d e v o n
EXPECTATIONS
TMBGareOK. The Official They Might Be Giants tumblr
No title available
Phantogram Three
art blog(derogatory)
Game Changer & Make Some Noise
YOU ARE THE REASON
I'd rather be in outer space đž
Lint Roller? I Barely Know Her
tannertan36
Love Begins
Product Placement
PR's Tumblrdome
KIROKAZE
@theartofmadeline
Origami Around
ellievsbear
No title available
Cosmic Funnies
seen from Malaysia
seen from United States
seen from Malaysia
seen from TĂŒrkiye
seen from United Kingdom
seen from Zambia
seen from United States
seen from Venezuela
seen from Canada
seen from Spain
seen from United States
seen from Malaysia
seen from Iraq
seen from United States
seen from Bulgaria
seen from Guatemala
seen from United States
seen from Thailand
seen from Colombia
seen from Philippines
@cariton
"If you use em dash in your works, it makes them look AI generated. No real human uses em dash."
Imaging thinking actual human writers are Not Real because they use... professional writing in their works.
Imagine thinking millions of people who have been using em dash way before AI becomes a thing are all robots.
REBLOG IF YOU'RE A HUMAN AND YOU USE EM DASH
Sheâs no man D:
You can only reblog this on the 3st of January
the 3st huh?
the 3st.
Happy 3st of January to all celebrants.
I hate that Hermione gets shackled with Ron which absolutely KILLS all the storytelling potential for her romantically.
Mainly because the romance just wasn't any good imo. There's also the glaring fact that Hermione just outshines Ron as a character.
This is hilarious to come across because Hermione has been a stagnant character since book 4 at the latest-- the narrative refuses to interrogate any of her flaws, and thus takes away any opportunity for her to grow as a character. She's an inventory slot. She's a tutorial character who pops up with a "guess what I just found out at the library" text box.
Not to mention, she has no significant relationships outside of Ron and Harry-- She's an emotionally un-anchored character and thus a less dynamic character. We know nothing about her parents. We know nothing about her home life. Her sacrifices and her decision to stick around in the deathly hallows both hit less hard than Ron's sacrifices and his decision to walk out, because the audience has spent the last six books getting a full primer on Ron's place in his family and his relationship to all of them, especially his mother and his sister, who everyone seems to forget was the real catalyst for him blowing his fuse.
The relationship lending Hermione much-needed flaw and complexity and emotional believability as a teenage girl is literally her relationship with Ron. That he brings out something irrational and mad in her is foundational to her character-- in fact, everything that's notable about Hermione's character is in some way inextricable from Ron because they were written as inextricable narrative equals. Her position in wizarding society as an undesirable? It's Ron who constantly reacts to this. Her relentless striving for justice? It's Ron who ends up invested in her causes in a real emotional capacity (buckbeak, the elves, etc). Even their pettiness is inextricable from each other. Their jealousy. Their mutual fixation.
The storytelling potential you're thinking of is a self-insert Emma Watson Hermione being the smartest most beautiful most preternaturally good and kind and badass witch in the world who simultaneously has no self-respect and let's Dom daddy Draco Malfoy really show her the ropes in bed. Boring. Trite. Completely removed from anything the series wanted to tell us about Hermione, Draco, Ron, or Love as an idea itself. Do not pass go. Do not collect 200 dollars. Go read your umpteenth dramione fic about how the Handmaid's Tale is actually a romance and you should totally keep your rape baby.
Again, why does every female character have to be forced into this "strong independent woman" archetype, or else be labeled as missing potential or lacking growth?
Hermione is with Ron. They're happy. It's great. He's her first love, she's his. They get married right out of high school. It's the 00s. They have kids. Beautiful. Whatever.
This doesn't mark the end of her character development. You don't just stop changing as a person once you get "shackled" - you grow together, change together. And with a strong foundation (which they have), this can be really good for a relationship.
I think it's doing Hermione a disservice to say she made the wrong decision. She's not punching down or settling by being with Ron. It makes sense actually - if you understand her character and what motivates her. ( @heartachehotel explained it perfectly)
What astounds me is that Hermione is a TEXTBOOK example of the strong independent woman-- She's the bloody minister of magic, only she realistically 100% owes part of that success to the fact that her husband put a stopper on his own career as an auror and took up, canonically, the role of the homemaker which has traditionally been imposed upon the woman in a marriage. Why do you think married men usually shoot up the ladder, while wives and mothers contribute to the overall wage gap between men and women?
It's not actually feminist to write a woman into a superhuman role where she requires no help and no support to excel in both the private and public sphere-- this "unfinished revolution" under capitalism, where women have been integrated into the workforce without having the onus of domestic labour lifted from them, is an outright focus of specifically Marxist feminists.
Ron and Hermione are almost aspirational from that angle. I can't think of another romantic endgame in a series of this kind of clout where this specifically feminist argument has been so clearly addressed.
People hating Romnione is always so funny to me. Obviously you can like/dislike any ship you want for whatever reason you want, but with Romnione it's rarely about the ship and mostly about hating Ron Weasley. And the reasons why people hate Ron usually say a lot about those people.
Draco Malfoy spends most of the books calling Hermione slurs and barely viewing her as human, but apparently he is a better fit for her because he has higher grades than Ron?
Also the weasleys are poor and even though most won't admit it a lot of people believe to some extent in prosperity gospel. That rich people have inherently better character simply because they are rich.
The weasleys are by far the most loving family in all of Harry Potter, but because they are poor they are often presented as the worst in fanfiction and Ron is the primary example for this.
It's worth mentioning that there is genuinely zero canonical basis for the assertion that Draco was a higher academical achiever than Ron. If anything, all sources point to Draco receiving three owl grades, where Ron received seven.
And the seven owl grades in question are particularly academically demanding subjects-- since they are the exact ones required for becoming an auror or a healer.
What can be conceded, however, is that Draco most probably had an Outstanding in potions-- whereas Ron and Harry both received Exceeds Expectations apiece. Being better in one subject can hardly be held as some ironclad evidence of superior intellect, especially when the instructor of the subject in question had a not-insignificant bias for and against these students.
If the stunt with Vanishing Cabinet is held as evidence of Draco's apparently obvious genius, one is compelled to bring up the fact that Ron Weasley was a chessmaster of such incredible strategic mind at the tender age of eleven, that he won a game of death chess with two extra handicaps.
It would've been three, but he was so also so comically brave and self-sacrificial that he was prepared to die for this game.
I agree with everything you said, especially the bit about chess. Ron is a tactical genius and it's sad that this isn't more often acknowledged. It actually makes him and Hermione compliment each other very nicely, because he is the tactician able to think quick on his feet and she is the strategist always planing for the bigger picture.
I do think it's fair to say that Ron as a person isn't that interested in academia and to be honest I don't think it's actually important whether he gets good grades or not. He is smart, but his smarts don't always correlate to good grades. More importantly he is a good person. My main point was that it doesn't matter how good, or bad, he did in school. Hermione didn't fell in love with him because of his grades and it's weird that people portrayal her as so shallow of a person that she would choose her partner based on their success, be it academic or otherwise.
okay but I did not know that there is a story about f. scott fitzgerald nervously showing ernest hemingway his penis because zelda said he couldnât satisfy a woman with it and ernest hemingway was like âlol no dude youâre fineâ
what are the modernists even
the best part of that story in context is that before they pull out their dicks, hemingway spends the better part of a chapter physically describing fitzgerald in great detail, claiming to be grossed out by him but obviously, obviously uncomfortably attracted
oh my god, it got better. I just went to find an excerpt and
Scott was a man then who looked like a boy with a face between handsome and pretty. He had very fair wavy hair, a high forehead, excited and friendly eyes and a delicate long-lipped Irish mouth that, on a girl, would have been the mouth of a beauty. His chin was well built and he had good ears and a handsome, almost beautiful, unmarked nose. This should not have added up to a pretty face, but that came from the coloring, the very fair hair and the mouth. The mouth worried you until you knew him and then it worried you more.
ernest hemingway calm down and control your thirst a little
âThe mouth worried you until you knew him and then it worried you moreâ is a hell of a lineÂ
No Homo: A Literary Masterpiece
not to write another goddamn essay on this clown movie but like. pattyâs grief is about unpacking the years you had together and finding where you start and your partner ends, and negotiating with the places theyâre gone from: the other half of the bed, the empty seat in the car, the extra cup and toothbrush and razor next to yours. itâs about having to go the rest of your life with the title widower but waking up every morning and choosing to put your wedding ring on anyway
and richieâs grief is about not being able to mourn like that, itâs about the fact that he has to mourn in private, because he never had any of those things. richieâs grief is about mourning what could have been and should have been but never was. itâs about forgetting the grief for a day, because you have your separate life, and then being reminded and it hitting you like a wave until you feel like youâre drowning
Resources For Writing Sketchy Topics
Medicine
A Study In Physical Injury
Comas
Medical Facts And Tips For Your Writing Needs
Broken Bones
Burns
Unconsciousness & Head Trauma
Blood Loss
Stab Wounds
Pain & Shock
All About Mechanical Injuries (Injuries Caused By Violence)
Writing Specific Characters
Portraying a kleptomaniac.
Playing a character with cancer.
How to portray a power driven character.
Playing the manipulative character.
Portraying a character with borderline personality disorder.
Playing a character with Orthorexia Nervosa.
Writing a character who lost someone important.
Playing the bullies.
Portraying the drug dealer.
Playing a rebellious character.
How to portray a sociopath.
How to write characters with PTSD.
Playing characters with memory loss.
Playing a pyromaniac.
How to write a mute character.
How to write a character with an OCD.
How to play a stoner.
Playing a character with an eating disorder.
Portraying a character who is anti-social.
Portraying a character who is depressed.
How to portray someone with dyslexia.
How to portray a character with bipolar disorder.
Portraying a character with severe depression.
How to play a serial killer.
Writing insane characters.
Playing a character under the influence of marijuana.
Tips on writing a drug addict.
How to write a character with HPD.
Writing a character with Nymphomania.
Writing a character with schizophrenia.
Writing a character with Dissociative Identity Disorder.
Writing a character with depression.
Writing a character who suffers from night terrors.
Writing a character with paranoid personality disorder.
How to play a victim of rape.
How to play a mentally ill/insane character.
Writing a character who self-harms.
Writing a character who is high on amphetamines.
How to play the stalker.
How to portray a character high on cocaine.
Playing a character with ADHD.
How to play a sexual assault victim.
Writing a compulsive gambler.
Playing a character who is faking a disorder.
Playing a prisoner.
Portraying an emotionally detached character.
How to play a character with social anxiety.
Portraying a character who is high.
Portraying characters who have secrets.
Portraying a recovering alcoholic.
Portraying a sex addict.
How to play someone creepy.
Portraying sexually/emotionally abused characters.
Playing a character under the influence of drugs.
Playing a character who struggles with Bulimia.
Illegal Activity
Examining Mob Mentality
How Street Gangs Work
Domestic Abuse
Torture
Assault
Murder
Terrorism
Internet Fraud
Cyberwarfare
Computer Viruses
Corporate Crime
Political Corruption
Drug Trafficking
Human Trafficking
Sex Trafficking
Illegal Immigration
Contemporary SlaveryÂ
Black Market Prices & Profits
AK-47 prices on the black market
Bribes
Computer Hackers and Online Fraud
Contract Killing
Exotic Animals
Fake Diplomas
Fake ID Cards, Passports and Other Identity Documents
Human Smuggling Fees
Human Traffickers Prices
Kidney and Organ Trafficking Prices
Prostitution Prices
Cocaine Prices
Ecstasy Pills Prices
Heroin Prices
Marijuana Prices
Meth Prices
Earnings From Illegal Jobs
Countries In Order Of Largest To Smallest Risk
Forensics
arson
Asphyxia
Blood Analysis
Book Review
Cause & Manner of Death
Chemistry/Physics
Computers/Cell Phones/Electronics
Cool & Odd-Mostly Odd
Corpse Identification
Corpse Location
Crime and Science Radio
crime lab
Crime Scene
Cults and Religions
DNA
Document Examination
Fingerprints/Patterned Evidence
Firearms Analysis
Forensic Anthropology
Forensic Art
Forensic Dentistry
Forensic History
Forensic Psychiatry
General Forensics
Guest Blogger
High Tech Forensics
Interesting Cases
Interesting Places
Interviews
Medical History
Medical Issues
Misc
Multiple Murderers
On This Day
Poisons & Drugs
Police Procedure
Q&A
serial killers
Space Program
Stupid Criminals
Theft
Time of Death
Toxicology
Trauma
@boopifer you write lots of angst. Thought this might come in handy.
The number of people who have tagged me in this genuinely delights me!! Thank you!
I needed this
Writing
Fic authors deserve more credit.
Story time: I started a book about 23 hours ago and just finished it. Also in that time I slept for 10 hours, spent time with family, was at work, etc. Anyway, I enjoyed the book (Simon vs. the Homo Sapiens Agenda). But it felt like it flew by, so after I finished I looked up the word count because what are pages? Pages are meaningless. I only function in word counts anymore.
The estimate I found was 58,580. My immediate reaction was âoh, thatâs why. Thatâs nothing!â But what a shitty response. Because no. Thatâs not nothing. Thatâs a whole. Damn. Book. An entire novel! And Fic authors regularly bust out 30k, 50k, 100k, 150k words. AND THEY DO IT FOR FREE. WHILE WORKING AND LIVING THEIR LIVES.
So anyway, thank your favorite fic author today because they deserve it. Because theyâre amazing. Theyâre the MVPs.
Some rough word count equivalencies for you, via famous novels, just to give you an idea of what OP is saying:
30k fic = Animal Farm by George Orwell
50k fic = The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald
75k fic = Catcher in the Rye by JD Salinger
100k fic = To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee
150k fic = The Two Towers by JRR Tolkien
200k fic = Moby Dick by Herman Melville
250k fic = Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix by JK Rowling
300k fic = A Feast for Crows by George RR Martin
350k fic = Lonesome Dove by Larry McMurtry
400k fic = Gone with the Wind by Margaret Mitchell
I WROTE SOMETHING AS LONG AS MOBY DICK AND I DIDNâT EVEN KNOW
I canât believe Iâve surpassed Animal Farm.
Holy shit.
This is awesome. With that said, huge appreciation also to fic writers who write shorter fics - 10k, 5k, 1k, 500 words. Because yeah, huge long fics get a lot of love, and a lot of labour goes into them, but the same is true for tiny fics as well. Not everyone is banging out huge great novels, but little ficlets are fantastic and still bring readers a ton of joy.
So if youâre feeling a bit downcast because you canât write that 50 chapter epic or your latest WIP is âonlyâ 2k and it still took you ages - thatâs amazing. Seriously. Not everyone is naturally wordy or prolific. And you can say a ton with just a few hundred or thousand words.
Props to short fic creators - you guys are awesome.
The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe = 38k fic
Charlie and the Chocolate Factory = 30k fic
Of Mice and Men = 30k fic
Breakfast At Tiffanyâs = 24k fic
For those writers who discredit themselves because they feel they arenât writing the novels that others might, youâre still writing a novella, my dears. Youâre still putting time, effort, and passion into something. Well done.
(honestly shout out to all fuckin fic writers. You didnât have to give us shit and still y'all out here living ya best life and doin something you love. Bravo.)
weak concept: eddie doesnât find richieâs jokes funny and refuses to laugh at his stand-up shows or whatever i dont even understand this concept enough to reference it properly
powerful concept: not only does eddie find richieâs jokes hilarious but he finds the ones that are particularly bad EXTREMELY hilarious and when richie fails a joke at one of his stand up gigs in the dead awkward silence you can just hear eddie losing his absolute fucking mind in the front row and Richie just beaming up on stage despite no one else laughing
and later on richie just saying to some interviewer âyeah i can have an entire room laughing but if eddie isnât laughing then the joke failed imo but if everyone else is frowning and eddieâs laughing then it was a good nightâ
anyway in this house we cater to aggressively supportive reddie get that eddie being cold shit outta here that boy SHRIEKS with laughter at richies jokes so much in the book he thinks heâs so amazing and ambitious LET HIM BE WILDLY IN LOVE AND ENTHRALLED WITH RICHIE TOZIER DAMN
here to remind yâall that eddie kaspbrak was a hypochondriac (which is an illness anxiety disorder) as well as the victim of munchausen by proxy (a condition where a caregiver creates the appearance of health problems in their child).
you see, eddie did not have asthma but he did have intense anxiety. hypochondriacs often arenât aware that depression and anxiety produce their own physical symptoms, and mistake these symptoms for manifestations of another mental or physical disorder or disease. so what he thought were asthma attacks were really panic attacks (a good thing the inhaler worked as a placebo to calm him tbh). what is worse is that he was coerced into taking medication he didnât need for illnesses he didnât have, while being robbed of the medication he really needed for the illness he did have. making him worse and worse by the day.Â
and so, as an adult, we see that eddie kept playing the sick role in front of people since he was taught that he was more likely to receive the positive maternal attention he craved⊠but hypochondriasis can cause clinically significant distress or impairment in social, occupational, or other important areas of functioning, making it even harder for him. the chance that he also developed psychological disorders such as clinical depression, panic disorder, separation anxiety and ocd is very high.
eddie kaspbrak was physically, mentally and socially abused as a child, and it resulted in severe consequences for him as an adult. eddie kaspbrak lived alongside demons of anxiety, fear and dejection his entire lifeâŠ
but he died a hero fighting these demons.Â
I've noticed lately that people have noticed the similarities between Richie's manager and Eddie in the new movie, so I'm here to help people learn more about my favorite hot-headed manager in all of Chicago. Most of these things are from the book, as that's where we learn the most about him:
Richie's manager is named Steve Covall, but we don't know much about how he looks because his interaction with Richie is over the phone
I don't remember the actor who played him in the miniseries, but he is played by Jason Fuchs in the 2019 movie; Jason was also a producer and a writer for the movie
Jason and James Ransone (Eddie) are both coincidentally 5'9", which I think is pretty funny based on how they're supposed to be a parallel for each other
In the 2010 script, they were in what I'm guessing was a serious relationship, as they lived together and had a black labrador; however, Richie being in the closet at the time was a source of frustration for Steve
In the book, Steve and Richie have known each other for roughly nine years, as Richie says that his mother had died ten years ago and Steve hadn't known about that
They have immense respect and trust in each other, as Steve was okay with Richie dropping everything and going to Maine for an unknown amount of time
Richie always puts Steve in a good mood, even when he doesn't laugh at his jokes; Richie also tends to be really patient with Steve and tries to calm him when he gets anxious
Steve is very logical, and he understands how important communication is; he tends to get angry at Richie when he isn't explaining himself or when he gets too quiet
Richie understands Steve a lot more than Steve understands Richie, as when Richie was saying words that didn't make much sense, Richie noted that he could hear the frown in his voice
I will add more if anyone is interested! I'm just glad to see that more than two people are interested in this character, he certainly is a fun person to try to figure out because of the way he's written in the book and the script.
Thereâs only one thing Iâm worried about at this point when it comes to Eddie being gay- I havenât gotten to the part yet, but doesnât IT appear as Greta to him for a second as an adult? Honestly I think I know already why it would appear as her but i need reassurance lol
Youâre right, actually, now that I think back on it! Thereâs a moment during Eddieâs walking tour when multiple dead Derry residents show up, after the leper does - Tony Tracker, Greta Bowie, and Patrick Hockstetter. So I was wrong when I said IT never manifests as a woman around Eddie - but for what itâs worth, itâs still not her by herself, sheâs accompanied by other people, and itâs not sexual in nature like the leper/Belch.Â
She tells Eddie that she died in a car accident while drunk and high on reds (most likely Seconal, a sedative), and is holding a balloon that says asthma medicine causes cancer. So instead of being sexual, dead!Greta represents Eddieâs medical fears in a more straightforward way - random things causing cancer, his asthma medicine doing more harm than good, and the bad side effects of abusing sedatives like heâs implied to do, etc.Â
Personally I donât see it as evidence that he isnât gay. Itâs more of an example of his high capacity for empathy - IT uses the bulliesâ sob stories as fodder for getting an emotional response out of Eddie (Gretaâs car crash, Belch being in a Yankees uniform to show âwhat couldâve beenâ) because IT knows he has a soft spot for humanizing people who are jerks to him. If that makes sense?
i rarely add text to posts so iâm sorry for derailing!! but this has me thinking about how eddie thinks about belch - not only does he see his baseball potential but he wonders if he would have grown into a gentler person. belch is a representation of the sad loss of a potentially positive future.
but when heâs thinking about tony and phil tracker, these are his thoughts:
as opposed to the potential he imagines for belch (presumably a straight character), he imagines a heart attack and auto accident for tony and phil, who he recalls his mother derisively calling âqueerâ. he also compares himself to both of them in a way that says: âtheir deaths were because of their own actions (tony didnât take care of himself and phil shouldâve chosen a safer career), but i get an ekg every year and i mostly work in the office nowâ. he empathizes with belch and greta but he seemingly doesnât do so with tony or phil, and in fact tries to mentally distance himself from them.
however, i think heâs actually empathizing too much with tony and phil. he has to remind himself the things he does to prevent being like them because he sees himself in them and wants to convince himself heâd never face the same fate. itâs similar to his reaction to adrian. he touches his aspirator because he empathizes so strongly on a very personal level and he realizes that couldâve been him. he can empathize with anyone, even his bullies, but his empathy for anyone he thinks is gay is stronger and presents differently. in addition to empathy it always holds the fear of âthat could be meâ. he feels that fear regarding gay men the same way he feels that fear in relation to greta, who faced the consequences of a substance abuse problem that he shares. empathy comes with fear if he relates to the person.
Amazing addition!! I have nothing to add because itâs 100% accurate! I love how Eddie imagines deaths for the Trackers that are specifically related to his own life - itâs such an obvious case of âthey brought this on themselves, but Iâm not Like That, because I have self controlâ while at the same time, as usual, completely skirting around the real reason heâs even thinking about them in such a way. God, I love him so much!
wait why do we including me always hc richie as the spectacularly wealthy one who takes eddie shopping for gucci loafers at barney's when richie is a standup comedian and eddie is a wall street risk analyst who drives an escalade
very amusing to think of eddie trying to show richie the finer things in life like just going full whateveryoulike.mp3 on his ass while richie is like, i am perfectly comfortable buying all of my clothes at value village and i see no reason why that has to change. eddie takes him to van cleef and arpels to pick out wedding rings and after about five minutes of silent browsing richie turns to eddie and whispers, "that ring is $15,000 dollars" and eddie goes, "yeah, and?" and richie goes, "eds... there's people that are homeless"
eddie: asks the waitress to toss his half-finished squid ink pasta at the end of his meal rather than bag it up and take it home because he doesn't "do" leftovers, the risk of foodborne illness is too high
richie: rinses off saran wrap so he can re-use it
I love every single canon divergence fic where Eddie survives, but my absolute favourite ones are the ones where Eddie dies, meets up with Stan, and they both go 'Well, guess this is it huh? We're dead'. And immediately Maturin materializes and straight up goes
âI sleep. I dream. I make up things that I would never say. I say them very quietly.â â Richard Siken, Meanwhile
Direct Quotes: Richieâs Bisexuality in the Book
Richie and girls
âą Looking at a dirty magazine with girls in it and getting turned on.
as Richie Tozier was sneaking a look at the half-undressed girls in a copy of Gem he had found at the bottom of his fatherâs socks-and-underwear drawer and getting a regular good boner
â
âą His attraction to Beverly.
Richie liked Bev a lot. Well, he liked her, but not that way. He admired her looks (and knew he wasnât aloneâgirls like Sally Mueller and Greta Bowie hated Beverly like fire, still too young to understand how they could have everything else so easily ⊠and still have to compete in the matter of looks with a girl who lived in one of those slummy apartments on Lower Main Street), but mostly he liked her because she was tough and had a really good sense of humor. Also, she usually had cigarettes. He liked her, in short, because she was a good guy. Still, he had once or twice caught himself wondering what color underwear she was wearing under her small selection of rather faded skirts, and that was not the sort of thing you wondered about the other guys, was it?
And, Richie had to admit, she was one hell of a pretty guy.
[âŠ]
âHi, Richie,â Bev said, and when she turned toward him he saw a purple-blackish bruise on her right cheek, like the shadow of a crowâs wing. He was again struck by her good looks ⊠only it occurred to him now that she might actually be beautiful. It had never really occurred to him until that moment that there might be beautiful girls outside of the movies, or that he himself might know one. Perhaps it was the bruise that allowed him to see the possibility of her beautyâan essential contrast, a particular flaw which first drew attention to itself and then somehow defined the rest: the gray-blue eyes, the naturally red lips, the creamy unblemished childâs skin. There was a tiny spray of freckles across her nose.
[âŠ]
She leaned against Richieâs shoulder for a moment and Richie had just time to reflect that her touch, and the sensation of her lightly carried weight, was not exactly unpleasant.
[âŠ]
Her eyes, that fine clear shade of blue-gray, turned up to his. They were coolly amused. She pretended to primp her hair and asked him, âOh dear, am I being asked out on a date?â
For a moment Richie was uncharacteristically flustered. He actually felt a blush rising in his cheeks. He had made the offer in a perfectly natural way, just as he had made it to Ben ⊠except hadnât he said something to Ben about owesies? Yes. But he hadnât said anything about owesies to Beverly.
Richie suddenly felt a bit weird. He had dropped his eyes, retreating from her amused glance, and realized now that her skirt had ridden up a bit when she shifted forward to drop the ice-cream cone in the litter barrel, and he could see her knees. He raised his eyes but that was no help; now he was looking at the beginning swells of her bosoms.
Richie, as he usually did in such moments of confusion, took refuge in absurdity.
âYes! A date!â he screamed, throwing himself on his knees before her and holding his clasped hands up. âPlease come! Please come! I shall ruddy kill meself if you say no, ay-wot? Wot-wot?â
âOh, Richie, youâre such a fuzzbrain,â she said, giggling again ⊠but werenât her cheeks also a trifle flushed? If so, it made her look prettier than ever.
[âŠ]
âSure,â she said. âThank you very much. Think of it! My first date. Just wait until I write it in my diary tonight.â She clasped her hands together between her budding breasts, fluttered her eyelashes rapidly, and then laughed.
âI wish youâd stop calling it that,â Richie said.
She sighed. âYou donât have much romance in your soul.â
âDamn right I donât.â
But he felt somehow delighted with himself. The world seemed suddenly very clear to him, and very friendly. He found himself glancing sideways at her from time to time. She was looking in the shop windowsâat the dresses and nightgowns in Cornell-Hopleyâs, at the towels and pots in the window of the Discount Barn, and he stole glances at her hair, the line of her jaw. He observed the way her bare arms came out of the round holes of her blouse. He saw the edge of her slip strap. All of these things delighted him.
[âŠ]
Bev spotted daisies growing on the riverbank and picked one. She held it first under Richieâs chin and then under Benâs chin to see if they liked butter. She said they both did. As she held the flower under their chins, each was conscious of her light touch on their shoulders and the clean scent of her hair.
[âŠ]
She scolded Richie all the time they were picking them up again, and Richie joked and screeched in many Voices, and thought to himself how beautiful she was.
â
âą The full story of his ex-girlfriend Sandy and his vasectomy.
âWell,â Richie was saying, âI could make this long and sad or I could give you the Blondie and Dagwood comic-strip version, but Iâll settle for something in the middle. The year after I moved out to California I met a girl, and we fell pretty hard for each other. Started living together. She was on the pill at first, but it made her feel sick almost all the time. She talked about getting an IUD, but I wasnât too crazy about thatâthe first stories about how they might not be completely safe were just starting to come out in the papers.
âWe had talked a lot about kids, and had pretty well decided we didnât want them even if we decided to legalize the relationship. Irresponsible to bring kids into such a shitty, dangerous, overpopulated world ⊠and blah-blah-blah, babble-babble-babble, letâs go out and put a bomb in the menâs room of the Bank of America and then come on back to the crashpad and smoke some dope and talk about the difference between Maoism and Trotskyism, if you see what I mean.
âOr maybe Iâm being too hard on both of us. Shit, we were young and reasonably idealistic. The upshot was that I got my wires cut, as the Beverly Hills crowd puts it with their unfailing vulgar chic. The operation went with no problem and I had no adverse aftereffects.
[âŠ]
âSandy and I lived together for two and a half years,â Richie went on. âCame really close to getting married twice. As things turned out, I guess we saved ourselves a lot of heartache and all that community-property bullshit by keeping it simple. She got an offer to join a corporate law-firm in Washington around the same time I got an offer to come to KLAD as a weekend jockânot much, but a foot in the door. She told me it was her big chance and I had to be the most insensitive male chauvinist oinker in the United States to be dragging my feet, and furthermore sheâd had it with California anyway. I told her I also had a chance. So we thrashed it out, and we trashed each other out, and at the end of all the thrashing and trashing Sandy went.
âAbout a year after that I decided to try and get the vasectomy reversed. No real reason for it, and I knew from the stuff Iâd read that the chances were pretty spotty, but I thought what the hell.â
âYou were seeing someone steadily then?â Bill asked.
âNoâthatâs the funny part of it,â Richie said, frowning. âI just woke up one day with this ⊠I dunno, this hobbyhorse about getting it reversed.â
âYou must have been nuts,â Eddie said. âGeneral anesthetic instead of a local? Surgery? Maybe a week in the hospital afterward?â
âYeah, the doctor told me all of that stuff,â Richie replied. âAnd I told him I wanted to go ahead anyway. I donât know why. The doc asked me if I understood the aftermath of the operation was sure to be painful while the result was only going to be a coin-toss at best. I said I did. He said okay, and I asked him whenâmy attitude being the sooner the better, you know. So he says hold your horses, son, hold your horses, the first step is to get a sperm sample just to make sure the reversal operation is necessary. I said, âCome on, I had the exam after the vasectomy. It worked.â He told me that sometimes the vasa reconnected spontaneously. âYo mamma!â I says. âNobody ever told me that.â He said the chances were very smallâinfinitesimal, reallyâbut because the operation was so serious, we ought to check it out. So I popped into the menâs room with a Frederickâs of Hollywood catalogue and jerked off into a Dixie cupââ
âBeep-beep, Richie,â Beverly said.
âYeah, youâre right,â Richie said. âThe part about the Frederickâs catalogue is a lieâyou never find anything that good in a doctorâs office. Anyway, the doc called me three days later and asked me which I wanted first, the good news or the bad news.
â âGimme the good news first,â I said.
â âThe good news is the operation wonât be necessary,â he said. âThe bad news is that anybody youâve been to bed with over the last two or three years could hit you with a paternity suit pretty much at will.â
â âAre you saying what I think youâre saying?â I asked him.
â âIâm telling you that you arenât shooting blanks and havenât been for quite awhile now,â he said. âMillions of little wigglies in your sperm sample. Your days of going gaily in bareback with no questions asked have temporarily come to an end, Richard.â
âI thanked him and hung up. Then I called Sandy in Washington.
â âRich!â she says to me,â and Richieâs voice suddenly became the voice of this girl Sandy whom none of them had ever met. It was not an imitation or even a likeness, exactly; it was more like an auditory painting. â âItâs great to hear from you! I got married!â
â âYeah, thatâs great,â I said. âYou should have let me know. I would have sent you a blender.â
âShe goes, âSame old Richie, always full of gags.â
âSo I said âSure, same old Richie, always full of gags. By the way, Sandy, you didnât happen to have a kid or anything after you left L.A., did you? Or maybe an unscheduled d and c, or something?â
â âThat gag isnât so funny, Rich,â she said, and I had a brainwave that she was getting ready to hang up on me, so I told her what happened. She started laughing, only this time it was real hardâshe was laughing the way I always used to laugh with you guys, like somebody had told her the worldâs biggest bellybuster. So when she finally starts slowing down I ask her what in Godâs name is funny. âItâs just so wonderful,â she said. âThis time the jokeâs on you. After all these years the joke is finally on Records Tozier. How many bastards have you sired since I came east, Rich?â
â âI take it that means you still havenât experienced the joys of motherhood?â I ask her.
â âIâm due in July,â she says. âWere there any more questions?â
â âYeah,â I go. âWhen did you change your mind about the immorality of bringing children into such a shitty world?â
â âWhen I finally met a man who wasnât a shit,â she answers, and hangs up.â
Bill began to laugh. He laughed until tears rolled down his cheeks.
âYeah,â Richie said. âI think she cut it off quick so sheâd really get the last word, but she could have hung on the line all day. I know when Iâve been aced. I went back to the doctor a week later and asked him if he could be a little clearer on the odds against that sort of spontaneous regeneration. He said heâd talked with some of his colleagues about the matter. It turned out that in the three-year period 1980â82, the California branch of the AMA logged twenty-three reports of spontaneous regeneration. Six of those turned out to be simply botched operations. Six others were either hoaxes or consâguys looking to take a bite out of some doctorâs bank account. So ⊠eleven real ones in three years.â
âEleven out of how many?â Beverly asked.
âTwenty-eight thousand six hundred and eighteen,â Richie said calmly.
Silence around the table.
âSo I went and beat Irish Sweepstakes odds,â Richie said, âand still no kid to show for it. That give you any good chucks, Eds?â
â
Richie and boys
âą Conscious of looking queer in public.
Alarmed, Richie put an arm around Billâs shoulders (after taking a quick glance around to make sure no one who might mistake them for a couple of fagolas was looking).
âYouâre okay,â he said. âYouâre okay, Billy, right? Come on. Turn off the waterworks.â
âI didnât wuh-wuh-want h-him t-to g-g-get kuh-hilled!â Bill sobbed. âTH-THAT WUH-WUH-WASNâT ON MY M-M-M-MIND AT UH-UH-ALL!â
âChrist, Billy, I know it wasnât,â Richie said. âIf youâd wanted to scrub him, you woulda pushed him downstairs or something.â Richie patted Billâs shoulder clumsily and gave him a hard little hug before letting go. âCome on, quit bawlin, okay? You sound like a baby.â
â
âą Checking out Billâs shoulders and back and describing him as handsome.
Looking at Billâs back, which was amazingly broad for a boy of eleven-going-on-twelve, watching it work under the duffel coat, the shoulders slanting first one way and then the other as he shifted his weight from one pedal to the other, Richie suddenly became sure that they were invulnerable ⊠they would live forever and ever. Well ⊠perhaps not they, but Bill would. Bill had no idea of how strong he was, how somehow sure and perfect.
[âŠ]
Bill was here, and Bill would take care; Bill would not let things get out of control. He was the tallest of them, and surely the most handsome.
â
âą His relationship with Eddie and his love for him.
Richie came bopping down to the stream, glanced at Ben with some interest, and then pinched Eddieâs cheek.
âDonât do that! I hate it when you do that, Richie.â
âAh, you love it, Eds,â Richie said, and beamed at him.
[âŠ]
âOhâyou mean it was your idea, Eds? Jesus, Iâm sorry.â He fell down in front of Eddie and began salaaming wildly again.
âGet up, stop it, youâre splattering mud on me!â Eddie cried.
Richie jumped to his feet a second time and pinched Eddieâs cheek. âCute, cute, cute!â Richie exclaimed.
âStop it, I hate that!â
[âŠ]
âTheyâll all pinch my cheek and tell me how much Iâve grown,â Eddie said.
âThatâs cause they know how cute you are, Edsâjust like me. I saw what a cutie you were the first time I met you.â
âSometimes youâre really a turd, Richie.â
âIt takes one to know one, Eds, and you know em all.â
[âŠ]
âThis wise man,â Richie said, âtold me this: âNo matter how much you squirm and dance, the last two drops go in your pants.â And thatâs why thereâs so much cancer in the world, Eddie my love.â
[âŠ]
âPut him down,â Beverly said. âHe can stay here.â
âItâs too dark,â Richie sobbed. âYou know ⊠itâs too dark. Eds ⊠he âŠâ
âNo, itâs okay,â Ben said. âMaybe this is where heâs supposed to be. I think maybe it is.â
They put him down, and Richie kissed Eddieâs cheek. Then he looked blindly up at Ben. âYou sure?â
âYeah. Come on, Richie.â
Richie got up and turned toward the door. âFuck you, Bitch!â he cried suddenly, and kicked the door shut with his foot. It made a solid chukking sound as it closed and latched.
âWhyâd you do that?â Beverly asked.
âI donât know,â Richie said, but he knew well enough.
â
How IT manifests itself to Richie
âą Sees himself as the werewolf, who is partly a man and partly a monster that canât help the way he is.
The movies were great. The Teenage Frankenstein was suitably gross. The Teenage Werewolf was somehow scarier, though ⊠perhaps because he also seemed a little sad. What had happened wasnât his own fault. There was this hypnotist who had fucked him up, but the only reason heâd been able to was that the kid who turned into the werewolf was full of anger and bad feelings. Richie found himself wondering if there were many people in the world hiding bad feelings like that. Henry Bowers was just overflowing with bad feelings, but he sure didnât bother hiding them.
[âŠ]
Richie chanced a glance behind him as he flung himself onto the package carrier and saw the Werewolf crossing the lawn toward them, less than twenty feet away now. Blood and slobber mixed on its high-school jacket. White bone gleamed through its pelt about the right temple. There were white smudges of sneezing powder on the sides of its nose. And Richie saw two other things which seemed to complete the horror. There was no zipper on the thingâs jacket; instead there were big fluffy orange buttons, like pompoms. The other thing was worse. It was the other thing that made him feel as if he might faint, or just give up and let it kill him. A name was stitched on the jacket in gold thread, the kind of thing you could get done down at Machenâs for a buck if you wanted it.
Stitched on the bloody left breast of the Werewolfâs jacket, stained but readable, were the words RICHIE TOZIER.
â
âą IT chooses to taunt him with Beverly and Eddie.
âYou hear me, Richie? Bring your yo-yo. Have Beverly wear a big full skirt with four or five petticoats underneath. Have her wear her husbandâs ring around her neck! Get Eddie to wear his saddle-shoes! Weâll play some bop, Richie! Weâll play AAALLLL THE HITS!â
â
The final verdict? Richie Tozier is bi as fuck.
pennywise tells richie âi know your secret⊠should i tell them?ââ to me, this means that richieâs fear wasnât of his sexuality, but of people finding out about it;
so to me, the reason pennywise only used this fear against him when he was alone, and never during the big battle scenes with everyone fighting together, is because it knew the losers would accept richie without a second thought, and eddie would return his feelings, and that would make richie braver rather than scared
