Work Text:
“And then, the entire party lived happily ever after…” Mike trails off, bracing himself for the verbal abuse that’s probably about to be hurled at him.
“What? That’s bullshit,” Lucas groans immediately, “your ending sucked.”
“Agreed,” Dustin rolls his eyes, “the amount of plot holes was glaring. I mean, what happened to Suzie? You wait so long to give me a love interest and then mention her like, twice.”
“Suzie wasn’t the only love interest you terminated,” Will adds thoughtfully, “what happened to Vickie? What was the point of your lesbian original character if her girlfriend’s irrelevant?”
“I know, I know. I had something really cool planned for the ending,” Mike huffs, “but you heard my mom. She’d have killed me if I let it drag on.”
Mike Wheeler and his friends are on Thanksgiving break, and they gave themselves the challenge to organize a D&D campaign that lasts twenty-four straight hours.
So, they got together, and decided to include random people from the town as side characters, and they went crazy. The entire thing is Mike taking people he sees walking around every day — like Nancy’s douchebag boyfriend, Steve Harrington — and giving them entire backstories and character arcs for no reason. Steve is now best friends with Dustin and some other girl called Robin, who Mike had the tactical decision to make lesbian on the spot.
Of course, there’s no reason why he decided to make her like girls, but in this day and age that’s not a very widely accepted thing, so perhaps he was testing out adding a character who’s a bit more out there to see if his friends would have any sort of problem with it.
They don’t, by the way. In fact, this girl who likes girls seems to be the least of their concerns. Obviously, Mike doesn’t need to note that his friends seemingly aren’t bothered by queer people, because it’s not like he would note that because that means the chances are higher of Mike being accepted by them if he was theoretically queer, which he isn’t, by the way — why the hell would you think that?
That singular, tiny plot point with zero significance to Mike’s actual life aside, they did end up making the campaign last twenty four hours, before Mike’s mom caught them and got very concerned for their health so she made them shut it down.
Honestly, that happened right as Mike got lazy as hell, and everyone was super tired and his brain could not be bothered to generate a good ending. In the end, he wrapped nothing up, and everything was god awful, which he can definitely recognize and own up to.
His lame “happy ever after” ending made no sense, and there were a million plot holes plus a shit ton of horrible undertones to some of the messages in his writing. He’s mad at himself for killing off no one and then deciding to give Eleven some ambiguous death at the end.
In short, Mike really shouldn’t let himself write stories when he’s tired and in a rush. Now that entire speech he gave to Eleven when she piggybacked from a pizza dough freezer was just full of crap with no payoff, when it was actually supposed to be a really cool setup for a really cool plot twist.
Same with that painting. God, he didn’t even mention the painting. He doesn’t even want to think about how royally he screwed up with this campaign, but it’s all the other three will talk about.
“My storyline did not do me any justice,” Lucas points out, “Max is great and all, but I’m literally just her boyfriend.”
“I don’t see the point in the whole Holly thing,” Will says, “it was fine at first but I think you just rushed it. Vecna wasn’t nearly as interesting as he should have been.”
“Both of those are fair,” Mike leans back in his chair, “and I’m sorry. I would have done a lot more with it if we had, like, ten more hours and a bunch of sleep.”
“Alright, but, the ending aside,” Dustin raises a point, “did you do a line before writing some of these plot lines? There’s Max, and then there’s her racist older stepbrother who tries to hook up with your mom?”
The game in itself was pretty questionable actually. Most of it was just Mike adding in the most absurd plot points possible and then hyping it up with a “this is crucial for things to work” or “it’s for the plot”, which was honestly kind of funny.
He was made fun of a lot throughout the game for saying shit like “okay Will now your powers actually work because you’re super in love with me! This will all make sense later” and “and now Dustin you and your girlfriend have to sing Never Ending Story while the world is ending, it’s for the plot”.
Which, that’s fair, but it was pretty funny.
“Yeah, why the hell was he trying to hook up with your mom?” Lucas backs up Dustin’s pretty fair point.
“Okay, that was for the plot,” Mike tries to explain, “that was very important in emphasizing that Billy was a terrible person.”
“But why your mom?” Will asks.
Again, fair question. Mike’s answer: he doesn’t know. He was running out of characters to use. It’s not like he could make it Will’s mom, god no. Mrs Byers got a boyfriend who was brutally mauled by demodogs and then she got with the police chief, like a normal person. Plus, Mike knows his mom has, like, no interest in his dad. He could see her emotionally cheating a little.
“Why is emotionally cheating, like, a recurring thing with your family?” Lucas inquires. “Nancy did it with Will’s brother!”
“Actually, what was that about?” Will tilts his head. “And the fact that you had to pause the game to clarify they broke up did not look good on you.”
“Okay, all of the couples were actually just for laughs,” Mike explains, “I just thought, this would be funny, and I made them kiss. That’s how your mom and the police chief happened.”
“Were me and Suzie not funny enough for you to keep us together?” Dustin asks, still hung up on that. “And you created Eleven just to be a horrible boyfriend. I would have been better for her.”
“Yeah, okay, in my defence,” Mike stammers, “me and Eleven were supposed to be more important, but I was crunched for time. It would have made a lot more sense if we were under better circumstances.”
“Wait, so…” Will begins, curiosity filling his gaze. “I was supposed to be in love with you, right? Why’d you dumb it down to just a crush? Kind of an unsatisfying end to my storyline…”
“It was a rushed ending, okay?” Mike huffs defensively. “I promise I’ll give you a better conclusion. I know it all sucked but I’ll write you guys a better one.”
“Actually, no, go back.” Lucas looks slightly confused. “Why the hell did you write Will to be in love with you in the first place?”
Great. That was the one thing Mike was desperately trying to avoid.
He can be defensive about all of his questionable writing decisions, but he seriously doesn’t want to explain what the hell he was thinking when he wrote that part.
In all truth, Mike has sort of been experiencing some homosexual thoughts lately. Of course, he’s sure they’re going to go away. He’s only been having them for a couple months, so he figures it’s just a part of puberty or something. As far as he’s aware, every straight twelve-year-old boy goes through this.
It’s strange, actually, because these symptoms of homosexuality he’s been showing recently are only shown around Will for whatever reason.
Will is the most amazing person ever, Mike knows that. And he’s very close with Will. They’ve been close since forever, and everyone makes jokes about them dating.
That idea is preposterous, because Mike would never date Will, they’re both straight. The fact that they share clothes to the point where they can’t keep track of whose clothes are whose, and they got fake married on the playground twice with an exchange of cheek kisses in elementary school, and that they have fallen asleep in each other’s arms on multiple occasions, means nothing.
Mike doesn’t like Will like that, end of story. What’s happening is that his stupid brain is malfunctioning and making him think that he likes Will like that. The two’s lack of regard for personal space and the way Mike’s chest always kind of tightens when Will gets too close to his face is completely platonic.
In fact, Mike probably just has heart problems. That’s it. He’s solved it. He’s not gay, he actually just has heart problems. Because the way his heart beat accelerates when Will compliments him or Will’s hand brushes against his or even when he simply thinks about Will too hard, is probably some kind of heart disorder.
Think about it logically, Mike’s heart beating too fast at mundane moments that mean absolutely nothing, that just happen to be about the same person, can only realistically be, like, signs he could go into cardiac arrest at any moment. Can twelve-year-olds even go into cardiac arrest? Probably, because that’s what Mike is experiencing symptoms for, and definitely not a crush on his best friend.
And it’s not only heart problems that Mike has, apparently he has a slight staring problem.
Mike likes to zone out a lot, he’s hardly tuned into the real world when he doesn’t need to be. Often, he finds himself zoned out while looking directly at Will’s face.
Of course, that has nothing to do with Will himself, and it’s actually a pure coincidence that Mike likes to daydream as he just so happens to be staring pretty intensely in the exact direction of Will’s gorgeous face.
He finds it gorgeous in a platonic way, by the way. He thinks that Will is very pretty in general, though he wouldn’t say it out of fear of it being interpreted as romantic. He loves Will’s moles and his smile that could light up a whole town and he would defend that absolutely adorable bowl cut with his life.
So Mike likes to stare, every once in a while. He likes taking in every detail of Will’s face and becoming overwhelmed with the inexplicable desire to run his fingers through Will’s hair and breaking eye contact every once in a while, because for whatever unknown reason Mike’s eyes sometimes pull themselves down to exactly where Will’s mouth is.
He’s not staring at Will’s mouth, of course, although that’s probably what it looks like. Take his word for it, though, that’s not it at all. Sometimes, his eyes just flicker downwards for no reason in particular, and it only happens when he stares at Will’s face, no follow-up questions.
There are other things as well, like the phenomenon of what Lucas likes to call the “Will voice”, in which Mike always speaks in a softer tone to Will.
Mike doesn’t hear it. He thinks he speaks to Will like he would speak to anyone else. He doesn’t yell at him, because Will hates yelling, and he tries to make sure Will feels comfortable, but he doesn’t change his voice. At least, he doesn’t think he does.
However, Dustin and Lucas make fun of him constantly for “switching up” to his “Will voice” whenever he speaks to Will.
Even if this supposed voice did exist, it would mean nothing. Will doesn’t like to be yelled at, Mike doesn’t yell at him. That doesn’t have any romantic undertones whatsoever.
Mike would be here all day if he were to explain every single reason why people think Will and Mike are in love or whatever, but the point is, the two of them are just really close, and Mike stares sometimes, and he might need to see a heart doctor, and he allegedly talks softer to him.
The problem with all this came when Mike started to think of this all as romantic, too.
Like, despite how he just went through how platonic his relationship with Will is, his brain is starting to disagree with him, which is insane.
He thinks about Will all too much, and his insides start to kind of twist whenever Will does basically anything. He gets butterflies when Will does something kind for him, and goes out of his way to make as much physical contact with him as humanly possible.
All of this has been happening for years, but lately the feelings in his brain have been starting to connect with the feelings in his heart. Now his breath catches when Will’s face is anything closer than six inches away from his, and a voice in the back of his head starts going “what if I am in love with Will?”.
That’s insane. It’s so ridiculous, it’s almost kind of laughable to think about. But the intimate relationship between Mike and Will has recently had him questioning if they’re something more.
And when he starts thinking about that, it opens a can of worms in his brain, and all of a sudden he’s imagining what they would be like if they were something more. Sometimes his stupid brain makes them kiss, which is a thought he definitely shouldn’t be having, but it pops into his head out of his control whenever they’re too close to each other.
He thinks about holding Will’s hand and whatever, telling him that they’ll go crazy together or something. With every waking moment, his tweenage hormones take over his brain and try to trick him into thinking he’s falling in love with his best friend.
Hence, homosexual thoughts. He’s not actually gay or in love with Will, this is simply a puberty thing that will go away once his voice gets deeper.
What’s problematic about these silly thoughts is that they’re becoming obvious now. This campaign was designed to be a funny “haha what if we took all these people in Hawkins that we know nothing about and then we made up these crazy backstories for them” and he kinda sorta ended up writing Will to be deeply in love with him.
It was a crazy thing to write, because Will obviously isn’t gay. It was an impulse writing decision, and means nothing.
In all truth, the one thing he regrets most about this awful campaign is Will’s storyline. He hates it so much and it feels like such a humiliation ritual for Will.
Dustin may be onto something, because Mike might have actually snorted a line when he decided that he should make it an integral part of Will’s storyline that he’s in love with Mike, for some reason. The other three probably read it as Mike trying to tell them something about himself.
The idea of the storyline was that Mike’s love interest was Eleven, a girl who Mike only really showed any interest in when she looked like a guy — better yet, when she was mistaken for Will Byers with a buzz cut — and he was a bad boyfriend to her, but the plot twist was that he actually acted that way because he was like, gay and in love with Will.
And Will was gay and in love with Mike, and the storyline would conclude on a satisfying note with Mike redeeming himself for being a shitty friend, and getting with Will and allowing the poor guy to experience real love for once in his lifetime.
However, Mike must have gained consciousness when his mom told them to wrap it up, because he then realized that his homosexual thoughts were completely leaking into this campaign. He would have so much explaining to do if he followed through and put his character with Will’s, so he chickened out.
He chickened out at the last second and gave Will an abysmal storyline, because instead of his happy ending, Mike had to make Will’s feelings seem like they were nothing in an attempt to downplay the insanely gay sounding storyline he actually had in mind.
Because making Mike’s character and Will’s character a thing sounds like Mike and Will themselves are a thing, when they’re not. They have an interesting dynamic that Mike simply wanted to explore as a possible romantic storyline, and it has absolutely zero connections to their friendship in real life.
Still, he feels horrible about it. He wishes he hadn’t added that to Will in the first place, but more than that he wishes he actually just followed through with having him and Will end up together. He doesn’t know why. He definitely shouldn’t wish that, but he can’t help the thought.
“Will being in love with me was for the plot, okay?” Mike stumbles over his words in an attempt to defend his honor.
“How?” Dustin asks, very reasonably. “In what world could that have possibly been for the plot?”
“And you put so much thought into it as well,” Lucas adds, “like, that whole painting thing that was disregarded? And that hand hold thing that, like, saved Will from the mind flayer. Are you trying to tell us something, Mike?”
“I’m not gay,” Mike replies a little too quickly, “and neither is Will. This is all fictional, and Will just had to be madly in love with me, for the plot.”
“But I don’t get how “madly in love” turned into “Tammy”.” Will comments, the thoughtfulness in his eyes showing that he doesn’t seem to mind the idea of the plot line in general. “And I had to ask for any closure. I can tell you got lazy.”
“I’m sorry, Will,” Mike’s voice softens on instinct, “I’m tired and I got lazy and it was super rushed, and I’m sorry.”
Mike wants to tell the truth, he wants to say that he would have put them together if he wasn’t a coward, that he only created this part of the story because of the twisted thoughts that linger inside his head. He only wants to tell that to Will, though.
He has a lot of explaining to do, and he can’t formulate any of it. How does he explain that he isn’t gay, he just decided to experiment with the idea of his best friend being a repressed homosexual who’s in love with him because he hasn’t been thinking straight lately (pun intended) and it’s starting to show, even though it’s just a growing up thing that every boy experiences with their best friend?
The worst part is, that storyline looks ten times weirder with the idea that Mike didn’t reciprocate Will’s feelings. Mike wrote the damn thing, and he just decided to write his straight best friend like that so he could reject him? This is not painting him in a good light.
So, Mike’s either trying to come out to them or he’s an egotistical asshole who wanted to put his best friend through that. This sucks.
“Are you sure you’re not gay?” Dustin asks, once again, very reasonably. “I’m not bothered if you are, but I can’t think of a single good reason why Will would be in love with you if not that you’re trying to tell him you’re into him right now.”
“Okay, that’s not true,” Mike turns to Will, “that isn’t true. It was for the plot, alright? It was for the plot.”
Mike can see the curiosity in Will’s face, and perhaps he stares for a second too long. He knows that Will wants to know what the hell that was about, everyone does. He can only be glad that Will doesn’t seem to mind the storyline itself, just its atrocious execution.
Which, fair. Mike thinks he’ll tell Will.
He trusts Will more than anyone. He couldn’t lie to him if he tried. If Will asks him about it in private, he’ll most likely fold and tell the truth. He’ll tell him that he wanted to experiment with a storyline he hasn’t tried before, which just so happens to include an unexpected taboo romance between two main characters, which just so happens to sort of fit them.
So maybe he won’t tell the full truth. He can keep the fact that he’s been thinking about Will in a more romantic light that he should to himself, because he doesn’t want to have to explain that to anyone.
“I’m too tired for this,” Lucas sighs, “I need sleep.”
Lucas makes his way to his sleeping bag on the floor, practically collapsing into it, and Mike lets out a sigh of relief seeing that Lucas and Dustin are going to stop interrogating him for the night.
“Agreed,” Dustin goes over to his own sleeping bag, “Mike, you’ll explain yourself in the morning. Good night.”
He has until the morning to think of a viable excuse for the whole Will plot line. He doesn’t think it’s nearly enough time, but he’ll work with what he’s got.
“I’m exhausted, too,” Mike turns to Will, “sorry about the campaign. We should get some sleep, though.”
“Yeah, me too.” Will smiles a little, and Mike’s chest immediately feels warm at the sight. “Don’t worry about it. Dustin, Lucas and I will interrogate you about it when we have the energy.”
“Right,” Mike laughs, “good night.”
“Good night, Mike.”
Will’s sweet smile is infectious as he goes over to his sleeping bag, knocking out almost instantly.
Mike has no idea what time it is. It could be midday, it could be midnight. They’ve been in this basement so long they can hardly keep track.
He likes it when Will is asleep. Will isn’t the greatest when it comes to sleeping, and Mike has spent many sleepovers cuddled up against him and speaking in his gentlest voice, trying to help him doze off.
It’s always nice when he sees Will looking so peaceful, sleeping so carefree and hopefully without nightmares. He hopes Will’s dreaming about something he loves, like art. He hopes Will’s having the coolest dream about art.
Sometimes Mike wonders if Will ever dreams about him. He probably shouldn’t, but he does. Will manages to appear in most of Mike’s dreams. Some would say it’s because Mike thinks about him all the time, which is sort of true.
Whatever Will’s dreaming about, the point still stands that Mike is overcome by this wave of peace and content at seeing Will fall asleep so fast.
He turns the lights off, climbs into his sleeping bag and scoots ever so slightly closer to Will, allowing his tired eyelids to glue themselves shut.
When Mike wakes up, he hasn’t a clue what time it is.
He assumes it’s some time in the middle of the night, because no natural light is making its way into the basement.
It takes a couple seconds for his eyes to adjust to the dark, and he rolls over onto his back, staring at the ceiling.
“Mike?”
The sound of a quiet voice with a similar consistency to honey pours out into the darkness. Mike turns on his side to see Will, wide-eyed and his face painted by the tiniest smile.
“Will?” Mike’s slightly taken aback. “You’re awake?”
“Yeah,” Will shuffles closer to Mike, “I don’t know how long for.”
“Did you sleep badly?” Mike whispers, concern apparent in his voice.
“Don’t worry,” Will tries to reassure him, “I don’t feel tired.”
“That doesn’t really answer my question…”
“I think I slept well,” Will shakes his head, “don’t worry about it. You can go back to sleep.”
“No way,” Mike’s almost offended at the idea, “I’m not tired. I’d rather stay awake and keep you company.”
“Thanks, Mike.” Will smiles, and Mike thinks that the pitch dark room is a little lighter.
“Are the other two awake?” Mike jerks his head to gesture towards Dustin and Lucas.
“I don’t know,” Will answers, “I don’t think so.”
“Okay.”
There’s silence for a long second. Mike’s breath catches as Will moves in just a little closer to him, and his thoughts start to go haywire as he can faintly feel Will breathing on his face.
“Mike?” Will breaks the silence, his voice cracked and barely a whisper. “Why’d you write that? You know, in the campaign.”
Awesome. Mike’s thankful that the dark obscures the shade of red that he knows his face is turning.
Listen. Mike knows he said he’d tell Will, but it’s still a nerve wracking concept. How is he supposed to explain it? He would trust Will with his life, but it doesn’t make this topic any easier to verbalize.
“Well, I— I don’t know,” Mike admits, “it’s really weird. I just thought, I’m trying new things with my writing. And, uh, I thought that us, you know, a paladin and a cleric, might work together. It’s a kind of out-there storyline that I just wanted to explore and I promise that it has nothing to do with us in real life. I didn’t want it to seem weird.”
That’s true. It’s as true as it can get without confronting the thoughts buried in his mind.
“I don’t think it’s weird,” Will breathes, “just random. I’m not bothered by it or anything, and I think I get it now. Like, a taboo plot twist romance hidden in plain sight. I think it’s pretty cool.”
Will rolls onto his back, staring up at the ceiling, his eyes sparkling with something Mike can’t read.
“What I don’t get,” Will turns back to Mike, “is why we — I mean, why our characters — didn’t end up together.”
Mike really doesn’t want to have to explain that he’s just a coward, but who is he to lie to Will? Plus, he owes him an apology for his god awful storyline.
“It was kind of because I was lazy and in a rush,” Mike observes the curiosity in Will’s expression, “but you know that’s not it, don’t you? The truth is, I chickened out. I realized that the entire thing was weird and I got scared because I knew that you and Dustin and Lucas were going to think I have feelings for you or whatever, and I backed out. Which led to giving you a half-baked story which was honestly disrespectful, and I had to downplay the whole thing to make it seem way less romantically charged than it looked like, but the damage was already done. In fact, I think I just made it look worse.”
“I understand that,” Will says, “it did look strange on you. I mean, you kind of had me thinking that you liked me for a second, and putting us together would have only confirmed that for me. I just can’t fully understand why you did it in the first place.”
“That’s the part I don’t get, either.” Mike exhales, because he wants Will to understand, which involves being a little more emotionally vulnerable than he’d like. “Honestly, I haven’t been thinking straight lately. In, uh, in more ways than one.”
There’s an air of confusion about Will, but the words Mike needs to clarify what he means get stuck in his throat.
Is this what a heart attack feels like? His heart is pounding so intensely he wouldn’t be surprised if Will can hear it. He thinks he might need a cardiologist on standby, because his heart problems that only show around Will that sort of link to his gay-but-actually-straight thoughts are getting worse.
“And I don’t, for the life of me, have any idea why I thought that making you… well, you know…” Mike gestures, the words “in love” not willing to come out of him. “Why I thought doing that was a good idea in the first place. Maybe there was something in those brownies I ate, but I only realized the weight of what I was doing when I had already done way too much.”
Mike pulls his eyes away from Will’s face, forcing them at the ceiling and taking his turn to lay on his back.
“Then, when I tried to take back what I had done,” Mike’s mind starts slipping away as he talks, “I ended up making myself look like an idiot. I mean, to be a writer someday, I need to write groundbreaking shit. And that includes subverting expectations. Setting up something and then straying away completely in a way that will… shock society and whatever. For some reason, I chose taking us, and making us like each other. That’s not just gonna shock society, it might offend them. It’s, like, perfect, but it looked weird on me for choosing us specifically, because it looked like it meant something.”
Once again, Will shuffles in a little closer. At this point, Will’s turned on his back too, and their shoulders are pressed together. Will’s eyes are filled with the utmost interest, as if all he wants to do is listen to Mike talk until he can finally fully understand where he’s coming from.
Something twists inside Mike at the fact that Will is patiently waiting for him to resume talking, and Mike wonders what other health problems he may have. He thinks he should definitely see a doctor, because the weird feeling in his chest is making its way down to his stomach.
“So I didn’t subvert any expectations,” Mike continues, “and I’m sorry. For the entire thing, but especially for writing that on you in the first place. Because I didn’t do it well, and it probably looks to the other two that we’re… you know… a thing. And we’re not. I mean, you definitely don’t like me like that, so I don’t know why I had the bright idea to write that. It was all for fun, I guess. I wrote in a ton of couples for nothing more than fun, but this one feels different because it’s me and you.”
Mike doesn’t know how much better he’s making this. He doesn’t know if he’s making it worse. By the way Will’s looking at him, he’s still expecting something more. Mike’s thoughts start to get away from him completely as his mouth opens and he just starts speaking.
“I don’t even understand,” Mike huffs, “I know you’re waiting for me to tell you a clear reason but I can’t. It feels like there’s one part of this that I’m missing that will make it all make sense, but I can’t figure it out. I don’t know. I think I’m going crazy.”
“Crazy together?” Will teases, and Mike looks over at his sickening smile.
“You shut up,” Mike lets out a breathy laugh, “pretend I just hit you on the shoulder or something. I can’t do it while laying down.”
“If it helps,” Will begins, “I think if you didn’t get lazy and back out, and then leave a lot of glaring plot holes… your story could have been really good. And I understand what you’re trying to say, kinda, I just still don’t fully get your reasoning.”
“Neither do I,” Mike shakes his head, “you’re the only one I trust enough to talk about this with, you know. But all I know is bits and pieces of my thought process. I mean, I wrote the thing, I should have a clear answer to your question. But there’s one answer that even I don’t know, and I think it’s the answer making everything make sense.”
“That’s okay,” Will smiles, “you don’t have to know everything, even some things you think you should. But, if you ever find out, will you tell me?”
Mike turns on his side to face Will once more, and Will’s already looking at him with a wonder in his eyes. Mike’s overtaken by a warm feeling that makes his insides feel like they’re going to melt into goo.
“Yeah,” Mike says after a couple seconds, “yeah, I will.”
It’s silent for a moment, but Mike’s brain is loud. He stares at Will, his eyes trying to burn every feature of Will’s face into his mind in the pitch dark. Will’s so kind and patient and he’s such a good listener and he’s so trustworthy and understanding and that shimmering look in his eyes accompanied by his light smile is oddly making Mike feel some type of way right now.
Mike stares for as long as he can, his face so close to Will’s they might as well be breathing on each other.
It’s in this type of situation where his homosexual thoughts are at their worst.
His mind is being flooded with the image of him leaning in for a kiss right about now, as well as the constant thought track talking about how pretty Will is and also the monologue that’s sort of questioning if maybe he does have a thing for Will.
It’s a war zone up there, and Mike’s panicked because all he can do is stare and think.
And he thinks really hard, and he thinks about the missing piece to this whole puzzle.
What if, theoretically, this was all because he was actually in love with Will?
It’s crazy, which is why it’s only a hypothetical, but what if his whole subverting expectations thing and his puberty-hormonal-gay-thoughts starting to involuntarily show through the campaign with Mike taking far too long to realize the absurdity of it, and the way his homosexual thoughts are only about Will so he decided to make Will the one who’s in love with him, and he still doesn’t know what ever possessed him into thinking that this was ever even a remotely good idea, is all, in theory, a product of his feelings for Will manifesting themselves?
No way. That can’t be it. That’s just a theory, a game theory. He knows that there are multiple other plausible explanations that tie this all together.
Okay, that’s a lie. There are no other plausible explanations. But that can’t be true, right? His brain has been acting up, tricking him into thinking he’s in love with Will. It’s a growing up thing. He feels completely platonically about Will.
Gosh, he’s been over this. That’s his entire story. He went on a huge monologue about it earlier.
So why now is he doubting it more than ever? Maybe a voice in the back of his head has doubted him before, but he feels like he’s trying to convince himself. Or has he been trying to convince himself the whole time?
It’s the only thing that makes sense. But it makes no sense. No sense at all. Or maybe it does make sense. Does it make sense?
It takes about three seconds to set in.
Mike has spent an embarrassing amount of time denying this information, and it’s all coming back for him now.
Because, as much as he loathes admitting it, it makes perfect sense.
Everything he’s ever felt about Will, everything he’s ever said to him or done with him, and especially the entire D&D campaign only actually makes full sense when he thinks of himself as the one thing he’s spent his whole childhood denying he is.
In love with Will.
He’s in love with Will.
What’s he going to do with this information? He’s got to tell him, surely.
Wait, no. Horrible idea. He’s pretty sure Will would never like him like that.
But what’s he going to do, not tell him? Keep a secret from Will? He thinks he might explode.
Plus, he just told Will that he would tell him that one answer if he ever figures it out. He just figured it out, he can’t not tell Will.
So he’s made up his mind, he’s got to tell Will right now, in the middle of the night on the floor of his basement with their two other friends sleeping in earshot.
Perhaps he’s under thinking it. Perhaps he should stop and consider that this is a big risk and a huge thing to confess, and that if Will doesn’t reciprocate his feelings it could ruin or at least have lasting repercussions on their friendship which could bleed into their teenage or even adult years. Perhaps he should—
“Will?”
—Never mind, he’s doing it.
“Yeah?”
“I think I figured it out,” Mike tries to switch his brain off and just talk, “that answer.”
“Already?” Will looks curious, patiently waiting for Mike to resume speaking.
“Uh-huh,” Mike clears his throat, “I think I’m gay.”
Okay, he did it. He did the hard part, he got the words out. A huge weight lifts itself off of his shoulders, knowing that he said the simple sentence and has officially given Will all of his closure.
Where this goes now, is all up to Will’s reaction.
“What?”
“Okay, so recently,” Mike begins to explain, “I, like, have been having these really weird thoughts. About us. Like, romantic thoughts. And I figured it was normal and would go away, so I’ve been denying that they meant anything. And then they started to leak into the campaign without me realizing. I thought my brain was, like, tricking me into thinking I was in love with you. And then I realized that everything I’ve been questioning has an answer if I considered that I may… have feelings for you. So, I think now, that my brain wasn’t tricking me.”
There’s silence for a second. Or maybe an hour. How long Will stares at him without words is a mystery.
“Thank god,” Mike’s taken aback when Will sounds relieved, “I’m so glad to hear that.”
“Huh?”
“I’ve had this huge crush on you for years,” Will grins, “and when you wrote that campaign I thought it was you telling me that you knew or something. In fact, it was really confusing me, especially when I found out that you did all that under the assumption that neither of us had feelings for the other. It makes sense now.”
“So you like me too?” Mike is confused, surprised, relieved, and excited all at once.
“I think I might just be in love with you.”
“Okay, cool,” Mike attempts to keep his head on straight, “cool, cool, cool, cool. No doubt, no doubt.”
Maybe he is actually going into cardiac arrest, after hearing the Will Byers whisper all sweet that he might just be in love with Mike. That’s too much for his already wrecked brain to take.
But it’s too much in the best way possible.
There’s a hesitant look in Will’s eyes, as he gazes at Mike and leans in closer. Like, a lot closer.
Mike’s breath catches as Will presses the lightest kiss to Mike’s lips. It’s just a peck and only a split second but it gives Mike a sensation in his chest that he’ll probably be thinking about for years.
Mike feels all warm and fuzzy inside and there’s a buzz in his head and all he can do is stare at Will, who’s looking back at him and wearing the shyest smile. He feels ridiculous.
“You know,” Mike begins, on cloud nine, “I didn’t think I would be discovering something about myself through a twenty-four hour game of D&D. Especially not something like this.”
“Things have a weird way of happening.” Will says, the utter joy filling his voice enough to make Mike want to melt into the basement floor.
“I guess that’s true,” Mike can’t help but wear his goofiest grin.
There’s a moment of comfortable silence, though Mike’s brain is still loud.
One part is immensely joyful, another part is sure that this scenario is too good to be true and the other is still hung up on the fact that Mike’s gay.
“Are you gonna go back to sleep?” Will asks.
“Nah,” Mike admits, “I’m not tired. Plus, I’m too afraid I’m dreaming right now to go back to sleep.”
“Great,” Will laughs, “me too.”
He doesn’t think he’ll ever be able to fully unpack what the hell just happened. As it turns out, his homosexual thoughts were just straight up homosexuality, which should have been obvious, and he discovered that through a D&D campaign when he realized he’s actually in love with Will, who also loves him back, and also just kissed him.
That’s too much. He might go into overload and break down. But at the same time, he’s elated beyond belief.
“How are we gonna tell Dustin and Lucas?” Mike asks.
“Oh we already know,” Lucas says, making both Will and Mike jump.
“How long have you been awake?” Will asks, his voice hushed and clearly flustered.
“Not long, don’t worry,” Dustin speaks up, “we didn’t hear everything. Just the part where you guys confessed your feelings for each other. Congrats, by the way, everyone already thought you were dating.”
“Why didn’t you guys say anything?” Mike questions, feeling his face flush.
“We didn’t wanna interrupt your moment,” Lucas says plainly, “you guys were already having some deep philosophical conversation about your feelings when we woke up.”
“I’m just glad that you admitted you’ve got a thing for Will,” Dustin tells Mike, “it was getting tiring watching you deny it so much, especially after the game.”
“Well, thanks?” Mike decides to be grateful, though he’s still a little embarrassed. He’s glad that the other two don’t mind.
There’s silence between the four, until Dustin breaks it.
“Do you guys wanna get breakfast right about now or is that crazy?”
“It’s, like, 2am, that’s crazy,” Lucas answers before doubting himself, “is it crazy?”
“I mean, we’re all awake,” Will comments.
“And I’m not not hungry.” Mike adds.
There’s another silence.
“Oh, what the hell,” Dustin shifts and climbs out of his sleeping bag, “I’m doing it.”
Lucas gets up as well, and Mike follows.
Dustin and Lucas tiptoe their way up the basement stairs, as Mike waits for Will to shuffle out of his sleeping bag and stand up.
When he does, the two stifle a giggle as they move to follow Dustin and Lucas up the stairs, but not before Mike slips his hand into Will’s.