Work Text:
JANUARY 5TH, 1986
The idea came to me so suddenly, it was almost whiplash.
Mike Wheeler was my best friend. He had told me on the phone just a week prior that he would be coming to California to see Eleven and I in the spring. The plans were official, finalized. It was happening.
Since that phone call, I have done nothing but mentally wrestle with different gestures I should express. Somehow, words could not be enough. Maybe I was trying to match up to El, because I knew she was planning an all-out day with him, or maybe I was just trying to prove that we were still best friends. That I still cared, and that maybe he would return that gesture, too.
In the midst of my near-breakdown about what I should do, my mom knocked on my door—and I knew because of that little jingle she does—and handed me a letter. I didn’t have to think twice before I knew where it came from.
Mike had told me he missed being a paladin. That was the kicker, for me. In the four or five months I’ve lacked contact with Mike, he never mentioned that his character for the Hellfire campaigns was a god-damned thief. This was because there were, quote, “Already enough paladins and I didn’t want to be a burden”, end quote.
It was a thought that, oddly, shook me more than most of the other things Mike had to tell me about that high school. In that same thought, I remembered what had made our party so special—we didn’t have to even worry about others anyway. It was just us, the four. Then it became different.
Mike and I had many differences, but I think, in that moment, I knew we had both shared one thought: I wish you were here.
The idea came to me, whiplash: I’ll do something I used to do all the time. When Mike comes to see me in March, I’ll give him a piece of my art—an extension of myself. Maybe then, he’d know I’d still cared, and that I was still his best friend.
JANUARY 14th, 1986
It was a long time to be away from home. The feeling of loss had been creeping up on me for months, and as the weather had gotten more bitter and unforgiving, the gravity of that isolation hit harder than it had before. It would be a long time before I’d be home again, if at all.
I understand it. I know there’s strong feelings about Hawkins for everyone. Mom, El, Jonathan—Me. I can’t help but feel like it’s somehow my fault, like I’m the reason we can’t ever go back. I know it’s not true, deep down—there was no way I’d put myself through all of that on purpose. But there’s never anything to stop the way you feel about something you couldn’t control.
If I’m being honest, I just wish all of those feelings would go away.
Along with all that had come upon me within the arrival of winter, I still hadn’t found my footing in Lenora, either. I hadn’t really mentioned it to any of my friends back at Hawkins, and it’s not like I’d lie if they asked me about it, but I still hadn’t found my people. If my people even existed.
It’s like I was forsaken. The feeling of truly being alone, and being stuck in a place that would never understand you. That feeling you try to avoid, because it is the most crippling. It gets you anyway, though, because it always does.
I sometimes wonder: If Mike had not asked to be my friend, would I have any? Would I still be friends with Lucas? Would Dustin still seek me out? I don’t know. Maybe I would have just ended up like Jonathan; the creep loser who never says a word to anyone and no one says a word to him.
What I’m trying to say is—does fate exist? Was I supposed to always be drawn back to my friends at Hawkins?
I sat at the lunch table by myself. Eleven had taken to eating in the girl’s bathroom as of late because at the very least she can have some sort of solace away from the loud, terrorizing lunchroom. Meanwhile, I sort of blend in.
Or—it’s not really that I blend in. It’s just that I’ve become something invisible. I know Mike would probably say it’s, like, a superpower or something—to be so invisible. That thought makes me smile. The reality, on the other hand, is that most of the student body at Lenora High sees the weird kid from Indiana and thinks “Oh God, I can’t possibly be seen with him.”
There was a noise coming from my left, but I wasn’t paying attention. I wasn’t even eating my lunch. I was, instead, drawing in my notebook. It’s easy to get engrossed in your own work when there’s nothing else to distract you.
Except, now there was, because of course someone was throwing paper airplanes across the room. Of course.
One poked me right in the cheek.
I dropped my pencil and looked to my right only to see Angela and her posse giggling in my direction. What happened to my invisibility? Maybe I rolled a critical failure. They made a face and a gesture at me, like I was some kind of animal in the San Diego Zoo. They want me to open it, I thought.
Cautious, I opened the paper airplane. Dread washed over me at that moment, and I quickly crumpled the paper before I couldn’t tear my eyes away from the word written. Scribbled in dark, harsh strokes, radiating with hatred.
It isn’t often that my invisibility fails me, but when it does, it doesn’t matter how many times I’ve faced it and heard the same word over and over—the same cold feeling of being drenched in icy water washed over me like a tidal wave—I’d still obsess over it, and run it back a hundred times before I could let it go. That was all I was to everyone. That was what they thought.
I went back to drawing. I will deal with this later, I tell myself, sketching out the lines of a paladin.
JANUARY 20th, 1986
I didn’t think it was possible for it to snow in California. In Hawkins, it always snowed plenty of times before January had even rolled around. California, on the other hand, was hot and dry. Lenora was in a weird spot in California where the weather was usually just sunny and warm, even in late fall. Which is exactly why I didn’t think snow was possible.
But there it was, anyway. On a particularly cold day for Lenora, little white specks drifted down from the sky. They didn’t stick, of course, because the ground was too warm. But it still snowed.
I thought about calling my friends. I thought about calling Mike. As the thought crept into my mind, I glanced over from the window to the dining room table, and saw my mom scratching something down on a notepad, talking in a false-cheeriness reserved for the average customer. I glanced back at the snow. They’re still in class anyway. I’ll just wait.
“Oh!” My mom gasped from across the room. She hurried over beside me, wide-eyed, but almost shivering from excitement. “It’s snowing,” she whispered, covering the phone speaker.
I grinned in return. “I didn’t think it would.”
She quickly returned to the table, writing more down, completing whatever transaction was occurring. I figured I’d had enough of the snow and retreated to my room.
Despite moving everything back in October, I still managed to have a few boxes of random things from my old room scattered on my floor. I couldn’t even remember what was in them, anyway.
As if I was drawn to it, I made my way to my easel and the current very blank canvas. Staring at it so long as if I were boring a hole in it, I eventually decided it was a fruitless effort.
It wasn’t that I didn’t know what I wanted to paint, I knew exactly what I wanted to paint. The sketch of it had been sitting in my notebook for almost a week. Yet, despite this, an overwhelming anxiety overtook me every time I approached my easel. It was as if it became too big of a thing. Was this just a painting for Mike? A simple token of friendship, like it had always been?
I glanced between the paints and the canvas. I couldn’t start it. Where would I even begin?
Yet, despite the gnawing feeling in my gut, the buzzing in my chest, I picked up the small round brush sitting on the edge of my easel, dipped it in water and a little bit of paint, and drew strokes across the canvas.
FEBRUARY 6th, 1986
LETTER TO WILL, FROM MIKE
Dear Will,
Sorry it’s taken so long to get back to you. How are things over there? I know you said it’s kind of lonely. I understand what you mean.
I would’ve written this sooner if
it was easier
I wasn’t so busy myself. There is a lot going on in Hellfire. I still hope that you’ll be able to meet Eddie someday. He’s seriously awesome.
Anyway, by the time you get this it’ll probably be February already. That means there’s only a month and a half left until I see you guys! I’m so excited.
Do you have anything in mind for what we should do? El is saying she’s keeping it a surprise, but I figured you’d tell me what you have planned.
Can’t wait to visit,
Mike
RE: LETTER TO WILL, FROM MIKE
Dear Mike,
Don’t worry about how long it’s been. I understand.
Hellfire sounds wicked. Did you get the picture I sent you last time? It was the one for your campaign. I hope they liked it.
Otherwise, I think things here are going… okay. It’s still pretty lonely without my friends, but I’ve been working on my own art a lot recently, and it’s keeping me occupied. I’m improving a lot too! The art classes in high school are way better.
Perhaps I could show you what I’ve been working on when you come here? I mean, I have a lot, but there’s something in particular that I’m really excited to share with you. I think you’ll like it.
All the best,
Will
FEBRUARY 7th, 1986
Gingerly setting down the letter, I shut the mailbox door and hurried back up the steps. It was a chilly evening and I had to make a call.
“Mom?” I called, eyeing the telephone on the counter top. “I’m going to use the phone for a bit.”
I brush myself off as if there was any dust in the first place. A breath in, a breath out. I slowly dial the numbers, the ones I’ve known by heart since second grade, and pick the receiver up to my ear.
There’s a solid thirty seconds of nothing but the dial tone. Then, through the other side, I heard a small “Hi.”
“Hey, Mike,” My voice quivered but I’m not sure it was discernible from the static.
“Did you get it?” He asked, tentatively.
“What? The letter?” I respond, or really ask, then answer myself a moment later. “Yeah, I got it. Thanks.”
“Cool, cool.” Mike replied. “Why did you call me? It’s almost dinner time.”
I shrugged as if he could see me.
“Uh,” I then reply, because he can’t see me, and can’t see my halfhearted shrug. “El—er, Jane wanted to talk to you.” I stumbled over my words like a newborn horse trying to walk.
I knew that was a lie. El hasn’t had much she wanted to say to Mike. But it wasn’t a complete lie, because El would come to the phone regardless after four minutes of me and Mike having our own conversation. Mike would get distracted, because it’s El, and then that would be the end of my time on the call. It was best to just give it up now.
“Oh, really?” Mike’s voice almost cracked. It’s been like that for a year, wavering and cracking while it’s doing a meager attempt at deepening.
“Yeah,” I replied, “I’ll get her now. Be right back.”
I almost drop the phone on the ground as I hurry to place it on the table. I hastily moved my feet up the stairs, nearly tripping as I made my way to her door. I knocked a jingle I knew she would recognize.
“Come in,” She said, muffled between her room, the door, and the hall.
I open the doorknob and enter as casually as I could muster. “Do you want to talk to Mike? He’s on the phone.”
El looks at me for a moment, humming, before deciding, simply, “No.”
My head falls to the side. “Are you sure? You always want to.”
El nodded. Simple answer.
Except it’s not, because she then added, “I talked to him yesterday.”
Great, I thought. I nodded and stumbled back down the stairs. I gently picked up the receiver again, hoping Mike was still even there. Before I answered I could hear the sound of a joystick bobbing around in the background.
“Are you playing Mario again?” I asked, because by the sounds the game was making, it sure sounded like a little red Italian plumber going down a pipe.
“Yeah, um, sorry. I figured out the fastest shortcuts. Just went to World 8.” Mike said.
My face grew warm as I realized it's been a solid twenty seconds before I spoke again. “That’s—that’s awesome.”
Mike sighed, and it was a big sigh considering he didn’t try to hide it. “She doesn’t want to talk to me?”
“No?” I answered, but it sounded more like a question than a statement. I had to backtrack. “Well, she said she... Wasn’t feeling it today.”
There’s a quiet moment then. An uncomfortable silence.
Breaking the silence, through static I could hear a muffled Mrs. Wheeler calling for Mike.
“Sorry, Will. Dinner time.” He replied.
“It’s okay, uh—call soon?” I fidgeted with the phone cord.
“Sure, yeah.” Mike dismisses. “Bye.”
“Bye.” I call, but the line goes dead before I can get it all out.
I put down the receiver, knowing that he won’t call again soon.
MARCH 3rd, 1986
March crept up on me like time was a laughable concept. It had only made me more wretchedly nervous. Through bitten nails and frequent spurts of zoning out, I don’t think I retained a single thing I’ve learned in school during the past week.
The anxiety around it all was channeled into my painting. Well, not necessarily the anxiety—but the comfort painting brought me had eased my tense shoulders and dissipated the heavy sense of doom. Once I was in the world of my own creation, it was like the rest of the world faded away.
That was until, of course, I would be interrupted.
“What is that?” El peeked over my easel. I nearly jumped at her sudden appearance.
“Nothing.” My face grew hotter by the second, and I’m sure I looked visibly similar to the dragon I was in the middle of painting—Crimson.
“Is that a painting?” El ignored me and leant closer.
“Yes, it’s uh, really nothing though.” I turned the canvas away so El couldn't see.
Not that it was anything innately vulnerable, I thought.
“Aw, come on, Will. I like your artwork.” She pleaded, like any sister would, because why would she ever give it up ?
“It’s for—” I blurted, before catching myself, then, quickly finishing, “It’s a gift for someone.”
El made a little drawn out “oh” sound and nodded. “I will leave you to it then.” But something about her mischievous demeanor says she won’t leave me to it, and she’ll keep bothering me about it. Who is it for, Will? Tell me! I could already hear.
The moment El closed the door and finally left me on my own, I let out a heavy sigh I didn’t know I was withholding. I slumped back on my stool, adjusting the canvas. I still haven’t gotten very far, but there’s splashes of red and green and blue on the canvas already.
I spun around to my radio, popping in the cassette for some band Jonathan recommended to me months ago that I hadn’t got to yet.
I turned back to the painting, music flowing through me, unrecognizable, and lifted my brush once more.
It isn’t that it was some grand gesture. That was, at least, my first thought. The painting was just a gift. It was just a token of undying friendship. It was just like every other time I gave Mike one of my drawings, except that this was a painting.
But was that really all there was? If I was honest with myself, and only myself, would that really be the answer?
I’m not expecting anything from this. Mike and El are glued to each other. I don’t expect anything. I repeated this thought like a mantra, keeping me from falling off the edge.
The problem is that I dreamt about it, anyway. When I was younger, it was sort of normal to be close and friendly with your best friend. It didn’t matter that you were both boys.
Somehow, some way, that notion changes when you become older.
So, maybe , I hold on to the way things used to be.
That would be fine, too. That’s a normal thing for two best friends to feel if you’ve been friends since kindergarten. You wish you could just be little kids again, eating the dirt from the ground and playing with little toy trucks.
Except that I don’t want to be a little kid again. I just don’t want things to have to change.
So perhaps this painting is a grand gesture. Perhaps it is asking Mike, my best friend, “Do you want things to go back to how they were? Do you, too, wish that we could talk like how we used to talk? That we could tell each other anything and it wouldn’t matter?”
I’m not expecting anything from this. I’m really not.
MARCH 21st, 1986
No matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t rest. The moment that I would close my eyes, they would open back up again. My mind was absolutely racing with hundreds of possibilities: How would I greet him? Would I say something funny and he’d laugh? Would he hug me tight because we haven’t breathed the same air in six months? Would he like my painting?
I supposed it was a way for my brain to process and mentally prepare for the following day, but that didn’t make the struggle against the Sandman any less arduous.
I lifted myself up abruptly. There was something that was missing.
I shuffled over to my easel, still sitting dead center in the middle of my room. I glared at everything about the painting, from the top corner down to the bottom corner. What was missing?
Art was weird, like that. You’d stare at a piece for hours, sculpt and shape it into the best picture you can muster, and then you’d take a step back for a while. Maybe you go downstairs and get a coke from the fridge, stretch your muscles because you were hunched over a stool trying to perfect the shading on a horse for an hour. Then you return back upstairs, you take a good look at your work and you’re proud of yourself. You go to bed.
Or, you don’t. Because there’s too much on your mind and there’s something still missing about that damned painting.
Mike , my mind piped up. You’re missing Mike.
“That’s not right, he’s right there.” I whispered, as if my thoughts were someone else’s.
Compared to the size of the whole canvas, he was quite small, but stood out among the others with a sword and big silver shield. There was Mike, leading the rest of the party.
I knew he was the culprit. I was so sickeningly nervous about the following morning because I knew I’d see him again. But even acknowledging that, I still felt uncomfortable about the painting. What was it?
I needed to change something about it. I glanced over it once more, thinking; If I had to add anything, it would have to be on the shield.
A symbol. An insignia. A mark that shows that it’s Mike.
If I thought about him long enough, Mike was easily the leader of our party. And if I thought about him longer, I would know that Mike would be the Elmer’s glue to our popsicle stick castle.
Mike was the one to ask to be my friend. Mike was the one that was my first friend, my best friend, and it stayed that way for so long because he always cared. He listened to me and understood me when no one else had. He believed that my possession, the thing that almost killed everyone, made me like a super-spy.
In the dark, softly illuminated by the moon, I picked up my brush. Dipping it in red, black, gold—there was the symbol. The heart.
I took a step back, looking over my painting one last time. The feeling of unease, of dissatisfaction, quickly settled once I took notice of the heart symbol on Mike’s shield. There it was. That was what was bothering me for so long. The grand gesture.
I crawled back into my bed and, finally, was able to rest my eyes with ease.
MARCH 22nd, 1986
I was so giddy in the moment that I hadn’t realized how much I was fidgeting with the thin rubber band keeping my painting together. However, the moment that I did, I quickly put it down and picked at my cuticles instead. I’d prefer to ruin my own fingers than something I’d be giving to Mike.
I glanced over to my side, and El wasn’t any less excited than I was. Her eyes darted from every corner of the airport, almost like an excited little puppy.
Jonathan and Argyle, on the other hand, didn’t seem to share the same sentiment. I was aware Jonathan had his own somewhat negative opinions on Mike. Not that he hated Mike, because he couldn’t—That was Nancy’s little brother, and my best friend. But I think that he thought of our friendship differently, and he didn’t really know what Mike was like. What he was truly like. So I wasn’t sure he’d care for Mike if it wasn’t for me.
As for Argyle, I wasn’t even sure he knew what he was looking for.
“So like, what does this guy even look like?” Argyle asked, slowly, in that sort of surfer way of saying things. Or maybe it was the stoner way, I wasn’t sure what this guy’s deal was. Californians were weird.
“You’ll know who it is when you see him.” Jonathan responded, picking his head up to feign attentiveness. “ Trust me .”
Argyle nodded with a mildly baked smile.
I ignored them and kept my gaze forward towards the gate. It would have been any minute.
Suddenly, there he was.
—In the stupidest outfit I’d ever seen him in. Not that I didn’t think it was a little charming at the same time.
I quickly rose from the bench, mind dead set on giving him the biggest hug since I’d left in October.
The mind, however, doesn’t predict quite well when you have clear bias.
Mike and El hugged, exchanging a small kiss while he gave her a bouquet of yellow and purple flowers. They were talking about something, though I wasn’t listening; I could barely think outside of what I planned to say. It repeated over and over again in my brain, like a loop:
Hi, Mike! It’s so good to see you! I can’t believe it’s been almost six months! While you were away, I made you this!
And then, of course, he’d unroll it and be amazed at my artistry. Maybe.
That didn’t happen, though. As soon as I tried to make my way over to him, greet him like I would’ve expected to, he gave me a half-hearted, awkward “bro” hug.
Okay.
“What’s that?” He pointed to the painting. At that point, I’m barely thinking anymore.
“Oh, it’s just this painting I’ve been working on.” I replied, deflated. Surely he could sense it.
“Cool.” He said. Cool.
There was a beat of silence. It was possibly fifteen seconds, but it felt like an hour.
Had I done something wrong? Was it something I said? Oh, God, could he tell I was too excited? More excited than I should be? But I thought we were best friends.
Suddenly, Argyle’s telling Mike that his shirt’s a cheap knock-off and Mike and El interlock their arms in a sickeningly affectionate way and we’re leaving the airport. I wouldn’t consider myself egregiously jealous, but judging by the way I couldn’t help but feel a little agitated by Mike’s behavior, I guessed that it was still getting to me anyway.
It was settling in then, though not quite burrowed in my consciousness, that things were different, and changing, and I was becoming increasingly aware of my unwilling solitude.
MARCH 26th, 1986
The drive was long between California and Eleven. Mike and I sat knee to knee in the back of the van.
I gave it to him. A prolonged effort; my best friend had received my great grand gesture.
Except that he doesn’t know it was my gesture.
I sniffled, the dried tears clinging to my skin. I didn’t know what changed. I didn’t know things had changed so drastically until it was far too late, and I was trapped. An emotional suffocation.
I couldn’t tell him that it was my idea. It didn’t make sense. He would take it the—
“Wrong way, man. Map says ’s this way.” Argyle stretches out the map that, from what I could tell, was clearly upside down.
Pun not intended.
“Argyle, I swear to God—” Jonathan started.
I tuned them out. I turned to Mike, who was clearly zoned out. I didn’t even think he heard either Stupid or I’m With Stupid up front anyway.
I shook his shoulder. Or, really, I just put my hand weakly on it. “Mike.”
He glanced over at me. Then, suddenly, as if he were shaking water off of himself, he jolted to the present. “What—what is it?”
“Are you...” I began, only to stop to glance over Mike’s features once, then, “Are you okay?”
“Yeah,” Mike replied, “Yeah, I’m fine.”
He was lying.
I gave him a look that said I know you’re not.
He gave me a look that said Seriously, leave it.
I huffed. Tears pricked my eyelids and I returned my gaze to the window. The desert was clearly more interesting than whatever was wrong with Mike. Or, maybe, whatever was wrong with me.
MANY MONTHS LATER, 1987
Found in a crumpled little ball, an old letter was addressed from Mike.
RE: LETTER TO MIKE, FROM WILL; FEBRUARY 1986
Dear Will,
Are you kidding? I would LOVE to see your art! I miss having more to add to my wall. I mean, not that I don’t love your old stuff, but it’s all I have. I miss being able to watch you draw, and help you figure out what colors to use for our characters. I miss having you with the party. All of it.
I know I haven’t been talking to you that much on the phone. I’ve tried to get to it, but... I don’t know. It’s also kinda hard with your mom being on the phone all the time, too.
These past few months felt so odd. I hate to admit it, but I really just holed myself up in my room playing Nintendo. I barely hung out with Dustin and Lucas like we used to.
I’m sorry, that’s probably stupid. But do you get what I mean? I guess without you, our party doesn’t really work. It’s fallen apart, in a lot of ways.
I always figured you were my best friend, but without having you around all the time, there’s like a giant, gaping hole where you used to be.
I guess what I’m trying to say is that I miss you.
That’s not really an excuse for not calling you, or not writing to you more. But I guess...this feeling...whatever it is, is making it hard to talk to you at all. It doesn’t make sense. That’s why it’s stupid.
Love,
Mike