#it basically all depends on what ship i put richie in tbh

[derryhawkins]

Growing Fame (2/??)

summary: A modern AU where the losers are semi-famous for different things, and when they all run into each other at a certain event, all of their fans go bat-shit crazy – wanting the seven to spend more time together. What they didn’t expect even more than that, though, was a well-known and mean journalist to write bad reviews on them all. Their growing fame could soon shrink, they quickly realized. warnings: nothing, really; swearing pairings: benverly; the rest is undecided a/n: btw they’re all around the ages of 20-21 in this fic. Except for Georgie, he’s like 13. If there are any spelling mistakes, I’ll make sure to fix it up as soon as I can.

word count is 2.6k

CH 1 | CH 2 | CH 3

First Meetings and Greetings

“We’re gonna be late!”

“You’ll live, Eddie, chill out.”

“Why do we have to get Georgie anyway?”

Bill glanced to the passenger’s seat of the car where Stan was sitting and then behind him some as Eddie’s head appeared between the two seats. He quickly looked back to the road and said, “Mom told him we’re going to comic con and Georgie has always wanted to go, so she called me and basically forced me to come pick him up. He just wants to meet Princess Merida from Brave and a few Marvel characters.”

“Isn’t he, like, six?” Eddie asked.

“Thirteen,” the two up front replied in unison.

Eddie shrugged and looked down at his costume. Right after picking up Georgie, they were going straight to comic con. It wasn’t too far of a drive but he wasn’t looking forward to sitting down for a long while in a skin tight, red, and blue suit. He was Peter Parker, Spider-Man, one of his favorite Marvel characters. He then looked over at Stan who hadn’t dressed; he just wanted to hang out there with his friends and record a few things and talk to a few fictional characters. Eddie then looked at Bill. The guy was wearing a Flash suit.

“Is Georgie doing a costume?” Eddie asked.

“Peter Pan,” Bill said simply, though Eddie and Stan could hear the fond amusement.

Stan looked over at Bill and cracked a smile at seeing him smiling to himself. Eddie looked over as well and grinned; it was clear as day that Bill Denbrough loved his little brother immensely. “That’s cute - forever young,” Stan said.

“He claims they look exactly alike.”

“They kinda do, actually,” Eddie pointed out.

Bill rolled his eyes, “Tell Georgie that and he’ll love you forever.”

The short boy grinned. “Doesn’t sound too bad.”

The rest of the drive to the Denbrough’s house was filled with the radio playing music constantly and Stan filming a short portion of the drive, explaining what was happening for the vlog he would be putting up later. Time went by rather quickly as the three boys goofed off with each other. Stan even cracked a few jokes. Because of their actions, and their joyfulness, the three boys felt as if the drive went by in a blur. By the time Bill pulled up into his parent’s driveway, their cheeks were red and hurting from laughing and grinning so much. Bill honked the horn as he rolled down his window. He yelled out as the door opened.

“Hiya, Georgie!” He grinned and waved, half hanging out of the car. (Eddie and Stan both got pictures of it).

“Hey, Billy!” The kid yelled back as he ran to the car, clad in a Peter Pan costume, after hugging their mother who had shouted for the boys to drive safely. 

Once Bill’s kid brother was fasted down in the seat beside Eddie, and after waving to their mother, Bill backed out of the driveway and left for comic con. It didn’t take long for Eddie to go back to freaking out about possibly being late, or Stan to try to fix his slightly crooked clothes, or for Georgie to yell at Bill to play his favorite songs. Between talking about how they couldn’t be late, Eddie talked to Georgie about random, small things and laughed when the kid pouted about hating a song that played. It was a crazy ride there, Bill will admit that.

Mike and Ben entered the building with wide grins on their faces. They both were dressed as characters from Marvel; Mike had a costume of Miles Morales’ Spider-Man and Ben was fully dressed as Peter Quill, Star Lard. Together they walked around and socialized. Mike had taken off the mask and held it tightly in one of his hands as he walked. Ben twirled the fake gun in his hands and a walk man on his hip, the earbuds wrapped around his neck. Once in a while, a kid would run up with their parents and ask for a picture with them both. They also got stopped because people recognized them from the Internet.

It made them smile even more; it made them even more ecstatic of being there.

“You should play the walk man and dance around like he does in the movie,” Mike suggested to Ben as they past a booth, dodging running teenagers.

“Uh, no thanks,” Ben chuckled nervously.

“Dude, step out of your shell! Star Lord isn’t a shy hermit, B.” Mike pulled out his phone then to check his messages. He smiled at seeing a text from his mom, and he tried to swipe it to answer the message but because of the cloth around his fingers he was unable to. He glowered and shoved the phone to Ben for him to answer it for him.

Ben laughed and grabbed the phone, replied to the message, and then gave the device back. As Mike muttered a thanks, he said, “I’m not really Peter Quill, okay? Just plain old Ben.”

“Plain old Ben who’s had girls all over him!”

“Only because I lost weight and gained muscle instead.”

“Okay, that means you are Peter Quill. You know how played him? Chris Pratt! Pratt was fat once upon a time and now he’s hot as hell. You two are the same, man, just let out your inner Peter Quill.” Mike patted his old college roommate’s shoulder and gave a kind, reassuring smile. “Or Chris Pratt, whichever comes first. The ladies love ‘em both.”

The slightly shorter male rolled his eyes but a thankful smile formed. “I’ll try my best,” he sighed.

“Great!”

Thirty minutes later Mike was trying to get Ben to talk to a pretty red head dressed as Poison Ivy from DC’s comic universe. Ben was more than hesitant to go over to her and talk, especially because tall male with curly dark hair dressed up as Deadpool stood beside her. Mike kept on reassuring him that they weren’t dating; Ben didn’t buy it one bit. It was a back and forth bickering between the two friends as Mike occasionally shoved Ben in the girl’s direction, only for him to shout in protest and stand his ground.

“Ben! Look, that’s Richie Tozier from The Records, okay, he’s fucking single! He broke up with his girl a month ago. The red head is his best friend!”

“Okay, no, that can’t be the dude from The Records.”

“You don’t even listen to them, let alone know what they all look like.”

The light haired male simply stared. Mike let out a sigh and rubbed a hand over his face before looking back to Ben.

“Okay, look, here’s the plan-,”

“Dude.”

“-we both go over there but I do the talking. Mostly to Richie about music shit. You converse with the girl,” he explained, “Got it?”

Once again, Ben simply stared. Though, a few seconds of silence later, he sighed in defeat. He knew Mike wasn’t going to let the situation go, especially if the guy was in fact who Mike said he was. The Records were growing with fame everyday, especially since they got signed, and Mike was quick to join in on the hype some months ago. They were good, Ben has to admit, just not his type of music. Ben eventually gave Mike the ‘okay’ and regretted it instantly as Mike happily led the way.

Shit, she’s prettier up close, Ben thought to himself as he stopped in front of the two strangers. Mike instantly started talking to Richie after they introduced themselves, and Ben nervously greeted the girl he learned to be Beverly Marsh. Despite going as a DC villain, Beverly was sweet and easy going. She wasn’t too intimidating at all, Ben realized as they conversed about how fun comic con was, and he was a bit grateful he gave into Mike.

They all seemed to talk for a while. Occasional Mike and Richie would bump into Bev’s and Ben’s conversation and vice versa. It was smooth. Not many awkward pauses, something Ben was happy about. It wasn’t until Richie gave a short and loud shout after checking his buzzing phone when Ben and Beverly actually stopped talking. Richie’s hand went to Beverly’s elbow as he pressed his phone to his ear.

“Big Bill is here, Bev!” He shouted enthusiastically. A large grin on his face.

Ben and Mike stared in confusion at the sudden excitement. Meanwhile, Beverly grinned back. She knew of Bill; she butted in on Richie’s and Bill’s FaceTime call once a month or so back. He was a kind young man, Bev will give him that. 

“Really?” She asked.

“Fuck yeah- Bill?! Where the fuck are you, man?” Richie talked into the phone as he let go of Beverly’s elbow, finally. He moved to the side some, too.

“Who’s Bill?” Mike asked the redhead as Richie talked a million words per second to the Bill guy on the phone.

“Richie’s best friend,” Beverly said, “They’re super close and haven’t seen each other in, like, seven months.”

“I couldn’t imagine not seeing this guy for that long,” Mike said. He patted Ben’s shoulder and they grinned at one another.

“Same here, man,” Ben said. “Is it the same with you and Richie?”

“Dude’s like my brother, but yeah,” she laughed.

“Guys!” Richie wrapped his arms around Mike and Beverly, and used his closest hand to Ben to softly nudge him in the shouder. “You wanna meet Bill Denbrough?”

The three stared at each other for a moment before back at Richie. A chorus of agreements followed soon after even though Mike and Ben had no clue who Bill Denbrough was. But nonetheless they followed an excited Richie Tozier. Sure enough, they got stopped a couple of times because of Richie’s growing fame; actually, because of all their fame. Each of them got stopped at least once as they made the trek to wherever Richie’s best friend was. None of them minded it. They actually loved it.

The curly headed male moved around people as he walked as he searched for the familiar brown, red-ish hair of his best friend. Richie was pretty tall, so it was easy for him to look over people; it also helped that Bill was on the tall side as well. Soon enough, Richie noticed the familiar head of hair and didn’t hesitate to run to the boy. Beverly groaned and complained as Richie took off running and Mike just laughed; he didn’t hear anything from Ben, but he was sure the guy made an facial expression of sorts.

The instant Richie got close enough, he tackled Bill Denbrough in a hug from behind. One arm over one of Bill’s shoulders, the other arm over Bill’s arm; both arms held him in a tight hug. His head head went in the crook of Bill’s neck and he grinned. Bill knew instantly that it was Richie. No one else had hugged him so oddly from behind before. Plus, no one else was so touchy, either. Richie loved hugs - both getting and giving them.

“What’s up, Rich?” Bill asked with a large smile, laughing slightly as he patted Richie’s arms.

“Not seeing my best friend for seven months fucking sucks,” Richie said.

“Uh, Rich, my brother is-.”

Richie flung from Bill and looked around until he caught sight of a taller Georgie Denbrough. “Georgie!” He shouted. There was no denying the fact that Richie loved the two Denbrough brothers; everyone else standing around them could tell exactly that.

“Richie!” Georgie shouted back and rushed to hug the older boy.

After pulling away from the smaller Denbrough’s hug, Richie leaned on the short male beside Bill. His arm rested on the unknown guy’s shoulder. “So, let’s do some introductions, yeah?”

“Get the fuck off of me,” the short guy snapped out and shoved Richie’s elbow off of him.

“Eddie, stop saying the f-bomb around my brother,” Bill said.

“Your mom was saying the complete opposite last night, cutie.” He winked and smirked, making the other boy groan and roll his eyes.

“Beep beep, Richie,” once again, it came from Bill.

For the next twenty minutes, introductions were said and the group of eight talked among themselves. Everyone got along pretty well. The occasional “fuck off” was thrown at Richie from Eddie Kaspbrak or Stan Uris, but still the two boys found some humor in what the singer joked about. It wasn’t until, though, that Ben noticed the absence of a certain thirteen year old boy that everyone realized they weren’t a group of eight. It was a group of seven.

Bill instantly started freaking out. Where the fuck could he had disappeared to? He couldn’t be the reason his brother was kidnapped. His parents would  be devastated, including him. Richie calmed his best friend down enough to say they should all split up and search for Georgie. And that’s how a Jedi, the Flash, two Spider-Men, Deadpool, Star Lord, and Poison Ivy started yelling the kid’s name as they searched everywhere they could in the building.

Thankfully, though, it didn’t take long at all to find Georgie. He had ran off in excitement at seeing someone cosplaying as Princess Merida that he simply bolted without telling the others around him. The rest of the time they were there, they walked around as a group and hung out. It was amazing how easily they all got along, even with the occasional ‘beep beep, Richie’ from Bill or Beverly when the guy had almost gone too far with saying something.

It was also almost like a train wreck around them as well. Not a bad one, if that makes any sense; but a train wreck where they were all just goofing around and sometimes causing a scene within the crowds with how loud they got. (No thanks to Richie or Georgie or Eddie).

“Where do you guys live from here?” Bill asked.

“Rich and I are just thirty minutes away,” Beverly answered.

“Two hours,” Mike said for himself and Ben. “You guys?”

“Forty-five minutes, an hour at most,” Eddie said.

“Why?” Ben asked.

Bill shrugged and carefully watched as Georgie fumbled with a toy of sorts he had gotten earlier, trying to open the box it came in. He then looked back up to the others. “Just wondering. Maybe we could all hang out? You’re pretty fun to be around with,” he explained.

Stan raised an eyebrow but it quickly went back down as he said, “I agree, honestly. Even Trashmouth over here isn’t so bad.”

“Trashmouth, that’s a new one,” Richie laughed.

“I’m surprised,” Eddie said. Richie looked at him and flashed him a smile. The shorter male just shook his head and looked away.

“Yeah, you guys are pretty cool,” Ben said.

“Even though I’m literally the only girl here, I actually don’t mind being with you. So I will fu- freaking love it if we hung out again,” Beverly quickly corrected herself to not say the f-bomb around Georgie, even though she was pretty sure he had probably heard it from a few strangers at comic con.

“Then it’s settled!” Richie yelled. He threw his arms around the two people beside, which happened to be Beverly and Bill. “Let’s all exchange numbers and figure out a day to hang out so we can get to know each other better!”

And that’s exactly what they did. Well, actually, Beverly got a pen and a random piece of balled up paper from her bag and wrote down everyone’s numbers. Once she was done with that, the seven took a picture of the piece of paper so they could all add the numbers in later.

TAG LIST: @cupcakeatl @howellhxlic

[editorialsonlife]

Well

Welp, feeling like doing an update because there's been a lot going on to be honest. its one of those weird dichotomies where every day feels like an eternity and there's so much going on and then you look back and you're like oh, ok its just my brain making it difficult and making things take forever but anyway.

LOCKDOOOOOOOWWWWWWNNNNNNN

Lockdown life was good, apart from being thrust into it so suddenly dave left a banana on his desk. Wasn't great to come back to after 5 weeks out of the office - mummified mouldy banana!! Classic. We luckily got our first jab before lockdown started so that was good, and we were reasonably well stocked up on food and were generally a lot healthier this lockdown that last. honestly, there's a level of chill and serenity in lockdown that i just love. the ability to set my own schedule and only work the hours I actually work to get the job done? Amazing. getting 8.5 hours of sleep each night without having to wake to an alarm blaring? AMAZING. getting to go for walks every afternoon? SO FLIPPING GOOD. I love it so much, I really really do. I need this to be my life permanently.

WORK

Work is just ongoing and draining and honestly, coming back to the office was so fucking stressful and it was only one day. Being at home is just the fucking bomb. Pending home decisions, I wanna go contracting I think, but also ideally two part time contracts to have more flexibility? I dunno. You'd think a big 4 would provide variety but it really doesn't and honestly, with Richie leaving, wellington is just a sinking ship. Sean's off on parental leave, Kirstyn is down to four days a week, ben will be gone if he doesn't get promoted (and I don't think he will be tbh). Jack is just muddling along, Nigel wants to swap to consulting as well, Matt's going to be a shit leader in terms of bringing in work so it's just not going to work. and in our wider group it's going to get even more messy with heaps of the analysts leaving and a couple of senior hires too. so I think it's probably time to jump ship in general, pending the home stuff below. Also, coming back after a break again, I'm like, I don't actually like a lot of you? All the people I enjoy here are in other teams and groups, and I'll be sad to leave you all, but like, not enough to stay anyway lol.

Pending the home below, two options are to just going and get a job with a $30k payrise to make up for the maternity leave benefits I'm gunna leave behind when I leave this role - 18 weeks full pay, $100 a week for the first year back and a full year of maternity leave. It's basically 30k post tax which is a bit nuts to walk away from to be honest.

Otherwise the other option is to go contracting. Less security overall but holy shit so much money. If I went in as a project coordinator at the lowest rate to build up a bit of a portfolio I'd need to work 40 weeks of 40 hr weeks and Id basically match my current salary plus the lost family leave benefits and still qualify for govt maternity leave payments. Realistically I could go in as a project manager for $140 an hour ($60 more an hour than the above math) and absolutely smash it at that level as well so ya know, there's a bunch of other info. I like the idea of the flexibility of it and only having 6 months even if its a shitshow and beign able to walk away at the end of it. I really don't want to get a govt job and this is a v govt town which is fine but also, if I can avoid it that would be great. I just know I'm not gunna thrive in that environment.

Need to talk to Dave to get him across the line on the security issue part of that though. I've mostly come a long way in terms of my financial management (thanks YNAB) so I think he'd be ok with it mostly.

So there's a lot to toss up there because......

HOME

We got the reno plans done during lockdown, finally. which was super good. but holy fkn jesus $$$$$$ ++++++++++. The guy is coming around for the final quote on Thursday. We indicatively said $100k total because we're doing kitchen laundry bathroom and toilet. so only the most expensive rooms and when I was talking to him last week he said 'that might cover it' and they're seeing cost escalations of 7-10% a week which is just insane. we're not doing anything structural apart from putting in a cavity slider in the bathroom, and the quote they'll give us won't include flooring since they won't do it.

Meanwhile, the prefab homes I were looking at for our site were $425k fully done. Like, I'm not going to spend $130K on doing up my 1940s ex state house ya know? That's not good cost benefit ratio.

So depending on what that comes out at on thursday we'll be able to make some plans.

We also want to start trying for kids next year and need these renos done first - I am not having kids and no dishwasher lol.

Also we need bank financing so good to be in a permanent stable job for that application. the good thing is we have so much equity we know we can borrow whatever we need, I just don't want to spend that much money on it because it's fkn ridiculous. and if I'm going on maternity leave we need to be able to cover it all on dave's salary and whatever benefits I have as well so there;s a lot of financial planning and spreadsheeting going on at the moment lol. it's fab.

either way. we've got plenty of options up our sleeve. we've got friends who's brother owns a building company so we can talk to them, we've got the garage so we can get things prefabricated even if they're not installed til next year, Dave can get shit at cost through his work for whiteware, there;s plenty of things to like cost control we can do, we just need to know where we're starting from basically. thats the challenging part. but we'll figure it out, its just taking longer than I want it to basically.

We also planted up the vege garden for the spring/summer which was lovely, super jazzed about that. we've finally got the garden to a reasonably low maintenance level where everything is mostly under control and it's such a relief, honestly.

PERSONAL

Man what a shift to lockdown last year honestly. I think the last 8 weeks in particular has just been like, a massive reality check of how absolutely shit the last year was and how fucking glad I am to be rid of it. I spent a week absolutely spiralling 2 weeks ago now and honestly, I don't know how I lived in the state for more than a year. I actually don't know how I did it. and I could not be more glad that I'm finally on the other side of it, for the most part. There's still a bunch of other stuff to work through (hahahahahaha when is there not like damn) but fucking hell its nice to just not be anxious and nauseous and wound up constantly. life is actually accessible. miracle.

My workmate had his bebe - I went round and got newborn cuddles and was like, oh, is this what it is to be clucky? this is odd. so there's that as well. I think we'll probably start trying next year pending renos and jobs etc. If the renos can be done in jan I'll prob just stick it at the job to get the benefits but I dunno. it's a tough call to make really. we shall see. This all assumes we get knocked up without any issues which is questionable these days. I really want to feel healthier before getting pregnant as well, and part of that is losing weight. however, given discussing that is what triggered the spiral we're working on that one slowly.

Also, lets have a moment for counselling, because fkn bless anne and all her hard work honestly. I actually ended up emailing her being like, I;m losing my shit on the monday and then talked to her on thursday. And its so funny because it's such a counselling thing but I didn't realise until afterwards what she'd done but she was like you're clearly not doing well and then the night before dave got a fkn miserable migraine and he was up for like, 2 hrs powerchucking except he didn't make it to the bathroom in time so guess who was cleaning up vomit at 130am trying not to chuck herself but I digress. anyway, not doing well, couldn't even explain why, didn't even have words and super tired and she's like, what lynaire up to this week how's she going with izzy and chat about that and then be like how are you feeling about your body and then 5 more mins of chat about the cat and the chickens and then like bam hard question and then hows it going with x and y and z and its like, it wasn't til I was on my walk afterwards when I FINALLY started feeling marginally better I was like damn woman work your magic for figuring it out for me and helping me reregulate. all over the phone as well since we were still in lockdown. GREAT WORK FRIEND.

and then last week was like totally fucked theoretical discussion about religion and the role it's played in my life and fate vs free will and all this nutty shit but genuinely just a great discussion. She's the best and I love her. thank good for good counsellors. thank god I can afford to pay for it honestly.

Dave and I are just chugging along, god bless that man. I love him. its amazing. I miss having friends close by but understand why they had to move (boooooo f u house prices). Family is pretty chill, still not really talking to dave's parents which is nightmarish but we'll deal with that when we need to. gunna have to go and visit them at some point coz dave misses them and I feel for him, I really do. It's the whole boundaries renegotiation I went through with my family last year post wedding blow up and its just not a fun place to be. oh well. can't fix it for him but also I'm not putting up with that level of BS from either of our families once we have children. not gunna happen.

Either way, life is busy and full and fun and I'm enjoying it. Daylight savings starts this weekend too, its october next week WTF and I'm just waiting for 4pm to find out what's gunna happen to our girls trip. Clearly we cancelled our sept trip to christchurch and akaroa and hanmer springs so my covid travel curse continues. fkn ridic. Still dunno what we're gunna do with $2500 of flight credits coz if we get knocked up theres def no international trips happening any time soon.

thus concludes the almost 2000 word write up of life. hope you've enjoyed it. I'll throw up some pics in a separate post if people care about reno plans. such a good time!