say you'll remember me

Little did you know your homes really only a town you're a guest in

"The fuck do I do now" Richie mutters to himself when he gets into town.

He starts just walking around the town looking into store windows and when he past a thrift store he saw an old arcade machine for sale and as soon as he saw that he knew exactly where he was gonna go.

When he gets to the front of the arcade/ theatre, he notices that it's closed down and not respected by the people of Derry anymore as there is graffiti covered on the front but there is also a broken window right at the bar to open it from the inside, which is lucky for Richie cause if there wasn't a broken window then he would have no way of getting in.

When he walks in he isn't walking on a floor he's walking on glass, he looks around at the shithole that he used to call a third home, first home is his real home with his real family, second is the losers club and the third is melting his brain with video games.

Then he turns around to see that one machine that melting his brain the most, street fighter and let's just say seeing that machine again triggers his flight or fight.

He then walks over to the machine when you put in a quarter and you get out a token, hey maybe Richie's token should be an actual token, when he picks up the token and looks at it, it brings back such an awful memory.

———————————————————————
1989

Richie is playing his favourite arcade game, street fighter, with a total random boy he has just saw today, probably not from Derry as everyone from Derry knows each other, he said his name is Connor but he didn't give his last name, oh well who cares, a total stranger doesn't think Richie is a loser so that's a win, but it isn't just any stranger it's a a good looking stranger, who doesn't care when Richie beats him or makes jokes about his mom, he actually laughs at them, sending some sort of pride to Richie's brain.

"Your fucking good" Connor says after Richie beats him, normally when anyone is playing with Richie and he wins they all start getting angry at him or saying it's based on luck, it's nice having someone that appreciates his talents.

Then they did this awkward hand slide thing, if Richie's being honest his hands might of lingered too long.

"Oh well, I gotta go" Connor says, wait fuck, he can't leave he's the only person thats talked to him since the fight with bill, he can't lose him too.

"Hey, um" Richie says will picking up another game token "why don't we go again, play some more, only if you want too" he adds the last bit because he doesn't want to scare the kid off by been too much and too needy.

And of course this is the moment when Henry and his goons decided to come in, of fucking course.

"Dude, why are you being weird, I'm not your fucking boyfriend" Connor says after he turned around seeing Henry.

"Woah,I, I didn't mean-" Richie says before Henry intervened.

"The fucks going on here" Henry says.

"You assholes didn't tell me that your town is full of little fairies" Connor says, and suddenly when he says that it's like Connor doesn't understand him anymore.

"Richie fucking tozier, you trying to bone my little cousin, get the fuck outta here fag" Henry says completely humiliating Richie, making his safe place not so safe anymore,"fucking move" Henry says because Richie isn't hurrying to get out, so then he ran out, ran out on the place that he called a third home.

So he ran, ran until his legs got tired so he found a Bench in the middle of town, right in front of Paul bunion, he sat down and started crying, what was his safe place gonna be now?.

"What's up Richie" Richie hears, it sounds like it's coming from a monsters mouth, so he hurries to put on his glasses and when he did he say that Paul was gone, BRILLIANT! Just what he needed today.

Then he turned to his side to see that the statue came to life, so Richie got off of his ass and ran, and of course if his day wasn't already bad enough the statute is now chasing after him and trying to kill him with a giant axe, JUST GREAT!.

Then Paul flung his axe to hard on the ground making Richie fall,"it's not real,it's not real,it's not real" Richie says to himself, then he looks up and puts his glasses on to see that he's gone, "I think I just shit my pants" he says laying back down, he deserves a break.
———————————————————————
2016

So Richie twenty seven years later has to revisit the place where he was scared shitless, cause who doesn't live a bit of Trauma.

He just stands and stares at Paul, now that he's grown he knows that Pennywise taunted Richie with Paul because he resembles masculinity and that was the day Richie realised that he really could never be himself, without being hated on.

"Canal days festival, closing day is tonight like to see you there, handsome" the man, wait is he a man?, he looks dead, he dropped a leaflet into his hands and the leaflet says in loving memory of Richie tozier, fuck that's another thing Richie is worried about dying, he can't die, he isn't going to die, right?.

"Did you miss me Richie" Richie looks up when he hears his name and of course it's the fucking clown.

"Cause I missed you, no one wants to play with the clown anymore" Pennywise says sort of sadly.

"Play a game with me would ya" Pennywise says now suddenly in a perky mood. "How about street fighter, ohhh you like that one don't ya, or maybe truth or dare".

"Jesus" Richie says, he swears he's more scared of the clown now than he was as a kid.

"Oh you wouldn't want anyone to pick truth though, would you" he says before floating down, "you wouldn't want anyone to know what you are hiding", Richie hates how much this clown knows him, on a personal level.

"I know your secret, your dirty little secret" oh great he's singing now, "I know your secret, your dirty little secret, I know your secret, your dirty little secret" now he's down floating and only a few steps away from Richie.

"Should I tell them all" the clown says looking rather pleased with himself cause that clown knows that Richie isn't scared of him, he's scared of himself.

So he closes his eyes again just like he did when he was a kid, "this isn't real", he says and god does he wish that it wasn't real.

And when he opens up his eyes he sees Pennywise running towards him, proving the fact that this is real, so Richie runs away from him "come back and play, come back and play with the clown" Pennywise says.

Yep that'll do it, Richie is going back to his home with his kid fuck staying in this town for one more second.