summer camp

Twelve

 After giving Richie another pill and taking him to the nurse, Richie settled back into their cabin, on Henry's bed.

Considering what happened the night before, Henry shouldn't be bothered by it. But he was. After his mini-crisis that he had just before Richie woke up, he wasn't sure what to think of their relationship, if they even had one. Were they friends, or still enemies?

Henry decided to just suck it up and ask. He sat down next to Richie, who was once again laying on his stomach, pencil in hand, working on another drawing. He noticed this before he could say anything, and found himself distracted by Richie's work. Richie wasn't good at a lot of things in life, including keeping his mouth shut, but drawing? Richie was good at drawing, even if he denied it while looking at his other drawings before.

He forgot what he was doing in the first place when Richie finished his drawing and flipped the page, craning his neck to look back at Henry. "Do you want me to draw you now? I can."

At first, he couldn't form words. Sure, it would be interesting to see how Richie saw him, but did he really want to know?

Of course he wanted to know. That's what he was doing before he got distracted by Richie's drawing. He wanted to know how Richie felt about them- if they were acquaintances, or even friends. Henry wasn't sure what answer he wanted in response, but he could probably handle whatever Richie said back to him. "If- uh-" Henry spat out, breaking eye contact with Richie to look down at the empty notepad. "If you want," he said quietly.

What the hell was that? Why did he suddenly act so... nervous? So submissive? Henry wasn't either of those things. He was just caught off guard, that was it. That had to be it.

Almost immediately, Richie turned back to his empty page and started drawing. Henry didn't know what Richie would do. Accurately draw him, or purposefully make him malformed, like an inbred? If Richie did the latter, Henry knew he deserved it. Way worse than that, actually.

He hated to admit it, but yes- everything he did to Richie back in Derry was horrible, and he was realizing that now. Thinking about it made him feel like shit. But Richie didn't seem to be angry with him anymore. Henry wasn't sure how he was able to do that. To forgive him. If his father started straightening up, Henry wouldn't forgive him after all that he'd done, and that was a fact.

Richie wasn't too far into the drawing before muttering a quick, "I'm tired." He folded his glasses and set them on top of the notebook, letting the pencil fall from his hand and roll towards his chest. Henry watched in silence, still baffled at the fact that Richie felt like this was his bed. That it was normal to share a bed with anyone, let alone another boy. Did Richie do this at sleepovers, with his loser friends? Were they all gay? Was their group a gay cult, with one girl thrown into the mix to avoid suspicion? No, there were barely any gay people in Derry. Richie wasn't gay, and neither were any of the Losers, although Henry had his own suspicions about the Jew.

Just like that, Richie was asleep. Henry picked up his notebook, pencil, and glasses, setting them on the bedside table closest to him. He wasn't tired, and he didn't know any other way to pass the time. He watched Richie.

Nobody could say shit about it.