Richie frowned down at his phone and rubbed at the stubble on his chin. Not exactly the conversation he expected to have today, but hey, why the fuck not?
Richie:I liked the idea of sucking dick? Lol I dunno dude it was a long time ago
Eddie:Jesus Christ.
Eddie:So you knew when we were kids?
Richie rolled his eyes.
Richie:Yes I knew when we were kids. Why?
Eddie:Just wondering.
That was that for a while, so Richie fell back into his mindless Twitter scroll and was nearly at the point where he forgot about the conversation, when another text from Eddie vibrated on in.
Eddie:Was there, like, anyone in particular or anything? Or just dicks in general?
Richie gets asked to the Sadie Hawkins dance, and Eddie is officially forced to confront some uncomfortable thoughts for the first time.
“Is Richie…cool?”
Stan snorts from behind his book and pokes an eye above the pages to raise an unimpressed eyebrow. “No,” he answers shortly, “absolutely not.”
“He got asked to the dance,” Eddie argues, but Stan puts down his book to level with him face to face.
“He got asked by one of the other theater kids,” he explains, rolling his eyes. “You know how they are.”
Eddie doesn’t, actually, ‘know how they are’, but for the sake of argument, he doesn’t press. Instead, he pays an uncomfortable amount of attention to Richie and his theater friends, determined to get the bottom of why he feels so…shitty…about the whole dance thing.
It’s Ben, finally, nearly a week later, that pulls Eddie aside to talk him through the problem, (not that it helps).
“I’mnot jealous,” he insists, hotly. “I don’t even know any of those weird girls.”
Ben sighs. “Not jealous of Richie, Eddie,” he explains, a bit apologetically. “You’re jealous of the girls for getting to go to the dance withRichie.”
And Eddie, his brain a mess of static, promptly decides he wishes he could go back to just thinking Richie was cool.
After months of begging and pleading and bugging his parents, Richie Tozier gets contacts one weekend in early May, 1990.
He goes to school that Monday with a new sense of confidence, and is pleasantly surprised at the compliments and second glances his new look earns him while he goes about his day.
He gets to lunch feeling pretty good about himself, and accepts the Losers’ ‘Ooo’s’ and ‘aahh’s’. He nervously looks across the table to see if Eddie has any kind of interest or positive reaction, and is surprised when he kind of scrunches up his nose and raises an eyebrow, unimpressed.
“You looked fine before,” he grumbles.
“E-Eddie,” Bill chides him, kicking him softly under the table.
“What?” he cries. “He did! Fuck what everyone else thinks, I like your glasses, Rich.”
Richie is a bit taken back by the sudden admission, but is pretty pleased about it too. Even more so when he wears his glasses again the next day, and Eddie is uncharacteristically clingy and complimentary.
He doesn’t get it, but fuck, he takes what he can get.
It’s only twenty seven years later that Eddie finally admits that he actually thought Richie looked nice without his glasses too, but did not enjoy all the extra attention girls had been giving him, and wanted to put a stop to it.
Eddie is thirteen; innocent, naïve, and still under his mom’s oppressive thumb.
Richie carves their initials into the Kissing Bridge and lies to himself that it is enough for now, convinced anything more could ruin their friendship, and, for once, keeps his big mouth shut.
Eddie is freshly out of surgery and recovering, and Richie swears them all to secrecy in the waiting room.
“For fucks sake, guys,” he groans, his eyes still rimmed red, “Eddie almost died, now is not the time to confess anything.”
Eddie is divorcing his wife and moving across the country to live with Bev in Chicago while they navigate their divorces, and Richie threatens them all with violence if they tell.
“The last thing he needs is someone dumping all their issues on him right now,” Richie insists is a harsh whisper, grabbing the last box of Eddie’s shit out of the back of Ben’s truck and handing it to Mike. “Fucking drop it.”
Eddie comes out a few months later while the Losers are all at Stan and Patty’s baby shower, and Richie glares at everyone over the top of his mimosa when they all send intrigued and encouraging looks his way, hoping to convey “Shut the fuck up, you fucking morons” with his eyes alone.
It’s only, a few more months after that, when Eddie is staying at Richie’s place in LA, where all the Losers are attending Bill’s new movie premiere, that Richie admits to being in love with him, and even then, it is only because Eddie says it first.
“It’s been almost a year, man,” he huffs, his cheeks burning pink and his lips pouted all cutely. “If you’re gonna make a move, fucking make it. Shit or get off the pot.”
And Richie does, laughing, even as his eyes well up with happy tears, and finally kissing Eddie just like he’s always wanted.
Eddie is the Loser who, ironically, functions best in an emergency. Eddie is the person you want around when shit goes awry. Eddie is the Loser who tends to jump into the fray first and with the most vigour, and the one who’s ready to throw a punch when the situation calls for it. He’s the Loser who most likely knows CPR and first aid best, and who never hesitates to get in there and get shit done when there’s a need for it.
Eddie doesn’t “freeze up” when his friends are in danger. He kicks the shit out of the problem and then makes sure they’re all okay, and administers first aid where it’s required.
“And almost idly, in a kind of side-thought, Eddie discovered one of his childhood’s great truths. Grownups are the real monsters, he thought. It was no big deal, not a thought that came in a revelatory flash or announced itself with trumpets and bells. It just came and was gone, almost buried under the stronger, overriding thought: I want my aspirator and I want to be out of here.”
just thinking about tiny Eddie with his train and cowboy shirts following Bill around on the playground like a baby duck because he’s so brave and cool and pretty
