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Sunlight woke him first.
It was a slow dawning, rays poking through the cracks of his senses like deft, warm hands blanketing his body and mind as he waded through a sea of dreamless sleep. There was a tickle at the back of this drowsy state whispering that something was off - an even slower dawning too that he wasn't still dreaming - and warmth tickled his cheeks insistently, brushing past the four-day-old stubble he'd forgone shaving and scratching the sliver of consciousness trying to figure out what was happening. Eddie squeezed his eyes shut tighter and burrowed deeper into the soft mound around him.
The soft, frigid mound of blankets. So not a sea after all.
Eddie cracked one eye open after a moment of processing this, and frowned, squinting against the sunlight that was indeed streaming through their blinds. Fuck, Richie must've shut them the wrong way last night before bed. Again. He'd find it more endearing if he didn't feel like burying himself under the covers and living like a mole for the rest of existence.
Richie wasn't here, though.
His frown pinched as he lifted his head and scanned the bedroom. Sure enough, the right side of the bed was devoid of any sign of Richie, the only indication that he'd been there at all being a suspicious indent beside Eddie and the blankets thrown back. Eddie groaned and ran a hand through his hair, grimacing at the slight wave to his bedhead, curls that he could feel sticking straight up toward the sky. He felt even colder once he sat up; he knew he should've kept his t-shirt on when they went to bed. Richie liked to keep the apartment freezing - because he apparently was an Arctic polar bear at heart - and even with the heat from the June sun outside shining into the bedroom, Eddie still longed for a sweatshirt or something substantial to protect him from the chill creeping up his naked chest.
He shivered and pushed the covers off of him with another groan, and it took herculean effort not to crawl back into bed and instead hurry over to where Richie had flung his yellow watermelon-patterned button-up hours ago. It wasn't as thick as he hoped, more shivers wracking his body as he struggled to button the two middle buttons with cold fingers, but the smell of Richie lingered on the collar and a different kind of warmth nestled in his chest. It shocked him that he could just do things like taking Richie's shirt and tuck it around him as a security blanket, like some shirt-stealing gremlin who only came out on weekends, and Richie would likely seize him by the fruit-speckled collar to kiss him against the kitchen counter like he was thanking Eddie for doing so.
It was a pretty great thank you, he mused, and the corners of his mouth curled as he tugged on his briefs.
One month prior, Eddie wouldn't have thought he could have this. He wanted with his whole being and his bones ached from suppressing the urge to jump Richie - not necessarily because of arousal, but because he was so damn infuriating without trying and it made Eddie want to kiss the living daylights out of him and never let him go.
But now, look at him. Sharing a bed with the man he loved, sleeping in late on a Saturday and content as he'd been since...
Well, since he was a child in Derry. Which was a depressing thought, actually. For a number of reasons.
Speaking of the man he loved, however, where the fucking hell was he?
The answer came to him within moments. Or, rather he came to the answer.
(It made more sense in his head. Maybe he was more exhausted than he thought.)
Richie's back faced Eddie as the latter padded into the kitchen, his bare feet quiet against the floor as he used one hand to scrub the crust of sleep out of his eyes. He was still shirtless, sitting at the kitchen table and swirling his Lucky Charms around in a bowl of - well, that definitely wasn't milk.
“Since when do you eat cereal with fucking orange juice? Who does that?” Eddie grumbled as he drew closer. He ran another hand through his hair but it did jackshit to tame the errant curls.
Richie laughed, a soft thing that he could've listened to all day. He raised his head from the bowl but didn't quite meet Eddie's gaze as he glanced over his shoulder up at him. His eyes were bloodshot. “True connoisseurs, of course. Only the finest of breakfast connoisseurs know the orange juice and the marshmallows taste divine together.”
“I'm going to ignore the fact that you're eating orange juice pulp, sugary cereal and marshmallows at the same time for my own sanity,” Eddie said. He wrapped his arms around Richie's neck and rested his chin on top of Richie's equally wild curls. Richie hadn't showered yet, and Eddie could feel a light sheen of sweat sticking to his forearms as he ran his fingers over his chest idly. A breathless sigh left Richie and even though he was facing his absurd breakfast again, Eddie could feel the wide, fond smile on Richie's face warming him and the kitchen.
“Whatever you say, Eds.”
“You're up early.” It was perhaps too abrupt a transition, but Eddie was less focused on coming off rude and more so on the way Richie stiffened for a split-second under him.
“Yeah. Well, I wanted a nice, early start to the day. You know me.”
“I missed you.”
That earned him a second laugh, and Richie tilted his head, ignoring Eddie's protests for his nice, comfortable headrest so he could stare up at Eddie instead. “Oh?”
“Oh? That all you have to say?”
“Someone's grumpy without their coffee,” Richie teased, but he pecked Eddie's chin, effectively gentling the joke even though it wasn't necessary. They were good at sensing when they were overstepping boundaries most of the time, something Eddie was grateful for when he considered how little he or Myra had cared or thought to care about each other's wants. Not that they didn't care about each other at all - Eddie just never cared as much about putting his foot in his mouth past I've said I love her four times tonight, what does she want, a medal? and immediately feeling guilty enough to murmur “I love you” for his own guilty conscience's sake.
Yes, both he and Myra were far better enough without each other now. It was for the best.
“Sleep okay?” Eddie asked.
Richie hid his flinch better this time, but Eddie knew him well enough to catch the shadow that crossed his stare, his eyes sliding away from Eddie's. It only lasted for a moment, but he saw it. “Yeah. Peachy keen, lemon bean.”
“What the fuck is a lemon bean? I don't think that's how that saying goes.”
“Still fits!”
“How? How does that - oh, wait, I think it's jelly bean.”
Richie squinted. “Well, that doesn't sound right.”
“I didn't make up the saying, dipshit. It's just how it goes!” Eddie forced himself to take a deep breath and lower his voice. Now wasn't the time for their usual back-and-forth, much as Richie was aiming to distract him. And it was on purpose, there was no doubt about it. “Seriously, though. You look tired.” Richie opened his mouth and Eddie tapped the bottom of Richie's chin. His mouth quirked involuntarily at how ridiculous Richie looked still staring up at him. “Hey. Rich. Talk to me.”
Richie made a gruff noise in the back of his throat, but he didn't look away this time. One of his hands snuck up to where Eddie's other hand lay, tracing circles across the thick hair on his chest. He wasn't sure if it was an unconscious gesture, but Eddie felt like a daisy preening for attention, stretching towards the sun and wriggling in the summer breeze for Richie to look at him, touch him, talk to him.
“I'm fine. Really. Just woke up early,” Richie said.
“Yeah?”
Rolling his eyes, Richie mumbled, voice shifting into something curt now, “Jeez, it's not some big mystery to solve. I'm just tired. That's it. That's all of it. Stop the presses! Trashmouth gets tired!”
Eddie bit back a retort on the tip of his tongue and drew back, the fervor dissipating quickly as it had come. He headed for the cabinets to make himself some coffee. “Okay.”
“Okay?”
“Okay, as in okay. As in fine.” He closed the cabinet after grabbing his mug and winced internally when that, in turn, rattled the other mugs. Easy now, Kaspbrak. It took another beat for him to feel certain he could speak without snapping. “So, uh, what time are Stan and Patty getting in?”
Silence greeted him, which was fair given the fast subject change again. Eddie got halfway through starting up the Keurig when Richie cleared his throat, an uncharacteristically stilted sound that nearly made Eddie glance his way in concern.
“Eleven-thirty.”
“Do they need a ride? From the airport?”
“Oh. No. I believe Patty said we should sleep in like our lives depended on it. That's a direct quote right there.”
Eddie snorted, and the tension dissolved. Just a little. “Yeah? I'll be sure to call Stan to confirm that at least one of us slept in ‘like our lives depended on it’. What about Mike?”
“Hasn't texted yet, but, shock of all shock, Bill already sent a sappy happy one year trauma-versary seven paragraph essay to the groupchat. I counted the number of times he says he loves us at a whopping thirty-three so far.”
That definitely sounded like something Bill would've done. “You know, you don't have to call it that.”
“Sure, sure. We're all perfectly well-adjusted adults with no childhood trauma or near-death experiences, after all.”
Eddie raised an eyebrow at Richie as he listened to the Keurig gurgle next to him. Richie was back to shoveling orange juice-tainted marshmallows in his mouth once more, but he would've bet a thousand bucks that Richie was watching him out of the corner of his eye all the while. “You sure you're not the one who needs coffee right now?”
“Told you, I'm a perfectly - ”
“Well-adjusted adult, right. Right.” Why did he even bother? Eddie leaned his elbows on the counter to watch the Keurig, his temples already beginning to pound. They’d gone to bed late last night, but even with sleeping in, Eddie knew his headache would only get worse. Especially since they had to meet up with the Losers later.
Arms tucked around his middle and Eddie barely restrained himself from throwing an elbow back to nail Richie in the eye on accident. He must have started enough for Richie to notice though, because a quiet snuffle into his shoulder that sounded more like a laugh than a deep breath reached his ear. Dark curls wriggled against the shell of his ear as Richie buried his face into Eddie’s collarbone, pressing a light kiss on the skin there. Eddie swallowed hard.
“Don’t remember when I turned into a teddy bear,” Eddie teased, a soft remark with little bitterness as he let his weight fall back against Richie.
“Yeah, you’re just as cuddly and small as one.”
“I’m average height. Dick.”
“That’s my name,” Richie murmured. He pressed a second kiss to the skin behind Eddie’s ear and Eddie closed his eyes, his gut humming with contentment. “Sorry.”
That caught his attention. “Sorry?”
“Shouldn’t have snapped. Real shithead move.” The almost meek tentativeness to Richie’s voice both set him on edge and gave him enough courage to turn his head so he could look Richie in the eye. Even if Richie wanted to do nothing more than continue trying to avoid his gaze until Eddie nudged him a few times gently. Fractals of gloom broke through the blue of Richie’s irises, and for the first time that morning he realized how truly exhausted Richie was.
No, not exhausted. There was something else there, too. He thought he recognized it now, that he had glossed over it in his effort to express his concern because he hadn't realized why he needed to be concerned.
“Thought you said you didn’t have the nightmares anymore,” Eddie said before he could think twice, and the familiar shuttering of Richie’s expression began in two seconds flat. Richie started to pull away but Eddie turned fully to face him and gripped his forearms, a relatively light grip that Richie could’ve broken free from if he wanted. “No, hey, I - sorry. I didn’t mean to spook you.”
“‘M not a wild horse.” Those figurative shutters over his face didn’t disappear, though, and Eddie could see Richie weighing the consequences of bolting for the bedroom. It reminded him of that day on the pier, of every time they tried to have a conversation, a proper one, about Derry and the clown and how every time Eddie got frustrated or gave up or Richie ran. They were supposed to be working on communication and trusting each other - but it was less a matter of trust, Eddie thought ruefully, and maybe more a matter of them both getting spooked.
Eddie pictured the sewers, pictured Bev’s tight but determined expression as the weight of the fence post passed from her fingertips to his, pictured Richie staring down at him and murmuring what deep down, Eddie wanted to believe and maybe had since he was a boy. He pictured Richie screaming at the clown, saving Mike, joining the others as Eddie bled out, impulsive decision after impulsive decision for better or for worse and how he didn’t think twice before defending any of the Losers.
He pictured the kitchen a month ago and the tears in Richie’s eyes and the soft cradling of Richie’s hands in his own before Eddie surged forward to kiss him.
Adrenaline could’ve been a factor in all of those moments, sure, but Eddie liked to think it wasn’t just adrenaline. It wasn’t a one-off. They could be brave, and that choice had always been there because they’d always been brave.
“Do you want to talk about it?” Eddie whispered, knocking his forehead against Richie’s as they swayed in place, steadying one another.
Richie bit his lip. The shutters shuddered for a moment. “It’s not - I mean, it’s nothing new.”
“We’ve never…” Eddie sighed. “We’ve never talked about it before. I don’t want to push you, but - ”
“It’s just the clown.” It came out of Richie in a hurried burst, his eyes widening as he floundered for more to say, a rarity that concerned Eddie more than he’d admit. “The deadlights.”
His stomach swelled and he pushed aside the flare of worry and remained put, remained patient. “Do you want to talk about it?” he repeated, more hesitant now.
Richie shook his head. “No. It’s not even really - it’s what came after.”
“Oh,” Eddie said, and the realization of what lingered unsaid hit him like a train. “Oh.”
“I don’t - it’s fine.” Richie’s hands tightened around Eddie, clutching the back of his shirt. Eddie shifted one hand to brush hair out of Richie’s eyes, and he let his fingers linger on his sideburns, on the shape of his jaw, clenched from nerves. “I’m not trying to be - maybe it was the big one year mark, I don’t know. I haven’t had one in two weeks. It was just bad.”
Eddie tried not to feel offended or aggrieved that he hadn’t noticed anything off two weeks ago either; then again, he hadn’t started sharing a bed with Richie until last week, when an ill-timed joke led to Eddie muttering that maybe he wanted to sleep next to the “human furnace” every night and that had been that. Even he had noticed then, Richie would have either never admitted a thing or played it off.
“I still get them too,” he confessed, his voice trailing off as Richie’s eyes shot to his. “Not as bad, but… It helps not being alone.”
“It does.” Pink flooded Richie’s cheeks and he cleared his throat. “It does help. You always help, Eds. It’s just my dumb brain.”
“I dream about that. As well.”
“That?”
“What… What happened. After.” Eddie paused. “When I almost died. When I thought you wouldn’t wake up from the deadlights for a split-second.”
Another constricted noise from Richie, verging on the start of a word before he cut it off, escaped him and his fingers fisted tighter in the fabric at the back of the button-up. Eddie let Richie lean against him now, a little heavier than he anticipated but he would’ve lifted the skies and stars and moon for Richie if he gave him permission. Perhaps without permission too, since Richie never was good at asking for what he wanted.
“It scares the shit out of me.” He waited, allowing the words to hover between them, as if they were waiting too. “But it’s only a memory. It’s not - we’re here now.”
“I know.” Richie squeezed his eyes shut and his breath fanned in a trembling wave over Eddie’s face. “I know. I know that. Just feels bad. Knowing it happened at all.”
“Yeah.”
They stood in silence for a few moments more, heads pressed together, breathing in each other and simply standing, waiting. Contrary to popular belief (i.e. anyone who claimed to know Richie but didn’t really know the real Richie Tozier), quiet came easier than jokes and laughter sometimes. At night, they both lay with hips and shoulders slotted in the spaces they couldn’t fill alone, and Eddie relished in how he could lay there for centuries and never need anything more.
This silence was different, of course, and pregnant with an uneasy, morose understanding. But still, they remained put, and the frigidity of the apartment dissolved the longer Eddie drew Richie to him, drew the warmth of their bodies close.
“Didn’t mean to bring down the mood of this fine anniversary,” Richie said after a while. His voice cracked on the last couple words and he winced.
“I think you mean trauma-versary, actually.”
Richie’s guffaw came out more like a sob but his smile was bright, genuine. “How silly of me.”
Eddie snorted and kissed Richie, a chaste press of the lips that shouldn’t have sparked any fireworks or sent hearts racing when it lasted for less than a second, but Richie’s left hand flew up to cup the back of Eddie’s head immediately, even as Eddie pulled away. Richie’s eyes were dark with emotion as he stared back, and not for the first time, Eddie wondered how he’d ever lived for twenty-seven years without his best friend.
“I love you,” Richie told him with certainty that still knocked his heart out of his chest and sent it free-falling into the center of the earth.
“I love you too,” Eddie replied, and the smile that earned him was contagious, inciting Eddie’s lips to curl into a wide smile of his own.
“I’m still telling Bill and Stan you called it trauma-versary.”
Eddie squawked in outrage and Richie had five seconds of a headstart to run for his phone before Eddie came charging after him, their shouts echoing in the apartment. He wouldn’t have it any other way.