what gets me is that this whole time it actually was bad writing, queerbait or both and there are genuinely no other explanations, specifically because of the exact choices they made.
will seemed to make peace with his love being unrequited at the end of season 4. there was no reason to wake it back up unless they were going to do something with it (or wanted it to look a hell of a lot like they were going to); they could have written in an ACTUAL tammy-like figure in, like a hallway crush at their school, but they didn't. if they really wanted to not give will a love story and prove him right when he said he'd never find love that badly, a self-acceptance arc could've been done without any love interest at all.
his conversation with robin could easily have been about how she knew she was gay or how she came to accept herself but it wasn't. it was about visible signs that someone was interested in you, signs which were displayed by both mike and will throughout the entire show up until volume 2, when it just stopped with no explanation.
and why would he even be asking about signs if mike and el were supposedly together the entire time? they purposefully kept their relationship status ambiguous up until the moment of el's death. they didn't have to make all of these deliberate choices but they did, only to deliver a far worse story.
this entire thing is insane too because i didn't even ship byler until volume 1 came out. i hoped to see will be loved back and experience romance more than anything else but i saw that by keeping him in love with mike they had backed themselves into a corner and there was really only one way that could happen.
i am so sorry everyone, i know some of you have been in these trenches since season 1. its truly such a waste, both of our time and what could've been a beautiful story.
fuck them forever, they never deserved will byers.