Archive of Our Own ^beta

It all starts with damp hair, ridiculously enough.

“You’re telling me you haven’t done anything even remotely risky in the past twenty-seven years?”

A pause, like he’s thinking it over.

“No.”

“But- why?”

“Why do you think, dipshit!”

Richie sputters when Eddie splashes him with his filthy bath water, and shakes his head like a wet dog.

“I’m not talking about bungee-jumping, I’m talking about letting your hair air-dry!”

“Yeah, no thanks, I’d rather not turn fifty and have my sinuses explode and a rheumatic cervical vertebra!”

A pause.

“What the fuck does that even mean.”

“It means being old and unable to turn your head because you’ve fucked your neck up so bad, despite years of warning head colds and other shit, just because you couldn’t be bothered to pick up a fucking air dryer!”

Richie frowns.

“Yeah, alright, but like. You know that intense heat ruins your hair, yes?”

“I will not take hair care lessons from a man who wasn’t even using conditioner until a week ago!” Eddie snaps, trying to sound final. “And besides, you’re one to talk- what risky shit have you done in your life?”

That manages to get Richie to change topic as he thinks it over while he rubs a towel over Eddie’s hair. Eddie feels a bit like he’s taking advantage of Richie, but it’s not his fault he still can’t lift his arms without his healing wound hurting like a bitch. And he doesn’t mind sitting in the tub in his swimming trunks until Richie’s done washing his hair, only to leave him to shower or bathe and return later to help dry it.

“I’ve had sex with strangers,” Richie says, casually. Eddie blanches. “Like, safe sex- protected, you know? As safe as following a stranger home can be. I’ve also taken unknown drugs at parties. And accepted lifts from randos.” Eddie starts to feel faint just at the thought, and he nearly slips back from the edge of the tub. Richie’s steadying hands on his shoulders keep him from falling back into it. “Woah there! I’m fine and alive, see? That was ages ago.” Richie plunges his hand in the lukewarm water and tugs the drain cover free. He shakes his hand out and then pats it dry with a towel. “I knew it was stupid, but I’d always acted up so I assumed it fit into that.”

“Stupid? It was- it was moronic! You could’ve died in a number of horrible ways!” Eddie doesn’t screech. Richie has the audacity to grin sheepishly at him.

“Aw, Eds, I never knew you cared!” Liar. “Idk, dying never sounded like the worst case scenario. Now I know why, of course: repressed murder clown memories!”

“Stop saying abbreviations out loud,” Eddie says, smacking Richie’s shoulder. If Richie notices that that particular movement doesn’t cause Eddie any pain, he doesn’t mention it.

“And here you are, never even letting your hair dry because it might hurt your neck!” Richie circles back.

“Why do you care about my hair so much!” Eddie snaps, standing up and wrapping his bathrobe tighter around himself.

“I don’t, that’s not the point. I just mean… you’re so brave, Eddie. I get that you’d forgotten that you could be – we all did. But now you can let yourself go a bit. Like, yeah, your cashew allergy is real, but eat a pizza every now and then! Walk with your earbuds in! Sit in the sun a minute too long! You stood up to your mother, to It and, your most notable achievement, to your wife. Are you really telling me there’s nothing you’ve always wanted to do that you were always afraid to before now?”

Oh, yeah. Plenty of things. But he isn’t about to tell Richie that. Sure, now that he remembers him he knows he’s always been the best friend he’s ever had, but he hasn’t known him as a grown up very long. He’s just a week out of the hospital, and while Richie’s support there had easily morphed into an offer to change scenery for a bit and clear his mind before – if ever – returning to his life in New York, it still surprises Eddie to keep learning that Richie might’ve actually grown into a… responsible is too strong a word, perhaps, but he supposes it’s close enough.

“I always wanted to ride a bike,” he throws Richie a bone. The way his face lights up and splits into a goofy grin is worth the admission. “But I like the idea of it more than I’d like the truth of it, I think.”

Richie stands up so abruptly he bangs his knee against the nearby toilet, but he doesn’t seem to notice. Instead he spreads his arms like he’s about to make an important revelation.

“And you nearly died before you got to do that! Don’t you see? You don’t have to do anything dangerous, but denying yourself of something just because you’re scared- that’s not living, that’s miserable!”

Shit, has Richie always been the smart one other than the brave one?

“Okay, first of all, motorcycles are very dangerous, okay? A lot of accidents involve reckless bikers and irresponsible traffic behavior, and I don’t want to end up splattered all over the asphalt by a truck. Second-”

“Then just be a careful biker! If there’s someone who can do it that’s you, Eddie. I’m sure you’re the most sensible biker I’ll ever know.” Richie steamrolls over his sentence, and Eddie closes his mouth with a click.

Is it stupid that that’s all it takes to convince him to actually consider it?

“I- it’s- it’s easy for you to say that!” Eddie says in exasperation. Richie’s smile almost falters, and for a moment Eddie hates him – the hair falling in his eyes, the thick rimmed glasses, the plain black t-shirt that stretches across his broad chest, the cartoonish heart-patterned boxers that leave his knobby knees and hairy legs exposed. “You’re the bravest man I know, Rich.”

“What? Pfffch- no!” Richie scoffs and rolls his eyes, a self-deprecating smile on his face, and Eddie could smack him.

“Yeah you are, you dick! You always said you wanted to do voices, and then you went and did voices so good you became successful in one of the most make it or break it careers in the world! You’re not good,” he adds just to make Richie laugh, because the intense, star-struck way he’s looking at Eddie makes him feel weird, “let me make that clear. You’re, like, so not funny. Terrible in fact. But fuck, Richie, don’t you dare tell me that it doesn’t take a considerable set of balls. To go on a stage and suck so bad.”

“Aw. Do you kiss your mom with that mouth?” Richie says, but he’s scuffing his socked foot against the bath mat and staring at it, and he sounds a strange mix of embarrassed and proud.

“I mean it,” Eddie ignores the joke, reaching to squeeze Richie’s elbow.

“Thanks, Eds. You’re wrong, I’m very good, but it really means a lot to me that you think I’m brave,” he says. He meets Eddie’s eyes and they smile softly at each other for a moment. Then Richie takes the towel and wraps it around Eddie’s head in a bad approximation of a turban. “Now, your majesty, call me when you’re dressed and I’ll dry your precious hair.”

The eye roll is just a reflex at this point.

So, Eddie starts looking into all the things he’s always been too afraid to do. He doesn’t go and impulse buy a bike right away (of course he doesn’t, that’s a serious investment that needs consideration) but he does start looking into it. Budgeting, models, statistics, safety measures. Mortality rates, especially in LA county. It feels weird, like he’s planning to stay, but truth is he doesn’t know what he’s planning yet. He’ll figure it out soon, probably.

He thinks he’s being smooth about it, too, until Richie leaves a copy of Two Wheels Magazine on the coffee table for him to find.

Who knows, maybe he is being smooth, and Richie is just being thoughtful.

That’s something Eddie still can’t seem to be able to wrap his head around. He’s having a hard time reconciling the idea of an adult Richie Tozier that recently resurfaced in his mind with the reality of him.

Sometimes Richie acts like Eddie would expect him to, eating fridge cold pizza while yelling profanities at some poor guy on the other side of his Call of Duty game, sleep dried hair sticking up in every which direction, sitting too close to the TV screen in an old bean bag with a ripped seam, trickling tiny Styrofoam balls all over the shaggy rug to be lost forever.

But, other times Richie just acts… normal. Eddie watches him work at his laptop, humming tunelessly to himself as he balances a pencil between his nose and upper lip and taps his fingers on a blank notepad. Eddie watches him as he methodically hangs out his laundry, following some scheme in his head, and he watches him fold it carefully once it’s dry. He watches as he cleans his pantry from canned food that expired six years ago. He watches as he behaves like a functional adult.

Maybe it feels weird because Eddie doesn’t feel like one. He was supposed to grow up into a normal person while Richie blundered through his life, yet here they were, and the names for who owns a house and who ran away from a wife are swapped from what he had expected them to be.

Yet it’s undeniable that Richie is still, partly, the boy Eddie had forgotten knowing. He could see him in the way he speaks on the phone with his manager, in the way he shoves chips in his face while watching How It’s Made videos at 2am, in the way he cleans his glasses on the edge of his t-shirt and then swears as he pokes yet another careless cigarette hole in the fabric.

Eddie sees these weird in betweens in Richie’s living space, too. The succulents lined on the windowsill in tiny pots shaped like peach and eggplant emojis, the sensible Ikea bookshelves full of comic books, novels and videogames, the collection of DVDs that range from classic movies to cartoons. The junk food stored near healthy snacks in the cupboards, the old tour posters decorating the walls along with landscape photography and modern artworks, the plain couch with the Nichols Cage sequin throw pillow that had scared the living shit out of Eddie the first time he had turned around to see a face staring at him in the darkened room. Richie had apologized, but he’s also never going to let him live that down, making comments like “Is it safe to watch National Treasure or will your Nick Cage phobia act up again?”

Despite that, Eddie notices the way Richie is attentive to his needs. Even now that he doesn’t need as much help anymore, Eddie can see the small ways Richie keeps facilitating things for him. Sometimes it’s just his mug already on the counter so he won’t have to reach for it in the cupboard; other times it’s a magazine Richie thought he might need or enjoy.

He thinks what Richie said over, thinks about all the little things he would have liked to do but never took the risk to.

He thinks of all the times he had looked around in his New York gym, at people bigger and stronger than him sporting cool tattoos, and thought he would have loved a tattoo himself, if only he had anything worth imprinting on his skin forever.

(“A gym? Is that why you’re so fucking ripped?”

“I’m not ripped,” Eddie had said, because it sounded better than yeah, that’s your only option when you need an excuse to get away from your home even on weekends.

“Yeah, right, you’re shredded. Let me go grab some cheese real quick, let’s see if it’ll grate!”

“If you get cheese anywhere near my open chest wound I swear to god—”)

He had mentioned this to Richie a night he was in a sharing mood, because he’s finally, possibly coming to terms with the fact that not everything he says will be met with a joke.

“What, like a cover up?” Richie had replied, glancing at the spot where he knew his scar to be.

“No, god, that’d take a lot of time and money, and what if I don’t like it or regret it?”

Richie had shrugged.

“Laser surgery, bro. Nowadays it takes off almost anything.”

“I still have a hard time trusting laser surgery.”

“I’ve had laser surgery and I’m fine,” Richie had said matter of factly. Eddie had looked at him for a long moment. “Yeah, both my eyes. Didn’t you notice my glasses aren’t as thick as when I was a young boy?” He had paused, a grin splitting his face before intoning, “My father! Took me into the city! To see a marching band!”

Well, okay, maybe it’s fairer to say that not everything Eddie says will be met with a joke at his expense.

“Of course I’ve noticed, I just hadn’t thought… You took a big risk there.”

“Eh, beats being legally blind the moment my glasses are off my face. Now I’m just mostly blind,” he had said, taking them off his face and grinning again. “But I must say, you’re pretty attractive for a blurry blob, Eddie-bear.”

That had gotten him a faceful of Nick Cage from a flustered Eddie.

A scar cover up would really be too big to risk regretting it, so Eddie doesn’t consider that option too much. He does think it over, though. A small tattoo, something that meant something to him. A reminder of the person he is, the person he was and the person he wants to be.

He thinks he has the perfect design for that, but he still needs time to consider it.

First, he should take smaller steps. Even if his hypochondria is getting better now that he remembers himself, he’s still a risk analyst and a cautious man to his core, no matter how proximity to Richie always seems to make him a bit more reckless, a bit braver by default. Like Eddie’s trying to match him.

So, one day Eddie lets his hair dry in the humid LA air, sitting on Richie’s sunny patio with a book.

“Should I call the police? I think someone’s kidnapped my best friend.”

Eddie flips him the bird, but doesn’t acknowledge him otherwise.

“You have at least put sunscreen on, right? Come on man, let me know you’re my Eddie.”

Richie leans close to Eddie’s face, and he gives him a half-hearted glare from over the edge of his book.

“Well, the scowl is convincing enough,” Richie says, standing straight again. “Look at that, you’re adorable!”

“What?” Eddie frowns.

“Yeah! I didn’t know your hair was still curly,” Richie says, running his fingers through Eddie’s hair.

Richie hasn’t really touched him since Eddie started washing his hair on his own a few weeks back, surely that’s the reason his stomach is doing somersaults. Eddie bats Richie’s hand away before he can think better of it.

“Stop, I just washed it,” he grumbles. Thankfully Richie doesn’t seem to mind.

“Ah, there you are, Kaspbrak, thank fuck.”

“You’re such a dick. I’m just doing what you said!”

“Um, yeah? Exactly? You see why I was worried,” Richie says, and Eddie rolls his eyes.

“It’s LA, okay? It’s warm enough to let it air dry, it’s basically summer all year round, and-and besides! Besides, it’s the environmentally conscious choice, alright? You’re the one who doesn’t own a drier, after all, and using a hair drier in this weather feels stupid. And also, do you know how much intense heat ruins your hair?”

That has Richie laughing, and Eddie idly wonders where he’s heard the words before.

“Yeah, I know. Glad you know it too, now. And stop it with the rambling, I’m convinced it’s you now, Freckles.”

Freckles?!

“Beep-beep, Richie,” he says, looking at his book again and trying to pretend his cheeks aren’t flushed.

To his credit, Richie does shut up, like he always does when those words are uttered, and Eddie feels a bit unfair. They’re a way to let him know he’s being inappropriate when he can’t tell himself, and they’re very different from a ‘shut up, man’; that’s why he always falls silent, and Eddie knows he’s taken advantage of the words’ power.

He’ll make it up to him.

The next risk Eddie takes is going for a walk with his headphones on. He keeps the volume low, sticks to the sidewalks and waits until there’s a bit of a crowd before crossing the street, but he still dampens one of his senses – on purpose! – and makes it home safe and sound.

It’s ridiculous how thrilled he feels from such a trivial thing, but it’s so different from the life he was leading just four months ago that he can’t help himself.

He returns to Richie’s place to find Billie Joel’s We Didn’t Start the Fire blaring from Richie’s smart TV, and when he enters with his copy of the keys (and doesn’t that concept still feel like a kick in the nuts sometimes) he’s greeted by Richie singing along and dancing around his living room in his boxers (why is he allergic to pants?).

He thinks he’s gone unnoticed, and he lingers by the door until Richie turns around calling, “Eddie!” over the loud music.

Eddie tries to stifle a grin, because he’s supposed to be annoyed: music this loud can seriously damage your hearing, after all, and he’s pretty sure Richie has been jumping on the couch prior to his arrival, not to mention the possible noise complaints. But how can he look cross when it takes Richie’s stupid legs barely four strides to get to the door and pull him further inside, dancing their way back to the middle of the open living space?

Richie isn’t pushy, he just holds Eddie’s wrists in his huge hands as he moves his own feet and hips about wildly, looking more like he’s having a fit rather than dancing. He doesn’t insist Eddie dance with him, for which he’s grateful, but Eddie still tries to match his energy. He was never a good dancer, and now his movements feel particularly jerked and stilted compered to Richie’s spontaneity, but the least he can do is try.

“Hell yeah, Eds! Let it out,” Richie still says happily, like Eddie’s doing him proud.

Who knows, maybe he is.

“I’m no good, Rich,” Eddie says pitifully. The last time he’s danced was at his wedding, and even then he had managed to fuck up, stepping on Myra’s toes enough times that by the end of the song her white shoes were covered in grey dust.

“It doesn’t matter! You’re shaking that thing and that’s enough for me,” Richie replies with what looks like a truly happy smile on his face.

Maybe this is enough, Eddie thinks. Maybe Richie just needs small things like this to be happy. Maybe the things Eddie can give will be enough.

He should say something but his mind is, as usual, just a helpless mess of bundled up thoughts.

He wants Richie happy, yes. That’s true, that’s right he does! What that means, though, he’d rather not think about. Deep down, he’s still a coward, no matter what Richie believes. Leaving his wife, his life behind was far easier than doing some soul searching is, and he’s afraid of what he’d find out about himself if he takes the time to delve deep down into his own mind. He’s always been good at pretending nothing’s up, after all, and for good reason.

Eddie looks away from Richie’s beaming face and down to his feet, trying to keep up with the taller man’s whimsical movements and with the fast paced music, when the song comes to an end.

It must be a playlist because the silence lasts only a few seconds before another starts, covering Richie’s elated laugh. Eddie doesn’t recognize the song until the lyrics kick in, and by then it’s too late.

Oh I, I just died in your arms tonight
It must have been something you said
I just died in your arms tonight—

Richie’s eyes widen and he scrambles for the remote, turning away from Eddie as he slams his fingers on the buttons to try and stop the song. By the time he manages, Eddie can see his hand tremors in the way his whole body seems to be shaking.

Fuck.

“Richie? Hey, Rich—look at me.” Eddie walks up to him and pulls the remote out of his lax hands, Richie’s fingers flexing and gripping onto each other to fill the empty space. He puts it down on the coffee table without taking his eyes off of Richie.

That’s another thing he can’t seem to wrap his head about. Richie Tozier, Mr Bravado, the king of sarcastic comments at the worst possible moment, the one person known to crack jokes at funerals because he’s feeling uncomfortable, broken by something so trivial as a song.

“I… I thought I’d blacklisted it,” he says, and Eddie hates how helpless he sounds.

“Hey, you’re okay Rich. Look at me,” he asks again, and Richie does so before Eddie can work up the courage to cup his jaw and turn his head. “I’m fine. I did not die in your arms, tonight or any other night. In fact,” he says, and this time he does touch Richie while carefully looking away from his face, taking his elbows in his hands and gently pushing upwards, “you saved my life with these arms. You picked me up and carried me to safety in your arms. I’m here thanks to you.”

Richie doesn’t look at his arms, but Eddie thinks he’s made his point clear anyways. He does look into Eddie’s face, though, like he can’t decide if he’s a ghost or not, and Eddie hates to see him looking this devastated.

If he were a braver man, he thinks he might kiss him.

Eddie never wants to see him look like that again. He doesn’t ever again want to hear Richie sob into his shoulder, hands covered in Eddie’s blood from trying to put pressure on his wound, begging anyone who will listen to help him, to carry him out. He doesn’t think he can forget how it felt to realize – no, to learn all over again, that he’s so loved that six other people are willing to risk their lives for him, preferring to die with him in a collapsing sewer rather than live without having taken the chance to save him.

Speaking of risky shit.

(When he had asked about it, Ben had admitted he wasn’t sure they were going to do it before realizing that even though his chances of survival were slim, leaving him there meant abandoning Richie too.

“He wasn’t going to leave your side, man. Maybe you don’t remember, but he was willing to try and shield you from the collapse with his body. He didn’t say it, but we all knew he was thinking ‘if he stays, I stay’.”

Eddie doesn’t know how to feel about that. What are you supposed to do with that sort of knowledge?)

He could take a risk himself, now. Something that feels bigger than earbuds, tattoos and motorbikes combined. He could be honest, for fucking once, and tell Richie about the way he makes Eddie feel.

But he can’t bring himself to, because even after everything, he’s still fucking afraid.

“You’re fine,” Richie says, his voice smaller than Eddie has ever heard it. “You’re fine,” he repeats, closing his eyes. “You’re fine, you’re fine, you’re fine,” he almost chants under his breath, leaning forward until their foreheads are touching and Eddie’s heart misses a beat in his chest.

“Yeah, I’m fine. We’re fine,” Eddie insists, because sometimes he has a feeling that Richie forgets that part. He was so focused on him, on getting him out, that sometimes Eddie wonders if Richie had thought about his own wellbeing at all in those panic fueled moments. And sometimes, he knows he hasn’t. Sometimes it’s not even a question. Sometime Richie looks at him with such intensity that it’s almost like his eyes are saying I would do it again in a heartbeat. I’d do it again even if I didn’t know that I’d survive, and when he does this Eddie feels like his chest has been hollowed out with a grapefruit spoon and he’s forgotten how to exist.

Richie’s eyes are unfocused right now, even as he repeats “you’re fine” over and over again in decreasingly pained whispers, veiled over with something Eddie can’t put his finger on. They’re not misted over with tears, but he rather looks like he’s back to It’s lair in his mind. Richie’s forehead is beaded with sweat, damp where it’s pressed against his own, skin pale like he’s coming up with a fever.

This time, Eddie doesn’t hesitate. He puts his hand on the curve of Richie’s strong jaw, where he can see the muscles clench so hard it makes his teeth ache in sympathy, digging his thumb in the joint and massaging the spot like Richie is a dog he has to cajole into spitting a razor blade. Eddie cups his other cheek as well and tilts his head back until their eyes meet, glaring like Richie will feel the weight of his gaze and snap back into focus. That doesn’t happen. What does happen is that Richie’s hands spring forward and grip him by the sides, fisting into his shirt so tight it gets bunched up and slips out of Eddie’s waistband. He doesn’t even care that he’ll have to iron the creases out: the jolt of recognition in Richie’s eyes fills him with a flood of relief so intense his legs nearly buckle with it.

“You’re fine,” Richie says one last time, his voice hoarse. He takes a deep breath, and not for the first time Eddie thinks that maybe they should address this, whatever it is, but the word PTSD is as taboo as anything else having to do with them.

“Yeah,” is all Eddie can say as Richie’s shaking hands let go of him. He swallows all the things sitting heavy on his tongue as he feels Richie’s broad palm stroking down his back, trying to smooth away the wrinkles he has worked in the fabric. “I’m fine.”

Richie nods solemnly. They stand close together for another couple of minutes, and Eddie belatedly lets his own hands fall from Richie’s face. They linger on his shoulders for a moment, and then he pulls them away rather than indulging in the fantasy of running them down his chest.

“I… I’ll put on some more music,” Richie says with a wobbly smile that Eddie matches with a strained one.

“Yeah, that sounds good. I’ll make myself some tea, would you like a cup?” Eddie asks, even though Richie knows it’ll be the green kind he more than once complained smells worse than Neibolt’s grass.

It’s a testament to how shaken he is that Richie says instead, “Sure, thank you,” while scrolling through his phone, probably blacklisting every reiteration of that song from his streaming services. Music is back to filling the room before the kettle even boils, and Eddie has to yell at Richie to get off the couch, where he’s flailing his arms and hips about wildly in what he explains is a dance move called flossing, while he sings at the top of his lungs, “I’ll beeeeeeeeee goooooooooone! In a day or TWOOOOO!” in a pitch so ridiculously high it has Eddie doubled over the kitchen island in a fit of laughter.

Eddie really starts to wonder what it was he had been so afraid of all his life since jogging along LA’s beautiful promenade is actually the most relaxing thing he’s ever done. He’s been running there for a few weeks now, enjoying the warmth of the Californian sun on his skin, Fitbit strapped securely to his arm, his growing collection of tank tops and shorts facilitating his tan, hair pushed back with the clean sweat of a satisfying workout.

Sometimes he just enjoys the sound of the rolling waves, taking in the salty scent of the briny air as he dodges slower passersby enjoying a stroll while carefully avoiding to get in the way of youngsters on skateboards and rollerblades that make him feel like he’s been given a second shot at the ‘80s. But lately he finds himself keeping his earbuds in even as he jogs, and he blames Richie for it since his songs have crept into Eddie’s phone without him even noticing.

He hasn’t actively listened to this much music since college, he reckons, and it makes him feel weirdly closer to Richie. It’s not just because he has rediscovered songs they would sing along to at the top of their little lungs when they were teens, but because some of the songs Richie listens to have a way to make Eddie’s stomach churn with a feeling he doesn’t want to examine too closely.

He’ll be cooking while singing along to Queen’s You’re My Best Friend, he’ll empty the dishwasher while humming along to Hey, Jude only to get increasingly louder as the last refrain repeats on and on again instead of fading away with the song, and other times Richie’ll be doing this silly thing that always makes Eddie swoon (though he’ll never admit it) where he points at him like he’s singing to him, and it’s fine when it’s a bad rendition of Wonderwall, but it’s devastating when it’s ABBA’s Take A Chance On Me.

Eddie’s listening to it right now as he jogs back home, unconsciously matching the cadence of his feet with the rhythm of the song (take a chance, take a chance, take a-take a chan-chance), trying very hard not to think about the meaning of the words. It’s just a catchy workout jam and he doesn’t need to worry about anything else. The same way he has nothing to worry about when he hears Richie intoning old love ballads in a voice too deep and too melancholy to bear thinking about.

He enters the house expecting to find Richie having breakfast, but when he turns the music off he’s met with silence. Eddie peels his shoes and socks off quietly by the front door, thinking that maybe Richie is still asleep. It’s not too late in the morning, not even nine yet, and Richie sometimes oversleeps during the weekends because he often ends up binging shows or playing games until late at night. It’s not the healthiest of sleep patterns probably, but at the same time it’s pretty regular and Eddie isn’t anyone to tell Richie that maybe, at forty, he should try to get to bed a bit earlier.

So, mindful of a possibly sleeping Richie, Eddie creeps towards the main bathroom to grab a clean set of towels from the cabinet in front of the door. He’ll shower in the en-suite to his bedroom, as always, but that bathroom is smaller and overtime, one shared laundry load after another, some of Eddie’s things have started mingling with Richie’s and his towels have taken residence with all the others, migrating to the main bathroom. If he were a towel he’d probably prefer it there, too. The cherry red tiles and white paint should give the long room a groovy ‘50s diner vibe, but the faux white marble floors make it look more like the eccentric choice of decor of someone who got rich by directing lots of porn movies. It doesn’t help that the square bathtub at the far end of the room is large enough to fit Eddie three times, or that there’s a tall full figure mirror directly opposite to the smaller one over the sink that makes it possible to check oneself out fully. Eddie has taken advantage of it before, mainly to examine the damage from their last encounter with It.

At first he thought the mirrors placement was a deliberate choice on Richie’s part, to have the chance to check if an outfit was flattering before going places, but he has since realized that Richie’s preparation to meetings and events consisted in getting into clothes that didn’t clash too badly together and maybe comb his hair if it was really something fancy. Still, Eddie had assumed that Richie has to use the mirrors sometimes, because why else keep them if not? Hell, maybe it’s even for sexual reasons – he doesn’t know what the man likes after all. But as he slinks towards the bathroom, Eddie’s assumptions shift.

From where he come to a halt in the hallway, some feet away from the open door, he can see Richie standing in front of the sink. His face is still unshaven and his glasses are off, toothbrush in one hand, but he doesn’t look sleepy so Eddie thinks he must have gotten up a while ago.

What stopped Eddie in his tracks is not that; knocking on the door to announce his presence and retrieving the towels wouldn’t be anything out of the ordinary. What gave him pause is the way Richie’s looking at himself. He’s in just his boxers, and Eddie does his best not to stare at all that pale flesh Richie never seems to let out enough to see the sun, tan lines clear where the neck and sleeves of his t-shirts and shirts always covered him up.

He looks leaner than what Eddie had imagined, the gentle swell of his chest covered in dark hair that trails down along his stomach, which is about all he can see in the mirror with the way Richie is positioned. From where he’s standing Eddie has mostly a view of Richie’s broad shoulders and strong arms, the nape of his neck where his hair curls naturally making Eddie want to play with it. He can see the bumps of his spine and he counts them with his eyes, down to the narrow taper of his hips where the boxer briefs begin.

He can see some beauty marks on his milky back, the wrinkled skin of his elbows, the flare of his shoulder blades and the faint shadows of his ribs, wrapped protectively around his vulnerable parts. He looks at the spot where his own back is marred by a jagged scar the Losers had blamed on falling debris from the haunted house they had visited for old times’ sake that had come crashing down around them, and he thinks fiercely about his pain and how happy he is that it wasn’t Richie, or Bill, or Mike who had to bear it. He wouldn’t wish on anyone the grotesque feeling of ribs breaking like breadsticks, of insides being rearranged crudely by something that stabs its way into your body.

Eddie sometimes gets lost looking at himself too, at his scars, because as unsightly as they may be they also remind him that he was still alive to heal, and is still alive to see them.

But he doesn’t understand what Richie is doing until he sees him move, shifting his weight from one foot to the other as he lifts one arm and touches his face – the sunken cheeks that won’t fill out, the bags under his eyes that never leave no matter how much he sleeps, the spot where his hairline begins, way higher than when they were younger (or maybe just more noticeable with this hairstyle); then his hand moves down, to his middle, and Eddie flinches with unease when he sees Richie prod at his stomach, jabbing at the spot above his belly button, sinking his fingers cruelly in the giving flesh where he grabs himself as if he could pull out the parts he hated and be rid of them.

When he lets go there are red welts in his skin from where he squeezed too hard, and Eddie, has to turn heels and leave, towels forgotten.

In the following days Eddie can’t shake the guilty feeling from what he has seen. It was private and he had no right to intrude, let alone for the selfish reasons he keeps denying in his head – mostly, that he likes the sight of a half-naked Richie. He understands why the man is so open about flashing his endless legs but never goes without a shirt in Eddie’s presence and that knowledge almost crushes him, like a secret he wasn’t supposed to find out.

And of course, Eddie being Eddie, he can’t help but worry.

“Have you had your lunch yet?” he’ll ask when he finds Richie sitting on the couch around noon, slumped as he reads a book. Eddie knows he sometimes skips meals, and while it has a lot to do with ADHD (god knows Eddie would be just as bad if it weren’t for the strict schedule his mother first and his wife second have drilled into him), he’s also aware that Richie does know how to cook; before Eddie had gotten his allergies tested again, officially proving he’s only mildly gluten intolerant and that cashews are the only thing he actually can’t eat (and he’ll forever hate the dumb fucking nuts anyways for convincing his mother he needed her constant supervision), Richie had often cooked for him because Eddie was too prissy and paranoid to have take-out every night but couldn’t stand at the stove for too long without his wounds starting to hurt. So, the point isn’t that Richie can’t provide for himself, just that… he doesn’t always do that.

“Uh, yeah, I had a boiled egg,” he’ll reply, sometimes. “Not yet,” other times.

“Just an egg?”

“Yeah, I know you don’t like me skipping lunch but I wasn’t too hungry – and if I had instant ramen again I thought you might have an aneurysm. Or that you’d start ranting about my sodium intake again.”

And maybe Richie really doesn’t get hungry that often, but the image of him torturing himself in front of the mirror would play back inside Eddie’s mind and the gnawing feeling that Richie withholds food from himself for some reason or another would plague him.

“Well, I’m making pasta, I could make a bit more if you’d like some?” he’ll say, trying to sound casual about it, even though he cooks almost all his meals now and always offers to make extra for Richie.

“I wouldn’t want to impose, but if you just need to add more penne to the pot…”

Eddie isn’t sure when his life circled back from “worrying about Richie Tozier’s wellbeing” to “worrying about Richie Tozier’s wellbeing”, but to be fair with himself he really doesn’t mind. Besides, it’s the least he can do for him after all that’s been going on, after Derry, and everything Richie has done for him. It’s just what being a good friend means.

He doesn’t even realize what’s wrong until they have a fight about it.

“You said you have a headache, what’s wrong with asking if you’ve taken something for it?” Eddie snaps one evening, feeling weirdly defensive after the way Richie has barked at him to shut up.

“What’s—god, you don’t even realize you’re doing it, do you?” Richie asks in apparent bewilderment, and Eddie bristles.

“What the fuck are you talking about?” he bites, feeling like they’re thirteen again and fighting over who gets to use the hammock. But there’s something dark and bitter underlying their words, a rage that’s squatting at the back of Eddie’s mind the same way It’s fear had.

“Nothing, Eds, I’m not talking about anything because apparently I can’t take care of myself.”

“I never said anything like that, Rich, what the hell?” Richie’s words feel sharper than knives and Eddie only wants to spit venom back at him.

“You don’t need to say it, your actions speak for you,” Richie barrels on before Eddie can say anything, “You’re always nagging me about my sleeping schedule, you make my meals and buy me healthy snacks, you put my shoes in front of the door like I wouldn’t know where to fucking find them on my own, now you ask if I’m taking stuff for a mild headache?” he lists off on his fingers. “Fuck, Eddie, why not just go all the way! Strap a fucking watch on my wrist and give me a fanny pack of meds I don’t need!”

The way Richie nearly yells the last part has Eddie’s blood run cold. He finds his hands shaking with a deep rage he can’t justify, and he clenches his fists tightly willing them to stop.

“Don’t you fucking dare,” he says, voice quaking. “It’s not the same! I’m not getting off of this, it’s not a weird power trip, I just—” I just worry about you, Eddie-bear, why can’t you see that? “I just care about you!” Even as he says it, he feels the fight rush out of him and he puts his face in his hands with a groan. Richie doesn’t reply, and Eddie idly wonders if he’s giving him time to elaborate or if he’s just pitying him. “Fuck, do I really sound like that?”

“Yeah, man, you fucking do. It fucking sucks,” Richie says, arms crossed protectively over his chest.

“I’m sorry,” is all Eddie can offer without fessing up, but after a few seconds he does it anyway. “It’s just that- I get worried about you,” he says despite himself, and he hates the way Richie tenses around the shoulders.

“Because apparently it’s a mystery how I’ve survived this long on my own,” Richie spits, and Eddie bristles again.

“Stop putting words in my fucking mouth!” He yowls like a feral cat, “Yes, I’m apprehensive, but it’s not unwarranted! I just—I saw you, and I’m sorry, but it got me worried okay!?”

“Saw what, Eddie?” Richie is yelling again, “What could you possibly have seen that made you think—!”

“I saw you staring in the mirror in a way no one should look at themselves!”

There’s a long pause; the silence stretches thick around them like sap from an ancient tree, and if it doesn’t break soon Eddie is sure their remains will be found hundreds of years in the future from now, encased in golden amber.

“What?” Richie asks, the curve of his open mouth flattening around the word in a way that looks so familiar it makes Eddie’s chest ache, the way Richie’s cheeks rise to accommodate the movement of his lips making his eyes crease at the corners in maddening juxtaposition to the lines of his frowning eyebrows.

“I’m sorry alright, I didn’t mean to-to spy on you, but I saw you there gripping at your stomach like it was an alien thing, and you sometimes skip meals and so I started to think, I-I started to worry about you!” Eddie can feel his voice getting high-pitched and he can’t even be bothered. What does bother him is the way his face flushes with the secular shame that comes with confession. “I didn’t mean to invade your privacy, it just happened, and then I didn’t want to tell you about it because I… I was ashamed, okay?”

Richie just stares at him for a long moment, so long that Eddie starts to grow manic, until his skin is crawling and he wants to clap his hands in front of Richie’s face to snap him out of it. Eventually, Richie shifts his weight from foot to foot.

“So you thought I- what, that I have an eating disorder?”

“No,” Eddie shakes his head. “No, but—I mean, what if you did?” he says helplessly. He notices the tense way Richie holds himself now, and he can’t even blame him for it. He’d react the same way, if not worse. No, scratch that: definitely worse.

“I mean. I have self-image issues, sure, but I don’t— I’m not bulimic or anything,” Richie says, and it looks like the admission pains him, “I just, I mean… sometimes I can’t be bothered to make myself food, or stuff like that, because I just…  I don’t deserve it.”

“What the fuck,” Eddie says, and he knows he isn’t being fair, but just, “What the fuck?”

Richie just shrugs around the stiffness in his shoulders.

“Rich, you. You know that’s not true, right? You deserve food, and rest, and everything else you need,” Eddie says, taking a step closer.

“I know. I know, alright? Rationally, I know. I just… well, I feel like a coward most of the time, and like I don’t do enough to deserve good shit, but then I turn around and there you are, caring about what happens to me and listening to the stuff I tell you like you actually give a damn, and I don’t… I don’t know anything anymore. Because if you care, then I can’t be such a worthless bag of human waste after all, right?”

They should talk about all that, they really should. Eddie knows there’s something there, under the layers of hurt and defensiveness, and it sounds terribly like whatever’s burning a hole in Eddie’s soul, because what does it matter if Eddie cares about Richie? How is that what determines his worth as a person, in Richie’s mind? Is it because it’s Eddie, or just what comes with being truly seen for the first time in nearly thirty years? That is the one that more often plagues Eddie’s mind.

He looks again at the creases in Richie’s face, taking in the way his eyebrows furrow in two little trenches just above the bridge of his nose. Eddie could read the lines of his face like a well-loved book.

“It can’t have anything to do with what happened to Derry, right? Because if it does I’m making you eat the speech you gave me in the cistern,” he warns him, and that seems to get a tight smile out of Richie.

“No, shit. Not with the clown, at least. It’s just something I got from my mother, I guess.” He burns a hole in a spot by Eddie’s feet as he speaks, and he looks like he’s discovering this about himself as he goes. “She had this way of… putting herself out there for people, you know? Even if it came to the cost of something for herself. I always thought it was stupid – what’s the point to cook a casserole for the neighbor just because their kid disappeared, it won’t bring them back and they won’t thank you because they have more important things to think about, right? But then I guess I always did that too, whenever I had someone worth doing it for. Whether it was a joke to break the tension, which I always thought was just to cover up that I’m an emotionally constipated ass, or, apparently, offering my spare bedroom to my friend because I can’t bear the thought of him being all alone or worse, in a shitty relationship. Not that I don’t want you here,” he’s quick to add. “I just mean, sometimes I look around and I feel like I’m not living here anymore, I’m just here to make sure you know where to get everything you need. I guess I did take after her, after all.”

Eddie is speechless. He thinks back on everything that has happened since he’s moved in – the way Richie helped him in the shower, yes, but also the way the fridge was always stocked with healthy foods he never bought for himself again, the way the cabinets were stocked with Eddie’s favorite brands of housecleaning products, the way Richie had immediately adhered to some rules like no shoes in the house, no not even to or from the bedroom, the fucking Two Wheels Magazine copies that keep appearing on the coffee table whenever a new issue comes out.

He can’t believe he has never made the connection between the way Richie acts and the way Maggie Tozier would always make sure his son’s friends had enough juice boxes, or how she would drive them home if the weather took a turn for the worse even if that meant missing her favorite program, or how she always volunteered to drive Stan around because his father was busy at the synagogue, even though Richie said she often complained about it afterwards. When Eddie had asked why she did that if she hated it, Richie had shrugged and repeated what she had told him: “Because it’s selfish to put yourself first, Richie. If someone needs help and you can give it to them, you must do so even if it’s annoying or boring. That’s what it means to be a good person.”

(“That sounds like bullshit,” Eddie had said.

“It fucking is,” Richie had grumbled. “Grownups are stupid.”)

“God, look at us,” Eddie says, tiredly scrubbing at his face with his hands, all the fight gone out of him. “Rich, I… I’m so fucking sorry. The last thing I wanted was to make you feel the way my mom made me feel.” Which is miserable.

“Well. You can take a boy out of his mother but you can’t take a mother out of her boy,” Richie jokes, but he seems less tense than he did a moment ago.

Eddie snorts.

“That’s one way to put it,” he says.

“Mh.”

“Hey, Rich- let’s make each other a promise, okay?” Eddie says, letting his hands fall to his sides. He thinks of shards of broken glass glinting in the September sun and blood running hot against his palm, staining his cast. “Let’s not become like our fucking parents. Let’s- let’s talk about this stuff, okay? If there’s something that’s bothering us, we’ll tell each other, alright?”

“Eds, that makes it sound like we’re in a healthy relationship,” Richie says. Eddie just blinks at him.

“Would you rather be in an unhealthy one?”

Richie sways on his feet, seems to hesitate, but then shrugs.

“I mean, when you put it like that…”

Eddie half-giggles and rubs at his arm, feeling stupidly self-conscious.

“I just don’t want to fight with you. Especially not because I’m just like my mother.”

“You’re not,” Richie reassures him. “Although you know how she drove me crazy.” The crude gesture he makes gets him a startled laugh out of Eddie.

“Fuck off!” he cracks up, slapping at Richie’s shoulder. It feels exactly like those childish pretenses to touch each other all the time. “You’re not like your mother either, you know. We’ll just have to remind each other of it every now and again.”

Richie smiles sheepishly and nods in agreement.

“Alright, Spagheds. I’ll try not to be a human doormat.”

“And I’ll try not to treat you like a child. But seriously, if your head hurts you should take an aspirin…”

“Oh my god!”

Things do get better after that. They simply go back to how things were, losing that tension they hadn’t even realized had built up around them and gaining in its stead the capacity to talk a bit more earnestly to each other.

Surprising no one but themselves, they actually decide to handle things like adults. They still don’t address the thing Eddie is sure they can both feel lurking between them like a predator ready to pounce, but they get better at communicating about things that bother them.

Sometimes Richie will feel like a waste of space and lie in bed a few hours longer than he should, but instead of letting him feel bad for spending the day doing nothing, Eddie will join him there to talk about this or that, to ask an opinion about something, or generally just to sit together in companionable silence.

Other times Eddie will feel his neurosis acting up, and he’ll worry about the stupidest things, feeling restless and itching like he’s made of a thousand ants in a trench coat; those times he just needs to look at Richie and the man will start a dramatic retelling of something ridiculous he’s witnessed one time, or start rambling about things Eddie knows half as much as he would need to be able to follow, but he’ll always sound so fired up about whatever it is he’s going on about that Eddie will end up either laughing or shouting obscenities with him.

They read up about ADHD together, listing off what checks and what doesn’t like trading cards from a sticker album, and Eddie hates to see how similar they are even in this. They have always had similar patterns, similar ways of dealing with things, with the only difference being in how their parents handled them: the Toziers let their son roll around in the grass to fake brawl with their friends, and Sonia Kaspbrak had put a leash on Eddie by the means of a bottle full of placebos. The sad thing is that today that leash is still what allows Eddie to keep the appearance of a functional adult.

So, as much as it pains him to, Eddie considers taking a leaf out of his mother’s book. He makes a list of tasks and chores, and tries to decide together with Richie which ones should be distributed equally between them and which ones can be left up to whoever. After some debating they convene that since they’re both adults who live in the same house, and since neither of them is known to slack off on this sort of thing, all chores should be left to whoever. In the end they decide to keep splitting bills and groceries and keep other things as they are.

The only thing they truly end up settling on is meal times: when they don’t have other plans or engagements, Richie and Eddie agree to cook and eat at about the same time to reinforce the importance of regular schedules.

Barely two weeks go by before they end up sharing the same meal more often than not, and another before they start cooking together. Eddie tries not to think about how peeling potatoes side by side at the counter in their house clothes feels more domestic than ten years of marriage did, because that would mean getting in the beast’s territory and he wants to avoid that at all costs. He knows he’s not that brave.

Eddie keeps on taking small risks, because the more time passes the more he feels dumb for never allowing himself to do anything. At first he had kept stubbornly pretending it has nothing to do with what Richie had told him, but eventually he realizes that’s yet another dumb thing he keeps lying to himself about out of some fucked up sense of pride rather than for any rational reason. If anything, Richie deserves to know about the positive impact he’s had on Eddie’s life. It hasn’t escaped Eddie’s notice that whenever he does something he wouldn’t have before moving to Los Angeles, Richie’s chest puffs like he’s a proud mother hen but not in a way that makes Eddie feel self-conscious, or like he’s being coddled – which, if anything, makes him feel worse about the way he treated Richie. It’s been a couple of months, but he isn’t sure he’ll forgive himself so soon.

Richie seems to be doing better, himself. He had talked to his manager right after Derry and he had managed to convince him he needed a sabbatical. After missing his dates in Reno, and after the show he bombed because of Mike’s phone call, it wasn’t too hard to play it off as a minor break down. In a way, it had been.

Richie’s scheduled grand return is still a few months away, but already Eddie can see that he’s trying to rebrand himself. He has started working on his own material again, deciding that the time for self-pity and too many bad, sexist jokes was over. He didn’t like where his career was headed and he decided to get control of it back rather than let himself be carried adrift by his own passive behavior. Eddie can see how the fear of failure sometimes seems to petrify him, but whenever he asks how he’s feeling at the idea of his second debut Richie just gives him a shaky smile and a shakier thumbs up, and then reassure him that his rebranding was long overdue.

“It’s about time I start being true to myself,” he’ll say without elaborating, and Eddie always assumes he means being true to his comedic self. It’s not too off the mark, either. He knows Richie has been working his ass off on his new routine, leaving Eddie to herd him to bed at the same time as he to keep him on the healthy pattern.

Some mornings Eddie finds Richie asleep on top of the covers but in his bed, his notepad clutched tight to his chest and a pen held loosely in one hand, bedtable lamp still on. He brings him coffee and wakes him up gently, knowing he probably worked late even like this, but had probably fallen asleep sooner than he would have otherwise. It’s good to see him so committed to his work, but Eddie quietly makes sure he’s not exhausting himself and collapsing.

Other times Richie insists he needs to finish just one thing, and Eddie then hears him slink to bed in the middle of the night. He still gets up at about the same time, stifling his yawns behind his knuckles and rubbing behind his glasses with probing fingers, and at Eddie’s inquiries he’ll say that his bit is going well enough, he thinks.

And then, one time Eddie gets up to get some water and finds him slumped over his laptop in the patio, fast asleep in the warm Californian night, his notepad near his head. The screen is dead, probably out of juice, and Eddie sighs. He wishes he could help Richie with whatever is bothering him, but he’s being very private about his new piece and the only thing Eddie can do is give reassurances about how funny he is when he’s using his own words. Eddie thinks he wants the bit to be a surprise of some kind, but the way Richie stares back at him whenever he offers vague positive reinforcements makes his insides feel like a pot of bubbling stew.

Eddie respects Richie’s privacy, of course, so he doesn’t intrude on his process. He thinks it’s weird Richie won’t test run by him even a single joke, because back when they were kids Eddie had apparently been his favorite soundboard, but he doesn’t push. Whatever it is it seems to be very private, and Eddie knows he’ll hear it in time.

Which is why he feels so guilty when he puts a blanket around Richie’s shoulders and his eye falls on the open page positively covered in Richie’s tiny, messy print, where he catches a few words that make him read the whole thing from over Richie’s gently rising and falling back.

The words aren’t always easy to make out, some warped together in the way typical of a mind that runs faster than a pen could follow, but there aren’t as many blacked out parts as Eddie would have expected to find with how unsure Richie seems about it all.

Eddie hopes to find a context for the words that had sent his stomach plummeting, but the more he reads the more he finds his heart shooting up in his throat, a weird mix of guilt and elation swirling so furiously in his gut he might as well have been cast out at sea in the middle of a storm.

“Thank you all. But, back on track, what does that leave me? I could make jokes about myself, but there's not much fun to be had watching a grown man cry, unless that's a specific kink of yours - and if it is, (stage whisper) call me. (wink) [laugh] No, no, I think I'll do what I always did best. Not your moma jokes, no, but I will definitely start running my mouth and make jokes at my crush’s expense. Yup, still hasn't noticed me after thirty years. (is this funny or just depressing?)

“And so I'll start from the obvious: what the fuck is a risk analyst? [laugh] Why is that a thing, was this profession specifically made for people who spent their fucking childhood ranting about staph infections and how you can get AIDS from hangnails and dirty poles on the New York subway? As if I wasn't already terrified by it! [laugh] And at the same time, this guy is a spitfire. He's 5'9" of pure, vicious hatred for anyone who tells him what to do. He does things out of spite. I remember as kids once I dared him to lick the doorknob to our history classroom, and he fucking did it because I'd called him chicken! And THEN he rambled about all the horrid infections he could've gotten like that, and what if my tongue falls out, does it look swollen to you Richie? - to which of course I replied "not as much as your mom's vagina", because that's what I did. [laugh, assuming they haven't walked out as soon as I used male pronouns]

“But the fact still stands that he did it! Without question! Just because I riled him up that good. And the other day I dared him to go for a walk with his earbuds in and he did! A risk analyst! He was probably thinking about all the horrible things that could have happened to him, walking without hearing what was going on, but he still did it. How can I not fall hard for someone with that kind of fire in them?”

The piece ends there, clearly unfinished, and by the way a lot of the last parts were blacked over Eddie assumes that Richie isn’t yet sure about this. He understands why: it’s extremely vulnerable, it’s putting himself out there in the world, it’s exposing himself to the scorn and laughter and possibly hatred of hundreds of thousands of people.

It’s showing his soft underbelly to Eddie.

Eddie, who shouldn’t be reading all this stuff. He’s half-sure Richie doesn’t even mean all of that, because he can’t, can he? Surely if he does feel this way, this is not the way he’s planning on acknowledging the beast—is it?

Eddie may be willing to take small risks now, but when the implications of all this come crashing down on him he still reacts the way he always has: he runs from the patio, leaving an unaware Richie sleeping peacefully on his notes.

Eddie doesn’t talk about it. Of course he doesn’t, not so soon after admitting he had accidentally spied on Richie. It would look—bad. Worse than it really is. It would seem like Eddie is actively spying on Richie when he isn’t! He really isn’t! He’s not actively lurking around corners waiting to catch him red-handed, because he’s been on the other side of that treatment in his own home and it fucking sucks. He never wants Richie to have to experience that kind of paranoia.

It’s not Eddie’s fault that his eyes seem to be trained to catch these things. Maybe because his wishful thinking makes him zero in on this kind of thing, trying to see if he can find any sign that Richie… likes him. Maybe it’s because of how he grew up, used to be cautious, always tiptoeing around even though he wasn’t doing anything wrong, because it was better than being caught having a snack at the wrong time or with his feet on the coffee table. He had almost argued with himself that it’s been almost nine months already since the last time he’s had to worry about that sort of thing, but then he remembered he was still acting like his mother’s son without noticing after twenty-odd years, so that would have been a moot point.

It’s not his fault, either, that seeing the word “crush” written black on white in Richie’s hand had sent him spiraling in a frenzy of boyish panic. He had felt thirteen again, catching a glimpse of a poster with a naked woman on it in one of the older boy’s lockers in school. He had felt his heart shoot up so far high up his throat for a moment he thought he was going to cough it out right there on the desk for Richie to find when he woke up.

And so he thinks it’s only natural that he keeps… watching. Not spying, because that’s not what he’s doing; he just. Looks. Trying to read Richie’s face, to understand what goes on in his head when he pinches Eddie’s side on his way to the fancy Italian espresso machine sitting on his counter, or when he calls Eddie all the way from the other side of the house so he can show him something dumb Richie thinks will make him laugh, or whether his smile had always been so wide and crooked whenever he was setting a bad joke up or if it’s grown brighter recently. Has it? Is the crush Richie mentioned something from their past that he now fondly remembers as something childish and juvenile, faded over the course of many long years? Was it short lived, like a butterfly during a warm summer day, something Richie has long since moved on from? Has it always just… been there? Is it, still?

Eddie isn’t sure what the worst part is. On one hand, there’s the knowledge that he might always have been blind to this side of Richie. It’s not like he had never stared at his friend before, never caught himself looking too long or too hard at him instead of the different kind of birds that were passing overhead as they lay in the grass while listening to Stan name them all; it’s not like he had never relished in the sound of Richie’s laughter he had put on his lips, in the way he always seemed to take advantage of any excuse to touch him; it’s not like he hadn’t done the same, always looking for an excuse to grapple with the taller teen under the pretense of making him eat the hundredth joke about his mother.

So, on one hand there’s the realization that maybe they had both felt something all those years ago, something that Eddie can’t bear to dwell on because of the way it was taken from them. Any chance, any possibility, any future that it could’ve lead to… gone without either of them even realizing. How’s that thing go, about “almost” being the saddest word?

On the other hand there’s the crippling doubt and uncertainty, the confusion and the struggle to understand, to explain even to himself the turmoil in the pit of his stomach. Does Richie still feel those things? Does Eddie? Is he just latching onto this because it’s there, it’s familiar and close and maybe even easy? Does he like the idea of being with Richie or is he convincing himself that he would like it because it’s better than being alone? Is he projecting his current feelings on his newly found memories or is it the other way around? Is he fooling himself all the way, in every way? He feels like he’s going mad with self-doubt, his anxiety spiking whenever Richie caught him staring.

And then there’s a third hand, short fingered but well-manicured, broad palm facing him, a wedding band glistening on the ring finger, beckoning him. It’s his mother’s and it’s Myra’s. It’s his own fear of the unknown, begging him to return to the better known shores of the life he’s supposed to lead. It’s his mind telling him he should go back to what’s easy and familiar, and to forget all that nonsense of jogging with earphones, and motorbikes, and Richie. It’s the risk analyst in him saying that here’s a very fat chance that this won’t end well for anyone. That it’s just a phase, some confusion, he’ll get over it once he remembers who he’s supposed to be – what everyone expects him to be. It might as well have been fucking Pennywise’s, trying to fit him back into the sealed coffin of heteronormativity, and isn’t that just one of the many nifty words he has learned recently?

But no, that was all just a big dumb placebo, something of his own prescription. Don’t stray from the path ahead, don’t stand out from the crowd, keep following the life laid out for you. Get that degree, that job, that wife and that picket fence suburban life, live the dream, be a supporting character in your own fucking story. It was compulsive heterosexuality, as far as he could tell, the desire to fit in the mold he’s always been supposed to accept. Where had that lead him? For all his fear of being a weirdo and a loner, he has turned into one without anyone’s help. Worse, still, that he’s turned into a sad one. When was the last time he had laughed, truly laughed with someone in his life, before that night a month short of one year ago at the Jade of the Orient? He isn’t surprised that he can’t remember.

But a year has almost passed, and despite all the trauma and the pain and the mortal wounds he had to survive, he has lived more in the past eleven months since meeting the Losers again than in his eleven years of marriage. It doesn’t matter if those thoughts are there to try and lure him back in the box, he’s like fucking toothpaste out of the tube, with no intention of getting back inside. He’s grown stronger, more self-assured, braver. Happier, definitely.

And so what if he doubts, for a moment? If knowing what he knows about Richie’s feelings, whether still there or not, makes him spiral for a week? What if it makes him feel like he’s backpedaled all the way to before Derry times, like all his progress is for nothing because he’s suddenly scared shitless of what the future might hold? That doesn’t deny all the things he’s done, all the way in which he’s better now.

He remembers being truly brave only three times in his life: the first, when he had confronted his mother, threw her shitty pills on the floor and walked away from her to go and save his friends; the second, when he had done pretty much the same thing, packing his bags quickly while trying to explain to Myra that he didn’t know why he had to go, but that he was going to Derry to save his friends; and the third time was when he had done exactly that, nearly getting killed in the process, regretting nothing because if that was how it ended for him, at least he knew he would have died to save them all.

All those times, he remembered Richie being the source of strength he needed to do what he needed to do. He called him, that day in ’89, to tell him Beverly had been taken. He had been the first person back in his mind, aside from Mike, after the call that lead him to crash his car. He had been the one floating, caught in the Deadlights, the one Eddie had almost let down just a few hours earlier and that he couldn’t bear to let down.

Everything else, the small risks he’s been taking and the bigger ones, like signing the divorce papers… all of that hadn’t even felt like bravery. Not because he hadn’t been scared of those things, in some way, but because it’s all been done with Richie by his side. Not physically, maybe, but still there – like the sun hiding behind a thunderous cloud on a summer day, letting its presence be known in the heat all around you.

Yes, Eddie thinks. I’m never going back to the way things were. I can be brave– I am brave, and it’s about time I fucking act like it. You had a moment, so what?, he remembers in a voice that isn’t his own. You’re braver than you think.

That’s what finally sets him in motion, really.

It feels touristy, but not in a bad way: just because Eddie is taking risks and doing stuff he never thought he’d do in a million years doesn’t mean he isn’t still his fastidious, ready-for-anything self. Just because he is about to take his first surfing lesson ever doesn’t mean that his knees aren’t shaking, that he hasn’t meticulously researched the best spots and beginners’ courses in LA, or that he’s not covered in so much sunscreen that Richie jokes he could skip him off the ocean’s surface like a stone since he’s surely waterproof by now.

Oh, yes, it especially doesn’t mean he’s not going to take a friend with him, because what if his surfboard hits him in the head and he needs to be rushed to the hospital? It’s still an extreme sport, after all, and he hasn’t turned into a reckless fool overnight. It doesn’t matter that he would have brought Richie even if he actually had any other friends.

Eddie had felt a bit silly, asking Richie to go to the beach together only to explain, once there, that he’s attending a surfing class ad he wants someone he knows near. It was a bit like asking his mother to hold his hand while he gets his flu shot, he knows, but Richie hadn’t done anything other than beam at him and yell, ‘No way Eds, that’s so fucking rad!’

“You’re laughing, but I’m not taking any chances, neither with sunburn nor melanoma.”

“You’re going to wear one of those sexy little scuba outfits, why not put sunscreen on later on the rest of you!”

“Ok, first of all, they’re not scuba outfits, and they’re not that sexy—”

“They’re a tight fit, Eds.”

“—and I have a scar so I need to be extra careful, and second, fuck you, why would it be little! I’m not that short!”

“That’s just how they are, Eddie! They’re so small! They stretch the fuck out and stick to you and shit!”

They bicker all the way up until the rest of the class shows up and Eddie has to go and claim an appropriately sized surfboard, and as he listens to the instructor Eddie can’t help but turn around to see what Richie’s doing.

He’s sitting in the shade of a nearby kiosk at the start of the pier, not too far from the beach. Eddie can see him squinting against the glare of his phone’s screen, long legs poking out of his shorts as he sips on an iced coffee, waving wildly whenever he catches him looking.

It’s not like he isn’t listening, he can multitask – and besides most of the things the instructor brings up Eddie has already done his own research on. The best weather conditions to surf, how to gauge where a wave is taking you, how to understand when to step back and wait for it to pass, how to safely avoid being washed away… of course he’s done his research on all that stuff. And so he listens to his instructor, listens when other people ask questions, raises his hand and mentions his past injuries and asks how they might affect his experience, and gets in the water when everyone else does with one last look back in Richie’s direction.

He swims out with everyone else, pushing himself to the right spot, then clings to his board and flunks the first two waves, too afraid to try and stand up right away – perfectly normal, he’s assured, and he’s not the only one who hesitates, either. On his third try he manages to stand up, but it takes him a moment too long to find his balance and he topples off the board, throwing himself to the side in the way the instructor recommended, to make sure he does not actually hit his head. But then, on the fifth attempt he manages to ride his first wave for a few moments, and even though he ends up splashing off again before it reaches the shore, he still feels a sense of accomplishment that’s almost completely new to him, and a thrill that makes him feel alive. He’ll still never be a reckless person, but at least now he gets the appeal of extreme sports that aren’t reckless driving in New York City.

Two hours and a half pass in the blink of an eye and Eddie finds he hasn’t had this much fun on his own in years. He feels silly, because even though he hasn’t managed to ride a wave all the way yet, he kept looking over at where he knew he would find Richie, now sitting on a towel on the beach under the umbrella Eddie bought the moment he learned Richie didn’t own one; he feels childish, in a look, mom, are you watching, look, did you see what I did, did you see, did you see! kind of way, but from what he can make out of Richie’s face he’s been smiling at him the whole time.

When Eddie drags himself to where Richie’s lounging in the shadow, surf wear discarded in exchange for the t-shirt he had worn on the way to the beach, he’s smiling so much his cheeks are hurting.

“Alright, mate!” Richie greets him with his best Aussie accent as Eddie slumps down in a tired sprawl on his own beach towel, face pressed in the warm fabric. “How was it?”

“Fun,” Eddie says, looking up at him. “I don’t know if I’ll ever get any good at it, but I liked it a lot.”

“You looked good out there,” Richie says, curling his toes in the golden sand, hot in the late morning sun. “Happy.”

Eddie blinks, then smiles again.

“I felt that way. My core muscles will kill me tonight, and I need to reapply the sunscreen, but…”

“Small price to pay?” Richie supplies, earning himself another wide grin.

“You can say that.”

Eddie’s phone chimes in his bag, resting at the base of the umbrella. Eddie takes a moment to look at the setup, taking note of the way Richie has arranged their bags, away from the sun, and their towels, huddled together now that the high sun has reduced the umbrella’s shadow to a pinprick. He looks at Richie, his bare legs stretched out in the light, but before he can ask Richie assures him he is wearing protection.

“I never do anything unprotected,” he adds with a waggle of his eyebrows, and Eddie scoffs and rolls his eyes even as he fishes his phone out.

There he finds a number of messages that have apparently been streaming in all morning from the ridiculous group chat they shared with the rest of the Losers, on everyone’s insistence that they don’t lose touch like that ever again. They’re all busy adults, so they don’t spend every moment of the day texting there, but apparently it’s been a slow morning for everyone because they’ve been commenting on Eddie’s performance, courtesy of Richie.

He doesn’t read the hundred and fifty something messages he’s missed, promising himself to do so later, and just looks at the latest dozen or so. There’s a video, and Eddie beams when he realizes Richie has been “documenting his adventures in surfing for posterity” as he’d texted with the first picture Eddie had scrolled past.

He’s looking good!, Bev had texted.

I’m having flashbacks from when he tried to learn how to skate, Bill had said.

You mean when he spent an afternoon clinging to Richie, alternating between yelling ‘DON’T LET ME GO!’ and ‘FUCK OFF I CAN DO IT!’?, was Stan.

happiest afternoon of my life tbh earns Richie a bit of stink eye.

He’s not doing bad for a rookie!, because of course Ben surfs.

Eddie has to stifle a grin, but he chooses to reply to everyone at once with a voice message to really let his tone pass. He clicks on the little microphone icon and says, sweet as can be,

“Hi, Eddie Kaspbrak speaking, could I interest you all in a ladder so you can get off my back?”

The message ends on Richie’s bark of laughter, and then Eddie’s taking his t-shirt off and throwing it at him.

“Stop being useless and help me with the sunscreen!”

Richie’s still laughing as he peels the t-shirt from his face, their phones pinging as more messages come in. Eddie doesn’t read them right away, trading the device for the bottle of aloe scented lotion.

“I refilled your water bottle at the bar while you were falling off your board,” Richie points, smiling.

Eddie is reminded once more about how caring the man actually is, and he can’t help the way his own smile turns fond.

“Thanks, Rich. I’m sorry that you had to spend the morning making fun of my skills, so let me make it up to you. I’m paying for lunch.” Eddie wants to be brave, bring up that there’s something he wants to talk to Richie about, but he isn’t sure how to breach the subject. Hey, I’d like to know if you have a crush on me because that’d be a funny coincidence, want to talk about it over a club sandwich?

“It’s too early for lunch, but I’ll take a raincheck on that,” Richie says as Eddie rubs sunscreen on his arms.

“What? Wait, what time is it?”

“It’s like half past ten, dude.”

“Fuck,” Eddie groans. “I’m starving.”

“That’s what you get for skipping breakfast! Though now I know why,” Richie teases.

“You know how dangerous indigestion can be!” Eddie tries to sound reasonable, but he knows how he sounds and he has to stomp down on the rant building up in his throat. “Well, it doesn’t matter, we can go and have brunch. That’s a thing, right?”

“Oh, Eddie, darlin’. Havencha heard brunch is for the women and the gays?” Richie brings out his southern accent, and honestly, usually it would frustrate Eddie to no end, because he’s trying to work up the courage to say something, but right now he latches onto it.

He stops applying the sunscreen and looks out at the ocean. The waves are still cresting and crashing on the shore, and Eddie can’t quite believe he was on top of those just some minutes ago. The sun shines down on them, the June air hot but not unpleasant as the cries of the seagulls overhead make the rest of the world seem distant and foreign.

I was brave enough to stand on a surfboard. I’m brave enough to say it.

“Well, that won’t be a problem,” he says, letting his eyes drink in all that blue before turning to meet that of Richie’s eyes. “I think I fit in with the latter.”

He isn’t sure what he expects. Maybe a laugh of incredulity, or a joke to counter what Richie might think is a joke. Maybe a holler and a wolf-whistle, or just a long silence. What he gets instead is one of Richie’s hands on his shoulder, squeezing gently.

“Oh, hey, that’s great! I’d hate to get kicked out.” There’s a pause, a length of time during which they stare at each other, and Eddie thinks he sees in Richie’s gaze the same understanding and utter affection that he feels swelling in his chest. “And you’d look terrible in drag, so we could never pass you for a lady!”

Eddie blinks, and then shoves Richie down on the towel. Were they still kids, he’d probably be on him by now, trying to feed him sand; but they’re adults, and so what Eddie does is squirt some lotion at him with a burst of laughter.

“Fuck off! I’d look great in drag!” he says, catching Richie in the chest.

“Ugh! I’ve been hit! Oh, cruel fate, to be killed by my Spagheds!” Richie slumps back down on the towel, flinging his arm dramatically over his eyes. He gasps a few more times for effect, then tilts his head to the side and goes limp, tongue lolling out of his mouth.

“You’re so full of shit,” Eddie chuckles, twisting around to slap at his knee and watching as Richie sits back up and wipes at the stain on his black shirt.

“Who knew Kaspbrak was into the nasty stuff?” he says, showing his hand to Eddie, who somehow manages to only blush a moderate amount looking at the white cream webbed between Richie’s fingers.

“Come on, don’t waste that, put it on my back,” Eddie all but orders, turning around again.

“Bossy,” Richie says, but the thing is, he still does it. Just like he had this morning, before leaving the house, because Eddie might be fully recovered but there are ways his upper body just isn’t supposed to stretch anymore.

Eddie closes his eyes and allows himself to relax under Richie’s ministrations, which follow pretty much the same pattern as earlier in the morning. Richie starts at the center of Eddie’s back, covering his scar in a nice layer of sunscreen, then rubs more of the lotions between his palms and starts working it on the spot that are harder to reach for Eddie, namely the shoulders and the hollow between his shoulder blades where his ribcage sinks into him, on the side without the scar. It’s so easy to allow himself to be touched like this, especially since Eddie has realized he’s been starved for human contact for so long. He doesn’t remember – nor does he want to remember the last time Myra had touched him so gently, or the last time he had wanted her to. He only knows that Richie’s hands are soft, and warm, and big against him, and that when he digs his thumbs at either sides of Eddie’s spine at the base of his neck, it’s enough to make him gasp.

“Sorry,” Richie says softly, as if even he doesn’t want to ruin the moment.

Eddie hums in return, wishing he could just lean back fully against him and ask to be held.

And, the worst part is, Richie would do it. No questions asked, no further motives, not even a joke – because surprisingly, at some point in his life, Trashmouth had learned when to shut up. Or maybe, a voice in Eddie’s brain supplies, maybe he’s never nervous around you. You know he rambles when he’s uncomfortable. But Eddie doesn’t want to ask, even if he knows Richie would do it. He wants it to happen, and he wants to make sure they’re on the same page when it does, whether that means they convene nothing should happen, or because… well. Eddie doesn’t presume that now that he’s sort-of-out as not-straight Richie will magically be interested in him, of course.

So, what Eddie says instead is,

“Come on, let me return the favor.”

“Oh, no need, I tan like a lobster anyways.”

“That’s not true! You tan like everyone else, you just need to be more careful with your pasty-ass complexion.”

“Excuse me, I’m pretty sure the correct term is fair, not, ah, how did you put it- ‘pasty-ass’,” Richie says in a prim British accent that cracks Eddie up again.

“And besides,” he continues, ignoring him, “UV rays aren’t fully blocked by clothes or umbrellas, so there’s still a chance you might get sunburnt! It’s for your own safety, even if you don’t sit directly in the sun!” He turns around on his towel and gently nudges Richie’s thigh with his knee. “You should also get rid of your farmer’s tan, it’s ridiculous. You’ve got nothing to hide, Rich.”

“I know, I know,” Richie says with a tone that Eddie understands to mean, ‘let’s not go there again’. And he doesn’t intend to. But he wishes Richie could understand: he’s so tall and broad, his smile so wide and warm, his face so open and beautiful. He always looked like comfort to Eddie, even back when they were both scrawny kids with scarecrow bones, but now... now he just wants to sink into his arms and never pull away. How does he not understand that he deserves the world?

“So, just let me put some sunscreen on you, ya big baby,” Eddie says. Richie snorts.

“Was that a voice?” he asks with a toothy grin.

“What? No. What voice would that even be?”

“I don’t know, jackass!”

Eddie tries to distract from his mild embarrassment by knocking Richie’s polo hat off his head, watching the two waving hand emojis telling him ‘great job!’ do a backwards flip before landing on the towel.

“Not everyone’s always pretending to be someone else.”

“Aren’t we, though?” Richie laughs, so honest and open that Eddie has to look away because he feels like he’s just swallowed the sun.

“Don’t try to get all philosophical on me, Trashmouth,” Eddie rolls his eyes. “Take your shirt off, come on,” he prompts.

“Oh, you really are bossy,” Richie repeats, but this time he obeys without arguments because he knows it’s the fastest way to ensure Eddie will drop the issue. He tugs the shirt over his head and his glasses remain stuck in the garment, leaving Richie blinking and bleary eyed. “Where’d’ya go, Eds,” he called, choosing on an old man’s frail voice now. He had grown so talented after puberty had stopped messing with his timbre, and Eddie was simultaneously relieved and devastated at the realization that, had they never forgotten each other, Richie would have spent their twenties practicing with him – either using him as an audience or by prank calling him in the times before digital displays.

It’s not the first time that such a realization leaves him feeling robbed and cheated, and he knows it won’t be the last, even though it shouldn’t matter anymore. What gets him this time, however, is the way Richie so casually accompanies the act with a physicality he completely lacked as a gangly teen, when he expressed every emotion, real or portrayed, with a flail of limbs and an exuberance of energy. But now he raises a hand with controlled composure, letting it shake minutely, pretending to feel around him to look for Eddie but missing him completely. His face is pinched, eyes squinting, head sunken between his shoulders like his spine is crooked with age, and Eddie feels like he’s sitting in a theatre watching a live performance.

Before he can think of something smart to say, though, Richie’s letting his hands – one at first, soon joined by the other – find Eddie. His left hand lands on Eddie’s shoulder, while the right finds his cheek, as if it’s the most natural thing in the world, as if it doesn’t steal the breath away from his lungs.

“There you are!” he says, that same wheezy quality to his voice, for which Eddie is glad. Any other inflection and he might’ve done something stupid. Hell, he still might.

He’s suddenly remembered of something that happened to him as a child, before It, before anything, really.

One day Eddie had dropped a jar of jam, and it had shattered on the kitchen floor. The noise hadn’t been enough to immediately alert his mother, so Eddie had hurried up to try and clean the mess before she could come in and flip at the sight of shards of glass all over the floor. The jar had broken in half, so Eddie had carefully picked up the bigger parts and thrown them in the trash.

He had gotten a wet rag, knowing the best way to get rid of the smallest shards would be to let them stick to the wet fabric before throwing it out in the trash, especially because of the mess of raspberry jam mixed in with it that made sweeping impossible. But Eddie hadn’t wiped it all up right away. He had found himself strangely drawn to the bright red jelly, and he remembers thinking, what a waste. He had reached out, scooping up a dollop with his finger, thinking about germs, about a piece of glass cutting his insides to bloody ribbons.

He remembers thinking about the risks, wondering if they were worth just a dollop of the sweet confection, and he remembers feeling brave as he brought his finger to his mouth and sucked it clean. The cold fear that had gripped him when something hard crunched under his teeth, only to realize it was a raspberry seed. How the sweet taste had lingered on his tongue for the rest of the morning, even after he had cleaned the whole mess up and skipped breakfast to run to the store and buy a new jar so that his mother wouldn’t notice.

He feels the same way now, staring at Richie’s goofy smile.

The risk of glass.

The taste of jam.

He knows the script. Eddie knows what’s expected of him, acutely aware of it as he’s been all his life. He knows what he’s supposed to do – to laugh at Richie’s antics, tell him to stop making a fool of himself and to put the lotion on – but he does none of those things.

Instead, he closes his eyes and leans into Richie’s hand, the warm weight of it offering him a comfort he wasn’t aware he needs.

“Yeah,” he says softly as he places his own hand on top of Richie’s. “Here I am.”

Eddie is sure he hears Richie inhale sharply, and he waits to find out if he’s about to chew glass.

It’s worth it, he still thinks. It’s worth it, either way. Richie’s worth chewing glass for. And you’re brave, Eddie. You’re brave, and full of love, and you have to let it out, and Richie deserves it.

“Ah,” Richie says in his own voice, soft and fond. “Yes, I can see you. I just hadn’t recognized you with all those curls.” The hand on Eddie’s shoulder moving to run though his hair in a caress rather than the usual ruffle.

“The curls are entirely your fault,” he reminds him, finally daring to open his eyes and look at him. Richie is still without glasses, but his eyes are clear and staring right into Eddie’s.

“One of my best accomplishments,” Richie nods solemnly.

Eddie rolls his eyes and gropes around in Richie’s discarded shirt, until he finally finds his glasses.

“Here,” he says, placing them carefully on Richie’s nose. “Now let me put this lotion on you so we can go and have our brunch, alright?”

Richie strokes his cheek with his thumb for a moment, tracing the silver scar marring his skin before letting his hand fall in his lap. And then, because of course he does, he proceeds to say,

“Oil me up, daddy!”

Eddie’s lips twitch and he has to shoot Richie with the sunscreen again just so he’ll flop back down and won’t see the smile breaking on his face.

He’s sure to hear his laughter, though.

The front door opens and closes, and Eddie tenses a bit on the couch. He shouldn’t, and he knows as much because he has nothing to hide – but at this point he’s pretty sure he’s never getting rid of the pavlovian reaction the sound causes in him. Too many afternoons reading borrowed comic books over his school work, tense as a bowstring, ready to bolt and stash them under the textbooks at any sound coming from downstairs to pretend he was studying for the eight consecutive hour rather than taking a break from all those boring notions.

“It’s dumb, making you cram like that,” Richie always said whenever he would push the latest issue in his hands. “Your brain can only fit so much stuff, after a while it just can’t get any fuller so why bother! And besides, some of the most important lessons in life aren’t learned in textbooks,” he would quote his father.

“Eds?” he calls now, his voice enough to make Eddie smile.

“In here,” he says, feeling ridiculously domestic. They haven’t really talked about the moment they had at the beach, but more similar moments had followed.

Just a couple of days ago Eddie had returned from a run to find Richie making them both French toast, singing along to a ridiculous song Richie had found and was playing loudly in the kitchen,

“And while the years have clawed at us and tears have gnawed at us, the song in my head still resounds! And I hope that one day, dear friend, you will come around!” Richie had sung, using his spatula as a microphone and pointing it at Eddie when he turned around to greet him in a way that would have sent him spiraling just a few months earlier, especially because he knew what would come next. “Oh Eddie, baby, won't you come to my arms tonight? I beg and plead you, please succumb to my charms tonight!”

But instead Eddie had just blushed and grinned, tapping his feet to the rhythm, reveling in the absolutely delighted look on Richie’s face as he started lip synching to the lyrics.

“I give my heart, but you take it and you break it and you tear it apart - ooh Eddie, baby, won't you come to my arms!”

Richie had met him in the middle of the kitchen, shimmying his shoulders to the music, and Eddie had almost pressed closer to him. What he did instead was take Richie’s free hand in his as they swayed together to the music, grinning like loons and unable to take their eyes off of each other, until their faces were hurting from their smiles.

They had kept going until the end of the song, saved by their idiotic staring at each other by the smell of burning bread; Richie had dived to the stove to save their breakfast and Eddie had started ranting about the dangers of kitchen fires and why one should never leave an unsupervised burner on too high, but he laughed at the triumphant way Richie had declared, “They’re saved!” before plating the food.

So, things are a bit weird, but not in a bad way. Eddie has a feeling they’re testing the waters around each other, like two rabbits trying to figure out if the shadow they just saw belong to a wolf’s or not. He doesn’t exactly mind – it gives him more time to think about how to go on with this. After all he has never had to figure out if someone was into him before. Dating Myra hadn’t exactly been the stuff of rom-coms, a mutual friend had introduced them back in college. There had been no spark at all, just a disquieting sense of familiarity and comfort the thought of which now makes Eddie’s skin crawl in realization.

And Richie… well, Richie likes him, that much is obvious, but does he like like him? It feels so juvenile to wonder like this, but it’s not like Eddie’s never asked himself this question back when he was a teenager, before knowing why he cared so much about it.

“Whatcha doin’ there?” Richie comes over to him on his way to the kitchen, glancing over his shoulder curiously. Not because Eddie never lounges about seemingly doing nothing, but because Richie delights in these moments and always looks for an excuse to join him that Eddie is usually more than happy to provide.

Eddie has his feet kicked up on the coffee table and is leafing through yet another issue of Two Wheels, a poorly contained smile on his face. He has told Richie how much he appreciates the magazine, of course, but right now he’s remembering all those sneaked comic books and the similarity is more than endearing.

“Reading,” he says, voice even.

“Huh, alright.” Richie resumes walking in direction of the kitchen, and Eddie waits.

He turns a page in his magazine and distracts himself for a couple of minutes by reading the specifics of the Honda Rebel 500; then, the expected happens. The fridge’s door slams closed and there’s the sound of hurried footsteps, and then Richie’s walking around the couch and stopping in front of him, across the coffee table. He stares openly, and Eddie feels his lips twitch in amusement.

“Yes?” he asks, knowing perfectly well what it is that Richie saw and needed a moment to process.

“Eds?” he starts, sounding hesitant, like Eddie’s playing a prank on him. “Eddie, what’s that.”

“Hmm?” Eddie hums distractedly, barely taking his eyes off the pages as he lifts his right elbow to highlight his forearm. “This, you mean?”

“Yes, Eddie, obviously I mean that!”

And Eddie can only laugh as he looks up at Richie’s shocked face. He stretches his arm out for inspection, and Richie steps forward, cautiously, as if it were some kind of trap.

“Well, surely you remember me mentioning that I’ve wanted a tattoo for a while, now.” Richie nods. “And that I had recently thought of something worth etching on my skin forever.” Another nod. “Well… I found an artist that could deliver what I wanted, looked up their credentials and online ratings, did a routine check of the sanitary condition of their shop before letting them get anywhere near my skin, and… ta-dah!”

Richie is quiet for a moment, and Eddie watches as he takes in the word on his arm, red on black on tan skin shining with a thin layer of Vaseline. The bold, capital letters that Eddie had requested in a simple font, asking the artist to redraw them again and again on the test paper before he was satisfied enough with the result to make his own addition.

He had felt his lungs constrict with anxiety for a moment, and he had wished Richie were there with him – but Eddie hadn’t asked him to come for a reason, and the thought of the surprised look that was sure to bloom on Richie’s face had been enough to calm him down, together with a few deep breaths. The drone of the tattoo gun had helped, too, a steady buzzing sound he could synch his breathing to, eyes firmly closed because, nope.

And he had been right: Richie is simultaneously looking at him like he’s grown a second head and like he’s done something miraculous.

“Of all things in the world, this is the one worth getting inked on you?” Richie sounds incredulous.

“Yeah. What else?” he shrugs. In the end the choice had been very easy.

Richie steps closer, walking around the coffee table and sitting close to Eddie, their thighs pressed together on the couch, Eddie’s right arm resting between them. Eddie uses the armrest of the couch as a bookmark for his magazine, so he can give all of his attention to Richie, who in turn gives all of his attention to his tattoo. He traces the letters with his eyes, but he seems to get stuck on the slash of red ink over the ‘S’.

“Do you mind if I take a picture?” Richie asks, and Eddie tilts his head to the side.

“I was hoping you’d ask. I want to send it in the group chat, but the angle is weird for me.”

“Well, I’ve got you covered,” Richie smiles, patting down his pockets to find his phone. He whips it out, and in a moment he’s snapping a close-up picture of Eddie’s forearm and sending it to everyone else.

GUYS, reads the caption.

???, asks Ben. Is that Eddie?

no way!!, says Beverly.

You’re a terrible influence on him, Richie. Next thing we know he’ll start wearing jorts, Mike says with an aghast looking emoji.

Well, actually…

Richie follows up with another picture, showing off Eddie’s full figure, outstretched legs, feet on the table, jorts and middle finger jutting from his tattooed arm included. He isn’t looking directly at the camera, it’s more of a side eye with a subdued smirk on his face.

So wait, he just stopped using hair products?, asks Bev, noticing that even without the help of briny sea water Eddie’s hair was curled in delicate waves over his head. You look good, Eddie!

Fuck yeah. Let loose, Stan quips, making Richie dissolve in a cascade of giggles.

He’s so cute when he’s like this, and how is that fair on Eddie? Richie’s a fucking grown man and he’s so endearing, Eddie’s lungs constrict in his chest like they did at the tattoo parlor.

Richie types something back, and Eddie has to pull his phone out to check what it is.

yeah, don’t you know too much hair product means you’re gay?

“Dickhead,” Eddie laughs, watching as another message from Stan pops up.

Then why do you never style yours?

I get in the zone for five minutes and Eddie Kaspbrak gets a tattoo?? What year is this, how long have I been gone, Bill texts.

Is it so hard to believe that I may be finally living my rebellious phase at age 40?, Eddie asks their friends, a grin on his face. He looks absolutely content and relaxed, peering down at his phone while talking to his friends, and he knows this because another picture of him comes through.

“not gay as in happy but queer as in fuck you!”, the caption reads.

Fuck off!

See what I mean?

The next picture the Losers receive is a bit out of focus, testifying the candid nature of it, but the subject is still unmistakable as Richie, laughing as he’s caught in a headlock by Eddie, the forearm under his chin shining as if to highlight the tattooed – the word LOSER, with a red V carefully traced in the middle.

Let us know if we’re coming down there for a funeral rather than a show, Stan says, and the conversation continues for a while longer but Eddie and Richie won’t see it until later, when they’re both laughing and exhausted after their impromptu wrestling match that, if asked, both will claim to have won.

“Mind if I join you?”

Richie tilts his head back so he can look at the door without having to turn around, and Eddie leans against the frame with a smile.

Richie’s sitting on his patio in just a pair of boxers, flip flops, and a garish lime green shirt with a tiny dancing avocados pattern, going over his new routine one more time. He’s still not reading it out loud whenever Eddie’s in the house, claiming he wants to see Eddie either laugh or boo him from the audience, but he probably rehearses it whenever he has the place completely to himself, which is often enough nowadays between Eddie’s run, his surf class and his shopping trips.

“Of course, Eddie, mi casa es tu casa,” Richie says easily, and Eddie goes and sits on the vacant chair next to his.

“Yes, well. You seem busy, I don’t want to throw off your groove or anything,” he says, lifting his hands defensively.

“Eh, not much to be done about it now. I’ve thought of another joke but I don’t think I’ll manage to squeeze it in,” Richie says, gesturing to the notepad in his lap. He hasn’t needed to look at it for weeks, learning the whole thing by heart in a way that had seemed effortless but that Eddie knows must have been anything but, yet he still kept poking and prodding at the whole thing, growing ever more nervous as the date draw closer.

Eddie knows Richie’s satisfied with his work for the first time in years – he’d told him as much himself; but he has a feeling he knows one of the reasons Richie’s so nervous, and he wants to ease him out of that particular sticky situation, even if it means derailing his plans. He’d rather give Richie one less reason to fret than see him buzzing with nervous energy for another full week.

“I’m sure you’ll think of something. If not, keep it for the next one! No reason to jam-pack this one full when there’s always going to be another routine to fill out, right?” Eddie says, joining his hands together between his knees as he leans forward towards Richie.

“I guess,” he sighs, closing his eyes as a gust of summer breezes across the patio, ruffling Richie’s hair.

If this weren’t Los Angeles, they would be in a prime position for some stargazing.

Eddie remembers sneaking onto his roof as a kid to watch the stars, in the heart of the night when he couldn’t sleep. He remembers being terrified the first few times, paranoid that he’d slip and fall and break his neck or worse, get grounded for life, with bars on his window like more of a prisoner than he already was – but then, after a while, it had become as natural as breathing. When his worries and anxiety kept him up at night, a voice just like his mother’s ringing in his head to tell him he’d fail out of school, or graduate and never get a job, or get a job and be miserable, of never finding love or being worthy of anyone’s love; when that voice started berating him and dripping poison in his ear, he’d always sneak out his window to sit on the cold shingles, wrapped up in his duvet, counting the stars until he was moments away from falling asleep and had to drag himself back inside.

Eddie suddenly wants to watch the stars with Richie so desperately his heart aches with longing.

What the fuck, Eddie thinks, smiling despite himself. Why the fuck don’t you then, you lovesick moron?

And, well, that’s fair.

“So.” He looks at Richie, sprawled in his chair, his glasses reflecting the light pollution from the night sky. “I read it.” No reason to put it off.

“What?”

“Your bit. Well, a part of it, anyway.”

Richie sits up so fast that he nearly tumbles off the chair in his hurry to mirror Eddie’s position, but he catches himself on the small table between them. His notepad falls to the floor in a rustle of paper, thudding against the hollow wooden floorboards.

“Shit, you—which bit?” Richie asks, and Eddie can see the fear and hope behind his eyes, so wide and dark without the sun shining in them.

“I don’t remember the exact words, but… the bit where you mention having a crush on me as kids.” Eddie isn’t sure how he manages to sound so calm, where he’s harvesting this inner peace that right now probably makes him sound like a father about to explain to his son why he shouldn’t smoke pot in school.

Richie’s face does this weird thing where it seems to pale and blush at the same time, and if it weren’t for the barely concealed panic Eddie can see there, he would laugh at him for the bizarre feat.

“I, uh, yeah, it was a long time ago and—”

“Was it?” Eddie interrupts him before he can start rambling out random excuses and apologies. “Because, I mean… I know it’s been thirty years, and I know they’ve been weird. Clown and all. But…” Here goes nothing.

Eddie’s gaze has strayed away from Richie’s face, to his shoes, but now Eddie pushes himself into looking into his eyes. He stands up, too, manic energy coursing through him. He doesn’t pace like he would like to, but he clenches his hands at his sides and then stuffs them in his pockets so Richie won’t take it the wrong way.

But Richie, Richie is only staring up at him like Eddie knows the secrets of the universe and is deciding whether he’ll share them or not. Richie looks at him like Eddie somehow holds the answer to some unknown question that’s bigger than either of them, like he’ll be lost unless Eddie tells him the way.

He clearly remembers seeing Richie with that same look on his face back when they were teenagers, Richie’s searching eyes digging his soul out from under the layers of dirt his mother kept shoveling on him in her attempts to smother his flame, never saying anything, but Eddie knew. Richie had never needed to say anything because Eddie… knew. He just didn’t understand yet.

“But,” Eddie takes a shuddering breath, “if it’s at all important, now… I felt the same.”

He doesn’t say ‘I had a crush on you too’, because that would be reductive and there’s no scaling down this huge thing inside his chest anymore.

Of course you’re full of love to bursting, he thinks nonsensically, you always felt like this and had nowhere to put it, no one to direct it at because you forgot where it was supposed to go – who it belonged to; and so you held onto it until it came out as frustration and rage but even those weren’t going in the right place but you can fix it now, fix it.

“Still feel,” he adds as he takes in Richie’s comically bewildered expression.

Richie keeps unconsciously leaning forward, until he nearly flips the chair over with his weight. Then, he scrambles to his feet and Eddie has to shift his gaze accordingly. It’s still always a bit of a shock, to see how much taller of him Richie is. Eddie really doesn’t mind his height, he really is average in the best of ways – he reaches most high shelves, passes through all doors and fits comfortably in almost every car, and every store carries his size; he’s perfectly average under pretty much every aspect, really – but he especially doesn’t mind his height when it puts him in such a wonderful situation. He had always secretly liked looking up at Richie.

“You… you do?” he asks, licking his lips – a movement Eddie can’t help but notice and follow with his eyes.

“Yeah,” he replies, suddenly feeling his mouth go dry. “But I’m not expecting… I mean, nearly thirty y—” He stops talking when Richie cups his face. “Oh,” he breathes.

“Eddie,” Richie says, and now he’s blushing again. He’s handsome, and Eddie can only smile back.

“Rich,” he calls softly, lifting one hand to caress his cheek in turn.

“Do you mean it?”

“Why would I lie about this!” Eddie laughs.

“I don’t know, man! Good things never happen to me,” Richie pouts, and Eddie wants to kiss him. Instead, he brushes some hair away from his forehead and grins.

“You’re about the only person who would call me ‘a good thing’.”

“Well, many people wouldn’t know a good thing if it landed in their lap, right?”

“I’m not sitting in your lap,” Eddie says fast enough for Richie to break into giggles. “Nice try, Trashmouth!” he adds, just to make him giggle even more, and when Richie leans forward to press his forehead against his shoulder, Eddie feels happy enough to burst. “But… if pressed, I will agree to a date.”

“Oh, is that so? You’ll do me the honor of a date? Shall we share a bowl of spaghetti and kiss passionately?” Richie pulls away to look at him. “Pastion- past—is this anything?”

“Dude, how is this your literal job,” Eddie snorts.

“Seems like someone isn’t getting my meatballs!” Richie waggles his eyebrows, and Eddie can’t help but laugh fully.

“Smartass. You know what, I’ve changed my mind!” He starts pulling back, but Richie’s hand lands on top of his own and keeps it there. Eddie can feel the creases of his face forming under his fingers as Richie’s smile turns fond, but not less bright.

“No, you haven’t,” he says simply, and the small acknowledgement knocks the breath out of Eddie.

He knows. Richie knows.

“No, I haven’t,” he admits in a whisper, closing the distance between their bodies until their chests press together, hot in the warm summer evening. “I’m afraid I’ll never be rid of you.”

“Oh, no, whatever shall I do,” Richie grins, leaning down to press their foreheads together.

“It’s a two-way street, you do realize,” Eddie says with a roll of his eyes, lips twitching. He moves his other hand to the back of Richie’s neck, watches him lean even closer as he settles under the weight.

“Oh, no, whatever shall I do,” he repeats, but now his grin is impossibly wide and his purposefully flat tone is colored by mirth. He inches closer.

“Whatever it is, we’ll take a chance and find out together,” Eddie breathes against his mouth.

They’re both smiling too much to kiss, but neither can bring himself to care. There will be plenty of time for that: they aren’t going anywhere.