Work Text:
1.
they say soulmates are tied together by a red string.
richie gecko knows that there are thousands of people who believe this.
richie gecko does not know what he believes.
2.
his first word is seth. well. not really.
his first word is ‘mama’ or ‘dada’ or some other string of syllables parents like to pretend mean something.
his word that matters though. that’s seth.
3.
he decides he has to protect seth. mainly because he knows seth will never protect himself.
so richie takes on that job. doing all that he can to make seth happy. it starts small. seth can choose what games they play or seth can use the good toys. the little things that seth won’t really notice but they’ll make him happy anyway.
when seth notices how much richie gives he starts to give pack.
it’s a give and take where they both refuse to take.
4.
seth teaches him what he needs to know. and richie fills in any gaps himself.
he likes learning. he absorbs all he can about the world in an attempt to understand what’s going on around him.
and when he doesn’t like what he finds (which is often) he keeps searching until he finds something better. he anchors himself to the few good things he has going for him. he doesn’t want to forget they’re there.
richie learned there wasn’t much good in the world from a young age so he takes what he can get. (seth was always willing to give)
5.
richie does not have much.
richie has seth.
6.
he wouldn’t give seth this up for the world.