"FUCK YOU, FUCK YOU, FUCK YOU," Elle toppled out of the maze with a fumble of her ankles, bruising them a little as she did so, but she didn't care. Her only concern was trying to stop her heart from jumping painfully out of her chest. "FUCK YOU, RICHIE! Oh my GOD," she inhaled deeply, her voice becoming raspy.
Richie's laughter choked him from around his waist and almost stopped his breathing entirely. "Holy fuck, I didn't think I'd get you that good, you freaked the hell out," he taunted, an out-of-breath gasp for air separating each word in the heckling sentence.
She couldn't see it in the darkness blanketing the world around them, but his smile grew to touch every part of his inner being, bringing him to life with a joy that he hadn't felt since he was four years old. With his hand on his chest, he gave himself time to recover from the effects of the cruel prank he'd played on the girl that he held closest to him:
As the two sifted through the dried towers of corn while they remained hand-in-hand, Elle cautiously peered through whatever separation the stalks had left between themselves. When she decided the coast had been cleared, she led the way, tugging Richie behind her closely. But his roguish character had other plans; Forcing himself to break their gravitational hold and sink into the field of crops surrounding the pair.
When she no longer felt his hold around her, a touch of anxiety hit her core like a searing rush of lava, heating her up from within despite it being only 40 degrees. She tried to soothe the broadening feeling of abandonment by calling out to him in a careful tone. "Richie? Richie, come on dude, where the fuck did you go? This is fucked." Her voice wavered, the dirt path under her acting as a trail for her panic to lead her down. She laughed inwardly as she said this, and the sound reached Richie like echolocation, pouring him to the brim with excitement. And tenderness. That too.
"Fine," she gave a shrug of her tense shoulders. "I'm leaving without you. Screw this."
She repeated the pattern of analyzing the space in between every stalk of corn while she got herself more and more lost in the midst of it. The silence was almost unsettling if it weren't for the fact she could hear chatters and screams of families a few rows over, but as far as the area she'd managed to get herself lost in, it was about as silent and dark as the stream flowing at night. There were no voices, or chatters, or screams, or families, or people at all for that matter. Except for Richie's asshole self.
When he found her vulnerable enough, he used his lanky figure to pull himself through the crinkling husks of the tall vegetable and wrap around her arm with tense fingers. She sucked in a sharp breath that stuck in her chest like a knife, said her first "fuck you!" of many, and miraculously managed to find her way out of the network of paths and hedges with the newfound adrenaline.
Now, they both folded over themselves in hysterics on the exit-side of the maze, a place that nobody else had found yet. It was a lot quieter than where the entrance was placed, but not too far off from it. Richie could still hear the music blaring over the speakers.
Once she composed herself of the happiness she was clearly feeling, she glared at him. "You're such a dick, Richie. I hate you. I swear to God I do."
A smirk of arrogant triumph faded into his features. "Now, if that were true, you wouldn't have held my hand and cried like a baby when I let go."
She nudged his ribcage with the sharp edge of her elbow, departing from him afterwards.
"Where are you going?" He inquired, bending over with his hands on his knees in an effort to catch his breath.
"I'm sitting over here on this bench," she pointed to a wooden seat placed against the side of a barn, "I'm tired."
"Why? Is the Hanlon Family Fright Fest too much for you, Elowynn? You gonna keep being a little baby?"
A roll of her eyes complimented her twisted expression. "By the looks of it, you're not too energized either, Toaster. Know your place." She respired, sitting on top of the oak planks. She smoothed the edges of her skirt and took a minute to refresh the power in her body.
Every little bass and bridge in 'I Melt with You' by Modern English could be heard from their side of the empty barn, filling the sky and flooding the environment with a sense of exhilaration. Richie grinned in response to her facetious remark, taking what he considered to be "his place", in her words, right next to her.
"I love this song," she commented, her eyes shut blissfully while they rested.
Open them back up. Show me the windows to your perfectly-good soul. Look at me the way I look at you. "Yeah? Really? Kind of a cliché if you ask me," he replied, pulling at the threads of his jeans.
"The clichés are great, Rich. That's why they're clichés."
She opened her eyes back up, absorbing his presence with those light brown irises that filled the empty space stretching between them. They were just like the maze they had run through -- he couldn't help but get lost in them. The eyes were no longer the windows to the soul, they were the golden gateway to every positive emotion he could think of.
They no longer spoke to each other, for they only conversed with their golden gateways. Her eyes looked like coming home, Richie thought, but this time, his home wasn't filled with a dense emptiness.
Her soft lips pulled into the corner of her cheek as she watched him mouth the lyrics to the song she claimed to love, and Richie couldn't help but hope that she'd begin to love him the way she loved that song. Maybe that was the whole point.
"You're stupid," she uttered, but the smile on her face was enough to tell him how much she was really enjoying it.
"You don't like it?" He asked.
"No," she lied, still spreading her smirk across her face.
He continued to sing along, out loud this time, using his hands to emphasize his enthusiasm. "I'll stop the world and melt with you,"
"Stop..."
"You've seen the difference and it's getting better all the time," he continued.
"Richie-"
"There's nothing you and I won't-"
He was interrupted by her palm pressing against his lips while she slipped beautiful laughter out of her own. "You're incredibly annoying, you really are. I guess that's why they call you Trashmouth."
He remained silent for a minute, staring at her hand, then at her face, then back at her hand. "I'm gonna lick you again," he finally muffled. She snatched her hand away, exposing the smile he had hidden underneath it.
When she seized it away, it didn't find comfort by her side again. Instead, she placed it on his shoulder, wrapping her hand around the back of his neck. Her fingers combed through the warmth of his hair and she could feel every curl of his twist and turn under her touch. They were the color of obsidian and turned to diamond with each stroke. He could hear her repeating how beautiful she thought he was even though her mouth wasn't moving.
Her mouth. God, that mouth. Richie's gaze perplexed over it and realized that it held millions of fulfilled promises. Her lips were blushing and full, doused with an energetic pull that unconsciously lured him in.
And he figured that just like her eyes, and the maze, and his life, and her presence, that he'd get lost in those, too.
YOU ARE READING
Lover | Richie Tozier
Fanfiction"Her soft lips pulled into the corner of her cheek as she watched him mouth the lyrics to the song she claimed to love, and Richie couldn't help but hope that she'd begin to love him the way she loved that song. Maybe that was the whole point." ____...
