Chapter Text
JUNIOR YEAR: Green
The argument they have over costumes is enormous, the biggest yet; starts on a Tuesday and takes a week to settle and decombust. Rich hates the color Virgil chose, and leaves the station in a huff after a ten minute long shouting match.
Virgil hesitantly offers another design a week later, if Richie will drop by the house after school.
When the dust cleared, Richie was brushing lint off of the surprisingly well made purple and yellow jacket and trying not to fit his palms into the siren call of V’s hair. The dreadlocked teen cleared his throat and caught Richie’s eye in the mirror, looking mildly annoyed and itching for another argument.
“You mind, Osgood?”
Richie’s eyes went dark as his grip tightened briefly on the line of Virgil’s shoulders. “Nah, I don’t.”
“Richie…”
That kind of order, that small sound of a keen, it made Richie want to grab Virgil’s hips so hard it bruised. Pale hands rose instead, in surrender, as Rich backed away a little and moved to share the mirror with his friend.
Idly, as he looked at his own green circuited suit, the blonde wondered when Virgil had learned how to sew, but something told him not to ask. They’d been volatile together lately, frustration building up easily as if they needed a good fight to unwind each other, but it wasn’t all bad. The Bang had definitely created plenty of super-punks for the pair of them to fight, and Richie was almost grateful for their extra angry energy when it meant they could pull all nighters three days in a row and still make school at a decent hour. He was definitely grateful that it left them exhausted enough that they didn’t have to speak with each other. (He carefully didn’t think about why exactly he felt violent around V.)
And Richie wasn’t stupid; he had known why they couldn’t stand to be around each other the way they used to. The blonde had been telling himself that it was because they were learning how to mesh with each other again— that the year apart had really changed them both and they were trying to make new edges fit— but in the middle of the night, on Virgil’s floor in a sleeping bag or crashing on the couch in the gas station or crashing in V’s bed together, Richie was old enough to admit that it was probably because they wanted to fuck each other senseless.
It was new to Virgil, Rich could tell. They had grown up in each other’s pockets, Richie knew what got V’s motor running and knew the look he got on his face when he was at a full tank of gas, but it had always been for girls before. V had never allowed himself to look at another guy like that. Stretching had never put that on his face before, and neither had working on his gadgetry without a shirt on. But there V was all the time, spread fluidly over the couch like a damn centerfold, watching Richie work with dark, dark eyes. The confusion came fast on its heels every time, too, a cute wrinkle to his nose and shy glances as Virgil swung his legs back to the floor, tried to busy himself with something else.
But nothing should’ve changed for Richie. He had always wanted that, and he had always known that, but it had been...doubled, or something, by the night of the Big Bang. Something about Virgil almost losing his life had made Richie’s inner animal grab tightly to the idea of his friend and he had yet to figure out how to separate himself without going a little crazy.
And he had gone a little crazy, but not without goading from Virgil. What had happened, it was a two way street. Richie was still picking up the pieces after that fight even though it had been a month ago.
“You don’t look half bad, Rich.”
The flat, blank stare in the mirror was his own; when he refocused on Virgil, he found the teen had moved behind him and the warm line of V at his back made Richie suppress a shiver. “Yeah? All I get’s a ‘not bad’?”
He had been trying for teasing, maybe even mocking, something friendly and open in a way they hadn’t been lately. But his voice was a low, crawling thing, had dropped down on all fours and was slinking without permission. Virgil got that look in his eyes that Richie had only seen once before, and took a step closer.
“Gotta earn anything else, Richie. Don’t you think?”
A gap of five inches. Virgil leaned forward just a little bit and it put his chin right over Richie’s shoulder, made him close enough that Richie’s skin lit up with the sensation of V’s dreads trailing across it, gave his back the solid weight of V’s chest behind him without actually giving him the feel of it against his back. Richie sucked in a breath, eyes narrowed and pinned by Virgil’s in the mirror. That look he kept giving Rich, it was a fucking challenge. Virgil probably didn’t even know he was doing it, that he had been doing it for an entire month even when they were arguing, but Richie wanted to spank it off of him.
“I think I might deserve it on principle, Hawkins.”
Virgil had the nerve to huff a laugh in Richie’s ear, the sound smooth and his lips too damn close to the shell of it. He took one step closer and Rich felt hyper aware of it, knew there must be something like a three inch gap between them and realized in a moment of small hysteria that this was the closest they had been since that night without being injured. With a helpless feeling, Richie swayed back into the gravity of Virgil and almost gasped when they connected, a small brush of his shoulder against V’s chest.
In the mirror, Virgil’s eyes dilated.
A door closed loudly downstairs and— this was usually where they might’ve sprung apart, caught red-faced by each other, but Virgil stood his ground and that’s when Richie felt his eyes grow wider. He could only watch as Virgil turned slightly, his nose brushing the pale shell of ear now as he murmured, "We okay?"
"Shit, man," Richie breathed, "we’re not. I...you know that."
Virgil swallowed, his nose brushing just behind Richie's ear now, soft passes that jolted through the blonde each time they happened. "Yeah, Rich. I know."
"Jesus, V—"
The blonde felt powerless in this position, an odd feeling that he didn't think he'd really have again. Richie couldn't have moved even if Sharon had come up the stairs and slammed open the door, not with Virgil's lips making the barest of passes on Richie's skin as the darker teen nuzzled into the crook of his friend's neck. Instead, Richie leant back into Virgil's space completely and closed his eyes with a soft noise. It felt a little silly, for his head to loll back into Virgil's shoulder, but all the other boy did to accommodate his weight was step even closer.
When V's arm came up to circle his waist, he almost wanted to cry, it felt so good.
"Richie, I...I know I haven't apologized properly for last year, or last month. And I know you weren't looking for an apology but, you deserve one, man, just for puttin' up with my bullheadedness, you feel me?"
Virgil stopped and took a deep breath, arm tightening around Richie's waist before he let go. Pressing a small kiss to the back of Richie's ear, he pulled away completely, waiting until he had Richie's gaze in the mirror again. "I ain't running from this talk any more, man. I'm open to whatever you want to discuss, whatever you want to ask."
Richie nodded silently, beet red from hairline to collar as he met V's gaze in the glass, skin tingling-- probably from too much static electricity in that air, he thought with an edge of hysteria.
"Understood, V."
With a nod, Virgil headed to the bathroom to change, darting a quick glance out of his room to check for Sharon before slipping into the hallway.
In the mirror Richie looked down at all the green, spans and spans of it, and determinedly didn't look at his own blush. The dark green of the mimicked circuits looked stark and good against the mint, something Richie wouldn't have thought of but, as he remembered fondly, it was something V had thought up one night while looking at a pair of his sister's heels.
He shoved sappy-ass thoughts of new beginnings from his mind with a wry grin at himself in the cool glass. Richie wouldn't have changed their beginning for anything. It was the denouement they needed to hash out.