Chapter Text
“You want one or two?” Richie asks as he shakes a little white mountain out of a dime bag and onto his phone screen. Eddie wants badly to lecture him about how many germs could be found on a cellphone, but what else could they even use? The crusty notebook Richie kept in his glove box? Not a chance in hell. “This batch is a bit stronger than the last one—just FYI.”
“Two; I like to keep my nostrils equally fucked,” Eddie responds after pretending to think it over for a few seconds. He watches Richie tap out a bit more before setting the baggie aside and using a razor blade—routinely sanitized and replaced at the first signs of rust by Eddie himself—to cut up the bigger pieces and separate their lines. Richie was always good about making sure it was fine enough to not get lodged in any nose hair—only because he knew that Eddie wasn’t one to jam his finger up there and rub it in. “Uncouth,” he called it, like he wasn’t the one meticulously budgeting their money to set aside a monthly stipend to purchase illicit substances.
Richie pulls out the shortened piece of a plastic straw he keeps in his wallet and does both his lines in one fluid motion. Eddie liked watching Richie do this; always so quick and effortless with it. Normally, Eddie was the one with an abundance of knowledge about any and everything they came across, but the ins-and-outs of drugs were one of many topics Eddie had been learning from Richie over the last few years.
Richie sniffs a few more times as he pulls Eddie’s straw out of the separate baggie he kept in his pocket. “All yours, hot stuff, then we’re off to Mike’s.”
Eddie grabs the straw and stretches carefully over the phone resting on the center console to catch Richie's lips between his own. It's a slow, deep kiss because Eddie gets irrationally turned on by all of Richie’s inane skills. The kiss doesn’t last long; Eddie knows how weird it feels to breathe afterwards. He pulls back with one last peck to the side of Richie's grinning mouth and snorts his lines, too—with little to no finesse at all.
“Ah shit,” Eddie says, eyes squeezed shut and head tilted back. He was still sort of new to doing coke, so the burning sensation in his sinuses never failed to make his eyes water. It was especially bad this time, which meant that Richie wasn’t lying, at least. And he assumed it would probably hit a lot faster.
“Yeah, sorry Eds,” Richie sighs out as he turns the car on. “I have a Fanta in my bag if the drip is too much.” He picks up his phone and wipes up the residual dust with his pinky to rub onto his gums. Eddie didn't care for his mouth to be numb. It reminded him too much of being dragged to the dentist nearly every month for non-existent issues at the behest of his mother. He had only tried it once when they’d gotten drunk and Richie offered to do it for him as a thinly veiled excuse to get his fingers in Eddie’s mouth. Something Six-Shots-Deep Eddie had been more than happy to allow.
“I’ll deal. I’m used to the taste of chemicals at the back of my throat.” Eddie opens his eyes again, feeling Richie's ancient car jerk into reverse. He watches Richie smirk as he turns around to carefully back out of his parents’ driveway.
“I know something else you can handle at the back of your throat,” he says, throwing a quick wink at Eddie.
Eddie reaches over to smack Richie’s leg even as he fails to hold back a snort. “You’re not fucking funny, Rich.”
“Eh, but you love it, though.”
“I love you. Your terrible jokes are something I'm obligated to deal with.”
“I will purposely ignore your slander against my comedy because I love you, too.”
Eddie’s cheeks flush with warmth, but he still rolls his eyes. They both tend to get sappy when they’re high. More so than normal, at least. It wasn’t like Eddie minded, really, he just sometimes felt so overwhelmed with reciprocal affection that his heart hurt. And every time it does, he remembers how long it took for them to admit the feelings they had for each other. It was a long, arduous affair that was way more dramatic than it needed to be, frankly, but Eddie wouldn’t have wanted it any other way in the end. Besides the sex and the kissing and the surreptitious foray into casual drug use, almost nothing had changed in their relationship.
Knowing someone for almost your entire life could have that kind of effect, Eddie guesses, but he wasn’t in love with the rest of his friends. He had known their friend, Bill, for even longer and there wasn't nearly as much chemistry between them. That never stopped them from having a strong friendship, it was just an undeniable fact about their little friend group. There were a lot of undeniable facts, really. Eddie and Richie are practically inseparable; a package deal. Mike is into Bill and Bill had liked Bev at one point before moving onto Mike. Stan is into some girl named Patty that he met at summer camp. Bev thought Bill was cute, at first, but then Ben came around and the rest was history.
Thinking about their friends makes Eddie’s heart ache in a different way. He and Richie had only just made it back into Derry after being gone for about a year and a half. Eddie’s god-awful mother had finally kicked the bucket right as he was getting ready to graduate and be shipped off to his aunts in Bangor to get a nursing degree. It was a miracle in his eyes because he was able to toss that Sonia-Fabricated, bullshit dream into the garbage and skip town with Richie, consequence free. They had both turned eighteen fairly early and Eddie figured they could take a loosely-structured gap year to discover what it was they wanted out of life while they were really living their lives out on the road.
The two of them had driven their way across two-thirds of the country before the homesick nights quickly became homesick weeks. Facetiming their friends who were already off at college trying to make something out of themselves wasn't quite cutting it anymore. Well, that and stealing gas was a tremendous effort.
Richie's parents had been willing to give him enough money to last another six months, only if he was willing to come back home and go to school when it ran out. They also made it very clear that Eddie was more than welcome to their spare room (granted they couldn't afford to pay for his education). Richie and Eddie had both tentatively agreed to the conditions; a one foot out of the door type of deal. And it was always a treat to visit Maggie and Went, but they had only stopped by long enough to eat, shower, and change—anxious to get to the rest of the losers on time.
“Bill and Stan are bringing weed, Mike has drinks, and Ben is bringing his super hightech laptop projector so we can watch movies,” Richie tells Eddie at a stoplight.
Eddie makes an excited noise and grabs Richie's phone. “Maybe Bev can bring her speaker!”
“Woo! Look at those neurons fire, Eds!” Richie shouts, blinding smile somehow even brighter. “Can’t believe I get to marry you someday.”
“Shut the fuck up, oh my god.”
Eddie glances up from the phone to look at Richie and, of course, he’s already looking back at Eddie with the same dopey heart eyes he’d been flashing since they were kids. At least both of their faces are bright red this time. Eddie can’t even pretend he isn’t affected by it because he can practically feel the goop pouring out of his own eyes. “Light’s green, dumbass,” he says softly.
Richie winks at him as he goes back to driving, “I knew that.”