"It was the best thing I've ever done" Byler Oneshots

[5] A couch is much better when it's cramped with you

(AKA, Mike, to nobodies surprise, screwed things up again. And now he's alone on the couch and the silence is eating at him alive. He would do anything to get Will to sit beside him, to join him on the sofa so the space between them didn't seem to feel like miles of distance.)

- - -

He could feel the air tightening slowly around his throat, a claw gripping the flesh and sucking out the breath from his lungs. Mike had screwed up- again.

Holy shit- he did that way too much..

And now Will wouldn't even glance in his direction without an inanimate object to look at instead. It burned like a curling iron to the ear- or whatever, he didn't really understand "feminine" beauty products. And that wasn't his concern right now because his best friend was pissed at him.

The fact that made this whole situation even more guilt tripping for Mike was that Will wasn't even mad for Wills sake. He was upset because Mike hadn't even chased after that police car as Will's sister was being dragged away. And it was so selfless of him 'cause Mike had literally ignored him on his birthday and called him 'clingy' in the mix of it. (A moment of which he thoroughly regretted.)

The striped, faux-leather plush beneath him began to ache. Oxygen keeping that deadly clutch around his throat. Mike was terrified to move a bit too much or even produce a breath that was just a tad too noisy. Anything that could draw attention could bring that sore topic back up and end with Mike spilling out meaningless words that tarnish the two's relationship even further.
I'm sorry.
He begged to say.
Can you sit next to me?
If he could just get a grip on himself, just stop dramatizing this whole event. Just go back to that filtered emotions thingy he had done for the past year-ish of his life.

It was just that whenever Will was around it was like all of those emotions that had been swept under the fridge like a tarnished ice cube seemed to arise. To be freed from that bondage he had held them back in. Will opened up those floodgates.

And when that happened there were too many to manage all at once. Like the anger he had kept towards his dad who never seemed interested in anything remotely related to his life, and his frustration with his stupid blabber mouth that spilled over and over and over again.

And that other emotion he felt when Will was around. That quaking in the stomach, that pulse in his chest that quickened way faster than it was supposed to.

All of that was wrong.

He should've been feeling that towards El, his girlfriend. He should be nervous when she was around, he should be staring at her eyes, marveling at all of the different adjectives that could possibly be used to describe them.

Mike hoped it was hormones and that it would go away when he realized that it was childish to think Will Byers was pretty.
Though he was pretty.
Very pretty.

And that wasn't even the point right now because Sleeping Beauty was wide awake and purposefully ignoring him, not needing the true loves kiss that Mike would gladly offer.

"Hey guys." Jonathan barged in, a towel patting down at his freshly washed hair. His presence was coated in some type of herbal soap that caught in Mikes nostrils. Jonathan glanced around, apparently noticing the tense position of his younger brother and Mike.
"Did I- did I miss anything?" And, as an older brother does, he immediately glared at Mike. Knowingly, wisely.