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A mere two months had passed since Vecna’s prophecy had occurred. Hawkins had been placed under a strict quarantine; no one in, and no one out. With nowhere else to go after their departure to California, the Byers family had moved in with the Wheelers.
Karen had offered Joyce the opportunity after the government had started their military clean up procedures. Although staying with Hopper most of the time, Joyce occupied the guest room while her two sons WIll and Jonathan took up the couches in their basement.
Two stories above where Will rested laid Mike, now former best friend. A statement that nobody would’ve dared to speak a month prior. A lot can change in a month, as well as a person. The two once inseparable best friends spoke few words to one another, although, one more than the other.
Rather than the basis of the reasoning of the fight that had taken place in California, it was Mike that would attempt more efforts at reconciliation with Will. He laid upon his bed, tossing and turning continuously wondering where it went wrong. Why their last conversation at Hopper’s cabin seemed to have meant nothing to Will and seemed to have been spoken in vain.
Mike got up the next morning with very few hours of sleep in his system. He made his way downstairs to the now common scene of a chaotic breakfast; the table overstimulating with noise. He grabbed his plate and sat down where he was used to sitting: right next to Will. Mike’s gaze casted to his right and saw Will pushing his food around lightly, seemingly in a daze. As if he felt Mike’s eyes on him, he looked up at Mike meeting his stare before Mike gave him a small nod, acknowledging him before quickly averting it.
While the table was buzzing with overlapping conversations, the space around the two had never felt so silent. So hollow and a reflection of what once was.
Despite their lack of engagement, their newer routine of taking Holly to school together didn’t seem to have faded. Department stores other than strictly grocery had yet to reopen but the schools had re-opened up last week. Not trusting Mike to take her on his own, she asked Will to accompany Mike to Holly’s school and he agreed.
The recurring silence fell between the pair as they got onto their bikes. They shared a glance before Mike turned back to Holly.
“C’mon, Holly. We’ve gotta go. We’re gonna be late,” Mike said, pushing off the ground, creating a small gap between him and Will. Will followed in silence with Holly following substantially.
“Wait up! I’m coming as fast as I can,” she hollered back. And while Mike normally would have, he wasn’t in the mood for Will’s lack of words at the moment.
Another time, he thought.
The day was long and dragging. Once dropping off Holly at her school, Mike and Will began their journey to Hawkins High. The now familiar silence is still present amongst them.
A silence Mike has tried to fill everyday and even so had Will at one point. But it seemed neither felt the effort was worth it today.
When they got to school, they parked their bikes and walked in silence. Mike looked at Will behind him as they approached the front door. He turned back and held the door open for him as he followed Will’s retreating figure.
“Thanks,” Will thanked him. Mike nodded and followed him inside.
Progress, Mike thought. As small as it was, Will at the very least had spoken to him
The pair had made it to Lucas and Dustin in their regular meeting spot. Despite the four of them accompanying one another as they once did everyday, it wasn’t the same. A tense, permanent atmosphere hovered over the boys as they spoke to one another.
Dustin had changed in the way he carried himself after the loss of Eddie. Not quite a shell of who he was prior to his passing but rather fragments were missing. Lucas wasn’t much better. After school, he took it upon himself to stay in Max’ hospital room and visit her until visiting hours were over.
Mike and Will’s rather confusing falling out was the final nail in the coffin at the now lackluster party. Their conversations flowed stale and always led back to their own personal shortcomings. However, every once in a while, they’d share a lunch where everything almost felt normal. Jokes being shared and Lucas’ intense laughter followed by Dustin. But even in those moments, Will and Mike remained hushed. Mike conversed more so than WIll. His eyes met Will’s often with he spoke, regardless of the topic.
An old habit that Mike didn’t think he’d ever fall out of; even despite their ongoing conflict. He didn’t mind looking into Will’s eyes every so often. But that didn’t matter when Will had moved his eyes away swiftly before they could linger in Mike.s for too long. Mike wondered what went on in Will’s mind. How he rarely spoke anymore but how he managed to look like he had so much to say yet he never said it. Of course, he couldn’t speak too much because he did the same, albeit worse.
While Will and Dustin had begun to walk a bit further from him and Lucas, the other had shifted towards Mike a bit and leaned in.
“Are you two ever going to stop ignoring each other? It’s been two months,” Lucas integrated while gripping his left backpack strap.
“I don't know, I’ve tried. He won't talk to me really,” Mike shrugged.
A scoff left Lucas’ mouth. “I doubt you have.”
“Why do you say that? I’ve tried talking on our way to school and at breakfast. Late at night while we were getting ready for the night. Nothing. It’s like radio silence from him,” Mike explained, waving his hands around animatedly.
The motion attracts Will’s gaze from his peripheral vision. Mike promptly brought his hands down but not before catching Will’s eyes following his arms’ motion before refacing Dustin and re-emersing himself in the conversation.
“Okay. What have you tried talking to him about?”
“This comic I’ve been reading-”
“Really riveting. So only about yourself?” Lucas scoffed again but this time in a mix of disbelief and amusement.
“You interrupted me. He’s been drawing a lot,” a short pause followed as Mike’s expression morphed into a rather solemn one. A look of longing. “But he won’t tell me or show me what. He used to always share his art,” Mike finished and he met Lucas’ face.
Lucas looked at him for a moment before simply telling Mike,
“Just try again.” and the bell rang.
Mike thought over what Lucas had said to him one more time before he begrudgingly made his way to his next class; mind blanketed with overwhelming thoughts of rekindling a relationship far too valuable to lose.
Dusk was slowly creeping into the insides of the Wheeler household. The energy was winding down unhurriedly and the voices were dropping in decibels. Karen was helping getting Holly ready for her bedtime as Jonathan and Nancy were parting ways for the evening and Ted was lounging in his chair propped up with a newspaper. Joyce was currently spending the night with Hopper which left Mike and Will.
Will was currently sitting at the table in the basement, hunched over his sketchpad with a dim lamp shining over the paper when his eyes began to get that familiar feeling to them. He was getting tired, and that shouldn’t have been a big deal if he hadn’t had to go up into Mike’s room to borrow a sleep shirt.
When the quarantine had hit, they weren’t able to go shopping for long term stays as they weren’t expecting a temporary situation to become a much more lasting accommodation. Hence forth the reasonings as to why Will was making his least desired routine of the day that was walking into Mike’s room for a shirt while they barely acknowledged one another and greeting each other with a departing nod or a silent goodbye.
Will made his way up the last step before turning down the hall towards MIke’s door. He pressed his hand against the door, taking a moment to listen for Mike’s muted shuffling around the room before he made his way inside.
Mike was currently putting on a darker blue shaded shirt when he stopped abruptly at the sound of his door opening. His eyes met Will’s before they both quickly averted their gazes to other spots in Mike’s room; Mike’s landing on his closet door and Will’s shifting to an art piece hung up on his wall. It was a piece Will had made him in the earlier years of their friendship, a light rosy hue covering his cheeks as he huffed out a small “sorry,” before making his way to Mike’s closet door.
“It’s okay,” Mike replied distantly.
Will looked around the closet for the easiest thing to grab that would be comfortable for slumber but also so he could leave this room as quickly as possible. He settled for the soft yellow shirt he wasn’t aware Mike owned before grabbing it and making his way towards the door.
As his hand moved towards the handle and began to open the door, it shut as quickly as it was opened.
Mike.
A soft gasp left his mouth as he looked up. Mike’s hand pressed against the upper half of the door keeping it closed. A silent and tense atmosphere clouded the area around the two as their eyes remained a gaze. Will searched Mike’s for an explanation but Mike’s moved quicker than Will could find a reason.
“Will,” he looked off to the side, “We need to talk.”
Will gulped and he looked away, nerves filling his system. He looked back at Mike.
“About what?”
Mike’s eyebrows furrowed as he moved closer to Will. Will took a step back.
“What do you mean about what? You’ve barely spoken to me in the entirety of your stay here,” Mike accused.
Will scoffed at the accusation. Feeling an uncomfortable emotion creep over his body and the deja vu of the direction this conversation was heading.
God, he never changes. Just like Lenora.
An exhausted sigh left Will’s mouth before he regained his composure to the best of his abilities. He was gonna say something. Will didn’t know how many more sleepless nights he could handle before he lost his mind to the words that left Mike’s mouth that day in Surfer Boy Pizza.
“Why’d you say that that day?”
“Say what?” Mike asked immediately, a grimace ghosting his expression.
“Say that to El. At Surfer Boy Pizza,” a small sigh escaped Will’s lips. “About how your life began that day you met her in the woods?”
Mike’s eyes widened, not expecting that to be the cause of Will’s two month long silence. His mouth opened in shock but no words succeeded in leaving. He didn’t know how to respond.
Taking his absence of words as a rejection at conversing, Will made his way towards the door in annoyance and defeat. Of course MIke wasn’t willing to discuss this. He simply didn’t care anymore. He didn’t even care to be Will’s friend anymore. He didn’t- a hand grabbed his wrist.
“Will?”
WIll stopped his movement and his eyes widened.
That voice. He hasn't used that tone in forever.
“Please don't leave. I can explain,” he begged softly.
Will turned back to Mike and he felt his heart quicken in pace just a little. Mike’s eyes glassy with a pleading expression.
God, he was so weak. So weak for this boy in front of him.
“Okay,” he moved away from the door. “Explain.”
Mike’s demeanor changed almost instantly, it was almost comical. Endearing to Will but as was anything Mike did.
He pulled Will closer to his bed and sat the pair down. He looked at his hands in his lap and looked back up at Will before speaking.
“When I said that, I said that my life started that day when I met her in the woods, I was desperate. I didn’t know what else to say,” Mike said finally. Will stared at him.
“But why that? You had just told me earlier that day in the van that it wasn’t fate. You said that it was dumb luck and that you were lucky that superwoman landed on his doorstep,” WIll said exasperatedly.
Mike mumbled something.
“What?”
“I said superMAN. Not superWOMAN.”
“That’s what you're choosing to focus on right now? Seriously?” Will scoffed in disbelief once more. This was getting ridiculous. He crossed his arms over one another and leaned back slightly.
“No, just correcting,” he replied softly.
There was a shift in the air surrounding them. Neither one of them could decipher what it was, but it made the next words of the conversation easier to utter.
“My point still stands, Mike. Why did you lie?” he moved his hands onto the bed and leaned forward in anticipation of Mike's response.
“She was fighting and I needed something. You were in my ear telling me that I was the heart. I didn’t know what else to say. I couldn’t say the one thing she had needed me to say. I just couldn’t,” Mike explained.
Will looked at him.
“But you did, Mike. You did say it.”
“I know,” Mike looked away.
They didn't say anything for a moment.
“Did you mean it? When you told her that you loved her?” There was a hidden yearning in Will’s questions. A hope for what could be between them.
“No,” he replied softly. Honestly. Probably the most honest Will had seen him when speaking of his relationship with El.
“No, I didn’t mean it. That’s probably why she couldn’t escape Vecna’s grasp right away. That was her on her own that got her out. She didn’t need me,” Mike added.
Before Will could say anything back, Mike told him,
“And I’m okay with that. I don’t need her to need me.”
Will’s eyes widened in shock. His mind relayed the conversation in the van. The one held prior before his concealed confession. Mike had disclosed his insecurities to Will about his relationship with El. Stating that was what worried him the most: El not needing him anymore. He didn’t understand the change in Mike’s mind.
Two months could really change a person.
“You are? I thought that’s what worried you the most?” Will asked, inching a bit closer to Mike.
“It was,” he spoke before a small grin crept its way onto his face. His eyes mirrored it as they shined a bit brighter when landing on Will. Will felt his heart shake a little at the notion.
“Until I felt needed more somewhere else,” his grin grew a little more when he saw the slight blush bloom across Will’s cheeks.
“I’m glad, Mike,” Will admitted shyly. Shifting back and forth on his hands.
“Yea, me too.”
WIll made a move to get up before speaking once more.
“Thanks for asking to speak,” it was quiet for a little more before Will admitted, “That’s been bothering me all this time.”
“All you had to do was ask,” Mike said looking up at Will. an unknown emotion dancing around in his eyes that Will couldn’t quite detect.
“I could say the same thing about you, Mike,” he laughed a little before heading towards the door for the third time this night. Getting a shirt had taken a lot longer than he expected it would.
He almost left again before that familiar soft voice called out again.
“Change your shirt and stay. Read this new comic with me for a while. Then we’ll sleep,” Mike offered, already picking it up as if he knew Will’s answer. ‘
WIll closed the door certainly this time and smiled walking back towards the bed.
“Okay.”