Ted Wheeler dies during Mikeâs first year of college. It's not violent. There's no car accident or bloody thirsty beast. Ted Wheeler dies in his recliner chair, a heart attack, the doctors tell them, and for a while, Mike's life continues as usual.
Will, his beloved boyfriend, frets over him, but Mikeâs fine. He says a few words at the funeral about playing catch in the yard as a young boy, one of the few fond memories of his father, because it wasnât long after that that Ted became apathetic, and then they go back to their apartment in New York. Heâs fine.
Heâs not mourning the man because what is there to mourn? His days arenât disrupted because, other than sharing a house, his father hasnât been part of his life for years now. Heâs fine.
And itâs true. For weeks, Mike turns in college papers, does grocery runs, and sleeps beside his boyfriend undisturbed. The only change is the more frequent phone calls home to check on his mother, but nobody in the Wheeler family cries for long. Ted Wheeler did nothing to earn their grief, and so it doesnât come.
One day, Mike wakes up, and his father's face appears on the backs of his eyelids before he opens his eyes. He doesn't look how he did before he died, old, streaks of grey lining his temples, wrinkles dragging his lips down, cementing his face into the permanent tired frown he wore for his thirties and forties. He looks young, like he's been torn from the family photos from Mike's infancy, and he smiles down at his son with pride and hope.
Hope that Mike would grow into something he could be proud of. Something that could make living in a cul-de-sac and taking over Mike's grandad's company straight out of high school worth it.
And then Mike opens his eyes.
He never became something his father could be proud of, and that stopped bothering him a long time ago. He stopped tying himself into knots over it, denying who he was in fear of disappointing the man who had decided he already wasn't enough before Mike hit the age of ten.
But it sticks with him that day. There's a heavy stone that sits in his stomach, as if he'd gotten the call about his father that morning, and not weeks prior. He's silent over breakfast, the young image of his father refusing to budge every time he blinks. Will notices, but he knows Mike won't answer if he asks what's wrong, so he only wraps an arm around his waist and guides his head onto his shoulder, and they sit in peaceful silence on their couch, sipping at their morning brews, the thick scent of ground coffee beans filling the air.
The stone doesn't go away, no matter what Mike does. It sits lodged in his chest like a pill swallowed dry. The words on his assignments blur together. He gets lost in the rain, splattering on the glass as he washes dishes; his showers get longer as he loses time and sleep.
He downs coffee in hopes of finding concentration. He comes home and throws himself at his boyfriend, distracting him and riling him up, purposely getting under his skin until Will's hands are under his clothes. The sex becomes rougher. Mike wants it harder. Faster, he says, and for a brief moment, the bruises left behind alleviate some of the pressure. Like a pill slowly dissolving, the lump becomes less noticeable.
Why is this bothering him, anyway? If Mike were the one who died, Ted wouldn't have batted an eye. What is Mike even mourning?
He can't sleep one night.
Will is behind him, his arms shackled tight around Mike's torso, his hot breath fanning the back of Mike's neck, his nose nuzzled in Mike's hair. Mike's body aches where Will grabbed, bit, and slapped.
He knows his boyfriend is worried. Their sex life hasn't been very vanilla for a long time, but actively seeking pain is new, and Mike can tell Will isn't entirely into it, too in love to fully enjoy seeing him hurt, but too in love to deny Mike anything.
He watches the rain dribble down their window. For hours, he watches the moon traverse the sky, watches the stars wink and flutter, and places bets on which droplets will reach the window frame first.
Ted's face shows up again, young, smooth, and smiling, and, suddenly, the lump that's been nestled in his throat for weeks swells until it chokes him. His breath shudders and his eyes sting painfully, and the tears come before he can even think to stop them.
His first thought is that he can't wake Will, and so, he carefully slips from his arms. It takes a while. Will's grip is iron-tight, and he's not the deepest sleeper, but eventually Mike has replaced the shape of his body with an armful of duvet, and his breath shakes, and he hiccups as he makes his way to the living room.
Shrugging on one of Will's band tees, Mike drops onto the armchair. He doesn't turn a lamp on, as if he's doing something bad--something best left in the dark. The only light that pours in is from the moon, and for the first time after getting the phone call, Mike weeps.
He thinks of his father, and he wonders if he was scared when he went. He wonders whether he thought of his kids or only of himself. He wonders if he died with regrets, and if Mike was one of them. He wonders if, in Ted's final moments, he saw good memories, and if playing catch in the yard together was one of them.
He sobs, and he sniffles, and he realises he's grieving that day. He's grieving his father's laugh as he dove for the ball and missed. He's grieving for the way Ted had picked his tiny frame up and spun him around, for the way he'd been called son.
They will never get the chance to reconcile. They'll never get the chance to mend, or rather, to build any relationship at all. There was never any conclusion, never any discussion. Mike never told Ted how much he hated him, how much he scared him, yet how badly he wanted Ted to love him. Mike moved out, Ted carried one or two of his boxes to the car because Karen told him to, awkwardly clapped him on the back and then didn't see him off.
There was no 'I'm proud of you, son.' At last. There were no smiles, no contentment, no compromise. They never met in the middle, agreed to love each other despite their differences. There was nothing.
Mike cries until he falls asleep. He wakes back in his bed, tucked in and, presumably, forehead kissed, with a note from Will that says, 'I love you.'
He doesn't get out of bed until noon, and he cries again. He feels stupid for crying. He feels angry for crying. Why should Ted get Mike's grief? Why does he have the right to tear him apart like this?
And then he cries again, because what an awful thought to have about his Dad.
Will comes home, and Mike is still crying. He feels a little broken because he just can't get the tears to stop, but Will doesn't berate him for it. He doesn't tell him to suck it up and be a man.
Will cradles him, sweeping his frame into his arms and telling him it's okay.
The absence of the lump leaves a hollow feeling, as if he's been scooped clean out, and something is missing.
Will helps a lot. He stops entertaining Mike's attempts to rile him up and instead just holds him. Their sex is gentle, but it still scrambles Mike's mind pleasantly regardless. Will makes sure the focus stays on him, and he starts sleeping through the night again.
He goes home for Spring Break, and he visits his dad for the first time since the funeral. The gravesite is pleasant enough, if not a little impersonal.
'Ted Wheeler. Husband and Father.'
Besides the other tombstones, ones with words like: 'Beloved.' 'Treasured.' 'Dearest.' It's sad. Mike's sure he'll laugh about it one day, because it's also a little funny, but in that moment, he's only sad.
Alone with only a stone left of his father, Mike sits on the grass six feet above the coffin, and he doesn't say anything. He brought the ball that's been sitting in the garage for over a decade. It's deflated, dirty and dusty. Decomposing, almost.
He sets it on the grass in front of him and reads the words on Ted's grave over and over.
'Ted Wheeler. Husband and Father.'
Mike doesn't say anything. Despite all the words they could've shared, at this moment, Mike has nothing to say. This is the man who neglected him his entire life and died alone.
Mike doesn't have to chase his validation anymore, but then, he stopped running after it years ago.
He sits there until he gets hungry, and then he stands. The visit has felt anticlimactic, like a waste of time, and slight embarrassment sizzles under his skin because he thought he'd feel something more. Aren't you supposed to feel something visiting your father's grave?
"Bye, Dad," Mike says, and turns his back, but he only makes it a step. Something pops into his head, words to say, at last.
He swallows and turns back. He reads the tombstone for the last time, and he says:
Sorry that he wasn't enough. Sorry that he didn't try harder. Sorry that he wasn't good at catching a ball. Sorry that Ted didn't want to accept him for who he is, that he won't get a chance to see his son live a happy life, and sorry that he wouldn't have wanted to in the first place.
Mike Wheeler walks away, and the gaping chasm of hollowness that's plagued his chest for weeks fades. Like a sutured wound, it scars over. He leaves behind the resentment, the ball that hasn't been touched since that afternoon in the yard, and he leaves behind his father, and how close Mike once got to becoming him.
He goes home. His Mother smiles at him, she kisses his forehead, and she demands that he and Will tell her all about their life in New York. She's glowing with pride in a way Mike hasn't seen her do before. The house feels lighter, less like there's a bear trap in every doorway, or an argument around every corner. There are more plants and flowers on every windowsill and hanging from the ceiling instead of being confined to the outside because they'd make Ted sneeze.
The pink rug that has been collecting dust in the attic is now laid out in front of the TV, and Mike realises that his father's chair is gone, replaced with a new, better-smelling, floral chair with a pile of wool on it, a sweater in the making.
It reminds him of the Byers house after Lonnie left, when they took down the photos of him and his old, rusting trophies from his 'glory days' and replaced them with things Will made or photos Jonathan took, when the house got that brightness and warmth that made it distinctly Byers.
Like then, the Wheeler house has a new air to it. Ted never ruled over them with iron, violent fists like Lonnie did with his family, but he choked the house regardless. He sucked the life out of it, leaving it as grey and static as the glow from the old movies he'd watch day in and day out.
It's nice, Mike decides. The new air.
There's a pang of grief. A pang of sympathy that after Ted's death, all that will remain of him is his children, something that clearly wasn't enough, but there's no guilt anymore.
It would have been nice if they could've gotten along. If Ted could have been a happier man, but he wasn't.
That night, Mike sleeps in his own bed. Will sleeps with him, rather than in the guest room, like he would've had to under different circumstances, and Mike sleeps better.
Ted was a door that would never close, yet a doorway that Mike could never pass through. Like a jammed door in a storm, the cold would sweep in, gusts of wind so sharp and icy that it was like claws dragging over your skin.
Now, the door closes, and the Wheeler house feels warm. Warmer than it has been in a very, very long time.
Mike closes his eyes, and he only sees blackness.
ââââââââââââ
Iâve done like 23 mount runs today on WOW and gotten nothing so have some Mike Wheeler suffering
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