Magicaleigh
Recent works
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Is it dumb believing you might love me too? by Magicaleigh
Fandoms: Stranger Things (TV 2016)
07 Jan 2026
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Summary
Will just wants—no, he needs—someone he can be one hundred percent himself around. Someone who knows, someone who sees him, supports him, someone to share the burden of this secret. And he knows who he wants it to be: The person he’s always felt safest with, the person who always listens, who understands him better than anyone, who has never reacted badly to any of his darkest and strangest thoughts, who makes him feel like he’s not a mistake, like he’s better for being different.
Mike.
There’s no one Will trusts more, and no one he likes lying to less.
Or: Will comes out to Mike, and it goes better than he ever could've imagined.
Or: Five times Will didn't realize Mike was flirting with him (and one time he did)
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Summary
Mike wakes up—no, that’s not right.
Mike isn’t awake. Not now. Not yet. Maybe not ever again.
Series
- Part 2 of Come Sleep
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Summary
Maybe it’s the lingering adrenaline from the false alarm a moment ago, but Mike suddenly has a bad feeling deep in his gut. Something is off. Slowly, he walks around to look at Chrissy’s face.
White eyes. Rapid blinking. Unfocused. Unseeing.
Mike’s terror multiplies tenfold, heart rate ratcheting back up. He blinks and it’s Will standing in front of him, glaze-eyed and shaking, seizing, eyes twitching in their sockets, stuck in a waking nightmare as the Mind Flayer forces itself into every orifice.
He blinks again and it’s Chrissy, going through the same thing. Or something very similar.
Fuck. Not now. Not again.Or: After witnessing Chrissy's death, Mike finds himself on the frontlines of the latest interdimensional battle—and at the top of Hawkins’ Most Wanted list, as police, crazed townspeople, and otherworldly monsters all vie to get to him first.
Series
- Part 1 of Come Sleep
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Summary
How am I going to play this? I could fall back on old habits. I could sneer. I could insult him. That always worked when we were in school, but now I fear he’d see right through it. The act only worked then because it wasn’t an act. Not at first, anyway. I did, at one point, actually hate him, and he never had any reason to believe that had changed.
Now, though. Now he knows that was all fake, that I was just overcompensating to hide my true feelings. Now it’d only be a sign to him that I’m hiding something. That I still care. That I’m still hopelessly, tragically in love.
I can’t let him know that. Not after I broke up with him.Or: Two-odd years after the events of Carry On, Simon and Baz have broken up and gone no-contact. A chance encounter unearths old feelings.
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“Are you offended that people think we’re dating?”
“No,” Mike says immediately. “Of course not,” because, again, he should be so lucky.
Will’s baffled expression does not change. “Then why would I be?”
“So– okay, fine, whatever. Should we, like, tell them to get their heads out of their asses and that we’re not– um– dating, or–”
“I think,” Will cuts in, “well. You know what would be funny?”
Honestly, Mike doesn't know what he thought being Will Byers' fake-boyfriend would entail, but he definitely didn't think it would involve this many ugly Christmas sweaters.
- Language:
- English
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- 29,011
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Bookmarked by Magicaleigh
06 Feb 2026
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Summary
Oh. She thinks he and Will are dating.
And Mike knows it's wrong, he knows it is, but his mom is waging psychological warfare on him in the frozen food section at eight in the morning, and he hasn't even had coffee yet, and he really, really needs this. It would be vindicating. It would be his one chance at proving to his family that his thing for Tom Cruise wasn't a phase. And most importantly, it would be kind of hilarious.
"Mom," Mike says slowly, ducking his head to make pointed eye contact for the first time over the course of their conversation, "Will and I are together. Romantically. And I'm not having Christmas dinner without him."
Bookmarked by Magicaleigh
04 Feb 2026
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Summary
The feeling of being wanted is a powerful drug. Being wanted by the one you want is incomparable.
"Mike," Will says lowly. "You’re— You’re so close."
Too close, his brain supplies, a little hysterical. Too much.
Mike doesn’t pull away. "I know."
"Why?"
"Keeping up…" Mike exhales a short laugh that Will feels on his neck, "appearances."
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A guy hits on Will at a party, Mike leaves with a hickey, and by morning everybody thinks they're dating.
Will knows it’s supposed to be pretend. He just doesn’t know how to act like he hasn’t wanted this for as long as he can remember.
Bookmarked by Magicaleigh
01 Feb 2026
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Summary
The screaming is unusual.
Will’s nightmares rarely announce themselves like this. They usually arrive quietly, in the form of a locked jaw, trembling limbs, a desperate, instinctive commitment to silence. His fear is usually swallowed and choked back, even in slumber.
———————
Or, Will starts screaming in the night. Of course, Mike is there to comfort and protect him. But that’s just friendship… right?
———————
This is my love letter to Byler. Who in my heart end up together no matter what. It’s an exploration of genuine emotion, care, shared trauma and love in a friendship and how that can develop into something more. Something they’ve both waited a long time for.
Series
- Part 1 of Pockets of Safety
Bookmarked by Magicaleigh
14 Jan 2026
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Summary
Will struggles to develop a relationship with someone who will never truly understand. Several states away, Mike struggles to untangle his complicated web of grief. Despite their best efforts to move on, they both find themselves back where it all began: in Hawkins, Indiana. Together.
Bookmarked by Magicaleigh
13 Jan 2026