Drowning On My Dreams

Heyyyyy! Here's a little Richie one-shot because oh god I love him so much! Sorry for the mistakes, my first language is not English and I wrote this at like 3AM so it probably isn't perfect. Feel free to leave a comment, it always makes me smile :DEnjoy!!!TW: well there's Pennywise, so I guess blood, violence(maybe?), death and horror, but it's all in a dream so... Well anyway, better be safe than sorry. ;)

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"Shut up, asshole, I'm trying to sleep!" Eddie said groggily, raising his head from his pillow to glare at Richie in the darkness. The Losers were having sleepovers more often than not since the whole Pennywise incident, and tonight was no exception. They were all scattered on the floor in Bill's living room, unable to close their eyes for more than three seconds because Richie just wouldn't stop talking. He kept on rambling about stupid things, and at first it was nice because they all wanted a distraction, but it didn't take long before they grew tired of it.

Fortunately, Richie seemed to understand the message this time, and his mouth clicked shut. The Losers welcomed the silence with open arms, and they settled for good, wrapping up in blankets and holding their pillows a little tighter. It didn't take long before they were all asleep, feeling safe with each other close.

Well, except for Richie. The boy turned in his sleeping bag restlessly, buzzing with energy. He changed position every few minutes, and quite sadly, none of them felt comfortable enough for him to let himself drift off to sleep. But that wasn't the real reason that kept him from sleeping, and he knew it, even though he tried to ignore it.

The reason Richie couldn't sleep wasn't because he wasn't tired: in fact, he hadn't slept in a while, and he was really beginning to grow exhausted. Even his teachers had noticed the dark rings under his eyes, and that was saying something since most of them didn't give a shit about their students. It wasn't because the floor was too hard either: he already had to sleep on the ground before and it never stopped him. It wasn't because he had too much things on his mind, or because he was too excited about something.

Nah, none of these were right. The real reason was that Richie was afraid. He was scared of the moment he would close his eyes, of the moment the darkness would envelop him. Well, that wasn't quite true: he would've preferred the obscurity over what waited for him as soon as his eyelids would shut down. He would've preferred being engulfed by the black nothingness of sleep rather than having those dreams.

He would close his eyes, and images would immediately assault his mind. Then, if he was finally able to fall asleep, the dreams would take the relay. Richie knew it wasn't the reality, that it couldn't hurt him, but it felt so real, that he had to convince himself that it didn't really happen.

He wanted to talk about it to his friends: after all, they had lived the same experience, to different degrees yes, but it was shared trauma nonetheless. He knew for a fact that the Losers all had nightmares, just like him. But there was something keeping him from opening his mouth. For once, some would say, but still, he was unable to admit it out loud: Richie Tozier had nightmares.

He was supposed to be the funny one, not the one bothering everyone with stupid scary dreams about a bitch ass clown. He was supposed to be carefree, to be the comic relief, to lighten the mood with bright smiles and shitty jokes. He didn't want to be a burden with his problems. Anyway, it didn't matter if his smiles were fake now, or if his jokes were forced, as long as nobody noticed. If he could still bring some comfort to his friends one way or another, it was fine. Nobody needed to know that he wasn't perfectly fine.