Chapter 3

"Ah, how nice of you to finally join us Mr. Tozier."Oh, for fucks sake, no. Not him again. Eddie gripped his pencil tight, hesitantly looking up at the door, surely there was someone else called Tozier, please don't be him, please don't be him, please don't be-In all honesty, he didn't know what he had been expecting, for there stood Richie Tozier, backpack slung over one shoulder, hand still on the door handle, and watching the teacher with a false apologetic look on his face.

"I'm sorry Mr. uh..." he glanced down at the nametag, "Ferris, I uh... got busy with some...things." Mr. Ferris, stared at the boy with an expressionless face, he seemed like he didn't give a damn about Richie's attendance, but still had to put up an annoyed act, to at least keep up the illusion of his deep care about their education, and so putting down his abnormally large Spanish book, asked with a bored voice. "And what was so important that it kept you from turning up to class on time," Richie didn't reply immediately, his brows slightly furrowed and eyes fixed on the fat Spanish textbook, looking a bit confused. Then blinking and tilting his head up to scan the room until his eyes finally landed on Eddie, and with a slightly upturned mouth turned his head back to Mr. Ferris, replying shortly "I got caught up doing some stuff," The teacher blinked tiredly at Richie's vague answer, and when neither looked like they would be saying anymore, motioned Richie to go sit down at one of the desks. Richie of course, beelined for the empty seat next to Eddie, who was not irritated but not exactly pleased with Richie's presence, and the boy dumped his stuff onto the desk and began to take out an old notebook and a single pen.

"What are you doing here? " Eddie asked, tapping his pencil impatiently on the desk. Richie's entrance had signaled the end of everyone's attention span, and there was a low hum of voices as Richie shoved his bag onto the floor and slouched in his seat, turning to eddie with a smile. "Well Eduardo, I do believe that one needs an education to grow in society and the ranks of life in general," This was all said in a horrible cockney accent, and Eddie made a strange face at Richie's terrible attempt at being British.

"Right. makes sense, which is obviously why you have never turned up to class before.", he said with a hint of sarcasm, raising an eyebrow. Richie didn't give an answer straight away but instead flicked the old notebook until he landed on a clean page, popping open his pen lid and writing down the date and title, then he put his pen down and, looking eddie in the eye said flirtatiously, "I couldn't possibly skip knowing that there was an extremely cute boy in the class,"

...

Eddie didn't say anything not knowing how to respond to Richie's....strange comment, confusion taking over his face. Richie rolled his eyes and with half a grin said, "Geez Eds cant ya take a joke," he paused and looked at something over his shoulder, whispering, "My side hoe told me Betty Ripsoms in this class- and let me tell you, Betty," he gave a low whistle and a sly smile, "Has one hell of an ass" Eddie scoffed, of course this is why Richie came to class, he really shouldn't have expected him to actually learn "That's so gross Rich, could you just I don't know, get on with the work?" "But Eds, have you seen it?" he said in awe "I don't know what she's been eating, but her boobs are just as humoungo-"

"Richie." Eddie cut in, "Now is not the time." "So your saying we can talk about this later?" the boy asked hopefully, unfazed by Eddie's unamused face. Richie gave a defeated sigh after a few seconds, and looked at Eddie, who was trying really hard not to roll his eyes for the umpteenth time, "But-" he protested, not wanting to drop the subject of hot girls. "No" Eddie deadpanned, removing himself from the conversation, and focusing back on the board, and preparing to do some more mind numbing problems. Richie huffed and glanced back down at his own notebook muttering, "Stick in the mud," "I heard that dickhead." Eddie said not looking up and rummaging in his pencil case for a ruler. "Well maybe you were meant to." "Fuck you." "When and where?"

...

3 minutes. 3 minutes was all it took for Richie to completely lose all focus and pester Eddie again. The small boy squeezed his eyes shut in frustration at the 6th poke in the last ten seconds. "What," he whispered harshly, whipping his head around to Richie, who was leaning on his arm, laying across the desk and doodling on the corner of his empty page, eyes drooping a bit as his pen wobbled in his grip

"Can you just leave me the fuck alone, I have to get this done," Richie's facial expression made no change at eddies evident annoyance, and he looked down at his empty paper and then back up at eddie "I'm boooored Eds,"

"Well that's not my fucking problem now is it?" Eddie snapped, turning back to his own page, now half full of numbers, equations, formulae- all things math. For a second he thought that Richie had finally stopped, when all that could be heard was the quiet murmur of voices and the turning of glossy pages of a book that the teacher was reading, but alas, the peace was short lived as Richie leaned over to Eddie and whispered,

"Eeeedddieeeee, Edssssss, Eduardooooo, Eddissoooonnnn", with each word, there followed a poke to the arm, and Eddie was losing his patience, his anger growing by the second. "Shut the fuck up Richard", Eddie growled, grabbing Richie's wrist halfway to his arm and pinning it to the surface of the desk, and a very surprised Richie stopped his antics completely, now seeing that eddie was genuinely tired of his shit. But Richie being Richie, couldn't resist a prod at the fire, and said with a mischievous grin, "Woah there Eds, I didn't take you as a guy with top energy, but damn, that's kinky."

"Oh, for the love of Jesus Christ," Eddie groaned, holding his head in his hands whilst Richie chuckled beside him. "Won't you help a boy out Eduardo, I don't get any of this shit." Richie whined, pushing eddies shoulder lightly, to get the boy to look back up at him, "The only reason I came here was to be with you...and talk about Betty" he added quickly, "But you don't want to do that, so now I actually have to learn, and I really don't want to, because math is fucking boring and-"

"Mr Tozier" a stern voice interrupted, causing eddie to lift up his head, and Richie to halt mid rant, "Watch your profanities, you are not to be talking so much in this class, math is an important subject. If you need any help, you should be asking me, and if not you should zip your mouth or else see me after class." Mr. Ferris eyed Richie grimly, taking in his slouched posture and lazy grin, this kid is nothing but trouble, he thought, putting down his Spanish textbook and throwing Richie an expectant look, waiting for a response.

Richie's mouth opened and shut like a goldfish, his head swivelling around to look at the other students in the classroom, who had also been talking. He was ticked off that Mr Ferris had singled him out as he clearly wasn't the only one who wasn't paying attention, he frowned slightly, about to retort, when his eyes landed on the Spanish book in hand a wicked glint flashing through his eyes and the corners or his mouth tilting up.

"Well you see Mr Ferris, I didn't want to interrupt you and your reading," he said, straightening up a bit, and plastering an innocent look on his face, "I can tell that you were very, very into your book, considering that you've been on the same page for the past half an hour."

  The noise suddenly died down and it was as though everyone had just now acknowledged Richie's statement to be true, and had wanted to listen in on the conversation. Mr Ferris could feel his palms become clammier as he gripped the edges of the textbook very tightly, trying his best to look confused as he furrowed his eyebrows and stared at Richie, surely this kid hadn't seen? No, he couldn't have, but what if, he gulped and said "This is an extremely interesting book, I happen to have taken a liking to French-"

"But Mr Ferris" Richie cut in "I suggest that you get the latest copy of Juggs, yours is from last week, if you really want something interesting to read, since Spanish doesn't seem to be your strong suit" teased Richie, not being able to contain the smirk on his face at having caught the man red handed, the whole class erupting into laughter at the flustered teacher, who wasted no time in slamming the textbook shut, but not before tucking the magazine in between the pages, his attempt at being subtle failing as the kids at the front got a perfect view of the front cover, bursting into louder giggles at the embarrassed man.

"SILENCE," he shouted, but to no avail, the class remained extremely noisy, still chuckling at what had happened, and, sitting down in defeat, he proceeded to hide his face behind the textbook for the rest of the lesson, the pages now visibly turning as he read. There was a huge grin on Richie's face as he turned towards an unimpressed Eddie, "Why the actual fuck did you do that?"

"Why the actual fuck was he reading porn in class", Richie said with a pointed look, "He had it coming for him, if I hadn't seen the magazine, I'm sure someone else would have, besides, he wasn't doing a great job at hiding it either,"

Eddie had no words, he knew the poor guy would be a laughingstock now, and decided to ignore that Richie had a point. "Anyways," he heard the boy speak from beside him, "now you can help me with this," whilst distastefully gesturing towards the board. "I don't want to" Eddie stated simply.

"Well no shit Sherlock, it may come as a surprise but, I'd kinda figured that out by now", he said propping his elbows onto the desk and resting his chin in his palms, and then with the bat of his eyelashes and small pout on his mouth continued, "But do a poor boy a favour Eds, and help me out"

Richie watched as eddie let out a small sigh, and turned back to his work, shuffling his papers around and looking through his pencil case, appearing to have ignored Richie's desperate pleas for help. He waited for a few seconds, before focusing back on his own paper, slightly disappointed and disheartened that Eddie hadn't helped him. 

He let his arms drop and he lay across his desk again, scribbling away in the corner of his paper, the margins already being full of random objects- chairs, pens, bags, a balding, overly fat Mr. Ferris, and a crossbreed between a chicken and a man which Richie had so imaginatively thought up. I've annoyed him, he thought, as he drew some feathers on the underside of the chicken man's leg. I took it too far, I bet he's probably pissed off at me. I know he thinks I'm just some stupid guy with my mom jokes, I mean he's not wrong, but I really need him to.... I need him to....

Richie couldn't quite put his finger on it, but he felt as though he needed eddie to like him- not romantically of course, that would be gay, but he didn't want eddie to dislike him. There was a certain pull he felt, as if he was drawn to him, something in his heart, a strong magnetic force almost as if he needed to-

The snapping of his pencil lid broke his train of thought and he dove back in to reality, What the actual fuck, he thought furrowing his brows and shaking his head a bit, What's wrong with me? Eddie's not special or anything, there's no magnetic pull, What the fuck was up with all that cheesy shit, there wasn't anything wrong in wanting to make some new friends, and that's all that Eddie was. A nice, new friend, that's it. That's it." 

Richie reassured himself over and over, but even though he played those thoughts on repeat, as he started drawing a dick next to me Ferris' face, he didn't quite believe them. Because in truth, Richie found eddie very intriguing. More than he would like to, but he just couldn't figure out why, which is what frustrated him the most. Richie Tozier, like eddie, wasn't one to willingly socialise, having stuck to the same two friends since elementary school, which is why it was so strange to him, to actually want to get to someone new. 

Someone different. 

Someone like eddie.The scraping of a chair being dragged to his desk, made him look up suddenly, a smile breaking out across his face, as he pushed some curls out of his hair, put his pencil down, and once again propped himself up on his elbows. Just as Richie was about to speak Eddie cut in, "Shut up, I'm only doing this because I'm a nice person and because," he eyed Richie paper littered with doodles and gave a huff, "because I don't want you drawing dicks everywhere, so... Don't expect me to do this again."

"Yes sir, understood, sir" said Richie firmly, giving a mock salute and then a wink, causing eddie to roll his eyes. The boy swiveled around in his chair, reaching over to grab his own workpapers, and set them down on Richie's desk, turning around to explain to him, "Now tell me, what did you need help with?"

Richie cleared his throat awkwardly, blinking a few times, scratching his head and murmuring, "uh....everything?"

Eddie shook his head slightly, and pulled Richie's paper towards him, but just before he began to rapidly explain, Richie could swear he caught the ghost of a smile of Eddie's face, disappearing quickly as he concentrated on solving the complicated questions. 

Eddie must have been talking for at least 15 minutes, slowly packing the page up with the equations, and formulae of how to solve them, even drawing tiny arrows showing how to complete the method, all for the benefit of Richie, except the boy was hardly paying attention, after hearing the words 'parametric equation' he had completely lost the plot, zoning out and existing in his own little world. 

It wasn't a lie that Richie had tried to focus, thinking only about the words Eddie was saying, but soon realized that he wasn't actually processing anything, only watching the way Eddie's mouth moved, while no sound came out of it.

  He stared.

He was paying attention, just not to the right thing, not at the right time, and definitely not the right way. Eddies lips, Richie thought, were a pretty pink- a very pretty pink, standing out against his pale skin, so it would be quite difficult to not look at them, Richie thought, while remembering that they reminded him of the pastel pink wrappers of his favourite bubble gum.

 He watched as Eddie nibbled on them unconsciously, whilst working away, his teeth nipping away in slow rhythms, the pink flesh being pulled and released from their grip. His lips arched up into his cupid's bow perfectly, the corners tilting up ever so slightly, and his bottom lip being just a tad bit fuller than the top. They are so pretty. So very pretty. I bet they're soft, they look soft, I wonder how they would feel on.....

wait-

"Hey, HEY dickhead! Helloo, Earth to Moronville?"Eddie said snapping his fingers in front of Richie's face, the boy's dazed look melting into one of mild surprise and slightly widened eyes, searching Eddie's face before calming down again. He couldn't read minds could he?  Richie gulped looking away from Eddie's gaze, his cheeks heating up, had he really been thinking about...... 

No, he was straight. 

He was sure of that.

He doesn't even know eddie. 

He was straight, definitely straight. 

He didn't even a reason not to be. 

The mind wanders to funny places sometimes a wise person once said...maybe

Actually if he just forgot about this moment it wouldn't even matter. 

There. 

Done. 

Forgotten. 

He couldn't dwell on something he didn't remember.

"What the fuck were you thinking about?" Eddie asked, irritated, knowing that Richie had definitely not been paying attention.Richie blinked once.He blinked twice.And suddenly gathering himself, looked Eddie dead in the eye, and smirked"Fucking your mom"

...

A/N

Heyyyy y'all Richie's acting a little sus isn't he?👀 

This is part of the prewritten chapter I wrote back in like October and I'm rly tired rn so I haven't read it over and now I'm hoping it just fits in with everything else I've written. Anywaysss don't forget to voteeee and tell your friends abt this story, lmao jk but like I hope you liked it :))

Have a great dayyy see you in the next update <3