Archive of Our Own ^beta

PART I : A face on a lover with a fire in his heart / A man under cover, but you tore me apart

He’s an idiot. He knows he’s an idiot. But all of this could have been avoided if his mom wasn’t so damn meddlesome— really, she’s the main offender here. If she hadn’t kept prodding at him, prying into his personal life like he owes her a confessional every Sunday, then he could have enjoyed a normal Christmas. Slash-Hannukah, because if things were normal, he’d be spending the winter holidays at the Hopper-Byers house, just like he has every year since he came out to his family and left for college in Chicago.

Honestly, it was a relief to be free of his parents. He hadn’t expected them to understand, so when he cracked a joke at family dinner about crushing on River Phoenix, he was already prepared— his suitcase was packed upstairs with a month’s worth of clothes, his walkie and batteries, and a stack of bills from his summer job at Family Video.

There was no yelling, no condemnations or bible-thumping like he expected, just stunned silence. His father said something about conversion camp, and his mom was looking at him with wide, wet eyes, like he was broken, and the decision was made. Really, it was a weight off his shoulders.

He only intended to stay with Will’s family until Steve and Robin finished settling into their new apartment, where they promised him a room to himself if he agreed to pay a portion of their rent, but the Hopper-Byers house had expanded after the spring of ‘86 to include space for the Chief and El, and they’d added an extra guest room, and Joyce assured him it wouldn’t be any trouble for them to have him there until college.

So Mike stayed. And for a long time, things were good.

He and Will applied to several of the same out-of-state schools, determined to make up for lost time— there’s nothing like a road trip from hell and an interdimensional apocalypse to mend a friendship. After the events of the previous year, they were closer than ever, the tension between them dissipating alongside El and Mike’s dumpster fire of a relationship. And even though Mike ached to be more than Will’s college roommate, he wasn’t about to destroy what he’d spent an entire summer repairing.

They were set on NYU for a while, because Jonathan was majoring in photography there and raved about the visual arts program to Will every time he called, but then Nancy mentioned the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, which was kind of a mouthful but touted renowned art and writing programs. They visited that winter, and Will was starry-eyed the whole drive home. With the guaranteed college admission Owens had promised the Party to buy their silence on the whole Upside Down catastrophe, it was a done deal.

And every winter since, Mike’s been spending Hannukah and Christmas with the Byers-Hopper clan, gorging on latkes and kugel and lobbing snowballs at Hopper as he hangs Christmas lights on the roof.

And that’s how he likes it. Surrounded by the people who know him best, better than his own family, at least. Nancy spends most of her break with them, too, since she and Jonathan are still being disgusting together.

This year would’ve been the same, a blissful respite after the living hell that was finals week, but no. No, Mike just had to bump into his mother at the grocery store at eight in the morning, when he looked like he’d recently been resurrected from the dead and toothpaste was still crusted in the corner of his mouth.

To be fair, he’d volunteered to go shopping. Will was exhausted from driving them home the day before, and El was still cramming for her finals at Ancilla Community College, and Hopper and Joyce were both at work. And they desperately needed food. Like, it was bad.

He was browsing the frozen food aisle for El’s latest obsession— pizza bagels— when she cornered him.

Well, maybe that’s a bit dramatic. But in Mike’s defense, he hadn’t seen her in person for at least two years. It was kind of a shock.

He heard her before he saw her, high heels clacking to an abrupt stop a few feet away.

“Michael, is that you?”

His first thought is that one of his high school teachers has clocked him. Nobody’s called him Michael since he was seventeen, maybe.

But then he turns and sees his mom, her blonde curls swept back and makeup fresh on her face, walking towards him with renewed purpose.

His second thought is that he needs to run.

But he’s closed in by the freezer behind him, and she looks strangely happy to see him, and— Mike isn’t proud of it, okay? But he returns her nervous smile with one of his own, even though it doesn’t reach his eyes, waving awkwardly.

“Hi, Mom.”

“Oh, it’s so good to see you,” she says, like he’s one of her jazzercise accountability buddies, and Mike fights the urge to roll his eyes. Be civil. Be civil, and then he can get El’s pizza bagels and get the fuck home.

“It’s good to see you, too,” he says, smiling tightly.

“How’s school? Have— have you met any pretty girls in your classes?”

Oh, nevermind, fuck this.

Her face is wide-open with undisguised hope, like his coming out never happened, like he didn’t leave home and cut off contact with her because of the fact that he’s a raging queer and she won’t ever understand that. Did he meet any girls at school? Mike is gripped by the sudden urge to go running with his shopping cart right out the double doors of Hawkins Grocery, but in a show of staggering emotional maturity, he manages to remain stationary.

“No, mom,” he says, and, before he can stop himself, “As you might recall, I’m gay.”

Her expression flickers, eyes blinking in annoyance. She tilts her head at him, and he’s thrown back into the past— it’s the same look she’d give him when he was being a little shit at family reunions, or when he got in fights at school (only defending Will’s honor, obviously), right down to the slant of her eyebrows and the tension in her jaw. Mike isn’t prepared for the effect it has on him.

“Honey, we— we miss you,” she says, her irritation seemingly melting. It’s painfully typical of her to be dismissive, ignore his comment altogether. It’s how she copes. She fiddles with the ring on her right hand, twisting it nervously. “And we were thinking— your father and I— that… that you might want to join us for Christmas dinner this year.”

Her eyes grow wet, and Mike swallows nervously. A wave of nausea grips him.

“And I know things have been… stilted, between us, but I really feel that we would all benefit from this. Nancy’s already agreed.”

Oh, she’s definitely bullshitting. Nancy never spends Christmas with them, because she’s always at the Hopper-Byers house. Mike knows this, on account of the fact that he fucking lives there, but he doubts his mom does. It would be comical if she wasn’t still looking at him like she‘s a second away from having a Will-doing-math-homework level breakdown.

“Holly misses you, too,” his mom says, and fuck. She’s whipping out the big guns here. Holly is his one regret; they haven’t been able to see each other since he left, because his father refuses to let her leave the house with Nancy— he says it’s because of her history with totalling cars over the years, which is bullshit because Nancy’s a great driver when she isn’t being chased by the government or an interdimensional eldritch nightmare, but Mike knows the real reason. He doesn’t want Holly seeing Mike, not as long as he’s “confused.” It’s infuriating.

But here his mom is, offering his little sister up like bait.

Mike can’t help it; he’s an idiot. And guilt-ridden. And his mom is still batting her teary eyes at him like she actually cares.

“Alright,” he says. “Alright, I’ll come over on Christmas. But just for dinner.”

A smile breaks over her face, and if Mike wasn’t a lifelong scholar of emotional manipulation, he’d maybe believe it was genuine. “That’s great, honey, that’s— thank you. Your father will be so glad to see you.”

Bullshit.

“On one condition,” Mike says. He’ll never hear the end of it, but he’s sure as hell not doing this alone. “Will gets to come, too.”

His mother sighs, her smile receding like his father’s hairline. “I really thought you’d be done with that boy by now, Michael.”

Okay, what? Firstly, Will is his best friend. Mike could never be done with him, that’s not how friendships like theirs work. They’re stuck with each other, whether she likes it or not. And secondly, she’s looking at him weird. Like the rose-tinted glasses preventing her from acknowledging his sexuality have finally been ripped off her face.

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 just a phase. And most importantly, it would be kind of hilarious.

Will will understand. He’ll think it’s hilarious, too, Mike reasons, because they’ve always had the same sense of humor, it’s part of the reason they work. It’ll be like… a running bit. Totally harmless.

“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.”

Considering the way the words make his heart rate spike, Mike thinks he delivers a pretty convincing performance.

She searches his face for a moment before her shoulders drop in defeat, and she nods, resigned. “Fine. Fine, you win. If this is what it takes to let us see you, fine.”

She twists her ring again, a nervous tic, and meets his eyes one last time. “We’ll expect you around seven.”

“That works,” Mike says, turning to grab the pizza bagels from the freezer behind him and throwing the box into his now-full shopping cart. Leave leave leave, his brain screams like a stuck vinyl record, and he hightails it to the checkout without a backward glance.

When he gets in his car, the gravity of what he’s done hits him in a wave. Christmas dinner at his parents’ house. With Will. With Will, who Mike is definitely not dating.

He slams his forehead down on the steering wheel, releasing a long, drawn-out scream.

He is so screwed.

When he gets back to the Hopper-Byers house, Will is lounging on the living room couch with a bowl of dry Cheerios. Mike wasn’t kidding when he said their food situation was dire.

He drops an armful of groceries on the kitchen counter, panting from the effort of carrying them all the way in from the car. Will glances up from Star Wars: Empire Strikes Back, amused.

“Need any help?”

Mike just glowers at him, breaking into a grin when Will laughs. “This is everything, so no. But you can help me put it all away.”

He isn’t serious, but Will sets his cereal aside and gets to his feet all the same, trailing into the kitchen. He stretches his arms above his head, yawning, and Mike laughs.

“Still recovering from the drive?”

“Yes,” Will sighs, shaking his head at himself. “I didn’t think it’d be this bad, but the sleep deprivation from finals week got to me, I guess.”

“Yeah, you didn’t even have finals last year, did you?” Mike asks, avoiding Will’s eyes as he puts the milk in the fridge. He’ll have to explain what went down at the store at some point, but it’s still pretty early, and the morning sunlight is painting everything in a soft golden glow, and Mike doesn’t want to disrupt the peace when Will’s still half-asleep on his feet.

“Yeah, I just had, like, painting assignments and projects to turn in. But this year we had to build these portfolios, and… it was just a lot.”

“That sounds stressful,” Mike agrees, laughing when Will tries to put away the corn flakes and has to stretch up on his tip-toes to reach the highest shelf in the pantry. Joyce insists they keep the cereal there, because if they don’t, Will will consume all of it before they can enjoy some for themselves. She isn’t wrong.

“Shut up,” Will says, a smile in his voice. Mike ignores the fluttery feeling in his chest, which he’s actually gotten pretty good at lately. What can he say? He’s a learned expert of emotional constipation. Thanks, Dad.

“Want me to do it?” Mike asks, grinning wider when Will turns and levels him with a glare.

“I’m not even that short!”

“Yeah, yeah,” Mike concedes, grabbing the box from Will and sliding it onto the highest shelf with ease. “Put the ice cream away before it melts.”

“You got ice cream? It’s December, Mike.”

“El wanted some!”

“You have got to stop enabling her,” Will says, but he shoves the pint of mint chocolate-chip into the freezer anyway.

They put away the rest of the food in amicable silence, soaking up the tranquility of having zero deadlines, lectures, or exams to worry about. When they’re done, cramming the plastic shopping bags into the kitchen trash, Mike grabs an apple and they trail back into the living room. Star Wars drones on, the volume on low, as they flop bonelessly onto the couch.

Mike turns to get a good look at Will— he’s gotten pretty stealthy over the years, so much so that he’s started allowing himself a solid minute of staring at least once a day. It’s not creepy. Mike is very respectful about it, and it’s not like he hasn’t seen Will stare at other guys before. There’s nothing wrong with it. It’s taken him a while to accept that, but he really believes it. Is it a little weird that he’s in love with his best friend and hasn’t told him even after moving into his childhood home? Yeah, yes. It is. But there’s nothing wrong with— with admiring him. From an objective, aesthetic standpoint. This morning, he’s wearing one of Jonathan’s NYU sweatshirts, and the sleeves are rolled up to his elbows, exposing his forearms. Is Mike weird for having a thing for Will’s forearms?

Actually, forget he asked that. He doesn’t want to know.

He’s still staring when Will nudges him, his eyes searching Mike’s face. “You’re zoned out,” he says, a tinge of worry coloring his voice. “Everything okay?”

After Vecna, they both made it a point to check in on each other often. It was strange, at first, because Mike was always just used to being Will’s support system and had never really expected anything in return. But his trance and what came after changed things, and now Will takes note of his silences, asks how he is if he’s up getting water in the middle of the night or spacing out while they’re out with friends. It’s nice, being checked in on. It makes him feel wanted, not just needed.

But right now, it wakes the coil of nervousness in Mike’s gut. He swallows, trying for casual. He never has been able to lie to Will for long.

“Yeah, I just… I saw my mom at the grocery store.”

Will’s brows furrow together, and he mutes the T.V., sitting up more fully. “Shit, Mike. Why didn’t you say something sooner?”

“I don’t know,” Mike says weakly, avoiding Will’s worried gaze. “I don’t know, I just— didn’t want to worry you. And anyway, uh, nothing bad happened. She just… she invited me for dinner on Christmas.”

Something like hurt spills over Will’s face, and he moves closer to Mike on the couch. The air between them hums. “What’d you say?”

“I… She told me Holly missed me, and I caved. I’m sorry, Will, I just— she kept looking at me like she actually wanted me there, and I—,”

“Hey,” Will’s saying, putting a comforting hand on Mike’s shoulder, “It’s okay, don’t apologize, Mike. Just breathe.”

He didn’t mean to panic like this, but suddenly the weight of what he’s gotten them into is hitting him all over again. He nods as Will rubs his shoulder comfortingly, ignoring the heat that washes over him at the contact.

He’s so screwed. God.

“That’s not all of it,” he says, his voice coming out quiet. Will leans forward to hear him better, nodding encouragingly for him to go on.

Mike swallows hard. “She made this comment, about me meeting girls at school, and I told her… I told her I’d only come for dinner if you could come, too. And then she looked at me funny, and I just knew. She thinks we’re dating. And… well, I wanted you there with me, so I didn’t exactly refute it.”

There’s a beat of tense silence.

“Wait, so—,” Will starts, shaking his head like he’s Dustin stuck on a Physics problem. “So your mom agreed to let us both stay for dinner under the guise that we’re a couple?”

“Yeah,” Mike breathes out. He risks a glance at Will, and feels a wave of relief at the expression on his face. A devilish grin tugs at his mouth.

“That’s hilarious,” Will says, and the tension in Mike’s shoulders melts.

“Oh, thank fuck,” Mike says, barking out a laugh when Will dissolves into giggles beside him. He leans into Mike’s space, and a buzzing warmth envelops them.

God, he loves Will.

Stop that, the logical side of his brain scolds. Mike mentally flips it off in response.

“What, were you worried I’d be mad at you?” Will asks when they’ve caught their breath. His eyes are shining in the sunlight slanting in from the living room windows.

“I mean, yeah,” Mike says. His voice sounds small, and he cringes inwardly at it. Will’s expression softens.

“Jesus, Mike. No, I’m not mad. This’ll be a riot, you’ve just given me a free pass to terrorize your dad for an hour and guaranteed we’ll be eating something actually edible on Christmas. That’s a win in my book.”

“So you’ll do it?” Mike asks, and Will nods emphatically, still gripping his shoulder.

“Of course, are you serious? I’m not sending you over there by yourself. It’ll be fun, we’ll play the whole thing up,” he says. “And you’ll finally get to see Holly.”

“Yeah,” Mike says, a little more sure of himself. This will be fine. It’s only an hour or two of their time, he’ll get his moment of gay triumph, and his little sister will finally be reminded of his existence. With Will by his side, even the shittier moments will be bearable. “Yeah, okay. Thanks, Will.”

“Of course,” Will says again, his voice soft. He really does look great in the NYU sweatshirt— it’s a crisp navy, and instead of taking away from Will’s dark features, it only seems to highlight them more. There are circles under his eyes from the lack of sleep in the past week, but he’s still unfairly gorgeous in the early light.

“Wanna finish the movie with me?”

God, Mike needs to get a hold of himself. His allotted minute of staring is up, goddammit.

“Uh-huh,” he manages, nodding and turning towards the T.V. screen. He prays Will can’t hear the hummingbird-fast beat of his heart against his chest.

They stay side-by-side, not paying any mind to each other’s personal space. This part is customary for them, comfortable, and Mike lets himself relax against the couch, resting his head on Will’s shoulder. They’ve always been touchy, and even though it sends his nerves alight with that buzzy, heady feeling that just won’t leave him alone when Will’s involved, Mike takes comfort in the easy familiarity.

An hour passes before El gets home, her arrival signaled by a gust of frigid air sweeping into the house and punctuated by the slamming of the front door. Mike jumps at the sound.

“I am going to kill my English professor!”

Will whips around to look wide-eyed at Mike, clapping a hand over his mouth to muffle a laugh.

El stomps into the living room, her eyes blazing and her hands curled into fists at her sides.

“She gave my final essay a C! And she wrote, ‘look for reputable sources’ in the margins! My sources are reputable! She is lucky I did not dismember her during our last lecture today.”

“El,” Will says slowly, a gentle playfulness coating his words, “what sources did you use, exactly?”

El sighs heavily. She paces in front of them, wringing her hands, and oh, this is a whole thing. “Myself!”

Mike shoots Will an amused glance, then looks back at El. She’s clearly displacing some anger here— Steve and his stupid Psych degree would have a field day— but it is finals week, and he knows that she’s been working herself to the bone.

El’s majoring in Kinesiology; after Max woke up, she had to undergo a pretty extensive physical therapy program, and Lucas and El often accompanied her to appointments. Over time, movement became easier for her despite her bad pain days, and El watched it all with wonder. She came home one day after Max made a breakthrough and announced that she knew what she wanted to do for college. ‘She is smiling more and more now,’ El said that night over dinner, her eyes shining. ‘And I heard her singing when we were baking yesterday. I want to do what those doctors do. I want to help other people like Max.’

So even though she’s just catching up with core classes, Mike knows how much it matters to her to do well in school. And he can’t stand seeing her upset.

“Well, nobody explained all the Works Cited bullshit to you,” Mike says, his voice going soft, “So you can’t blame yourself for that, El. Some professors are just shitty. It’s just one C, I promise you’ll be okay.”

El sighs again, her eyebrows drawing together. “Are you sure?”

“Of course,” Will answers for him, “Seriously, El, I’ve gotten way worse grades in my math classes. Thank God I’m done with core curriculum.”

“And hey, you won’t have to worry about English at all next year,” Mike adds. El brightens, a little, and moves to join them on the couch, nestling up to Will’s side and giggling when he bats her cold hands away.

“Jesus Christ, your hands are freezing! El, don’t put them on my neck—!”

Mike cackles, the sound bright in the mid-morning quiet, and pulls Will off the couch to escape his sister’s wrath.

El vaults herself off the couch, hands outstretched in a wordless threat. “Come here, Will!”

“Stay away!” Will yells, laughing and dodging behind Mike when El darts out to grab him.

Mike doesn’t mean to trip, but he’s wearing these fuzzy candy-cane patterned socks that Nancy sent him as an early Christmas gift, and they’ve got wooden floors now, and, well—

Will moves behind him, and El darts forward, and Mike stumbles back, sending him and Will sprawling.

“Oh, shit—!”

They fall so fast Mike barely has time to cushion the back of Will’s head with his hand, but the Universe must do him a solid as an apology for this morning, because somehow he manages it before they hit the ground.

Will’s taken the brunt of the fall, what with Mike being on top of him and everything, but Mike’s hand is still cradling his head, his other hand braced on the floor beside them. Will’s breathing hard, the wind knocked out of him, but he’s staring up at Mike with something like reverence in his eyes.

Could just be the shock of getting thrown to the living-room floor, though. That’s definitely it. Mike needs to stop letting himself hope.

El gasps in sympathy, already offering Mike a hand to help them up.

“Will, you okay?” Mike asks, when he can finally speak again. Will nods, a small smile tugging at his lips.

“Yeah, but I’d be better if you’d get off of me,” he says, outright laughing when Mike scowls in mock-offense. He grabs El’s outstretched hand and pulls himself to his feet, looking down at Will fondly.

“Seriously, are you okay?”

“Oh my God, yes, Mom,” Will laughs, finally getting up off the floor. He brushes lint off of his sweatpants and sighs. “Now that you’re both here, I need to warn you guys that Jonathan’s bringing the whole gang over for movie night tonight.”

El’s eyes go wide. “Wait, Steve and Nancy and Robin and Argyle?”

“No,” Mike says in a daze. He hadn’t prepared for this level of socialization, and the thought of dealing with Steve and Robin and Argyle on top of the Party is overwhelming, to say the least. “No, no, they weren’t supposed to get here ‘til the nineteenth!”

“I’m sorry,” Will says, patting Mike on the shoulder mournfully, “I tried to reason with him, really I did.”

“Oh, this is perfect!” El is practically bouncing with excitement now, her face lit up, and maybe it slightly makes up for the absolute chaos that tonight entails. Just a little. “I need to call Max and tell her they’ll be here; she has missed Robin so much!”

“It’ll be okay, Mike,” Will says. “We’ll do our campaign in my room, and that’ll keep Steve away.”

Mike sighs, resigned to their fate. He’s definitely going to wake up with a noise-induced migraine tomorrow, but El’s rushing into the kitchen for the phone, dialing Max’s number, and Will’s leaning into his side contentedly, and that somehow makes it okay.

They’d made plans a week ago to meet up with the rest of the Party the day after Mike and Will got out for winter break. Max and Lucas were already home from Loyola, and Dustin came home from Indiana Tech the day before Will and Mike.

They’d been calling every week since they went their separate ways, and Mike would be lying if he said their absence hasn’t been hard on him. Will, too, of course, but college opened up a whole new door for him in terms of meeting different people— art majors are a little more approachable than the kids in Mike’s creative writing classes.

He went out for drinks with a couple of people from one of his seminars, but they were just so… pretentious. Competitive. He went home the same night and watched Will work on a gouache painting of a five-headed lizard for an hour, and instantly felt better. And he likes Will’s friends, with their dyed hair and rings and ripped jeans, even if their music taste is highly questionable and some of the jokes they make go totally over his head. They’re inviting and warm, everything Will puts out into the world and deserves in return— Mike is happy for him, really.

But he’s eager to get the Party back together, and he knows Will is, too.

“Yes, Argyle will be here, too. I’m sorry!” El is saying, twirling the phone cord around her finger, “But so will Robin! Robin and Steve! You like them.”

Will tugs Mike into the kitchen to catch Max’s response— he ignores the warmth that washes over him at the contact.

“Yeah, but the last time we all hung out with Steve and Robin they convinced Dustin there was a radioactive fungus in their crawlspace and then locked him in there as a joke when he went to investigate,” Max reminds her, and Mike can just see her deadpan expression— wow, maybe he’s missed Max—, “And then he got stuck for like, four hours and we had to call the fire department. Do you really want to invite that energy into your own home?”

El sighs, rolling her eyes at Will, who’s laughing silently beside Mike, his hand over his mouth. “Max, you underestimate my zest for chaos.”

“Yeah, Max,” Lucas’s voice spills through the phone, “Quit underestimating El’s zest!”

“Lucas,” Will says, grabbing for the phone, “Lucas, get your ass over here already! Mike almost killed us and now we’re bored!”

There’s a squabbling on the other end of the line, like Lucas and Max are fighting for the phone, and El holds it away from her ear and grimaces.

“If they come over early, we have to call Dustin, too,” she says. “And let Dad know they’ll be here when he gets home. He needs to be… emotionally prepared.”

Ominous.

“I’ll do it,” Will tells her, laughing when she sets the phone down on the kitchen counter and waits for the fighting to stop. “Mike, my room. Come on.”

His face goes red. He knows his face goes red because he blushes at fucking everything and of course Will’s meaning doesn’t register until a full second later— their second phone is in his room. He’s calling Dustin and Hop, fucking duh, but it’s early and Mike is still reeling from the run-in with his mom, and Will is looking at him with this gentle expression that’s sending his heart rate dangerously high.

Fuck. How is he going to deal with pretending to date Will if he’s barely managing just acting normal around him? How did he think he could do this without short-circuiting his brain like one of Dustin’s failed robotics projects?

Jesus, Mike needs to get a grip.

“Yeah, sure,” he manages, trailing after Will out of the kitchen and down the hall.

Will’s room is freshly-vacuumed and unchanged from how he left it the last time they visited home— his stack of sci-fi dystopia novels on the nightstand, his art from senior year studio lining the walls, posters for the Talking Heads and The Who and U2, piles of knit blankets on his bed that reappear in his room every October because he hates getting cold at night. Mike hasn’t seen it since the last time they came home from school, which was nearly two months ago. He breathes in, inhaling the familiar scent of pencil shavings and crayon and something unnamable under it, something distinctly Will.

“So, I may have had ulterior motives for dragging you in here,” Will says conspiratorily, jolting Mike from his reverie.

“Concerning,” Mike says, grinning when Will smiles. “Continue.”

Will’s smile changes, then, going kind of tight, and he breathes in like he’s psyching himself up for something. “So, you can totally veto this, but I was just thinking… um. We might need to, like, practice if we really wanna fool your mom on Christmas.”

It takes a minute for the meaning to sink in, and then Mike’s heart skips a beat.

“Oh,” he says, cringing when it comes out a little breathless. He clears his throat, forces nonchalance into his tone. “Yeah, that makes sense. So, uh, what— what exactly would that entail?”

Will’s eyes go wide. “Oh. I wasn’t really expecting you to agree. Um, I guess just… acting couple-y around the Party. If you’re comfortable with that, I mean. Just— just to see if we can get a reaction out of them, y’know? So we go into dinner with your mom with an idea of what does and doesn’t work. So we don’t mess it up.”

It’s a solid point. Really, Mike is grateful to Will for going all-in on this, fully committing to the bit, but a small, selfish part of him is screaming no, no, no. No, you idiot, he’ll figure it out. It’s almost Shakespearean, the clusterfuck of a situation he’s in, because it’s entirely self-imposed. God, Mike really is his own worst enemy.

He doesn’t deserve Will.

But still, he finds himself nodding. What else can he do? Will’s looking at him with a cautious, hopeful expression, which— which Mike doesn’t let himself analyze, because he just can’t risk getting it wrong and ruining everything. Ruining their friendship. And he’d probably be getting it wrong.

“Sure,” he says, his tone light. “Sure, that’s a good idea.”

“Okay,” Will says, his voice small, and then he shakes his head as if clearing a fog and grabs for the phone on his nightstand. “Awesome. I mean, cool. I’m gonna call Dustin and Dad now.”

“Okay,” Mike parrots, flopping down on Will’s bed and looking around at all the art on his walls. “You have fun with that.”

“If Hop yells at me, you’re doing damage control,” Will replies, grinning. The tension between them— which Mike is probably definitely imagining— melts, and Will dials Dustin’s number with careful precision. He has their numbers all memorized, has since ‘85.

The painting Mike’s looking at is new. He hadn’t noticed it the last time they visited— it’s an empty swing set, the backdrop a vivid kaleidoscope of orange and pink and red, a Hawkins sunset.

“Yeah, Dad, they’re staying for dinner,” Will’s saying, pacing as he talks, “I told Jonathan we wouldn’t have room for everyone, but he was persistent. Yeah, they’re coming over now. Well, Dustin and Lucas, not Jonathan and the others. I know. Yeah, we’ll keep things contained. Alright, see you tonight.”

He sets the phone down with a soft click, shooting Mike a nervous grin. “Dustin’s on his way. Also, um. How did you wanna do this?”

Mike sits up and turns to face him, caught off-guard. “You were the one who suggested it,” he says, half-accusatory and half-amused. “But, I mean, I’m down for whatever. We’re already kind of touchy, but if we really play that up they’ll probably catch on pretty quickly. And I— I could, like, hold your hand. Or call you pet names, or something stupid like that.”

Is Will blushing, or is it just the light? Mike focuses intently on the floor to avoid further embarrassment. God, what did he get them into?

“Sure, that works,” Will says, his voice coming out light. “I just— I was really just trying to ask about boundaries, I guess. How far is too far, for you?”

Mike swallows thickly. “Um,” he starts, heat already rising on his cheeks, “I… I guess kissing in front of them would be way too obvious. And we can’t do that in front of my mom, anyway, so… so.”

God, he wants to sink into the floor.

“So maybe we draw the line there. Anything else— hand-holding, hugging, compliments and pet names and all that sappy stuff— that’s good with me.”

“Okay,” Will says, nodding. There’s something in his expression that Mike can’t pin down. “Yeah, that works.”

“You’re sure about this?” Mike asks, trying not to sound as nervous as he feels. His heart is doing cartwheels in his chest.

Will’s expression flickers, like he’s debating saying something else, before he nods. “Yeah, of course.”

Mike doesn’t let himself think too hard about that.

Before he can come up with a suave enough segue, though, there’s an explosion of noise at the front door, El’s excited yell carrying all the way down the hall, and then a thundering in the house like several people running.

Will and Mike lock eyes— the Party’s here.

They go running for the door just a few seconds before it flings open, and then they’re all crashing into each other, a giant, jumbled group hug— Max’s hair is in Mike’s face, Lucas’s elbow digging into his ribs, Dustin’s gleeful, shoulder-shaking laugh threatening to topple them all to the ground. Mike’s caught in the middle of all of them, El and Will pressing into his sides, and it’s only when Max chokes out, “Can’t breathe, Jeez, Wheeler,” that they all extricate themselves from the embrace.

They all look the same, Mike notes with relief: Max is brandishing her cane at a grinning Dustin, who’s wearing a hoodie that reads “Ask Me About Covalent Bonds” in bold green. Lucas is just as tall and unfairly ripped as he’s been since their freshman year of high school, but he’s changed out of his usual jock uniform and into a form-fitting turtleneck, which— Mike’s looking away. Yep. Not that he thinks of Lucas that way, God no, especially not when there’s Will.

And that’s another thing— Will’s still pressed up beside him, a warm line of familiarity. Mike leans into the contact, testing the waters.

“I can’t believe we all survived finals,” Dustin says, and everyone laughs in that jangly, nervous way they do when it’s been a while since they’ve all been in the same room.

“Yeah, I thought for sure I was gonna fail Stats,” Max says. “Steve did not prepare me for the perils of getting a Psych degree. Bastard.”

“Hey,” Dustin protests, “You passed, didn’t you? Also, don’t blame Steve for your lack of preparation.”

Max glares in his general direction. “Firstly, I resent your hero worship and diagnose you with codependency disease. It’s terminal. Secondly, I passed at a great cost.”

“What cost?” Mike asks, making sure she can hear the grin in his voice, “The last shred of your compassion? We haven’t seen Dustin for like, a million years and you’re already ripping his head off.”

Max swings her cane at his knees, and he stumbles back into Will, cursing. “Jesus! How did you know exactly where to aim?!”

Lucas barks out a laugh, and Max just grins wickedly. Violent impulses aside, Mike’s missed her like hell. They got unexpectedly close after they were both mind-palace tortured by Vecna, and after Mike told her about Will. Around the others, though, they have a reputation of hostility to maintain, and that means Mike lobbing baseless insults and Max inflicting physical harm on him in small socially-acceptable increments. So far, it’s worked out great for them.

“Guys, stop fighing,” Will says, rolling his eyes fondly. “And can we migrate? As much as I love having everyone crowded together in my room, I think we’d have more fun in the kitchen. Mom got a bunch of stuff to bake cookies the other day.”

“Oh, hell yes,” Dustin says, and Lucas laughs again, loud and bright, and Mike feels a surge of love for his friends.

El tugs him by the wrist out Will’s bedroom door, everyone talking over each other already, and Will moves beside him and slips his hand into Mike’s free one, smiling mischeviously.

And so it begins.

Lucas hops up onto one of the kitchen barstools, tapping Max on the shoulder and pulling the other one out for her to sit in.

Dustin leans against the stove, rambling to El about some final project he’d done this semester for an introductory engineering course. She listens with rapt attention, her eyes wide and shining under the warm kitchen lights.

Will moves to the pantry, tugging Mike with him.

“Alright, so we need flour, sugar, eggs… chocolate chips?”

“Yes yes yes!” El cuts in, beaming. “Do we have the caramel kind, too?”

“Don’t think so,” Will says apologetically. “That’s on Mike, though. Sorry, guys, I really thought I trained him better than this.”

And then he turns to lock eyes with Mike and fucking smirks, and Mike’s heart climbs into his throat.

Neither of them miss the curious glance Lucas shoots Dustin. Will grins wider, ruffling Mike’s hair before turning back to the pantry and grabbing all the ingredients in one armful. Mike moves to help him, but he pushes past Mike, hip-checking him as he does.

Lucas outright laughs.

Two can play at this game, Mike thinks.

“Hey, Will, remind me again what I’m

charging you for making me your personal housemaid? You know, besides the scintillating pleasure of your company?”

Max chokes on a sip of water, spluttering as Lucas laughs again.

Will sighs, pulling Joyce’s chocolate-chip cookie recipe out of their junk drawer, and Mike has no idea how he’s still keeping a straight face.

El pounces on the recipe, oblivious to their back-and-forth, and Dustin starts getting out the mixing bowl and measuring cups.

“If I’m remembering right, it’s two hugs per grocery store run, but… I don’t know, you kind of screwed up this time. I mean, no caramel chocolate chips? That’s a Hopper-Byers staple, Mike,” Will says.

“I’m sorry, did you say you’re paying Mike in hugs?” Max asks, an evil smile stretching across her face. Inwardly, Mike counts it as a win. Maybe they really can do this. His mom already thinks they’re together— if they can fool his friends, they can definitely fool her.

For a split second, Will’s face goes pale in faux-shock, but smooths over just as quick. He plasters on a nervous smile, eyes drifting from Mike to Max across the kitchen. “Uh, yeah. It was a joke, obviously.”

He really should’ve minored in theater.

“Yeah, Maxine,” Mike says in his I’m-pretending-to-hate-you voice, “Keep up, jeez.”

“Yeah, jeez!” El parrots absentmindedly, clearly paying zero attention to them. She’s poring over the recipe, instructing Dustin as he does the work for all of them, pouring flour into the mixing bowl and cursing when some of it spills and dusts the floor.

“I can’t believe this,” Max complains, draping herself over Lucas dramatically, “You invite me into your home after months of my absence and immediately slander me. What kind of household is this? Who the fuck are you people?”

“And those months were agonizing, truly,” Mike says, grinning when Will mirrors Max, leaning heavily on his shoulder and nestling into the crook of his neck. Lucas’s eyes grow to the size of dinner plates— another win. The loss? Mike’s sanity. He’s so distracted by the warm weight of Will against him that he forgets to finish his previous thought.

Max’s eyes narrow in suspicion, and she turns to Lucas imploringly. “What are they doing? Stalker, narrate! You’re my eyes, we’ve talked about this.”

“Sorry, sorry,” Lucas manages, his eyebrows coming together in an expression of profound confusion. Mike almost laughs. “Uh… Will’s just copying you. As a… joke.”

Will smiles innocently, throwing his arms around Mike’s neck like… like a koala. He’s so warm. God, Mike is going to die. “Yeah, Max, I’m just joking around. I think it distracted Mike, though. What were you saying, again?”

Mike swallows, scrambling, “Uh, just that— we really have missed you. All of you guys.”

“Aww, he does have a heart!” Max croons.

“Shut up,” Mike shoots back, grinning. “Dustin, El, how’s the recipe coming?”

“Perfect so far,” El says, cracking three eggs in rapid succession with her powers. Dustin watches in undisguised wonder— even after seeing her flip vans and make people bleed from their eyes, he’s captivated by little things like this. Mike can practically see the cogs in his brain turning. “No thanks to you.”

“Sorry, guys,” Will says, actually sounding it. He moves to help them, pouring sugar into a measuring cup. He’s getting it on Jonathan’s sweatshirt, and his hair’s spilling into his eyes— they’ve both gone for far too long without a haircut— and only then is Mike hit with the idea.

If Nancy ever questions his intellect again, he’s putting this moment on the record as indisputable evidence that he’s a fucking genius.

“Hey, Will,” he says, stealthily dipping his hand into the open bag of flour on the counter. Just as Will turns, Mike brushes his hand over Will’s nose, dusting it with flour.

El cackles.

“What just happened?” Max asks, shaking Lucas by the shoulder.

“Mike just… booped Will’s nose?” Lucas says, his tone vaguely disbelieving. “With flour. And now Will’s retaliating.”

Mike whirls back around just as Will smears flour down his forehead, grinning devilishly, and oh, it’s so on.

El shrieks as Mike upends the measuring cup of sugar Will was just pouring, dusting his hair with it.

“Oh, fuck you,” Will says, but he’s beaming, and then he flies at Mike and slams into him, and they’re sliding sock-footed across the kitchen tile, half-wrestling and half-hugging as the others break out into laughter.

“What the hell are you guys on?” Dustin yells over the chaos. Somehow, Will’s gotten Mike in a headlock— he doesn’t know how it happened.

“Do you surrender?” Will’s asking, breathing hard through his laughter as Mike struggles.

“Will’s beating Mike up,” Lucas tells Max. She nods approvingly.

“Fucking finally. Knock him out, Will!”

“I surrender, I surrender,” Mike says breathlessly, holding up his hands, and Will releases him so fast he nearly falls. He grabs onto Will’s shoulder for leverage, and Will steadies him by the waist. It sends a thrill through Mike, hot and electric. He swallows thickly and tries with everything in him to ignore it.

“Shit, Mike, don’t fall,” Will says, genuine concern coating his words. He’s still panting, flour dusting his nose, and Mike is gripped by the sudden urge to reach out and brush it away.

He looks up into Will’s eyes, and it’s— it’s like time slows to a crawl. The rest of the room falls away, and it’s just them— performance or not— inches apart. Up close, Will’s eyelashes are dusted with sugar, his eyes dark and endless.

Mike can’t help himself— instinctually, his eyes dart down to Will’s lips, chapped from the December cold and bitten red. He has a nasty habit of biting his bottom lip when his mind is somewhere else. It’s having quite the effect on Mike. He blinks slowly, and Will breathes out fast and hard, and all at once he remembers where they are.

Oh, Jesus.

The others aren’t even trying to hide their shock— El’s staring open-mouthed as Dustin just shakes his head at them and wordlessly slides the cookie tray into the oven. Across the kitchen, Lucas is trying to catch El’s eye, just as surprised. Max is narrowing her eyes in their general direction, clearly picking up on the change in energy. The room does feel hotter, all of a sudden.

God, are they good at this? Mike thinks they might be good at this. He looks to Will again for confirmation and blushes when he finds that he’s already staring.

There’s that something in his face that Mike can’t name, affection and amusement something heavier, but then he sees Mike seeing and smooths his expression into a warm smile. Mike relaxes— this look, he knows. This look is familiar, safe. He mirrors it, grinning fondly back at Will.

“Uh,” Lucas says loudly, “Okay. What the fuck is going on with you guys?”

They whip around to face the rest of the Party, and even though this is all pretend, an elaborate scheme, Mike still feels oddly caught. His heart hammers hard in his chest, and he looks to Will again for reassurance, but he’s just staring at El.

El, who’s watching them with a piercing look on her face, like she knows something that even they don’t.

“Yeah, shit’s gotten really weird really fast,” Max tacks on, her voice teasing. It lightens some of the tension in the room, and Mike feels a rush of gratitude for her. “Come on, spit it out.”

Will laughs, a short burst of nervousness, and Mike huffs a sigh. He’s going to have to spill everything to them, he knows. He owes it to Will, because otherwise this is just embarrassing for him. He’s so out of Mike’s league it’s ridiculous.

“We were pretending to date,” he says at the same time Will blurts, “We’re boyfriends.”

They look at each other with wide eyes. A beat of shocked silence hangs in the air before Max loses it, throwing her head back and cackling.

“Oh my God,” she says, gasping, “Fuck you guys.”

“Wait,” Lucas says slowly, still catching up. “Wait, this was a prank?”

El just rolls her eyes. “Of course. I should have caught them sooner.” And then, “Dustin, the cookies.”

Right on cue, the oven beeps. Dustin pulls on Joyce’s oven mitts, cursing.

“Wait, why?” Lucas asks, squinting incredulously at Mike and Will. “Like, what did you guys gain from this?”

“It’s a long story,” Mike sighs, circling around the kitchen bar to poke Max in the shoulder repeatedly. “Stop laughing, it’s not that funny.”

“It is, though,” Max says, grabbing his hand and bending his fingers back. He yelps, twisting out of her grip. “Especially when you have all the necessary background information.”

Oh, he’s going to kill her. Mike is going to kill Max, and Lucas is going to kill him, which is fine with him at this point because now Will is looking at them with this adorably confused expression, and Mike is going to kill Max. Holy shit. He never should have told her. Granted, they were high on Argyle’s emergency stash of Purple Palm Tree Delight, so his defenses were lowered, but still. What was he thinking?

“What does that mean?” Will asks, just as Max’s face goes pale.

She turns to Mike, panicked, before neutralizing her expression and chirping, “Oh, nothing! Just that you guys have always been weirdly close. It wouldn’t be a stretch to claim you’ve been dating since, like, seventh grade.”

Will isn’t blushing, it’s just the light. It’s just the light, and Mike needs to get a damn hold of his emotions before Christmas if he wants to make it through the holiday alive.

“My girlfriend is correct, as always,” Lucas says, smiling fondly when Max kisses him on the cheek.

“You guys are so gross,” Dustin complains, no real heat behind the insult. He sets the baking sheet of cookies out to cool on the stove and turns to face the rest of them, and a look of curiosity spills over his features. “Anyway. Mike, you said it was a ‘long story,’ but we have time. An abundance of it, actually. Care to explain?”

Mike drops his face into his hands and groans.

So that’s how it starts. The Party settles down in a circle on the living room floor, cookies on a platter on the coffee table, and Mike recounts the morning’s events while Will squeezes his shoulder encouragingly. The others agree that they’d been convincing, and Mike feels a heady relief wash over him as the conversation shifts to El’s finals, Lucas’s rivalry with one of his basketball teammates, and the disability rights organization Max is starting at Loyola.

The afternoon passes all too quickly, and when the light finally starts to fade outside, there’s a flurry of knocking on their front door.

Jonathan and Nancy and the chaos trio. Jesus Christ.

El squeals with excitement, lurching to her feet so fast she nearly slips, and the others all rush for the door.

Lucas reaches it first and yanks it open, and Steve immediately pulls him into a hug, Dustin shoving him aside to throw his arms around Steve’s neck.

“Steve!”

“Henderson!”

Robin’s raspy voice rises above the Party’s— “Let Stevie breathe! Also, it’s cold as balls out here and we need to get inside. Move, strange children! Clear a path!”

“Don’t say ‘cold as balls,’ Robin,” Jonathan says, totally deadpan as he pushes Steve inside and holds the door for her and Nancy and Argyle.

“Oh, it smells gnarly in here,” Argyle says by way of greeting, closing the door behind them and inhaling deeply. “Did you little dudes have a baking contest?”

“No, but we did make cookies,” El says, grinning brightly when Robin ruffles her hair. “Do you want one?”

“No,” Jonathan answers for him, his voice slightly manic. “No, sugar makes him super hyper. You don’t wanna do that, El.”

El’s face falls, only slightly, and Jonathan instantly folds. “Alright, fine. But it’s your funeral.”

He’s so atrociously permissive when it comes to her; Mike would be offended on his own behalf (he has known Jonathan longer), but if anyone understands having a soft spot for El, it’s him.

Dustin points Argyle in the direction of the cookies as Steve pulls Max into a hug, laughing when she messes up his hair.

Mike watches them with what he knows is a sickening softness, but he can’t help it— Max told him how she felt after Billy died, how Steve easily took on and surpassed the role her stepbrother never even came close to fulfilling. And from what Nancy’s told him about Steve’s home life, Mike knows he needs her just as much.

“How was everyone’s first semester?” Nancy asks, grabbing Mike by the shoulders and wrangling him into a hug. Once she’s caught him, he can’t escape for a full three minutes— that’s another change since ‘86. And since he left for Chicago, they’ve only gotten closer.

Part of Mike suspects she’s picked up this parentification shit from Jonathan, but he knows she’s also compensating for their parents’ shittiness. It makes a lump tug up in his throat, and he blinks harshly.

“Terrible,” Lucas answers brightly. “But now, we’re free!”

“Liberated!” El cheers, throwing her arms around Lucas in celebration.

Mike isn’t crying. It’s just Nancy’s fucking perfume. That floral shit she knows he hates.

He finally pushes her back when his lungs start burning, and he can’t stop himself from grinning when she says, “God, did you get even taller? The hell, Mike?”

“I know,” Will says indignantly, throwing his hands up. “It’s dehumanizing at this point.”

Mike rolls his eyes fondly, pulling Will in and resting his chin on the top of his head. In his defense, he isn’t even thinking about it— it’s just instinct. But Will inhales sharply, huffing a strangled laugh, and Robin watches them with a strange, gleeful expression.

“I bet,” she says, smirking. “You’ll catch up to him, Little Byers. I have faith in you.”

“And I have faith in my cooking being better than Mom’s,” Jonathan says, making a beeline for the kitchen. “Help me make dinner before she gets home so she doesn’t burn the house down.”

Nancy trails after him, pulling Robin with her. Steve and Argyle hang back, sitting on the couch and passing the cookie platter back and forth.

The Party migrates into Will’s room again to start on the campaign, and as they shut the door and pull the DnD set out from under the bed, an indescribable calm falls over Mike.

Max and Lucas are whispering to each other like little kids, sitting criss-cross on the carpet, and El is resting her head on Dustin’s shoulder, and Will’s grinning warmly beside him. Sugar still sticks in his hair, and Mike aches to brush it out. In the dim lamplight, his cheeks are rosy and his eyelashes are freakishly long, and— God. Will is so pretty sometimes it hurts.

Normally, thinking like this would make that squirming, vaguely guilty feeling take hold of him. Here, though, surrounded by his closest friends and listening to Jonathan and Nancy and Steve-Robin-Argyle’s voices crescendoing in the kitchen, the shame can’t catch him. Will’s room is warm and Max is telling him to hurry up and start the story, dumbass, and Steve’s yelling down the hall that they brought eggnog, and for the first time in a long two years, he doesn’t even worry about his parents. Even after this morning, even after hatching the scheme with Will. Even after all of that, Mike feels unshakable. Power of friendship and all that sappy shit.

Friendship. He finds himself looking at Will again, and his heart gives a weak tug in his chest. God, Mike is an idiot.

—

PART II : Oh, oh now I've found a real love /

You'll never fool me again

“Dustin, I’ve literally explained this to you a million times,” Will says with fond exasperation, placing an unwrapped chocolate gelt on his forehead, “Hanukkah isn’t Jewish Christmas. Now stay still. You can do this if you just concentrate.”

They’ve been playing Hannukah-themed games all day. It’s the twenty-first already, impossibly, and the whole Party is gathered at Will’s again. They’ve gone through several rounds of dreidel (which Mike maintains El definitely cheated at), a latke-cooking competition (Joyce’s won every time), and now they’re trying to maneuver chocolate coins from their foreheads to their mouths without using their hands. Will is unfairly good at it, and Dustin has dropped his every round.

“I know that,” Dustin insists, tilting his head to the right and groaning when the chocolate lands flat on the kitchen table. “I never said it was.”

“Yeah, but you implied it,” Will says with a shit-eating grin. He always gets like this when Dustin overenthusiastically wishes him a happy Hannukah, because ‘it’s kind of one of our lukewarm holidays compared to Rosh Hashanah or Yom Kippur. I don’t get why he’s so excited for me.’

Mike knows it’s just Dustin’s way of trying to make Will feel included. But he doesn’t really need to— the Byers family has always celebrated Christmas, too; well, in the commercial sense. They have a tree and always get each other presents, because Joyce never wanted Will or Jonathan to feel left out when kids at school got all excited for Christmas, but they don’t observe the holiday like Mike’s parents do.

He itches just thinking about the countless stuffy Christmas Eves he spent in the Baptist Church, the mind-numbingly boring family reunions, and the stilted awkwardness of forcing smiles after receiving his third pair of wool socks from an aunt and uncle he barely knows while his grandpa lectures them all about starting off the new year by vowing not to sin. It all felt so impersonal, so cold.

The Hopper-Byers house does the winter holidays much differently.

“Dustin, you have to use small, controlled movements,” El tells him seriously, her eyes wide with sincerity. “It will work, I promise.”

“No offense, El,” Dustin says, “But you’re in no position to give me advice when you’ve been cheating with your powers this whole time.”

El’s eyes narrow in offense, and Max scoffs, “You’d use them too, if you had them!”

“She’s right,” Mike says, laughing when Dustin glares at him. “What? You’d be the worst out of all of us!”

“Oh, he totally would,” Lucas agrees sagely. He grabs Dustin’s failed chocolate coin from the kitchen table and pops it into his mouth, laughing hysterically when El wrinkles her nose.

“Dude, that’s disgusting,” Dustin whines, affronted.

“Your boyfriend just ate the candy that was on Dustin’s face a second ago,” Mike stage-whispers to Max. She fake-retches, and he laughs.

“Alright, I’m calling the game,” Will says, counting up the tally he’s sketched on a blue-and-white napkin. They’ve been playing this game for a while, mostly for the chocolate. Joyce bought an ungodly amount when El told her gelt was her favorite. “It’s a tie between me and El!”

“The wonder twins strike again,” Lucas says in a booming announcer voice, hands cupped around his mouth. Max rolls her eyes at his antics, but she’s smiling like Christmas came early.

“Alright, what are we doing now?” El asks, her face lit up. She loves the holidays more than anyone Mike knows, has ever since Joyce and Hop and the Party properly explained them to her. She’s the one that campaigned for them to decorate the yard with lights again, the clear warm white kind that won’t trigger any of them, and convinced Hopper to start their annual tradition of exchanging one gift on the night of Christmas Eve.

He also thinks there’s a small chance she still believes in Santa, but knowing El, she could just be messing with them. Nobody’s broken the news to her yet, and Mike knows for a fact that Will’s in charge of writing her letters back and eating the cookies she leaves out. She seems to take a devious pleasure in leaving more and more cookies for Santa each year, and now Mike has to help Will get rid of them. He wouldn’t be complaining, but El’s desserts are so sugary they give him migraines.

He wishes he were kidding.

“I’m bored of Hanukkah games,” Max announces. “No offense, Will. Anyway, I’m bored of holiday stuff in general. I think we should put on a record and see how long it takes for Mike to fall on his face.”

“Fuck all the way off,” Mike says, flinching when Max hurls a chocolate coin at him. Jesus, how is a blind girl’s aim this good?

El stops it in midair and floats it over to Dustin.

“Consolation prize,” she says. He takes it and smiles at her gratefully.

El turns back to the rest of them, grinning. “Dancing would be fun! Mike and Will should practice. For their Christmas dinner with the Wheelers.”

“What?” Mike sputters. “Okay, one: in what world would my parents play music with the intention of getting me to dance? And two: in what world would they tolerate me dancing with my supposed boyfriend? Like, in front of them?”

“They would not,” El says, still smiling, “But can you imagine the looks on their faces if you two suggested it?”

Will laughs a weird, jangly laugh that sounds like it’s half-caught in his throat. “El, what?”

“You know,” she says, dead serious, leaning towards them over the table, “If you asked to put a record on after dinner, and they thought you meant Christmas music to set the mood, but instead you slow-danced. As part of the joke.”

Mike squints at her dubiously. He’s almost certain she’s fucking with them, because she has that glint in her eye that only surfaces when she’s up to something, but he just can’t pin down what.

He looks over at Will for answers, but he’s staring at El like he’s trying to communicate telepathically with her— which, actually, Mike guesses they might be able to do. The thought sends a chill up his spine.

“No, no, I think El’s on to something,” Max says, and Mike does not like the way they’re both smiling at each other— what the fuck is going on?

“I’m not slow-dancing with Will in front of you guys unless it’s to Queen,” Mike deadpans, and Max and El’s faces light up.

He just keeps making things worse for himself.

The Universe should revoke his ability to speak more than five words at a time.

“Alright,” Max says definitively, hopping up from her seat and unfolding her cane. “Where the hell is Hopper’s record player? He keeps fucking moving it.”

“Tiny end table by the T.V.,” Lucas says, lobbing a balled-up chocolate wrapper at Dustin. “About ten steps to your left.”

She reaches it easily, smiling with what Mike can only describe as pure, unabashed evil in her expression.

“Mike, come help me find the Queen vinyls!”

“Fine,” he groans, resigned to his fate. He paws through the box of vinyl records underneath the end table and finds ‘A Kind of Magic.’ He hands it to Max and drags her finger down the tracklist.

“It’s got One Vision, A Kind of Magic, I Want to Break Free, Friends Will Be Friends…”

Max’s face lights up, and she stops Mike’s hand. “Friends Will Be Friends! Friends Will Be Friends, Mike, it’s perfect.”

He’s lucky Will isn’t listening in— he’s engrossed in a debate with Lucas about whether mandel bread is better than babka.

“If you don’t stop messing with me about the Will Problem, I’m actually going to file a restraining order,” Mike says, dropping his voice low. “This isn’t a joke, Max.”

She just laughs, shoving him playfully, and Mike feels his irritation melt. He never can stay mad at her anymore— he’s going soft. It’s embarrassing.

“Put the record on,” he grumbles. “I’ll move the needle to the right song.”

“You love this,” she insists. “You’re practically vibrating with excitement right now, it’s hilarious.”

“Your face is hilarious.”

Max gasps theatrically. “Are you mocking a disabled woman?”

Lucas chucks several gelt coins at him in rapid succession, and Mike glowers at him.

They put the record on, and Freddie Mercury’s objectively angelic voice floats through the room.

“Another red letter day

So the pound has dropped and the children are creating

The other half ran away

Taking all the cash and leaving you with the lumber…”

The Party jumps up from their seats, Lucas doing air guitar as El pushes a blushing Will towards Mike, far too delighted at this turn of events to be innocent in its conception.

Synth and electric guitar fold around them as Dustin and Lucas break out into the some of the worst dance moves Mike’s ever seen— pinwheeling their arms with no real rhythm, circling each other doing the sprinkler—

Will’s hands move to rest on his shoulders, and Mike’s breath catches in his chest. In a daze, he grips Will’s waist. They’re really doing this.

“It's not easy love, but you've got friends you can trust

Friends will be friends

When you're in need of love they give you care and attention

Friends will be friends…”

Will’s looking at him with something like… like want in his eyes. And Mike knows it’s wishful thinking, knows he had his chance with Will in ‘85 and blew it spectacularly, but his heart still jolts in his chest. The sounds of El and Max singing along and Lucas laughing at Dustin’s rendition of the robot melt away as they move in a slow three-step. A waltz. Mike and Will are waltzing to Queen in the Hopper-Byers’ kitchen. Is he dreaming? Is he dead?

“Now it's a beautiful day

The postman delivered a letter from your lover

Only a phone call away…”

“Are you okay?” Will asks, his voice so soft Mike almost misses it over the music. He leans forward to hear better, and the air between them hums with tension. Imagined tension, Mike reminds himself. The thought feels bitter, and he brushes it off— Will doesn’t owe him anything.

“Mike,” Will says again, and shit, he was supposed to have responded by now. Their faces are so close.

Stop it, stop it, stop it, Mike’s brain screams.

“Yeah,” he says breathlessly. Fuck. “Yeah, yeah, everything’s fine.”

Will cracks a smile, skeptical. “You sure? You’re… you seem really nervous.”

“Yeah, sorry,” Mike says, his voice low. “Sorry, I just… I can’t dance.”

Will snorts. “I know.”

Mike gapes at him, kind of offended but mostly relieved as hell that he’s steered the conversation in a somewhat normal direction.

“Neither can I!” Will rushes to add, laughing. God, Will has a nice laugh. And he’s watching Mike with this warm, dopey smile, like he’s genuinely happy that they’re awkwardly slow-dancing to a song with fucking electric guitar in it, and Mike could kiss him. He could do it quick, just lean down and press their lips together hard. What would Will do? Would he push Mike away, laugh in his face? Or would he sigh and melt into it and pull him closer?

No, something deep in him protests. No, stop, he didn’t ask for you to think about him like this.

“It’s so easy now,” Max and El are singing, twirling each other around wildly, “'cause you got friends you can trust! Friends will be friends—,”

“Hey,” Will says, leaning back a little, “We can stop, y’know. I’m pretty sure El just had us do this as a practical joke.”

“No, no, we can— I mean, we can stop if you want to,” Mike says, his voice too loud in his ears, “But I’m good. This is… nice.”

Fuck, why did he say that? Why does Mike still let himself speak, with the track record he has? He wants to start seeing the clock again.

But miraculously, Will grins. Beams, really, his smile crinkling his eyes. “Okay.”

“Okay,” Mike echoes stupidly.

The music swells, and something in Will’s face shifts, and he grabs Mike by the waist and dips him— for a split-second, he watches the world upside down, Dustin and Lucas still dancing crazily, El and Max shimmying in time with the drums, and then Will pulls him back up and grins hard.

“What was—? You’re so—!” Mike sputters, shaking his head. He can hear the smile in his own voice, saccharine-sweet. What the hell has Will reduced him to? “What was that?!”

“I don’t know,” Will laughs, tugging Mike closer. “Freddie Mercury just compelled me to do it.”

“You’re such a dork,” Mike says, and he doesn’t mean for it to come out so whisper-y and gentle, but it does. Color rises to Will’s cheeks, so vivid Mike knows he isn’t imagining it this time. He feels dizzy, suddenly, and not from all the spinning they’re doing.

“So are you.”

“Friends will be friends

When you're through with life and all hope is lost

Hold out your hand 'cause right till the end, friends will be friends

Yeah, yeah…”

That night, when the Party’s gone home and Will and Jonathan and El have fallen asleep watching Days Of Our Lives on the living room couch, Mike holes up in his room and plays ‘Friends Will Be Friends’ on repeat on his Walkman. It’s been a good day, the kind that feels slightly dangerous, like he isn’t allowed it. Like any second, things will go to shit again.

But something about the song puts his mind at ease. He lays back on his bed and pulls the rainbow quilt El knitted him last year over his head. It smells like Will, crayons and pine and rain.

Something about the way Will looked at him today just won’t leave him alone. Tomorrow, it will be three days before dinner with his parents. Three days before they put their performance to the test.

Mike feels kind of sick, suddenly.

He clicks his Walkman off and buries his face in his pillow, and doesn’t fall asleep for two more hours.

—

It’s Christmas.

Impossibly, against all laws of nature, time has moved at its standard pace and it’s Christmas and Mike wakes up to El shrieking in his ear, her knees digging into his legs as she shakes him awake.

“Jesus, El, get off of him,” Will laughs from the doorway, grinning at Mike when he blinks blearily up at them.

“I’m awake, I’m awake,” he says, grabbing El by the shoulders and toppling her off of him— she falls back on his mattress, giggling like a little kid, and a dizzying warmth blooms in Mike’s chest.

He’s so, so glad he’s here.

Will moves into the room and pulls them both to their feet, saying, “C’mon, everyone else is in the living room.”

The sun isn’t even up yet, and everyone’s talking quietly in that night-before-a-field-trip voice, and Mike honestly doesn’t care what’s under the tree— he’s just psyched to spend the morning watching El and Will open presents. They both get the most excited out of everyone, and it’s his favorite part of the whole morning. Well, that and Hopper’s famous pancakes. He refuses to cook breakfast for them on any other occasion, and before Mike had them the first Christmas he spent with the Hopper-Byers family, he just kind of assumed it was because the Chief couldn’t cook. But he can, he can and he’s a magician and Mike can smell the pancakes wafting down the hall, Jesus—

“Mike, slow down,” Will says, laughing around the words and grabbing Mike by the collar of his pajama shirt. He skids in his socks, falling back into Will, who grabs onto El for balance and ends up pulling down, and all three of them go sprawling on the hardwood floor.

“What the hell?” Jonathan asks, and the living room light flicks on, spilling into the hallway. El is wheezing with laughter, pulling Will and Mike to their feet. “Are you guys on crack?”

“We are high on Christmas,” El says seriously, and Hopper barks a laugh from the kitchen.

“Honey, we’re Jewish,” Joyce reminds her teasingly from the living room couch, and El giggles, tugging Will and Mike into the room. The tree, decorated with homemade Hanukkah-themed ornaments and warm white lights, glints like a childhood memory.

“Dad, bring the pancakes in here,” Will says, grinning at Mike. His hair is mussed from sleep, and he’s wearing a giant white sweatshirt with a blue menorah stitched on the front. His sleeves are so long they go past his fingertips.

Mike wants to kiss him.

It’s six a.m., alright? He’s… in a weird headspace. Give him a break.

Hopper strides into the room with the pancakes on a giant platter, and Mike dives for one before he’s even set it on the coffee table.

“Mike,” Hopper grits out, but he’s smiling warmly despite the gruffness in his voice. “Jeez, kid, you’d think we starve you or something. It’s not going anywhere.”

“There’s six people living under this roof,” Will points out, watching Mike with a warm expression that is definitely not impacting his heart rate, “He’s just taking preemptive measures.”

“Who cares about pancakes?” El says pleadingly, her eyes on the presents under the tree. “Can we please start handing out gifts now?”

“Hey,” Hopper protests, faux-offended, “I slaved over these, missy.”

El sighs and leans up to hug him in lieu of an apology. “Thank you. But I will not be eating them; I hate pancakes.”

“And I tell you they’re just like waffles every year. Just try one!”

El laughs, shaking her head stubbornly, and Hopper heaves a world-weary sigh.

“Will, Jonathan, why don’t you start passing things out?” Joyce asks, sipping her coffee to hide her smile. “Names are on the gift tags.”

What follows is a typical Hopper-Byers Christmas morning— they tear into packages and exchange hugs and thank-yous, Hopper moves around the living room with a trash bag collecting discarded wrapping paper and ribbons, Joyce watches them all with soft eyes, and Mike feels himself falling into their family’s orbit like he’s always belonged there. He’ll never be able to thank them enough for being there for him to fall back on, will never be able to verbalize how thoroughly they’ve changed things for him, but he knows they don’t expect that from him anyway. They give and give and won’t ever ask anything of him in return. He used to feel guilty about it; now, as Jonathan snaps pictures of him and El and Will with a brand-new film camera, he just feels grateful.

The rest of the day passes in a hazy, warm, sugary blur. They watch the stop-motion Santa Clause movie from the 70’s, gorge themselves on Christmas cookies and rugelach and beignets, and try out El’s new rollerblades, courtesy of Jonathan— they’re rubber-bladed, of course.

“Hey, be careful!” Joyce calls from the kitchen as Will goes rolling down the hall towards his room, Mike and El running after him. They’ve been trying to topple him for the past five minutes, but he’s freakishly well-balanced and refuses to fall.

“Will, they’re my skates,” El says, narrowing her eyes as she chases him

into his room, and oh, shit, that’s her pissed-off-sibling glare. Mike rushes after them.

“One more minute,” Will says, skating in a smooth circle around Mike.

El shakes her head, and Mike knows that look— he turns to catch Will just as he stumbles, and miraculously, they remain upright. Will grins triumphantly, but Mike tugs him over to his desk chair and sits him down.

“Take those off before she kills you,” he says, and Will huffs a laugh, complying.

“Fine, but only because I was getting dizzy,” he concedes.

“Sorry for pushing you,” El says, actually sounding it. She never lets things go this quickly, even petty disputes like Will hogging the maple syrup at breakfast or closing the blinds in the living room when it’s sunny out. The magic of Christmas, or mass consumerism, Mike guesses.

“It’s okay,” Will says easily, and both of them brighten. “I was hogging them anyway.”

Lunch is leftovers, eaten on the living room floor. Will tosses gelt in the air and El floats it into his mouth, and Jonathan freaks when he realizes Hop’s eaten the last of the jelly doughnuts.

Nancy arrives at 1:00 with Robin, Steve, and Argyle in tow. They’re carrying a truckload of gifts, and Hopper just sighs and gets out another garbage bag for the wrapping paper tornado that’s bound to occur.

Steve and Robin beg to play dreidel, because they’ve never done it before and have likely heard Dustin complain about El cheating, and Will gets up from the couch and goes to retrieve it from his room.

They huddle around the coffee table and watch as Steve spins it.

“We should play this, but whoever it lands on has to do a dare or something,” Robin’s saying, just as it rattles to a stop facing Mike.

“That was barely five seconds,” Will says, laughing, and Steve shoots him a halfhearted glare. “Mike, show Steve how it’s done.”

He leans forward and spins it, and it stays spinning for at least a minute before stopping on Robin.

“I can totally see El cheating at this,” Steve says, just as El flounces into the room and looks at him murderously.

“I do not cheat,” she says. “Dustin is a conniving, melodramatic liar.”

She’s wearing these giant black overalls that Hop gifted her this morning, and her hair’s slicked back like it was in ‘85, mascara smeared around her eyes. Her certified “bitchin’” look, which Mike has noticed she only reverts to when she’s feeling especially confident.

“You look cool,” Will says as she stalks across the room towards Steve, who looks comically pale.

“Move over, Steve,” El orders. “I’m going to kick everyone’s asses at this game, and you will all know I’m not cheating because my nose will not bleed.”

“You got it, Strawberry Switchblade,” Steve quips, oblivious to El’s lack of pop culture knowledge.

She squints at him. “Knives are not my weapon of choice.”

Robin laughs, loud and bright, and Will just grins and shakes his head, nudging El with his shoulder to get her to spin the dreidel.

It goes for a full four minutes (timed, courtesy of Mike’s watch) before stopping. Steve declares foul play, but El’s nose is clean.

By the time six o’clock rolls around, Mike is barely even anxious about dinner with his parents. He’s sprawled out on the couch with Will while A Christmas Story blares from the T.V. (truly a horrendous movie— remind Mike to never trust El’s judgment again), and they’re tangled together, a little too warm to be comfortable, but Mike feels more relaxed than he has in months. Will’s head is on his chest, a steady weight, and he keeps turning and whispering to Mike about certain parts of the film— continuity errors and poor editing and character inconsistencies.

And then Nancy walks into the living room and points at him and Will, gesturing for them to get up. “You guys still coming to dinner?”

Will tenses up, and Mike sighs, disentangling their limbs and pulling himself to his feet. Will follows, stretching as a yawn escapes him.

“You don’t have to—,” Mike starts, but Will cuts him off with a pointed look.

“I want to. Now come on, we don’t wanna be gay and late. That might be pushing it.”

Nancy snorts a laugh and kisses Jonathan goodbye— gross— and they’re out the door.

The car ride across town is strangely peaceful. Nancy turns the radio to some jazzy Christmas oldies station, and Nat King Cole floats through the car. Mike and Will are sitting in the backseat, watching the snow-covered landscape pass in a warm white blur. Halfway to Mike’s house, Will wordlessly slips a hand into his, squeezing reassuringly.

Mike risks a glance up at him, smiling in silent thanks. Will’s thumb brushes over the pulse point on his wrist, warm and soothing.

And then Nancy turns into their old neighborhood, and Mike’s heart climbs into his throat. He feels sick, suddenly, his palms clammy, and he regretfully pulls his hand out of Will’s, wiping it roughly on his jeans.

“You alright, Mike?” Nancy asks, her voice going gentle. “You know you don’t have to see them.”

“We’re already here,” Mike says, trying to sound less rattled than he feels. Will’s watching him, his gaze soft but intense, and he feels too hot in the navy turtleneck El bought him. “And I want to see Holly. I… I need to see her.”

“Okay,” Nancy says, her voice taking on that determined edge it does when she’s about to throw herself into harm’s way for them, “Okay, just let me know if you want to leave.”

“I will,” Mike promises. They pull into their old driveway, and Nancy puts the car in park and hops out of the driver’s side.

Will pats Mike on the shoulder, his hand lingering for a second too long to be normal (imagining it, Mike’s imagining it) before he gets out and shuts the car door. Mike swallows and heaves a sigh before getting out on his side and walking around the car to rejoin hands with Will.

His mom answers the door. She looks just as put-together as usual, dialed up by twenty since it’s Christmas— freshly-manicured nails, cherry-red sweater, a full face of makeup. Mike can smell her vanilla perfume from the porch.

He gulps in a breath, and Will leans his head on Mike’s shoulder seemingly unthinkingly. It sends a warm shudder through him.

“Oh, it’s so good to see you all,” his mom gushes, pulling Nancy into a tight hug. Nancy returns the embrace, but Mike sees the way she stiffens.

They follow his mom inside, and a wave of nostalgia washes over him at the smell of the kitchen— honey-baked ham and macaroni and cheese and his mom’s pumpkin pie. It’s… almost painful. This used to be what home smelled like; used to be his normal. And despite the stilted coldness of his childhood, Mike still found comfort in his mom’s cooking and the warmth of their kitchen and the cozy isolation of the basement. He misses it, for just a moment, before the memories from this morning and all of today catch up

to him. He has the Byers-Hopper family now. He’ll never be one of them, not really, but he’s gotten as close as he can get.

Mike follows Nancy in a daze to the kitchen, where they make their plates, and then the dining table, which is already set with placemats and silverware.

Will pulls out his chair for him, and Mike ignores the burning of his father’s eyes on them. He hopes Will can, too. Hopes he can’t even feel it in the first place.

They sit, and Nancy pulls out the chair right across from them. Her posture is rigid— she’s on high alert already.

Holly bounds into the room, then, her blond hair tied back in a red ribbon and her eyes bright. When she sees Mike, her grin doubles in size, and she tears around the table despite his mom’s protests.

“Mike!” She exclaims, throwing herself at him just as he opens his arms. He smiles, ruffling her hair and blinking hard when his eyes mist over.

“I missed you, Holls,” he says, his voice coming out tight and quiet. Holly just beams as she pulls back from the embrace, oblivious.

“I missed you, too!”

“Holly, come sit down,” His mom says, and Holly ruffles Mike’s hair back before circling the table again to take the seat next to their mom.

“So, Will,” Mike’s dad says as they tuck into their food, “I hear you’re majoring in art. What do you plan to do with a degree like that?”

Will’s eyes widen marginally before he takes a sip of water. He gets this question a lot, Mike knows; he’s been on the receiving end of it, too, as a creative writing major.

“Well, hopefully art,” Will jokes, his mouth quirking up in a grin even when neither of Mike’s parents laugh.

“I mean, I’m planning on selling my work. I’ve already had it shown in some galleries on campus— not like museums or anything, obviously, they’re just… they’re for the students to showcase their art. But… but yeah. That’s what I want to do, ideally, but if it’s a slow start I’d love to teach art. Maybe at a high school level.”

Mike suppresses a smile— Will’s rambling, which he only does when he’s either nervous or annoyed, and from the relaxed slope of his shoulders, Mike guesses it’s the latter.

Across the table, his father hums. Shovels a forkful of ham into his mouth, chewing pensively. “So you’re planning on couch-surfing, then?”

Will chokes on his water, and Mike scrambles to pat him on the back, slightly panicked. Nancy bites back a laugh at both of their faces, hiding it in her napkin.

“Dad,” Mike grits out when Will’s done coughing, his face red, “What the hell?”

“Michael, language,” his mom says sharply, and wow. Wow, they’re really going there this fast, huh?

“No, actually,” Will says, addressing Mike’s dad. He presses his knee against Mike’s under the table, and for a second Mike forgets how to breathe. “I’ll have your son to fall back on.”

Here, he turns to Mike and grins his patented I’m-being-a-little-shit grin, and Mike is blushing before he can stop himself, before he even remembers that he doesn’t have to stop himself.

It’s better if he doesn’t stop himself.

“Yeah,” he says, letting his voice go soft and gooey the way it always does around Will, and maybe this shouldn’t be so natural, so familiar, but Mike can’t bring himself to care. Nancy’s watching them with a strange, reverent expression, and it’s making his throat burn a little. “Yeah, I’ll make sure he doesn’t end up a starving artist.”

And then, very pointedly not stopping himself, Mike leans down and pecks Will on the temple.

His dad’s face is fire-engine red.

Honestly, it’s fucking worth it.

“Mike, we’re at the table,” his mother says, and Holly looks at him with confused eyes— at least there’s no trace of disgust in her expression. Something thorned in his chest twists.

“Jonathan and I have kissed at dinner before,” Nancy cuts in, her voice razor-blade sharp, and their mom blinks like she’s just been told their town is sitting on top of an alternate dimension full of monsters from her kids’ DnD games.

“That’s different,” his dad says, his voice taking on a hard edge, “And you know it. Don’t be difficult, Nancy.”

“I won’t be difficult if you won’t be a bigot,” Nancy shoots back, smiling like she knows she’s won, and their dad just sighs heavily like he’s suddenly exhausted.

And then Will smothers a laugh into Mike’s shoulder, which sets Mike off, too, and then they’re both full-on laughing, breathless, falling into each other as Nancy grins despite herself.

“I’m— oh God— I’m sorry,” Will manages when he’s mostly recovered, looking kind of mortified even though he has zero respect for Mike’s parents, “Sorry.” He clears his throat, spooning a bite of mac and cheese into his mouth, and for some reason that sets Mike off again.

Holly looks between both of them, a tiny smile creeping onto her face. “Are they drunk?”

“Alright,” their mom says in a strained voice. “How about a subject change? Holly, why don’t you tell Mike what you got for Christmas?”

Holly grins toothily, and Mike leans against Will’s side fondly as she launches into a long list of everything she’d asked for and received, and he can’t even feel his dad watching them because he doesn’t seem to care— he’s just eating his ham, watching his youngest daughter prattle on about the new Happy Holidays Barbie. And where Mike used to feel bitterness towards his dad, because the best he could hope for from him was always indifference, now he just feels this weird pity. Deep in his chest, barely there, because he has a family. A real one, back at Will’s place, with Joyce and Hop and El and Jonathan, and they’re so much more than he grew up with that he can’t really bring himself to mourn his own parents.

Halfway through his little sister’s spiel, Will slips his hand into Mike’s under the table and rubs slow circles on his palm. It takes Mike a second to realize— this isn’t performative. It’s just Will, comforting him. It’s just for them.

He feels impossibly warm inside for the rest of their dinner.

His mom pulls him aside as the others wash the dishes, tugging him into the living room.

Mike swallows hard, searching her expression. “What is it?”

She takes a deep, shuddering breath, and it’s only then that he realizes her eyes are glossy with tears. “I just wanted to say… I’m sorry.”

Mike blinks slowly, lost. “What for? Kicking me out for saying I’m gay or refusing to believe I actually am?”

His mom sighs, wiping harshly at her face. It’s blotchy despite her concealer. “For— for all of it. I… I know you wouldn’t want to come back and live with us anyway, not after everything, but. But our door is open.”

Mike forces himself to breathe through the anger. It’s flaring up after years of dormancy, and he can’t lash out at her when this is the closest he’s ever gotten to an actual acknowledgement of his queerness.

“Mom,” he says, swallowing against the lump that’s risen in his throat, “If your door was open, I wouldn’t have to bring Will over and force him to sit through the worst family dinner he’s ever experienced just to prove to you that I’m not going to turn straight for one of the church girls you’ve tried to set me up with. If your door was open, I wouldn’t be going back to his house tonight and having breakfast with his family in the morning. If your door was open, I’d get to see my little sister more than once every two years. And tonight doesn’t change any of that.”

He brushes past her before she can respond. Will’s waiting for him in the doorway with his hand outstretched. Mike takes it, leans into him, ignoring the way his mom inhales sharply when Will kisses the top of his head. He doesn’t feel even a prickle of shame.

After he’s hugged Holly for the last time and slipped her his new phone number, and his mom has sighed and wiped her eyes and told him to call them, and Nancy’s piled several tins of their nana’s chocolate fudge into her arms, they trudge out to the car and climb inside.

Nancy cranked it a couple of minutes ago; now it’s a cocoon of warmth, and Mike feels the tension leak out of him as they start to drive home. Will sets his hand on the middle seat in between them, a wordless invitation.

Outside, as they pass the golden cones of other cars’ headlights, it starts to snow.

Mike breathes in deep and slow and takes Will’s hand into his own.

Nancy turns on the radio, switches the station, and ‘Last Christmas’ by Wham! floats through the car.

“I’m proud of you, Mike,” she says, catching his eye in the rearview mirror.

Mike grins, and it doesn’t feel plastic or too tight or wrong on his face. “Me, too.”

Will rests his head on Mike’s shoulder and smiles.

That night, after Nancy’s set up for the night on the living room couch and Jonathan’s hugged her goodnight and Joyce has sent El and Will and Mike off to bed, ruffling their hair, Mike flops down on his bed and sighs hard.

He can’t stop thinking about Will’s hand in his on the car ride home.

Or “Shit, Mike, don’t fall,” and Will’s hands on his waist, steadying him on the kitchen tile.

Or Will dipping him while Freddie Mercury crooned “Friends will be friends,” the easy, beautiful smile on his face when he pulled Mike upright again.

The way he’d tangled their legs together on the couch watching A Christmas Story.

His stupid fucking menorah sweater. His unfairly long eyelashes. His you’re-being-an-idiot grin and his too-long bangs and the way he’d drawn circles on Mike’s wrist at dinner and “I’ll have your son to fall back on.”

Mike presses the heels of his hands into his eyes, sighing deeply when starbursts of color bloom on the backs of his eyelids. He is so irrevocably fucked.

He wants to sink into the floor and get absorbed into the soil below Will’s house. He wants to explode. He wants to crank his radio up and blast ‘Crazy for You’ by Madonna and kiss Will senseless. He wants to be a kid again, back when everything was easy and tinged green and he felt weightless.

He needs to call Max.

He dials her number with shaking hands, his whole body tingling with something like desperation. He needs to fucking vent, to get all of this sappy shit out in the open before he blurts it out at breakfast or the Party’s weekly movie night or one of his and Will’s campaign planning sessions. God, he’s finally losing it.

Max picks up on the first ring.

“Mike? Why the hell are you calling at two a.m.?”

“Shut up, you were awake,” he says, and he can practically hear her glaring at him.

“Yeah, yeah,” she sighs. When she speaks again, her voice has gone uncharacteristically soft. “Are you okay?”

Mike just groans in response, letting it crescendo in volume when Max starts to laugh.

“Is it Will?”

“Shut up,” he whines, kicking his legs up in the air and letting them flop back down onto the mattress. “You don’t get it. It’s killing me. I— God, I feel like I’m going insane.”

“Mike, just tell him,” she says, all gentle and serious, like it’s that fucking easy.

“No,” he argues, his voice taking on a frenzied edge. “No, we just got close again. We just fixed things between us, I can’t— I— Max. I just can’t.”

She sighs, long and tinged with sympathy, and Mike pouts even though she can’t see him. Well, she wouldn’t be able to even if they were talking in person, but… God. He really needs to start getting more sleep.

“Mike,” Max says, “It’s been three years since you and Will weren’t on good terms. That’s plenty of time, okay? He’s not— you don’t have to walk on eggshells around him. And anyway, this isn’t going to ruin anything. Seriously. Please just trust me.”

Mike pauses, considering. And then, more than a shred of suspicion in his voice, “What do you know?”

Max gives a strangled laugh, and holy shit, he’s caught her.

“Max,” He says again, urgently, “What. Do. You. Know.”

“I’m sworn to secrecy!” Max yells into the phone. Mike flinches back as it crackles. “Figure it out for yourself, Wheels!”

Mike’s mouth drops open, and before he can tell her not to fucking call him that, she hangs up on him.

Asshole.

This is how he ends up pacing outside Will’s bedroom door at three in the morning, his mind racing, adrenaline making him feel floaty and a little invincible. He could just do it. Knock on the door and ask if he can kiss him and do it, lean down quick and just— shit.

Mike pulls a hand through his hair, swiping it out of his face manically. He forces himself to stop pacing and just stands in front of Will’s door, but somehow that’s worse, and he almost starts wringing his hands but then another door opens down the hall— El’s, he realizes with relief— and warm light spills into the hall.

“Mike?” El asks groggily, her hair falling into her eyes. She’s wearing one of Joyce’s U2 T-shirts and a pair of Will’s long plaid pajama pants, and she’s looking at him in a haze of confusion.

“You saw nothing,” he says, moving down the hall and dragging her back into her bedroom.

“Mike, what is going on?” El asks, an edge of panic creeping into her voice. He must look wild-eyed, because she grabs him by the shoulders with a startling intensity. “Did you have a nightmare? Henry is gone, Mike, we—,”

“No,” Mike says breathlessly, shaking his head as El’s face crumples in relief, “No, no, nothing like that. It’s fine, I’m fine.”

El nods, swallowing hard. “Okay, sorry. Just checking.”

Her posture is still tense, her shoulders drawn up and rigid. Mike pulls her into a hug, and she melts into it, sighing. “Why were you outside Will’s room, then?”

He squeezes his eyes shut against her shoulder. He doesn’t have the mental energy to lie right now.

“Please don’t say anything to him,” he says, “I… I was trying to figure out how to tell him something. Something important.”

El pulls back, searching his face. Her eyes are wide and gleaming in the low amber lamplight, and Mike feels a rush of warmth bloom in his chest when she reaches out and brushes a curl off his forehead. “You can tell me.”

He sighs, long and shaky towards the end, and El’s eyebrows knit together in concern.

“I know,” he says, looking down. “I know. Listen, you can’t… you can’t say anything to him. Really, El, I’m serious. I just can’t— I can’t have him finding out before I’m ready.”

“Mike,” El says in her get-to-the-point voice, laughing a little when he shakes his head at himself.

“Sorry. I know you won’t tell him. Okay, um. Shit.” He rakes his hands through his hair.

“I’m in love with Will.”

It’s so different, saying it out loud. Mike forces himself to breathe as El’s eyes go wide and she grins hard, taking his face in his hands so he’ll look at her. “I knew it!”

“El,” he groans, laughing around the panic and twisting away from her. God, this is embarrassing. “El, God, I’m literally begging you to stop— wait, what do you mean you knew?!”

She grins impossibly wider, poking him in the ribs until he cracks a smile, batting her hands away. “You are painfully obvious! And so is Will. You should talk to him, when you are ready. But maybe not at three in the morning.”

Mike stops smiling, grabbing her hands mid-poke. “What do you mean, ‘so is Will’?”

El’s face changes, then, going pale and expressionless in the dim light. She opens her mouth to respond, but nothing comes out.

“El?” Mike says intently, leaning forward as she blinks rapidly. “What did you mean?”

“Nothing,” she says, a too-cheerful mirror of Max’s voice just a few days ago. “Nothing, just… I am not getting in the middle of this, Mike. And you need to get some sleep.”

And then she’s pushing him out the door, ignoring his whispered protests, and he’s alone again in the darkened hall.

Mike trudges back to his own room, buries his face in his pillow, and screams.

—

PART III : Now I know what a fool I've been /

But if you kissed me now, I know you'd fool me again

It’s a week after Christmas, and Hanukkah’s drawn to a close, and the Party is at Family Video.

They’re on the hunt for Heathers and Halloween 4, a double-feature for movie night at the Hopper-Byers’ house. Everyone’s broken off into groups to comb the shelves, because the video store is always a mess and Mike knows for a fact Steve restocks everything in the wrong place. Once, he found a copy of Gremlins in the romance aisle. Not that he frequents that section, or anything.

Now, Mike runs a hand along the slasher movies as he walks past the rows of tapes, skimming the titles for Halloween. Will follows after him, searching the shelves with a more careful eye.

“You stalking me, Byers?” Mike asks, looking over his shoulder and laughing when Will’s face goes red.

“Wh— no, shut up,” he says, laughing around the words. “I’m checking behind you because you’re barely even looking at the titles!”

“You wound me,” Mike exclaims, stumbling back like he’s been shot, hands clutching at his chest as Will throws his head back and laughs.

“Hey, dipshits,” Steve says from

the front counter where Max wields the ‘Be Kind, Rewind’ sticker gun like a lethal weapon, “Keep it down! We’ve got other customers besides you guys, y’know.”

Mike rolls his eyes, scoffing, but Will’s ears go red. He turns back towards the shelf nearest to them and pulls out Halloween 4, grinning triumphantly.

“Dustin, we found it!” Mike says, and his friend darts around the corner, grinning toothily with El at his side. She brandishes Heathers in the air like a trophy.

“So did we!”

“Fucking finally,” Max says, standing on tiptoe to mess up Steve’s hair before joining them at the counter. Lucas comes up behind her, tapping a quick pattern on her right shoulder to signal that it’s him, and she smiles and leans into his side.

“If the titles were in Braille, Max would have found them before Mike and Will did,” El says, laughing when Will flicks her on the side of the head.

Dustin collects the tapes, sliding them across the counter to Robin with a sickly-sweet smile. “Party discount?”

She squints at him like he’s just asked her if she wants to help him open a new Gate for his thesis project. “Is that even a question?”

Dustin’s face falls, but then Robin grins wickedly and hands him back half the amount he’s supposed to pay.

Steve tears off their receipt and winks at them. “Don’t tell Keith.”

“You guys are the best!” Dustin gushes, handing Lucas the bag and heading for the door. El follows close behind him, waving over her shoulder.

Lucas hangs back while Max unfolds her cane, smiling gratefully at Steve and Robin. The Party’s lucky they’re still working shifts here during their breaks from college— otherwise they’d have to start pooling their money to afford movies.

When Max is ready to go, Lucas leads the way outside, holding the door for her and Mike and Will. Dustin and El are huddled together on the sidewalk, shivering from

the cold even bundled in sweaters knitted by Nancy and their big winter coats.

“Lucas, unlock the car!” El says, her teeth chattering. Mike grins and pulls her into his side, rubbing her arms to try to warm her up.

“You guys should’ve waited for the rest of us,” Will says, no real heat behind it, and Lucas unlocks his car and hops into the driver’s side.

“Shotgun!” Max shouts, clambering past them even though she’s blind and they’re in a fucking parking lot, and other cars are moving—

Mike lunges forward, saying, “Max, I’m coming up behind you, there’s a car pulling up on our right.”

Max stops halfway to the passenger’s side, and Mike grips her shoulder and steers her towards the door as the car beside them shifts into park. “Okay, you’re good. Door’s right in front of you.”

“Thanks, Mike,” she says over her shoulder, slamming the door as El and Dustin climb into the back.

That leaves the very back row of seats for Mike and Will, which means Dustin and El have to get out again, and Lucas is sighing up front telling them to hurry up while Max laughs brightly.

On the drive back to Will’s, Max cranks up the radio and ‘Don’t You Want Me’ blasts through the car, shaking the floorboards as El screams the opening lyrics.

Will’s face lights up, and he breaks out into an equally-pitchy rendition, holding one hand up as a microphone and pointing at Mike with the other, and Mike gets a little breathless as the synth sends all of them into a flurry of dancing and scream-singing and raucous laughter.

“I was working as a waitress in a cocktail bar, that much is true,” Dustin croons, grabbing El by the shoulders and shaking her as she laughs, “But even then I knew I’d find a much better place—,”

“Either with or with-out you!” Lucas and Max scream up front.

“Don’t,” Will starts, his voice pitching down with exaggerated drama as they all belt the chorus, “Don’t you want me—,”

Oh, does he ever. Mike watches him with undisguised fondness, laughing when Will breaks into a ridiculous grin and has to stop singing to catch his breath.

They cycle through a couple more songs to cover everyone’s taste, Madonna for El and Crowded House for Will and Blondie for Dustin and the Pixies for Mike, before Lucas pulls into the Hopper-Byers’ driveway and leans on the horn until Jonathan and Nancy emerge, glaring at him with their arms crossed identically.

Freaks.

“Stalker, you have a disease of the mind,” Max tells him, shaking her head while he cackles, and they pile out of the car and trail up the porch steps, the guitar riffs of ‘Here Comes Your Man’ still vibrating in their ribcages.

“Why were you honking at us?” Jonathan asks flatly as he holds the front door open for them. “Seriously, you’re lucky Dad isn’t home.”

“Lucas is just in a very devious mood,” El informs him. She got a Thesaurus from Hop for Christmas, a gag gift that she’s actually been taking seriously. “As in: unprincipled, immoral, scheming.”

“I thought that was Mike’s M.O.,” Max quips, leading them all into the living room. The house is warm and lit only by the lamps Joyce always has on in the living room. It’s probably a fire hazard at this point.

“I do love a good scheme,” Mike replies, but he’s watching Will, both of them grinning at each other. His heart flips in his chest.

He’s going to tell him later.

El’s words have been echoing in his head since Christmas, bouncing around with Max’s, and although things between him and Will

have been blessedly normal since dinner with Mike’s parents, a selfish part of him still itches for more. For Will’s hand in his again, his head on Mike’s shoulder, his arms around Mike’s neck, his lips—

Stop. Stop, okay, he needs to stop.

The Party’s flopping down on the living room couch, limbs tangling together. Mike lets himself be pulled down into the empty space between El and Will, Max reaching across the group to mess up his hair, and he grabs her wrist and licks a stripe up the back of her hand in retaliation.

“What the FUCK, Mike!” She shouts, disgusted, wiping her hand on Lucas, who cringes away and squints at Mike incredulously.

“What is wrong with you,” Dustin deadpans.

Mike just laughs, El wrinkling her nose at him while Will scoffs a sigh that’s equal parts exasperated and fond.

“Are we watching the new Halloween, now, or what?” Mike asks, and Dustin shakes his head and gets up to put the tape in.

They settle into a comfortable silence as the opening soundtrack floats into the room, and Mike leans back against the couch cushions and tries to ignore the warm weight of Will beside him. He’s leaning against Mike’s shoulder, his breath warm on Mike’s neck, and the blue light of the T.V. is making him look strangely angelic. He’s watching the movie with rapt attention— Will is the horror buff out of all of them— and he’s so close, and Mike could kiss him here, in the dark of the living room while the rest of their friends aren’t looking—,

No. Nope, Mike isn’t going there.

He gets up to make them all popcorn.

While the bag spins in the microwave, Mike leans against the kitchen cabinets and tries to control his breathing.

He needs to talk to someone other than El and Max about this, or he’s going to lose his goddamn mind. Maybe he already has— maybe he’s going to snap like Michael Myers and kill all of his friends.

The microwave beeps shrilly, breaking him out of his thoughts. Mike curses as he extricates the bag of popcorn, his fingertips burning.

He needs to figure this out, and fast.

Later, when the Party’s gone home and El has joined Nancy on the living room floor to help her knit Robin a scarf, Jonathan surfing channels on the T.V., Mike tells Joyce and Hop he’s going on a drive.

The first week he stayed with the Hopper-Byers family, he got into a habit of driving Hopper’s car around the neighborhood at night— the street was always dead quiet, and the vast darkness and open air gave him space to breathe and scream and cry, if he needed to. After he settled in more and stopped feeling guilty for taking up space, though, he stopped needing to get out as much. He hasn’t gone on a night drive in a while, not since before he left for college at least.

Which is why Joyce’s face goes pale as soon as the words leave Mike’s mouth.

“Oh, honey, is everything okay?”

Mike swallows hard. Hop’s looking at him with a matching expression of concern, and it’s making him itch. “No, yeah, everything’s fine,” he says, cringing at the falseness of his voice.

Everything’s fine, except I’m in love with your son, and I’m living in your house, and you’re probably going to want me out of it for good after I confess to him and knock everything spectacularly off-balance like I always do.

Joyce and Hopper exchange a Look. Mike wants to sink into the floor.

“Well, if you’re sure you’re alright, sweetie,” Joyce says, reaching out and squeezing his shoulder comfortingly. “Just be careful; it’s dark out there and you know how that bitch down the street tears around corners without her headlights on.”

“I will,” Mike assures her, smiling reassuringly. He waves to Nancy and Jonathan and El, and he’s halfway out the door when Will emerges from the hall and says, “Can I come with?”

Fuck.

He’s wearing the menorah sweater again, and his hair is all mussed from sleep because he passed out halfway through Heathers an hour ago, and he’s watching Mike with a wide-open, knowing look, like he can see right into him.

“Sure,” Mike says, because everyone’s looking at them now and his vocabulary has suddenly become very limited with the way Will’s looking at him. “Sure, let’s go.”

The air outside is bitingly cold, stinging Mike’s eyes as the front door swings shut behind them. They haven’t even gotten down the porch steps when Will grabs his hand and tugs him to a stop.

“Hey,” he says, his eyes gleaming under the orange porch light, “What’s bothering you? You’ve been all quiet lately.”

Mike huffs a sigh, leading them both to the car. “I’ll… I’ll explain in a minute. Come on.”

Mike feels Will watching him anxiously, and a pang of guilt courses through him.

“Mike, just— whatever it is, you can talk to me,” Will says. Their doors close at the same time, and Mike turns up the heat as the cold leaks out of him.

“Please just let me drive for a minute. I’ll… I’ll tell you when I find the right words, okay?”

Will nods, empathetic as ever, and Mike relaxes and drums his fingers on the steering wheel. They pull out of the Byers’ driveway and coast onto the street; outside, Christmas lights line the neighboring houses, and Mike feels a tentative calmness fall over him.

Will leans forward and turns on the radio, lowering the volume almost all the way, and ‘Last Christmas’ comes on again. It’s the only song playing on all the holiday stations, Mike swears.

They loop around the block twice before Mike takes a deep breath and starts talking.

“Okay. I’m about to say something really stupid, so if you need me to drop you off back at your house I totally will, you can stop me whenever, just, um. Just let me know if I start sounding too crazy and I’ll let you out, okay?”

He’s had his eyes glued to the road in front of them this whole time, but now, he risks a glance at Will. He’s watching Mike with a sad expression, almost pitying. “Mike, I’m not gonna leave you here alone in the car. I promise, whatever you say, I won’t have a problem with it.”

Mike sighs, long and shaky, and holds Will’s gaze for a beat. “Are you sure?”

Will nods emphatically, his eyes wide and genuine in the grainy half-light of the car. They roll past a stop sign, and Mike forces his eyes back on the road. Blows out a breath.

“Okay,” he says, drawing the word out. “Okay, so here’s the thing. I know our little stunt for my mom was just something you agreed to do to help me out, and… and it did make her see that I’m actually gay, so that’s definitely progress. And I want you to know how much I appreciate it, because I… I don’t know, I don’t know that many people that would do that for their friends. It means a lot to me. But— Shit.”

He pulls over onto the shoulder of the road and puts the car into park. His hands won’t stop shaking.

Will turns the radio off and watches him anxiously, twisting his hands in his lap. “Mike, you’re kind of freaking me out. Are you sure you're okay?”

Mike drops his face into his hands. “No,” he says before he can stop himself, and then any hopes he had of laying all of this out in an organized, controlled way goes out the window. The floodgates are open, and Mike’s mouth is a pipe that’s burst.

“No, I’m not, I— I…”

Will grabs both of his wrists and pulls his hands away from his face. His eyes are wide and teary and run over Mike’s face like he’s looking for something.

“I don’t want this to be pretend,” MIke says quietly. “Fuck, Will, I’m sorry. I know I don’t have a chance, and I know you don’t see me that way, but I can’t just be your friend, not when it hurts like this. I’m in love with you. I’m in love with you and I have been for years and I know this is just gonna complicate things because I fucking live with you and if your mom and Hop want me to leave I will, I’ll figure something out and you won’t ever have to s–”

Will surges forward and kisses him before he can finish the sentence, and Mike’s brain shorts out like a faulty power line.

It’s like Mike’s waking up, all of his nerves alight at once, and his heart skips a beat when Will cradles his face in his hands and leans further over the console to deepen the kiss. It’s like coming home, like rain on the roof of Castle Byers, like jumping off the swings on the Hawkins Middle playground and flying through the air, like The Cure playing on Will’s stereo, the volume so loud that it shakes them down to their bones. Mike slides a hand into Will’s hair and tugs him impossibly closer and God, he’s kissing Will, Will is kissing him, is he dying? Is he dead?

“Mike,” Will says when they finally come up for air, and oh God, his voice is raspy and low and Mike nearly melts, “You have no idea how long I’ve been waiting to do that.”

A slow, idiotic grin spreads across Mike’s face. He feels dazed, like something’s shocked him. “Really?”

“Really,” Will breathes, leaning back in, and MIke could die right here in Hopper’s car with the dark pressing around them on all sides. They’re pulled over next to a vacant house that’s been for sale for a year, and the woods on the other side of them shield them from the view of cars speeding down the highway. It’s safe; they’re safe, and Will is kissing him soft and slow like he’ll shatter if he makes a wrong move.

Mike loses track of time. They both do– when they finally break apart, smiling disbelievingly at each other, half an hour has passed. Mike checks his watch and lets out a string of swears that would make Steve glare at him.

“Shit, we have to get back,” he says, pulling back onto the road, even as Will leans in and presses a kiss to his cheek. “Stop, don’t distract me.”

“Do we have to go home?”

“Will,” Mike says around a laugh, “Your mom is probably seconds away from a heart attack right now. We’ll– we’ll pick up where we left off later.”

“How much later?” Will asks, watching Mike with a wicked smile on his face, and God, he’s going to be the fucking death of him.

“How about this,” Mike says as he pulls into the Hopper-Byers’ driveway, a fresh wave of adrenaline making him braver than usual, “You let me take you out on a date first.”

Will looks at him with wide eyes. “Yeah?”

“Yeah,” Mike says, not even trying to keep the fondness out of his voice. He reaches out and brushes Will’s hair out of his eyes– they really do need haircuts. “Tomorrow. El and Max are going shopping at the new mall, and Dustin’s helping Lucas bake cupcakes for Erica’s birthday party, so we won’t be flaking on them or anything. What about dinner and a movie?”

Will beams at him, looking adorably shy all of a sudden, and Mike aches to kiss him again. “That sounds perfect.”

Mike allows himself a solid minute of (blatantly) staring at Will before he gets out of the car, circling around the front to hold Will’s door open for him.

They trail up the porch steps, and before Mike opens the front door, Will kisses him one more time, fast and bruising. Mike blinks slowly as he pulls away, mesmerized.

How did it take them this long to get their shit together?

When they walk into the living room, it’s to an audience.

Joyce and Hopper and El sit on the couch, and Nancy and Jonathan take up a single armchair, and Mike and Will stand awkwardly in the foyer as El just grins at them. A wave of panic grips Mike. Does she know? How would she know? Are he and Will blushing?

“So, what kept you guys out so late?” Nancy asks innocently, still knitting Robin’s scarf as Jonathan pretends to read the handbook she still has to use for it.

“Um,” Will says dumbly, looking at Mike for help, but fuck if he knows what to say.

God, they’re both hopeless under pressure.

“Don’t answer all at once,” Hopper says drily, grinning when Mike blushes.

Okay, what the fuck is going on?

“We saw you kissing on the porch outside the window,” El says finally, breaking into a laughing fit at their faces.

“Oh, God,” Mike says under his breath. Will looks like he might pass out, swaying on his feet.

“It’s okay, boys,” Joyce rushes to assure them, standing and crossing the room to pull them both into a hug. “But this does mean we’ll need to establish some ground rules.”

“Three inches!” El yells triumphantly, and Hopper barks out a laugh, pointing at her like, the kid’s right.

Mike hates them. He can feel his eyes watering at Joyce pulls away, fixing both of them with a soft, loving gaze. She smells like old cigarettes and linen and coffee.

“Mike, you know you’re staying with us no matter what,” she says, and something small in his chest snaps.

“Oh, honey,” Joyce says, folding him into a tighter hug as he cries. He’s dimly aware of Nancy rushing over to them, and Hop and El getting off the couch, but it’s all kind of a blur because he can’t stop crying for some reason, and things were fine a second ago, and he doesn’t understand.

“We’re here, Mike,” Will says, wrapping his arms around him and Joyce. El wriggles into the hug, too, and then Nancy and Jonathan and Hopper join them, and it’s all a mess of warmth and reassurance and Mike laughing when El’s sweater gets hung on Nancy’s acrylic nails, and he loves them. He loves them, and they love him, and he’s part of their family. Not just orbiting them, not just peripheral.

When they finally disentangle themselves, Jonathan helping El and Nancy unravel the offending thread that’s linking them, Mike breathes out and finds that a weight has lifted.

He smiles when Joyce ruffles his and Will’s hair, and everyone settles back into their spots as El flicks on the T.V. and settles on a rerun of Miami Vice. Mike and Will sprawl out on the living room floor, leaning into each other’s space even as El throws popcorn at them from the couch, giggling like a maniac.

Halfway through the episode, Will’s hand finds Mike’s, and his head nestles into Mike’s shoulder, and the dim light of the T.V. and the glow of the Christmas tree makes him look more at peace than Mike’s ever seen him.

Mike guesses maybe he is. Maybe they both are. He presses a kiss to Will’s hair and soaks up the feeling.