Oh but how William Byers loved Michael Wheeler. He loved the way Mike spoke his words, the way they left his mouth before he realized. Mike’s mouth was grand too, big coscade lips, so very pretty. Cheekbones that stretched for days, just like his legs. And soft, soft curls, bending away and sprouting out.
Mike was always sprouting out in away. Venturing the world, crossing its forests and rivers in his mind and in his ways. Will loved the way Mike led the way, taking Will’s hand and running the both of them off, so fast that neither of them could breathe, choking on their own laughter.
Will loved the way Mike was both the lost and the found at once. Will loved the way Mike told his jokes, and how red he got when he was jealous. Will loved the remarks Mike had at the top of his head. Will loved Mike’s sass and salt. Will loved Mike. Will loves Mike.
She was a lot of things. A redhead. A fifteen year old. A boss ass bitch. But she wasn’t stupid. Or dumb. Or Stupid.
You know two people who are?
William Byers and Michael Wheeler.
Max had nothing against the two, infact, they were two of her closest friends. Will was sweet and soft and kind, and sometimes she just wanted to wrap him up in a blanket with milk and cookies. Will was also insanely strong, and brave. He kind of reminded her of Neville Longbottom. Mike, well Max and him didn’t really get along at first, but it developed from a rocky friendship to a beloved one. Mike was salty and cool, and loyal. He also took no shit, and was a big nerd.
So yeah, they were awesome. But also real fucking stupid.
They’d been pining over each other for what, two years? But then again, that’s just how long Max had known the two. The pair had met in pre-school, so who knows when the crushes developed. The two were whipped, and they couldn’t see a mutual opposite. Stupid.
She wanted them to come together on there own terms, but oh. Come on. It was taking too long, and they would never do anything. It’s time for an intervention.
Max had this all planned out. It was December 7, not too close to Christmas, but close enough that Christmas decorations could be hung up, however a bit too soon to give away Christmas presents.
The party was all Max’s house, helping put up red and green banners, and liven the place up. The Hargrove-Mayfield family was boring, and iffy, but the one thing they always let her do was put up Christmas decorations. Granted it was normally a family tradition, but the party was her family.
“Hey Max, where’s your tinsel?” Dustin asks, over near the fake tree they set up minutes ago, opening up the ornament boxes that were put away for centuries.
Mike and Will were still opening up the ends of the Christmas tree, and Elle and Lucas were wrapping Christmas lights around the tree.
“I don’t know, let me check upstairs. Will, can you check in the box on my dad’s desk downstairs?” Max asked. Will nodded and wandered down the stairs. Max looked up at Dustin, and he winked, she winked back, and she ran up the stairs.
Both Dustin and Max knew that the tinsel was in the box at Dustin’s feet.
She scrambled towards her room, bursting her door open. Layed on her bed was a huge black hockey stick Billy used to own but got tired of, and he gave her for her birthday, despite Max not playing hockey.
She grabbed it and ran back down the stairs. Thanks Billy. Will was at the foot of the stairs, on his way up from the basement.
“Sorry Max, it wasn’t in the box. Did you manage to find it?” Will said, raising an eyebrow as he looked down at Max’s hands to find a hockey stick but no tinsel.
“No, rats. Whatever.” Max shrugged. “But, hey, I found this uh- hockey stick, think of it as an early Christmas present. I’m giving another one to whoever’s my Secret Santa, but you know T’is the Season and all that.”
Max shoved the hockey stick in his hand, and walked over to Dustin who eyed the conversation with a bright beam on his face. She passed by him and gave him a high-five. Dustin bent down to grab something from the decoration box, and tossed it over to Max, who caught it without looking.
Will walked over to Mike, as expected, the hockey stick’s front facing behind him as he held it to his side as he walked. The stick was far too big from him, and near towering over him from the back.
Max ran over to Will, and tied her hand’s holding to the stick front. It was mistletoe.
“Hey, uh, Will?” Dustin said, breaking the conversation between Mike and Will. “Why don’t you show Mike what you got there?”
The party looked to Mike and Will, Will whirling the stick to Mike, oblivious to what was on top of him. Mike blushed furiously, his cheeks crimson giving away what little calm cover he attempted to have.
“Are you sure Will?” Mike asked. Will caught up in the daze of how pretty Mike’s blush was, nodded inattentively. Mike cupped the side of Will’s cheek, and leaned in slowly, having to bend down to meet Will’s lips.
Yes. Yes. Yes.
The party cheered when the two lips met, Will’s thin soft ones to meet Mike’s chapped but still gentle ones. Mike pulled away slowly, Will still looking a bit confused, but dropping the hockey stick to wrap his arms around Mike’s neck to pull him down again, leg curling up behind him. There lips moved in carousel turns, and once it got, um, deeper, the party looked away.
Mike always really liked Will’s hands. His nails were always short because Will could never stop biting them, not for the life of him. Sometimes he put on nail polish, which he got from Nancy, and Mike doesn’t really care for nail polish too much but Will loves doing it for Mike, so Mike lets him do it. Mike’s hands always end up perfected because Will’s hands are steady, but whenever Mike tries to do it for Will, it gets all messy and all over. Will still lets Mike do it though.
But he had small hands, and always wore cocoa hand lotion so they smelt nice and were always really soft. There’s two freckles running down Will’s left wrist, and in between Will’s right pointer finger and thumb and a thin scar from when Will was a baby and messed around with Jonathan’s carving knives. But oh, how achingly soft.
Mike could imagine holding them. Not that he thought about it, the thought just crossed his mind time from time. Would Will like holding on tightly, as if he was near falling off a cliff, or would Will have a soft grip, fingers lightly intertwined in a grazing touch. Mike wondered, and for curiosity sake, wanted to find out. Just curiosity.
Will, was not, in anyway, at all, afraid of horror movies. Or clowns. Or horror. Or horror movies. He wasn’t. In anyway. At all.
“Can we at least keep the light on?” Will whined asked. They were all in Lucas’ basement, around the television. Mike and Will sharing a cushion, while Dustin layed across the other in a position that somewhat resembled one of a laying seated twist. Lucas and Max were on the ground, leaning against the bottom couch, and Elle was sprawled on the Settee.
“It won’t be the same that way!” Max exclaimed, turning to look at Will, lava hair whizzing at the sudden neck turn, and the hair whipped into Luca’s face, who sputtered. “It’s our movie marathon sleepover. It’s near one am, it keeps the spook!”
Dustin and Lucas nodded furiously, those boys were so whipped. But Max softened and Will’s worried look. “But it’s okay, if you really want to we can.” Max comforted.
Dustin and Lucas nodded furiously again. Elle just seemed kind of confused.
“Yeah Will, I was going to ask to anyway,” Mike added, turning to Will. It was quite obvious that Mike was lying.
“No, it’s alright. Keep them off.” Will assured. Max and Mike both looked uneasy and if they wanted to say more. “Seriously.” They didn’t say more.
Max got up to put the “It” disc in, and the movie plays.
It’s fine at first, Max saying “mood” to everything Richie says, Elle pointing out that Eddie is so gay for Richie, Dustin going on about Georgie being a dumbass but still his new son, which has Eleven confused.
And then Mike says that Richie looks just like him, and Will kind of fizzes out at the thought of two Mike’s. Will shakes it off and tunes back in to Lucas saying that Mike looked nothing like Richie. Mike kept insisting he did, and Will backed Mike up, although Lucas was right, and the two really did look like polar opposites.
And then Patrick died, and things got a bit - achy. Everyone was too focused on the movie, and Dustin and Lucas barely got taken aback on the jumpscares. I mean one nearly had Will off the sofa. Will curled up to the pillow left to him, which felt suspiciously like a human. And then they go into the Neilbolt House, and Will freaks and grabs the closets thing to him and holds it. Tight. Will ignores the fact that the thing holds him just as tight as he does.
And then it’s over.
And Max turns the light on, panting, beaming with sunflower eyes and bambling about how great the movie was, why Elle and Lucas discuss how gay Eddie was, and deciphering the party members as Losers, but Will is still in it man. It takes him a while to notice the party staring at him. Everyone but Mike actually. Where is Mike?
And then Will hears a squawk from above him, looks up, and freezes. Somehow, Will is at Mike’s side, Mike’s head leaning on his, and he’s practically on Mike’s lap. Mike’s right hand is around his waist, and clasping to meet his right hand, which is in a near death grip to his. They both flail and hop to opposite sides of the couch, which leaves Mike crashing into Dustin, which forces the two of them off the couch. It’s silent until Max breaks the silence with an outrageous snort which develops into witch-like laughter. Dustin and Lucas shortly follow, and Elle is giggling, but still looks a bit confused.
Will forces himself to look at Mike, who’s gone crimson, and Will has no doubt he looks the same.
“Uhh, sorry.” Mike mumbles, and Will tries to nonchalantly shrug.
“It’s cool.”
Lucas, oh god bless Lucas, cuts in the awkward tension, “So, i’m thinking a comedy next to lighten the mood?”
Will can’t hear whatever Dustin responds because Max is still cackling.
Okay but consider Stranger Things season two in Max’s perspective. Moving to a shit town, forcibly, leaving all you’ve ever known to get stuck in Fucksville, USA. Getting stuck with an older brother and abusive father. And the only places to get away being school and the arcade. And then these creepo guys start falling you around, one of them having the audacity to pull out a pair of binoculars, like what he’s Diego The Explorer?
And then, hey they actually start acting pretty cool. Will, the short one is really nice and sweet, and for a while he wouldn’t say much to you. But then he starts talking a bit more, and you realize he’s just shy. Mike, you realize doesn’t like you, but it’s alright, because maybe he’s like Will and will come around soon. Probably. Maybe. Dustin’s great, he talks a lot and is really funny. And Lucas, hey maybe he even likes you. Like likes you. He’s nervous and excited and fumbles over his words but he’s cool. Really cool. He’s totally tubular.
But sometimes they’re all huddled up, and keep secrets. And at first you think, maybe they don’t trust you yet. You haven’t been friends that long. Whatever. But then it happens again. And again, and again, and again. Is it because you’re a girl? But Elle, she was a girl. Who is she anyway? Maybe it’s not because you’re a girl. Maybe it’s because you’re you. And then things aren’t pretty cool.
And you know what? You’re sick of it. All of it. And you confront them, and you’re done. But then it’s hell at home, and awkward and lonely and school, and the party is always, always, at the arcade.
And then Lucas finally says he’s gonna explain. And, you let hope surge through you again. Lucas always was your favorite anyway. But, telekinesis? The Upside Down? What does he think you’re stupid?
Maybe you are stupid, thinking things would be okay again. They’re not. They’re really not.
It was parallel to all the movies in a way, wasn’t it?
In the movies, you fall in love slowly.
It’s smiling more and you fall in love with each thing at once. The way they smile, or mutter comments under their breath. The way they dig their thumb into the side of their pointer finger when they try not to get mad.
Or the way they shoot up when they remember something, eyes glowing when they agree.
But for Will it wasn’t this gradual fall. It came all at once, like this flicker of a light.
Late, late, at night. Where the aura’s dead, and it’s dark enough to fall out.
Where everyone in Hawkins must have been asleep, even the midnight workers down at the convenience stores past Deckner.
But no, not Mike Wheeler. Or Will Byers. They were up at two am, at a sleepover working through the same routine they have since they were six.
Search through Netflix to find a new movie, but ending up watching the same episodes of Parks and Recreation they always do. Shoving their faces with food, then laying through the stomach aches on Will’s couch.
Then, when Joyce comes from her room telling them that they should get to sleep, they go back to Will’s room and whisper through the rest of the night while Jonathan sneaks them snacks until he goes to sleep.
The lights off, so Will can’t see anything except for the trace of moonlight coming through the window and laying on Mike, emblazing as if an angel.
A thought sneaks past Will. He looks gorgeous. And the eye contact Will has with Mike as Mike goes on about god knows what at this point, has fallen to Mike’s pink nicotine lips.
And they stay there, for far too long.
“Will. Will?” Mike asks, as Will pops back up to life so springy he nearly falls of the bed.
“Are you good? Dude you were out for a while.” Mike asks, a laugh barely slipping out his lips, although concern still present in his eyes.
“Yeah, yeah. What were you saying?”
Mike shakes his head a little, but continues his cute little rant, and Will laughs at how Mike glows up at some parts, and Will sort of falls in love with that for a little while.
The kids at school didn’t know as much as they think they did about Richard Thomas Tozier. A lot of people thought he was funny, and a lot hated him. He would never shut up, and appeared to have no volume control, could never be serious, and seemed to have a need for attention.But to the Loser’s Club, he was everything he was not. It doesn’t make sense, but there a billion Richard Tozier’s.
There’s the one you see at school, who get’s detention so often he has a reserved seat, who knows every dirty joke known to man kind, with mucked up glasses held up by tape, and the worst possible fashion choices.
There’s the one that has an extra inhaler in the back of his backpack kept for Eddie, the one who seems to not be cold at all when his friends are, and can always lend them a sweater. There’s the one who knew each and every one of Eddie’s so called “allergies” and sicknesses". Who can recite every single word Stan did at his bar mitzvah because he let Stan practice with him a billion times.
There’s also the one that keeps a baseball bat next to his bed, and can’t sleep at night without wearing one of the loser club’s hoodies. The one that hates attending parties because it’s almost guaranteed that balloon’s will be hung. The one that can always finds routes with sidewalks without sewers, even if the street crossings adds an extra ten minutes.
Don’t listen to what he says. That kid is not alright.
and the way you cut your hair (ten things i hate about you chapter two/byler)
Summary of Fanfic: Ten Things I “Hate” About You
Summary of Chapter: They all go the arcade, and Will starts liking Mike.
Word Count: 820
A/N: none.
chapter one
And the way you cut your hair
It was seven pm on a Friday night. It was supposed to be an Elle, Max, and Will night. But instead, the three were at The Palace. Will didn’t know why he thought Max wouldn’t want to come tonight, The Palace was her second home. Well actually, her real home was an actual hell hole. Will didn’t doubt Max would rather name the arcade her first.
“You came!” Wheeler exclaimed. He rushed over to Will the three. Will notices Mike’s new haircut, and his curls are still kept long, but well it doesn’t look bad. It looks good fine. There’s also a new pink streak going through a one curl in the front. It looked cute. Will looks away and finds sudden interest in his beat down white converse.“Mike!” Will looks back up again.to find an angry Dustin stomping over and a smirking Luke? No, Lucas.
“You scared me! You made me lose the game!” Dustin grumbles, and Will tries not to smirk.
“No, you lost the game because you suck.” Lucas responds, and Dustin sends him the middle finger without even looking.
“Ah! Will’s too young for this!” Max leans over, and covers his eyes, and Will shrugs her off, as Elle laughs.
“Oh.” “Hi!” Lucas and Dustin say, just then noticing the three.
Will waves, Elle smiles, and Max walks over to Lucas and wraps an arm around his shoulders.
“What’s up, Stalker?” Max askes, causing Lucas to blush. No one really says anything, but Will quietly notes how Lucas gets embarrassed, and how he reaches up for the hand around his shoulder and holds it.
“Elle, right?” Dustin asks, and Elle nods.
“Dustin?” Dustin nods. “Cool. Hey Lucas. Lucas is in my gym class.” Elle says, and Will nods at him weirdly, and Lucas nods back.
“I’m Will.” Will says, reaching to shake Dustin’s hand, and he takes it.
“Yeah, we’ve heard a lot about you. From Mi-” Mike nudges him, and Dustin smirks. What?
“So, you guys play Dig Dug?” Mike askes, dragging them to the arcade games and out from the entrance.
“Uh, yeah.” Max says. “I’m the top score.”
Lucas and Dustin practically choke on air. “You’re MadMax?”
“Know any other Max in Hawkins?” Max says smugly, and Will smiles.
“Well, we’re go-gonna beat your high score. Just you wait.” Dustin exclaims, and all three run to the Dig-Dug game.
Mike laughs softly. It’s a pretty laugh.
“So, what do you wanna play first?” Mike asks.
“Actually, I need to use the bathroom. You guys go ahead,” Elle says, and walks away. She turns around and winks at Will. Damnit Elle.
“So?” Mike asks, making eye contact with Will. Elle was right, he was way, way nicer now. And Max had seemed to completely forgive Mike.
“I kinda like Pac-Man. Not too good at it though.” Will says. Mike lays an arm around Will’s shoulders, and Will doesn’t hate it?
“Well here, Byers. I’ll show you all my best tips.” Mike says, and takes him to the Pac-Man front.
“No! No! It’s coming!” Will exclaims, and Mike panics, and thrusts the button to late, and the “you lost!” screen appears. Mike groans and bangs his head on the machine.
“Damn.” Mike mumbles, and Will giggles. Actually giggles. Will’s surprised at them getting long.
Mike comes back up, “You’re turn.” Will reaches his hand into his pocket, and frowns.
“I don’t have any money left, you go ahead.” Will says.
“No, I got you.” Mike says, fishing a coin out of his jeans pocket.
“No, no, it’s alright.” Will says, pushing Mike’s hand back.
“I invited you, I should get to pay. It’s alright.” Mike says, and puts the coin in Will’s hand. Will pauses, then takes it. Mike grips his hand for a second longer then needed, and pulls away, making Will blush.
Will looks up at Mike’s hair again, but Mike sees his gaze.
“Oh, you like it?” Mike beams, sifting his hand through the pink curl. “My mom will kill me, but it’s worth it.”
“It’s pretty.” Will stutters. “I mean, p-pretty cool.” Mike laughs.
“Hey Mike! Will!” Dustin calls, and the two turn around and see Dustin, Lucas, Elle, and Max at the tables. “We ordered food!”
The two walk to the table, and Will puts the coin back in Mike’s hand. \
“We all got fries to share. Without salt, because they always put way too much,” Max says when they near the table.
Will, sits on the one side of the table where Max and Dustin sit, and Mike takes a seat where Elle and Lucas are. It’s been only an hour, but the two groups have already become comfortable with each other.
“Will’s cool! Can we keep him?” Mike jokes, pretending to whisper to Lucas and Dustin. Everyone laughs, and the two groups unofficially officially decide to keep each other.
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