Chapter Text
For the next week, it seemed as though nothing had changed. Eddie and Richie decided to not tell anyone what had happened. Although it was eating Eddie up inside to not be able to say anything to Bill or Stan, who had watched his mental breakdown and seen what this whole situation had done to him. They had been there to watch him go from seemingly not giving a damn about Richie Tozier to being friends to clearly have a crush on him. But Eddie was anything but selfish, all his friends knew, he would put everyone else’s needs in front of his own.
Because of this, he knew that what Richie wanted was to feel this out first, see where it would take them, before they even told their friends. But Eddie also knew that he promised Stan a year ago that he wouldn’t date Richie. And it was making him feel pretty damn terrible.
“You knew Stan had a crush on you, right?” Eddie asked one day after school as they lay in Richie’s bed.
“Yeah but that was last year.” Richie responded, readjusting his arm so he could curl Eddie into his side. “He’s over it. Everyone said so.”
Eddie hummed a response. “Yes, but did you ever know how long it was.”
“Bev told me freshman year that some kid in her class had a full blown crush on me. Never thought he would end up being one of my best friends, but, hey, life is weird.”
“He was practically in love with you for three years.” Eddie spoke softly, afraid of saying the wrong thing. He almost felt dirty talking about Stan’s crush with the object of his affection. But he also felt as if he needed to talk out his feelings, get everything out in the open. And it’s not like Stan was subtle with his crush. “And you never felt anything for him?”
Richie let out a sigh and with his arm not pinned under Eddie’s body, ruffled his hair. “If I’m being honest, Eds, I tried. It felt good to have someone be into me and, you know, I love Stan, he’s great. So I spent a lot of time with him outside of school in the beginning, really tried to get myself to see him that way. Bev caught on and told me not to force it.”
“Bev seems to catch on to a lot of things.”
“That girl needs to be a P.I. or something. She can pick up on things from a mile away.” Richie agreed.
“She knew I had a crush on you.” Eddie’s voice was barely over a whisper. He still felt odd admitting it out loud, after so much time burying it deep within him, never thinking the emotions would see the light of day. “Everyone else liked to tease me, joke about it. But Bev actually knew.”
Richie stayed silent, staring up at his ceiling. Eddie breathed in the scent of Richie’s shirt from where he was pressed against his side. He smelled so different up close, by himself. Boy was the easiest way to describe the scent, a mix of deodorant, vaguely sweat, and laundry detergent, all coming together to create something uniquely Richie that couldn’t be replicated.
Eddie continued. “She always told me that it was okay. That I didn’t need to hide it, to be so deep in denial. But you can’t possibly understand what it’s like to have these feelings that you so desperately believe would end a friendship if they came out. To be best friends with a guy who had such an intense crush that it caused you to work yourself into being sick with anxiety over what would happen if he found out the truth.”
He heard Richie take a deep breath, but did not seem like he was going to speak.
“I didn’t know what to do. So I ignored it. I didn’t admit it to anyone, not even Bev, until after that stupid night of truth or dare.”
“Stan asked me, before that stupid night, as you put it,” Richie finally spoke up. “if I liked you.”
“He did what?” Eddie sat up, removing himself from Richie’s side to sit with his legs crossed, facing the boy still laying down.
Richie looked up at him. “I thought that was him admitting he was over me without actually saying anything. He asked me one day if I liked you, because everyone was making jokes about it. I was too afraid to say anything but no.” He sat up as well, grabbing Eddie’s hand with his own and setting them in his lap.
“Did you want to say anything but no?”
Richie chuckled. “I really thought you could read me like an open book, Eds.”
“What do you mean?”
“I’ve told you before, that you’ve always been everything.”
Eddie felt his eyes prickling and welling up with tears. “I don’t know what that means.”
“It means from that day I saw you our freshman year, you’ve always been the one in the back of my mind. I didn’t even know you then, and you showed up at my baseball game and my brain was just screaming The cute boy is here! and I pathetically couldn’t even talk to you after that. And then we became friends and it’s like you started to occupy my every thought and by the time we were juniors, I was head over heels for you, Kaspbrak.”
“Really?” The tears welling up before in his eyes had now spilled out, dripping down all the way to his neck, dampening the collar of his shirt.
“Every damn joke I’ve made has been the truth.” Richie leaned forward to press their foreheads together, breathing in each other.
Despite declaring their feelings for each other a week ago, they had yet to talk about exactly what those feelings entailed.
“You know when that fucking chicken game happened and Stan stormed off and I realized he wasn’t over it, that he was just curious, I felt like utter shit.”
“It’s not your fault.”
“You know, I may not know what it’s like to have feelings for the same person my best friend does. But I do know how it is to have a friend have feelings for me and to feel so trapped by it. To not be able to do anything in fear that I’d hurt a friend.”
“I never thought about it that way.”
“Bev helped me through that, too.”
“So she knew?”
“Bev claims she knew the beginning of sophomore year, apparently I didn’t shut up about you or something.” He smiled widely. “But she was the first person I told when I figured it out myself.”
“God,” Eddie chuckled. “That girl deserves a prize or something for dealing with all this emotion baggage.”
Richie laughed as well, pressing their lips together in a quick kiss. “Despite it all though, at the end of the day, I’m just so damn happy I get to kiss you.”
Eddie pushed him so he was laying on the bed and kissed him again.
Eddie wasn’t good at lying. He never thought he was. He guessed it made sense that everyone made all those jokes about him and Richie before, they could all tell what was going on inside his own head while he simultaneously was lying to himself. So, when Bill cornered him after school as he was walking to his bike, his body instantly filled with tread.
“I don’t believe you.” Bill stated.
“Huh?”
“When you told me and Stan that you and Richie worked on your project a week ago and everything was fine and normal. I don’t believe you. Something happened or you’d be freaking out.”
“I told you,” Eddie’s voice wavered. “I’m just trying to get over it, he obviously doesn’t want to talk.”
“Get your bike, I’m driving you home.” Bill put his hand on Eddie’s backpack, guiding him to the bike racks.
The minute Eddie shut Bill’s car door behind him, Bill began the interrogation again. “You wouldn’t be this chill about it.”
“How do you know?”
Bill looked over at him for a second, eyebrow raised. “Really? You’re going to play that card?”
Eddie found it best to not respond.
“Is it because of Stan? Is that why you didn’t say anything?”
“You know, he claims he’s over Richie. But I know he’s not.”
“So, you’re just going to keep this from him? You know that would hurt him even worse.”
“What do you want me to do, Bill? I like Richie, okay? Everyone knows that now. I don’t want to lose him but I don’t want to lose Stan either. I figure if I keep this a secret, I can keep them both.”
“That’s stupid.”
“I’m sparing him from the hurt!” Eddie argued. “What he doesn’t know won’t hurt him, okay? He doesn’t need to know this.”
“And what exactly is this?”
Eddie took a deep breath. “I don’t know. We’re together, I guess. It’s new, and not official, but we both wanted to keep it a secret for a while, see what this could be.”
“So that day?”
“I asked him if he was going to ignore what happened. I told him I liked him. We kissed. End of story.”
Eddie felt himself about to cry for what felt like the millionth time that week. He hated it, that he got so full of emotions so quickly. But he always felt things in extremes, and he was so full of stress and worry that the tears just squeezed out of him at every chance.
“Hey, hey.” Bill reached over and grabbed Eddie’s shoulder. “I’m happy for you, it’s okay. I know how hard this has been.”
“I’ve talked to Richie about everything.” He sniffed. “About how difficult it is to like the same person as your best friend. How frustrating it is to not be able to do anything about it but it seems like everyone else knows what’s going on. It’s been so hard and Richie is the only person I can talk about this but he hasn’t been there for every step of this.”
“You can talk to me, now.”
“But I can’t. It’s not fair. Richie doesn’t want to tell anyone and it’s not fair to ask you to keep this a secret from your best friends.”
“It’s not fair of Richie to ask that of you either.”
Eddie slowed his breathing down to the point where he was no longer about to tip over the edge into crying. “He doesn’t want to rip a hole in our friendship group or anything before we’re stable.”
“That’s ridiculously dramatic.”
“It is Richie.” Eddie said and Bill chuckled at that. “But I get what he means. Like, changing the dynamic of everything before we’ve even figured out how to go from friends to whatever it is we are.”
“I guess.”
The rest of the ride to Eddie’s house is in silence. Thoughts swirled around Eddie’s head at a million miles a minute. He knew that what he was doing was wrong. That he should tell Stan. That lying to him and Bill in the first place wasn’t the right call. But he also knew that he had a chance to have something real with Richie. The highlight of his entire week had been the little moments he was able to have with him in private, kissing, talking, even just sitting in silence, taking in the other, thinking about everything that had led them to this moment.
He was stuck in the middle of a situation that seemed to have no good outcome. He had seen in one of Richie and Ben’s many baseball games a player that would run back and forth from base to base, while a ball was thrown back and forth between the player guarding said base, the runner having no way to win. He felt out of breath and nervous, as if he was the one running at the end of a championship game. Telling Stan would relieve a big weight of his chest, allowing him to actually relax, but it could end up hurting him so bad their friendship wouldn’t recover.
When Bill parked in Eddie’s driveway, he grabbed his arm to stop him from leaving the car. “Whatever you do, just remember, you and Stan have been friends forever. I don’t think anything can get between you guys.”
Eddie could just hope and pray that that was true.
Eddie was in the middle of doing his homework when something smacked against his window, causing him to jump. He smiled and ran to the window, opening it, to see Richie waving in his yard.
“My mom’s not home, just come in!”
When Richie got to his room, he ran in and pushed the books off his bed, opening his arms. “I missed you, Eds, come here.”
Eddie rolled his eyes but hugged Richie nonetheless, who then pulled them both down onto the bed. “You just saw me today.”
“Yeah, but I wasn’t able to do this.”
Richie leaned down to connect their lips. Eddie responded by moving his arms up so he could run his hands through Richie’s messy hair, pulling him even closer. He doesn’t think he’d ever get sick of this. Of Richie’s body pressing him into the bed, of his hands running up and down his sides, of the way his body feels between his legs. Their kisses range from messy and desperate to soft and slow and everything in between. They’re feeling each other out, trying to see what works, much like dancing, trying to find the right rhythm. Richie disconnected their lips and Eddie breathed out hard, panting from the lack of air and let his head fall back on his pillow. Richie put his face into the crook of Eddie’s neck, placing a soft kiss there, then brought his face back up.
“Eds?”
“Yeah?” Eddie looked up at him, his face flushed and his lips swollen.
“You wanna go on an actual date?” His eyes flickered across Eddie’s face.
He smiled widely and nodded. “Of course.”
They leaned in for another kiss but were interrupted by a knock on the front door.
“Who’s that?” Richie asked.
“Why would I know?”
Another knock.
“Should I get it?” Eddie asked.
“Ignore them.” Richie gave a harsh kiss to Eddie’s neck, nipping slightly, causing him to squirm.
Then Eddie heard the unmistakable sound of the door opening, followed by Beverly’s voice booming through the house. “Eddie, I know you’re here and I know your ma’s not, so I’m coming up.”
“Shit.” Eddie pushed Richie off of him. “Shit, shit, shit.” He scrambled to get up.
“Fuck, uh, where should I go?” Richie asked, standing up, looking around.
“Closet.” Eddie shoved him, opening the closet door and pushing him in. “Please, stay quiet.”
“Damn, Eds, this is a small closet, are you sure -?”
Eddie closed the closet door harshly, ensuring it latched close and Richie was in there as he heard the footsteps approach his bedroom door.
“Bev!” He smiled when she opened the door.
“Why didn’t you answer?” She asked, looking around the room.
“I didn’t hear you, I was doing homework…and listening to music.”
“Oh.” She smiled.
“So, what’s up?” He asked, sitting down on his bed, and tried to discreetly pick up his books from their scattered position on the floor.
“I just wanted to talk.” She shrugged, taking a seat at his desk. “Things have been weird, and I know it can’t be easy for you.”
Eddie swallowed hard. “What do you mean?”
“Richie told me that he tried to talk to you the other day and you ran away. Why did you do that?”
“Uh…”
“I know this whole Stan thing is difficult, but I’ve been telling you it’ll be fine. You’re into him! And it devastated him when you ran away. He was full on crying while he was telling me.”
“Crying?” Eddie tried not to let himself smile, instead putting on a look of concern.
“Okay, I shouldn’t say anything, because he told me in confidence, but I really want you two to get together.” She sighed. “He’s, like, really into you. Has been for a while now. Like he never shuts the fuck up about you. And I know for a fact that you’re into him, despite you never wanting to admit it. Attracted to, yes, like, no.” She ended with an attempt to mock Eddie’s voice.
“Bev, I’ve told you,” He takes a deep breath. “With Stan, it’s just too complicated. I’m afraid.”
“So, go talk to Stan, and then go make out with Richie.”
Eddie smiled. “Making out with him is really nice.”
“What?” Bev coughed.
“What?”
“It is?”
“I mean -” He felt his face heat up and he couldn’t get any words out, just noises.
“Eddie, what the hell aren’t you telling me?” She stood up from her seat, walking towards him.
“I mean, it probably is, it’s not like I know, I wouldn’t know, hey have you ever kissed him, I’m sure you’d know, it’s nothing, Richie? Richie who? I don’t know -”
“Bev!” Richie fell out of the closet.
She screamed loudly, putting her hands up to defend herself before she processed who had fallen into a heap on the ground before he scrambled up.
“What the fuck are you doing in there?” She yelled and then whipped her head towards Eddie, pointing her finger accusingly at him. “What the fuck is happening here?”
“Beverly, oh my lovely Beverly.” Richie walked towards her and wrapped an arm around her shoulder. “You can’t say anything.”
“Are you guys together?”
Eddie and Richie looked at each other for a moment, both of them stammering.
“I mean, we make out and we’re going on a date soon.” Richie spoke.
“Richie!” Eddie said harshly.
“What? She caught us!” He shrugged. “Please don’t say anything, Marsh.”
“Why?”
“We’re trying to keep it a secret. We need to figure it out.” Eddie explained.
“We also need to figure out how to tell Stan.” Richie pointed out.
“Don’t remind me.” Eddie ran his hand through his hair in frustration.
“What…” Bev squinted her eyes, looking between the two of them. “Wh – how did this happen?”
“We talked about it after that day.” Richie shrugged.
“And that’s that? Years of repression and denial and drama and it’s this nonchalant?”
“What did you want?” Eddie asked.
She laughed a little. “I don’t know, I guess this is just weird.”
“Trust me, we know.”
They fell into comfortable silence, Richie walking over to where Eddie was sitting on the bed and pressing a kiss into his hair. Beverly smiled at them, her heart warming at the gesture. Eddie looked up at Richie, grinning and wrapped his arms around his middle in a hug. Bev had been on both sides of this journey, seeing what it was doing to not only her lifelong best friend, but her new friends as well. She had witnessed Richie in very out of character tears, tears that really only came up when it came to Eddie. She saw Eddie full of anxiety any time Richie was mentioned, his head and his heart constantly at battle. She couldn’t help but be happy that they seemed to be completely comfortable with each other, their bodies seeming to be void of all tension.
“We’ll tell everyone else eventually.” Richie said with a smile. “We just like having this little bubble for now.”
And with everything else they had gone through, she felt as if they did deserve their little bubble.