greetings from stardust / reddie

chapter 1

The thing is, Eddie hadn't thought about it until he saw the letter.

Sure, maybe it was in the back of his head somewhere; logically he knew that they'd all grow up and eventually move away. Hell, they constantly talked about moving away, but usually in a more fanciful sense - throwing all their shit into the back of Richie's car and leaving in the middle of the night, never to be seen again. That unrealistic kind of daydreaming that made nothing seem real, that always had Eddie ignoring reality, because in his version they all stayed together forever.

He and Richie stayed together forever.

The actual thing is, Eddie can't picture a world in which they don't. He hasn't tried and he doesn't want to and it just doesn't make sense. Richie is a constant - all the losers are, his life revolves around them and they're at the top of his list of priorities. Well. The losers are at the top, and Richie... Richie is at the very top of that.

Which is why seeing a college admission letter on the ground, half-hidden under a pair of jeans, feels like everything screeching to a halt. One little domino falling over and causing a chain reaction until eventually, inevitably, all of him will be scattered pieces on the ground. Because this letter is for Richie. Because this means Richie got into college, somewhere that's not here, which was always the plan and Eddie shouldn't be surprised, but that means Richie is leaving. Finally, after talking about it for years, Richie will leave. He'll drive away, car packed with everything he'll need for a new life, and that will not include Eddie.

He takes a step back, frame unfreezing and thoughts running through his head quicker than he can process them. He puts a hand on Richie's desk to steady himself and seriously thinks about reaching for his inhaler.

"Eds?" Richie asks from behind him, having reentered the room at just the perfect fucking moment. It's not like Eddie's world is crashing down around him or anything. "You good?"

"Yeah," Eddie lies. He's glad his voice doesn't sound as shaky as it feels. Or maybe it does, he can't really tell. "I just, um. Feel like I'm getting an allergy attack, or something. Did you bring any weird plants into your room recently?"

Smooth.

"Is this your way of asking if I have weed?" Richie asks, smirk evident in his voice.

"No," Eddie wheezes. "I just - I feel a bit lightheaded, and my eyes itch, and if my throat starts to close up I'm fucking blaming you because -"

"Hey," Richie's hand closes around his wrist, and Eddie can already feel his pulse slowing. "You're fine. You don't have allergies."

"I am allergic to penicillin!" Eddie squeaks, still unable to tear his eyes away from the paper.

Richie tugs on him. "Okay," he says. "Well I don't have any penicillin in here, so."

Eddie lets himself go easily this time, allowing Richie to pull him away from the desk and over to the bed, where he has an assortment of junk food spread out. "Penicillin is a strain of mold, actually, so it's possible there's mold in your wall of a similar kind that's causing my -"

"Eds, you're fine." Richie repeats.

He couldn't be more wrong, Eddie thinks.

He hands him a box of girl scout cookies, thin mints, and Eddie takes them just to do something with his hands, but he's not hungry. Not even a little bit.

"If mom's gonna try and make everyone go on a diet with her," Richie is saying, somewhere far away to Eddie's brain currently, "the least she could do is hide the good stuff somewhere better than on top of the refrigerator. How short does she think I am? That may have worked when I was twelve, but I'm taller than her now -"