Chapter Text
About three weeks into this Thing that’s definitely a Thing, but otherwise nameless, Eddie comes home one day and Richie knows he’s ready. Maybe from the moment he hears his toolbox settle by the door, but definitely by the time his boots topple onto the floor with a thud. Thud thud thud thud thud they keep thudding. That’s too many thuds- Eddie only has two boots, two feet, two beautiful hands that are unzipping the top half of his coveralls as he comes into the kitchen to greet Richie.
“Hey there, big guy,” he kisses Richie, standing at the open fridge.
The refrigerator door and one of Eddie’s arms pens him into a little triangular miracle, where he could pick up radio waves playing a waltz from eighty years past, or discover a secret, sunken island built of pearl. The Bermuda Triangle, due about fifteen hundred miles northwest of where it ought to be. Every outlandish fantasy is possible here, as they kiss.
Thud thud thud.
“Hey, Blondie,” Richie says, smiling as he pulls back. He hopes it’s audible over the way his heart pounds under Eddie’s hand.
Be quiet for like, a minute, will ya? Give a guy a chance to set it up before you punch through with the capper! He should say it. He wants to. He will.
“You making a shopping list?” Eddie asks, tilting his head so his hair flops over one eye. Delightful.
Richie looks back and forth between the fridge and the notepad he’s holding, where he’s workshopping rhymes for broccoli. “Sort of,” he figures. “Filling up my brain cart with ideas. Got a sort of Schoolhouse Rock style song about high fiber diets for gays I’m workin’ on.”
“That sounds like hungry work.” Eddie grins at him. He starts wriggling out of the sleeves of his coveralls so he can wash his hands and get all the way up to his elbows, unimpeded. He’s got one of Richie’s old tees on underneath, Ask Me About My Podcast! and some grease marks on his hands and arms too stubborn to wipe away with a rag, here and there.
“Yeah, yep.” Richie shuts the fridge and flexes, for good, manly measure. “Almost as honest a day’s labor as replacing a carburetor-“
“-It was a camshaft,“ Eddie corrects him, indulgently.
“Started with a C, this time, though! That’s closer than when I called it an alternator.”
Eddie squints at him over his shoulder as he turns the tap on the sink. “Alliteratively speaking, sure. It’s a good thing that’s more your line of work.”
Richie chucks his notepad up on top of the fridge where the manuals for the appliances go to die, so that he can wrap his arms around Eddie from behind. “Admit it,” he rumbles into his ear. “You find my mechanical ignorance adorable.”
Eddie giggles as he scrubs. “Exploitable, certainly.”
“What, you mean it doesn’t take more than one dude to screw in a lightbulb?”
“I hate to be the one to break it, but the jokes have been lying to you this whole time.”
Richie gasps. “I knew it. You just like it when I reach for something and my shirt rides up!”
“I’m a simple man.”
He is. Richie hums agreement into Eddie’s shoulder. He’s not like Richie with all his layers of irony and myriad versions of himself, public and private. If you forget about all the time traveling, dimension hopping shit, Eddie is straightforward and sincere and mind-boggling humble considering how stupid gorgeous he is. He’s simply a good man, who takes care of Richie and who is so easy to care for in return. He waits until Eddie turns off the sink again. Get a clean take. Then he turns Eddie’s chin toward him to kiss his cheek and his whole body follows until they’re facing each other, Eddie’s dripping wet hands folded at the small of his back.
“You came home just in time for me to tell you something I came up with, Eddie.”
Thud thud thud, mutters Richie’s heart.
“Oh yeah, what’s that?” Eddie readies himself for a joke, already smiling up at Richie.
Know your audience, they say, and Richie knows this audience so well, he can already hear the hoped for response in the warmth of his voice. When Richie finds the words on their way to his lips now, it’s not like the other first times he’s said it in the past, invariably too late- often as a last ditch effort to salvage Things that were actually Nothings. For once, he’s going to be on time. For once, he’s going to hear it back.
“-I love you,” Richie says.
Eddie blinks up at him, brow jumping in a beautiful moment of joy. “I love you too, Richie. I think- maybe since the beginning, if you can believe that.”
“Well duh, you’d be crazy not to jump on this. I’m a total catch,” Richie winks, gathering up Eddie’s face in his hands.
“I hope you believe that, too,” Eddie laughs, and then he meets Richie in the middle for a very persuasive kiss. Richie knows anything Eddie says, you can take to the bank.
And hell yeah, having someone love you back is a confidence boost! He is a catch! If Richie could have tapped into some of this years back, he might never have developed the personality flaws required to go into comedy. Maybe he would have taken over the dentistry practice like his dad had always hoped! Right now, though- there’s only one kind of oral care he’s interested in.
He teases out Eddie’s tongue and draws it into his mouth as a preview of things to come. Eddie moans into him, hands scrabbling at Richie’s back to pull him even closer. They already knew how much they love to make each other feel good, but now Eddie knows Richie loves him, too. They fuse all of this, pushing themselves together, lips and bodies inseparable. His hands slip from Eddie’s neck, down his body and the thud thud thud of his chest, to his waist where he tied the sleeves of his coveralls while he washed up. Just a little bit too tight for Richie to push down or shove his hands into.
“You installed BloJack,” Richie pouts at the double knot.
Eddie giggles into the top of his bowed head and kisses his hair as he crouches closer. “One of my automotive services.”
Richie pries his fingers into Eddie’s clothes. “Disable it and I’ll give you a little roadside assistance.”
“Not here in the kitchen,” Eddie chides as Richie pulls apart the first knot. “I want to go for a walk with you tonight, and you’ll need your knees for that.”
“You’re wise beyond your many, many, many years, old man,” Richie teases as he gets through the second. Instead of sliding down to kneel on the floor, he straightens up and tugs Eddie close by the length of his sleeves and re-ties them behind himself so they’re stuck together.
“This’ll make walking difficult, too.” Eddie touches his face, brushing his thumb along the line of Richie’s mouth and feeling the corner of his smile as he just stares at Eddie, this beautiful creature wrapped up with only him in this moment. As he often does, Eddie gets a little bashful under the quiet, undivided attention. “What?” he blushes.
“Here’s lookin’ at you, kid,” Richie Bogeys. He kisses Eddie again.
“Take a picture, it’ll last longer,” Eddie grins, making Richie’s spread all the wider, too.
A lightbulb goes off over his head.
“I should!” He undoes the sleeves so he can get into his pocket for his phone. Then he can always have Eddie just like this, loved and knowing it.
Eddie smirks and leans back against the counter, backlit by the late afternoon sun that pours in through the window. He’s got the halo he always deserved. Richie squares the camera on him and snaps a few times until it all catches just right.
“This must be what legit creative people are talking about when they have muses,” he tells Eddie. “The best I ever had was writing just after eating a really fucking good burrito.”
“You’re a creative person,” Eddie frowns. “I don’t know who told you otherwise.”
Richie scrolls through his camera roll to select the best image to message off to Eddie. He’ll probably wanna post it for Bev, who sweet talked Eddie into making an Instagram so they could keep in touch. “You’ve only ever known post-hack Richie,” he says, scrolling back even further to other doting photos he’s taken. Eddie’s elbow-patched sweater. Eddie cutting his pizza with a knife and fork. “You totally missed the decade of crap I put out while I was selling my soul for some sweet hetero success.”
Eddie crosses his arms. “Says who? You taught me how to use YouTube, remember?”
Richie’s jaw drops in horror. “Please tell me you skipped the 2014 tour. Please.”
Eddie clears his throat. “-But I’ve seen stuff from much earlier, too. Your hair was longer, and there’s the little logo in the corner with the buildings?” He circles his fingers to illustrate.
Comedy Central hasn’t had little buildings on the logo since- when? Richie was thirty? There’s only a few of his old TV spots floating around from before everyone started walking around with smartphones, recording gigs just as fast as Richie’s manager can dish DMCA takedowns- but they’re out there. That’s about where the break happened between him performing his own material and getting a ghostwriter. As much as he hates the idea of Eddie knowing about the absolute fucking dreck he’d been doing up until they met, it’s some comfort to know that at least he’s been exposed to the more genuine, if deeply closeted Richie, too.
“It’s so unfair I can’t dig out your embarrassing baby pictures,” Richie rolls his eyes. “If you even had an awkward stage, you jag.” He flips around his phone to show Eddie a picture he took months ago, before they started hooking up (on purpose, anyway). They’d been sightseeing all around Chicago, taking selfies at The Bean, and Richie’s scarf would not stop flapping up into his face in the wind, meanwhile this asshole over here looks like he’s starring in a Whitesnake music video.
“Eh. The Seventies weren’t my sharpest look,” Eddie says mysteriously.
“Were their bellbottoms?” Richie asks, tucking his phone away again. “I’m imagining bellbottoms. And flagrant abuse of paisley.”
“It's worse than that,” says Eddie. He pushes himself off the counter, holding up his disheveled coveralls with one hand. “Lapels for days. Belted vests. Wouldn’t leave the house without an ascot.”
“Ravishing,” Richie sighs, taking Eddie’s available hand to drag him off for just that.
-
A few days later, they’re on the couch, half watching (Eddie), half re-living (Richie) the trash fire that is Scandal. To distract himself from the ache of seeing a favorite character long since squandered, Richie pesters Eddie with contextual trivia.
“I hear most of this Oval furniture is from The West Wing set. Oh fuck, we gotta watch West Wing.”
“Is- is the president the bad guy from Ghost?” Eddie asks.
“Yep.”
“Gosh, I saw that only a few months ago...”
It must be a mindfuck to constantly run into famous faces that look like they got into a freak accident with the California Raisins. Should he fill Eddie in on the fate of all the other stars, or-
“Wait wait wait, you’ve read up on the whole Clinton-Lewinsky thing this is referencing, right?”
Eddie squints, going through his mental rolodex of all the American history he’s had to cram since leapfrogging through time. “When was that?”
“Uh. ‘96 or ‘97ish? I was in college. Took a while to shake out.”
“Was this a campaign ticket?” Eddie asks. He likes to keep a list of things to research in his phone, so he draws it out.
“God, I would vote for her,” Richie laughs. Then, like a near death experience, every godawful joke he made back then that did not age well flashes before his eyes. “Ugh. Not a ticket, though, no. But you know what? It’s better that you don’t know. Just go follow Monica Lewinsky on Twitter, she rocks.”
Eddie starts to make a note of that instead, but- “I’m not on Twitter.”
“Not yet,” says Richie. “But I saw you blowing up Instagram today. You’ll have more followers than me, soon. It’s time to spread your influencer wings and fly, baby!”
“I- what?” He flips over to his Instagram app and pulls a face. “Huh. It must cap out at ninety-nine likes... Oh that’s nice of her, look- Beverly shared my picture. No wonder.”
Richie leans over to look, squishing Eddie into the arm of the couch as he does. “Aww, look at you, getting DMs from strangers. They grow up so fast!” he sniffs.
So far it’s just the one, actually, that’s not from Richie or Bev. Stan’s on here somewhere, too, but he won’t interact with anyone who posts things besides bird and nature pics. Eddie clicks into the chat, where some young woman with chunky bangs digitally greets him.
hi Better Dreams! i love your IG and you seem really cool. DO you have a podcast?
“You hear that, Richie? ‘Really cool’.” Eddie snickers.
“That was just a couple minutes ago, dude, you can probably catch her and tell her what a horrible embarrassing mistake she’s made,” Richie teases.
Hi! Thank you. I don’t have a podcast. Just Instagram for now. It’s fun to share pictures, Eddie messages back.
“You used way too many periods, she’s gonna think you’re a serial killer.”
Eddie gives Richie a fondly exasperated sidelong glance. “All right, Cyrano, you tell me what to say next time.”
He’s not trying to boss Eddie around though, so Richie lays his head in his lap and just watches the show for a bit, minding his own business. He entirely forgot that dude from LOST is in the first season of this before he fucks off. Maybe to the island. It could be a shared universe.
Eddie pets his head between messages, smoothing his hair back from the temple. The third time he stops, Eddie draws a sharp breath. “Richie, can I ask you something?”
“Yeah, that character’s gay,” Richie points.
“Ah, okay. But can I ask you something about us?”
Those are words right up there with We Need to Talk. Richie’s scalp prickles like it’s been dunked in cold water. And it had just felt so nice. “What is it?” he asks nervously.
“Well, she asked who takes the pictures of me, and- well I wouldn’t mention you by name, I know better than that. But, can I call you my boyfriend?”
Oh! Richie bolts upright. “Eddie! Yeah, of course!”
“I didn’t want to assume,” Eddie says, looking worried. “I know it’s complicated, with you in the public eye and me not exactly existing as far as the public is concerned.”
“Shit, yeah.” Richie still needs to follow up with Eds about some fake docs. He kind of had a lot on his plate when Richie dumped that request on him. “No, you’re right. We don’t want to draw too much attention to you until that’s worked out. It will be soon, though.”
Eddie relaxes. “It doesn’t come up so much when I’m fixing people’s cars, but you know. I’ll be getting two coffees or something and people like to be friendly and ask who the other’s for.”
Richie knows exactly what Eddie is talking about. They haven’t told the Losers or anyone they regularly see in person about them yet, and it’s been kind of a strain. “Yeah!” he says. “Like, I said to my manager the other day when I had to move a meeting around- Let me just tell my roommate - and it was the worst feeling I’ve had since, I dunno, feeling like I’m made of fucking sunshine all the time now that I’m with you.”
“Aw Richie.” Eddie beams at him.
“I mean, I went through all the trouble of coming out so I could have this, right? So- I’m not gonna say that anymore, to anyone,” Richie decides. He lays a hand at Eddie’s neck and scratches into the hair at his nape. “I love you too much.”
Sure, if he’s gonna apply this policy across the board, it’ll ruin some of his material about platonic gay roommates signing the lease with their dicks, but that doesn’t matter. Eddie matters.
He leans into Richie, smiling all the way to those big doe eyes. “Well don’t that beat all,” he says in his adorable Boomer way, and kisses him.
Richie chuckles into it. “Aren’t you gonna brag to your new buddy about your hot photographer boyfriend?”
“In a minute...”
When Eddie eventually gets back to his conversation, his little bit of candor goes over even better than Richie could dare hope. Squaregirlwearspants encourages him to tag future photos of himself #gaysofinstagram since, as Eddie quotes, ‘it’s inspiring to see older folks who are out’.
“She really say that?” It makes Richie feel kind of warm and fuzzy, considering. If he wasn’t so determined to let Eddie have his moment, maybe he would let him use Richie’s name just this once.
“Yeah.” Eddie gives him a look that says he knows exactly what kind of an ego rub that would be. “It’s no Full DisTozier tour, but- I think I’ll do it next time.”
-
Richie figures he owes his first officially boyfriended call to Bev, since she had been such a help with the tour and prodding Eddie along, but it kind of takes the wind out of his sails.
“Well, I think this is great,” she says. “But make sure you tell Eddie- our Eddie?- before he finds out on his own.”
That’ll require some effort on Richie’s part. “Eds hasn’t called me back since he promised to help with the paperwork. Most I hear from him is in the groupchat.”
“You kind of laid the mother of all existential crises at his feet like, two months after a near death experience, Richie. I’m shocked he didn’t show up in Chicago in the middle of the night to kill his clone.”
“They’re not clones,” Richie grumbles. Bev should know that. She should know them. They’re different people. Eds is more challenging, but Eddie is more direct. They can both be slow to trust, but once you get there? Eddie is slow with the way he handles people, too. He savors them. He indulges. Eds, on the other hand- his intimacy is like a game show, barking out as many correct answers as possible before the buzzer. His passion is sharp and thrilling, while Eddie’s is deep and lingering.
Bev sighs. “I know that, but Eds has really been through the ringer.”
“Do you talk to him a lot?”
“Sure. He’s in the same boat as I am, so it’s nice to commiserate. Crazy ex, starting over, and all that.”
Okay, so Bev is right. Freshly undead, in the midst of a divorce, and having a doppelganger from the past are all pretty absorbing independently. Unfortunately, that’s not all of the baggage on this particularly fucked carousel.
“Has he told you that... I told him how I felt?” Richie asks.
“No? You did?” Bev winces. “That puts another layer on things,” she admits.
Richie blows out a hard breath. “Yeah. What the fuck was I thinking?”
“What did you say, exactly?”
“Well, he was talking about Myra making things hard on him, saying that he used her while he was recovering, even though he couldn’t exactly tell her to get lost while he was in a fucking coma,” Richie snarls. “She said that no one would love him like she did, because he was so impossible to get along with... You get the picture.”
“I’ve heard all this, yeah.”
Richie pushes his glasses up into his hair and scrubs his face with the heel of his hand. “So I said- I love you like that.”
Eds let him down gently, of course. That’s uhm, really nice of you to share. I don’t- I’m sorry I don’t feel like that, but it’s... nice to hear? Thank you.
“When was this?”
“Before things with- well. Fuck, Bev.”
She had seen the state that Richie was in at the hospital when the Eddies came in. He was a wreck. Liable to do anything or anyone, maybe.
“Before you and Eddie got together?”
Just get it out there, Tozier...
“Yes and no,” Richie forces. “We sort of. Hooked up in Derry.”
“Woah.”
“Just the one time,” Richie rushes. “And then we agreed it wasn’t a great idea- that he needed help getting on his feet more than either of us needed to get laid- but now I love him, Bev. And he loves me, not like-“ Richie cuts himself off.
Bev fills in the blank. “I’ll be honest, Richie, if you told me you were in love with me and I said thanks but no thanks, and then the next thing I knew you were having sex with my twin-“
“They don’t look alike-“ Richie defends feebly.
“You know they have more in common than two guys named John Smith, Richie, get real.”
How much realer can he get than already living with one of them?
“Well it’s never gonna fucking happen with Eds, right? I’m happy with Eddie and my friends should be happy for me, right?” Richie says, getting a little louder than he intends. “So what’s the problem? He should be flattered and move on, right?!”
“Right,” Bev says flatly, sounding like she’s had quite enough of being shouted at.
“Bev- I’m sorry.”
She sighs again. “Richie, you’ve got a good thing going, I can see that. When he stops being weirded out, I’m sure Eds will see that, too. Just try not to rub it in his face and kick him while he’s down.”
Richie hears her. Starting on the defense and lording your better fortune over each other isn’t what friends do. Even if Eds has no qualms about him and Eddie being a couple, he can try to be sensitive. The guy’s gotta be lonely.
“Okay. Uhm. I think it might take a few days for me to be chill enough to call him,” says Richie. “Don’t say anything?”
“I won’t. I hope it goes well,” she concludes. “Tell Eddie I said hi.”
“Sure thing, lady.”
-
It took some conversion for Richie, but before they go to bed, Eddie likes to shut their phones in a drawer. And really, it’s not so bad living life by the alarm clock again. He probably sleeps better, and he definitely cuddles more attentively.
Still, there’s a last call around 10pm, where Richie will fuck around on whatever dumb game he’s gotten himself addicted to this week and Eddie will make sure he hasn’t missed any good work opportunities on Craigslist. He’ll check Instagram now, too, since it’s gotten busier. With him being sort of a homebody, it’s good he’s getting some extra socialization where he can get it, Richie thinks. He climbs over Eddie to drop his phone into the drawer first, tonight, and then plops down alongside him.
“Anyone else banging down your door, requesting beauty tips?”
Eddie’s eyebrows knit together. “Not exactly.”
He hands Richie his phone to show him a new message request from rockinbodtodd.
you’re so hot, it’s crazy
can’t wait to see your summer pics
“Dang,” says Richie, nuzzling into Eddie’s shoulder. He’s wearing another of Richie’s old band tees to bed. Has Richie played any BNL for him yet, or does Eddie think this is another joke slogan? Either way- “Now I’m waiting for those shirtless thirst traps.” Richie nips at the fabric of the sleeve with his teeth.
Eddie hmms. “You can have some. Not so sure about Todd, here.”
“Well I don’t care about that, if you wanna post beach pictures or whatever. I’ve been half naked in like, four different TV shows, dude. Free The Nipple 2017!”
Granted Richie’s public nudity played more along the lines of, Ha ha look at this funny hairy man with no abs! He eats carbs! while Eddie’s might inspire a viral outcry in the twink loving corners of the internet. But Richie can’t stand in the way of people worshiping Eddie, he’s too busy kowtowing.
“What do I say?” Eddie considers his phone.
“You don’t have to say anything,” Richie says. “Or, you can tell him ‘Thanks my boyfriend says the same thing.’” he suggests. Because he loves that word now. Boyfriend.
Eddie taps away. “Pfft. Now he’s wondering if you have an Instagram, too.”
“You could tell him my unverified one, but I don’t think he’s looking for six year old pictures of every cheese fry I’ve ever eaten, he’s looking for my chili dog.”
“I’ll say no, but trust me, my boyfriend's very good looking and tall.”
“With a big dick.”
“Big shoulders,” Eddie allows, typing more.
“And laser vision!”
“Eyes that crinkle when he smiles...”
Richie turns his body a little more so he’s half on top of Eddie and grins down at him. “What’s it like to be so fucking gorgeous that he’ll take my hotness on credit?”
Eddie lowers his phone to receive a kiss. “Well, it landed me you, so pretty darn good, I’d say.” He wraps his arm around Richie’s neck and lets himself be driven deep into the pillows by kisses. He drops his phone entirely when Richie starts pushing up at the bottom of his shirt. “Mmm. Oh, just take it off, I know you want to.”
“Too obvious?” Richie chuckles. He rolls with him in his arms so Eddie ends up on top, where that’s easier to accomplish. Once he’s got it off, Richie flags his shirt triumphantly before tossing it aside.
Eddie combs at his hair, fixing it. “Could you put my glasses aside? Thank you.”
Richie does, but then he remusses Eddie’s hair. “You got it, Blondie.”
“You’re a brute,” Eddie grins.
“And you’re a total babe.” Richie splays a hand on his bare ribs and grabs Eddie’s phone with the other so he can take a picture to send himself. He texts a little kissy winky emoji, too.
Eddie takes his phone back. “For a moment there, I thought you were sending that to him,” he says, when he sees just the text message app open. He adds some of his own flourish for Richie to read later on. “...For. The. Road.”
“What did Todd have to say? ”
Eddie goes back over to Instagram, eyebrow raised. “He says, as long as you treat me right.”
“Mmm, I wanna. How does he suggest I do that?” jokes Richie, with a roll of his hips. Eddie smirks and types. Oh. “Did you just send that?”
Eddie freezes. “Shoot. I’m sorry. I just enjoy flirting with you, Richie, I got carried away. I can put the phone down.”
Richie catches his hand before Eddie can drop his phone and brings it to his lips. “Hey, honey, it’s okay, I’m sorry.” It’s not like Richie didn’t egg him on into making this guy think Eddie wants to cyber. “You like flirting with me, but maybe also with me. I can dig that. I like that other people like you. Think you’re fuckin' amazing like I do.”
“That doesn’t bother you?” Eddie asks.
Richie shrugs. He’s never really had it in him to be a jealous person. Maybe because he’s never had the experience of being exclusive with someone before.
“I want people to like you, too.” Eddie leans down to him. He looks so serious. “I love you, Richie. I only ever loved my Losers like this, before. And we all- we were all in love, I think. So when I love you, I want you to have as much as there is. I want you to have enough.”
Richie looks up at him, wondrous. “I have you.”
Eddie smiles. “You do.”
Does anyone else have a heart as big and sweet as Eddie’s? Even if they don’t work out, somehow Richie knows he’ll be loved for as long as he’s alive. He won’t take that for granted. “Okay. I’m trying to wrap my head around this for clarity’s sake,” he says. He’s gonna get this right. “Flirting’s cool. What about sex? And specifically like, this thing with the dude online? He like, definitely thinks we wanna fuck for his benefit.”
Eddie scoffs. “This- this phone isn’t sex to me. Sex is my body. I only really want you to have that,” he says, very certainly. “And I wouldn’t want you touched by anyone who doesn’t love you, either.” But then he comes over more thoughtful. “But telling someone else about it is-”
“Voyeurism and/or exhibitionism?” Richie offers. For once he's not trying to be funny, but Eddie laughs.
“It’s just different, is what it is.”
But different- good, clearly. Eddie had enjoyed showing off that he had Richie at his beck and call. Imagine if he had some reinforcement to take full advantage of Richie’s people pleasing streak. If he was a little more comfortable ordering Richie around...
Richie gulps. “Would you like it if I did whatever he says?”
Eddie glances at the phone gripped in both their hands and licks his lips, considering. “Within reason.”
“We could just check to see,” Richie says, practically. He kisses Eddie’s knuckles one last time and loosens his grasp. “He’s probably been jerking it this whole time and already got off, so probably all he’s gotta say is ‘I dunno, man, fuck your own damn boyfriend’-”
“Would that be a hardship for you?”
“Not as hard as I would be for you,” Richie waggles his eyebrows.
Eddie chuckles as he sits back again to read. He scans the screen and then puts the phone down to the side. “He says you should watch me take off all my clothes-”
“I was workin’ on that,” Richie points out. He plays with the drawstring of Eddie’s pajamas.
“-And that that better make you good and hard.”
Richie groans. “Fuck, I’m skipping steps.”
Eddie starts to kneel off of him. “I better catch up, then.”
He slips off the edge of the bed and Richie moves quickly to sit in front of him, rapt. Is there a better sight than all of Eddie, all at once? He’s so beautiful, head to toe. The soft light of the evening lands on the smooth lines of his nose and neck and shoulders and his graceful arms. Those slender, long-fingered hands of his smooth down his hips as he lets his pajama pants fall. Then they curl into his underwear, dragging down over Eddie’s own hard cock, not so very far from eye level. He turns on the spot, standing between Richie’s feet, showing off the tawny trail of hair from his belly to his groin and the pair of dimples at the top of his ass, right where Richie’s thumbs should go.
Richie’s mouth waters and he can’t help but reach out to touch the jut of bone at Eddie’s hip and draw him in. “Come sit in my lap?”
“Of course, sweetheart.” Eddie nods and holds out his hand for the phone again. Richie gives it to him and he reads. “But first show me what I do to you.”
“Mmmgod.” Immediately, he pulls himself out past the waistband of his sweats, swollen stiff. “You make me desperate.”
“‘Desperate’,” Eddie reports. Then he leans in, hands on Richie’s shoulders. “Come on,” he kisses Richie. “Take those off so I can feel you.”
Richie squirms out of his pants and kicks them away. Eddie tsks at the things being strewn all about when there's a hamper so close by, but pulls Richie’s shirt off too, and drops it on the floor with the rest.
“You’re all willy nilly, tonight, huh?”
“I don’t know what’s got into me,” Eddie says, toeing away the laundry. He brings together Richie’s knees a bit and then turns around to sit on his lap.
Richie twines his arms around him. “Me, in a minute.”
Eddie shivers at the promise, the blades of his shoulders pinching. “You have to kiss me, and touch me.”
“I have to,” Richie agrees. He doesn’t need anyone to tell him that. He kisses between Eddie’s shoulders and glides his hands up and down his lovely back.
“And tell me how bad you want me.”
That’s all? Nice work if you can get it.
“I want you like I’m one of your cars,” Richie says, pressing another kiss. “I want you so much, thousands of pounds of fucking steel, much. I want you blinking my lights and roaring my engine,” he growls. “I want you climbing inside me and rolling under me, on one of those- what’s it called?”
“A creeper.” Eddie chuckles. “I can’t possibly type all this.”
Richie puts on his best impression of Eddie’s New York by way of New England accent. “He wants me so bad, he wishes he was a car. Luckily I’m into that. ”
“Very lucky,” Eddie says. “Hmm. He wants me so bad he’s using metaphors. ”
Richie muffles a laugh into his back then runs his hands around Eddie's waist to his front as he types. He pulls them closer at the hip so he can grind against Eddie’s ass while he feels his way up his panting chest and throat. Eddie leans back into him, becoming liquid as Richie kisses his neck.
“Richie... please,” he whimpers as Richie drifts a hand towards his dick. Richie just holds him to start, nice and firm, but not moving. “Oh, oh please Richie.” Eager for it, Eddie tries to twitch in and out of his fist, but he’s a little too short in the leg to get the leverage for more.
“I wanna take it slow, like this. Just hold you, and touch you,” Richie says as he starts to stroke Eddie lazily. He could spend hours and hours just teasing his darling, making him dizzy with need. That’s probably not something their playmate has the patience for, though. “I could do this all night,” Richie kisses to him.
“Me too,” Eddie says with a tremble. “I don’t have anywhere to be tomorrow, do you?”
They can do whatever they want when it comes down to it.
“We can keep going until Wednesday, at least,” Richie tells him. “I have a phone meeting tomorrow, but if you can keep quiet...”
“I think you like my feedback too much to stick to that.”
“Hazard of being a performer.”
Eddie huffs a shaky laugh, as good as any applause. Richie wants to give him something to really give a rave review about.
He nibbles his way to Eddie’s ear so he can whisper, “I’m gonna lay you down and open you up, so I can just be inside of you. I’ll stay put once I’m there, filling you. Kiss you. Touch you slow. Make you come before I even think of myself. Is that treating you right enough?”
“Yes,” Eddie hisses.
“Wanna tell that to rockinbodtodd?”
Eddie casts his phone aside, shaking his golden head. “No, I just want you to do it.”
-
It was bound to happen eventually. Eddie claims it was probably the mother of four’s minivan he was replacing the seat belts in, but Richie is still convinced it’s his fault. Eddie is deadly serious about hygiene while Richie is a walking petri dish, always dipping in and out of crowds, shaking hands, and generally relying on those hardy Mainer genes to pull him through. ‘Let the air get at it’ was the Tozier family motto. He probably didn’t wash his hands after taking the L or something stupidly preventable like that, that he should have done, because he lives with someone who doesn’t have the luxury of health insurance.
He loads up at Walgreens and comes home to Eddie, still curled up on the couch where he left him, swaddled in the chunkiest blanket in the apartment. He didn’t even bother putting on his glasses this morning, since unlike Richie he only really needs them for distance, and the TV is close enough.
“Hey, toots.” Richie lays a kiss at the top of his sweaty, miserable head. “Got what you asked for. Sorta.” He lines up a battery of bottles and boxes- mostly comfort foods and various brands of iced tea. They don’t make the kind Eddie likes anymore, so he’ll have to pick a new favorite.
“We should change the pillowcases,” Eddie wheezes through his cocoon. “I don’t want you to get sick too.”
“That’s cute and all, but think the good ship Contamination sailed when I jumped you in the shower last night.”
Eddie answers in a double sneeze.
Ugh. Richie needs to nut up and call Eds about the ID stuff already. This time it’s just a cold, but next time he could get hurt while working, or need a tooth drilled or something. If they’re anything alike, and yeah, Richie has to admit on some levels they are, it must stress Eddie the fuck out that he doesn’t have a safety net in place.
He cracks open one of the Arizonas and puts it in Eddie’s hand before he goes to make his call. “Drink, dude.”
The debate he has with himself about whether or not to close the bedroom door to use the phone goes something like this- Richie hasn’t shut the door since he and Eddie started sleeping together. Phone calls are private sometimes! Not with his manager, or his friends, or Wendy, though? You can fucking see Eddie is resting in the next room, right? Be quiet!
He shuts the door. He finds the contact for Eds in his phone. Spaghetti. He waits for him to pick up.
“Hey, Rich,” says Eds, too neutral for Richie to project anything onto the greeting.
“Uh, hey man, how’s it going?”
Eds blows out a troubled breath. “Ah, it keeps going, I guess. That’s something?”
Richie winces. “Yeah, sorry, I know you... probably got a lot going on. Catching up on work and moving and the kinda nuts favor I asked and-”
“Fuck! Richie-”
“-fucking physio? I guess?”
Eddie cuts over him. “Shit, I totally dropped the ball on you! I mean. You’re right, shit’s been really whack-”
Aaaand some of that is Richie’s fault! “Err, sorry. Maybe I shouldn’t have-”
“No, I- I’m able to help. I’m helping. I should, I mean the guy saved my life and its like, worse than if he was undocumented. Setting him up is like? The least I can do? Sorry, I just got really swamped by life and kept... not calling back.” By the trailing of his voice, Eds does sound genuinely overwhelmed.
“Okay, all right, yeah,” Richie says. He doesn’t feel like he’s in a place to forgive Eds, since he is for sure more the one at fault between the two of them, shoving his stupid little heart down his throat without thinking how much he already had going on and asking for a colossal, illegal favor besides. Great friending! Richie clicks his tongue. “So... Where do things stand?”
“Uhm-”
“With the papers, I mean.” Not- he’s not asking about that.
“Right.” Eddie clears his throat. “I have someone who can take care of it. I have no idea if we’re being fleeced on the price but-”
Richie shakes his head. “Doesn’t matter, I’m good for it.”
“Other than that the only thing I need from you is pictures for the IDs?”
“Gimme a sec.”
This, Richie has anticipated. He speakers the call and goes to look for the super generic shoulders-up pictures they took while Richie was first cooking up a plan to get Eddie a new life. There’s about a million photos in his roll between now and then. Mostly of Eddie, or him and Eddie, or something he saw he thought Eddie would ‘get a good chuck’ out of. He selects a few, smiling and unsmiling, cropped and uncropped, just in case. As they load into the text log with Eds he realizes he accidentally checked a neighboring snapshot of Eddie, boggling at the price of gas on their drive from Derry to Chicago. Hardly incriminating, but still. Richie took it because he couldn’t get enough of the way Eddie ran his fingers through his hair when he was really staggered by something.
“Huh,” says Eds on the other end. “Not what I expected...”
If that’s good or bad, Richie doesn’t know. Is it a relief to see that his other dimensional counterpart isn’t a carbon copy? A let down that he’s psyched himself out about this whole fucking thing for this to be the result?
“Key-yoot, right?” Richie clenches his teeth.
“He’s? Blond? The other me,” Eddie sort of whispers. He’s probably at work at this hour, trying not to be overheard. Kook alert!
But Richie can’t help feeling the same tangled frustration that he had talking to Bev. “He’s not a you. You’re your fucking self and he’s who he is.”
Eds rattles on, unheeding. “I figured maybe cause of like, the difference in fucking flouride or nature/nurture he’d have like, different teeth or different grooming or whatever the fuck, but this is like-? Did you send the right fucking pictures? No, I know you did, but, it’s just-”
“Anyway!” Richie throws in, hoping to save both them and the rabbit who is minding his own business at the bottom of this hole some embarrassed sputtering. He takes a deep breath. “Thanks, Eds. You can mail them over whenever. It means a lot to me that you’re helping, though. Uh. Because-”
Eds scoffs and there’s the sound of a door shutting. Definitely at the office, then. “Uhhh, no. I’m not putting a fucking stamp on these and chancing them to the fucking USPS, dipshit. I’ll book a flight and bring them over myself. If I’m gonna do some fraud, I figure, what the shit, do it in person! And I should meet the guy at least once, right?”
“Uhm.”
“-I should be able to make it out for a visit week after next.”
That’s so soon, that’s too soon. But Richie can’t delay it either. Eddie shouldn’t have to scrounge for under-the-table work forever, he’s way too skilled. And Richie wants to be able to fly with him for weekend getaways and get him flu shots and for it to finally be okay for his Wikipedia page to say something true under Personal Life. Fuck! Richie really hadn’t planned on them meeting so soon, but he definitely can’t let it happen before Eds knows what’s up. It’s not fair to Eddie to make him pretend they’re not together in his own fucking home.
“Eds, that’s- that’s great. It’ll be good to- uhm. Any day but the 27th?”
“Got it. Great.” A pen clicks as he must make a note. “Listen Richie, sorry, but I gotta go. It really will be good to see you, though. I’m excited.“
Richie’s window is closing. “Eds- I gotta tell you about something-“
“Next time, buddy! Promise.”
“Shit. Okay.” When he calls back with a firm date for the visit. Then. “Bye Eds.”
“Bye Richie.”
-
He says goodnight to Eddie before his show, since he won’t get back to his hotel until at least midnight, Chicago time. It goes over really well and he gets a chance to talk to some fans at the theater, after, which is less of a chore than it used to be, but still a lot of ol’ grip and grin, Thanks for coming out, No thank you for coming out, Haha that’s a good one. It seems he’s always chin deep in women at these meet and greet things now, which Straight Richie would have had a good crack about. He’s mostly just glad anyone came here to laugh. It was Chewbacca levels of hairy for a bit right after he came out, but for the most part the dudebros who are personally pissed off at Gay Richie have moved on to their next outrage.
A tall woman with a southern accent that’s definitely not from around these parts gives him an extra hard handshake. “I saw the St. Louis show too, last month.”
Richie’s heart squeezes. Somehow he knows this’ll be it, the first to-his-face reaction. “So you’re a ticket hoarding stalker fan, huh?”
“Security!” she jokes back. She lets go and looks away, a little sheepish. “But, uh. I heard the tweak on your bit about the roommate-“
“Yeah...”
“-and it’s none of my business if there even is a roommate, or if he was always your boyfriend and you just wanted to play around with the delivery or whatever, but like- if it’s true I just wanted to say I’m really happy for you. That you get to joke about it now.”
It’s his first time hearing that arrangement of sentiments. People have been complimentary on this coming out tour in a way they haven’t been in ages, but it’s always been like it’s a favor he did for them and not for himself. He encourages that, of course, Aw thanks, I did it for the kids, but really. It was for one particular kid with knobby, scabby knees and goofy glasses above all.
“Thanks! Thank you. Uh-” Ah, fuck his eyes are watering. “I’m happy about it, too.”
“That’s great! Great show!”
Though he would have happily taken a selfie with her even while starting to blubber, mercifully she does not ask.
He really wishes he could see Eddie when he finally crashes for the night. He wishes he could scoop him up in his arms and kiss his face and tell him how it went and thank him for being part of it, but the best he can do at this hour is to belly flop into some hotel pillows and look at pictures. So he does just that. Eddie might even have posted something new, if he checks Instagram.
The most recent post by betterdreamsandplenty is a shot of a several records picked out from their collection and fanned on the shag rug in front of the entertainment system. Richie’s 69 Love Songs is mixed in among Eddie’s usual selection of lady folk singers and easy listening, because he’s slowly broadening his musical horizons. Missing someone tonight, the caption says, simply. There are no tags, but the post is dated at being from only thirty-two minutes ago. Richie comments with his lurker account.
discogarbagedisposal tsk tsk its past your bedtime
Eddie’s never been a great sleeper, though he’s definitely more motivated to try and get some shut eye when Richie’s available to snuggle with. When that won’t cut it, it’s plenty enjoyable to sit up late with some music, Eddie with a word puzzle, Richie with some writing or his Nintendo. They footsie and slowly droop into the middle of the couch together, all evening. Missing those cozy nights is what makes Richie sorriest about being away. Eddie should have a more reliable source of company, after spending so long alone.
Richie browses down to some older posts, lingering especially on the one in the kitchen with the coveralls. It really fucking blew up thanks to Bev. Loads of heart-eyed emojis confetti the post. While he revisits some other favorites he gets a comment back.
betterdreamsandplenty commented: It’s too quiet. I’m used to you raking up the coals.
@betterdreamsandplenty zzzZz (i had to use grandpa google translate to decode that i hope youre happy)
@discogarbagedisposal I will be when you come home.
@betterdreamsandplenty wish you were here too. tuck me in?
This method of communication is a little unwieldy for Eddie’s liking, so he DMs Richie instead.
How was your show?
really good
i was nervous about some of the rewrites fucking with the energy in the middle but it was like even better??
That’s great. I want to see you again, soon. I love seeing you perform.
Richie has got to convince Eddie it’s okay to loosen up with an exclamation point now and then. It makes everything he says with his customary, uptight punctuation seem either super serene, or super direct.
haha you’ll get sick of that real quick i promise
No. I want to see you right now.
Super direct to his dick! Richie moans into his pillow.
i wanna kiss you goodnight
turn the lights off and take off both our glasses and just feel our way back together
He waits a little while for a response, hopefully because Eddie is closing down shop for the night and getting into bed. Mayhaps undressing? He can hope.
You could follow the sound of my voice.
mmm. what are you saying?
I’m here, Richie. Come to bed. Kiss me.
Richie takes a sharp breath. Here goes nothing. can i do more?
Since the thing with rockinbodtodd they haven’t had another threesome wander into their unsuspecting DMs. They might give it another go, Richie thinks, but seeing as they wound up ghosting Todd in the middle of things, it seemed kind of douchey to angle him for a repeat. Either way, it’d be lying to say Richie hadn’t been hoping that next time he was on the road he could get Eddie to sext him one on one.
What do you have in mind? Eddie asks. A green light.
i find you in the dark and kiss you
your hands touch my face
and theyre so pretty so perfectly made
That sounds nice.
i want your fingers in my mouth
since im not there can you do that for me?
Yes
Richie spits in his hand and shoves it down between himself and the mattress.
suck them
I am
good for touching
try it
Yes
feels good?
Yes
He can almost see Eddie laying in their bed, one of those elegant hands of his wrapped around his dick. Too involved to do more than stamp out three letter answers with his other shaky hand. Wanting Richie from two thousand miles away.
“You need me to sleep, don’t you?” Richie huffs to an empty room as he humps. “Need me to make you come.”
is it enough? he asks Eddie.
No
I want you
want you too blondie
So much. So fucking much. It’s perfect agony to keep focus on what he’s typing through his yearning. He feels stretched out, about to burst for how bad he wants this.
i turn you over
put my dick between your legs, Richie types. He pulls his hand out of his pants just long enough to get it even wetter. He throws himself into his palm like a Slip n’ Slide.
near your hole
Richie squeezes himself.
is that enough?
No
As soon as he can get Eddie to say it he’s gonna lose it.
tell me
whats enough
He’s only ever heard it once from Eddie’s own mouth, the first time he took it up the ass for Richie. They did it sort of like this, face down, sandwiched head to toe, fingers laced together. Richie had his face in Eddie’s hair, his heart in his throat, and Eddie said it and he came so quick, so hard. He wound up having to finish Eddie off with his mouth.
Fuck me
yeah
ill fuck you good honey
“Hhn! Ohmygod,” Richie grunts into his pillow, spilling into his hand in fitful jerks. “Shit.” He lets out a ragged breath, flops over, and wipes his hand dry as fast as he can to be there for Eddie.
you feel so good so full of me
you love it dont you
Y
Eddie dropping his phone, head back, arching his slim body and wishing Richie was there to pin him back down. Keep all the pieces of him safe as he falls apart. Richie doesn’t expect to hear from him again until he’s finished but-
Please
come for me honey
i got you
i love you
He waits. He’s definitely sleepy. How nice would it be to kiss until they both dropped off...
I love you, too.
:D
Good job, team.
Richie tugs at the covers of the bed and crawls in so he can hunker down for a little digital pillow talk. Since there’s no one here to gripe about him throwing jizz rags around he opts to free ball it, pulling off his underpants and kicking them out of bed. See? This little long distance arrangement could have all kinds of benefits.
how you feelin?
Very good. That worked out better than I expected.
well not to toot my own horn because its tired rn
but i like to think i picked up some tricks catfishing dudes on AIM
He can hear the Eddie in his head sigh and add that to his research list.
I’ll have to look that up, I guess.
Richie grins at his phone.
you finally sleepy now?
Yeah.
im glad even if i cant take you on tour with me i can still take you to bed
Maybe soon you can.
Maybe. It’s kind of hard to think that far ahead. There’s kind of a self-imposed mental block there that has nothing to do with Richie’s exhaustion level. He’s nervous about seeing Eds again (and nervous about being nervous) in order to get the shit that’ll make traveling together possible in the first place, and then even more nervous about what will happen when they eventually do try it. What if it doesn’t work? Jail for all three of them? Maybe they’ll all get bunked together and have lots of opportunity to sort out any awkwardness. Ugh. Well, whatever’s gonna happen, it’s not gonna get solved tonight.
“Just make a fucking joke already, Tozier.”
yeah next time im on the road i can bring you and well text from across the bed ;)
Haha.
i miss your sleepy laugh
Me too.
I think I need to say goodnight, Richie.
want me to snore you to sleep?
zzzZZZZZZZZZZZZZ
Ah, just like usual.
gnight eddie
-
The weather’s shitty in Chicago, so Richie spends a lot longer than he anticipated hanging around the airport in San Diego. He finds himself some lunch that sadly is not the Pequod’s pizza Eddie saved for him from last night, then completely neglects to eat it as he waits for a new gate. He can’t stop thinking about the whole Travel With Eddie thing, here. How’s a guy supposed to have an appetite under these conditions?
Ooh, Toblerones.
Anyway. If sitting around doing nothing is already making him queasy, he should just lean into it, right?
Richie opens an email draft. No chance of getting verbally derailed by Eds in the middle of an email.
Whuttup Spaghettiiiiii
Look, I know it was some really heavy shit finding out you didn’t die because a dude with your same name and hometown and home life and general biography but like, a Boomer, rocked up to save the day. It was probably also kinda wild to find out that I’d been in some secret love with you for thirty years! What do these things have in common you ask? I’m getting to that! Now, hear me out. You don’t have to worry about me being lonely forever because I’m eternally pining after your straight ass. Good news, right? You also don’t have to worry we can’t be friends anymore which is probably why you didn’t call me back for like, three months. We can be friends and I can be in love with the other Eddie instead and everything’s fine! Please don’t not do the ID stuff because of this.
Respectfully,
Richie
Yeah, he cannot send any part of this, this is fucking coo coo for cocoa puffs right here. Delete delete delete.
Okay, Richie. Think. The sooner he gets this out in the open, the sooner Eds can wrap his neurotic little brain around it, get over it, and hopefully be super fucking cool about it when he meets Eddie. They still have a week. How long did it take him to get over it that time in high school when Eds told his sister her prom makeup was pretty? Two months? Except it’s not really comparable. There’s no jealousy involved. Not unless Eddie is worried about the way Richie feels- felt- about Eds. Ah, fuck. They should probably talk about it at some point, just to put the whole Richie/Eds thing to bed. Figuratively.
Over the next hour more gates are announced, but not his. His lunch is still uneaten. The weather hasn’t changed. Nothing will change until Richie makes it happen, he’s pretty sure.
He has to do this.
He tosses his soggy sandwich in the garbage and finds a patch of hallway where people are too busy rushing to pay attention to whatever kind of conniption he’s about to induce in himself.
“Okay, slugger, you got this,” he says, hopping in place like a boxer at the heavy bag. “You tell hundreds of fucking strangers at a time that you lost count how many dicks you sucked sometime in the high forties. This is just one non stranger and one particular dick. And you don’t even have to bring dicks up, bro! You can just say- we’re dating!”
A woman pushing her elderly charge in a wheelchair gives Richie’s frantic gesticulation a passing side eye.
“You wanna switch?” He calls after her. “I’ll push that thing so fucking fast you won’t need the plane!”
She hurries along past him, and finally, he dials.
Maybe Eds won’t pick up, wouldn’t that be lucky? No, wait. He needs him to pick up. Right, right.
“Hey Richie!” answers an unsuspecting Eds.
“HiEdsIhavesomethingtotellyouandifIdoawholefuckingpreambleaboutitI’mnotgonnagetitout.”
He snorts at Richie. “What’re you on fucking Cash Cab? Take a breath, dude. In and out.”
Richie does. “Yeah, yeah. Sure. Breathing, I’ve heard of it.” Fuck, is this how it feels to be Eds? Being told to do your most reflexive bodily function all the time? “I, uh. Have something to tell you.”
“Will it take longer than forty-five minutes?”
No way, he’ll have a heart attack long before that. “I don’t think so.”
“Then shoot, Rich.”
He looks up at the screen for Departures again. Chicago is still TBA.
Richie rubs his eyes under his glasses. “Uhm. So, the thing is...” Breathe in and out. “Eddie is my boyfriend.”
There’s silence for a moment. “Oh, uhm. The one. That you live with?”
Richie’s empty stomach gurgles like the pump for a koi pond. Maybe he shouldn’t have thrown that sandwich out. “No, Eddie fucking Van Halen. I’ll get you tickets.”
“Fuck you if you don’t.”
“Not really!”
“I know that! I-” Eds makes a noise that’s not at all a word. “I just don’t know what to say.”
Neither does Richie. Buhhhh. “Do you like, have any questions?” he tries.
“...Since when?” Eddie ventures, voice thin. “Since you told me... about him?”
Well, that’s about when Richie started seriously considering it, but parceling it all out for Eds is a fantastic way to accidentally tell him he blew Eddie in the bathroom of a dive bar while he was being airlifted to a bigger hospital. “Uhh, we’ve been together for a month. More? Hard to say? You know how blurry it is when you’re about to- well maybe you’d don’t, but-” Richie pauses his rambling. “I’m really happy with him.” That’s the important take away. He’s happy and Eds, being his friend, should be able to latch onto that if nothing else.
“So-”
“So?”
“He’s- he’s gay? The other Eddie?”
Richie rolls his eyes. “Grain of salt, if you’re worried about a late life conversion. Word is, his original Richie was such a poon hound he had to get a vasectomy. And it reversed itself!”
“How do you even figure that out- no I don’t want to know.”
The Departures board begins cycling through an update.
“Well, uh- it sounds like I’ve left you with enough to chew on for now, haha, uhm.”
Well, would you look at that. Chicago, 25A.
“Uh.”
Richie starts bouncing on the balls of his feet again. “Hey, Eds, my gate just got changed, I gotta fucking skedaddle, dude.”
“Yeah, fuck. Uhm. Run. I’ll let you know my flight info later.”
“Peace out cub scout.”
-
There are people who don’t like doing the dishes, and that’s fair. There’s the germs thing for those who are so inclined, for sure, and some textures are super gross. Richie’s been known to puke at the sight of pudding bones, and yep, that made getting his tonsils out a real treat. So, his philosophy is that dishes are a necessary evil that’s better faced head on before that shit has a chance to congeal. They can even be a little fun sometimes. Especially when there’s someone to tease.
“Hey old man, back in your day-”
Eddie neatly folds up his sleeves. “This oughta be good...” Although there’s plenty of room on the drying rack, he takes up a towel at Richie’s elbow.
“Did your mother make you take your dishes down to the river to wash with lye?”
“Yeah, me and all the other little urchins, in our pinafores and bonnets.”
“I fucking knew it.” Richie hands off a plate and goes in for a pint glass next. “Hold your breath, Eddie.”
He puffs out his cheeks gamely, but looks at Richie with a legible Why? etched between his eyebrows.
“I was home alone once while I was in the middle of a Good Son kick,” Richie starts to explain as he scrubs the rim. “I dunno, I think I was trying to convince my parents to put me on the roster for car time or something, but anyway. I was doing dishes without being asked, washing a glass just like this and-” Richie pops his lips. “Broke right through my knuckle.”
Eddie grimaces. “Gosh.”
“Took like, all the skin right off. Looked like the wrong end of a chicken leg.” Richie holds his breath himself as he sticks his hand in to wash out the inside of the cup. “Phew!” No harm, no foul.
“Still gives you the willies?”
Richie shudders as he rinses. “Well you know. I’m a little accident prone.”
He hands Eddie the glass to dry, but he puts it aside on the rack. He gathers Richie’s hand into his, inspecting it like he did when Richie ate shit on the ice a few months back. Eddie pats off the wet and rubs the pad of his thumb at a particular knuckle.
“This one?”
“Yep.” There’s a C shaped scar around the knob of it, like a moat around a castle. Not as gruesome as the scar Bill had once given him, maybe, but more lasting.
“Well you managed to keep the skin! Did you go to the doctor for it?”
“Nah, Eds patched me up. He lived pretty close by, so I ran over with my bloody dish rag. His mom loved that.”
Richie can remember her screeching through the bathroom door, telling Richie to leave, to take his sick, filthy blood with him and never touch her baby again. It was too much, too close to his fear that Eds would push him away if he ever knew what Richie was. Richie wanted to go, to duck out the window and disappear into the Barrens to bleed to death. (Admittedly he was a bit of a drama queen.) But Eds, cool and methodical in that moment- he told Richie to stop, so he stopped.
“Well, if she was anything like my ma...” Eddie sighs, turning Richie’s hand and working his thumbs into the meat of his palm. He frowns, but not at Richie.
“She had him convinced, half the time. We were gonna infect him with AIDs or make him suffocate or some shit- but then he’d break through it when you needed him to. Everytime. Maybe he was scared, but Eds’d be in there, in the fucking blood, helping. He-”
He’ll show up. He might be disgusted with Richie at the same time, but he’ll be gentle with Eddie like he always is when someone needs help. He’s good like that. One of the best. Richie didn't feel the way he did about him for nothing.
“-He’s a really good guy, considering,” Richie concludes simply. He doesn’t have to tell Eddie about crazy moms.
“I look forward to meeting him properly,” Eddie smiles up at him, still kneading Richie’s hand in his own. Is this how manicurists get all their gossip? He feels tranced, and maybe like he's said more than he meant.
“Yeah, he’s a riot,” Richie says, and pulls his hand back. There are still utensils to clean. “Anyway, tomorrow I’ll be done with the recording people by ten, so, plenty of time for me to swing back here and then we’ll go to the airport?”
“I could pick you up if you need?”
“No way, I’m twice your size, squirt!” Richie grins at some cutlery.
Eddie picks up his towel again. “Well, you just let me know who needs a ride, when.”
“Right-oh! Twice around the park, Jeeves,” says the British Guy.
“Oh, so that’s the voice you’re going with for the recording,” Eddie smirks.
“Nah, see- I was hoping if I put a sorta Waylon Jennings stank on it, Produce Queen would top the country charts. You know-” Richie clacks two soapy forks together to a beat. “Thick ol’ carrot or a stuh-ringy bean, that’s the way ah keep it clean- and then! Then I make it a crossover hit by doing the eurotrash club remix.”
Eddie holds out the towel to receive the forks. “I think I’ll hold out for the instrumental version.”
“Hey! ”
Eddie chuckles. “I listen to your voice all day, all night!”
Richie plunges an eyebrow at him. “You’ve had enough of me, then?”
“I’m full up.”
“Hmph!” Richie leaves the last of the utensils and shuts off the water. “Maybe I should be more withholding.”
“You’re going to put a sock in it?”
Zip! Richie only nods and wipes his hands off on his pants.
“I suppose scarcity does drive demand...”
“Mmm yes, demand me.” Oh for fuck’s sake. Ten whole seconds?
But Eddie folds Richie into his arms before he can suffer too much disappointment. “You really held out, there,” he teases. “Inspiring conviction.”
“Ahright then, ya wise guy,” Richie kisses him. “No serenade for you.”