Chapter Text
Richie Tozier had been having a shit year. Sure, he now remembered his friends the Losers, but two of them were gone. Sure, he finally felt comfortable being gay in his own skin, but the love of his life would never know. Sure, the fucking clown ancient fucking extra-terrastrial spirit shitbag was finally dead, but what did it really matter? Sure, Steve was able to reschedule some of those tour dates and just rearrange his career, but now he just wanted a damn hiatus.
And now that he had that hiatus – late April 2017 having his last tour date to make-up – he was back at home, sitting and feeling uneasy. The Losers did weekly calls and they rotated between playing games with him over Discord when possible, but he just felt lonely. Empty. Hopeless. He cleaned his apartment regularly, never remembering a time where he kept it so pristine. If the Losers noticed when they passed through LA, they didn’t say anything about it.
If he started cleaning compulsively while they were there, Mike or Ben would be the ones to jump in and help out. Bev would pull up a chair and talk his ear off about music, movies, or places in the Caribbean he should travel to with them. Bill would put on one of Richie’s classic vinyls, sometimes it is set record like A Night at the Met, by Robin Williams, other’s Paul’s Boutique by the Beastie Boys, but always when they were done switching it to side two of Talking Heads Remain in Light, and then write while sitting on the couch.
Then, on Cinco de Mayo he decides to pull himself out of the house and to a gay bar. He gets hit on by someone who is far too young, but just the right height, with large brown eyes, soft brown hair, and who laughs at his jokes. All he ever wanted really. They keep knocking back palomas, fuzzing Richie’s brain because he can see him enjoying such a cocktail as an adult with all the fruit variations, and yeah, this person is totally the hole in his head and heart he has been looking for the past year. Right?
They grind and dance and kiss and the other person puts her tongue in Richie’s mouth and suddenly his fantasy is gone and he is completely sober. This isn’t his love. His love would ask for an entire CBC panel to get a health history before making out. Richie looked up what that was in October when he thought of a new joke before throwing it in the trash when he turned to tell it to his love that wasn’t there. He disentangled himself from the person opposite him, told him thanks for the great time, but he wasn’t ready for that, wasn’t over his last situationship.
Jokes to protect himself. Moreso to protect the other guy.
He got a cab home at 11 at night, scrubbed himself raw in a burning show and cried himself to sleep.