timing : stozier

57

december 23/24

a/n: happy holidays everyone!! merry christmas if you celebrate it!! and i apologize for not wishing my jewish followers a happy hanukkah i was unaware of the dates it was taking place!! nonetheless, i hope 2021 has good things for us all <33

"do you want a blanket?" was the first thing stanley asked upon richie getting into the car. he was obviously cold, basically shivering, and very frozen. stanley then noticed richie's physical appearance. he looked disheveled, yes, but there was a red mark on the side of richie's cheek. 

"yes please," richie responded, and stan reached into the back for a blanket, putting it lightly onto richie's lap. richie wrapped it around himself and then put on his seatbelt, being quieter than stan had expected.

stanley soon came to the conclusion that richie may have lied to him. it didn't deter him though, he simply started the car and began to drive. the first couple minutes were silent until richie decided to speak.

"can i ask you a question?" he said, stan nodding as he turned the wheel delicately.  

"yeah, duh," 

"what was it like when i left? like, what happened?" richie asked, leaving the context of the question to be determined. stan looked over at richie briefly, and richie knew stan's eyes were flickering between his eyes and the bruise rapidly forming on his cheek.

"... in derry?" richie nodded at stan's clarification. stan grit his teeth. how was he supposed to answer that? it was bad, it was so fucking bad, what else would it have been? he went with, "oh. uh... well it sucked."

richie swallowed the knot in his throat, "but like, when did bill tell you? and did it really change anything? i sound so fucking conceited asking that, i'm sorry." richie didn't want to bring up the subject of their relationship, especially taking into account that richie was currently running away from his current fiancé. but he wanted to know.

"no, no i'll answer it. it was after all-all the moving trucks were gone. when we were sure that you had just up and moved. none of us knew where you had went. bill told us one night at his house, bev nearly strangled him right there," stanley seemed to think about something, staring into the road. he bit his lip nervously, chewing on the skin for a moment.

stan breathed in once again, "but it sucked. we had lost one of our best friends, and he didn't even tell us he was going. y'know? i don't know, shit wasn't as funny anymore. it wasn't fun. it took around 3 months for anything to remotely go back to normal, and even then it never really did. bev and eddie ignored bill violently for not telling them."

"fuck, i never wanted bill to take the blame for that," richie spoke his thoughts aloud, knowing one of his bigger worries of that moment had come true. he buried his head in his hands. 

"but eddie was his boyfriend soon enough, so i guess he forgave him. bev's grudge stuck around a bit longer. i tried to reason with her that it wasn't his fault but, i dunno. they're fine now, though. i haven't seen bev in... oh god i don't know." stan tried to comfort richie, knowing he felt overly guilty. 

stan hadn't really thought about the whole thing since he saw richie for the first time.

he had been heartbroken, of course. he felt angry. he felt horribly fucking sad, and he felt scared that he'd never be able to tell richie how he really felt. he had really only felt negative things, but he had suppressed those thoughts when hanging out with the losers club.

honestly, it was only because he had hardly ever been vulnerable around any of them except for richie and bill. bill had been a tough situation at the time, so it became something he kept inside. they knew he was hurt, but none of them knew how to talk to stan about it. therefore, he didn't.