This is What Happened - Silicon Valley Fanfiction

This is What Happened

When Richard got fired he crawled into bed and didn't leave for three days. He wasn't even allowed to stay on as CTO. Within a week, Pied Piper was picked up and moved lock, stock, and servers, into an office building. The guys assured him the new CEO was a dick, and that was nice of them, but Richard didn't care about his replacement. The fuse in his caring circuit had blown out. If Big Head and Jared hadn't brought him food he probably wouldn't have eaten.

Erlich let him stay- Richard didn't even have to ask. He let Jared stay too, first in a tent in the yard, then in the garage, then in Dinesh's room after he and Gilfoyle moved out. Once Jared started drawing a salary Erlich made him pay rent.

***

The wall between their rooms was too thin - Richard could still hear Jared speaking German in the night. Shouting sometimes, weeping.

One night Richard finally went over and gently shook Jared's arm. "Jared. You're having a nightmare."

Jared wiped the tears from his face. "I'm sorry for waking you."

Richard hadn't been sleeping. He rarely slept the night anymore.

Jared drifted back off almost immediately, and seeing him sleeping peacefully made Richard feel so very calm. He didn't want to leave, so he didn't. He laid down on the edge of Jared's bed and in the morning woke up with Jared's arm around him. It was the best sleep either of them had had in months.

***

A few nights later Richard went back. Then again, the night after that.

They slept deeply and soundly together. Richard didn't care if Erlich noticed, or what he thought about it if he did.

***

When Richard started feeling like a person again, he decided to go home. Tulsa. His parents' basement. Accept his ignominious defeat like the man-child he was. Jared quit his job and drove him there in his Volt. Richard didn't question why. He wasn't sure if he knew how to sleep anymore without Jared's arm around him and the warmth of his chest at his back.

***

"We can share my old room," he told his parents, and they assumed this was his way of coming out. He let them assume whatever they wanted. They treated Jared like the daughter-in-law they thought they would never get. Jared loved that, and Richard was happy for him.

When they started referring to Richard and Jared as boyfriends, neither one bothered to correct them. Functionally, it might as well be true, even if they'd never done anything in bed except sleep.

Jared sometimes rested his hand on Richard's stomach and sometimes called him 'liebchen' in his sleep. Richard sometimes woke up with morning wood.

That was all.

***

Jared got a job at the corporate office of a car rental company. It was quite a pivot, but he proved worthy of the challenge. They moved into a one-bedroom apartment together. After a few months of searching, Richard got a job as a drug store cashier, where he rang through a lot of old friends and classmates. He thought it would be humiliating, but it turned out that he really had zero shits left to give.

The favourite part of his day was the part where Jared held the covers up so he could crawl into bed beside him, and they settled up against each other for the night.

When everything finally caught up to him, Richard started missing work to stay home and sleep. Jared called Big Head, who took vacation days for an extended visit. It was like the time Richard dropped out of Stanford. Big Head helped him with the basics and helped him find a good therapist. Richard came out of it faster this time.