no sweeter innocence than our gentle sin

by bridgetobyler

Chapter 2: PART 2

Notes:

PLEASE read the tags before diving into this chapter. there are heavy themes and suicide ideations. consider this as your reminder! (don’t say i didn’t warn you…!)

as someone who has dealt with a lot of this, this was really such an incredible experience to write. i hope you enjoy this as much as i enjoyed pouring my heart into it :')

thank you so much for taking the time to read this! I appreciate you endlessly!

find me on twitter: bylerbridges

“Do you believe in God?” Mike asks suddenly, with his arms crossed as he stares straight ahead. Both boys sit in the middle of the pews, a couple of rows back from the front. They’re close enough that their knees brush, and Will can’t help but shudder at the question. 

“I mean,” Will furrows his eyebrows, swallowing as he really thinks about it. He doesn’t know a life without believing in God, his abilities, and his moral judgment. His mother constantly reminded him of the importance of proper behaviour because there’s a higher power out there, and going to church is what he needed to do. “Of course I do. Don’t you?”

“I don’t know,” Mike sighs, a hint of fatigue lacing his voice. “I guess?”

Will blinks. “Your dad is the pastor, and you don’t believe in God?”

“I never said I don’t believe in Him,” Mike retorts, his hand falling to his sides. Will’s hands, which are gripping the edge of the wooden seat, tighten their grasp. Did he upset him? Mike gradually touches Will’s pinky finger with his own, and a warmth spreads across his stomach. He looks up at the ceiling to distract himself from how a simple touch makes him feel dizzy. “I just… don’t agree with everything He stands for.”

“Everything?” Will asks, inching his hand slightly closer to Mike’s. Will feels the heat that was pooling in his stomach reach the tips of his ears. Mike reaches a little further, interlocking their pinkies together. “Like… like what?”

Before Mike can answer his question, the unmistakable sound of the heavy, wooden doors of the main hall opening is heard. Will immediately pulls back his hand from Mike, placing his hands in his lap. 

"I don't think I've ever seen you spend this much time in church, son,” Mike’s father’s voice echoes throughout the open space, and Will immediately stiffens. They aren’t supposed to be here, he thinks. Service ended an hour earlier, and everyone had slowly trickled out, leaving the pair alone, sitting side by side. The pastor isn’t an idiot — he can connect the dots, can’t he? Are they going to get in trouble? Is he going to be told to leave? To leave Mike alone? To... never come back? “I wasn’t aware you enjoyed being here, especially when I see you dozing off right in front of me all throughout service.”

“I am interested, actually.” Mike shrugs. 

“Are you?” His father replies, almost as if it’s some form of a test. The stiffness is still suffocating Will, and he wishes it would be appropriate for him to get up and leave in the middle of the conversation. 

Mike, completely casually, says, “Would you rather I be out doing drugs or something?”

Will cringes at the words coming from Mike’s mouth. There has to be a million better ways to speak to the pastor, his father, but he isn’t sure he expects anything less. Is he trying to upset him?

“Don’t say stupidities in this place of prayer, Michael,” the pastor replies, unkindly. “Is there a reason you boys are here after the day’s sermon is finished?” he asks, adjusting the glasses perched on the bridge of his nose. “I don’t imagine you both are very… interested in the Lord’s work.”

“Who says we aren’t?” Mike lets out a small sigh, sending a reassuring look to Will. “For your information, Will here is incredibly god-fearing. He’s a good influence on me, honestly.”

Not answering his son, he turns his attention towards Will. “What’s your last name, son?”

Will stands up from his spot on the pew, straightening his posture and clearing his throat. “Byers. I’m, um, Will Byers.” Does he know? Will thinks, his breath getting caught in his chest. Is that why he’s here? Is that why the pastor decided to come to church when he usually doesn’t? Did… did God tell him they were here? “It’s nice to, um, formally meet you.”

The pastor nods slowly, pursing his lips. “Michael, you know better than to be here this late. I suggest you tell your friend to go home.” 

The way the Pastor emphasizes the word ‘friend’ makes Will wince. He knows, doesn’t he? He must know. Were they sitting too close? Did he see the way Will looks at his son? Is it written on his forehead?

“We’re actually just heading out.” Mike stands up from his seat and walks past his father. “Tell Mom she doesn’t need to prepare dinner for me tonight. I’m not sure when I’ll be back.”

The pastor doesn’t say anything as both boys walk out through the main entrance, and guilt begins to suffocate. Will knows that this feels wrong. So incredibly wrong. What’s gotten into him? Why does he suddenly feel so… at ease with giving into sin? 

Will begins to walk the familiar path toward his house when Mike lightly jogs to catch up with him. “Where, um, where are you going?”

“Home?” Will responds, eyebrows knitting as he keeps walking. He wants to create as much distance as possible between himself and the church — and between him and the pastor. “Your dad told us to, um, leave and go home, so… that’s where I’m going.”

“You didn’t bike today?”

“No,” Will replies sheepishly. “Not today.”

“Oh, then don’t worry. You’re not walking home.” Mike gestures toward the keys hanging from the silver carabiner attached to the belt loop of his black jeans. “I have my car.” He gestures to a bright red Cadillac, and Will can feel his heart pounding in his chest as he senses that Mike is not asking — but rather, telling. 

“You drive?” Will asks, throat dry. He isn’t sure why he thought otherwise — he’s seen it parked outside the church many times before, but didn’t connect the dots until now. Mike, having a red car, makes sense to him. The thought of Mike behind the wheel makes Will feel slightly dizzy. “Since when?”

“Since I was like sixteen?” Mike replies, shrugging. Will bites the inside of his cheek, knowing that, of course, he knows how to drive if he has a car. “Come, we’ll go for a drive. I don’t want to go home right away.” 

“You don’t even know where I live,” is the only thing Will can think to say, and he regrets the words as soon as they leave his lips. 

“I’m sure you’ll tell me,” Mike smiles softly, “Won’t you?”

Will turns his head back toward the church. What if the pastor is watching? What if all of this is some sort of… test? Are Mike and the pastor working together to see if he’s going to fall for it? If he’s going to take the bait — and follow Mike into the car?

“Right,” Will nods, unable to focus fully on their conversation, fidgeting in his spot. What if the pastor saw them hold hands? “Yeah, um, I would.”   

“He’s not looking at us, if that’s what’s distracting you,” Mike mutters, kicking a rock along the sidewalk. “I’m pretty sure he went straight to his office. That’s what he usually does, anyway.”

“Do you really think so?” Will asks, eyes trailing over the tall building. He doesn’t see anything through the windows, and with the front door closed, he definitely can’t see inside. He’s grateful that Mike brought it up before Will had to. Can he read his mind? Is he… scared, too?  “What if he is watching? Us, I mean. Shouldn’t I go home? Is he going to be mad at you or something?”

“Will,” Mike mumbles, reaching for his hand and threading their fingers together. The simple touch makes Will’s heart race a thousand miles per hour, yet it also soothes him at the same time. It frightens Will, the way Mike has such a commanding effect on him. This can’t be normal, he thinks. “Let’s go for a drive, alright? I promise I’ll have you home before the sun goes down.”

Against his better judgement, he nods his head — and doesn’t let go of Mike’s hand. 

☾𖤓

Will isn’t entirely sure where they’re headed. Mike is driving somewhere he knows for certain isn’t his house. He doesn’t question it – humming along to a song on the radio, despite being unable to focus on any part of the melody, drowned out by the thoughts racing relentlessly through his mind. 

He shouldn’t be in Mike’s car, and he knows that.

Will should have told him that he doesn’t need a ride home, that he doesn’t need to get into his car – that he’s perfectly fine walking home alone. He should have resisted, but somehow, for a stupid, scarily simple reason, he finds it ridiculously hard to say no to Mike. 

He wants to spend time with him, get to know him better, and, as much as it terrifies Will, kiss him again. Will tries his best to focus on the road in front of him and outside his window, though his eyes can’t help but be drawn towards Mike’s hands on the steering wheel, with the silver rings on his fingers. How is it possible for hands to look that… good?

“I drive to this place a lot,” Mike says as they pull into the parking lot of a park Will rarely visits. It’s a secluded spot, and the relief lifts from his shoulders as Mike finds a parking spot in the corner, surrounded by trees. “It’s really pretty when the sun sets.”

“It is really nice,” Will agrees, as the sky turns a mixture of orange and pink. It is beautiful, with only bits and pieces of the sky visible from where they’re parked, peeking through the branches of the trees, through the foliage, but he likes it. Will quickly glances at the rest of the parking lot — all other spots are empty. They’re alone. They’re really alone. Nobody can see them here. “I guess there’s not many places to hide, with um, a red car… is there?”

That earns a small laugh from Mike, who shakes his head in response. “No, not really.” 

“Why’d you choose red then?” Will asks, curiosity getting the better of him. 

There aren’t many red cars in Hawkins, and he knows that Mike probably attracts attention wherever he goes. Not just because of the car, Will thinks. Maybe also because of his curly hair, or his prominent bone structure, or the freckles scattered all over his nose and cheeks, or the way his piercings gleam in the dusk. Catching himself, he shuts his eyes in an effort to push all of those thoughts out of his mind. 

Is he insane?

“To piss off my parents, mainly.” Mike shrugs. “Besides, I think it looks badass, doesn’t it?”

“It is pretty cool,” Will can’t help but giggle. Mike laughs, too, reaching for Will’s hand and lacing their fingers together once again. Will’s stomach flips. Just touching Mike’s hands gives him butterflies. 

“You know, I really like hanging out with you,” Mike smiles, and as much as Will enjoys hearing those words, he’s immediately overwhelmed by a wave of guilt. The guilt grips his neck; it pierces him straight through his heart. He isn’t supposed to be like this. He isn’t supposed to want this. He can’t. He won’t. “Thanks for, um, letting me take a small detour to show you this place. It means a lot.” 

He pulls his hand from Mike. “I don’t think we should do this,” Will speaks first, looking out the window, instead of at the boy beside him. 

A brief silence fills the car. Will knows that Mike is probably confused, and the slight ache in his chest makes him think he’s a little upset, too. Gently, Mike asks, “What do you mean?”

“I mean… this.” His voice trembles as he blinks rapidly to hold back tears that threaten to spill over. “It’s wrong, and a sin, and you saw how your father looked at us in the church, Mike. Like… like there’s something wrong with us, with me. Because, you know, there is. I’m not supposed to be like this.”

“Do you really think that?” Mike asks, voice hollow. The hands that were just holding Will’s fall to his lap. “Or, are you just saying this to try and make yourself feel better about it?”

Will stiffens, still unable to look in Mike’s direction. “What do you mean?” He almost doesn’t want to ask, doesn’t want to know how obvious he makes it.

“I can tell by the way you kissed me, Will, that you don’t believe that.” Mike reaches for Will, his hand now resting on his thigh. Will clears his throat, sitting up straighter, trying not to think about how the simple touch sends electricity through his entire body. “I can tell by the way you look at me.”

“It doesn’t matter how I feel, Mike.” Will’s voice falters. He wishes they lived in a world where things like this didn’t matter—that he could kiss Mike without feeling he’d be punished for it. “What matters is what’s right… and what’s wrong. This, us, is wrong.”

“What if I don’t want to be right?”

Will thinks he might be sick. “Huh?”

“What if I like kissing you?” Mike asks, his hand lightly squeezing Will’s thigh. Will’s abdomen tightens at the touch. “We kissed once, and it’s all I’ve been able to think about. It… it’s always just… there.” 

This can’t be happening. “It is?”

“Yeah,” Mike unbuckles his seatbelt and turns toward Will. The only thing separating them is the middle leather console. He lifts his hand for just a second, and Will nearly reaches out for it, but he quickly puts it back where it was before he’s able to try anything. “I think about it too much, probably.  I want to kiss you again.” 

Will’s ears start to ring. Mike… Mike wants to kiss him again. Even though Mike knows it’s wrong, he wants to do it anyway. “You… you do?” He turns toward Mike, swallowing. 

“Yeah,” Mike licks his lips. Will tries hard not to notice how… beautiful the sunset looks against Mike’s face, how beautiful Mike is. “I do.”

“This is wrong,” Will repeats softly, though not moving from where he’s sitting, not giving Mike any indication that he doesn’t want this, too. He really hopes Mike doesn’t notice the way his voice shakes. Mike leans a little closer to him, and Will feels his stomach flip. “We’re probably going to go to Hell.”

“Probably,” Mike’s eyes slowly begin to drift to Will’s lips. Maybe it’s the Devil taking over, maybe Will struggles to listen to the parts of his brain that are screaming at him, pleading not to give in, but it doesn’t matter — because Mike is moving closer to him, and he’s not stopping him. He doesn’t want to. “Can… Will, can I kiss you?”

Will nods his head, and it doesn’t take Mike long before he closes the distance between them. 

At first, their touch is hesitant; it’s slow. Their lips fit perfectly together, and Mike lifts one of his hands to Will’s cheek, guiding him even closer. Will doesn’t resist, scooting as close to the centre console as possible, not wanting their lips to part. He loves it when Mike puts his hands on him; he loves the feeling of his palm against his cheek.

Mike lightly bites on Will’s bottom lip, earning an airy breath from Will. How does he know how to do that? Will kisses him back, earnestly, because he wants to. 

“Mike,” Will mumbles, breath catching in his throat. He’s tempted to throw his leg over the middle console, tempted to position himself right on top of Mike in an attempt to get… closer. He isn’t sure how that would be possible, but he isn’t close enough. They need to be closer. 

“Can you climb over the middle?” Mike asks, and Will drops one hand to unbuckle his seatbelt, giving himself more freedom of movement. Will licks his lips, eyes drift down to the leather console separating them. He wants him to… climb over? “I want you to sit on my lap.”

“What… what if someone sees us?” Will asks, still choosing to reattach their lips together. 

Even with the risk of getting caught, he thinks it’s nearly impossible not to get lost in this — lost in him. Will revels in the familiarity of cigarettes and mint. Maybe the taste of the smoke doesn’t quite bother him anymore. Mike reciprocates easily, their noses bumping slightly, earning a small laugh from the taller. 

“We’re surrounded by trees,” Mike replies easily, and Will nods his head slowly. It is really difficult to see through the thick leaves. Mike looks back at Will, leaving a small and chaste kiss against his lips. Will pushes down a smile at the action. “I chose to park here on purpose.” He adjusts his position in the front seat, trying to get more comfortable. “Wait, let me just—”

Will takes a sharp breath as Mike’s hand brushes past his crotch, settling on his waist. Mike’s eyes lift, tentatively watching Will as if trying to decipher whether his reaction is due to surprise or sensitivity. 

“Mike,” Will mumbles, voice coming out strained. Will clears his throat, wincing slightly as embarrassment washes over him. He barely touched him, and Will can already feel the tightness in the fabric of his jeans around his groin. 

Mike licks his lips. “Yeah?”

“I…” Will lowers his head, a red flush covering his face. He can’t say anything. He shouldn’t say anything. “Nevermind, it’s fine.”

“Tell me,” Mike whispers, pressing two fingers under Will’s chin and tilting his head upwards so he can look the boy in the eye. “I want to know.”

Will shakes his head, still looking down, rather than at Mike. What is he even supposed to say? ‘Your hand accidentally touched my dick, and I’m pretty sure I’m kind of hard right now?’

“Your, um,” He lets out strangled words. “Hand.”

Mike’s eyebrows lift, and a small smirk spreads across his lips as he finally understands what’s happening. 

“Oh,” he lowers his free hand, tentatively pressing the fabric of Will’s jeans just above his crotch. He presses firmly, but not enough to satisfy the desperate craving Will has. Will thinks he might not be able to breathe much longer. Is he doing this on purpose?  “Is it because I accidentally did… this?”

Will takes in another sharp breath, and a mixture of humiliation and arousal eases through him. He can’t help but subconsciously lift his hips at the contact, and Mike licks his lips. “Yeah.” He’s barely able to get the word out, eyes shutting and head hitting the headrest of the seat. 

Mike presses harder this time, eliciting a strangled moan from Will’s lips. It feels so good, he thinks. He wants more; as much as he tries to deny it, he knows that he wants Mike to touch him everywhere. He weakly tries to hold back the sounds that threaten to escape from his mouth, but he knows it’s no use when Mike continues to press his palm against his crotch and presses his lips to Will’s neck. 

Will tries not to think about all of the silver rings on Mike’s fingers and how the thickness of the silver bands feels against his clothed cock. He wants Mike to never take them off. 

“Do you want me to continue?” Mike whispers into Will’s ear, and the low voice sends goosebumps down his spine. His hand, just resting over his crotch, is no longer pressing, and Will misses the feeling. “If you don’t want this, I’ll stop.” Will’s head shakes, lifting his hips in a desperate attempt to gain more friction. When Mike still doesn’t move his hand, Will lets out a shaky sigh. Why isn’t he touching him? “I want to hear you say it.”

“I want you,” Will swallows, eyes finally looking up at Mike to give him what he wants. “To continue.”                                                            

“Yeah?” Mike whispers, pressing his hand a little harder, but still not quite enough. Will is still chasing the feeling, embarrassment seeping into every pore of his skin, and he’s finding it harder to resist the temptation. “Like this?”

“A bit harder,” Will mumbles, face hot. “Please.”

“Harder?” Mike drawls, pressing his hand harder on Will’s clothed cock. Will lets out another strangled moan, his head falling forward and resting on Mike’s shoulder. Mike reaches his other hand around Will, his hand resting on the back of his neck, the tips of his fingers brushing against Will's hair, pushing Will’s body closer to his. Will really wishes the leather console wasn’t in the middle of them.  “You’re doing so good for me, Will.” 

Will’s eyes flutter shut at the praise, head nodding, Mike’s hand moulds to his clothed cock, pressing harder. “Fuck,” Will can’t think straight, his chest rising and falling as Mike continues to knead at his length, and the tightness of his jeans makes everything feel incredibly amplified. He can feel the blood rush to his cock, already hard due to the fact that Mike is palming his through his jeans. 

He continues to buck his hips as Mike presses harder, and Will almost considers telling him to unbutton his pants and to slip his hand underneath his underwear. His hand is so fucking big, Will thinks, wanting nothing more than to feel his hand against his skin. But that thought fades when he realizes he’s already close. 

“Mike,” Mike’s moving his hand as if he knows exactly how to drive Will insane, and he does, with Will completely losing himself in the building sensation, his stomach clenching as he lets out yet another moan. Mike takes that as a sign to keep going, to knead his palm faster. The pressure in his base is becoming too much for him to handle, too much for him to deal with on his own.  “I’m… I’m already…”

“Fuck,” Mike wraps his fingers around Will’s neck with the hand that was resting there, lightly pulling Will’s head off his shoulder so he can press his forehead against Will’s. His hand keeps moving, pressing hard and squeezing as much as he can through the stiff fabric of Will’s jeans. Will closes his eyes, breath caught in his throat. He’s never felt like this before. “Look at me,” Mike licks his lips. Will listens, as he always does, and opens his eyes, making eye contact, and he knows he’ll come at any second. His mouth opens, but no sound escapes echoes in the car, apart from his panting, and his hips begin to twitch. He won’t last much longer – not with the way Mike is staring at him. “There you go, Will. You’re doing so good, angel.” Mike whispers gently, hand still working against Will’s clothed cock. The combination of praise, Mike calling him an angel, and his hand is what pushes him over the edge.

He can feel his cum spread in the fabric of his underwear, and Will awkwardly shifts in his seat as he looks down at the fabric of his jeans. He’s a mess, he thinks to himself. He’s in Mike’s car, in the passenger seat, sitting in his own cum. He notices a small wet patch on the dark blue denim, and a wave of embarrassment washes over him. He looks up at Mike, who is staring at him as if he wants to devour him whole.

“That…” Will clears his throat. “That was, um…”

Mike doesn’t let him finish, reaching forward, placing his hand on Will’s cheek and kissing him. It takes Will by surprise at first, but he quickly adjusts and kisses Mike back. 

☾𖤓

Over the last couple of weeks, Will’s become very familiar with the Wheeler household.

Or, at the very least, sneaking into it.

It’s two in the morning, and as Will steers his bike into the sharp curvature of the Wheeler family’s driveway (and trying his best to avoid biking over the perfectly trimmed grass with his tires), Mike is already waiting for him outside. 

Mike is in his pyjamas, flannelled pants and wearing a sweater that’s a little too tight for his frame. Will can’t help but think that even in his sleepwear, he’s the most beautiful person he’s ever seen. Maybe it has something to do with the moonlight, he thinks. 

Luckily, there’s a door in Mike’s basement that leads directly outside, so they’ve become accustomed to sneaking in through there rather than the front door. It’s less risky, Mike tells him — and Will agrees. 

Despite the familiarity of the plans, Will keeps telling Mike he doesn’t have to wait for him outside in the cold, that he could just leave the door unlocked and he would let himself in when he gets there, but Mike insists, saying he doesn’t want Will to be alone outside in the dark. Will doesn’t fight it anymore, secretly thinking that it’s cute, how protective he is, really.

“Hey,” Will smiles, kicking out the stand of his bike, letting it lean on itself. He always feels a little bit awkward getting off the bike in front of Mike, so he keeps his eyes trained on the grass as he hides his bike from being seen through any of the windows in the front of the house.

“Hey,” Mike extends his hand, taking Will’s bag off his back. Will smiles at the action, the tips of his ears turning red. “I got this. Come inside.”

Will tries not to shiver the moment he steps into Mike’s basement. It’s dark, the only light coming from the lamp with a weak lightbulb on the table next to the couch, and the frigidity in the air makes Will wonder if they’re in the middle of summer — or the middle of winter.

 “It’s so cold down here,” Will mumbles, wishing he had chosen to wear a sweater instead of a t-shirt. He shivers once again, which offsets the heat radiating throughout his face. 

“I know,” Mike cringes, scratching the back of his head as he places Will’s bag down beside the door. Immediately, Will’s eyes notice the glint of his silver rings. Why is he wearing them now? At two in the morning? A red flush washes through his face. Did Mike wear them because he knows Will likes them? “I always feel bad asking you to hang out down here. Lately, my mom has been too light a sleeper to risk going upstairs. And, you know, my dad…”

“I’m not complaining.” Will sends a small smile before sitting down on the couch, the leather of the couch cold against his skin. “I like it down here. It’s… private.” Will cringes as the words fall from his lips. Private? Really, that’s all he can come up with?“I mean, you know, it’s nice to, um, hang out.”

Mike looks at him for a couple of seconds. “Here.” He begins to take off his sweater, the shirt underneath his hoodie riding up so that Will can see Mike’s bare stomach, his pale skin warm due to the lack of light in the basement, and Will can’t take his eyes off of him. “Take this.” He hands Will his sweater, to which he takes it without hesitation, placing the material over his head and onto his body, immediately overwhelmed by Mike’s scent. Is it weird to love the way Mike smells? Is it weird to… miss it?

Will pulls the hoodie over his head, instantly feeling the warmth. He doesn’t want to give the sweater back; he doesn’t want to forget how Mike creeping into every part of him feels, begging to be let in. 

“How do I look?” Will asks, looking down at Mike’s sweater and fidgeting with the sleeves.

“Will,” Mike swallows, his voice sounding a bit strained. He doesn’t take his eyes off of him, and Will begins to feel a little self-conscious. “You look really good in my clothes.”

“I do?” Will asks, blush creeping up his cheeks. 

“Yeah,” Mike nods his head, licking his lips. “It makes me, um, want to…”

Will’s eyes widen, and his  “Want to… what?”

Mike leans in first, and Will doesn’t resist — hands immediately moving to Mike’s cheeks, adjusting his sitting position on the couch. Mike keeps moving forward until Will is lying down and he’s hovering over him, his thighs on either side of Will’s waist. Will feels how Mike’s legs lightly squeeze his waist, trying to convince himself that it’s just because there isn’t much room on the couch. 

Will blinks, trying to internalize every possible detail of Mike’s face. God, Will thinks. He’s so fucking beautiful. 

“I think I’m going to give you all of my hoodies,” Mike mumbles, kissing Will again. Warmth spreads across his stomach as Mike presses a trail of wet kisses down his neck, his hand gripping the collar of the hoodie and pulling it downwards so he can reach the skin of his neck. “You look so....” His voice gets muffled by the fabric of the hoodie, but Will can hear everything he’s saying perfectly. 

Will swallows, the words sending heat to the bottom of his stomach. This… this is different than just kissing, he thinks. His hands reach up, threading his fingers through Mike’s hair, hands inadvertently tugging when Mike reaches his sweet spot in the crook of his neck. How does he always know exactly where to put his lips? Will pauses, his breath catching in his throat as he realizes how much of an effect that has on him. Will can feel the heat pooling in the base of his abdomen. 

Mike lowers his body until their bottom halves are touching, and Will lets out an involuntary moan at the contact. Will immediately mumbles a soft ‘Sorry,’ but Mike shakes his head, licking his lips as he looks down at Will. Holy shit, he thinks. Is Mike going to think he’s a freak for liking that?

“That… no, that’s okay,” Mike mumbles, connecting their lips together. He lowers his body more purposefully this time, and Will can feel it. It’s hard not to, the material of Mike’s pyjama pants painfully thin, not leaving much to Will’s imagination. 

“Can… can you, um…” Will swallows, lifting his hips and meeting Mike’s hips in the middle. “Call me…”

Mike’s head tilts back as their clothed abdomens touch. With a strangled breath, he manages to let out a small and breathy: “Call you what?”

“Angel?” Will asks, his voice fading at the end. Is this too much? Maybe it’s a little too much, he thinks to himself. Maybe he shouldn’t have said anything, and if Mike wants to call him that again, he will do it on his own accord. Should he even be asking him to say it? “It’s okay if you, um, don’t want to – but you, um, called me that in the car, and, um, I… I liked it.”

“Stand up for a second,” Mike says, lightly pushing himself off of Will’s body, now standing up beside the couch. Will moves obediently, wondering if what he just asked for was crossing some sort of… line, and maybe Mike called him an angel by accident when they were in his car. Did he ruin the moment? 

Mike lies down on the couch, both hands resting on his thighs. Will’s eyes widen as they move down to his legs, swallowing hard as his gaze shifts to the drawstrings of Mike’s pyjama pants. He swallows, trying not to make it obvious that he’s staring directly at his dick – though, it’s proving to be very difficult when he’s already hard. 

“Sit on my lap,” is all Mike says, his hands lightly tapping his thighs. 

“Huh?” Will replies, heat flooding through his veins and settling directly at the base of his length. God, he thinks. Mike wants him to… sit on his lap?

“It’ll feel better in that position,” Mike murmurs, and Will notices a slight flush spreading across his face, as if he’s almost… nervous to suggest it. His dick twitches at the realization that maybe Will has just as strong a hold on him as Mike does on himself. “At least, um, I think it will.”

“Okay,” Will replies, licking his lips. He tentatively swings his leg to the other side of Mike, his turn for both legs to settle on either side of his torso. 

He doesn’t sit down, not yet, worried that maybe Mike doesn’t mean what he thinks he means. Does he want him just to hover on top? Does he want Will to lean forward, to kiss him? Is it as obvious as it feels that Will has barely any experience doing stuff like this?

As if reading his mind, Mike clears his throat. “Sit.” His voice is strained, and the tone of his voice sends a wave of electricity through Will’s body. His eyes widen as he slowly sits on top of Mike’s groin, the unmistakable hardness of his bulge against his ass makes Will feel slightly dizzy. Mike’s hands reach for Will’s waist, snaking underneath the hoodie (his hoodie), and gripping tightly. “Fuck, angel. This already feels so good.”

Will doesn’t know what to do, slightly adjusting his position atop Mike. He moves his body a little to the left, earning a light groan from Mike’s lips. Immediately, Will surges his hand forward, covering Mike’s mouth. What if someone can hear them? Mike’s eyes drop to the hand covering his mouth, and Will pulls his hand back.

“Sorry,” Will licks his lips. “Don’t want, um, anyone to hear us.”

“It’s okay,” he blinks, eyebrows creasing slightly. Will shifts a bit, placing his right hand on the leather cushion of the couch. Mike lets out another small groan, though Will can tell he’s really holding back. “Maybe, try, um… moving a little bit?”

Will nods his head, shifting his hips forward slightly, and the feeling quickly spreads across his abdomen. Will doesn’t have the words to properly describe what he’s feeling right in this moment – pushing his body forward, Mike’s hands gripping even tighter against his waist to steady him. This feels… good. This feels really good. 

Mike bucks his hips again, and just like what happened in Mike’s car in the parking lot, Will finds himself craving more. He moves his hips faster this time, and the unmistakable sensation of Mike’s hard length against his own causes him to let out a small moan. He can feel it through his pants, and Will is trying very hard to contain the noises, knowing that Mike’s parents and siblings are in the same house as them.

That’s much easier said than done, Will notices, when Mike begins to thrust. Will’s head tilts back, the sensation unlike anything else he’s ever experienced. Despite both boys being fully clothed, Will can feel his legs grow weak at the thought of how good this must feel when there are no layers in between them. He wants to chase this feeling, he tells himself, continuously grinding against Mike’s abdomen. Mike has his bottom lip between his teeth, clearly trying to avoid making too much noise, and Will can’t help but think that makes this entire thing… hotter.

Will reaches forward, both of his hands clutching Mike’s thin, white shirt. Is he going to Hell for wanting to take it off? For wanting to… feel Mike? Every part of him? For wanting to touch his bare skin? He uses the material for leverage, once again pressing his hips against him. Mike props himself up, now sitting rather than lying down, and Will shifts his legs, wrapping them around Mike. 

“God,” Will mutters, still moving his hips. This new position is overstimulating, and his head rests against the familiarity of Mike's shoulder. His breathing falters, and his hands wrap around Mike’s back. They’re so close, their bodies grinding against each other, soft, lewd whines escaping from both of their mouths. This feels so fucking good. 

Will struggles to stay quiet, pressing his mouth on Mike’s shoulder, muffling his voice. Fuck, he isn’t going to last much longer, he thinks to himself. 

“Will,” Mike lets out a low, guttural groan. Their movements are sloppy, desperate, Mike’s hands shifting from Will’s waist, and eventually up to Will’s hair. They’re both chasing their highs; the friction of their clothed cocks against each other feels euphoric. “Scratch my back.” Will easily drags both of his hands across his back, over the shirt. Reaching back to Will’s waist, he pushes down, trying to make both of them feel more.

Will grips Mike tighter, making sure he leaves scratches along Mike’s back just like he asked him to, and he wishes Mike could take off his shirt so he could see what he’s doing to his skin, to him, but neither of them remove their clothes. Will finds himself wondering if any of this is a sin if they’re not naked – the layers of clothing are touching, not them. As quickly as the thought enters his mind, he forces himself to push it far, far away.  

“This is so…” Will is barely able to get the words to leave his mouth, a thin layer of sweat forming on his forehead. This is… a lot, and he finds himself loving just how close they are, how he can feel Mike’s breath against him, how their bodies press together. “You’re so…”

Will feels his legs start to twitch, and he knows he’s close. He also knows that no amount of guilt festering in his chest can take away how good Mike makes him feel.

☾𖤓

If someone told Will that he would be kissing a boy in the middle of the night in the same church he’s been attending since he was a child, there’s no way he would believe it. In fact, he would probably call them crazy, honestly. 

Yet, there they are – the familiarity of the pillars surrounding the pews, the platform and the stained glass windows proves to him that this is real, and this is very much happening. 

“Will, angel,” Mike licks his lips, lifting one of his hands to delicately move some of Will’s hair from his eyes. Will’s stomach flips at the nickname. Ever since Will told Mike that he likes being called that, it comes easily to his tongue. Each time, without fail, it makes Will’s stomach flip. “How do you feel about trying something new tonight, hm?” 

“Oh,” Will avoids eye contact, still unable to meet Mike’s gaze. His head tilts, and his face flushes. He is grateful for the darkness peeking through the window, which makes the redness on his face less visible to the boy standing before him. “What, um, would you want to do?”

“Come with me,” Mike whispers, his hand moving to thread through Will’s. The familiarity of Mike’s silver rings against his knuckles causes his stomach to flip. What is he thinking about?

It takes a couple of seconds for Will to realize what he’s looking at. A small, wooden structure with two separate doors, split in the middle by a mesh that’s barely see-through.

It’s a confessional booth.

“That’s…”

“Yeah,” A smirk appears on his face. He’s enjoying this, Will can tell. “Yeah, it is.”

“What?” Will breathes out, unable to take his eyes off the wooden fixture. “What do you want to do?”

“Get inside, and then I’ll tell you.” Mike motions to the blue curtains blocking both sides of the booth, and Will thinks he might have died and gone to Heaven. His version of Heaven, but he’ll take it. 

He follows Mike, hesitantly stepping into one side, while Mike steps into the other. This is… different. This is much different compared to anything they’ve ever done before — their handful of makeouts and clothed touches don’t compare to the rush he’s feeling in this very moment. 

“Mike?” Will’s voice calls from the other edge of the wooden fixture. It’s small, small enough that if Will stretched his hand forward, it would touch the wall in front of him, easily. 

“Yeah?” Mike asks, voice slightly hesitant. When Will doesn’t answer him right away, Mike speaks once again: “Are you okay? If… if anything I’m about to say is too much, you can tell me, alright?”

“I’m okay,” Will nods his head slowly, unsure of what Mike is about to do, but the curiosity that bubbles in the base of his abdomen wants to find out. “Don’t worry.”

“Promise?”

Will licks his lips. “Yeah, I promise.”

“Okay,” Mike sighs shakily, clearing his throat. “I… I need to tell you something.”

Will furrows his eyebrows. “What is it?”

“We’re in the confessional booth,” Mike states, and Will can hear him shuffle in the chair beside him. “Aren’t we?”

“We are,” Will’s throat dries.

“Well, then I think it’s important for you to know that I have a dirty sin to confess, Reverend.” Mike’s voice is low, sultry, and Will feels the fabric around his cock tighten at the shift in conversation. Reverend? Is he… roleplaying right now? Will swallows, a weird sensation taking over his body at the thought. He’s never done anything like this before, but he’s always been… curious. “You’re the only person I trust with this secret.”

“Oh yeah?” Will’s voice falters, his voice higher an octave than he’d like it to be, but that doesn’t matter, because he’s so incredibly turned on right now. He doesn’t know what to do with his hands, placing them on his thighs, lightly grabbing the fabric of his jeans. “What is it?”

“There’s this boy,” Mike begins, and though Will can’t see him through the screen, he can feel him. He can feel the way Mike is shifting in his wooden seat, and Will can picture him perfectly. “I don’t know what to do with him.”

“You don’t?” Will whispers, suddenly not minding that he’s in a small, small room, that the gnawing feeling in the back of his mind is telling him that what they’re doing is wrong, and he’s sitting in the same chair Mike’s dad sits in every day. “What, um, what aren’t you sure of?”

“Well,” Mike pauses, the air between them now thick with anticipation. “I want to fuck him again.” 

The words make Will bite down on his bottom lip. This is so wrong, he thinks. This is so wrong, but it’s so good at the same time. 

“You do?” 

“Yeah,” he replies instantly, Will's cock twitching in response. “I think about it all the time. I think about how… how perfect his ass is. I think about how tight his virgin hole is, and how it would probably take me so perfectly. How… how his lips, God, his lips—”

“Don’t use His name in vain.” The words flow out before Will can stop them, and he can hear the slight gasp Mike makes in response, and he wishes for nothing more than for the taller boy to rid the distance between them — to touch him, to feel him, to taste him. 

“Oh?” Mike replies, though his voice is anything but apologetic. “Do you not like that? I’m so sorry, Reverend.”

He unbuckles his pants, the coolness of the room hitting against his skin. “Tell me.” Will swallows. “Tell me what you’d do to this… boy, if he were here. Confess your sin, Mike.”

Mike pauses for a second, and Will wonders if he’s going too far. Maybe he shouldn’t have said anything, but before he’s able to spiral any more than he already has, he starts speaking again. 

“First, I would unbutton his pants.” Mike begins, voice tantalizingly slow. 

“Yeah?” Will replies, voice breathless. His hands instinctively reach for the button of his pants, fumbling with it. Why the hell did he decide to wear jeans? “What else?”

“I would pull his pants down.” 

Will doesn’t wait, pulling his jeans down so they swim at his ankles, and heavy material covering his feet. Looking down at his boxers, he can see that already, there is a small stain of wetness near his clothed cock, and it isn’t surprising. Mike has an intense effect on him, and despite not touching him physically, he can still get Will as worked up as if his hands were on his body. 

“Keep going.” The words come off more desperately than he anticipates it to, but he doesn’t matter. Will’s cock is aching, and it doesn’t help that he can hear Mike also fumbling with his pants, hearing the material of his sweatpants falling to the wooden floor underneath him. Is he going to touch himself at the same time? Will swallows hard, beginning to feel dizzy. 

It’s no surprise that he wants Mike. He wants Mike so badly that he is willing to do many unholy things to him in this place of worship. 

“I would start off by palming his dick through his underwear,” Mike begins, licking his lips, really concentrating on the words coming from his mouth. “I want to feel how wet I make him before I even touch him properly.”

Like a prayer, Will immediately begins to palm at his length, pressing his palm down to create the friction he so desperately needs. He quickly realizes it won’t be enough. Will is holding back a moan, though he’s sure Mike hears the sound of his head hitting the wall behind him, neck exposed. Will’s mind wanders to what it would be like to kiss Mike’s skin, to leave marks everywhere on his neck so that people know he’s his. The mental image of Will’s lips against Mike’s skin makes him buck his hips as he continues to palm his cock, the wet spot of pre-cum spreading tenfold, resisting the urge not to stick his hand underneath the fabric of his underwear because Mike didn’t tell him to do that yet. 

“You want to touch him?” Will’s breath hitches as he moves his palm. He’s aware of how much of a mess he sounds like, already unravelling for Mike — wanting more, needing more. “How… How would you touch him?”

“I would put my hand in his underwear, and wrap my hand around his hard cock,” Mike purrs, and Will immediately mimics the action, wrapping his hand around his length, hissing at the contact. His eyes shut immediately. “Good boy,” Mike mumbles from the other side of the screen, and Jesus Christ, Will thinks he might cum in that second. 

“Would you move your hand?” Will asks, desperately, hand still holding onto the base of his cock, waiting for him to speak once more. Mike doesn’t answer right away, and Will thinks he’s doing it on purpose — he’s making him wait, he’s making him earn it. His length is throbbing, painfully hard, and Will almost has it in him to whine. Will can feel his heartbeat, as though it’s almost beating out of his chest. All he needs is for Mike to tell him he could move his hand. All he needs is Mike's permission. “Mike, would you move your hand?”

“Slowly,” his voice shakes. Will is picturing Mike, head back, his big hands wrapped around his cock, mouth open. He misses his touch. He misses his touch so fucking bad right now. “Fuck, I would move my hand so fucking slow he’d be begging for me to go faster.” Mike takes in a deep breath. “I would make him go so fucking slow that he’s going to be crying, whining, for me to touch him.”

“Go faster,” Will replies, voice shaking as his hand moves painfully slow against his length. His tip is bright pink and swollen from the lack of attention, and Will feels like he’s seeing stars. “Mike, I need you to go faster. Please, do something.”

“Beg,” Mike mumbles, his voice slightly hazy. Will wishes he could see him; he wishes he could see the way his eyes darken, the way his head tips, the way he touches himself. “I would want him to beg for me to jerk him off. I would want him to beg for me to make him feel so good, to tell me that only I can make him cum.”

“Please touch my dick,” Will repeats, head shaking and begging just as Mike asks him to. He would do anything right now if that meant Mike would touch him, that he would cross into his side of the confessional, and bend him over. “Please touch me, please move your hand. Please, Mike. Only you can make me feel this good, fuck, only you can make me cum.”

He wants to see what Mike looks like right now. He wants to see if he’s as flushed as Will is; he wants to see if his bottom lip is swollen from biting down on it to suppress the noise. 

“Go faster,” Mike gives in, and Will can hear the heavy breathing of the boy next to him, though the screen between the seats is blocking his view of him. “I want to hear you. I want to know how hot you sound when you touch yourself.”

Will nods his head, instantly moving his hand up and down his length just as Mike tells him to, harder and quicker. The moan he’s been trying so hard to hold back spills from his lips. The sound echoes through the wooden structure, and he can hear Mike take in a sharp breath beside him. Fuck, he thinks. A second moan follows shortly after, and Will thinks that if God really is watching, he would be enjoying this, too. “This feels so good.” 

“You’re doing so good for me, angel.” Mike mumbles, and that makes Will move his hand faster, lifting his thumb to the delicate skin surrounding his slit, and he almost sees stars. “You sound so pretty.”

“I am?” Will can tell he’s close, the point in his stomach tightening and his legs beginning to shake. “Tell me how pretty I am.”

“So fucking pretty,” Mike affirms, and all of the praise begins to push Will over the edge. “Only for me.” A low grunt comes from Mike’s side of the wooden booth, and all Will can picture is Mike wrapping his own big hand around his length. Fuck, Will thinks. He wants to feel Mike so fucking bad. He wants to taste him; he wants to consume him.

“Mike,” Will moans, knowing he has seconds left. His hands keep pumping, and he can feel it coming. He can feel the orgasm budding from the base of his abdomen. “I… fuck, Mike.”

A small groan escapes Mike’s lips, and Will wishes nothing more than to see him right now. To see if Mike is just as badly on the edge as he is, to see if he also feels like he might explode.

“Are you close?” Mike asks, voice shaking. Will nods his head frantically, not realizing that Mike can’t see him until he asks again, “Will?”

“Yes.” He continues to pump, his ass clenching as the pressure builds in his stomach. He tries his best to control himself, lips pressed tightly together. Keep it together, he thinks to himself. All he wants to do is show Mike how good he can handle this, how good he can handle this. “So fucking close.”

“Keep going,” Mike’s voice is tight, and the thought of him being close, too, makes it really fucking hard for Will not to cum all over his hands. “Don’t hide your moans, Will. I want to hear you.”

Will knows that Mike has a crazy effect on him, and that there’s no use in fighting it anymore. The moan trails from his lips, the sound foreign to his own ears. Holy shit, he continues to pump his length, thinking about Mike, wanting Mike to come on his side of the screen, wanting Mike to come and help him finish. 

“Mike,” Will begs, his back arching. He’s barely able to get the words out, dizziness overtaking his entire consciousness. This… this is too much. “Mike, I need… I want you to come here.”

“Finish,” Mike replies, his voice shaking. Will shuts his eyes, focusing on the fact that Mike is asking him. “Fuck, Will, I’m also…”

Will lets out a strangled moan as the orgasm takes over his body, trails of his cum spilling onto his hand, dropping onto the floor beneath him. He can’t think straight, his body lightly shaking as he tries to process what just happened. Will lets out a shaky breath, knowing that he’s never cummed that hard in his life, and Mike didn’t even touch him. 

His head hits the back of the booth, trying to calm his beating heart. He turns his head, only slightly but just enough to see Mike doing the same, eyes shut. Did they come at the same time? The thought makes Will’s cock ache at the overstimulation. 

“Holy shit,” Mike mumbles from his side of the confessional booth, and Will can’t help but look up to the ceiling and apologize to God. 

☾𖤓

“Mrs. Byers, these cookies are so good,” Mike all but moans, shutting his eyes as he takes another bite of the warm, freshly made, homemade chocolate chip cookies Joyce pulled out from the oven minutes before. “How come Will didn’t tell me he lives with like… a pastry chef?”

Normally, Will wouldn’t mind having people over. Sure, their house is smaller than most, and his mom can be slightly overbearing, but having Mike sitting in a chair in his kitchen makes him almost… embarrassed. His house is nowhere near as… intricate as Mike’s – nowhere near as big, either. Is he judging him for everything he doesn’t have? Does he think any less of him because his house isn’t… three stories? 

“Pastry chef?” Joyce laughs, shaking her head in disagreement. A wide smile spreads across her face, “I wouldn’t consider myself anything close to that, Michael. But, I appreciate the compliment nonetheless.”

“Maybe you should,” Mike replies, honestly. “I’m not even joking when I say these might be the most delicious cookies I’ve ever had in my life.”

“Maybe I’ll bring some to church one day,” Joyce smiles, sending a smile in Will’s direction. “I’m sure your sisters would appreciate some of them too, wouldn’t they?”

“They won’t get any,” Mike shakes his head, reaching for another on the plate Joyce set on the table a couple of minutes earlier. Will’s lost track of how many Mike’s had, but the stack looks significantly smaller. “I’ll make sure to eat them all before they even know they exist.”

“I’m flattered,” Joyce smiles, sending Will a thumbs up when Mike’s back is turned. Will smiles painfully, trying his best to not let the awkwardness he feels emanate in his kitchen. Why does his mother keep trying to talk to him? How much longer are they going to be standing there? “You’re more than welcome to come over whenever you’d like, if you’re going to keep complimenting my baking.”

Mike smiles, taking a bite. “Only if there’ll be more cookies.” 

“Maybe I can try some new recipes,” Joyce quickly walks over to the counter, flipping through the pages of a notebook she uses to copy recipes down from the cookbooks she borrows from the library, or friends. “I think I have a brownie recipe here somewhere…” 

“Should we go upstairs?” Will clears his throat, awkwardly standing by the door of the kitchen. It isn’t that he doesn’t want his mother to speak to Mike, but rather, he’s feeling slightly anxious about having Mike in his… space. What if his mother starts to ask questions about why they’ve been hanging out? What if Jonathan walks in and starts speaking to him? 

“Sure,” Mike nods his head, standing up from the kitchen chair, the wood lightly scratching against the linoleum of their floor. “Thank you for the cookies, Mrs. Byers.”

“You guys are more than welcome to bring the rest of the plate with you to your room,” she smiles, sending a look in Will’s direction, as if indirectly telling him to be the one to pick up the plate and not Mike. He lets out a small sigh as he reaches for the plate, knowing that even here, in her own house, she’s worried about making a good impression. “To be honest, it’s better than leaving the cookies here with me. I might eat them all. Just make sure you don’t leave it there. The last thing we need are bugs. Exterminators are expensive these days.”

“Thanks, mom,” Will mumbles, before turning around and walking down the hallway. Why does she have to bring up bugs? He’s sure Mike’s parents never have to worry about the price of exterminators – will he judge them? Will he tell his parents about how… different their house is? 

Pushing all those thoughts from his mind, he can hear Mike following behind, the sound of footsteps softened by his socks. He doesn’t turn around until he’s in his room. 

He clears his throat, placing the half-eaten plate of cookies on top of a stack of sketchbooks in the corner of his desk. Out of the corner of his eye, he notices the small, black leather notebook Mike gave him a couple of weeks earlier, from their first time in the church at night. “This is, um… my room. It isn’t much, but it’s… mine, so…”

Only then does Will realize how messy his room truly is. He wishes he had taken the time to tidy up before Mike arrived – sketchbooks scattered across every surface, an easel in the corner (his favourite art supply, which his mother found at a yard sale last summer), charcoal pencils sprawled all over his desk, and his work-in-progress drawings taped to the wall to help him figure out the right perspective.  

He hopes that Mike doesn’t pay too much attention to the clutter – but Will knows in a space this small, it’s inevitable. All he can think about is what Mike thinks about this. About how… different their homes are, how Mike’s room is so much bigger than his own. 

“Holy shit,” Mike mutters, eyes widening as he takes in his surroundings. He walks over to the walls, his hands delicately tracing the sketches taped there, then turns towards the painting drying on the easel. Will cringes, knowing that the painting is still very much a work in progress. It’s in the ‘rough stage,’ which Will likes to call the step before everything becomes ‘pretty’— the muddiness of the shadows blending together before highlights are added to create contrast. “These are all so…” He shakes his eyebrows, “Will, you are… so talented.” 

“Thank you,” Will feels a blush spread across his cheeks, head shaking. “It’s, um, nothing special really. Half of these aren’t even done, anyway. I’ve still got a long way to go.”

“Nothing special?” Mike repeats, eyes widening as he shoots a look of disbelief at Will. "Will, these are... more than special. These are insane.” Stepping closer, he places both hands on Will’s waist, causing his heart to race. “You could, like, make a career out of this.”

“Career?” Will repeats, head shaking. “Oh, no, Mike. I’m nowhere near ready to take any form of commissions yet.”

“I beg to differ,” Mike shakes his head, the look of awe still evident on his face. “Let me commission you, then. I want to be your first customer.” A smile spreads across his lips. “Do… Do you think you can draw me?”

“You want me to… draw you?”

“Yeah,” Mike asks, tone completely serious. “I mean, unless you have better things to draw, then I totally get it—”

“I’m not going to charge you for anything,” Will shakes his head, trying not to feel insulted by Mike offering him money. “I’m also not going to take money from you.”

“I’m sure,” Mike pauses, hands squeezing against Will’s waist, “That we can find a way to compensate you that doesn’t involve money at all, hm?” Just the words are enough to make Will’s stomach flutter. To… compensate him? “How does that sound?”

“I can try,” Will replies sheepishly, lightly lifting his shoulders. He doesn’t comment on Mike’s suggestion, though he’s sure the blush on his cheeks is enough of an answer for the taller boy to understand. “To, um, draw you. If you want.”

“Okay,” Mike walks towards Will’s bed and sits on the edge of it, looking at Will expectantly, rubbing his hands against his thighs. “I’m ready.”

Will blinks. “You mean… You want me to draw you… right now?” 

“Yeah,” Mike nods his head. “We have time, don’t we? I promise I’ll stay really still. It’ll be like you’re drawing a statue, or something.”

Will’s nervous as his pencil touches the paper. 

Sitting at the other end of the bed, he tries to avoid looking at Mike as much as possible, relying on his memory to sketch his features. Don’t stare, he reminds himself. Mike, on the other hand, is unapologetically giving Will his full and unwavering attention – eyes almost piercing a hole through the paper Will is drawing on. 

He shifts his focus to drawing Mike from his chest up, avoiding the effort of sketching legs to save time. Maybe he can do a full figure study when Mike isn’t staring at him. He strives to capture every detail that makes Mike so… beautiful. Like, the sharpness of his nose and jawline, the way his eyebrows slightly lift, and how his septum ring almost appears… delicate, or the way his cheekbones are subtly sunken, and the way his curly hair drapes over most of his forehead and brush past his shoulders.

As he tries his best to highlight every single detail of the boy sitting before him, Will reminds himself that it’s a sin to worship anyone but God. He knows it’s wrong to admire anyone else; he knows it’s frowned upon, and even… sacrilegious – but with someone as… handsome as Mike sitting on the edge of the bed, can anyone blame him? 

He quickly lifts his eyes, as if trying to steal a glance at Mike without him noticing. It’s funny, Will thinks. He’s supposed to be able to look at Mike— to use this as an opportunity to stare at him openly, but now, more than ever, shyness creeps up his spine. It’s almost as though he’s… scared. 

His pencil falters against the paper, wondering if Mike might feel a little overwhelmed if Will does such an… intricate and detailed drawing of him. Maybe he should dial it back a bit, he thinks to himself. Maybe he should scale back the details. It’s only supposed to be a quick sketch, he reminds himself, so why does he feel the need to get it… perfectly?

“You look cute when you concentrate,” Mike says softly, not moving from his position on the bed. Will stops drawing, the tip of the graphite pencil frozen against the paper. Taking a second to compose himself, he realizes just how… easily his body reacts to anything Mike says. Especially when he compliments him. 

“Thank you,” Will mumbles, trying his best to focus on the curls in Mike’s hair, his pencil working over the same section, over and over. No longer being able to focus, he clears his throat at the sketch. It isn’t his best work, but he'll blame Mike for the way he was… staring at him if he decides to say anything about it. “I think it’s, um, done?”

Mike smiles, getting up from where he’s sitting and settling on the bed beside Will. “This is so cool, Will.” Mike’s eyes widen, turning his head so that he’s looking over Will’s shoulder, his eyes trailing over every aspect of the drawing. “You… this looks just like me.”

“I kind of rushed it,” Will lifts his shoulders, another blush spreading across his face. “So if it doesn’t look exactly like you–”

“No,” Mike shakes his head. “You got my curly hair perfectly… and don’t even try to downplay it, because I know that’s hard to do because my younger sister always complains when she tries to draw me. You even got my eyebrow and septum piercing.” His eyes don’t leave the paper, gently taking it from Will’s grip. “I love this.”

“You do?” Will asks, playing with the pencil he’s still holding. Stress pulses through his hands, and he worries he might snap the pencil in half. “If you don’t, you don’t have to pretend that you do. I can handle criticism, really–”

Mike doesn’t answer, leaning forward and placing a kiss on Will’s cheek. He’s smiling, hands still holding onto the sketch, as if someone would take it away from him if he sets it down. “It’s perfect.”

Will’s hands loosen around the pencil.

☾𖤓

“Will,” Mike swallows, his voice low. “There’s something I’ve been thinking about for a while.” He pauses for a second before adding: “I daydream about it a lot while I’m stuck here, too.”

“Daydream?” Will turns his head, his eyebrows contracting as he looks at the taller boy beside him. His stomach does a small flip. “What,” he pauses, “did you daydream about?”

“I’ve been thinking a lot,” Mike begins, running a hand through his long hair. “My dad’s such an… asshole, you know?” He mumbles slightly, pursing his lips as he walks up the wooden steps to the platform. Will follows close behind, watching as Mike turns to face the row of empty pews. “He doesn’t know what the fuck he’s talking about. It… it makes me so mad because he always has to control everything, but who made him the boss?”

Will flinches slightly as Mike’s voice echoes through the main hall of the church, awkwardly fidgeting with his fingers to distract himself from the anxiety crawling up the back of his neck, worried that, despite being alone in the church, he’s being so… vocal about his disdain for the pastor, his own father, out loud. Mike seems… off, and Will almost has half a mind to ask him why he’s so upset tonight, what’s bothering him, but he doesn’t want to overstep. He can’t overstep.

“I mean,” Will clears his throat, his eyes fixed on the shades of blue, red, yellow and green from the stained-glass seeping into the space between them. “I think maybe it’s because your dad is the, um, pastor of this church—”

“I want to fuck you,” Mike says suddenly, his hands reaching instinctively toward Will and pulling him closer. With his hands now gripping Will’s waist, it’s impossible to ignore the heat pooling at the base of his stomach as the words fall from Mike’s mouth. Did he hear Mike right? He wants to… fuck him? Mike wants… this? Will desperately searches Mike’s face for any sign that he might be misreading the situation, that maybe Mike doesn’t really mean it. When Mike leans forward, lips grazing Will’s ear relentlessly, he realizes he isn’t joking – his breath catches in his throat, and his face flushes. Holy shit, Will thinks. “Do you want to know what I want to do to you?”

“Yes,” Will nods, his face flushed. God, he wants to know so badly. He wants to know how Mike wants to ruin him and to hear it from his own mouth. “Mike, please, tell me.” 

Mike reaches upward, lightly grabbing Will’s chin and turning it toward the centre of the platform they’re standing on. With their backs now facing the rows of pews, both boys look at a single, velvet-covered chair. “I want to bend you over the chair my stupid dad sits on during his stupid sermons to preach his stupid bullshit.” Will can feel his heart beating furiously against his chest, flustered at how easily Mike is saying these things. “I want to stretch you out and feel your tight hole around my cock, and I want him to know, to see that everything he tells us and everything he tells us and everything he preaches is a sin, feels so fucking good.”

Will’s knees lock in place, and he worries that if Mike lets him go, he might fall to the ground below. This doesn’t feel real, Will thinks. It’s not that they haven’t done anything already in the church – namely, in the confessional booth – but that was different. They… they didn’t touch each other. As much as Will wanted to, as much as he was tempted to, all they did was touch themselves, with a screen separating them. They’ve never had sex before, and Will feels a wave of self-consciousness about how inexperienced he is. Mike knows he’s a virgin. Mike isn’t. Will is nervous, so fucking nervous, but he wants Mike so badly that the excitement and desire overtake any fear and embarrassment bubbling in his stomach.

“Mike,” is the only word he’s able to pull out of his mouth, eyes trailing back to the chair that Mike wants to bend him over. Jesus Christ, he thinks, already picturing it in his mind.

“Tell me,” he whispers, his voice sending a trail of goosebumps across Will’s skin. How is it possible that Mike has such an effect on him? How is it possible that all it takes is for Mike to speak for Will to completely unravel? “Tell me if you don’t want this. I’ll stop, I’ll stop right now, and we can pretend it never happened. We can go back to… normal, if that’s what you want. You can tell me.”

Will doesn’t want to pretend this never happened. He doesn’t want to go back to normal – whatever their version of normal is. He knows he wants Mike to do whatever he wants with him. As guilty as it makes him feel, he wants to know what it’s like to have Mike’s hands all over him, to have Mike’s hands inside him. 

“Mike,” Will repeats, his voice shaking. He’s overwhelmed and doesn’t know how to tell Mike that there’s nothing he wants more. “I…”

“Do you know how crazy you make me feel?” Mike swallows, shaking his head rapidly. There’s a glint in his eye, one Mike can only describe as pure hunger. “I can’t believe you’ve never been touched before. The fact that you’ve never been fucked before makes me want to lose my mind. All… All I’ve been able to think about whenever I see you here is how much I want to be your first. I want to be the only one who has you like this. Only me, Will. I want to be the one who corrupts you.”

Corrupt him? Will can feel the words make a direct line to his cock. Biting the inside of his cheek, his mind is overwhelmed and flurrying with thoughts of Mike touching him, of Mike touching every single part of him, and Will knows he wants this. He knows he needs this.

“You want to… here?” Will’s throat goes dry, his mind spinning. He still can’t process what Mike is asking — he can’t process the fact  “Or… or in the basement? You, um, mean the basement, right? This place is so… open, Mike. What if someone walks in? What if someone can see us?”

Mike doesn’t answer right away, beginning to kiss Will’s exposed neck, two of his fingers tugging at the collar of Will’s shirt, pulling it downward so he can get a better angle and more skin to taste. Mike finds his sweet spot fairly quickly, as he usually does, and Will’s eyes flutter shut at the contact.  

“No, I don’t mean the basement, baby.” Mike purrs, and Will tilts his head even more, allowing Mike to explore the skin under his jawline with his lips and tongue. His voice vibrates against his neck, “Here. I want to fuck you right here, on the platform. In the chair.” 

“Here?” Will repeats, mind clouding as it always does when around him. For a second, he thinks this is what being high must feel like. Dazed, but present – dazed, but willing. Mike’s hands travel down to Will’s ass, both hands cupping each of his cheeks and squeezing, squeezing so tightly, and Will lets out a small whimper in response. His hands are so big, and Will all but lets out a moan at the thought of his hands inside of him. Can he ask Mike to see his hands? Is it… Okay to ask that?

“Yes,” Mike licks his lips, reattaching them to Will’s neck, both hands still on his ass, gripping firmly. Mike brings them closer, their clothed cocks touching through the layers of fabric. The friction is barely there, but Will sharply inhales, feeling everything. He needs more, moving his hips in an attempt to chase the friction and the relief he’s desperate for. Mike presses harder, faster, letting out a soft groan. “Fuck, Will. You don’t even know what the hell you do to me, do you?”

They’re moving quicker now, their breaths labouring against each other. Mike still grips his ass and pulls him as close as possible. Mike’s legs begin to shake, and all he can think about is getting out of these clothes. The fabric of his pants tightens uncomfortably around his crotch, and Will’s face flushes.

Snaking his hands around Mike’s neck, his hips still chasing more, Will turns his head to look at the chair Mike is speaking about. It’s wooden, with red velvet seating and intricate golden trim, covered in colours bleeding in from the multiple stained-glass windows around them, catching the moonlight. He recognizes the seat well, having seen Mike’s father sit on it multiple times throughout each sermon. This is wrong. This is so wrong.  

Will feels heat rush directly to his length at the thought of Mike bending him over the armrests and fucking him. The thought of doing something so… sinful in the middle of the church, in the middle of what is supposed to be the holiest place in Hawkins, unexpectedly excites him.

“Mike,” Will places his forehead on Mike’s shoulder, his breath catching in his throat as both boys continue to rub against each other. He squeezes his eyes shut, feeling a slight wave of embarrassment hit him, knowing that, despite barely touching him, despite both of them still wearing all of their clothing, Will is already losing his mind. He can’t even imagine what it’s going to feel like when Mike probably, finally touches him. When they’re naked.

“Hm?” Mike asks innocently, lightly pulling back his hips, as though he isn’t sure why Will is acting this way — why Will is already so worked up. Taking another sharp break at the lack of contact, Mike lifts one hand from Will’s ass, bringing it up to Will’s chin and tilting it upward. “Use your words, angel. I want to hear you say it. I need to hear you say it.”

He wants Mike to be the one to touch him. He wants Mike to be the only one who can fuck him; he wants him to be the one to bend him over, the one to make him cry and feel so fucking good. Something in his brain shifts, suddenly uncaring if this is… wrong. He doesn’t care if someone walks in and sees them. He doesn’t care that someone might tell him he’s going to Hell, because if this is what it feels like to sin, then it’s all worth it. It’s worth the risk of eternal damnation, and it’s worth being locked out of Heaven.

Will decides that Heaven is no longer enticing, that he doesn’t need it, not when Mike is the one touching him.

“I want this,” Will nods his head feverishly, never so sure about anything in his entire life. He doesn’t want Mike to question whether he wants this ot not, because he does. So fucking badly. Finally looking up at Mike, eyes glazed over and blinking softly, he watches as Mike’s eyes widen. “I want you, Mike. I want you to fuck me.”

A small smirk forms on Mike’s face before he immediately presses their lips together. Will’s hands wrap naturally around Mike’s neck. They stumble backwards, Mike snaking one hand around Will’s waist, the grip tightening to steady the pair and keep them from falling to the floor.

Will revels in the familiarity of Mike’s lips against his, how their lips slot together perfectly, and the tongues battling for dominance. He missed kissing him. He missed tasting him. It’s quiet enough in the main hall that their heavy breaths echo off the walls, creating a symphony against the stained glass windows. They continue to move, walking backwards until Will bumps into the chair.

The pastor’s chair.

“Mike, fuck, I want to do this so badly,” Will’s head tilts back, a soft moan escaping from his mouth as Mike reaches forward and bites the base of his neck. “I’ve… I’ve never done this before.”

“I know,” Mike places a delicate kiss against his collarbone as a small sign of reassurance, before lightly nipping at Will’s earlobe. Will fights back yet another moan. How is he so good at this? “Have you ever… fingered yourself?”

“I…” Will’s face flushes, his eyes widening at the brazenness of the question as he tries to make it look like he doesn’t feel as overwhelmed as he does. He’s never done any of that, and he doesn’t have the slightest idea how. He can’t help but think how embarrassing this is. Despite his innocence, Will isn’t completely clueless — he’s heard about fingering before, mainly from hushed whispers from the girls he used to hang out with in high school, but he never once considered that it would do anything for him. How is he supposed to… touch himself like that? “No, um, I’ve never…”

“Fuck,” Mike’s breath hitches, his eyes darkening. Licking his lips, his mouth still directly beside Will’s ear, he says, with a shaky breath: “I need you to try for me, okay?”

“Here?” Will swallows, barely able to get the word out. He knows that usually, when someone wants to insert anything, there needs to be liquid. There needs to be… something that makes it hurt less. “I don’t have, um…” Heat radiates from his neck. “How am I supposed to…”

Mike doesn’t answer at first, simply grabbing one of Will’s hands and bringing it to his mouth. Gently, Mike presses down all of Will’s fingers except for one, and Will thinks he might explode at the sight of Mike wrapping his lips around Will’s pointer finger. Will can feel every inch of Mike’s tongue, the way it twists, swirls and turns around his finger so unashamedly, and the sensation goes straight to his cock.

Will isn’t sure whether he’s dreaming, completely mesmerized as he watches Mike pull his lips away from his finger, leaving a trail of spit connecting the tip of Will’s finger to Mike’s lips. Mike lets a shaky breath escape from his mouth as he reaches forward and tugs at the waistband of Will’s underwear that is peaking out from the waistband of his pants. “Take this off, baby. We have… this, and it’ll be good enough, I promise.”

Will knows there’s no going back now, not as his pants drop to the floor and hit the wooden platform. He bends down, the wood creaking under the weight of both boys, and throws his jeans aside. Now standing in his underwear, he watches as Mike stares at him so intently, as if he’ll miss something if he blinks. His mouth slightly open, Will wonders whether he wants to consume him as badly as he wants to consume Mike.

Swallowing, Will’s eyes drift down to his own underwear. It’s obvious that he’s hard — his precum already staining the grey fabric near his tip, the material now practically black. He doubts he’s ever felt this aroused before. Hearing Mike tell him to… touch himself, to finger himself, and watching Mike put his finger in his mouth, Will thinks there may never be another moment like this, and he’s okay with that.

“Sit on the chair,” Mike’s voice is low, sending a trail of goosebumps up Will’s spine. He watches as Mike reaches for his own belt, his fingers shaking as he undoes it too fast, slipping off the leather. He takes a couple of seconds to collect himself before trying again, his pants falling to his feet, pooling on the wooden platform. Mike steps over them, pulling off his shirt at the same time, now standing in nothing but his underwear. He reaches forward, again, tugging at Will’s waistband. “Take off your underwear.”

Will listens to Mike, pushing off the last layer of protection, the last opportunity not to cross any boundaries. He walks backward, taking one step up, his bare ass resting on the red velvet cushion of the same chair the pastor sits on to communicate with God.

Mike takes in a sharp breath, eyes trailing over and covering every inch of Will’s naked skin, his hand reaching down toward his own length. He roughly shoves his hand underneath his fabric, and Will swallows as he notices how pink the tip of Mike’s cock is against his stomach. It’s so beautiful, he can’t help but think, another wave of arousal washing through him. He’s so… big. He watches as Mike rubs his thumb over his own slit, the way his stomach contracts with every twist of his hand. Fuck, Will thinks as his free hand reaches for his own length, desperate for the return of friction, desperate for something to relieve the aching, pulsing of his cock.

“Mike,” Will’s voice is higher-pitched than normal. His finger is still wet from where Mike just sucked on it. Just… looking isn’t enough. He needs more. “Mike, I need you to touch me.”

With a hand still wrapped around his cock, Mike shakes his head, taking a small step forward as his legs continue to twitch as he pleasures himself. “I want to see how you touch yourself first.” Mike licks his lips, using his free hand to spread and lift one of Will’s legs over the armrest and the other over the opposite. It doesn’t take Will long to realize just how… exposed he is, his naked body on full display to the empty rows of pews before him, and the hanging, life-size statue of Jesus Christ on the crucifix above the front doors. “Holy shit, Will.” Another moan escapes his throat. “You’re… you’re so fucking pretty, like this.”

Hearing Mike call him pretty sends another painful wave of pleasure to his cock. It’s hard enough that it begins to hurt, and Will isn’t sure how much longer this, not touching himself, is going to last before he begins to ascend. “Mike—”

“Put a finger in,” Mike interrupts, eyebrows creasing, tongue wetting his lips and eyes dropping to Will’s ass. “I want to see how many fingers your tight hole can take.” Will swallows, keeping one hand on his length, pumping dazedly as he nods his head. He wants to reach forward, wants to feel Mike’s lips against his own, against every part of him, but Mike is too far away.

“I can’t,” he tries again, a moan lightly edging his voice. Will feels like he’s on another planet, the overwhelming and debilitating need and desire he feels for Mike making it difficult to form coherent thoughts, and he’s barely even been touched. “I don’t know how. Can… can you do it for me?”

“Soon, baby.” He gently pushes as he reaches for Will’s hand, guiding it toward his own rim. Will’s breath catches as he watches Mike’s bottom lip catch between his teeth. Fuck, Will thinks. Is this really happening right now? Is he really about to do this in front of Mike? “Try with one finger first.”

Will, desperate for any form of relief, slides his wet finger into his opening. He lets out a small hiss, not used to the feeling, eyes squeezing shut. He doesn’t move his finger, slightly adjusting his position in the chair to get more comfortable. He can feel the tightness of his hole, and it sends a shudder through his system. It isn’t bad, by any means, just… different.

“This…” Unable to find the words, he settles on tilting his head back.

“Does it feel okay?” Mike asks, his voice soft. Will feels his hole clench around Mike’s finger at the concern he shows him, at the care, and Will wants more. He needs more. Will nods furiously, heat rushing to every inch of his exposed skin. “Do you think you can… move it a little?”

“Mhm,” Will licks his lips, not bothering to try and form any words as he nods his head, slowly. He pushes the finger in slowly, deeper, and lets out another sharp breath as the sensation travels through his body, settling in his core. It doesn’t take long before Will knows it feels good. “Mike,” he breathes out, opening his eyes wide enough to lock eyes with the boy standing before him.

All Will can think about is how beautiful Mike is. As Will sits there, completely and utterly exposed, he can’t help but notice how the colours from the array of stained-glass windows bleed through, completely covering Mike’s naked body. He’s so fucking stunning, he thinks. Will, completely mesmerized, can’t help it — he wonders if he is the God he should be praying to.

“Yeah?” His voice shakes with the one word, and the sight makes Will push his finger even deeper, slightly curving it, trying to find any form of relief.

His eyes trail to Mike’s hand, still wrapped around his own cock and pumping. All he can think about is how badly he wants Mike’s long fingers inside of him, reaching places he’s unable to reach on his own. He wants Mike inside of him.

“I need more,” Will mumbles. He needs Mike to touch him. He wants to be touched. “Mike, I need your help. Fuck, Mike, please.”

“Add another finger,” Mike replies instantly, swallowing. He moves closer to Will, removing his hand from his cock to spread Will’s thighs even more apart. He bends over, placing a trail of kisses against the supple skin of Will’s thighs. “Jesus fucking Christ, Will.”

“Not wet enough,” Will moans, still pumping his finger in his hole. “Can’t,” He lets out a soft groan, breath hitching. Lowering his head, he knows he likely looks as pathetic as he feels, but he doesn’t care. “Move fast enough to add another.”

“Fuck it,” Mike mumbles, letting go of the resolve and self-control he’s been forcing himself to maintain.

Taking a slight step back, Mike stumbles over to a metal bowl a couple of feet away from the pastor’s chair. Will recognizes it faintly, knowing it was used in private ceremonies. He watches as Mike moves slowly, trying his best not to spill any of the liquid over the edge. Will continues to move his fingers, quicker now, trying to make sense of what he’s seeing, of what he’s witnessing, his hips continuing to buck every couple of seconds. He’s getting close, but nowhere near close enough.

“You…” Warmth and arousal flash immediately deep into his abdomen as Will watches him dip his hand into the metal bowl. In turn, he begins to move his finger even faster, breath caught in his throat. What is he doing? “What do you need the holy water for?”

“Take your finger out,” He mumbles, and Will doesn’t need to be told twice to listen to him — immediately pulling it out, a small, inadvertent whine leaving his lips in protest, both hands reaching to the armrests of the chair to stop himself from falling over. He misses the feeling of the finger inside of him, not wanting to be empty. “Open your mouth,” Mike mumbles, his hand drenched in the baptismal water, the oil slick on his fingers.

Will’s eyes widen as he watches it leave a trail that drips down his arm and onto the floor beneath him. Using his free hand, Mike tugs on Will’s chin, pushing his head upward. They make brief eye contact, and Will knows that Mike is being serious. He knows that Mike wants this just as much as he does, and he knows what he should do — what he’s meant to do.

His eyebrows crease, and his mouth opens just wide enough for Mike to slip his two fingers inside, resting on his tongue.

As if it’s second nature, Will closes his lips around Mike’s digits, eyes fluttering shut as the combination of oil and balsam washes over his senses. How does this taste so good? His tongue laps around Mike’s skin, wondering how he has more faith in Mike, whose fingers are in his mouth, than he ever will in God.

Continuing to suck on Mike’s fingers, he opens his eyes to see Mike staring at him with such intent, such hunger, that he wants to force himself off the chair and onto his knees immediately. He wants Mike to ruin him, and he would welcome it with open arms.

“You like that? You like having my fingers in your mouth?” Mike asks, licking his lips as his eyes remain on Will, not moving in the slightest. Will nods, fingers still in his mouth. Mike separates the fingers, and Will uses the opportunity to slide his tongue between them, pushing his head forward. Will nods his head vigorously, voice getting muffled with his stuffed mouth. “You’re so good at this, baby, taking my fingers like a natural.”

Will isn’t sure how long he sits there, sucking on Mike’s fingers like his life depends on it, until Mike slowly pulls his fingers from Will’s mouth, drenched in a mixture of Will’s spit and the holy water. Will thinks the sight might make him come on the spot, but he holds out — watching as Mike dips his hand back into the bowl. He’s so fucking hot. “Now every time someone gets blessed by this stupid bowl, they’ll be lucky enough to have a part of you in it.”

“Hurry,” Will’s words come out harsher than he intends them to, his patience scarcely running thin. “Please.”

“In a rush, angel?” Mike smiles, walking towards the chair, holy water still dripping down his arm. Will wants to lick it off his skin. “I thought we were just getting started.” Mike’s wet hand hovers over Will’s rim, his middle finger lightly tracing the outline. Will shudders at the coldness of the liquid against his sensitive skin, his eyes shut. Mike continues to move his finger round and round and round again, and Will wants to scream.

Will moans, head shaking. His free hand travels back to his cock. Before he’s able to wrap his fingers around his length, Mike pushes it away, stripping him of the friction he desperately needs. Will lets out a frustrated groan in response. Will can feel tears begin to pool along his lashline. “Please, Mike, stop teasing me.”

“Beg.” His voice is surprisingly calm, which, Will thinks, might be making everything feel that much more agonizing. Mike’s finger continues to move tantalizingly slowly around Will’s hole, and he thinks he might cry from the desperation coursing through his veins. “Tell me how badly you want this, and I’ll give it to you.” 

“Please, Mike, please, touch me.” Will shakes his head, hips lifting off the velvet chair, hoping, praying, the rash movement would allow him to feel something. Why does Mike sound so fucking hot when he’s telling him what to do? His mind begins to spin at the realization of how much he’s enjoying this. He wants Mike to keep talking, keep ordering him around, and tell him to do whatever he wants. His cock feels so fucking hard that he’s worried he won’t be able to stop himself from coming before Mike gets the chance to even touch him. “Fuck, Mike, please, please touch me. Do anything, anything, please.”

Just like he said, Mike obeys immediately, sticking one of his fingers into Will’s hole. Will lets out a loud, strangled moan. Mike’s fingers are long, much longer than his own, and just from one finger, he’s able to reach places Will didn’t even think were possible. He steadies himself for a handful of seconds, Mike’s finger unmoving as he adjusts to the pressure forming in his abdomen. Fuck, he thinks. If one, unmoving finger feels this good, how good will two feel? How good will it feel if he starts… moving?

“Is this okay?” Mike asks, his voice more serious this time. Will nods, because fuck, it feels so good. A couple of seconds later, Mike speaks again. “I want to hear you say it.”

“Yes,” Will manages to push out, the word shaking from his lips. “I need…” His head hits the back of the chair, and a wave of dizziness washes over him. “God, don’t stop, please don’t stop.”

“God isn’t here, baby. Just me.” Mike still doesn't take his eyes off him, his other hand squeezing Will’s thigh. Maybe this is close to divination that he’s ever going to get.“What do you need?”

“I need you to move, or do something,” Will croaks, and Mike immediately begins to pump his fingers slowly in response, listening to the broken words coming from Will’s mouth. Too slow, Will thinks. He needs more. “Faster.”

Mike does exactly what Will asks, earning a string of moans and whimpers from Will’s mouth. One of his hands grips the armrest of the chair, the other reaching and gripping Mike’s shoulder. Still, he needs more. This isn’t enough. This is nowhere near enough. “Can, um, you… fuck, put another finger?”

“Want me to stretch you out, baby?” Mike asks, licking his lips. His breathing quickens, and Will watches as he uses his free hand to palm himself. This is so fucking hot, he thinks. His eyes remain glued to Mike’s cock.  A flurry of thoughts begins to crowd his mind, consuming him. He wants to know what it’s like to have something like that inside of him. He wants to know what it would be like to have Mike’s cock inside of him. “Want me to fuck you that badly, don’t you?” Will nods, because yes, that’s all he wants. “So impatient, angel.”

“Yes,” Will shakes his head, watching as some of Mike’s hair falls across his eyes as he bends over, and Will has half a mind to reach out and tuck the curly strand behind Mike’s ear. “I can’t wait anymore. I want you to fuck me.” 

Mike inserts a second finger, and Will thinks God might really be present within the four walls of this church. His mouth opens, no sound coming out, eyes fluttering shut. Mike’s fingers are so fucking long, he thinks. How did he go so long without this? How did he go so long without Mike’s touch?

“I want to feel you around me.” The hunger in Mike’s voice makes him sound feral, and Will loves it. He nods, his mouth opening as Mike begins to scissor his fingers into his hole. “I want to hear your pretty voice say my name.” 

“Mike,” Will says instantly, repeating his name over and over, grip on Mike’s shoulder tightening. “Fuck, Mike, God, Mike—”

It isn’t long before he feels it. 

Mike’s fingers curl, and they hit him right in the prostate, and Will thinks he might see stars. Clenching his stomach and bucking his hips upward, he desperately tries to get Mike’s fingers to brush the sensitive spot again, praying he can feel this sensation for more than three seconds. 

“Right there,” Will nods his head, biting his lips to try to calm himself down. Mike doesn’t slow down, his fingers curling again, directly hitting his bud. “Yeah, your fingers, holy fucking shit.” 

“Are they good enough for you, baby?”

Will feels both dazed and disoriented, his fingers curling just right, hitting the bundle of nerves that makes everything feel like too much. “I’m… I’m so fucking close—” Before Will can reach the precipice, Mike pulls out both of his fingers. Will instantly looks up, his hole now clenching around nothing, and he misses it. “Why did you stop?”

“I told you,” Mike replies, bringing the same fingers he just put in Will’s hole to his own mouth. He places them on his tongue. Will thinks seeing Mike like this might be enough to finish. Pulling his fingers from his mouth, sucked clean of any trace of Will, Mike says, his voice guttural: “I want to fuck you on this chair.”

Will nods his head, viscerally, because this is all he wants.

He tries to catch his breath, watching as Mike’s hand dips back into the bowl of baptismal water and oil. He coats his dick with the liquid, pumping fast. His head tilts back, his long, curly hair messy, and for the first time in a long time, Will is thankful for what God is putting before him.

“Lift your hips for me, baby,” Mike mumbles, bending slightly. With Will’s legs still spread across each armrest, he pushes his hips upward, ignoring the burning in his legs from the effort it takes to stay in position.

Mike places his open palm on the back of the chair, steadying himself as he lines himself up with Will. He feels like asking Mike what’s taking so long, feeling the tip press against his hole.

“Mike,” Will licks his lips, moving his hips forward. The feeling of Mike’s tip against his hole makes him want to ascend into another universe. How good is it going to feel when it’s inside of him? “What are you waiting for?”

Mike pauses, and Will thinks he might lose his mind if he isn’t touched this very second. “This might hurt a little,” Mike says, moving one of his hands to cradle Will’s face. “If… if it’s too much, you need to tell me. I’ll stop right away, okay?”

“I don’t care,” he says before he’s able to stop himself. “You said you were going to fuck me, so fuck me.”

Will takes in a deep breath as Mike pushes his cock into him, met with a pressure that’s much different than the fingers he had inside of him earlier. He feels… impossibly full, knowing that must be due to the fact that Mike is… so big.

Will lets out a strangled gasp, and Mike lifts his head immediately, eyebrows creasing, his piercing shines blue, catching the stained-glass light. Shutting his eyes, Will bites down on the inside of his cheek. He moves slightly, his legs still aching from the position they’re in, but he’s in no position to complain — not when Mike is inside him. The baptismal water makes for an easy glide, and Will is thankful, unable to imagine what it would feel like without it.

“You’re so…” He takes another deep breath, legs still spread. “Big,” Will finishes, teeth clenched. “Can… can you try to move a little?”

“Do you think you’re ready?” Mike pauses, his voice both rushed and soft. “Do you want to wait a bit longer before I move?”

Will doesn’t have time to think. Why is he hesitating now? “Move, Mike.”

Mike places one hand behind Will, tugging him a bit closer, the new angle making Will see stars.

“You’re so fucking tight, Will.” Mike lets out a soft groan, moving slowly, his hips clenching with every thrust. “You’re doing so good for me.” With one hand on the small of Will’s back and the other gripping his thigh, Will watches Mike. 

As he tries to form coherent thoughts, he’s unable to look away from the way Mike’s curly hair moves like it has a mind of its own, the slight layer of sweat forming on his forehead, the way his septum piercing is crooked, and the way his lip is caught between his bottom teeth. Will’s eyes trail down to his hands, his fucking hands. Mike is so fucking beautiful, and in this moment, all his. Will wants to reach forward; he wants to kiss him and feel Mike’s forehead against his own. 

“Am I?”

Mike nods his head, placing sloppy kisses on the damp skin of Will’s neck. “It’s like you’re made for me.”

“I am,” Will mumbles, rolling his hips closer to Mike, and both of them moan in unison. In a desperate bid for more, Will uses whatever strength he has left to wrap both legs around Mike’s torso. A loud moan escapes his lips at how deep this angle is, and Mike immediately places both hands under Will’s thigh, steadying him. “God… So good.”

Will’s back is pressed up against the seat. Mike is moving faster, and his thrusts are deep; they’re so fucking deep. Will’s breaths are laboured, and he looks up at Mike. He wants to kiss him. He wants to kiss him so fucking badly.

Mike closes the distance between them, as though reading his mind. The angle is a bit awkward, their noses bumping, but it quickly fixes itself when Mike, with his hands under Will’s thighs, lifts him and turns them around. The kiss is messy, and Will is unsure if either one of them is fully there, too busy trying to process how fucking good all of this feels.

Mike is now the one sitting in the chair, still inside Will. This position is much more comfortable for him, naturally lifting himself and lowering back onto Mike’s length. The sound of his ass against the bare skin of Mike’s thighs echoes throughout the main hall, and Will moans louder than he anticipates.

“Fuck,” Mike moans, both of his hands travel down and grip Will’s ass. He squeezes hard enough that it causes Will’s back to arch and his eyes to roll back. “All mine,” he mumbles. The words travel directly to his cock, and Will reaches for his cock, precum leaking everywhere. He hisses at the contact, the double stimulation brings tears to his eyes, and Mike takes his half-lidded eyes as a sign to move quicker — to move faster. “So fucking tight. Nobody has ever fucked you, and nobody ever will. Only me.”

“Mike,” Will moans, all attempts to contain himself useless now, he’s unravelling with each second that passes, skin sticky, his precum now all over his stomach and Mike’s thighs. This feels so good. His cock aches badly, and he moves his hips more comfortably, now. He presses his thumb against his slit, another moan threatening to escape, another moan threatening to overtake him. He isn’t sure how much longer he can hold out before finishing. “I… I can’t—”

“Come on,” Mike whispers, bucking his hips harder. Will is trying his best to lift himself off Mike’s legs and back down again, moving as fast as possible. His hand lightly squeezes his cock, letting out a loud whine in response. “I want you to cum on this seat. I want my dad to,” he takes a sharp breath, his head hitting the back of the seat for a second time. “Give his stupid sermon tomorrow on a chair full of your cum. I want,” he pauses again, “Fuck, I want him to know he’s full of shit. This… this feels so fucking good, Will.”

Will can feel his hole tighten around Mike’s cock at the words coming from his mouth, and a moan from the boy underneath him follows immediately. The thought of the pastor sitting in a chair that he and Mike desecrated together during service tomorrow makes his stomach twist in a way he doesn’t know is possible. The same man who preaches this to be a sin will be surrounded by it.

“It is a sin,” Will mumbles, partly because he believes it, but partly because he loves to see how… riled up Mike gets from it. Mike places both of his hands on Will’s shoulders, pushing him down far enough that Will begins to see stars. His eyes roll back, bottoming out. Mike continues to push him down, and Will wraps his hands around Mike’s neck, pressing his face into the crook of his neck. “A dirty, dirty sin—”

Mike reaches for Will’s cock, his large hand wrapping around Will’s length and lightly squeezing before beginning to pump faster, as he lifts his thighs, movements sharper, quicker. “I’ll show you what a real sin is.”

“Didn’t you say,” Will continues, placing both hands on the armrests, gripping the red velvet seat to position himself. With his breath caught in his throat, he manages to let out a couple of words: “You wanted to corrupt me?”

Mike’s eyes widen, and he becomes unrelenting. 

“Fuck,” Will can’t handle the overstimulation, tears rimming his eyelids. He’s not going to last much longer, not with Mike touching him everywhere. His nails dig into Mike’s shoulders, but he doesn’t stop bouncing; the skin-on-skin sound is lewd, but Will finds himself loving it. Mike’s pace quickens, and Will, shaking his head, arches his back so he can show Mike just how much this is affecting him.

“Is it too much?” Mike asks, breathing heavily. He slows his pace, eyes locking with Will and hand stilling on his shaft, wanting to be sure everything is okay. “Tell me, and I’ll stop–”

“Keep going,” Will says through gritted teeth. He doesn’t want Mike to be gentle. He wants Mike to be rough with him; he wants Mike to make him come. His eyes, half lidded, start to roll back. “I’m… so fucking close.” Mike immediately resumes pumping Will’s dick, a trickle of moans coming from his mouth. 

“Come on, baby.” Mike continues, unrelenting with his pace, thrusting into Will faster than he’s able to keep up with. Will tries to grip onto the chair to stop himself from sliding down Mike’s thighs, but he props a hand on his ass to keep him from falling. “Come on, finish for me. I want us to,” He tilts his head back, “Finish together.”

Will nods his head, tears falling down his face freely at the pure pleasure radiating through his body. His stomach tightens, and his thighs clench. He wants to let go, he wants to finish so fucking badly. 

Will wonders how the hell Mike is still going, but before he can say another word, a wave of pure euphoria washes over him. With his eyebrows pressed together, his legs begin to twitch. He lets out a trail of moans as his back arches, hand reaching forward to grab something, anything that will help him feel steady. 

Mike reaches forward, slowly letting go of Will’s cock, cum all over his hand. Will, in a complete daze, thinks he might be dreaming as he watches Mike lick the cum off of his skin. This has to be a dream, he thinks. His breath is still caught in his throat, and he tries to force himself to calm down, to relax, but Mike, sitting in front of him, makes him want to go for another round. 

“Are you okay?” Mike asks, leaning down to press a small kiss on Will’s forehead. “This might feel a little weird,” he says as he slowly pulls out his dick from Will’s hole, which immediately clenches from the empty feel. Will lets out a soft sigh, missing the feeling of Mike inside of him, but the feeling is immediately replaced with another wave of desire as Will’s eyes trail down to Mike’s cock, cum all over his shaft. “You did amazing, angel.” 

It’s only then that he realizes why he feels so… full. 

He can feel liquid seep out of his hole, and Will feels another wave of arousal rush to his cock at the thought of being filled by Mike’s cum. 

Yeah,” Will nods his head, feeling the sweat covering his skin as his high slowly fades. His mind keeps spinning, and he doesn’t think he can form a coherent sentence, but he tries anyway. “Mike, that was… you’re so…”

Mike leans forward, pressing a kiss to Will’s lips as he reaches a hand around Will’s back, lightly tracing a finger around Will’s hole. Will hisses at the contact, sensitivity rushing through his veins, and a smile spreads across his lips.

☾𖤓

"You and Michael have gotten pretty close, haven't you?" Jonathan asks, absentmindedly, as he places two slices of bread in the toaster and presses the handle down. He turns the dial on the machine to '3' (which, in Will's opinion, is the perfect balance between toasted and burnt). With his back still toward his younger brother, he continues to speak. "You guys hang out a lot after church. You barely come home with us anymore.”

Will stiffens, staring at his bowl of cereal. He tries to distract himself, playing with the metal spoon in his hand, dipping it back into the sugar-stained milk left by the cereal their mother swears will eventually give them cavities. He clears his throat, trying to be as nonchalant as possible — he can't know what's happening between them, can he? There's no way, he tries his best to reassure himself.

"I mean, yeah? We're friends. Friends, you know, hang out all the time?"

“Friends," Jonathan repeats, nodding slowly, still staring at the toaster on the counter instead of his younger brother. Wanting to crawl out of his skin, Will keeps dipping his spoon into the milk. "Is that who you're sneaking out almost every night to see?" Jonathan asks. "You keep forgetting to close your window. The draft gets under my door."

“What?” Will tries his best to let out a small laugh, as awkward as it sounds. How does he know? Will is sure he always closes the window—he double and triple-checks every time before he leaves. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Listen,” Jonathan sighs, finally turning around and facing Will. “If I’m being honest, I don’t mind that you’re sneaking out, really. It’s none of my business who you go to see. You’re old enough. I would just appreciate it if you told me where you’re going, or who you’re with, so that if Mom ever wakes up, I can cover for you. You know how mom is. You know she would have a panic attack.”

“I told you,” Will shrugs, hoping his voice is not as unconvincing as it feels. “I’m not sneaking out. I like sleeping with the window open.”

“Really?” Jonathan lifts his eyebrows, letting out a small laugh. The laughter isn’t one full of humour, Will realizes – but one that comes from a place of annoyance, which, in turn, makes Will even more frustrated with what’s going on. “That’s the story you’re going with?” 

“It’s not a story,” Will pushes, hoping his brother would take the hint and drop the conversation already. “It’s the truth. I don’t understand why you’re suddenly choosing to question where I’m going at night. Didn’t you just say that I’m old enough, and I’m responsible. You know I am. You’re not my parent. You’re… you’re judging me, when all I’m doing is telling you the truth.” 

Sighing, Jonathan sits down on the kitchen chair beside him. Will fights back the urge to roll his eyes. “I would never judge you, Will.” 

Will doesn’t like the direction the conversation is heading in. Not one bit. “You’re saying that, but… but you’re literally judging me right now for liking it cold when I sleep? I didn’t know you cared about stuff like that.”

“Will,” Jonathan shakes his head. “We both know that you hate being cold. You don’t have to lie to me.” 

“I don’t lie.” Will snaps, the anger finally surfacing in his voice. “Can’t you just drop it?”

Except, he doesn’t. Jonathan lifts one hand, rubbing it against his forehead. “Can you just tell me… are you being safe?”

Will drops the spoon in his hand, and the sound of the metal hitting the ceramic bowl reverberates across the kitchen. “What the hell is that supposed to mean?” 

Jonathan looks at him, confused. “What I mean is that I want to make sure that you’re not hanging out with the wrong crowd, you know?”

“Wrong crowd?” Will repeats, trying to calm the pounding of his heart, the near panic attack he almost had at his kitchen table. There’s no way his older brother… knows, does he? There’s no way he can see right through him, can he?

“Where do you keep going in the middle of the night?” 

“I have friends, Jonathan. I… I’m allowed to stay out late with them, you know. I don’t have to come home before dinner every single night.”

“What about Robin?” Jonathan asks, crossing his arms. “She called the house, Will. She asked me where the hell you’ve been. So, if you’re not hanging out with her, who the hell are you hanging out with besides Michael from church?”

Will feels his face heat up at the mention of Robin. He knows they haven’t been hanging out much this summer, not nearly as much as they normally do, and sure, he’s missed maybe one or two calls, maybe missed a few hangouts, but… things are a bit different now.

“That’s not any of your business–”

Jonathan is trying his best to remain level-headed, but Will can tell by the way his breath is beginning to shake that he’s nearing his limits. Regardless, Will knows that he won’t yell at him. He never has. “I asked mom if she knew–”

“You asked Mom?” Will interrupts. “Are you trying to get me grounded?”

“Can you just listen to me for a second?” Jonathan’s voice is sharp, though not aggressive. “She said you have been hanging out with Michael a lot, that maybe you’ve become friends with some people at church.” 

“And I have,” Will replies.

“Right,” Jonathan shakes his head, seemingly giving up. “Just… just promise me that if you need help, or… or someone to talk to, you’ll reach out to me.”

“Whatever,” Will stands up from his chair, bringing his bowl to the sink. 

☾𖤓

It’s almost routine — whenever it’s dark out, he meets Mike in front of the church. 

The idea of sneaking into the church doesn’t scare Will much anymore. They’ve done it enough times that he thinks he can walk the hallways with his eyes shut and still know where he is. It’s ironic, he thinks. The only place they’re able to be truly alone together is the same place that threatens to separate them.

Tonight, unlike the others, Will follows Mike into a room they’ve never ventured into. It’s an office, hit by the immediate, overwhelming smell of old books. Will can’t help but wonder why they’re in there, but he can’t deny the curiosity that stems from it, too. 

“Can you believe my dad gets to sit in here every day and do… nothing?” Mike sighs, flipping on the light in his office. The harsh, artificial yellow light makes Will wince, and it takes him a couple of seconds to adjust to the brightness. “All he has to do is speak in front of people about whatever he’s pissed off about that day, and people just… listen. They willingly hang off of every word my dad says, and they don’t even question it. He even gets… donations! I mean, think about it, Will, where does all the money people donate to the church even go?”

“Who knows?” Will mumbles, eyes too busy looking over every detail of the office. Books are stacked everywhere, and he has the sneaking suspicion the pastor doesn’t read anything. “I mean, maybe he uses it for books and stuff? Can you even buy scripture at a store? Do… pastors have special stores to buy their stuff, or something?”

“I’m sure he pockets the majority of the money.” Mike walks over to his father’s desk, lifting up a pen that looks much too expensive. He drops it onto the mahogany surface, the sound rattling in the room between them. Will winces at the loud sound. He wants to tell Mike to be careful, that if they break anything, the pastor will know they’ve been there, and everything will blow up in their faces. “I mean, how else are they able to go on vacation twice a year?”

Will moves toward Mike, now standing beside him. Their shoulders brush. “Is that even allowed?” He looks down at the desk. 

A small, bright yellow post-it catches his eye. In unmistakable, legible handwriting, Will reads: ‘Sermon 193 (Thursday, July 19): Discuss the sins of sodomy, stress the importance of keeping the sanctity of marriage and sexual relationships between man and woman only’. A bitter taste fills his mouth, eyes dropping to the floor. Is this God trying to remind him that he’s sinful? Is this God’s way of trying to veer him back onto the moral path? To repent? 

Mike sends Will a soft look. “Since when do the rules apply to him?” Will doesn’t answer, eyes trained on the note and the handwriting of Mike’s father, eyes glazing over. Don’t cry, he tells himself. Don’t cry in front of Mike. “Will?” Mike asks, eyebrows creasing. The concern in his voice makes Will want to cry even more. How can he always read him so easily? “What’s wrong?”

Will reaches down and picks up the note. He wants to rip it into shreds; he wants to burn it. At the same time, he feels another wave of self-consciousness wash over him. God, what if this is really wrong? What if he’s going to be punished for everything he’s done over the past month when the time comes? What if he will regret this for the rest of his life, wishing he followed the words of the Bible rather than his own selfish greed?

“This… this is wrong.” Will takes a deep breath, shaking his head. “Isn’t it? This goes against everything we’ve been taught, everything that I’ve been taught.”

“Hey,” Mike shakes his head, instantly taking the note from Will’s hand, crumpling it up in his fist and throwing it onto the carpet beneath him. “Hey, hey, Will, no. Don’t listen to that shit. There’s…There's nothing wrong with you. With us, okay?” He clears his throat, pushing the hair out of Will’s face, out of his eyes. Will can’t help but feel a blush rise to the centre of his cheeks. 

Will shakes his head, wondering how long it’s going to take before he finds himself in a spiral that becomes too difficult to pull himself out of. “According to your father, there is.”

“Fuck him,” Mike rushes out, though his voice is sincere. He places both of his hands on Will’s face, eyes meeting his. “He doesn’t matter. He won’t matter. You have me, alright? I’m here, and I’m not going anywhere.”

Will doesn’t answer, his eyes falling to Mike’s lips. God, he thinks. There has to be something wrong with him, doesn’t there? All he can think about is Mike and how much he likes kissing him, rather than how likely he is to go to Hell. All he can think about is how badly he wants to kiss Mike right now, rather than unpack the implications of the fact they’re standing in the pastor’s office, inside his church. 

They’re surrounded by more Bibles than Will can count, and even more scriptures that tell them what they’re doing and how they’re feeling is wrong. It doesn’t matter, Will quickly thinks; Mike is making his way into every facet of Will’s brain – into every crevice, into every fold and settling there as though it belongs. Will realizes, very quickly, that he doesn’t mind it one bit.

“Promise?” The word falls from Will’s tongue, hesitantly. He wants the reassurance – he needs the reassurance to know that he’s not the only one who knows this is wrong. That he’s not the only one who knows what they’re doing is a sin. His eyes are still trained on Mike’s lips. He watches as Mike slowly licks his bottom lip, and his eyes follow the movement to his throat, watching his Adam’s apple bob as he swallows. Jesus Christ. 

Mike nods, closing the distance between them. “Promise.”

Their lips touch tentatively – starting off slow. Will loves it just as much when Mike takes his time with him as when they’re in a frenzy, unable to control themselves or their desire. There’s something so… addicting about Mike, something that makes Will feel like he’s going crazy — but he will welcome the insanity. 

Lifting his hands and threading them into Mike’s slightly curly hair, he fists a handful of his locks and squeezes. Mike reacts immediately, as he always does, pressing their bodies together. Mike grabs onto Will’s waist and turns him so that his ass bumps against the edge of the mahogany desk, both of his hands pressed against the surface beside him, trapping him within his body. Will’s hands move from Mike’s hair to the delicate skin of his neck, then to the collar of his shirt. 

“You look so good in those jeans,” Mike mumbles, breaking the kiss for a second, biting Will’s bottom lip and drawing a breathy moan from the boy in front of him. He tugs on Will’s lips, and Will welcomes it. “Do you know that?” 

“Do I?” Will replies, heat spreading all over his body at the compliment. He wants Mike; he needs Mike. 

“You do, angel.” Mike mumbles, pressing their bodies together. “I think you know just what you do to me.” Mike hisses at the material of their pants pressing against each other. “Don’t you?”

“Fuck,” Will tilts his head back, the words going straight to his cock. That’s a good enough answer for Mike, who continues to press their clothed dicks together. 

Will, still pressed up against the desk, places his hands farther back both to steady himself, but to give him the strength to lift his hips, making it easier for Mike to create more friction. He’s uncaring that he’s making a mess of all the things scattered across the desk, and the pastor will likely notice his things being out of place, but he doesn’t care. He doesn’t care because Mike is making him feel good. 

They’re moving quickly, Mike’s hands falling to Will’s waist, and squeezing. “Will, please, I need more.” Mike moans, both boys chasing the pleasure that comes from their bodies pressing against each other.  

“What… what do you want?”

“Want to… feel you.” Mike struggles to get the words out of his mouth, and when his breathing steadies, he adds: “Want to feel your lips…”

Will knows exactly what he’s referring to, having imagined this many times over the past couple of weeks. Mike wants Will to suck his dick, and Will thinks he might just burst on the spot. Will pushes himself off the desk, placing a hand on Mike’s chest. He pushes him, causing Mike to stumble over his own feet and land on the chair. Will reaches forward, gripping the chair's handles to stop it from rolling backwards and hitting the window.  

He can tell Mike doesn’t expect Will’s initiative, eyes widening as Will gets on his knees in front of him. Will can’t help but think about how… new this is to him – that he’s never done anything like this before. What if he does it wrong? he thinks, licking his lips. What if… he’s bad at making Mike feel good?

“Fuck, angel.” Mike sighs, legs spread and head tilting back against the leather cushion of his father’s office chair. “Have I ever told you how good you look on your knees? All pretty for me?”

The word pretty sends a wave of arousal right to his cock, slightly moving his hip back to accommodate the building friction in his pants. God, he thinks. There’s nothing he loves more than being called pretty. 

“Yeah?” Will asks, the carpet a comfortable place to sit on his knees, looking up at Mike. Hesitantly, he moves closer toward Mike’s lap – hands hovering over the belt. His hands are shaking slightly. He’s nervous, but he’s so, so willing. “Can… can I?” 

“Please.” Mike’s voice hitches in the base of his throat. “Holy shit,” the words fall from his tongue as he watches Will fumble with the buckle of his belt. Will thinks he might finish in his pants, just from seeing the pure desire on Mike’s face. He wants him. Mike wants him badly enough that they’re doing this in his father’s office, the pastor’s office. “Please touch me.”

Will shuts his eyes the moment the tip enters his mouth. He lets out a soft, guttural moan as he lowers his head onto Mike’s length, his tongue swirling at the base. He’s so big, Will thinks, desperate to take and taste every single inch of him in his mouth. Placing both of his hands on Mike’s thighs, he tries his best to maintain a rhythm, trying to picture what he would want to help him 

Mike’s hands reach forward, threading his hands in Will’s hair as he begins to bob his head up and down. Mike lightly guides him toward the pace he wants, his grip faltering as Will continues to swirl his tongue around Mike’s cock. Will wants more; he needs more. He lowers his mouth, trying to take in as much of Mike’s length as possible and hollowing out his cheeks, eyes shutting as tears begin to form in his eyes. 

“You’re doing so, ah,” Mike groans, eyebrows furrowing – the piercing shining under the yellow glow of the artificial light. “Good for me. Keep… keep going, fuck.”

Will hums in response, causing Mike to tighten his grip on his hair, earning another moan from Will’s mouth. The vibration spreads across Mike’s dick, and he bucks his hips upward, desperate to follow the feeling. He can taste the saltiness of the precum, a taste unfamiliar in his own mouth, but not one that he doesn’t welcome. He can’t help but think that his cum tastes… good.

Will’s hands drop to Mike’s length, gently tugging on both of Mike’s testicles, and a wave of pleasure courses through him at the illicit moan escaping from Mike’s lips. 

All Will can think about is how he’s making Mike feel good; that only he can have that effect on him, and even if the pastor preaches about how wrong it is, his own son loves it.

He continues to bob his head, quickly switching to leave kisses along Mike’s shaft until he reaches the tip. Mike lets in a sharp breath as Will begins to suck at the tip, and he can tell by the way his legs begin to shake that he’s close.

“Will,” Mike mumbles, eyes half-lidded. Will watches as Mike begins to pump his own length, chasing a high he’s  “I… I’m going to… can you get, um, a tissue?”

Will can get a tissue. There’s a box on the desk behind him. It would only take a couple of seconds to stand up from where he’s kneeling on the floor, and he can let Mike finish on his own. Instead, he shakes his head. The material of his pants tightens painfully around his own cock, and any slight movement sends a wave of pleasure up to his stomach. He can get off just by watching Mike, he thinks.  “Can I, um… can you… in my mouth?”

“Fuck,” Mike nods his head feverishly, eyes widening and hand pumping faster. “Yes, fuck, yes, you’re so… perfect.”

 Will isn’t sure exactly how he’s supposed to be ready for it, but his eyes are unable to leave Mike’s cock – how it’s a dark shade of pink, how it practically screams that it’s about to come, and Will can’t help but lick his lips. The taste of precum, the taste of Mike still rests on his tongue, and he finds himself wanting more.  

“Open your mouth,” Mike says through gritted teeth, and Will can tell he’s trying to hold it in. Will scoots closer, letting out a soft moan at the friction in his pants. He reaches down, palming his own dick as he does exactly what Mike asked of him – mouth open wide.

It comes out in slow spurts, but Will sits there, letting the cum coat his tongue. He considers placing his mouth on Mike’s tip, but with the way Mike is breathing, and the way he looks so… overstimulated, he decides to let him revel in it. This feeling… this must be what makes it a sin, he thinks to himself. 

This must be the greed they talk about in the Bible. 

He can feel some of it drip down his chin, so he uses the back of his hand to wipe it away. He’s never done anything even remotely close to this before, as if something possessed him to act this way. He doesn’t mind, he really doesn’t, because he finds himself swallowing it all. He doesn’t have time to think about the amount of sins he’s just participated in, nor does he want to think about the implications of any of this – not right now, and not when his own length is… throbbing. 

“That was so fucking hot,” Mike’s eyes trail down to Will’s lips. “I… I didn’t know you were into that.”

“I didn’t either.”

“Do… do you need help, baby? Come, sit down, I could–”

Will can still taste the cum in his mouth, but his eyes drift to the crumpled note on the floor. This feels like a sin. This is a sin. This is a sin that they committed in the pastor's office, surrounded by… Bibles.

“No,” Will shakes his head quickly, a little too quickly, but Mike doesn’t push it. His stomach flips, worried that Mike might take it the wrong way. “I mean, it’s not that I don’t want you to,” Will adds, “I just, I’m worried that… he might show up.”

“My dad?” Mike asks, his pants still off. “He won’t be.”

“I don’t know that, though.” Will winces.

Mike pauses, studying Will’s face intently. “Are you okay?”

He is okay, he thinks to himself. This has everything to do with him and nothing to do with Mike. 

“Yeah,” Will smiles, standing up on his legs, slightly wobbling due to the numbness in his legs. He leans forward, pressing a kiss to Mike’s lips. Mike immediately reciprocates, placing his hand on Will’s cheek. “I promise.”

☾𖤓

“Do you ever think about our… future?” Mike asks, his knees drawn up to his chest and his hands wrapped around his legs. It’s dark outside, dark enough that Will can see only the faint outline of the stars through the branches of the trees that surround them in the church’s backyard. 

Instinctively, he moves closer to Mike, their shoulders now pressed together. “Of course I do,” he replies casually — because he has. It’s all he thinks about. He thinks about the possibility of being together, really together, of raising a family, and even of getting legally married one day. He knows this is much easier said than done, especially in Hawkins, but it doesn’t make him want it any less. In fact, it makes him want it more. Spending time with Mike, being with Mike, makes him realize that there isn’t a universe he doesn’t want to end up with him. “I just wonder how much of it is possible in Hawkins, I guess.”

“Who says we have to stay here?” Mike asks, biting the inside of his cheek. The faint smell of cigarette smoke wafting off his clothing tells Will he smoked before he got there. “I mean, even with everything considered, Hawkins is a shit place to live. Who would want to stay here longer than they have to? This place is full of… assholes, who will never understand us. Why would we subject ourselves to this shit?”

“I guess,” Will shrugs, agreeing with the boy beside him. Moving out of Hawkins does sound tempting — the possibility of starting over, of maybe living somewhere that’s just a little more understanding, makes his chest hurt. The thought of living somewhere else with… Mike makes his chest tighten even more. “It’s just… everyone we know is here. It would be hard to leave them.”

“Would they even miss us?” Mike asks, voice raw. Their shoulders are still touching, and Mike reaches down and links his fingers with Will’s. 

Will sways, heart fluttering at the touch. Despite everything they’ve done, even the simplest of touches makes Will’s heart race. “What do you mean?”

“I mean, if they found out about us, would they even want us to stay?”

A silence settles between them, and Will doesn’t know what to say. The bitter reality weighs on him like a weighted blanket, guilt creeping up the back of his neck. He knows Mike is right — he knows that if anyone finds out what they do and who they are, they wouldn’t even bother saying goodbye. 

“Do you think that it’s, um… possible? For us?” Will asks, voice quiet. He looks up at Mike, eyebrows creasing together. “To have… a future?”

His grip tightens around Will’s hand, a smile spreading across Mike’s lips, though it doesn’t reach his eyes. “I really hope so.”

“What made you, um, ask?” Will asks, resting his head on Mike’s shoulder. His eyes close for a couple of seconds as he takes in Mike’s scent, one he’s grown familiar with. One that he feels so comfortable in. “I mean, we don’t usually talk about this stuff.”

A silence settles between the pair, and Will shifts in his place. Why does something seem… off? 

“I’m leaving.” Mike clears his throat. “Tomorrow morning.”

The words send chills down Will’s spine. He isn’t sure he heard Mike properly — leaving? Leaving… where? On a trip? Mike mentioned earlier that his parents often go on vacation; is he joining them? He doesn’t remember the pastor mentioning that he would be leaving. 

“You’re… leaving?” The words barely leave his throat, catching in the base of his neck. This has to be a joke, Will thinks. Where is he even going? “Like… on a vacation? What? Why didn’t you tell me sooner? Weren’t we, um, supposed to hang out with your friends this weekend?”

Mike doesn’t look at him, staring straight ahead into the distance, focusing on the tall blades of grass in the field. “Apparently, my dad found my hidden weed stash in my room and thinks I must be some out-of-control stoner who will graduate to cocaine in, like, a week if I don’t seek help immediately.” 

“Weed?” Will repeats, shaking his head. Help? What is he even talking about? “You don’t smoke weed, Mike. Since when do you smoke weed?”

“I don’t!” Mike sighs, rubbing his hand over his eyes. “I… I tried to explain that to them. I… I don’t know why I even have it in the first place. Sometimes… Dustin and Lucas smoke that shit, so I just keep some in case they want to when we hang out. Is that so wrong? That’s like, the number one rule of being a good host, isn’t it?” 

“Mike,” Will’s eyebrows crease. “Did you… tell them that you only smoke cigarettes?” He pushes, his hands still holding onto Mike’s. “They… they have to understand, don’t they? So many people smoke!” 

“They’re sending me to some… program. A stupid rehab centre. For, um, three months.” Mike’s voice settles, and he uses his free hand to pick at the blades of grass they’re sitting on. “They don’t want me to smoke at all. Cigarettes included.” He pauses, tilting his head. “For alcohol, too. My mom used the word ‘clean slate,’ to be um, exact.” 

“Three months?” The voice that comes from Will’s mouth is cracked. Mike is going to be gone for… three months? What is he going to do without Mike for that long? Will tries his best to control the onslaught of emotions washing over him. 

“Think about it, Will.” Mike tilts his head towards Will. He’s blinking rapidly, and Will knows Mike well enough to tell that he’s fighting back tears, which makes Will want to cry even more. “Three months will pass by super quickly. I’ll, um, I’ll be back in no time. You won’t even notice I was gone.”

“Of course I will,” Will swallows, head shaking. Why is Mike even saying things like that? “Three… three months is a long time,” Will swallows, his mind immediately spiralling into dissecting all of the possible worst-case scenarios. “What… what if you find someone else—”

“Not possible,” Mike replies, voice stern, though remaining gentle. “That won’t ever happen, Will.” 

Will wants to scream because how could Mike be so sure? How is it possible for him to know he won’t find anyone better than him? Maybe Mike only likes him because he’s here, in Hawkins. Maybe the minute Mike leaves, he’ll see that Will isn’t that special. That all they’ve done isn’t as special as Will makes it out to be, and that he’s not worth keeping around? What if… what if this is their punishment? For… for being so sinful, God is punishing them with separation?

“No,” Will continues on, eyes blurred. His eyelashes are wet with his tears, and he’s barely able to see the boy sitting beside him. “I’m sure there are a ton of pretty boys at the rehab, Mike, it would make sense that you find someone who is better—”

“I love you,” Mike blurts out, the air between them freezing, and Will feels his stomach drop to his knees. “That’s how I know I won’t find someone better than you.”

“You… you love me?” Will whispers, the tears now flowing down his cheeks freely, lip quivering.  His heart is beating loud enough that he wonders if Mike can hear it from where he’s sitting. God, he thinks. What has he ever done to deserve him?

“Fuck, I do.” Mike nods his head, crying. “So much.”

“I love you, too.” Will’s cries are louder now, uncaring whether anyone might hear them. It doesn’t matter because Mike has to leave for three months, and he doesn’t want him to go. He doesn’t want him to leave. His lips tense as he tries to control himself so Mike doesn’t think he’s a complete mess. “Mike, I really do.”

“You’re not going to… forget about me, are you?” Mike asks, voice shaking. 

“How can I forget you?” 

“You’ll write me letters, right?” Mike asks, his voice breaking as he reaches forward and lightly grabs Will’s face in his hands. “I… I made sure to write down the address on a piece of paper.” He pulls out a crumpled piece of paper, lightly damp from the tears coating his hands. “Here. It has all the, um, information on here. Ignore the smudges. I was writing everything down as quickly as possible. I… I’ll be waiting for every single one of them, alright? I’ll send as many as they’ll let me. If… if they have a mailman, or someone who comes to get the letters, they’ll be sick of me, alright?”

A smile spreads across Will’s face, their foreheads now touching. The tears are still blurring his vision, but he doesn’t care. He doesn’t care because he loves Mike. He loves him more than he’s able to put into words, and most importantly, he loves Will, too. 

☾𖤓

08/05/94

Hey Mike,

Dear Mike,

This is the first official letter I’ll be sending to you, and I don’t know why it makes me so nervous to write this on actual paper. Maybe it’s because we usually talk face-to-face. 

I hope you don’t mind the xmas design, this is the only spare paper I was able to find. I’ll make sure to run to the store in time for the next letter :) I’m using one of Jonathan’s fancy pens, and he insists anyone with eyes can tell the difference in how the ink flows on the paper, but I don’t see a difference. I trust your opinion, so let me know.

You’ve been in rehab for a week, and every day I wake up wondering if you’re having a hard day. Are the withdrawals bad? Do they give you… alternatives or something? I’m sure they’re taking good care of you. I did some research on the facility and found that it has an entire music room! I hope you’re able to listen to some good music when you’re there… 

I’m not sure if the staff read the letters, so I’ll have to use some code words. I guess mentioning code words kind of goes against the point, but I miss you. So much. 

Hope to hear from you soon,

 Love, From, Will

08/20/94

Dear Mike,

It’s been a couple of days since I last sent a letter. 

To be honest, there are like… a million things I want to talk about here, but I don’t want to bore you, or make this too long. I know you promised to send me some letters too, but none of them have been delivered yet I can’t wait to read them! 

Remember my friend Robin? She and Steve finally convinced me to try a cigarette today. I coughed for like twenty minutes straight, and tbh I think I can still feel some of it in my throat. So not worth it. I don’t know how you do it. Or I guess, how you used to do it? Sorry. Maybe I shouldn’t bring up your smoking habits in a letter being sent to you at rehab. I’m sure you’re making incredible progress!!!

The weather is getting a little chilly in Hawkins, fall is coming soon i hope. I’ve been wearing your sweater :-) 

I miss you so much. I mean it. 

Love, Will

09/10/94

Dear Mike,

I haven’t heard from you yet. There’s no rush. I’m sure you’re super busy with rehab stuff and trying to get better. Don’t worry about responding right away. 

I was thinking maybe you can’t send letters from the facility, so i’m leaving you my number. It’s my house number, but someone is always home so it should rarely go to voicemail. Maybe when you have a chance, you can call: 765-303-2020

Fall is officially here. I’m still wearing your sweater. I’m going to say something cheesy, so skip over the next line if you need to: I think one of the things I miss the most is your voice, your laugh. 

Is it bad that I keep telling you that I miss you?

Love, Will.

09/28/94

Hey Mike,

I don’t want to be annoying, I just want to know everything is okay. I met up with Max and Lucas today, and they said you’ve been completely radio silent with them, too. Can you just let me know if you’re doing okay? I’ll put my number again in this letter. Maybe I wrote it wrong last time: 765-303-2020.

I miss you,

Will

10/13/94

Mike, 

It’s been three months since you left. 

You’re supposed to be back by now, aren't you?

I’m not sure if you’re getting these, but if you are, can you let me know? 

I miss you,

Will.

10/24/94

Mike, 

I don’t even know what to say anymore.

I feel awful saying this, but you promised you would send me letters. You promised we would keep in touch. 

I’m sorry if I’ve been too overbearing with these letters, 

Will. 

☾𖤓

“Will!” A call comes from the kitchen. Will, still half-asleep, lies under the covers of his bed. He rubs his eyes, wondering whether to ignore his mother — let her think he’s still asleep. “The phone! It’s for you!” 

Will immediately pushes the bedding off of his body, a wave of worry washing through him. Is it Mike? It has to be Mike. Who else would be calling him? Who else would it be? Robin doesn’t bother calling him much anymore, opting to just show up at his house unannounced.

He runs down the hallway, almost slipping on the linoleum flooring, but he doesn’t care. Mike must be on the phone. It has to be him. 

Grabbing the phone from his mother’s hand, she recoils at the speed with which Will yanks it from her hand. Nearly out of breath, he tries to control his breathing before asking a soft, but shaky, “Hello?”

“Hi, am I speaking with William Byers?”

Will licks his lips. “Uh, yes, this is him.”

“Great,” the lady on the other end of the phone all but sighed in relief. “I’ve been meaning to get a hold of you. Since August, have you been sending letters addressed to Michael Wheeler?” 

Tightening his grip on the phone and walking as far as the cord from the base of the phone allows, he’s desperate to create as much space as possible between his mother and brother, who are unashamedly staring at him. Why can’t they just mind their own business?

“Yes, I have,” Will responds, probably too eagerly, but he doesn’t care because he’s been waiting for this. He can’t wait to speak to Mike and hear his voice again. “Did he get them? Did I not use enough stamps? I was worried the letter might be too heavy to mail, and that I might need to add a second stamp. If that’s the case, I can send a few extra to cover the extra postage.”

“Well, I hate to be the bearer of bad news, honey, but we do not currently have anyone named Michael Wheeler under our care.”

Will feels his stomach drop. 

“What?” Will feels tears well in his eyes before he can process what’s just been said to him. “That’s… that’s impossible. He told me he would be here. He gave me the address and everything.”

“I’m sorry—”

This doesn’t make sense. This can’t make sense. Mike told him he would be there. He gave him the address. Why wouldn’t he be at the rehab facility?

“Is it possible that he might be under Mike, not Michael?” Will’s voice falters, finger gripping the cord of the phone a little too tightly, worried it might rip out of the phone itself. Keep it together, he tells himself. Don’t cry. Don’t cry in front of Jonathan. Don’t cry in front of your mother. 

“Unfortunately, Will, we don’t list anyone under any form of nickname.” The woman seems apologetic, and the line between them settles. As if trying to ease the building tension, the woman lets out a soft sigh before continuing. “I wasn’t supposed to do this, you know. I opened one of the letters, which, yes, I know is a federal crime, but I just needed to figure out who was sending them, and your number was attached. I assume you’ve been waiting to hear back from… Michael, is it?”

“Yeah,” Will takes in a deep, shaky breath. Why does this always have to happen to him? “I have.” 

“Listen,” the lady lowers her voice on the other end of the line, “I know this isn’t my place, and hell, I could probably get into massive trouble with my employer for even entertaining this conversation at the moment, but I think you should know that if you love someone enough to send them this many letters, despite not getting any back — they’re worth finding.”

Will’s heart aches. 

Mumbling a soft ‘thank you,’ he hangs up the phone.

☾𖤓

He walks to the back of the building, feet following the familiar dirt path that he and Mike used to walk nearly every night. This time, compared to the other times before, he doesn’t care that anyone could catch him sneaking in through the back window in the middle of the night. Let them catch me, he thinks to himself. 

Today would be exactly three months and one week since Mike left for ‘rehab,’ and he misses him. As angry as Will is that he hasn’t heard from him, the hole in his heart is proving to be more painful than anything else. He doesn’t know what to do — staying in his room, looking out the window, hoping that Mike might be outside the window, calling down for him to sneak out.

Except, he doesn’t. 

His hands find the familiar latch on the window, and it moves easily as he pushes it up. He snakes himself in, and a wave of sadness and fear washes over him at the thought of being in the church, alone. He misses Mike more than he’d like to admit, he thinks. It doesn’t take him long to weave himself through the familiarity of the hallways, directly to the stairs that lead toward the basement of the building. He slowly walks down the creaky wooden steps. 

“Holy shit,” A voice mumbles from behind him, “Will? Is that you?”

Goosebumps spread across Will’s skin, not needing to turn around to know who the voice belongs to. It can’t be. 

Mike?

Will turns around, Will turns around, quicker than he wants to — but there’s no way to contain the excitement coursing through his veins at the thought of seeing Mike. All the anger and frustration that’s been lingering over Mike’s complete and utter silence are replaced with relief. Suddenly, it doesn’t matter that Mike didn’t send him a single letter back. Suddenly, it doesn’t matter that he never called. 

He blinks once, twice — as if trying to make sure Mike is really standing in front of him. Maybe he’s dreaming, unsure of the last time he had a good night’s sleep (though painfully, he knows his lack of sleep began three months ago, and the reason is now in the same room as him).

None of that matters, not anymore. 

He’s here. Mike’s here, and he’s home.

Will’s eyes widen as he takes in the image of the boy standing before him. 

Mike looks different — much different from when he last saw him. His long, curly hair, which Will loves so much, is gone, cut short and swooshed to one side. Is that a… side part?  Both his eyebrow and septum piercings are gone, leaving his face bare. He’s wearing a blue polo, one Mike never would have worn before, and black slacks, rather than his normal black, ripped jeans.

A strange feeling spreads through the base of Will’s stomach. Why does Mike look so much like… his father? Even though Will thinks he should look away, he can’t stop himself from lightly shaking his head, trying to dissect every detail — the way the shirt’s fabric is perfectly ironed, the way he’s wearing dress shoes. 

Who is this, and what the hell happened to the Mike he knew three months ago?

“Mike,” The word falls from his lips, breath caught in his throat. “What…”

“I missed you.” Walking across the room, Mike reaches forward and envelops Will’s body in a hug, wrapping his arms around Will’s neck. 

Immediately, Will softens to the touch, the familiarity of Mike’s scent overwhelming his senses, and he can already feel tears clouding his vision. With Will’s head on Mike’s chest, he finds himself missing the usual lingering smell of cigarettes woven within Mike’s clothing — replaced with a laundry detergent that Will thinks doesn’t suit him at all. 

“I missed you more.” The words fall from Will’s tongue easily because, no matter how upset he is with Mike not answering him throughout the three months, it would be a lie to say he didn’t miss him. It would be a lie to say he didn’t think about him every night before he shut his eyes, and every morning before getting out of bed. 

“I… I didn’t know you’d be here,” Mike mumbles into Will’s shoulder, hands frantically grabbing at the fabric of the sweater he’s wearing – Mike’s sweater. His voice breaks slightly, and Will wants to cry. “What are you doing here, Will?”

Will shakes his head, gently pushing Mike off him – his hands now gripping his shoulders. “Where… where were you, Mike?”

Mike swallows, eyes dropping to the floor. Will feels bad, of course he does – but what is he supposed to ask? Is he supposed to just… ignore the fact that Mike didn’t keep his promise? That he didn’t care to? “I…”

“I sent you letters every week,” Will continues, biting the inside of his cheek to stop himself from crying. “I… I looked so stupid sending it to that stupid rehab centre, you know that?” Any hope of holding back tears is gone now, tears flowing down his cheeks and words echoing in the emptiness of the church basement. Will can’t help but feel like this whole situation feels incredibly ironic. “You weren’t even there.”

“What?” Mike takes a step forward toward Will, his eyebrows creasing. “How did you…”

Will tries his best to hide the hurt lacing his voice as it leaves his throat, but there is no use in doing so. Mike should know. Mike needs to know. He needs him to know how much time Will spent on those letters, thinking of the right words to say, telling him about his day, how much he misses him, and Mike didn’t get them because he didn’t give him the right address. 

Was it done on purpose? Did he… purposely ignore all of the attempts Will made to keep in touch, refusing to send a single letter back? Even if he had the wrong address, Mike should’ve found a way. He promised Will, before he left, that he would keep in touch. He promised. 

“The rehab centre called me, Mike. They called me because I kept sending you letters. They called because in my letters, I gave you my phone number so that you’d be able to call me, because I thought that maybe the reason you weren’t answering my letters is that, maybe, you, I don’t know, couldn’t send me any back? It’s pathetic, really, that all I did was wait by the phone for you, Mike. I wanted you to call me so badly that I told my mom not to hang up on anyone who called for me, even if I wasn't home. I just wanted to speak to you.”

“Will, please—”

“Tell me,” Will lifts his hands to his face and uses the back of his hand to wipe away the trail of tears along his cheeks. “Do… do you not want me anymore? Is… is that what this is? You… you were forced to go to rehab, or wherever the hell you were, and suddenly you don’t want anything to do with me? Is that it? You don’t speak to me for… over three months, after you tell me that you love me, and you expect me to be… okay with that?”

“What?” Mike’s face immediately turns to confusion, and Will thinks he might throw up. Does he really not know how badly this affected him? Does he not… care? “No, Will, come on, that’s not it at all—"

“Then why didn’t you tell me where you were going?” Will continues, reaching forward and lightly pressing his fingers against Mike’s shoulder. He doesn’t care if he’s being too loud, if he’s risking them getting caught in the basement together, or if Mike thinks that he’s overreacting. “If you loved me like you said you do, why would you give me the wrong address?”

“Will, I didn’t give you the wrong address on purpose. I gave you the address of the rehab I thought I was going to!” Mike insists, an edge of desperation in his voice that Will isn’t sure he will ever be able to forget. Will swallows. “I thought… that’s what my parents told me, too. Obviously, if I knew I wasn’t going to be there, I would’ve told you. I didn’t know.” Will’s eyes fall to Mike’s shaking hands. “I didn’t know.”

Will falters in his place, watching as Mike’s whole body begins to shake. Something is wrong, he thinks. Something is very, very wrong. 

“I don’t understand, Mike.” Will’s voice teeters on the edge of desperation. “You literally gave me the address. I… I memorized it. How is it possible that you didn’t know where you were going? I waited over three months for you, Mike.”

“I’m trying, Will. I’m trying so fucking hard.” Mike raises a hand to his eyes, and only then does Will realize Mike is crying, too. Pulling at his own collar, Mike’s breathing grows increasingly shallow. “I… fuck, this is harder than I thought it would be.”

Will takes a step toward Mike, who instinctively steps back from him. A strange feeling flashes through Will’s body. 

“Mike,” Will whispers, swallowing as he tries to process the fact that Mike is stepping away from him. He can feel the anxiety radiating from Mike’s body and into the space between them, and it sends chills down his own spine. “What’s going on? You’re… scaring me. Are you okay?”

Will tries to move closer to the boy standing in front of him, but Mike steps back again. 

“I… I didn’t go to rehab, Will.” Mike’s voice is barely above a whisper, his eyes fixed on the familiar carpet beneath them, rather than looking at Will. “Fuck, I wish I did, honestly. That would make… everything so much easier.”

Will can feel his heartbeat rise to his throat, furrowing his eyebrows. “You… didn’t?”

“No,” Mike’s lips tighten, and his head shifts to the left as though he’s fighting the words rising in his own throat. “I… um,” His hands begin fidgeting with the seams of his polo shirt. Will knows something is wrong — he knows Mike isn’t telling him something. “I was sent to a, um…”

“Mike,” Will repeats, swallowing, a slight edge of fear spreading across his chest. Why isn’t he telling him anything? “What’s going on? You can tell me these things. Maybe, maybe I can try to help.”

“I know,” Mike shakes his head, and Will can tell that whatever he’s holding back is… painful. “I know you want to help, Will, but I don’t think you can.”

“You don’t know that!” Will pushes, on the edge of begging. He wants an answer; after three months of… silence, he feels he deserves one. Doesn’t he? “Please, tell me, Mike.”

A silence spreads between them, and for a second, Will worries that he might be too harsh. Mike is clearly struggling to get the words out, and Will is afraid to say anything else, worried that Mike might retreat rather than tell him anything.

Mike’s eyes are shut, and his lips are caught between his teeth. He takes a deep breath, though it is still shaky. “I wasn’t at rehab.”

Will’s throat feels stale. “You weren’t?”

“I…” Clearing his throat, “I wasn’t at rehab because I was, um, forced to go to conversion therapy.”

Will feels his blood run cold at the words coming from Mike’s mouth.

Conversion therapy? 

Will can only compare the pain to a sharp dagger piercing through the skin of his chest, aiming directly for the heart. There’s no way, Will forces himself to rationalize. There’s no way that Will heard Mike properly, because that’s impossible. That’s… cruel, that’s disastrous. 

“What?” Will lifts his hand to cover his mouth in shock, eyes widening. “Mike, what did you just say?”

A wave of lightheadedness washes over him, and he worries he might drop to the floor. He’s heard of those places, of course — sending a child to a ‘camp’ in the hopes they’ll return ‘heteronormative’ and ‘cured’ of who they really are is one of the most dangerous, hurtful and damaging things both parents and religion can do — and it’s Will’s worst fear.

He was twelve the first time he ever heard of conversion therapy — an ad flashed on the television in their living room. Home alone, and unable to take his eyes from the screen, he doesn’t think he will ever forget the camp’s slogan, displayed in bright, white lettering with ‘cheerful’ music playing in the background: ‘Pray the gay away!’. 

The drop of his heart into the pit of his stomach is something he will stay with him forever; the lingering feeling of overwhelming guilt and anxiety made it difficult to eat, speak to his brother, or look his mother in the eye for days, months, even. That was the day he realized just how… wrong he is. That there’s something inside him he needs to fix. That people think he shouldn’t exist. That whenever he sets foot in that church, they’re all praying to never become like… him.

Will thinks he might be sick. Actually, he knows he will be sick at the thought of Mike being forced to go to conversion therapy.

“I… I only found out where we were when we pulled into the campground. I couldn’t… I wasn’t allowed to leave until I finished their program. Until I passed.” Mike is still staring at the floor, his hands balled into fists at his sides, every breath he takes shaking. “They… they told me that someone saw us, Will.”

“What?” 

“Someone saw us, I don’t even know where, but they told my mom, who told my dad, and they… they absolutely freaked out and lost their minds. They told me I would ruin my father’s career because of my selfishness, that nobody would come to his church or take him seriously anymore. Said I needed to be fixed. Like… Like I’m a fucking dog.”

Will’s heart is breaking with every ounce of being alongside it. The guilt washes through him that he spent the past three months so… angry when Mike was going through something so much worse.

“Mike,” the tears are streaming from his eyes. “You… You don’t believe any of that stuff, do you?” The words rush from his mouth, sloppy and riddled with anxiety. “You don’t… You don’t really believe that anything is wrong with you, right? There’s nothing you need to fix.”

“Will,” Mike’s voice shakes, as if he isn’t sure he entirely believes what Will is saying, and Will wants to scream. There’s… There’s no way he doesn’t love him anymore, is there? There’s no way the conversion therapy… worked? “I know that we thought this, us, wasn’t wrong, but… but the shit they made me do there, Will, I… I don’t know.”

Horror seeps through his veins. This is a nightmare. An absolute nightmare. Will doesn’t want to ask. He doesn’t want to ask, but he needs to know. He needs to know.

“Did they… hurt you?”

“No,” Mike shakes his head immediately, eyebrows creasing. “No. They didn’t hurt me. Not, um, physically, at least.”

Will moves forward, instantly wrapping his arms around Mike’s body. “I’m so sorry,” He mumbles over and over again into the fabric of Mike’s shoulder, tears staining the fabric, turning the light shade of blue dark. “I’m so, so sorry, Mike. I’m sorry.” 

“Why are you apologizing?” Mike is crying now, too. Will can tell from the way his breath is catching in his throat. “This isn’t your fault. I promise you this isn’t your fault.”

“I should’ve been more careful, Mike. I… someone saw us, which means I didn’t try hard enough to hide it.” He swallows, the lump in his throat refusing to go away. His anxiety grows even larger when he realizes Mike isn’t hugging him back. Despite Will’s arms wrapped around Mike’s torso, he doesn’t feel the familiarity of Mike’s touch on his own body. Why isn’t he hugging him back? “I can’t believe they sent you there.”

“Will?” Mike looks down at the ground, fighting back more tears from falling. Will wants to reach out and grab Mike in another hug, hold him tight enough so that he knows he isn’t going anywhere. He feels awful. How could Mike go through all of that alone? How could Mike’s family do this to him? “What if… what if the reason this hurts so much is because it’s wrong?” 

Will feels his heart rip out of his chest.

“What?”

Mike shuts his eyes, his hands playing with the sides of his pants – grabbing at the seams, crumpling the fabric in his palm. “What if… what if all the suffering we’ve been through, all the times we’ve been forced to hide what we do, is because we know it’s a sin?”

Will takes a staggering step back from the boy standing in front of him. He wants to throw up, to vomit all over the floor in front of him, because this is his worst nightmare. This is everything he feared, everything he didn’t want happening to him. What is going on? 

“A… sin?”

“They… they told me that sometimes, sin can be… tempting. That even though it’s wrong, it can feel like it’s right.” Mike’s voice breaks, no longer making eye contact. “You… you made me feel so fucking good, but what if… what if that’s the Devil?”

“Mike,” Will swallows, eyebrows raising, and the pit in his stomach widening. Tears begin flowing down his own cheeks, once again. What the hell did they do to him? “You know that’s not true.” 

“That’s the thing, Will, I don’t… I don’t know.” Mike begins to cry again, sitting on the couch. His head is buried in his hands, propped on his knees. The cry is guttural — the heaves coming from the base of his stomach make it difficult for Will to decipher the words coming from Mike’s mouth. “I know that I love being around you. I know that you mean so much to me, but they kept telling me that this is wrong, they kept showing me that I’m… wrong, that this… this is sacrilegious.”

“I don’t know what they did to you,” Will swallows, slowly walking toward the couch. “I don’t know what they said to you, but don’t you remember? You’re the one who told me that this is real.” He sits beside Mike, now crying alongside him. Now lightheaded, Will wishes for nothing more than for Mike to see him the way he does. To know that he was right, that nothing about this — about them — is wrong. No amount of… ‘correction’ can change that.“That this is… valid, and that your dad… your dad says such bullshit, because he doesn’t know what he’s talking about. He will never know what he’s talking about. He will never understand us.” 

Both boys are crying, and Will thinks that if it were physically possible, his heart would be ripped into two pieces. Maybe more, matching every tear shed from Mike’s eyes. With shaky hands, he lifts one hand to Mike’s cheek, tears still falling, cries growing louder as he flinches from Will’s touch. 

This can’t be happening. This can’t be real.

What did they do to him? What happened to him?

“Mike,” Will’s voice shakes. His hand remains on Mike’s cheek, and his eyes take in every beautiful detail of his face. Mike’s eyes, his favourite thing ever, are sunken and dark. Did he sleep properly for the entire three months he was there? “Mike, I love you. Nothing… nothing you’ve been through, or anything they did to you, will change that, okay? Nothing.”

“Will,” Mike mumbles, eyes staring directly into his. Mike looks so… defeated, so broken, so unlike himself. “I’m so… I’m so sorry.”

“You don’t have to say anything, Mike.” Will shakes his head, meaning every word he says, despite his heart shattering into a hundred pieces. “I’m here for you.”

“I really do love you,” Mike cries, breaking eye contact and looking down at his legs. “Fuck, I really do. I just… It’s just… so hard.”

“I know,” Will repeats, nodding. “I know, but please, Mike, please don’t think you can’t have this. Please don’t think you can’t have me.”

“I want you,” Mike’s voice quivers, and the shakiness of his voice makes Will want to scream. What did they do to him? “I know I do.”

“Isn’t that enough?” Will whispers, desperately. His eyes trace every single aspect of Mike’s face, trying to get him to understand what he’s trying to say, what he means.  “Isn’t the fact that we both want each other, that we both love each other, enough?”

“I don’t know,” Mike mumbles, but he reaches forward, engulfing Will in a hug anyway. 

☾𖤓

As Will lies on the couch in Mike’s basement, despite it being the middle of the night, he’s never been more awake.  

“Will,” Mike mumbles, legs intertwined together on the couch. It’s a tight fit, but they make it work. Any excuse to be close to each other, any opportunity to touch, both boys revel in it. “I don’t know what I’m going to do.”

“What do you mean?” Will keeps his voice low. Despite being in the basement of Mike’s house, they really need to be quiet. If his parents know that Will’s in their house, who knows what will happen to them. To him.

Still, Will cherishes the moments they can share alone. They can’t really interact in public anymore — especially not anywhere near the church. If they do, Mike constantly and anxiously looks over his shoulder as if to make sure nobody is watching them, and that nobody sees them together. This is routine now—ever since coming back to Hawkins, Mike is much more paranoid about being seen in public with him, and Will understands. Of course he does.  

But that doesn’t mean it doesn’t hurt.

A small part of him wonders if this is all he deserves: small scraps of privacy in exchange for the sin he’s committing. Surely, there has to be a downfall for going against the word of God, Will thinks. Going against the higher power has to come with some prices to pay, doesn’t it?

Mike pauses for a second, as though he’s trying to figure out what to say before he continues, “You have to promise me that you trust me.”

“I trust you, Mike.” He replies easily. He does. Will trusts him so much that it could be considered a fault, he thinks. “We’ve been through… all of this for a reason, haven’t we?”

“Yeah,” he smiles softly, his fingers reaching toward Will’s hair, threading through the strands softly. “I just want to make sure that you know I would never do anything to purposely hurt you, right?”

Will lifts his head slightly, eyebrows creasing. It would be a lie for him to say that he isn’t the slightest bit worried about what Mike is about to say. Did something happen with his parents? Did he… did he change his mind? Does he not want to be with him anymore? 

“I mean, of course, but what’s going on?”

 Another silence stretches and moulds into Mike’s basement, and Will just wishes he would say whatever is clearly bothering him. 

“My… my parents are setting me up with someone.” He cringes. The words send a knife directly through his heart, “I’m supposed to take her out on a date, tomorrow night.”

“What?” The words ghost from Will’s mouth. “Like…” He doesn’t even want to say the word out loud, knowing that the second he does, the second he makes all of this… real, there is no going back. “A girl?”

“I don’t want to date her,” Mike says, head still resting on Will’s chest. Blinking rapidly, Will notices the tears glazing over his eyes, knowing that even if he doesn’t explicitly mention a girl, he knows that’s who it’ll be. “I don’t want to date anyone but you.”

Will thinks he might be sick. “What’s her name?”

“Jane,” Mike replies softly. Will fights back the urge to roll his eyes. Of course, her name is Jane. That sounds so… proper, so… safe. “But… but even though her name is Jane, that shouldn’t matter because I don’t want to date her.”

The silence between them is thick, and he’s sure that Mike can feel his heartbeat rising as he lies on his chest. “What are you going to do?”

“My parents gave me an ultimatum.” The words are scratching against his throat. His hands reach forward, playing with the fabric of Will’s shirt. 

Will can feel the tears line his eyes, already. Keep it together, he tells himself. Control your emotions, Will. “An ultimatum?”

“Yeah,” He continues. “I… I have to start seeing someone.”

“Seeing someone?” Will repeats, pushing himself up onto the couch. This can’t be happening. Mike lifts his head in response, a solemn look in his eyes, and Will knows, in that very moment, that he’s being serious. “Like, dating someone?”

“Unfortunately,” Mike nods his head, solemnly. “They said they have… Someone they approve of. Someone that fits their… stupid standard, someone that will prove to them that I’m… fixed.”

Will tries his best not to internalize it all, voice shaking. “How long do they want you guys to be together?”

“I’m not sure,” Mike replies, and Will feels his heart breaking once again. “However long they think is necessary, I guess.”

“That… That could be a long time,” Will furrows his eyebrows. 

“It could be,” Mike nods his head.

“What… what are we going to do?” 

“For now, all we can do is this,” Mike swallows. “Until we come up with a better plan. Maybe, you know, when all of this… settles a bit, we can think of something that might actually work.”

Will wants to believe that will happen – that even if Mike is forced to start… dating someone else, he’ll find a way back to him. “You really think so?”

Mike leans forward, pressing a soft kiss to Will’s cheek. “I know so.” 

☾𖤓

Will thinks he might start crying. 

In fact, he knows he probably will begin to cry as he watches Mike walk to the front of the pews, with the girl holding his hand. She looks stupidly nice, wearing a light blue dress that reaches her knees and a light green cardigan that covers her shoulders. It makes Will upset that she can hold Mike’s hand freely, that she can laugh at something he says, and nobody will bat an eye. 

If only he had the same luxury. If only he could hold Mike’s hand in public without getting weird, judgmental looks from everyone watching. If only he could be with Mike without worrying about his parents sending him away for another three months.

Instead, he’s forced to watch Mike hold hands with someone who’s not him.

“You okay?” Jonathan leans in, whispering in Will’s ear. “You look… bothered.”

Will clears his throat, head shaking vehemently. He bats his eyelids, pushing down the tears that threaten to escape. He can’t cry, not before a service, and sure as hell not in front of his brother.

“Yeah,” Will nods. “I’m fine.”

He isn’t fine, not in the slightest – and he knows his brother can see right through him. Seeing Mike and Jane together, knowing he can’t talk to anyone about how he feels, makes him sick. He wishes there was someone he could tell, but he knows better.

Under his breath, he mumbles, “You don’t look fine.”

Will clenches his jaw, eyes dropping to his hands in his lap. Keep it together, he reminds himself. With his shaky breath, he says, “Drop it, Jonathan.”

Jonathan knows better than to push it, and Will takes the long way home. 

☾𖤓

“How was your, um, date?” The words feel bitter on Will’s tongue. As much as he tries to make it seem like he’s unbothered by what’s going on, he’s very bothered. In fact, he doesn’t think he’s ever been more bothered. Who can blame him, really? How is he supposed to feel about Mike being forced to see someone else? 

Being forced to date a… woman?

Sure, Mike is still meeting up with him almost every night, still telling Will that he only loves him and only wants to be with him, but the image of Mike and Jane being all over each other in church still stings. How is he supposed to just be… okay with this?

The reality of it all hurts most of all. The reality is that even if Mike isn’t being forced to date Jane by his parents, they still couldn’t be together. 

Especially not publicly.

Mike tilts his head back. “Awful,” he groans, taking off his jacket. “She’s just so… boring, you know? I mean, to the right person, I’m sure she’s like… the funniest person ever, but I think watching paint dry would probably be more entertaining. She didn’t even want to turn on the radio when I was driving her home. How boring do you have to be to not want to listen to The Cure?”

Will sighs at the fact that she sat in the passenger seat of Mike’s car. The same seat where Will sits, the same one he’s kissed Mike in. She doesn’t understand what it’s like to be forced to hide, even when driving in the car. She doesn’t know what it’s like to be them. 

Will looks down, playing with his fingers nervously. “When you dropped her off, um, at home, did you guys, um…” Will swallows painfully. “Kiss?”

“No,” Mike denies immediately, moving so they’re a bit closer on the couch. “I mean, I guess my parents chose someone who is super fucking religious to offset the whole… being gay thing, because she told me she wants to wait until marriage for like, everything.”

“Marriage?” The word scratches at his throat. “You guys are going to get married?” The idea that Mike would marry someone else, especially a woman, makes his heart feel like it’s being ripped out of his chest. He doesn’t want to see Mike with anyone but him. Not now, not ever.

“I don’t know,” Mike replies cautiously, avoiding eye contact. “I don’t want to, Will. You know that.”

Will quickly realizes that the answer Mike gives him isn’t good enough. 

“You don’t have to marry her.” Will places both hands in Mike’s. With their fingers now intertwined, Will tries to keep his voice as delicate as possible. “You don’t have to do anything you don’t want to do.” He knows he’s being a bit ridiculous, that maybe he’s reacting a bit too emotionally, irrationally and selfishly considering the situation Mike is in, but he can’t help it. He doesn’t want Mike to marry anyone else. Is that so bad?

“I wish it were that simple, Will.” Mike winces, though he still holds onto Will’s hands, his grip tight. Will tries his best to push the tears down, not to cry in front of Mike. “You don’t understand,” Mike tries to explain, and he’s right – Will doesn’t understand what he’s going through. He doesn’t know what it’s like to be sent to conversion therapy, he doesn’t understand what it’s like to be forced to be with a girl to appease his parents, but he can try to help. He can try to get Mike to understand that there has to be more out there for them. “I… what am I supposed to tell my parents? They… if they see I’m still like this, then they’ll send me back there. Or… I don’t know, somewhere out of state, like Montauk, to live with my aunt. I don’t want to leave you here. I can’t go through this again.”

“I'm not denying that this is… hard, Mike.” Will places a hand on Mike’s shoulder.  All he wants, all he needs, is for Mike to want to be with him in the same way he wants to be. A life without Jane, a life without being forced into conformity. “But… but this isn’t easy for me, you know? Am I just supposed to watch you hold hands with her? Kiss her on the cheek? Walk down the aisle? Start a family? I won’t do that to myself. I can’t, Mike. I love you.” He’s failing at the futile attempts to hold back his tears, and he knows it.  He doesn’t want to see Mike with Jane – it hurts him, and he knows it hurts Mike, too. “It would break my fucking heart to see that happen. I know it would break yours, too.”

“I love you too, Will.” Mike lifts his hand, voice pained. “I don’t… want to be with Jane. Everything is just so… complicated right now. I’ve never dealt with anything like this before. I don’t even know how to approach any of it.” Mike bites down on his bottom lip to stop it from shaking. “I’m scared. I’m scared that there isn’t really a way out of this.”  

“Can’t we just… pretend?” Will replies, swallowing. “Even if we can’t… be together right now, at least not in public, that doesn’t mean we won’t ever be able to. What happens if you’re actually forced to…marry her?”

“I… Do we have to talk about this right now?” Mike sighs, leg shaking. “We don’t have much time together,” he says, reaching toward Will, pulling him into a hug. Will lets out a soft sigh, though, wrapping his arms around Mike, regardless.“Let’s just… take this day by day, alright? We can… just be us, for a while. Us without Jane, without my parents, and without stupid, fucking Hawkins.”

Will wants to tell him that no, this isn’t something they can just sweep under the rug when it becomes overwhelming. That this, them, is never going to be easy, but they’re worth it, aren’t they? 

So, Will chooses to swallow his words. Mike is right, he thinks. They don’t have much time together, and they should spend it being… happy, not thinking about how everything around them is threatening to tear them apart. 

☾𖤓

Service goes by excruciatingly slowly. 

Will can’t take his eyes off of Mike, who is sitting in the first row of the pews. Jane has her head on Mike’s shoulder, and he doesn’t need to be facing them to know that she also has her hand around Mike’s arm. Why is she touching him in church? In the service? Does she have no shame? In front of the… pastor? Why isn’t Mike pushing her off? Why isn’t he telling her to stop touching him? Does he want her to touch him? Does he… like it?

The minute the service concludes, he wants nothing more than to go home and hide underneath his covers. How is this fair? How is any of this fair? 

Will stands up from his seat, feeling the weight on his chest amplify as he watches someone walk up to Mike and Jane, and sees her… smile so openly. God, he thinks. She’s so pretty. Maybe that makes everything that much harder. 

“I’ll probably walk home today,” Will turns toward Jonathan, avoiding eye contact. “You don’t, um, need to drive me home.”

“Are you sure?” Jonathan asks skeptically. “It’s getting pretty cold out, and you don’t have a sweater.”

“I’m sure,” Will mumbles, pushing past his older brother to thread his way through the crowd. He knows that he shouldn’t even be looking for Mike, especially not when he’s with her, but he can’t help himself. Besides, he thinks to himself, he thinks that it’s only fair that he meets the girl that Mike is forced to date, isn’t it?

Unfortunately for him, he regrets his decision the moment he’s face-to-face with Jane and Mike.

“You must be Will!” Jane smiles, hand still wrapped around Mike’s arm. He isn’t holding her back, but the fact that she’s allowed to wrap her perfectly manicured hand around the arm of the boy he loves makes his skin crawl. “Mike told me you both are close. I am so happy to meet you!”

“Oh, um, yeah.” Will sends a tentative look to Mike, who is trying his best not to meet his gaze, a mixture of guilt and worry on his face. “Friends.”

“Best friends,” Mike corrects, clearing his throat. Will wishes for nothing more than the ground to swallow him whole. 

Best friends? They’re more than that — lovers, if they’re being honest, but he knows Mike will never admit it out loud. That’s their secret. That’s their truth, one nobody can know. They’re both forced to live a lie, to live in a reality where their relationship is nothing more than something between them. 

“Well,” She smiles, tucking a strand of her perfectly curled hair behind her ear, “I am so happy Mike has friends who also go to this church. I love that his friends also see the value in following the word of God.”

“The word of God,” Will repeats, nodding his head slowly. He wonders what Jane might think of the word of God if he tells her about what he and Mike do together. Would she still want to be with Mike? Would she still think he… follows the word of God? He knows better than to ever say any of that out loud, so instead, he forces a smile that he knows Mike will be able to notice is fake. “Yeah, um, of course. That’s why I’m here, isn’t it?”

“Absolutely.” Jane smiles, “I just realized I never introduced myself. I’m Jane. Jane Hopper.” 

“It’s nice to meet you,” Will replies. He hates how kind she is. Even more, he hates how... clueless she seems. Does she seriously believe Mike wants to marry her? Does she even know anything about him? Anything about the real Mike? Not the one he’s forced to become to appease his parents. “I’ve, um, heard a lot about you.”

“You have?” Jane squeals, pressing into Mike’s chest, a blush spreading across her cheeks. “All good things, I suppose?”

“Of course,” Will replies, trying his very best to remain as civil as possible. 

“He’s such a gentleman,” Jane sighs dreamily, reaching up to Mike’s hair, where the gel he used that morning missed a strand. With her perfectly manicured nails, she presses down gently. Will is trying very hard not to look as jealous as he feels, but it proves to be extremely difficult. “How did I get so lucky?”

“I ask myself the same question,” Mike replies half-hazardly, and Will can tell that he doesn’t mean it, but Jane is oblivious, nonetheless. Still holding onto him, her eyes widen as she spots someone across the room. 

“Oh! Mike, my friend Ella is over there! I’ve been dying to introduce you to her! Come on, honey.” she says, giving an apologetic look in Will’s direction as she begins tugging Mike’s direction. “It was so nice to meet you, Will. Please, excuse us.”

Mike mumbles a small, “See you,” to Will as he watches the pair walk to the other side of the room, the pit in his stomach growing larger with every second that passes.

☾𖤓

“William,” A voice calls from behind him, and Will feels his blood run cold, knowing exactly who this voice belongs to. He turns around slowly and sees the pastor, Mike’s father, staring directly at him. “Do you have a minute?”

Will wishes he could say that no, he doesn’t have a minute, but he knows better than to disrespect the pastor. He also knows better than to scan the room, to see if Mike notices that his father is talking to him, that his father wants to speak to him. This isn’t normal, this isn’t something that… happens, and the pit in his stomach grows with each second that passes.

“Yes, um, of course.” He replies, wiping his hands against the fabric of his pants. What could he possibly want from him? He follows him slowly as they weave their way through the familiarity of the church hallways — the same one Mike showed him.

“I’m sure you know from all my sermons that God is a very forgiving being,” the pastor begins, leaning back in his chair. “Despite this, He has His limits. As do I.” Will says nothing, standing awkwardly in place, on the opposite end of the mahogany desk. “Your mother is a very kind woman, Will. Don’t you think you owe her a little bit… more?”

“My mother?” Will repeats, his voice shaking. Why is he mentioning his mother? What does she have anything to do with this? “What… what do you mean?”

“Despite the kindness she’s shown to my church over the years, I think that she’s raised you to be a… questionable young man.” His words are calm, though as sharp as a knife — which arguably makes them feel worse, more targeted. 

Will swallows, feeling a wave of dizziness wash over him. “Questionable?”

“I wanted to speak to you because I think forgiveness is a crucial part of how we live our daily lives. I forgive people every time I come into the church and every hour I spend in the confessional. I’m offering you the very generous courtesy of forgiving you for your shameless acts of sodomy, but I worry that despite God’s good intentions, He will not be as willing.”

Will feels like he’s going to pass out, his hands beginning to shake. He knows. The pastor knows what he’s been doing, he knows who… who he is. He doesn’t know what to say, what he can say, without completely breaking down in front of him. How much does he know? 

“Sir—”

“I expected more from you, William.” He continues, uncaring that Will is in the middle of speaking. “Ultimately, I cannot change what you choose to live your… life. You can choose to behave however you see fit, you can choose to give in to sin and live a destructive, sacrilegious life if that’s what you so desire.” He pauses, adjusting his glasses. “What I do have a problem with is when you begin to involve my son.”

Will can feel his face turn a deep shade of red. He’s mortified, absolutely terrified. “Involve? He’s not… I’m not…What are you talking about—”

“Do not take me for a fool.” His voice cuts through the tense air like a knife, “I am not an idiot, and neither is my wife.”

“I never said—”

“Luckily, we were able to fix Michael. The intervention was quick, and he received glowing results from the… therapy. He is seeing a lovely, God-fearing young lady. The issue for you, William, is that I think you might be too far gone. I don’t think you realize how your… lifestyle affects the people around you and rubs off on them.” He pauses, picking up one of the many Bibles stacked on his desk. “I suggest you reconnect with God, William. I expect you to have no further contact with my son should you wish to remain in this congregation.” 

Will doesn’t know what to say, tears flowing freely down his cheeks. He’s mortified, absolutely mortified, as all his greatest fears culminate before him — manifesting in a way that is going to drag him down into a pit he isn’t sure he will be able to crawl himself out of. In a way that he’s sure he can never show his face here again, to Mike again. 

“You may leave, William.” He sighs, crossing his arms. Will slowly turns toward the door, trying to steady himself with each step, though he fails. “One last thing, before you go.” He clears his throat, and Will turns his head toward Mike’s father. Though his vision is blurry, he doesn’t miss the stark look of… shame directed toward him. “Do not lean your bike against the panelling of our house. It will chip the paint.”

☾𖤓

It’s been years since Will’s been to the quarry alone, but his feet guide him back to the familiar edge as though he’s never left. 

It feels the same, he thinks. He sits too close to the edge because nothing matters anymore. The wind is strong, his clothes sticking to his skin, and he considers dangling his feet over the edge. He wonders how far the drop will be if he jumps. Will the pain end quickly? Will he feel any at all? 

He can’t go home. He knows he can’t go home for the foreseeable future. Did the pastor tell his mom? Did he tell Jonathan? Did he tell… Mike? What disaster is waiting for him?

God, he thinks. This is all his own fault. Why did he think he even had a chance? Why did he think that someone like… him could have someone like… that? Why did he think that there would ever be a universe in which he could have a ‘happy ever after’ while living in Hawkins? 

Will gets up off the ground, now standing motionless. He looks down, watching as the water moves slowly, gently lapping against the rocks that surround it. He wonders whether the water would consume him whole or whether he would rise to the surface. He wonders how long it would take for his family, for Mike, to notice he’s not here anymore. Wouldn’t they be better off? Wouldn’t they be… happy to know that someone as… sinful as him is no longer breathing? 

He takes a small step closer to the edge of the rocks, the tips of his toes hanging off. This shouldn’t be too hard, he thinks. He deserves this. He wasn’t careful enough, and Mike was sent to conversion therapy because of him. If Will wasn’t there, if Will didn’t… tempt Mike, he would be happy. He would be himself, not a shell of who he once was. 

There’s nobody here with him, unlike the time he came with Mike and his friends. There’s nobody here who would stop him. Nobody here to tell him that this is a bad idea, nobody to tell him that maybe he’s taking things a bit too far. 

None of that matters, because this is all his fault, isn’t it? He bites the inside of his cheek, knowing that if there’s ever a better time, it’s right now. This is what the pastor wants, is it not? For… sinners to pay their dues? Tears flood his vision as the wind hits his back.

If only there were someone here to push him. If only there was someone to watch him jump over the edge, to see him decide his own fate. Maybe the pastor would do it if asked. Will knows very well that all sinners will eventually die. Why not get it out of the way? Why wait another sixty years, until he’s old and barely able to walk, or until he’s hooked up on a machine and a family member decides to take him off life support?

If only time travel were real, and he could convince himself that nothing is worth it. That no matter how badly it hurts to hear that there’s something wrong with him, this feels worse. This feels infinitely worse. Everything is falling apart in front of him, and nothing will ever be the same. Nothing will ever go back to the ‘normal’ Will was able to craft for himself since he was a child, when he first realised something was… wrong with him. 

“Come on,” he mumbles to himself, shaking his head. The wind hits his face, making it difficult for the tears to fall down his face. He just needs to get over the fear of dying, he tells himself. As long as he comes to terms with his decision, everything wil be okay. He’s sure his mother will understand once the pastor tells her his reasoning. He’s sure Jonathan will, too. “Just… jump.” He’s sobbing now, sobbing so hard he can’t make out what’s really in front of him anymore. His hands are shaking, and his knees are locking. “I deserve this. I know I do.”

“Will?” A voice calls from behind him, though distant. “Will, is that you?”

Will doesn’t turn around. He can’t turn around because he doesn’t deserve to. He doesn’t deserve to know who’s calling out for him. He deserves to jump; he deserves to drown in the quarry, to sink to the bottom and stay there. There’s something wrong with him. There’s something so deeply wrong with him that it affects everyone around him. He’s too selfish. He gives in to sin, and this punishment fits his crime. 

The punishment he deserves is death. 

An agonizing, cruel death. 

“Will? Will!” The voice is closer now, and there’s no mistaking it. It belongs to Mike, and Will begins to shake his head. He can’t face him. He can’t face him without wanting to cry even more, and he can’t see him like this. He can’t see him this way. Mike hates him, doesn’t he? He hates the fact that Will was stupid enough to get them caught. There’s resentment there, isn’t there? Even though he tries to tell him that this isn’t his fault, he knows it is.  

He inches closer to the edge, now with half his foot in the open air, and he knows that if a strong gust of wind hits him at this very moment, it would be enough to send him over. Maybe he should leave it up to fate, he thinks. 

Maybe God should be the one to decide whether he lives or dies. 

It’s what he deserves, isn’t it? Leaving his fate in the hands of the same being he’s been disobeying seems pretty fair, to Will. 

He doesn’t realize Mike is right behind him until he feels two hands wrap around his body, pulling him back, his feet no longer hanging over the edge. He stumbles over their legs, and both boys tumble into the dirt, away from the edge. 

“What are you doing—” Will manages to stifle a sob, trying to break free of Mike’s grip, though it’s unforgiving. The pain of hitting the hard ground beneath him is nothing compared to the pain he feels inside. All he can think about is jumping; he needs to end this before he hurts anyone else. Why isn’t Mike letting go?

Mike speaks at the exact same time, the words rushing out of his mouth.“What the hell are you doing?”

“Mike,” Will’s voice is desperate. His arms thrash, still tangled in Mike’s grip. He needs to let him go. Why isn’t he letting him go? “Mike, you have to let me—”

“I’m not letting you do anything!” he exclaims, shaking his head back and forth vehemently and tightening his hold on Will. “You… you looked like you were going to—”

“Let me jump!” he screams, his throat raw. Tears stream down his face, his body shaking. “This is all my fault, this is… this is all my fault. This is all my fault.” He repeats, over and over, like a prayer. His body shrinks into the fetal position, rocking back and forth against the dirt, feeling completely disoriented. With one hand still holding onto Will’s torso, Mike’s other reaches up toward his face. 

He’s panicked, and the shakiness of his voice becomes evident. “Will, please, none of this is your fault. You need to believe me.”

“How isn’t it?” Will’s voice is raw, his breathing hiccuping. “I… I ruined your life, Mike.”

“What?” He repeats, shaking his head. Tears are falling from Mike’s eyes, and Will can’t help but notice that his hair is… messy. It’s not gelled back the way it has been since he came back, his eyes red and puffy. It makes Will so fucking sad to see Mike, stripped of himself, because of Will. It’s all because of Will. “No, Will, no, angel, you didn’t ruin anything.”

Will can’t be consoled. The tears keep spilling, and the weight on his chest makes it hard to breathe. He called him angel, Will thinks. He hasn’t called him that in so long.

“You should be with her… With Jane. You can get married, have kids, have a family, Mike. I’m… I’m ruining everything, how… how can’t you see it? I’ve already ruined it all. God, Mike, this is all my fault. Your dad is completely right—”

“Will, Will, please, I don’t want any of that.” Mike shakes his head, bringing his hands to Will’s cheeks, his eyes searching Will’s face as though trying to understand where any of this is coming from. The wind is hitting both of them now, and Will is using it as a reminder that he’s still alive. “I don’t want a… a marriage, or kids, or a family with anyone else, Will. Especially Jane. I don’t want that. I don’t care what anyone says, I don’t care what my dad says.”

“But what about your family?” Will cries, heaving. “If you’re with me, you’ll never be able to talk to them again.” He can feel his spiral continuing, grabbing at the dirt beneath him, searching for anything that will ground him. “They’ll… they’ll cut you off. Your mom will stop talking to you. Who… who knows what your dad is going to do. Your sisters, God, your sisters–”

“Fuck them,” Mike replies immediately, brushing his thumbs across the tears staining Will’s cheeks. Both of them are crying now, and the goosebumps trailing his skin are no longer from the chill of the air. “They don’t matter to me, Will. Don’t you get it? I… I can’t lose you, Will.”

“Don’t lie to me,” Will shakes his head, his eyes falling back to the edge of the quarry. Of course, his family matters to him. Of course, he wants to keep in touch with them. Will isn’t sure how he could live with himself if he were the reason Mike’s family no longer spoke to him. “Don’t lie to me–”

“I’m not lying.” Mike’s voice hiccups as he cries. “If they can’t accept this… us, then what’s the fucking point of keeping them around?”

“They’re your parents, Mike.” Will’s on the edge of pleading. Why won’t he let him go through with it? Why isn’t Mike… letting him die?

“That doesn’t matter.” Both of Mike’s hands cradle Will’s face. “They’re not you.” 

“They shouldn’t be like me,” Will sobs.  “Nobody… Nobody should be like me.”

“Like us,” Mike clarifies, not letting go of Will, as though he doesn’t trust him not to run toward the edge. “You’re not alone in this. You have me. You will always have me.” 

☾𖤓

Mike refuses to go home that night.

“I can sleep on the ground,” he mumbles, awkwardly pacing the floor of Will’s bedroom, eyes unable to leave Will. Guilt seeps through Will’s body as he watches Mike look so… stressed out. He sighs before turning toward Will again. “You… are you sure you feel okay?”

“Yeah, I’m fine.” Will nods his head, though he knows it isn’t convincing. “You… you don’t have to sleep on the floor. You can sleep on my bed. I can, um, lock my door.” Will says softly, and he can practically see the relief wash over Mike’s body.

“Oh, yeah, that’d be great.” Mike clears his throat, walking toward the bed. “Do you, um, want to lie down now?”

Will nods his head, settling into the left side of the mattress, and Mike follows underneath the sheets. They lay there for a while, Will figuring out how to approach him.

“How did you know?” Will asks, staring at the ceiling. Their shoulders brush, and Will wants to reach over and mould his body onto Mike’s.

“How did I know what?”

“That I was…” He swallows. “At the, um, quarry?”

“I heard my dad speak to my mom when I got home. He told her that he spoke to you, and… and I freaked out on them. Everyone was yelling. It… it was a mess, but I was so scared. I, um, I came here first. I asked Mrs. Byers if she would know where you’d be, if… and she says sometimes when you’re alone you like to go to the quarry.”

“You… did?” Will’s throat dries. “Did… did she ask any questions?”

He can’t imagine what the pastor said to Mike’s outburst, and he isn’t sure he wants to find out. There’s no denying that he knows about the two of them, and if Mike’s reaction was as intense as he says, he probably knows they’re still in some form of communication. He tries to push back the fear crawling back up his throat. He’s in his home – he’s safe here. Mike is with him; Mike is safe. Nothing can happen to either one of them when they’re in his bedroom. 

“No,” he shakes his head slowly, their hands brushing against each other underneath the sheets of the bed. “After Mrs. Byers told me that you weren’t here, all I could think about was how you… You looked terrified when we went to the quarry together. I believed you, then, when you said you were scared of heights, but after tonight… I realize that it was so much bigger than that. I was so scared.”

“Scared of what?”

“Of losing you,” Mike blinks, and though the only light is coming from the window in his bedroom, Will can see the tears in his eyes. Soon enough, Will is crying too.

Turning his body, he shapes himself into Mike’s frame. Will feels so… secure in Mike’s presence, loving how Mike’s arms wrap around his torso easily, as if they’re meant to hold him and only him, and Will welcomes the touch. Mike threads his legs into Will’s, now tangled together, and Will knows he wouldn’t want it any other way.

☾𖤓

“My parents aren’t going to be home for the weekend.” The words rush from Mike’s lips, as though he’s afraid the words are going to disappear from his mouth before he has the chance to say them. Will quickly looks around them, making sure nobody is seeing them together or talking. “They’re going somewhere with Holly. A stupid youth group thing the next state over.”

“And,” Will swallows, “What, um, about your older sister?”

“Going to a friend’s house,” he replies, not offering much of an explanation. 

Will’s eyebrows lift. “The whole weekend?” 

“The whole weekend,” Mike repeats, letting a small smile spread across his face before immediately pushing it down. “We’ll have the house to ourselves.” He clears his throat, his eyes falling to the ground. “Come over, at like, eight tonight, okay?” 

And like that, he’s gone. 

Will watches him walk back toward Jane, who is too busy talking to another girl to notice that Mike has even left her side. It’s unfortunate, he thinks. A wave of jealousy washes through him as she lights up when he returns to her side. It’s very sad that despite Mike standing next to her, Will is going to be the one who gets to see him at night. 

☾𖤓

This is probably the most nervous he’s ever been, standing in front of the door leading into Mike’s house. Despite Mike’s parents being away for the entire weekend, he can’t help but wince at being here after the conversation with the Pastor. What if they find out he came over? What if someone tells them that he spent time with Mike, and he gets sent… back? 

Will’s eyes widen as the door opens. Mike’s hair is messy because his parents are gone, so he didn’t bother gelling it down. Will can see the small curls forming, and though it’s nowhere near as long as it was before he left, it suits him much more than the side part his parents force him into. Mike moves out of the way, making room for Will to pass by, which he does easily. 

He walks into the familiarity of the Wheelers’ living room, the same wave of eeriness washing over him as he’s surrounded by all of the crucifixes on the wall. Mike wraps his arms around Will, pulling him into a hug from behind. “I’m happy you’re here.”

“Me too,” Will smiles, lifting his head so that Mike can give him a small kiss. “What’s that smell?”

Mike’s face instantly lights up walking toward the kitchen. Will smiles, following closely behind.

“I know this isn’t much,” Mike clears his throat, scratching the back of his neck sheepishly. “I, um, found a couple of cans of tomato soup and figured they would be good with grilled cheese. I mean, Holly likes it.” He pauses, and Will no longer can fight back the smile creeping up onto his face. “Wait, Will, I’m not saying you have the same taste buds as a child, but I’ve had it before, and the combination tastes super good. Plus, I didn’t want to use anything from the freezer in case my mom notices.” 

“This… this is perfect,” Will blinks in a futile attempt to stop himself from crying at the thought that Mike is doing all of this… for him. “I love tomato soup.”

“You do?” Mike’s expression brightens, pushing back a smile as he nods his head quickly. God, Will thinks. Mike is so…. “Great, um, I’m happy you like it. You do like grilled cheese, right?” 

“Yes, Mike, I like grilled cheese.” A small laugh escapes his lips before settling in his throat.“You didn’t have to do all of this, by the way.” Will shrugs slightly, trying to remain as nonchalant as possible, despite his heart being ready to jump from his chest. “I thought I was just coming over to, um, hang out.”

“I mean, yeah, I want to hang out with you, of course I do.” Mike shakes his head, as if to make sure Will doesn’t misunderstand. He takes a couple of steps closer to Will, placing one hand against Will’s cheek, a smile forming on his lips as they make eye contact. “It’s just, you’ve been through a lot, you know, over these past couple of weeks, with… everything that happened to me, my parents, and with, um, Jane, and I wanted to do this to show you that I, um, really care about you.”

“That’s sweet of you,” Will feels the blush spread across his face as Mike’s thumb caresses the skin of his cheek, which he can tell is warm to the touch. Mike cares about him, and only him. “I really appreciate this.”

Mike leans in, slowly enough to give Will time to shut his eyes, before hearing a small, “Fuck,” escape from his lips. 

Will opens his eyes, his eyebrows creasing. “What’s wrong?” 

 “I forgot about the sandwiches on the pan.” Mike, slightly panicked, begins to run through the living room, towards the stove top in the kitchen. “They’re going to burn.” 

Will can’t help but let out a small laugh as he follows him, watching as Mike lets out a small string of curse words while using his fingers to pull the (now slightly) burnt grilled cheese sandwiches off the pan and onto two different plates. He shakes his hand, quickly moving toward the sink to run his fingers under cold water. 

“Are you okay? Did you get burned badly?” Will asks, reaching for the metal dials of the stovetop and turning them off. The last thing he needs is for Mike to accidentally burn down the Wheeler house while he’s there, giving his father another reason to think he’s going to Hell. “You shouldn’t use your hands to grab hot things off a pan, Mike.”

A wave of embarrassment washes over Mike’s face, eyes trailing back to his hand underneath the cold water. “I know, I… I just don’t want you to eat a burnt grilled cheese.”

“I’ll eat anything you give me,” Will smiles, because it's the truth. “I wouldn’t mind if it’s a little burned, Mike.”

Mike lets out a small sigh, shaking his head. “I mind,” he says, shutting the tap off and turning toward Will. “I wanted things to be… perfect, you know. You deserve perfect, and my parents are only gone for the weekend, so we don’t have much time—”

“Mike,” Will’s voice is soft, head tilting. His heart aches at the thought that Mike might think this isn’t… enough. “This… this is perfect. Spending time with you makes me happy.”

“It makes me happy, too.” Mike smiles. “Just… just promise me you don’t think any of this is lame? Or, if you do, tell me, and I can totally plan something else–”

Will, standing on his tiptoes, kisses Mike gently as a method to stop him from speaking. It works; Mike instantly reciprocates with a kiss. Will pulls away, a smile on his face. “Not lame, totally perfect.”

“Are you sure?” Mike tries again, and though Will knows he just wants another kiss, he gives it to him anyway. 

 ☾𖤓

“Should we go upstairs?” Mike whispers, causing goosebumps to spread all over Will’s skin. “I think you deserve more than a couch right now.” Will feels the heat pool in his stomach at the words coming from his mouth.  

“Oh,” Will nods, taking a deep, shaky breath at the thought of going up to Mike’s room. Will doesn’t understand how Mike has such an effect on him. “Yeah, that would be nice.” The chance to be on a bed, the opportunity to lie down with him, makes his skin flush. Sure, the couch is nice, but the chance to have room to do whatever they want makes his pulse quicken. 

His mind immediately wanders to the first time he hung out in the church basement with Mike’s friends, when Mike told them he’d… fucked someone in his parents’ bed before. Is it true? Will can’t help but feel a spark of curiosity wash through him. Did… did he enjoy it? Was it… fun? A wave of jealousy washes through him at the thought of Mike fucking anyone else, of Mike touching anyone else. He doesn’t want Mike to fuck or touch anyone who isn’t him. 

“I have, um, a question,” Will says before he can change his mind. 

“Hm?” Mike asks, before reattaching his lips to the same spot on Will’s neck, causing him to lift his hands and thread them through Mike’s hair. “What’s wrong, angel?”

Will shakes his head, regret seeping through his pores. Why is he even bringing it up? Mike is going to think he’s…weird, won’t he? “Is it, um, true?”

Mike, again, moves away from Will’s neck, lips no longer touching him. “Is what true?”

“That you,” Will doesn’t know how to ask, but the words tumble from his mouth. “Um, Fucked someone on your parents’ bed.” 

Mike’s eyes widen, as if he’s internalizing the words coming from Will’s mouth. “Holy shit,” he mumbles.

“What?” Will swallows, head shaking, and gaze dropping to the floor. 

“I… I didn’t think you remembered about that.”

Will furrows his eyebrows. “I mean, I think that’s pretty hard to forget.” 

“Right,” Mike nods his head, his bottom lip between his lips. “Can we…” His voice trails off, not taking his eyes off of Will. “I mean, if you are into that–”

“Yes,” Will replies, embarrassingly fast. “Yes, um, I think that would be… fun?”

Mike’s eyes darken as he grabs onto Will’s hand, pulling him up the stairs. 

☾𖤓

“I bet they’d be so fucking pissed if they saw you sprawled out like this, so prettily, on their bed,” Mike whispers, eyes taking in every inch of Will’s naked body. As Mike hovers over him, Will sees the crosses hanging all over the wall, the Bibles stacked on both of the night tables. Pictures of Mr. and Mrs. Wheeler adorn the wall, and Will wonders if they’re watching. If Hell is real, he’s definitely going there now. “I wish they could see you the way I do, angel.” Mike purrs, lifting his hand to pull the chain that hangs loosely around Will’s neck, his ring dangling from it. Will’s chest lifts from the tug, and he’s absolutely lost in the boy’s eyes above him. He would let Mike do anything to him. Absolutely anything. “I fucking love seeing you wear my ring on a necklace.”

“You do?” Will barely manages to let the words fumble from his lips, overwhelmed by the pure adrenaline coursing through his veins. This is the bed that the Pastor sleeps in. This is his room. 

“Fuck yeah,” Mike mumbles into the crook of Will’s neck, leaving a trail of wet kisses. He lightly nips at the skin, and Will almost has half a mind to tell him to leave a mark on him. To let everyone know that he belongs to him, that he’s… Mike’s. “It looks so fucking good on you.”

“Mhm,” Will’s eyes flutter closed at the familiarity of Mike’s lips touching his body. He missed this. He missed this so fucking much. “Does it?”

“Fuck yes,” Mike tilts his head, lips now right underneath Will’s jawbone. Will’s head digs into the Pastor’s pillow. Mike, as though reading his mind, begins to leave hickies all over Will’s bare chest. He’s smart enough to leave them on places that are easily hidden, the feeling of Mike sucking on his skin makes Will feel dizzy. “Would look better on your ring finger, though.”

“Then put it there,” Will mumbles, knowing all Mike has to do is ask, and he’ll be his. Forever. “I’m yours, if you'd ask me.”

Will moves his hands under the pillow, and his fingers brush against a beaded thread. He pulls it out, with Mike’s lips sucking on the delicate part of Will’s neck, enough to leave a mark, but Will doesn’t care. Not anymore. 

His eyes widen as he realizes it resembles a necklace — red beads symmetrically spaced with a cross hanging where both ends meet. Soon, he realizes it’s not a necklace at all — but a rosary. The pastor’s rosary.

“Is this…” The words fall flat against his ears, but he can’t help but keep staring at it. He wonders if the pastor uses it to pray each night, hoping that people like Will, people like Mike, will repent and pay their dues to reach Heaven. A trail of goosebumps covers his skin.

“Holy shit,” Mike mumbles, eyes drawn to it. “I didn’t realize that he even kept one there.”

“Should I?” Will mumbles, eyes locking with Mike. “Put it away?”

“No,” Mike replies, quickly. Too quickly, Will notices, but he doesn’t say anything. “I want you to hold onto it while I fuck you.” The words fall from Mike’s tongue so naturally, and he can feel his bulge react. He’s hard already, he shifts on the bed, hoping Mike gets the hint and touches him.

“We don’t have holy water,” Will says, watching Mike carefully. His stomach flips at the memory. That was so fucking hot, he thinks. “What are we going to use?”  

Mike fishes his hand into his pocket, pulling out a small bottle of lube. “This.”

“Where… where did you even get that?” Will asks, knowing that everyone in Hawkins knows Mike, and he also knows that if anyone saw him buying lube at the store, it would become a huge topic of discussion that his parents would not be happy with. 

“I have my ways,” he smiles, biting down on his bottom lip. Will watches as he opens the bottle and squeezes the clear liquid into the palm of his hand, rubbing his hands together to warm it. His finger quickly begins to dance around Will’s hole, and with the rosary in his hand, and his hand over his heart, his back arches. “I need you to stop teasing me.”

“What are you talking about?” Mike asks, feigning innocence. He places his finger over the opening of his hole, but doesn’t push it inside. “I’m not teasing you, angel.” 

“Fuck,” Will mumbles, eyes shutting and a flare of frustration bubbling through him. “Put it in.” 

Mike lets out a small laugh, licking his lips. “Anything for you.”

Will’s breath catches as he adjusts to Mike’s finger. He loves the feeling of Mike’s digits inside of him. Loves the way it knows how to hit his prostate every single time without fail. “You… You can move now.”

Mike begins to pump slowly, his fingers going deeper each time he reenters. Will lets out a moan, moving his hips to the same rhythm Mike is using, and very quickly, he’s reminded why Mike is just so good at this. 

“You like having my fingers inside of you?” Mike asks, using his free hand to touch every inch of Will’s chest. “How does it feel?”

“So fucking good,” Will’s voice drops off, eyes fluttering shut as Mike enters a second finger. He can feel his hole clench around them, and stars begin to cloud his vision.

“Good enough to tell me who you really believe in?” Mike asks. Will lets out another string of moans, using his free hand to reach toward his shaft. Mike pushes his hand away, and Will can’t help but whine. He wants to touch himself so badly. He wants more. 

“Can’t you just please…” Will tries again to reach for his cock, and Mike pushes him away for a second time. “Just let me touch…” This time, he slips a third finger in, and Will’s mouth opens, and his back continues to arch. He wants Mike to touch him everywhere.  

“Say it,” Mike sneers, pace quickening. One of Will’s hands grips the sheets beneath him, the other holding onto the rosary tightly. The sound of their skin hitting against each other echoes in the bedroom, and Will is barely able to form any coherent thoughts. This feels so, so good. “Tell me who you believe in.”

“You.” Will stutters, mouth opening as Mike’s three fingers hit him in the right spot. Mike keeps moving his fingers relentlessly, hitting his prostate without fail. When he curls his fingers, Will knows he’s close. 

“Say it like you mean it,” Mike continues to pump his curled fingers. His breathing hardens, his other hand now touching his own cock. He’s enjoying this, isn’t he? “Tell me, Will, or I’ll take these out right now.”

“I believe in you,” Will cries, tears rimming his lash line. “Only you.” 

“What’s my name?” The rosary nearly slips through Will’s fingers, so Mike reaches for his hand, wrapping his hand around Will’s. “I want to hear you.”

“Mike,” he repeats, like a prayer. “Mike Wheeler.” Mike presses his hand further in response, and Will nearly screams. This feels so fucking good. “Fuck, Mike, only you. I only believe in you.”

In this moment of pure bliss, in this moment of pure desire, Will knows that Mike means more to him than God ever will. 

☾𖤓

The warmth of the water hits his skin as the last of the soap washes over his body.

He doesn’t remember the last time he showered in lukewarm water. He can’t count on his hands the number of times he’s subjected himself to boiling water in the hopes of rendering himself ‘clean’. Despite the urge that still simmers at the base of his stomach, he’s okay with the way things are. He’s okay because Mike is here with him. Or, at the very least, he’s going to be okay, because he has someone who wants to stay by his side.

He reaches for the shampoo bottle perched on the edge of the ceramic bathtub, smiling to himself as he reads the words, in bright-blue writing, ‘coconut scented.’ He really likes the smell of coconut in Mike’s hair. He lets out a small sigh at the fact that it’s… empty. 

“Mike! There’s no more shampoo!” he calls out, letting the water hit his skin and not wanting to move from his spot in the shower. “Mike!” After a couple of seconds with no answer, he lets out a deep sigh and shuts off the shower. 

A wave of coldness washes over his body, and he reaches for the towel Mike laid out for him on the countertop. Why isn’t he answering? Maybe he can’t hear him through the bathroom door, so he quickly looks at himself in the mirror (or, as best he can, considering the steam clouding the mirrored surface). The marks Mike left strategically can be hidden with a shirt, but he almost wishes that they were visible to everyone. Small blooms of purple and pink are scattered all over his chest and as low as his waist, and a small wave of happiness rushes through him. Mike did this to him. 

With one hand holding the light yellow towel wrapped around his waist, he runs the other through his wet hair. He doesn’t bother fixing it properly, knowing all he’s about to do is find Mike to get more shampoo, then hop right back into the shower. He leans into the shower, grabbing the empty shampoo bottle so he can throw it out. The hollow plastic bottle feels light in his hands. Why would he keep an empty bottle in the shower? 

Will sighs as he pushes open the bathroom door, looking down at his feet, hoping he’s dry enough not to track too much water onto the carpet. “Mike, I’ve been trying to call you—” Lifting his head, he immediately stops in his tracks, his heart dropping to his stomach. 

Right in front of him, isn’t Mike. 

It’s Nancy — his older sister.

Will drops the empty shampoo bottle. The hollow plastic bottle hits the floor beneath his feet and rattles into silence. This can’t be happening. This… this doesn’t make sense. Mike said she was going to be away all weekend, at a friend’s house, so — why is she back? 

Will doesn’t know what to say, all of the words suddenly leaving his vocabulary. This is bad. This is really bad. 

“Will… Byers?” Her voice comes out slow, confused. Her eyes drift from his face to the towel wrapped around his body, then to the marks all over his chest. This isn’t good. This isn’t good at all. “What… what are you doing here? Did you just take a shower?”

“Nancy,” Will clears his throat, desperate to find anything he can say to make this feel less awkward and terrifying than it currently does. “Um, I…”

“Nancy?” Mike’s voice calls from behind them, eyes widening and face paling. His hair is still wet from the shower, and the white shirt he’s wearing becomes slightly see-through from the droplets of water. He looks just as frightened as Will feels. Will thinks he might be sick. Actually, he knows he might be sick. “Nancy, what… what are you doing here? You… you weren’t supposed to be home until Monday.”

“I… I wasn’t.” Nancy replies, head shaking slightly. Will can’t read her expression, eyes constantly shifting between Mike and Will. “Are… are you going to tell me what’s going on, here?”

Mike shakes his head vehemently, “Nancy, Nancy, please, it’s not like that.”

“He’s in a towel, Mike.” Nancy’s eyes drift toward the ceiling, and Will can feel the nausea overtake his senses. She can’t even look at him. She’s probably mortified – disgusted, too. How can he be so reckless? “What else can it be like?”

Mike and Will both exchange worried glances. Will tears his gaze, shifting it to the floor. What the hell are they supposed to do?

“I… I think I’m going to put some clothes on.” Will manages to croak out, walking past Nancy, heading to Mike’s room. He doesn’t know what to do, what to say, how to make any of this better. He isn’t supposed to be here. He isn’t supposed to be anywhere near Mike. If… If the Pastor finds out that Will is still hanging out with his son, who knows what he will do to him? Who knows what he’s going to do… to Mike. 

He closes the door behind him and feels dizziness take over. Nancy is home. Nancy is here, and so is he. Should he try to sneak out? Walking over to the window, he quickly peers closer to the glass, but the thought vanishes the second he remembers he’s on the second floor of the house — and the last thing he needs is to break a limb. Faltering for a second, he wonders whether the risk might outweigh the cons. Maybe jumping would be worth it, thinking it would be easier to explain to his mother that he broke his leg, rather than what he was doing. 

He manages to will himself toward the bed, where Mike left out some clothes for Will to change into. Ironically, it’s the Hellfire shirt and a pair of dark blue shorts that definitely are not Mike’s. He lifts them up and winces. Are these Nancy’s? He can’t walk out of this room with that shirt and those shorts, he thinks to himself. Nancy will freak out, or worse — she will make him take them off in front of her. 

He doesn’t know what to do — he can’t leave Mike alone with her, not when he doesn’t know what she’s going to do. She’s probably getting mad at him, probably telling her brother that she knows everything they do together, everything they’ve done. What… what if she’s the one who told Mike’s parents, the one who saw them together? What if she… knew the entire time? 

This is all Will’s fault. 

This is all his fault.

He needs to head back out there – he knows he does. Besides, he can’t leave Mike alone, not after what just happened. He’s sure Nancy isn’t stupid, and there are about a million things he’d rather be doing than face her. Reluctantly, he throws the shirt over his head and the shorts over his legs. They’re short, a bit too short, but he doesn’t bother to check his reflection. 

Before opening Mike’s bedroom door, he carefully presses his ear against the wooden surface. Are they arguing? Are they talking about him? His eyebrows furrow at the realization that he doesn’t hear anything. A wave of fear washes over him — is Mike okay? Did something happen to him? What if something happened to him and he needed his help? Why is it so quiet? It doesn’t matter how scared he is for his own safety; the worry that Mike might not be okay supercedes his fear of facing Nancy. 

Quickly grabbing the doorknob, he turns it and steps into the hallway. From his position at the top of the stairs, he can see the pair of siblings in the living room. Mike is pacing nervously, and it makes his chest tighten. Will pauses for a moment — another wave of doubt crosses his mind. Should he go to comfort him? Should he give him space? Should he give Nancy space?

He can’t let Mike go through this alone.

Not again.

Will slowly walks down the stairs, hovering halfway as Mike begins to ramble. He stops, not wanting to interrupt him. What is he supposed to do? He feels so… useless. 

“Fuck,” Mike mutters under his breath, one hand anxiously fidgeting with his eyebrow piercing. Will feels like he might cry, never having seen Mike this nervous before. Nancy, on the other hand, sits on the couch with her legs crossed, looking up at her brother with an expression Will can’t quite place. She hates him, doesn’t she? She… she hates Mike, and Will knows it’s all his fault. “How do I even say this? Nancy… you need to promise that you’ll listen to me, okay?” He continues to pace back and forth, and Will slowly walks down the rest of the staircase, now only a few feet away from Mike. “You… you can’t tell mom and dad. They’ll…” He takes a shaky breath, running a hand nervously through his hair. Nancy still isn’t saying anything, her eyebrows furrowed. Will wants to tell him that everything will be okay, that he’ll be okay, but he doesn’t want to make things worse than they already are. This is all his fault, he thinks. Nancy is going to tell the pastor, and Mike is going to get into trouble again. He can’t lose him again. He refuses to. “They’ll send me back there, or… or somewhere worse, and I don’t think I can deal with that. Not again. You… you don’t have to like this, but please. Please don’t tell them. Please.”

“Mike—”

“I promise I’m not a bad person,” Mike shakes his head, not bothering to wipe the tears falling from his eyes. This is awful. “Nancy, you need to believe me. I’m not a bad person, I… I just love Will, and I know it’s fucked up, I know he’s a boy, and you’re probably disgusted right now, and I know I’m going to need to repent, and I know mom and dad tell you this is… evil, and it’s disgraceful, but I love him, Nance. I’m not a bad person. You have to believe me. I’m still me. I’m still Mike.” The words flow messily from his mouth; the sobs make it hard for both of them to understand him. “Just… just because I… I’m different, doesn’t make me… bad.”

This is bad, Will thinks. He needs to fix it. He needs to find a way to make sure that Mike doesn’t get in trouble. 

“Nancy,” Will awkwardly takes a few steps forward, eyes focused on the floor beneath his feet, fidgeting with his fingers and struggling to form any words as they come out of his mouth. He needs to make sure Nancy understands that this isn’t Mike’s fault. He needs to make sure she gets it. The thought of Mike being sent back there, the thought of Mike getting into trouble again, because Will wasn’t able to control his urges, his desires, isn’t fair. Not in the slightest. “This… this isn’t Mike’s fault.”

Both Nancy and Mike turn toward him, confused. “What?” Mike interjects, head shaking slightly. Mike’s eyes are red and puffy from all of the crying. “Will, what are you even saying—”

“Don’t be mad at him,” Will continues, the words fumbling out of his mouth messily. This is his fault. This is all his fault, and Mike is going to suffer even more because of him. “Blame me. You… you can tell your parents that I… I… I did this. This is all my fault.”

Mike takes a step closer, towards Will. “Will, no, what are you talking about–”

“I had, um, a conversation with the pastor, your father, a while ago. He… he told me a lot of things. Mainly that my…” Will lifts his hand to wipe the tears from his cheeks. “Lifestyle can… rub off on others. I… just tell him that’s what happened. Tell him that it’s me who did all of this. It’s… It’s all… It’s all me, and I promise, Nancy, if you don’t tell your parents, I won’t ever come back to the church, I won’t ever speak to Mike again–”

“Can both of you just relax?” Nancy interrupts, her voice firm but gentle. Will bites the inside of his cheek to stop himself from saying anything more. Does she understand that this isn’t Mike’s fault? “I… I don’t hate you, Mike, and I don’t blame you, Will.”

“What?” Mike asks, voice croaking. He stumbles back slightly, as if he doesn’t believe the words coming from his older sister. 

“I don’t hate you.” Nancy’s voice is delicate. “Can… can you sit down, Mike? All of your pacing is making me stressed out.”

“Sit down?” Mike repeats, nodding and glancing quickly at Will. He awkwardly sits on the couch directly opposite Nancy, still tense—his back straight, hands on his knees, as if about to be scolded. “Yeah, um, sure. I can totally do that."

Nancy looks at Will, and he feels his stomach drop to his knees. “You too, Will.”

“Oh,” Will mumbles. He doesn’t know where to sit. Either he sits next to Nancy or next to Mike. He makes brief eye contact with Mike, who motions with his head to sit beside him. He immediately walks toward him, sitting at a respectful distance from Mike on the couch. For Nancy’s sake, he thinks. 

“First of all,” Nancy clears her throat, shifting her gaze toward Will. “Are those my shorts?”

Will feels his face heat up with the question, clearing his throat. 

“All my pants were dirty,” Mike replies instantly. “Haven’t had the chance to do laundry.”

“All of your pants?” Nancy repeats, clearly not believing anything her brother is saying. “You have no pants left? You’re telling me that if I walk into your room right now, there would be nothing for Will to change into?”

“Does this really matter right now?” Mike huffs, and Nancy rolls her eyes in response. 

Will is still struggling to breathe, gripping the fabric of the Hellfire shirt in a lame attempt to regain control of the situation, looking down at the short, blue shorts he has on. Is Nancy judging him? Should he say something about the shorts? Maybe he should. Clearing his throat, and all eyes fall onto him. “I’m sure I can, um, find another pair of pants in Mike’s room if you want me to go change—”

“It’s fine, Will.” Nancy sighs, rubbing her temples with her fingers. “I think we probably need to have a more important conversation right now.”

“Right,” Will mumbles, face turning a light shade of red. “More, um, important things than these, um, shorts. Right.”

A silence settles between the three of them, but Nancy leans back on the couch, and out of the corner of his eye, Will can see Mike stiffen in his spot. Is she going to scream? Yell? Call their parents? Tell the congregation? Tell his mother? Tell… Jonathan? 

“How long has… this been going on?” Nancy asks, lifting her fingers and pointing from her younger brother to Will. “Days? Weeks?”

“Um,” Mike clears his throat, scratching the back of his neck. “Since… since the middle of the summer?”

“Oh,” Nancy replies, nodding her head slowly. “So he’s who… someone saw you with?”

Mike takes in a shaky breath, playing with his hands. “Yeah.”

“I didn’t know, by the way,” is all Nancy says, voice shaking. “Mom and Dad told me you were going to rehab, and I believed them, because everyone knows you smoke. I thought, maybe, they finally got enough of the stupid smell of cigarettes lingering in the house. Even then, I didn’t realize how… reactionary it would be to send their son to rehab for something as simple to quit as cigarettes.” She swallows, looking up at Mike, her eyes glassy. “I… I didn’t know until they came back. Mom sat me down, told me that they needed to correct your ‘disturbing’ behaviour.”

Mike’s hands ball into fists, as though the mere mention makes him angry. Will wants to reach out, wants to hold onto Mike and tell him that everything is going to be okay, that he’s here, but Nancy continues to speak. 

“I felt awful, Mike.” Nancy takes in a sharp breath, head tilting and pressing her tongue against her cheek to stop from crying. “The entire three months, I couldn’t believe they would do that to you. Then… then you came back, looking so different, looking so unlike yourself, and I felt like shit, Mike. I couldn’t believe you had to go through that alone.”

Will isn’t sure he’s hearing her correctly, eyes shifting toward Mike, who seems just as confused as he is. What is happening right now? Is she being… supportive?

Mike opens his mouth slightly, only to shut it again. Will knows that he’s surprised by the words coming from his older sister’s mouth. “What?”

“There’s nothing wrong with you.” Nancy stands up from her chair. “They just… don’t get it, and I don’t think they ever will, but what kind of an older sister am I? I couldn’t even… protect you from this shit.”

“Nancy—” Mike swallows, welcoming the tears as they fall for a second time. 

“No, Mike, let me finish.” She interrupts, taking in a deep breath. “I don’t think you should stay here. In Hawkins.”

“What?” Mike stutters, “What… what are you talking about? Are you… going to kick me out? Is that… what this is? You’re trying to soften the blow by making me think you’re willing to accept me, but you’re telling me you think I should leave Hawkins?”

“If… if you stay here, you won’t be able to be yourself, Mike.” A sad smile spreads across her lips. “What kind of a life is that?” She turns toward Will. “For both of you.”

“You…”

“I love you, Mike.” Nancy begins to cry. “This is who you are. Even if mom and dad don’t understand it, I will be here for you. You’re not alone, Mike. I’m sorry that you’ve had to go through all of this, and I’m sorry that our parents are… the way they are. You don’t deserve this. You both don’t deserve this.”

Mike rushes forward, wrapping his older sister in a hug. He’s so much taller than she is, despite being younger, and the sight makes Will cry even more. The tears continuously stream down his cheeks, and he doesn’t bother wiping them away. Mike is sobbing, and Nancy is too. His hands grasp the material of her sweater, pulling her as close to his body as possible. Mike deserves this. He deserves to have someone on his side, someone who loves him as much as he does. 

“I love you, Nancy,” Mike mumbles into her shoulders, the words difficult to decipher through his sobs and his mouth against her sweater. Will watches, still sitting on the couch. “I love you so much.”

Nancy pulls away from Mike, keeping her hands on his shoulders. Her face is completely damp from all of the crying. “Will,” She manages to push out. Mike takes a step back. “Come here.”

Will immediately gets up from where he’s sitting, and walks right to Nancy, who now has her arms wide open for him to fall into. He does, and she holds onto him so tight. He melts into the hug, head falling onto her shoulders. “You’re okay,” She cooes, rubbing circles in his back. “You’re… you’re okay, Mike’s okay. You both will be okay.” 

☾𖤓

“You look great,” Joyce smiles, pulling her son into a hug. Will smiles as he’s engulfed in her familiar scent. A wave of nostalgia washes over him at the thought that she’s still in Hawkins. “This suit fits you perfectly.”

“This suit was so expensive, Mom.” Will winces, looking down at the threading that likely costs more than his rent for two months. “I would’ve been fine getting one from a thrift shop or something. There are like a million here in New York. I’m sure we would’ve found one that was just as good. We can still return it if you want–”

“Don’t be ridiculous,” she frowns, head shaking as she fixes the lapel of his suit jacket. “It’s not every day my son is getting married to the love of his life, is it?” Lifting a hand, she fixes a strand of hair that falls in front of Will’s eye, catching on his eyelashes. “Besides, even if the ceremony has no… legal standing, it’s real to us. Might as well spend the budget I had set aside for it, right? Who needs a… super fancy cake, anyway? I always found those to be pretentious.” 

“Thank you, Mom.” Will nods his head, blinking back the tears in his eyes. “For, um, everything. This… this wasn’t easy.” 

“Why are you thanking me?” she asks, blinking away her tears. Both of her hands reach out to Will’s face. “You’re my son, honey. I will always love you. No matter what.”

 He tilts his head upward as she begins to fiddle with his tie. “Do you think his parents will show up?” They sent them an invitation in the mail, but they never received a reply. Both he and Mike know that at this point, it’s wishful thinking – but there’s still a small part of Mike who, after everything, wants his parents there. 

“I don’t know, sweetheart.” Joyce smiles sadly. “What matters, my love, is that you both are surrounded by people who love and accept you for who you are. If they’re not here, that’s their loss. He’s very lucky to have Nancy, who supports him. She’s such a kind, responsible girl. Do you think she would like Jonathan?”

“Mom,” Will groans, though a smile spreads across his face. “Can we not do any matchmaking at my wedding, please? I have enough to stress out about.”

“I was just asking,” she smiles, leaning in and planting a kiss on Will’s cheek. “Let’s go find you a husband, shall we?”

☾𖤓

“I can’t believe this is really happening,” Will’s voice trembles, hands trembling as he clutches the paper where he carefully wrote every word of his vows the week before. He can hear his mother let out a small laugh, and it makes tears well up even more. “It seems like it was only yesterday that I hated every part of myself for loving you, because I thought feeling this strongly about a boy meant there was something wrong with me. But now, I know that the love I feel for you isn’t… disgusting, or gross at all, but… beautiful. The most beautiful thing I will ever experience. I am so lucky to have you by my side, and even luckier to marry you. You make me laugh, you make me cry, you make me feel everything I didn’t think I ever would.” He’s full-on crying right now; in any other circumstance, he would feel embarrassed – shameful even, but not anymore. Never anymore. “I know this… this isn’t a legal wedding, and it’s in our one-bedroom, crammed apartment, but I don’t think I would have it any other way. I would marry you in every single lifetime, and I would fall in love with you in every single universe. I love you, Mike Wheeler, and I would be honoured to be your husband. For now, and for always.”

He can hear the sniffles from those watching – he doesn’t need to look to know that his mother is crying, with Jonathan’s arm around her shoulders, and so is Robin, who is sitting alongside her. Mike’s friends are here – and he can swear Max might also have some tears in her eyes. Nancy, who is leaning against the wall, brings a tissue to her eye to avoid ruining her makeup. Everyone who is in this room loves them. 

Mike, who is standing directly across from him, is a complete mess. Despite telling Will that he wasn’t going to cry, he’s crying more than Will. He’s perfect, Will thinks. 

“When someone asks me how I first knew I was in love with you,” Mike begins, swallowing. His hands are shaking slightly, and Will can already feel the tears blurring his vision. “The answer is simple, really. The first time you left service, you asked me if I was allowed to smoke. I was having a really shitty day, but you made me laugh. You made me feel better without even knowing. That’s, um, the thing with you, Will. You always know how to make me happy, how to… take my mind off of things.” Adjusting the paper in his hands and taking in a deep breath, he continues. “Before I met you, I was miserable. I used to dread waking up every morning. When I met you, I looked forward to starting new days. I looked forward to being with you, to hanging out with you, to just… being in your presence. I know our journey wasn’t easy. I know our path was hard, but I wouldn’t trade it for the world. I would go through everything again if that means I could still end up with you. I love you, and at times, I love you more than I do myself. I love you more than anything in the world. I look forward to waking up every morning with you, to brewing you tea when I brew my coffee, even though you say our new coffee machine is pretentious.” That earns a small laugh from the group, and a smile from Will. “I don’t know if we will ever be able to get married for real, but this is good enough for me. I was the luckiest guy in the world when you said yes to my proposal, and I am the luckiest guy in the world today. Every single day we’re together, I am happy to be alive. I love you so fucking much, Will Byers.”

Mike and Will are both crying, clutching their vows. Mike tucks his into the pocket of his jacket, and Will follows suit with his. 

Will smiles softly, and it doesn’t take Mike long to place one hand on Will’s cheek, the other on his waist, and kiss him –  sharing their first kiss as unofficial, yet very official, husbands. 

 

Notes:

thank you so much for taking the time to read this! I appreciate you endlessly!

find me on twitter: bylerbridges

Notes:

thank you so much for taking the time to read this! I appreciate you endlessly!

listen to the playlist i made for this fic!

find me on twitter: bylerbridges