kitchen, a guy sticks a red solo cup in each of their hands and he must be high because his grin is dopey and eyes red-rimmed. Not to mention he’s talking complete nonsense that would have made Argyle, Jonathan’s stoner friend Mike had met during one of his few visits to California, proud. Will indulges him, nodding and attempting to follow the conversation to the best of his ability, while Mike sips from a red solo cup, the two of them sharing occasional confused glances. He almost doesn’t hear Charlie approaching him before he pulls him in for a quick hug, patting him harshly on the back.

“Wheeler!” he yells drunkenly. He hugs Will as well, who looks slightly confused.

Charlie, Mike mouths at him, and Will’s eyes widen in understanding, and they three of them watch Argyle 2.0 show off various card tricks with a deck of cards he pulls out of his breast pocket.

Mike isn’t sure when they get separated. Charlie drags them both into a game of beer pong, and they stumble upon him and Will’s mutual friend and Mike goes to the bathroom, and–

The point is this: around half past ten, Mike looks to his left and Will isn’t there and he starts to feel restless, starts feeling too hot, like something inside of him is itching to bolt. He pushes himself through the throng of people, steps outside to see if Will might have gone out for a smoke but he doesn’t see him among any of the little groups scattered on the lawn. He checks the kitchen, once, twice, enters any room he can enter (and sees his fair share of college students going at it), circles around the dancefloor – he isn’t there.

“Hey, have you seen Will?” he asks Argyle 2.0, who doesn’t seem to know who he’s talking about. “The guy I was with earlier? About this tall, brown hair, band t-shirt, kind of looks like Bambi? You showed him a card trick?”

“Uhhhh,” he drones, and Mike resists the urge to violently shake him back and forth.

“Ugh, just. Whatever.”

He’s walking through a dim hallway in a part of the house he hasn’t been in before, panic rising until it sits tight and thick and bile-like in his throat, and he thinks he might be a little lost, when finally, finally he spots him, sitting on the floor. Mike navigates past a couple who are making out, sorry, he tells them awkwardly.

“Will,” he calls, frazzled and anxious and his voice sounds strangely far away, cottony, but the relief is palpable in his voice, and only now does he realize how afraid he’d been. How much it had reminded him of losing sight of a smaller, younger Will going trick or treating, of Jonathan’s camera lying abandoned on the asphalt, of calling out and receiving no reply. Of finding him curled into a little ball, shaking, breaths quick and shallow.

Will glances at the hand Mike has placed on his shoulder, then up at Mike who has started rambling. “I couldn’t find you, one second you were there and the next you were gone–”

Will’s features soften, and he covers Mike’s shaking hand with his own. “Hey, it’s okay. I’m okay,” he tells him. “I’m okay, Mike.”

“You sure?”

“Positive.” he assures him, before his brows furrow in concern. “Are you?”

Mike nods, but Will gets up, and now he’s the one who has a hand on Mike’s shoulder, eyes piercing right through him.

“Do you wanna go home?” he whispers.

And Mike feels pathetic, truly, truly. This was exactly why he’d stopped attending parties – they always dug up the worst parts of him, the ugliest parts of him, a writhing, throbbing mass of anxiety and mood swings and fear. He avoids Will’s gaze, is about to tell him that he's fine, but his body language seems to be enough for him.

He turns away from Mike, kneels down to say something to the guy sitting next to him that Mike hadn’t even noticed, and then he’s back by Mike’s side, a careful hand on his back as he directs him through the house, and it makes Mike feel so inadequate, so small.

They’re outside, finally and Will turns to Mike by the car. “I’m fine to drive, I only had one beer,” he tells him so Mike hands him the keys and gets into the passenger seat, feeling useless and he sort of wants to cry.

When Will goes to pull the handbrake back, Mike puts his hand on top of his, angles his body towards him. Will glances at him, brows furrowed in a question mark.

“Will, I…” he starts, trails off. He wets his lip, tries again. “I don’t wanna drag you away from the fun or anything, I’ll just- you can have the car keys if you want, I mean maybe don’t drive if you’ve been drinking a lot, but I’ll just find another way home-”

Will carefully draws his hand back from underneath Mike’s and puts it on Mike’s shoulder. “Mike, listen to me. It’s okay. I don’t mind. We came here together, so we’ll leave together, okay?”

He waits for Mike to nod before continuing. “You’ve done this exact thing for me, so many times. You helped me… took care of me, every time I had an episode, remember that?”

Mike thinks of Halloween, of the camera, of Will curled into a tiny ball. Of crazy together.

“Just,” he takes a breath. “Let me do the same for you.”

Something in Mike just… stops, and he thinks it might be his heart. His chest feels like it is filled to the brim with something soft.

He forces an "oh," past his lips, Will's words echoing in his head.

You took care of me every time I had an episode. Let me do the same for you.

"O-okay," he says; he lets him.

Okay.

With November comes colder weather, and it sweeps through the streets of New York like an undercurrent. Will, starts walking around in bulkier sweaters, thicker sweatshirts, his fingers and the backs of his hands pressing against the radiator and mugs of hot coffee.

As for Mike, he’s running purely on caffeine during the day because he can’t sleep when all his dreams have to do with fishing his best friend’s dead body out of the quarry and El sacrificing herself and watching Will writhe and scream his throat hoarse on a hospital bed, his eyes no longer their familiar shade of hazel, but empty pools of black.

If Will notices his sudden increase in caffeine intake, he doesn’t comment on it, and Mike suspects it’s because he already knows. He gets it, and he gets Mike. He always has.

It is the night of November 6th, and Mike can't sleep. He's reading instead, a book he'd borrowed from the library with Will, but finds his thoughts drifting to the quarry every now and then.

It's dumb. Will is in the room right next to his, alive and well, and the fact that Mike still thinks about that night is dumb.

He rubs his face with a hand, feels like ripping his hair out, rereads the same sentence he has been stuck at for what feels like an hour but can't be more than a few minutes. Stops when there’s a noise from the other side of the wall, something akin to a gasp, as if Will has just surged awake from a nightmare, and Mike hesitates for about two seconds before he is up and out the door.

“Will?” he asks, knocking on his bedroom door. He waits for a few beats, knocks again. Silence.

Are you okay are you okay are you okay, some part of his brain demands to know, so he pushes the door open, just enough so he can look around and he’s breaking at least two of their unspoken rules right now, but he can’t find it in himself to care.

The blinds aren’t shut all the way – the light of a streetlamp casts the room in a gentle glow.

“Will? Are you okay?” he mutters into the half-lit room, his voice slightly hoarse from disuse. Will is on his bed, covers bundled up at the foot of it, and his back is pressed against the wall, chest falling and rising rapidly, unevenly.

“Mike?” he croaks, sounding a little confused more than anything, but Mike is by the side of the bed in a few long strides, sits down on the edge of the bed.

"It was just a nightmare," he clears his throat. "The usual, you know? Like, interdimensional monsters and-" he continues, attempts to play it off as a joke, but his voice thickens, and he chokes the rest of his sentence, rests the back of his head against the wall with a heavy sigh, and Mike wants to... he isn't sure what he wants. Anything to remove Will's pain. Anything to make him feel better. So he opens his arms, and Will goes willingly, lets Mike pull him against his chest, lets him wrap his arms tightly around his shoulders. He feels Will’s wrap around his waist in turn with a silent sob, and it aches.

Mike runs a hand up and down Will's back, feels his heart break on behalf of this boy who had done nothing but be hurt. “It's okay," he mutters, over and over again, holds Will through it while he cries, sobs into Mike's shirt, all in as much silence as he can muster, as if, even now, he tries to take up as little space as possible.

When Will withdraws from the embrace he has stopped crying, and he wipes his cheeks with the back of a hand. “I’m sorry,” he mumbles. “I hate that I still get like this. I can’t even sleep in the dark,” he spits, throwing a hand out towards the half-drawn blinds in a helpless gesture. “It’s been years, and it’s still like every time I make progress I just… relapse, and I’m just stuck like this for the rest of my life. There’s no miraculous cure-all, it’s just… It's just how I am now. I hate being such a–a burden to everyone around me.”

Unthinkingly, Mike covers Will’s hand with his own, like Will had covered his back in the car, outside of the party.

“Don’t apologize,” says Mike, trying to catch Will’s gaze, pools as much conviction he can into his voice. “Don’t ever apologize. It’s not… not dumb, it’s not a showcase of weakness.”

Will sniffles, but meets his gaze, open and vulnerable and raw like a fresh wound, and Mike wants nothing more than to take away all of his pain. If given the choice, he would transfer it all to himself, so Will wouldn’t have to feel it anymore.

“You’re one of the strongest people I know. Only you would’ve survived that week, Will. Not me, not Lucas, not Dustin. Only you. And- and I’m so glad you did, I don’t know what… what we would’ve done if we didn’t get you back, so don’t ever, for a second, think that your trauma makes you weak, or-or a burden to others. You are never going to be any of those things, never.”

He realizes he's rambling now, but not enough to stop, not when Will’s looking at him like that, like he’s listening to every word he’s saying, hangs onto them like a lifeline; even the things he leaves unspoken, like a secret (I don’t know what I would’ve done if I didn’t get you back and you are never going to be any of those things, not to me).

“And nothing you do could ever make us want to leave you behind. You may have to deal with this for the rest of your life, but we’ll always be here. It doesn’t matter because you… you mean so much to all of us.”

(I could never leave you, never, ever again, and of course, although he's just realizing it now-)

There’s a long silence, and Mike takes to studying the carpet under his feet. Maybe he's said a bit too much. Offered himself directly up for Will’s perception.

Then, "Sometimes I think this isn't real. I know it's stupid,"

Mike lifts his gaze, brows pulled together in a frown. "This?"

Will shrugs helplessly. "This apartment, us. Being friends with you again. Sometimes I'm convinced it's just The Upside Down playing tricks on me. I finally have this one good thing, and it's just gonna pull the carpet up from under my feet like "just kidding! Here's another traumatic event to add to the list instead."

And Mike's stomach twists, knowing that Will doesn’t truly believe good things can happen to him, that he is doomed to suffer for the rest of his life. That he can’t even have something as simple as one of his closest childhood friends back in his life.

“This is all real, see?” says Mike, grabbing Will’s hand, squeezing it a little too tightly for comfort. Will smiles at the gesture. “You deserve to be happy, Will. Don't ever think otherwise.”

“I'm really, really glad to have you back."

"Yeah, me too." says Mike, but it comes out like a whisper. A few beats passes, before Will wets his lips to say something. Mike’s eyes dart down to his mouth, follows the movement, the way he opens his mouth to speak, then closes again to stop himself.

"What is it Will?"

"Could you… stay in here tonight?”

Oh, thinks Mike, suddenly all too aware that he's still gripping Will's hand. “Yeah, of course.” he says, because it’s Will and he can’t really say no to him these days, and maybe he doesn’t really want to either because Will needs him. He needs him.

“Sorry, I know it’s a weird thing to ask for, I just–” Will starts to explain, but Mike hurries to cut off his stream of words before he can squeeze in more apologies.

“It’s not weird,” he says quickly and hopes he doesn’t sound off, he hopes Will can’t hear the cacophony of butterfly wings that are fluttering up a tiny storm in his stomach. “We used to do this all the time right? I don’t mind.”

A shy smile blooms on Will’s face, and Mike is definitely never saying no to Will Byers ever again. He’ll do anything for him, every time, if this is what it means. He gestures for Will to move further towards the wall, and slots himself into the space Will has left for him. Will lies down on his side so he’s facing Mike, and Mike mirrors him, heart beating out of his chest all the while.

“Nothing could ever make me leave you either,” whispers Will and Mike’s heart stops. “About what you said earlier, I mean. I’ll always be here for you too.”

His heart restarts, palpitates out of his chest, thump thump thump, and the butterflies threaten to erupt out of his stomach. “Oh. That’s… I guess we’re on the same page, then.” he says awkwardly, voice trembling with nerves.

“Yeah, I guess we are.”

They talk about everything and nothing until Will finally drifts back to sleep, and it's like the basement in his parents’ house where Mike and Will and Lucas and Dustin liked to sleep on weekends or during holidays, and Mike and Will would stay awake till long past midnight, just whispering into the space between their faces which were turned towards each other. Back then, whenever Will fell asleep before Mike, Mike would sometimes put his ear to his chest, just to hear his heartbeat. Make sure it was still beating, still pumping blood.

He no longer feels the need to check, hasn't in years. Either way, he still can't sleep. He doesn't mind all that much, is content to just lie next to Will for a while.

(I love you.)

Things are slightly different after that. Mike finds himself staring at Will more often, like when he’s standing by the window to water their plants and the light hits him just right, makes him otherworldly, ethereal; or when he’s been painting and there is a smudge of yellow on his cheek as if he has scratched it absently; or when he’s reading for his classes and yawns tiredly into his hand, eyes dropping as if he is fighting to stay awake. He stares, and his gaze is heavy with the knowledge that he loves him. Probably has for a while now.

It's strange, Mike would've thought his brain would be a tangled, disastrous mess of thoughts, sort of like how he'd freaked out in the bathroom, but his head is clear. He gets it, finally things make sense to him, it's as if all he needed to calm the storm in his head was an explanation. And now he has it.

Sometimes he is perfectly content – he will look over at Will while they’re doing the dishes together and think he could live the rest of his life like this. He could spend the rest of his life doing the dishes with Will within this apartment, and he would be happy, happier than he’s ever been.

Other times he gets restless – the simple domesticity isn’t enough, this – this thing they have right now, sweet and fragile like a baby bird – isn’t enough. He wants more of Will, more of his laughs and his annoyed groans and his art plastered on his walls so he can look at it always, and his touch, more, more, more. He wants Will forever, wants to run his fingers through his hair forever, wants to write extremely bad poetry about him like all the great poets with their sappy sublime romanticism and their muses forever. Often, he thinks about what it would be like to kiss him, nearly jumps out of his skin with how much he wants it sometimes.

During Christmas break he doesn’t see Will for an entire week; Will heads to Lenora where he will spend the holiday with his mom, El and Jonathan, and Mike drives back to Hawkins. It’s nice to see his family again, and it's nice to see Dustin, Lucas and Max who are also visiting their families. He spends his days indulging Holly and bickering with Nancy, the two of them only coming to agreement whenever they're rolling their eyes at their parents. He, Dustin, Lucas and Max exchange presents and go to the arcade and watch movies in the Wheelers' basement, and it's just like the old times except, of course, Will and El aren't there. But things are different now, better.

Before, Will's absence had been the elephant in the room, something no one mentioned, especially not to Mike, and now it makes Mike feel sheepish, guilt-ridden. It’s not that he and the other members of their old party hadn’t spoken to each other for years – Mike and El still exchange letters at least once a month and he speaks to Dustin over the phone semi-weekly. He’d visited Lucas and Max in California in the beginning of the summerbreak and he’d let them drag him all around their city, let them try to teach him to surf, had let them laugh at him whenever he fell because that was just how fiercely he’d missed them. And he knows for a fact that Will still talks to all of the old party members as well, mostly El - a given - and Lucas.

It’s just that they hadn’t seen each other, as a group, as a party, ever since the summer before their junior year of high school. And well, it was mostly Mike’s fault – everyone had known how awkward Mike and Will were around each other, that they’d had some sort of falling out, that things were no longer the same between them, and that had affected everyone. Once, Dustin had compared their friend group to a machine, “if one part malfunctions, the entire thing falls apart”, he’d said and Mike had rolled his eyes, told him he was being dramatic even though he’d kind of been right. Dustin was rarely wrong, a fact Mike has found irritating through most of their friendship, but has begun to just accept. He’d always been an irritatingly smart kid.

Dustin had been the one to suggest Mike contacted Will about his rooming situation after all, so Mike doesn't mind it, not really, not when, the air in the basement is crackling with the prospect of a proper reunion, a proper movie night with all of them.

The four of them chatter excitedly about coming to California for spring break, or visiting Mike and Will in New York. They jokingly plan sprawling road trips across the country, long travels overseas; Mike suggests Germany because Johnny has told him all about how awesome it is, and then Lucas suggests they travel through the entire continent of Europe together, and they keep building and building onto each others' impossible ideas until Max shuts it down. For now: spring break in California. Or New York. They have yet to plan out the details. Really, the only thing that's clear is that it will be with all of them, and that is all that matters to Mike. Mike-Lucas-Dustin-Max-El-Will. Just like how it used to be.

He spends a lot of his time in Hawkins wondering what to get Will for a belated Christmas present; he plays around with the idea of making a mixtape but realizes soon enough that it would bare too much of his soul, that it would practically be a love confession handed to Will in a silver platter. Finally, he settles on something he knows Will is going to appreciate, something less personal. He gets a pack of charcoals and some fancy watercolors from some art supply store, and look, Mike knows little to nothing about art, but Will had complained about running out (he was going through charcoals at lightning speed), and the clerk had directed him to the best ones. He’d thought about painting something for Will too because Will had so often gifted him art, but he’d quickly dismissed the idea – all of his creative talents had gone to writing and music. The last time he’d tried painting something in art class, Lucas had made the honest mistake of thinking his drawing of a regular, average dog was supposed to be a demodog. Instead, he writes a little card and does his best at drawing a tiny version of Will the Wise next to the Merry Christmas!

By the time he’s driving back home, home-home, he thinks he has had enough family time to sustain him for at least ten years.

Will arrives in New York on the 28th, a day after Mike. Mike is practically vibrating with the anticipation of giving Will his present, of seeing his face brighten and his eyes glow. Will steps in through the door while Mike is lounging in the couch on his belly, speedrunning through a level of Super Mario Land on his Gameboy. Mike is quick to greet him with a loud hey!, game forgotten as he makes his way to the entrance, sticks his head in to see Will, bundled up in a thick scarf that covers the lower half of his face. Rapidly melting snowflakes cover his shoulders, and he’s standing in a small puddle of water.

“Weather’s shit,” he says through the scarf, roughly pulling his wet woolen hat off, and his hair is a mess underneath; it sticks in every direction, messy and ruffled. He pulls down the scarf so Mike can see his entire face, how red his nose and his cheeks are from the cold, and Mike admittedly doesn’t have great impulse control, but he doesn’t word-vomit his feelings in a gross, slimy puddle on the floor by Will’s feet right then and there, which is some of an achievement. He doesn’t follow his sudden urge to scoop Will up into a never-ending embrace until he’s warm again, doesn’t follow his sudden (but certainly not a rarity these days) impulse to capture his lips with his own in an impromptu welcome-home-I’ve-missed-you kiss. But his skin itches to do something, anything to relieve him of this foreign feeling of longing.

“Really? I didn’t notice,” he says instead, cracks a grin while staring pointedly at the water gathered at Will’s feet, and ducks with a laugh to avoid the wet hat Will chucks at his face.

It’s incredibly embarrassing, how present Will is in his mind. At these times, he feels incredibly selfish. Greedy.

But either way, he doesn’t push him away, doesn’t push what he’s feeling away, which is a step-up from his teenage-self.

Life is different, knowing he loves Will – loves him the same, familiar way he has since they were four, and in a way that is wholly, dizzyingly new. A way that makes him want to keep him safe, whether that be from schoolyard bullies, drunk family members or interdimensional monsters. A way that makes him want to create the world for him. It’s different, but not by a lot. And not a bad different, most of the time.

Later that day, they swap presents. Neither of them expected the other to get them anything, but Mike supposes it all checks out fine that way. Will laughs at the tiny Will the Wise that Mike has drawn, and pulls him in for a hug after he opens his present, and Mike holds onto him, fingers curled on his back, for a bit longer than necessary. Will has gotten Mike a book, and Mike reads the small message he has scribbled on the inner cover four times: For Mike. Merry Christmas! I hope your elitist literary brain will like this - the main character reminds me a lot of you. Thanks for being the best roommate and friend. Love, Will.

He runs his interfinger over “love, Will” as if it can imprint itself onto his skin, as if it can sink through it and enter his bloodstream if he does it enough.

“It isn’t much but-“ Will starts to say, and this time Mike is the one pulling Will into him with his free hand, the other one holding the book pressed between them.

“It’s perfect, I love it. Thank you Will.” he mutters into the crook of Will’s neck, and they’ve done this - embracing - so many times lately, it is as if Mike’s body is beginning to memorize how Will’s feels against his, how his ribs are aligned in comparison to his own, where his heart beats against Mike’s.

They spend the rest of the evening trying out the presents like little kids who have received toys. Will draws and paints tiny landscapes and sketches portraits, Mike reads while he’s actually just thinking about love, Will and love and Will and they’ve put on a record Jonathan has gifted Will. Will tries to teach Mike how to draw with charcoals with no luck, and Mike tries to convince Will to draw him, and Will does, both of them sitting on the couch, backs leant against the armrests, legs bent and slotted between each other like jigsaw pieces, Will drawing and Mike reading, but he refuses to let Mike see it no matter how much he begs and whines and pouts and pretends to be mad.

"You're a horrible actor," says Will through a fond laugh because Mike is grinning at him, finds he can't stop looking at his face. It's the end of December, the weather is shitty, and Mike is so in love with Will.

On New Years Eve, Mike almost stays home from a party in favor of staying home with Will, but Will insists that he goes, so he does. Maybe it's because it's a smaller party, or because Mike is feeling so much lighter these days, but the night doesn't end in total disaster, for once. He gets pleasantly buzzed, just enough for his limbs and his mouth to loosen.

He's having fun, but Mike's sure it would've been much more fun if Will was there, so at midnight he calls Will because he needs to wish him a happy new year, urgently so. Not just a happy new year, but the happiest new year ever. Will huffs out a laugh into his ear and it makes Mike's spine tingle.

"Happy New Year, Mike. Are you having fun?"

He tells him that he is, while simultaneously realizing he kind of wants to go home now because talking to Will has made him miss him.

"Could you come get me? I wanna go home."

"What, why? Is something the matter?" asks Will, worry creeping into his voice and Mike shakes his head even though he knows Will can't see him.

"Just tired," he says, while not sounding that tired at all. Will is by the entrance twenty minutes later, looking at Mike with a question in his gaze and Mike thinks he has never been happier to see him (which might be a lie). He grins at him, wide and toothy, while he puts on his coat.

"Will! I'm so glad you came!" he says, throws his arms around Will in a quick, but tight, embrace.

"Well, who am I to deny the Mike Wheeler?" says Will into his ear, indulging him. Mike really likes the way Will says his name, the way the syllables roll off his tongue. Mike Wheeler. He wishes he'd say it all the time. Mike.

Mike lets go of him, throws a hasty goodbye over his shoulder to no one in particular, and then he's ushering Will out the door. The air is freezing outside, but completely still, as if to make up for the cacophony of noise and blinding lights and colors of the fireworks. They walk across the parking lot to Mike's car, and Mike’s gaze flicks to Will every time they walk under a streetlamp just to watch his silhouette bathe in the soft glow. Every now and then, Will looks back at him to meet his gaze, and his eyes crinkle at the corners while he knocks his shoulder against his.

Mike hums along to the songs on the radio while Will drives, and he admits that he really likes music but feels weird about practicing while Will is home, to which Will laughs.

"It's not weird. I don't mind." he says, and then they're home, the cracks and pops of fireworks dulling behind the closed door. They hook scarves and coats and hats on the coatrack.

“Do you wanna go to bed now?” asks Will him.

"Not really."

Will makes two cups of hot chocolate instead, and Mike, perched on the counter like a little kid, watches him dunk an unhealthy amount of marshmallows and whipped cream onto Mike's because he knows that’s how he prefers it.

Mike sips at his mug, immediately scalds his tongue. "Ow," he says.

"You're an idiot," Will points out. He waits for Mike to finish blowing onto the surface of the hot chocolate, before he speaks again. "Are you gonna tell me what all that was about? Back at the party?

Mike shrugs earnestly, swings his legs. "What d'you mean?"

"Did something happen? Why did you want to leave so early?"

Mike shrugs again, worry-free in a way he normally isn't. Will sounds a little concerned, a light frown marring his delicate features, and the way he cares makes Mike soar. "Nothing happened. I just wanted to be here instead."

"At home? But wouldn't it be boring?"

"No, because you're here," says Mike matter-of-factly, and watches Will's eyes shine with amusement and something else. Fondness, maybe. Mike hopes it is. "You're way cooler than all of them combined, anyways." he adds just so he can watch Will's mouth pull up at the corners. And because it's true. None of the people in Mike's life held a candle to Will when it came to coolness - well, maybe El, obviously, and maybe Nancy, as much as it pains him to admit.

"That's really sweet of you to say," Will tells him, and heat spreads from Mike's neck, causing him to flush a brilliant red. "Let's watch a movie? You can pick which one."

Mike hops down from the counter, somehow makes it to their VHS shelf without spilling his hot chocolate and chooses A New Hope because he's seen it so many times he has it memorized, which means he can sneak glances at Will through the entire movie without getting completely lost in the plot. Outside, the entire city is celebrating the new year, but Mike frankly couldn't care less - he doesn't even care for watching the fireworks, knows that he'd much rather look at Will, that his gaze would stray to him involuntarily, like how a compass needle always points towards north, how a sunflower always follows the sun.

On January 1st, Mike wakes in his room, warm and toasty. Way more than usual, in fact. It takes him a few seconds of groggy blinking before he realizes his gangly limbs are wrapped around Will.

Huh, he thinks, still trying to break through the fog in his mind. His head feels heavy. He is suddenly, violently jerked out of his daze; the realization kicks in all at once: he is wrapped around Will. Like he's some fucking moss growing on a rock. They're cuddling.

His heartbeat spikes, palpitates. Fuck, had he done something embarrassing last night? He goes through the entire night in his head, hopes and prays he didn't say anything weird: he'd left the house around seven, had hung around until midnight where he'd phoned Will and had all but demanded him to drive him home. Will had made hot chocolate, and Mike's tongue feels strange; sore, as if he has burnt it, which, upon second thought, he has. They'd watched a movie, and Mike had spent most of it just staring shamelessly at Will. After the movie - and Mike cringes at this - Mike had practically dragged Will into his room so they could have a sleepover, "just like the old times", and because they'd had one in Will's room already, "so it was only fair".

Great. He'd been about as transparent as he could possibly be. What the fuck is wrong with him? He hadn't even been that drunk. And here's Will, tangled up in Mike's overgrown limbs; he'd indulged Mike's whims, as always. Mike lets out a long sigh and attempts to remove himself from Will's very warm body, but the movement causes him to stir awake, and Mike's heart sits in his throat.

"Mike?" he croaks, voice low and scratchy from disuse, hair all messy from sleep, and god. It isn't fair. Nothing about Will has ever been fair.

"Hey," whispers Mike.

Will smiles softly up at Mike, and it makes Mike pleasantly warm in the face. "Hi."

It's a slow morning - or well, noon. They make scrambled eggs for breakfast, and eat them with an obscene amount of syrup on them, a preference they both had picked up as children. They wash up, smiling contentedly to each other in the bathroom mirror. They do the dishes, the ones from breakfast and the cups from last night, and Mike watches the leftover hot chocolate empty down the sink, wonders whether it's possible to be content while also wanting more, like how being with Will like this makes him happy and sad at the same time: happy because it's Will, and sad because it's not, well. More.

Maybe life is all about coexisting contradictions, and maybe he just needs to accept that, because there is no way in hell that he is jeopardizing the friendship that he and Will have rebuilt, all because he'd so foolishly fallen in love with him and couldn't go one second without being selfish.

But, whispers the voice, what if you aren't jeopardizing anything? What if he wants it too?

And Will's shy smiles might just be enough to convince him. How gentle he is with Mike, the way he had looked at him last night, gazes meeting under the the glow of streetlights. The way he had put his hand on top of Mike's in the car, told him let me do the same for you. The way he hasn't pushed Mike away, not yet, even when Mike feels like he is being mortifyingly transparent with his feelings.

(I guess we're on the same page, then.

Yeah, I guess we are.)

Mike's scrubbing the cup Will had used last night when he bursts: "I need to tell you something." It's out of his mouth before he even knows what he's going to say. There's a brief silence.

"Oh-kay?" says Will after a few beats, tone cautiously alarmed, dishes all but forgotten.

"Uhm," starts Mike, finds himself at a total loss at what to say, continues scrubbing the cup like an idiot for lack of anything better to do with his hands. "Okay. Uhm. Shit, this is harder than I thought it'd be."

"Mike, you-"

"It's about last night." Mike cuts in, rinses the cup under the tap. "You asked me why I wanted to leave so early, and I said it was because I'd rather be at home."

Will hums to let him know he's listening, takes the clean cup from Mike's hand to wipe it dry. "I didn't even want to go to that stupid party at first, I just wanted to be here. And it's not that I just really hate going places, or that I just really love this apartment- I mean, all of that is true I guess, but-"

Oh god, what is he even doing.

"Uhm, what I'm trying to say is that, uhm, living here with Johnny was different from living here with you. With Johnny this was just like. A normal apartment, you know? You're what makes this feel like home. And if you had come with me yesterday I wouldn't have wanted to leave."

There's a brief silence; Mike's words, their implications settle over them. He's too mortified to utter out the words he now realizes are true, that Will is his home; that the apartment scarcely matters in this equation because it's all Will, but he must get it because he always does.

"Mike," mutters Will, and there's a warm, rough hand on the side of his face, gently urging him to turn his head, to look at Will. Like nature, like the tide answering the moon, Mike does, angles his entire body towards Will's so they're facing each other, puts his hand on top of Will's where it's cradling the side of his face. Will's staring at him like Mike has handed him the answer to the universe, and to Mike, he's breathtaking. He stops fighting it, this greedy wanting that crawls along his spine and sits at his fingertips and cover his lungs; he removes his hand from atop of Will's so he can take his face in his hands, steps closer until they’re mere inches apart and Mike can see every speck of color in Will’s eyes.

“Is this okay?” he mutters, can barely hear himself over the blood rushing in his ears. Instead of replying, Will closes the gap between them, puts his hands on Mike’s shoulders.

Mike isn’t entirely sure what he’d expected kissing Will would be like. Maybe like something to be taken well care of, to be held carefully. And it is, at first; their first kiss is hesitant, shy, closemouthed, schoolyard-like as if both of them are afraid the other is going to bolt if pushed too far. They separate, but Mike rests his forehead against Will’s, lips ghosting lips, one hand moving to the back of Will’s neck, and he is so utterly sick with love, feels it overflow.

Will’s lips meet his again, bolder this time, and he feels Will’s fingers on the back of his head, tangled in his hair, and one of them, he isn’t sure who, deepens the kiss, and Mike can taste syrup and cigarette smoke and Will on his tongue. His hands move down Will’s waist to pull him closer, closer, he wants Will’s warmth to envelop him until it's all he feels.

He parts his mouth from Will’s briefly, “Come here,” he mutters against his lips, pulls him against him while he backs up against the kitchen counter, feels them pull into a smile against his own, Will's huffs of fond laughter hot against his mouth. They're kissing again, Mike’s hands resting on Will’s waits, thumbs slipping under his sweatshirt to make a home there, and everything about this feels right. Like they belong in each others' arms. Will bites Mike’s lower lip, soothes with a lick of his tongue in a way that makes Mike dizzy, and he lets out an embarrassing whimper which Will swallows with his mouth.

They separate again, this time so Will can press openmouthed kisses down Mike’s jaw, and holy shit, Mike thinks he might be on fire. Will snorts into Mike’s neck.

“That’s cute,” he mumbles into the juncture between Mike’s neck and shoulder, causing Mike to redden – he might’ve said that out loud. He’d never claimed his brain-to-mouth filter was any good; it hadn't been any good last night when he'd been slightly buzzed on cheap beer, and it isn't good now, not when his mind is all hazy like this, clouded, drunk on this boy he has spent weeks longing for.

“Shut up,” Mike lies. He never wants Will to stop talking, he could listen to him talk about anything, even if it’s at his expense. Will presses his lips against his in a short peck that feels embedded, like routine already.

“Never,” he whispers. The way he gazes at Mike drips with affection and the sheer honesty of it sort of makes Mike wish Will would look at him forever. It makes him want to hide and never come out again at the same time. No one has ever looked at him like Will is doing right now, not even El; as if he can truly see him, every single thing that makes Mike Mike. As if he still wants him, despite it. Will's gaze cuts him right to the bone, and he dissolves like a wave crashing against a shore. He’s sure he’s looking back at Will like he has hung the stars and the moon in the sky, but the saying seems inadequate somehow, because Mike knows that he would be the one to hang them for Will. He would do anything for him, anything to see him happy.

“Never,” agrees Mike, pulls Will back against his mouth with an insistent tug at the front of his shirt, retaliates with a scrape of his teeth against Will’s lower lip, sucks on his tongue, and Will lets out this sweet sound that Mike wants to replay until he grows utterly sick of it. I love you, he thinks, and he says it out loud too, mumbled against Will’s lips like he’s entrusting him with a secret, and this time it isn’t something that escapes him at the heat of the moment, this time it’s a choice. He loves him. It has always been a choice for Mike, always.

“I love you,” tells Will him – a secret for a secret. “I have since we were kids. It’s always been you.”

Will caresses Mike’s cheek with a thumb and Mike wonders how he could've ever thought, just for a second, that they wouldn’t have found their way back to each other, eventually – they were intertwined, not because of fate or destiny, but because they’d chosen it. They’d chosen each other on that day by the swing set, they’d chosen to stick by each others side through the worst supernatural horrors the universe could offer, and they’d chosen to reopen the doors to each others’ lives after years of keeping them closed shut. It’s second-nature; it is easy. Will makes it so, so easy to choose him, to love him.

And when Will looks at him, eyes shining with unfiltered adoration, he knows, without a doubt, that he’ll choose him again, in a million other lifetimes.