Chapter Text
Mike Wheeler wouldn’t exactly call himself spoiled.
Despite popular opinion, he worked hard for the money he earned. That is, if earned meant given to and if worked for meant doing chores for his mom.
He biked Holly to school everyday and washed dishes with his mom after dinner each night. An exhausting position as the jobless middle child if you ask Mike. And it was a contented plan for all of the eighteen years he had his allowance, up until his very own bloodline ruined his chance at having any semblance of fun this summer.
“When is Mike gonna get kicked out of the basement to find a job?” Nancy questions as Mike shuts the door to the basement and enters the kitchen. Will, Lucas, and Dustin all laugh from the dinner table.
“Nance, I know you’re jealous of our sessions. If you wanna join you can just—“
“Actually, Micheal I was thinking…” His mom smiles and Mike looks for the nearest window to either jump from or push Nancy out of.
Look, just because Nancy had to suffer through her shit-hole newspaper job four summers ago doesn’t mean Mike has to too. Allowance from his mom for doing his chores each week is a very respectable position as an eighteen year old…
Okay, maybe Mike Wheeler is a little spoiled.
Deep down, he considered unemployment. Mike was completely content with being broke all summer! He simply wanted to enjoy his and his friends’ time together without the looming dread of inter-dimensional monsters or college applications. Both things being equally traumatizing for Mike.
But it turns out that the rest of the Party thought otherwise.
Lucas reclaimed his position at the Hawkins Community Pool as a life guard. Even if he worked somewhere else, he’s pretty certain that Karl the pool director would’ve hunted him down, ripped his uniform from his unfairly athletic body, and returned the best employee to the top of the pool chair.
Mike claims his hatred for the overzealous employer comes from worrying about the safety of a close friend, and absolutely not Karl disregarding Mike’s natural athleticism and missing the opportunity at hiring another all-star lifeguard.
“So,” Mike drawls as he sidles up next to Lucas standing at the end of the pool. “Is there any openings or…”
Lucas raises an eyebrow with a less than impressed look on his face. “You better not be talking about what I think you’re talking about.”
“You know I am! And I’m, like, perfect for the job.” Throwing his hands up in a gesture draws Lucas’ judgmental gaze to Mike’s arms. Then torso. And then legs. Lucas slides his sunglasses on.
“Dude. The only reason anyone can see your chicken legs is because they’re literally reflecting the sun. I think you’re better fit as a walking lighthouse.”
Ignoring the multiple assassination attempts on his body image, Mike shakes his head.
“How hard can working as a lifeguard be? You just sit around all sweaty, holding your huge red stick.” Mike knocks his knuckles against the red foam rescue tube held under Lucas’ arm.
Lucas pushes Mike into the pool.
Dustin quickly got hired at the Surfer Boy Pizza inside the mall. While most of the Party sent out applications anywhere and everywhere that was hiring, Dustin had his heart set on the pizzeria. He felt that the “tropical themes and use of semolina would do wonders for his nervous system.”
“Wouldn’t getting salmonella hurt your immune system?” Mike questions through a mouthful of pepperoni. Bits of red meat spew out of his mouth and a mother of two scowls at him from the booth across from them.
“Gross, Mike.” Lucas wears the same grimace as he throws a napkin at Mike’s face.
“He said semolina,” Will corrects as he picks the rest of pepperoni off of his pizza slice. “It’s a type of flour.”
“How do you even know that?” Lucas shakes his head but Will only shrugs. Mike knows it’s from Joyce and Will’s baking kick from sophomore year. Mike likes that he’s the only one who knows that. “And how the hell does that help your nervous system?”
“It’s extremely calming.” Dustin explains around his own piece of pizza. Lucas throws up his hands, looking between Mike and Dustin with a face best reading, why am I even in proximity to you pigs. “I’m essentially at the beach sitting in the sand while making money. If sea shells were raw dough. And the ocean was a four hundred fifty degree oven.”
At that, Dustin holds up his hand to show a healing blister. Everyone grimaces so he points to his fingernails instead. “But it does wonders for my cuticles! I’ve never felt so… exfoliated.”
Will leans over the table, taking Dustin’s hand in his to examine it, nodding. Mike nudges Will and Will redirects his focus to hand Mike the pepperoni he picked off his pizza.
“That does sound relaxing.” Will grins.
And Will followed Dustin to stupid, smelly, exfoliating Surfer Boy Pizza.
“Will.” Mike deadpans, eyes blinking rapidly at the ridiculous red apron and ugly yellow visor in his best friend’s hands. “Will, you didn’t.”
“Oh! But he did, our dear Micheal!” Dustin booms with a hand clasped around Will’s shoulder. “William has finally escaped the prison that is unemployment and joined me at Surfer Boys.”
Will smiles broadly at Dustin, chuckling under his breath. Mike groans with his hands over his eyes, throwing himself back onto the basement couch and nearly decapitating Lucas with his elbow.
Lucas pries Mike’s hands away from his face and pitches his voice up obnoxiously. “Did you seriously think we were gonna stay jobless in your basement for the rest of our lives?”
“Dude!” Mike shrieks at the devastating memory and aims to kick Lucas in the dick. He fails miserably. Will is laughing brightly on the other side of the basement though, which eases Mike’s nerves. “Will! We were supposed to be unemployed together!”
“You really wanted to be broke all summer?” Dustin questions.
“Mike said I should do caricatures of people at the mall,” Will explains with a sigh. Mike hopes it’s a fond “Mike’s a dork but I love him” sigh, and not a “Mike’s a fucking numbskull and a brokie” sigh.
“That’s not bad, actually,” Lucas comments. He’s still fending off Mike’s attempts at gouging his eyes out with little effort, merely throwing a pillow at Mike’s face. “What about Mike?”
“Breakdancing.” There’s a collective yikes between Lucas and Dustin.
“But we would be broke together!” Mike wails through the pillow, hoping to either silence his tantrum or suffocate. Suddenly, he drops the pillow and stands. “Wait, couldn’t I just work with you?”
Will’s jaw drops a bit at the blatant favoritism, looking away unsurely when he goes to speak, but Dustin chimes in.
“No can-do, Buddy.” Mike collapses into the couch again. “I only got Will in because we just fired a guy for stealing the chicken tender baggies and using them to sell drugs.”
“What?!” Lucas exclaims. “You’re saying I could’ve had crack in my tender basket the other day?”
“I can’t wait to start.” Will grins, giddily bouncing on the balls of his feet and Mike watches from where he’s slumped on the couch. Mike can’t be too upset. Not when he knows how much Will has been stressing about gas cost and grocery cost and tuition for college and— yeah, Mike’s an asshole.
He shouldn’t have expected Will to ditch all responsibilities to remain within a twenty foot radius of him throughout the whole summer. While Will can’t do that, maybe Mike—
“You know where you could work?” Lucas raises his eyebrows with a knowing expression on his face, and a mischievous one at that.
The Scoops Ahoy uniform is literally the most repulsive thing Mike has ever seen.
“What is this?” Mike squints into the mirror on the sun visor, holding the red fabric sagging around his neck. It sticks out obnoxiously against the rest of his blue uniform and while Mike has never particularly cared about how he looks, this is where he draws the god damn line. “Like, what the hell do I even do with this?”
“You tie it,” Will responds from the driver seat. His presence is likely half the reason for the crushing sense of stupidity Mike feels at the moment. Never from Will’s judgement, he’s too kind to ever cause any real harm to Mike or anyone’s ego, but by simple comparison.
Will’s in a boat not much better than him in regards to uniform design, considering the vibes at Surfer Boy Pizza consist of California sun and an acid trip. And yet, the bright yellow t-shirt being framed by the red apron cinched around his waist is looking far more… pleasant on Will, then it should on anyone else.
“You do know how to tie, right?” Will scoffs at Mike’s silence. Mike has to pull his eyes away from the red apron and the thighs spread beneath it, unsure of when his gaze even drifted. He pushes the sun visor into place against the roof in favor of thinking about it.
“I knew I should’ve bribed Dustin to give me his spot at Surfer Boys,” Mike sighs while fiddling with the red cloth around his neck. “Then I wouldn’t have to play dress-up as an olden sailor. I’d much rather what you’ve got.”
“You’re joking.” The open window has been tossing Will’s hair around through the whole car ride, so when he shakes his head it really looks wild. A stray piece of brown hair by Will’s temple flickers in the wind. “I’m literally wearing three complimentary colors and somehow they’re all clashing.”
Lifting up the apron, Will reveals the multicolor checkered shorts he adorns.
“It’s…” Mike’s face scrunches as he ponders an adjective for the uniform. “…Alternative. It looks good.”
“Sure, Mike.” Will laughs, like he doesn’t believe him. Mike watches the fabric shift as the muscles in Will’s legs tense beneath his skin every time his foot presses on the gas. Then he looks at the yellow shirt hanging comfortably off his arms, moving across his chest with each breath. Will’s breathing is steady, slow.
“I’m serious!” Mike leans forward in his seat to try and catch Will’s eye. When he does, Mike nods encouragingly. “It looks really good on you!”
Will’s breathing catches.
It’s silent for a moment while they roll to a stop at a red light. Will looks at him, brows furrowed and eyes so intense that Mike has the irrational fear that he’s getting a vision which makes no god damn sense—
But then Will huffs and pushes his knuckles into Mike’s shoulder to get him to sit back in his seat.
“Whatever.” Will rolls his eyes, breathing calmly again. “Like Dustin could ever be bribed out of his job.”
Mike is paralyzed for a couple seconds because he feels a bit like Will just used his no-longer existent Vecna-powers on him. Like, looked into his soul and felt around his brain to figure out what’s going through his head. And it seems as though Will found an answer based on the lilt in his voice and set of his jaw.
“I’d make it work.” Mike’s gaze hasn’t left Will’s face, even when Will looks at the road again to continue driving. “I’d smuggle out three pounds of flour each shift for him.”
“It’s semolina.” Will corrects with a smile and Mike knew he was going to say that, so maybe that’s why it makes Mike laugh a bit hysterically. “Alright, I guess that could work. As long as he can keep up with his cuticles.”
The rest of the car ride feels so achingly familiar that Mike entirely forgets about Will finding an answer in his eyes that Mike doesn’t even know the question to. It’s hard not to get tripped up in the way the wind sneaks through the windows to soothe the heat from the mid-day sun. Or the quiet tunes of The Clash mixtape left by Jonathan inside the car’s radio. Or Will’s own, even quieter humming to the music that Mike takes greater enjoyment out of.
And it’s so lighthearted that Mike almost forgets where they’re going and how terribly he’s going to suffer for the next five hours of his life, until Will shifts the car into park.
The mall is a dingy thing compared to its predecessor. It’s far from the Star Court mall, but it is a smaller, more cherished version. None of flashy neon colors or dynamic architecture, and yet it earns the same amount of patrons. During quarantine, the Hawkins residents needed something to do other than throw rocks at the MAC-Z soldiers, so it was partially rebuilt.
Mike and Will dodge past the crowd entering the building. On their way through the main hall, passing by all the windows looking into the stores, a kid spots them from inside the Toys-R-Us. Her eyes bug out as she tracks Mike in his sailor uniform.
“Hey,” Will elbows Mike. “She looks like Holly.”
Mike feels a little stab somewhere in his sternum because yeah, Will lived in his house for a year and a half but also he lived with his family. Holly’s scribbly drawings of Will the Wise hung up in her room is a testament to that and that throbbing in his chest doubles. It’s somewhere between his ribs, warm and aching.
It’s probably indigestion.
Grinning while walking past, Mike swings his hand in an enthusiastic wave towards the pigtailed girl.
She grips her hair in each hand, bringing it over her eyes as she bursts out crying.
“Oh.” Mike drops his hand as his face burns. Will doubles over in laughter.
Mike has to coax Will to walk the last couple feet into the food court because he won’t stop these random fits of giggles. It’s probably the best and worst thing to happen to Mike this week.
Scoops Ahoy is at the heart of the food court, being framed by countless booths and tables. Even without the crowd of people gathering outside for the lunch rush, the restaurant is hard to miss with its blue and white stripes, bright red seating, and the giant ship wheel hanging above the doorway.
“Don’t make me,” Mike groans. There’s teenagers and families shouldering past them to enter the line inside Scoops Ahoy, so Will drifts away from the crowd and Mike follows without much thought. “You can’t make me go in there.”
“I mean, yeah but I’m your ride home, so…” Will shrugs while he eyes the crowd until he really looks at Mike for the first time since their conversation in the car. His expression pinches, eyebrows drawing together and eyes squinting. “Mike, what is that?”
“What is what?” Mike looks down at himself, confused.
“What is that.” Will demands, finger gesturing around Mike’s neck.
Following the line of Will’s gaze, Mike quickly understands and he thumbs at the red cloth at his throat. “You said tie it.”
“Not literally make it a tie!”
Gracing Mike’s uniform is the world's smallest, goofiest looking red tie hanging from his neck. It’s the only thing making the already absurd outfit look even more stupid.
“You should’ve been more specific.” Mike is already unraveling the cloth, but nothing more.
“What other way could I have meant it?” Will shakes his head in a baffled type of amusement.
“I don’t know.” Shrugging, Mike tries to stamp down the grin threatening to split his face and instead keeps a facade of ignorance. “You’ve just got to show me.”
Will looks at him with apprehension. “Mike…”
“What? I have no idea what to do with this!” To prove his point, he waves the fabric around wildly.
Mike knows he’s being dense. Remaining difficult is a skill of Mike’s and while Will’s not often on the opposing end, today just feels different. They’re both taking a new step in their lives, getting serious and entering a workplace. And soon, they won’t even be able to take the next bigger, more important step together once they’re off to college.
But right now, arguing over Mike’s uniform is reminding him of when Will made fun of him before the Snowball for not knowing how to tie a tie. Back then, Will stepped into his space and did it for him, teasing him all the while they shared the same breath as they laughed. So, sue Mike if he wants Will close, wants Will laughing, wants Will like they’re thirteen again.
“Okay, okay.” Will relents, taking the cloth from Mike’s hand and Mike can’t stop the triumphant grin from spreading across his lips.
Will looks around the food court with the same pinched expression. The tables and booths are filled but the lunch crowd is dying down and everyone is in their own world, so Will steps forward. He laces the red fabric around the base of Mike’s throat, evening the ends before wrapping one over the other.
From here, Mike can see the wrinkled skin between Will’s eyebrows drawn in concentration. His eyes trail down across his nose, then cheek bones and jaw, all set strong in a way that only comes with years of endurance and age. Mike realizes now that they aren’t thirteen anymore, young and innocent, and they haven’t been for a long time.
Will is saying something and Mike only notices when he looks at the mole near his mouth, moving as those lips stretch—
“What?” Mike mutters, blurred gaze refocusing to see Will stepping back.
“I said,” Will starts, blinking his own eyes rapidly. He breathes out one hard breath. “I think they would use these as sweat rags.”
“Yeah…Wait, they?” Mike shakes his head to clear it of moles and pink skin. “Who’s they? And use what?”
“Sailors?” Will’s tone lilts in amusement. “You were wondering what that cloth’s for, and I think it’s for, like, sweat.”
“No. I think I use it to strangle myself when a gang of middle schoolers steal their parents' credit cards and shake me down for ten orders of mouse tracks or mint chocolate chips or like…vanilla.” As Mike rambles, Will’s smile grows and Mike physically cannot stop talking. “With whipped cream and cherries. In a waffle cone.”
“How will you ever cope?” Will laughs.
“I won’t.” Mike shakes his head vigorously.
And in these last five minutes, where their lives have hung between before and after this next step, Mike doesn’t care how old they are or the shit they’ve been through this past year— this past decade. Because they’re together. Mike and Will, the Paladin and Cleric, best friends—
RING-RING-RING
“HEY, WHEELER!”
Both Mike and Will’s heads snap to the inside of Scoops Ahoy where a god damn bell is being rung loudly behind the counter. And there, hand leaving the bell to lean against the front counter, in all her blue and red glory, is Mike’s extremely annoyed coworker.
“You’re late.” Max scowls.