Chapter Text
He knew, the very second he entered the room, that Richie Tozier was going to be a piece of work.
And even that was an understatement.
It was Moving In Week, the week where all the incoming freshmen gathered together in the front of the campus, found their dorms, and set up all their various doohickeys and chachke that they'd accumulated over the years. You were supposed to meet your roommate prior, or at least become aware of their presence, but Eddie was so stressed with moving out that it didn't even pass his mind.
That was his first mistake.
It was too late to switch roommates, of course unless there was something severely difficult about staying with the guy. He wasn't a serial killer or anything, and he certainly didn't look like a criminal, but the vibe he emitted was one that constantly toyed with Eddie's buttons. He was like a toddler in front of a piano--he knew the exact keys to press to get Eddie riled up and distracted.
He was sitting there, almost completely naked except for the two-sizes-too-large Street Fighter T-shirt, briefs, and purple bunny slippers, flipping through a magazine on his bed. His lips were pursed, and even when Eddie came in and dropped his bags, Richie didn't bat an eye and kept reading. Finally, when Eddie shot him a confused look, Richie noticed him and put down the magazine, smiling at him.
"Hey, pal," he said, mockingly, almost sneering when he said it. He extended his hand, practically begging for it to be shaken. "What's your name?"
Eddie let the hand hang in the air for a few moments, eyeing it suspiciously. He didn't return the handshake, on account of being too weirded out by the whole display, and instead turned to unpacking his luggage. "Eddie Kaspbrak. Photography."
"Oh, so it's gonna be like that, huh?" He dropped his hand and picked the magazine back up, unwrinkling the pages with his thumb. "Richie Tozier. Undecided."
Richie Tozier. That was his name, and although he would've loved to forget it, it was certainly a pretty name. It was definitely an art school name, and suddenly Eddie's mind was empty. There was nothing to say to that.
Luckily, Richie had him covered.
"You know, the second I saw you, I knew you were a Photography major. You give off that kind of... vibe. You don't look like an art kid." He didn't know what to say to that, but Richie continued nonetheless. "I mean, don't get me wrong, you don't look all too bright either, but you look capable enough, you know? Capable enough not to be a... I don't know, like... A Music major or something."
"And you do look like you're undecided about a lot of things."
"Why don't you think I'm wearing clothes? That's a lot of decisions!" He rose from the bed, groggy and messy, as if he were asleep for days. "Did you meet the other floor mates?"
"The... what?" He turned to follow Richie as he practically kicked open the door and peered into the hallway.
"Stan! Stan the Man! I know you're not jerking it this early in the day."
There was a loud ruckus of footsteps and yelling before another person's voice could be heard clearly in the hallway. "If you bring that up one more time, I'll fucking cut you. I won't hesitate. I'm serious. Stop laughing."
Richie pushed the door open further so Eddie could see a tall, lanky man walk towards them. It must have been Stan, whoever that was. He was skinny and pale, with curly, stuttering hair atop a pointy face. He definitely didn't look like a person you'd refer to as "Stan the Man", or anything other than Stanley. He was a basic, clean-cut boy with clear skin and deep eye-bags. "Stan and me went to high school together. He was there during The Neck Brace Incident."
Eddie lowered his eyes. "Excuse me?"
Stan groaned, "It's exactly what it sounds like," and left it at that.
While Stan and Richie discussed the wonders of the universe, Eddie shoved the door closed with his hip and slid down against it until he was sitting on the floor. He faced the empty room and exhaled, finally taking it all in, finally getting a moment of muffled silence.
MalArts. It was only the top art school on the eastern seaboard, situated above Portland but below Brunswick. Not to be confused with CalArts, the art school on the western seaboard. This one was a lot less renowned and a lot less expensive. It was also a hub of conceited assholes who weren't forced to go their by their overbearing mothers, but he digressed.
Speaking of assholes, there was a knock at the door, cutting off Eddie's moment of silence. "Hey, Edward! I'm not exactly a fan of standing out here in my underwear."
He rose quickly and unlocked the door, blushing immensely. He didn't say anything in response as Richie slid past him and returned to his position on the bed, unfolding the magazine again and examining it.
Richie didn't change for the rest of the day, and he definitely didn't leave his room. He spent hours just flipping through the magazine, occasionally sending glances at Eddie as he unpacked his things. A normal person would assume Richie was watching them, but not Eddie. He lived with enough weird people in his life to assume he was just being weird. It was an art school after all.
It was around six PM when Eddie finally could consider himself unpacked.
Unpacking was no normal feat. You couldn't just shove your clothes into a drawer and throw a bag of chips on the dresser. No sir. You had to first clean the room, and when you realize you forgot your miniature vacuum cleaner at your mom's house, you'd have to go around the hall asking for one. Once you finally finished cleaning your space, you would have to vacuum up the chips that your roommate flicked at you in an attempt to get on your nerves.
"Come on. We're just having a little fun here," was his only excuse.
Then the actual unpacking began. Dress shirts, jeans, slacks, cargo pants, socks, tube socks, knee socks, running shorts (in red, yellow, and blue), flannels, polos, tank tops and wife beaters, vests, gloves for formal wear and snowy weather, snow pants, parkas, light jackets, windbreakers, boxers, briefs, boxer briefs, swimwear, pajama bottoms, pajama tops, large T-shirts for pajama tops (in need be), and an assortment of fanny packs. And that was only his first bag.
His second bag was for his medications. Pills, creams, ointments, and EpiPens, all packed neatly into plastic bags and tightly packed into his luggage. However, below all his B-12 tablets and pill packaging was The Bag. He packed that one without his mother's knowledge and sealed it far below the rest.
Of course, when he pulled out The Bag, as discreetly as he tried, Richie Tozier could smell fear. He limbered over to him, away from his assumed position on the bed, and nabbed it from his grip. "Hey, buddy, why're you shaking like that?"
Oh shit, he was shaking. And he was shaking bad. He didn't even notice it.
He didn't respond and grabbed the bag back. "Shouldn't you be unpacking?"
"'Shouldn't you be unpacking'?" he mocked before gesturing to the bag. "What's in the bag?" He crossed his arms.
"Why do you care?" he said after a while, meekly.
"Look, I don't care. I smoked plenty of it in high school."
"You... What?"
"The weed. I know there's weed in that," he laughed, grabbing it back. Before Eddie could stop him, Richie ripped open the small black bag and looked inside, his eyes widening. "Okay, that's not weed."
There were three boxes of condoms, all Trojan, all latex, and a bottle of Durex. Richie bit his lip before laughing, trying to break the awkward silence. "Jeez, Eds. A real freak over here."
Eddie practically tore the bag back from him. "I'd like if you didn't call me that."
He put his hands up defensively. "What? Never been called Eds before?"
"No, dipshit. A freak."
"I didn't mean it in, like, a bad way," he argued as Eddie turned away, shoving the bag back into his bedside drawer. "I meant it in a sexual way. Like, you're-drowning-in-pussy kind of sexual way."
"Look, I don't know if this living arrangement is gonna work."
"Minor inconvenience aside, I feel like we have good chemistry, Edward," he said, sitting back down on his bed, his legs crossed. "Or at least we can. Listen, if you run out of condoms, you can always borrow mine, free of charge. They're natural. Lambskin."
"Thanks, but lambskin condoms don't protect against STDs."
He snorted. "Of course they do, stupid. They're condoms."
He didn't respond to that and instead finally sat down on his bed, finished with his unpacking escapades. "You know they're made from sheep intestines, right?"
"...From what?"
Eddie shook his head and changed the subject. "Whatever. Where're you from, anyway?"
He smiled proudly. "Bangor. I'm so glad I'm outta that shithole."
"I'm from Portland," he murmured and lowered his voice, repeating himself, "I'm from Portland."
"You don't look like it. You look like you crawled outta a back alley in Augusta," he laughed, although he didn't think it was that funny. Eddie shot him a dull look. "So... Photography. What made you pick that?"
He shrugged. "I wasn't real good at anything else. I thought it'd be easy."
"Art school makes everything easy difficult," Richie groaned, his leg jumping at his spoke. He was a lanky guy, too skinny in some places and defined in others. He had fluffy, curly hair that covered his forehead and thick-rimmed glasses. He was still wearing that Street Fighter shirt--the one with a red-ribbon wearing martial arts master on the front, screaming and throwing a punch. He had luckily kicked the slippers off to the side.
"I'll drink to that," Eddie groaned, cradling his jaw in his hand.
That lit Richie up, sending a shock down his spine as he smiled. "You wanna?"
"I wanna what?"
"You wanna get shitfaced?" he smiled, rising from the bed. "We can go out, or we can stay here. Nothing like a good brewski with the boys."
Eddie rolled his eyes and put his hands up. "No, no. I'm finally getting settled. I don't wanna make a bad impression."
Richie voice got quiet and whisper-y, but he was still almost screaming. "Listen, virgin. Everybody here does crack cocaine and LSD. We're the good ones, brother."
"I seriously doubt that."
"There's a traphouse three blocks away from here. I can get a brick in two days if I really wanted." He raised a finger as he lowered himself, pulling an icebox out from under his bed. "But I don't, because the last thing my body needs is more energy."
Oh, boy.
He pulled out two ice-cold bottles of brew, extending one to Eddie, who shook his head. "I really shouldn't."
"It's one beer. What? You can't handle a little booze?"
"It's six-thirty in the fucking afternoon. No, I don't want booze."
"Then do you wanna go out tonight? You prefer getting shitfaced in public?" He sat back down and popped open the cap, bringing the tip to his lips and sipping. Richie's eyes were blown out and settled, watching him, unblinking.
He shook his head again. "I'm not the partying type--"
"Neither am I! We're really similar, Eds."
"You? And me?" He shook his head wildly. "No, no, we are not similar. Not in the slightest. I'm not even sure you're human."
He tipped the bottle back, taking another sip as he smiled. "Whatever. We can just stay in. The offer's still on, though."
"What offer?"
He rolled his eyes and groaned, as if it were the dumbest thing he had ever had the graciousness to witness. "To get shitfaced, dumbass. I usually do it with Stan and then we play Street Fighter on my SNES, but he's with Bill tonight." Eddie didn't know what half that sentence meant.
"You know," he said before a long pause, "If it gets me to finally relax with you around, fuck it. Yeah, let's do it."
Richie gave a yip before handing him the bottle. "Welcome to college."
It was nine PM and Eddie was almost completely blitzed. Richie, on the other hand, was barely keeping himself together.
"So then... Me and Bill, right? We..." He croaked slightly, before admitting, "I lost my train of... thought."
"Do you do this every night?" Eddie slurred, but not quite. He figured one more beer wouldn't hurt, and then he would bid the funny stuff adieu. "Get drunk and play video games and wait three months and then flunk out?"
"I made it through high school," he laughed, dropping his last bottle into the trash before sitting back, propping himself up by his elbows. They were sitting on opposite beds--Eddie's tightly made and pressed, Richie's covered in shirts and blankets and pillows--and had been laughing about nothing for the majority of two hours. Richie was funny, but only when he didn't mean to be.
Richie was giving him these lazy eyes, as if he was trying to squint at him but the muscles in his face wouldn't tighten. Finally, he bit his lip and cracked his neck, asking out of the blue, "Okay, so what's the masturbation arrangement?"
Eddie spit out his sip of beer onto the floor, a mess he'd obviously have to clean up later, and stared at Richie with wild amusement. Sober, he would've been pissed, but now it was just funny. "Excuse me?"
"We're sleepin' together, right? When do I get to jerk off and when do you?"
"When you're alone! Like everyone else."
Richie shook his head, smiling. "No, Stan and Bill already set it up. Bill jerks off Mondays, Wednesdays, Fridays, and Sundays. Stan cranks it Tuesdays, Thursday, and Saturdays."
"Wait, wait... Bill get one more day."
"Bill's also single."
"What do they do while the other one's...?"
He nods, understanding as he takes another sip. "Depending on the time, they text the other when they're done and they punch this time card. At the end of the month, the days you don't use get rolled over, so you can jerk off more later."
Eddie thought this over before asking, "Is that true?"
"No! Of course it's not!" he laughed, smacking his knee as he downed the rest of the bottle. "Imagine people actually did that shit... No, no. What I'm saying is," he paused for a long time as his eyes almost rolled back, "I am super horny right now and I'm asking you... to leave."
Eddie narrowed his eyes, disposing of his last bottle. "Where am I supposed to go?"
He nodded his head over in the opposite general direction. "One of the other rooms. Or outside. A club, perhaps. Unless you want to stay here and hear me belt like a donkey. Ee-aw, Ee-aw," he mocked, his drunken expression melting in and out of a smile.
"Why would you be horny? Like, right now?"
"'Cause you're so cute, Eds. You got me feelin' all warm and shit," he slurred, still propped up by his elbows. That made Eddie blush hard, enough to get a stream of sweat down his back. "Anyway, go over to Stan's room. Keep him company."
Eddie didn't know how to respond to any of this. Maybe he was being complimented by this guy for once, or maybe this was an elaborate joke that he'd walk straight into and fall on his ass. Either way, it'd give him another excuse to send a new roommate request form, so he figured he would win in the end regardless.
He rose slowly, keeping his eyes on Richie as he continued to gesture to the door. "Come on. Get at 'em, boy."
Eddie left the room, pushing the door closed slowly behind him. He heard Richie groan loudly from the other side of the room, more in a joking way than anything else, and now Eddie had a choice. He could either venture off to this Stan guy's room and sleep there overnight, or he could go wander the MalArts campus until he figured Richie would be done. Both seemed like Godawful scenarios.
At least Stan's room would be air conditioned. He hoped.
He walked across the hall and cautiously knocked on the door. It had "Uris & Denbrough" written on a whiteboard on the door and a quote below it: "Hold fast to dreams, for if dreams die, life is a broken-winged bird that cannot fly." Below that was a printed out picture of Stan, taken when he was pissing at a urinal and he noticed a camera taking a photo of him.
He heard a tired, "Come in," from inside and noticed the door was slightly ajar. He nudged it open with his foot, cautious yet curious, and entered Stan's room. Well, it wasn't just Stan's room, apparently. There was another guy sitting on the bottom bunk of their living arrangement, flipping through a number of folders and whispering under his breath. Stan was doing a jigsaw puzzle on the floor.
"...Hi."
"Hello," Stan replied, almost too boldly to be a proper introduction. He looked up from his position on the floor and gave Eddie a look. "Aren't you Rich's roommate?"
He nodded quickly. "Yeah. He kicked me out."
"W-W-Why would he do that?" the other guy asked, lowering the folders into his lap. "We should kick his a-ass, Stan."
"He was..." Eddie didn't know how to explain it, so he made an obscene gesture with his fist. Stan and Bill's eyes widened before the two began snickering, which then developed into full, obnoxious laughter. "Yeah..." he nervously laughed, feeling awkwardly stiff standing in front of the door.
"Richie's such an a-asshole," Bill muttered, returning to his folders.
Stan interjected, "Yeah, I wouldn't want to be there, either. Stay here if you want."
Eddie nodded and awkwardly sat down on the floor next to Stan, cross-legged and sticking out like a sore thumb. He watched as Stan tried a puzzle piece, figured out it didn't fit, and tried another one. This went on for a minute or two before Bill spoke up.
"What's your n-n-name?"
"Eddie. Eddie Kaspbrak."
"Major?" Stan asked, raising his eyebrows, still staring at the puzzle.
"Photography. You?"
Stan pointed to the other. "Bill here is a Fine Arts major, and I'm in Fine Arts Management. So, in conclusion, I'll still be pulling Bill's ass around when we get out of here." He rolled his eyes and finished a corner of the puzzle, bothered. "Have you met Mike yet? Or Ben?"
"Or Beverly?" Bill asked, a little too quietly to hear.
"No. Just Richie."
"What a painful existence that would be," Stan groaned, fitting in another piece. "Just knowing Richie. Let me guess... You got drunk. I can smell it on your breath. Drunk on the first day."
"It's not the first day. We're just getting settled," Eddie argued, the room slightly spinning from underneath him. He was keeping is composure, albeit haphazardly. "I'm not drunk. Richie is drunk. I'm just a little tipsy."
"You're gonna be a little t-tipsy for the rest of college. G-Get used to it." Bill finally finished sorting whatever he had to sort and chucked the folders underneath the bunk bed. "We should get Mike here. Make it a p-p-party."
"You know, you're right. Go knock on his door. I'll keep Short Stack company," he said, eyeing Eddie as he slightly uncoiled.
"That guy's shorter than me, though." He didn't mean it to come out exasperated.
"Oh, Bill? He has tall energy. You're just short," Stan replied as Bill exited, disappearing into the hallway. "You're gonna like Mike. Everybody does."
A minute of complete silence later, Bill reentered with a tall, broad man by his side, a warm smile on his face. It had to be Mike. He was wearing a plaid button-up and slacks, as if he were preparing to head out any second, and had a backpack of books strapped to his back. Some were sketchbooks, but Bill made it clear none of them were Mike's. The second Mike put the pack down, Bill withdrew three sketchbooks and slid them under the bunk bed.
He waved to Stan with a dark, strong hand. "Hey! How's Patricia?"
"Is that how everyone's gonna greet me these days?" he said, smiling as he did a pre-rehearsed handshake with the taller man. Eddie sat and watched, dumbfounded and confused. "I get a hot girlfriend and everyone thinks I'm chop liver."
Mike shot Eddie a dreamy look. "Who's the little guy?"
Eddie furrowed his eyebrows before relaxing them. There was no use fighting it. "Eddie Kaspbrak. Photography."
"You gotta stop greeting people like that, man," Stan said quietly and concerned, a smile on his face. "Say something like, 'Hi, I'm Eddie. Nice to meet you.'"
"Stan, you have no r-r-right to make fun of Eds' social s-skills."
"Whatever," Eddie interjected. "What's your major, Mike?"
"Major in Journalism, minor in Creative Writing," he said, smiling. "I was planning on a double major, but I couldn't fit in my schedule."
"Mike's a busy man," Stan murmured, adding another puzzle piece.
Mike glanced around the room before asking, "Hey, where's Rich?"
Stan pointed in the hallway's general direction. "In his room, choking his chicken."
"I didn't need all the details, Stan," Mike said, scratching the back of his neck. "I seriously doubt he'd actually be doing that, especially if he told you he was going to."
"So, what? We should plan a r-r-raid?"
Mike lowered his eyes and smiled at Eddie. He had a cool, calm way of speaking--a way that could persuade anyone to do anything. "Eddie, what should we do?"
Stan snapped, "We should knock on his door, that's what."
Eerie, devious smiles filled the room as Eddie watched the three boys rise. Almost in unison, they started chuckling and heading to the door, where they leaked out into the hallway towards Richie's room. Mike stayed in the doorway of Stan's room, however, and Eddie just didn't leave. "Guys--"
It was too late. He heard a sudden rapping against a door and then hushed laughter. It had begun.
There was a minute of silence before Eddie heard the door creak open. He wasn't watching--he didn't want to see what could be on the other side--and instead concentrated on the bird puzzle Stan was working on. A stout blue canary sitting on a branch, eyes black and blown out, not a worry in the world. He was around halfway finished with it.
Suddenly there was a loud ruckus from the hallway and a loud hammering from the door. "Can't a guy just get some privacy? For once in his life?"
"You scared the little g-guy away! He's suckin' his thumb in the other r-room!" he heard Bill laugh.
"So I should've let him stay? Huh? I'll show you guys something really scary."
There was a brief silence before the sound of fabric on skin and a loud yelp from Bill. "It's the f-f-first fucking day!"
"Well, I don't got a roommate to jerk me off like you and Stan got."
Eddie heard a slap and then light rough-housing from the hallway. He had half a mind to get up and see what was happening, but the thought was quickly quenched when Richie stumbled into the room, a pair of sweatpants sagging halfway down his thighs, his boxers up tightly as if he just threw them on. He slammed the door behind him and leaned against it, holding it shut.
He was smiling at Eddie deviously, but also with a hint of venom. "You ratted me out, you snitch."
"No I didn't! You kicked me out."
"You didn't have to tell them what I was doing," he groaned, clicking the lock on the door and relaxing off of it. Someone was pounding on the door. "I thought I could trust you, sweetheart."
Sweetheart.
"Anyway, I'm gonna wait until Bill cools off. I think they're gonna run off to Au Bon, so we got some time to kill until then." He slid down to the floor, now to Eddie's level. "Whattya wanna do?"
"Honestly, I just wanna--" He meant to say "sleep", but his words got caught in his throat when he noticed Richie's sweatpants had bunched up around his knees and he was still obviously hard. "I just want to, uh..."
"You wanna go through Bill's sketchbook with me?" Richie's eyes lit up, a smile on his face. He still wasn't aware.
He gulped and nodded slowly. "Uh, yeah. Sure." Invasion of privacy be damned.
Richie smiled--that damn, wide, satisfying smile--and cross the room to the bunk bed. He knelt down and pulled one of the ringed sketchbooks out from the pile, making sure it was the most worn one with the most rips and duct tape. When he turned back, he was still oblivious to his crotch.
He must have noticed. Maybe he was just being an asshole.
Anyway, Richie sat down beside him, almost a little bit too close, and flipped open the sketchbook. He was probably looking for something in particular--maybe some anatomy studies or crappy doodles, drawings of breasts or thighs or pelvises. Maybe that's why he wanted to look through it, just for some more jerk-off material. After all, he did have a slightly lewd Chun-Li poster in his room.
"I actually really like Bill's stuff," Richie admitted, "But he refuses to draw anything nude. Even when they do, like, figure studies, he draws clothes over the naughty bits. It drives his teacher crazy."
Well, that answers that.
He flipped to a noticeably blank page and had a wicked smile on his face. "I'm gonna draw you, Eds," he snickered, grabbing a random Sharpie from off the floor. "It's gonna be great."
"Should you be drawing in his sketchbook?"
"I've drawn a lot worse on his skin. Plus, I'm a great artist," Richie laughed, beginning to draw a crude face with his thick marker. "Hey, it already looks like you," he says, making the guys legs short enough to almost connect his pelvis to his ankles.
"Fuck off."
"I should be a Fine Arts major. I'm a visionary."
"You sure are something," Eddie murmured, watching as Richie finished his obscene drawing. His dick had finally calmed down, thank God, and Eddie could focus on something else. Not like he was actually focusing on Richie's dick, but he digressed.
"Shut up, cupcake," he crooned mockingly, adding Eddie's inhaler to his little, crudely-drawn hand. "Whatever. You're stuck with me. We're gonna get along great."