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Will had gotten a new obsession with paint.
And no, not just painting on things that Mike would think people would paint on. Oh no. That would be too easy, wouldn’t it?
No, Will had a new obsession with painting on himself .
They were laying in their shared dorm room, Mike on his back, Will on his stomach. Mike was staring at the ceiling - and if that led to staring at Will because his face was so close he could see him out of the corner of his eye then that was just coincidental - and Will was painting on his hand.
Mike sat up on his elbows. “Why do you do that?”
Will hummed softly, stretching his hand out in front of him like he was inspecting it, like it wasn’t already the best piece of art ever because he had created it. “Do what?”
“Paint yourself.” You’re already gorgeous enough.
Will shrugged, gently blowing on his hand with pursed lips that Mike definitely didn’t linger on for too long. “I don’t know, it’s comforting, I guess. It’s like I can give myself a tattoo without the permanence.”
“Oh,” Mike said, accidentally, surprising himself with the nearly-gasp-sounding-word. Will glanced at him, cheeks slightly red from a blush, like someone had sprinkled a pinch of cinnamon on his cheek bones. “Erm…”
Mike couldn’t come up with a good recovery. Not with Will’s eyes on him the way that they were, the way they seemed to be picking him apart piece by piece until Mike’s carefully built facade was deconstructed and left him exposed, vulnerable, heart laid bare in front of the boy he loved.
He felt so naked .
“Would you-“ Will licked his lips, and Mike followed the movement with nearly his whole head, and felt so incredibly stupid about it that he wanted to slap himself. He was so in love . “Would you like me to paint you?”
Mike opened his mouth in shock, barely parting his lips, but somehow, a very pathetic sounding “please ” slipped out of his lips, and then Will was blinking at him with those long lashes of his, and there was no way Mike would ever recover from this.
He had a feeling he would be okay with that, though.
Will looked almost nervous, like he hadn’t really expected to get this far. “Um, okay. Just uh - lay back down, then.”
Mike nodded, and, mind even more completely devoid of all thought than usual, dropped back on the floor with a thud.
The floor really couldn’t be so kind as to open and swallow him whole, could it?
He could hear Will’s badly suppressed giggles from his place in his (hopeful) grave, and it made him respond with a badly repressed smile through the headache that he could feel forming in the back of his nearly non-existent brain.
Non-existent when Will was getting this close, anyways.
He gently placed a palette next to Mike’s head, and Mike could hear him take a sharp intake of breath as suddenly - holy fuck - Will was straddling him.
“I’m…uh,” he explained, quite eloquently, and then looked away like he could hide from Mike’s eyes when he was right on top of him. “I’m going to paint your face.”
Mike blinked. “Why my face?”
Will blushed harder, if that was even possible. “I - just, let the artist do his work.”
Mike smiled up at him, and poked the other boy’s side with a finger, and Will let out a giggle so beautiful he forgot about the awkwardness of the position for a moment.
Then it all came rushing back, with a vengeance.
Because, oh God, they were in a position , weren’t they?
Will’s hand reached up to brush Mike’s long hair out of his face, and Mike held his breath as Will grabbed a brush. He was watching Mike with such intensity that Mike vaguely wondered if there was something wrong with his face, until he realized Will was trying to figure out where to start.
“My favorite color is blue,” Mike blurted out, as if Will didn’t already know that, or everything else about him. “In case that, y’know, helps. Or something.”
Will smiled at him, then, and it was like Mike was a plant dying in an eternal night time and Will’s smile was the sun and now Mike had strength to live .
Will carefully leaned towards his face to get a better angle - to paint …obviously - and slowly began painting Mike’s face.
He should’ve felt awkward, maybe, or something other than the pure bliss he felt at being worshipped with such kind ferocity, like Will couldn’t wait to see him as a finished product, complete by the only person who would ever complete him . But he was so kind, so gentle about it, like always, and Mike didn’t realize how much he craved this kind of touch from his friend until then.
He closed his eyes, and could feel the brush’s soothing end moving in light strokes, the paint hitting his skin with a cool, calming feeling and leaving behind a slightly dry, crinkly feeling. It felt good to be held like this, to be Will’s canvas, and Mike realized he would gladly let this boy paint his whole body if it made him happy.
“You’re so pretty.”
Mike’s eyes flew open, and Will was staring at him with wide hazel irises, pupils slightly blown, and Mike blinked. “What?”
Will blushed. “I didn’t mean to say that out loud, I’m sorry.“
He began to move, and Mike’s head just became a chorus of no no no ’s, because he was grabbing Will’s hips and pinning them down before he knew what he was doing.
Will stared at him, eyes even wider than before. “Mike-“
“Please stay. Please finish,” Mike pleaded, and it took a moment of Will looking alarmed for him to realize what he said. “I - I mean, not like that . Just like. Finish the painting. If you want.”
Will’s mouth opened and closed a couple of times before he gulped and nodded. He hesitantly began to lean back down, gently putting the brush back on Mike’s nose, and Mike could feel his eyes slipping shut again.
Mike wasn’t sure if he fell asleep or not, but he was definitely hovering on the edge of consciousness, because at one point he could feel Will’s breath on his lips, and he could hear the other boy’s heartbeat going nearly as fast as his own.
That could’ve just been a dream, though.
“Mike,” Will said quietly, tapping him on the shoulder lightly.
Mike groaned as he opened his eyes, expecting to be assaulted with light but instead was surprised by the darkness around them. “Will?”
Will chuckled as he moved off of him, and Mike immediately missed the comforting weight of the other boy. “I’m done, and it’s dark outside.”
“Thanks,” Mike grumbled sarcastically, but Will just grinned at him. “You’re done? With what?”
Will’s grin was gone and replaced with nervousness. “Uh, your face. I hope you like it.”
Mike blinked at him, then squinted at him, and when doing so didn’t reveal any magical answers, he sighed as he pushed himself up onto his feet. “Will, if you made it, I’ll love it.”
Oh shit. That was really sappy.
Mike rushed off into their shared bathroom and turned on the lights before Will could comment.
And holy fuck .
Mike stared at himself with wide eyes, and he reached up to touch his cheek in disbelief. There, on his face, were hundreds of lines.
No, not just any lines, he realized. There was a line that connected every single freckle on his face, every dot he had always been insecure about, on his cheeks and his forehead and over the bridge of his nose and even on his eye lids. The right side of his face was covered in blue lines, the left in yellow, and the middle was green , a forest green, the color of Will’s eyes when the light hit them just perfect.
Will .
“D’you like it?” Will asked shyly, from the doorway to the bathroom. “It’s easy to take off, if you don’t. Here, let me go grab the stuff-“
For the second time that evening, Mike reached out to stop Will from walking away.
“Will,” he whispered, too choked up to be any louder. “It’s beautiful.”
Will blushed and looked away. “Yeah, well, it fits the rest of you, now.”
Mike blinked at his best friend. Beautiful? Mike? No, if anyone was beautiful, it was Will, with his big, pleading eyes and his cute little nose and his full lips that Mike just wanted to kiss .
No, Mike was not the beautiful one here.
He tried to get the words out, but his throat was constricting awkwardly and Will looked like he was about to sink into the ground in embarrassment, so Mike leaned forward and kissed him.
He gently pressed his lips to Will’s, weaving a hand through the hair on the back of his head, and then Will started reciprocating, and oh my god, Will was kissing him back.
They were kissing, and it felt like all the air Mike had ever inhaled was a faraway dream, that this, here, was all he ever needed to survive, and how did he get this far without this feeling, because this was heaven .
Will pulled away for air, leaning his forehead against Mike’s. “I’ve been waiting for this for so long,” he admitted, almost more to himself than to Mike, but Mike just chuckled as he took both of Will’s cheeks in his hands and pulled away farther to look at the boy.
Some green had transferred from Mike’s forehead to Will’s, but it complimented his eyes so perfectly Mike couldn’t bring himself to care. His lips were red and flushed from Mike’s, and Mike craved to make them worse , to kiss them every chance he could now that he knew Will felt the same way.
Will was smiling at him, beaming , and Mike grinned back. “You can paint me any time you want,” he said, and Will lit up even more.
“Right now?” He asked, like he used to be at Christmas, shyly trying to make sure opening his present was okay.
Mike nodded enthusiastically, and Will got that smile again, the one that felt like Mike was basking in sunlight, and yeah , he was willing to be Will’s canvas whenever he wanted.
It was the least he could do for the boy he loved.