Lover | Richie Tozier

Chapter 63.

December wonderlands overcame the weakening November foliage, overturning into a new month like Richie would restlessly turn in his bed at night. Weeks brushed by with no real presence and the bitter cold numbed him even further than he already was. Reaching into his fingertips, the inability to feel surged through his system, desensitizing everything else inside of him with cruel suffering.

The fact that he felt numb again wasn't anything surprising; it was the fact that he somehow felt high off of it. It was pain, but it was still something. During hissing midnights and whiteouts with his eyes glued to the ceiling, he let the numbness consume him just so he could be sure that he was still alive. He felt everything yet he felt nothing at all.

Richie now ambled down the empty school hallway and hardly made a dent on the earth below him. Unlike the night of the first snowfall when he conversed with Eddie on the bench, his butterfly wings had since been clipped.

He glanced down at his knuckles and assessed the fresh wounds that were left there the night before by another outburst. They weren't physically bleeding anymore, but emotionally they were. It seemed like they always would be. Some scars never fade if they're deep enough.

"This fucking burns," he hissed to himself, his whispering voice barely cutting through the quiet air. The sting was warm and deep, but not like the kind that Elle would give to him. This kind of ache spiraled through him and scolded his abdomen. He took a sharp turn into the bathroom, ready to feel chilled water caress over his wounds and put out the fire that he had started.

The squeal of the faucet echoing through the room was almost cinematic as Richie turned the cold iron knobs. In waves of relief, cold water took the role of the most efficient thief of warmth. It seeped into his wounds and provided him with so much relief that his hand began to slightly shake. He tipped his head back, staring at the lights above him before closing his eyes and shutting himself off from the world.

When he opened them back up again, he glanced down towards his hands, and then straight foreword at himself in the mirror. His broken expression agitated him so much that he grew surprised he hadn't driven a fist through that mirror, too. His knuckles fastened themselves around the knob again, turning it with more force in an effort to rid the world of all of its water. The only thing that could be heard in that moment were singing streams, unsteady exhales, and a breaking heart.

Just when Richie had grown accustomed to the stillness of everything, a harsh question rumbled out from behind him and overpowered his feelings of bitterness.

"He's home, isn't he?"

Richie's eyes measured over the reflective surface in front of him again. The faucet stopped leaking, drawing his attention to the evil that took form in the boy facing his back.

A primitive part of Richie's brain twitched and filled itself with anger that only sought to harm. His eyes narrowed in an obvious scowl. "Why do you care?" He rattled, turning around and tasting the inside of his cheek with his tongue.

"I don't," Henry shrugged disdainfully. "Maybe you need it. Maybe someone will finally shut you up. It's what you need, Richie. Your dad is only there to do what mine couldn't."

Without the conscious ability to grasp onto it and hold it back, a sarcastic laugh scoffed between Richie's raw lips. "It's been almost 10 years, dickface. Aren't you over that by now? Learn to let go a little, Jesus Christ," he advised arrogantly.

Henry was unable to keep himself from launching foreword, ready to feel Richie's throat between his tight hands like it was the only thing that'd ever cure the burn within him. As if he had been training all his life for this, which he had been, Richie slid to the side and missed the strike.