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"You should sit down. We need to talk."
It took Eddie the whole flight back to New York, the whole drive back to his house, plus two additional days on top of all that, to finally open up to Myra about what happened in Maine.
He needed the time to work out the least crazy way of explaining it all, he rationalized to himself. It was a bonkers, batshit story; it was gonna need to be handled delicately.
Also, he was secretly, guiltily, kind of hoping they would all just forget about everything again, and it would be a nonissue. Sadly, that didn't appear to be the case.
" I did it. It was hard, and she still has a lot of questions, but she believes me ," Stan texted the mini group chat made up of Eddie, Stan, and Bill, a little telling-the-spouses-what-happened support group, if you will. They had invited Bev as well, but she turned them down with a dark look on her face and said it ' wouldn't be necessary ' so they didn't push it.
" Proud of you, Stan the Man. Telling Audra soon, " Bill texted back. " Wish me luck. "
Eddie remained tellingly silent.
Maybe he should have followed Bev's lead on this one? It wasn't like he was going to stay in this Oedipal nightmare of a marriage much longer...
But no, even after everything, Myra deserved to know what was going on before he broke the news he was asking for a divorce. He could do that much for her.
"Is this about what happened?" Myra asked him quietly, her eyes flicking back and forth from his eyes to the bandage on his cheek, and somehow sounding both on the verge of tears and ready to yell and scream and snap at him at any moment at the same time. Eddie nodded.
"Yes, it is," he answered quietly. "And Myra, I'm going to need you to let me get all this out, okay? No inturrup—"
"Did you cheat on me?" she interrupted.
Eddie screwed his face up in annoyance and confusion. "What?"
Myra's eyes began to water. "I heard a woman's voice in the background when you called from your hotel," she gasped wetly. Eddie rubbed his eyes tiredly. Jesus Christ.
"No, Myra, I didn't cheat on you," he bit out tightly, trying to keep his composure. "That was just a friend of mine. I told you I was meeting up with friends."
"You never told me you had other women friends I've never met," she bit back, and this was not how Eddie wanted to start this fucking conversation, at all .
"Myra," he sighed. "I—I'll get to that, okay? I'll explain everything, but it's a long story, and you're going to need to just listen to me, okay? Can you do that for me?"
Myra didn't look convinced, but miraculously, she nodded, sat back, and let Eddie take the floor, promising not to interrupt, she ‘just wanted to know the truth .’
So, Eddie told her the truth.
He told her the truth about the Losers, It, the murders, the sewers, the fear, the oath, his mother's lies. He told her the truth about forgetting, about the twenty-seven years between, about Adrian Mellon, about Mike calling them back. He told her the truth about dinner at The Jade, the memories, the tokens, the Ritual of Chüd . About Henry Bowers stabbing him in the face, and Richie killing him with an axe. About saving Richie from the deadlights, and Stan saving him from the claw. About Eddie figuring out how to beat It, and how the lucky seven came together once again to crush It's heart into fucking dust .
By the end, he was breathing heavily, the excitement and adrenaline from the whole adventure catching up with him, and turned to Myra, who had (rather impressively) actually remained silent throughout the whole narrative, and waited for her reaction.
"...Eddie," she began cautiously. "Have you been taking your medication?"
Eddie's face immediately fell.
"We can get you some refills, if you need them," Myra continued. "It's late, but we still may catch Dr. Robbins in the office if we call now."
"Myra..."
"I only ask because you said something about throwing away your medication—"
"Because they were placebos! "
"—and suddenly going off medications without a doctor's consent or approval can cause some strange side effects."
Eddie dragged his hand down his face, willing himself patience. "I'm not crazy, Marty," he said tiredly. "You asked for the truth, so I gave you the truth. Why would I even lie about something like this?"
This was, apparently, the exact wrong thing to say, as Myra's face suddenly darkened from its overwhelming pity to something a little more dubious and mistrustful. "Well, Eddie ," she all but growled out. "I would say there are a lot of reasons a forty year old man might feel the need to lie to his wife about where and why he took off out of state so quickly."
Eddie groaned. "Are we seriously back on this again?" he cried. "I didn't fucking cheat on you!"
Myra's eyes widened, immediately filling up with tears. Fuck. "Don't curse, Eddie," she wept. "You know I hate it when you curse."
"I know," he said softly, calmly, fighting the urge to bite the inside of his still-healing cheek. "I'm sorry. I was just frustrated and I feel like you aren't really listening to me."
"Because your story is ridiculous !" she snapped, the tears drying up as quickly as they came. "Evil interdimensional killer clowns in the sewers? Memory curses? Ancient rituals? I wish you would just tell me what is really going on, rather than make up some insane, preposterous story! Do you really respect me so little?"
Eddie rubbed his temples, trying and failing to stamp down the headache he could feel forming just behind his eyes, when his phone vibrated in his pocket with a text from Bill, " Just told Audra. Went better than I expected. So glad Mike was available for backup. :) "
"What if I call up one of my friends to vouch for me?" Eddie asked suddenly.
Myra raised an eyebrow skeptically. "I don't know these people, Eddie," she scoffed. "Why would I believe them?" Which, okay, yeah, that was fair.
Except Myra did know some of his friends, he realized excitedly.
Maybe not, like, personally, but in a roundabout way, totally ! Four of the six were varrified on Twitter, for fuck's sake!
He had to be careful in his decision of who to call though, he knew. Richie was an absolute fuck no, for example. Even if Myra didn't actively despise stand-up comedy as she did, who knew what kind of nonsense that asshole was capable of pulling? No way.
Bev should have been a good pick; Myra followed and respected fashion, even had a Rogan & Marsh cardigan she got from her sister for Christmas a few years back that she absolutely loved, but Myra apparently thought they were sleeping together , so yeah, definitely not.
Eddie didn't think Myra knew anything about architecture, but he had a feeling she would probably believe Ben despite not knowing who he was, simply because he was so dreamy. Eddie kept him in mind as a maybe.
But at the end of the day, he knew it was going to have to be Big Bill. Myra was familiar enough with his books, was even more familiar with his movies, and maybe he wasn't necessarily as classically handsome as Ben, or was as weirdly charismatic as Richie, but he always had that sort of natural charm that made you want to follow him wherever he would lead you, like into a sewer for example, even if it meant you were going to get eaten.
Or like, you know, cholera.
The two big fears of Eddie Kaspbrak's life.
"Okay, Myra, you know William Denbrough?" he asked.
"The author?"
Eddie nodded. "Yeah! He wrote, uh..." He scratched his head. " Black Rapids ? Right? And that one book of his is getting made into a movie with his wife, Audra, um..."
Myra's hard glare softened a bit at that, if only a little. "Phillips?"
"Yes!" Eddie cried, pointing at her in excitement. "Audra Phillips! She was in that one romantic comedy you really liked with, uh, what's his face...?" He snapped. "Dylan McDermott."
"It was Dermot Mulroney," Myra mumbled, but if nothing else, it looked like she was coming around. "You're saying you know William Denbrough well enough to just...call him?"
"I am."
"And you have his personal phone number?"
"I do."
"And you never thought to tell me this information before?"
Eddie's already strained smile tightened even more. "I didn't know , remember? The whole memory thing? I would have told you if I had remembered." He held up his phone and selected Bill's contact, his thumb hovering just over the call button. "Let me FaceTime him, okay? So you can see it's actually him. He'll back me up."
Myra frowned, but nodded. "Fine." Eddie beamed and started the call.
It rang for only a few seconds before the screen filled up with Bill's face, just a hair too close to the camera. "Eddie!" he cried. "Did he muh-make it?"
Eddie blinked. "What?" he asked.
Bill's eyes widened. "What?" he parroted anxiously. Eddie frowned.
"What are you talking about? Did who make what ?"
"Uhhh..." Bill drawled. "N-nothing. Nevermind." He grinned a little too widely. "What's up?"
Eddie narrowed his eyes suspiciously, but decided not to think too deeply about Bill being weird and move on to the topic at hand. "I'm in the process of telling Myra about Derry," he explained, trying to widen his eyes to convey, silently ' it's not going well, help me. '
Bill, bless him, seemed to pick up on it right away. "Oh. Ooh . Yeah. Rough stuff. Audra h-had a tough time believing m-me at first."
Eddie nodded, finally glancing over to Myra, ony to see her eyes widen at the fact that yes, this was the famous William Denbrough on her husband's phone. He smirked smugly to himself. "Myra would benefit from hearing it all from someone else too, Bill. Like how Mike helped you?"
Bill hummed in agreement, and Eddie turned the phone so Myra was in the picture. She immediately started fussing with her hair. "Myra," Bill began. "Whatever Eddie's t-told you is true."
" Dude ," Eddie groaned.
"What?"
"That's so not helpful! You need to give details , if you just say ' yeah, what he said' there's no proof!"
Bill moaned, running a hand through his hair. "I don't know w-what you've already told her!"
"The truth! Just fucking tell her anything that happened!"
Myra grumbled something about watching his language, but Bill was already talking again, so thankfully he missed it. "When we were k-kids, we were t-terrorized by an interdimensional monster that disguised itself as a c-clown," he finally explained. "When we left D-Derry, we lost all of our childhood memories, and only g-got them back when we went back to k-kill the clown again this time, w-which we did."
He glanced at Eddie like ' that work for you, asshole? ' and Eddie rolled his eyes, but shrugged. Yeah Bill, it was better than nothing. Thanks for doing the bare fucking minimum .
Next to him, unnervingly quiet, Myra shifted a little in her seat and cleared her throat. "If I may, Mr. Denbrough," she began. "Excuse me for saying so, but this all sounds a lot like the plot to a very strange scary movie. You know, something a horror novelist might write?" She pursed her lips. "How do I know this isn't just something you both made up to cover Eddie's affair?"
"Affair?" Bill balked. Eddie rolled his eyes.
"She thinks I'm sleeping with Bev."
Bill snorted.
"Oh, fuck you, dude."
Myra grumbled something about his language again, but Bill continued. "I'm just s-saying Eds, not exactly the Loser I w-would have imagined you having a sordid r-romance with after that last night."
Eddie flushed.
Shit.
So... Okay. Maybe, on their last night there, once they had all cleaned themselves up (properly, with, like, soap and not just in the fucking quarry), he had maybe had one too many celebratory drinks. He hadn't drank in a while, and things affected him quicker than he realized. Maybe, after consuming said drinks, he had wandered over to where Bill and Ben had been hanging out talking about, who knows, set design or something, and had launched into a spirited monologue on the audacity Richie had to grow up and look like that , with his fucking shoulders and jawline... his fucking arms .
Ben had laughed a little awkwardly and suggested maybe Eddie had had enough for the night, but Bill, the asshole, apparently decided this was the best thing that had happened to him all week, and wrapped Eddie up, arm around his shoulders, and continued pushing for more information, which Eddie had no qualms about indulging.
Things got fuzzy in his brain after that, and Eddie, probably naively, assumed Bill, who had his fair share of alcohol that night as well, had forgotten all about his little tirade. Apparently that wasn't the fucking case. Figures.
Myra zoned in on that comment like a fucking hawk, her eyes first widening, then narrowing, as she whipped her focus between the two of them. "What does he mean by that , Eddie?" she demanded.
"Nothing," he grumbled, while Bill shrugged on the other end of the phone, looking both highly amused and, to his credit, at least a little ashamed. "Just a stupid inside joke, ignore him." She opened her mouth to argue, but Eddie pushed on, cutting her off. "Just, like, focus on the topic at hand, okay? If we were lying, don't you think we would have picked something more believable? "
"I don't like how much you've thought about lying to me, Eddie," Myra responded to that with a frown, and Eddie forced himself to take a few deep breaths to keep himself from losing his goddamn mind. How the hell had he tolerated this roundabout lunacy with Myra these last few years? Was the shred of self-respect he regained along with his memories really enough to help him see through this fog he had been in where living like this was okay ?
Like. Did he expect Myra to fully believe him immediately, blindly, no questions asked? No, of course not. No offense to Patty and Audra, but you would have to be insane to think their story was true.
But, like. Throw him a bone at least, right? Give him the benefit of the doubt for once in his fucking life, right?
Eddie had mindlessly allowed Myra to go ahead and invest his hard earned money into that fucking pyramid scheme she promised was definitely not a pyramid scheme a few years ago, was this even all that different?
No. No it was not.
All the more reason this needed to be done, Eddie decided to himself. Myra needed to understand why he wouldn't be able to live like this. Not anymore. Not now that he remembered who he really was and what real, healthy love was really like.
"M-maybe she just needs to hear it all from one m-more person?" Bill suggested to Eddie. Myra huffed and grumbled about being talked about like she wasn't there, but Bill, the legend, pointedly ignored her. "You could call Stan?"
Eddie nodded. Stan was smart and sensible. He would trust Stan. "I could call Stan."
"Or just w-wait until Richie gets there and ask him."
What.
"What?"
Bill gulped. "Uh," he started, but was almost immediately interrupted by a quick succession of knocks sounding from the front door. Eddie shot Bill a shocked and wide-eyed look of surprise. "Oh l-look at that! Speak of the d-devil! Good luck, Eddie! Bye!" he chirped and then promptly hung up.
Eddie and Myra sat still in the awkward silence until the knocks sounded through the house once again. Myra turned to him and glared.
"I should..." Eddie babbled, pointing vaguely in the direction of the door and scrambling off the couch. Myra called out something to him as he shuffled across the room, but the incessant knocking blocked it out. He didn't think he would have acknowledged it anyway.
With a deep breath, he opened the door and, as expected, found Richie Tozier on the other side.
"Eds," he breathed, snapping himself into standing up straight. The sight of him warmed Eddie's heart, even after Bill spilled the beans.
"Rich—?" he started, but Richie immediately held up his hand to cut him off, his eyes wild behind his glasses.
"Nope, nuh-uh, shut up. I need to get this out before I shit myself, so just, like, be quiet for four seconds," he asserted, a little manically. Eddie's mouth snapped shut with a click. "Okay, so, fuck." He adjusted his glasses nervously. "Dude...I'm like, so fucking in love with you," he laughed weakly. Eddie's heart immediately beat itself into his throat, because, like. Holy shit . "I've loved you since we we're fucking kids , man, and I'm so fucking sorry, I know this is like, the last fucking thing you probably need right now, but damn it, Eds, I lost you." He sniffed, his eyes remaining stubbornly on his shoes. "I lost you when we all left Derry the first time, and I almost lost you again , dude. If Stan hadn't—" His breath hitched for a moment, and he took a deep breath to calm himself down. "God. Okay. What I'm trying to say is, life is too fucking short to let you go on without knowing someone out there fucking loves you, alright? You don't have to love me back or run away with me or anything, but you should...fucking know, I guess."
With one last deep breath, he finally met Eddie's eyes, and Eddie had no idea what his face was doing, but it must have been fucking ridiculous, because Richie suddenly looked bewildered. "Richie, he said softly. "You're timing..." He paused. "Is fucking perfect , actually. Hold on."
Richie blinked. "What?" he mumbled, looking confused and adorable. Eddie made a quick promise to himself to like, kiss the little worried crinkle between his eyebrows when things were a little bit less fucking wackadoo in his life, but for now, he was going to take whatever peace offering the universe was willing to throw his way, no questions fucking asked.
"Myra!" Eddie cried over his shoulder. Myra came tentatively into the room a moment later, and judging by the fact that she looked confused and grumpy, rather than fucking furious , Eddie had a feeling she hadn't heard anything.
"Eddie, who's this?" she asked, eyeing Richie suspiciously.
"Actor slash comedian Richie Tozier," he stated simply, making Richie snort softly in amusement behind him.
Myra's eyes narrowed suspiciously, probably trying to figure out if Richie looked familiar or not (she never cared for most comedy, but her twelve year old nephew, embarrassingly enough, was actually a fan, so it wouldn't be unheard of if she had seen him around at some point), and huffed a little in displeasure, before inviting him into the other room to join them, she supposed .
As soon as Myra was out of sight, Eddie turned his, admittedly intense, attention back to Richie. "Rich," he said seriously, gripping his ( Oh . Unexpectedly firm? What? ) biceps. "I promise you. As soon as possible, we will one hundred percent unpack and sort through every single thing you just said with a fine tooth comb, but right now, I really need your help leaving my wife."
Richie blinked, the shadow of an understandably confused grin creeping onto his lips. "My perfect Wednesday night. Ruining a marriage and a long, drawn out talk about feelings."
"Oh, the marriage was ruined far before today, dude," Eddie sighed, then shot Richie what he hoped was a gentle, thankful smile. "Thanks Rich. I promise I'm not ignoring what you just told me, this just needs to be taken care of first."
Richie smiled gently back at him. The butterflies in Eddie's stomach flipped at the sight. "For the record, you are completely welcome to forget anything and everything I said, because I am mortified by literally all of it, but I am happy to help. What do you need from me?"
Eddie groaned. "Okay, so I'm in the middle of telling Myra what happened in Derry, and—"
"Woah," Richie interrupted, his eyes wide. "Like, the truth about what happened in Derry?"
"Yes, Richie. The truth about what happened in Derry."
Richie raised an eyebrow. "Uh? Why the fuck would you do that if you just plan on leaving her anyway? Like. Fucking lie , man."
Eddie huffed in annoyance. "She asked for the truth , asshole. So I gave her the truth, and now she won't even listen to the truth." He paused, and definitely didn't pout. "It's the principle of the fucking thing," he grumbled. Richie laughed.
"Oh, now it's a fucking challenge ," he teased, poking at Eddie's cheek. Eddie slapped his hand away.
"Fuck off , dude," Eddie snapped playfully, to Richie's delight, rolling his eyes. "It's just," he sighed, "everything will make so much more sense if she understands why I'm... This . Why I was one way, and then came home an entirely different way. It's not... you know, her fault I didn't know any better than to fall into old habits."
Richie nodded sagely. "You mean the part where you married your mom?"
Eddie glared and pointed to the door. "Out. Out of my house."
Richie cackled, but reached over to ruffle Eddie's hair. "Aww, Doro-thy," he cooed in some weird kind of old school, farmy drawl. "Wouldja look at that? The Tin Man had a heart all along ."
Eddie bit back a grin. "That makes you the Scarecrow here, right? Due to the whole lack of a brain thing?"
"Eds gets off a good one!" Richie cheered with a beam, only for it to morph into something a little sweeter a moment later. "Though, if we're going true to life, you'd make a better Lion. Braver than you think."
Eddie met his eyes and allowed himself to remember how it felt down in the cistern, the last time Richie had looked at him the way he looked at him now, and let the confidence wash over him until he was standing just a little straighter, and turned to face the doorway into the next room. "Braver than I think," he told himself proudly. Richie clapped him on the back.
"Damn right," he agreed. "Now let's wreck this fucking home."
O
In the end, Eddie couldn't say if Richie's presence helped his confidence or not, but he appreciated at least having a witness just in case Myra murdered him.
"So, Richie Tozier," Myra began tersely, "you're one of Eddie's mysteriously famous childhood friends I've never heard of until today." From the corner of his eye, Eddie could see she had been scanning Richie's IMDB page on her phone.
"Uh, yup." Richie shrugged. "Just all reconnected this weekend for some good old fashioned sewer clown fighting and murder."
Myra's gaze hardened as she stuck her nose into the air. "So I'm told."
Richie, who had been keeping up a seemingly relatively neutral, if not aloof, disposition towards Myra up until that point, suddenly seemed to bristle, his mouth flattening into a terse line. "Well, you've been told the truth," he told her flatly.
"Funny that it seems to be a truth that's impossible to prove," she grumbled. "Quite a coincidence."
Richie's grip on the armrest of his chair tightened. "I mean," he began sarcastically, "your husband was definitely stabbed in the face." He gestured to Eddie with his thumb. Eddie nodded, his eyes wide, and pointed to his own face as well. "So like, there's your fucking proof."
Myra scowled, then immediately sat up primly, sticking her nose into the air. "I'm sorry, Mr. Tozier, but we actually don't use cuss words in this house."
Richie's eyebrows shot up in surprise, and Eddie had to grip the hem of his shirt in an attempt to keep himself from barking out an embarrassed explanation. Thankfully, Richie beat him to the punch. "Are you fucking serious?" he asked, flabbergasted. "No cuss—? Have you met your husband?"
"Eddie has an occasional slip up, Mr. Tozier, but I can assure you, he understands that profanity is the effort of a feeble brain to—"
"To express itself forcibly. Yeah, yeah, I've heard the quote. Counterpoint: It's fucking fun, and Eddie has been cursing like a goddamn sailor since we were ten."
Myra huffed, crossing her arms across her chest, her lips twisting into a scowl. "Is there a reason you're here, Mr. Tozier?" he bit out angrily, intelligently changing the subject.
Richie opened his mouth to answer, but Eddie quickly jumped in before he could say something that might get them both in trouble. "We reconnected, Myra. He's here to see me and help me—"
"Help you cover up your dirty affair with that—that woman! " she interrupted, her eyes welling up with tears yet again . Eddie inwardly (and maybe a little outwardly) groaned.
"Woah," Richie mumbled, turning to Eddie in surprise. "What? Affair? "
Eddie rubbed his temples. "She has it in her head that I was cheating on her with Bev in Derry."
The corner of Richie's lip twitched up in a little, infuriating, teasing smile. "Bev?" he asked around a little chuckle. "You? I mean, no offense Eds, you're hot and all; like quality, grade-A top-choice meat, but she's like, one-hundred percent hooking up with Ben. They were majorly macking on each other in the quarry."
Eddie's eyes widened. "No shit?"
"Yeah! Did you miss that? Dude!" He laughed, excitedly leaning forward, excited to share the hot gossip. "They tried to play it off like they were looking for my glasses, right? But they were really down there fucking frenching each other."
"In the quarry?! " Eddie gasped. "Around all the fucking, parasites and shit? Gross!"
"Right? They totally ran off together, too, when we all left. Off to be all hot and romantic on Ben's boat. It's some cute shit." Richie smiled a little wistfully, and—Oh yeah. Richie had always secretly been a bit of a romantic, hadn't he?
He had always been an idealistic dreamer at heart, despite his frequent vocal objection to such a thing, watching with just a bit too much interest and longing during all the sappy, romantic bits of the movies they watched as kids, only to turn around and make some comment about someone's boobs or something to cover it up. And judging by his earlier confession, apparently all those little amorous tendencies were because of Eddie; which, holy shit .
Eddie smiled softly back at Richie. Maybe Eddie was actually a bit of a romantic as well. After all, while Richie watched all pie-eyed at Westley telling Buttercup ' As you wish ', or when Lloyd stood outside Diane's window with his boombox, well, while Richie was watching all that, Eddie was watching Richie .
So, fuck it.
"Yeah, good for Ben, finally getting the girl and having his little teenage dreams become a reality." He grinned at Richie confidently. "And he's not the only one who deserves that."
Richie's attention snapped immediately to Eddie. "Huh?"
Eddie turned resolutely back to Myra, who was all but fuming at being ignored for the last minute or so, but Eddie couldn't give a flying fuck. "Myra," he declared, "every single thing I told you was true. We fought a eldritch sewer clown, I was stabbed in the face by a serial killer, and for the love of fucking god, I didn't cheat on you ." He squared his shoulders. "But, I'll be honest, I wanted to ."
"Eddie ," Myra gasped, but Eddie pushed on before she could say any more.
"Not with Bev," he explained. Then, pointing at Richie, clarified, "With him."
"What? " Myra and Richie cried out together, but Eddie stuck to his guns and continued.
"Myra, this marriage is over. We're getting a divorce. My memories are back, and I am, in all honesty, not the same man you married. That man wasn't the real me, never was and never will be again if I have any say in the matter. Neither of us is ever going to be happy in this relationship, and it's time for the both of us to find what we really want. And what I want, unfortunately, is this idiot right here."
"Eds," Richie began, his voice breaking just slightly on the word. "You don't—"
"Shut up," Eddie snapped. "Don't you dare think I'm just saying this to get out of my marriage, Rich. You said you love me. Well, I love you too, you dick. Deal with it."
Richie's eyes shimmered. "God, that was the most aggressive break-up slash love confession I've ever heard. Why am I so turned on right now?"
Eddie sighed fondly. "You're a mess."
"Enough!" Myra cried, shooting to her feet and forcefully reminding everyone of her presence. "How dare you," she spat venomously, her glare honed in on Richie. " You did this to him! You corrupted my Eddie! He would have never acted this way before all of you came back into his life!"
"Well yeah, dude," Richie chuckled. "He just told you he's a new man, weren't you listening? Also, FYI, I think you are giving me way too much credit here; I'm just as surprised by this delightful turn of events as you are."
"Out!" she screeched, obviously fuming. "Out of this house, both of you!"
And maybe Eddie should have argued with that a bit more. The house was under his name after all; he was the one that paid the mortgage, and he didn’t even know if Richie had thought ahead to find a place to stay in the city or anything.
But all it took was one look at Richie's stupid handsome face to make up his mind.
So, fuck it.
Eddie and Richie exchanged glances and shrugs as Eddie extended his hand for Richie to take, offering him a shy little smile. Richie, mirroring him, took his hand in his own, and swinging their entwined hands giddily between them, waltzed right out the door, not sparing even a glance behind them.
O
Later, basking in the glow of what was undoubtedly the best and most satisfying sexual encounter of Eddie's goddamn life, he ran his fingers absently down Richie's arm and snuggled just a bit deeper into the fluffy hotel pillow.
"Rich?" he asked quietly.
"Hm?" Richie hummed, eyes still closed in something like bliss, his fingers carding through Eddie's hair just as sweetly. He almost hated to break the tranquility.
Almost.
"What do you say we unpack that confession of yours now?" he asked, biting back a shit-eating grin as Richie groaned out in annoyance. "I have questions."
"Dude, no, " he cried dramatically, ripping the pillow out from under their heads, like, super rudely, to bury his face into it. "We don't have to unpack shit . I love you, you love me, we all good! You got the whole story!"
"Bullshit!" Eddie laughed, yanking the pillow of Richie's now blushing and pouting face. "You liked me when we were kids?" he prodded, poking him in the shoulder with every question. "Since when? When did you start? Does anyone else know? Why didn't you tell me?"
Richie rolled his eyes, not even bothering to hide his lovesick grin. "You're a menace," he told him simply. "Think it's too late to see if Myra will take you back? Maybe we can ask really nicely—"
"Shut up, you asshole," he said with a smirk. Finally, he kissed the little wrinkle between Richie's eyebrows. "You wrecked this home, you get to shelter me."
Richie beamed right back, resting their foreheads together and leaning in for a kiss. "Deal."