the comfort of a laugh track // streddie

!

your name is richie tozier, and youve been mourning the deaths of your boyfriends for far too long.

one of your childhood best friends, mike hanlon, recently mentioned this "Very Cool And Interesting Thing" he discovered in his back yard, which made you wonder whether or not you should check it out.

nervous, you dial up your other childhood best friend, beverly marsh, with the question-

"hello, beverly marsh speaking."

no time to think now.

"hey, its trashmouth."

--

after a while of talking about it, and beverly finally giving you the "go ahead," and calling up mike, youre speeding down the road with two body bags in your back seat, silently thanking whatever entity out there for not putting police officers on the road tonight.

it takes you about fifteen minutes to get to mikes house, and the two of you are hauling said body bags out of your car, you nearly losing it as you carefully carry the, very heavy, eddie kaspbrak, mike carrying stanley in front of you.

you cant help but look around, to make sure no one is around, and youre not even sure why you think there are people watching you. its damn near midnight, three days after the service for eddie and exactly a week after the service for stanley, theres no reason for anyone to be out this late.

there definitely isnt any reason for you to be doing this, either.

you two dug a new hole, buried them again, and waited. you slept at mikes house on his couch that night.

--

the next morning, youre woken up by the sound of a plate smashing in the kitchen, and a chuckle. you assume its mike, already forgetting the previous night, and you get up.

you arent even entirely sure why youre on his couch in the first place. you just assume you came drunk from a bar or something.

until you step foot into the kitchen, you think youre going crazy. hes not even in there, hes asleep. its only five in the morning, theres no way hes up now.

you nearly lose it, just staring at the two, eddie frantically trying to sweep up the mess as stanley just laughs, telling him not to worry about it so much and that hed take care of it.

stanley notices you first, almost immediately holding his arms out for you. eddie looks up at him, then at you, a grin tugging at his, quite obviously chapped and cracked, lips.

you cringe for a moment, not wanting to believe it, but you instead go to hug stanley, eddie joining in soon after dusting his hands off on his pants.

one kiss to each of their cheeks is an obvious sign that, yes, this is reality.

and you could never be happier.