Archive of Our Own

Chapter Text

Richie put on his glasses to stare up at the ceiling uncomprehendingly.

He knew, objectively, that doing so was a waste of effort. He also knew that, if caught in this position, his plausible deniability of wakefulness would be severely compromised, possibly even unsalvageable.

Without meaning to, he made a face at the ceiling fan. He hated that he did shit like that, mugging for an invisible camera or audience, trying to get a laugh out of an empty theater just by the force of his stupid reactions to his own stupid decisions.

The bed was as comfortable as it had always been, but Richie wasn't tired. He wasn't even feeling particularly lazy, nor inclined to lounge about, as he had done for so very long.

The problem was Eddie.

He could hear Eddie, his marching little footsteps ambling around the kitchen, and he could almost see him in his mind's eye. He was probably dressed "smart," that's how older people always described it. Or "snappy," if they were feeling condescending. His hair was probably gelled into some ridiculous businessman's style, even though he was just going golfing with some coworkers. Richie, of course, had made fun of him relentlessly, despite endless protestations that it isn't just for games, Richie, it's to foster relations with the new insurance companies. He was probably even packing his dinky little backpack, somewhere in the overlap of briefcase and rucksack, full of unnecessary golf and sport paraphernalia that would ultimately go unused.

Eddie Kaspbrak was the lamest, most annoying person in the world, and Richie adored him. If he had his own pathetic druthers, he'd be out there with Eddie, mussing his hair and hiding his golf gloves (for his own good, of course) and then pouring him a coffee and kissing the worried wrinkle on his forehead on his way out the door.

That delightful scenario, unfortunately, was not on offer.

Living with Eddie was, in some ways, a dream come true. Richie's love for him was transcendent, so a substantial amount of his desires for intimacy were fulfilled just by coexisting. Sometimes, he thought it was enough to eat dinner together every night, have a shared calendar on the fridge, and watch movies together every Wednesday and Friday.

Sometimes, it felt so close to the truth of his longest-held, most-childlike fantasies that it made him want to vomit.

In any case, and for all of the things about which he was uncertain, Richie knew Eddie. He knew him without thinking, like he knew the way to the nearest bar and how to change lanes on the highway and which vowels sounded different in a Minnesota accent. And, because he knew Eddie, he had two related causes for lying in bed, staring at the ceiling, waiting for him to leave.

Firstly, Eddie had something he wanted to talk to him about, and secondly, this was Eddie's ideal serious conversation time. Neither of them were particularly adept at serious conversation, but Eddie was certainly more likely to initiate one in the mid-to-late morning or over dinner. Nighttime was universally for silly, banal conversations, midday was for work or logistics, and early morning was for a secret language of grunts and squints that boiled down to 'leave me alone, Richie.'

Richie had managed to successfully avoid that conversation for two and a half months. Granted, he was aided by the fact that he had spent one week half-delirious in a hospital in Derry and the second one half-delirious in a hotel just outside the city limits. Now, though, this conversation was a bomb, waiting to detonate and take their friendship with it.

Eddie might be too mature to ignore the imminent destruction and go about his daily life, but Richie certainly wasn't.

Eddie's voice rang through the bedroom door. "Rich?"

Richie widened his eyes at the ceiling. "Mmm?" He replied, trying to sound sleepy.

"I'm heading out, I'll see you tonight." There was a pause. "It's nearly eleven."

"Hmm," Richie replied, maintaining his illusion of exhaustion.

He heard an audible sigh, then, "you're going to get bedsores or something if you don't get the fuck up."

Richie grinned, still working to keep his voice a little groggy. "Roger roger, Captain, I'll get up as soon as you leave."

He could almost feel tremors in the foundations of the building from the force of Eddie's eyeroll. "Fucking dickhead," Eddie murmured, then strode out the door.

Another morning, another successful avoidance.

He wasn't, to be clear, unsure of what the problem was. He knew exactly what it was, and, as a result, did not want or feel the need to hash it out and beat it to death with someone so involved in it.

When he got out of bed and ambled lazily into the kitchen, he felt a stab of… Something, some unidentifiable, unwanted emotion, at the sight of a cup of coffee on the counter in his special Chewbacca mug. The color was perfect, just a slight dash of cream, and Richie felt, briefly, like he might cry. Next to it were his two pills and a granola bar and Richie wondered if he was within his rights to scream or laugh or punch himself in the face.

Unable to stop himself, he texted Eddie.

Richie Tozier: coffee and pills? are you trying to butter up a version of me from age twenty-five?

He drained half the coffee in one gulp, stretching and opening the cupboard to decide if he could get away without grocery shopping for another day.

Eds: Interesting that it still applies. Seems like you have not changed or matured at all since then.

Eds: Do you just lie in bed awake waiting to get out of bed until I leave?

Richie choked on his granola bar, feeling himself tripping toward the precipice of having to face this fucking conversation.

Richie Tozier: how else would I sneak out my adoring lovers without you knowing

There was a long pause, Eddie's typing bubble appearing and disappearing several times before the phone chimed again.

Eds: I cannot stand you.

Missile dodged. Richie breathed a sigh of relief.

He didn't blame Eddie. If their positions were reversed, Richie would never have given him this much time before trying to annoy the truth out of him. He wished, though, that Eddie would consider how open Richie is about almost everything, and possibly weigh the notion that something he didn't want to talk about was, in fact, better left unsaid.

He didn't know how much longer he could get away with this.

The problem, of course, started in Derry.

Richie couldn't quite remember everything. Well, maybe that wasn't true. The truth was that he didn't know what was real and what wasn't, and he didn't know what only he could see. He knew that he stared into those horrible, burning lights, that he saw Eddie die in front of him, then was pulled out of them by Eddie, himself. He knew that he had, in a moment of extreme terror, rolled the two of them over to stop Eddie from being lethally impaled. He knew also that, in doing so, the clown had gashed Richie's side clean open.

Worst of all, when he had looked up, It wasn't a clown anymore.

It was Eddie, his Eddie, somehow both old and young. The look on his face was unfamiliar, or, at least, had never been used on Richie before. He couldn't quite place it, not so quickly, but he could recognize parts of it from other expressions. Eddie's slightly flared nostrils, that was disgust, like looking at something sickening. And his wide, unblinking eyes, that was fear. The expression lived somewhere in that overlap.

At first, Richie had believed that it was simply his own vision, his own nightmare scenario. Then, Eddie, real Eddie, had muttered from behind him, "what the fuck?"

"It's sick, Richie," the other Eddie was saying. "You're… I think you're sick."

"I-…" Richie felt like he might be right. He felt like he was going to throw up, or explode, or start sobbing. "I'm sorry—"

"You're sorry?" It hissed. God, It sounded just like him. "You're sorry? You should be in fucking prison. I trusted you, and you… You…"

Richie shook his head. "Eds—"

"You perverted it." Eddie's head cocked sideways, that arrogant little look he always got when he was winning. "That's the truth, isn't it, Rich?"

"Stop."

"Isn't that what people like you do? You were supposed to be my friend, and instead you violated that trust." He grinned, and, for a second, he did not look like Eddie, because Eddie did not smile when he was angry. "You violated me."

There was a loud bang as someone else, Bill, probably, smashed into It with something and began yelling obscenities at it.

"Richie," the real Eddie said, reaching for him.

Richie tried to flinch away. Frankly, he wanted to run away, but the pain suddenly hit him.

"Richie," Eddie repeated, his voice shaky. "Your side, it's…" He sat up more, taking off his jacket and pressing it over the gash. "Don't move, you fucking idiot, you can't lose that much more blood."

"You aren't actually a doctor, you know," Richie said, but talking was excruciating. He wanted to make Eddie laugh, though, he didn't like the look on his face. "It's like—"

"Shut up, please. Please, shut the fuck up," Eddie said, and his words were trembling now.

"Eds," Richie gritted out. "You can go help."

Eddie looked at him like he had two heads. "Are you insane? If I don't put pressure on this—"

"It doesn't matter."

The expression on his face mutated into something horrible. For a second, Richie wondered if Pennywise had gutted him after all, but he saw no visible damage. "What's that supposed to mean?"

What do you think it means, dipshit? Richie thought, but just shook his head. "That clown needs to get fucked up, okay? I can sit here for a few minutes, you can do it."

Eddie rolled his lips between his teeth. "You won't be dead when I come back, right?"

"Fucking… Hope not."

A horrible, manic laugh slipped out of him. "Me, too."

Richie felt his own eyes drifting closed, and then there was a cool hand on his cheek. He opened them again, forcing himself to smile feebly. "Go. You can do this. I'll be here."

"Promise me."

Unenforceable. "I promise."

Eddie nodded tentatively, then ran over to join the others.

Richie let his eyes close again, his awareness of his surroundings diminishing. The last thing he heard was Eddie screaming.

When he woke up, it was to arguing.

He recognized Eddie's voice the most. "I'll take care of him," he was saying.

Someone, Bill, Richie thought, huffed. "Why would you be taking care of him?"

"I'm most qualified."

"What makes you most qualified?"

There was an indignant scoff. "Um, the fact that I'm more qualified than any of you dumbfucks."

"You're not the only one who cares about him." Another voice, he was pretty sure it was Mike's, replied levelly.

"Really? I'm the only one who's been here twenty-four-fucking-seven for three days."

"I knew you were going to throw that in our faces. Look, just because you—"

"'Throw it in your face?' I'm not Richie, Bill, don't start shit with me, I'm not going to—"

Richie tried to clear his throat. "Guys?"

Eddie stopped mid-sentence, but Beverly got to him first. "Jesus, Rich, you're awake," she said, tentatively touching his hand.

"I guess," Richie croaked out. "What… Um…" He blinked roughly. "What's happening?"

"You're in the hospital," Mike told him. "Your side was cut up pretty badly, you were in surgery for hours."

He furrowed his eyebrows, glancing around at the five of them staring down at him. This was probably how babies felt when adults stared into their cribs, he thought deliriously. "Does it look cool, at least?"

"It looks like someone tried to gore you with a railroad spike," Eddie said, then gave him a little smile. "So, yeah."

Richie felt consciousness slipping away from him as quickly as it had come, but wanted to hold on a little longer. "Did you guys cry?" He mumbled.

That got a little chuckle, though Richie wondered if it was just pity. "Like babies," Beverly told him, then patted his hand. "You going back to sleep?"

He half-shrugged, already losing it.

The next time he woke up, it was to a quieter, more respectful argument.

"I live closer to where he lives, it'll be easier to just move him once," Bill was saying.

"A flight might be hard on him right now," Beverly suggested. "Mike's more local."

"Richie's staying with me."

A silence fell over the other people, and Richie, even with his eyes closed, could imagine them all looking at Eddie.

"Right," Ben acquiesced, "initially, of course, but once he doesn't need full-time help, he doesn't have to just—"

"Richie needs-…" Eddie cut himself off, then tried again. "He bel-…" The words died in the air.

There was another moment of silence, then Beverly spoke up. "Right, Eddie, you'll stay with him. If you're sure you're okay with that."

"Is your wife okay with it?" Bill asked, and Richie thought it sounded like he was trying to be delicate.

"Myra is out of the picture."

Richie felt himself perk up. He didn't know anything about Myra, except that he hated her and wanted her to die very badly.

He let himself drift off again, listening to the soothing sound of their voices as they talked logistics, discussing his care and transport like he was an especially valuable plant or piece of cargo. He wished he had the wherewithal to craft a Little Shop of Horrors joke, but couldn't quite make his mouth open.

The third time, he awoke to quiet.

He opened his eyes and scanned the room. No crowd standing around his bed, no hand on his, but there was Eddie, tapping unenthusiastically on a laptop in the chair next to his bed, his socked feet crossed and resting by Richie's knees.

Richie cleared his throat. "You look comfy."

Eddie startled, nearly dropping the laptop, then huffed, shutting it and putting it on the table next to him. He stared at Richie for a minute, sitting up straighter and removing his feet, then slowly reaching out and taking his hand. "I'm so glad you're awake."

"What, really?"

"I didn't realize it until recently," he said slowly, "but the others are just as fucking annoying as you are, and I don't know how much longer I can deal with it alone."

Richie burst out laughing. "You need a teammate, is that it?"

"No," Eddie said, still holding his hand. "I need a weapon. You can fight back with your unique brand of off-putting, unfunny commentary."

"You using me, Kaspbrak?" Richie asked, ignoring the swoop in his belly and squeezing Eddie's fingers.

"Yeah, dude." Eddie squeezed back. "Do you know how many nights I've slept here? You owe me this."

Richie grinned. "I guess I do. How unfunny do you want me to be? Just the mom-fucking stuff? Or should I get freaky with it? I can throw in some dark shit, too, if you want? Act like I know what's on the Other Side."

Eddie's eyes remained fixed on him, and, for a second, they were a little watery, then he blinked the wetness away. "Yeah. Yeah, fuck, get 'em back, Rich. You're like a nuclear bomb."

"Oh, so you've seen my standup."

Eddie laughed, and it almost managed not to sound watery. "Yeah, you wanna talk about bombing."

"Am I on, like, a lot of medication?"

With a nod, Eddie let go of his hand and grabbed a notebook beneath him. "Yeah, you're on an NSAID, an opioid, an anti-emetic, um, a few other things that shouldn't be affecting how you're feeling, why? Are you in pain?"

"No, no, just…" He chuckled. "I feel like I might cry and I want to know if I have an excuse."

"You definitely have an excuse," Eddie assured him. "That said, I will make fun of you and tell all of our friends."

Richie laughed again, forcing himself not to let it turn into a sob. "I would expect nothing less."

"Everybody will be by in a few hours," Eddie told him, putting the notebook back. "They'll want to talk to you."

"It's over, right?"

Eddie nodded solemnly. "It's over. Hey," the corners of his lips twitched up. "I think you saved my life."

Richie shook his head, casting his gaze toward his lap. "Not really."

"Don't be like that, trying to pretend you're some fucking modest hero."

Richie huffed. "Look, stop making me laugh or I'm gonna cry, and then we'll both be uncomfortable and you'll wish I let us all die down there."

"I could put on one of your specials, they suck laughter out of the room pretty well."

He covered his face with his hands, pressing the heels of them into his eye sockets before sniffling audibly. "Shit, um…" He exhaled loudly, plastering a smile on his face. "Where are my glasses?"

"Oh, right." Eddie narrowed his eyes at the probably garish smile. "They broke. They need to get you new ones, but your prescription was kind of old, so they're gonna test your eyes again once they're sure you don't have a concussion."

"Was anyone else hurt?"

Eddie sighed. "Not like you. Little stuff, all of our shit got handled in urgent care." He cleared his throat. "You woke up a few times before. Do you remember anything?"

"I remember you having some kind of bitch fight with Bill."

"Oh, fuck you," Eddie spat, without vitriol. "I'm in charge of you for the next little while, so don't do anything to piss me off."

"Ask for something reasonable." Richie tried to sit himself up, feeling a little disoriented by lying on his back while Eddie was upright. He pushed himself up the bed, then gasped at the sharp pain in his side.

"Jesus, what are you doing?" Eddie grabbed him and hauled him up. "Are you a complete idiot? Is there anything in your head at all?"

"I just wanted to sit up, Nana, can you cool it?"

"Weren't you listening when I told you that your side is slashed open?"

"'Tis but a flesh wound," he blurted out in his least attractive British accent, then internally shook his head at himself.

"'Tis not, actually, you fucking tool. It's a real, life-threatening gash that had you in surgery for hours, you…" He cut himself off, glancing around nervously, then seemingly forced his gaze back onto Richie. "You lost almost half of your blood. It took six units to replace it, they thought you were going to die."

He looked scared, like that anxious little boy that Richie had loved as a child, big, worried eyes and a furrowed eyebrows. If Richie was a better man, he'd stop with all the bravado and try to console him, try to do anything even semi-useful for his own best friend. It's fine, now, he needed to say. Please, don't be upset, I never want you to be upset.

Something gross and saccharine like that. Anyway. He wasn't a better man. "How's your face?"

"What?" Eddie blinked, apparently a little jarred. "Oh. Right. Yeah, it's fine. They re-stitched it, but it'll leave a scar, they think."

"Kickass."

"Right, that's what people want in their risk analysts, someone kickass."

Richie chuckled, wincing at the pain in his side. "It does raise questions about how well you can assess risks." He coughed, throat scratchy and dry and full up with affection and sorrow and regret and a thousand other things, and they were choking him like a ball of hot wax.

"Fuck, here," Eddie jumped up and got him a plastic cup of water with a straw, which he held up to his mouth.

"You can't be serious."

"Your hands are not as functional as you think they are, man."

Richie made an attempt to clench and unclench his fist, but found it a little slow to react. He sighed, long-suffering, then leaned forward and sipped from the straw, staring Eddie down as he did so.

"Ugh, you're so weird, your eyes are all unfocused," he grumbled, putting it on the table next to the bed. "If you need more, tell me."

"Am I paying for this nurse service?"

Eddie rolled his eyes. "It's free. Low-quality, though. You get what you pay for."

Richie rested his head against the wall behind him. "Now, what?"

"I got us a hotel suite just outside of Derry," Eddie said. "I don't think you're up to flying. I think they'll let you leave, soon, now that you're awake."

"You don't have to do that. I can call Steve, he can… Figure something out, I don't know."

Eddie scowled. "Who the fuck is Steve?"

"My manager. You know, the person I pay to handle my fuckups and stuff."

"You didn't fuck anything up."

Richie laughed, once, then cringed at a splitting pain in his head. "God, that's a first." At Eddie's narrowed eyes, he sighed. "Hey, man, if you're set on playing nursemaid, I won't stop you. I just wanted to give you an out if you wanted it."

"Well, I don't need you to give me an out, dipshit, I'm a grown man, I don't need your fucking permission—"

"Mr. Tozier?"

Eddie and Richie looked up to see the a doctor standing in the doorway, a visible hesitation on her face.

"I'm, um… I'm here to take you to optometry for your new prescription?"

Richie shifted. "Oh, yeah, one second." At the movement, there was a sharp sting in his side before Eddie shoved his shoulders down once again.

"In a wheelchair, Richie."

The doctor convinced Eddie to stay where he was, though it didn't come easily. Richie was pretty sure they were trying to give him an opportunity to tell them that Eddie was some kind of abusive partner or possessive pimp, but instead he let himself go quiet. In the absence of an audience he cared about, the exhaustion gnawed at him.

"Your vision has deteriorated, Mr. Tozier," the doctor said after testing his eyes. "How's your diet?"

"Like, bad."

"And your stress levels?"

Richie shrugged. "Also bad, probably."

You almost died, Eddie had said. Richie wanted to say, so did you. He wanted to say, I felt how it would be to grieve you, after just getting you back. He wanted to ask, do you hate me? Did you hear what it said? Do you know? He wanted to scream or cry or vomit but all he felt like he could do was sit catatonically as the doctor berated him and wait to be deposited back in his bed.

When he finally was rolled back into his room, Beverly and Ben were waiting for him.

"Benverly!" He made himself exclaim, trying not to let the exhaustion eat him alive. "How's it hanging?"

"You don't have to do that," Beverly replied immediately, every bit the whip-quick monster she'd always been. "We're not here for the show, Rich."

The nurse helped him onto his bed, where Beverly sat next to him, loooking down at his forcibly reclined form amusedly.

Ben collapsed quietly into the chair Eddie had been occupying. "We sent Eddie to go get some food."

Richie wrinkled his nose. "From where?"

"Anywhere but here." Beverly was eyeing him closely. "He hasn't left your side the whole time, you know."

"He was probably just trying to avoid this little lovefest." Richie gestured between Ben and Beverly. "This hospital room is a romance-free zone."

Beverly caught Ben's eye. "We haven't been here much, but, from what I've seen, I don't think that's true."

"What's going on with his wife?" Richie asked, proud of himself from having held off even this long.

"He called her and asked for a divorce," Ben said. "She wasn't thrilled about it, so he ended up just sending over the papers from here."

Richie felt his eyes widen. "She tried to make him stay?"

"It was like being back with his mom." Ben folded his arms, looking off to the side in slight discomfort. "It was… Horrible."

"But it's over now," Beverly said decisively. "He was really brave, you would've been proud."

Richie hummed, settling down into the bed a little more. "That's Eds."

"Are you okay?" Beverly asked, then tapped Richie's forehead. "In here, I mean?"

"I'm on so much medication, it's pretty much just cotton in there."

"So, the usual, then?"

Richie chuckled, then cringed at the splitting pain in his head. "How about you guys? Eddie said no one else was hurt too bad."

"Just cuts and scrapes," Ben told him. "We were really worried about you."

"I'm tougher than that, Haystack, give me a little credit."

"Do you remember any of the other times you woke up?"

"Not really," Richie said. "I remember you guys arguing about who had to nurse me back to health."

Beverly huffed. "Which time?"

"Was it more than once?"

"Try every day," she said. "Bill was saying that it should be him, since he lives closer to you. Mike had some reason to cover up the fact that he blames himself. We got kicked out of the running pretty early, since Ben's gonna move and I have to deal with my insane ex-husband."

Richie felt his face twitch in disdain. "Do you want me to kill him? I'm already a murderer, technically."

"Get in line," Ben grumbled.

"I've got it under control," Beverly assured them, and Richie knew her. He knew she was right, that she could do this better than any of them. "Anyway. Despite all that, Eddie won."

"Sort of a fast-and-loose interpretation of a win."

Ben laughed. "Don't let him hear you talking like that, he fought hard for it."

Richie hummed, eyes drifting shut. Something about this, the emotional dogpile of his childhood friends, the teasing and ribbing, it was soothing him.

"Ben," he heard Beverly say softly. "Could I have a minute with Richie?"

Without opening his eyes, he heard Ben's soft footsteps drift out of the room.

"What'd you see?"

Refusing to look at the world around him, Richie replied, "what are you talking about?"

"Richie," she said gently. "I've been in the Deadlights, you don't come out of it unscathed."

She was right. Of course, she was right, she was Beverly Marsh, the smartest guy around. She was Beverly Marsh, who'd always been just this side of psychic. She was Beverly Marsh, who'd stared into the Deadlights at 13 and come out of it intact.

But he was Richie Tozier, a man so good at repression that he'd managed to forget the only real emotion he'd ever felt for nearly thirty years. "Don't remember."

He felt her flick his forehead. "Bet you do."

He opened one eye and swallowed, his own throat feeling thick and unfamiliar. "Maybe it's something you don't want to hear about. Maybe it's something awful. Or pervy, you know me. Maybe it was filthy."

"Then I want to hear it even more," she said, a sly smile on her face. "What'd you see?"

And he didn't want to say it. Saying it might disturb the tenuous reality in which his Deadlights visions were just horrible alternatives, saying it might poke this illusionary world where Eddie was alive and safe and send him back to whatever horrible truth he'd endured. At the same time, he was terrified. Terrified that this was an illusion, terrified that it would start over and he'd be doomed to that unbearable existence, terrified that Eddie had died down there and Richie had to live with it or die with it. "It's not what I saw," Richie said softly. "I lived it. He… Eddie…"

"He died down there," she completed.

"Yeah. On top of me. And we," his voice broke. "We left him there. He hated it down there, I pushed him to be brave, I made him be reckless, and then I left him to rot in a place he hated." He sniffled. "I tried to…" He shook his head. "We all went home. I… I had you guys back but, without him… It wasn't right. It's already not right, without Stan, but Eddie went down there, and he died, and it was my fault. He did it for me. And I left him there. I didn't…" He looked off to the side, unable to meet Beverly's eyes. "I couldn't live with that."

There were tears in his eyes, but he didn't want them to fall. If they fell, he might not ever be able to make them stop falling. He sniffled again, loudly, then wiped his eyes before they could wet his cheeks.

"Oh, Richie, you didn't—"

"What the hell's going on here?"

Richie and Beverly both looked to the door, where Eddie stood, holding two plastic bags full of food.

"Eds, you're back," Richie said, clearing his throat.

"Are you crying?" Eddie bustled over, setting the bags on the chair. "He's supposed to take it easy, what are you doing, making him cry?" He demanded.

"I wasn't trying to—"

"She didn't make me cry, I've had a rough week, if you can believe that."

Eddie scanned him, almost as though he didn't hear. "You need to be resting, not having little sobfests about fuck knows what."

Richie looked up at him, still not quite able to see. But his sort of undefined form was there, moving around and adjusting tubes and pulling Richie's blanket up a little. He was alive.

"Hey," Eddie said, his voice uncharacteristically soft. "Hey, Rich, are you okay? Can you see?"

Richie cleared his throat again. "I'm sorry, Griffin Dunne, I was just surprised you were visiting."

Beverly snorted, covering her mouth a second too late.

"Oh, fuck you." Eddie began unpacking the bags. "Do you know any references from this century?"

Richie smiled, listening to Eddie and Beverly chatter and sinking further into his pillow and letting himself drift off a little.

"I'm worried about him," he heard Beverly say, after an indeterminate amount of time had passed.

"What were you two talking about?"

"Deadlights stuff." There was a pause. "I'm really glad you're all right, Eddie. For his sake, but also for ours."

There was a dip in the bed by his shin, which he assumed was Eddie's hand. It tapped twice against his calf, then stilled. "He's gonna be okay, right?"

"I think so."

When he woke up next, Eddie was pacing around the room, wearing a headset and barking into it. "I told him to pull the TIRs from all three companies, I don't know why he can't follow a simple fucking directive." He paused. "I wasn't saying he should be fired, but that's only because I don't want to have to fire him. If you'll do it, I'm all for it." The other person, who, Richie assumed, was a grotesquely corporate man sitting behind a giant desk in a corner office, responded, and Eddie scoffed. "Replace him or don't. I can take on his shit, I'm practically doing it anyway."

Richie adored him. He was so bitchy and mean and snarky, the way he'd been as a kid but scaled up into something adult and horrible and amazing. He wished he had his new glasses, that he could watch Eddie more closely, get to know this version of him the way he'd so completely known the old one.

"Yeah, I know," Eddie was saying. "I always thought I'd hate being remote, but so far, it's not so bad." He looked over at Richie and hissed, "what are you looking at?" Then went back to his conversation.

Richie felt the grin on his face.

"Yeah, fine with me. We'll touch base Tuesday?" Eddie half-chuckled, something a little bit mean and a little bit fake. "Something like that. Enjoy Corfu." He pressed a button on his headphones. "Get that look off your face."

"The transformation I just saw…" Richie mused in feigned awe. "It was like the Mask, but if one of the personas was a corporate douchebag and the other was a regular douchebag."

"Fuck you," he said. "Your new glasses are on that table." He watched Richie paw around at the table for a minute, then sighed.

He felt soft fingertips brushing his temples, then the backs of his ears, and his eyelids fluttered shut for a fraction of a second. He realized what he was doing and snapped them open, and the world was clear again.

"Hey, thanks," he said, moving to push himself up the bed.

"Richie, don't—" Eddie huffed, grabbing him by his good side and helping him. "Jesus, could you try to be careful? You'll rip your stitches."

Richie, trying to remember how to behave like a straight man, clapped him on the shoulder and then slid his hand up to his neck to look at the bandage on his cheek. "How's the battle wound, Tony Montana?"

"They said I can take the dressing off, but I don't want to yet." He grabbed something else from the table and presented a Subway sandwich to Richie. "I got this for you earlier, but you fell asleep."

Richie unwrapped it slowly, clumsily, his hands increasingly function but still subpar. "Is this…?"

"Turkey and provolone, a disgusting amount of banana peppers and olives, no tomatoes."

"Holy shit," Richie said, the corners of his mouth pulling up. "I can't believe you remember that."

"You probably don't still have the same Subway order from when you were twelve, but—"

"No, I do," Richie said, trying to ignore the beam in his chest, the ridiculous urge to wind his arms around Eddie Kaspbrak and squeeze him until their bodies melded together. "That's… That's super lame, dude, wow."

Eddie scoffed. "Well, you still look like you're about to burst into tears about it, so what does that make you?"

Richie slugged him half-heartedly on the shoulder, resolutely ignoring the tear in the corner of his eye and the thickness of his throat. He slowly took a bite of the sub, wondering how he was ever going to cope with this sort of emotion returning to his life.

"I think they'll let you leave tomorrow," Eddie said. "I'm gonna go to the hotel tonight and make sure everything's set up okay. After you're feeling up to flying, you can come with me to New York or, if you need, I can come to LA."

"Eddie," Richie said, not knowing how to continue. You wouldn't want to stay with me if you knew, he thought. These are false pretenses. I think you're sick, Richie. "Look, you don't have to do this. I'm not going to die, I can call—"

"If you tell me you're gonna call Steve, I'm gonna fucking kill you."

Richie wanted to sob, a little bit. There were too many things in his heart, too many sick, stupid things that belonged to a sick, stupid boy. "I can't ask you to do this, you have a life, Eddie—"

"Thanks to you!"

"Yeah, and you almost didn't have it thanks to me, too, so…"

Eddie blinked at him. "What?"

"Nothing, just… It doesn't count for saving your life when it was my fault your life was in danger so… Stop saying that."

"'Stop saying that,' who do you think you are? I'll say whatever I want, fuck you." His eyebrows furrowed. "Do you not want to stay with me?"

Humorlessly, Richie chuckled. "Believe me, that's not it."

"Then I'll see you tomorrow. Ben's supposed to stop by tonight."

"I'm bedbound, you guys don't have to babysit me, I feel like I'm back in—" he cut himself off. "Like, kindergarten, or something," he finished lamely.

Eddie narrowed his eyes at him. Slowly, he pressed the flat of his palm over Richie's injured side. "Does it hurt?"

"I'm not a pussy, Eddie, fuck's sake."

It did hurt. It was excruciating, both the injury itself and fact that Eddie, his Eddie, of gray water and Richie, make it sitand R+E, was touching him.

He wouldn't be touching you if he knew, Richie reminded himself, in a thousand voices he could've imitated flawlessly.

"Goodnight, Rich," Eddie said, oblivious to Richie's turmoil.

When he was gone, Richie slowly, miserably finished his sandwich, wishing he could fall asleep. In Eddie's absence, he lived the same week over and over. Eddie dying, leaving him under the Niebolt house, re-carving their initials into the kissing bridge, going home, falling apart, sinking and choosing not to re-surface. He relived, also, the same thirty seconds that had happened, at least, that Richie had seen, you perverted it, you violated me, digging deeper and deeper into it with a long-perfected self-destructive cruelty.

You can't do this to him, Richie thought. You're ruining his life and you're doing it because you're in love with him. This is wrong.

"Jeez, what's eating you?"

Richie blinked, startled, and turned toward the door, where Ben Hanscom stood, holding a milkshake in each hand. "Please tell me one of those is for me."

"Yeah, don't tell your warden, I was advised to bring a smoothie to make sure you got your nutritional intake, but…" He handed Richie one of the cups. "It's Oreo, so… Don't tell him."

"Secret's safe with me," Richie said, immediately slurping at it. "Jesus, I needed this."

Ben watched him, eerily pensive. "Are you okay?"

"I'm peachy, Haystack." The nickname fell out of his mouth too easily, and Richie began to wonder if he was regressing somehow. "How are you?"

"Worried."

Richie paused mid-slurp. "About me?"

"Yeah," he drank a bit of his own. "But also about us. All of us, separately and together. I'm worried about losing touch again, forgetting you guys again, I can't… I don't want to lose this when we just got it back. And I'm worried about Bill, because I don't think he's very happy in his marriage but he seems intent on sticking it out. I'm worried about Mike, he's been stuck here so long and now the cord's cut and he's just going to… Go to Florida? Alone? He should be with someone, you know? Not… I'm not saying he has to couple up, I just think he deserves to be happy. I'm worried about Eddie, and dealing with this divorce mess, and I'm worried about Beverly, because… Well, you know."

Richie gave him a half-smile. "So I'm the only one you're not worried about?"

With a gentle laugh, Ben shook his head. "No, Richie. I'm worried about you, too. I'm worried because, even though we faced It, and we won, against all odds, even after all that…" He hesitated, eyes kinder than Richie deserved. "You still seem so fucking scared."

A chill ran down his spine. Like prey, like a fawn dropping into the grass at the sound of a wolf, Richie froze. "What would I be scared of?"

"I don't know." Ben let that hang in the air a second, then pressed on. "I know we were never the closest. I mean, you kind of let me into the group first, you know, but you were always closer with Beverly, and Eddie, and…"

Stan, Richie thought, why are we all so scared to say his name?

"And Stan," Ben added, as though he'd heard. "Maybe that's part of why, you know, because you were always around Bev, and I was so scared of making a dick out of myself in front of her that I sort of veered closer to Mike and Eddie, I don't know."

"Is this supposed to be comforting me? You're reassuring me that you and I aren't that close of friends?"

Ben chuckled. "No, I'm making a point, just let me get there." He took another sip. "We weren't the closest, but I love you, Richie. I'm really glad we're all back in each other's lives, and I don't want to lose any of you again."

"Aww," Richie forced himself to say, trying not to shift uncomfortably. Would he be saying that if he knew? "'And your eyes, they tell me how much you care—'" he sang tonelessly.

"Don't weaponize Diana Ross against me, Richie Tozier." There was a tentative smile on his face. "Let me finish my thought, okay?"

Richie did his best not to sink into his pillow.

"I love you, and there's nothing you could tell me that would change that," Ben said, staring into his eyes with gut-wrenching intensity. "Do you understand? Nothing. You could kill someone—"

"I did kill someone."

"Okay, bad example. You could quit comedy, you could drive a Prius, you could…" He swallowed. "You could be gay, Richie, and I would still love you."

"I'm not," Richie said automatically, and then felt like his lung might've collapsed. Why else was there no air in this room? He shifted, wondering if he could stand, wondering if he could run away. Was he—

He grabbed the metal tin on his bedside table and vomited into it.

It was so hot. Suddenly the room was boiling, and he had to get out of there but he couldn't move, he couldn't breathe, couldn't talk, couldn't swallow. His eyes refused to focus, panning around, looking for some escape route. He wondered if he should call a nurse, or something, and, distantly, he heard his heart monitor beeping erratically.

"Richie," he heard from far away. "Richie, listen to me."

"I'm not," Richie repeated.

There was a hand on his back. Why was he touching him? If he knew, and he knew Richie had hidden it all this time, hidden it like a predator, like a spy, like something insidious, why was he being touched?

"I love you anyway, Rich."

Richie took in a shaky breath, finally feeling the able to function somewhat normally, though he still felt a little like he might pass out or puke again. His hands were shaking, he realized, as he slowly looked at Ben, whose face held nothing but kindness. "Is there any chance I could convince you that was my reaction to the idea of driving a Prius?"

"I'll believe whatever you tell me," Ben said. "Maybe none of those things are true, that's fine, too. I just wanted to let you know that there's nothing you have to hide from me."

"Because we're such distant friends?"

Ben smiled, his hand still on Richie's shoulder. "Because you're my friend and I love you."

Richie exhaled loudly. "You're so good at saying it."

"I'm not, really," Ben replied, standing up and taking Richie's vomit-tin away. "I haven't said it to anyone in a long time, until coming back here with you guys."

"But you're so handsome," Richie said, then caught himself and added quickly, "I mean, objectively, you know, I'm not—"

"Don't do that, come on." Ben sat back down in the chair next to his bed. "There was no one I loved. Except you guys. And, like, my family, of course."

Richie stared at him for a moment, then looked at the Subway wrapper in front of him. "I am," he said slowly. "Gay, I mean."

"Cool," Ben said. "That's great, Richie."

"It's not." He fidgeted with his blanket. "If I tell you something, will you promise me you won't tell anyone? Even Bev?"

"Of course."

He rolled his lips between his teeth. "I'm in love with Eddie."

Ben gave him the gentlest look yet. "Yeah."

"What the fuck does that mean?"

"No, it's not obvious or anything, I don't think anyone else knows. It's just… I was in love with Bev all that time, you know, so I knew what it looked like, what it felt like. I didn't know for sure, I just suspected you might be going through the same thing that I was."

"There's no way I was anywhere near as lame as you were about it," Richie asserted. "I didn't write him a poem, that's for sure."

Ben laughed. "There's still time."

"Oh, fuck you." He finally looked at Ben again. "I've never told anyone… Either thing."

"I wondered. I was torn about saying this to you. I wanted you to be able to tell me on your own time, but I also felt like maybe you had some misconceptions about how it was going to go."

Richie huffed a laugh. "I can't believe you're still here, man."

There was a moment of silence, heavy and pregnant, where Ben just stared at him, then sighed. "Oh, Richie," he said, and then stood up and wrapped his arms around him, palpably trying to be delicate.

Richie remained frozen for a moment, then exhaled shakily again and grabbed onto him. He's touching me, he thought, baffled. He knows and he's not afraid of touching me.

Ben sat back down in his chair. "It wouldn't change anything for any of them, you know."

"You think it wouldn't change anything for Eddie?" Richie asked, sounding a little cruel, even to his own ears. "'Hey, man, I've been in love with you for, like, twenty-five years. Is it still cool if I move in with you and invade your life? Not in a gay way, but it will be in a gay way for me, and I will be deriving some sick pleasure out of your presence.' You think he'd be okay with that?"

"Jeez," Ben said, sounding more than a little heartbroken. "Of course not, Richie. He loves you. And nothing about wanting to spend time with someone you care about is sick, man, what's in your head?"

"It would ruin everything. He trusts me, how could he ever trust me again, knowing that I…"

Ben's brow furrowed. "That you what?"

"Want him."

"Wanting someone isn't bad, Richie. Wanting someone isn't predatory or evil or sick."

Richie stared down at his lap. "I have to tell him, don't I?"

"No."

He looked up, startled. "What? I thought you'd be all, 'come out, Richie, let's have a big celebratory party with a rainbow cake and we can all rock out to Born This Way.'"

With a chuckle, Ben shook his head. "I don't think you owe anyone anything. Even Eddie."

"I'm a coward."

"I don't think so." He gestured to the room around them. "I think you just grew up… Here. In a shitty, hateful town."

Richie sniffled. "I can't believe this. I can't believe you just… Know. And it's okay."

"I do. It is." He leaned back in the chair, kicking his feet up on the edge of the bed. "Now, tell me what it was like to be in Killer Kats."