❝and when i say i'm in love with you,❞ a long pause lays between his words, so much emotion lacing throughout his eyes, ❝i fucking mean it.❞
-⚘ in which i had a smut book with 400k reads and it got deleted. now, i'm writing new, original chapters (l...
20: SUCH A FOOL FOR SACRIFICE by: wonderwheelzier (ao3) b+r
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Bill Denbrough had never necessarily believed in luck - but now he was seriously considering that it might exist, and that he might have the worst luck on the planet. Because his professor had just announced project partners, and his was Richie Tozier. Richie got fine grades - great grades, actually - so Bill thought that at least that as a silver lining. But there were other smart people in the class, people who weren't absolutely insufferable. People who hadn't broken Bill's heart six months ago.
It hadn't been a break up, since they were never dating. Bill guessed it was more of a falling out, though that sounded incredibly calm considering the end of their friendship (or whatever it had been) had been pretty explosive. Bill had a summer to get over it, but he hadn't, and given the way Richie completely ignored him he figured he hadn't either. Still, Richie was the one to approach him at the end of class, and he was wearing that stupid smirk he always wore. "Howdy, pardner," he greeted Bill as he was packing up his bag. Bill just rolled his eyes to cover up the way his heart ached. He'd missed Richie's voice like crazy, even the dumb voices. "So, when and where do you wanna work on this?" Bill sighed as he slung his bag over his shoulder, realizing there wasn't going to be any escaping this.
"I'm free all night Sunday after like four." He hated how stiff his words were, he hated that he had to be formal and distant with Richie now.
"Works for me. Wanna come over to mine? We can order some pizza if you want, I'm thinking this will take a few hours."
Bill clenched his jaw. Pizza? He wants to share a pizza? "Okay," he said, then promptly left the room.
"I still live in the same place!" Richie called after him. Bill thought he heard him grumble something after that, but he didn't catch what it was. It didn't matter though, it was probably just something insulting that would end up making Bill even angrier.
Bill spent the weekend making sure that he was as prepared as he could be in order to make the meeting with Richie as short as possible. Ben was sympathetic to Bill's suffering and offered to help in any way he could, but Bill knew he couldn't put off the inevitable. So as he stood in front of Richie's apartment door that Sunday afternoon, he did his best to swallow his distaste, his anger, his pain. Richie was wearing sweatpants and a t-shirt when he opened the door, which was no surprise to Bill. "Bev not home?" Bill asked as he entered the apartment. He liked Bev a lot. It was just a shame that he only knew her through Richie, because it meant he didn't get to see her that much anymore.
"Nah, she's at her girlfriend's place for the night." Bill's heart jumped at the realization that he would be alone with Richie for the rest of the night. He sat down at the dinner table, his heart jolting once again when Richie sat down next to him rather than across from him. Bill didn't say anything, just pulled out his notes and showed Richie what he'd done so far. Richie hadn't done nearly as much planning, but then, he rarely did. And then he aced everything anyway. It was something that only added to Bill's frustration.
