telescope
reddie, 1.2k, pointless fluff
(read on ao3)
“Jesus, did you just wake up? Your shift starts in thirty minutes.”
“Aw, you got my schedule memorized?” Richie’s sleep-clogged brain quietly informs him that he has Eddie’s schedule memorized, too, but today he feels like being a hypocrite. “That’s cute.”
“No.” It’s too fast, and Eddie knows it, silent for a moment before letting out a frustrated little ugh, defeated. “Your shift starts in thirty minutes,” he repeats.
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The first time Richie sees Eddie after their small-town, high school graduation, is in the middle of a grocery store.
He is twenty-eight, struggling to stomach the mortifying reality of approaching thirty while unable to recall most of his twenties. It’s odd because they are miles away from where they parted, and miles still from where either of them were heading to when they left.
It’s nearly midnight, and Eddie sees him first. Or, recognizes him first. Richie is too startled by the child sitting in the front of his cart, kicking her legs out against his stomach, and tries to rearrange the man’s face into somebody else until a moment’s passed and he still hasn’t looked away, hasn’t moved to push his cart forward. They are at the end of the aisle, spilling out around the corner, when Eddie bites his lips between his teeth as though to hide the way they quiver and says, so quietly: “Richie?”
He seems almost to reach out to Richie, but finds himself. Offers a hand, finds himself again. They had nearly died together, once.
Richie can hardly move, his breath stilted then stuck in his lungs. He can’t look away from the girl, who could be two or could be six—he wouldn’t know the difference. He ruins his future ten times over in his head and barely manages a shaky laugh and reminiscent greeting before asking Is—is she your’s? All rushed and way too soon.
“No,” Eddie says. But he doesn’t say it the way Richie needs him to, like the thought would be absurd. Instead he smiles at her fondly, catching her foot in his hand the next time she kicks it. “Stan, um. Stanley and his wife are out of town for the weekend.”
The whole of Richie’s body goes cold at Stan’s name. Stan. Stanley Uris. Stan the Man. “So Stan got married, huh?” He tries to keep it light.
“Yeah.” When Eddie turns to look at him, his smile falters. His grip on his cart tightens, and Richie notices the wedding band on his finger. “We tried to find you, Rich.”
Richie hates this. Eddie here, in this place. Playing catch-up by the cereal bars, their carts turned away from each other. Blocking aisles. He feels invasive for ever loving him. For loving him still, and it’s crawling all over his skin. Like he knew Eddie, somehow. Now other people know him—other people Richie does not know.
“We thought surely Bill had kept in touch,” Eddie is saying. “But...”
“I’ve been off the grid,” Richie tells him. Off the wagon.
The kid is getting fussy. Stan’s kid. Richie should have known; she looks just like him. Hair curly, eyes big. He should ask about her name, about her age—about the song that lulls her to sleep in the car—but he doesn’t want her to see him like this. She must know. He can’t even smile.
Eddie turns his attention to her. He’s a man now, and it’s devastating. Richie looks for his wedding ring again, because it somehow hurts less, but Eddie has turned his grip almost unnaturally forward, and it’s hidden from view.
“It‘s late,” Eddie says. Slow and careful, like everything he’s done tonight. It’s unfamiliar.
Richie looks pointedly at the kid. “It was late three hours ago.”
“Yeah. Listen, will you call?” His chest heaves. “We...I...miss you.”
Richie huffs. “Got a number?”
“Right.”
He watches Eddie pat around his chest and jeans with his left hand, hesitate, and then take his right off the cart to pull a pen out of his back pocket. He reaches out and Richie, perplexed, offers his palm. Eddie holds it close to him and scribbles a number on it, the pen ticklish and the ring cool against the skin. He looks up when he’s done.
“Soon?” he asks, and there’s something in his eyes now that Richie is looking at them.
He doesn’t let go until Richie smiles tightly and says “Sure, Eds.” His face softening at the sound of his name.
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