the kissing bridge [reddie+stenbrough]

12

Richie could tell that Eddie had been crying.

"Damn, what happened to you?" Richie says to him. Eddie sits down next to Richie, with his knees pressed against his chest.

They sat quietly for a few minutes. Eddie scoots closer to Richie. "I have a question." Richie looks at him.

"Have you ever had a secret? Not some kind of bullshit secret like 'I like New Kids on the Block' or something," Eddie looks at Richie, "But, a secret that you're scared of? A secret that no one else would understand so you try not to think about it? And you try to avoid it because the second you say it out loud it just gets too real? And it causes you to shut out the people you love because you don't know what they'll think about you if they knew about it. But you love them and want them to know this thing about you and you just fight with yourself over it because you don't want to be alone with this secret but you also don't want your friends to leave you because of this secret."

"I know exactly how you feel," Richie adjusts his glasses, "turn around."

Eddie turns to see the 'R+E' carving on the bridge. He softly smiles and looks at Richie, "Now, you turn around." Richie turns and looks at the 'R' inside of the heart. "You did this? That heart is very asymmetrical," Richie jokes to lighten the mood. "Shut up," Eddie blushes, "Mike helped me and he didn't even know it was for you."

"Mike helped?," Richie shakes his head. "Oh, by the way," Eddie pulls Richie's picket knife out of his fanny pack, "here's your knife back."

"Eds, you stole my knife? How romantic," Richie rolls his eyes. "Well, my mom would've killed me if I had took one from the kitchen. She already wanted to kill me when I told her-"

"Hey," Richie grabs Eddie's face and looks into his eyes. "I think it's cute." They were both blushing as Richie leans in to kiss him.

They hear a car horn honk and they quickly pull away from each other.

"Well, well, well, look who it is," Henry Bowers says as he steps out of his car, "Richie Tozier sucking face with another little fairy." His two friends, Victor and Belch, get out of Henry's car.

"Hey, don't call him that!" Richie stands up from the ground. He grabs Eddie's hand and pulls him up.

"What do you think you're gonna do about it, bitch?" Henry moves closer to Richie. Eddie pushes Henry onto the ground before getting on his bike. "Richie, let's go!" Richie gets on his bike and they leave. "I'm gonna fucking kill them," Henry gets up and they get back into his car, chasing them down the road.

///

"I want to go to Florida someday," Mike says, "What about you guys?"

Eddie climbs down into the clubhouse, taking deep breaths. "Hurry the fuck up, Richie! Close the door!" Richie gets in and closes the entrance of the clubhouse. Eddie sits down on the floor and pulls out his inhaler. Richie sits next to him and puts his hand on Eddie's back.

"Hi, Richie and Eddie," Beverly waves to them. Richie waves back at her and Eddie takes a few puffs from his inhaler. Richie whispers to him, "It's okay, they don't know where we are."

Stan and Bill move to sit next to Richie and Eddie. "W-What happened? Are y-y-you guys okay?," Bill asks. "We were hanging out at the kissing bridge and saw Bowers and he fucking tried to run us over on the way here," Richie answers.

Stan and Bill look at each other, then at Richie and Eddie. Eddie had his hand on Richie's thigh, still having trouble breathing. "Eddie, are you alright?," Stan asks, "Do you want to lay down on the hammock?" "Yeah... that would be nice.," Eddie says, slowly standing up. Richie stands up and goes to the hammock with him.