talk too much | max mayfield

bonus chapter 6

THE MIKE CHAPTER

Nora Harrington and Mike Wheeler have been best friends since the beginning of time.

Nora was the only one who would eat lunch with Mike during pre-school after all the kids called him "frog face," and Mike was the only one who would agree to race Nora during recess because all the other kids knew she would leave them in the dust (Mike was slower than a turtle too, but it's the principle of the thing).

The rest of the party soon became friends with each other too - all stories for another time - but Nora and Mike could never forget how close they were.

Nora was there when Mike broke his first bone (she was also the one who pushed him off the swing, but that's irrelevant), and there many occasions that Steve and Nora would realize they'd eaten pizza every night for dinner for a month straight, and the Wheeler's lasagna single-handedly saved their digestive systems.

It's because of how close they are that Nora feels obligated to bully him.

Obviously, if anyone else did it, Nora would punch them (breaking Troy's nose is her greatest achievement), but when she does it, it's for character development, so it's okay.

Besides, Mike gets back at her - or at least, he did when they were younger - and pulls all the stupid "girls have cooties" jokes and teases her for being in love with every guy she interacts with outside the party.

They're constantly bantering with each other and to anyone else, it probably seems like they hate each other (they kinda do, but in a loving way!).

But Nora was the only one Mike would talk to about the girl's he had crushes on in middle school - he said it was because Nora was a girl and could offer "a different perspective," but they both knew he was just too worried the guys would make fun of him.

And Mike absolutely flipped his shit when he found out Nora was in the hospital and why.

The two weren't on the best terms because of everything with Eddie's final campaign and the championship basketball game, and Nora was and always will be the number one hater of El and Mike's relationship, and was sure to let her feelings known as she watched Mike get on an airplane for the sole purpose of making Will feel like a third wheel.

Maybe it was because of those old grudges that Mike's feeling were so amplified that he yelled at Lucas for even looking at Jason Carver, or maybe - not that he'd ever admit it - he cared about Nora unconditionally, and it was of his own accord that he argued with the hospital lady until midnight to convince her to let him spend more time with Nora, despite the fact that visiting hours ended 5 hours ago and Nora had been fast asleep since before then.

"What douche-y things did you do while you were in the land of the douchebags?" Nora doesn't open her eyes, but addresses the second youngest Wheeler who she knows is still sitting on the same chair from when he first arrived, eyes bloodshot from staying open for so long, probably not going to sleep anytime soon.

"Realize you were right," Nora turns her head at his words, eyebrows raised.

"I'm right about a lot of things," Nora tries bantering, but she knows her mind is elsewhere too.

"Everything," Mike shrugs, clearly not in the mood to get into all of it, Nora assumes it's because of the lack of sleep.

"I expect details at a more reasonable hour in the morning," she tries in a bossy tone, not liking this Mike who doesn't say a thousand words at once and tries to prove he's better than everyone, hoping her word choice will push him to try and get some sleep.

"Hm," he says simply in response, still staring into the distance.

His pensive look makes Nora feel alone in her own thoughts too, but instead of doing some desperately needed reflection, she just closes her eyes and tries to go to sleep without having any nightmares.

a/n:
cali crew rewrite coming after i finish writing bonus chapters for each member of the og party I kinda did Will in bonus chapter 1 but if we want backstory stuff like I did w everyone else lmk but until then 1 more Dustin chapter then we can party 🥳🥳