greetings from stardust / reddie

chapter 4

The next morning, Eddie wakes up before Richie, which is not unusual. He looks over to see a mess of black hair sticking out of the sheets in various directions. He stares for a little while, lost in thought, and then Richie is stretching, groaning, flopping out of bed onto the floor.

"Ow," he mumbles.

"Morning," Eddie says. "You okay?"

"Yeah," Richie picks himself up begrudgingly. He looks sleep-rumpled and disoriented and Eddie kinda wants to smooth his hair down, but he also kinda likes it how it is.

Bright sunlight peeks through the blackout curtains, sending a golden stripe right down the center of the room that illuminates everything around it just enough to see. It feels so weird, being here. Somewhere in Ohio, in a motel room that he hardly remembers what it looks like from the outside. It's so unfamiliar - the way the room smells and feels and looks, the knowledge that he really has no idea where he is besides the name of the state. He would be frightened by it all.

Would be. Except Richie gives another stretch and a lopsided grin, and his brain fills his body with safesafesafe.

"Breakfast?" Richie asks.

"Yes, fuck, I'm starving."

It only takes a few minutes to be ready to leave, since Richie just took out a toothbrush and Eddie is an expert packer. He double checks the room anyway to make sure they didn't forget anything, and then they're gone.

They go back to the diner, sit in the same booth, and Alice brings them coffee and pancakes, which Richie smothers with butter and syrup and Eddie spreads a light layer of strawberry jam on. Richie sits sideways in the booth now with his back against the wall and his legs up on the bench. His sunglasses are on this time to shield his eyes from the harsh lights. It they weren't travelling, Eddie suspects he'd still be asleep. They talk about nonsense like they always do, Richie makes Eddie laugh like he always does, but there's something... off.

"Hey, Rich?" Eddie asks after a Robert De Niro impression lacks the same gusto he's used to.

"Hm?" Richie hums, sipping his coffee.

"What's wrong? Are you homesick?"

Richie snorts. "Not even a little bit," he says.

"Then what is it?" Eddie pushes. "Don't tell me it's nothing, I know you, remember?"

Richie grins against the rim of the mug, and then sets it down slowly, pushing his sunglasses up on his head. "It's... not a big something."

Eddie raises an eyebrow, unimpressed.

Richie rolls his eyes and his whole head, thunking it back against the wall. He stares ahead for a moment. Eddie lets the silence pass patiently. "What if..." he starts quietly. "What if it doesn't... work."

"What do you mean?"

"I mean," Richie thumps his head back again, which makes an old lady at the table over look up and glare. "What if I don't work there? What if they hate me or something?"

Eddie blinks. "Isn't it my job to be irrationally worried about everything?"

The fondness comes back to Richie's eyes for just a second, then falls away again in favor of something else. Something sadder. "I'm serious," he says. "It's not like I was ever popular, really. Not that I wanted to be. I was totally and completely fine having just you and the losers."

"You're not anymore?" Eddie asks. It sounds selfish coming out of his mouth, and he wishes he'd said something a little more sympathetic.

Richie chews his bottom lip. "The losers won't be with me," he says. "You won't be with me."