affection || reddie 💫

Chapter 40

Tears were all that came out of Richies eyes next, tears and a painful look that Eddie hated every time he saw it. Which was in fact, not a lot, but it did happen a few times— whenever Richie had these dreams. These nightmares.

It's not like Richie had them every night but just having them every now and then was incredibly damaging to him.

And now it was happening, right here, in Bills living room, on what was meant to be a fun night with the four boys; had now turned into Richie bawling his eyes out painfully into Eddies chest. Maybe it would have been better if Bill did wake Richie up— woke him up before he had the chance to get into that stage of sleep in which the nightmares came.

Stanley and Bill watched from the other couch in utter-despair as Eddie cradled the back of Richies head against his chest and whispered comforting words into his ear, trying to get him to calm down.

"Shhh.. it's okay baby.. you're okay, I'm here I got you.. shhh.." Eddie cooed in a soothing voice.

The comforting was working, Richie was crying less than he had been a few minutes ago, but nonetheless he was still wetting Eddies shirt with his tears; not lifting his head up for even a second. Richies glasses were pushed up off of his face, resting on top of his head, and Eddie quickly took them off to place them on the table behind him before continuing to comfort him.

"Is he okay..?" Stanley asked, pupils blown wide, both Bill and Stan weren't sure what to do in this situation. Go over and hug Richie? Stay there and let Eddie comfort him? Leave the room? Talk to Richie? But the look Eddie had given them when it started signified that for now, Richie would just be clinging to Eddie and Eddie only.

"Does it look like he's okay?" Eddie responded, shifting his gaze to the two.

"Calm d-down Ed's, we j-just wanna h-help.." Bill said quietly.

Eddie sighed and paused for a second before looking back down at Richie again. "Rich..? Baby you okay now..?" he asked softly, now that Richies tears had subsided for the most part.

Richie hugged into Eddie a little more and sort of rubbed his face against his shirt, making Eddie wince when he realised that Richie was basically wiping the rest of his snot and tears onto the fabric. Richie keened, feeling Eddie trying to pull him off, and hugged onto him tighter, "just hold me.." he whimpered brokenly, and Eddie couldn't help but do just that. Eddie had only planned to stay like that for a few more minutes, but a few more minutes had ended up turning into the rest of the night as Richie just did not want to move.

Even when the second movie finished and the loud sound of the TV was quickly silenced after Bill switched it off, Richie still didn't move. Eddie signalled Stanley and Bill to just go up to bed and that they'd come afterwards, so he gave it about ten minutes from when the couple had gone upstairs before nudging Richie and telling him they needed to go to sleep now. Richie unwillingly obeyed and they both headed upstairs to Bills bedroom, not before Eddie gave Richie a few small comforting kisses and 'I love you's outside of the door first, but after that they headed inside to their makeshift bed and cuddled up to sleep, both praying another nightmare wouldn't come.

They would talk about this in the morning.

—

Richie woke up alone that morning, kind of disappointed when he expected Eddies arms to be around him, but he knew Eddie got up early when it came to school so it made sense.