I'm really excited about this chapter and I hope you guys like it as much as I do :)
December 7th 1988
After getting a call from her dad that he would be working late yet again Jane had a crystal clear image on how the rest of her Thursday night would go. She would finish the last of her homework, order some crappy take-out food, and watch the same movies she always did. All while trying to keep herself from calling Mike and inviting him over. She would come close a few times, probably even go so far as to pick up the receiver but put it down only moments later in fear of being annoying. If she was really itching to talk to someone she was determined to call Max instead. She had been at Mike's house the day before after school and she didn't want him to get sick of her if they hung out too often.
It was nearing 5 pm when she dared to put in her tape of Rocky Horror, a movie she hadn't watched since Halloween. Her stomach filled with butterflies when she heard Brad Majors said the very same words Mike has said before kissing her at the Halloween party. She remembered how cute he had looked in the thick black glasses and messy hair. Over a month later and thinking of Halloween night made her into a blushy lovesick mess. Jane hummed along to the songs and hid her face in a pillow every time anything sexual happened as if someone were around to see how red her face got.
She and Max more often than not ended up talked about her status with Mike. It seemed to be a fascinating topic to her red haired friend. She couldn't quite wrap her mind around why Jane was scared to make things with him official. Try as Jane might to spell things out for her as clear as day she still didn't understand. Things with Mike were perfect. He was quickly turning into one of her best friends (of course Max held a special place in her heart that could never be replaced) and someone she cared for dangerously so. The more she fell for Mike the more scared she was. But it was hard to be scared when he looked at her like she was something really special. She couldn't help but feel like something special around him.
The phone rang in the middle of the Rose Tint My World and she paused the movie to answer the call, the blanket she had on still wrapped around her shoulders. She hurried into the kitchen and leaned against the wall next to the phone before picking it up. Jane tried to suffocate the hope that it was Mike calling her to ask if she wanted to hang out. "Hello?"
"Yeah, hey, it's me." Her father said from the other line. "We're pretty busy here so I can't talk for long but I have to tell you something."
Her stomach sank all the way down to the tiled floor. If he couldn't talk long but called anyway it must have been something serious. "What is it?"
"A classmate of yours, Troy, has been brought in. He got into a really bad fight after school. We're waiting to see if the other kid is pressing charges while we hold him."
Jane's jaw was dropped open slack. Troy was a menace but he couldn't imagine him beating someone up so bad that he had to be taken into custody. Even if he didn't go to prison Jane knew for a fact he was sitting in the cell while they waited to see what to do with him. "Holy shit."
"Yeah, um, that's not all." Her father continued. "The kid he beat up was Mike."
Every drop of blood in her body went ice cold. Images of an injured Mike flooded through her brain and made her feel like she was drowning. "Mike? Wheeler?"
"Yeah."
"I-" her mind was moving a mile a minute, already halfway to the Wheeler's house. "I have to go. Thanks."
She hung up the phone without letting him get another word in and sprinted to her bedroom, leaving her blanket on the kitchen floor. Jane pulled on the first pair of sneakers and jacket she could find before grabbing her keys and running out the front door and to the garage. It took her a moment to find her old bike that was stiff from not being used in years and was just a tad too small but she didn't care. She slammed the garage door shut and then she was off.
Jane was never an athletic person per say but she rode to Mike's house like she was in the tour de France. The only clear and coherent thought in her mind was that he was hurt. The rest of her thoughts were a jumbled an anxious mess. Why had Troy beat him up in the first place? How badly was he hurt? Who had called the police? Was Mike at the hospital? Was he okay? Please be okay please be okay please.
Every so often something would happen and she would be struck by just how much she cared for Mike. Like when he insisted on standing between her and the road when they were walking around town. Or how he explained the same math problem over to her three times in a row just because she didn't get it. Or when she could see just how much he struggled to keep her hands off her when they were around their friends. Not that they didn't know something was going on between them. Neither of them were crazy about the idea of kissing in front of the very same people who teased them so much.
After finding out that Mike was hurt her feelings were so hard to ignore it was like they'd walked up to her and punched her square in the face. Her body ached to be close to him, her eyes burning to see him. Every cell in her body screamed that she needed him by her side. The L word was perhaps the scariest word in the English language. But she felt tears burning in her eyes when she imagined the boy she might L word being a bloody and hurt mess.
When she reached the house she practically threw her bike down on the ground and ran up to the front door, pressing her finger on the doorbell five times in a row just to get the point across that she was in a rush. She only had to wait a few moments for the door to open and for her eyes to land on Nancy.
She took one look at Jane before stepping to the side. "He's in his room."
Jane muttered a quick thanks before hurrying inside and taking the steps two at a time. Her heart pounded so hard it threatened to burst out of her chest as she approached his room. She made it to the doorway and was frozen in place when her eyes landed on Mike sitting with his back against his headboard. He was wrapping an ice pack in a towel and there were a few drops of blood on his shirt. There were cuts and bruises scattered across his face, the two biggest ones being on his chin and his forehead. His face was screwed up into a wince before he noticed her standing there and his eyes went wide.
"What are you doing here?" he blurted, laying the ice pack on his hand.
"I-" her voice faltered as she did another once over of his face. She felt anger swell up inside her chest and she wished Troy were nearby so she could hurt him like he had hurt Mike. But she swallowed the feeling down, reminding herself that Mike was in front of her and he was the one that mattered. "My dad called me. Troy's at the station."
"Oh."
Her feet carried her over to him on her own accord, as if her body craved to be near him while her mind was still working in slow motion. Every single cut and bruise on his perfect face made her heart crack and she wanted to wipe them all away. "What happened?"
Underneath a bruise on his cheekbone she saw his face go red. "I don't wanna tell you."
"Why?"
"Because you're gonna feel bad."
Jane sat down on the bed next to him. Her hands craved to touch him so she kept them locked between her thighs. She didn't know if both his hands were hurt and she didn't want to make him feel worse. "If you don't tell me then I'll sneak into my dad's office and read the police report." She told him. "Can't you just save me the trouble?"
Mike groaned and leaned his head back against the headboard, closing his eyes. "Okay, fine." He said, though he didn't at all sound pleased to tell her. "We were leaving AV club and I heard him talking about you. He was probably just trying to bother me but… I got really mad. He was saying really awful things."
"Like what?"
He shook his head. "I'm not telling you. You don't have to hear stuff like that."
Jane sighed, her curiosity urging her to pester him more but she managed to hold back. "Okay, what happened then?"
"I told him to shut up but he just kept going. So I pushed him into the lockers. Then he pushed me back so I punched him." Mike glanced at Jane and let out a groan when he saw her shocked expression. "Will ran to the payphone to call the cops and we were still going at it when they got there. They took two cars so your dad gave me a ride home."
Jane inched closer to him, tentatively reaching for his hand that didn't seem to be hurt. He met her halfway and laced his fingers through hers. "Mike what the hell were you thinking?"
He raised one eyebrow at her, the one that didn't have a cut right above it. "Should I have just let him talk about you like that?"
"Yes!" She said. "People talk about me all the time, Mike. What are you gonna do? Beat up every person who looks at me the wrong way?"
He rolled his eyes. "No, of course not."
"You know how Troy is." She continued. "What did you expect, you would tell him to shut up and he would go 'oh, shit, you're right. I shouldn't talk about women that way.'"
She watched him squeeze his eyes shut and tilt his head back. Jane waited for him to reply longer than she had expected to. "Can we put off fighting until I don't have dried blood on my face."
Jane pulled her hand back, feeling her heart stop for a moment. She stared at him for a moment and tried to stop her bottom lip from shaking. When she felt a burn in her throat she jumped to her feet and blurted "I'll be right back" before rushing into the bathroom down the hall.
She closed the door and leaned her back against it, taking deep breaths in through her nose. She felt like a fool. The whole point of not making this official and serious with Mike was to avoid things like fighting and tension. And of course the day she realized just how much she truly cared about him she went and picked a fight with him. Her heart pounded at her racing thoughts. What if he broke things off with her? What if he got tired of her getting scared and pushing him away every other week? What if he was sick of not being official and gave up on her all together? What if what if what if? She angrily wiped at her eyes with her jacket sleeves and tried to keep her crying noises to a minimum.
Jane glared at herself in the mirror and wondered to herself if she was completely messing things up by keeping Mike at arms distance. She had let him in on more than she ever expected to when she decided the day after they met that he was someone she wanted to call a friend. He knew things about her family and her life from Chicago that she had been tight lipped about since her move to Hawkins. Yet despite how much he knew there was still so much she hid from him. Telling him about things that had happened to her was the easy part. But talking about her feelings, specifically how he made her feel, was what she struggled with.
She made it plain as day how much she cared about him through her actions. How she begged and pleaded with him to just be a little bit later to home room to spend some more time with her. How she struggled to keep the distance between them around their friends just as much as he did. How, try as she might to spend time away from him and not become dependent on his touch, she always ended up asking him to hang out the next day. It was words that she struggled with. Articulating just how she felt about him was something far too vulnerable for her. Though she knew he deserved to hear it she couldn't made herself say this.
A small knock from the other side of the door interrupted her train of thoughts and made her straighten up. "Jane?" Mike asked, his voice sounding hesitant. "You okay?"
"Yeah, uh, I'm fine. I'm fine." Though it was clear by the shakiness of her words that she was crying. She cringed slightly at the sound of her own voice.
She heard him sigh quietly. "Look, I'm sorry. I don't wanna fight. I'm really happy you're here. Please come out?"
Jane glanced in the mirror and wiped at her cheeks one last time before opening the door. Though it was pretty clear she still looked like she was crying by the look on his face. "I snapped at you." She pointed out. "Why are you sorry?"
"I shouldn't have told you what happened." He said. "I knew it would upset you."
"You absolutely should have told me." she countered. "I just reacted like a crazy person. You stood up for me and I'm getting mad at you."
He reached for her hand with his that wasn't cut up from throwing punches and hooked his pointer finger with hers. "We okay?"
Jane felt her bottom lip start to shake again so she quickly pulled him into a hug before she could start crying again. "Yeah. We're okay."
Mike held onto her like he never wanted to let her go. And she didn't want him to. She spent so much of her time feeling average and unimportant. But it was hard to not feel at least a little bit special around Mike Wheeler, who listened with absolute attention and cared fiercely. She pulled away just enough to press kisses onto his face, all around the spots where he was hurt but being careful not to touch them directly. Jane wished she could kiss away all his pain, not just the ones on the surface. As much as he listened to her talk about hard things he hardly ever shared some himself. But she knew there was something in there he was hiding from her. She planned on waiting patiently for him to show it to her.
They went back to his room after a few minutes, Mike closing the door behind him. She insisted that he lay down and not tire himself out and he very clearly left room for her beside him. How could she refuse? He lay the blankets over both of them once she was on her side facing him. It was an amazing feeling to be in the very spot he spent about 50% of a 24 hour day in. She wondered if he had ever lay awake in the middle of the night thinking of her. She had certainly done the same for him.
"What are you thinking about?" he asked her. It was a question they often used when they wanted to talk but didn't know what to say. Something she and her dad had used often in the early days of the adoption.
"You." She answered, wrapping her arms around his waist and pulling him closer. Not that they could get much closer since they were laying in a twin sized bed. "I hope all those cuts heal quick because you're way too handsome to have them there for any long."
He rolled his eyes at her. "It'll probably be about a week. They aren't very deep."
She tilted her head up to see him better. "Are you gonna be in school tomorrow?"
Mike shrugged, his arms moving against her. "Maybe. It all depends on how my hand is in the morning. If I can't write than the only point in going tomorrow would be to spend time with you."
"Then don't go." She told him. "I'll come by after school tomorrow whether you want me to or not."
"I absolutely want you to."
Jane grinned at him, squeezing him tighter. "Troy better hope they keep him in lockup overnight because if I see him in school tomorrow I'm gonna kick his ass."
Mike made a face at her. "Don't."
"I'll still wear my steel toed boots tomorrow just in case."
She stayed at Mike's house for another hour or so, checking and double checking he was okay before she left and making him promise to call her after he finished eating dinner. Her body felt heavy as she made her way to her discarded bike on his front lawn. She knew she couldn't just sit at home worrying about him for the rest of the night so instead she biked to Max's house, the route even more familiar than the one to Mike's. Jane was thankful that Billy's car wasn't in the driveway since she could bang on the front door as loud as she pleased.
Max appeared in the doorway with a scowl that melted when she saw Jane standing on the porch. "You heard what happened to Mike?" she asked instead of a greeting.
Jane nodded. "Wanna drive me to the police station?"
The police station was just as busy as she expected it to be. They were understaffed by three people so almost everyone was working overtime just to keep the building from burning down. No one noticed as Jane and Max wondered into her dads office which was, of course, unlocked. The room was just as messy as it had been the last time she was there. They both searched through the countless files on his desk for the incident report that had likely already been written up.
"I found it!" Jane announced, picking up the file and reading out loud.
"Wheeler overheard Harrington talking about a friend of his and approached him to tell him to stop. Harrington continued to degrade the friend so Wheeler pushed him into the lockers. Wheeler delivered two punches before Harrington grabbed him in the shirt and started punching back. Witnesses say Harrington delivered up to eight punches before they went to call the police. When officers arrived on the scene Wheeler was on the ground and Harrington was kicking him in the stomach and had to be pulled away by two officers. Wheelers wounds were mostly superficial so he was taken home while Harrington was taken into custody for further questioning on the situation. Neither Wheeler or any witnesses have revealed what Harrington said to start the fight."
Jane set the file down on the desk again and for a moment her and Max stared wordlessly at each other. The report gave her much more information than Mike had and she was able to come up with a play by play of the confrontation in her head. She winced as she imagined the sight on Mike on the floor getting kicked in the stomach. He certainly hadn't brought that injury up when she'd been at his house.
"Man." Max said, being the first to break the silence. "He's totally in love with you."
If she wasn't so speechless she would have blushed.
Her shock eventually wore off and she was soon storming out of the office and down the hall to the holding cells with Max close behind. There were three cells and the two next to Troy's were empty, which she was thankful for. She swelled with pride at the sight of his busted lip and the knowledge that Mike had given it to him. Simply because he had said bad things about her. At the sight of her and Max coming in Troy jumped to his feet and stood as far away from them as he could in the confined space.
"What the hell are you doing here?"
Jane didn't listen to him as she pulled a bobby pin out of her hair and used it to pick the lock. A small voice in the back of her mind told her she needed to watch herself. There was only so much trouble her dad could bail her out of. But the words in the incident report circled around her mind and it was hard to think clearly. Jane had an embarrassing amount of experience with picking locks but she was thankful for it when the cell opened with ease. As she stepped into the cell Max wandered over towards the end of the hall to serve as lookout.
Troy's shock at her presence gave her the advantage to grab him by the shirt and slam him against the bars. He was almost as tall as Mike and built like a football player while Jane was barely over 5 foot and could lift 25 pounds maximum. But she detected a flicker of fear behind his expression that he managed to cover almost instantly. Still, she hadn't missed it.
She got closer to Troy than she had ever imagined being. "If you ever touch a hair on Mike Wheeler's head I will make you sorry you ever met him." she growled. "Got it?"
He hesitated only a moment longer than he likely meant to. "I really hope you're putting out for him after the ass whooping he got for you."
Jane brought her leg up and connected her knee with his crotch with all her force. He doubled over in pain but she forced him upright again. "You spread that rumor about me that I spent six months in jail, right? I'll do it for real if I ever see you even look at him the wrong way."
"I got no clue what he sees in a crazy bitch like you."
Normally such words would dig up some of her insecurities and make her cry once she was alone in her room. But they bounced harmlessly off her. "Damn right I'm a crazy bitch. Don't you forget it."
She slammed him against the bars one last time before letting go of his shirt and walking out of the cell, pushing the door shut with a satisfying clink. Jane turned towards Max who wore a face of shock and pride all at the same time. They hurried out of the station before anyone could see them (just in case Troy told someone what happened) and ran through the parking lot to Max's moms car. Once they were sitting they burst out laughing at the look on Troy's face when they had walked in. It was a mental image Jane would cherish forever.
"Man," Max said as she backed out of the parking space. "You're totally in love with him."
Totally and completely.