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It takes Richie at least five full minutes to leave his car, his hands aren’t shaking yet but he can feel the tremors build in his knuckles and spread to his fingertips as he tries again to unlock his door. In the seven hours that it took to fly to Maine, he’s had to time to run over and over again the few memories that now popped in his mind every time he mouthed Derry quietly to himself. It’s only flashes, pixeled images of one cruel Summer or fainted postcards of consciousness that tell the story of a friendship that ran deeper than he could have ever imagined.
In all these years, he had forgotten far more than the trauma of attacking a child-eating monster wearing a red nose. He truly hates the fact that those are the parts that come to his mind so easily, he can feel the cold weight of a metal baseball bat in his hands but he can’t seem to place just yet why the mini carton of vanilla Haagen-Dazs he bought at the duty-free store suddenly made him feel nauseous and lonely. He’s had ice cream in the twenty-seven years since he left his shithole town, so why does he only feel now like there’s something missing in this equation? Something he can’t name yet?
He taps on his steering wheel, his nails scratching the plastic leather a little as he tries to control his breathing with the technique one of his old managers taught him when he started doing regular shows. This is a rental, a red Mustang that clashes almost pathetically with the car he actually owns back in LA, a green beat-up Toyota he bought when he was thirty-one after his first big paycheck and that he’s never had the heart to change, even when it stopped giving him the time. He would like to say that he doesn’t why he chose this particular flashy type of ride, but he knows deep down that this is just a new performance. He hopes his friends, the ones he can’t remember the names of yet, see his car and think that he made it, that he’s a big deal now and not that he’s the same loser who left Derry when he was fifteen and never looked back.
He takes a deep breath, his hands still tight around the wheel and he exhales, sweat starting to form on his forehead as he finally steps a foot out and tries not to vomit on the spot. He wonders how long the fear in his stomach will physically revolt him so, he hopes he won’t spill his guts when he sees his friends for the first time in almost three decades, both metaphorically and physically.
This town, it’s cold and humid weather that makes the tip of his hair curl upward, its crisp wind that brings no other smell than the reminiscence of piss, shit and death that are stuck in Richie’s nose and its pastel-toned shops that mimic the fifties like they weren’t a time of absolute cruelty, everything makes Richie want to step out of his skin and run.
Richie is aware of his repression, he knows he’s so far deep in the closet that he could make out with a coat. He knows what he is, even if he can never say it out loud, never admit it, even to his few but destroying hookups who liberate something crucial inside of him in the darkness of his room before he locks it again, further and further with every man who presses a kiss to his temple as the loathing that lives inside him like a virus tries to drown him. He knows that he’s the byproduct of period typical homophobia and small-town despotism but knowing doesn’t vaccinate you from internalising that shit so fucking deeply that you almost forget your own sexuality. He’s lucky he remembers it every time he has to make a joke about boobs on stage, it’s like a shot of recognition that also tastes like absolute shit. So basically, vodka.
His tongue feels heavy and pasty in his mouth, like raw unshapen dough, he craves something that will give him a sort of form. He probably has a joint somewhere in his bag but he left it at the hotel and he doesn’t have fucking time to go smoke one before he has to meet his friends.
His friends .
Gosh, he needs a cigarette. He starts digging in his jacket’s pockets when he notices the small redhead woman in front of the restaurant and the tall man approaching her, leaning on himself like he’s trying to seem less impressive. He’s drawn to them, looking at how the woman throws herself in the man’s arms like she’s known him her entire life before something in him snaps, and her name is on his lips. That’s his Beverly.
He stares a little longer, lost in colour of her hair and the way it reminds him of the sun and that overwhelming feeling of courage that you can only have when you love someone or when you’re thirteen and you’ve faced death. And the man, the man whose face has changed but whose eyes are still the same shade of soft brown, melted dravite, that once looked at him as he kept his hands firmly clamped on the bloody letter carved on his abdomen.
Ben and Bev, back again and better looking. It’s almost a little insulting how beautiful they are next to each other, and even apart, but even though they look like models now, their hugs feel the same and for a moment, a fleeting one, Richie remembers being loved.
They enter the restaurant together, Ben and Bev talking quickly as he looks around, taking in the red and green decor and the shiny gong on his right. He picks up drumstick before he can even think about it, it’s heavier than it looked and it’s a little unbalanced but he’s quite satisfied with the sound he makes as he hits the instrument and makes the four men in front of fish tank jump in surprise.
He recognises Bill first and as he recognises his blue eyes and his genuine smile, he’s also reminded of the grainy picture at the back of the book he’s reading right now, that book about a fucking car who kills people like that’s a normal thing cars do. Big Bill become an author and a real one, Richie has seen at least a dozen of his books come out and he’s bought almost just as much, weirdly attracted to this particular brand of horror without actually enjoying the genre ordinary. He guesses that now he knows why he sometimes binge reads William Denbrough’s books and feels uncomfortable sad afterwards, he wasn’t just being embarrassing, he had baggage there.
Mike looks good, better than Ben if Richie gives his opinion. A solid nine, like very solid, he wonders if Mike had always looked so tall and brawny or if he’s Derry’s local sturdy monster hunter. Either way, Richie has missed him terribly and it helps that the guy is a pleasure to look at.
His eyes stop on Stanley next. That dear darling Stan Uris, the man, the legend, the one that Richie didn’t remember until two seconds ago but who now fills every gap in his life like a puzzle piece. If Bev, Ben, Bill and Mike were his friends, his best friends, Stan was something more. Stan was the missing link that had kept his life whole for so long and had left him barren when they grew apart. He feels himself start smiling so wide, something like hysteric joy bubbling in his heart as he takes in all of Stan and Stan takes all of him. The other man smiles too and something passes between them, the unspoken knowledge that whatever happens tonight, Richie and Stan are never forgetting each other ever again.
He makes a move to catch Stan in his arms and hug him so tight that he snaps one of his ribs, but he’s interrupted when someone waves on Stan’s left, and that’s when Richie’s brain stops working.
Eddie Kaspbrak is standing right there, in a red vest and a fucking polo shirt, his brown hair combed neatly and his eyes still bigger than anyone’s eyes should ever be. His face must be seventy-five per cent eyes, Richie feels his blood drawn out of his face as he adjusts his glasses in panic. There’s Eddie Spaghetti Kaspbrak right in front of him, all grown up and pretty, awkward smile and all, beautiful like it isn’t fucking weird for a forty-year-old man to be beautiful, like that isn’t a personal attack on Richie Tozier’s pining ass. It’s been twenty-seven years but Richie looks at Eddie Kaspbrak and he’s in love again.
He looks at Eddie and he’s thirteen and scared. He’s thirteen and the murderous clown that lives in the sewers isn’t the most threatening villain of his life, he’s thirteen and he’s crying, balls of snot running down his nose as he tries to calm the nausea that grips his throat like a knife. He’s thirteen and he hates himself but he loves Eddie Kaspbrak so much and he’s carving their initials on the Kissing Bridge. His biggest act of bravery as a teen, bigger even than bashing in the head of the monster that killed his friend’s brother.
He doesn’t wait to be sat down to order seven shots, all for himself, and they’ve barely all said hello when he starts drinking. If someone finds that rude, they don’t comment on it, not even Eddie but he does catch a look from Stan, who is right next to him and steals one of his spring rolls out of his plate when they start eating. He listens to his friends’ life stories, sometimes a little distracted by the blur that starts to cloud his mind as he downs another shot and swallows whole shrimp tempura. Stan is an accountant, he’s married to a woman named Patty he seems to love a lot. Which doesn’t look to be the case for Bev, who barely talks about her husband and redirects the conversation on her company. It’s exciting and thrilling, Richie agrees, but the way she covers her wrists with her shirt or with her other hand (which doesn’t wear a shiny wedding ring) leaves a sour taste at the back of his mouth, something vile.
Bill is really an author and he writes shitty endings that Mike seems to be the only one to enjoy. Mike hasn’t changed much in a distressing way, he’s become a librarian now but Derry has drained the cheer out of him, it’s crumbled him down in palatable parts that Richie hopes they can all put back together now.
Ben is an architect, a very famous one with that, and he’s talented and smart and still as kind and still as beautiful but now Richie guesses the vainest people can notice it too. He talks about his work with sombre humility and about his dog with unconditional adoration and that’s the Ben that Richie loves.
He does another shot before he asks the question that he knows will hurt him, the one he’s asked over and over tonight but not to Eddie, never to Eddie, because he’s noticed the ring, he knows, but he needs to hear it. He needs to let himself give it up, he needs to move on, he has to. It’s been 27 years.
“So wait, Eddie, you got married?”
He sees the way Eddie tenses up, the way his shoulder form a harsh horizontal line and with anyone else he would brace himself for the rebuttal, but if his memory doesn’t mislead him, he knows Eddie is going to answer.
He’s right.
“Yeah, why is it so fucking funny, dickwad?” Eddie says, a chopstick pointed accusingly towards Richie, who still has the tart taste of tequila on his tongue and bites back a smile.
“What, to like a woman?”
Eddie’s lips get thin and his eyes burn a little brighter, the weight in Richie’s chest gets heavier. “Fuck you, bro.”
He can feel Stan’s eyes on him and he feels sticky with sweat, alcohol and shame, but it doesn’t stop him. He knows his role. “Fuck you!” He sings back and his fingers stretch ahead under the table, towards the red vest that Eddie wears. Red like the V he had written on his cast, that Summer of 1989.
“What about you, Trashmouth, you got married?” Bill asks on his right and he’s smiling but Richie knows where to look to find the tentative jitters in Bill’s attitude. He wants to give Richie an out, which is kind of him, but also not totally uninterested, because Richie can also see in the way Bill turns his ring three times on his finger while he glances at Mike that this is also Bill’s own exit door.
Beverly dismisses the idea immediately and Stan makes a joke about lost invitations, but Richie’s eyes are still strained on Eddie. There’s a pressure building in his lungs and he feels like they’re gonna collapse under it, like he’s slowly filling with rancid water, grey and warmed with blood and yeah, he was right. He’s thirteen again and he knows his role, he’s created it all alone and he never broke character. Because boys like him need to be fucking good actors to survive a place like the town of Derry.
For a second, he thinks of saying no, because it’s the truth, but he’s never been really good with the truth and he rejects the idea immediately. Then he thinks about making a joke, because that’s part of the role too, that’s what he’s good at. Or what he used to know, now he has writers who tell him what to say and what’s funny, so maybe, his jokes aren’t good anymore. Maybe they never were.
“Yeah, I got married.”
Beverly takes a sip of her wine with a sigh, “Richie, I don’t believe it.”
“Yeah, no, I got married.” He’s drowning now, he can feel it. But it’s okay, he’s used to it, he knows how long he can keep his head under. Stan’s hand flexes next to him, like he’s trying to stay quiet, like the truth is trying to spill out of him. But Stan doesn’t know his life, doesn’t really know him anymore, he just knows , Richie guesses, because he’s Stan and this is his way of saying slow down .
Stan tries to say, silently, breathe . But Richie is drowning, he’s been for twenty-seven years and he guesses that in a sick way, he’s never fucking learned how to swim.
“Her name is Lisa,” He lies, the name compact on his tongue, unfamiliar and strange. Lisa was the name of his scene partner when he did acting camp in third grade. He hopes to God or any deity that inhabits Derry and that doesn’t want his skin that nobody will remember that or point it out. He starts taping on the table with a chopstick, eyes stuck to the plate of noodle in front of him. “She’s, uh, she’s great.”
He can’t look up, can’t think of trying to catch Eddie’s glance, he thinks it would kill him. Ben comes to his rescue.
“What does she do?”
His question seems to wake his friends up from their trance and new interrogations fuse from right to left, Beverly asks how long they’ve been together (He says five years, for no reason in particular), Bill wonders where they met (A random work party, she worked in communication with one of his managers), Mike asks if they think of having kids (Yes? Maybe? He’s not sure.) Stan doesn’t ask questions, he stays quiet and keeps drinking his beer, a look of perfected composure plastered on his face as Richie lies through his teeth about his wife’s favourite type of flowers. Eddie doesn’t talk either, he seems busy digging in his fried rice with the end of his chopstick, the wood making a shrill sound every time it hits the plate. He doesn’t look up either, his eyes drilling holes in the surface of the table. Richie doesn’t wanna say that he’s avoiding him, but it looks and feels like it. He gets ready to ask if Eddie is okay when the other man finally speaks up, his face still turned towards his food but his words adressed to Richie.
“Do you have a picture of her?”
Richie opens his mouth, breath punched out of him as his mind starts spinning. He doesn’t have a picture of her, how could he? She doesn’t exist. And why does Eddie want to see a picture of his wife, his wife and not Bill’s or Stan’s? Why does it matter what Richie’s wife looks like? Why does he need to have a picture of her? Why has he put himself in this fucking situation in the first place?
“Why, Spaghetti?” He starts, a stressed smile breaking his face in half, “You wanna see if I scored bigger than you? I can call MTV if you want and we can do one of those wives swap shows.”
Eddie looks up and his eyes, the same ones who take half of his face and makes him look like a wounded baby animal, they’ve turned to stone. “I just don’t believe you, that’s all.”
He says it so calmly, a hand pressed under his chin, letting his head rest peacefully on his palm, like he didn’t just drop a bomb on this table, like he didn’t just harm Richie to the bone. Because what is that supposed to mean? That he doesn’t believe Richie is married? Or could get married? Does he really believe Richie is too much of a dick to get hitched? Because that would be a shitty thing to think about one of your friends and Richie knows that they are, friends, Richie knows that. He knows Eddie likes him, loves him even and that he probably doesn’t fucking think that Richie is too unlovable to find someone. Hopefully, at least. So what does it mean?
Or maybe Eddie knows too, like Stan knows. Maybe Eddie, sweet Eddie who would always try to get in the hammock when Richie was already there, sweet Eddie who would crash on his sofa when Sonya was becoming too much, sweet Eddie who must have passed the Kissing Bridge, must have seen it and who never said anything because he was too kind, too young to confront Richie about it.
But now they’re not young anymore.
And maybe Eddie has waited all these years, without even remembering his existence, to tell Richie that he had known all this time and that he didn’t believe him now when Richie weaves lies around them. Maybe he had waited to tell that now, he could see through Richie’s bullshit and call him out on it, here, in front of all their friends. Except, that didn’t sound like Eddie, this didn’t sound like any of his friends, really, it was just Richie’s mind trying to engulf him up once again, to suffocate his performed confidence with scenarios of his friends unmasking him at this table with disgusted sneers.
He takes another shot, eyes fixed on Eddie, whose face is unreadable, except for the small frown that marks his forehead. Richie smiles, wiping his chin as he grabs his phone and hopes that he hasn’t deleted all the pictures from his birthday party from his album yet. He scrolls aimlessly for a few seconds before he falls on an over-exposed but recognisable picture of him and his stylist, Bianca DeVino, they’re in a loose embrace and they’re dressed fancy. Her dark, curly hair falls a little on his shoulder, her golden sequin dress reflects light on his glasses and he’s looking at her affectionately, his arms wrapped around her naked shoulders. It’s not romantic, not in the slightest, but it’s an intimate enough pose that he can fake a relationship between them. He also has a few pictures of her alone on there too, blurry pictures he took while she tried to get him to wear a cardigan for a press tour. She’s his friend, if he can say that he has friend, she always sends him a text to know if he wants to go get a drink or go see a movie, sometimes they even get take out and eat at her place. They’re friends and he likes her enough to know a little bit about her, suitably enough to pretend his way out of this.
He extends his phone to Eddie, whose frown turns sour, but he doesn’t protest and gives the phone to Ben who nods appreciatively, Bill does something similar and Mike smiles wide. Beverly is the only one to react loudly.
“Oh so, she’s hot hot.” She whistles a bit and Stan snorts on Richie’s right as he gives him his phone back, not even taking a look at the picture.
“Don’t be crass, Miss Marsh,” Richie says in a perfect impression of their old English teacher, “Such language doesn’t suit a lovely young lady such as yourself.”
“Beep beep, Richie,” Ben laughs while Beverly tries to hit him in the eye with a shrimp missile.
“I can’t believe you got married, Rich,” Mike says, beaming, “Who would have thought!”
Stan takes a long sip of his beer before replying, “I wouldn't have.”
“Neither would I,” Eddie says, eyes back on his plate. He doesn’t look satisfied like Richie thought he’d be now that he had a proof, a fake one but still, of Richie’s marriage.
“Alright, don’t spare me then,” Richie laughs a little awkwardly, “I’ll tell Lisa you all think she’s out of my league.”
“I thought you didn’t even play sport,” Beverly teases.
“I didn’t even think you could walk,” Stan counters back and Richie flicks some sweet and spicy sauce on to his face.
“It’s amazing, Richie,” Bill says, “You deserve to be happy.”
The cotton that obstructed Richie’s lungs turns to lead and strangles him. He hides it by drinking again, the bitter taste of beer covering the acrid flavour of his lies. He waits for the conversation to change, to shift to Ben’s fabulous makeover or Stan’s wife once again, but Eddie stops it all.
“Are you?” He says, looking back at Richie dead in the eyes, something flickering in his gaze.
Richie turns his head, “Am I what?” He asks, voice rough. “Fucking your mom? Always, Spaghetti, even in the afterlife.”
Eddie doesn’t sigh or roll his eyes, he stays focused and maybe that’s what scares Richie the most. “Are you happy?” He replies, so low that it’s almost a whisper, like he’s trying to keep hi question a secret, to reserve it to Richie’s ears only.
The smile that Richie fakes should have cut him open, in the great scheme of things, it should have left him bleeding out, because it’s a lie. It’s acid and rancorous, it should crack his lips, splinter them in pieces. It should shrivel his heart and spit it out on his plate, an offering to Eddie Kaspbrak, twenty-seven years after Richie offered it silently, speaking only by letters carved into dry wood. But life hs never been fair and Richie’s lie doesn’t hurt his throat and mouth more than the alcohol he forces down once again, hoping that it will give him some courage.
“Of course I am,” He says, his smile painted on, “Why wouldn't I be?”
Everything goes to shit a little after that, because of course, they’re in Derry after all. They’re no way for them to have a normal evening to reunite, it has to be ruined by visions of crying baby hybrids, slimy eyes and bat-like creatures exiting the shell of fortune cookies and trying to attack them. It would almost be a little funny if it didn’t terrify Richie to the bone.
Stan and Mike got them out of the restaurant, the first one silent while the other tried to fill the gaps in their memories about the monster that thrived under their feet. Richie remembers some pieces, he remembered the Summer of 1989 in some way, he could recall his fight with Bill but not what it was about really, apart from Eddie breaking his arm, but once again, why had Eddie broken his arm in the first place? When Mike explains, images of death, pain and fear flashes before his eyes in chilling clarity. He can see the clown’s face in his mind so precisely that it feels like he’s looking right back at him, with his blue and yellow eyes that tore at Richie and broke him down digestible bites.
“You should have told us!” Eddie screams, breathing quickly, an empty inhaler in one hand that he points towards Mike like a weapon. “How could you keep it a secret?!”
“Let me explain,” Mike tries, his forehead glistening with sweat and his eyes haggard. “I was going to tell you all!”
“You should have told us before we flew here,” Beverly says, arms crossed. The visions of horror they just witnessed left her pale, her lips seem too red for her face, “You knew all along and you let us come back to die here.”
“I had no choice!” Mike cries back and Richie almost feels bad for the anger that boils at the pit of his stomach. He can’t imagine being the only one left here, he had bailed out of Derry as soon as he could, he doesn’t want to think about what Mike had lived through, waking up every day in this town that tried to kill him. “We made an oath.”
“We were thirteen,” Richie replies, a little hysterical, “We didn’t know any better! We made an oath but we didn’t know it would come back, we didn’t know we’d have to fight it again!”
“We promised we would come back,” Ben says calmly.
“When we were literal children,” Eddie yells back as he paces around them. “You can’t hold a promise we made more than twenty years ago over our heads like this!”
“You tricked us into coming back,” Beverly continues, “You tricked all of us.”
“Not all of us,” A voice says on Richie’s left and he doesn’t have to turn to know it’s Stanley. The other man is serene, or at least he looks like it on the surface, he’s looking right back at Mike with a composed smile, “I remembered it all.” He says and Richie doesn’t know what to think, “I remembered and I came back because Mike and Ben are right, we made a promise and we can’t break it.”
Stan looks at Bill next and somethings passes between them, some sort of knowledge that Richie doesn’t think he’ll ever understand. It upsets him, in a strange way, and he grabs his car keeps before he can even really think about it. “Nope, I’m out of here.” He twirls his keychain around his finger furiously, his other hand going to his face to reposition his glasses. “If you all want get murdered by a Ronald McDonald wannabe that’s your right but I don’t. I have a fucking life and I can’t just decide to throw it all away the moment one of you calls me back to this shit hole. I’m going back to the hotel and I’m getting my shit, who’s with me?”
Eddie raises his hand immediately, followed by Beverly and a reluctant Ben. Richie looks back to Stan, trying to say with fewer words that he doesn’t have to stay here, he doesn’t have to die here. Whatever he thinks he owes to this town, which is rat’s shit, he doesn’t have to die for it. Stanley stares back at him, his hazel eyes glistening and before Richie can try to argue with him out loud this time, the other man sighs deeply, rubbing two fingers on the bridge of his nose. When he raises his hand as well, Richie feels like he won more than a battle, he feels like he won an entire war.
They all go back to the hotel in their own cars and Richie makes sure of closing the line, wanting to make sure that Stan isn’t going to drive away and join Mike and Bill somewhere else to go on a fatal quest directly into the jaws of death, or more accurately, into the open mouth of a child-eating monster. When they arrived, Richie watched Eddie hurry up the stairs while muttering about anti-bacterial face wash and charcoal toothpaste. Richie’s heart clenches a little but he lets Eddie go, turning on his feet to go to the bar. Beverly pours him a drink, she’s been acting awfully strange since they got attacked, which shouldn’t be surprising, stuff like this will probably leave you a little uptight if you’re not completely insane, but Ben is making circles around her, asking her what she’s hiding and Richie can’t deal with that right now.
He takes his whiskey and sprawls in one of the leather sofas, pressing the cold glass to his burning forehead. He lets the ice slosh around, clicking on the edges of the glass, the sound lulling him into a calmer state. The other side of the sofa sinks on itself a little as Stan sits next to him, a menthol cigarette in one hand as he takes Richie’s glass, takes a swing of it and replaces it in Richie’s open hand as if nothing happened.
“You’re not supposed to smoke inside,” Richie says, closing his eyes, he can hear Stan taking a lighter out of his pocket and he can hear the slight crackle of the paper burning. The smell of menthol overtakes him and he groans, the need for a smoke amplifying. Stan places the cigarette between two of his fingers and Richie sticks it in his mouth, breathing it in and moaning a little, as lewd as one can be in the bar of a hotel. “I haven’t smoked a menthol since I was in college, fuck.” He laughs, puffing out the almost turquoise smoke out as he passes the cigarette back to Stan.
“Patty hates when I smoke so I stopped altogether almost six years ago,” Stan reveals, the incriminating cigarette hanging from his lips, “But when I got to the airport yesterday, I just grabbed one pack without thinking about it.”
“Derry makes sinners of us all,” Richie says, cheering Stan’s cigarette with his whiskey. He's unbearably tired, he feels drained of any strength he might have possessed earlier, as if Derry was slowly sucking the life out of him, like a hungry wolf would the bone marrow out off a carcass.
"And liars, it seems," Stan replies blowing a circle like it's easy and not something he and Richie had trained on for months behind Derry High with Beverly. He's smirking but it's almost bitter.
Richie straightens up a little, "I don't see what you mean."
Stan huffs, "Sure and I believe that."
"I don't know what you want me to tell you, Staniel, it's been a long while since we talked, I'm not sure you're still the expert on all things me."
Stan cocks an eyebrow, "I would know you blind, Tozier, twenty-seven years of not knowing you existed doesn't change that."
"That would almost make a touching poem if it wasn't the absolutely fucked up truth."
"Tell me about it," Stan sighs, crushing the bud of his cigarette in a tacky crystal ashtray, "Today has put me into so many weird situations I don't even know where I stand. One moment, I'm forty, I'm married and I'm an accountant, the next I'm thirteen, I ran off from my own Bar Mitzvah and I'm getting ready to kill a sewer clown."
"I still think we could sell this story to some Hollywood big gun and make some cash."
"With some luck, Bill will write a book about it." Stan says, smiling slightly before it slides off his face, as if he's remembering suddenly that he's not here to play nice. "And I guess that means we should give it a good ending."
Richie downs the rest of his whiskey and he can feel now how much he's really been drinking all night, he's lucid, he can still feel his anxiety kick him in the balls, so he knows he's conscious but it hits him hard for a moment. He feels heavy and tired, he just wants to go home, whatever that means. "You know It will kill us, Stan, there's no way It won't take us down."
"Maybe," Stan starts and there's fear in his eyes, Richie can see it, but there's something else too, something so akin to hope that Richie can't help but get infected by it. "But maybe we won't, maybe this is where it ends for us, but maybe not."
"You seem so sure," Richie mumbles, "How can you be so sure?"
"I'm not," Stan raises a hand and drops it on Richie's shoulder, "I'm really not, but listen, I know and I understand why you wanna leave, why you wanna hide." And Richie knows that Stan might be the only one who truly understands, who genuinely perceives all of the crooks and notches that form him. "But we made an oath and we promised we would kill It, we promised we would get this town rid of it. And maybe we don't owe it to the town, you're right, this town never loved us. But there are children here, kids like we were and I don't want them to have nightmares for twenty-seven years about their worst fears that wake them up in the middle of the night and that leave them unable to look at their spouses without seeing visions of their bodies. And maybe, we owe it to Mike too."
The guilt that had settled in Richie’s stomach and that had started taking form earlier at the restaurant like ice, makes him nauseous once again. He’s been back in Derry for less than twenty-four hours and he’s itching to escape from here as quickly as possible, he doesn’t want to imagine how jailed Mike must have felt, remembering the entirety of their last Summer together but cut from all of the people who loved him and forgot it all, forgot him.
"We'll lose," Richie says, but he knows already that he won't leave, he knows he's stuck here as long as his friends are, because Stan was right all those years ago, when he shocked his father and fled his own Bar Mitzvah; they're losers and they always fucking will be.
"Maybe," Stan stands up, "But if we do, I want to be where it matters."
"Fuck Stan," Richie groans, almost pouting, "Fuck you and your inspirational speeches, how the fuck am I supposed to get the fuck out of this town now?"
"Well, if you do, I'll be very impressed by your lack of empathy."
"Fuck you."
"Back at you."
Richie stands up too and he finally gives Stanley the hug he'd been planning all evening. He wraps his arms around the shorter man and tries to crush him to his chest, Stan doesn't complain, but he does pinch one of Richie's side hard enough that Richie gasps and takes a step back, smiling.
Stan smiles too when he grabs Richie's arm and stares at him right in the eyes again, "You need to tell the truth to Eddie too."
"Oh for fuck sake, how the fuck did you know?" Richie complains, rolling his eyes, "Is it because I don't have a ring? Because none of the others noticed."
Stan's smile grows wider, "I don't need a ring to know, Richard, I just had to see how you looked at him."
"And how did I look at him?"
"Exactly as you always have." Stan says, shrugging a little, "Like you always have and like you never stopped."
Riche blinks, the weight in his chest slowly starting to break apart in stifling pieces, cloaking his throat as he tries to speak. "I can't tell him, it would ruin everything."
"Pretty sure the fake marriage is the thing that could ruin everything actually."
"You don't get it," Richie says softly, voice low and raspy, "I can't, Stan, I can't have him look at me like that."
"Like what?"
Richie smiles, but he knows it must look like a grimace, "Like he always has, like he never stopped, like all I've ever wanted to say would make him run far away."
A silence settles between them, one of those heavy ones that choke the air a little more out of Richie and leaves him needing another drink, but before he can make a move towards the bar, Stan stops him.
"If you think he'll run, if you really think that, then I guess you actually haven't been looking close enough." Stan says, the same confidence in his words as he had exhibited just a few minutes ago and Richie knows how this ends too, he knows when he unconsciously leaves his glass on the coffee table and doesn't pick it up again. "If we want to have a chance to fight It, Richie, we need to face our fears. You need to tell him the truth, he needs to know, you need to say it."
Richie walks towards the stairs before he can stop himself, his legs struggling, weakened by the alcohol and the doubt, but he can feel Stan's eyes behind him as he climbs the first steps, and he can hear Stan's voice in his head tell him to continue as he climbs more and more, to finally arrive to Eddie's door. It's a nice door, he thinks, as he runs his knuckles on it, incapable on knocking on it, it's a red-ish brown that would also actually fit Eddie pretty well. Eddie always suited red.
"It's a fucking door," He whispers to himself as he smooths the polish with his fingers, the idea of making any sound making him sweat in fear. "C'mon Tozier, don't be such a fucking wimp."
He takes some momentum and closes his eyes, aiming instinctively towards Eddie's door. He rams his fist in the door twice, it's loud and a little too frantic, but it's all he's able to do with his eyes closed, and with his eyes open too if he's being honest. He waits a little, his heart beating so quickly that he's afraid it will fly off his chest, splattering blood and truths everywhere when Eddie'll open the door. He hears some footsteps behind the door, a little dulled but the green carpet that he knows covers every room's floor and that is probably giving Eddie the heebie-jeebies with the potential amount of bacteria it must contain. The thought makes Richie smile a little to himself.
When Eddie opens the door, the smile stays stuck on his face. Eddie removed his vest and he's now only wearing his white polo, which on anyone else would be the most ridiculous and boring piece of clothing that ever graced Richie's eyes, but on Eddie Kaspbrak? Absolutely breathtaking.
"Richie? Is everything alright?" Eddie asks, frowning, "Did something happen?"
Richie's mouth opens and closes a few times before he can form a coherent sentence in his mouth and with every passing second, Eddie's frown gets deeper and deeper, marking his forehead and the corners of his eyes. "I need to talk to you," Richie blurts out, cursing himself for his total lack of cool. He wonders if it's because he's old and rusty at this confessing your feelings thing but he's pretty sure that he was already shit at it when he was a teenager. He's just a fucking loser, which should re-comfort him, because Eddie is one big loser too, but weirdly it doesn't make him jump out in enthusiasm.
"Uh, yeah? Sure, come in." Eddie steps away from the door and Richie engulfs in it, strangely afraid that Eddie will change his mind and lock him out for some reason. He doesn't, because Eddie might be a loser but he isn't a weird creep.
Richie naturally goes to Eddie's bed and stops himself before he throws himself on it like some sort of barbarian. He stands next to it, a few steps away and when Eddie looks at him for some sort of explanation, Richie only nods for him to sit, which Eddie does, thank god.
"Are you gonna tell me what this is about, Rich?" Eddie starts, arms crossed, "I was on the phone with Myra and she'll want me to call her back soon." Something flashes in Eddie's eyes and before Richie can even say a word, he keeps talking, "Did you call your wife? Lisa, was it? Did you call her? She must be worried, I mean, you're still a pretty young couple, it must be weird for her to have you so far away."
"Edd-"
"I mean, not that I'm saying your couple isn't strong, I wouldn't say that" Eddie claims, lifting his hands in the air as if he tried to separate himself from the words he had just said, "I mean, I guess that if it was me, I'd want to know if you got to Derry safely, but that's me and Myra likes to know these things too, so I don't really know how it is for people who don't feel the need to check on their partners. Does Lisa feel the need to check on you?"
Richie's mind is still spinning with the speed of what Eddie just said, he's a little lost and he only hums, which seems to drive Eddie in an even deeper level of stress. "Oh well that's great then. She checks upon you, she's pretty, she's funny, I guess she must also really like the same music as you, right? It's a think you used to really care about when we were teenagers, you didn't wanna go to prom with Daphnee Harris because she didn't listen to Duran Duran."
Richie actually hadn't gone to prom with Daphnee Harris because he had been too busy trying to scheme a way to ditch prom with Eddie and make it casual. He'd almost thought about slashing his own tires to say that he couldn't drive them but he had been certain that Ben would have offered to drive them both, which would have totally rendered the plan useless. He had only told Eddie it was because Daphnee Harris didn't like Duran Duran because it was far easier than saying I'd rather take you and your red shorts over any girls of this entire state without sounding absolutely insane and without getting beat up behind the baseball bleachers.
"Did you make Lisa, your wife, mixtapes when you started dating? You used to make a lot of those for me, I remember they would take the whole bottom drawer of my desk." Eddie asks, something blazing in his stare, like he was burning in the inside. Richie also wondered why he felt like repeating the word wife over and over in every sentence but he didn't point it out.
"Uh," He says, still a little confused and not sure how to piece back all the things Eddie has said to him in the past two minutes and twenty-eight seconds. "Yeah?"
Eddie's smile gets a little sharp around the edges, "Oh, well, that's great! Just awesome! What do you put in her mixes?"
"Uh," What the fuck is Richie supposed to answer to that? He'd come here expressly to tell Eddie that Lisa had never existed to begin with and now they were talking mixtapes? What the holy fuck? "The Cure, I guess?"
Eddie's smile turns brittle, like an autumn leaf disintegrating in the wind, he swallows around it and he puts on a brave face before he lets it fall in his open hands, shielding it from Richie's gaze. And what is Richie supposed to do? He doesn't know what he's doing here, he has no idea of how to react, he's in front of Eddie Kaspbrak, the boy he's loved his entire life, and Eddie won't look at him. He tries to approach, a hand extended towards Eddie but the other man speaks up, "I can't," He says, dejected, "I really can't do this."
"Eddie?" Richie asks softly, "Are you okay?"
He looks up, staring right back at Richie with wet eyes, a cold fire inhabiting him, something that petrifies Richie where he stands. "I can't pretend I'm happy for you. I'm glad, so glad that you're happy and that you're in love but I just can't, Rich."
"Eddie, what are you talking about?"
"I can't pretend I'm happy that you're in love with someone else!" Eddie burst out, jumping up, "I can't pretend that I just find it so cool that you made her mixtapes with songs from my favourite band like the ones you used to make for me! I can't pretend, Richie, I can't be happy that you're happy without me when I felt like I was missing something for twenty-seven years. I just can't."
Richie stares back at him, at his red eyes he's trying to hide and his trembling mouth, at his hair that he used to dream running his hand through, at his cheeks, covered in moles and freckles. He stares back at Eddie and he feels brave in Derry twenty-seven years after his biggest act of bravery. "You're right to say that I'm in love, Eddie," He starts, letting himself fall next to the other man, trying to catch his eyes, "You're right to say that I'm in love, you're so fucking right." He smiles, grabbing Eddie's hand and making him look, "But if you really think I've been happy without you and that I've stopped being in love with you for one second all this time, than you're the dumbest bowl of spaghetti in this kitchen, Spaghetti."
Eddie's eyes flutter and Richie is overwhelmed by how beautiful he is, how long his lashes are and how dark his eyes can be in the room's obscurity. "That doesn't make any sense, Richie, your wife-"
"Doesn't exist," Richie says, feeling something in his chest snap in place, "She's not fucking real, Eds."
"But the picture-"
"It's my stylist Bianca, she's a friend, she's great, but Eds," He cups his cheek, his finger falling one mole he used to think about kissing constantly, "Eddie, I'm gay."
"You're-"
"I'm gay, Eds, like, so fucking gay. Next to me, Elton John is a womanizer." He laughs at his own joke, feeling so exhilarated that it's almost like he's floating, "I'm gay, Eddie, I'm gay and I've been in love you since you threw dirt at my head when we were eight."
Eddie looks at him, mouth agape and then he smiles too, so brightly that Richie thinks he'll really turn blind, "Well that ain't fucking fair, Trashmouth, I've been in love with you since you held my hand when we watched The Wicker Man when we were ten."
"I beat you by two years, Spaghetti."
"Yeah," Eddie says, letting his head really fall in Richie's hand, his soft hair tingling Richie's palm as he moves their faces closer, "I guess you do, you bitch."
When Eddie kisses him, when he presses their lips together, biting Richie's bottom lip slightly and running the tip of his tongue on the soft spot, Richie's chest expands until he feels like he's ten sizes bigger and for the first time since he can clearly remember, he inhales, he exhales and he doesn't feel like he's drowning.
He kisses Eddie Kaspbrak in the town of Derry and he breathes.