#it ch2

0_0 Size Shifter Richie Tozier. Desperately trying to stay calm during the "I know your secret" scene in the park so he doesn't shrink. It being a gamble of whether he shrinks or grows when he feels too seen, sometimes able to shrink away and run, other times feeling like everyone is LOOKING at him and he can't get away from their gaze and they KNOW so he grows, forced to be looked at. Part of why he makes so many jokes about Eddie's size, is to deflect from the subtle growth he experiences, so full up on love that his body feels like it needs to shift to accommodate it. Richie, physically shaking from the effort to stay normal sized as he holds onto Eddie and tell him how brave he is, wanting to just grow and hold him and take him away from this awful place. Richie, wishing he had when he sees Eddie torn through. He thinks for a moment he's going to shrink, get smaller and smaller until he's a spec of dust in this cavern. But the look of horror on Eddie's face, the way he whimpers out Richie's name. Rage and grief fills him, and Eddie isn't pulled away, a large hand coming and gripping the offending monstrous leg and snapping it with ease, causing Pennywise to howl in pain. He acts like a shield, covering his friends as they gather together, as Eddie tells him what he knows. They defeat Pennywise, Richie holding his friends as they hold It's heart and crush it. Giant Richie, holding his friends close, hidden in his dirty shirt, cradled close to his chest, using the hand not holding Eddie's body to dig them out from under Neibolt disregarding the way the cavern stones rip through his skin. Pulling through the ground, uncaring for the damage he does, before putting down his friends at the edge of the hole, before crawling out himself, rapidly shrinking. His friends gather around him and Eddie, an exhausted Richie curling small into his neck. They think Eddie's gone, until a sluggish hand comes part way up as if to hold Richie. After that it blurs. When the ambulance arrives, Bill rides with a half-truth about Eddie being his brother, Tiny Richie curled up hidden in his shirt pocket, hearing Bill's heart and regulating his breathing to it, trying to stay awake and tune in to the frantic voices of the EMTs before passing out from exhaustion. Richie stays small for a long while after, riding in his friend's pockets as they make camp in the emergency room waiting area. It makes it easy to take him back to the Inn, despite his fighting, managing to convince him to wash off in the sink while they grab clean clothes for when he eventually grows back to normal. When they get the all-clear from the nurses, Eddie is stable and can have a few brief visitors, Richie's back to normal size. But if he shrinks small again in Eddie's room, curled up and weeping feather-light on his chest with Eddie's drug-heavy hand around his back, well, the Losers aren't going to say anything