#i forgot ed gets a hole in his left arm at promised day lmao | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

hornsandthings · 5 years

Text

victory in the wrong clothing;

pairing: (adult) richie tozier x reader

summary: richie returns to his s/o after having left abruptly for derry. still grieving for eddie, he struggles to talk about what has happened. his s/o is there to comfort him, learning more about what richie had once wanted as a child and what he wants now for his future as an adult.

warnings: canon-typical themes, fluff & angst, language lmao // word count: 2.2k (oops)

you felt like an impostor here, sitting on richie tozier’s couch inside his chicago high-rise. richie trashmouth tozier’s couch; comfortable, luxurious, expensive. despite this, you knew what you’d find if you were to have a look around: the awards in his office, the display of rare vinyls next to the record player in the living room, his collection of bizarre ties that he reserved for formal events only. god, you thought a little wildly, the tea in your hands long since gone cold, i feel like a stalker. an outsider who had broken into the comedy star’s apartment, an avid fan whose mind had gone a little haywire with obsession.

and, perhaps just as a stalker would’ve, you took richie’s absence personally. first, it had manifested as anger – you had half a mind to trash trashmouth’s apartment by day two – but then it transformed into a type of gnawing worry. even now, as you sat wide awake at midnight (like every other night of this past week), your gut roiled and your heart pounded as you stared out the big window over the city. chicago’s lights – once exciting and bright – were barely coherent against the night’s darkness, twinkling pitifully as it seemed moments from being swallowed up.

richie was out in that darkness somewhere, his number no longer in service. he had left on a tuesday, home only a moment after a show of his at one of the city’s intimate comedy clubs. your friends had said things like what a bastard! and maybe all those voices finally drove him crazy and oh hon, can’t you see? he found someone else. if it had been anyone else, perhaps you would’ve believed such things, but the way richie had left…

you still remembered it vividly, because it was scary.his hands were shaking, his face pale and drawn as he was throwing clothes into a suitcase, eyes glazed over. in answer to your bewildered questions, he’d been mumbling about home and a call and a promise. some of the panic dissipated into grim determination, but richie tozier had left still looking like a dead man walking.

i don’t understand, you’d nearly wailed, richie, please! talk to me!

richie barely remembered his childhood. for him to return to the town he couldn’t name – or perhaps wouldn’tname – on some sort of random whim…

it had you guiltily checking the medicine cabinet, fearing some sort of break – but no, he’d packed his ADHD medication too. there was this, but also the way he had turned back to you before closing the door. don’t forget me, he’d said, before giving you a desperate, rushed kiss.

the smell of sweat was still in your nose. the smell of fear. richie tozier had been afraid. so no, then. he hadn’t left you. he was running towards something, even if it was the absolute last thing he wanted to do.

so here you sat in the silent apartment, watching the night deepen. you were so in thought that you didn’t register the roll of a suitcase, or the click of a key turning the lock, but then the lights flicked on and footsteps shuffled and you turned and the mug shattered on the floor and there he was, richie tozier, your boyfriend, your goddamn lover.

god, you almost couldn’t believe it. perhaps you were gaping at him, but richie looked older, almost like a stranger. but then his face crumpled, long legs taking stagger-steps as he reached for you, and you all but jumpedhim, wrapping him up in your arms.

“richie! oh god, richie—richie, i—”

“i’m sorry, baby,” he whispered, leaning over you as he hid his face in your hair, almost crushing you as he held tight – but you didn’t care, you welcomed this almost-pain, reassuring you that this was real. his shoulders were shaking, his breath haggard, nails digging into your skin. richie was crying.

you whimpered against his chest, clutching at his crinkled shirt. it almost hurt to hold him like this, body all tense, but it was all you could do for a while, still standing there on the threshold of the living room. when he got a little too heavy, his knees too weak to even hold himself up, you gently pulled him onto that couch.

richie was loathe to let go of you; he clung on, manoeuvring your legs over his lap and your head to his shoulder. cradling the back of your neck, he pressed his lips to yours in a wet kiss, mouth moulding to yours slow and steady, again and again. you cupped his jaw, the scratch of stubble against your palms and as you held his face close, his nose cold as it brushed yours.

“i missed you,” you said, and he ran his thumb over your cheekbone. “i worried for you. you scaredme, richie.” he scared you a little even now, his eyes so solemn. it was a far cry from the richie who would shock audiences with sheer audacity, make you flustered in public, make you giddy and soft with his kindness and affection. i fucking adore you, he’d once whispered into your ear.

richie winced, averting his eyes. “i know. i’m sorry. but i had to, baby. and it—it worked, but—fuck!” he shuddered, squeezing his eyes shut. “not everyone—eddie—”

he was shaking now, removing his glasses before pinching the bridge of his nose. you shook your head, feeling your own eyes well up. he wasn’t making any sense, but he was clearly in such despairthat it made your heart ache. “baby,” you murmured, gently taking his hands. “baby, what happened to you? where did you go? who… who’s eddie?”

richie looked at you, taking in your careful grip, your soft tone, your honest face. his chest seized at the way you had said eddie, no suspicion there but only concern and sympathy. god, he didn’t know how to even begin to tell you. i killed a killer clown from outer space, baby, and his psychotic henchman! they both used to pick on me and my friends in middle school! i remembered a whole life i’d forgotten and lost half of it, all in one night! i had some fucking wild TIMES, BABY!

he wanted to tell you the truth – fuck, some part of him needed to – but for all the love he knew you had for him, any sane person would make moves to have him committed. there was this, yes, but it was mostly the burden of knowing which stopped him. to know that there were horrors lurking amongst the stars, things beyond human comprehension, things which had set foot on this fucking earth – it had broken stanley’s mind, the one who had been the most adult of them all. no, he couldn’t do that to you.

“richie,” you said, reverting to a much more simpler question, “are you okay?”

and he broke, a sob escaping his throat with a hitching, ugly sound. he leaned into your touch as you hugged him close, nuzzling his face in your neck as he shook against you. it hurt to cry like this, throat constricting and nose stinging and head aching and heart breaking. the memories in his head ran like a well-watched film reel: the scrape of ground beneath him. eddie’s smile. the splattering of blood. the harsh tug of hands all over him as he screamed, they screamed, the cavern around them screamed. it was all swallowing him again, the smell of the sewers, the unspeakable sights—

it was gradual, but richie started to shift his focus back to the here and now, guided out of the black hole that was the memory of derry by your murmured reassurances, by your hand running through his hair.

“i’m sorry,” he croaked again, but you only hushed him, pressing a kiss to his temple.

“i’m just glad you’re back.”

richie sighed, lifting his head to look at you. he felt a little pathetic, practically draped over you and weeping incoherently while you were being patient, so patient. “geez. fuck me,” he groaned, but you didn’t laugh. instead, you wiped away at a track a tear had left.

he caught your wrist, held onto it as he turned his head to kiss your palm. with a deep breath, richie steeled himself, trying to think of some way to frame the recent horrors into a reasonable narrative. eventually he managed, twisting the truth into a tale of how he and childhood friends – brought back to derry to reunite after hearing one of them had died – were targeted by a serial killer. it all culminated in some unstable underground tunnel, where eddie had died and the damned thing had collapsed before richie could get him out.

“eddie…eds,” he was saying. you had tears in your eyes, squeezing his hands tightly as richie swallowed hard, eyes shining. “oh, baby,” he sighed, wincing at you in weak apology but you shook your head, managing a small smile. you could already tell – it was in the way he had said eddie’s name, in the sorrow that lined his very shoulders. “i… i loved him. when—when we were children. the fucking hypochondriac. he was so fucking neurotic, you know? god… and i never told him. i fucking forgot—how could i—”

oh, it was so painful. when richie had seen him again, seen the whole loser’s club again, they had fallen back into their childhood roles so easily – the things they said, their behaviours, their feelings. there had been moments when richie felt it again – love – but it was tainted by derry’s ugly, ugly attitudes, his own insecurities and doubts. and when eddie had died, in richie’s fucking arms, eddie had ended it with a joke and richie still hadn’t told him, his confession left silent and anonymous on the kissing bridge for those two boys of 1989.

“and we left him there, in the ground, oh fuck he’s gonna hate it—”

his voice faltered as guilt started to gnaw at him again. every night since that horrible, fateful day did richie think about this, about the fact that they had left eddie in the sewers, left him to rotnext to that horrid fucking bitch clown monster fuck and turn into the very thing he feared the most: a putrid leper. a decaying corpse.

you didn’t know what to say. all you could do was watch as richie’s face hardened, eyes rimmed red and lips set in a thin line. there was no anger in you, no sense of betrayal. you knew how strange it could be, to return to your childhood friends – a kind of regression took place, and some part of your old sense of self was reasserted, if only for a little while.

you splayed a palm over his chest. “i am so sorry, richie.” perhaps a cliché phrase, but it was the truth – you wished all of that horrorhadn’t happened to him, wished that he hadn’t suffered such a tragedy. “i love you,” you added, because this was still the truth, too. “i’m here for you, in whatever way you need.”

richie’s brow furrowed, fingers curling over your own. studying the lines of your hand, his thoughts raced, stumbling over each other as emotions roiled and bubbled up within him.

“marry me,” he blurted, head snapping up as he looked at you with wide eyes. “life is so fucking fickle. marry me. marry me, baby.” he was leaning closer now, searching your eyes. “i love you. i know i sound like a fucking two-timer but i’m still in love with you. so much. but when, when he died i just felt everything i did as a kid—”

“you don’t have to explain it away, richie,” you murmured. your heart was pounding as the question – the proposal – settled in your mind, not entirely unrealistic but certainly abrupt. he squeezed your hand once – perhaps in acknowledgement, or perhaps with impatience. “but of course – of course i’ll marry you,” you smiled, pressing a kiss to his knuckles. richie gasped a laugh, grinning wide as he hugged you close. his big hands were roaming your back, eager to touch and to hold.

you had meant what you said – of course you did – yet knew him well enough to know that sometimes he said things before really considering them. careful to keep your voice low and gentle, you said, “but maybe reconsider when you’re not… when you’re not grieving, baby.” you pulled away to see his face fall, but richie nodded, reaching for his glasses.

“i’ll still be asking you,” he murmured.

“and i’ll still say yes.”

richie’s mouth quirked, kissing your forehead as he gathered you back into his arms, his heart still aching a little but warmer now. indeed, when he had first set eyes on you tonight, he realised that it was only now that he felt truly safe again.

“i think a part of every person who we love stays with us,” you spoke, and richie had to agree, because the scar on his palm and the one on his heart were never going to go away. and eventually, hopefully, a small stretch of skin on his ring finger would always be lighter, showing the impression of a ring which he only would seldom – if ever – take off.

with this image in his mind, richie kissed you again, big hands gentle as they curled over your ears. “wanna stay with you forever,” he murmured, hand sliding down to your neck to feel your pulse. such a fragile thing, the heart. but capable of extraordinary strength, too. perhaps his would heal in time. but if it didn’t, if the cracks proved too big to mend, then at least he had you there for him, with him, to hold him if the hurt was to stay.

and he was quite alright with that.

#richie tozier x reader #richie tozier x you #richie tozier imagine #richie tozier #it stephen king #some reddie discussion le cri #not too happy w/ the end but had to get it out & finish it!

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