Warnings: Abuse, major character deaths, self-harm, depression.
Major character deaths are Joyce and Johnathan.
Happens post-season 4.
Title inspired from Nothing and Everything by Red
This is going to be short, just two chapters.
This is kind of like a series of drabbles in a way, only chronologically in order.
His new home was small and smelled strange, even if the main smell was cigarette smoke which he was used to and was kind of strangely comforting. His dad moved into a place with two bedrooms but his bedroom was small, barely enough room for a bed and set of drawers much less, much of anything else. His room in Lenora had been comparatively huge but there was nothing in Lenora for him anymore. He sat on his new bed and pulled his legs up to his chest and rested his chin on them.
He had cried nearly every day on the outskirts of Hawkins but here in Indianapolis, it seemed like his tears had dried up. It was probably a good thing, his Dad hated when he cried.
o0o
His Dad had promised at his Mom's funeral that this time things would be different. That he was going to give up drinking and be a good father. It was Will's fault he believed him.
For two weeks Lonnie lived up to his word. He didn't drink and he actually seemed to be trying to be there physically for him. But he should have known that it was too good to be true because one day he had come home from school and he was drunk. His father was a mean drunk.
o0o
The actual punches didn't hurt as bad as the words. That it was his fault his mom and brother were dead that if he wasn't so weird wasn't such a fag, a fairy, a disappointment that they would still be alive.
The cover story was an earthquake that had turned the ground into a sink hole but somehow Lonnie still knew that it was his fault. If he had never been stolen, if he hadn't been possessed, if he hadn't had a connection to Venca that his family had tried so hard to break they would still be alive. Lonnie wasn't wrong, even if he didn't know the whole story.
o0o
This time around the party doesn't forget him. Lucas and Dustin's calls vary from twice a week or once every few weeks but Mike calls every Thursday at 7 like clockwork. El calls every Sunday. Max's mom moved them back to California after everything but they manage to talk every couple of weeks too.
El and Mike are still dating but this time the jealousy doesn't burn the way it used to. Maybe because Mike is making such an effort even though he knows that since Mike and El live the closest to each other now and they see each other much more. Talking with his friends is the only time he smiles anymore. They had just finished reminiscing about an old D and D campaign and were about to hang up when Mike suddenly said.
"Oh! Me and El are coming down this weekend. I promise it won't be like last time, we're coming for you," Will smiles for a split second before he remembers what his face looked like, a mess of blue and purple. His dad had decorated his face just a few nights before and it still throbs but there no way they would believe he just fell.
He wants to see them, to talk with them in person. To hug them but they can't know. They would wonder why he hadn't tried to stop him, to stand up to him, after facing actual monsters. Why he hadn't told anyone or asked for help. He especially didn't want El to know who had a thing for punishing bullies.
"Oh sorry I can't this weekend," he lies completely. If Mike had asked about injuries as a child, he had lied at first badly but over time he just nodded and then stayed quiet. "I made some friends," Another lie nobody wanted to talk to the weird new boy who didn't speak to anyone. " And we're hanging out," Maybe next weekend," he offered. The bruises might be faded enough by then, at least he hoped that they were. He would really like to see them. Both of them. He missed them. His best friend and his sister.
"Oh," Mike said, sounding both surprised and disappointed and Will feels guilt swell inside of him. He lied to him. Friends don't lie.
o0o
The bruises fade the next time Mike asks and Lonnie starts to remember to punch him where his clothes would cover like before. But still when Mike asks for him and El to come down again Will still hesitated. Mike knows him better or at least used to know him better than almost anyone. El was his sister, even if he's often jealous of her and Mike's relationship. The jealousy ebbed considerably since the move since he no longer saw her every day and missed hanging out with her, but he still hesitates.
If anyone would be able to see it, it would be the two of them. They couldn't see it, they couldn't know. So this time he blurts out that his dad's taking him to a baseball game, even though his Dad was getting drunk like usual and Will would be kept up half the night listening to him and his girlfriend. Pretty normal for a weekend. Mike sounds even more disappointed this time and the lies make his stomach hurt but it's better, it's better than them knowing.
o0o
Sometimes he forgets just for a moment. He'd open his mouth to ask Johnathan for a ride, just to close it as he remembers. Sometimes he'd walk into the kitchen expecting to see Johnathan cooking, even though his brother had never been to this house.
Sometimes when he was half asleep and the alarm clock going off at his side he'd whine 'Mo-" before he remembers. Sometimes he sees her in the grocery store and Johnathan in the car, but then he blinks and someone else is standing there or the space is empty. He doesn't talk about it, not to anyone. Any time any of his friends bring it up he changes the subject or finds some excuse to hang up.
o0o
Four months after he moves in he starts smoking. Both his parents smoke and it reminds him of his mother. He can almost imagine her sitting next to him as he sits on the porch at night looking up at the stars. His dad doesn't really care about him smoking, said he started smoking around the same age even if Linda, his dad's girlfriend, for some reason worries about it.
Even after five months, school might as well be empty for how much he interacts with anyone. Even teachers, over time teachers, have learned not to call on him. Even when he's aware enough to know the answers he refuses to talk.
At the beginning, he got a few detentions but over time they have learned they learned he was from Hawkins. To the rest of the world, Hawkins was the site of the biggest earthquake in recent history. Plus, they realized that no matter how much they tried, he wouldn't talk and started leaving him alone.
He doesn't eat lunch in the cafeteria, when he does eat at school at all. After Lenora, he has learned how to disappear, and how to go unnoticed. Here he might as well be a ghost.
o0o
He's been smoking for about 6 weeks now. He's on the porch as usual looking up at the stars, imagining being somewhere far, far away. He sighs and knows that he has to go back in and go to bed if he wants to at least get a couple of hours of sleep before he goes back to school. There's a mark on the steps full of ash where he put out his cigarettes against the porch most nights. The same area every time. But this time he hesitates and looks at the still-burning cigarette. He rolled up his left sleeve and put it out on the pale skin underneath his arm instead. The smell dissipates into the air leaving just the mark.
o0o
Linda's moved in with them now. Lonnie doesn't hit when she's home, even when he's really drunk. She feels sorry for him and tries to be nice. Sometimes, he appreciates it, sometimes he doesn't. She works the swing shift now so she's often gone when he comes home from school until about midnight. But she has Tuesdays and Thursdays off and so when the phone rings Will lets it because he forgets that he's not the only one home.
Her soft voice pulls him away from the television show he's looking at but not really watching. She looks nothing like his mom. Her hair is a dirty blond and is a mess of curls and is about ten years younger but not nearly as pretty. She lacks her light and energy.
"The phone's for you." Will's not really in the mood to come up with more excuses about why they can't see him and the phone calls that used to be his lifeline seems daunting. Will reaches for the phone but pauses halfway through.
"Tell them I'm not home." He goes out the door so it's not really a lie. He does enough lying.
o0o
He avoids at least half the phone calls that come now and part of him wants to avoid them all but if he avoids them all they might come. Or maybe they will finally let him go…which option is worse? He doesn't know.
The conversations are short and stilted as if part of him thinks that if he can make it as awkward as possible they'll finally stop calling even though part of him fears it, the other part knows he would deserve it.
This time it's El and she's crying because he is a truly awful brother. He hadn't even been a good brother back in Lenora either.
"Why don't you want to see me?" El sounded heartbroken and Will didn't know what to tell her. She had lived with them for 8 months and she was probably struggling with losing them too. She probably wanted them to grieve together but…he couldn't. He couldn't. He didn't know how to explain it, she deserves an explanation but no words come out.
"Please don't call again," Will says and surprisingly his voice doesn't shake, before El can speak he hangs up. It's better this way. El had the others. She has Hop. She has Mike. She doesn't need him. She hasn't ever needed him. She'll be happier without him. He burns his arm 3 times that night and doesn't answer those calls again.
o0o
Will doesn't speak much anymore. He mostly communicates by nodding or shaking his head. Lonnie calls him a freak and a fag because he can't even pretend to be normal and because he's noticed the scars on his arms.
"If you wanted pain, all you had to do was ask," Lonnie says before hitting him hard enough to take his breath away but doesn't stop until his chest almost resembles one of his old paintings, with its shades of dark purple, purple, green, and yellow. He doesn't stop him. He still doesn't fight back.
He knows it's what he deserves. He actually craves the pain, whether it's Lonnie or himself as long as he's being punished.
o0o
"You look like her." Somehow those words hurt more than when Lonnie told him that it was his fault. He doesn't even say it sharply, more just sad and wistfully as he sat next to him smelling strongly of Coors.
He says it like maybe some part of him grieves for her too. At some time he had to have loved her, even if he ended up leaving them. But he only left them in the first place because of him, because Lonnie cannot stand who he is, deep down. It's always been his fault. It was his fault they were poor. His fault Johnathan had to give up his childhood. His fault from the start.
o0o
Will's walking home from school when he hears it behind him.
"Will?" Will freezes. He should've expected it but he thought if he ignored them enough they'd go away. Part of him is glad to be wrong. The other part of him is terrified to see her.
"Will," she repeated like she was worried he hadn't heard her. He had, he just has no idea how to respond.
"Will," Mike's voice, came more worried than El's and Will still has no idea how to respond. They were supposed to stay away. Stay away from him.
"Will say something," He opens his mouth but still can't think of anything to say. Footsteps come towards him scuffling against the sidewalk, but before he can really think about it, he's running away like the coward he is.
" Will!" He heard both of their voices call for him but he didn't stop. He had to get away. He had to get away. From them, from everyone