fire. richie tozier angst. (DISCONTINUED)

III

TW: abuse

wentworth yanked him out of the chair, and richie yelped.

"you lightin' fires in my house?" went yelled in richies face, holding the back of his neck firmly. richie squirmed a bit under his grasp, causing him to hold tighter. richie winced. "answer me when i'm talkin' to you!" went roared.

"y-yes sir." richie stumbled out, his breathing shallow, chest beginning to ache.

"you tryna burn my fuckin' house down? that it?" richie stared up at the man with a look nothing short of terror on his face.

"no sir, no. i would never." richie blinked back tears, knowing they'd cause nothing but more pain than he was already going to receive.

"you fuckin' sure? cause it damn looks like it." went yelled. "who said you could light a candle? hm?"

"i did," maggie said lazily. richie couldn't believe it. maggie was—helping him? was she really that drunk?

"don't b..beat him up o-over a.. candle went. s'fine, i s-said he could." maggie slurred. went rolled his eyes and punched richie in the chest.

"don't be lightin' no more candles in my goddamn house." went said firmly. richie doubled over, wheezing as he tried to breathe but failed. "if you're gonna die, do it quietly. i've got a shit load of paperwork to do. with that, he stormed off, leaving richie unable to breathe where he stood.

once richie was finally able to breathe as best as he could, he looked over at maggie. he wanted to thank her, or ask her why she helped him, but she was blacked out on the couch, the empty bottle on his chest, slowly rising and falling.

like usual, richie brought a small trashcan over to the couch and turned maggie over so she didn't choke on her own vomit. he didn't know why he did this, however. shouldn't he want her to die? she was an awful mother and hardly cared at all when went beat him.

he could only guess it was a feeling he had deep inside of him that, despite her failure to be one, she was still his mother whether he liked it or not. he looked once more at the blacked out body of maggie as he headed towards his room, quietly opening and closing the door, worried he might set wentworth off again. it was hardly five, but he knew there was no hope of him getting dinner tonight, so he didn't bother trying to be alert.

(we're gonna pretend this is a modern times book ok? ok) richie got out his phone and airpods and began listening to some music, ignoring the buzzing coming from his phone. the losers' group chat, no doubt. no one else cared enough to text him.

in the end he fell asleep, and he found himself waking up still in his clothes from the day before, shoes and all. he looked at his phone to see 29 notifications from the group chat. he opened his phone and began to scroll through them, ignoring the clock that showed 5:32 (am). he thought about reading them through instead of mentally noting who was talking, but honestly didn't care that much, so he got up and started getting ready.

by the time he was coming down the stairs it was hardly 6:30, but he couldn't have cared less. he hurried out of his house and grabbed his bike, running a good block before hopping on.

by the time he'd made it to school it was around 7, and all of the losers were waiting outside the building per usual.

he dropped his bike near theirs and tried his best to ignore the pain in his abdomen. he didn't realize how truly hard went had punched him.

when he made it over, beverly ran over to him giggling and pulled out her phone.

"why weren't you on last night? doesn't matter. you need to see this." she said, shoving her phone in his face, as if he wasn't in the same group chat she was showing him.

mikahell 🤭🔥: stan you can't be saying shit "you're better than that" the fuck you tryna pull? turning into y/n or something? except y/ns a jewish bird fucking psycho?

stanlerd 🙄🦅 is offline

mikahell 🤭🔥: yeah that's what i fuckin thought go sing fight song at the top of your lungs on the roof why don't you? maybe you'll find your 9'7 alpha vampire mafia leader wolf hybrid celebrity lion boyfriend there

richie let out a halfhearted chuckle, smiling up at mike. "didn't know mike was chill like that."

mike smiled sheepishly. "i was already mad at something and i guess i took it out on stan. sorry," he chuckled. stan shrugged, seemingly unbothered. richie wasn't fooled, though, he could see the glint of embarrassment hidden in stans eyes.

mike noticed a small yet noticeable bruise on richie's arm. he could also tell richie wasn't his usual, cheery self, considering how sad his little laugh sounded. he tapped richie on the shoulder to get the attention of the shorter boy. richie looked up at mike, tilting his head and crossing his arms with mock impatience.

mike vent down slightly and spoke quietly, making sure only him and richie could hear him. "are you okay? that bruise looks pretty bad," he nodded towards the throbbing bruise on richies arm, and richie shrugged.

"i fell off of my bike, it's fine," richie made up an excuse, but mike was smarter than that.

"if you fell off your bike it would leave more of a scrape rather than a bulging bruise. it's okay if you don't want to tell me, i understand." he knew how painful it was to have someone push a subject you aren't ready to talk about. richie held back a sad smile, showing off a fake goofy one instead. he nodded lazily, patting mike on the shoulder.

"thanks for the concern, mickey. to be totally honest with you it was bowers. nothing he hasn't done before, though. it's fine." he smiled again, and mike smiled back sadly, clear sympathy in his eyes.

the bell rang, signaling all students to get to their first period. richie waved dramatically as he entered his first period, hiding his disappointment that none of the losers were in it with him.

like usual, the day went by and richie paid no attention whatsoever to his teachers. during pe he'd even gotten a goal in soccer without realizing or really trying.

the only thing on his mind was fire. any event that had to do with fire, such as the holocaust. he considered asking ben for a book about fire, or at least well known events. he had no doubt ben had one, but he didn't want anyone to think something was wrong with him. he never read on purpose. he didn't think the losers knew he could read.

in the end he asked ben if he had any books about fire, preferably picture books, or lower grade level books. he didn't, but he offered to go to the library with richie to go find one.

richie agreed, and thankfully ben didn't question him any about the book. he'd probably just assumed richie needed one for class or something.

instead of going with the losers to ride him, richie and ben went the opposite direction and headed towards the library, ignoring the questions from the rest of the losers as they left.

they road up to the library and richie looked at the small building, shocked at how little it is.

richie sighed, dropping his bike in front of the building, not caring about the bike racks, and followed ben up to the building.

he thought, surely, this was the weirdest thing he had done in his short life.