Work Text:
I said I loved you to death
So I must be dead
It makes me sick, you know my skin
My sins are all built in, you know
So I must be dead
It makes me sick, you know my skin
My freckles and my hands, you know
-
No one talks about relationships in the context of their endings. Everyone always talks about how happy they are and how in love they are and they only talk in terms of next month or next year or forever. No one talks about how few of those relationships actually lasted.
But they should've. Richie and Eddie, they were always supposed to be forever. All their friends saw it, knew it from the time they were kids: they were something special.
Despite all that, Richie still ended up where he was, stretched across his unmade bed in a room covered in dirty clothes, scrolling through pictures he should've deleted already. It had been 3 weeks. 3 weeks since he'd talked to Eddie, 3 weeks since his life was ripped apart, 3 weeks since he'd eaten a proper meal or gone out with a friend or left his apartment for any reason other than work.
Heartbreak felt a little like drowning.
About half way through the pictures, he started crying. Right after, the crying was more painful, like his heart was being physically ripped from his chest and someone was squeezing at his head, trying to make it explode. After a while, everything dulled, to the point where he didn't notice he was crying until he saw wet marks show up on his sleeves.
So he kept scrolling, wiping carelessly at his cheek with the back of his hand. Another minute later and the phone started vibrating with a call. He looked at the name with a sigh. Bev. He could call her back.
He'd been saying that for 2 weeks.
Bev was the first person he called after everything, his body shaking with sobs that made him hard to understand. She stayed up with him all night, whispering comforting words at 2 a.m. when he found something new to cry over. He called her nearly every night for a week, despite the fact that he was in California and she was in New York, so it was usually around 1 in the morning when he called; but no matter what, she was always there.
He couldn't really put into words why he stopped calling. Maybe he was tired of being an inconvenience, or maybe he felt that, after a week, he should be more recovered. Or at the very least, not up half the night crying. He wanted to talk to her when he was better. So he stopped answering.
-
I've never seen a face with your type of shine
You moved in behind my eyes and built yourself a shrine
But then you ran away
And you left the picture frames
Now I don't see my face the same
-
You never really know whether something you say could be the last words you say to someone. They could end up dead right after they leave you or you could just lose touch with them or you're in the middle of a huge fight that could end whatever connection you had.
Eddie kept thinking about the last things he said to Richie for weeks after they ended. He ran them over and over in his mind, flipping them upside down and inside out, wishing to take them back.
It was his fault. That single thought kept echoing, in the middle of a class or a shift at work, creeping in like a virus and infecting everything else. He started the fight. He wasn't around enough. Richie had to come see him more than he could go to see Richie. He was distant and distracted or overbearing and overprotective. They'd still be together if he didn't fuck up.
Maybe his mother was right. He'd always end up alone.
It seemed easy enough to act normal, even as his chest was caving in. He broke down the day it happened, calling Stan who almost booked a flight from Florida to come see him until he promised to go over and see Bev and Ben if he needed company. But the next day, he was back at school and at work, smiling and laughing and joking. Until he went home alone and cried as he found a t-shirt Richie left in his apartment, falling asleep curled up around the old, worn out cotton, only to fake it through the next day again.
It was his fault, so he deserved it all.
-
Do you see
You're the reason I can't sleep?
Lose it where your head should be
In the dark between my sheets
Do you see
You're the reason I can't sleep?
Lose it where your head should be
In the dark between my sheets
-
"Eds, your feet are like fucking ice cubes, stop!"
Eddie just laughed softly at Richie's grumbling, pressing his feet against his boyfriend's bare legs again, making Richie flail his arms in the covers.
"It's always so fucking cold here," Richie continued, finally settling again with his arms firmly around Eddie's waist.
"No, California has made you weak," Eddie countered, his head settling comfortably in the crook of Richie's neck.
It was a few days before the break up, the last time Richie flew from LA to New York to spend a week with Eddie in his tiny apartment. When they were good, they were really really good. They spent their weeks together letting take out boxes pile up as they watched Netflix and fell into bed together, a messy tangle of limbs and sheets.
It was one of those nights and they were both in nothing but boxers despite the below freezing weather, sharing blankets and body heat. After freezing Richie with his feet, Eddie lazily tangled a hand in Richie's messy curls as Richie trailed gentle kisses across the smaller man's forehead, a soft smile on his face.
"Come live with me," Richie murmured after a beat.
Eddie let out a quick laugh, shaking his head. "Rich, we've been over this. I'm still in school. I still have a life here."
Richie was the only one of their group who hadn't committed to college after graduation, choosing instead to head to California and try his hand at breaking into acting or comedy or both. He and Eddie started dating senior year of high school and everyone said they wouldn't be able to handle the distance. They made it through 3 years before everyone ended up being right.
"Yeah, for 8 months. Then you'll graduate and you'll be completely free to say fuck everything and join your devilishly handsome boyfriend in the sunshine state."
"Richie, Florida is the sunshine state."
"You're not answering." Richie's reply came with another kiss to Eddie's head, hoping to distract from his pounding heart. They had talked about this before, every time they saw each other, but the closer it got to Eddie's graduation, the more real it felt.
A silence settled over the room and every fiber of Richie's being wanted to make a joke, to lighten the mood and forget he ever brought it up. But for once, he stayed quiet.
Finally, Eddie sighed deeply, hiding his face in Richie's shoulder before speaking. "We've never spent more than a couple weeks together since high school. What if you end up hating me?"
Just like that, Richie felt the tight grip on his lungs easing and he laughed a little too loudly, the sound bouncing off the walls. "Shit, Eds, that's what you're worried about? We spent every day together the whole time growing up and you think I'm gonna get sick of you?"
"We're not kids anymore, Rich."
"I know, everything I did with your mom last night is legal now."
Richie could practically hear Eddie roll his eyes, though he also heard a faint chuckle, so he accomplished his goal.
They fell quiet again after that, Richie tracing gentle circles on Eddie's shoulder with his finger until he finally spoke up after a few minutes. "I'm not gonna hate you. Ever. You're the love of my life, Eds. You always have been. You always will be. I want you with me all the time." He sighed a little, voice softer when he continued. "If you don't wanna come to California, I could move here. I'll do open mic nights at clubs and get a day job."
"Richie…"
"No, I'm serious." He locked eyes with Eddie, mouth set in an almost intense frown. "I'd do anything for you, Eds. I just wanna be with you."
"Give me a little time?" Eddie whispered, squeezing his eyes shut.
The grip on Richie's lungs returned, but he nodded, keeping his tone light. "Yeah, of course, baby. I'm not going anywhere."
-
I said I loved you to death
So I must be dead
It makes me sick, you know my skin
My sins are all built in, you know
So I must be dead
It makes me sick, you know my skin
My freckles and my hands, you know
-
An hour after ignoring Bev's phone call, Richie got a text from her. He sighed deeply when he saw it pop up on his screen, not wanting to open it. If he opened it, she'd know he was ignoring her. He spent a solid minute staring at his screen, listening to nothing but his heart pounding in his ear and distant sirens outside, until he finally decided to bite the bullet and read the text.
"Richie I know you're ignoring my calls. It's okay if you're still hurting, just talk to me, we're worried"
Richie sighed again, rubbing at his tired, damp eyes before staring at the ceiling again. He wasn't sure how long he went without responding, but apparently it was long enough for Bev to text again.
"I know you read this, just talk to me. We don't have to talk about it, we can just talk"
He squeezed his eyes shut as more tears gathered there, wiping roughly at his cheek and sitting up slowly. His head started spinning as soon as he lifted it, but he forced himself to stay sitting. He hadn't eaten enough, he knew that. Couldn't remember the last time he drank any water, but that wasn't abnormal. Eddie was always yelling at him over that.
"sorry. it's hard to talk about anything u know?"
More tears came as he pressed send and he pulled his knees up to his chest, curling into a ball around himself. He knew well enough that his simple text, as depressing as it was, definitely had Bev smiling. At least he responded for once.
"I get it, Richie, I do. It wasn't just 4 years, it was your whole life. You don't have to be okay yet"
Bev anyways understood everything, better than he ever could. She was his voice of reason, his conscious in another body who kept his head on straight, as straight as it could be.
He wanted her there. He'd built up enough air miles from visiting Eddie, he could swing a flight to see Bev. But that meant being back in the same city as Eddie, where anything around every corner could remind him and send him back into a downward spiral.
"i still feel him everywhere. like… still smell him on my clothes or i see someone in the street and i think it's him"
"Maybe this is stupid, but… why don't you just call him? He misses you too"
Richie sighed again as his chest constricted, the sound of his pounding heart thumping loudly in his ear. He'd thought about calling, at least 5 times a day, but it couldn't be that easy. They broke up for a reason, right?
"i'm trying to let him move on"
Maybe he didn't call because he was just scared of the response.
-
Sober makes the months go slower
So I tried to get away
I flew to California
I chose the worst place
It's where I flew to see you for the first time
I was broke but sold half of my records, gave the money to an airline
2015 was cold and I was see-through
Had to meet you, now I'm watching past me in the rear-view
-
Eddie never could handle his liquor well. Anytime he tried going out with his friends, he ended up in the bathroom throwing up after just a few drinks. Which led to him thinking about all the filth on the floor he was kneeling on and the diseases he could get from it, which sent him into near panic attacks on top of his drunken state.
Anyone else could go out and get wasted to distract from a break up, but Eddie knew it wouldn't help him.
So why was he doing it anyway?
Ben kept trying to tell him to slow down, reminding him of how fucked up he'd end up getting, but then he got a glimpse of a tall man with curly brown hair and he knew it wasn't Richie, he knew it, but it made his heart ache anyway and he downed another shot.
Almost like clockwork, he was in the bathroom 10 minutes later, knelt over the toilet and trying to steady his breathing. The alcohol didn't fill the aching hole in chest. It might have made it worse, in fact. That was Eddie's one clear thought as he leaned against the bathroom wall, sobs coming in sputtered gasps.
He missed Richie.
He'd had a few nights like this while he and Richie were together, and he would call and Richie calmed him down, helping him breathe through the panic and sobering him up at the same time. He just wanted to call Richie again.
A couple minutes of crying had him leaning over the toilet again, throwing up and starting the cycle over. He pulled out his phone as his breathing picked up again, finger hovering over Richie's contact info.
He knew he needed to leave Richie alone. Neither of them could ever move on if they still leaned on each other for everything. But he needed Richie. Needed to hear his voice or his heart felt like it would explode.
So he pressed call.
-
Do you see
You're the reason I can't sleep?
Lose it where your head should be
In the dark between my sheets
Do you see
You're the reason I can't sleep?
Lose it where your head should be
In the dark between my sheets
-
Richie had only been back in LA for a few hours after his last week with Eddie when everything blew up. He'd texted Eddie, telling him he'd got back safely then headed home, not too concern when he didn't hear back right away. Eddie may have been working or doing homework and couldn't check his phone.
When it had been 3 hours, though, and his text had "read" written under it, that made Richie worry.
"eds, everything okay? it's fine if ur busy i'm just missing u already"
"u and ur mom"
Read and read. Fuck. Richie paused, dropping a half-eaten slice of pizza back into the box and calling Eddie, the familiar constriction on his lungs returning once more.
He let out a quiet sigh of relief when Eddie answered with a mumbled, "Hi," but his heart kept hammering.
"Eds, hey!" Richie said quickly. "Did something happen, you seemed fine when you dropped me at the airport. Is Stan coming to visit and dragging you bird watching again?"
He tried for a laugh but it caught in his throat, his fear growing with every second.
"Richie…" Eddie replied, sounding about as far away as he actually was. "I can't move to California. And I can't make you move here."
"Eds, I told you, I could never hate you," Richie murmured, tugging a hand through his messy curls.
"It's not that." Eddie let out a shaky sigh and it sounded like he was crying, but Richie couldn't be sure. "We have our own lives. I already have an interview for a job after graduation with my internship, you have auditions and an agent. I love you but we can't… if we give up our life for this, just to live together, we're gonna end up resenting each other.
"So we just… keep this up? Flying across the country, being alone most of the time, losing sleep just to talk? Eddie, I wanna be with you. I'd give up all this other shit just to see you every day, don't you feel like that?"
He could hear the desperation, the pleading in his voice, and he hated himself for it but he couldn't stop it.
"Of course I do," Eddie said, the faintest hint of a sharp edge on his tone. "You know I do, but that doesn't mean we won't end up resenting it later. So what if you move here, then in 5 years, you find out about this movie role you could've gotten but you couldn't even audition because you were in New York with me?"
"Then I'll figure something out! I'll get the fuck over it, I don't fucking know, I just… we always had an ending to the long distance thing. 4 years and you graduate and we move in together, that was the goal."
"Things change."
That's when the walls started closing in. This couldn't be happening, it was never ever supposed to happen. They were forever. They were always forever.
"Eds please… we'll figure something out, don't do this."
"I'm not doing anything! I'm just giving you a dose of reality, Rich, because you can never seem to find it yourself."
Richie's breathing became more unsteady then, the grip on his chest tightening and he had to bite at his lip to hold back tears.
"We can't keep it up like this forever," Richie breathed out. "So I guess you are doing something."
The line fell silent, aside from a few choked sobs from Eddie's end, until he finally responded.
"I guess so. Have a good life, Rich. Hope you get everything you want."
Richie couldn't respond. The aching sobs hit him and he ended the call before Eddie could hear. His apartment felt too small and the smell of pizza was threatening to make him throw up, so he stumbled into the bedroom, curling in on himself and letting himself cry until his head was pounding.
-
I said I loved you to death
So I must be dead
It makes me sick, you know my skin
My sins are all built in, you know
So I must be dead
It makes me sick, you know my skin
My freckles and my hands, you know
-
"Eddie?" Richie said as he answered Eddie's drunken phone call, almost convinced he imagined the name on his phone. He thought about Eddie calling so many times, it wouldn't be too far fetched.
"Hey, Rich," Eddie responded, his slurred words making it clear that he was drunk. The sound of Richie's voice already made him feel calmer, even despite everything.
"Eds…" He wanted to ask a million questions, beg for Eddie to take him back, but he knew exactly where Eddie was and snapped into action without thinking. "Take some deep breaths, okay? In through your nose, out through your mouth." He breathed with Eddie for a minute, sighing when Eddie spoke again.
"Thank you. I'm… sorry I called you like this. I just needed you."
They both fell quiet, Richie staring at his floor and Eddie staring up at the ceiling.
"I miss you, Richie. I've missed you every day and I can't stop thinking about you… regretting what I did…"
"You had a good point, " Richie murmured. "I still… I don't think I could ever resent you, but you had a point."
"I shouldn't have said it the way I did, though. You deserved better."
Richie felt tears in his eyes again, but he let them fall, a hand gripping his knee to steady himself.
"I haven't stopped thinking about you," Richie whispered. "Everything feels empty without you."
Eddie went quiet again and Richie only heard a faint noise as he lifted himself up off the floor, moving to the sink before he spoke up again.
"We should talk… when I'm not drunk. We need to talk."
"Yeah… okay."
-
Do you see?
You're the reason I can't sleep
Lose it where your head should be
In the dark between my sheets, my sheets
Do you see?
You're the reason I can't sleep
Lose it where your head should be
In the dark between my sheets
My sheets, my sheets, my-
-
A week later and Eddie was in California, catching a cab to Richie's place. Richie tried to fly there, but Eddie's nagging guilt over causing the whole situation in the first place wouldn't let him agree to that. He ended things, he'd make the effort to fix it.
His hands were sweaty and shaking as he knocked at Richie's door, breathing unsteady. It couldn't have been more than 30 seconds before Richie opened the door, but it felt like an eternity before he finally saw the other man's face.
They both looked tired, extra bags under their eyes and skin pale. Richie looked thinner, a clear sign of how little he'd been eating and Eddie hadn't shaved in a while, a faint scruff of dark hair covering his chin.
"Um, come in," Richie murmured, moving out of the way. He hadn't bothered cleaning, laundry still piled on the couch and sink full of dishes, but Eddie tried not to linger on it as he took a seat.
"Have you eaten today?" Eddie murmured, looking up at Richie as he made his way to the couch to sit next to Eddie.
"No, I haven't." Richie sighed a little, avoiding Eddie's eyes as he braced for a lecture that never came.
"I'm sorry," Eddie said instead, looking at his feet. "I know I said it already, but… I feel like I need to keep saying it."
"It's okay, Eds. I get it."
"It's not okay. I was scared. I've always been scared and I finally let it… fuck everything up."
The air in the room was thick and there was an awkwardness between them that they'd never had before. Richie wanted to wrap his arms around Eddie, pull him in and kiss him until everything was okay again, but he knew he couldn't.
"We can figure it out, Eds," Richie whispered, an echo of the same pleas he made the night they broke up. "I know we can."
Eddie looked up at Richie finally, eyes wet with tears. "I want to. I really, really want to."
He tried to hold himself back, but he couldn't help himself when he saw Eddie crying. He wrapped an arm around the smaller man's shoulder, pulling him into a tight hug. Eddie almost collapsed against Richie's chest, his crying picking up as he wrapped his arms around Richie's waist and held onto him for dear life.
They stayed like that for a while, tangled together and Eddie's tears soaking Richie's shirt. Finally, they broke apart, a shaky breath leaving Eddie. "I missed you, Rich."
"We'll figure it out," Richie promised again.
The month-long grip on his chest finally let go as Eddie leaned into him again and he breathed a sigh of relief, kissing Eddie's head.
It wasn't perfect. Nothing ever was. But it was enough.