Build You A Castle, Call It Home - Chapter 13 - loudsnapdragon (2024)

Chapter Text

1989, 90, 91, 92…

When Will gets off the bus in Chicago, he worries it was all a dream, because things that happened in Hawkins often feel like dreams, nightmares sometimes, but all just sleepy fantasies in the end.

He takes the train back to the apartment. Harry opens the door, gives him a cautious hello, like she’s trying to determine if everything he feared had really been as bad as he imagined. He smiles, drops his bags by her feet.

‘It was okay.’ He doesn’t know why he plays coy, because he can’t hide how happy he is, his voice peppered with joyful inflections that she instantly picks up on.

‘That’s so good to hear.’ She pulls his stuff inside, forces him on to the couch and hands him the ramen she prepared for his arrival. ‘Who knows? Does Hopper know? What about Mike?’

‘All of them.’ Will slurps up the noodles with a smile. ‘They don’t care.’ They don’t care, and they still love him. The world hasn’t ended, the monsters in his mind don’t exist, and he has Gareth. He has never been happier.

When he finishes his food, he pushes Harry’s essays off the bamboo coffee table and puts the bowl down, lets her stretch her legs over his lap.

‘Any other exciting news from Hicksville?’

Will nods. ‘Very exciting. Amazing, actually.’

She picks up a bottle of maroon nail polish from the bamboo coffee table. ‘Oh yeah?’

‘Gareth.’

Her cheeks swell as she smiles. She puts down the nail polish, clearly considering this gossip far more important than her toenails. ‘Finally?’

‘Yep. Finally. Me and Gareth.’

He goes into all the messy, dirty details, knows that Harry will love it all. She scolds him at first, for the bonfire dramatics, then slaps his shoulder when he tells her about Castle Byers. ‘That’s adorable! Who knew he was such a romantic? Wait- Oh my god. Did you guys f*ck in the woods?’

‘No.’ He blushes. ‘We managed to make it back home first.’ Only just, if he had ten percent less willpower, they would have totally f*cked in the woods.

‘Who knows? Can I tell people? Please let me tell Sebastian, he’s been begging for you guys to get together for months.’

‘Sebastian knew I liked Gareth?’

‘Uh yeah.’ She scoffs. ‘You talk about Gareth constantly, and he brings you up all the time, of course Sebastian noticed.’ She sighs, happy. ‘sh*t. It’s going to be even worse now, you guys are never going to shut up about each other, are you?’

‘Nope.’ Will replies, dreamily, already thinking about when he gets to see Gareth next.

Will has his first shift back at the café. He doesn’t plan on telling Cathy, but then the morning rush lulls, and he gets bored wiping down the tables.

‘I f*cking knew it.’ She steals the wipe cloth from him, twists it through her fingers as she talks. ‘Merde. Could you get those angel wings back from him now? I need them for a cabaret.’

He goes to Gareth’s place after work to ask about the angel wings, finds out Gareth fixed the broken parts with superglue and feathers cut out from his bed pillow.

‘Why did you fix them?’ He asks, stunned. ‘They look so good.’ He wishes Gareth didn’t sacrifice his one good pillow to get the job done, but they do look amazing, way better than before. Cathy’s cabaret performance is going to be far too classy if she goes on stage wearing these.

‘I dunno. I like fixing things.’ Gareth says, ‘I didn’t know if you’d ask for them back. I thought you forgot about them.’

Will carefully places the wings down on the kitchen counter. ‘I felt weird asking, like- if it was bad to remind you about that night.’

Gareth leans against the fridge, tucks his hands into his pockets. ‘It’s okay. We’re past it.’

Will scratches his arm, doesn’t know how to say it. How to ask if they really are past it. They’re good, fantastic, actually, but they’re trying to do this new thing where they actually talk about their feelings, instead of being so terminally polite and nice that neither of them admits when the other one’s f*cked up. Harry was the one to suggest it, Max seconded the idea.

‘Are you sure it’s okay?’

‘I asked you out, you weren’t ready, that’s all. It’s okay Will, really. I don’t mind.’

‘Wait- what?’

‘It was a date and you freaked out. I get it. It’s cool.’ Gareth smiles with his bottom lip stuck out, like this is obvious, non-mind shattering news.

Will’s arms drop to his side, trying to take it in. ‘It was a date?’

Gareth pushes his back away from the fridge, stands straighter. ‘Uh. Yeah? I asked you if wanted to walk over together, just us? And we were meant to get a drink before?’

‘But you-you didn’t say it was a date.’

‘Well, yeah…’ His voice pitches. ‘Maybe I didn’t use the word, but what did you think it was?’

Will thought it was Gareth trying to trick him into meeting up with El and Mike. He thought it was the world ending. He never even considered it could be a date. They stand staring, both blinking rapidly as they work out what happened.

‘Oh my god.’ He mumbles, hides his face in his hands. ‘I’m so stupid.’

Gareth pulls Will’s hands away from his eyes. He opens them when Gareth leans his forehead against his, smiling. ‘No, you’re not. But next time I ask you on a date, I’ll say it very clearly. A date.’

‘Please do.’

Will moves to kiss him, pulls back when he hears heavy footsteps come down the hallway.

‘Hey.’ Gareth’s roommate says when he walks in. He reaches around them to open the fridge, looks at Will, smirks. ‘Hey to you too.’

Gareth doesn’t like his roommates much, but this must be the one he’s on friendly terms with, Sean, because he looks over, pats him on the shoulder. ‘Guess what?’

‘What?’ Sean guzzles down a bottle of orange juice. He’s got hair cut into a flat top and a chain around his neck, spills juice onto his hoodie as he talks.

‘Will didn’t know it was a date.’ Gareth smiles, kindly chooses to blur the truth. ‘He thought I was trying to make him hang out with sister’s boyfriend.’

Sean chuckles, raises his eyebrows at Will. ‘sh*t, dude. Even I knew it was a date.’ He wipes his mouth clean. ‘I didn’t even know Gareth liked guys at that point.’

Will groans, rests his head on Gareth’s shoulder, feels safe to do so now. ‘He didn’t tell me.’

He keeps his face hidden there as Sean walks away laughing, only kisses Gareth when he hears a bedroom door shut. ‘I really didn’t realize. I’m sorry.’

Gareth kisses the corner of his mouth, places his hand firmly on Will’s shoulder. ‘I know. But it’s nice to hear you say it.’

Classes start again.

In the library, Harry peeks over her impossibly tall stack of books to declare she’s going to law school after she graduates. Will smiles, congratulates her. He doesn’t have a clue what he’s going to do after college, doesn’t worry, he’s got time to figure it out. When they leave the building, he wraps up in ten layers just to charge through the snow without catching hypothermia.

Brown sludge hits the back of his legs as cars drive past him, and he pulls his hat down to cover his cold ears. He still loves seeing the city covered in white though, makes all the ugly parts diamond bright.

After he gets home, he calls Gareth on his work break. He’s stuck working the matinee and evening shows because he took off too much time for the holidays. He’s sick too, caught a cold from eating popcorn he stole off an usher. His boss won’t let him take any time to rest up, so anytime he isn’t working, he’s in bed with a bottle of cough syrup and a box of tissues. Will offers to bring him chicken noodle soup, but Gareth tells him to stay away, doesn’t want him getting sick too.

Will cuddles up on the armchair after they hang up, sad he hasn’t seen Gareth in so long. Only six days, but it feels like ages.

David jumps up from the couch, offers to beat up Gareth’s boss, and Will has to consider it very seriously before he tells him not to.

‘Good. I am so not a fighter dude. You just sounded so sad I thought I had to offer.’

Will waves him away, laughs when David says he’s meeting Steve at the gym, showing him how to get some real gains.

He reads more of Eddie’s story, doodles distractedly, lasts a couple of hours before he starts thinking about Gareth again. Imagines him exhausted, coming home from work and trying to sleep in his horrible apartment. Gets an idea.

It’s an impulsive plan, kinda stupid, but Gareth likes it when Will gives into his stupid side, so he goes with it.

He grabs his backpack, takes the mirror from his bedroom that he never uses, packs up the spare pillow, searches for the flyers he’s saved from Gareth’s gigs. He finds the nice bedsheets he always forgets about too. He wraps up in his winter coats again, carries it all over to Gareth’s place. Picks up some takeout on the way.

One of Gareth’s unnamed roommates lets him in without protest, doesn’t say hello, just shrugs when Will walks into Gareth’s room unannounced.

It’s a disaster. Clothes all over the floor, the sheet half falling off the bed, snotty tissues piling up the trash, molding delivery boxes thrown into the corner, sad barren walls, devoid of any pictures. Will opens the window to air everything out, closes it shortly after the snow starts threatening to fall in, then gets to work. He changes the bed, throws all the laundry to the side, makes a note to buy Gareth a laundry basket -because how he has lived alone for this long without a laundry basket?- Idiot. Will adores him.

He gathers all the dirty plates and drops them off in the kitchen, much to the amusem*nt of Sean, who stands by the sink eating peanut butter from the jar. Sean shows him Gareth’s shelf in the fridge, empty other than a cube of old, dry cheese. Will throws it in the trash, replaces it with the takeout chicken soup he brought along.

He walks back to the bedroom. Hangs up the mirror on the wall by the door, then takes out the flyers and decides where to pin them. Maybe it’s weird to decorate his boyfriend- sh*t. They haven’t actually had that conversation yet- Well, maybe it’s weird to decorate Gareth’s bedroom with flyers for his own gigs, but he needs something nice on the walls.

He doesn’t notice the time go by. Ends up sat on the bed, deciding which flyer to pin up by the window, the Mudhoney one with the crude drawing of the curvy lady covered in mud (oh, he just got that), or the green screen-printed wizard from that Smashing Pumpkins show he can’t remember, when Gareth walks in.

‘Well, well...’ Gareth leans against the doorframe, crosses his arms. ‘What’s a boy like you doing in a place like this- sh*t. Did you tidy?’ He drops his arms, eyes skirting around.

‘Um. Yeah, I did.’ Will starts second guessing himself. ‘Sorry, if it’s weird. I just- I wanted you to have a nice bedroom.’

Gareth pulls off his gloves, stumbles over to the bed as he takes off his coat. ‘You decorated for me? Wait, there’s a mirror?’

Will laughs. ‘I wasn’t using it. I don’t get how you don’t own a mirror or a laundry basket.’

Gareth smiles at the flyers lying on the floor. ‘Yeah, don’t really think about stuff like that when it’s for me.’ He sniffles, rubs his nose with the end of his sleeve, which is gross, but somehow still looks cute. His hair looks wild, must have been blown about by the wind, his lips are chapped, the skin around his nose gone crusty and white. Will wants to kiss him, which is how he knows he’s really in it, because Gareth is objectively disgusting right now.

He picks up one of the flyers. ‘Where did you get this?’

Will stutters slightly when he answers. ‘I saved it.’

‘You saved it from the gig? This was months ago.’

‘I save all of them.’

Gareth grins as he settles back on the bed. ‘f*ck. You’re amazing.’ He turns to face him. ‘I’ve missed you.’

Will smiles back, rests his head on Gareth’s shoulder. ‘Yeah?’

Gareth’s eyes glance down at his lips. ‘Yeah, really wanted to see you. Just work stuff. Everyone and their grandma wants to see Cats at the moment, and the dancers keep on breaking the sets. It’s been exhausting.’

‘Are you too tired to hang out?’ Will asks, nervous he’s being a nuisance. ‘I can go…’

‘You’re staying right here.’ He leans in, stops suddenly. ‘Is this okay? I know I must look like sh*t right now…’

Will shuts him up with a kiss, figures he’s had his flu shot, he should be alright, it’s worth the risk.

They end up messing up the freshly made bed. Will stays the night, tucked under Gareth’s arm. Gareth sleep talks a lot, mentions pretty boys, at least twice, makes Will smile guiltily. He wakes up with a crook in his neck, the twin-size too small to spread out.

He pats Gareth’s chest when he stirs, gets to see him blink awake all slow and sweet.

‘Next time, you’re sleeping over at mine.’ Will yawns.

Gareth sleepily pulls him close to his chest, sounds all groggy and nasally when he speaks. ‘Next time…’ Then he smiles, eyes closed, the stench of his morning breath hitting Will’s cheek.

Will kisses him on the forehead, snuggles back in.

They’re at Steve’s for a movie night. Will and Robin moan until everyone lets them choose.

‘Why would anyone willingly watch a movie about laundry?’ Steve says, draped over Eddie on the couch. Eddie raises his beer bottle, points it at Robin, as if he’s underlining Steve’s point.

Will stirs from his position leaning on Gareth, their backs against the couch. ‘It’s not just about laundry, it’s about-’

‘Queer love and racial prejudice in Britain’s oppressive Thatcher years.’ Eddie interrupts. ‘I’ve heard it all before from Buck. I don’t need it repeating.’

‘Just because you wanted to watch Nightmare on Elm Street.’ Will pouts, burrows into Gareth’s side, his arm around Will’s shoulders.

‘Because it’s a classic.’ Eddie says, takes a sip of his beer, raises the bottle to Steve, who takes a drink from it too, like now that they’re a couple they’re incapable of not sharing literally everything together.

‘You like this movie?’ Will whispers to Gareth. ‘Right?’

Gareth smiles around the bottle top, pulls him in closer. ‘Yeah, I do. Eddie’s just sad he doesn’t get to ogle Johnny Depp in a crop top.’

Eddie reaches down from the couch, taps the bottom of his bottle against the top of Gareth’s, makes the drink froth up and onto his lap.

‘Oh f*ck you.’ He tries to drink the beer as it froths over, not wanting to waste a drop. Steve and Eddie laugh. Will joins in despite himself, gently wipes some beer away from Gareth’s collar.

‘That’s what you get for pretending you’re above Freddie Kruger dude.’ Eddie mutters.

The movie plays out on Steve’s massive TV, cuts to a scene of a washing machine bubbling gallons of soapy water onto the lead’s feet. Not unlike Gareth’s beer.

‘This is so boring.’ Steve drawls. Eddie nods, distracts himself by picking at Steve’s hair. Will is pretty sure he sees Eddie find a piece of lint, then eat it, like a mother ape looking after its young. Eddie gives him a look after, like he knows Will is judging him for it, but it doesn’t stop him from doing it again.

‘You guys are such philistines.’ Robin pulls her knees up on the armchair. ‘Can you please try and pay attention? I deserve a break, do you know how hard it is being surrounded by all this?’ She waves at Steve and Eddie in their loved-up position.

Steve smirks, bats away Eddie’s hand but then holds it tight, kisses his knuckles, smirks even harder at Robin. ‘Jealous?’

‘Yes.’ Robin says, flicking her head away from him and back to the screen. The situation with Vicky isn’t bad, but it’s far from the romance Robin had imagined it would be. ‘f*ck all you guys.’

‘What did we do?’ Gareth asks.

‘You two are just as bad as them.’

Will tries to shake his head in disagreement, but then his nose tickles, he sneezes, still not over that cold he caught from Gareth.

Robin raises her eyebrows. ‘Like I don’t know how you caught that cold.’ She sticks out her tongue as she mimes vomiting. Steve and Eddie make obnoxious smooching noises from the couch.

Will hides in Gareth’s neck, whispers to him, ‘We’re not that bad, are we?’

Gareth laughs, ‘I think we might be worse.’

Will’s nervous about telling his mom over the phone. He called her last week, tried to introduce the idea casually, slowly warm her up to it, got so nervous the phone slipped away from his sweaty hand. He lurched to grab it, stepped on the curled wire by accident, snapped the plastic cord, splintered the cables beyond repair.

Harry was too caught up feeling vindicated to be angry with him, told him she always knew it was going to snap one day if he kept on dragging it to his bedroom, told him his private conversations couldn’t be that important.

Maybe she’s right, usually, but this conversation, unfortunately, is very important.

Unable to call from the apartment, too stressed to use the phone at Steve’s or Gareth’s, he decides on a payphone outside of campus, wraps up in his winter layers, brings a huge stack of coins with him, preparing for something long.

He rubs his legs together for warmth as the dial rings. He phones her every week these days, it’s easy saying hello.

In the end, the rest of it is easy too.

‘You don’t mind?’

‘No sweetheart. Sounds like it would be best for you to stay. We still have New Years.’

‘I’ll be there.’ He swallows, shivers in the payphone booth. ‘I- Um. Thank you. I just don’t want to leave him here on his own.’

‘Verity will be pleased you’re staying with him. I can’t believe they’re making him work Christmas Eve.’

‘Yeah, his boss is the worst.’

She hums, moans a little about her old boss at Melvald’s, says she’s lucky she doesn’t have to worry about those things anymore.

‘I didn’t know if you would be okay with me staying.’ It’s not like summer, or spring break, or graduation, he’s not avoiding Hawkins this time. He’s sad he won’t be there for Christmas. But Gareth can’t spend Christmas on his own. He can’t.

‘Oh Will.’ She sighs, but it doesn’t sound unhappy. ‘I trust you. You’re an adult, we all have to make decisions like this sometimes.’

Maybe it’s the new resolution he has with Gareth, to really talk about things, or maybe it’s the relief of everyone knowing, but his old rules are too broken to follow any longer. He asks her the questions he used to bite back, he’s honest this time.

‘Then why were you annoyed that I didn’t come back last summer?’

A car drives past and beeps it’s horn at a group of loud students walking past his booth, the cold air kisses his nose, wind whistles down the line. Eventually she answers.

‘I was worried.’ She says, ‘You didn’t phone, and when you did… you didn’t sound right. You sounded sad.’

He doesn’t know how to answer that, because he realizes, amidst the memory of rushed summer city freedom, maybe it’s true. Maybe he was sad back then.

‘Sorry.’

‘Honey, stop it with the sorrys.’ She’s said it a hundred times before, he never learns. ‘You talked about your friend sometimes, that Lance boy…’ The line crackles. She waits for him to tell the truth. He does.

‘I was dating him.’

‘Ah. I see.’ She says, no judgement, but clearly completing a half idea she already had. Maybe El told her some, but he suspects not everything.

‘We broke up in October- Well, he broke up with me.’

‘Idiot.’

He laughs, sudden, hears her laugh follow shortly after.

‘What was he like?’

‘I dunno. Fancy. Tall.’ Not Gareth. Not Gareth. ‘Older.’ sh*t. He shouldn’t have said that part. She won’t like that. It’s not like Gareth isn’t also older than him, but he’s not like Lance, he doesn’t make Will feel small. She knows that.

‘Hmm.’ There’s a rustle in the background, her rearranging the phone around her shoulders. ‘Was he handsome?’

He laughs again, quieter, thinks it’s funny that his mom cares about something like that. Thinks about telling her the whole Mike Wheeler of the Lance situation, saves it for another time. ‘Yeah, annoyingly.’

‘I talked about him with Jonathan.’

‘Really?’ He didn’t realize he was that obvious. Didn’t realize they both knew what was going on.

‘Yes. I didn’t know you were seeing him, but I didn’t understand why you would be friends with someone like that.’ She sighs. ‘Do you know what your brother said?’

‘What did he say?’

‘He said that Lance sounded like a total yuppie with terrible music taste.’

He groans, amused and relieved, brings the phone closer to his ear. ‘He’s not wrong.’

She giggles, it’s a lovely noise. He pushes quarters into the payphone, talks to her for over an hour, shivering in the snow, tells her things he didn’t before. Not all of it, but more than enough.

Three days after Christmas, Will and Gareth get the bus back to Hawkins together. They bring an entire suitcase of late presents between them. He sleeps with his headphones on for half the drive. Wakes up on the highway, but doesn’t open his eyes at first, feels Gareth’s elbow move against his side as he fiddles with something in his lap. He sneaks a look through his eyelashes, sees Gareth switching the tapes in his Walkman for him, from Throwing Muses to Black Sabbath.

‘You can’t trick me into listening to heavy metal when I’m asleep.’

Gareth smiles, caught out, waves his hand in front of him like he’s pretending to hypnotize him. ‘Shh… You’ll love this album, you love it.’

Will laughs quietly, lets him turn up the music. Doesn’t sleep for the rest of the journey, Sabbath blaring in his ears.

‘Okay, I do kinda like it.’

‘Better than The Clash?’

‘Nope.’

Gareth tuts, like he hasn’t secretly admitted he likes punk too (he told Will to not tell Eddie). He falls asleep on Will’s shoulder, country flying past their window. Will looks out and counts the signs on the highway, smiles when he sees Welcome to Hawkins Hell. He wakes up Gareth to show him how they still haven’t cleaned up the graffiti yet, just to hear him laugh.

1990, Spring.

El and Mike find an apartment a few streets away from Will’s place. It’s massive. The windows are even taller than the ones at Steve’s.

‘Do you like it?’

Will turns in the vast, currently empty living room, laughs when he sees El spinning, arms outstretched. It feels a little like a kid playing house, only pretending to be an adult, but he can’t judge. He’s spent far too long doing that, pretending.

‘It’s incredible. How did you find somewhere like this?’ How did she afford it more like.

She raises an eyebrow, jumps in front of him, answers the question he was really asking.

‘Your share of the hush money went on college, mine went on this.’

The loft only looks larger after Mike and Gareth take in the couch from the moving van, the lone piece of furniture in the whole apartment. They have boxes of plates and cutlery, books and boardgames, but not much else yet. They’re going to go shopping for the rest when Max arrives.

They order pizza. Gareth and Will eat cross-legged on the hardwood floors. Mike places his boombox by the couch and pushes in a cassette. The music echoes throughout the space, nothing to bounce off. The lights of the city’s tall buildings gleam outside the windows. The boys drink beers, a moving in gift from Eddie.

‘We should get another couch. A purple one.’ El announces, reclining on the singular couch, stolen from Mike’s basem*nt.

Mike leans against her side, smiles. ‘One of your paintings should go there.’ He points to the brick wall opposite them.

‘Your guitar.’ She points. ‘There.’

‘Do you still play?’ Gareth asks Mike.

‘Getting back into it.’ Mike says, unenthusiastically.

For one split-second, it’s too easy to notice the awkwardness between them, but El doesn’t let something like that ruin her excitement. ‘He’s really good! You could play together. Jam.’

‘Jam?’ Will asks, wondering where she heard that particular word. Doesn’t sound like Hopper or Max, definitely not Mike. Maybe it was mom.

‘Yes. Jam.’ She says, serious. ‘They should jam together.’

Mike laughs, kisses her cheek, gets up from the couch, walks over to throw the dirty takeout boxes in a trash bag hanging from a kitchen cabinet.

‘Are you? Going to jam together?’ Will whispers to Gareth, El facing away from them.

‘Maybe we will.’ Gareth says, one eyebrow raised, daring. Will smiles, kisses his cheek too, just because he can.

He stands, follows Mike to the kitchen. He’s not worried about leaving Gareth with El, they share a certain sincerity that makes talk easy. He hears El ask a very detailed question about Cats, Gareth groaning about how much he hates it, El egging him on to complain even more.

‘This apartment really is cool.’ Will says, eyeing up the freezer space jealously. He doesn’t know when he became the kind of person who gets jealous about freezer space, maybe it’s a sign of maturity. Probably not.

‘I know dude. Lucas was so bitter when I showed him the listing.’ Mike says, leaning against the kitchen island. ‘Guess what he called me though, when I told him about El sorting out the down payment.’

‘What?’

‘A gold-digger.’ He scowls, eyes lighting up when Will laughs.

‘Any luck finding a job?’

‘Not really looked yet to be honest.’ Mike says. ‘Don’t know what I want to do. I’m not going back to an office. I left my suit in Hawkins. Dad can have it back if he likes it so much.’

‘What would you like to do?’

‘I dunno- Like a record store or something? That would be cool.’

‘I could show you the store Gareth likes. He knows the guys there, maybe put in a good word for you.’

A moment passes, awkward, almost like the unease Gareth and Mike have. Sure, Gareth knew Mike back in high school, but it’s different here. It’s different for Will and Mike too. The memories are there, always strong, but the familiarity isn’t fully recovered, not yet.

‘I didn’t realize, you guys were so, together.’ It’s not mean, how he says it, not polite either, but Mike isn’t often polite, so it’s not upsetting.

Will doesn’t mean to make a face, but he must do, because Mike apologizes fast.

‘Sorry, just you know… You never told me it was a thing.’

‘It’s more than a thing.’

‘Oh.’ Mike twists his mouth into a smile, not easily, but it’s genuine. ‘That’s cool.’

The building is cold, too much empty space to be warmed up their four bodies. Will shivers, doesn’t mind it. Gareth always jokes that Will is cold-blooded, made for the snow, feet like icicles when they brush against his in bed.

It’s an open plan apartment, lets Mike gaze out the massive windows from the kitchen, the skyline hovering above El and Gareth’s heads. ‘I don’t get how you were brave enough to do it.’ He says, eyes tracing skyscrapers.

‘Moving here?’

Mike nods, doesn’t stop looking out the windows, sizing up his new home.

‘I was scared at first, but it gets easier. It’s okay when you have friends here.’ Will tells him.

‘But you didn’t. You moved here on your own.’

‘Steve and Robin were here already, and Eddie.’

‘They’re not the same though.’

‘I had Gareth too.’

‘Is he the same?’ Mike asks. Will sits with the question, looks away as he thinks. The same as what- The same as the Party? No. The same as Mike? Definitely not.

Gareth helped when Will moved here, showed him parts of the city he would have never seen otherwise, but he didn’t do everything. Will moved here on his own. He made a life for himself here, on his own.

He didn’t need Mike in the end, or Jonathan either. Gareth was at his side, but Will wasn’t dependent on him. He survived on his own, just not alone, not this time.

‘You guys will get along.’ Will knows he sounds uncharacteristically forceful, maybe he picked the attitude up from El. It’s not a suggestion, it’s a demand. If Mike wants to be here with Will, he must learn to like the people Will loves.

Mike turns away from the window. ‘I do like him.’ He lowers his head, nods hurriedly. ‘I do! Just weird seeing him here, all fancy.’

‘Fancy?’ Gareth is many things, fancy is not one of them.

‘Yeah. Fancy. With his career, and his band, and his apartment.’

‘This apartment is way fancier than Gareth’s.’

‘Okay, maybe not fancy then.’ Mike relents, rolls his eyes. ‘But he is really different to how he was in high school. You wouldn’t believe the sh*t I saw him get up to.’

Mike smiles playfully, like he’s been waiting to drop a secret all night. ‘There was this one time… I walked in on him and Eddie having a f*cking, insanely loud, fart contest before Hellfire.’

The laughter escapes Will before he can hide it. Gareth turns at the sound, always does.

‘The whole room stank.’ Mike carries on. ‘I swear, they didn’t even stop after I walked in. They just tried even harder.’

Mike beams as Will rests on the counter to steady himself. Gareth slides up to them, looks between the two, curious, worried. Will leans against his side, doesn’t stop laughing.

‘What’s so funny?’

‘Mike was telling me- Never mind.’ He smiles. ‘You are so gross.’ It comes out all soft, so Gareth eases, places his arm over Will’s shoulders.

The weather is calm by the time they leave. He walks, too fast, as Gareth cycles, too slow, back to Will’s place. Gareth winds his bike across the sidewalk, leaving a wavy trail in the snow. ‘What were you guys talking about?’

‘Just stories about you and Eddie back in high school.’

Gareth nearly cycles into a lamppost. ‘What stories?’

Will reaches out to the handlebar, holds it stable, smirks. ‘Don’t be so worried.’

‘I’m not worried.’ Gareth grits out, eyes wide. ‘Just- just what stories?’

Gareth’s nose has gone pink in the cold, his hair sticking to his neck with sweat. Will brushes the hair away as he speaks, feels Gareth’s neck move as he breaths. ‘Just you guys in Hellfire. Messing around. It sounded nice.’

Gareth’s face relaxes, he tilts his head slightly, jaw resting in Will’s hand. ‘It’s a shame you weren’t in the club back then. Wasn’t the same after graduation. Eddie used to hate hearing your name at the table.’

‘Really?’ Will laughs, he never imagined the guys bringing up him up back then.

‘Yeah. It was Will the Wise this, and Will the Wise that. In his first session Dustin told Eddie him you were a better DM, don’t think he ever got over it.’

Will smiles, decides something he’s been meaning to for a long time. ‘We should set up a campaign.’ He means it, he’s missed it. He moves his hand away to hold onto the bike firmly. ‘I think I actually want to play again, with Eddie, I mean. I’ll let him be DM too.’

‘Cool.’ Gareth grins. ‘He’s desperate to show off to you. Always says the games at Steve’s old place didn’t count.’

Will smiles, thinks he agrees. The games back then didn’t count. He never had fun, but that wasn’t Eddie’s fault. Wasn’t Gareth’s fault either, not really.

‘But I want to see you DM first.’ Gareth says.

‘Are you going to revive Ginnler the Ferocious?’

‘Nah, don’t want to be a barbarian anymore. Maybe a rogue?’

Will leans in close, admires the color on Gareth’s cheeks. Two triangles of coral. ‘No way.’

‘You don’t think I could be a rogue?’

‘Stealthy and nimble?’ He doesn’t hide his disbelief. Gareth smirks, inches his fingers closer on the handlebar.

‘Fine. Not a rogue. What do you think I should be?’

‘A paladin.’

Gareth raises his eyebrows, tuts slightly. ‘You just like paladins. You think everyone should be one.’

‘I don’t think everyone should be one. I just like them.’

Gareth eyes dart to either end of the street, he kisses Will, quick, pulls back and smiles. Seems to already have a character in mind.

‘How did Ginnler die again anyway?’ Will asks, following Gareth’s bike again as they slowly travel home. ‘I know Dustin said it was stupid, but I can’t remember the rest.’

Gareth laughs, speeds up a little, makes Will race after him on foot. ‘I don’t remember! I wasn’t paying attention.’

‘What?’ Will shouts, smiling. ‘I thought you loved Eddie’s game.’

‘Eh.’ Gareth turns his head round slightly as he cycles. ‘It was the first session after you let your character die, I was distracted dude.’

He says it like it’s nothing, like it’s just a funny detail from the story, but Will senses there was something sad there once, behind the simple secret. He chases after Gareth, climbs on his back and makes him cycle them both home. Thinks he might spend the rest of his life dedicated to discovering all of Gareth’s secrets. He might have even more than Will does.

1990, Summer.

Hopper visits Chicago. He brings Wayne along with him.

‘I didn’t realize they were friends.’ Will says, following Eddie into the stadium. Steve walks ahead, trying to impress the two men he’s decided are his new father figures. He’s stopped calling Hopper Sir, at least, but still bounces like a puppy whenever Wayne gruffly laughs at something he says, like he’s begging for a pat on the head. Wayne provides, because he might be a softy too under all the grit.

Robin thinks Steve’s affection for the two old men is hilarious. She told Will and Eddie not to say anything, said they weren’t allowed to ruin it for him. Apparently, it’s the first time Steve’s ever gone to a real game, his dad never took him, so Will and Eddie aren’t completely alone in their confusion. But Steve does actually know all the rules, unlike them.

‘Me neither.’ Eddie says, stubbing his cigarette under his boot, scowling at a visiting Giants fan who’s been sneering at them. ‘It’s good though. Wayne needs buddies.’

Will nods, shows his ticket to the guy at the barriers. ‘Hopper does too.’

‘Aww look at us, setting up the old guys.’ Eddie waves his ticket at them. ‘It’s a romance in the making.’

It’s not quite a romance, but it is cute. Hopper and Wayne shouting at the players together, Steve squashed in the middle, like they’ve all been buddies for years. Eddie and Will sit behind them, two tag-along queers who are hopelessly underprepared.

‘We support the guys in red, right?’ He asks Eddie.

Steve turns to answer when Eddie flounders. ‘Yes. We support the Bears, we want the ball in that goal over there.’ He points. Will rolls his eyes, like that was obvious, but is secretly very grateful for the clarification.

They last half an hour before Eddie’s restless legs become unbearable. Will can’t stand it either, too many people, feels like the rowdy men behind them are shouting directly into his ear.

‘I’m going for a smoke.’ Eddie declares.

‘You can smoke here.’ Wayne turns, takes in the sorry state of them. ‘Ah. Nevermind, you two go get us some fries.’

‘Sure thing.’ Eddie drawls sarcastically. ‘Want anything Jim?’

Hopper doesn’t reply, just stands and throws his arms at the field, because apparently one of the players did something he wasn’t meant to.

Will walks away with Eddie, doesn’t take out his Camels until he knows Hopper can’t see. The hallways behind the stadium are empty enough that they can smoke without anyone giving them a look. They’ve received a lot of looks since entering, mainly Eddie, but some for Will too. They don’t fit here.

‘Why did you come?’

‘Wayne wanted to.’ Eddie shrugs, looks over the balcony railing at the car lot. ‘You?’

‘Yeah, same. El wanted to but she’s busy at work.’ Will smokes, imagines her racing around the gallery, hanging up her canvases. ‘Thought I should hang out with Hopper too.’

‘He hates me.’ Eddie says, grinning, delighted. ‘I bet he thinks I’m corrupting you.’

Will smiles around the cigarette, doesn’t reply.

‘Come on! He must do.’ Eddie exhales above them, eyebrows raised, desperate to hear something spicy.

‘I don’t think he cares about you honestly.’ It’s a lie, but a fun one, so he doesn’t feel bad about it.

Hopper definitely cares about Eddie’s existence, just not in relation to Will. He cares about Eddie the same way he cares about Mike. Begrudgingly, constantly infuriated, reluctantly accepting due to Steve and El’s infatuation, respectively.

Gareth seems to be the only boyfriend that doesn’t present a deeply annoying personal offense to Hopper, so Will’s very proud of him.

Eddie puffs up dramatically, then gives up trying, releases all the offended air like a pricked balloon. He holds his cigarette like Wayne does. ‘You going to show me your drawings any time soon?’

Will shuffles his feet, looks over the railing with him. He knew Gareth was going to blab about them. Doesn’t mean he feels any more confident about it. ‘They’re just doodles.’

‘Like sh*t they are.’ Eddie huffs, smiles after. ‘I’ve seen the painting you did for Mike, there’s no way they’re just doodles.’

‘I don’t get why you want to see them so bad.’

‘You’re drawing stuff from my stories, it’s insanely cool. Never thought anyone would do that.’

There’s a particularly vicious roar from the center of the stadium, makes them share a nod, silently agreeing to hiding a little while longer.

‘There’s a copier at work. I was going to print out some stuff, get Robin’s help with it. Make it look professional.’ Eddie says, his free hand walking fingers down the railing. ‘I thought I could put your drawings in it.’

‘What for?’

‘f*ck dude. You’re the one who said they could be a real book. You really shouldn’t have put that idea in my head if you didn’t want me to fixate on it.’

It feels like homework, another assignment added to the pile, but Eddie looks so happy when Will agrees to, that he can’t mind. They walk back to their seats after halftime, pick up polystyrene cartons of fries on the way.

He leans over the stalls to hand the food to Hopper.

‘You alright back there kid?’

‘All good.’

Hopper nods, scowls when he sniffs Will’s jacket, raises his eyebrows. ‘Cigarettes? Really?’

Cold sweat forms on his forehead, his eyes too wide, cheeks bright pink. He looks very guilty, very fast.

Wayne laughs, grunts in Eddie’s direction, tells Hopper it was probably his fault.

‘T’was I that introduced the young boy to smokes Chief, blame me!’ Eddie burs, earning even more confused looks from the guys sat behind them.

Hopper clearly knows there’s another story there, but Eddie seems so overjoyed to have given evidence of his imagined role as the corrupter, that Hopper just grunts along with Wayne, forgiving.

Steve flicks a fry against Eddie’s knee before he turns back to the game, tells him to pay attention. Will watches as Eddie’s fingers run over the collar of Steve’s jacket from behind, unseen by anyone else. Eddie catches him looking, doesn’t stop, just turns his chin down to hide his embarrassment.

Two blushing gay boys at football game, two not-dads, and a bisexual between them. Feels like there’s a joke in there somewhere, but Will can’t find it.

It was a gift to himself, a way to celebrate passing his last exams of the year. Harry encouraged it. Steve went with him, got the same piercing on the opposite ear. It was an impulsive decision, and like most impulsive decisions, Will already regrets it.

‘Calm down, it’s cool, you don’t need to worry. It adds to the nerdy Bowie thing you have going on.’ Max says, gently rubbing her fingers over the piercing. ‘Is this the gay ear?’

‘No idea. If it is, does that mean Steve’s would be the bisexual ear?’

She laughs, shuffles away to the opposite end of the couch. They’re sitting on the purple one. El is sprawled out on the one pinched from Mike’s basem*nt. She has piercings too, a line of them going up her right ear, the same ear as Steve’s. She got them a month after moving, the buzzcut girl at the barber shop told her about the studio downtown. Hopper hates them.

She’s filling up envelopes with invitations for her next exhibition, licking each seal, piling them up by her feet.

‘Are you sure you don’t want any help?’ Max asks, sipping at her coffee.

‘Yes.’ El snips. She smiles slily when they laugh, knows that she’s being ridiculous. There’s over a hundred invitations, but she insists on doing it all herself, so they’re not allowed to help her until she predictably admits her tongue is getting tired. ‘I’ve been thinking…’

Will hums, absentmindedly looks through the braille handbooks Max is studying. She hasn’t got the hang of it yet, but she’s learning. Signed up at a specialist school nearby, won’t tell anyone what it’s like, but she’s still there after six weeks, so she can’t hate it that much.

‘I’m bisexual.’ El licks another envelope, doesn’t elaborate. Max doesn’t drop her coffee cup, Will doesn’t throw down the handbooks, but their postures change, shoot upright.

‘Are you sure?’ He asks, can’t stop himself.

‘Yes.’ El replies, using the same snippy tone as before.

They don’t talk for a while. El carries on with her envelopes. The Kit-Kat clock ticks away in the kitchen. Max stands, walks over slowly, hugs her from the side, waits until El drops the envelopes before she speaks.

‘That’s cool.’ She pulls in her lips, something else there that Will can’t place. ‘How long have you known?’

He watches El carefully. She’s a pretty picture, in her stained cotton dress, milky white against the painting that hangs on the wall behind them. Swirling pinks and greens, something she refuses to sell because Max likes it, says the colors are bright enough even she could see them from space. Max’s green flannel (probably stolen from Eddie, who stole it from Gareth) blends into the soft, twirling brushstrokes.

‘I spoke to Gareth last night.’ El says. ‘He helped me understand.’

No time to be annoyed he was left out of the loop, kindness matters more. ‘How do you feel about it?’

‘Good.’ She says without shame.

There’s a piece of him, the small, cruel part that he’s never going to be rid of, that thinks it’s unfair, that she has no shame. The same cruelness makes him want to assume things, like she’s too stupid to realize how big this is. But that’s not true. She’s always been clever. From the ways the whites of her eyes shimmer against the low hanging halcyon bulbs, he thinks she realizes the risk here. This is big and confusing and unfair and scary, but she simply doesn’t care. Why would she care about anything that stops her from being who she is. Braver than he was. Inspiring, almost.

‘Are you going to tell Mike?’ Max asks, picking up her coffee again, satisfied with El’s assuredness.

‘Maybe.’

It feels like an echo. Something he said once, the same secret. She locks eyes with him, smiles bright.

He smiles back. It feels easier than he imagined.

‘So that’s definitely the bisexual ear.’ He says.

El giggles. Max laughs, leans over and prods his fresh piercing just to make it sting.

He’s lying in bed, back against the headboard, taking notes for a class next semester, spare hand itching for tobacco. He doesn’t smoke in the apartment anymore. The landlord complained. Harry was already pissed about the phone breaking. He wouldn’t put it past her calling up his mom and revealing the extent of his bad habit.

And he can’t forget last week, El sprinting round the park ahead of him, beating him by three laps. He refuses to let her find him panting for breath and resting in a surprisingly comfortable bush next time they go jogging together.

The front door clicks, steps approach his bedroom. Gareth knocks, doesn’t wait for an answer before stumbling in. He mumbles a hello, kicks off his shoes, jumps on to the bed face first, makes Will bounce on his side.

‘Street clothes.’ He mutters, pats him on the back of the head anyway. ‘You’re going to make me regret giving you that key.’

‘I’m tired.’ Gareth groans into the mattress, turns his head to the side, one cheek smushed against the sheets. ‘Your bed is comfy.’

‘How was work?’ Will fiddles with Gareth’s hair, unwinding a curl by his neck.

Gareth moans. ‘Rumpelteazer managed to break my toolbox with his tail today.’

‘El stands by what she said, she’ll do it if you let her.’

‘Oh, I want her to.’ Gareth smiles up at him. ‘I just don’t know how she could, you know, telepathically manifest the downfall of Cats and everyone who pays to see it.’

‘Don’t underestimate her.’

‘Never.’ He murmurs, eyes fluttering as Will strokes his hair. ‘How was your day?’

‘Just at the coffee shop, went over to the loft after.’

‘Is Cathy still pining over Vickie?’

‘Oh yeah, but Vickie came in three times today, never once finished her lattes, so I think it’s mutual.’

Gareth closes his eyes, laughs quietly. ‘She says she likes studying there.’

‘I’m sure she does. Just like how Robin likes studying with Nancy over the phone.’

Gareth’s eyes widen, he suddenly pushes himself up by the elbows, twists round so his back is against the headboard, leans onto Will’s shoulder. ‘What’s that?’

Will runs his fingers over the fresh piercing, almost forgot it was there, feels anxious all over again. ‘I- Um. I got it done yesterday.’

Gareth stares at it, mouth open. ‘Why?’

‘I thought it might look cool? I dunno-’

Gareth keeps staring, moves closer, his lips hovering by Will’s neck.

‘Sorry. Sorry, I should have told you, just, Sebastian has one and I…’

He hears Gareth swallow, sees him lick his lips. It’s almost cartoonish.

Will instantly relaxes, thrilled. ‘You like it?’

‘Yes.’ Gareth exhales. ‘Why didn’t you tell me you were getting it?’

‘Kinda a spur of the moment thing. Steve got one too.’

‘Cool. Cool. Don’t give a sh*t about Steve getting one, but yeah. Cool.’

Will smirks, pushes him away when he tries to kiss the silver stud. ‘I have to let it heal.’

Gareth kisses under the ear instead, moves his hand to Will’s thigh, seems to have come over with a plan. ‘Can’t believe you didn’t tell me.’

‘Hmm.’ It’s petty, but that doesn’t stop him. ‘Can’t believe you were keeping secrets from me too.’

Gareth just hums, carries on kissing down Will neck, nudges his tee lower with his chin. His skin tingles where Gareth’s hair falls, lips soft and warm, skin smelling like pine. Will leans into it, but carries on talking, maybe it’s a mood-killer, but he isn’t going to let this go.

‘Not telling me about El.’

Gareth stops, looks up, mouth pinched. ‘She told you?’ He moves his hands back to his side of the bed. ‘Was she alright?’

‘Yeah. She’s good.’ He’s not mean enough to hold that back from him. ‘Surprised me though.’

They shuffle, sit upright. A different conversation to be had.

‘Me too.’ Gareth frowns, soft. ‘I don’t know why people always come to me about that stuff.’

‘Always?’ Will asks, mouth twitching into a sceptical smile.

‘Well, there was El, and Steve, Vickie too.’ Gareth drifts as he remembers. ‘Can’t forget I was there when Eddie has his first massive gay freak out.’

‘I can’t imagine that.’

‘What? Eddie freaking out? He does it all the time, you saw him literally kick that box of cereal out the window when he realized Robin stole the little prize.’

‘No- not like that.’ Will smiles, laughs onto Gareth’s shoulder. Robin refused to give Eddie the glow in the dark wacky-wall-walker spider until he bought a new box for the apartment. Took him three weeks to do it, too stubborn. ‘Just, can’t imagine him freaking out about the gay stuff. He always seems so sure of himself.’

‘It’s all an act.’ Gareth says, hazily, eyes resting on Will’s hands. ‘It took him a long time.’

A beat passes, words edging towards something too serious.

‘Like me?’ It feels vulnerable, in a way he isn’t quite comfortable with, but he needs to know. He’s come to learn they’re alike now, him and Eddie, wonders if this is another similarity.

‘Not like you.’ Gareth kisses him, chaste, turns away to speak, looks over at the desk in the corner, littered in drawings. ‘Not exactly.’

‘He told me about his first kiss.’ Will remembers that, maybe that was the moment he realized they weren’t complete opposites. Not alone in their horrible first adventures in romance. Well, maybe not romance, not going by how Eddie described it.

‘sh*t.’ Gareth barks back a laugh. ‘I remember that.’

‘You saw it?’

‘Only the aftermath. Eddie running through a party with a bloody chin and a very pissed off Andy McKinley pretending he got with some chick with big teeth.’

‘Oh my god.’ Will knocks his head back. ‘That’s even worse than I imagined.’

‘Yeah.’ Gareth laughs. ‘The worst.’ He stops laughing, too sudden, expression sliding downwards. ‘I really am sorry.’

‘For what?’ Will asks.

Gareth looks away, taps his fingers against his thigh.

Will takes Gareth’s hands, holds them in his lap, asks again.

‘I made your first kiss sh*t.’

‘That wasn’t your fault.’ He didn’t realize there was any doubt left in Gareth’s mind. He wants to white it out and paint something fresh over the memory. Kisses him as an attempt.

Gareth kisses back, moves on top of him. Brings his hand up to Will’s neck and scratches under his unpierced ear. ‘We’re good, right?’ He whispers.

‘We’re good.’ Will rustles his hand under Gareth’s flannel, pulls him in closer by the small of his back.

Their legs slot together, another urge taking hold. But Will is petty, doesn’t try to hide it anymore, and there’s something else on his mind

‘There was another-’ He lets Gareth claw at his tee, tuck it under his neck. ‘There was another secret you were keeping from me.’

‘What’s that?’ Gareth mumbles, only half-listening, sucking on Will’s jaw.

‘You told Eddie about my doodles.’

Gareth rests his forehead on Will’s shoulder, sounds annoyed in a way that always makes Will laugh. ‘Just let him put the drawings in with his stories dude.’ He groans. ‘They’re good-’

‘They’re not.’

‘Shut up. Yes, they are. They are!’ One hand snakes into Will’s hair, holds tight. ‘They’re good and people should see them and seriously dude, you have got to stop being so modest.’

‘Stop calling me dude.’ Will mutters, just to be an asshole. He knows Gareth can see he’s smiling.

‘Babe.’ Gareth says, mock serious, glances up to him. ‘Please show Eddie the drawings, and please, finally let me do this.’

He lowers his hand down to Will’s belt, and Will happily shuts up.

1990, Fall.

It’s been three years in the making, but finally, Will’s one-shot campaign is happening, and he’s stressed as hell. He’s running around the apartment, bringing chairs to the table, pushing Harry’s bar cart into her bedroom, gathering all his notepads on the table, arranging them in order of plot importance, only to rearrange them by chronological need quickly after.

‘Dude. It’s going to be fine.’ Mike says, draped over the couch. Will lowers down to pick up the dirty plate by Mike’s feet, and Mike flicks the wizard hat off his head as he does it.

‘I haven’t done this in years! I haven’t played D&D at all, let alone DM a game!’ Will grabs the hat, places it back on his head defiantly. The hat is ridiculous, too small for him these days, but it’s helping him get into the role.

The buzzer rings, and Will presses to let the guys in. Dustin and Lucas flew in specially for the game, Erica won’t admit she did too. Robin’s picking her up from the bus station.

Their chatter echoes in the stairwell as they walk up. They’ve been in Chicago a couple days, but it’s the first time seeing Will’s apartment. Lucas gives an approving nod when he enters. Dustin stares at the hom*oerotic art above the TV for too long, but eventually shrugs, tells Will he likes the drawing of the pirate pinned up on the fridge.

‘How’s it going at Eddie’s place?’ Mike asks, sitting upright and leaving space for the guys to join him.

‘Repulsive.’ Dustin scowls pointedly at Eddie as he sits down.

Lucas grins. He chose to sleep over at the loft, but Dustin insisted on staying with Steve and Eddie. Will is not surprised to learn he’s regretting the decision.

‘It’s not that bad! Steve cleaned for you!’ Eddie defends, opening the fridge and helping himself to a soda. He has his old Hellfire tee on, says it doesn’t matter if Will thinks this doesn’t count as a Hellfire session, Eddie is making it one, whether Will likes it or not. ‘You’re just too delicate for the couch.’

‘The pull-out isn’t the problem, Eddie.’ Dustin throws off his jacket. ‘It’s the horrors I’ve seen.’

‘What horrors?’ Will asks, holding his dice tray.

‘You don’t want to know.’ Lucas mutters, with a look that says he’s heard it all already. Dustin doesn’t notice, launches ahead.

‘The shower! The fire-escape! The kitchen table!’ Dustin falls on to his knees, holds up his hands like he’s pleading to the gods. ‘Everywhere! They’re at it everywhere.’

‘Ew.’ Will says, not looking away from the dice tray, still considering if there’s a better spot for it. ‘Really?’

‘He saw us kiss.’ Eddie says between gritted teeth, raising his eyebrows in Will’s direction. ‘That is all.’

He hums, nods understandingly, waits until Eddie’s guard is down. Thinks this will be a nice distraction from his pre-game nerves. ‘I walked in on him going at it at the store once.’

‘You f*ckin-’ Eddie pulls his hair by both hands, spins as Lucas and Dustin squirm. ‘That was one time.’

‘The store, Eddie? Seriously?’ Lucas’ lips turn up in disgust. ‘You did it at the grocery store?’

‘It was back when I was at the comic place-’

‘That does not make it any better.’ Mike interrupts.

‘Behind a closed door. Not my fault Wizard and Supergirl stormed in without knocking.’ Eddie seethes, slides his soda away on the counter. ‘You got anything harder than this?’

Will points towards the bar cart in Harry’s room, figures he probably owes Eddie a drink now. Mike looks over to him, smiles giddy.

Eddie sulks away, returns with a gin and tonic poured into one of Harry’s silver-rimmed vintage co*cktails glasses, complete with a little umbrella, looks very pleased with it, ribbing near-forgotten.

Will chats away with Lucas and Mike, talking about old characters, new quests, hints at the battles he has planned. It all feels intensely nerdy, in a way he hasn’t been for a long time.

Dustin joins in but he’s preoccupied, perched on the far end of the couch. He co*cks his head, skews his eyes, stares at Eddie until he rolls his head round to him, eyebrows raised.

‘What?’

‘You weren’t dating Steve when you worked at the comic store.’ Dustin says. ‘You guys started dating a couple months after you left.’

Eddie goes pale, eyes absurdly wide, the hand carrying the drink trembles. Will takes it from him, places it next to his notebooks. Can’t have Harry complaining about one of her vintage co*cktail glasses breaking, she still hasn’t forgiven him for the phone.

Eddie speaks very quickly, like if he speed-runs the confession Dustin won’t notice. It comes out as one long, breathless, word. There’s a moment of silence after he finishes, the boys taking it in.

‘Your boss?’ Lucas asks, not unkind, but far from impressed. Eddie shrugs, draws his hair in front of his face, bites on it. It’s the kind of movement that makes Steve go all wide eyed, claiming it’s cute. To everyone else, it just looks like Eddie giving into the feral racoon behavior he’s inclined too.

Dustin sours, but pats Eddie’s shoulder, nods like an old man. ‘It is forgiven Eddie, do not worry.’

Eddie squints, looks puzzled. ‘Eh?’

‘What is he forgiven for, Dustin?’ Mike asks, resting his chin in his hand propped up on the couch armrest. Lucas shakes his head, smiles, observes it all with his arms crossed. Seems to be enjoying the show.

‘Not realizing that Steve was his true love and wasting his time on this Smith dude.’ Dustin says. ‘And for not telling me about it the first-time round. Rude.’ He huffs, ignores Eddie’s stretched groan. ‘Did Gareth know?’

‘Yes.’ Eddie closes his eyes, sighs. ‘Gareth knew.’

‘The bastard. Why do you always tell him before me?’

Erica declares the apartment is woefully unfit for human life, but she seems excited to sleep over at the loft when the game finishes, whenever it does. It’s going to be a long game, five hours at least. It would be good for her to see the city while it’s still light out. Robin wants to walk her back past the campus. It’s a nice plan, but it seems more and more unlikely, as the sun starts setting, the sound of store shutters falling and bars opening drifting through the window, and Gareth being embarrassingly late.

‘Where is he?’ Mike moans. ‘He’s not even working today.’

‘He has band practice.’ Will says, warily. Lucas and Erica throw pointed looks his way, the Sinclair eyebrows matching in their disdain.

‘He does!’ Will takes off his wizard hat, wants to look serious as he defends him. ‘They’re rehearsing a lot these days.’

‘Cool, your boyfriend has his super cool band to hang out with any other day, this is Hellfire time.’ Now that Mike’s comfortable with Gareth, he’s grown to judge him like he judges all his friends; sarcastically.

Robin laughs at them, opens the front door to start her escape, refusing to witness any of their nerd shenanigans, reveals Gareth stomping up the stairwell.

Gareth pushes past her, starts apologizing. Robin flashes finger guns in Erica’s direction, a strange habit she’s appeared to pick up from Steve in recent years. Erica waves back, tries to hide her smile, laughs when Robin slams the door as she exits.

‘Sorry! Sorry.’ Gareth kisses Will on the cheek, pulls his notes out of his backpack, squashed and stained, like always. ‘John made me stay late to test out this rift he’s working on.’

‘Don’t care. Don’t care.’ Dustin pushes him into the circle sitting around the card table, then dims the lights. Will mentioned wanting an ambience for the game, and Dustin is very committed to the idea. ‘Let us please get started.’

Eddie reaches over Erica to pat Gareth on the back, grins, whispers something into his ear that makes Gareth laugh. Erica hears it, smirks.

‘Do you have your character name?’ Will places his hat back on, sees Gareth smile at the action. He hasn’t seen the hat before, but there’s no time to explain. ‘I have all your other stats but you didn’t give me a name.’

Gareth blinks, shakes his hair. ‘sh*t. I forgot.’

‘How do you forget to make a character name?’ Erica sighs, tightening the American flag cape around her neck. She might be sixteen now, but she’s not too old for the make-shift costume, she insists on it even. Feels like kinship with Will’s dorky hat.

‘Lady Applejack has a good point.’ Eddie cottons on. Dustin nods emphatically.

‘Okay, okay, just let me think of one…’ Gareth picks up a pencil, chews on the end. The group leans in, anticipating. Impatient to play.

‘How about…’ He drops the pencil. ‘Gareth the Great?’

‘Gareth the Great.’ Mike repeats, completely unimpressed.

‘Seriously?’ Erica adds. ‘That’s it? I can’t believe you ever tried to convince me I wasn’t cool enough for this club.’

Will imagines those intimidation stances Gareth used to talk about, doubts they ever worked on her. He rests his hand on Gareth’s shoulder. ‘I like it.’

‘Of course you do.’ Eddie rolls his eyes along with Mike. They almost look like siblings, long hair, pale cheekbones, and matching Hellfire shirts. Though Mike’s is noticeably less threadbare than Eddie’s.

‘Gareth the Great.’ Will says again, not caring about the group’s disapproval. He likes Gareth’s new character, drew a little profile of the Paladin for his birthday card. Gareth has it pinned above his bed. ‘Gareth the Great has approached the Party.’ He starts, falling into his old DM voice remarkably naturally. It’s like calling up an old friend.

‘It’s a sunny day across the Fields of Valoria, and your party has chosen to rest by the petrified remains of the ancient oak lords where great heroes were once slain…’

It’s ridiculous. It’s dorky. It’s stupid, the way he borrows Gareth’s old barbarian voice. The way he roars for the dragon when Eddie’s Bard tries to charm him into revealing the secret passage. He whispers like a haggard witch when Dustin chooses to approach the sorcerer at the tavern. He lends his extra dice to Erica when she tries a complex wisdom save. He rolls the dice like a gambler betting on life-changing odds when Lucas tries to throw a fireball. He pretends to perish under the flames when Mike adds his bonus. He doesn’t complain when Eddie clambers onto the table, nearly knocking over the minis, lets him screech as Tasha’s Hideous Laughter takes affect.

If Harry ever saw Will like this, she would scowl with such intensity her lipstick would melt off. Sebastian would beg belief. He never mentioned D&D to Lance, but if his ex was here, he would dump Will all over again out of sheer embarrassment.

But it’s incredibly fun. Stupid in a way he can only be here, with these select few. It’s better than the games at Steve’s. He never paid attention back then. The one-shot lasts eight hours in total. They don’t take any breaks, just shovel peanuts into their mouths for sustenance between turns.

Dustin beams when they finish, even though his character met a watery death under the Cascades of Misery, waiting to be revived whenever they play again.

Eddie doesn’t concede defeat as a lesser DM, just casually mentions leading a game next time. The boys squeal in excitement.

The bars on the street below are closing for the night by the time people get up to leave. Mike treats Lucas and Erica to a taxi back to the loft. Eddie walks Dustin back home. Gareth spreads out over the couch, doesn’t need saying that he spends the night.

‘You’re really good.’ He says, stealing the wizard hat when Will sits beside him.

‘Yeah?’ He steals the hat back from him, holds it in his lap.

‘Oh yeah.’ Gareth smiles, rests his arm on Will’s shoulders. ‘Lived up to all my expectations.’

‘So did you, Gareth the Great.’

‘Gareth the Great and Will the Wise.’ He yawns. ‘Sounds like the beginning of a good book.’

‘Sounds stupid.’ Will lies. He would read it. He would love it.

‘Don’t lie, you’d love it.’ Gareth mutters, knocks the wizard hat to the floor and pulls him down into the couch, too tired to get up and stumble towards the bedroom together.

1991, Summer.

‘What is that?’ El stares at the fax machine, perplexed and fascinated.

Will bought it with tips he saved up from the café. Harry suggested it. Says that if Will and Eddie are really determined to pull the drawings and stories together, they need a way of sending their ideas that doesn’t involve Gareth risking his life biking across the city at breakneck speed with the storyboards in his backpack, only to race back again when one of them inevitably has another artistic disagreement.

‘I use it to send notes to Eddie.’ Will shows her the mechanism, lets her send a hand drawn smiley face, complete with her love heart signature. They receive a reply only a few minutes later. It’s from Steve. A scribbly Hi El! with a note attached telling her to remind Max to return the tapes she stole off him last week.

El holds the fax in front of her, brows furrowed. ‘I want one.’

‘They sell them at the computer store on Halsted Avenue.’

She nods, making a mental note for later, folds up the paper and tucks it into her pocket. Another strange memento to add to the loft’s walls.

She leans over the fax machine, looks closely at all the drawings pinned above his workspace. Smiles when she sees the knight with long red hair and white eyes. Eddie originally wrote the knight to be a bald guy, but Will said the character would look better this way. Drew her before Eddie got the chance to tell him not to. He had to change all the pronouns in his manuscript and bitched about it for weeks, until he eventually agreed that it was both visually and thematically, a better choice.

‘When will the book be finished?’ She turns, perches on the edge of the desk, looks at him through her eyelashes.

‘I don’t know.’ He frowns. ‘I’m busy.’ He’s not really, but he’s procrastinating. So’s Eddie.

‘College is done.’ She says, like that proves he has endless free time to work on his little passion project.

‘No, it’s not.’ He glares at her. She knows that’s not how it works. ‘It’s starts up again in a month El. Junior year is important.’

She shrugs, pouts. ‘I finished my paintings for the exhibition in a month.’ Her third exhibition since moving. A different gallery this time.

‘Yeah, yeah, and the exhibition was amazing and you sold everything and you’re really successful.’ He rolls his eyes, smiles when she laughs at his sarcasm.

‘I want to show it to mom and dad.’

It still gives him a pause when she does that. Mom. It hasn’t been Hopper to her for a long time, but she clung onto Joyce’s name for a while. But now she says it all, easy as pie.

Will can’t quite bring himself to drop Hopper’s name yet, neither can Jonathan, but they’re closer to it now. The real word, the one that means something.

‘I’ll show them the rough draft.’ He starts searching through his files for the grey scale copy he printed last week. ‘But it won’t be properly finished for a while, at least October.’

She grabs the copy from him, starts flicking through it excitedly. Uses her pinkie finger to trace the drawings she likes best.

It’s a small thing, barely a protest, more a small gathering outside City Hall’s steps. The sun is out strong and Steve stops to pull off his shirt, wipes his chin, sweat glistening through his thin vest. Sebastian whoops from the side, half-sarcastic, half-drooling, makes Steve blush. Eddie slaps Sebastian’s sign. Tells him to go hit on his own man.

Sebastian just laughs, smiles at Eddie, turns to Will. ‘I like him.’

‘I don’t know why.’ Will snips, just for fun.

‘Oh hush.’ Sebastian slides up to his side, both perched on the steps. ‘He’s funny. And it’s always good to have more people. I don’t understand why he didn’t come before.’

‘He had his reasons.’ Will says, remembers the quiet conversation they shared last night. Eddie and Will smoking on the fire escape, talking away from the rest.

Eddie stamps up to the front of the group, joins Steve in handing out the flyers. The group has joined forces with the Lesbian United Front for today, so Robin and Vickie are there, not dating, just being queer-platonic. Eddie made fun of her for it, asked why they couldn’t just say friends, like normal people, and it became a whole thing. Gareth had to settle the argument, pointed out to Eddie that technically they’re queer-platonic, and Eddie gagged at the idea of them ever being considered anything else. Total drama queen behavior. Will sided with Robin, partly just to piss off Eddie, but honestly, who could blame him.

The other guys from the group are doing their best to make Mike feel welcome. Mike has a handful of flyers, can’t look any of the onlookers in the eye walking past, but doesn’t stop passing them out when a stranger gives him a sneer. It’s just a flyer. Statistics, demands, requests for medical funding. It’s scary. Mike is still trying. He throws Will a wobbly smile, turns back to the street.

‘What reasons?’ Sebastian asks, pushes up his wire frame glasses.

Will puts his own sunglasses on. They’re not the ones Lance bought him. It’s a pair Mike found him in a thrift store, cracked around the tortoise shell frame. They suit Will better. ‘Death isn’t easy for him to talk about.’

Sebastian nods, takes it in. Doesn’t ask any more questions. Talks about his boyfriend’s next drag show, laughs when Will says he’s bringing Mike along, just to see how bad Mike will freak out around the breastplates and glittered wigs.

It’s better that Sebastian doesn’t ask any more questions. He’s a good friend, but he’s never going to know about Will’s hometown. He’s never going to know about the dead boy that came back, or the proven innocent killer whose heart momentarily faded on the monitor. The Zombie Boys of Hawkins.

Last night, on the fire escape steps, the sweet sounds of Max’s guitar playing drifting through Eddie’s bedroom door, El singing along in an eerily accurate Woody Guthrie voice. Robin and Steve cackling on the couch. Gareth and Mike arguing in the kitchen about something neither really cared about. Last night, they were sat away from the Party, when Eddie told him he thought it was a term of endearment.

‘Endearment?’ Will repeated, pinching another Camel from Eddie’s pack.

‘Yeah, dude.’ Eddie said. ‘I thought it was cool. Back in the day, before I got caught up in everything, I even tried to write a song about it.’

‘Really?’ Will lit up, took a drag, looked up at the stars. They’re hard to see in the city. He misses how bright they hang above the cabin.

Eddie nodded. ‘Saw it on the posters around school, felt bad but when the inspiration strikes...’ He smiled. ‘Zombie boy, watch out, killer decoy, about.’ He sung, punctuating each phrase with a kick to the metal grid beneath them.

Will raised his eyebrows.

‘Ok, not my best lyrics.’ Eddie said. ‘But it’s true. I really didn’t think you’d hate it.’

‘I don’t anymore.’ Will admitted. ‘But it hurt when you used to say it.’

‘Yeah, well, I wasn’t good back then.’ He took a long drag of cigarette, released the smoke into the air above them. ‘The way I said it, probably did hurt.’

Will swallowed, twirled his cigarette between his fingers, looked Eddie in the eye. Strange. Felt like the first time. Eddie’s eyes were dark, wide, blinking, settled on him, needing to hear more.

‘Do you remember that day at Steve’s?’ Will asked.

Eddie titled his head slightly.

‘You just came out of hospital.’ Will clarified, skirted around certain details, to be kind. ‘Broke into his dad’s liquor cabinet…’

Eddie sighed, twisted his hair round a finger. ‘I remember.’ He looked down at his feet. ‘I f*cking hate whiskey.’

‘I’m sorry.’ Will said, abruptly. Eddie jumped up, looked confused. Will was confused by the apology too, doesn’t know why he said it, felt it meant something, went with it. ‘I didn’t realize how hard it was for you. Held it against you for a long time.’

They smoked in silence for a while. Pink sunset hovering on the skyline, pigeons gathering on the steps below them.

‘I’m happy for you and Gareth.’ Eddie said, eventually. ‘He deserves something good.’

It wasn’t an apology, but then, Will didn’t need one. Thinks Eddie might have apologized enough already.

‘Thank you.’

He never knew he wanted Eddie’s approval before then. Wondered if this is how Gareth felt after that long phone call with Jonathan. He threw his cigarette stub into the overflowing can by the window ledge. ‘Do you want to come to the protest tomorrow?’

‘Why?’ Eddie asked, blinked some more.

Will shrugged. ‘I dunno. It would be nice. Steve’s wanted you to come along for ages.’

‘I don’t get how you guys do it.’ Eddie said, with a small, odd smile. ‘Well, I understand why Stevie does. He’s determined to be the best activist ever, talks about it like the Superbowl. He’s turning it into a competitive sport.’

‘I noticed. He got so annoyed when Harry brought along cookies last time. I think I saw him sulking because the group said they tasted better than the donuts he bought.’

Eddie chuckled, stamped out his cigarette. ‘So that’s why he’s been baking up a storm.’

‘Will you think about it?’ He asked, not giving up. He wanted Eddie to come. ‘The protest.’

‘I wasn’t lying.’ Eddie’s shoulders drooped. ‘I don’t get how you do it.’

‘What?’

Eddie sighed, not irritated, just sad. ‘sh*t dude. We’ve come so close to it.’

The sun fell behind the horizon, the streetlights and amber windows of faceless neighbors shining brighter. Cars drove under their feet. Eddie fiddled with his fingers, long nails scratching against his palms. He used to be paler, back in Hawkins, purple bruises around each knuckle. Recovering still. He must be healthier now, fleshed out. Maybe it’s Steve’s baking.

He looked up at Will, locked eyes with him again. Said it without speaking. Death.

They’ve both brushed hands with death. Will lived with death for a while. Eddie sank into it. They both clambered out in the end.

This death isn’t the same, but it still feels constructed for them personally, a sickness designed specially. A certain pitfall only unlucky queer boys are intended to be trapped by.

‘I don’t want to hang out with a load of well-wishers who think they can fix it with some banners and shouting. That sh*t is scary.’

‘We don’t have to talk about it. We can’t fix it.’ Will said. ‘We just have to try.’

A few too many beats passed, the metal under their feet turning cold without the sunrays to warm it up. A moment for Eddie to decide.

‘sh*t Byers. You are so deep sometimes.’

‘f*ck off.’

Eddie snorted, stubbed out his cigarette, lit another and let Will steal one more too. ‘I’m sorry about the other name too.’

Will quirked a brow, confused, searching through all the slights against his personhood he used to personally blame Eddie for.

‘Baby Byers.’ Eddie explained, looked embarrassed about it too. ‘I knew you never liked that one.’

‘Oh.’ Will lit his cigarette, breathed the smoke in deep. ‘Yeah, I hated that.’

‘I don’t get why.’ Eddie laughed, losing all sense of wariness, proceeding without caution into his usual pettiness. ‘Gareth calls you babe, and you don’t seem to mind that. Basically the same thing.’

‘No. It’s not.’ Will said, eyes immediately darting away, cheeks flushed. ‘It is not similar at all.’

Eddie only grinned, Cheshire cat smile floating into the night’s sky.

1991, Fall.

The store door clatters as the bell rings. There’s a new Spiderman on display that Will wouldn’t mind browsing, but before his fingers can trace the plastic edges of the sleeve, he’s dragged to the front along with Eddie.

‘Where is the Green Idiot.' Steve seethes.

‘Great start Stevie.’ Eddie scoffs, but still joins Steve in leaning over the counter intimidatingly, both hands planted by the till. ‘Where is the manager?’

Will would feel sorry for the poor store clerk, but she doesn’t seem to be very distressed by the two men staring her down, just pops her gum, sighs loudly. ‘You’re speaking to her.’

‘No, not you. Smith.’ Steve talked about walking in with a softer approach, trying to flirt the information out of the staff, but Robin slapped that idea out of him. So now he seems committed to the insane asshole approach, eyes frantic and staggard, mouth set in a furious line.

She flicks a page of the comic lying in front of her, unaffected. ‘Smith? Who’s that?’

Will bites his lip, cowers behind Eddie. He really didn’t want this to be a confrontation. He just mentioned it in passing; like, hey, I dropped off the comic at Eddie’s old store because they were asking for new stuff at the zine table, El went in a couple days after, said it wasn’t on display anymore, maybe Eddie’s ex had something to do with it, like ha, funny that? Right? Imagine if Eddie’s old boss destroyed our book just because he was still upset about being dumped, that would be silly.

Only no one else found it funny.

‘Smith. The dictator with the green hair and lax understanding of human resources.’ Eddie quips, but his stance wavers, slowly realizing they might have charged in under some very outdated information.

‘Oh. Smith.’ She nods, brushes her braids behind her shoulder. ‘He was fired months ago.’

‘Really?’ Will asks, moves closer. She smiles slightly. He thinks he recognizes her from college.

‘Yeah, the owner ditched him last year. Something to do with him using the staffroom to hook up with his boytoy.’

Steve blushes, rubs his hand against his neck as he looks anywhere but Eddie.

Eddie just laughs, throws his arms over Steve’s shoulders. ‘I’m a boytoy.’ He whispers, not very quietly. The manager smirks, observes the two with an entertained glint in her eye.

‘We wanted to ask about something missing from the zine table.’ Will says. ‘I dropped it off last week.’

Steve scampers away and pretends to be interested in the fantasy section. Eddie follows, happy to let Will sort out the mess. The manager shared that Economics class with him last spring, makes him laugh by bringing up how the professor spent half the lectures with his fly open.

‘Yeah, I remember your book, the fantasy comic thing?’ She says, Will nods. ‘You only gave us three copies, sold out the second day.’

Eddie runs back into the conversation, Steve trails behind. ‘We sold out?’

‘Completely.’ She smiles, looks down at her book. ‘No payment though. Zine table is for donations only.’ She turns a page. ‘You guys should get a publisher, that’s how you make some real money.’

Steve pulls Eddie and Will into a bear hug, only releases Will to let him pay for the new Spiderman, sans staff discount.

1992, Spring.

They burst out the bar’s entrance, heaving for fresh air. Jonathan stumbles ahead onto the street.

‘That was so good.’ He says, panting. ‘That’s the best gig I’ve been to in years.’

Will runs up to him smiling. ‘You had a good time?’

Jonathan wipes his brow, pulls up his collar. Will can’t say he was prepared to see his big brother in the mosh pit, but the picture of him thrashing around in a crowd full of other long-haired dudes did make surprising visual sense.

‘Yeah, Will. I had a great time.’ He smiles, wide and confident, he does that more these days, more than he ever did back in Hawkins.

Will pretends to fuss when Jonathan reaches over to pull his hat down over his ears, mumbling about the cold. Jonathan likes Chicago, but he can’t stand the February snow, thinks Will is insane for calling it dreamy.

Eddie, Mike, and Gareth tumble out to join them. Eddie already has a cigarette waiting to be lit between his teeth. ‘f*cking punks.’ He mutters, flicking Gareth’s zippo.

Gareth flops onto Will’s shoulder, blows a raspberry in Eddie’s direction. ‘Stop pretending yoou didn’t enjoy it.’

He’s slurring, more than a little drunk. He can buy his own drinks now, no fake needed, still hasn’t learnt how to pace himself. Will can’t complain, he’s spent enough tipsy time leaning onto Gareth’s side. He props Gareth up, places a kiss into his greasy hair when no one’s looking.

They’re both in a messy state, sweaty tees, warm cheeks bruising pink in the cold air. Will did his usual thing, kept to the sides of the venue, watched on in amazement as Gareth and Jonathan threw themselves into the screaming pit. Mike in the crowd too, only a few feet away from the chaos. Eddie stood next to Will, complaining about the band the entire set. Only cheering when Gareth got a shout out from the front man. Gareth’s band supported theirs the other week.

The five of them start walking back to Steve’s place, could maybe make it back to Will’s, but Jonathan mentioned wanting to hang out with Steve. Nearly admitted to being Steve’s friend publicly the other day, only stopped because he knew Mike and Will would never let him forget it.

Jonathan met Harry and David yesterday. He let Harry lecture him in great detail on the influence of New York City punk on Seattle grunge, over lattes at Café Violet. She kept on re-applying her lipstick, asking him about the scene out west, fluttering her eyelashes. It was kinda gross for Will, seeing his friend flirt with his brother, but it was nice to see Harry flustered. Doesn’t think he’s ever captured that rare sight before. Made David super jumpy though. Suspects it’s why them two skipped the gig and went out on a date instead.

‘Nancy would’ve loved that.’ Jonathan says, helping Will drag Gareth along. Eddie’s spinning round a lamppost ahead, listening to Mike chat fanatic about the band.

‘You think?’ Will asks, surprised. ‘Nancy likes punk?’

‘Yeah.’ Jonathan sighs, laughs when Gareth burps. ‘She stole my Goo Goo Dolls cassette, and Ramones vinyl. There’s no chance I’m getting them back now she’s off to New York.’

‘I can’t imagine her at a show like that.’ Will doesn’t really fit in at the punk shows either, flannels a bit too clean. Gareth says his style makes him more intimidating though, says you’ve always got to look out for the quiet, respectably dressed guys at the gigs, they’re the wild ones, hiding fury like a warm shotgun underneath it all.

Actually, maybe, he can imagine Nancy the punk rocker.

Jonathan smiles faintly, like he can see the image clicking in Will’s head.

‘You guys always talk about Nancy…’ Gareth mumbles, footsteps uneven. His breath smells like cheap beer. ‘…and the book club…and ice cream… f*ckin Russians…’

It’s indecipherable. Makes Will smile all embarrassing and fond, pulls Gareth closer, lets him rest his full weight on him. ‘How you feeling?’

Gareth doesn’t reply, just tilts his head, looks up at Will dreamily.

‘Gareth?’

‘Babe.’ He blinks, sticks his lower lip out like he can’t control it. They don’t normally call each other that in public. ‘Babe. I can’t feel my legs.’

And sure enough, only seconds later, he trips over his sneakers, nearly falls onto the sidewalk, Jonathan and Will catching him at the last second.

The street is busy, partiers out for the weekend, cabs flying past them, and the walk ahead looks long. ‘I’m going to get a taxi home with him.’ Will says, smiles when Jonathan tuts, fake scolding.

Jonathan tries to hail a ride for them, Will preoccupied with keeping a very talkative Gareth standing upright. Eddie and Mike lean on a brick wall, amending everything that comes out of Gareth’s mouth, keeping him chatting stupid.

‘You guys seen Will’s brother….?’ Gareth slurs, eyebrows high, like he’s genuinely worried they’ve lost Jonathan, even as he stands less than a foot away.

‘Johnny-boy’s near, don’t fret man.’ Eddie says. Gareth frowns, with puppy dog eyes.

‘Why? You worried about him?’ Mike asks, leading, he and Eddie practically giggling.

Gareth staggers forward, and Will has to physically pull him upright again. ‘Do you think Jonathan knows? I think he knows- oh noo- he knows…’

‘Knows what?’ Mike says, his lips curling evilly.

‘About me and Will.’ Gareth whisper-shouts, voice breathy but incredibly loud still. Jonathan smirks, acting like he can’t hear, his arm caught in the air, catching sight of a driver.

‘Yeah dude. He knows you're together.’ Eddie laughs. ‘You told him? Remember?’

‘No, no.’ Gareth wags his finger, like Eddie’s being stupid. ‘He knows I love him.’

Will sighs, hot and embarrassed, not angry though. A pair of crust punks walk by them, snarl. Eddie snarls back. All empty threats.

Mike laughs, pushes his feet away from the wall and helps Will hold Gareth up. ‘Yeah dude. You never shut up about it.’

‘But- but… Jonathan doesn’t know the other part...’ Gareth’s says, loose tongue slipping. ‘He doesn’t know we have sex-’

‘Nope.’ Will interrupts, drags him away from a cackling Mike. A cab finally pulls up to the curb. ‘We’re going home. Someone needs to go to bed right now.’

Jonathan opens the car door for them, smirks so hard his lips turn blue, or maybe that’s just the cold. ‘Get home safe. And dude-’ He holds Gareth by the shoulder before pushing him into the backseat. ‘Unfortunately, I do know.’

Will closes his eyes, sighs heavily. Gareth doesn’t even react, too drunk to realize, just dopily waves to the guys as the taxi drives away.

‘Did you have a good time?’ Gareth asks, resting his head on the car window, eyes darting as the street goes by.

‘Yeah.’ Will smiles, mortified, but not unhappy. ‘Always do.’

They get to Will’s place quickly. He pays the driver, pushes Gareth up the stairwell and watches him flop onto the loveseat when they enter.

‘I am drunk.’ He announces.

‘I know.’ Will snorts, sits by Gareth’s feet and helps him pull his shoes off. ‘I’ve never seen you this bad.’

Gareth turns, chin on his chest as he looks down at Will. ‘You did have a good time, right?’

‘Yes.’ Will throws his shoes to the side, helps him stand up again. ‘You already asked that.’

Gareth moans as Will guides him to the bedroom. ‘I worry s’ all.’

Will forces him to change into a clean t-shirt, makes him drink from the waterglass by the bed, tucks him in under the sheets. Gareth curls up with his hands under his head, which always makes him look like a golden retriever puppy after a long walk, so Will happily pets his hair, completing the ridiculous image.

‘You don’t need to worry about me.’ Will says, quietly, not really for Gareth to hear.

Gareth stirs, mumbles against the pillow. ‘Always do.’ He blinks awake, looks up at Will with foggy eyes. ‘Doesn’t go well when I kiss pretty boys.’ He closes his eyes again, nestles back into the pillow. ‘Always ruin it.’

The words sound soft, but they cut Will up sharp, make the alcohol suddenly sweat out of him like cold panic. ‘Hey, hey, are you okay?’ What was that about, please tell me, please tell me, I thought all the secrets were done, all the scary ones at least.

But Gareth just smiles, falls asleep, snores loudly. Will curves his body round him, falls asleep when the sun starts to rise outside.

They all look like sh*t. Eddie is the first to say it, and Robin agrees, waving her fork skewered with bacon around the table as if to point out the degree of how awful they look.

Will isn’t even hungover, he’s just tired. Stayed up all night worrying. But the rest of the guys look like hollowed out beanpoles, the bile leftovers from last night’s cheap beer. Jonathan and Steve are in the worst state, who knows how they made it to the diner in one piece.

‘You didn’t even come out last night.’ Gareth says, breathing heavy, carefully, to avoid gagging, still managing to send a judgmental look Steve’s way. ‘How are you worse than me?’

‘These two,’ Robin points between Jonathan and Steve, ‘Stayed up all night gossiping and shrieking and drinking wine coolers. It was like a cheerleader sleepover in there.’

‘Like you were ever lucky enough to get an invite to a cheerleader sleepover.’ Eddie says, wearing a stolen pair of Steve’s sunglasses. Mike laughs, doesn’t care when Robin scowls at him.

‘Do you want me to repeat what I heard last night, about our dear friend Argyle?’ She glares at Jonathan, stops him smiling along.

‘No.’ Jonathan’s lips flatten, he sighs. I’m sorry.’

Robin nods, satisfied.

Will pokes his brother’s side, sends him a look.

‘I’ll tell you later.’ Jonathan whispers. He’s waiting on an obscene pile of hash browns to be delivered to the table, he’s going to need it if there’s any chance of his stomach surviving the drive down to Hawkins. He came over to the east coast for spring break, saved up his holiday so he could see the whole family. Spent the first few days of his trip hanging out with El, showing off his photographs to the high art crowd she associates with, networking, though he would never call it that.

When their coffee arrives, Will and Eddie both grab the sugar at the same time. Eddie pushes Will’s hand away rudely, then holds the shaker close to his chest.

‘Mine.’ He hisses, snakelike, like he’s actually won something.

Steve rolls his eyes, bats at Eddie’s hand. ‘Share.’

Eddie pouts, takes his time pouring the sugar into his mug. ‘Maybe I don’t want to.’

‘Please may I have the sugar, Eddie.’ Will asks, performative manners, just to rile him up.

‘Oh f*ck you and your polite bullsh*t.’ Eddie mutters as he slides the shaker over.

Mike squints at the coffee cups for a long time, the sight makes Will curious. ‘What?’

‘Just realized something.’ Mike smirks. ‘You guys both massacre your coffee the exact same way.’

‘No we don’t.’ Will and Eddie say in unison, a cascade of sugar falling into Will’s cup, matching the endless stream of creamer landing in Eddie’s. They proceed to scowl at each other. The table laughs.

‘They f*cking do.’ Gareth says, bumping shoulders with Mike. An uncommon agreement between the two.

Will drinks up his milky sweet coffee, holds Gareth’s hand under the table, still thinking about last night, wondering if he’ll even get a chance to bring up Gareth’s perturbing sleepy mumbles.

Perhaps it’s because they all look like sh*t, even after scarfing down a variable banquet of breakfast, or maybe it’s because he’s busy observing his brother melting into the east coast group so comfortably, but it means he’s unprepared when the universe decides to mess with him. He’s already worried about Gareth, less so after seeing him laugh over coffee, but the concern doesn’t leave him, so when they stumble out the diner, chatting mindlessly about the upcoming drive down to Hawkins, he’s distracted, then subsequently anxiety ridden, sudden cold sweat, over the sight of his ex-boyfriend, gliding down the sidewalk, about to witness Will’s sunken eyes.

Maybe he would have gotten away with a courtesy nod or lazy wave, but Lance’s arrival times up perfectly with Eddie’s decision to pick up Robin for a spinning hug, only he doesn’t have Steve’s core strength, so they immediately fail at the motion, and go tripping into Lance Tweeder’s walking path.

After the initial shock, the memory of the prep standing aghast in front of them slowly returning to him, Eddie makes a comical apology, bowing with his hand hanging low, stretching out Lance’s name like it’s a double-barrelled title. Robin pointedly doesn’t apologize, joins Steve in glaring Lance’s way. Mike is hopelessly confused, but follows Eddie’s attitude, looks at Lance like he’s a preppy fly waiting to be stamped out.

Lance sounds nonchalant when he says hello, like always.

Will nods, tries to say hello back, stutters, like old times.

Lance is wearing a suit, even though it’s a Sunday, he can’t be working at the bank, he must just be wearing it because he’s the kinda weirdo who thinks it looks cool. It makes Will recall Mike in his office lackey days, really highlights the similarities between the two, and while the realization doesn’t feel life-ruining anymore, it still makes Will’s mouth sour. They exchange pleasantries, and he comes to find out he’ll be sharing another class with Lance next semester, fantastic.

Gareth moves closer, tries to stake his territory, doesn’t stutter when Lance tries him with his signature waspy small talk, but doesn’t reply with much either.

Lance shakes his head, drops a scathing ‘Figures,’ at the sight of the two of them, coupled up. He sighs loudly, like this was all so terribly predictable. He then storms down the sidewalk, his briefcase slapping against his leg.

Jonathan and Mike spin to Will, their faces torn up in scornful worry and judgement, asking how the hell he dated that. Will rushes to walk back to Steve’s place, because they need to pick up the car, and they need to set off back to Hawkins soon, and hopefully, if he keeps on walking with his back facing them, he won’t have to explain in horrific detail all the embarrassing details why he dated Lance.

Robin seems to be sympathetic to the situation, chatting up a hurricane to distract the crew, bringing their eyes back to her, but her conversation always rambles, monologues in the making, and this particular speech blunders on to the truth of the situation in mortifying clarity. They’re walking down street with the pretty brown brick buildings, and she’s amid a whirling surge of words, when she stumbles between explaining how Will met Lance, how she was very happy for him, and so forth, when she accidentally, and Will knows it’s accidental from the way her voice turns into a sharp squeak after she says it, tells everyone that it took her mere seconds to clock Lance as Mike look-a-like.

Will trips over his boots, lets Jonathan pull him back up, turns in time to catch Mike’s frozen, blinking expression. It’s not like it’s a secret, just another detail to add to the humiliation. Will wants to speak, maybe to snap at Robin, maybe to beg Mike to please be cool about this, but he’s too slow, and Mike starts asking questions too quick.

‘Who’d you say he looks like?’ Mike asks, genuinely confused.

Robin flails, cheeks bright pink. Eddie and Gareth sigh belatedly, reply in the same moment, but with very, very different answers.

‘You.’ Says Eddie, doubling down on the humiliation.

‘Steve.’ Says Gareth, miserably, and seemingly unaware of the clusterf*ck of new information he just dropped. He walks onwards.

The rest of the group stall, even Mike, who while new to this particular litany of unwarranted opinions on Will’s dating life, seems thrilled to join in on the messy aftermath.

‘Steve?’ Robin asks.

‘Steve?’ Eddie grins.

‘Me?’ Steve grimaces.

Gareth slowly turns round when he realizes no one is following him up the steps to the apartment, parts his lips and tilts his head. ‘Err, yeah? Jesus, dude. You don’t have to make a thing out of it.’ He grumbles, rolls his eyes Eddie’s way, like this is something they’ve joked about before.

‘Oh Gare-bear.’ Eddie whispers with a sarcastic smile, places a claw-like hand on Gareth’s shoulder. ‘You have no idea.’

While witnessing the whole debacle, Will is slow to react externally, his mouth dropped open, the cold air seeping in and biting at his gums. Jonathan pushes Will’s jaw closed, like he’s training a child to hold its tongue, whispers with a giggle trapped in his throat. ‘Is he saying what I think he’s saying?’

Gareth looks to Will, eyes wet and wide. ‘sh*t. What did I do?’ He runs down the building’s steps to Will’s side. ‘I thought it was a thing, like you had a crush on Steve and now it’s fine right? Right?’

‘Ah.’ Will gulps, holds Gareth’s shaking arms. ‘Not Steve. Never Steve.’ He glances over to Mike, makes it obvious, sees Gareth’s stare follow the direction. ‘Didn’t have a crush on him, didn’t know he had any resemblance to Lance either.’ It takes a second for the connection to kick, to realize the Mike Wheeler of the Lance situation. Gareth curses when he realizes, stamps his feet, reminded once again.

‘Goddamit.’

‘Sorry dude.’ Mike says, tucks his hands into his jean pockets, sucks in his lips. Good to know he caught up fast. What little remains of Will’s integrity and pride would be burnt to a crisp if he had to explain this any further.

Eddie leaps up the steps, opens the building door and ushers everyone inside. ‘How the f*ck did you look at Patrick Bateman Jr. back there and think of Stevie?’ He asks, following Gareth’s furious stomp up the stairwell.

‘Swooshy hair! They both have swooshy hair!’

Steve looks nauseous at the mere idea. Will thinks he can hear him whispering to Robin, something about needing to shake up his wardrobe, moving away from The Gap.

Will pulls Gareth aside when they enter the apartment, kisses him as an apology. ‘I didn’t realize either.’ He genuinely had no clue Lance looked like Mike until he was told.

‘That does not help.’ Gareth pouts, kisses Will back anyway, pushes him into the bathroom sink. ‘I really thought it was something to do with Steve.’

‘Dude, no.’ He runs his hands around Gareth’s neck.

‘Not at all?’ Gareth’s mouth is all cute and squishy. ‘Are you sure?’ He asks, clearly disturbed by his own imaginings.

Will thinks about Steve, tries to really imagine if he harbored an unspoken crush, luckily comes up naught, but does linger a while on the image of Steve post-run, dressed in his summer sweats, muscles shining through thin polyester.

‘Ok, maybe a little.’ Will admits. ‘But it was entirely superficial.’

Gareth blows his hair out of his eyes with an angry puff from his lower lip, kisses Will again. ‘Mean.’

Will smiles, kisses under Gareth’s eyelashes, apologizes again, just in case.

‘I’m going to miss you.’ Gareth mutters, as they ignore Robin’s knocking on the bathroom door.

‘I’ll be back in four days.’

‘You better be.’

They pick up El from the loft. The quiet drive back to Hawkins is periodically interrupted by the sheer surprise that half of the Byers-Hopper family is currently cooped up inside Steve Harrington’s Beemer. He let them borrow it, in exchange for a mere box of white wine and lemonade and Jonathan’s conversational company.

‘Robin says it’s a sign of true friendship.’ Will says, smug, his legs drawn up on the front passenger seat, a sketchpad resting against his knees.

‘What is?’ El asks innocently, lying down precariously on the backseat. She stayed up late in the studio, wants to catch up on sleep before she sees everyone.

‘Steve letting Jonathan drive the Beemer.’

Jonathan rolls his eyes. ‘Okay, okay.’ He laughs lightly. ‘We are friends. Real-life, actual friends. If I promise to never deny it again, will you stop talking about it?’

Will purses his lips, pretends to consider the idea. El laughs, props herself up on her elbows. ‘Robin told me about the not-crush.’

Will blushes, reminded of the whole debacle again, sulks when Jonathan laughs. His big brother clearly thankful for something embarrassing to balance the levels.

It’s dark by the time they reach the cabin. El wakes up to the sound of low hanging branches slapping on the car’s roof. Her and Will both grimace, worried about scratches on Steve’s precious baby, but quickly forget when they see Hopper, smiling, arms crossed, waiting out on the porch for them.

They’re only in Hawkins a couple days, it flies by. Hopper shows them more changes to cabin, the new stove, the satellite TV, the wireless phone set. Will and El marvel and coo appropriately. Will shows his mom the comic, on Jonathan’s insistence. She buys a copy from him right there, on the spot, tucks the payment into his shirt pocket before he can refuse. She sticks it up on the fridge, alongside El’s faded report card, her first A*, a sweet memory nowadays.

Will still can’t drive, doesn’t care to learn no matter how many disparaging looks Hopper gives him for it, so he ends up cycling over to Gareth’s old place. Meets Gareth’s dad at the door, who takes the sack of Joyce’s homegrown cabbage and broccoli with an understanding smile. Talks about his wife’s habit for converting the housewives of Hawkins to her gardening ways with warm affection. Mentions another lady has joined the homegrown community under Verity’s tutelage, turning her place up on Maple Street into a veritable organic forest, a Mrs. Wheeler, well Ms. Wheeler these days.

Jonathan chokes on the broccoli casserole their mom boils for dinner, politely acknowledges that, yes, Argyle’s cooking is superior, apologies for it too. Their mom just laughs, seems delighted someone’s finally admitted how awful her food is.

Will shows Castle Byers Two to El. Walks her through the woods and smiles when she calls the fort a feat of creative genius. He remembers seeing those words in a newspaper review of her latest exhibition, knows it isn’t arrogance which caused her to borrow the phrase, just pure excitement. They eat a picnic inside the castle, and Will spots the tell-tale signs of Erica and Holly’s co-habitation of the place since he’s been away, biro drawings, decapitated Barbie dolls, scattered candy poker chips. Last he heard, Erica runs an underground D&D club at the high school, with Holly as her middle-school protégé. Lucas and Mike are very proud, even if neither of them can bare to confess that to their little sisters.

On the last night of their short trip, Hopper invites him out to the porch, leaves his mom and El in the living room, dancing to the Primal Scream record Jonathan set down on the new record player. Under the lit string tea lights wrapped around the tiger orange awnings, Hopper offers Will a sly cigarette, raises his eyebrows in a way that says, just this once.

Their smokes hovers above them, grey whispers fading into the dark silhouettes of the trees. The stars shine even brighter than Will remembered.

‘How’s Gareth?’ Hopper asks, low tone and relaxed. No accusation, just interest.

‘He’s good.’ Will says. ‘His boss just left for a theatre in Indie, so we’re hopeful the new guy will be better.’

Hopper scoffs. ‘They never are.’ He smiles. ‘But I hope it ain’t too bad.’

The Marlboros don’t taste as nice as Gareth’s old Camels, but Will doesn’t complain. Makes him think about Gareth though, makes him worry about the things whispered the night before they left Chicago. The appearance of Lance squashed any attempt Will was going to make at bringing it up.

Will always thought he was good at hiding, disguising his expressions, but maybe the old tricks don’t come to him as natural anymore, because Hopper takes one quick glance at him, coughs, asks him what’s up kid, too pointed to ignore.

‘I dunno…’ It’s an awkward thing to talk about with anyone, let alone Hopper. It’s not fun embarrassing Hopper with the gay talk when it’s a bit too real. ‘Gareth worries a lot...’

‘So do you.’ Hopper interrupts.

Will laughs softly. ‘Yeah, just… I think there’s something he won’t tell me. Something about-’ About pretty boys, but he’s not saying that here. ‘Something about dating guys.’ He settles on, slightly less awkward.

Hopper hums, slaps his boots on the deck. He wears the same boots as Gareth, work shoes, steel toe caps.

‘I thought you boys were trying this new talking thing.’ He snarls his lips, like talking is a dirty word. Makes Will laugh.

‘Yeah, suppose we are. How did you-?’

Hopper grunts, takes a drag of his cigarette, shrugs his shoulders. ‘From Wayne, Eddie must’a heard about it.’ He stubs out his cigarette, gives Will a long look, eyebrows bent in a kind curve. ‘Verity said some stuff happened him when he was a kid. Ask him about it.’

‘She told you?’

Hopper shakes his head, walks him back inside. ‘Not all bad things are made by the government science hacks, doesn’t mean he ain’t been through it.’ Feels like an obvious thing, makes Will nod shamefully, feeling selfish that he could ever forget the fact. He stores the idea away for later, finds it funny he’s taking romantic advice from Hopper.

They drive back to Chicago the next day. El takes the wheel, makes a show of driving very sensibly. When they get back to the city, she drops Jonathan off at Will’s place, looks at them expectantly, one eyebrow raised, doesn’t say anything. Jonathan whispers to Will when they walk into the apartment, careful so they don’t wake up Harry.

‘She gets that from you.’

Will quirks a brow, pulls extra blankets onto the bed so Jonathan can share. They sleep toe to chin.

‘Passive aggressive point making.’ Jonathan explains. ‘She wants us to tell everyone she’s a good driver now.’

Will doesn’t really get it, still pouts to act offended.

He goes to bed happy, soft and drained. Tells Jonathan before they succumb to sleep, doesn’t want to forget to say it. It doesn’t even feel like a secret, just important.

‘I’m not scared of Hawkins anymore.’

‘That’s good.’ Jonathan turns on to his side, looks out the window. ‘Me neither.’ He yawns. ‘Did something weird though.’

‘What?’ Will laughs, tired and quiet.

‘Called Hopper Dad.’

‘Oh.’ Will replies, staring up at the ceiling, faint glimmers of streetlights dancing across it. ‘Probably about time.’

‘Yeah, that’s what I thought.’ Jonathan says. ‘You think you’re gonna call him that too?’

‘Yeah. I will.’ It’s a decision, a choice to think of Hopper that way. A scary one. He chooses to anyway.

The record sleeve spits out dust when Will pulls it out the rack. He reads the track listing, walks over to the counter where Mike sits, an intimidating set of forms lying in front of him.

‘Did you know the Pixies have a song called Ed is Dead?’ He asks, motioning for Mike to place the vinyl down on the player that feeds music into the store.

‘Yeah. Eddie think’s it’s hilarious.’ Mike says glibly, takes the record, queues it up behind the Nirvana record he chose. ‘He doesn’t even like them, but he says this song is basically dedicated to him, even if Black Francis doesn’t know it.’

He goes back to staring at the forms, fiddles with his staff badge without thinking. The little grey plastic tab says I’m Mike! Ask me anything! And the way it’s over-enthusiastic attitude contrasts with Mike’s general apathy always makes Will giggle. Mike likes working at the store though, well at least for now, he says.

Will leans against the counter, tries to sound supportive considering the awkward emotional state Mike’s failing to hide. ‘You’ll get in. Your grades are good, Harry says they actually like it more if people take a break after school. Shows you’re mature.’

Mike nods, murmurs a thank you. Still looks at the college application forms like it’s one of the endless NDAs they were forced to sign back in the day. Something thrust upon on him without choice. Which isn’t the case, he asked Will to pick up the forms, sounded positive about it at the time.

‘You don’t have to do it.’

‘I want to do something.’ Mike says. ‘I need to do something.’

‘Doesn’t have to be college though.’

Mike looks up, smiles through his teeth, shrugs, shoves the forms to the side. ‘You think you’re going to stay in Chicago after you graduate?’

‘Yeah, I like it here.’ Will says. The store’s door rings as a customer enters, some moody long haired grunge fun. The store’s clientele seems to be exclusively made up of those guys, apart from Will, who only ever really come in here to check up on Mike and beg for a staff discount.

‘Oh. Sure, sure.’ Mike mutters, tapping away at the till for something to do. Will should ask more, but he doesn’t, thinks this is a decision Mike needs to make for himself, whatever it is.

1992, Summer.

Gareth makes him marinaded tofu with roast pineapple to celebrate. He doesn’t really like tofu, but Will does, and it’s the only dish Gareth is really good at cooking. He presents it to Will at the table with a flourish and cheeky grin.

‘You ever going to tell your mum you’re not a vegetarian?’ Will asks, before biting down into the sweet n’sour tofu, humming his approval.

‘Nope.’ Gareth pours out the wine. A fat shiny green bottle Eddie stole from work for them. ‘She doesn’t need to know I gave it up age sixteen the second after Eddie offered to drive me over to McDonalds after school.’

Will raises his glass to meet Gareth’s.

‘To you! A published artist.’ They clink their glasses, drink, white wine dripping onto Gareth’s chin.

‘Published artist doesn’t sound right.’ Will says before he can stop himself. El is an exhibiting artist, that’s what her little write-ups always say, next to the paragraphs detailing her recent awards. Gareth snorts, wipes his mouth with the back of his hand.

‘Okay, not published artist then.’ He leans across the table and taps Will on the chin. ‘How about- professional doodler?’

Will laughs. ‘Yeah, I like that more.’

They eat and drink slowly, don’t really talk about the publishing deal much, but Gareth keeps on making proud comments when Will least expects it, makes him blush.

Robin helped. She found an indie comics publisher interested in undiscovered talent, sent in the manuscripts with a fancy cover letter. Will phoned up the cabin as soon as he heard the good news. Hopper Dad clearly didn’t understand what was going on, but still called Will a genius for it.

They eventually move to the couch. Gareth’s roommates are curiously absent, and Will wonders if he asked them to leave the living area alone. He brought flowers along for date night. Gareth placed them in a torn beer can, the lilies sticking out of the jagged Heineken metal, pride of place on the kitchen counter.

Tracy Chapman plays on the boombox. Will likes her, spent an entire weekend with Fast Car on repeat as he finished up the final panels for the comic. He knows Gareth calls it cheesy, so he cuddles up to him, whispers teases into his ear.

‘I can like cheesy.’ Gareth grumbles. ‘Just don’t tell Eddie.’

Will smiles, thinks he’s definitely going to tell Eddie later.

‘I mean it.’ Gareth’s brow furrows. ‘Don’t tell him.’

‘Okay.’ Will lies, smiles when Gareth laughs knowingly. ‘Keep your secrets.’

‘You’re one to talk.’ It sounds sweet, how Gareth says it, like he admires Will for it somehow. But then, Gareth just always sounds sweet.

Will doesn’t want to ruin it, but it’s been on his mind a while, knows he shouldn’t avoid asking any longer. Hopper reminded him to ask Gareth too, said he would feel better with it out in the open. So, he asks the question quietly, arms wrapped around Gareth’s side, chin resting in his messy hair.

‘You sleep talk sometimes.’ Will does too, but his sleep talking is more desperate cries of spider limbed zombies and sweating out death trapped inside a circle of space heaters. Those memories linger on, even now.

‘Ah, hope it’s not too stupid.’ Gareth jokes, closing his eyes sleepily. ‘What do I talk about?’

Pretty boys, he talks about pretty boys, but even in the tired mumbles, the words are laced with regret. Makes Will ache in a fresh tenderness he isn’t accustom too.

‘You talk about a boy.’ He whispers.

Gareth opens his eyes, his shoulders tense, but he doesn’t move away, instead tucks his chin into Will’s neck.

He asks a few more questions, waits for Gareth to answer, lets him opt out if he wants, is gently relieved when he doesn’t.

Gareth tells him the other story, the one just as painful as Will’s, but lacking in supernatural horrors and psychic forests.

He whispers, voice crackling, like the words are all new to him, never spoken before. It’s about a boy who kissed a pretty boy, the boy who had a kind mom who never let him feel shame for it, who didn’t realize the danger, the mom who let her lovely son tell someone he shouldn’t. The aftermath. The freezing cruelness only children could ever act out. The story about a boy who ended middle school friendless. Spent weekends lying in the living room, listening to records with his mom and dad, no one else to hang out with.

Gareth doesn’t cry. He’s good at that, not crying. He talks about meeting Eddie, making Hellfire, describes it like a haven, barely a club, just a couple of lonely nerds gathered under the King Freak. Gareth found the drama room, knew they could use it because Mr. Davies would let him eat lunch there, back when he didn’t have anyone to sit with in the cafeteria. Talks about driving up to the woods in Eddie’s van, smoking pot with him under the trees, the stick and poke flame above his ankle, a birthday gift from his best friend. Eddie’s needle strapped to the back of a biro with an elastic band. Rebellion etched onto skin, screamed out, pinned to flannel shirts. Awkward dudes refusing to smile for the popular kids. Signing up the younger freaks, an oasis for the lost boys.

Before Will and Mike returned to Hawkins, jumping out of a pizza van and running to their friends, there was Gareth, Grant, and Jeff down the street, patched up in Verity’s kitchen, bleeding and crying in equal measure, because they had been hunted down, not by mouths ripped like origami flowers, but by scared jocks powered by a religious vengeance they never really understood.

Gareth lost his best friend, and Eddie died a killer.

And then he came back. Breathing in chemical life with unexplained teeth bites sprinkled against his ribs. Steve Harrington slumped in an armchair next to the hospital bed, police officers guarding the ward. Cleared of all charges, reputation dragged through the mud and left to rot despite it.

‘I know this isn’t true, it wasn’t me, but sometimes…’ Gareth sighs. Will holds him tighter. ‘Eddie always talks about the butterfly effect, events crashing into each other. Sometimes I think- if I never kissed Tim, then I wouldn’t have found Eddie, maybe we would never have set up Hellfire, maybe then, maybe everything would have been fine.’

‘It’s not your fault.’ Will says. He is crying, because he was never very good at not crying, not really. ‘I don’t think Eddie would still be here if it wasn’t for you.’ Morbid truth. Something he couldn’t say to anyone else. But Gareth takes it.

‘Thank you, for helping him.’ Gareth whispers, breath warm against Will’s neck. ‘Helping me help him. I don’t know if I ever said that before.’

Will pulls away to speak, keeps his chest close. ‘I don’t know if I ever really did.’ He says, ‘I was never very nice to him.’

A sly smile slowly spreads over Gareth’s face, he moves his hands to Will’s waist, looks him in the eye. ‘Eddie doesn’t like nice.’

Will laughs, it comes out small and wet. ‘Do you? Do you like nice?’

‘Nah.’ Gareth says, kisses him. ‘I like you.’

They kiss again, cheeks marked with tears. Gareth pushes Will into the couch, moves on top. ‘I love you, actually.’

Will doesn’t say it. Not yet. But it feels within his grasp.

1992, Fall.

They’re in a lecture hall. Will fidgets on the hard wooden seats. He likes this part of the campus, outdated features, red carpet, curving arches left from the last century. He stews in the history, uncomfortable but content, scribbles down notes as he listens to the professor.

He likes this professor too. She helped him choose his major, finally. English Lit. Hopper Dad thinks it’s the kind of degree which will leave Will completely unemployable, doesn’t seem worried though. Just glad that people are buying the comic, made his buddies at the flea market order copies too. Keeps on asking when Will and Eddie are going to start on the sequel.

The professor walks across the stage, kitten heels clacking against the floorboards, waves her arms as she describes Charlotte Bronte’s oeuvre. She throws a question to the audience, picks on Lance.

That’s another reason Will likes her. She always picks on Lance. Harry likes it too, tuts loudly when Lance references the wrong Bronte sister. Will hides his smile behind his palm, writes a message to her at the top of his notebook.

Meet tonight at seven?

She writes back in red ink.

:) Yes! Excited?

Will smiles at her, nods slightly. He’s invited everyone to the gig, but Harry’s presence is more important than most. It’s Gareth’s first big show. They’ve had other gigs, but the band couldn’t decide on a name, went under too many iterations, lost in the posters.

It was Blood Rage, then Fury Fire, Anger-Armageddon, then just Anger-Anger (which Will thinks was definitely the stupidest one) but they’ve stuck with Screaming Fire the longest. Will suggested it. Gareth wasn’t too keen, but John liked it, so him and Will bullied the rest of the guys into choosing it.

Max uses her cane to knock several punks out of the way so she can be served first. She doesn’t have a fake. She uses and abuses the blind card, the bartender too nervous to turn her away. She buys El a beer too, and they skulk off to the corner of the venue, Steve stamping around them, like a guard dog, giving his bitchiest glare to any man who even thinks of looking their way.

‘God. It’s so hot when he does that.’ Eddie sighs, admiring his boyfriend from the bar.

Will sends him a withering look. Eddie laughs, pulls him into the center of the crowd. Harry joins them, dragging David along behind her. She and Eddie sneer, then nod, short. Will doesn’t worry, he knows this is a bit they do, pretending to hate each other. David doesn’t bother with the act, just excitedly asks Eddie about a new Star Trek novel, the two of them babbling like boys at summer camp.

It’s a small venue, a basem*nt with crumbling walls and sticky floors. Makes it feel even more packed than it is. The support band is cool, Riot Grrls on tour from Seattle, makes Max holler and hoot from the back. Will is just stunned that there’s a support act.

There’s a tap on his shoulder. Will finds Mike behind him, still wearing his goofy work badge. ‘Sorry I’m late!’ He shouts over the crowd, growing rowdy in anticipation. Will doesn’t normally stand this forward, can’t help being frightened by the yells and loud chatter, but he wants to see everything tonight, can’t risk being stuck at the back.

The lights dim when the band takes the stage. Gareth looks nervous when he sits behind the drum set, throws a shaky thumbs up Will’s way.

‘Are you alright here?’ Mike asks, leaning over his shoulder.

‘Yeah!’ Will shouts back, not turning to look at him, eyes fixed on Gareth, watching him warm up his drumsticks.

There were three encores, because of course there were, it was f*cking amazing. Gareth broke four different drumsticks, threw them out into the crowd. Will has one tucked in his back pocket. He feels a little like a groupie, hanging by the back exit, bouncing foot to foot, waiting for Gareth to come out. Harry and David already left, El and Max too, told Will to congratulate everybody on their behalf.

Mike leans against the alley wall, listens as Eddie screams with excitement. ‘He did it! That was sick, epic, a gig worthy of Ozzy himself!’

Steve laughs, throws his arms over Eddie’s shoulders. ‘You proud?’

‘Yes! I am!’ Eddie’s cheeks swell, he clasps Steve’s hands and plants a quick kiss on his knuckles. ‘Did you see that! My little dude did it!’

The band invited Eddie on stage, let him scream along for the penultimate song. Will never realized how good a singer he was, guttural and commanding, makes him want to ask if Eddie’s still trying with the guitar. Not tonight though, he doesn’t want to spoil the buzzing excitement.

Everyone is bruised and battered from the mosh pit. A first for Will, surprised himself with that. He looks over to Mike, sees him withdrawn, less excited than the rest. He towards Will cautiously, something on his mind.

Will moves away from the exit to stand next to him. ‘Did you like it?’

‘Yeah, yeah I did.’ Mike says, looking down at his feet. ‘Gareth was good, huh?’

It’s not mean, how he says it, not happy either though. Will asks him if he’s alright, tries to say it quietly, private, even with Steve and Eddie falling through the motions of their hom*oerotic mating dance next to them (it’s not quite cuddling these days, not when it’s in public).

‘I dunno.’ Mike says, voice small and tight. ‘Just jealous, I suppose.’ He looks up at Will, smiles unconvincingly. ‘Don’t worry about it.’

And then Gareth walks out the building, the band cheering behind him, and Will tags along to the afterparty, doesn’t hug Mike when they go opposite directions at the end of the street, doesn’t ask why Mike isn’t coming to the afterparty too, even though it’s the kind of thing he used to dream about doing in the city.

He hopes El is still awake when Mike gets back to the loft.

It’s a memorial, not a funeral. Brown leaves gather outside the townhouse. Gareth shakes some more out his hair when they enter. Sebastian stands in the hallway, pale, holding a small glass of tonic water and forgetting to drink it. Will hugs him on sight, let’s go quickly. Sebastian thanks them for being there, pats Gareth on the back, hugs Harry and listens intently as she talks to him in hush tones. She’s good at this sort of thing.

She knows memorials. Will only knows funerals, and even then, only in the same way stage actors know ushers. He’s never been on the other side, only the starring show.

When Sebastian addresses everyone gathered, he describes his friend full of color and life not made memory yet. Even makes a joke about his friend losing all his hair after the chemo, says bald suited him better. He was called Leo, real name Ryan. They moved out here together, both chose names from the glossy pages of art history books they used to read lying down on the dusty carpet floors of their high school library. St. Sebastian, as painted by Leonardo.

Will didn’t know Leo very well. Sebastian lost touch with him when he started college. Only found him again after he started volunteering at the hospital.

Will gets teary, because of course he does, and Gareth holds his hand, doesn’t hide it, not in this crowd. Steve and Robin are here, arranging the buffet, smiling forlornly, don't need to say anything else.

They stay the appropriate amount of time.

They catch the train back to the apartment and go to bed early. Will pulls the curtains tight to stop the sunlight feeing through. He doesn’t complain about the crumbs when they end up eating sandwiches under the covers. He lies on top of Gareth, heartbeat pulsing.

‘You were always safe, right?’

Will nods shakily, wishes he could bring up the stupid story about Steve and the condoms, leaves it for another time. ‘Yeah. I got tested too.’

Gareth cuffs Will’s wrist with his hand, callouses tingling against the skin, raises it to kiss his fingertips. ‘I used to worry about you, in those bars.’

‘I was alright.’ Will replies, thinks he was, at least. Harry used to joke about his slu*tty phase, but he’s lucky it never lasted long. That was never really him.

‘Better now though? Right?’

‘Yes.’ He kisses him, because it is better. Even when it’s bad, it’s better, because he has Gareth, and they are safe.

It’s a lazy Sunday morning. Gareth and Will are watching Star Trek re-runs on the TV, backs at opposite ends of the couch, legs overlapped in the middle. Harry is sat on a chair from the kitchen, pulled up to the coffee table, her foot in her hand as she paints her nails.

As what normally happens when Gareth stays the night, they’ve accidentally swapped clothes, not paying attention when they woke up, so Will is wearing a Black Sabbath shirt under his yellow flannel. He pretends to pout when Harry raises her eyebrows at it.

‘Didn’t take you for an Ozzy fan.’

‘There’s a lot about me you don’t know.’

Gareth laughs loudly, slumps lower into the couch. He makes eyes at Will, like yeah, there is a whole lot Harry doesn’t know about Will, mainly scientific horror underworlds, but some other embarrassing stuff too.

Harry reaches over and attacks him with her nail polish, leaves a purple strike along Gareth’s cheek. ‘f*ck you.’ He grumbles, failing to wipe it off with his thumb. Will loves the way the lines around Gareth’s nose wrinkle. He resists the urge to smooth them out with his forefinger, knows Harry would call him a softie for it. Waits till they’re alone.

‘What are you boys doing today then?’ She asks, smiling, pleased with herself.

‘There’s a Chagall exhibition at the Art Institute.’ Will says, smiling slightly when Gareth absentmindedly rubs his feet. ‘El liked it, told us to go see it.’

Harry nods, finishes painting her nails and wiggles her toes with satisfaction. ‘Would be good for Gareth to see some culture.’

‘I know culture.’ Gareth mumbles, stubbornly, turns to the TV screen and ponders something for a moment. ‘Is it me, or is Spock kinda hot?’

Harry tilts her head to consider this, raises her eyebrows like she’s surprised she agrees. Will doesn’t see it.

‘Do you think Mike would want to come along to the museum?’ Gareth asks, staring at the TV.

Will stirs from his slumped position against the couch, pushes himself up his elbows, surprised. ‘He’s not really into art like that. Why did you think of him?’

Gareth shrugs. ‘Just, haven’t seen him around much.’

‘He went to your gig.’ Harry reminds him.

‘That was weeks ago.’ Gareth says, ‘I dunno, just thinking. Worried he might not be going out much.’

She laughs. ‘You’re worried about Mike?’

Gareth smiles at it, looks away from her. Will thinks for a moment, tries to count the times he’s hung out with Mike lately. Only at the store, maybe the loft, a couple gigs Eddie dragged him along too. Mike really doesn’t go out at all. Stays cooped up the loft, always talking about big things, never actually doing them.

‘We should call him up.’ Will says, mouth twitching. ‘Invite him out.’

They do call him. Mike declines, says he’s tired.

Halfway round the exhibition, seated on a black leather bench in front of Chagall’s Over the Town, Will asks Gareth about it. Gareth doesn’t look surprised, seemed to be waiting for him to bring it up.

‘I really thought he would like Chicago.’ Will says quietly, polite in the formal space. ‘He always talked about wanting to leave Hawkins, see things, meet people.’

Mike hasn’t met anybody new since moving. Just hangs out with El and Max, well, less El these days.

Gareth moves his hand to lean behind Will’s back, leaving an inch of space between them, always wary in public. ‘Maybe the city isn’t for him.’

Will hums, stares at the painting, the two figures flying over their hometown, arms wrapped around each other. ‘I suppose there is a world outside of Chicago.’

‘We’re just too comfortable here.’ Gareth agrees, brushes his hair away from his face, lips sucked in as he focuses on the painting. ‘Maybe he needs to find his own place, see what else is out there.’

‘Huh.’ Will ruminates, ‘Yeah, I’ll talk to him about it.’

Gareth nods slightly, opens his mouth, then closes it, then opens it again, like he doesn’t care about stopping himself from what he says next. ‘These paintings are sh*t compared to yours.’

Will laughs, too loud for the museum, hides his flushed cheeks in his hands when the guard gives them a scolding face. Gareth looks proud of himself, listens to Will as he tries to explain why Chagall is a way better artist than him, still refuses to change his mind on the matter.

1993, Summer.

Will books a place at a Turkish restaurant downtown, feels embarrassed when he tells the hostess he needs a reservation for thirteen people.

Hopper takes the head of the table, orders meze and pilaz, the correct pronunciation rolling off his tongue, because apparently, he loves Turkish food, survived off it alone when he lived in Chicago for a brief stint in his twenties. Steve and Eddie sit on the right, keep on making jokes about being surrounded by pretentious academics.

Robin rolls her eyes, introduces Eddie to her dad, who isn’t a pretentious academic, but is very proud of his daughter in the process of becoming one, so he gives Eddie the stink-eye, asks Robin if either of the terrible twosome are going to hurry up and marry her one day, looks confused when the rest of the table laughs.

Joyce doesn’t let Will take off the scratchy graduation robe, tells him he looks very smart, makes Jonathan take far too many photos. Harry whispers into Will’s ear, threatening to bring up the subject of gun control to Hopper, but Gareth leans over and tells her to can it, says she’s already had her fun.

Harry and Robin graduated summa cum laude. David and Will did not. They pretended to sulk when the girls were photographed with the other top students. Harry’s mum is very proud. It’s her first visit to the Windy City, and she keeps on eyeing up David with undeserved disdain, waits till he’s chomping down on a gigantic piece of kebab meat to ask him when he was going to tell her that he and Harry are moving in together. David gulps, eyes wide and terrified, massive shoulders knocking into Gareth’s.

Gareth and Steve jump in to defend, start regaling stories relating to David’s upmost moral character, suggesting he is probably the best boyfriend material in existence. Harry’s mom clearly doesn’t believe it, but it’s nice that they try.

El orders an exceedingly spicy behran soup, makes Will try a sip, just to see his nose run. Max laughs at him. She has her own achievement to celebrate, graduating from the specialist school, applying to a couple college classes, maybe even getting an assistance dog. It’s going to be expensive but Mike and El are working on it. They’re calling up the classified government phone line and leaving threatening messages, suggesting they may want to reveal some of the secrets that imploded beneath Hawkins, mentioning they know a journalist in New York, a Miss. Nancy Wheeler, who is desperate to write up the story. They have no intention of doing such thing, but the threats mean a steady drip of government hush money keeps falling into Max’s bank account.

Steve is celebrating too, but he doesn’t bring it up. He finally gave up the dog sitting. He’s had a couple shifts at The Closet, bartending, and he’s going to start part-time soon, keeping his weekends free to keep up with the volunteer drives. Apparently makes the worst bloody marys in Chicago if Robin is telling the truth. Doesn’t seem to affect his tips though, reeling in the cash.

The conversation fires around them, so Will leans back, holds Gareth’s hand against his thigh under the table, both happy silently witnessing the cacophony of flustered reunions and future dreams. Joyce glows at Hopper’s side, asks Robin about her post-graduation plans.

Steve replies for her, with a scathing review of the Linguistics Masters at NYU. Robin laughs, tells Joyce she’s already accepted the offer, she’ll be moving in June. She slaps Steve’s cheeks affectionately; tells him he needs to come visit.

Eddie and Mike scoff. Mike brings up Nancy, again, ask Robin if she’ll be living in Brooklyn like her, smirks when Robin scowls. She loudly tells them that Nancy has nothing to with her post-grad plans. Steve snorts, calls her a bad liar.

Will wipes his mouth clean with the paper napkin, hands one over to Gareth to prompt him to do the same. Gareth drinks up his raki, runs his thumb over Will’s knuckles.

‘So, Harry is moving out?’ He asks.

‘Well David already practically lives with us.’ Will says quietly, wary of Harry’s mom and her pin-sharp hearing. ‘Thought I might let them have the apartment. Might be good for me to move, I was going to ask Sebastian about looking for a place.’

‘Oh. Cool. Cool.’ Gareth does a bad job at hiding his disappointment.

Will smirks, leans closer to his ear. ‘Why do you ask?’

Gareth shifts on his chair, looks down, caught out. ‘I was thinking…’

‘Hmm?’

‘I got that pay rise, and my lease is ending, and it would be really nice to live somewhere without rats in the walls.’

Will nods, moves a little closer, vaguely aware they’re being watched by Steve and Eddie across the table, not caring enough to shoo them away. The rest of the table’s talk passes over them, lets their conversation carry on covertly. ‘You should move. There’re some nice apartments by Logan Square.’

‘You like it round there?’ Gareth asks, one hand tapping a spoon against a dirty plate, the other still holding Will’s under the table.

‘Yeah, I do.’

‘Want to live there?’ Gareth bites his lip, looking up to face him. ‘With me?’

‘Yes.’ Will answers before he even fully comprehends the offer, a slow, wide, completely unguarded smile appearing on his face. He doesn’t kiss Gareth, too public, but he really wants to, thinks Gareth knows that too, from the way their eyes meet. ‘Let’s do it, if you want to.’

‘I really want to.’

‘Cool.’

Gareth grins, bounces on his seat, opens his mouth to say something else, yelps, as a sudden kick passes Will’s legs and hits Gareth’s shin. ‘Hey!’

Eddie leans back on his chair acting innocent, Steve’s arm hanging over his shoulders, both looking very proud of themselves. ‘Only took you two months to ask Gare-bear, we’ve very impressed.’

Steve picks up his glass, raises it in Jonathan’s direction, who cottons on to the conversation, nods wisely at Gareth.

Will spins from Jonathan to Gareth. ‘What’s that about?’

Jonathan bends round Max’s side to talk. ‘He asked for my permission.’ He grins, like he’s happy Gareth thought to do so, but is still deeply aware of how his little brother will react. ‘Said he couldn’t ask you without asking me first.’

Will blushes, looks down at his empty plate. It is cute, that Gareth would do that, but also, really f*cking embarrassing. He can literally hear Gareth gulp from his side.

‘It is very gentlemanly.’ El butts in. ‘Very polite. Like a knight.’

Max nods along with El, smiles slyly, like she knows it’s silly but can’t be bothered to point it out.

‘f*ckin paladin.’ Eddie scoffs. His leg shuffles under the table, as do Gareth’s, clearly engaging in some unseen kickboxing match. ‘Always so noble.’

The table shakes as their feet keep kicking. Will taps Gareth’s thigh, the kicking on their side stops, raises an eyebrow his way. ‘Seriously?’ It doesn’t come out judgemental, actually sounds too far the opposite. Makes it obvious how much Will really likes it, his boyfriend being ridiculously noble.

Gareth smiles, all bashful and sweet. ‘Yeah…’ He scratches his head, glances in Hopper’s direction. ‘Just wanted to do it right.’

This is so genuinely, tragically sincere, and bluntly honourable, that Will isn’t surprised when Steve scoffs, accompanied by Eddie loudly cackling. He smacks his palms against the table, the sudden noise earning a shocked jump from a passing waitress. ‘You two are so sweet, I bet your blood runs like molasses...’

Will rolls his eyes as Eddie drawls on.

‘So sweet, I get tooth ache just lookin at you…’

Robin and Harry huff in tandem, swing their gaze over to watch the commotion, extend the look to their parents, who all nod in kind, seem to realise their daughters deal with this bullsh*t all the time.

‘So sweet you’re giving me diabetes, my blood sugar is pumping, Stevie you better walk behind me to catch me when I faint from the honey love hypoglycaemia- so sweet-’

‘Did you ask Hopper before you asked Steve to be your boyfriend?’ Max interrupts.

Eddie shuts up, his face goes blank. ‘What.’

‘You know what Max?’ Hopper sticks out his lips, smug. He’s wearing a new Hawaiian shirt, because that’s his fancy shirt. Will said he liked the old pink one, and his dad went out and bought five more. The print makes his cartoonish grin stand out, wicked smile above the playful palm trees. ‘He never did.’

Max releases a bitten down kebab skewer from her teeth, points it in Eddie’s direction. ‘Huh. Doesn’t sound very respectful to me.’ Her monotone puzzles the new people around the table, but El’s giggles seem to soothe the confusion.

‘Not respectful at all.’ Hopper cracks a grin, visibly enjoying the panicked fear burning behind Eddie’s cheeks. Steve barely hides his laugh in Robin’s shoulders. Her dad rubs at the skin beneath his glasses.

‘They’re dating?’ He barely whispers. Robin shrugs. He sighs. ‘This all makes so much more sense now.’ He lowers his glasses, messes with his tie, scrunches up his face as something clicks into place. He talks like Robin does, dry and crackly. She goes pale, nervous, talks with a short carefulness, she only reserves for precious moments.

The rest of the table politely everts their gaze, focus on embarrassing Eddie further. It's followed by sweet, mindless babble, as a conversation years in the making occurs between them.

They leave the restaurant hours later. After several hugs, and even more photographs, all the parents, plus Jonathan, head off to the airport.

It’s a beautiful day. The dirty streets scattered with late cherry blossom, pooling in the river, birds swimming through the pink leaving dotted lines in the water. They take meandering routes home, soaking up the sun.

Robin and Steve walk ahead, bundled up together and pretending to not get misty eyed.

‘I’m proud of her.’ Gareth says, walking by Will’s side, carrying the folded graduation robe. He’s not just talking about graduation. Turns out Robin never told her family, not because she was scared exactly, more because she never thought they would want to hear about that part of her life. Not interesting enough.

‘She’d despise you talking about her like that.’ Eddie says, hands tucked into his jean pockets. ‘Like she’s a baby gay and you’re her wise elder.’

‘You’re not proud?’ Will asks, observing the gentle slant to Eddie’s dark eyes.

‘Nah. I am.’ He says, ‘I’m proud of her.’

Gareth borrows Steve’s car for moving in day. Cathy offers to help out. She brings along some old crates from the café, laughs at Gareth’s terrible packing techniques, doesn’t ask before rearranging everything. Vickie and Robin tag along too, and Will’s worries that it’s going to be awkward are quickly dashed. Turns out, if anything can mend the Chicago lesbian-incest-triangle strife, it’s the three of them uniting to bully Will and Gareth. Lesbians seem to love moving. They all agree that the couple is utterly underprepared.

‘How do you not own any plates? Either of you?’ Vickie says. Robin nods, as she lands on the beanie bag (they stole it off Sean) her legs dangerously outstretched like trip-hazards over the hardwood floors.

‘I dunno. Harry always had that stuff.’

‘Ok, you have an excuse, Gary does not.’ Vickie replies, mouth twitching as she looks around the naked kitchen drawers.

‘You and his mum are the only ones to call him that.’ He laughs.

‘What? Gary?’ Vickie snorts, wrinkles her nose. ‘Makes sense. I only call him that when I end up mothering him. The boy is hopeless at looking after himself.’

‘I know.’ Will mutters, smiles when Vickie laughs, singsong.

Other than judging their lack of kitchenware, Vickie is very sweet, keeps on cooing whenever Will unpacks another box of sketchbooks or art supplies. ‘Robin didn’t tell me you were so good!’

He shrugs, tries to not be embarrassed by the compliment, hears Gareth talk loudly from the stairwell, two boxes balanced precariously in his arms. ‘He’s really good! Don’t let him tell you otherwise.’

Vickie leaves early for her big band rehearsal, kisses Cathy, then hugs Gareth before she goes. Will wonders if he should feel jealous, a pretty girl touching his boyfriend like that, but he simply can’t. Maybe it’s the queer-platonic edge to their friendship, or whatever Robin would call it, or, maybe, just maybe, it’s trust. He thinks it’s trust.

It’s a small apartment, smaller than Harry’s place. But there’s a red brick wall in the bedroom, a south facing window that makes the floors shine yellow in the sun, a tiny second bedroom they have no plans on using as a second bedroom, and a balcony hanging off the living room, just big enough to stand on and watch pedestrians walk by. Will leans over the railing to spy on Gareth smoking with Cathy by the streetside. Smiles when Gareth looks up and waves.

Robin chucks the screwdriver in the air as they finish setting up the bedframe, helps unfold the blankets Will set aside.

‘Vickie is really nice.’ Will says, absentmindedly. ‘I can’t imagine her with someone like Cathy, happy for them though.’

‘Why do I feel like you’re judging me somehow.’ Robin says, tucking in the sheets at the top end of the bed, popping up with a sardonic grin.

‘No- no, I didn’t mean that…’ He really wasn’t trying to make a weird snip about Robin’s love life, not this time at least.

‘Calm down Byers.’ She smiles, a little forced. ‘I was the one to end it with them two.’

She laughs when she catches Will fluffing up the pillows, waits a minute to talk again. ‘I feel like me and Vickie were too similar. It was like dating my sister.’

‘Oh. Ew.’

‘Yeah.’

‘And Cathy?’

‘Too mean.’ She jokes, dryly.

‘She is mean.’ Will admits, but it’s with love. Doesn’t really get why that would be a problem for Robin though, thinks she might like mean. Mike describes Nancy as cutting sometimes, can’t imagine she’s all nice. Not that Will is meant to bring up Nancy. Steve told everyone to cut it out with the teasing, said Robin will actually scalp him if anyone mentions a possible Nancy romance one more time.

Robin follows him into the kitchenette, accepts a cup of coffee. She fiddles with the office tie wrapped around her neck, skews her eyes before she talks, like she’s considering what she feels comfortable telling him.

‘Gareth knows, like, everything, right?’

Will nods, a little guilty. Gareth knows more than enough about the supernatural hell dimension beneath Hawkins, that if the Department of Energy ever found out, he might get swat teamed cycling on the way to work.

‘Huh.’ Robin hums. ‘That’s good. I think that’s important for a relationship. It’s good for you guys to be able to talk about the big things, not worrying about the NDAs.’

He nods, almost feels shy. Doesn’t matter how long he’s known Robin and Steve, it’s always going to feel like the big kids talking to him. Can’t decide if he cares about their approval of his relationship or not, thinks it’s nice that Robin is trying anyway.

‘Is that…’ He checks himself, tries to be brave. Hopes she doesn’t think he’s being mean, not about this. ‘Is that what you want? Someone you can talk to about everything that happened? To be honest with?’

She sips her coffee, looks at him shrewdly, her lips curling, like she’s secretly happy he asked that question. ‘Yeah. I think I do.’

He silently commends himself for not bringing up Nancy.

1993, Fall.

El invites everyone she knows. So do Max and Mike. It turns out to mainly be El’s friends in the end. The Cramps plays on repeat. She’s gone mad with the decorations, cobwebs and skeletons hanging from the high ceilings, orange tulle draped over the couches, a cauldron of mysterious purple punch that Will stays far, far away from.

He tries not to scratch at his hobbit feet. Gareth made them specially, and no matter how many pointed remarks Mike makes, Will refuses to admit how itchy they are.

‘Dude, I’m not saying they don’t look good!’ Mike is dressed as Wesley to El’s Buttercup. He laughed when Will told him he looks like a slimeball with the little moustache. ‘Just, you don’t have to pretend they’re not killing you.’

‘It’s fine.’ Will holds his hands behind his back to resist lowering them to his shins. His green cape bunches up with the movement, too many layers for the warm room.

‘Suit yourself.’ Mike smirks, moves away to talk to one of Max’s friends from school.

Will walks over to Gareth, sees him laugh at some bullsh*t Eddie’s pulling with Harry. David sits nearby on the beige couch, beer resting between his thighs, chatting away with Steve and John.

‘Hey Frodo.’ Gareth says, like he hasn’t done that ten times since entering. He’s Samwise. They spent way too long on the outfits, but El gave them the cardboard trophy for best costume, so maybe it was all worth it. Well, Gareth looks really good as Samwise, rugged and strong, so it’s definitely worth it.

‘Angharad!’

Harry sighs slowly, points her lips to the ceiling. They’re painted pink today. They match her blood-stained dress. She’s Carrie post-prom. David came as a werewolf, but his efforts are lacking, just a scratchy brown jumper and willingness to howl whenever people complain about his lack of costume. ‘It’s not Angharad.’

‘What are they fighting about?’ Will asks Gareth, taking a second to brush some stray cobweb from his shoulder. Doesn’t want to think about Shelob tonight.

‘Harry’s real name.’ Gareth throws his arm over Will’s shoulder. ‘If he keeps at it, I think it might finally happen tonight.’

‘Do you think she’ll cut him with her nails, or stab him with a stiletto?’

‘Stiletto.’ Gareth says, smiling at the old joke. ‘She’s going to kill Eddie with the stiletto, and I’ll be powerless to stop her.’ He mimes a knife to the heart, makes a stupid gagging noise that makes Will laugh.

‘Henrietta then!’ Eddie shouts, leaning against the couch armrest, eyeing Harry up mischievously. She shakes her head, sighs again, even louder. ‘What? Not Henrietta?

‘No.’

‘Hermione!’

‘Absolutely not.’ She sneers, fails to completely hide her smile. ‘I’ll give you one more guess, and if you fail this time, you owe me free groceries for a week.’

‘You’re on.’ Eddie taps his finger against his chin, thinking.

‘You can’t give out anymore free groceries.’ Steve says from the couch, not looking up. ‘Your boss nearly fired you when you took that case of Eggos last week.’

‘The lady of the hour made a request, I couldn’t refuse!’ Eddie drawls, throws himself on to Steve’s lap, feet landing on David’s legs. John startles, nearly spills his drink, makes a face at Gareth, who just shrugs in reply. Steve smiles, catches Eddie’s head. Eddie’s recklessness with his body is second nature to Steve these days.

‘Come on David. Sweetheart. Darling David. You must know her real name. Tell me.’

David blushes, slaps Eddie’s ankle away. Harry shoots him a threatening look.

‘I wasn’t going to tell him anything.’ David says, looking tired. ‘I wasn’t!’

‘You better not.’ Harry says, brows drawn together.

Steve pulls Eddie’s shoulders against his chest, tells him to stop being mean, but smiles in a way that suggests he’s actually really enjoying the spectacle. He came as Mitchell from Top Gun. Robin called it stupid, said Steve is literally incapable of doing Halloween without a Tom Cruise look. Eddie just came out as a vague concept of a resurrected vampire, seems to find Steve’s costume very interesting, from the way he digs his hands under the bomber jacket at any available chance.

‘I’m going to look for El.’ Will tells Gareth. ‘Let me know if he figures it out.’

‘I’ll think you’ll hear the punching match if that happens.’

Will kisses Gareth on the cheek, waves his cloak as he walks away, searching through the busy loft for El, keeping an eye out for a long blonde wig.

Harry told Will what her name was short for last month, when David finally got that tattoo. He went to a basem*nt parlour Eddie recommended on Belmont Avenue, got a small music note on his chest, to the left, just above his heart. Harmony. Will drew up the rough design for him. Music notes for his Harmony, it’s very sweet.

David’s going to propose soon. Harry pretends she doesn’t know. Will made fun of her for it. Reminded her about Allison, how they used to judge Harry’s old roommate for wanting to marry the first boy she dated in college, how they used to call it cliché.

Harry didn’t care, said she was happy to fall for the cliché. Will’s happy for her too.

He runs into a couple of old college friends, recognises the gallery owner sitting by a barstool at the kitchen island, looking perplexed by everything coming out of Grant and Jeff’s mouth. Gareth was ecstatic when he found out those guys wanted to visit them in Chicago. Eddie was too. Seems like Corroded Coffin’s legacy lives on.

Will skirts around the edge of the crowd of people dancing to Goo Goo Muck, fails to spot El’s medieval dress. Ends up walking up by the windows, hobbit feet slapping comically against the floor, spots Robin and Max leaning against the glass, heads close together.

Robin pulls away when Will approaches, forces a smile. Walks off, tells them she’s going to get another drink.

Max is Red Riding Hood, if Red Riding Hood carried a display of plastic costume knives strapped to a leg holster, and a cane fashioned into an axe made from aluminium foil. She smiles for Will, remains hunched over.

‘What’s up?’ He asks, joining her, their backs facing the tall, dark windows.

She shrugs, takes a sip of her punch. ‘Just not feeling it, sorry.’

‘You don’t need to apologise.’ Will says, ‘You know how bad I am at parties.’

‘Always running off.’ She says, smiling as she remembers. ‘Not anymore though.’ She waves to the scattered groups in front of them. ‘You seem to be doing just fine.’

‘Eh. Took me a while to get used to it.’ He says, ‘El’s the one who’s a social butterfly.’

‘She is, isn’t she.’ May says, not unhappily. ‘She’s done so well since moving here.’

Will notes the hesitation in her voice, makes him worry. ‘Do you like it here? Chicago?’

She nods, smiles genuinely. ‘I do.’

They don’t speak for a moment. Will takes a chance to scratch at the seam of the hobbit feet, stubbornly hopes Mike can’t see him. Doesn’t want to move away until Max gives him something more.

‘How did you do it?’ She asks.

‘Move here?’

‘No, not that. Proud of you for doing so well though.’ She says, bats him lightly, like she can see him blushing at the compliment. ‘Not moving. Just… being with Mike. After everything.’

It’s not what he was expecting. The emphasis on Mike’s name. It’s not sarcastic judgement. It’s heavy-laden, like an emotion spent unwisely. He leans against her shoulder, wants her to know he understands the question, thinks he does, just needs to consider how to answer. Be careful.

‘He’s been good.’ Will says, laughs at himself, like he’s talking about training a toddler. Feels Max laugh at his side too. ‘He made it easier for me, but I think it helped when I started telling the truth.’

‘Yeah, that make sense.’

‘Like El used to say.’ Will switches into an ominous voice. ‘Friends don’t lie. Even when they’ve got stupid gay crushes on them.’ He’s trying to be funny, but is only half satisfied when Max laughs, because it’s not an easy laugh, it ends with a sharp inhale, like she’s trying not to cry.

‘Have you spoken to Lucas lately?’ Will tries. ‘He really helped me.’

‘No… not about this.’

‘You could, he gets stuff like this.’ Will says, unsure of what this is, just knows Max needs something he might not be able to give, despite how badly he might want to.

She nods, tells Will she’ll call Lucas tomorrow.

El pops up from the crowd, beams when she sees them, pulls them in for a dance to the Time Warp. Will doesn’t last long, floats off to Gareth’s side, watches on as Max scowls, pretending to not have fun. She leans a little too close to El, but El doesn’t push her away, if anything, she smiles brighter, lets her hand linger on the soft skin below Max’s elbow.

1994, Summer.

El cries the same way her nose bleeds. A single stream from her left, the tear glistening in the light emitted from her bedroom lamp. The same pink beaded thing she used back in the cabin, only now it sits on a vintage plant stand (one of Hopper's finds), to the right of her four-poster bed.

It used to be Mike’s bed too, of course, but not anymore.

It didn’t come out of nowhere. They’re both so young. El likes Chicago, Mike doesn’t. Things change. Still left Will reeling. Thrown off his axis.

‘You’ll be alight.’ He says, hugging her from the side, their legs resting over the side of the bed. ‘You’ll be both be alright.'

‘Max won’t talk to me about it.’ El whispers, voice hiccupping. ‘Why won’t she talk to me.’

‘She’s not angry.’ He thinks he knows why Max can’t, thinks Max told him in a round-about way. Thinks it’s the same kind of guilt he felt for years. Hopes she doesn’t let it ruin her like it nearly ruined him. She has more than half a chance.

‘I think you made the right choice.’ He says, means it.

‘But you are his friend.’ She says, moving to look at him, brows furrowed. ‘You should be on his side.’

‘You’re my sister.’ He tells her. ‘And there’s no sides in this. I love you both. I think he needed to hear it.’

She sniffles, burrows into his side. ‘I don’t know what I am without him.’

He understands, maybe he’s the only person who will ever understand El and Mike. El’s world began with Mike discovering her shivering in the woods. Will’s world began the day he walked up to Mike at recess and asked to be his friend. They both had to say goodbye in the end, find a new home for themselves.

‘You’re your own person El.’ He says, ‘Don’t forget that. You can do this.’

‘It still hurt telling him it was over.’

He nods, lets her cry on his shoulder. Only leaves the bed to make her some coffee and Eggos. She called him over at 7am. Mike left last night. Slept over at Steve’s. Max got a cab over and stayed with Will and Gareth. El hasn’t had breakfast yet.

It’s not a nice thought, it’s not polite, but watching her recover from the tears, drinking up her milky coffee, smiling at him through bites of waffles, he stumbles upon a truth.

Thinks he’s grateful to be the one who was rejected, not the other way round. Couldn’t imagine ever denying Mike Wheeler, thinks El’s always been braver than him. Brave enough to do what he never could.

Mike made it easy for him. Will’s been leaving freer ever since.

Will helps carry Mike’s backpack to the train station. Max carries the sandwiches she made for him in a little metal lunchbox she found at a thrift shop downtown. Its Power Rangers themed. Mike said it was patronising, still got teary eyed when he realised she’d made him a pack lunch for the long train ride.

El stayed home. Mike left her a letter. He understands, doesn’t judge her for it.

‘So how long will you be at the farm?’ Max asks, as they follow him onto the train platform.

‘Three months, then I’ll get my travel visa.’ Mike replies, checking the times on his tickets. Train to New York, staying with some friends of Eddie’s, then it’s a one-way plane ticket to Tuscany. Then an interrail pass leading him anywhere.

‘I cannot believe you’re going to be living on a farm. You’re going to be actually working. There’s going to be so much mud.’ She laughs. ‘I’ll bet you complain all the time.’

‘Luckily, he still hasn’t learnt Italian, so none of the locals will understand the moping.’ Will adds on.

Mike rolls his eyes, smiling, jumps from either foot nervously. ‘Can’t believe I’m doing it either.’ He grasps the ticket in his sweaty hand. ‘sh*t. Should I do it? Maybe I shouldn’t do it. I could go back to the store right… I could-’

‘Nah dude. Eddie stole your job.’ Max places her hand on his shoulder. ‘You made your bed, now lie in it.’ She says, deadly serious, only cracking when Mike’s eyebrows jump to his hairline. ‘You’ll be fine! God.’

Will lowers the backpack by Mike’s feet. ‘It’ll be great. It’s going to be so cool.’

Late runners crowd the platform as the train calls in. Max hugs Mike, whispers kind threats into his ear. ‘If you don’t send us postcards, I’m going to Europe and hunting you down myself.’

They watch him settle into his seat through the grimy train windows, a grey rectangle framing him as his figure races down the tracks away from them.

‘You’re going to miss him.’ Will teases, slyly wiping a tear away from his eye. Not quite crying.

‘Shut up.’ Max pouts, linking arms with him as they walk back to the loft.

1994, Fall.

It was a long day coming. It should have been predictable. Cathy still acts like Will has betrayed her to her very core.

‘You’re leaving?’ She violently drops her espresso cup against its saucer. ‘Why William? Why? Explain yourself.’

Will shuffles behind the counter, tries to hide when he sees an old regular laugh at the conversation. ‘Um. Well- I got a couple other illustrator gigs, and I went over the finances… so with Gareth’s pay rise it’s okay… and I have another comic with Eddie coming up… and I-’

Cathy sighs, then draws her lips tight, walks over to the tip jar, throws out the rainbow flag, and starts dividing the coins up. ‘I am happy for you.’ She says, no happy inflection to her words, like she’s angry she has to admit it. ‘Your comics are very good.’ Again, no emotion, it’s borderline terrifying.

She thrusts a handful of coins and notes into his palm. ‘You were a good employee.’

This is perhaps, the nicest Cathy has ever been to him (her capacity for sweetness is extended to Vickie, and Vickie alone) he almost wants to cry happy tears. Instead, he just hugs her, promises to come back to the café every day. She snorts, tells him he won’t be getting free pastries anymore.

Eddie asks him via fax, like a coward. Will is so confused, he picks up the phone (the new apartment has a cordless one, not that the secrecy is needed anymore) and calls Eddie up to ask him what the hell he’s going on about.

‘I think the message is clear.’ Eddie says.

Will looks down at the faxed sheet. TOP-SECRET. Take Steve to Open Mic. Be cool. PLEASE. In Eddie’s rushed, looping, handwriting. How can he be such a good author, and still write bullsh*t like this. Half the notes he sends over about Will’s character designs are illegible.

‘The open mic tonight?’ Will asks. The one on West Ontario St. Max plays at it most weeks, acoustic guitar and old country, sometimes her own songs. She doesn’t realise how good she is. ‘Why does it have to be top-secret? Steve always goes.’

‘Well, sometimes he doesn’t. Gets tied up at work. But he really, really needs to go tonight. It is of the upmost importance that he goes.’

‘Why?’

Eddie curses and grumbles over the phone. ‘It’s a secret, okay? Just get him there, make sure he’s on time.’

‘Fine.’ Will says, scrunches up the fax and chucks it into the wastepaper bin under his desk. ‘Why ask me though?’

‘Because Stevie would be suspicious if Gareth asked him to go, and El would reveal the big surprise immediately if she walked him there.’

‘What big surprise?’ Will pesters.

‘f*ck-’ Eddie sighs. ‘I’m not telling you, okay? I shouldn’t have even told her. Just, it’s important. I want to do something nice for him. He’s had a sh*t time recently.’

There’s no denying that. Steve got cut-off from the Harrington trust-fund last month, had to move out the nice apartment. The new place is alright, but it’s not nice, definitely not the luxury Steve is used to. And with Robin miles away in New York, he’s been lost with his other-half missing. You could argue that Eddie should be considered his other-half, but even Eddie doesn’t try that.

‘Okay, I’ll meet up with him before I go.’ Will says, ‘One more question though.’

‘What?’ Eddie huffs.

‘Is it a romantic surprise?’

Eddie takes a long time to reply. ‘No.’ It doesn’t sound convincing.

Will waits him out.

‘Okay.’ Eddie discloses. ‘It’s meant to be a little, tiny, bit romantic.’

Will tries to imagine what Eddie has planned, giddily, nervously, dreams up a hairbrained wedding proposal. ‘You do know it’s still illegal for two men to get married, right?’

‘Oh my god.’ Eddie snips. ‘f*ck you.’ Then he hangs up, and Will grins to himself.

He does follow through with Eddie’s request, because he isn’t a complete asshole. Gareth can’t come because he’s busy at work, so they’ll only be meeting El there. Steve is excited to see him, seems to have a built-up reserve of wasted babysitting energy that he wants to pour out on Will.

‘Have you been eating right?’ He asks, glancing over as they walk through downtown. He dresses less preppy these days, lots of borrowed band tees from Eddie. The only button-ups he wears these days are the ones he stole off Robin. He kicks leaves off the sidewalk as they weave through the crowds by a street crossing.

‘Yes, Steve.’ Will deadpans. He cooks for Gareth most nights, flicks through the recipe cards Harry gave him as a moving-out gift when he runs out of ideas.

‘Are you sure? You look awfully skinny.’

Will smirks, doesn’t reply, thinks it’s funny that Steve is still trying it with the mothering, even after all these years.

It’s dusk by the time they reach the bar. Will shows off his social security guard to the bouncer (still no driving license), then orders Steve a beer, because he knows Steve isn’t flash with the cash these days.

Steve looks put-out by it, insists on buying Will a beer in exchange. ‘Dude. I am not letting a kid buy me a beer.’

‘Not a kid.’ Will says, reflexively. Steve laughs, shoves the bottle into Will’s hand.

They find El settled at a table near the front, wearing her studio dungarees, covered in paint and plaster. She waves them over, smiles ear to ear when she sees Max take the stage.

Max doesn’t stutter when she introduces herself, but her breathing tenses when her lips reach the mic, shaking infinitesimally, only evident to those who know her well. It eases when she starts to sing.

The lyrics are sad, slow, vulnerable in a way she isn’t elsewhere. Will’s mind drifts away from her words, it isn’t her voice which pulls him in. He concentrates on the way her fingers move up the fretboard, skating along effortlessly, the chords dazzling, like songs from a fantastical wonderland. Wayne taught her well.

She doesn’t bow when she finishes, just stomps off the stage as El applauds loudly, Steve and Will too. The regular crowd clap and shout for her, compliment her by name. Mad Max. It’s a cute stage name, Eddie made her use it. She looks down at the table, drinks up the beer Will offers her, fails to hide her smile.

There’re a couple other acts, a slam poet that spits when he screams badly worded metaphors, a talented bongo player with dirt stuck under her nails, and a comedian who keeps on making jokes about his ex-wife. Steve heckles him, the regulars all boo along in agreement.

The last act on the line-up takes a while to prepare, shuffling behind the curtain at the back of the small stage. El smiles mischievously when Steve asks what’s going on.

‘I do not know.’ She says, using her unassuming voice. ‘It must be very good if it’s taking this long for him to get ready.’

‘Hmm.’ Steve finishes his drink, sticks out his bottom lip. ‘Do you know what’s up?’

Will shrugs, shares a secret look with El. Not quite sure of the details, but not at all surprised when Eddie walks on to the stage, taking a seat on the barstool by the mic.

Steve audibly gasps. Max pats him on the shoulder, eyes wide, also taken by surprise.

Eddie talks confidently, looks at the back of the room as he introduces his song. His hair is tied up, hanging in a curly ponytail by his neck. He’s wearing a thin white band tee, looks clean, for once, shows off the lines of his arms. They look strong these days, muscle rebuilt. His left hand holds the neck of hand-painted acoustic guitar tight.

‘When I was younger, I used to perform every week, at the nastiest dive bar in the Midwest. It was the best.’ He smiles, the audience laughs quietly, listening in. ‘Then I got in an accident. It was a doozy folks, lost enough blood to fill up the river. Messed up the muscle control in my left arm, no strength in my fingers.’ He raises his hand, waves the digits. ‘Had to say goodbye to my old lady for a while.’ He pats the guitar gently. ‘That was seven years ago. Haven’t performed since.’

Will watches Steve out the corner of his eye. Steve never gets emotional in front of them. Maybe he’s just good at keeping his cool, or maybe he has some idea about keeping it all together around the kids, whatever it is, it means that his reaction here is a precious, new, unpredictable thing. There’s a tear trapped in his waterline, his lip puffs, like he’s refusing to let anyone see it tremble. He doesn’t look away from Eddie, seems to hold his breath every time Eddie speaks into the mic.

‘But the sob story has a happy ending. I met some good people through that accident.’ Eddie says, still looking ahead at the backwall, like he can’t brave looking at his friends just yet. ‘I met some real good people. One person in particular.’

Steve swallows, tenses his hands against the edge of the table and leans forward slightly. Eddie finally looks down, smiles for a millisecond in Steve’s direction. It’s more than enough.

‘They know who they are.’ Eddie inhales, pulls his guitar up into position. ‘This song is for them.’

Eddie doesn’t play like Max. His hand moves a little too slow up the fretboard, he uses a tool for some of the chords. Will remembers Gareth calling it a capo. He stretches one leg out on to the stage, bouncing to the beat, the other holding the guitar up. Doesn’t look up from his hands. It’s a pretty song, prettier than Will would have expected for Eddie and his metal dedication.

Will almost gasps when Eddie starts singing.

It’s low, guttural, slow and stretched. He finishes each line with a harsh breath, makes the next sound warm and woody, like smoke after the fire. He doesn’t say Steve’s name, but he mentions brown eyes, a swimmer, a runner, a saviour in the storm.

He only plays the one song. It feels like minutes and hours at the same time. Like the crowd could be lulled by his singing, happily trapped in the bar for the rest of eternity, just to hear more. He ends with a slow strum, lets the strings vibrate until they reach their end naturally, takes a while to look up.

Max claps first, stands up and reaches her arms above her head, encourages the rest of the crowd to join in. El whoops, claps, whoops again. Will applauds fast and loud, smiles wide. Eddie acts atypically bashful, hides the guitar by his legs, tilts his head in an overly polite bow. Steve breathes heavily, smiles with his eyes slanted, full of passion, seems too weak to stand up with rest of them.

Eddie leans forward to the mic, to thank the crowd. ‘Not my usual style, so thanks for listening.’ He says, fiddling with his belt. ‘One more thing for my baby…’ Some ladies at the back sigh, call him a sweetheart. Eddie waves them away with a smile, clearly loving it. ‘I think you already know this, but it’s true. I would rather share one lifetime with you, than face all the ages of this world alone.’

The crowd claps again, and Eddie runs off the stage, heads into the alleyway exit, Steve racing behind him, beaming, catching his shoulder and leaning in close before slamming the door behind them.

‘Did he just use a Lord of the Rings quote to get into Steve’s pants?’ Will whispers, still smiling.

‘Is that what that was from?’ Max laughs. ‘They're both massive dorks.’

‘They are.’ El says, leaning forward to laugh with them. ‘It’s sweet.’

1994, Winter.

Will is sitting with a boy who built him a castle in his hometown. Packed up the toolbox and took it with them to the city, keeps it under their bed, like there’s always a chance he’ll build another home for him, if all the bricks and wooden beams crumble after the years, if the nut and bolts ever fail them.

‘Do you ever want to leave? Move somewhere smaller?’ Will asks carefully, because stray thoughts of prams and bunk beds and suburban roads are hard to erase, even if they feel best unsaid. The impossibility of it for them is unbearably unfair, but it’s also comforting, in a way he couldn’t admit to anyone else.

‘Sometimes I think about it. We could have a garden. My mom would love it.’ Gareth replies, his fingers stroking soft lines across Will’s arms. ‘Do you want to?’

‘Not really.’ Will says, rests his head on Gareth’s. ‘I like it here.’

‘Me too.’

‘We’ll never have space for a real garden though.’

‘You don’t know that. We might be rich one day. We could buy one of those mansions by Lincoln Park.’

He laughs, brushes his nose along Gareth’s jaw. ‘I draw dragons for a living. You build props for cat people. We’re never going to be rich.’

‘All the hush money gone, is it?’ Gareth whispers into his ear.

‘I’m not taking it from them.’ There’s not much left, but what there is, he’s leaving to his mom and dad, he likes them having it. Forever decorating a cabin in the woods. Another home he can add to the list.

‘Good. We don’t need it, we’ll be alright.’ Gareth says, moves his arm, pulls him in closer. ‘I’m going to build a window box.’

Will finds him looking at the window, the railing to the balcony, the ledge they sit on when they want to smoke. Sees Gareth measuring up the space, planning what wood to cut. Will looks at the city beyond it, the graffitied wall and the line of storefronts, the nameless people hurrying along the sidewalk. They’re not so anonymous anymore, El and Max living close, Steve and Eddie round the corner, Vickie and Cathy in Boystown too, Harry and David only a train ride away.

Robin and Nancy are in New York, Lucas moved to California, shares a place with Dustin. Jonathon and Argyle are still out West too. Mike’s somewhere in Germany currently, sent Will a postcard of the Berlin Wall remains. But airplane tickets aren’t too expensive, trips are being planned. They’re all closer to Will than they ever were before somehow.

‘We’ll grow tomatoes.’ He says, imagines the garden they could make together.

‘And sunflowers.’ Gareth adds.

‘Violets.’

‘Rosemary’

‘Sweet peas.’

‘Mint.’

‘And an apple tree.’

‘Well, that’s a bit ambitious.’

He laughs, kisses Gareth. ‘Shut up. I can dream.’

Gareth kisses him back, smiles. ‘Me too.’ He pauses, admires Will for a long moment. ‘You know I’d marry you if I could.’

‘I know.’

It still gives him pause, saying what he says next, doesn’t stop him from saying it all the time. Says it while he makes Gareth coffee, after Gareth fixes the tired fax machine, when he catches Gareth practicing his Paladin voice in the bathroom mirror, when Gareth catches him arranging the sock drawer by colour.

Even if it’s scary, he still does it. ‘I love you.’

Gareth hums happily, scratches his nose. ‘Love you too.’ He says it lazily, like it’s easy, like he could say it a million times and still mean it. It’s the least frightening thing in the world.

They’re going to stay in the city for a couple more years, maybe forever, or maybe they’ll chuck it all in and move out to Jonathan and Argyle’s ranch, raising cattle and complaining about the heat.

Or maybe they will move to the suburbs, pretend to be cousins. Gareth could finally buy his own drum set and practice it in the garage, anger all their neighbours.

Will doesn’t know where they’ll end up. Plans change, they’ll work it out.

They’ve got all the time in the world, and he isn’t going to waste it being scared anymore. If he runs, it’s only towards home, the places they’ve built together.

Gareth built him a castle, and Will’s going to fill it with flowers.