Archive of Our Own

Chapter Text

“What?” Will whispered shyly, unable to meet his eyes as he nuzzled further against Mike’s long fingers gently caressing his cheek, while he held Will’s face in place with his other hand.

Mike leaned closer, their noses touching, his breath ghosting against Will’s lips.

“You’re mine, Will Byers.”

He could hardly believe it was happening. It felt like a romantic scene from a cheesy movie, where the girl and the boy are unable to hold back their feelings for each other anymore—their desires taking over rational thought in a way that had them doing something stupid and impulsive.

“I am…I am…” Will murmured back, the words heavy and aching.

Will felt his back dig into the wooden surface of something like a bookshelf as Mike held him flush against him and pushed him into a dark, quiet corner of what looked like one of the shelves in their high school’s library.

A sharp gasp escaped his mouth—Will didn’t expect Mike to push him so hard, and he reached out with both hands for Mike’s shoulders to steady himself.

It was difficult to decipher the expression on Mike’s face, most of it hidden in shadow except for the faint glimmer in his dark eyes and the upward tilt in the corners of his familiar mouth—as he removed his hands from Will’s face, dragging them over his shoulders and arms before bringing them down to hold his wrists.

“Mike…” Will whined, embarrassed at the way the simple gesture of gripping his wrists had him shivering from the touch, his mouth leaning in further instinctively.

“Shhh…” The shushing disappeared against Will’s mouth as Mike closed the gap between them, by pressing his lips against Will’s.

Will felt his heartbeat stutter and pick up in an enticing rhythm, unable to hold back the nervous thrill of experiencing his first kiss with the boy of his dreams.

He held his breath, his thoughts slightly racing to figure out what he should try to do next to make the kiss feel good and satisfying enough for Mike.

Will tried to apply a little more pressure against Mike’s mouth, hesitating slightly before attempting something more. He’d seen it in a movie once, where the guy would part his own lips slightly and use the movement to nip at the girl’s bottom lip. Although Will wanted to know what it would feel like to have that be done to him, his heart was hammering against his ribs so nervously he wanted to make sure he could impress Mike with this one kiss. In the hopes that if he was good enough, maybe he’d like to kiss Will again.

With his hands still pinned to his sides in Mike’s grip, Will tried to lean his torso further into Mike’s space and use the moment to part his own lips.

Just when he was about to do so, Mike suddenly tightened his hold on his wrists and pressed harder against Will’s mouth—making Will freeze in place, and not out of his own volition.

“Mm-ike…” Will tried to say against the incessant press of Mike’s lips against his.

The heat in his veins was replaced by a cold chill, a kind of glacial parasite snaking up his arms and legs and up his spine, percolating offensively in the nape of his neck.

Will had never kissed anyone before. But he knew instantly, in this moment, that something was wrong.

He squeezed his eyes shut reflexively against the forcefulness of Mike’s actions, the grip on his wrists turned painful and the sensation of his lips against his felt oppressive instead of freeing.

“M-Mike, s-stop.”

Suddenly, he felt the absence of Mike’s lips from his, and Will inhaled a rattling breath as he tried to pull his hands back to himself.

“…you’re h-hurting me…”

Will snapped his eyes open to stare into the grotesque, twisted physique of the person that had tainted his soul forever.

“No….NO—” Will tried to shuffle backwards and ended up hitting his back against something that made an ugly, squelching noise, his mouth trembling and his eyes already swelling up with tears.

They were back in that library full of slimy vines and disgusting extensions of the Upside Down, a room that seemed both familiar and yet new, like a shadowed memory from a time that Will had tried to forget so badly for so long.

Gone was the familiar yet twisted touch and presence of his best friend, as Vecna lifted the corners of his mutilated mouth in an ominous grin while he flicked one of his clawed fingers in a quick motion.

Vines shot out of the wall behind him and wrapped around Will’s torso, arms, and legs in rapid succession, tightening their hold on him and lifting him up higher against the wall.

“NO!!!!” Will screamed as tears gushed down his face and his voice broke helplessly on the words as he struggled in vain against the vines tightening further.

“HELP! MIKE, PLEASE—SOMEONE HELP!!!”

“Haven’t you learned by now, William?” Vecna sighed, his voice tapering down slightly in a way that made him sound more like Henry.

Henry paused, cocking his head slightly and anticipating some kind of response from Will, who continued to cry, shaking against the vines—his body already forgetting the warmth of Mike’s torso against his.

“You are mine.” Henry enunciated the words with a terrifying precision, making Will freeze in his frantic movements to escape.

“My subject. My beneficiary. My ingénue.”

Henry twisted his face into a grimace-adjacent expression that was meant to be a veiled smile.

“W-what?” Will asked in a terrified whisper.

“Mike will never need or want you…” Henry exhaled unnaturally like the eldritch abomination he was.

Will opened his mouth to say something in frantic retaliation, but the sounds never left him as Henry flicked a finger on his clawed hand again—making a vine shoot out from somewhere next to Will’s waist, striking like a viper in the direction of his face before it opened up like a spider’s web and clamped down on his mouth.

“…but I do.”

Will watched in gut-wrenching horror, recoiling in vain from the revolting sensation of the vine over his mouth, as he followed the familiar, shadowy particles trickle through its translucent insides, moving quickly in the direction of his face.

***

On Friday morning, Mike woke up to the sound of Will stirring awake next to him with a guttural, wheezing inhale, like he had emerged through the surface of a deep body of water.

“Will!” Mike exclaimed in panic, his hands already reaching for Will’s wrist out of habit.

Before Mike could grab hold of him, Will was already shirking out of his grip and clambering out of bed on unsteady legs, making noises from the back of his throat like he was about to be really sick.

“Hey hey hey, Will, oh my god—” Mike jumped out of bed, running out of the room after him as Will rushed to the bathroom across the hall.

It must have been past 6 a.m. already because Nancy was rinsing out her mouth after brushing at the sink with the door open.

“What’s going—” Nancy began, before gasping lightly as Will bolted into the bathroom, pushing her aside a little too firmly in a way that was unfamiliar for him.

Will immediately dropped to his knees in front of the toilet, throwing the lid open and hurling what looked like the entire contents of the previous night’s dinner into it.

Mike crouched down behind him and placed a tentative hand on Will’s back, rubbing up against it with a nervous palm, feeling his back muscles shudder slightly from another wave of vomit being emptied out.

“Will, what happened?” Mike heard Nancy ask from behind him, her voice thick with worry and concern as she used the counter for support to lean towards the two of them on the floor. “What’s wrong??”

Mike remained silent over his hammering heartbeat, words failing him as he watched Will wipe his mouth with the back of his hand before reaching over to flush the toilet. He leaned back slightly to sit down fully on the tiled floor of the bathroom as he shuffled across from it, with Mike’s help, to lean against the edge of the bathtub.

Mike felt his knees give away at the sweaty, haunted pallor of his best friend’s face, the way those familiar hazel eyes glanced at him and Nancy once before darting back to a spot on the floor, his chest still heaving from the aftermath of the nausea.

Mike knew that look on his face. He had it memorised and etched on the pages of every worrying thought and anxious nightmare he had over Will’s safety, from the moment they had stepped back into Hawkins.

“It was him, wasn’t it?” Mike said quietly, his hand on Will’s shoulder sliding down slowly all the way to lightly close over his wrist, briefly stroking over his pulse point with a featherlight touch.

Will’s gaze snapped to Mike’s fingers on his wrist, his terror-paled lips parting in uncertainty as he continued to look down at it with a disbelieving expression.

Mike felt his heart clench painfully as Will looked up from their hands with a trembling mouth and eyes brimming with tears—to nod his head slowly.

“Oh, Will…” Nancy said sadly, and Mike could hardly hear the words over the visceral thrumming of every single cell in his body to reach over, pull Will into his arms, and cradle his head against his chest.

He began to open his mouth to say something when he heard footsteps scuffling by the doorway.

“WILL!” Jonathan cried out loudly, one of the rare times he raised his voice ever in the house, as he shot into the bathroom, dropping right next to Mike on the floor.

Will crumbled immediately into Jonathan’s open arms, tears escaping him with a kind of safety that only the embrace of his big brother could provide him.

Mike leaned his back against the bathtub, still sitting on the floor as he exchanged a worried look with Nancy before his gaze travelled to the door, to find Finn and Noah lingering by the doorway close to each other—the sight perpetually jarring and bitter to Mike.

“It’s okay…you’re okay…I’m here…” Jonathan mumbled the words into Will’s hair as he held him tightly and let his little brother fall apart in the safety of his arms.

***

Despite Jonathan and Mike’s nagging at the breakfast table, Finn nervously peered at Will over his morning coffee, who was insistent on turning down their suggestions to skip school that day.

“Please drop it, guys!” Will said tiredly as he furiously cut into his breakfast sausage and scrambled eggs. “I cannot miss AP Art today, okay? I promised Laura I would be there.”

Finn’s gaze flitted immediately to Mike, taking in the way Will’s words immediately shut him up, his face falling with a sharp rejection that was obvious to anyone in the room except Will apparently.

Everyone ate in silence for the rest of the meal, with Jonathan darting the occasional worried glance at his brother.

Soon, it was time for Mike and Will to leave for school, but they lingered at the sink in the kitchen, rinsing out their plates for a while longer than necessary.

“Try to take it a little easier today, okay?” Noah smiled at him softly as he patted the back of his head twice before dropping his rinsed plate into the dishwasher.

Will’s gaze went slightly vulnerable at Noah’s gesture, nodding back gently at him with a small smile of his own, before the latter excused himself to go to the bathroom upstairs.

The whole room waited in awkward silence, pretending to be busy with their meals or chores as they all paused to listen to the sound of the bathroom door shutting close upstairs.

“Okay, so—” Nancy began in a sharp whisper as she beckoned Will and Mike silently back to the dining area.

“After you guys are done with school, Will, you will—”

“—bike straight to Steve’s and wait for Robin and Finn to show up.” Will finished for her.

“Perfect! Mike, you’re going to—”

“…stay at home and keep Noah distracted, tell him that Finn’s left with you and Jonathan to talk to Hopper at the Squawk or something—okay, I honestly don’t get why I have to be the one to do that? Why can’t you stay here while I go with Will to Steve’s?” Mike scowled at Finn, folding his arms irritatedly over his chest.

“Dude, I told you—I want to pick out an outfit for Noah for the party. He’s kind of got the same preppy style as Steve going on. I’d rather pick something from there than have you guys spend unnecessary money on us again…” Finn trailed off uncertainly, glancing at Nancy for help.

“Why do you need Will to go with you? Just do it yourself! I don’t understa—” Mike began exasperatedly, the scowl never leaving his face as he glared at Finn.

“Mike!” Nancy snapped, already at the end of her patience first thing in the morning. “Are you stupid? How would you know what Noah would like?”

“I’m going to try on the stuff he picks so Finn can check how it’d fit on him…” Will trailed off, looking perplexed as to what was so difficult for Mike to understand.

“No, but I—” Mike stuttered at the logic in his words, and Finn had to purse his lips to not obnoxiously chuckle right at his increasingly flustered expression. “Finn can just tell me now what he likes and I’ll figure it out, I’ll radio him and—”

“I don’t think that’ll work,” Jonathan cut in, glancing at Mike with a strange look in his eyes. “Noah’s always around Finn, he might overhear him speaking on the walkie…”

“My plan is perfect, Mike. Do not mess with it, or you’re getting zero alcohol at this party.” Nancy aimed a dangerous, pointed glare at her little brother.

“Yeah alright, whatever…” Mike grumbled, darting a nervous glance at Finn before going back to staring at Will like a lovesick puppy from the corner of his eye.

Seriously, how was Will missing all of this?

Finn watched as Mike glanced back one last time at him with what was supposed to be a threatening look apparently, before he trailed behind Will towards their bikes in the garage and set off for school.

***

“You have a…walk-in closet?” Will asked with a stunned expression, as he stood between Robin and Finn—all three of their jaws dropping in unison at what was practically another bedroom attached to Steve’s room.

“Why?” Steve nervously glanced at them while he pulled the shutter-style doors wide open before flipping the lights on inside the closet. “Is—is it tacky to have one?”

“Sometimes…your wealth makes me feel physically ill, Steve.” Robin shuddered in an over-the-top way that made Finn chuckle out loud.

She walked ahead of all of them, shoving Steve’s head out of her way a little too forcefully.

“Hey!” Steve barked back with an affronted tone. “Watch the hair!”

Will followed behind the group hesitantly as Robin began opening every drawer and compartment built into the walls, wedged between Steve’s attempts to stop her from messing with his ‘system’ and Finn, who was completely zoned in on the task at hand as he made a beeline for the section full of striped polos and sweaters.

He lingered by the doorway as Robin began teasing Steve about owning multiple pairs of the same Nike shoes, wondering if his input was needed in any way when Finn suddenly turned around with a warm smile on his face and beckoned him over with a wave of his hand.

Will felt a sudden, embarrassing blush rise to his cheeks for no reason as he slowly walked over to him. Sometimes, when Finn smiled at him like that, it reminded him a lot of Mike during the campaigns they’d played after he’d come back from the Upside Down.

Will would be seated across from him as always, and Mike would be tormenting Dustin or Lucas through an especially frustrating bit in their character storylines. And when they were screaming and shouting between themselves to figure out their next move, Mike would peer over the cover of his D&D manual and aim a soft, indulgent grin across the table—just for Will. Will would always thank his lucky stars that his own manual was big enough to cover his furiously red cheeks and that Mike had no idea about the million butterflies jumping around in his stomach.

“This red, stripey, long-sleeved one, with these khakis?” Finn held them up by their hangers towards Will. “What do you think?”

“Oh, uh…” Will swallowed nervously. “I don’t really—um, I thought you knew what Noah liked?”

“Oh, I do.” Finn replied, glancing at Will once before pulling out another one of Steve’s long-sleeved polos, this time a blue and yellow striped one to compare with the previous one. “But you’re trying them on. I don’t want you to wear anything you’d feel uncomfortable with, y’know?”

Will’s eyes widened slightly at his words, his chest twisting painfully in envy for a passing second at the thought of Noah being on the receiving end of such unending casual consideration in their romantic relationship.

“I’m fine with trying anything that’s not… you know, hard to move in…” Will trailed off, darting a shy glance in the direction of Steve before he reached out a hand to graze against the row of Steve’s high-waisted, tight-fitting denim jeans hanging in the section next to the polos.

Finn followed Will’s line of sight before meeting his gaze again.

“Got it.” He chuckled lightly before moving to the row of formal shirts and ties.

After a few more minutes of tossing clothes onto Steve’s bed and arranging them into different outfit combinations, Will was handed them one by one to try on so Finn could pick one for Noah.

Steve was taller than both Will and Noah by a couple of inches, so most of the pants weren’t working. Rolling up the khakis at the ankles made every outfit look noticeably less cool, no matter how well Finn layered the formal shirts under the polos.

When Will finally suggested loaning Noah a pair of his old tan trousers that could pass for khakis, Finn settled on a striped white-and-burgundy long-sleeved polo from Ralph Lauren, paired with a faintly blue-striped formal shirt underneath and a dark navy tie.

“Steve, why do you have two of these?” Robin suddenly asked, still rummaging through the drawers without a care in the world.

“I swear to god Robin, stop moving my shit around!” Steve snapped at her as he attempted to snatch two white boxers with red hearts on them from her hands, as she waved them over her head like a rogue cowboy, with a disgusted expression on her face.

“Again—why do you have two of these?” Robin cackled, using her leg to threaten to kick Steve in the nuts as she kept dangling the items in front of his face.

“Dude, unironically?” Finn laughed out loud at them, the question hanging in the air as Will trailed behind him with pursed lips as he tried to fight back a smile.

“Whatever, I don’t need to explain anything to any of you…” Steve grumbled finally snatching the boxers from Robin, who was collectively guffawing with Finn—before haphazardly opening one of the drawers closest to him shove them deep inside it.

“Yeah yeah yeah, just wait until I find a way to include this little tidbit into one of my broadcasts—” Robin started.

“You wouldn’t—” Steve warned, eyeing her with a comically vexed look in his eyes.

Steve was about to finish the rest of his threat as Robin narrowed her eyes at him with a viciously goading expression, when the landline on Steve’s nightstand suddenly began to ring.

He let out a disgruntled huff toward Robin before going over to the phone and picking it up.

“Harrington residence.” Steve spoke into the receiver. “Who is this?”

There was a small pause as Steve listened to the other person on the call, while Finn took the pile of selected clothes from Will and placed it into a bag Robin had found somewhere in the closet.

“Fine, hold on—” Steve responded irritably before setting the receiver aside on the mattress of his bed. “Will, it’s for you.”

Will exchanged a confused glance with Finn before looking back at Steve.

“Who is it?”

“Mike.” Steve exhaled tiredly before going back to Robin to resume their petty squabble.

Will could feel Finn staring curiously at him from the corner of his eye as he walked over to the bed and sat down, before picking up the receiver.

“Hello?” Will asked uncertainly, wondering why he’d called. “Mike?”

“Hey, Will!” Mike’s voice was a tad too high-pitched for some reason, and Will had no idea why.

“Hi….”

“Hey…”

“Um. You already said that, Mike.” Will said, confusion evident in his tone. “Why are you calling?”

Will heard Finn chuckle lightly under his breath from next to him as he folded an outfit on the bed he had selected for himself from Steve’s wardrobe.

“No reason, uh—just wanted to know if you guys are done already or not…” Mike said, his voice suddenly turning down into a whisper. “How much time does it take to pick a—HEY, DO NOT TOUCH THAT, what the hell???”

Will jumped at Mike’s sudden yell into the call, flinching away from the receiver.

“What happened???” Will asked at the disturbance from Mike’s end. “Is Noah okay?”

Will immediately sensed Finn’s fingers pause on the fabric of the shirt he was folding, his head snapping alertly in his direction.

“What? No, nothing happened to him!” Mike huffed exasperatedly from the other end. “All your concern should be directed to me, actually! I invited Noah downstairs to the basement to play some Mario, and—HEY, THAT’S A SPECIAL EDITION, DON’T TAKE IT OUT OF THE SLEEVE, ARE YOU INSANE?”

Will flinched away from the receiver yet again, his eyebrows raised in a mix of perplexed amusement.

“Please keep him distracted for a little longer—we’re nearly done here.” Will replied, his voice as placating as possible.

“Hey Finn, what about this polo, though? Don’t you think Will would look cuter in this one? I’ve kinda felt primary colours were always his thing, and—” Robin came over by the bed and began filibustering on the merits of tucking shirts into pants.

Mike hadn’t said anything for two whole seconds, so Will assumed the conversation had already reached its conclusion.

“See you in a bit, bye—”

“...cuter?” Mike asked, his voice sounding strained. “Why is Robin asking him that?”

“What?” Will had already begun to pull the receiver away from his ear, so he’d missed the first part of Mike’s response.

“Mike, what are you saying?” Will pulled the phone back against his ear. “Sorry, I missed it—”

“No wait, yeah, I think he’d look adorable in that, actually!” Finn suddenly exclaimed as he took the hanger from Robin and held it against Will’s shoulder. “Wait, Will, could you try this one on for yourself, please…?”

“Okay, what the hell is going on over there????” Mike’s voice slightly cracked on the words, and Will was bewildered as to why he was panicking.

“Yeah, okay, I’ll try it—” Will nodded sheepishly at Finn and Robin. “Mike, I’m sorry, I gotta go now, see you soon!”

Will dropped the receiver back onto the landline and let himself be pushed by Robin into the en-suite bathroom to try on another one of Steve’s striped ensembles.

***

“Finn?”

“Mm?”

“Why am I dressed like Steve Harrington?” Noah whispered in Finn’s ear as they sat huddled in the back seat of Karen’s wagon, under the cover of several blankets to hide from being caught on the military CCTV feed on Maple Street. “In fact…why is everyone—”

“We’re going to a meeting at the Squawk.” Finn interjected with a whisper, and Noah could practically hear the giddy smile in his words. “Tonight’s dress code is 80s-preppy-wimbledon-chic-slash-steve-harrington.”

Noah turned his head to aim a deadpan look at his genius boyfriend.

“…and I’m assuming it has nothing to do with the fact that today’s October 3rd?”

“Oh my god Noah, be quiet—” Finn hissed playfully, his lips a hairbreadth away from Noah’s in a way that had him shaking his head slightly in amusement. “You’re going to ruin your own—ugh just pretend, please?”

“I’ll try…” Noah trailed off. “It would be helpful if I had the appropriate skill on my resume to help me do that, hmm…”

Noah shimmied further into their huddle and dropped his voice lower, hoping that Mike and Will wouldn’t hear them at all from the middle seat ahead of them.

“What will I get in return?” He asked Finn, putting on an innocent voice. “After putting on my best performance?”

Finn pulled his head back a little to give him a look that meant trouble. He then leaned in really, really close to Noah’s ear and whispered something very quickly that had Noah’s cheeks flaming and his pants feel slightly tighter immediately.

“Finn!” Noah gave him a flustered smack on his thigh, a sound which was not at all subtle and ricocheted throughout the entire vehicle.

“You asked for it!” Finn chuckled, as Noah heard a series of awkward throat-clearing and the volume of the car radio being turned up suddenly.

When the wagon stopped at its destination, Noah used all his mental strength to keep his expression neutral and unassuming as possible while Jonathan and Nancy made an excuse to rush to the basement to grab something, while not-so-subtly making gestures at Mike and Will to stall for a few minutes as they helped Finn and him out of the back seat.

Noah took Finn’s hand as he jumped out of the back of the wagon. The scarlet neon light of the WSQK cast all of them in a kind of blood-red moonlight against the fully darkened sky of an early October evening.

Will was wearing a red-and-blue striped T-shirt with a denim jacket and some old acid-washed jeans that looked like they might have been bought in California. Mike was openly checking out Will with zero decorum, fully unable to hide the fact that he was clearly flustered by how good his best friend looked.

Mike, on the other hand, was wearing a navy blue and yellow striped long-sleeved polo that he’d said his mom had bought for him a year ago, the tag of which he’d never ripped open until today. Along with it, he wore his usual pair of Levi’s that he regularly wore to school. Noah could see Will was trying to steal quick glances at Mike, using the excuse of adjusting his jacket sleeves.

“Should—um, should we uh, go now?” Will asked Mike suddenly, making the latter jerk his eyes back up to the former’s face from wherever his gaze had been roving near Will’s waist.

“Uh-um. Yeah, let’s do that—uh.” Mike stuttered nervously, glancing once at him and Finn before making a gesture at Will that screamed after you.

As they followed behind the younger boys, once both of them had their backs turned to Finn and Noah, the latter turned to the former with widened eyes.

“Oh my god.” Noah mouthed silently at Finn, who was already nodding at him with a similar sentiment on his face.

“Wow.” Finn silently mouthed back, before his gaze zeroed in on Mike and Will’s backs in sheer astonishment.

Noah shrugged quietly, still reeling from Mike’s total inability to be subtle about Will, as they stopped in front of the shelves that were pushed aside by Mike to reveal the secret stairway to the basement.

Mike and Will led their little group, with Finn trailing behind Noah.

The basement was pitch dark; all the lights and every glowing clock or piece of equipment had been turned off. But Noah could still hear the odd scuffle of a shoe or a breath being held by people hiding in different parts of the room in the darkness.

Mike and Will stood near the bottom of the stairs once they reached it, and Noah caught the way Will glanced back at him with a slightly somber glint in his eyes, while Mike continued to stare at Will with such longing that Noah had to look away.

As he neared the foot of the stairs, he was just about to turn back at Finn behind him to meet his eye when the room suddenly erupted into a burst of disco-coloured lights and shouts of greeting.

“HAPPY BIRTHDAY!”

Robin and Lucas loudly blew into their party horns, while Steve, Dustin, and Jonathan in the back each set off a confetti cannon.

“OH MY GOD—” Noah jumped back in shock, nearly colliding against Finn as he found himself uncontrollably smiling ear to ear at the lengths all of them had gone to.

He was expecting something super minimal, like a sit-down pizza party, and not anything like this.

Before he could say anything, Joyce and El suddenly came over from the other side of the room and hugged him in quick succession.

“Happy birthday, sweetie!” Joyce said, patting his cheek lightly, after which El placed a party hat on him with the thin, stretchy elastic band that went under his chin.

“Happy birthday, Noah.” El said softly, and Noah’s heart immediately clenched violently at how much he missed Millie in this moment.

“Thank you, El.” Noah hugged her again, his words choking up unexpectedly. “Thank you.”

One by one, everyone in the room took their turn to hug him and wish him a happy birthday—except Mike and Hopper.

Hopper settled for a firm handshake and a sincere ‘Happy birthday kid’ with a look in his eye so genuine and grateful—as they both turned to look at El together, standing across the room from them as she animatedly spoke to Will, Dustin, and Lucas about something.

When it was Mike’s turn, he stood there awkwardly with his hands by his sides, unsure how to proceed.

“Hey, man, um. Happy birthday.” Mike scratched his cheek sheepishly as he nodded at Noah. “Sorry for yelling at you earlier about the comic book.”

“Thanks!” Noah chuckled. “ I think we’re even now, right? I tackled you, you screamed at me…”

“Yeah.” Mike laughed quietly, finally meeting Noah’s eye with a bashful expression.

Suddenly, all the conversations in the entire room began to quieten down one after another as someone dimmed the lights, and Finn carefully walked behind Nancy down the spiral staircase with a cake in his hands, topped with multiple glowing candles.

Noah gasped, his breathing going slightly unsteady as Finn glanced at him with an adoring expression over the candles and made a beckoning gesture with his head toward the table set in front of where the projector used to be, now set aside in the locked up armoury in the corner, for tonight’s festivities.

As the entire room drew closer to the table, Noah found his eyes searching for Will in the group, who stood behind Lucas and Dustin, feeling farther away than everybody else.

“Come over to this side of the table, Noah.” Nancy instructed, as she placed the knife she was holding next to the cake, which, upon further inspection, seemed to be some kind of chocolate cake with frosting that looked suspiciously like Belgian dark chocolate—his favourite.

Noah felt Finn sidle up to him, his hand rubbing the small of his back, silently encouraging him to pick up the knife. He looked up to find Finn beaming at him, the candles reflected in his dark brown eyes, making them look more like coffee instead.

“Make a wish.” Finn whispered, but the room was so quiet that practically everyone heard it.

Noah glanced at all the faces around him, the realisation finally settling inside him that very few people would be as lucky as him in this moment, to have their birthday with such a strange and impossible group of people.

He began to close his eyes, his mind wandering on what kind of wish to make, when he suddenly snapped them open—feeling like something was off.

“Wait.” Noah frowned slightly as he set the knife down.

“What’s wrong?” Joyce was the first to ask, before Nancy tagged on with an “you okay?”

Noah looked up at Finn, who was blinking back at him with confusion, not having caught on to the sudden rise of emotion inside him.

“No, nothing’s wrong. I, uh…I’ve just never…cut my birthday cake alone.” Noah admitted, pursing his lips nervously. “I’m a twin. I always hold the knife with Chloe.”

“Oh…” Nancy said awkwardly, looking around the room as if someone was going to say something.

Noah looked up at Finn again, his gaze folding in on itself in a distraught way, and Noah could tell he was silently berating himself for forgetting this specific detail.

Noah reached over, slung his arm around Finn’s waist, and gave it a small squeeze, aiming a reassuring smile at him before looking back at the room—when suddenly a thought struck him, so sharp and innate that he could hardly hold back his excitement as he searched for Will in the group again.

“But… I do have a twin in this very room.” Noah smiled at everyone cheekily. “An identical twin, in fact.”

Nancy immediately caught onto Noah’s train of thought and turned around to locate Will. Everyone’s searching gaze zeroed in on the boy as people moved out of the way to find him at the very back of the group, standing next to Mike as he nervously pulled at the edge of his denim jacket, an extremely flustered look in his eyes.

“Would you do me the honour, Will?” Noah asked, holding the knife and raising it in the air as a silent invitation.

“M-me?”

“Yes, you.” Noah laughed, endlessly endeared by Will’s self-effacing nature.

“But it’s not really my birthday…” Will said quietly, his gaze darting to Mike for a quick second before going back to him.

“I know.” Noah replied with a serious look in his eyes, “…but as the birthday boy, I declare as my wish for today that it is also your honorary birthday, and therefore you have to listen to me and help me cut this cake, or I will start crying.”

“What?” Will chuckled in disbelief, unable to help himself. “Don’t waste your birthday wish on me!”

“Uh uh uh—what did I say? My birthday, my wish! And my wish is that today is your birthday too, soooo—class, what does that mean? It’s…” Noah gestured toward the entire room playfully, as if they were his orchestra and he was their conductor.

“WILL’S BIRTHDAY TOO—” Lucas and Dustin began chanting, just as Robin chimed in with a clapping beat.

“WILL’S BIRTHDAY TOO… WILL’S BIRTHDAY TOO… WILL’S BIRTHDAY TOO… WILL’S BIRTHDAY TOO… WILL’S BIRTHDAY TOO….”

Noah and Finn began clapping and joining in with the rest of the room, and the former noted the way Jonathan and Joyce were staring at him with utterly emotional looks on their faces, their eyes already red from trying to hold back their tears.

“Okay! Okay….” Will finally relented, his face slightly red from embarrassment as Lucas and Mike pushed him toward the other side of the table to stand next to Noah.

While Lucas went back to his spot next to Dustin across the cake, Mike remained lingering by Will as he stood on Noah’s left, with Finn still by Noah on his right side.

Noah draped an arm around Will’s shoulder and pulled him closer, unable to fight the fond smile taking over his entire face, while Will looked up at him with a hesitant yet trusting look in his eyes.

“Ready?” Noah said, extending the knife in his hands, beckoning Will to place his hand over his.

“Ready.” Will smiled back, a small and precious thing, and for just a moment, Noah felt a kinship with Jonathan and relished the feeling of what it was like to have the best little brother in the whole wide world.

“Okay, candles out on three… One, two, thr—” Noah began the countdown to blow—

“Wait.” Jonathan suddenly interrupted, making both Noah and Will look up at him. “Mike, can you stand a bit closer to Will?”

“W-what?” Mike stuttered at how every pair of eyes went straight to him at Jonathan’s request.

“I want to take a picture.” Jonathan raised his camera in the air, and it was then Noah noticed the strap hanging from his neck.

“It’ll…look more symmetrical that way, you know? Since Finn’s standing close to….”
Jonathan seemed to trail off on purpose without finishing his sentence, cocking his head sideways to gesture for Mike to move closer to Will.

“Okay…” Mike said softly, and Noah exchanged a loaded look with Finn before glancing at their younger doppelgängers press their shoulders against each other.

“Alright, cool—go ahead, guys!” Jonathan aimed a thumbs-up at Noah.

“One… two… three…”

Noah and Will blew out the candles together as the entire room cheered their names and wished them a happy birthday—just as the camera flashed brightly, capturing the precious moment, frozen in time on film.

***

After the pieces of cake were cut and distributed and the first round of pizzas were demolished, everyone pretended to enjoy their carbonated sodas and water until Hopper and Joyce said their goodbyes to the rest of the group around 7.30 p.m.

The deal was that El would be allowed to party with them till 11 p.m., which would allow Hop and Joyce to have the cabin to themselves for a few hours, until Jonathan was given strict instructions to escort El through the tunnels back home before midnight.

Jonathan and Steve had decided not to drink that night, self-designating themselves as the responsible drivers and chaperones for everyone, thus allowing Robin and Nancy to indulge with the rest of the remaining group.

As soon as Hopper and Joyce climbed up the staircase and left, everyone waited ten minutes before the entire setup of the room was transformed at record speed.

“Whoa—what’s happening?”

Finn watched from a corner of the room as Nancy pulled Noah out of the path of Dustin and Steve, who were carrying the big table all the way to the back of the room and set it against the wall where the crawl images were usually projected.

“What’s happening is that the real party is about to start…right…now—” Nancy aimed a sly smile at Noah as she pointed a finger at the ceiling.

Suddenly, the entire room plunged into darkness, and the disco ball lights came back in full force, casting the entire room in vibrant shades of yellow, blue, and green.

There was a faint static sound of a speaker and mic being plugged in, followed by the tap-tap-tap noise of someone testing the microphone, before a familiar voice cleared her throat and spoke into it.

“Good evening, my fellow partygoers! It is I, your friend, entertainer, and DJ, Robin Buckley… AKA Rockin’ Robin!”

Finn met Noah’s baffled yet excited gaze from across the room, winking at him once, before helping Steve move a pair of giant mixing bowls onto the table against the wall, while the Party arranged the different sodas, juices, and bottles of alcohol that Steve and Robin had scrounged from the former’s parents’ stash, along with the supplies Nancy and Jonathan had picked up during their grocery run.

“Today’s a very special broadcast—in that it’s actually not a broadcast. This is literally a party—and I have here a strictly curated list of songs I’ve been instructed to play to keep the birthday boy entertained! Or I guess, now it’s the birthday boys….”

Robin announced as she slid the first vinyl out of its sleeve and began adjusting the record player and speaker equipment on the small table in the corner, where the radio equipment for the crawls usually sat—before pressing play on the first song.

An iconic bass-line followed, paired with a familiar beat in tandem with synth chords.

She was more like a beauty queen from a movie scene
I said, "Don't mind, but what do you mean, I am the one
Who will dance on the floor in the round?”

“Okayyyyy—”

Finn heard Noah exclaim playfully from the other side of the room before grabbing Nancy and Lucas, who were closest to him, and pulling them to the empty space in the middle of the room under the disco ball lights that was to be their dance floor for the night.

“What are you guys doing?” El asked from next to Finn as she curiously peered over the two different batches of drinks being mixed in the bowls.

“This bowl’s for anyone under 18,” Steve pointed at the bowl to the right. “I better not see any of you little shits mess with how I mixed it—yeah, I’m looking at you, Henderson…”

Dustin was standing on Steve’s other side, rubbing his hands together like a comic book villain as he exchanged a mischievous grin with El.

“We’ll see about that—” Dustin started, already reaching for one of the solo cups stacked next to the bowls, haphazardly double-dipping into both bowls and making a mess of the table over Steve’s yelling.

Dustin shirked out of Steve’s grip and swiftly knocked back the contents of the entire cup, aiming a shit-eating grin at Steve as he moonwalked backwards in the direction of the dance floor, pulling El by the hand as they laughed in tandem.

Billie Jean is not my lover
She's just a girl who claims that I am the one

Steve placed his hands on his hips, exhaling in exasperation as he watched Dustin mouth the words of the song mockingly at him before turning to others who were already dancing.

“What’s in this one?” Mike suddenly asked, and Finn jumped slightly, not realising when Mike and Will had sidled up to the drinks table next to him.

“It’s none of your business, now is it, Wheeler?” Steve redirected his irritation about Dustin toward Mike instead.

“Fuck you too?” Mike frowned back. “It was just a question!”

“Mike…” Will chided Mike, elbowing him lightly.

“Actually, I kinda do wanna know,” Finn asked Steve, a grin appearing on his face as he exchanged an amused look with Will. “Since I’m over 18…”

Finn didn’t fail to note the way Mike caught the look between them, his gaze hardening as he unconsciously edged closer to Will.

“Right, yeah. Sorry, man.” Steve tiredly shook his head at Mike’s attitude before turning to Finn. “This one’s got one part alcohol, two parts juice, and a bit of soda. The kiddos just get juice and a small splash of booze.”

Finn eyed the bottles of vodka, rum, and tequila by the 18+ bowl, followed by a bunch of juices (orange, pineapple, and lemonade) and some Sprite and 7Up—and found himself nodding and shrugging. Not too bad for a last-minute party at all.

“The small splash being a tablespoon of vodka?” Mike commented, lifting the spoon placed behind the kids’ bowl.

“Stop whining, try it first before you complain, god…” Steve dipped two red solo cups into their bowl and handed them to Mike and Will, before pouring a cup for himself and Finn from the adults’ bowl.

“Cheers.” Will said quietly along with the others as everyone sipped on their first drinks of the night.

Finn’s eyebrows raised automatically; the drink was deceptively smooth and sweet, with a sharp kick toward the end.

He poured another cup to take to Noah, eyeing Mike and Will from the corner of his eye, who were silently staring at each other over their cups, their cheeks already looking slightly flushed—either from the drinks or something else entirely.

***

Nearly an hour into the party—after more songs, more pizza, more drinks, and the occasional dance floor takeover usually led by Noah pulling a bunch of the others in to shake a leg together—there was a slight lull in the event as the big group split into two smaller ones.

You were working as a waitress in a cocktail bar
When I met you
I picked you out, I shook up and turned you around
Turned you into someone new

As the song played in the background, Finn and Noah remained on the couch across from Jonathan, Nancy, Robin, and Steve, who occupied the other chairs and sofas, as they all ate pizza to soak up the drinks they’d had in the last twenty minutes.

Meanwhile, Mike, Will, El, Dustin, and Lucas had brought down some cushions from upstairs and were playing an intense match of Jenga on the floor—a new tabletop game that had recently come out in stores, which required them to be really steady with their hands.

“El, stop cheating!!!” Mike complained, and Noah glanced over at the group to find Will and El giggling together, while she telekinetically slid out a piece from the stacked tower and shamelessly wiped blood off her nose before giving Lucas and Dustin gleeful high-fives.

“Excuse me, ladies and gents, I need to change the song—” Robin was about to get up when Finn suddenly put his hand out to stop her from doing so.

“I’ll do it this time, Robin, please sit! You’ve been on your feet this entire time—”

“Why thank you kind sir…”

Noah felt Finn absently squeeze his thigh before getting up. He also observed the way every single eye went straight to it, and how Steve snapped his gaze to Robin with raised eyebrows, an obvious look of did you see that passing between them.

Noah was feeling pleasantly giddy and floaty from the drinks, and had just opened his mouth to make a cheeky comment about their expressions when Nancy suddenly cleared her throat.

“So, Noah, where’d you learn to dance like that?”

Noah snapped his gaze toward her, a smile already tugging at his lips.

“Oh, I don’t know… I’ve always been a natural.” He waggled his eyebrows at her with a giggle, earning an amused eye-roll. “No, I, um—I’ve had a bit of practice in college. Greek life, mixers, pre-games…stuff like that.”

“Don’t forget the sweaty ragers…” Finn mumbled under his breath from the music-equipment table as he pouted, which Noah immediately reciprocated with an affectionate eye-roll.

“Oh wow, if it isn’t a veritable party animal in our midst.” Robin gasped. “How is it that you, of all people, were picked to play Will?”

“Uh…” Noah laughed, scratching his head in slight embarrassment with his free hand.

“Don’t ask him rhetorical questions, guys.” Steve suddenly interjected, taking a sip from his can of Sprite. “The answer’s obvious.”

“Oh?” Robin lifted her solo cup to take a sip. “Please enlighten us, Harrington.”

“Method acting, obviously…”

Noah side-eyed Nancy and Robin, both of whom were trying to school their expressions to keep from bursting into laughter, while Jonathan fixed Steve with a sharply judgmental look.

“Oh yeah, obviously…” Noah indulged him with an agreeable nod, hiding his smile as he took a sip from his own cup.

The night we met, I knew I needed you so
And if I had the chance, I'd never let you go
So won't you say you love me?
I'll make you so proud of me
We'll make 'em turn their heads every place we go

Finn suddenly sauntered back to the couch as a new song played in the background, hands in his pockets, making playful eye contact with Noah before plopping down beside him.

So won't you, please (be my, be my baby)
Be my little baby? (My one, and only baby)
Say you'll be my darlin' (be my, be my baby)
Be my baby now (my one, and only baby)

“Happy birthday…” Finn whispered near his ear, and Noah felt a helpless blush rise to his cheeks.

“Thanks.” Noah glanced at him with a smile, aware of the audience watching them as he sipped his drink without making eye contact with anyone.

The conversations meandered in and out as everyone kept pouring themselves drink after drink, and at some point, the entire room drifted back to the dance floor after a brief rest to resume dancing.

Noah trusted Finn with the music choices—it was mostly his thing when it came to being familiar with the catchy hits of this time period. Finn also knew what he liked and was smart about picking the kinds of songs that had him excitedly jumping to his feet.

We are young
(Heartache to heartache)
Heartache to heartache
(We stand)
We stand

The song suddenly shifted to something familiar, and it took Noah a moment to place where he’d first heard it, while Nancy and Robin pulled El up from the floor to join them in learning the dance.

No promises
(No demands)
No demands
(Love is a battlefield)
Love is a battlefield
Whoa

“Wait—13 Going on 30?” Noah turned to Finn, surprise lighting his eyes. “You remembered?”

“Of course , it’s one of your favourite movies—”

Before Finn could finish, Lucas and Dustin were already dragging Noah away to join them, following along with Nancy, who, for some reason, had Pat Benatar’s entire routine for the song memorised.

We are strong
No one can tell us we're wrong
Searching our hearts for so long
Both of us knowing
Love is a battlefield

“Jonathan, stop taking pictures!” Nancy cried in embarrassment, shielding her eyes from the rapid flashes as she guided El through the steps.

“Mike! Will!” Noah beckoned to the two of them, who were standing off to the side in the corner of the room, goggling in shock at the scene in front of them with shy, flustered expressions.

“Absolutely not—” Mike protested.

“I’m good…” Will trailed off.

“Absolutely—yes.” Noah ran up to them, grabbing their wrists and pulling them forcefully toward the middle of the room.

“NOOOOOO—” Mike practically whined the entire way, while Will’s eyes went wide as saucers as they were corralled onto the dance floor.

Finn couldn’t stop laughing beside them as Noah did his best to manhandle a shimmy out of Mike.

“This is harassment! You’re harassing me!” Mike complained. “Will! Do something!”

“What am I supposed to do?” Will finally broke into laughter as he watched Lucas and Dustin form a kind of conga line with Robin, El, and Nancy, all shimmying as they cut between them like a train through a valley.

“Give in!” Finn yelled over the music. “Give in to the music, Mike!”

Noah tipped his head back in laughter at that, tugging Finn’s hand into his and moving with him to the beat.

The loud bass-line reverberating through the enclosed space, the faint smell of fruity alcohol and pizza, and the touch of Finn’s guitar string-callused fingers against his skin made Noah forget everything for a moment.

Finn held his gaze like a silent, unspoken promise, and when their eyes finally slipped sideways, both of them stilled—just for a beat.

Will had been pulled into a two-person, improvised jive with El, whose instincts were surprisingly sharp considering how much of her life she’d spent away from regular society. He kept dissolving into giggles and the occasional burst of laughter, unable to hold onto his usual restrained composure as he was passed from El’s arms to Robin’s, then Lucas’s, before Dustin spun him again.

Meanwhile, Mike…

Mike stood still in the middle of the dance floor, watching Will with open awe and something softer beneath it—his lips parting slightly as he took in the way happiness seemed to transform Will into someone almost unrecognisable.

When I'm losing control
Will you turn me away
Or touch me deep inside?
And when all this gets old
Will it still feel the same
There's no way this will die

Mike suddenly turned his gaze, locking eyes with Noah for a second before his eyes dropped to something near Noah’s waist, flicking back and forth rapidly between that and somewhere near Finn’s shoulders.

Noah frowned in confusion as he followed Mike’s line of sight…to Finn’s hand resting at his waist, and his own hands settled around Finn’s neck as they swayed absently to the music—having completely forgotten how they’d ended up that way.

But if we get much closer
I could lose control
And if your heart surrenders
You'll need me to hold

Finn seemed to register the terrifyingly vulnerable expression on Mike’s face at the same time Noah did, their hands slowly unentangling as they watched Mike’s breathing pick up in real time—his chest rising and falling frantically as he took a step back from them.

Mike unknowingly bumped into Will behind him, turning to find Will steadying him with both hands on his shoulders.

Noah watched as Mike slowly turned back around, Will’s hands still suspended in the air—his movement causing them to graze against Mike’s back before settling lightly on his shoulders.

We are young
Heartache to heartache
We stand
No promises
No demands
Love is a battlefield

Noah froze, exchanging a quick sideways glance with Finn before they both looked back just in time to see Mike slowly raise his hands, guiding them uncertainly toward Will’s waist.

Will stood there with flushed cheeks and wide, doe-like eyes, like a deer caught in headlights, his head tilted up expectantly to meet Mike’s gaze.

We are strong
No one can tell us we're wrong
Searching our hearts for so long
Both of us knowing
Love is a battlefield

If his thoughts could be loudly broadcast through the speakers, Noah imagined everyone listening to a steady stream of “come on, Mike…MIKE, COME ON” over and over again like a steady chant.

Suddenly, the song abruptly finished, and he heard Robin say, “I’m excited for this next one!” from the other side of the room as she placed the next vinyl on the record player.

Noah felt his heart drop to his stomach in disappointment. Mike’s hands immediately dropped to his sides as the songs switched; whatever spell of bravery that Pat Benatar’s lyrics and Finn’s arms around him had cast on him—seemed to disappear in a flash.

He watched as Will’s face fell when Mike stepped back, his expression a shade between shame and guilt as he turned around and put on a smile for El and Dustin, continuing to sway from side to side slightly, while Mike remained standing there with his fists at his sides, staring at the spot where Will had stood facing him moments ago.

Noah felt Finn move to go toward Mike, but Mike swiftly turned around and made a beeline for the drinks table. He glanced in the direction of the older teens, three of whom were busy trying to forcefully pull the camera off Jonathan’s neck and make him dance—before turning back around, scooping up a cup from the adults’ drink bowl, and swallowing the entire drink in one go.

***

As the clock began to edge toward 9 p.m., Finn, Noah, and the older teens lingered around the drinks table while the younger ones took over the sofa—sprawling across it haphazardly, completely sweaty and exhausted from the previous round on the dance floor.

Finn poured himself another drink, mentally promising himself that this would be his last for the night, as he turned around to find Noah patiently listening to a slightly tipsy Robin tattle to him about how wrong Steve was about his dancing being able to attract girls at a party.

“Can you not?” Steve leaned against the wall by the drinks table as he swirled around the half-empty can of Sprite in his hand. “This is supposed to be a classy celebration.”

“So you agree? Gyrating that thing—” Robin brazenly pointed at Steve’s ass, “—is the most unsophisticated, un-classy, revolting—”

“Okay, what is the problem here?” Noah interrupted with a curious tone. “I know a thing or two about dancing with girls at a party. How bad could it be?”

Finn closed his eyes and sighed, already sensing Jonathan and Nancy’s intrigued faces side-eyeing him at this.

“Go on, then! Go on! Show us!” Robin egged Steve on gleefully, the alcohol having made her even more hyper than was usually possible.

“Hold on—let me change the music to something appropriate.”

Robin scampered off like an excited squirrel, pulled out a new vinyl, and placed it on the record player.

And you can dance
For inspiration
Come on!
I′m waiting

Robin excitedly mouthed the lyrics, her drink sloshing out of her cup as she pranced back to their group.

Get into the groove
Boy, you've got to prove your love to me, yeah
Get up on your feet, yeah, step to the beat
Boy, what will it be?

There was a pause where Steve stood there awkwardly, gesturing aimlessly in the air for a second in a motion that meant to imply “seriously?” before exhaling loudly at everyone’s patiently waiting, amused expressions.

“Fine.”

Finn watched in anticipation, unable to hold back his grin at how mind-boggling and utterly ridiculous the sight in front of him was.

Music can be such a revelation
Dancing around, you feel the sweet sensation
We might be lovers if the rhythm′s right
I hope this feeling never ends tonight

“Okay, so it kinda goes something like this…” Steve trailed off as he walked into the space under the hanging disco lights.

Finn could feel the Party on the couch automatically quieten down the conversation they were having to spectate whatever was about to happen.

Steve brought his hands out in front of him in a kind of casual club-goer dancer pose and jutted out one hip, moving his rear in a bizarre motion that was a cross between a twerk and a Pilates lunge while slowly moving in a circle on the same spot.

“Oh, fuck—” Finn wheezed out loud and literally had to turn around and push his entire face against the nearest wall, essentially putting himself on visual time-out so that he didn’t make a noise somewhere between a witch-cackle and a high-pitched giggle.

“Dude…” Jonathan said, his voice aghast, as if the act of making him use his eyes to witness that was an affront in of itself.

“Steve, what the hell is that?” Nancy said, sounding dead serious, almost contemplative, as if she couldn’t believe she used to date him at one point.

“See!” Robin exclaimed euphorically. “What did I say? WHAT did I say???”

Someone from the couch wolf-whistled really loudly, followed by a “YEAH, BABY!”

“Shut UP, Dustin!” Steve barked back, immediately making to zoom back to his previous spot by the drinks table.

“Encore, encore!” Lucas and Dustin began chanting, and before they knew it, El, Will, and Mike joined in.

“No, wait—” Noah suddenly grabbed Steve by his wrist and pulled him back to the dance floor. “I think I’ve diagnosed your problem—come here…”

Only when I'm dancing can I feel this free
At night I lock the doors, where no one else can see
I'm tired of dancing here all by myself
Tonight I want to dance with someone else

Finn frowned at Noah’s suddenly gentler tone and turned around to find him pulling Steve closer toward him.

“Ease up first, you’re too tense, Steve.” Noah chuckled. “This is a dance floor, not a basketball game. No winners, no losers. Just fun!”

“Right…” Steve replied stupidly as he straightened up slightly and swayed in tandem with Noah, who was just moving his legs right to left and then back from left to right along with the beat of the song.

“See? You already have a sense of rhythm—you’re following along just great—” Noah smiled up at him before continuing.

“So when it comes to dancing with girls, you have to understand that they don’t care about the theatrics or performance of it all—if they spot a guy who’s too wrapped up in showing they’re having a good time, you’ve already lost them there!”

“Oh…then what should I be doing?” Steve asked, sounding genuinely sincere.

“Do I have your permission to touch you?” Noah asked.

Steve nodded back dumbly, his brows furrowing slightly in confusion about what was going to happen.

Finn heard an odd crinkling sound, like something plastic being crushed, and his gaze dropped to his hand and the way it was squeezing his solo cup a little too tightly, making the remaining alcohol rise up closer to the surface as a result.

Get into the groove
Boy, you′ve got to prove your love to me, yeah
Get up on your feet, yeah, step to the beat
Boy, what will it be? (Yeah)

Noah slowly brought his hands to either side of Steve’s waist, resting them right over where his belt was threaded through the loops of his jeans waistband.

“Try to move to the beat of the song.” Noah murmured.

The sound of his voice shot straight to somewhere south of the waistband of Finn’s own jeans, along with something green and fiery roiling in his stomach at the recipient of it being someone else.

When Steve began moving his hips again in the same robotic, jarring way, Noah stopped him once more.

“Nope, nope, you’re still tense, Steve—” Noah chuckled. “Try again!”

Finn clenched his jaw a little tighter, unable to find it in himself to glance sideways at how silent Robin, Nancy, and Jonathan had gone. He glanced once at the couch on the other side of the dance floor, his eyes automatically searching for Mike and Will, who were sitting far away from each other on opposite ends of the couch, with Lucas in between them.

For one horrifying second, Finn’s gaze met Mike’s from across the room—a kind of simmering bitterness mirrored back at him.

“There you go!” Noah laughed encouragingly. “You’re getting it!”

Live out your fantasy here with me
Just let the music set you free
Touch my body, and move in time
Now I know you're mine

“I’m getting it!” Steve grinned back with a chuckle.

When Finn turned his eyes back to the dance floor, he could feel that secret vein in his forehead start to make its presence known as he watched Steve, for some fucking reason, end up with his hands on his boyfriend’s shoulders, grinning from ear to ear as Noah held him and they swayed together through the repeated chorus of the song.

“Noah.” Finn cleared his throat before sipping on his drink a little forcefully. “I think he’s got it now.”

He finally glanced sideways to find Robin and Nancy looking at him with twin expressions of ooh this looks bad, while Jonathan was aiming a murderous glare at Steve, no doubt unable to distinguish Noah from his little brother in this moment.

“Steve. Lesson’s over.” Jonathan said, the words snappy and sharp over Madonna’s sultry singing voice.

It was finally Jonathan’s warning tone that made Steve snap out of whatever dance-lesson-induced ecstatic reverie Noah had put him in.

While the Party went back to resuming their conversations on the couch, Steve looked up to find Jonathan and Finn aiming death-threat-level expressions at him for wildly different reasons as he went back to his spot by the table.

Noah lingered by the dance floor, the disco lights making him look even more ethereal than usual as he met Finn’s slightly irritated expression with a wildly amused one.

Finn finished his drink and dropped his empty cup in the trash bag by the table before he determinedly walked over to Noah, grabbed him by the wrist, and began to pull him in the direction of the spiral staircase.

When he felt both groups in the room eye his sudden movement, he turned back before ascending the stairs.

“We’ll be back soon! Just need some fresh air!” Finn managed a smile as he avoided Noah’s knowing gaze burning a hole into the side of his face, before letting himself be pulled up the stairs by Finn.

“Finn…” Noah’s trailing voice held a teasing lilt to it as Finn continued to drag him out of the secret entrance to the basement, remembering to push the false shelf back in place with his free hand—and cross the glass recording booth of WSQK, all the way to the rear exit of the building, which was mostly in darkness.

A few feet away, the surroundings rolled out into a grassy incline that led down to the tunnel entrance on the far side of acres and acres of fields by the tree line.

Finn could feel the gentle way Noah’s thumb stroked against his fingers as he held onto his hand, each caress adding another kindle to the fire growing inside him.

“You are just soooo predictable—” Noah had begun to say with a laugh, but the rest of his sentence died with a heated gasp as Finn wrapped an arm around his waist and pushed him against the brick wall of the building, capturing the sound with his mouth on his.

Finn used his other hand to cup the back of Noah’s neck, tugging lightly at the hair at his nape to tilt his head up for better access. Almost instantly, he felt Noah’s arms around his neck, pulling him flush against his body as he kissed him back with an urgency that had them both groaning against each other’s lips at the same time.

“Happy birthday, baby…” Finn nipped slightly at Noah’s bottom lip. “And happy anniversarymmph—”

Noah had gone slightly onto his tiptoes, chasing Finn’s lips with his own while dragging his fingers into his hair and pulling him even closer.

Finn felt the frantic tugs against his scalp like an electric zing shooting all the way down between his legs, his hard-on pressing against Noah’s as he kept tugging at Finn’s hair and pulling him down, grinding slightly against his groin for some friction.

“Take—take this off,” Noah said between kisses as he pulled at the dark denim jacket Steve had lent Finn for the night. “Fuck, I’m sweating—”

Finn couldn’t help but giggle slightly at how overstimulated Noah was making himself as he tried to multitask between making out with him, ripping off his jacket, and also taking off the striped polo he was wearing.

As soon as their jackets and polos were off, with Noah also tugging off his tie and flinging it onto the pebbled gravel around the building—Finn immediately got to work, pushing him back against the wall, his arms tightening desperately around his waist. Noah’s hands roved just as frantically: over the side of Finn’s face, the back of his neck, his shoulders—as they continued to taste and nip at each other.

They hadn’t had sex in well over a week, and Finn could tell by the way Noah was practically trying to climb him like a tree, their kisses growing sloppier and more frantic with every second as Finn tried to memorise the feeling of Noah’s soft lips against his, over and over again.

“Finn…” Noah whined. “Finn, please…”

He hooked a leg around Finn’s waist, trying a new angle to rub their erections together, the scrape of denim over denim creating a whole new, infuriating kind of burning sensation that had them moving faster against each other.

“Wait, just wait—” Finn panted against Noah’s mouth, his tongue tracing the inside of Noah’s lip. “Let me just…”

“Finn…” Noah whined even louder as Finn adjusted their posture, crouching slightly to slot his knee between Noah’s legs. His hands slid from Noah’s waist to his ass, using the leverage to drag him up along the incline of his thigh.

The initial rutting motion had Noah letting out a noise somewhere between a gasp and a choke, and Finn immediately tried to quiet it by closing the gap between their mouths again, kissing him hungrily. He groaned into Noah’s mouth as his own erection found some relief against Noah’s thigh, inadvertently rubbing up against him in his attempt to chase his own pleasure.

They kept moving their mouths and hips against each other like that, picking up the pace as Finn’s open-mouthed kisses dropped from Noah’s lips down to his jaw, and his neck, before reaching for the sensitive spot of skin behind his ear.

At some point, both of them had their mouths pressed against the other’s neck, desperately trying to keep it quiet and failing miserably as they ground harder and faster against the other.

“I’m gonna’…” Noah whimpered against Finn’s ear, relentlessly rutting against him without pause. “I’m…”

Finn desperately held onto Noah, his usually constantly anxious mind wonderfully blank for what seemed like minutes now, unable to register much of anything except Noah in his arms, Noah against him, and Noah’s helpless, sweet noises against his ear as he continued making obscene grunting noises into Noah’s ear, nearly close to climaxing.

***

Mike could feel the first tendrils of tipsiness wrap themselves around him as he sat by himself on the couch and watched Dustin walk El through the basic directions of a two-step routine his mom had taught him before the Snow Ball.

He felt Dustin’s permission-seeking eyes automatically search for him as he silently asked Mike’s girlfriend if he could hold her waist, and Mike managed to avoid Dustin’s quizzical gaze as he sipped on the last dregs of his cup, pointedly turning his head toward the spiral staircase, which Will had climbed a few minutes earlier to use the bathroom located right by the false shelf.

Mike turned his head back toward the dance floor to find El staring at him with a cold look in her eyes as she grabbed Dustin’s hand without looking at him and pulled it closer to place on her waist.

Without sparing him another glance, El turned away from Mike and went back to smiling warmly at a confused Dustin, who resumed teaching her to the beat of yet another Madonna song that Robin claimed was a classic.

Swaying room, as the music starts
Strangers making the most of the dark
Two by two, their bodies become one
I see you through the smoky air
Can't you feel the weight of my stare?
You're so close, but still a world away

Mike swallowed tensely, waiting for something like jealousy to swirl inside him.

He waited and waited and waited, until the song reached the second chorus, until he realized it would never come—as his gaze automatically went back to lingering on the spiral staircase.

“Hey, man.”

Mike felt the space next to him on the couch dip as Lucas flopped down and exhaled loudly, exhausted from all the dancing and drinking.

“Hey.” Mike replied tightly as he dropped his empty cup on the low table in front of the couch before folding his arms across his chest and resuming his stare towards the staircase.

He couldn’t stop thinking about the look in Will’s eyes earlier, completely unaware of his lightly grazing fingers branding Mike’s shoulders with a kind of scorching finality.

Maybe it was the alcohol messing with his mind, but he was having a hard time distinguishing between the image of the ease with which Finn had his arms around Noah’s waist and Mike’s own greedy hands reaching for Will’s hips.

He exhaled in frustration, posture bowing over his lap as he rubbed his eyes and tried to push down the frantic tightness in his chest that would rear its needy head every single time Will was around him.

Mike knew it was just a matter of time before he’d have no control over his attempts to push his shit down—the closet inside his heart was nearly at full capacity and at its breaking limit, strained under his cowardice and fear.

“Mike? You okay?” Lucas’s gentle yet solid voice pulled him out of his thoughts.

“What?” Mike sharply turned to face his friend, noticing the way Lucas was trying to meet his eye with a concerned expression. “I’m fine.”

Lucas sighed softly, turning his head back to the dance floor to watch Dustin and El fumble through the steps together while Robin, Nancy, Jonathan, and Steve were whispering amongst themselves by the drinks table.

“You wanna catch some fresh air outside?” Lucas suddenly asked. “We’ve been down here for hours, and also…I’m kinda worried those clones may have gotten lost or something—”

“Yeah, sure…” Mike found himself saying, fully hoping to run into Will on the way outside.

He really couldn’t find it in himself to give a shit about the doppelgängers right now.

Lucas mouthed the words “fresh air” while pointing an index finger in the direction of upstairs as Nancy lifted her head from the conversation and glanced at them with a questioning look.

Mike barely registered her nod back as he climbed the stairs swiftly, making it all the way to the top and reaching for the handle to drag open the secret door.

Suddenly, the door slid open, and Mike almost stumbled right into Will, his arms protectively shooting out as he placed either hand on Will’s shoulders to steady himself.

“Oh!” Will gasped slightly, and Mike tracked the way the exertion from the dance floor and the alcohol in their drinks painted Will’s cheeks in a lovely shade of pink.

Will’s lips, perfect and plush, were delicately framed around the perfect O his mouth was making, and Mike could not for the life of him stop looking at them.

“Sorry…” Will said quietly, stepping aside for Mike and Lucas to pass through.

Mike retracted his arms slowly as he dragged his gaze upwards to Will’s eyes, wide and heartbreakingly striking as always, even under the shitty lighting of the party—the searching expression in them like a vice grip around his rib cage.

“Where are you guys going?” Will asked suddenly.

“Oh, uh…” Mike began lamely, wondering why he’d gotten up from the couch in the first place.

“To get some fresh air outside, It’s getting a little stuffy down here.” Lucas grumbled. “Wanna join us?”

Mike raised his eyebrows expectantly, hoping Will would say yes.

Will, for some reason, wouldn’t meet his eyes as he glanced at the room below, watching Robin make fun of Dustin about his dancing as El laughed along.

“Um, you guys go ahead.” Will nodded back at Lucas, darting a quick, unreadable look in Mike’s way before going back to Lucas again. “I’m good.”

“Alright…” Lucas trailed off, pausing to glance between Mike and Will before turning to the former. “Let’s go.”

Mike lingered by the step he was standing on, watching Will’s retreating figure, his thoughts flailing all over the place, trying to understand what Will was thinking just now.

Did he want Mike’s hands on his waist earlier?

Would Will have held on to his shoulder a little tighter if Mike had finally let himself stop second-guessing around his best friend and just did something? Anything?

Anything to make sense of why nothing made sense to Mike anymore unless it was with Will, or if Will wasn’t at the center of it all.

“Mike, you coming?”

He felt his eyes quickly dart to El, who pulled Will by the hand to the dance floor again, and Mike felt that tightness in his chest return in full force.

“Yeah…yeah, let’s go.”

When they reached the main floor and were making their way past the kitchen and the transparent recording booth, Lucas slowed his pace slightly to meet Mike’s sluggish, dragging feet.

“What is going on with you, Mike?” Lucas asked as they headed for the glass doors to the main entrance.

Mike simply clenched his jaw tighter, attempting to swallow down the tightness now reaching up towards his throat from his chest as he burrowed his hands deeper into the pockets of his jeans.

He heard Lucas audibly sigh next to him as he opened the glass doors, silently beckoning Mike to go out first.

“Are you really going to make me force it out of you?”

The chilly night air of early October hit them immediately as they stepped out, and Mike felt it temporarily quiet his turbulent thoughts and soothe his sweat-drenched skin.

Lucas began walking alongside the wall of the building, like a perimeter-check kind of stroll, their route partially in shadow and partially lit by the stray neon light from the WSQK signs and the looming radio tower’s blinking beacons.

Mike walked silently beside Lucas, determined to keep this conversation as neutral as possible.

“There is nothing going on with—”

Mike suddenly froze in the middle of his sentence, his ears picking up on an odd sound from the other side of the building.

Evenings out here were deathly quiet sometimes, with not even the occasional cicada in the distance anymore since it was already October.

The only sounds Mike could hear at the moment were the faint humming of the back-up generator by the radio tower and—

He felt his feet quicken in step before his mind could catch up in time.

There was someone in the darkness, making noises…sounding exactly like—Will?

A visceral shiver went down Mike’s spine, an unknown mix of anticipation and something else he had never felt before.

The rational part of his brain knew that Will was safe downstairs, that he’d just seen him moments ago with the rest of his friends. But unfortunately for Mike, he had never been fully in control of his instincts when it came to anything remotely related to Will.

Will is out there, his brain supplied.

Will could be in some kind of danger and unable to ask for help.

Will was making a kind of noise that Mike had never, ever heard him make, and the unfamiliarity of it struck him with a kind of bone-deep fear that he had no idea how to contend with in that very moment.

“Mike, wait for me!” Lucas ran behind him as Mike took off blindly in the direction of the sound.

When Mike turned the corner around the next bend of the building, he felt his heart stop instantly in his chest, his entire world tilting on its axis without any care for him whatsoever.

He barely registered Lucas stop right next to him, muttering a trembling ‘oh shit’ as he began pulling at Mike’s arm to get back immediately before they were spotted.

Will was kissing someone.

Will, with his arms around someone, frantically pulling at their hair and their shoulders as he writhed in their embrace.

Mike felt something ugly and bitter rise from the depths of his stomach, just as his lungs began to constrict, a kind of petrified infection beginning to take over his chest, his ribs, his airway—all the way to the rest of his face.

“Mike, let’s go.” Lucas muttered, whisper-soft next to him, trying to pull at his arm in vain.

Will suddenly tipped his head back towards the wall, pushing the other dark-haired person’s head down his body as he nipped and left open-mouthed kisses down Will’s jaw, his neck, before using his other hand to zip open the fly of his pants.

“Ahh… ahh…”

Mike could hardly breathe, could barely believe he was even alive or existing as he sharply clawed at his own sides with his fingers, letting his senses take in the lewd sounds like a man who had no idea he had been crawling through the desert his entire life, with a hand outstretched for a Will-shaped oasis.

“Mike—” Lucas furiously hissed, trying to pull at him again.

He was about to turn his gaze away, to give himself a momentary relief from the torture that was Will making sounds that no one else should be privy to except him, when the crouching dark-haired person lifted his head to look up at Will with heavy-lidded eyes, his hands palming Will’s visible erection—

Mike didn’t know how it happened.

One second, he was standing there with Lucas’s hand tugging on his arm.

The next second, he was letting some kind of frightening entity take over his soul as he rushed forward and yanked the dark-haired man up by his collar, pulling strength from every single time he had been afraid in his short life of fifteen years that Will would be taken away from him—before striking someone wearing his own face with a resounding punch.

“MIKE!” Lucas yelled from somewhere behind him as he rushed to Finn, who had been thrown to the gravel from the momentum of the hit, holding his jaw and grunting slightly from the pain.

“FINN! OH MY GOD—” Noah suddenly yelled out loud, snapping Mike out of whatever had taken possession of him moments ago as he stumbled back a step to find Noah frantically looking at him with a horrified expression on his face.

“Mike!!! What the fuck is wrong with you???” Noah snapped at him, his voice taking on a tone that Will would never take with him, even at his worst mood, as he scrambled to pull up the fly of his pants before going over to help Finn.

While Lucas and Noah knelt over Finn, helping him up to stand with latter having his hand still cupped over the section of his jaw where he’d been struck—Mike stood there, his vision going blurry for some reason, his entire self shaking as he looked down at his hand still curled into a fist like it wasn’t even a part of his own body.

“Mike…” Finn said gently as he nudged aside Noah and Lucas, approaching him slowly like he was some kind of wounded animal.

Mike slowly dragged his gaze up from his fist towards Finn, his chest constricting once painfully as he tried to take a breath.

“I…” Mike tried, words and oxygen failing him at the same time.

“Mike, it’s okay…” Finn said again, taking a step closer, using that gentle tone that sounded so disturbing to Mike when it was used on himself.

“I can’t—” Mike tried, his chest heaving up and down frantically, unable to use his lungs the way they should be used. “I…”

He glanced behind Finn at Lucas, staring at him with an expression that Mike couldn’t make sense of, before his gaze strayed to Noah—to his rumpled hair and his kiss-bitten, bruised lips—looking at him in a way similarly concerned to Will, and that had Mike erupt into short, panicked gasps instead of spoken sentences.

He felt the shakiness move towards his knees as the tightness in his throat threatened to choke the next breath out of him.

So Mike did what he did best—he ran.

***

Finn’s face hadn’t hurt this bad since he had fallen face-first from his skateboard onto the concrete of his neighbourhood park as a 9 year old.

But it was nothing compared to the pain twisting in his chest as he ran after Mike, who had taken off into the tall grasses in the direction of the expansive field that separated the WSQK lot from the tunnel entrance by the tree line.

“Mike!” Noah and Lucas yelled loudly after him, while Finn chose to hold his tongue, silently hoping that what Mike was going through right now wasn’t what he thought it was.

Mike made it less than a hundred yards downhill, large swaths of the grasses covered partially in darkness where they weren’t in the path of the WSQK building’s or the tower’s lights—before he made a sharp noise, like a child shuddering a breath in the middle of a cry as he fell to his knees, the sound piercing the stillness of the night.

When the three of them reached him, they immediately went down to their knees to mirror Mike, bowed over the grassy floor with his arms around his abdomen like he’d been stabbed.

Finn felt his throat go dry, his own eyes stinging slightly as he exchanged worried looks with Noah and Lucas over Mike’s hunched shoulders before reaching his hand out slowly and gently pushing his shoulder back to take a look at his face.

“NO!” The word tore out of Mike in a dishevelled, broken scream, and Finn took in Mike’s face completely drenched in tears, his own face heartbreakingly young and red and splotchy all over from every emotion trying to fight its way out of him.

“Mike, look at me—” Finn tried again, but Mike weakly shoved his hands away.

Noah suddenly crouched in front of Mike and tried to pat the side of his head in what was intended to be a caring gesture.

“It’s okay, Mike… it’s—”

Mike looked up suddenly, his eyes meeting Noah’s, fracturing something further in them.

“NO!!! I need Will…” Mike said breathlessly as sob after sob racked through him, mixed in with sharp gasps in between. “I want Will—”

“Wait here, I’ll get him…” Lucas suddenly moved to get up.

“NO!!!!” Mike screamed louder, his voice breaking heartbreakingly, his sobbing worsening, akin to an infant being birthed into a new world he had no idea existed.

“No….I can’t—I can’t breathe…”

Finn felt his heart drop to his stomach at the way Mike had suddenly stopped screaming and was bowing over again, his hands falling to his sides like dead weight.

“I can’t—I—”

“Mike… what are you…” Lucas’s voice trembled as he tried to reach out for his shoulder.

Mike’s words fizzled out into even more gasping, erratic breaths, and Finn immediately dropped fully onto the ground, shuffling behind Mike, pulling his shoulders flush against his chest as he wrapped both his arms around him, reaching over his shoulders as he interlocked his hands and applied pressure against Mike’s chest.

“Legooofme…” Mike mumbled nonsensically, words continuing to fail him.

“It’s okay, Mike, it’s okay…” Finn kept saying, applying more grounding pressure on Mike’s chest, feeling every heave and stutter of his panic attack shudder through him too.

“Let it happen, just let it happen…”

All of them remained there for what felt like hours, but it could have been only a couple of minutes, as Mike gasped and shuddered through every second of it.

Lucas sat fully cross-legged on the ground next to Mike, worriedly peering at his face every now and then, while Noah crouched behind him, occasionally catching Finn’s eye with a look that spoke a thousand words.

After a while, Mike’s hyperventilations seemed to slowly subside, and so did his screaming cries. Finn realised Mike was holding onto his hands tightly, his body weight leaning against his chest as if every ounce of energy had been drained out of him in the span of the last five minutes.

Finn let Mike use him as an anchor of sorts, lifting his gaze to meet Lucas’, who was staring at Mike’s tear-drenched, emotion-wrung face like it was the eighth wonder of the world.

“Lucas,” Finn said softly so as not to startle Mike, “can you grab us a couple of sodas from the kitchen fridge?”

Lucas sat up straighter at the request, nodding his head slowly as he kept darting worried glances toward Mike.

“He’s okay. The worst is over.” Finn assured him. “But he needs to have something sweet or sugary now, to help his nervous system. Trust me.”

When Noah continued to linger, Finn spoke again.

“It’s okay, baby…” Finn felt Lucas pause at the spoken endearment, glancing between him and Noah as he stood up.

“Just get us the sodas and go back inside. Tell them Mike and I are just chatting outside, getting to know each other.”

“You sure?” Noah looked extremely worried, his gaze drifting between Finn and Mike, who had his eyes slightly closed and was breathing a little more evenly.

“I’m sure,” Finn smiled softly at his concern, closing his eyes for a moment as he nodded back at him.

Once their footsteps had retreated a respectable distance away, Finn asked Mike if he wanted to lie down.

“Yeah…” Mike said very quietly, and Finn could sense he was already mostly back to his regular self from the tinge of embarrassment in his tone.

Finn helped him move out of his embrace and adjust into a lying-down position beside him. He mirrored Mike, lying down parallel next to him, as they stared up at the night sky quietly—waiting for their sodas.

They sat in unexpectedly comfortable silence in the aftermath of something explosive and vulnerable that Finn had no doubt Mike was itching to run away from speaking further about.

Five minutes later, both of them heard the sound of quick footsteps against the grassy floor before Lucas was quietly placing two cans of 7Up between their lying bodies, leaving shortly after squeezing Mike’s shoulder once.

Mike’s grateful gaze met Lucas’ in a shared moment before he and Finn were left on their own again.

Finn decided that he wouldn’t speak unless Mike began the conversation. As much as he was curious, he wouldn’t push unless he was given permission to.

He heard Mike sit up suddenly, an accidental sigh leaving his lips that was barely audible over the night breeze occasionally fluttering through the grassy field, leaving them with a slight chill.

There was a snapping metallic noise followed by the hiss of the initial fizz escaping the can, and Finn watched, still silent and lying down, as Mike took a sip and closed his eyes, tilting his head up toward the sky.

Finn picked up his own can, lifting it to his aching jaw instead of cracking it open. He hissed slightly as the cold surface touched the place where Mike’s fist had struck him.

Mike turned sideways and looked down at him mid-sip, his face twisting into a conflicted yet apologetic expression.

“Sorry.” He mumbled, and Finn noted the way Mike’s gaze went distant for a second, as if his thoughts had drifted somewhere else—possibly back to the scene that had triggered his outburst in the first place.

“It’s fine.” Finn replied quietly as he mirrored him and sat up. “Although… if you’d broken my nose, we’d be having an entirely different conversation altogether.”

“Right…” Mike chuckled weakly under his breath, a passing glint of amusement in his eyes as he glanced at Finn before going back to staring ahead at the mostly shadowed field in front of them.

Finn felt it was weirdly meditative in a way, sitting in silence with someone he thought he knew, and who he’d begun to realise he had only just barely scratched the surface of—breathing in tandem with him, the sound a comforting yet unnerving mirror to his own.

“Did it feel like this for you too?” Mike suddenly asked, still staring straight ahead. “The other night…in the basement?”

“No. That was a…slightly tamer version,” Finn replied honestly. “The first time is usually the most terrifying. You don’t know what to expect.”

There was a small pause before Finn felt Mike slowly turn his head toward him.

“The first time?” Mike said incredulously. “You mean this might happen to me again??”

“If you keep pushing stuff down for too long without processing them, then yeah. Maybe.”

Finn darted a quick glance at Mike to find him looking aghast, before he went back to staring at the field and lightly pressing the cold surface of the can against his jaw.

There was a long silence that stretched out for a minute, and Finn couldn’t tell how he knew, but he could feel the thoughts rattling around in Mike’s brain, struggling to be voiced out loud.

“…what kind of stuff?”

“I don’t know, man.” Finn sighed. “You tell me. I don’t wanna’ be presumptuous.”

“Didn’t you play me in the TV show?” Mike scoffed.

“Uh… yeah?”

“So don’t you already know everything about me? Stop being deliberately obtuse.”

Oh…oh.

Some of the puzzle pieces of Mike’s unexplained passive aggressiveness towards him were beginning to fall into place for Finn.

“Is that why you’ve been tiptoeing around me since I got here?” Finn turned to look at Mike, unable to help the incredulous frown force itself onto his face at this revelation. “Because you think I know you inside and out or something?”

“No!” Mike frowned defensively. “Of course not! I just…had nothing to say to you!”

“Sure…” Finn rolled his eyes and finally transferred the can to his left hand, cracking it open with a fizzy hiss with his right hand before taking a long sip.

There was a long, awkward pause again, and Mike was staring at the field with a disgruntled grimace.

“I don’t know everything about you, Mike.” Finn finally relented, sparing the younger boy from fighting with his own mind for any longer.

“I just know what was on the script. Which is like—nothing. News flash? You’re a severely guarded and complicated person, even to your writers. They don’t know shit about you. And apparently neither did I—”

Finn mumbled the last bit into his drink as he took another sip.

“What is that supposed to mean?” Mike asked, really, really quietly—and Finn knew just by the tone of his voice that he was genuinely waiting for an answer.

There was no hint of snark and no goading the other person in an attempt to shut down the conversation altogether.

Finn looked up from his drink, his eyes meeting Mike’s in the semi-darkness of the field—unable to shake how staring into your own eyes made every conversation feel ten times more vulnerable and off-kilter.

Mike drew his knees to his chest as he placed the can next to his feet and placed his arms around them to rest his head on top.

“I’ve been watching you ever since I got here,” Finn began, trying to tread as lightly as possible. “You…”

“What?”

“I used to think you had no idea what was going on inside you. That you’d spend all your time trying to be this… this idea of a person that others needed—which was helpful for me as an actor, because that’s your whole thing, isn’t it, Mike? To be needed?”

Finn paused to look at Mike, who had gone wide-eyed and completely still, gripping onto his knees as he remained silent, waiting for what Finn was about to say next.

“Maybe it’s just me. Maybe it’s easier for me to spot it on you because you wear my face—or I guess no, I wear your face, or… whatever. My point is—it will never go away. As much as you try to hide it, to push it down, to… to contort it into something manageable, you will never be able to run away from it.”

“It?” Mike murmured, his breathing going slightly ragged again. “It, what?”

Finn tried to give him a moment, to let the silence between them gently coax the epiphany out of Mike.

Finn waited, second after agonising second passing between them, refusing to put the words in Mike’s mouth.

Mike needed to say it himself. He needed to come to the conclusion himself. Finn couldn’t go back home and sleep easy at night knowing he hadn’t at least given Mike the privilege of this.

Finn exhaled loudly, turning away from Mike’s face before setting his own can down next to Mike’s and flopping back onto the grass again.

He had no idea how much time had passed as he continued to stare at the Indiana night sky, counting the handful of stars that had decided to make their appearance before Mike suddenly spoke up again.

“What is the deal between you and Noah?” Mike asked, a shy cadence to his question that made Finn stumble over his count of the stars. “Are you guys like…best friends?”

Finn had to physically hold himself back from rolling his eyes.

Mike Wheeler and the chokehold the term best friends had on him.

“Yeah.” Finn replied simply.

“Oh…” Mike replied, and Finn felt himself smile at the disappointed tone in his voice.

“Except, you can swap the word best with boy.”

Mike coughed sharply as he choked on his drink, the sound of his wheezing clashing harshly against the serene, rustic peacefulness of their surroundings.

“W-WHAT?”

“Why do you sound so surprised?” Finn chuckled in disbelief at the depth of Mike’s denial. “Exactly how many guys do you know are platonically making out with their best friend?”

“No, I… that’s not what I—” Mike spluttered, his face visibly red as he scanned Finn’s nonchalant expression before staring down at his can. “I, um… so then, he’s your, uh… boyfriend?”

“…Yes.” Finn mock-whispered the answer, before sitting back up and taking another sip of his drink.

Mike was quiet for ten long seconds before asking his next question.

“How does that work?” Mike asked with hesitation, his eyes darting at Finn before staring down at his can again.

“What? The sex?” Finn asked, confused about what he meant. “I mean, if you’re really curious I can expl—”

“NO!” Mike yelped, the sound of his can being squeezed sharply cutting through the air along with his frantic exhales. “I mean, yeah, I guess I’m a little curious about that, but—uh—no, I meant…how does it work, being friends and…boyfriends? At the same time…”

Finn slowly turned again to look at Mike, the innocence and sincerity behind the question taking him so off guard that he forgot to breathe for a second himself.

Oh, Mike.

This poor boy cared more about overstepping the boundaries of his friendship with Will than harbouring any kind of disgust or internalised shame about having those feelings for a boy in the first place.

“It was…a little tricky to navigate that stuff at the beginning, when we didn’t know we felt more than friendship for each other, figuring out the signs and stuff…” Finn trailed off, trying to think how best to explain it.

“Signs? What signs?”

“Oh uh, I don’t know—maybe something like a lingering touch, staring at them for a little while longer than necessary, finding it difficult to breathe when you’re around them…stuff like that.” Finn shrugged, smiling a little at himself.

“…why are you smiling?” Mike asked quietly, the words slightly breathless.

Mike remained silent, so Finn kept talking, unable to fight the grin from his face, suddenly realising the alcohol must still be in his system from the way he continued to speak without being prompted.

“We’d get these long breaks in between filming seasons, and for the first couple of years it was fine—I mean, I was a stupid kid. I had no idea of what I was feeling most of the time, and I, uh…every time I would go back on set after some time away, I’d see Noah and I’d get that feeling, you know? That weird…giddiness I didn’t get around other people, and just letting myself sink into it every time we joked about how I’d gotten taller than him over the summer, or just poke fun about his shitty eyesight, or how much bigger yet even more cuter he’d gotten, he’d—”

Finn stopped himself as he turned his face to meet Mike’s again, freezing slightly at that fearful, vulnerable expression on his face again, his eyes brimming with something imminent as he parted his lips to swallow nervously.

“What kind of feeling?” Mike asked, the words barely a whisper.

Finn held his eye contact, taking pity on him for just this one moment.

“That feeling…like the one you got when you saw Will at the airport after eight months? The one that made you feel that—”

Finn left the sentence unbearably hanging in mid-air, almost losing hope, just as Mike swooped in, ever the surprising, brave-hearted paladin.

“—that everything had changed.” Mike said, his voice trembling violently as he squeezed his eyes shut, the tears streaming down his face in two relentless rivulets.

Finn swallowed the sudden thickness in his throat as he watched Mike bury his head between his knees drawn to his chest, his back shaking violently as he began sobbing again.

This cry was a little different than the one before.

The previous one was a kind of crash-landing—an act of being torn out of a fantasy and dunked right into the ice-cold waters of your reality, unable to run away from the truth anymore since one had to learn how to swim now…

This one was a quiet acceptance. A kind of quietness that was so loud and violently clarifying, Finn could feel it in every erratic hiccup and choked sob in between the incessant, wailing birth of every single emotion and thought Mike had been pushing down for god knows how long he’d been having all these feelings for Will.

Finn reached over, hesitating slightly before patting Mike’s back gently a few times and leaving his hand there—as a physical anchor for Mike to use, just in case he needed a mooring back to the shores of his his own mind.

After what seemed like an age, Mike lifted his head, and Finn had to squeeze his own soda can to keep from keeling over and bursting into tears himself at seeing his own face—young, scarlet and completely drenched from the carnage left behind by the tears.

“You okay?” Finn asked softly.

Mike remained silent, staring at his can resting between his feet, looking utterly wrecked and drained.

“How…how did you do it?” Mike asked, his voice a ruined rasp from the cry.

“Do what?”

“How were you able to go from friends to…more?” Mike licked his lips absently, along with some of the tears collected on them as he continued to stare down at his feet. “How did you do it without…without losing him altogether?”

Mike finally looked up to meet Finn’s devastated gaze, the latter holding the eye contact for a while before shaking his head slightly and sighing before turning to look at the fields ahead again.

“What?” Mike asked, his tone eager and yet afraid.

“I don’t think you should do what I did.” Finn chuckled grimly under his breath. “I know the ends justify the means sometimes, but I, uh—I’d say that’s good by my books if my mistakes help someone else, by learning from them.”

“What the hell did you do, dude?” Mike asked, his voice sounding fearful in a way that had Finn nearly chuckle out loud this time.

Finn side-eyed him with mock-narrowed eyes before turning back to staring ahead.

“We got drunk on his birthday last year. Well, our last year. I kissed him—” Finn heard a loud gasp escape uninhibitedly from the back of Mike’s throat as he continued.

“—I told him I had feelings for him. We talked about it the next day when we were sober, and then we made things official.”

“Oh. That doesn’t sound too bad…” Mike trailed off.

“Yeah. That part doesn’t.” Finn sheepishly pursed his lips as he closed his eyes, nodding wryly for the next bit.

“But the part where I was emotionally cheating on my ex-girlfriend with him for years prior to that, was…”

He heard the can slip from Mike’s fingers and land on the grass with a dull thunk.

Finn gave Mike a moment, audibly hearing his breathing pick up pace again before opening his eyes and turning to look at him.

“…emotional cheating?”

“Yeah.”

“That’s not a—that’s not a thing.” Mike stumbled over his words. “You just made that up.”

“Why the fuck would I make that up?” Finn said incredulously.

“It’s when you’re cheating on your partner in every single way except physically. It’s a real thing. I would know, because I did it—for years.”

“No, that’s….” Mike tried to say, the rest of his sentence disappearing in his mouth as his eyes went slightly unfocused with whatever he was thinking about.

“So you had a girlfriend before, and now…you have a boyfriend?”

Finn raised his eyebrows at the quickness with which Mike was able to move on from the prospect of being morally ambiguous when it came to Will and segue into something more incisive.

“Yeah?” Finn said, a little nervously, wondering if where Mike was going with this was where he thought he was going with it.

“Oh… so, uh. How does that work?” Mike asked, before his voice dropped to a whisper for the second bit. “Does that mean you’re half… um, half gay?”

Finn couldn’t help but laugh out loud this time.

“Are you asking me if I’m bisexual?”

Mike raised his eyebrows in utter confusion, his mouth twisting to one side before parting open in an unasked question.

“A what?”

“It’s what you call a person who likes more than one gender.”

“Oh… so girls and boys?” Mike asked, his voice taking on a mysteriously unsure tone. “That’s allowed?”

“Totally! I mean, if that’s how you feel…” Finn swallowed, anxiety already beginning to roil inside his stomach at the direction this conversation was taking.

Mike remained quiet for a long moment, his gaze turning back to the fields that were looking a little darker than when they’d first sat down there.

“Is that what you are?” Mike asked quietly.

Finn closed his eyes again at the question, swallowing nervously against the lump in his throat. He really didn’t want to be the topic of this conversation right now. He wanted it to be about Mike, not about him.

For some reason, he opened his mouth and took a leap of faith, answering the question a little differently than he usually did.

“I don’t know.”

There was a sudden gust of wind that cut through the field, and the two of them followed the way it bent the taller grasses in a winding zig-zag motion.

This time, Finn was the one staring straight ahead and could feel Mike break his gaze away from the horizon to stare at his side profile.

Mike remained silent, waiting for Finn to continue. He had no idea how he knew, but on some level Finn could feel that Mike was trying really hard to be still for him, to not let the moment escape them and stay with him for as long as Finn needed.

“For a long time, I, uh… that’s how I identified—I still identify, I mean.” Finn corrected himself. “And after being with Noah for a year, I, um… I don’t know.”

Finn knew that was a shitty, half-baked response, but he let it sit in the air between him and Mike, forcing himself not to slap on the closest PR-sounding sentence his brain could think of and bookend the conversation immediately.

“Sorry.” Finn suddenly found himself saying when the silence between him and Mike stretched on for too long. “Really sorry, man. I’m not sure if that was the answer you deserve right now—”

“Dude, shut up.” Mike retorted in disbelief. “That is more than I deserve right now.”

Finn snapped his gaze back to Mike at that.

“You’re allowed to change your mind whenever you want, you know?” Mike shook his head in slight annoyance. “Even as an old person.”

“Excuse me?” Finn scoffed out loud, his mouth hanging slightly open as he shook his head at Mike’s insolence.

“Oh, my bad.” Mike rolled his eyes, a hint of a smile tugging at his face already. “Older person.”

They broke off into light laughter together, with Mike wiping away the rest of the tears on his face and Finn rubbing away the stinging in his eyes.

When the laughter died down a little and they picked up their respective cans again to finish the rest of their drinks, Finn felt himself reaching for the unfinished thread of the conversation again.

“You’re allowed to change your mind too, Mike.” Finn said softly. “You know that, right?”

Mike’s smile vanished at the question—a pained, guilty look taking over as he picked at the rim of his can with a fingernail.

“It’s different with me.”

“How so?”

“Will is not like me. He doesn’t…” Mike’s voice trembled slightly, mentioning Will by name for the first time ever since they sat together by themselves. “He doesn’t want me like that.”

Finn had to grip onto the grass by his feet to hold back the shudder threatening to pass through his spine at Mike’s words.

“And El… she does. I can’t just—I can’t just abandon her. I was the one who found her in those woods. I took that responsibility. I can’t just go back on my word and—”

“Mike?” Finn could feel his next question on the tip of his tongue, wondering if he should just rip off the band-aid or not.

“What?” Mike asked, his voice sounding frustrated in an unsettled and claustrophobic way.

“Since Will moved back to Hawkins, how many times in a day do you think about El?”

“W-what?” Mike stared at Finn, that flee-inducing fear from before back in his eyes again.

“Just give me a ballpark number.” Finn pushed, trying to help Mike out of his misery already. “From the moment you wake up, to the moment your brain shuts off for the night—how many times?”

“I…” Mike swallowed frantically, his gaze nervously darting between Finn’s eyes. “Like…I, uh…”

“Ten times?” Finn supplied, knowing he was being cruel in this moment but egging him on anyway. “Seven? Five? Three?”

“…Zero?” Finn tried really quietly, as Mike squeezed his eyes closed and dropped his head between his knees again.

“Stop it.” Mike said in a whisper, the sound muffled against his jeans.

“I’ll stop.” Finn replied immediately with a sigh, patting Mike’s back twice before taking his hand back.

“El is not your responsibility, Mike.” Finn finally said after a moment of pause. “Her legal guardian is Hopper.”

“I—I know that…” Mike said, tilting his head sideways against his knee to glance at Finn.

“Don’t make the same mistake as me.” Finn continued, trying to hold Mike’s gaze.

“Relationships are not supposed to feel like an obligation. Like some kind of role or part to perform. Believe me—I would know. I do enough of that for a living.”

“But El—”

“Dude, for the short time I’ve been here—you two barely look at each other when you’re in the same room. I’ve never even seen you have a conversation with her—just her—except for yelling at her today while playing Jenga! If you’re scared of abandoning her, I’m sorry, I really don’t want to be mean, but that ship has sailed, Mike! I’m not even sure the ship exists in the first place!”

Mike grimaced painfully, clearly finding it difficult to digest these words being said by a carbon copy of his voice.

“Meanwhile, I see you lingering on every word and move of Will’s. You are, like—obnoxiously obvious about him. Did you know that?”

“Wha—no I’m not!” Mike began to protest, but shut up immediately at Finn’s deadpan glare.

“Oh, so you decided to lose your shit and punch me for what exactly?” Finn gestured at his bruised jaw with a flourish of his hand.

“Yeah, okay.” Mike gave up, his voice grumbling the words out as he propped his chin up on his knee and stared ahead.

Their conversation petered out fully after that, both of them going back to staring at the field and the tree line beyond it. The next gust of wind was colder than usual, and Finn realised they must have been sitting out there for a while now.

Finn could feel Mike glance at him occasionally, an almost pleading, helpless look in his eyes. He knew what was on Mike’s mind. He knew Mike was itching to find a way out of the maze-like situation of his love life in the aftermath of their revelatory conversation.

Except, Finn was already aware that Mike knew this situation was no maze. It was a fixed path from point Mike to point Will. No detours except El, no stops except Will’s heart, no obstacles except Mike himself.

“When I was a little older than you are right now,” Finn suddenly spoke again after a while, “I was having a really bad night on set. I was in my trailer just tossing and turning, couldn’t sleep, appetite out of the fucking window, and all I could think about was some dumb joke I made earlier that day before a scene that Noah laughed at… and for some reason I ended up calling my brother Nick and just straight up wailed into the phone for an hour.”

Finn felt Mike turn his head toward him again, waiting patiently for the rest of his story.

“He knew I had a girlfriend. But he patiently listened to me cry like a total psycho on the phone about a boy.”

“He knew it was about…?”

“Maybe? He tells me now he always knew, but he’s always on some bullshit half the time—I don’t believe him.”

Mike chuckled at that, waiting for him to continue.

“Anyway. Once I’d stopped crying and was ready to hang up, he told me about this song and asked me to listen to it before I went to bed.” Finn explained. “It’s kind of a thing in our family—sharing a song when you can’t speak about the elephant in the room.”

He pulled out his phone from his back pocket, watching for a second as Mike leaned closer to linger on the picture on the lock screen before Finn went to the downloaded albums on his phone.

“It’s from a movie that came out the year I was born.”

Finn suddenly froze and watched Mike lie back down on the grass with closed eyes, resting his head on his arms placed behind it.

“For the full experience.” Mike cracked an eye open before closing it again.

Finn rolled his eyes in amusement, mirroring Mike’s position before pressing play on the song after placing the phone between them.

You've gotta hope that there's someone for you
As strange as you are
Who can cope with the things that you do
Without trying too hard

Finn tilted his head sideways to find Mike’s easy smile drop at the first verse, his gaze turning to meet Finn’s in a haunting mirror.

Because you can bend the truth until it's suiting you
These things that you're wrapping all around you
You never know what they will amount to
And your life is just going on without you
It's the end of the things you know, here we go

Mike’s mouth trembled slightly as his gaze fractured on the unspoken emotion shared between them before he turned his eyes to the open sky.

You've gotta know that there's more to this world
Than what you have seen
Because we all have a limited view
Of what we can be

Finn turned his own gaze back to the sky, keeping his eyes open as he tried to look for the North Star.

As we move along with our blinders on
Each one of us feels a little stranded
And you can't explain or understand it
Each one of us on a different planet
And amidst all the to and fro
Someone can say hello, here we go

Finn felt Mike’s elbow nearly bump against his head as he took an arm out from underneath his head to quickly wipe at his eyes before returning it back to its original position.

The feeling that someone really gets you
It's something that no one should object to
It could happen today
So I suggest you skip your habit of laying low
It's the end of the things you know, here we go

The song looped a couple more times before Mike suddenly sat up, something settling in his eyes as he looked at Finn.

“Can you do me a favour?”

“Yeah…what is it?” Finn asked gingerly.

“Can you go back inside and ask El to meet me out here, please?”

Finn immediately sat up at his words.

“Wh—now?”

“Yeah.” Mike said with a nervous clearing of his throat. “I don’t want to play pretend anymore.”

Finn held Mike’s gaze, feeling something immense rise inside him, a feeling between pride and awe.

He reached over and squeezed Mike’s shoulder and felt the younger boy lean into the touch.

“Okay…” Finn nodded back with a reassuring smile. “Okay.”

***

Mike sat there in the middle of the field, feeling the dropping temperature starting to bite at his skin.

As the minutes ticked by, and he kept absently tugging at stray pieces of grass near his feet with one hand while using the other to nervously pick at his eyebrow hairs—he realised his mind was weirdly blank.

He should be feeling nervous about the conversation he was about to have, but instead of that irresistible tug of seeking escape, he just felt… nothing.

Mike wondered if he had cried out every single gallon of water inside his body, and so he had none left to manufacture a functioning emotion.

“Mike.”

He flinched slightly at El’s voice, unable to hold back his shock at how she was able to tread so lightly that her feet barely made any noise against the grass.

Mike looked up to find her holding his jacket out to him as she zipped up her own and sat down next to him with a contemplative frown on her face.

“Thank you.”

“Don’t thank me. Will asked me to give it to you.”

Mike snapped his gaze to her, the jacket feeling ten times heavier and warmer in his hands than it did seconds ago.

“Oh…” He replied lamely before shrugging the jacket on.

The quiet pause that followed sat heavy between them. Mike knew El was extremely capable of remaining silent for as long as possible without feeling the need to fill it in with empty words.

Regardless of that fact, Mike sat there fully mute, unable to decide where to begin.

“Why did you call me out here?” El asked, her tone curt and guarded, a complete opposite to how happy she had seemed during the party earlier. “It’s getting really cold.”

“Oh, uh… I’m sorry. I just wanted to…” Mike looked up from his cross-legged feet to find El staring at him curiously.

“I wanted to apologise. For how I’ve been treating you… ever since we came back to Hawkins.”

“Oh…” El’s harsh gaze softened slightly, and Mike took it to mean that she wasn’t expecting that.

“I know I’ve been a really shitty boyfriend, and I’m really—I just don’t know how else to say this, but I’m so sorry. I should have tried to talk to you about this much earlier and not let this sit for so—”

“Are you?” El interjected suddenly, her tone slightly clipped in a way that had Mike freeze immediately.

“What?”

“Are you my boyfriend?” El stared at Mike blankly in a way that had him confused as to where exactly she was going with this.

Mike opened his mouth to say well, yeah, but for some reason his brain wouldn’t let him say it, like he was banned from addressing himself that way anymore.

“Because the way I see it,” El continued, “this is the first time since spring break that you have wanted to be alone with me—forget talking.”

“El… I…” Mike started again, swallowing thickly. “I know. You’re right. I’ve been really horrible about making the time and—”

“Making time?” El’s lips parted in disbelief before she brought them back together in a resolute thin line, her jaw hardening with a guarded emotion.

She sat there staring at him like that, and Mike was suddenly too nervous to say anything, much less even begin to broach the conversation in the direction of his real feelings.

“Did you know that I check on Max in the hospital?” El suddenly said, dragging her gaze away from him to stare ahead at the darkened field. “I go in the Void, and I check on her. Every day. And on the weekends, I see Lucas there, sitting beside her bed, talking to her and telling her about his week.”

Mike could feel that familiar stinging in his eyes return, his head hanging slightly.

“I’ve seen him there. Every weekend. Without fail. For the last six months.”

“I know.” Mike said quietly, his voice merely a whisper.

“Max isn’t even…” El’s voice trembled slightly before she continued, “…she’s in a coma, and Lucas goes and talks to her all the time like she’s actually there. Meanwhile…”

Mike closed his eyes, bringing the heels of both his palms to his eyes to shove back the tears about to drop.

“I’m right here. I’m—right here.” El’s voice was small and vulnerable. “And you won’t even look at me.”

Mike snapped his gaze back at her at that, feeling so ashamed for not realising that in all his talk of not wanting to abandon El, he’d already maybe begun to do it ages ago.

“I am looking at you,” Mike said, his gaze darting to a spot of grass behind El before going back to her. “I am, I…”

“No, you’re not…” El’s voice was deeply sad, and she trailed off on purpose. “You’re looking at… you’re…”

Mike felt his heartbeat pick up erratically, his breathing going shallow as he turned to look at El, his vision going blurry from the unshed tears.

“I didn’t really see it before,” El said quietly, “but I’ve been observing Finn and Noah this past week, and it’s so… I see it, Mike. I see it on your face every time he walks into a room and—”

“I’m so sorry, El, I’m so sorry…” Mike’s voice broke as he covered his face with his hands, feeling utterly humiliated and small at her bringing it up first before he was brave enough to do so himself.

Mike kept repeating himself, a kind of garbled, ungodly chant that had his self-esteem shrinking to utter non-existence.

He suddenly felt a small hand grab at his own, tugging them away from his face to find El fearfully peering at his face, the pupils in her light brown eyes dilating slightly in shock.

Mike realised this was probably the first time she’d ever seen him cry like this.

“What are you sorry for, Mike?” El asked in a measured voice. “For loving him? Or for not being able to love me?”

“Neither.” Mike sniffled slightly before lightly pulling his hand out from El’s grip to wipe his eyes.

“I do love you, El.”

“But you can’t write it?”

“No.” Mike swallowed thickly, facing the truth as he spoke the next words. “Because I… I love you like I love Lucas, Dustin, and Max.”

Mike braved a glance at El’s eyes to find them deflating slightly at his answer, a mix of relief at the honesty and despair at the significance behind it.

“And what about Will?”

Mike turned his face away from her to stare at the WSQK building behind them, his heart already in pain from trying to tear itself away from his chest and magnetically attach itself back to its rightful home sitting in the basement.

“I…I’m in love with him.”

Mike waited for a moment, to let the words finally spoken out loud affect his physical reality through some cataclysmic turn of events.

A lightning strike. The shift of a tectonic plate. Or even an avalanche rolling down a mountain.

But nothing happened, as if the very fabric of his reality was already existing with this truth woven into it, and him being blissfully unaware of it.

Mike turned back to El to find that she’d been staring back at the building with him, wearing a bittersweet expression on her face as two thick tracks of tears rolled down her cheeks.

“Why wouldn’t you tell me this six months ago, Mike?” El turned back to look at him, quickly wiping her face with the back of her hand.

“I—I didn’t want to believe it. I… I thought if I kept pushing everything down deeper inside me and kept convincing myself that the way I felt was because Will’s my best friend, and that I care about him, then maybe—”

“Oh my god, please spare me with your feelings of care!” El scoffed, rolling her eyes as she turned around to face the open field again. “Figure it out before you put Will through what you did with me—”

“I know, I know…” Mike sighed, bringing his knees up to his chest again for the second time that night. “You’re right.”

There was a long silence, where El took the hood off her jacket and kept massaging her temples and her scalp through her short, curly hair.

“I heard his voice.” El said really quietly, as if it hurt to recall something she’d been thinking about for a while. “In the pizza dough freezer, when I was inside Henry’s mind.”

“What?” Mike frowned in confusion, glancing at her.

“You would’ve stopped, wouldn’t you?” El said bluntly, her voice tinged with hurt. “If Will didn’t tell you to keep going, you—”

Mike felt his rib cage twist in on itself, threatening to plummet straight to his stomach when he realised what El was talking about.

“El…”

“Was any of what you said even true?” El asked helplessly. “Or was it just like your letters? Hiding the truth with your empty words?”

“I wanted them to be true…” Mike said, feeling his voice shake really badly as he spoke. “I wanted to be what you needed me to be.”

El’s eyes widened slightly at Mike’s words, her own breathing going shallow as she let his answer settle inside her.

“And what do you need, Mike?” El’s voice shook too, as Mike looked up to meet her gaze, the answer clear in his eyes.

“I need hi—… I need to let go of… I…”

The sobs escaped him uncontrollably, fragmenting his words as his hand automatically went to his eyes to cover them.

After a moment of holding his gaze too harshly, El turned away and looked down at her fingers in her lap, tugging at the cuffs of her jacket.

They sat like that in uncomfortable, stilted silence for a while before El spoke again.

“You… Hopper… Papa…” El began to list off names, each one sounding shakier than the last in her voice. “All my life, I’ve tried so hard. To be good enough for all of you. To be… good.”

Mike lifted his tear-soaked face from his hands and looked at El.

“But I guess it was my fault—”

“No, it wasn’t, El. I was the one who kissed you first, remember? I changed things for us at the beginning, and—”

“No, I also—” El countered, shaking her head vehemently, a few tears escaping her eyes that she immediately wiped away.

“I lied to you about how things were for me. In Lenora. I was lying to you, Mike. And I didn’t care about keeping things from you, because I wanted to be wanted so badly… that I was willing for all of it to be a lie…”

“I lied to you too, El…” Mike said quietly. “I should have told you something was going on with me before Lenora…”

El looked up from her lap at him, her eyes red from holding back tears.

“When I was growing up in the lab… Papa would—” El stopped herself, chewing on her lip contemplatively before continuing. “Some days he would be so happy with me, when I would do well on his tests for the day. He’d tell me I was his favourite student… his favourite daughter.”

Mike’s heart was in his throat, as El rarely ever talked about Brenner anymore. He gripped onto the grass next to him for support and waited for her to continue.

“But some days, I would wake up… wrong. I felt scared and… off. I would do badly on every test, and Papa, he—he wouldn’t yell at me for my mistakes. But he would punish me. In other ways.” El took in a shuddering breath. “He wouldn’t look at me the entire day. He would stop talking to me or not ask me any questions, and he would pretend like I didn’t even exist.”

Mike closed his eyes for a moment, feeling unbelievably upset, his stomach clenching at what was to come next.

“Every time Hopper came back home later than usual that first year I lived in the cabin… and in Lenora, every time I’d get a letter back from you without you telling me you loved me, I thought there was something wrong with me. Like I was being punished. Like I wasn’t—”

El stopped herself, taking in a deep breath as she wiped her face again and stared straight ahead at the open fields.

“There is nothing wrong with you, El,” Mike said resolutely. “And Brenner was a psychologically manipulative asshole. He treated you like a—like a machine. A… a means to an end. Please, I’m begging you, do not take his opinions to heart. He doesn’t matter at all. Nor does any man’s opinion. Especially Hopper’s.”

“Hey.” El said in a light warning tone, giving him a side-eye.

“I said what I said.” Mike replied with an even stare. “I know he’s trying to be a good dad to you, but he doesn’t know you. No one can fully, really. That’s for you to figure out.”

“Aren’t you a man too? You’re telling me what to do right now,” El said in that plain tone she always used, which made Mike freeze in embarrassment.

“Yeah, I am. I’m sorry, you’re right,” Mike said quietly, in an apologetic tone.

“Hop’s trying…” El said after a while. “He asked me the other day what I wanted to do after everything was over.”

“What do you mean?” Mike frowned slightly.

“After we kill Henry. He asked me what I wanted to do with my life after that,” El said softly. “He’s never asked me that before.”

Mike looked at El again and noted the contemplative glint in her eyes as she stared at the starry sky.

“Have you thought about it?”

“Yeah.” El replied immediately, taking Mike by surprise.

He himself was honestly too afraid to think about the future on any given day, every thought in his head having a Will-shaped blob of uncertainty, preventing him from even daring to turn the pages of his life without him in it.

“I want to see the world. Different places, like how Lenora and Hawkins were different from each other.”

Mike smiled at this, at the way she phrased her sentence.

“The world is much bigger than those two places. I can definitely tell you that much.”

“I’ve never even seen a mountain,” El remarked suddenly. “I don’t really want to move them—I just… I want to see one.”

Mike caught El’s sarcastic dig at his speech from spring break, as she glanced at him once with an eye-roll before turning her face back towards the horizon.

“Mountains are cool.”

“And I want to try really sweet foods and really spicy foods and compare them. At the same time.”

“Sure, why the hell not?” Mike laughed, and El turned to glance at him, the corners of her mouth lifting in a small smile before turning back to the sky.

“I want to kiss a girl once and see how it feels too.”

Mike froze, his face suddenly growing hot at her brazen declaration, and goggled at her.

“What?” El said defensively, catching the look on his face. “You can kiss Will, but I can’t kiss a girl? How is that fair?”

“I haven’t—we haven’t…” Mike spluttered, his cheeks feeling like molten lava as he snapped his gaze back to the tall grasses ahead. “El, I sat down here to talk to you first! Did you think I would do something like that with him before I—before we… oh my god—”

El grinned mischievously, watching as Mike grew even more flustered and rubbed at his face sheepishly.

“What about you?” El suddenly asked, while Mike slowly removed his hands from his face after trying to rub the blush out of it.

“What about me?”

“Have you thought about your future?”

Mike stared at her nervously for a moment before he blew out a rattling breath through his mouth.

“Graduate high school. And then… I don’t know. Get the hell out of Hawkins, like you.”

“Alone or…?” El said in an annoying, goading tone.

“What do you want me to say, El?” Mike said with a tired sigh, his gaze dropping to the torn pieces of grass next to him.

“I don’t know…” El said quietly. “I’ve never seen you like this before, Mike. I’m a little…surprised, I guess.”

Mike looked up at her to find her looking a little worried, as if searching for something in his face.

“W-what?” Mike stammered.

“Ever since you found me in the woods that day… I feel like you’ve always had a plan for everything. It’s strange seeing you like this—not having an answer to what you want to do,” El replied thoughtfully. “Everyone in the Party looks at you when they need something…”

El suddenly stopped in the middle of her own words, tracking something incriminating pass across his face.

“Does he know?”

“El…” Mike tried to cover his face again with his hand, but El reached forward suddenly and pulled it away, frowning at something blooming on his knuckles.

“So you ignore me for six months, you don’t even tell Will how you feel about him, and you punched Finn out of jealousy, I’m assuming?” El’s acute observations were like three rapid bullets being shot straight into Mike’s chest in succession.

“How did you—” Mike spluttered.

“Mike, I’m not an idiot!” El snapped at him. “Unlike you, apparently!” She gestured mockingly at his knuckles before throwing his hand back onto the grass next to his lap like a stray candy wrapper.

“It’s not that easy, okay?” Mike retaliated, snatching his hand back from the grass and rubbing uselessly at the light bruise forming on top of it. “Will doesn’t like me like that. I’m just his best friend to him.”

“Did he say that to you himself?”

“No…”

“Do you want me to reach into his mind and check?”

“WHAT? NO!” Mike yelped, glancing at El in horror, who rolled her eyes at him again.

They went back to staring at the dark sky, the occasional blinking lights of the radio tower causing the shadows to shift on the fields.

“El?” Mike suddenly asked, his throat closing up at what he was about to say.

“Yeah?”

“I want us to break up.”

Mike felt a silent pause between them before he heard El take a deep breath and then exhale in a way that sounded more self-assured than any other time in this whole conversation.

“I want us to break up too,” El said quietly. “But, uh…”

“Yeah?” Mike held his breath.

“I handled this conversation better than you, so I’m breaking up with you first.”

Mike felt a trembling smile fight its way onto his face, the relieved exhale escaping him in tandem.

“Of course.”

“I dump your ass, Mike.”

“Thanks for that, El.”

“You’re welcome.”

Mike turned his face to meet El’s, his own eyes brimming with bittersweet tears, mirrored on her face too.

“We’re still friends, right?” Mike said, the words breaking up as an emotion somewhere between grief and solace nearly choked him.

“Yes.” El nodded back with a smile, the tears escaping from her eyes with the movement. “But you need to stop lying to me from now on.”

“O-okay.” Mike choked back a sob as he dove into El, who opened her arms for an embrace, holding on to her as he felt her sobs against his shoulder too.

“And to yourself too.” El mumbled into his shoulder as they sobbed into each other’s shoulders together for a minute.

After a little while, when both their crying finally died down, Mike checked his watch to find it was nearly 10 pm.

“Let’s go back inside, Mike.” El suddenly said, as she got up and brushed out the wet grass stains from her jeans. “I have an hour more of freedom left before Jonathan walks me back home.”

“Yeah…let’s go,” Mike sighed, suddenly feeling utterly exhausted from the amount of crying he’d done out here in the past one and a half hours.

He stood up and grabbed his empty 7Up can, brushing the grass off his own clothes before stretching his joints, sore from sitting for so long.

El smiled at him, the expression more light-hearted than he’d ever seen her aim at him in their entire relationship. Mike smiled back, his insides feeling less heavy than they had been in years, despite the desperate ache in his heart never having eased due to a certain someone.

As they walked uphill together in the direction of the WSQK building, his smile suddenly faltered as he remembered something.

“Hey, El?” Mike asked. “God, I…”

“What is it?” El suddenly stopped alongside him, a worried frown on her face.

“That painting you had Will make for me—oh my god.” Mike rubbed his hand over his mouth, feeling awful about the circumstances of their break-up all over again.

“I never thanked you for it. That was, like, the best present ever! And even though now we are, uh…” Mike shook his head at himself, hating himself a little in the moment for how much he’d worked himself up over the gift in these past six months, all for it to…

“I just wanted to say thank you. It’s the best thing I ever own. Really.”

Mike looked up from his feet to find El looking at him with a funny expression.

“…what?” Mike said nervously, wondering if he’d offended her in some way.

“What are you talking about?” El asked with a bewildered tone. “What painting?”

“The—” Mike began to say, but stopped abruptly, frozen on the spot, his rapidly increasing heartbeat suddenly pounding in his ears.

No, of course she’ll still need you.
She’ll always need you, Mike.

El must have tracked the way Mike’s face went deathly pale, his easy smile vanishing into thin air.

“Will never really showed me his paintings…I told you that in my letter,” El said simply. “Remember?”

Will is painting a lot, but he… he won’t show me what he’s working on. Maybe it is for a girl. I think there is someone he likes, because he has been acting weird.

Mike hardly registered El’s words, his footsteps faltering as he stepped back a few paces, trying to control the furious thrashing of his heart against his rib cage.

“Mike… what’s wrong?” El reached for him worriedly, to prevent him from falling backwards down the incline of the hill.

“But what about…” Mike looked up at El breathlessly, “The heart… and the—shield, and the…”

If she was mean to you or she seemed like she was pushing you away, it’s because she’s scared of losing you, like you’re scared of losing her.

“Mike, what are you talking about?” El placed a hand on his shoulder. “What shield?”

Will lied to him.

Will lied to him.

Why would Will lie to him?

“I need to…” Mike heaved the words out, holding onto El’s hand on his shoulder for support before steadying himself on his feet. “I need Will… I need to see him—”

“O-okay… let’s go inside then…” El glanced at him in concern once again before they rushed their footsteps in the direction of the building.

Mike was numb from the tips of his fingers to his toes, unable to process much of anything as they entered the building through the glass doors, walked past the recording booth, all the way to the false shelf at the back of the room, which El pushed aside with her mind with a quick tilt of her head.

So, yeah, El needs you, Mike.
And she always will.

Mike and El lingered at the top of the spiral staircase and noted the basement colours had changed to green for some reason, with the disco lights being set to a mix of blue and yellow.

The song blaring through the speakers was unknown to Mike and overly staticky, as if the way it was set up to be transmitted was unconventional—from speaker to microphone to speaker.

Party on you, party on you
Party on-party on you, party on you
Party on-party on you, party on you
Party on-party on you, party on you

Mike stood frozen on the steps, the metallic banister of the staircase vibrating from the sheer volume of the bass-line drop of the song.

He glanced at El momentarily in confusion, who was looking down at the dance floor with a wondrous, wide-eyed look, physically holding herself back before she could join in.

Mike turned back to the basement, to everyone swaying tipsily with their drinks in their hands, even sober Steve and Jonathan trying to humour Robin and Nancy in their attempts to get them to join in their movements. Lucas and Dustin were trying to copy Noah, doing some corny-ass swinging dance move with their eyes closed and both hands outstretched in front of them.

Mike continued to search for him, before his stomach jolted violently at the sight of Finn holding Will’s hand and playfully twirling him over and over again in an attempt to make him dizzy, as they both continued to laugh out loud over the music—sights and sounds brutal enough to whip against his chest.

All I'm thinking, all I know is
That I hope you knock on my door
Nervous energy
My heart rate rises higher, higher up

Mike felt that familiar fear rise up inside him, a violent kind of pining that had made a home in him for longer than he really knew himself.

El turned to look at him with a worried expression, her smile having dropped after following Mike’s line of sight.

“Mike…”

Mike took a cowardly step backwards, his throat feeling like broken glass he had swallowed slowly.

“Mike…” El pleaded, gripping onto his hand.

“Is your bike still in the supply closet upstairs?”

“Mike, please don’t run, please…” El tried again, holding onto his hand tighter.

Mike turned towards the party again, the full force of his love for Will hitting him so hard that he couldn’t breathe at all.

I wish you'd get here, kiss my face
Instead you're somewhere far away
My nervous energy will stay
I hope you realize one day, uh (party on-party on you, party on you)

“El…” Mike trembled uncontrollably. “The song is about to end, just please… answer me…”

El stared at him for a moment, her gaze breaking at whatever was etched on his face right now.

“Yes…” El said finally, letting go of his hand. “I’ll check on you in the Void in twenty minutes, to see you’ve reached home. Okay?”

“Okay…” Mike brought the hand El had held to his mouth, pre-emptively pushing down the sob about to escape from it.

He stole one more glance at Will before he hurried up the stairs before the song ended, under the cover of the oppressive bass line and the haunting crooning of the singer, to camouflage the sounds of his frantic escape.

***

Will wrung his hands together nervously in his lap, his heartbeat stuttering with worry as he sat on the passenger side of Steve’s Beamer.

“I’m sure he’s okay, Will.” Steve suddenly said from next to him as he drove down the familiar streets of the neighbourhoods bordering Maple Street. “El did check and see that he was in his room.”

“I know.”

It had been close to 10:30 pm when the chaos on the dance floor had died down for the night, and he’d noticed that El had joined them again in the basement.

But Mike was nowhere to be seen.

He didn’t want to pry further, but there was an unreadable look in her eyes that had Will immediately pull Steve aside and request that he drop him home earlier than the others.

Jonathan had immediately begun to pull his usual overprotective stance and tried to take him home instead, but once Nancy reminded him that Hopper had specifically asked him to walk El back to the cabin through the tunnels, he gave in reluctantly with a stern look in Steve’s direction.

Will felt a strange, visceral shiver go down his spine at the look Finn and Noah aimed at him as he passed them on their way to the spiral staircase, with Steve trailing behind him.

Steve had barely stopped the car at the curb outside the Wheeler residence before Will was already flinging the car door open.

“Turn on the porch light once you’re in, please. I’ll only drive off after that.” Steve requested with a concerned tone.

“I will,” Will replied absently, his gaze going straight to Mike’s window on the second floor, which seemed dimly lit and thus confirmed as occupied to him. “Thanks, Steve.”

“Of course…”

Steve’s voice faded into the background as Will’s thudding heart took over his ears completely while he walked over to the front door, opening and closing it behind him, choosing to do so with preternatural silence for some reason.

He switched on the porch light and watched through the window by the door as Steve lingered for a second before driving off down the street.

Will stood in the entrance hall, standing quietly as he wondered why he was dawdling. He closed his eyes, the image of Mike’s hands slowly reaching for his waist on the dance floor brutally burning behind his eyelids for a moment before he opened them again.

Instead of heading upstairs, Will quietly walked towards the basement door and went downstairs. He changed into a clean pair of sweatpants and a T-shirt he usually wore to bed, and laid down on the couch for some reason.

The determination that had built up in his chest on the car ride had somehow fizzled down into a cold firework.

Will covered his eyes with his hands, shame roiling through his stomach as he kept playing the moment in the party over and over again in his mind, like some kind of mental self-flagellation.

Mike’s dark eyes on him.

Mike’s lips parting slightly to say something.

Mike’s big hands, with his long fingers and his sure grip, forging the sensation of them on his wrist…on his waist instead—pressing against the bare skin of his hips and…

Will gasped lightly, his hands dropping from his eyes to his mouth at his racy train of thought, before he bolted upright and sat still on the couch, squeezing his legs together in fear at the way the lower half of his body was suddenly aching.

What the hell was wrong with him?

Will sat there for five long minutes, trying to calm himself and his body down by going into the basement bathroom and splashing his face with some water, before he finally decided to go upstairs and check on Mike.

He slowly padded his bare feet up the stairs, any noise from his weight muffled by his careful steps and the carpeted floor.

Good times for a change
See, the luck I've had
Can make a good man turn bad

Will froze on the top step of the second floor, just one stride away from Mike’s bedroom door that was half ajar, as Morrissey’s forlorn voice drifted through.

His throat went dry for some inexplicable reason as Will took a small step forward and placed his palm against Mike’s door, slowly pushing it open.

So, please, please, please
Let me, let me, let me
Let me get what I want this time

The song must have camouflaged the sounds of Will’s entrance, because he remained frozen on the threshold of the room, finding Mike’s back to him, sitting on the red-carpeted floor.

He must have been working on a model of some kind, his broad back bowed over something placed on his swivelling desk chair, fully concealing it from Will’s line of sight.

Will opened his mouth to call his name, but the word remained stuck as he heard a short keening sound occasionally interrupt the song, Mike’s back stretching slightly as he set something down on the chair and wiped his face before going back to working on his project.

He felt his breathing pick up, uneven and terrified, as he attempted to swallow the feeling of broken glass in his throat.

Haven't had a dream in a long time
See, the life I've had
Can make a good man bad

Will knew he should make his presence known—he should knock on the door or clear his throat or do something.

But he didn’t do any of that as he softly stepped into the room.

A room that was so utterly familiar to him, like its owner, that he knew just how to step inside it, how to honour every crack and imperfection on its floor and its very foundation, as he inched his way in without Mike realising he was already inside, closing the door behind him with a kind of secret expertise that was only privy to him and no one else.

So, for once in my life
Let me get what I want
Lord knows, it would be the first time
Lord knows, it would be the first time

He stopped a few inches away from where Mike sat, just until he was able to get a clear view of what Mike was working on.

Will almost forgot about hiding his presence, his steps faltering suddenly at the same time as his heart skipped a beat at the model sitting on Mike’s chair.

Air came out of him in short, erratic gasps, his eyes two seconds away from stinging as he let himself take in the care with which Mike was holding what was supposed to be a miniature version of a small plank of wood, painting the words “Home of Will the Wise” on it with a small brush dipped in red paint.

Morrissey’s voice looped in the background, and Will’s vision went slightly blurry, unshed tears lining his eyes as he dragged his gaze to the unfinished, miniature version of Castle Byers that sat on the chair, with an assortment of scrap materials near Mike’s feet and some on his desk…

Will’s heart nearly stopped in his chest at the painting, unfurled and opened again on one side of Mike’s large mahogany table, with paperweights on all four edges to flatten out their curling corners.

“W-what is this?” The words escaped out of Will in a trembling whisper, without his permission.

Mike snapped his gaze in the direction of his voice, and Will felt his chest contract painfully when he looked at his face.

Mike was crying.

Will faltered another step sideways as he held onto the corner of Mike’s desk to steady himself in the face of his best friend’s profile—cheeks flushed from constantly rubbing away tears, lips bitten blood-red from holding them in, his dark curls a beautiful, heart-breaking mess scattered across his forehead.

“Will!”

Mike’s paintbrush dropped to the floor in surprise, the small plank of wood he was working on nearly slipping from his fingers before he set it aside carefully on the chair and stood up hurriedly, turning around towards his bed to frantically wipe at his face and run a quick hand through his hair.

“What happened?” Will asked softly, his voice trembling so badly at how wrecked Mike looked. “Why are you—why are you crying?”

Will stood up straighter, walking over to Mike as he raised a hesitating hand and placed it on his shoulder.

He felt Mike viscerally flinch against his touch, his stooped posture folding in on itself with his back still towards Will.

Will felt his heart drop painfully to his stomach at this, as he snatched his hand back from Mike and brought it to his own chest, holding it against his thundering heart with his other hand for support.

“I-I’m sorry… sor—sorry.” Will backed away a step, his own tears falling down his face this time.

Mike whipped around at his response, his eyes widening with shock at what Will had said.

“No, don’t! Please never say that!” Mike’s hands shot out to hold Will by his shoulders, the damning desires hibernating peacefully inside his body shooting awake at his fingers gripping him tightly.

Mike frantically glanced between Will’s eyes, searching for something before his gaze dropped to his own hands still on Will’s shoulders, before pulling them away immediately.

“Please don’t say sorry…” Mike said quietly, his voice a tired and defeated thing. “You haven’t done anything wrong, Will. Ever.”

Will remained standing there, his shoulders still buzzing from Mike’s grip on him as he watched Mike avoid his gaze and walk backwards before sitting down on the edge of his bed with his head hung.

A few seconds passed before Will took a step forward, not yet feeling brave enough to sit next to Mike on the bed.

“Why did you leave the party suddenly?” Will asked gently as he wiped the tears from his face. “Did something happen, Mike?”

Another long pause followed, and Will waited. Patiently.

“I, uh… I broke up with El.” Mike said in a low voice, but the words were enunciated with crystal-clear clarity. “Well, we both broke up with each other. But, uh… yeah.”

Will’s heart came to a juddering stop in his chest, like a malfunctioning motor that was finally showing signs of breaking down.

He tightly clutched the fabric of his shirt, a kind of tether to his physical reality as he felt the world tilt slightly off-kilter at Mike’s words.

“What….” Will murmured. “W-why?”

Will heard the room plunge into silence as the tape on Mike’s cassette player finally ended.

There were only Will’s short, erratic gasps that counted as breathing and Mike’s heaving inhales and exhales, as if respiration was a manual effort.

“…because… because…” Mike tried with difficulty, like dragging a dead horse around.

He finally lifted his head to look up at Will who remained standing.

There was a haunted expression on Mike’s face, in the slight twitch of the corner of his mouth and the way his eyebrows drooped downwards before raising themselves slightly. And yet…

And yet, Mike’s dark brown eyes had never looked clearer. Honest. Transparent.
Like he was done trying to hide, done trying to push down whatever he was about to say.

“Because I never—I was never in love with her.”

A really whisper-soft, keening gasp escaped from the back of Will’s throat without his permission, and he frantically used a hand to cover his mouth.

Mike was looking at him with a kind of unflinching certainty that had Will pinned to the spot, his gaze darting to the painting on the desk for one terrifying second before going back to him.

“What are you—” Will attempted to swallow down the emotion pushing up his throat. “You’re wrong, Mike. You… these last few months have been hard on both of you. You two will figure it out, you always do… and—”

Mike held his gaze, not blinking even once as his lips stretched into a tight, sad line and he slowly stood up from his bed.

“It’s already done, Will. I decided to finally let go of her,” Mike said resolutely. “I… finally realised what I needed to let go of.”

Will was fighting really hard to breathe properly, but his stupid lungs were not cooperating with him.

“You’re wrong…” Will said breathlessly, taking a step backwards as he held the corner of Mike’s desk for support, his traitorous gaze glancing once at the painting before looking back at Mike.

“I’m wrong?” Mike asked, the question in his tone mysteriously guarded in a way Will couldn’t quite put his finger on, and it severely bothered him. “What am I wrong about, exactly?”

“You…you said you loved her… you said you’re scared of the day she won’t need you anymore—that your fucking life started the day you found her in the fucking woods!” Will didn’t realise when his words had turned into a yell.

Will nearly missed the way Mike flinched at his swearing and his tone, more tears escaping both their eyes at the same time, before Mike was suddenly clearing the empty space between them with a long stride and stopping just a foot ahead of him.

“Was that a lie? You lied to her?” Will tilted his head, unable to reel back his anger for some reason. “It seems you’ve become really good at that!”

Mike’s lips parted at that in surprise, his own chest heaving from the conversation.

“What is that supposed to mean?”

“You lied to me, Mike…” Will felt the words tumble out of his mouth unbidden. “Laura told me. She called the right number the first time, she—”

Mike stumbled back a step at Will’s words, his eyes looking away in an incriminating manner that had Will’s stomach twisting in a painful yet indulgent way, as if the reaction stoked the fire of a secret greed inside him.

“I…” Mike tried, his nervous gaze darting away before meeting Will’s again.

“Telemarketers, Mike?” Will scoffed bitterly. “Why? Why would you lie about something so stupid? I just don’t understand. I’ve tried to go over it in my mind repeatedly, and I just—”

“You’ve lied to me too…” Mike said, the words a bedraggled whisper. “If I’m being called to the floor, then so are you…”

Mike stretched an arm out and pointed with an index finger at the painting on the table.

Will’s heart was thudding so violently against his rib cage that he hoped it would crack them open fatally before Mike continued the rest of this conversation.

“…why, Will?”

“I don’t….” Will tried, fully unable to speak anymore as tear after tear kept spilling out of him. “Mike, please….”

“I asked her about it today,” Mike tried to say over his shaking voice as he took a slight step forward. “She had no idea… why, Will? Why would you do something like this?”

“Mike…” Will closed his eyes and turned his head to the floor as he clutched at his sleep T-shirt. “I was trying to help…”

“How was this helpful? In what possible way could you lying to me be helpful in any way?”

Will snapped his gaze open to find Mike standing right in front of him, so close that he had to tilt his head up slightly.

His fingers ached to reach over and touch his face, and wipe the tears from them, but he held still, in sheer terror of revealing everything.

When Will remained silent, staring into Mike’s eyes as Mike gazed back down at him with an anguish that was tearing Will open from the inside—Mike spoke again.

“Everything you said, in the van… wasn’t from El then…”

“They could have been, I know her….”

“No, you don’t.” Mike shook his head sadly. “None of us do. She told me herself today. So why don’t you finally tell me the truth for once, Will? Or does ‘friends don’t lie’ not mean anything anymore in this Party?”

Will licked his lips nervously, unable to speak a single thought out loud as they both stood in silence in the room, feeling increasingly warm under Mike’s dark gaze and proximity.

“Was it out of pity?” Mike tried, searching for something in Will’s eyes. “You took pity on your best friend and decided to peddle a story for pathetic Mike Wheeler—”

“No…of course not!” Will gasped, shocked at the direction Mike was taking this in.

“…stupid Mike Wheeler, idiot Mike Wheeler, thinks he’s some fucking leader when he can’t even—”

“Stop it, Mike—” Will warned him, unable to bear his harshness toward himself.

Mike turned away from Will and walked towards his bed.

“…can’t even do the one thing that people ask of him, to be useful enough to actually save the people he loves, instead of lying to them and then getting your friends killed—”

“Mike, stop it!” Will walked over and pulled Mike by the wrist and turned him around. “What are you talking about? You haven’t killed anyone!”

“YES, I HAVE!” Mike’s voice pitched high in a broken cry, and Will nearly felt the sight as equal to having his heart be run through a shredder. “I nearly killed Max! I killed Eddie! I—I lied to El about loving her, and I distracted her from what’s important, and it nearly… it destroyed this entire town… IT’S ME… It’s all me…”

Will felt the next wave of tears escape him in a shuddering rush, not thinking clearly as he pulled Mike closer to him by the wrist—his feet going on slight tiptoes as he slung his arms around Mike’s shoulders, pulling him into a hug.

Will felt Mike’s almost entire weight collapse against him, his arms snaking around Will’s waist and pulling him closer instantly as he burrowed his head into Will’s shoulder.

“It’s not your fault, none of this is your fault… are you crazy?” Will implored through his own tears, his entire body shaking as he felt Mike sob harder against him.

“Yes, it is… it is…” Mike hiccuped against Will, leaning down further in Will’s grip to hook his chin over his shoulder, as Will kept one hand tight on Mike’s back and the other rubbing up and down it. “I kept shoving the truth inside me for years, and it killed people. I know it, I just know it…”

“Mike….” Will swallowed thickly, unable to parse the mixed emotions of concern and desire roiling inside him selfishly as he slowly guided Mike down towards the bed, before they both sat down on it together in one flopping motion.

After a few moments of Will holding Mike through his sobs, Mike began to lift his head slowly from his grip to sit up by himself.

Will felt the loss of touch immediately, the familiarity of Mike’s body against him so easy for his skin to get used to.

“Listen to me, Mike.” Will wiped his own face with the back of his hand before continuing. “You did not kill anyone. Vecna did. Vecna is responsible for every terrible thing that’s happened to us and our friends, not you. Okay?”

Will tried to meet Mike’s eyes, his hands still on his shoulders.

Mike avoided his gaze as he stared blankly at the floor of his room, a drawn expression on his face.

“Mike…” Will tried again, as he squeezed Mike’s shoulders to snap him out of the terrifyingly vacant reverie he was in.

“Vecna is not responsible for the most terrible thing that’s happened to me, Will.”

Mike slowly turned his gaze to Will, and Will could hardly fathom how someone could still look this handsome while looking so tortured.

“And what is that, exactly?”

Mike stared at him with such a frank and open look in his eyes that it made Will instinctively want to turn away from it like it was the sun itself.

It happened so quickly that Will hardly registered Mike’s long fingers, slightly cold and yet firm, wrapping around his wrists, with his hands still on Mike’s shoulders.

Will’s breathing went shallow as Mike’s thumbs slowly stroked against both his pulse points, the movement so familiar and yet the pace languid in a way that had blood rushing to Will’s cheeks immediately.

“I fell in love with someone who will never return my feelings in the same way.”

Will felt his surroundings tilt sideways in his peripheral vision, and he gripped a little harder onto Mike’s shoulders to hold himself upright.

“You….” Will tried, unable to inhale enough oxygen to complete the rest of his sentence right away. “With… someone?”

“Yeah…” Mike said softly, while his fingers kept their slow, agonising pace against Will’s wrists. “With… with a boy…”

Will gave up on air entirely, shuddering violently as his fingers clawed against the fabric of Mike’s T-shirt, grabbing it in his fists and holding on for dear life.

Mike’s dark eyes were already swimming with unshed tears, rapidly going back and forth between Will’s own hazel ones as if feverishly searching for something in them.

“You… you’re lying…”

Mike chuckled wetly, closing his eyes in a sharp movement that let more tears escape.

“I’m done with lying,” Mike said, a little quieter. “I lied about the call because I didn’t want you to go to Laura’s house.”

“W-what?”

“In fact, I don’t want you to go to any girl’s house. Ever.”

If it wasn’t for Mike’s fingers against his pulse, Will would hardly believe he was alive at this moment. Or that he wasn’t stuck in a terrible nightmare like last night.

Will’s silence must have worried Mike because he was slowly descending into a ramble, and Will could already feel it.

“I don’t want you to look at any girl, any boy, anybody except me.” Mike’s voice trembled as he continued. “Only me, and no one else.”

“Mike…” Will managed to say just that.

“I know. I know.” Mike squeezed his eyes shut for a moment, forcing more unshed tears out before speaking. “Mike Wheeler is stupid, pathetic, idiotic, crazy, selfish—”

“Mike… you don’t… you’re not…” A sob escaped Will, entirely unbidden.

“No, I am. I am selfish.” Mike shook his head, as if refusing to budge from his self-declarations. “I said something horrible to you on that rainy day… last summer, and I never apologised properly for it, and you—”

Mike’s eyes helplessly gestured to the incomplete model of Castle Byers still resting on his desk chair before going back to looking at Will.

“That is not your—” Will tried in vain as Mike shook his head slowly again, his caressing thumbs refusing to budge from their place on his wrists.

“I treated you horribly in Lenora, and your birthday too. I—” Mike’s throat made a noise between a hiccup and a sob, but he kept going.

“I kept dragging El around in this… this farce of a… when I knew, I knew…”

Mike couldn’t finish his own sentence as he began to cry again, and Will could barely hear it over the beginning of a faint static noise in his ears.

“…knew what?”

Mike abruptly stopped his movements over Will’s wrists.

“That I have feelings for you, Will.”

Mike said the words with such unhesitating clarity that it had Will’s grip slacken on Mike’s shoulders instantly, disbelief and shock aiding in the movement of Will’s hands sliding down Mike’s shoulders to land on Mike’s lap with a dull thwack.

The ringing in Will’s ears kept rising like a gargantuan wave of a tsunami, threatening to white out every single one of his senses.

“Will… say something… please—”

“No…no, you….”

Will suddenly stood up, walking all the way over to the closed door before turning around swiftly.

“I know…” Mike suddenly said, his own hand fisting in the fabric of his T-shirt resting over his heart. “I know you don’t like me like that, and I’m sorry. I’m so sorry, Will. I tried so hard to push it down, I tried to tell myself that you would never… that we’re just best friends, and I… god, Will….”

Mike suddenly stood, and for some unknown reason the movement spooked Will like a cat, as he inched backwards slowly before his back hit the left side of Mike’s desk, holding onto it for support as every single one of his senses threatened to burn itself to a crisp at Mike’s words.

“You don’t have to accept it, or even reciprocate it in any way, okay?” Mike was imploring him with a kind of fear in his eyes that Will had never seen and could barely even begin to unpack.

“We’re still best friends, we’re… always going to be best friends… right?” Mike asked, his posture slightly stooped, still clutching at his chest desperately. “Right, Will?”

Will dragged his gaze away from Mike, scanning his surroundings for something…anything, to reveal that this was his doing.

That Henry would come out of hiding at any moment, and he would be trapped in that dark, corrupted library again.

“Please, Will…” Mike’s voice broke, a fresh set of tears threatening to spill free. “Say something….”

“Who…who is making you say this?” Will finally said, his voice feeling raw from not having spoken for a while.

“What?” Mike suddenly dropped his hand from his chest in surprise at his question.

“It’s not funny… Mi—Henry,” Will said shakily, leaning against the desk as he tried to look around the room. “You… you’re in my head again, you’re haunting my dreams… you….”

“Will…” Mike rushed over, about to hold his hand again, but Will recoiled into the corner between Mike’s desk and the adjoining wall. “I’m not him… this is real… it’s me, Mike…”

“N-no… you’re lying…” Will’s voice trembled over the barrage of sobs beginning to escape him, the scene in front of him beginning to look too good to be true, and instead be tempting and cruel enough to be reality.

“You’re in my dreams again…I came back home from the party and fell asleep in the basement, I know it!” Will tried to bite back on a violent sob racking through him and failed.

“Will, please…” Mike tried to reach forward, but Will recoiled again, making Mike’s face fall into a painfully dejected expression.

“You’re TOYING WITH ME!” Will’s voice broke on the words at how loudly he yelled suddenly. “You… you know about every thought in my head, you know about the painting, you know how I feel about him—you…”

Mike froze at Will’s words, his face going slack, along with his arms at both sides.

“What…?” It was Mike’s turn to be breathless as he took a step back from Will in sheer disbelief.

Will stopped suddenly, his crazed, incoherent babbling dying in his mouth as he took in the way Mike stumbled backwards and braced himself with a palm against the wall next to him.

“You…” Will faltered again, staring at Mike, who was staring at him, as they both stood frozen in the moment like miniatures in a snow globe, the truth of their situation raining down on them without their permission.

“How…how do you feel about me, Will?” Mike asked, his voice earnest and brave in a way that had Will’s heart fluttering in his chest.

“I feel….” Will tried to speak, suddenly feeling like he was winded from the realisation hitting him that this wasn’t maybe a dream, and that Mike maybe…

“Yeah?” Mike asked again, softer than before, as he maintained eye contact with Will and slowly walked closer.

He kept moving until there were around seven inches of space between them.

“Mike, I…” Will felt Mike take a damning step closer, making him tilt his head upwards to meet his gaze.

“Will, before you finish that sentence, I just…” Mike licked his lips nervously, and Will’s gaze immediately dropped to them, that well-practiced, buried ache inside him rising in full force.

“I want you to know that…I’m yours, Will Byers.”

“W-what?” Mike’s voice was pitched lower than usual, and Will felt it in every hidden nook and corner of his body.

Mike took another small step forward, without making any sudden moves to touch Will, before slowly clasping his hands behind him like a chivalrous knight.

“I’m yours,” Mike repeated softly, his gaze going equally softer. “However you’ll have me. Best friend or anything more than that…I’m yours, Will Byers. I always will be.”

“Mike…” Will hitched in a shaking breath, unable to push himself any further against the side of Mike’s desk, so he reached forward and placed a hand on Mike’s chest, right over his heart, fisting the fabric of the T-shirt over it to help him stand up straighter.

Will noted the way Mike’s right hand escaped from his clasped posture to reach for his hand, but stopped himself…leaving Will to continue speaking.

He closed his eyes to seek some respite from Mike’s unflinching eyes staring straight into his soul, in order to collect himself for what he was about to say next.

“I’m selfish too…” Will began, opening his eyes to find Mike’s face leaned unknowingly a little closer to him than before.

“No—no…Will—” Mike began to shake his head, already rejecting the notion before it was expressed.

“No, I am! I am!” Will pressed on, using his grip on Mike’s shirt to pull him even closer. “I am stupid, and pathetic, and crazy, and so utterly selfish…when it comes to you!”

“Will…” Mike gasped his name out, almost as if his words had punched the air out of him.

“I was stupid enough to think that moving to Lenora would help me get over my feelings for you, pathetic enough to keep wanting you with every missed phone call and letter for a whole year, crazy enough to spin that insane lie that El commissioned the—”

Will let out a sudden gasp of air, feeling two sets of hands on his waist, the touch desperate and warm against his body.

“Sorry…I’m sorry…” Mike suddenly pulled his hands away, worry flickering across his face. His body, which had been practically an inch from Will’s, was now farther away than Will liked.

“—and selfish enough to need you…to keep needing you,” Will pulled Mike back closer with his grip on his T-shirt, “…despite not knowing if you needed me back.”

Will felt himself crash into Mike’s outstretched arms, their sobs coming back in full force in unison.

The tips of Will’s toes ached as he tried to push himself up to Mike’s height, his arms clinging around Mike’s neck with a kind of recklessness that he hadn’t let himself indulge in for years.

“I love—I love… I’m in love with you, Mike—” Will sobbed desperately into Mike’s shoulder, into the side of Mike’s neck and into Mike’s T-shirt, his arms carelessly roving all over his back, his nape, and his wild, beautiful curls that were so soft that it had Will crying harder against him.

“Will… Will… Will…” Will’s name kept growing more ragged through Mike’s bawling, as Will continued to repeatedly caress the side of his face, his neck, and his shoulders.

Will held him securely against his chest as Mike came undone with every single emotion that both of them had been pushing down for god knows how long, finally coming to terms with why the vital organs inside their chests had been swapped and placed in the other’s body for a good reason.

They remained interlocked in each other’s arms, the very foundation of their relationship shifting with every muffled “I love you” and “I’m in love with you” whispered into the other’s ear.

Every time Will lost his balance on his toes, he could feel Mike lean down closer to him and hold him tighter—their embrace remaining solid, even as they unsteadily swayed this way and that in the space by Mike’s desk, as if they were standing still and there was some kind of earthquake shaking the foundation of the room, leaving them unable to remain steady unless they held onto each other more tightly.

The two of them somehow stumbled their way against the side of Mike’s desk, with Will’s rear the only thing that absorbed the shock of the impact.

“Ow!” Will said suddenly into Mike’s ear, the torrent of their confessions disrupted by it.

“Oh god, are you okay?” Mike lifted his head up instantly, his hands reflexively sliding down from Will’s waist in a gesture that ended up with him cupping Will’s ass with both hands as a protective measure.

Will gasped right against Mike’s mouth, his fingers reactively curling into Mike’s hair and tugging at the strands sharply—making Mike gasp against Will’s mouth at the exact same time.

They remained frozen together like that, both their hands resting on the other’s body in a hesitant way.

Will tracked the way Mike’s cheeks had gone pink, his light, erratic breaths ghosting on Will’s lips that had absently tugging at Mike’s curls again.

“Will…” Mike made a noise that was close to a whimper, his hands absently squeezing against Will’s ass, a voracious heat coiling inside his lower abdomen.

“Sorry, I wanted to see if I was the one that…” Will’s gaze dropped to check the blush growing pinker on Mike’s face before going back to meet his dark eyes, fully dilated against the light of Mike’s amber lamp.

“That’s driving me crazy?” Mike whispered, his dilated eyes dropping to Will’s mouth before going up to his eyes. “Yeah….”

“I can’t believe this….” Will whispered back with a small, disbelieving smile, his fingers easing on Mike’s hair to just lightly run through it, just because he could.

“Neither can I…” Mike smiled softly down at him, his hands dragging their way back up to rest on Will’s waist.

They remained smiling at each other like that, with Will pushed against Mike’s desk and Mike holding him against it like it was the most natural place for him to be.

Suddenly, Mike’s smile slowly dropped into something pensive, his eyes searching for something in Will’s before he spoke.

“Will?”

“Yeah?”

“Can I…” Mike asked really quietly, “Can I kiss you?”

Will’s heart careened right through his rib cage and flew out of the window at his question.

He held Mike’s patient gaze, feeling his thumbs unknowingly stroke the sides of his waist as he waited for an answer.

Will nodded quickly without thinking, despite his mind suddenly recalling the Vecna vision-induced dreams from last night.

He felt himself close his eyes for his real first kiss as he felt Mike lean closer and closer.

Suddenly, instead of dark curls, full lips, and high cheekbones—flashing images of a mutilated, grotesque face and clawed hands appeared in his mind’s eye.

Will felt the touch of Mike’s lips, so soft and warm against his for less than a second before he snapped his head sideways, clinging to Mike’s neck to grip onto reality for dear life as his breathing became frantic and nervous.

“W-what is it?” Mike said, his voice heartbreakingly gentle and worried. “Was it bad? I’m sorry—”

“No, no… Mike.” Will snapped his eyes open and turned his head back to face Mike, who was anxiously scanning his face. “It’s not you, it’s….”

“I want to kiss you… really badly. I do.” Will looked up nervously at him, his hands never leaving Mike’s nape as he stared into his patient gaze. “It’s… it’s him.”

A split second passed before Will tracked the way Mike’s gaze went from thoughtful to concerned in record time as he realised who Will was talking about.

“What happened in your dream last night?” Mike asked worriedly. “If you don’t mind sharing…”

“He showed me you…” Will said quietly, and he felt Mike’s grip around his waist tighten at his words. “You were…you were kissing me, and I was kissing you back, and then…”

“Then what?” Mike’s voice had gone down to a harrowing whisper, his gaze fracturing in concern for Will.

“It became… forceful. I wanted to stop, and you… he… the vision, wouldn’t let me go, and then…”

Will told him the rest of the dream, and it had Mike shutting his eyes tightly as if it pained him physically to hear what had happened, before using one arm around his waist to pull him closer and dragging the other hand all the way over to Will’s shoulder, caressing the skin of his nape gently, which had Will shivering against Mike’s grip.

“I’m so sorry….” Mike kept whispering over and over again like he was the one who’d done it to Will. “I hate that rotting bastard so much…”

They remained like that for a while—Mike with his eyes closed as he murmured apologies on someone else’s behalf as he held Will, and Will holding on to Mike as he let himself be held by him.

But after a while, Mike’s fingers against his nape slowly veered from comfort to something else.

Something that stoked the fire that had begun to brew in Will’s lower abdomen, the flames spreading lower and lower towards that ache building between his legs.

“Mike…” Will suddenly whimpered against his better judgement.

Mike’s fingers immediately stopped, no doubt something about the noise Will just made alerting him.

“Yeah?” Mike replied hoarsely.

“Just because…uh… just because I’m not ready to kiss you on the… lips, yet,” Will avoided Mike’s gaze as he said the next words, “…doesn’t mean you can’t kiss me elsewhere…”

Mike’s hands had gone still immediately on Will’s body, and Will felt that familiar bolt of anxiety strike him—maybe Mike changed his mind, or Mike probably felt weird about the whole thing entirely, maybe Mike—

“Will, look at me…”

Will snapped his head immediately to Mike, the cadence of his voice faint in a way that had Will feeling slightly dizzy himself.

“Like where?” Mike asked as he licked his lips nervously.

“Like… uh…” Will’s heart hammered at Mike’s earnest question. “Somewhere close to the face…like….”

Will’s face was feeling so hot that he felt he might be losing circulation in other parts of his body due to all the blood rushing to his head.

He tilted his head sideways, exposing his neck to Mike.

For one long, mortifying second, Will felt that Mike would not comply with such a request.

“Maybe…oh!” Will’s sentence ended in a loud gasp before he could fully register Mike bringing both his hands to Will’s waist again, pulling him flush against his body before slowly beginning to lean closer into Will’s space.

The first kiss was featherlight, Mike’s soft lips pressing chastely against the skin right under his jaw.

“Mike—” Will hitched in a breath, gripping onto Mike’s hair for support.

“Is this okay?” Mike said against his neck, and the combination of his hot breath and soft lips against his skin had Will’s knees going weak.

“Y-yeah…but uh…” Will began, but decided against it immediately. “No, uh, it’s… keep going…”

“Will, please…” Mike spoke the words against his neck, open-mouthed and breathy. “Tell me what you need…”

“Okay…okay…” Will tried to breathe over his juddering heartbeat. “Can you…can you kiss me there like you would kiss my…my mouth…lips, I mean…”

This time, Mike didn’t ask Will for any kind of gentlemanly permission. Will felt his silent nod through Mike’s nose brushing against his skin, right before—

It felt like an electric current passing through him as Mike opened his mouth and pressed it against the incline of Will’s neck, his tongue darting out in regular intervals as he licked gently against the spot.

“Mike…” Will whined as Mike continued to suck against the skin there, his lips making a sound so loud and lewd in the utter silence of the room that Will was fighting for his life to stand upright as he pulled at Mike’s hair a little more tightly than intended.

Mike groaned loudly at the tug, suddenly stopping his licking and sucking to mumble something against Will’s neck that he didn’t catch.

“What?”

Will’s whole body weight had gone slack against Mike’s desk, the only thing holding him up was Mike’s grip on his waist and Will’s fingers threaded through Mike’s hair.

“Keep…going…?” Mike sounded like he was struggling to string together a sentence.

“Yeah…yeah…” Will nodded profusely, his breathing ragged, feeling his dick beginning to twitch at Mike’s words.

Mike used one hand to pull Will’s head sideways, giving him better access to his neck.

He licked once, as if cleaning the area with his spit, before kissing him softly for a few seconds, then following it up with a kind of furious alternating of nipping and kissing that had Will arching right off the desk, his fingers tugging at Mike’s hair and then his shoulders before going back to his hair, unable to contain the heat coiling tighter and tighter inside him.

“Will…” Mike moaned loudly against him as he moved to a spot lower than the previous one, starting his damned technique all over again. “Say my name, please… please…”

“Mike…” Will kept whispering over and over, his whines growing louder every time the licking suddenly switched to feeling Mike’s teeth graze against him. “M-Mike….”

Will could feel his legs going slightly shaky, the heat growing exponentially in the space between his thighs, and his dick quivering against Mike’s own hard-on pressing against his groin.

“Just my name, only my name…” Mike kept feverishly repeating against Will’s skin, as he tilted his head the other way, before suddenly changing his mind, leaning down further, to press a small kiss between Will’s clavicles, before dragging his tongue up the entire column of his neck.

“Oh my god—” Will choked out a groan, his eyes rolling to the back of his head at the extended wet, stroking sensation against him. “Mike, are you crazy—”

“Yeah…” Mike exhaled a rattling breath against a fresh patch of skin on the other side of Will’s neck, readying himself to christen it with his spit and teeth.

“Crazy, stupid, idiotic insane, pathetic—pull out the whole damn thesaurus at this point—”

“Please—” Will said sarcastically, as he attempted to roll his eyes judgementally at this.

Will’s breathing, waist and dick jerked erratically in tandem as Mike went to town on the other side of neck, this time suddenly biting on the soft skin there before doing anything else.

“Please…”

Will’s tone immediately changed tack, pulling Mike closer to his body as he felt the latter suddenly switching to licking and kissing—alternating rapidly between them in a way that had an unknown sensation building up inside him, hot and rapid and Will could feel his entire body seize up with a kind ferocious intensity he’d never known.

“Mike….Mike please….” Will had begun panting really loudly, his hands roving all over Mike’s back and hair, making a disastrous ruin of his curls. “What is….what—”

Mike used his comparatively larger hand to his advantage by tilting Will’s head up with his thumb and index finger while his remaining fingers scratched unknowingly at the side of Will’s jaw, trying to keep him steady as Will writhed in Mike’s arms.

“Mike please…I feel—” Will tried again, his eyes rolling to the back of his head again, slightly out of his own control, “What is that—wha—”

Mike suddenly removed his mouth from Will’s neck, half-way through licking a bite in the dip of his left clavicle, to look into Will’s eyes and try to make sense of his babble.

Will bit down on his bottom lip and felt his vision go white for an endless, stretched out second as he felt something like warmth and euphoria flooding every single vein in his body—with his dick jerking in his sweatpants in a way it had never done before.

He held onto Mike’s hair the entire time, as the frantic heat that had been pooling between his legs for so long, slowly ebbed out of him as he felt his body going slack in Mike’s arms.

After what seemed like a long minute, Will opened his eyes slowly, already feeling a sheen of sweat on his body—to find Mike staring at him with a wide-eyed, awed expression on his face, bordering on reverence.

“W-what?” Will managed to ask, his arms going slightly loose around Mike’s neck.

Will felt his breathlessness come back in full force, noticing the way Mike’s hair was ravaged, his lips wet from spit and utterly bruised and red from kissing Will’s neck.

Will followed as Mike’s gaze slowly travelled down Will’s torso and landed on the section of his grey sweatpants around his crotch.

Sweatpants that now had a considerably significant, dark stain on it.

“Wait….” Will looked at it in confusion for a one second before things finally clicked into place. “Oh….”

“Did I….” Mike began to say, staring at the stain in disbelief like he’d just won an Olympic gold medal. “Did I do that?”

Will kept staring at the stain, still slightly out of breath as he removed a hand from Mike’s neck to wipe the sheen of sweat from his top lip.

Will looked up to watch as Mike dragged his eyes from the stain to follow his hand, and linger on his mouth with a hungry yet questioning look in his gaze.

“Was there anyone else trying to consume my neck just seconds ago or…?” Will managed to quip as he dropped his shy gaze for a moment, the corner of his mouth tilting upwards wryly.

Mike chuckled lightly, the sound a surprising, beautiful thing to Will’s ears after the amount they had cried together thus far. He felt Mike’s hands adjust around his waist, loosening, then tightening, and then roving around the small of his back before tightening again.

Will looked up to find Mike’s chuckles beginning to peter out into short gasps, and before he knew it, Mike had begun tearing up again as he fought to maintain his smile from dropping completely.

“Hey… hey—” Will’s own fond smile vanished from his face as he tried to meet Mike’s escaping gaze, already trying to look away from Will as he continued crying silently.

“Mike, what is it? Did I… did I do something wr—”

Mike immediately turned to face him, his grip on Will’s waist firm and unhesitating.

“No, no, no… you’re perfect, I just—” Mike hung his head low to hide his face again as more tears escaped him, “I never thought this day would ever…—that you could ever feel the way I…”

Will’s heart squeezed painfully at Mike’s unfinished words, his trembling mouth and stinging eyes fighting to make a reappearance.

Slowly, he dragged his hands away from Mike’s hair, bringing them to either side of Mike’s face, tilting it upwards slightly to bring him eye to eye with him.

“Mike…” Will said softly.

Something in his voice must have induced some kind of spell on Mike, because he was already lifting his head up to meet his gaze, despite the tears relentlessly in their descent from his dark eyes.

“Y-yeah?” Mike replied shakily.

“I can bear it.” Will brought his face really close to his, dragging his hands from his face to caress the sides of Mike’s neck with his thumbs.

Will held unflinching eye contact with Mike, feeling something loosen in his chest, something immense and inescapable.

“I’m not going anywhere, Mike,” Will said intently. “You can cry if you want to…I can bear it. I want to bear it.”

“Will…” Mike leaned forward, their foreheads resting against each other.

“I can bear it.” Will repeated again, the string of the promise between their hearts going permanently taut with his words.

It was like Will’s words had unlocked a room inside Mike’s chest, one that was bolted shut with rust and a purposeful lack of maintenance for years.

Mike held onto Will with a kind of primal desperation that bordered on his survival as he cried his heart out, finally letting every single emotion he had been pushing down in order to hide himself away.

Will held Mike in place like an anchor, hands roving all over his back from a place of selfishness and selflessness, the two overlapping over each other in a way that it always did when it came to Mike.

After what seemed like it could have been a few minutes or a few hours, Mike had slowly begun to transition from loud hiccuping sobs, quieting down to soft shudders, before calming down fully.

Will watched quietly, his heart a pile of honeyed goo at Mike so utterly vulnerable in front of him, before he suddenly interjected without thinking when Mike began to pull back from their joined foreheads, removing a hand from his waist to wipe his tear-stained face with the back of his hand.

“Wait—” Will gripped Mike’s wrist with his hand before he had a chance to wipe his face.

“What?” Mike looked at him, a surprised glint in his eye.

“Can I wipe them instead… please?” Will asked, swallowing nervously at the insanely unhinged thought that just passed through his mind.

He could sense Mike’s hesitance on his face, unwilling to let Will do something for him that he could do himself.

“Please?” Will tried again, pursing his lips once before biting them.

He immediately tracked the way Mike’s gaze dropped swiftly to them again before going back up to his eyes.

Mike nodded back silently, his eyes still searching for something in Will’s face.

Will removed his hand from Mike’s wrist to return it to the side of his neck, mirroring his other hand on the other side of Mike’s neck. He watched as Mike looked at him patiently, his dark eyes completely open and vulnerable in a way that Will hadn’t witnessed in years since they were kids.

Will raised his hand from Mike’s neck again, intending to use his thumb to wipe at his cheeks…but he stopped himself at the last minute.

He abandoned all rational thought for a moment, and returned his hands back to the back of Mike’s head, his fingers finding their home in his curls again. This time, instead of just tugging at them reflexively in the throes of his own orgasm, Will grabbed them decisively—using the leverage to pull Mike’s face closer to his own face…to his mouth.

“Will… what are you…” Mike began to murmur, his voice a mere, undone rasp.

“I want to bear it…” Will whispered against Mike’s face, pulling him down to his height before he leaned forward and licked against the slope of Mike’s cheekbone, tasting the salt of his tears and something else….something decidedly Mike.

Will paused to take a breath, with his parted lips against Mike’s face as he reeled from his own audacity.

“Oh god—” Mike choked the words out, the sound vibrating against Will’s face, as he felt Mike’s hands slip from his waist in shock, before wandering down to his ass and cupping them tightly, pulling him even closer against him.

“Do you want me to—” Will managed to say, the rest of his words stranded in his throat as Mike squeezed harder.

“YES…god yes—”

Will closed his eyes, blindly following the line of Mike’s high cheekbones from years of drawing them—licking slowly, before using lips to kiss the spit away.

“Will…” Mike kept stuttering and moaning on his name with every lick and kiss, his fingers nearly clawing at Will’s ass when Will tried to bite at the sloping angle of his cheeks.

“One-third…” Will groaned unintelligibly against Mike’s other cheekbone, his entire body dizzy and hot from having to decide whether to lick, or kiss or bite first.

It was too much power…it was like Mike had given him the keys to the kingdom, and Will didn’t know what to do with himself with all that control over someone else, when he’d spent his entire life trying to restrain himself.

“One-third…please—” Will kept moaning through every wet, opened-mouth kiss, as he tilted Mike’s upwards with one hand, mouth parting to bite down a little too hard on his jaw-line, before smoothing out the nipping sensation with a small kiss and an accompanying drag of his wet tongue.

Will could already feel it, even before he had licked the first tear off of Mike’s face that Mike was painfully hard and with every taste of his skin, Mike kept pulling him closer against him.

It thrilled and terrified him to no end, that Mike actually wanted him—actively reaching for his body as he rutted his clothed erection against Will who was already hard again, but was more focused on licking every single last tear from Mike’s face.

He kept going, kissing and licking his way through Mike’s entire jaw-line, biting often like his life depended on it, feeling every single one of the jerking sensations of Mike’s dick against his own, as they both held each other in place against Mike’s desk.

“Will…I’m….I think I….” Mike’s frantic movements had become sloppy and ragged as Will kept kissing every inch of his face, except his mouth.

Mike moaned right into Will’s ears as he held onto him like a lifeboat in the middle of a vast ocean, and Will felt every quivering motion Mike’s body went through as he climaxed.

Will dragged a trembling hand against the nape of Mike’s neck, feeling a layer of sweat on it as he held onto Mike’s slack body against his—both of them fully leaning their exhausted bodies against the desk, before Will slowly disentangled himself, his gaze greedily roving down Mike’s plaid pyjamas to find a dark stain similar to his own.

“I did that…” Will mumbled with satisfaction, nodding to himself slowly before closing his eyes as Mike and him continued to hold each other and calm down from their respective highs.

After a while, when they could no longer remain slumped against each other like that anymore, Mike slowly stood up straighter on wobbly legs, pulling Will up to a stand with him.

“You okay?” Mike was breathing unevenly, his face a sweaty, scarlet mess as he looked down at Will with a small, lazy smile on his lips.

“I’m okay.” Will nodded back with a small grin, feeling Mike’s hands reach over to his before silently interlocking fingers with his own. “You?”

Mike squeezed their interlocked fingers steadfastly, closing his eyes once to nod back.

They remained staring at each other like that, occasionally one of them shyly darting their gaze aside before turning back to meet the other’s eyes as they swayed their hands childishly between them, looking down in disbelief—even after everything they had done together so far.

“Do you want to go to bed?” Mike asked quietly, catching Will’s eye with a thoughtful look. “Or do you want to talk about…everything?”

“Can we talk tomorrow?” Will asked softly, his heart skipping slightly at the way Mike was rubbing his thumb over Will’s knuckles. “I um…doing all that made me uh… I’m a bit tired…”

“Tomorrow it is.” Mike smiled back softly.

Mike began pulling him toward his bed with a mischievous look in his eye that had Will already turning his face away bashfully to catch his breath.

“Wait,” Will said suddenly, looking down at both their clothes. “We can’t sleep in this. I need to go get changed. I’ll be right back—”

Mike didn’t let go of his grip on Will, pulling him back swiftly toward him, making Will stumble back into Mike’s chest with a gasp.

“Will, please, I’ll go get it for you. Don’t go…please.” Mike was looking at him in that new, unguarded way that had Will forgetting to breathe again.

“Okay…” Will trailed off softly, nodding at him as Mike affectionately squeezed his hands twice before going to the basement to retrieve some spare sweatpants and underwear for him.

Ten minutes later, after the two of them had changed into fresh pyjamas and underwear, they climbed into bed together.

For the first time ever, Mike and Will left zero inches of space between them on the bed—legs tangled together, Mike’s hand around Will’s waist, and their faces so close together that the slightest movement had their noses brushing against each other, leaving them in a fit of breathless laughter every time.

“Go to sleep, Mike…” Will chided him lightly, feeling Mike’s arms tighten around him in the darkness of the room.

“You first.” Mike said, his words a warm whisper against Will’s lips.

“No, you…” Will replied playfully, his voice pitched lower than a whisper, a mere murmur against Mike’s lips.

“Nope, you first…”

Their playful back and forth slowly turned into something heated against their better judgment, with Will unconsciously tilting his head sideways in silent permission as Mike’s lips brushed against Will’s jaw.

Needless to say, they continued teasing each other like that much, much later into the night—picking right back up from where they had left off when they were pushed against the side of Mike’s desk earlier.

At some point before the others came back home, Mike pleaded with Will to wait for him as he scrambled downstairs and emptied out Will’s entire nightwear and underwear drawer into the closest plastic bag he could grab from the basement, dumping it carelessly at the foot of his bed along with stuff from his own closet in his room.

Under the covers, in the darkness of the night and the crackling electricity of this new discovery between them, the two of them were unable to satiate themselves, repeatedly changing out of their ruined undergarments to grab fresh ones, spiralling together in their need for each other until the front door finally slammed close and they had no option but to stop, finally falling asleep out of sheer and total exhaustion.

***

Finn eyed the closed door of Mike’s room across the hall as Noah and he brushed their teeth together at the bathroom sink.

“I’m worried.”

Noah looked up from next to him as Finn rinsed his mouth out.

“Like I’m genuinely…” Finn began, finding Noah eyeing him with a sentiment similar to his own as he faltered in his brushing before going back to the mirror to continue.

“The last thing he told me was that he was tired of playing pretend and then…boom, he hauled ass yet again?”

He heard Noah sigh loudly next to him before continuing to brush his teeth.

Finn was about to open his mouth to say something when Nancy’s loud voice erupted throughout the house, making them both jump at the same time.

“MIKE! I SWEAR TO GOD, IF YOUR BASKET’S NOT DOWN HERE IN THE NEXT FIVE MINUTES—I’M RUNNING THE MACHINES WITHOUT YOUR SHIT!”

“Oh my god…” Noah grumbled, bringing his hands to his tired eyes as he rubbed at them.

“How is she not hungover?” Finn shook his head in disbelief.

“Nancy!” Jonathan yelled back from somewhere in the kitchen, “Calm down!”

Finn heard tired footsteps climb upstairs and spotted Jonathan’s head peeking from the staircase landing.

“Guys, breakfast’s ready if you’re hungry.”

“Thanks, man.” Finn said, offering a grateful smile.

Jonathan nodded back and was about to head downstairs when Nancy yelled out again.

“MIKE! WAKE UP! LAUNDRY. NOW!!!”

Jonathan sighed audibly as he aimed a tired stare toward Mike’s closed bedroom door.

“Do you want me to wake him up?” Finn offered. “We kinda hit it off yesterday at the party, I think I could reason with him.”

“You’re a…lifesaver—seriously.” Jonathan heaved a relieved sigh as he immediately turned on his heel and went downstairs again.

He turned around to find Noah giving him a tired shrug as he leaned against the doorframe of the bathroom and continued to brush his teeth.

Finn dropped his toothbrush into one of the spare holders he and Noah had been using this past week before walking over to Mike’s door and knocking on it.

“Mike…” Finn lightly knocked twice. “Hey, Mike! You awake?”

“Seriously, Finn?” Noah scoffed through his toothbrush. “Teenagers sleep like the dead.”

Finn rolled his eyes with a sigh before turning around and knocking a little louder, using his full fist this time.

“Mike! Wake the hell up, dude!” Finn raised his voice a bit. “Nancy sounds pissed!”

“THAT’S BECAUSE I AM PISSED OFF, TELL HIM THAT!”

Finn jumped again, her raised voice stabbing daggers into his hungover senses. He waited a second before knocking on the door again, only for it to swing open from the inside this time, his fist knocking once against air.

“Mike, c’mon—”

Finn’s sentence died in a horrific, strangled screech at the back of his throat at the sight in front of him.

“Oh, hey Finn. Morning. What is it?” Will looked up at him with bleary eyes, rubbing at them tiredly. “Oh wow, your jaw looks a bit…”

“You—” Finn tried to speak, failing horrifically.

“…yeah?” Will asked, sounding utterly confused as if absolutely nothing was amiss.

“What’s going—oh my fucking god??????” Noah walked up right next to him, his words ending in a sharp whisper as he gripped Finn’s shoulder for dear life.

“What??” Will said frantically, his eyes going wider now. “What’s wrong??”

“What the hell happened to your neck?” Noah asked, horrified.

“Hey… what’s happening here?”

Mike’s voice suddenly appeared behind Will, and Finn had to grab Noah before they both toppled over the banister right behind them and fell down two flights of stairs.

“What’s happening here?” Finn asked incredulously. “Have you two looked in a fucking mirror?”

“W-what…?” Will asked nervously, his gaze darting between Finn and Noah before turning to Mike.

They both gasped out loud in unison, the sound a rattling wheeze that had them gripping onto each other, a near mirror to their doppelgängers.

“Okay, I have had enough of your shit today, Mike…”

All of them heard Nancy’s irritated voice appear at the bottom of the stairs, the staircase creaking loudly under her quick, frustrated steps—while Finn and Noah gaped in utter horror at the other two—with Mike’s entire lower half of his face marked with bites and bruises from cheek to jaw, while Will’s neck looked like he’d gotten a tattoo of leopard’s fleece on it, except instead of rosettes, the bruised patterns resembled the shape of someone’s mouth.

“SHIT!” Will whispered harshly in a panic.

“Shit, shit, SHIT…” Mike hissed at the same time, before helplessly turning to the other two.

“What do we do?”

***