Chapter Text
By the time Mike unlocks his front door and leads Will up the familiar path to Mike’s room, Will has already convinced himself that he’s fucked it all up.
Mike is quiet, for one thing, and a quiet Mike is a dangerous thing. He’s been quiet all day, actually. Ever since Will had said the words that had been trapped in his ribcage his whole life. In the glittering sun, surrounded by his five best friends in the world, treading water a few yards out from the shore of Lover’s Lake, Will had finally told the Party he was gay.
It had been about as perfect as it could be. El and Max wrapped him in a hug which turned into them trying to dunk him under the water, which bought Lucas and Dustin enough time to muster up supportive words, but Mike—
Mike has just been quiet .
Will had almost been surprised when, as the party went their separate ways after the lake day, Mike had still jutted his chin out to Will and asked, “You’re still sleeping over, right?”
Because that had been the plan, back when everything was normal a few short hours ago. But now, with a disturbingly quiet Mike leading him up the stairs of the Wheeler household, things felt decidedly not normal.
Mike knew, he had to know. It was the only explanation for the complete silence, the way he shut down and went distant with the whole party for the rest of the day. The way Will would catch Mike squinting in Will’s direction and then tear his gaze away, unable to meet Will’s eye.
It was all Will’s fault. Maybe he could get away with stealing glances at Mike usually—at the soft curl of his hair, at the smooth expanse of skin that he revealed when he stripped down to his swim shorts—but now Will had gone and admitted one of his greatest secrets and now Mike knew . Mike knew and he was uncomfortable and he didn’t want anything to do with Will anymore and Will couldn’t even be upset about it because it’s what he’d always expected.
So he braces himself for it, as Mike carefully clicks his bedroom door shut behind them, another click for the lock, then turns to face Will with trepidation.
But he doesn’t look angry, or disgusted. He just looks lost.
Will’s fingers are trembling so he curls them into his palm and he says, shaky, “I know it’s… different. And a lot. But I’m still the same me.”
It suddenly feels desperately important that Mike know that. That Mike know that he’s the same Will who’s been in love with him the whole time, and it doesn’t have to change anything.
But Mike’s scrambling, eyes wide and desperate as he rushes to correct—”No, Will, of course—It’s not different. It’s not bad.”
“But—you’ve been so quiet today. I thought you—” Will cuts off before saying something stupid like I thought you figured out I’ve been in love with you since we were kids and corrects, “---hated me or something.”
“Will, come on, it’s you ,” Mike says, like it’s obvious. “I couldn’t hate you.”
Will’s insides are a swirl of hot and cold, anxiety and excitement, but what he says is, “Oh.”
Finally, Will deflates, and crosses to sit on the edge of Mike’s bed. Mike joins him, close enough that their knees brush, and Will is hyper aware of it, has been hyper aware all day of the sliver of thigh that Mike’s shorts expose.
“I guess I’ve just been in my head a bit.”
Will swallows hard. “About…?”
Mike gulps in answer, Adam’s apple bobbing, and Will tracks the movement, not letting himself get distracted by Mike’s lush lips when they’re having a serious conversation.
Mike opens his mouth and no sound comes out, then his jaw clicks shut. When he finally speaks, the words are not ones Will could have expected.
“How… did you know?”
Mike is avoiding Will’s gaze, staring down at his hands which fiddle and twist together into anxious knots.
“That I’m gay?” Will guesses.
Mike finally glances up, Will catching his eye for the briefest of moments with the smallest of nods.
Will purses his lips, not sure how to answer the question in a way that Mike’s looking for.
“I guess I always knew, kind of, I mean, since I was really young. I just—always looked at boys the way I was supposed to look at girls.”
Something in Mike’s frown tells Will that answer wasn’t as helpful as Mike hoped.
“Sometimes I wish I could just—try it. To see how it feels.”
Mike’s face is dipped low, close and intimate, and a flush spreads across his freckled cheeks like a sunset. Will’s eyes dip down to Mike’s lips, the curve of them, watches as Mike presses them together and wets them with his tongue, a nervous gesture. Their knees and thighs are pressed solidly together now and Will’s heart quickens in his chest at the feeling, the closeness, the way it falls over him like a dizzy fog and—
Will would do anything Mike asked of him. Maybe that’s why he says—
“You could,” he says.
“I… what?”
“You could try it.” His mouth feels dry. His face feels hot. The patch of skin where their thighs touch is burning. Mike’s eyes are on Will and it makes him daring, makes him add. “With me, I mean.”
Mike’s hands drop from where they’d been fidgeting and the one between them lands on Will’s knee, and Mike’s just gaping at him, so he might not even mean to do iti when his palm splays wide over Will’s knee, gripping him there with hands that seem impossibly big, and Will’s maybe going a bit insane because suddenly the idea doesn’t seem crazy, it seems logical, and Will wants it badly even if it’s just a facade of what he really wants.
“It wouldn’t change anything between us,” Will blurts out. “You can just see how you feel.”
“Okay,” Mike says, words tumbling out like he’d been holding them in. Or like that had sealed the deal, the idea that he could do this and it wouldn’t mean anything.
Well, it might not mean anything to Mike, but it would mean everything to Will. Mike just doesn’t need to know that.
“Yeah?” Will breathes.
Mike gives a shaky nod. “Yeah.”
They flounder for a moment there, just nervously smiling at each other like a couple of idiots, and then the hand on Will’s knee curls, fingers pressing into skin, and Mike’s other hand is reaching for his face, holding his chin so carefully, like he’s something delicate. Mike’s face fills his vision, close and then closer, then stops.
“Is this okay?” Mike asks.
Will closes his eyes and surges forward to close the distance. Their lips crash and then melt together, hard and then soft, Mike’s hand gripping Will’s jaw with purpose now, and Mike tastes like the lakewater they’d swum in, fresh and earthy, mixed with something sweet, and Will could find himself addicted to it.
That’s exactly why he forces himself to pull back, but it takes him a solid few seconds to manage to open his eyes.
Mike is pink and beautiful, lips red and wet and Will wants to bite them.
But he needs to know—
“Is it good for you?”
Mike’s response is to press forward again, connecting their lips, solid and warm and wet, moving against Will insistently, with purpose, coaxing Will’s mouth open and introducing the hot slide of tongues. Both his hands are cupping Will’s face now, and one slides into his hair, the other slides down to cup his neck, and it reminds Will to make use of his own hands, forgotten in his lap. One finds Mike’s waist, curling gently into the fabric of Mike’s shirt, touching him softly like he’s not sure he’s allowed. The other, without Will making the conscious decision, weaves into Mike’s hair and tugs and Mike lets out a punched-out groan that breaks into a sigh and sends ripples of electricity down Will’s stomach and straight to his dick.
Mike pulls back and a string of saliva connects their lips for an embarrassingly long moment before it breaks, which is somehow the hottest thing to ever happen to Will, Mike’s eyes half-lidded and hazy, his lips parted and slick.
“Sorry,” Mike says, and about which part, Will doesn’t know, but Will is very okay with everything that’s happening right now, so it doesn’t matter.
“It’s okay,” Will whispers.
He’s becoming achingly aware that he’s hard, but before he can be too embarrassed, he notices the sizable tent growing in Mike’s shorts. Will swallows hard and can’t pull his eyes away from it, from the evidence that Mike liked this. That Will had done this to him.
“So I guess you could say I liked that,” Mike says, blushing so beautifully. Will wants to kiss him. Will wants to do a lot more than that, wants to press a palm to the bulge in his pants until Mike is squirming and begging, wants to drop to his knees and figure out what Mike tastes like, what he feels like in his mouth.
Will can’t help it. Prying his eyes from Mike’s dick to meet Mike’s eyes, he asks, “Have you ever…?”
Mike shakes his head, the pink of his cheeks spreading to the tips of his ears. “No.”
“Me either,” Will admits.
“Then… how do you know you would like it?”
Probably because every time Will touched his own dick he was overcome with fantasies of Mike touching him, Mike letting Will suck him off, Mike pushing into Will’s tight heat until Will was full of him—
“I think you kinda just know,” Will says instead.
Mike swallows hard. “I guess I’m not sure yet.” His wide eyes search Will’s face. “Do you want to… I mean, we could try it.”
Will tries very hard not to gape, and barely manages to avoid pinching himself. This doesn’t feel real. Mike kissing him already didn’t feel real, but now he’s sitting next to Will with his dick hard asking if Will wants to keep going and it’s dizzying .
“Do… you want to?” Will asks.
Mike’s lashes flutter as he looks down, sheepish, and Will dares to think that that means yes .
“Just to see what it’s like,” Mike stammers. “And—like you said, it doesn’t have to change anything. It doesn’t have to mean anything.”
And god, if anything could make Will say no to this, it was that . That he could have this and it would mean nothing. Maybe Mike could have this and move on, just a couple of bros who jerk each other off, but to Will—this was everything. Something he couldn’t undo or come back from.
Something he might never get the chance to do again.
And that’s what makes him decide.
“Of course. Okay. Let’s—um, do it.”
Mike snorts a laugh and raises a teasing eyebrow. “Yeah?”
Will scoffs. “What do you want me to say? I’ve never been propositioned before!”
It’s so ridiculous that they both break into laughter, and that’s—good. That’s perfect, really, it’s familiar, it’s them . It breaks the tiny bubble of discomfort that came with this unfamiliar territory, and maybe it wasn’t so scary and huge, maybe it didn’t have to be something that changed everything. Maybe it was just something nice he could do with his best friend.
So Will says, “Look, let’s just—keep kissing and, um, go from there.”
They’ve both softened over the course of the conversation anyway, the edge taken off now, so they’re just softly gazing, on the precipice, waiting for one of them to make a move.
It’s Mike who does, inching forward to nudge his nose with Will’s and then brush their lips together, soft and chaste and comforting. Will’s nerves ease, and he breathes into it as their mouths curl together, Mike’s hand back at Will’s face, fingers scritching above Will’s ear, and—
And it’s too gentle, it’s too sweet, especially when it doesn’t mean anything. So Will opens his mouth, licks the seam of Mike’s lips, presses closer so they’re chest to chest, winding his arms around Mike’s torso, one hand pushing up at the hem of his shirt to feel the smooth skin of his back. Mike hums into the kiss and opens up for Will. Their tongues brush and it’s like lightning, setting Will’s skin alight and prickling.
“Do you want to—” Mike starts between slick kisses, “I mean, can I—?”
“Yes,” Will hisses, because whatever the question, the answer will be the same.
Mike’s fingers twist at the waist of Will’s jean shorts, tugging at the button until he can help shove the pants down Will’s thighs. Will kicks them free, abandoned to the floor off the side of the bed.
Mike tugs at Will’s shirt. “This too?” he asks, as if Will would say no to him.
But he might make him work for it. “You first,” Will says.
Mike strips off his shirt.
The instant obedience makes him feel a little drunk with power. So he adds, “Pants too.”
Mike complies, and Will pulls off his shirt, and then it’s just them, side by side in only their tented boxers, both of them flushed pink all over, Will feeling overheated and dizzy in the best way possible.
Mike draws Will back toward him, both of them turned to meet in the middle, and Mike bites Will’s lip, sucks it between his teeth, and then puts his hand on Will’s thigh.
“Can I?” Mike asks.
“If you ask me that again I’m gonna kill you,” Will says.
Mike laughs, and then his hand covers Will’s erection, the thinnest layers of fabric between them, and Will moans loud. Mike covers Will’s mouth with his own, smothering the noise in another searing kiss, fingers curling around Will’s length through the fabric and squeezing slightly, pulling back from Will’s lips and whispering,
“You’re gonna need to keep quiet for me, okay baby?”
And that , Mike’s voice low, Mike’s breath hot against Will’s lips, Mike calling him baby . He can’t help but whimper.
Blessedly, Mike doesn’t ask permission this time before he reaches into Will’s boxers and frees his dick, the hard length of it springing free as Mike’s impossibly large hand wraps around Will’s dick, his thumb teasing along the head while Will gasps, forehead dropping forward to rest on Mike’s shoulder.
Mike’s hand pulls a tentative, slow, rough stroke up, then down, his other arm curling almost protectively around Will’s shoulders.
“Is it that good?” Mike asks, starting to find a slow, steady rhythm.
Will flushes as his hips jerk up into Mike’s touch. “It’s different when it’s someone else’s hand.”
He means, it’s different when it’s your hand .
Mike says, “I think I like this too.”
“I haven’t even touched you yet,” Will laughs. Which is probably rude of him, but forgive him for enjoying the moment.
“I mean I like doing this to you,” Mike says. “I like making you feel good.”
And he says it like it’s something simple, so Will lifts his head from where he’s tucked it against Mike’s shoulder to scrutinize Mike’s expression.
And—Mike’s heavy eyes are eagerly tracking everything. Mike is watching his own hand tugging at Will’s dick, Mike is watching for every jerk and shudder and gasp of a reaction, Mike is studying him like he’s a new game at the arcade he’s got to figure out, and he’s pushing every goddamn button on the way.
Mike presses a thumb to Will’s slit where he’s leaking, spreading the droplets to smooth the movement of his hand, which is steady and firm and just fucking right, and it’s frankly unfair how good Mike is at this.
And that thought only spurs him to finally take some action, and he reaches across the space to push at Mike’s boxers to expose his dick and doesn’t hesitate to get his hand around it. Mike is hard and throbbing and he keens forward with a grunt, hand stuttering in its ministrations on Will’s own length.
Mike says, “Please,” and Will loses it a little.
He lets out what could only be described as a growl and then shifts their position, heaving up and hooking a leg over Mike’s lap so he’s straddling Mike, so their bare chests can brush together and—more importantly—so he can shift his weight down until their dicks grind together.
“Oh my fucking God,” Mike says.
Will wraps his hand around both of their dicks, and Mike wraps his hand around Wills, moving in tandem, wrapped up in each other. Will loses himself in the feeling as their combined touch pulls pleasure from them both so sweetly.
Will moans, long and low, and he’s never been that loud when he was alone but it’s Mike , so Will is grunting and whimpering and saying, Mike, Mike, oh my god, Mike until Mike presses a hand over his mouth to keep him quiet, which just makes him moan more desperately. Mike replaces his hand with his mouth and Will quiets just long enough to suck Mike’s tongue into his mouth before the feeling really starts to build as their hands speed up and Mike jerks into their touch, his free arm curled around Will’s waist to keep him steady, hand splayed out almost posessively across his back.
“You look so good,” Mike wonders, but he can’t know what he’s saying, the way his eyes are hazy with need, the way his dick is leaking like a faucet. “You’re so gorgeous like this—”
Will kisses him to shut him up this time, because he can’t hear things like that.
“I’m close,” he pants against Mike’s mouth.
Mike says, “Please. I wanna see you come. I wanna—unh, ah— make you come—”
And like that, the feeling coils at his core and explodes outward like fireworks, vision going white as he rocks through it, crying out as the waves wrack his body, surrounded by the feel of Mike, the taste of Mike, the smell and sight and sound of Mike, and it’s intense and powerful and perfect.
By the time he comes to, Mike is shaking through his own orgasm, and Will gets to watch his best friend fall apart—the soft surprise his face falls into, the way his body tenses and trembles, the feeling of his dick spilling out on both of their hands, mixing with Will’s own mess.
Will is still gasping for breath when Mike falls forward and kisses Will once more, slow and slack-jawed and easy.
They pull back and just kind of—smile at each other for a moment, bodies tired and sated.
“So I take it you, uh, liked all of that too?” Will half teases, half asks.
“Yep,” Mike says, and flops back dramatically from Will to sprawl back on the bed. “Yep, no, I’m definitely gay.”
Will can’t help but giggle, and Mike cracks a grin, and then they’re both laughing again.
In a few minutes, they’ll have to get up and clean up the mess they’ve made. In a few hours, they’ll have to reevaluate their choices and possibly their relationship.
But right then, both of them giggly and soft from satisfaction, it feels like they’re glowing.
***
Will expects things to be awkward. Objectively, things should be awkward.
But Mike is acting like everything is completely normal. From resuming their sleepover routine and saying their goodbyes the morning after to seeing each other in school on Monday and greeting each other normally as the party met up before classes, it was all like it had never happened.
Will thinks, once or twice, that maybe he notices Mike’s eyes lingering on him longer than usual, but he tries not to read into it. Besides, he’s probably doing the same. It’s hard to see Mike in shorts now that he knows how Mike’s thighs shake when he comes. It’s hard to look at Mike’s hands now that he knows what they feel like around his dick.
“—that sound good? Will?”
Will blinks out of his reverie, blinking away images of Mike in only his boxers to focus his attention on Max.
“What?” Will asks.
“Did you not hear anything we just said?” Max rolls her eyes.
“Of course he didn’t, he’s been spacing out all morning,” Lucas says.
“The arcade,” Dustin gracefully interjects. “After school. Are you in?”
“Oh,” Will says. “Yeah. Of course.”
The others move on but Will catches Mike watching Will with an indescribable look on his face.
The bell rings for the start of class, and the group disperses, but Mike grabs Will’s shoulder—a touch that just a few days ago would have been casual, but now burns into him like an iron—and Will whirls around toward him.
“Can we talk a minute?” Mike asks.
“Uh, sure,” Will says.
Mike spares a glance both ways as the hallway clears out and tugs Will along with him to one end of the hallway, opening up a door to a supply closet and swiftly shutting them both inside.
Will can barely take in their new surroundings, boxes and boxes of papers and office supplies and a handful of heavy filing cabinets, because none of that matters compared to Mike, who dragged him in here by the wrist and is looking at him with strange intensity.
“What’s up?” Will squeaks.
Mike drops to his knees.
“I haven’t been able to stop thinking about this,” Mike says, fingers finding purchase in Will’s belt loops, tugging them gently. “Please let me.”
Will’s mouth goes dry and he has that familiar urge to pinch himself.
“Okay,” Will says.
Mike’s hands go to Will’s belt, working it open then tackling the pants zipper. Will is already getting hard at just the idea of it, at the idea of Mike wanting it, and Mike pulls back Will’s pants like he’s unwrapping a present.
“Were you thinking about me? When Max was talking about the arcade?”
“Uh,” Will says, knowing the answer but not knowing whether Mike wants to hear it.
“Because I thought about you all weekend,” Mike says, pushing Will’s boxers down next, unceremonious and eager, and gets both of his hands on him like it’s something he needs and Will is gonna pass out.
“Me too,” he admits, hands falling to Mike’s shoulders with a vice grip.
One of Mikes hands goes to grip at Will’s hip while the other pumps him a few times and Will’s hips jerk into it.
“Thought about doing this,” Mike says, and then opens his mouth and leans forward and wraps his lips around the head of Will’s dick, experimental, tongue swirling around the head like a lollipop and it’s all Will can do not to thrust forward into the wet heat.
But he doesn’t have to, because then Mike’s mouth sinks down on Will, taking him further, the ooey gooey warmth melting Will’s bones and gathering anticipation deep in his gut. Will lets out a sound like an injured animal, keening and desperate, and his hands find purchase on Mike’s head, tangling into his hair.
“Oh god, Mike—”
Mike’s hand wraps around the base of Will’s dick where his mouth can’t reach and Mike moves up and own a few times, testing the waters of moving his mouth at the same time as his hand, and Will doesn’t care that he’s clumsy and learning because it’s still, objectively, the best thing that’s ever happened to him so Will is blabbering, mouth moving without his go ahead—
“That feels so good, Mike, you feel so good, so perfect for me—”
And something about the praise makes Mike go crazy, groaning in response and moving faster and faster on Will’s dick. He lets go of Will’s hip and reaches down to palm himself through his jeans and it’s unbelievably hot, that Mike could be so turned on from doing this to Will. Mike looks up through his lashes at Will, sneaking a peek at his face, screwed up in pleasure, and the sight of Mike looking at him with his mouth split open around Will’s cock is so obscene that Will accidentally tugs Mike’s hair, hard.
Will’s rushing to apologize when Mike pulls off—
“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean—”
“No, that was—good.” Mike’s mouth is slick with spit and his hair is a mess from Will’s hands in it, and his eyes are focused and dark. Mike takes the moment to undo his own pants, reaching into his underwear to wrap a hand around himself and give a bit of relief.
“Do you want me to…?” Will asks.
“No,” Mike says. “I wanna do this for you.”
Mike jerks Will a few times with light strokes and then leans forward to press the flat of his tongue against the slit of Will’s dick. It’s so dirty an image Will almost feels he should look away, but he can’t, and doesn’t, just takes in the image and tries to memorize it as Mike slowly sinks back down Will’s length.
“That’s it, Mike,” Will sighs. “You take such good care of me.”
Mike’s moan vibrates through Will’s dick. Will smooths Mike’s hair back and away from his face, gathering it in one of his hands and giving a firm tug to test Mike’s reaction, and it doesn’t disappoint. Mike moans again and the hand he has jerking himself off quickens, along with Mike’s movements on Will’s dick.
“Oh god, Mike, I’m gonna—I’m about to, I’m—”
He means it as warning, expecting Mike to pull off, but Mike just hollows his cheeks and sucks and Will feels like his whole soul is being sucked out through his dick when he comes, bucking into the heat of Mike’s mouth as starbursts of pleasure go off in his head and the world goes dark and shaky, the only thing centering him is Mike’s mouth around him, Mike’s hair in his fingers, Mike’s groans filling his ears as his finishes into his hand.
Will’s knees are weak and shaky by the time he feels able to breathe again, so he doesn’t dare move more than an inch, eyes fluttering open to look down at Mike, so beautifully debauched on his knees, his own cum sticky on his hands and dripping down to the floor.
“Did you come on my shoes?” Will asks.
Mike inhales, exhales, collecting himself, then glances down at Will’s shoes and back up to his face.
“It sure seems that way,” Mike says.
Then lifts his sticky hand to his mouth and idly licks one of his fingers.
Will’s dick makes a very valiant effort to twitch back to life. “Holy shit, Mike.”
Mike just shrugs. “Yours tastes better than mine,” he says.
He pushes up to standing, grabbing a cloth from one of the shelves to wipe his hands and tucking his dick away neatly, zipping up his pants, like this was just a normal Monday between classes, and it was totally fine that Mike had just sucked him off in a supply closet. Will dazedly pulls his own pants up and as he’s buttoning his jeans, he speaks before thinking—
“So is this a thing now?” Will asks.
Mike grins and shrugs. “Why not? You like it. I like it. Nothing has to change, we can just be—best friends who touch each other’s dicks sometimes.”
Will can’t help but laugh even though that reminder of nothing has to change isn’t comforting, it’s a stab in the chest.
But the idea of not having this ever again, of knowing what it’s like and losing it, seems so much scarier than the idea of having this without really having Mike’s love. He’s spent his whole life wanting Mike’s love and not having it; at least he can have Mike in this way.
“Okay,” Will says. “Sure, yeah.”
“Cool,” Mike says, and the smile on his face is worth any heartache Will might endure.
“Cool,” says Will.
Mike lingers a moment to smile at Will, fuss with his hair, and make himself look like he hadn’t just been ravaged in a closet. Then he slides out of the closet and heads to class and Will, helpless as ever, follows him.