soft | reddie oneshots ✔️

train rides (f)

Eddie Kaspbrak entered the train early in the morning, dragging his feet towards the back seat, which was solemnly reserved for himself, and placed his earbuds swiftly in his ears, letting his mind drift as the music slowly pulled him from the reality he was forced to live in. Eddie came on the train every day and sat in the same spot. It was far in the back and he figured most New Yorkers that early in the morning wanted to be as close to the door as possible, so he quickly found out that the seat was always empty and saved for him.

The only thing that pulled him back from his music and escaping reality for a moment on the train ride to school was him. The mystery boy, holding a cigarette to his pink, chapped lips. He held a black ink pen in his delicate, pale hands, which ran down his sketchbook, the subway train moving the paper around, but the bold boy didn't seem to mind.

He had first noticed the mystery boy as the train began taking off. The boy had rushed in at the last second, squeezing through the half-shut doors and letting out a sigh of relief. He sat down across from Eddie and stared at him for a moment, almost as if he was waiting for Eddie to look away. Like it was a challenge. The mystery boy was someone Eddie had never seen before, a dark green beanie placed on his head covering someone of the black curls Eddie could see. His high cheekbones, his glasses too big for his face, and his black curls leaving Eddie in his uttermost thoughts.

The train ride was silent. Nobody would bother to talk, parents tired in the morning, hustling to work to feed their families, high schools headed off on the early train to school, and nurses sleeping in the left corner of the train, returning from their night shift.

The mystery boy would look up every couple minutes and the two boys would make eye connect. It would feel like Eddie's music, the train, people's deep breaths or voices, slowed down to a stop as they gazed at each other's eyes. The slowed-down sensation would only last a second before the boys would look away, telling themselves to not look up again. But yet they still looked up moments later, taking in each other.

Eddie wondered if he had seen him before. If the mystery boy had ridden the train every morning before this and sat in the seat across from Eddie, but Eddie figured if he had seen him before, he would have remembered his high cheekbones, his black ink pen, his delicate hands tracing around the sketchbook sitting on his lap. He would have remembered his black graphic t-shirt with no coat over that fumbled Eddie, considering his mother made him wear two coats, just to be sure he wouldn't get a cold.

The train came to a stop suddenly, Eddie hitting his head on the pole standing next to him at the halt, and he cursed to himself for being too focused on the boy across from him. He rubbed his head a bit before standing up, turning down his music and quietly humming to the beat. He forgot it was even on.

He followed the boy out the train, nearly gaping at how tall and lanky he was, compared to Eddie.

The boy dropped what was left of his cigarette on the ground, smoke exploding in the air around the pale figure in a series of fireworks, then stomped down on the butt. He killed all the fireworks until none were left, just a cloudy sky surrounding the two teenagers slowly being pushed further and further away from each other as people around them rushed off and on the train.

He casually turned his head up to look at Eddie not too far away from him and gave him a short glance before strutting away from the train, a mystery to never be revealed.

Eddie wasted no time to follow where he had been standing and picked up the remainder of the cigarette butt squished on the ground, placing it in the small ashtray just outside of the train doors.

"Do you usually pick up people's shit?"

Eddie physically flinched at the voice above him and he turned around, staring up at the mystery boy from the train, who stared down at him. He expected him to look angry or irritated from his tone of voice, but he just looked amused.

"I care about how the world looks," Eddie huffed in return, not sure where he was getting this confidence he had found in his clear answer. And it was true, he did care about how the world looked. He was going to be studying Environmental Studies in college, even though his mother was keen on keeping him cooped up at home for the rest of his life.

"Congrats, you're the only fucking one!" The tall boy had answered, his tone full of light sarcasm, and Eddie couldn't help but let out a small chuckle.

"Did you come over here just to tell me that?" Eddie asked, fixing his bag on his shoulders a bit, searching for something to do as he nervously waited for a reply.

"Maybe. You always take this train in the morning?" He looked as nervous as Eddie felt, which made Eddie feel better about his slightly sweaty hands in the cold New York weather and snow.

"Yeah. I've never seen you before though," Eddie coughed out, taking in the boys cigarette breath as he stared at his phone for a second, checking the time.

"Just got hired down the block," The mystery boy said, keeping his answer oddly vague. Eddie wondered how old he was. If he had his life planned out as Eddie did. "I'll see you tomorrow morning then?"

"Y-yeah," Eddie replied nervously, stumbling over his words as the mystery boy smiled at him, before turning to his slung over bag and ripping out a piece of paper from it, scribbling a few things down before handing it to Eddie.

"We have phones to give numbers to people know, you know that right? 21st century and all," Eddie chuckled, but still took the piece of paper. He looked down at it and his mouth gaped slightly, taking in the sketch.

It was him on the train, his head laid back against the window as he closed his eyes to the beat of the music, headphones in his ears. The sketch was messy and lines around his face were all connected a jumbled, but it was the mystery boy's own art style it seemed.

Eddie looked up back at the boy after looked for a few more seconds, but he was gone. All that was left was the people pushing him around and rushing back and forth, trains stopping at starting, phone screens, and billboards flashing in his eyes.

Eddie slowly started walking towards his high school, starting back down at the piece of sketch paper that was badly torn out of the notebook and found a set of numbers on the top of the page, along with a name next to it.

Richie.

+
I got bored and
rewrote this one.
-penny,, may 7