After the events of the evening had well and truly sunk in, everyone felt an intense wave of exhaustion, the weariness that had been building up since Will first went missing had overflowed. Nobody had the strength to even go home. Tonight was going to be a sleepover at The Byers'.
Pillows and blankets had been allocated to the whole gang. Joyce and Will slept in Joyce's room , Nancy, Jonathan, Steve and the party slept in the living room on the floor and El and Hopper slept in Will's room, Hopper on the ground. Well, that was the plan anyway.
Joyce and Will went to bed straight away. Everyone was dying to talk to Eleven, but she was still out cold. Joyce refused to let Will stay awake any longer, he needed to build up his strength.
Hopper carried El into Will's bed and arranged blankets on the floor. Even though there was no way in hell he was sleeping tonight. He was going to watch El all night and be there the second she woke up. Of course, this plan was flawed.
When Mike heard he had to sleep with the others in the living room while El slept in Will's room, he nearly threw an almighty fit. Mike told Hopper, fists clenched, trying to breath through his teeth and calm down, that there was no chance he was going to be sleeping tonight and under no circumstances would El wake up without Mike by her side.
Once Hopper realised how similar him and Mike were and thought of the crap the kid went through this year because of him, he couldn't really say no. Mike pulled up a chair and sat next to Will's bed, preparing for a long night.
Though all of Hopper's insincts screamed don't leave her again, he knew he had to let Mike have his time with her, even if she was asleep. For almost a year the poor kid didn't even know if she was alive. Hopper mentally added that to the list of reasons why he hated himself. So, even though it went against his better judgement, he let Mike stay there with El for the night, alone. Mike needed time to absorb the events of the night by himself without sitting in an awkward silence with Hopper, both just watching El as she slept, for 7 hours.
So Hopper spent the night in Jonathan's room.
Mike held El's hand. Mike truly had the best intentions to stay up all night waiting for El to wake up. But some time around 4AM he nodded off.
About an hour or two later, Mike felt a gentle tug on his hand. His eyes snapped open immediately. El was slowly waking up.
"El, are you ok? Are you awake?" Mike whispered, hardly able to contain his excitement and relief.
El's big brown eyes opened and looked straight into Mike's. Mike could have cried.
El's face slowly started to light up when she realised who was sitting next to her.
"Mike?"