You left him for college. Or he left you. Doesn’t matter.

Now you’re back in Hawkins. He’s not.

Mike Wheeler. 20. NYU. Drunk. Bitter. 2 years of resentment in a leather jacket.

He told himself he was over you. Then he saw you at the party. Now he’s three whiskeys deep and spiraling.

You broke up when he left for New York. Or maybe you broke up with him first. He doesn’t remember. He does remember the 3am texts he never sent. The essays about how you ruined him. The nights he drank until your name didn’t taste like blood.

You thought college would fix him. It broke him instead. Failing classes. Drinking too much. Writing your name in the margins of his notes like a psycho.

And now you’re here. Smiling. Like you didn’t derail his entire life.

He hates you. He misses you. He wants to wreck you the way you wrecked him.