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When Eddie decided to try it, he’d been a little nervous. This was not only for the fact that if the wrong person saw him he’d be mocked for it endlessly, but also, that if his mother saw she’d probably lock him in his room and not let him see other people until he’s forty.
Eddie painted his nails.
Or, more accurately: Bev painted his nails. It had been her idea too, though the idea itself stemmed from a conversation they’d had, which had consisted solely of Eddie saying If I weren’t such a pussy I’d paint my nails, and then Bev responding with You’re not a pussy, and I’ve got a box of nail polish under my bed.
It’s nothing super serious. With Halloween rapidly approaching, and Eddie’s everyday attire consisting of muted primaries, neutrals and black, with that fanny pack for his meds that he swears is just a cross-body bag, he’d needed something to commemorate the spooky season without going overboard. So, naturally, he’d gotten Bev to alternate between black and orange on his right hand, and then just back on his middle left, since that’s the hand he uses to flip people off with.
It’s kind of cool, actually. Eddie hadn’t realized how tacky the stuff was until he touched the little brush when Bev wasn’t looking and left identical orange prints on his thumb and index finger for her to clean later. Eddie also had to find out the hard way that it takes much longer for it to dry than one might expect. When he sheepishly showed the indents in his first three nails from banging them into God knows what, all Bev could do was laugh. That, and make him sit still while she fixed them and blew cool air on them to dry.
When Eddie gets home after lying to his mother that he’d been studying at the library, he has to shove his hands in the pockets of his hoodie so that she doesn’t see them. The last thing he needs is his mother on his back more than she already is. He’ll probably take it off by the end of the day tomorrow, but for now, Eddie feels alright.
-
In the morning, he feels significantly less alright about the whole thing. Most of him knows that it’s cool, that no one's going to care because no one pays attention to him. It’s 2019, after all. He may live in Fucksville, Maine, but it could be worse. Part of him, albeit a small part, still worries about that asshole Bowers and his gang of morons who still think they’re living in the seventies where they can say whatever they want and do whatever they want and get away with it.
As he’s walking, he calls Bev.
“I’m freaking out,” he rushes as soon as she picks up. She’s still at home: he can tell from the low Frank Ocean in the background.
(Eddie always gets to school at least a half an hour early, because they serve free breakfast every morning. It means that one) he has to put little to no effort in getting his shit together in the morning and two) that he doesn’t have to sit at the kitchen table with his mother and listen to her talking about things he doesn’t care about.)
“That’s nothing new. What’s up?”
Eddie sighs, kicks a pebble. “What if people make fun of me? More than usual, I mean.” He laughs, though there’s no humour behind it.
“For what? Your nails?” Eddie grumbles in response. “Nobody’s going to make fun of you,” she says. And Eddie knows she’s probably right, but he feels like things could still go horribly for him. “I wear nail polish all the time.”
“You’re a girl,” Eddie stresses. He tugs on his backpack straps and sighs again. “It’s different. You’re allowed to because women have done it forever. I on, the other hand, am deemed by society not allowed to do it because I’m a dude. I don’t want to get crazy deep or anything but I’m just saying.”
“Well,” Bev says. “Fuck that shit, man.”
“What?”
“Who gives a shit? Like, what is it going to hurt anyone?” Eddie mumbles something under his breath. “Do you like it?”
Eddie pauses to think. “Well, yeah.” Of course he does. Why would he have not picked it all off if he didn’t like it? Or even have let her do it in the first place?
“Then that’s all that matters.”
Huh. She’s kind of right. “I guess I never thought about it like that,” Eddie admits honestly, turning into the courtyard of his school. “Thanks, Bev."
“You got it, Eddie. See you in English?”
“Yep. See you.”
They hang up.
To be completely honest, Eddie’s most worried about the Losers’ opinions. What if they don’t like it? What if they think it makes him too effeminate?
Richie’s probably going to make fun of him for it.
He’s been mentally preparing for it all day, really, and brainstorming what he might say. Hand modelling now, Kaspbrak? or Look at you, finally trying to look nice in that stupid whiny voice or even What the fuck is that, Eds? Eddie’s not quite sure which one is worse. He’s been subject to Richie’s incessant teasing for as long as he can remember and most of the time it’s fine. It’s nothing more than nicknames and You’re so tiny. How’s the weather down there? and I fucked your mom, for the most part. This is different. Eddie actually cares about this kind of stuff and he’s not sure that Richie will get the memo.
Whatever. He knows that Bev’s got his back regardless. She punched Richie in the dick for stupid shit more times than Eddie can remember.
-
Despite being the place where eating is supposed to happen, the cafeteria is always the emptiest place at lunch. Most people go to that pizza shop on the main strip or the burger joint down the road. Those who don’t are usually on the edges of the halls. Eddie and his friends populate the table in the far back corner every lunch, and they have since they were freshies.
He hasn’t seen any of them except for Bev, since he doesn’t have any classes with them until after lunch on Day One. He and Bev also happen to be the last at the table, since she had to run and grab her money from her locker. Now, with lunch in hand, they approach their table.
“Hey, assholes,” Richie calls to them. He’s sitting on the table, even though there’s more than enough chairs for them.
Mike shoots Richie a look, then glances at the two approaching and says, “Hey, guys.”
Eddie waves hello with his free hand and sits down in the seat beside Stan. “What’s up?” he greets.
“Not much,” Bill says, “I was just talking about how my neighbour’s house caught on fire yesterday and now I own their cat until they can either a) fix the damage and replace the stuff they lost or b) find somewhere to live.”
“I’m sorry, what ?” Bev asks. Eddie pulls his sandwich out of his lunch bag. It’s homemade ham and cheese, cut diagonally with no crusts. He’s too proud to admit his mother still makes and packs his lunch, even though he’s graduating this year. The story is odd, Eddie will admit but it does sound like the kind of predicament one of his idiot friends would get themselves into.
“Yeah, remember that cat that I befriended in like, eighth grade? Apparently, its owners were my neighbours two doors down. They left a candle burning overnight like idiots and their whole second floor went up in flames. My parents said that we’d take the cat since they also decided to blab that I want to steal it, which is true, but definitely should not have been said in this instance.”
“Shit,” Eddie says, lifting his hands to take a bite of his sandwich. He remembers the cat, kind of. He remembers Bill posting videos of it on Snapchat. “At least you finally get to have a pet?”
“Yeah.” Bill shrugs. “Georgie seemed to like the idea a lot, and my parents couldn’t really say no since they offered to do anything the family needed. Downside is--”
“Woah,” Ben interjects. “What’d you do with your nails?” The group looks him, and then Eddie, who unceremoniously drops his sandwich into its container and folds his hands in his lap, away from their prying eyes.
“Nothing,” he brushes them off, shrugging.
“I didn’t mean it in a bad way,” Ben clarifies, looking hurt that Eddie would think that of him. Eddie purses his lips. “Can I see?” Hesitantly, he lifts his hands, tipping them downwards for everyone to see.
“I think it’s cool,” Stan says.
“Yeah,” Mike pipes in. “Halloween and shit. Seasonally appropriate. I like that.”
“Fashion-forward,” Ben says.
Bill nods in agreement. “Nice touch with just the middle finger on your left. That’s your flipping-off hand.”
Bev just kicks him under the table and gives him a look, as if to say I told you so. He narrows his eyes in a look that says Eat shit.
His friends are trying to be supportive without making things weird, and they’re only sort of succeeding. Eddie appreciates the sentiment, however, something feels off. He eyes the group and notices something. Bev seems to notice at the same time, because she says, “What do you think, Richie?” And he just gawks.
It’s crazy how Eddie managed to literally render Richie Tozier speechless. Never in his life has he ever seen Richie like this: eyes wide behind his thick glasses, eyebrows raised, quiet as a mouse. It’s almost chilling, actually.
“It, uh,” Richie says, adjusting his glasses. “It looks… nice, Eds.”
“What, no insult?” Eddie says. He’s just as shocked as the rest of them, who sit glancing at Richie with a mixture of confusion and shock on their faces. This is a big deal. Not only did Eddie render Richie speechless, he also fished a compliment out of him? What alternate universe did Eddie fall into where Richie Tozier isn’t a piece of shit?
Richie just shakes his head.
Okay. Cool.
“Right,” Mike says. “Back you your cat story, Bill.”
The whole thing is forgotten.
-
Richie acts really weird with him all day. Not that Richie doesn’t act weird anyways, but it’s a different weird. New weird. Awkward weird.
In science class he pretty much refuses to talk to Eddie even though they’re lab partners, and he hardly cracks a single joke about their teacher, Mr. Calloway, who has a triple butt-chin and for some reason speaks in a transatlantic accent despite the fact that it’s 2019 and nobody actually speaks in that accent since it’s made up. That’s comedy gold. Richie can always find something to say under his breath that will never fail to make Eddie laugh, but not today.
In English, he doesn’t even look at Eddie, and it’s freaking him out. Usually, he’ll at least shoot him a mocking expression at whatever Eddie’s forced to read aloud, but today, he keeps his eyes down and his nose buried in his boo
It’s starting to freak Eddie out.
What could he have possibly done to make Richie act so strangely?
Was it his nails? Was it that Richie was freaked out because of the feminine connotation? Because it’s stereotypically gay?
He corners Richie after school and drags him down to the baseball field he knows will be empty today. Literally drags him by the collar of his sweater.
“What the fuck are you doing, Eduardo?” he asks, but it’s not how he would normally have said it and they both know. Despite being a handful of inches shorter than Richie, Eddie tightens his grip and tugs harder so that Richie will walk faster. “Will you cut it out? You’re going to choke me to death, asswipe.”
When they get to the bleachers, Eddie finally lets Richie go. He stumbles for a moment before regaining balance.
“What the fuck is your problem, Richie?"
Richie looks at him incredulously. “What?”
“You’ve been acting weird ever since lunch ended. You hardly talked to me in science, you wouldn’t even look at me in English. You didn’t crack a single fucking joke about Mr. Calloway or Shakespeare. Not even about me.”
“You want me to make fun of you?” Richie narrows his eyes, deflecting the comment.
“I want you to tell me what the fuck is up.”
Richie huffs out a breath, fumbling. He twiddles with his fingers. Is he nervous?
After what feels like forever, he picks up Eddie’s right hand and says, “It’s this.”
Eddie furrows his eyebrows. “My nails?” he asks. He doesn’t understand why they’d have Richie so worked up. “What, because they make me gay? To which I’d have to say: it’s 2019--”
“Because I like them and you’re not,” Richie rushes, cutting Eddie off short. Eddie blinks up at him.
He wants to say: Oh my god Oh my god Oh my god Oh my god but it would hardly be coherent enough for Richie to understand. Instead, Eddie says: What the fuck are you saying to me right now? and it’ll just have to do.
“I’m saying that I like it and you’re not,” Richie stresses. “Gay, I mean.”
Eddie blinks slow again, processing. He glances down, and Richie is still holding his hand. Upon this realization, he drops it. “What gave you that impression?”
Now it’s Richie’s turn to blink slow. “You are?”
“Yeah.” Huh. Surprisingly easy to say. The only other person who he’s explicitly told was Bev because he trusts her. Not that he doesn’t trust Richie. It’s just different. “You like my nails, for real?”
“I like you, dipshit,” Richie says. Oh. Ohhhh. Eddie gets it. Why Richie was acting weird. Why he’s always acting weird. And Eddie thought he was the smart one.
Eddie doesn’t say anything. Instead, he leans up on his toes and kisses Richie on the mouth.
“Woah,” Richie says when they pull apart, like an idiot. “You--?”
“Yeah, dumbass.”
Richie nods. “Cool. Cool, cool, cool. Nice. Alright.”
“Rich,” Eddie stresses, but he’s smiling. “Shut up.” Then he kisses him again.