almost paradise- reddie

Chapter One- Pretty in Pink

The windchimes fluttered gently against the hot summer breeze. To others, the clinking of the metal rods clashing together would put them at ease and remind them of simpler times. But to Richie, it reminded him of a life that he desperately wished he could erase from his memory.

Sneering, Richie scraped his luminous orange converse against the concrete, striving to ignore the pestering chimes reverberating in his mind as he sauntered down the pathway. The air was thick, weighing down on his shoulders like a burden, and he thrust his hands into his pockets and let his shoulders slump under the all too familiar feeling. He could feel the crumpled dollar notes that were hastily crushed into his pockets only minutes ago between his coarse fingers, the cracks of the paper reminding him as to why he was leaving his house in the first place. To escape from his dreaded mother.

Divorce wasn't a foreign subject to Richie. Any time that he had heard it come up in a discussion or when it was generally discussed on television, Richie hardly bat an eye. But that word was now contaminated with the sudden absence of his father, the chilling word leaving the tangy taste of bile on his tongue whenever he let himself think about it. And he only had his mother to blame for that. It was her fault that his dad left.

With a sigh, Richie found his rusty bike clumsily dropped in the wild protection of the yellow grass in his lawn, it's overgrown needles concealing the shine of his bike from the blinding sun. Richie never bothered properly hiding his bike. The people in Derry didn't care enough about him to even pass by his house, let alone steal his two-wheeler. His slippery hands clenched on to the handles of the bike as if his life depended on it as he rolled the metal out of the lawn, and it truly did. Without his bike, he would never be able to escape his mother's presence and the lingering sting on his cheek whenever they argued. He would never be able to flee from his everyday reality and Richie found himself smiling down at his obnoxiously noisy bike gratefully.

It was warmer than it usually was, the heat shaping droplets of sweat to drip down Richie's back as he gradually rode his bike down the unpaved street. He was glad that summer was here. Not for the memories that he could possibly make or the sweet taste of ice cream left on his tongue, but for the longer days. The longer the sun persisted in the sky, the longer that Richie could stay away from his disastrous life. He pushed harder now, the houses turning into a blur as the wind blew severely at Richie's face, his glasses partly a guard to the loose pieces of gravel flying up into the air. He didn't need to think about where he was going. He essentially remembered every single street in Derry but the street to The Platinum Movie Theatre would forever be engraved in his memory. That was his safe place.

Skidding to a halt, Ritchie adjusted his glasses to sit more comfortably on his nose as he peered at the building that he ran to whenever he felt troubled and just needed freedom to think. It didn't look like a safe place. It was run-down, to say the least, the faded red bricks coated in a green moss that made it look awfully dirty. The sign didn't even spell out The Platinum Movie Theatre properly, the lights on the letter P totally busted. Nevertheless, the sight of the building brought warmth to Richie's chest, a warmth that only his dad could ever make him feel.

Scowling at the mention of his father, Richie stumbled off of his bike in order to place it in the hiding spot he always had. He didn't need to look at the sign that displayed the movies that would be playing for the next week because Richie had them memorised. Top Gun, Texas Chainsaw Massacre Part 2 and Pretty in Pink. He didn't have to contemplate what he would be watching either, he had set his mind on what he would be watching for the next week until the new movies would replace them, which was Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2. Richie had already seen it three times before but he would rather analyse the film for the fourth time than watch something as queer as Pretty in Pink.