Better // Reddie

three

TRIGGER WARNING: Depictions of eating disorders, descriptions of mental health facilities.

WORD COUNT: 2169

Behind the door was a long, white hallway. Giant sunflowers were painted on the walls, vines connecting them all together. The whole place seemed part hospital, part house. There were wooden floors, but they were paired with bright florescent lights. The doors were painted the same yellow as the sunflower petals. 

"This place really is Sunflower Meadows." Eddie said to himself, and Richie let out a laugh. 

"We call it Sunflower Hell." The (extremely tall) boy rolled his eyes. "This entire place is covered in them. Once I get out of here, if I ever see the color yellow again, I'll barf." He pushed open another door once they reached the end of the hallway. "That whole hall was just all of the offices for the staff here. You'll probably end up having a lot of your therapy sessions in there." 

The next room was the dining hall, which was three long tables with a serving window connected to the kitchen at the front. "Our groups all take turns making meals, cleaning up, all of the chores and shit." Richie continued, guiding him towards a pair of glass double doors leading outside. 

"Groups?" Eddie asked, following Richie out onto the lawn. 

"Oh, yeah. We're in groups with other patients. We do stuff like group therapy, movie nights, and all that together. You'll probably get yours later," Richie made sure the glass door slid shut behind them, and squinted into the sun. "This is... the outside. Obviously. Sometimes they make us play games out here. And water those stupid flowers." He threw a hand towards the towering sunflowers that seemed to border the property as a redheaded girl approached. 

She had short red hair that almost looked like fire in the sunlight, and a constellation of freckles across her face. As she got closer, Eddie could see some holes in her ears where it looked like piercings used to be. The mystery girl was pretty, but not in a Greta, "popular girl" kind of way. It was a unique kind of beauty, one that was entirely her own. 

"Trashmouth! Is this the newbie?" She slung an arm over Richie's shoulders, and the height difference looked slightly comical (were they dating? He hoped not). 

"Eds, this is Beverly. Beverly, meet Eds." Richie gestured between the two of them as Beverly reached out to aggressively shake Eddie's hand. Jeesh, this girl had a strong grip. 

"It's actually Eddie." Eddie shot a glare towards Richie. 

"Nice to meet ya, Eddie. You can call me Bev or Beverly, I don't really care which." She winked at him, and Richie swooped out from under Bev's arm. 

"Beverly is one of the coolest people here, besides maybe myself. You'll meet the other cool people later. But remember- they aren't cool if I don't say they are." Richie's voice took on an air of faux-seriousness, and he leaned closer to Eddie's face as if telling him a secret. 

"Beep beep, Rich," Bev rolled her eyes. "The people here aren't really that bad, Eddie. I promise." She winked again, and strolled back out into the field, returning to the group she'd came from. 

"Chop, chop, Edward! So much to see, so little time." Richie had abruptly slipped into an (atrocious) British (?) accent. He dramatically turned back to the house, opening the door with a flourish. 

"What, you're British now?" Eddie rolled his eyes. Richie might be the strangest person he'd ever met- not that he'd met many people to compare him to. At Derry High, Eddie considered himself the strangest person there. 

"I am many things, Eds." Richie said, matter-of-fact, and Eddie decided that his cryptic statement didn't deserve a response. 

Richie took him through another hallway connected to the dining hall. This place was like a maze- you would never be able to guess the clinic was this big from the outside. This hall had numbers attached to the doors, with sunflower-shaped tags that had names scrawled on them hung below.