a corruption of the mind [r.t.]

1

  — May 7th, 1993

     His heart was shattered that fateful day he went to school, expecting to see your beautiful, gleaming smile those braces had created and your striped sweaters you would always wear. Your shining personality, a ray of hope that sliced through the rotten decay of this horrid Derry High School.

     He thought for sure that he would be long gone from this world before letting you go, but it turns out that God really did hate him enough to take away the last bit of happiness he had standing for himself. Of course He did, look at what a terrible mistake He had created. The horrors of the power of creation is what he, Richie Tozier was. Even so, you seemed to not mind. In fact, with those kissable lips, you would tell him that he was a blessing, maybe not everyone, but he was to you. What comforting lies.

     He leaned on the side of the school with his Aquafina bottle full of vodka he snatched from his Mother that morning, taking a swig of the harsh liquid and letting the tears fall. Yet, his face stayed expressionless, knowing that you wouldn't have wanted to see him in such a week state. His mind rushed even with the vodka in his system, and he suddenly wished that Beverly was still around to lend him a cig, she always had the good ones. He never did any of these things when you were around.

     Oh how he wished he could be as dillusional as eleven-year-old Bill, saying you were just missing and that all of this could be solved by beating that fucking clown to death. Even he knew that what happened couldn't be solved with "courage", shit, it couldn't be solved at all. You were out of his grasp forever, and it finally hit him how real this was. And how dumb he was. Here they came, the tears.

     What he would do to see you standing in front of him right now, taking the plastic bottle out of his hand and dumping it out on the freshly mown grass. Then you would scold him about skipping class again, but he would smile through it because you skipped class just to tell him that. Fuck. Who said loss would be such a pain in the ass? If he knew it hurt this much, then he would have had more sympathy for Stuttering Bill.

     "What are you doing here?" The baby face of Eddie Kaspbrak appeared in front of him, eyed red from crying and holding his inhaler tightly to his chest. He must have already found out, the whole school probably already knew. He could hear them whispering all the gory details they added to make it more interesting, and the teachers who would tell the principle who would squish nine-hundred hormonal growing teens into a small gymnasium and talk about how sad=bad and pls don't hurt urself.

     "Skipping that fucking assembly what else?" He took off the headphones he had on, turning off his Walkman that was blasting a Nirvana song, slightly annoyed. He watched Eddie's face go from disbelief to disgust, not believing the sight in front of him. They had not spoken at all after the incident of '89, at least from his perspective. He drifted away from them, finding comfort in the junkies when he discovered them in high school. Then he would realize he didn't fit in anywhere, and later on discover the blossoming rose named [Name].

     God he loved you, he never did get to say it to your face, but he hoped he showed it to you in his actions. You deserved everything in the world, and he knew that he would never have a chance with a girl like you. Your [Hair Color] locks that fell smoothly down your back reminded him of waterfalls he could only see on postcards and your [Eye Color] eyes that always had this life to them, that light that left so quickly. Like it was not even there. It scared him sometimes that he depended on someone so much, but he let himself get out of control, just to be able to see your small form in front of him with that cute little look you gave him. How was he supposed to know? Was he too blinded by his love to see that you were secretly hurting? That underneath your striped sweaters you were hiding your scars? That behind that smile was a sixteen-year-old girl holding her head while she screamed?

     "I didn't know you could be this big of a dick until I saw you right now," Eddie tightened his hold on his inhaler, trembling from anger, "[Name] just fucking died and here you are smoking your fucking blunt and drinkung vodka out of a plastic bottle! Richie Tozier, trash mouth, and attention whore! A friend just died and you're still making this about yourself! How selfish can you get-?!"

     "Listen you disabled fuck head," the smaller boy instantly shuts up, " I don't care that you think you're such a fucking good person because you cried about someone's death, and I don't wanna hear none of your bullshit things like 'oh you're soooo disrespectful' cuz you didn't know her like I did!"

     The silence between them seeped tension and anger, neither of them thought that they would be reuniting in such a way. Richie knew he could not avoid so many people in such a small town for too long, but he thought that it would just be an exchange of hi's and disappearance. Nobody even suspected that the fragile Eddie Kaspbrak would face trash-but-not-so-much-mouth Richie. Not even his closest friends, hell, they were looking for him right now, knowing that he would be taking this pretty hard. The guy had the biggest crush on her, and now she was gone.

     "Whatever, go on and spread your fucking AIDs around and drink yourself dead, see if I care," Eddie turned to leave, looking back one more time, "it wouldn't be the first time in your family."

     And so he did, he drunk until it was all empty. He cried, knowing that you weren't here to hug him to sleep. Not anymore.

—

∆ Okay, so here's the first chapter. I needed something to spill my emo heart out onto and this is what I'm doing. I don't exactly know where this story is going, but I do know it's gonna be dark, so be ready bb's ;)