Mixtape

22

22

The front door slams shut and Richie stands there for a moment more, waiting for Henry to come back in and punch him until he can't feel his face anymore. But then, the Camaro starts up, its muffler bleeds, and Richie listens as Henry Bowers tears through the neighborhood at illegal speeds.
Richie sighs and shakes his head, turning around to return to the kitchen. He begins to put the groceries away with a lack of care. If his parents were home, his mother would throw a fit about whether vegetables can go in the fruit drawer and vice versa. But because there is a cute boy waiting for Richie up in his room, Rich really can't find a moment to care about where he puts the green peppers.
As Richie turns around to put a bunch of bananas on the counter, he's met with a tiny figure standing in the doorway of the kitchen, small hands resting against the oak frame with a certain delicateness that comes from fauna in woodland areas.
"Oh, Eds," Richie exhales, then remembers that Eddie could have heard the entire conversation that he confessed to Henry Bowers. "Eds. How long have you been standing there?"
"Just came down," Eddie says, then frowns. "Why the fuck are you- Why are you- You-"
Richie raises his eyebrows and puts on an auctioneer voice. "Step right up, step right up! This piece is an authentic, one-of-a-kind tongue of 15 year old Eds Kaspbrak! Caught by yer local kitty cat, dragged in from the lands of Derry! DoIhearuhhh 100? 100 ova there to that foine gent, do I hear uhh 200? 200? 200 to the lady with the massive breas-"
"Beep beep," Eddie spits out, glaring at Richie. "What the fuck were you doing with Henry Bowers? Are you- Are you friends? You're friends with the asshole that beats the shit out of me on a daily? Are you serious, Richie? I told you about how he... he... I thought- I thought I could trust you."
"Eds-" Richie begins.
"Don't fucking call me that!" Eddie shakes his head, his petite hands curling into fists by his sides. "Eddie! Eddie! Is that so fucking hard?"
Richie puts his hands up in defense, having to physically swallow another Voice from coming up. He's nervous, and when he's nervous, he performs.
"Eddie," Richie says softy, taking a step towards the boy. When Eddie doesn't push him away, he lets his hands gently rest on the sides of Eddie's cheeks. "I'll tell you everything. I swear. Come on, go wait upstairs."
Eddie opens his mouth to object, almost demanding that he goes home instead of listening to fabricated stories, but then he looks at Richie and sees a bit of that vulnerability that is considered a rarity for people like Rich.
"Okay," Eddie nods, pushing Richie's hands off his face. "This better be good."
Eddie begins climbing the stairs, and Richie smiles as he watches the boy's shirt untuck from his shorts, exposing a strip of tanned skin over the small of his back. He can hear Henry's voice calling him a poof, yet his only thought is Fuck yeah I am.
Richie finishes up the groceries quickly, and as soon as everything is put away, he's climbing the stairs two at a time to get to Eddie faster. As expected, the boy is in his room, but he's focused on the vinyl collection stacked on the bookshelf next to Richie's desk.
"Lot of oldies," Eddie says, then traces his fingers over the spines of Richie's modern collection. "Lot of new stuff, too."
"Little bit of both," Richie shrugs. "Do you want to listen to anything?"
"I'm starting to fancy tapes more," Eddie says, followed by him batting his wide eyes and saying in a feminine voice "They're groovy."
"God, the sixties called, they want their word back," Richie rolls his eyes.
Richie smiles, and for a moment, it feels like he doesn't have to explain anything to Eddie. It feels like they can just hang out in his room and have a normal night together, but then the sad fear shoots back up through Eddie's eyes like spiderwebs being sprayed from the ass of an arachnid.
"The thing about Henry Bowers is that-" Richie stops, realizing he doesn't exactly know what to say. How can one really explain their relationship? Richie sighs and sits on the bed, rubbing his face behind his glasses. Then, in a fit of exasperation, he dramatically throws himself back and says "Whale, oi'll be fooked."
"What was that, Scottish?" Eddie sits down next to him, crossing his legs on the mattress.
Richie rolls over onto his side to face Eddie, smiling at him. "Something like that."
"I think you always sound the same," Eddie says. "Every Voice just sounds like Richie Tozier to me."
"You wound me, Eds," Richie puts a hand on his chest in a dramatic fashion. "But... Voices aside, dude. I... I was friends with Henry when we were little. Like, real little. Six, seven maybe. I don't know. He was super different back then, y'know, not a complete-"
"Psychotic fucking asshole?" Eddie finishes his sentence, and then adds with a face of disdain "And... dirty."
Richie laughs at this, but continues talking, "Less of an ass, yeah. He was actually pretty nice, always taking care of me, letting me come over when my parents were being ''meanies," you know, kid stuff. He was nice, or at least he was to me. We were at each other's houses everyday, always hanging out and wrestling, just... bein' kids. We started growing up, but it was fine. Even when he went to middle school, he'd still come hang out with me everyday after school, and he'd tell me about this cool song he heard on his dad's radio that day. It was great, it was, we were best friends.
"And then... New Year's Eve came. Henry's father had thrown a party for everybody in his office, and my parents were invited too. Henry and I spent most of the night trying to see who could sneak the first glass of champagne without anybody noticing. At the end of the night, neither of us had been successful, but it was still fun just to try. Anyway, we had gone outside to see if we could see any shooting stars. Oh, that was a tradition by the way. Shooting stars on New Years Eve, and we always wished for the same thing; Henry Bowers stops getting hit and Richie Tozier stops being ignored. It was unspoken, but it was what we wished for every time.
"We were on the porch... it was cold, so I said "Hey, it's fucking cold." And then Henry looked at me. I remember his face, he was... he was terrified, Eddie. I always looked up to Henry, you know, he was older, stronger, cooler, he was everything I wanted to be. But he looked terrified, and I could hear the adults counting down to midnight inside, and I asked "Hen? What's the matter?" And the adults were inside, 5, 4, 3, 2, and it was freezing, and I couldn't see any shooting stars, and the adults were so drunk but we were kids outside, freezing our tiny acorn dicks off, and then they said "1!" and he had just kissed me."
"He what?!" Eddie practically shouts. Then, as jealousy blooms within him, the shock is quickly erased by an expression much more aggressive. "Did you kiss back?"
"No?" Richie scoffs. He shakes his head and says "We were just kids, I didn't even think about kissing girls, let alone my best friend. I pushed him away and suddenly understood why he was terrified, he was scared because of me. Because he wanted to kiss me but he didn't know how I would react, and that scared him. His dad's... his dad's rough, Eds. His dad throws him around, so being... being gay isn't an option for him. But he took that risk anyway because he- he- I don't know. I never got to look inside his mind, but I knew he was scared, and I knew that nothing would ever be the same. So I tried to go easy on him, I tried not to react the way his father would. I told him it was okay, that we could just forget it happened. Because it was an accident, right? He didn't mean it."
Richie stares up at the ceiling, his face vacant as he recalls the memory. He thinks things would be different if he didn't call the kiss an accident, but then he wouldn't have Eddie Kaspbrak in his bed. And as he told Henry; it's Eddie. Eddie.
"And then?" Eddie encourages him to go on.
Richie blinks as if he forgot Eddie was there, then chuckles a little. He shrugs, his shoulders sliding against the bed sheets as he says "And then he beat the shit out of me. And I mean it, dude. He fucked me up pretty bad. He was older, so he was, like, going through puberty, but I was still this shrimpy little boy. I tried to defend myself, but I couldn't put up much of a fight. He beat the fucking shit out of me, and I just walked home because I didn't want to go inside and ask my parents if we could leave. They didn't ask where the swollen eyes had come from, and they didn't say anything when five of my baby teeth had been at the bottom of the trash can when they got home. I went to school, and I didn't talk to Henry anymore. That was it."
"That's it?" Eddie asks. "No closure? No ending?"
Richie looks over and smiles. "What were you hopin' for, Eddie Spaghetti? Want me to marry Bowers and live happily ever after?"
"No, no," Eddie shakes his head. "I just- You never tried talking to him about it?"
Richie sits up from the bed and approaches his desk, opening the top drawer and withdrawing the folded up papers that he has been stressed over since he was given them. He hands the letter over to Eddie and takes his seat once more, watching as the boy's hands unfold the papers neatly.
"When I had detention two weeks ago, we had to write apologies to each other," Richie explains. "This is what Henry gave me."
Eddie reads it with precision, his careful eyes scanning over the words with a very intense concentration. His face twists up multiple times through the letter, his finger tracing along the words so he does not lose his spot. He moves about the words delicately, like he is reading the diary of his childhood bully.
When he finally sets the letter down, Eddie is at a loss for words. He looks at Richie, a little worried, because he doesn't think that he can compete with Richie's childhood best friend.
"You broke your pinky promise," Eddie finally says.
Richie's brows knit together, and he says "Excuse me?"
"Here. On page two, look," Eddie points to the paragraph about the pinky promise they made as kids, where Henry and Richie had promised to never tell anybody each other's secrets. "You broke your promise."
"Yeah, well, he broke my face, so," Richie shrugs, though he feels guilty. But... he needed Eddie to read this. He needed Eddie to understand. "Is that all you got from that entire letter?"
"No, I have literally one million questions," Eddie frowns, but then says "I guess I'll just boil it down to one, though."
He looks at Richie, then down at the letter to read the last couple paragraphs.
"Was he right?" Eddie's fingers scan over his own name in Bowers' hand writing. "Is it... is it me?"
Richie's face burns with the realization that Henry had basically pinpointed Richie's crush. Richie forgot about that portion of the letter, it had completely slipped his mind. If he had remembered that, he wouldn't have given Eddie the last page and just claimed he lost it.
Richie feels embarrassed. Though, he tries to own it, even when his pride is faltering. "You sound a little excited there, Eds. Something you want to tell me?"
Eddie looks away, rejected and embarrassed. "Okay, forget it."
Richie sits up and leans back on his elbows, watching the way that Eddie recoils. "No, wait."
"I said forget it, Richie," Eddie tucks his legs underneath his body, trying to get more comfortable. He looks so small, so delicate, and so fragile. Richie realizes that Eddie is giving him access to the kingdom, and he was just about to carelessly toss the key aside.
"Yeah," Richie blurts out. "Yes, it's you. Eddie. Yes."
Eddie's eyes widen and he looks at Richie with a bewildered expression. "Are you joking?"
Richie flinches.
"No?" He tries uneasily, almost certain that this isn't going the way he had hoped. "...Should I be?"
Eddie bites his lip, nervously fumbling around with his hands. He looks like he wants to say something, but as he opens his mouth, he only shakes his head and digs around in his pocket for his aspirator. He plunges it into his mouth just so that he doesn't have to talk.
Defeated, Richie lies back down and stares up at the ceiling. He feels like an idiot, so fucking stupid. Why would he tell Eddie that? Why? Why would he tell Henry that?
"Are you staying the night?" Richie asks, changing the subject to save himself the embarrassment of unrequited feelings.
Eddie watches as the boy throws his glasses aside, rubbing his face in frustration. Richie is clearly tense, so he doesn't know if he should accept the invitation or not.
"No. Is that okay?" Eddie says. When Richie nods, Eddie asks "Can I call my mom to come pick me up?"
Richie waves him off so Eddie quickly clambers down the stairs to the kitchen. He dials a phone number almost habitually, while Richie begins pacing around his room in anger.
Idiot. Fucking idiot. Why didn't he beep you? You were clearly saying something stupid, something inappropriate. Why would you say that? Dumbass.
Richie opens his bedroom door and sinks to the floor, listening to Eddie's voice from the top of the stairs. He lets his head rest against the wall, trying to dissect the words that the boy is quietly whispering.
"He's- I don't fucking know, Bill."
Richie listens a bit more closely.
"No! ...I don't know? ...I think he's gay."
Richie squeezes his eyes shut and feels the shame drip through him like an oil spill infecting the ocean.
"Do I like him? Are you stupid?-" Eddie's voice floats up the stairs, so Richie gets up and returns to his room. He tries to shut his door quietly, but the sheer anger and humiliation running through him still makes the door slam on its hinges, the wooden frame trembling beneath the force.
Richie paces, wanting to cry and punch something all at once. His fists clench and unclench, restless and confused. His body feels wrong and heavy, but he can't even imagine sitting down right now. He needs a fucking cigarette. His skin itches with impatience, but he knows he doesn't have any left. He can't call Bev, not after this morning. Does he have anybody? Anybody at all?
If my own parents don't love me, what makes me think that Eddie Kaspbrak would?
And maybe if Richie had stayed in the hallway, sitting at the top of the stairs, eavesdropping on a conversation he was not supposed to hear, maybe he would have heard the rest of Eddie's sentence.
"-Of course I do."