𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐫𝐮𝐬𝐡.

𝐜𝐨𝐧𝐯𝐞𝐫𝐬𝐚𝐭𝐞 𝐢𝐧 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐫𝐚𝐢𝐧 | 𝐞 & 𝐫

[END FLASHBACK]

Eddie looked back to him. "...For what? It's not your fault." And to this statement, Richie didn't reply. He sat near Eddie instantly wincing at the dampness of the porch, which did not make him any warmer. The air was moist and heavy, and the thick scent of rainy evening air lingered, making the hairs on the back of his neck stand up.

They watched as the rain from the sky created puddles with several ripples, contracting and growing in size rhythmically like a heart's pulsation. The trees moved with force due to the wind, sending lush green leaves tumbling to the ground. Just objects reacting to their environments, like people do. The atmosphere was alive, but the two youthful boys sitting on the porch lived vicariously through it. Why was it that some things would never change? The grass would never not collect dew on early spring mornings. The sun would never cease to rise each morning. Even through copious amounts of nimbus clouds trying to dim its light, there would always be gaps in which you could see the sun, whether it was reflecting off a mirror or shining through your curtain. The earth is breathing and leaving, and it always will. It was the comfort and stability Richie sought for so deeply.

People are more complicated than that. To be frank, people never make sense. We never make sense because we don't know how to. We're not as reasonable as we'd like to believe we are, because we are granted with the misconception that we innately are reasonable, therefore we don't need help with learning how to be. We don't know how to deal with situations outside of our parameters of reason. There's no guide on how to feel when your friend's life is stripped away from you. There's no written handbook that tells you what to do when you realize the one you feel so strongly for doesn't reciprocate those feelings back. No guide to show you how to cope with the feelings of failure, loss, regret. We're merely products of our own environment, and how we interpret our environment to be.

Nature is straightforward. It is a driving force. Our only driving force is the belief that we have one.

"It's weird to be here," Richie spoke up. "Especially given the circumstances."

"You know what's funny?" Eddie said abruptly.

Richie looked at his glazed over eyes and couldn't tell if he'd been crying or it was just the weather. Maybe a mix.

"I really thought we'd all be friends forever. All of us." Eddie continued. "Fucking pathetic." He murmured.

"It's not. And it's not anyone's fault," Richie said. "We were gonna grow out of them anyways. People grow and change." He said, trying to be reaffirming yet comforting.

"We didn't 'grow and change'. We left before we got the chance to."

Richie didn't reply back to this.

"I don't even think we'd know how to." Eddie continued. E ddie pushed his hair back, and leant back a bit. He felt pressure in his chest - he didn't know if it was the sadness or his asthma, but he'd rather not deal with either.

"If it means anything to you, I think you grew. And changed." Richie says, trying to remain positive.

"I don't think you did." Eddie said. Richie could tell Eddie didn't mean to say this, but it was the truth.

It was silent for a good minute. All that was heard was the rain. Eddie would like to imagine that everytime he felt sad and it was raining, that it was an angel crying his tears for him so that he didn't have to. It was stupid, but it made him feel better.

"Okay." Richie said, in response to Eddie's previous statement.

"I think you're someone I'll never forget." Eddie said, causing Richie's nervousness to spike.

"You showed me what it's like to want something for reasons that won't benefit me. I haven't felt that in a while." He continued.

"You know, the funny thing is, the more I want you, the more I get hurt. The more you hurt me...and the more I hurt you. I feel like a kid again. But I guess I am still a kid. I'm acting like one. But I'd rather be honest with you and show my childishness than to try to be something I'm not around you - something I'll never be, as hard as I try to." Eddie said. He didn't know if what he was saying made sense.

...
"Do you like me in the way you liked Stan?" Richie asked.

Eddie froze for a moment.

"Do you like me in the way you liked Stan?".

What even was the way he liked Stan? Did he like Stan like how he liked classical music, the crescendos and decrescendos it executed, and how each line displayed what it was like to love in a way he'd never loved before? Did he like Stan, how he liked the sand between his tan skin at the beach, and the waves breaking on top of him, the saltiness burning his eyes?

Or did he love Stan with the same amount of passion that he hated cold winter nights? Or that he hated being left alone, abandoned, or betrayed? Or the way he hated being used, or hated the chill reminder on cold summer nights that he was left alone in the woods for hours, with no means of protection, left to his own devices as one of the only people he trusted fleed without any warning?

He exhaled to soothe the influx of thoughts clouding over his minds like the clouds that covered the porch they sat on.

Richie knew the answer to his question - he remembered the anger, the redness in his face as he sat outside Stanley's house in the cold by the flickering streetlight.

"No." Eddie said, after a while.

"Not in that way. I just... I like you in the way that makes me want to hate you." He finished.

...

"We're gonna be okay here." Richie said, seeming to have shifted the topic. He was stifling a smile.

Without warning, Eddie kissed Richie. Richie moved Eddie's hair back, and then released the kiss.

It was more passionate, and nothing that Richie would have expected from Eddie of all people.

"Are you drunk?" Richie said skeptically, in a quiet voice.

"Not yet." Eddie said, even quieter.

The rain kept falling.