I’m so happy to announce that my friend, @strangerthingsiscool (Robin), finished out first collab!!!

Its right here!

Summary: “The plan failed.”. Mike has to choose who to save: El or Will?
In the Upside Down, Will fights against the Shadow Monster’s possession.

Words: 3,557

Notes: Robin wrote the amazing part one (from Mike’s Pov) and I wrote Part Two (Will’s Pov)

Tags: @im-not-a-joke @eraseyourbookofstories @iliveforbyeler @ialsocantdothis @raposapaodeforma 

Mike: Man, I’m so proud of myself. I really feel like I’ve done a good job of keeping my crush a secret! 
Will: *walks in* Hey guys. 
Mike: I gotta gay. 
Mike: I MEAN GO! I gotta ga–go!
Will: …
Dustin: …
Lucas: …
Mike: *runs out of the room* 
Will: …is he okay? 
Dustin: Yeah. He’s just not as good at keeping secrets as he thinks he is. 
Lucas: What else is new?

through karen’s eyes pt- 1 (byler)

Karen watches as her son grows up, makes friends, falls in love, and experiences untold horrors

- she always wanted a girl, when her first child, nancy, had been a girl karen had been overjoyed

- the thing was, girls were easy for karen, after all she was a girl- woman probably was the correct term but sometimes she still felt like the naïve young girl she was in her youth

- when she had a boy, mike, she was terrified. she had no idea what to expect, how to act, she was so scared of messing up and it’s not as though ted would be of any help, he would only be there to criticise her mistakes

- nancy turned out studious, quiet, slightly uptight, rather quick to anger, feminine, she was so many things karen was

- mike was rambunctious, stubborn, also studious, outgoing

- on his first day of school karen was so surprised at how scared he was, clinging tightly onto her and even nancy with whom he regularly bickered

- she was happy when he came home regaling tales of his teacher and other students and of his new friend, will

- it was a long time before she met this boy whom mike constantly talked about

- he was so silent and nervous when she first met him, karen couldn’t understand how he had become friends with mike

- over the years will came out of his shell more and more, with small smiles eventually growing to wide grins in her presence

- mikeandwill eventually grew to mikeandwillandlucas, then in fourth grade to mikeandwillandlucasanddustin

- the boys were a rowdy bunch and karen turned the basement into a space for them to play their games or whatever they spent so much time doing

- she liked all of the boys, however, she always had a soft spot for will, he was after all mikes first friend, and he felt like a second son to karen

- she still vividly remembers when he confessed to her about his father, she had noticed the way he would flinch at movements and always seemed to have various bruises (and various excuses), when he had left that day she cried over how someone could be so horrible to such a sweet little boy

- when lonnie finally left will spent a few nights at the wheelers house while joyce and jonathan tried to settle the dust

- one night she caught will sobbing in mikes arms in the kitchen, she decided not to interrupt, seeing the way her son was soft and comforting in a way she had never seen

- will was good for mike, she decided, he was a calming influence that he desperately needed

- when will went missing, saw an unbridled panic in her son’s eyes, but she would have taken that anyway over the broken looks when he collapsed in her arms one night- will was dead

- that night karen found herself crying over the fate of will byers

- when will was found, karen was dumbfounded, she knew there was more to the story than anyone seemed to be letting on, she knew both mike and nancy were involved, she could see it in their eyes, their new closeness, their tears shed behind locked doors

- most of all she knew from the government agents coming to their house making them sign all sorts of forms with stories of a russian girl- stories that seemed off for some reason but who was she to go against what the government says

- she felt her heart break for her children, forced to experience something, some untold trauma she had no idea about and probably never would

- most of all her heart broke for will byers, seeing him in the hospital looking so small and scared and weak

- she felt better seeing the two boys together, the way they seemed to relax around one another, the small smile that appeared whenever they were together, the giggles that erupted between them and with no one else

Tumblr gang back at it again.

@tea-for-one-please​

A New Fight chapter six be like 

(vague spoilers below beware)

alternatively

While taking a walk today, I got to thinking about how romantic relationships are handled on TV and in movies. It generally comes down to the basic formula of the male and female leads getting romantically linked, regardless of any actual romantic building. We just expect a man and a woman who meet to have some degree of romantic attraction to each other. We see it all the time in real life. How many of you have had friends or relatives who see boy and girl toddlers interacting and begin to say things like “He’ll be a real heartbreaker.” or “Oh, I hear wedding bells.” I imagine many of us who oppose the idea of heteronormativity have fallen into this behavior as well.

We simply have been conditioned to expect boys and girls to pair off. Joyce and Hopper had a fan following for their relationship as early as season 1, despite there not being much to go on until season 2. We knew they were familiar with each other, but there wasn’t really much in the way of romantic undertones. Still, fans started to pair them together. Mike and El’s fan base acted like they were the best couple in the history of fiction, even though they were 12 and only knew each other for a week. There were even people who shipped Will with Jennifer Hayes. Why? Because she cried at his funeral. That’s it. That’s all they needed.

Strong relationships between same-sex pairs end up being written off as mere friendship and/or adoration. Even worse, terrible same-sex relationships take off as popular pairings. Look at Steve and Billy. There’s no reason for those two to be romantically linked, but it’s one of the most popular pairs in the fandom. It reeks of a horrible concept of homosexuality, one characterized by animalistic attraction and a lack of genuine affection. This all harkens back to old ideas of gay people: that they are sexual deviants, immoral, primal. There’s still this idea in even progressive culture that sees the heterosexual couple as the ideal, and the homosexual couple as inferior. The better among those who think this way at least understand it is not a good mindset to have, but it still leaks, subconsciously or not, its way into popular culture.

Had Will been a girl, there’s no question as to whether his relationship with Mike would be seen as romantic. There’d be a full-fledged ship war going on. We’d have Team Will vs Team El. I realize that I have my own biases in this, but I didn’t start seeing Mike and Will romantically because I wanted them to get together. I started wanting them to get together because I was reading that there was something going on between them. Just close your eyes and imagine these scenes with a female actor playing Will:

• Mike becomes intensely worried after Will disappears and goes searching for her despite the growing danger.
• Mike breaks down in tears when Will’s (fake) body is pulled from the quarry. He tries to console himself by looking through the drawings she had given him.
• Mike is the only one awake in the hospital waiting room, and the first to rush to Will’s side when she wakes up.
• Mike dotes on Will during the entirely of Season 2. He’s constantly in tune with her emotional needs.
• Will trusts Mike, and Mike alone, with what is going on with her. Mike tells her that if they’re both going crazy, then they’ll go crazy together. Will smiles and says, “yeah, crazy together.”
• Mike becomes Will’s primary source of comfort throughout the season. He stays by her side, making use of a lot of physical contact. 
• Despite the Mindflayer eating into Will’s memory, she still remembers who Mike is. Mike smiles a bit bashfully in response.
• Mike tearfully recollects meeting Will in an attempt to break through to her. Will starts off staring blankly at him, as she did with Joyce and Jonathan, but by the end of Mike’s story her eyes are glassy and her mouth is trembling.
• When a boy walks up and asks Zombie Girl if she wants to dance, Will looks over at Mike briefly before going off at his urging. Mike suddenly looks stunned and then upset.
• That summer, when Mike meets Will, Max, and Lucas for a movie, Mike sits with Will a row apart from Max and Lucas. He notices when Will sense the Mindflayer, asking her if she’s ok.
• When Mike bails on the party to go off and make out with El, Will turns away with a sad look on her face.
• In fact, everytime Mike makes a display of his feelings for El, Will looks sad.
• When Mike and Will fight, and Mike asks if Will really expected things their relationship to stay the same forever, Will tearfully says she did. Mike looks sad as she bikes away from him. He chases after her in the rain to apologize.
• As Will sits in Castle Byers, she looks around at pictures of her and Mike and recollects him telling a campaign. She calls herself stupid and proceeds to destroy everything.
• Before she moves away, Will packs up her D&D set to donate to Erica. Mike nervously asks what she’s doing, but Will reassures him that she’ll just use his set when she comes back. She tells Mike it’s not possible for her to find a new party. They smile at each other.

This would be a blatant “Will they or won’t they?” situation if Will were a girl. There would be no shock that Will had feelings for Mike or that Mike had feelings for Will if it were to be revealed explicitly. Everyone would already have been waiting for it, regardless of who they wanted Mike to end up with. There would be no cries of pandering or sexualization of children. Fans wouldn’t be threatening to burn merchandise or boycott the show.

I know there’s no chance that anyone associated with the show will ever read this. I know that I probably shouldn’t get so worked up about the love lives of fictional teenagers. Still, the entire situation, and the fact that most fans insist Mike and Will are just friends, reeks of heteronormativity. It’s nothing more than a low-grade homophobia. It pisses me off. This mindset is one of the last obstacles to same-sex couples being truly accepted. Stranger Things has a real opportunity to strike a blow against it, but I worry that it won’t. The buildup is genuinely all there, we are not delusional, but will they pull the trigger on it?  I’ve grown to be pessimistic about such things. I hope I’m proven wrong.

Lucas: Why are Mike and Will sitting back to back?
Dustin: They had a fight. 
Lucas: …then why are they holding hands? 
Dustin: They get sad when they fight. 

Mike: *looking at Will*

Will: …

Will: Stop looking me like that or I’ll kiss you.

Mike: …

Mike: *looks more intensely*

mike and will are gay, it’s canon, i make my own rules

i have thought about this a lot and the vibe we need from mike in s4 is the guy from how you get the girl by taylor swift (obviously the genders are messed up but who cares anyway)

i mean: 

“stand there like a ghost
shaking from the rain, rain” rain!!

and then:

“say it’s been a long six months
and you were too afraid to tell her what you want, want” its gonna be a longer time skip than that but cmon, thats mike

and the chorus:

“and then you say
i want you for worse or for better
i would wait for ever and ever
broke your heart, i’ll put it back together
i would wait for ever and ever” please? this is what i want from him

With Stranger Things 3 having its one-year anniversary today, I can’t help but remember how, at the time, I was also writing my first set of Byeler and Reddie prompt fics. I remember being weary of asking for prompts, because I wasn’t sure anyone would ask me to write anything. But then I started getting requests, both on AO3 and on here, and suddenly I had a batch of ideas, both my own and those from readers.

And then I remember I wrote two of my most-read fics during that time — My Life is Incomplete Without You, a Byeler fic, and Braces, a Reddie fic, and I’m still blown away by the responses to those stories, and in truth, to all of my stories.

So, to all of my readers, thank you from the bottom of my heart. I’m so grateful to you all for taking the time to read my stories, leave kudos and write such wonderful, kind reviews. It’s been great interacting with some of you since writing those stories.

As to the future: you can certainly expect more from me. Right now, I’m in the planning phase of No Fate, my Terminator/Stranger Things crossover fic. Things are starting to come together in my mind and I’m excited to share with you all some details soon!

Onward!

New hc

Once will realizes his massive crush on mike, he just stops drawing him. It’s because he 1) is insecure and doesn’t want to mess up mike’s image and 2) he doesn’t want to reveal his crush via art

Mike gets all sad about it but doesn’t mention it

Question to any/all fanfic readers:

What’s your genuine opinion on Major Character Death, if it’s tagged, warned, and meaningful to the story?

Actual footage of bowlcut boi Will Byers meeting Max

Mike: Let’s play 20 Questions.
Will: Um…okay. What’s your career goal?
Mike: Triangle. So, do you like boys?

I’m gonna say it

I don’t want byler to be endgame now.

Don’t get me wrong, I still adore the ship, but if the writers were even considering making it so (which I doubt), they should have at least started the process in s3.

But they didn’t, so with only one or two seasons left, the only way it’ll happen is if it’s thrown in as an afterthought.

Compare it with the development (or not) of m*leven: first season establishing, then they didn’t formally become a couple until the end s2.

With only two seasons left and a whole circus of characters, there isn’t time to properly develop a romantic relationship for Mike and Will. I’d genuinely rather they didn’t bother than throw it into an epilogue and be like “we did the gay rights :D”

On its anniversary, I say that s3 had shattered my expectations for this show and ruined any hope for these two becoming a well-rounded canon couple.