.: Friday I'm In Love :|: Reddie :.

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An exhausted and close-to-collapsing Richie fell back onto a chair. It was wooden and uncomfortable. Bill had just been holding his brother for ten minutes now, and neither of them seemed to be in any rush to let go. Richie hasn't failed to notice the way Stan kept looking at him, like something was wrong and he didn't know it.

"Look, Stanley, have I got two heads or something? I know I'm half-dead, but would you tell me what's up? I've gotta go give Eddie his backpack." Holding up the bag, Richie watched as his friend's face twisted into one of guilt and pity. Richie's heart began to beat a little faster. What wasn't he being told? He glanced over and saw Bill looking at him grimly.

"Listen... Rich, there's something we've gotta tell you."

Then everything caught up with him and he nearly passed out right then and there. He must have looked really pale because Stan was starting to look more than mildly concerned.

"Yeah? What is it?" He felt like he was in a dark tunnel, and everything sounded far away. His voice echoed in his mind as he awaited the answer that he didn't want to hear.

"Eddie isn't here. Nobody has seen him for a little over a week now." Stan glanced at Bill, who just hugged Georgie tighter while he looked at Richie with fearful eyes. The curly-haired boy was dead silent. He hesitated, mind totally blanking.

Eddie, missing? Like he had just been? Was he at the old house, too, and Richie had just totally missed him?

"Georgie, we'd better call the police now and tell them what happened. I didn't know Eddie was there, or I never would've left without him. I don't want to leave him in that hellhole any longer that humanly possible." The little boy slid off of his big brother's lap and scurried over to the phone. He picked it up and dialed the local police station's number then handed the phone to Richie.

"Hi. My name is Richie Tozier. Yes, the missing one. I'm here with George Denbrough. Yes, the other missing one. No, Eddie Kaspbrak is not here with us. Neither are the others, but that's what I'm calling about. There is a house, where all of the children ended up. There's a man there who steals the kids that come too close. Number 29 Neibolt Street. Thank you very much. Please let me know what you find. Mhm." When he hung up, Richie nearly threw the phone at the wall. He clenched his teeth and instead placed it down firmly.

The house was silent when he left. Police sirens wailed in the distance, and he followed them, limping slowly along the street.

By the time he reached the hellish place, there were already crying parents and screaming children along with yelling cops and many flashing lights. Richie's stomach knotted over and over as he watched the door anxiously, glancing around for any sign of his best friend. He hadn't even noticed when someone put a blanket over his shoulders, he was too busy searching. When it seemed to be cleared up and he still hadn't spotted Eddie, Richie approached a police officer.

"Excuse me, Ma'am. You didn't happen to find a boy about yay tall with brown hair and brown eyes that goes by the name Eddie, did you?" He held up a hand to indicate how tall Eddie was, his heart falling into the pit of his stomach when she shook her head with a sympathetic glance.

"Sorry, kid. He wasn't here." Richie nodded numbly before turning and beginning to walk away. He shivered, and pulled the blanket tighter around himself as he felt the first few salty tears begin to tumble down his cheeks. He spotted two blurry shapes in the distance, even less clear because of his crying. He stumbled towards them and fell into the arms of Bill and Stan, who immediately helped support him from either side.

"It's going to be okay, Rich. We'll find him. Where else could he possibly be?" Stan sighed. All Richie could do was choke out sobs as they led him back to Bill's place. He collapsed onto the bathroom floor where Stan started to clean him up while Bill warded off any reporters and let the police sit down while Richie recovered.

And yet somehow through it all, it didn't feel quite right that the person tending to Richie's wounds wasn't a worrying young boy with soft brown hair and warm, chocolate brown eyes and the cutest freckles that Richie had ever seen in his life. It just felt wrong without the boy who really made a place feel like home.