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It was a stupid thing to say. Such a stupid, stupid thing to say.
If Will hadn’t agreed to go to the party, hadn’t shown up to Bethany Logan’s house filled with raving lights and completely wasted teenagers, hadn’t followed Mike and Lucas’ gang up to a spare bedroom, hadn’t agreed to participate in Truth or Dare, hadn’t chosen ‘Truth’ when the bottle landed on him, hadn’t grown up to be such a people-pleasing suck up—then maybe none of this would have ever happened.
But no. Of course, it did. Because that’s just Will’s luck.
Lucas had just finished taking off his own sock with his teeth and whipping it at the girl who had dared him to do it. It made everybody giggle and have a nice laugh because Lucas is just ever so charming.
So, when Lucas spun the glass Coca-Cola bottle sat in the middle of the circle and it landed on Will, Will froze up. He didn’t think to make a quick joke, like, ‘Ooh, what have you got in store for me, Sinclair?’, because everyone else would do that. And Will had learned long ago that he was nothing like everybody else.
“So, Will. Truth or dare?” Lucas asked. He had his hands locked together and his arms wrapped around his knees while a confident grin spread across his face.
Will nervously looked up at Lucas, a sense of fear present on his face. Truth or Dare? Truth or Dare? It was a simple choice, just one or the other. If he chose the right one, then he wouldn’t be embarrassed nearly as much than if he chose the other one, but which choice is the right choice? Maybe he should have thought it out as everyone was walking up the stairs, or while he watched everybody else take their turn in order to determine the right one.
To be quite honest with himself, Will didn’t even consider the idea that the bottle would land on him in the first place. Most things and most people in life just breezed right by him as if he didn’t exist, as if he wasn’t significant enough to gain their attention. He assumed the bottle would grow a sentient mind and do the exact same, and that he’d slip by its radar.
“Uh,” Will said. He paused, his jaw unintentionally clenched as he pondered which one to choose. “I’ll- I’ll do—” A dare seemed far too terrifying. Will didn’t want to be the center of attention to everyone in the room. “Truth. I’ll do truth.”
“Ah, alright,” Lucas said. He thought for a moment and whispered into the ear of the person next to him, who instantly nodded. “Will… if you could make out with anyone in this room… who’d it be?”
A wave of lewd laughter and taunting hums flooded the room. Will winced at the question and tried to hide the fact that it was the exact genre of question he didn’t want to answer.
“And to be clear,” Lucas stated. “It has to be a human. No making out with lamps, okay?” The entire room roared in laughter, and Lucas looked like he was bathing in it. To be fair, Lucas was always good at doing that. He had a knack for making an entire crowd light up with one sentence.
“Um, I don’t know,” Will lied. He made the mistake of looking at Mike and quickly averted his gaze once their eyes met.
The answer was Mike. It’s always been Mike. Will didn’t know what it was, but ever since they entered junior high, Will was pulled towards Mike like an electromagnetic force. It was never like that before, in elementary school, but it’s been like that for three and a half years now. They’re well into their freshman year, and the feelings still haven’t gone away. Will didn’t know what to do about it. He didn’t even know why he was so attracted to him. Sure, he was generally good-looking, but everyone knew that. He had a nice face shape and a sharp jawline, and sometimes Will imagined that sparks would fly down his body if he ever got a chance to run a hand through Mike’s dark brown hair, but that’s not a reason to be full-blown attracted to the guy.
“Oh, come on. There has to be someone!” Lucas said. Everyone else egged Will on with a chorus of, “Yeah!”, and “Who is it?”
“There’s nobody,” said Will. He looked at the group of girls in the room who were staring at him with such a curiosity that he felt the urge to run away, as far away as he could. He’d probably jump out of the window if he could get it open fast enough. But he didn’t, because he felt like he was practically glued to the floor. Instead, Will looked at Mike since that’s what he always did when he was nervous, but that was an incredibly bad idea at that moment. “I wouldn’t want to kiss any of you.” Will lied again. He hates lying.
Mike furrowed his eyebrows at how Will said that while looking directly at him, but Will quickly looked away before Mike could say anything else through his facial expressions.
“Ouch, Byers!” Lucas barked a laugh. “But seriously… who would you make out with? It’s Truth or Dare, you can’t back out of it. And we’ve got all these lovely ladies right here…”
Will started to shake his head, and before he could say anything that would get him further pressured into lying about his actual answer, Mike spoke up for him. “Hey, if he doesn’t want to answer, he doesn’t have to. It’s not even that big of a deal, anyway. Let’s just spin again.”
The room sounded of disgruntled groans and annoyed huffs, but they seemed to agree with what Mike said, anyway. Will looked at Mike again, but this time, he didn’t look away when they made eye contact. They just sort of stared at each other for a few seconds as the ruckus around them sounded. Will tried to send Mike a silent ‘thank you’, but he didn’t know if he received the message because Mike’s expression didn’t change at all. It felt like he was examining Will rather than saying ‘you’re welcome’, and Will knew that he would definitely prefer the latter.
Mike leaned forward and grabbed ahold of the Coca-Cola bottle. He spun it, and Will tracked every movement of the cap as it whizzed ‘round and ‘round in a circle. It started to slow down, and as it slowed, Will’s breath got caught in his throat.
It landed on him. Again.
By that point, Will was convinced that the glass bottle did have a sentient mind and instead of passing by its radar, he was the one person who made its radar blare red and beep like crazy. What incredible luck.
“Okay, Will,” said Mike. “Truth or Dare?”
“Hold on! No, no, no, no no!” Exclaimed Lucas. “If it lands on him for the second time in a row after he didn’t answer it the first time, then he has to answer it this time. It’s only fair.” Everyone in the room agreed with him, and all Will wanted to do was shrink into himself until everyone forgot the name ‘Will Byers’ all together.
Mike shook his head. “Those aren’t the rules.”
“Oh, screw the rules.” Lucas turned to face Will. “So, Will. Who in this room would you make out with? You have to choose someone human, and you have to say a name.”
Will stared at Lucas, who was staring back with a fiery intensity. Maybe if they had been playing this game back in seventh grade, sitting in Mike’s basement after finishing a Dungeons & Dragons campaign, Lucas would’ve let this question go because he knew Will’s limits. He knew that sometimes Will just didn’t want to do things, and that was fine, because they would still have fun either way. But Lucas and Will were in ninth grade, and things have changed. When they started their freshman year, Will was convinced their relationship wouldn’t change no matter what anyone said. But then they got sorted into different classes. Lucas met new people. Will met new people. Lucas joined the basketball team. Will joined the D&D club. And somehow, it’s like they never met each other at all.
“You don’t have to answer,” Mike told Will.
Lucas let out a scoff mixed with a laugh. “Uh, yes he does!” He said.
“I don’t want to,” said Will. That was probably the first time he had told the truth that night, and he was confident in himself. Will couldn’t remember the last time he had stood up for himself instead of saying ‘I don’t care’, but it felt good, and he wondered why he didn’t do it more often. Then Lucas opened his mouth. And he remembered why.
“And? Do you think I wanted to peel off my own sock and taste all my foot acid, Will?” Lucas asked.
One of the girls snorted. “I don’t think your foot’s supposed to have acid, Lucas.”
“Oh, whatever,” said Lucas. “My point still stands. We all do things we don’t want to do. And like Mike said, ‘it’s not even that big of a deal’, right?”
“But I don’t—”
“Come on, Will. An-swer! An-swer!” Lucas chanted. He pounded on the floor with his fist, and somehow in the blink of an eye, the entire room was chanting alongside him:
“An-swer! An-swer! An-swer!”
Will froze up. His heart swelled in fear and a loud, rapid pounding started to sound inside of his head. Their chants weren’t wavering, only getting louder, if anything. Everyone’s eyes were on him, and they were expectant, waiting for him to do something. If not, they’d be disappointed because of him.
At a certain point, Will’s eyes began to swim with tears and he felt pathetic, because why was he crying over this? It was such a stupid, stupid, thing to cry over, and yet here he was, tears threatening to fall as his ears began to ring. The yells of everyone became a muffled mess in Will’s mind and the feeling of dread inside of his chest built up with such intensity that he just wanted to scream until his voice went out.
They were relentless; they wouldn’t stop yelling, no matter how much Will shook his head and tried to tell them no. They kept chanting and pounding their hands harder and harder on the floor to the point where Will was sure the house was shaking.
“FINE!” Will finally screamed, standing up. “Do you want to know who I’d kiss?!”
The room simultaneously said “Yes!”, alongside a few ecstatic whoops, cheers, and hollers.
Will swayed on his feet. All of the faces stared up at him in intense curiosity. “It’s—It’s Mike,” he managed to say. “If I could make out with anybody in this room, it’d be Mike, because I like him. A lot. Since the sixth grade, and he is the one acceptable person in this entire room.”
Nobody said a word and their curious stares converted to gawks, and their jaws were essentially on the floor.
“Oh, shit,” Lucas said.
“I’m sorry if I’ve ruined your expectations, and to be honest, I’ve probably ruined your entire night, but I don’t care. Because every last one of you except for Mike are pieces of shit who haven’t heard the word ‘empathy’ in your life,” Will said. “You probably regret having some gay boy at this party, anyway.” The tears were warm and streaming down his face like they were on autopilot. He stood there for a few seconds, waiting to see if anybody would do anything, utter a single word. Nobody did. Except for Mike.
Mike did that weird thing he always did, where he stood up from a crisscross position with such ease and smoothness. He didn’t even use his hands. “Will,” he softly said.
Will refused to look at him. He wiped his tears, took in a deep breath, and charged out the room, sure to slam it shut as he left.
Will didn’t remember much of the path he took through the house in order to get outside. His vision was too foggy to pay attention to that sort of thing, but he soon found himself running along the side of the street as fast as he could. He was a few houses down from the party when he heard his name being called. He hated that he knew exactly who was calling it.
“Will!” Mike yelled. “Will!” His long legs were a curse, because Mike caught up with Will in a matter of seconds and he wasn’t even out of breath.
“Will,” Mike said. Will finally turned to face him, severely out of breath. They just stared at each other for a few seconds. Will expected Mike to say something since he was the one who ran all the way out here in the first place, but Mike only continued to stare. So, Will decided to be the one to speak first.
“I’m sorry,” he said. “I’m sorry for everything that I did. You probably never want to talk to me again, and you know what? That’s completely fine, I wouldn’t want to talk to me, either. But— But—”
“Will,” Mike said. Will didn’t pay any mind.
“I just had to get that off my chest back there. I’m so sorry. I didn’t think about what I was doing. It was stupid. I don’t want you to feel awkward about it, or—”
“Hang on,” said Mike. He took a small step towards Will, but Will was too busy averting his gaze to even notice.
“It’s just… It’s all my fault. And I really hope we can still be friends, or- or—”
“Will,” Mike said again. He took a larger step towards Will to the point where their chests were less than a foot apart. Hesitantly, he raised his hand and cupped it around Will’s face and lifted his head. Then, Mike lifted his other hand and wrapped it around the other side of Will’s face.
“Something… like that…” Will softly said. He looked at Mike with wide eyes. It was something about him, because Will couldn’t look away no matter how much he wanted to.
Then, suddenly, Mike moved forward and kissed Will. Right on the lips. Will’s arms remained limp at his sides, but his stomach churned at a hundred miles a minute and his thoughts had been turned to mush. Only one thing was on his mind: Mike.
When Mike pulled away (because Will would’ve kissed him all night if he could), they just stood there in silence. Will had no clue what to say to that. All he could think about were Mike’s eyes. They were the perfect shade of brown to get lost inside, lost until he couldn't tell his head from his foot because of how numb Mike made him feel.
“I…” Mike started. “I didn’t want to tell anyone either, but… I’ve sort of liked you for a while, as well.”
Will blinked. Was this real? Was this really happening? All the signs pointed to yes. Mike’s warm hands pressed up against his cheeks felt real, and the fabric of Mike’s shirt as Will brought his hands up to rest against his waist felt extremely real as well. Even the stray strands of Mike’s hair that flitted about in the wind looked far too meticulous for it to be a dream.
“Maybe we can make this work,” Mike softly said.
Will eagerly nodded. “Yeah. Yeah. Maybe we can make this work.”
Will and Mike walked back to the party with their hands interlocked and smiles on their faces which were impossible to wipe off.