#heartache over the albums like they’re actually novels

[moonlightsapphic]

for the past 24 hours I’ve been listening to fletcher’s you ruined new york city for me, the s(ex) tapes, and girl of my dreams and crying about the sapphic heartbreak in my twenties that I’ve never even had like holy hell how does the woman write like that

[writeyourownlifestory]

L I GH T S  U P

Chapters: 1/20 Fandom: IT Rating: M Warnings: No warnings at this time  Relationships: Eddie Kaspbrak/Richie Tozier, Beverly Marsh/Ben Hanscom Additional Tags: PunkRocker!Eddie, Writer!Richie, Beveddie!Friendship, No Clown Written by: myself & @ahardlife Tag list: @richietoaster, @beproudtozier, @that-weird-girls-blog, @s-onora, @s-s-georgie, @bellarosewrites, @iamcupcakefrosting, @reddieonwheels, @bi-gemini1983

Puff piece writer Richie Tozier is given the chance of a lifetime to interview his celebrity crush: Dr. K, the lead singer of punk rock band, Trashmouth. Dr. K is about to release his first solo album and Richie wants to get all the dirty details. But all is not what it appears to be and the two realize they know each other from a different time, in a different place, when they were both very different people.

One: Cruel To Be Kind: Nick Lowe

Oh I can't take another heartache Though you say you're my friend, I'm at my wit's end You say your love is bonafide, but that don't coincide With the things that you do And when I ask you to be nice, you say

You've gotta be cruel to be kind, in the right measure Cruel to be kind, it's a very good sign Cruel to be kind, means that I love you, baby (You've gotta be cruel) You gotta be cruel to be kind

Richie Tozier didn’t know what he wanted to do with his life.

That wasn’t a very unique statement but Richie wasn’t a very unique person. An average guy who was as blind as a bat, born in bumblefuck nowhere and eventually making it out of there and into the big wild city, making a living working at a big-name magazine.

Okay, the last part was pretty impressive, but he didn’t actually work very hard for that job.

He used to dream of writing comedy. Of telling jokes or writing for amazing shows like Saturday Night Life or something on Comedy Central. He wanted to be a comedian. To make people laugh. Sure, he is seen as the funny guy around the watering tank, but thats just because the rest of the people he worked with were a bunch of yuppies with impressive college degrees and no real personalities. They’re no better than the robots who work for Buzzfeed.

They had paperback covers and an app for people who didn’t want to go to the store to buy an actual copy. They had their own YouTube channel that hit millions of hits thanks to interviews and other shit that Richie took part in.

When Bill decided he wanted to make this into a real thing, he wanted it to make some sense. It wasn’t some balls to the ball insanity mag that people read for juicy gossip. It was real. The people who subscribed were real and the people featured in it were real.

Richie’s writing, not so much.

He mostly did puff pieces. Little things that didn’t take a lot of effort but were mostly filler in between the larger stories. It was something Bill had done for them after the magazine got big. You see, he and Bill had been buddies in college. Both young and naive about the world. Neither really knew what they wanted, but they had dreams and that was all that mattered back then.

It was Bill that had the real talent with writing and despite publishers being interested, he never took into account just how much time, effort, and money went into getting a book published. Richie, always believing in his best friend, decided to give him all the cash he had saved up for spring break so he would make the first move on getting his novel out.

He didn’t mind much as he found that he could eat, sleep, and drink on the couch the same way he could out on the beach.  

That novel ended up being a best seller and skyrocketed Bill’s career. Bill always remembered that, so when his second and third books became such a thrill, he decided to take the chance and create a magazine and brought Richie along for the ride.

It was easy work and he made good money for doing very little, but he found that was the main cause of his quarter-life crisis. He wanted so much more than he had been given that Richie was actually feeling guilty for wanting more.

He had done stand up in the city and even took an improv class, but nothing seemed to stick to him. Now he was over thirty and found himself in a rut. He lived alone in a small apartment filled with things he didn’t need but purchased because he thought they would bring out a sense of excitement.

He was single, though that was a whole nother issue as it took Richie an embarrassingly long time to come to terms with his own sexuality. Growing up in a small town where people were cruel and the world didn’t understand left marks on an impressionable kid. It wasn’t until he was halfway through college that he did anything with a guy and well-passed gradation that he realized that it was more than okay to be gay, it was normal.

So yeah, he was open and fine with it, but still lonely as hell. He had been with people in the past, but he found that he mostly just shut himself off from the world. He wasn’t happy about anything anymore and it seemed the only thing that got him by was that ending it all would have proved his teenage bullies right; that he was better off dead.

And if there was anything Richie wanted to live for, it was spite.

And also music.

Despite not being musically inclined at all, Richie loved music with all his heart. He spent a good portion of his time listening to records as a kid. He used to go around carrying a walkman and CD player and Zune throughout his life. He paid for the mom's gigs on his phone because he needed to have all his favorite songs ready to blast at the tap of a finger.

While they already had a guy that wrote specifically about music for the magazine, he had always been able to sweet talk Bill into allowing him to have a few moments to shine and write something about some artist. Those were the pieces that really mattered to him. The ones that gave Richie the chance to dive deep into the thing he loved.

Sure, he had written a whole expose on Street Fighter and perhaps he did make a big deal out of the Star Wars franchise, but it was the moments when Richie could reel back and listen before writing that got him going.

They rarely did full-length articles on performers as the magazine was something of a clusterfuck of topics. Bill Denbrough never wanted to settle on just one thing. Paper Boat was more than just one specific topic. It was everything and they would be damned if they ever settled on its something.

But of course, now and then something would come along and the whole team would be scrambling to put together a magazine dedicated to that one specific person. It wasn’t always a celebrity. Bill meant what he said when he wanted to keep the magazine aimed at the everyday people.

Their biggest seller to date had been when they put out issues all about Ben Hanscom the architect. Richie had no idea why anybody would want to read about the guy other than to enjoy the pictures that were taken of him, but low and behold, the world wanted to know.

As it turned out, Ben was a decent human being who just wanted to make the world a better place and he also happened to be extremely hot while doing it. Who knew that was possible!

The physical copies sold out everywhere and the website crashed thanks to all the promotions they did on it. Like, what the actual fuck?

Bill was that good at what he did and it also helped that he was writing his books on the side. He had people from all over coming through wanting to see what they could do and it only proved to be more impressive as time went on.

Now the magazine needed something new, something fresh and it seemed Bill had it all planned out.

“Here at Paper Boat, we don’t choose a good looking celebrity because we want to make money. You know, I’m not going to call up Jennifer Aniston and ask her to do me a favor -- I could, but I won’t -- because that isn’t what we do here.” Bill explained as they went over the board meeting for the next issue. “The people featured on our cover are interesting. People who want to bring the world together and make a change. Or maybe they’re just batshit insane and look good while doing it. Who knows.”

A small array of laughter came over the place. Richie leaned back in his chair, half paying attention. He knew how these things went. Bill made a big, exciting speech before revealing who or what they’d be focusing on. The assignments would be passed around and Richie would be given something soft and fun.

He got the dumb shit that got the people who didn’t want to read involved. Sometimes he’d do interviews while vlogging. They’d try food they never tried before or do something stupid. One of the most interesting had been when he got assigned to interview Kristen Wiig while bobbing for apples. Certainly interesting and the flow to the website was wonderful.

Richie was the writer they went to when they wanted it to seem kitsch and gimmicky. Enough for it to garner actual attention, but nothing worth anybody's time.

He tossed his stress ball up in the air, catching it as it followed the natural path and came back down. He got bored easily as meetings like this and he waited for Bill to just get on with it and assign everybody their respected jobs.

Bill hit a button on his computer, revealing a picture that Richie was all too familiar with. It was of a punk rock band that he had followed since he graduated from college. Trashmouth was one of the greatest bands that had ever come into Richie’s life. They were like if Queen and the Ramones were put together, had a baby, and then that baby had a baby with Green Day: that weirdly insane combination would be Trashmouth.

There were five members, but the main focus was and always had been the lead singer and guitarist Dr. K. Nobody knew why he went by that nor did he ever give an answer. Richie had googled him a couple of times, wanting to find out more, but the guy was a fucking mystery. It was like he just appeared on the scene, completely out of his mind with cut off sleeves and steller vocals.

It was safe to say Richie had a big gay crush on Dr. K.

And that was fine because Dr. K was just as gay.

He had never been seen with anybody, always choosing to keep his personal life private, but his songs were obvious enough even if most of them seemed pretty genderless. He had done one interview where the person asking the questions kept using the term ‘she’ or ‘her’ until finally, the guy replied that he writes songs about guys.

That took the world by fucking storm and Richie Tozier had never been the same.

“Some of you may be familiar with Trashmouth. Multiple Grammy noms and wins. Always in the top 40 listings despite repeatedly being told that punk rock was dead.”

“Please tell me we’re going to be featuring the band,” Mike, the music specialist for the magazine, piped up eagerly.

“I can’t because we won’t,” Bill replied. “Our focus is on him.” Bill hit another button and a solo picture of Dr. K popped up.

Richie’s mouth was watering and he sat up straight. He had the same picture in a small poster in his apartment. It was set up alongside some other pictures in what he called his “Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Wall” because he was just that big of a fan. He looked at it often, always finding himself thankful for all the music that had been created and got him through some pretty dark days as a kid.

Did it also help that Dr. K was incredibly attractive and gave Richie a little bit of encouragement just by looking so good? Yes, yes it did.

“It seems Dr. K will be going off on his own. My sources tell me he’ll be putting out a solo album by the end of the year and I want to know everything about it. Mikey, that’s your job. Speak to whoever you have to to find out what is going to be on that album. Audra, speak to the rest of the band, find out how they feel about the ending of an era. Georgie, get your camera ready because we’re doing a photo shoot with him in three days.”

“Who is doing the main exposé?” Greta asked, popping her gum as she spoke.

Bill smirked, turning back to his computer. “I’ll pick someone later. For now, you’re all dismissed.”

The group got up from their chairs and left Bill’s office. All except for Richie, who was too fucking flabbergasted to do a damn thing. As Bill began to head out, he finally scrambled to his feet to follow him. His long legs led him there quickly, though he mostly sidestepped around his coworkers to finally reach their boss.

“Bill! Big Bill! Wait up.” He called, following him to the elevator.

“What's up, Rich? I’m about to head out for lunch.” Bill said, turning to face him. “You hungry? We could check out that new sandwich place that opened across the way.

“Oh, no. I’m time. Stuffed.” Richie patted his stomach lamely, offering a large smile to his friend and boss. “Hey! So, just checking in to see about that latest pitch.”

“Oh right,” Bill paused, hitting the elevator button. “You were a fan of that band, right? Oof. Sorry about the breakup buddy. Haven’t you seen them like six times?”

“It’s sixteen, but that’s not important right now.” Richie corrected. “Bill. Buddy. You have to listen to me.”

“You got it, Rich.”

“I know you only trust me with the puff pieces because I’m not as talented as Mike or even Greta, but I need you to trust me on this.”

“You can do the exposé, Rich.”

“I have gotten better over time and I swear, if you just give me the chance, I promise. I won’t do a single embarrassing voice or anything to get Paper Boat blacklisted.”

“I’m sure you’ll embarrass yourself in one way or another, but that’s your issue. You have two days.”

“Until what?”

“Until your interview with Dr. K,” Bill said, stepping into the elevator as the doors opened. “If you’d stopped rambling you would have heard me tell you that you’re going to be the one doing the expose. You’ll be meeting him in two days, so you better come up with some good questions.”

“Holy shit,” Richie muttered.

“Holy shit, indeed Tozier,” Bill smirked. “I know you’ve been in some sort of funk lately, so I hope that this will shake you up a bit. Better keep your fanboy boner under control.” Bill warned, smiling as the elevator doors closed between them.

Whether Richie realized it or not, Bill believed in him and his writing ability. He may not have the raw talent like himself, but he knew what Richie was capable of. He has a way with people that allowed them to loosen up and relax and nothing was better for a good interview than someone comfortable with the person asking the questions.

Bill couldn’t think of a single person who would be better for this specific project and having Richie be an uber-fan of the artist was just a bonus. If Richie made an ass of himself, that would be his problem, not the magazines.

Richie stood there, not knowing what to do next. He looked to his watch, realizing he had less than 72 hours to come up with a buttload of questions for his idol. He ran back to his cubby to brainstorm.

[fatgirlsguidetodating]

Note to my 18 year old self.

I’m sure you’ve seen the myriad of iso challenges going round on all forms of social media. On insta the push-up challenge. On Facey the pick one album a day that influenced you for 10 days, the life is good 10 days of photos challenge, the pick a photo of you you love challenge or the iso baking challenge. On Tiktok the weird dance challenge. On Snapchat the iso is getting to me, better message my ex and see if I can fuck with their mind a little more because I just didn’t fuck them up quite enough already and I can’t turn down the chance to fuck with them some more challenge. Oh, that’s not a challenge? Just something they do for fun? My bad.

My point is there are challenges aplenty. And I’ve resolutely ignored every single one I’m tagged in. Because, like the majority of those “get to know your friends” quizzes we often see on Facebook, I simply cannot be fucked. Except one. The write a letter to 18 year old you which landed in my inbox this morning. But I’m doing it here instead, in the anonymity of my blog that only one friend from real life knows the name of and a handful of peeps on twitter who know my name may have seen it linked to.

I apologise though in advance- this might be kinda long. But brevity when it comes to writing is not my forte.

****

Dear 18 year old A,

Firstly: you’re awesome. Just in case nobody told you today. Which I can pretty much guarantee they didn’t. And even if they had would you have believed them? No. Because your sense of self-worth was (is) tied up entirely in your weight.

Which isn’t surprising given you had an unhealthy relationship with food from around the time you entered puberty and suddenly you weren’t the skinny little thing you had been growing up (side note: you will have that unhealthy relationship forever so you should probably address that before you get to 40 and still refuse to eat in public on your own in case people think look at that bigger girl eating food, how dare she! Another side note: don’t actually book that Europe dream holiday for 2020. Write that year off completely because it’s going to be a shitshow).

When suddenly you put weight on you freaked and have pretty much been on a diet of some form ever since. Yes that’s right, for 28 years you will always have that unhealthy view of food and weight. Sometimes you’ll go days, even weeks with just eating the one meal- dinner because you couldn’t hide not eating that from your parents whereas you could pretend to eat breakfast or the lunch and snacks your mum packed for you. (You’ll do that even at 40.) Sometimes you’ll get depressed and sneak junk food into your room to eat at night and throw the empty wrappers over the back fence onto the pipeline. Sometimes you’ll make yourself throw up whatever you ate and sit on the floor of the toilet in tears. Sometimes you’ll find a middle road. But the food relationship was never, ever healthy and it will, in some form, define the rest of your life. If you get some perspective on that and change that view your life will be so different. But you won’t.

It wasn’t that you didn’t do any exercise either, you played a few sports and school holidays and weekends were spent outside riding your bikes, playing footy or basketball or splashing around in the pool with your friends. It was just your luck to be a bigger girl. (And even though there are time’s when you would get down to near a healthy weight something would happen and the weight would pile back on.)

I know people scoff at the notion of being bigger boned or that some people are just meant to have a little weight thing (though science does talk about the fact that some people are genetically predisposed to gaining weight easier than others) but you are the spitting image of your grandmother when she was your age and have the stocky build that your paternal side of the family often have. But

in all honesty no matter what you will try it won’t work. At least not permanently. Which is precisely why the fact that your self-worth was so tied up in your weight was an issue. And remains an issue.

It’s hardly shocking that this was the case though. You’d see the ideal of a perfect girls body on “Dolly” or “Girlfriend”, or on tv- there wasn’t the added pressure of social media which is something I am eternally grateful to in so many ways even now- and hate yourself.

You’d see your skinny friends having boyfriend after boyfriend while you didn’t. And when, in year 8 one guy asked you out you assumed it was some kind of dare. It wasn’t and you probably should have said yes but that’s in the past and is not a decision that would make a huge impact to your life.

You’ll suddenly be of age to go out drinking with your friends. However a couple of them will use you to drive every Friday night and you will do it because you can’t say no to your friends but you really should because it wasn’t fair. Just because you were the only one with a licence and car you could have found other ways there or simply refused since it meant you couldn’t have a single drop of alcohol whilst they got shitfaced. But on nights out- whether you were drinking or not- guaranteed you’d be one of the only ones without any male attention. Though, in the fairness and slight objectivity that hindsight can bring, this could have been due, in part, to the fact you’d hunch into yourself and hide in a corner because the one time you did get drunk and have a dance a group of guys pissed themselves laughing at the fat girl dancing. (And it wasn’t because you couldn’t dance- you actually do have decent Rythm and did dance growing up.) You should allow yourself to have more fun, you shouldn’t hide the corner because who knows what could have happened.

But promise me you won’t let that lack of self-worth lead to you missing out on some of the best experiences you could have! Say yes to that Europe backpacking holiday. Say yes when a guy asked you on a date rather than assuming there was some kind of dare involved or that they thought you would be easy because you were a bigger girl. Say yes to so much more.

Secondly: though you didn’t have the confidence to stand up for yourself and what you wanted then- and to some degree never will- you need to follow your heart. Despite your absolute love of the law from the time you read “To kill a mockingbird” when you studied literature and your time doing legal studies as an elective during your VCE you should study what you want to at uni. Yes you will always love the law but you shouldn’t let people pressure you into what to study at uni. It was a given you’d go to uni. But you should put social work as your first preference and law as your second preference.

Don’t let people talk you out of studying what you wanted to do because it didn’t pay well. Yes at 18 the idea of making good money was a drawcard but years down the track you will decide to go back to uni and finally get that social work degree to go with the legal ones and postgrad ones. Career wise this will work well as the justice system desperately needs social workers and your time working in the legal arena fostered a life long love of the law. But follow your dreams here. Because money isn’t the be all and end all. And, with the benefit of hindsight here, I can say you wouldn’t be in the position you are in at 40 now.

Thirdly: though there are some mistakes you needed to make- after all isn’t that how we learn?- there are others you didn’t need to make. Others that will make life unnecessarily hard on yourself. I can see now, so many years later, that many of these stem from your lack of self worth and self confidence due to your weight. For instance you need to not give people more chances than they deserve (in both friendships and relationships but more on that to come). Instead of giving them infinite chances decide on a three strikes and you’re out policy and this will honestly save you a lot of heartache I promise. It won’t save all, and it probably shouldn’t because it’s from heartache that you will learn and grow, but it’ll save a lot.

I promise you life is worth living. On those many occasions when you will cry yourself to sleep for nights on end and on those occasions when you half-heartedly try to kill yourself it won’t feel like that but it is. And when you first realise that there’s something wrong please, please don’t think it’s just you, that you are a fuckup, don’t suffer in silence. Tell someone. Be it your parents, one of your best friends, even your doctor. Because it will effect parts of your life for a long time and there are times that it didn’t need to had you got help.

You need to be less trusting and naive. Because not everyone has the same morals in life as you. But at the same time please don’t let the hurt make your heart hard. Because your big heart is one of the things that those who know you love about you. That’s right: your friends love you. The person you see in the mirror does not represent all of you. That won’t matter to them.

You need to follow your passions in life. Like work on those novels more, remain working in animal rescue, do those courses that you wanted to do like learning sign language, and philosophy.

Fourth: Don’t put off that travel. It’s literally the best thing you could do. It will allow you to find yourself, to discover more about the world, to gain new perspectives. Don’t wait until you are older and wiser. Also that travel fling? Do it.

Fifth: Not all friendships should be watered. But you will allow your friends to walk all over you because you are so desperate to keep everyone happy. Only: what about keeping yourself happy? You matter too. So when friends use you, when friends make you feel shitty about your life walk away. You’ll find that, as you get older, the true friends will be the ones who remain. They’re the ones worth it.

Which leads me to six: same goes for relationships. There will be men in your life that shouldn’t be there and there will be men who aren’t but should be. There will be a couple of men who will totally define your life. And not necessarily in a good way. Take J for instance. He’s your first big mistake and he will fuck up your view of men forever. That will lead to you not trusting that a man can be decent. And it will lead you to making bad choices when it comes to men. So if you could avoid sleeping with him you’d be a lot better off. Because he doesn’t care. And he lied to you all about being separated.

Please don’t let that lack of self worth that drive you into situations you deserve more from. But you will. For many years. After all your lack of self-confidence, self love and self worth will all contribute to this. Because you’ll think what have I got to offer, this is the best I’ll get because who’d want a bigger girl. You won’t realise it at the time, and it will take you another 22 years to do so, but you deserve good things in life and in love. And eventually will learn that being single is better than settling for less than you are worth. Know this too: sex does not equate happiness. I mean yes there’s a happy feeling after sex but it doesn’t mean they have any feelings for you. It just means sex. Don’t let yourself believe it means more or that would lead to heartache.

Finally: there are actually good things about you. I know you can’t see them now, I know you wouldn’t believe me even if I told you, but there are. 40 year old you can see them. Though she would still have trouble admitting them because her self-confidence has not gotten to the levels where she can list good things about herself. But trust me: they’re there.

Don’t let the world get you down. There’s so much to see and experience. Just say yes!

40 year old A.