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Stan had heard a lot of silly, sometimes downright absurd things in his lifetime of sixteen years.The fact that people thought he was straight, (falsehood), every goddamn thing that came out of Richard Tozier’s mouth ever, most statements out of Trump’s presidential campaign, but this?
This was insane.
“I mean come on, I’m just saying, you and Richie have been different these past few months,” Beverly defends. “Like very different.”
Stan scoffs, “Okay, what’s that supposed to mean?”
“Dude! I’m not blind. You guys are constantly wearing each other's clothes, which isn’t too odd seeing as I’ve stolen about nineteen of Ben’s hoodies and a good twenty seven percent of y’all’s wardrobe, but with Richie, god! He’s stuck to you like glue, like, seriously! An ant couldn't even fit between you guys! Those girls at school coined you with a separation anxiety!”
“Damn. Beverly brought her facts.” Mike jokes.
“I mean, she’s kind-kin-she’s kinda right.” Bill adds, and Beverly fist-bumps him without breaking her eye contact with Stan.
Stan loved Bill, Bev, and Mike with every drop of his body. Their sparks and fierceness, the bravery they had helped place in Stan. Three of his closest friends, three of his favorite losers. He would fight the devil for them, and has. Stan would die for them. But sometimes, they made no shucking sense.
“Right about what?” Stan asks Beverly reluctantly, not too sure he truly wanted the answer.
“There’s a difference between insulting someone and flirting with them. You and Richie passed that line years ago. Trashmouth is a pretty cute pet name don’t you think?” Beverly teases, and Bill snorts.
“N-No, that’s different!” Stan stutters, in a way that Bill would call pulling a Denbrough.
Mike sends Stan a gentle smile, and Bill places a hand on Beverly’s shoulder. “I think, I think that that’s enough. It’s getting- it’s get- it’s pretty late.”
“Yeah, we should head out.” Mike remarks, holding an empathetic look in his eyes. Micheal Hanlon always had those expensive eyes, where he’d look at you and things could be alright. Normally, Mike was the father of the group, a light of sense. The only reason his friends didn’t drive him too insane. But, apparently, Mike had gone to the dogs too.
“Take care of yourself Stan.” Mike finishes, paddling Bill and Beverly to the doorway.
“Why in the world would I like Richie?” Stan mumbles to himself. Bill and Bev are too far gone, but Mike peeks his head back in the doorway, sending Stan another soft grin.
“I think you’re the only one can answer that.” Mike whispers after a moment of hesitation, then reaches his hand out to close the doorway. “Goodnight Stan, love you buddy.” He closes the door before Stan can respond, and Stan hears a quick pattern of footsteps of Mike trying to catch up to Bev and Bill.
Stanley stays on his couch for a moment, before hopping off to prepare for bed. It’s eleven pm, and a school night. His parents, the earliest of birds, are already fast asleep. It’s a wonder the four teens laughing didn’t wake the couple up. When Stan gets to his bedroom, he closes the door, flickers off the lights, and hops into bed. Despite how tired Stan was just a moment before, when Stan closes his eyes, he can’t fall asleep.
After that conversation, it’s like Beverly unconsciously flipped a switch that Stan didn’t even know existed. A lightbulb in the far, far back of Stan’s mind. The next day, at lunch, the seven friends are all sitting together in the east corner of the lunch room. The school has big tables, usually able to seat at least twelve students, but the losers don’t have any other friends that would want sit with them. Apparently, a tacky germaphobe, an annoying trashmouth, a slut, a post-homeschooled homeboy, the new kid nerd, a stutterer, and a teacher’s pet don’t make the best company. But this little island they have, close to the huge trash cans, but away from the other students, is a lot of fun. Stan wouldn’t want it any other way.
Eddie is going on about the math test Mr. Gray gave out, and Richie is fitting in his own input every now and then, “I think I did good on the math test.”
“Did well, Richie.” Stan interrupted, hardly paying attention, but still catching Richie’s mistake.
“I’ll show you what I can do well. More like who I can do well. Wanna see for yourself, Urine?” Richie looked right into a person’s eyes during a joke, and they could always the glint in his eyes, showing that he’s joking, and Richie always laughed like the world was on his side. Before, Stan used to roll his eyes at jokes like these. But now? Now Stan blushed. Stan looked away, hunting for a new place of focus. Mike, Beverly, and Bill all looked at him too knowingly, like they knew a secret he didn’t. Eddie looked between Richie and Stan like they were a musuem exhibit, and gasped in a new dramatic way, like everything else he’s ever done. Stan decided to talk to Ben.
Stan hated this light switch. Now was so much different.
Now Stan doesn’t know why, but he simply adores it whenever Richie tosses him a sweater for pajamas at a sleepover. Barely too big for Richie, but seeing as Richie was just awkwardly too tall and Stan was awkwardly too not, the oversized sweater left sweater paws and was a couple inches up Stan’s knees. Wrapped in Richie’s cloth, and it’s lingering smell of pine from Richie’s and Stan’s “adventures” in the forest, and for some reason dark chocolate and old ink. It smelt good. Too good.
And damn, his smile. Richie Tozier’s trashmouth smile. That stupid grin, the one Richie made when he made a dirty joke, or when he was messing around with the Loser’s Club. The one Stan had seen many times. But now he was daydreaming thinking about it in class, and it made Stan, uncontrollably, smile too.
But why? Why did Stan blush, and why did he smile? Stan felt so exposed in this light, yet all too much in the dark.
“Okay but, why Mike? I don’t like-like Richie. I can’t like-like Richie. Because he hasn’t changed. At all. He’s still the same Richie. So why now? There’s nothing different.” Stan asks Mike. The two of them are studying in Mike’s room, after school on Friday. The classic way to spend a weekend.
Mike sends Stan another soft empathetic smile. Damn those smiles. They’re basically Mike’s trademark.
“Maybe Richie hasn’t changed, but the tables have. Damn, the phrase is how the tables have turned, never mind. Then, um, oh how the tables have tabled.” Mike says. “But maybe, just maybe, you’ve liked him all along.”
“No.” Stan defends. “No way. But screw that, we actually need to study.” And the matter was pushed aside. Mike groaned and leaned back into his seat.
“Stan?” Richie asked.
It’s a silent and stiff car ride, something that’s not routine for Stan and Richie. Richie’s driving the two of them to Stan’s house, so they can have a peaceful sleepover because Stan’s parents aren’t home. They’ve had silent car rides before, comfortable with nothing but quiet, but now it felt odd and stilted. No eighties songs on the aux cord, no Richie belting out the lyrics, no Richie cursing at the traffic. No Stan droning on about how everyone in his gym class is an imbecile, or the new birds he’s seen. Nothing but nothing.This silence is all too loud. Stan’s too busy thinking. Mike’s words are almost fresh, shouting throughout Stan’s mind.
Maybe you’ve liked him all along.
“Stan? Uris? Staniel Uris?” Richie asks again, waving his hands in front of Stan’s face. Dangerous removing from this hands from the wheel, but effective, as it pulls Stan out of his thoughts.
“Sorry. Mmhm?” Stan says, turning to look at Richie.
Richie pauses, crossed eyebrows unfolding as he fumbles with his lip. “You’ve been different lately Stan. We’ve been different la-”
“If I hear that one more time, I actually swear,” Stan cuts himself off because he realizes that he just rudely reacted to Richie trying to open up, something Richie doesn’t do too often.
“I’m sorry. Again. Sorry, you can continue.” Stan apologizes, looking up at Richie, who has an unreadable expression on his face, for the first time since forever.
“Everything, or at least something’s different now, and I know the other Losers can see it too. Did I do something wrong? I think they all think you hate me, hell, I think you hate me.” Richie sniffs, pushing his glasses up. “I mean, you always insult me, and I- I know you’re joking, or at least think you are. You’re my best friend, and I'm pretty sure I'm yours. What’s wrong, Stan? What did I do?”
They’re pulled up to Stan’s driveway, it’s pitch dark outside, the phase of the night where everything's so silent it’s screaming, where everything is dead and all the stars are useless. And the rain is coming down hard, but neither of them motion to get out the car.
“I don’t. Richie, I don't hate you. It’s just-” Stan pauses.
“It’s just what, Stan.” Richie pushes, because Richie has always been a pusher and has never stood around for something.
Stan doesn’t know what to say. And suddenly he can’t say anything. Like a coward, he gets out of the car, and walks up to his porch.
“No! You can’t just leave. You can’t just run away!” Richie exclaims, opening and slamming his car door and jogging up to Stan. “You have to tell me what’s going on!”
“I can’t-I can’t.” Stan stutters. It’s Denbrough season all over again.
“Stan, stop being a bitch and tell me what's happening!” Richie shouts, and Stan flinches at the picked up volume. Richie looks sorryfor a second, because even though he always insults Stan, Richie has never been truly and intentionally mean, but rants on.
“I'm sorry if I'm being a trashmouth, okay?” Richie says, and the world is for a moment only full of guilt. “I’m sorry if I’ve been annoying you, or bothering you, that happens sometimes. But at least tell me to fuck off. You're trying to silently ice me out, I know it. But you can't just do that. Tell me if I'm bothering you. Tell me what the fuck is going on!”
“You wanna know what’s going on?” Stan yells, staring at Richie, whose face is barely an inch from his. The two are standing in the doorway, already drenched, and Stan hates the wet cloth clinging to him. The pitch dark seems crowding on Stan. This whole thing is shit.
Richie doesn’t break eye contact, but there’s a new expression on his face. Richie nods.
“What’s going on is suddenly everything is different. Everything is new. I miss when we were little kids. I miss when everything was fine! Because it’s not fine. Mike, Beverly, and Bill are convinced I like you, and that was new to me. They think I like-like you!” Everything’s coming out and not even Stan can control it. “It’s been too long not thinking about it, and not talking about it, and-” Stan’s panting hard and words are falling out like the pouring, strong, rain around them. But wet clothes and harsh rain forgotten, now Stan can barely feel it.
“Okay bu-” Richie tries to cut in, but Stan interrupts.
“And I didn’t think it would effect me so much but suddenly I’m blushing and suddenly you’re beautiful and suddenly it’s all different and my eyes are open and your stupid jokes are funny, and I hate to admit it and it's not like they weren't funny before but I just don't know. I just don't understand. Everything's all kind of fuzzy and I don't know what to think. And, and I’ve found a million things to love. A million reasons to fall in love and-”
Stan finally stops, and wishes that he could deny what he just said out loud. Stan realizes as soon as the words rushed out his mouth, what he said out loud is true. It's true. He realizes that the water pouring down his cheeks isn’t only the rain. There’s also tears.
“What did you just say?” Richie whispers, a drastic change from the volume before. Tichie steps closer to Stan, leaving space for near nothing between them, except tension.
“Um.” Stan looks down and finds interest in his soaked red converse.
But he wishes he was looking forward when Richie suddenly leans over, tips his head up slowly, presses him against the door and their lips meet into a kiss Stan never knew he needed.
And Stan can't think, because his fingers are curling around into Richie's surprisingly soft black curls and Richie’s arm is wrapping around Stan's waist while the other is pressing Stan to the wall. And their lips rotate together like magnets, in a rhythm that's slow, but everything comes as rapid to him as fast as his heartbeat is.
And it feels good. Really fucking good.
But they break away all too soon and Stan takes out a deep breath and they make eye contact and they both suddenly realized what they’ve both done.
Neither blink. Neither move. But before Stan can scream in his mind or he can freak out, he pulls the drawstring of Richie’s wet hoodie down, and they kiss again. And again. And again.
Somehow, in someway, Richie and Stan’s mouths know each other perfectly. Richie‘s tongue meets Stan’s and he bites Stan’s lip, and Stan lets out the prettiest of moans. The kiss is passionate, and their lip movement is faster. I guess this is what making out is like, Stan thinks.
They unwillingly break apart, because unfortunately, they can’t kiss for the rest of our lives.
“Well, I guess you don’t hate me.” Richie says, and Stan chuckles. Stan intertwines his fingers with Richie’s.
“I’m sorry for being a load of shit to you recently.” Stan apologizes, and although he can’t stop smiling, he at least attempts to look genuine.
“It’s alright. Your shittiness led to us kissing. I mean, I was worried, real worried. I thought you found out I had feelings for you.” Richie admits.
“Well that’s ironic, considering it was just me realizing I’ve been crushing you for the longest time.” Stan says.
“Ooh, you have a crush on me!” Richie grins and teases, and Stan rolls his eyes. The two look at each other. They stay silent until Stan realizes that they are both still out in the cold, soaking wet, and every warning Eddie has ever said is ringing in the back of his mind. Stan pulls his key out of his pocket, laces the two of their hands together again, unlocks the door, and pushes them inside.
Mike was right. The tables have really tabled.