Cautious
Requested by anon: Honestly just in need of more Richard content, he’s too underrated 😭 so ig if you could just do something angsty where he meets the reader for the first time but feels like need to push her away and treat her like he treated Jonas at first but eventually they are warming up to each other and he starts to tell her how he feels about her and honestly idk how to continue so its up to you 😭 im just in need for some Richard content whenever you have the time 💞 💞
Pairing: Richard x Female!Reader
Warnings: Slight angst, fluff
Words: 1,846
Note: Okay so like slight inspiration from Babydoll’s crying scene in Sucker Punch, and I listened to Asleep and Where Is My Mind (Sucker Punch OST Versions) while writing so those are some recommendations of mine 😅
Taglist: @matth1w, @redspaceace, @darling-i-read-it, @fandom-puff
Masterlist | Cody Fern Masterlist
Ever since Jonah was discharged, Richard had gone back to how he was before. No one was there to help him. With anything. So what was the point of trying? What was the point if it would be the same every time? He built his barrier back up, blocking out everyone.
So when a new girl arrived, no one was surprised at the thought that he would shut her out as well. She didn’t even notice him until her second day. Walking over to the chairs and tv, Y/n stretched her arms up with a yawn. She looked around, studying the people who were up already.
It was odd, she could admit, but it was one of her favorite things to do. Just, observe people. See what their expressions said when their words were blocked out by the sound around her. However, this little activity of hers caused her to stumble upon the one and only, Richard.
She found that he interested her beyond anything or anyone ever had. Entranced with him, she made her way to the armchair he sat in. “Hi. I’m Y/n.”
He didn’t move. Didn’t blink. Didn’t respond. Didn’t even look at her. Something in her felt hurt by this. Y/n felt agitated with the fact that he was ignoring her.
Shifting on her feet, she tried again. “Uhm... What’s your name?”
“It’s no use.” A girl on the floor mumbled, eyes never leaving the tv. “He’s like a mute. Only, he can talk...just chooses not to. Ever since Jonah left, he kinda...”
“Who’s Jonah?” Y/n turned to face the girl, walking over and sitting beside her. Her interest in Richard became interest in Jonah, interest in Richard’s past.
They talked for a while, the girl explained how Jonah was the asshole of the place, how he had begun to grow kinder as he hung out with Richard, how they’d been caught in bed together. It took Y/n by surprise, her eyes immediately finding Richard, but the girl laughed and told her that her “dirty mind could ease up” as nothing happened.
Y/n made it her mission to warm up to Richard. She continued to watch him, allowing her eyes to see every detail about him, even the ones he probably never noticed. That was one of the many things about being a “people watcher”. She could notice the unnoticed.
One day, she finally broke through his barrier; just not in the way she wanted.
“What is wrong with you?!” He’d pushed past her in the hallway, ignoring the call of his name until she snapped. “You don’t talk, you don’t acknowledge, you don’t even blink! I try, like really try, to be your friend but you-”
“Maybe I don’t want friends.”
“Well- I- ...Jonah was your friend.”
By the fact that Richard stumbled, hesitating with his words for a moment, Y/n could tell that she’d caught him off guard. “Don’t talk about him.”
“He was a dick. He was a dick until he became your friend. So why do you just let a guy like that into your life but you won’t let a girl, who genuinely wants to be your friend, anywhere into your social life?”
Richard backed her into a wall, glaring at her as she bent her knees, cowering with wide eyes. “Don’t. Talk. About. Him.”
“I’m not scared of you.” To prove her words, she took a sharp inhale of air before standing up fully, furrowing her eyebrows and swallowing. “I want to be your friend. I get that you may not be used to that, but please. All I’m asking is that you give me a chance.”
He stopped. His eyes darted around the room, a tell that he was thinking. “Okay. I’ll give you a chance.” With his final words, he left the hall, leaving her alone under the flickering light.
His chance wasn’t as much of a chance as Y/n liked. All he really did was allow her to sit by him and exchange hellos or good mornings. It wasn’t much, but it was progress. And progress was what would lead to the goal.
But the progress was stuck at the same spot, proving that his chance really wasn’t a chance.
Richard walked past the bathrooms, headed for the men’s. That’s when he heard it. Distinct sobbing from the women’s. He knew he shouldn’t be in there, but he went anyways, brows scrunched with concern and confusion. Normally, he wouldn’t think twice; but it was late, he was too tired to shut out his emotions, and he couldn’t help but feel empathy for the mystery person.
Opening the door slowly, as to not scare the person, he walked in. Surprise met his features when his eyes came across Y/n, practically huddled up in a ball on the bathroom floor. One of her knees was up, in front of her chest, and the other was lying flat on the floor. One of her arms ran through her hair as the other laid limp by her side.
Richard didn’t talk. He just walked over, sat next to her, exchanged eye contact with the puffy eyed girl and pulled her in his chest as tight as he could. She cried into his shoulder, holding him to herself just as tight as he held her. They stayed like that for awhile, just holding each other as Y/n cried.
When the time came, she pulled away and wiped her eyes. “Thank you, Richard.”
“You’re welcome...”
They had a rendezvous every night, Richard sneaking into the women’s bathroom and holding her close to him as her shoulders heaved, tears streaming down her face and wetting his night-shirt.
Their relationship outside the bathroom was the pretty much the same as it had been prior to his late night discovery. The same greetings and silence. The same everything... but one thing had definitely changed. Richard allowed Y/n to get closer to him, as she wanted, and said goodbyes and goodnights, exchanging smiles and slight lingering eye contact.
Despite their public life being shy, their bathroom-meet ups had grown into something...beautiful.
There was a night where Y/n couldn’t sleep, as usual, but felt like a drained battery. So, Richard extended his legs and patted his thighs,
“You can sleep, I’ll keep watch.”
“But- ...For what?”
“Workers, other people...monsters.” He smiled teasingly, ignoring his own demons subconsciously.
And that night, as his hand rubbed the top of her head soothingly, he swore he felt his heart stop.
He looked at her, furrowing his eyebrows and inhaling shakily. There was just something about her. Something he was just now noticing as he scanned her sleeping face. She turned slightly, breathing strangely- rushed.
Richard recognized the breathing pattern as a nightmare, tears of his own rushing down his cheeks as he pulled her close to him. Staring at the wall, he smiled to himself.
Then there was the night she noticed something herself.
Eyes trained on the smallest divots of the floor, her head resting on Richard’s shoulder as his rested on hers- she knew it.
She leaned closer to him, tears flooding her face again. Only, this time, they were tears of joy. Content. Love. Thinking he was asleep, guessing by the calmed breathing leaving his lips and the stillness of his body, she laughed to herself softly.
“What have you done to me, you quiet bastard?”
Richard was conscious though. And it brought a smile to his lips that he tried to fight back. Luckily, with the redness of his cheeks, it also gave him a goal of his own. Flashbacks of the night he realized his feelings for her zipped in and out of his head.
“Y/n?”
“Yeah?”
This was the night he’d do it. The red in her eyes was slowly fading; Richard had shown up earlier tonight and calmed her down, hugging her until he told himself to stop being a chicken.
But he couldn’t do it. His eyes met hers, mouth opening to confess- but he couldn’t do it. They drifted back to the floor. He didn’t have the confidence nor the faith that she’d say yes. Richard, knowing he couldn’t chicken out, not after weeks of preparing himself, took a deep breath. Then he did it.
Eyes slowly meeting hers again,
“Richard? What were you going to-”
He lunged in and kissed her. His hand gripped the back of her head as their lips moved in synch. Surprise ran through him as she kissed back; her hands combing through his locks and holding him close to her.
They pulled away, chest heaving as their lungs roped oxygen back into their bodies.
Y/n touched her lips, her eyes flicking back up to his as her mouth formed a smile and a giggle escaped it. Richard chuckled along, a slight nervousness coursing through the adrenaline rush, which he could thank their kiss for.
They stopped laughing and avoided eye contact with each other. An awkward tension, new to the two, formed between them. Richard felt responsible for it, as he was the one who initiated the kiss. “I’m sor-”
All of his worries were shot down when she pushed her lips back into his.
Richard may not have been great with words, but his feelings were known by Y/n. Soon enough, their bathroom progress turned into public progress.
Sometimes Y/n in front of his chair, by his feet, or on his lap as they watched tv. Sometimes Y/n would be found in Richard’s room, either cuddling or giggling as he tickled her, or drew her, or as he or she drew on the other while they listened to music- just whatever “cute couple” kind of things they could do.
Their nightly meetups were ongoing. Most of the time it was in the bathroom, but there were times when Richard snuck Y/n into his room. He often was the big spoon, but when the nightmares came despite her presence, she turned and got him to turn as well, promoting herself from small spoon.
But the time they feared came.
She was talked to by one of the staff members, told she was able to leave now. Her heart told her to make a choice, and when she was pulled into a hug, arms wrapped around her torso as the person pulled her onto their lap and allowing her to see her boyfriend’s face, she decided to do it.
Just as everyone thought the clinic was about to discharge her, Richard sitting in his chair and looking around with confusion, she walked back into the room and plopped into her boyfriends lap.
“Where were you? They- they said you were le-”
She pecked his lips before snatching the remote and clicking through the channels. “Nah. They’re not gonna get rid of me that easily.” Y/n smiled, feeling Richard, lips formed in a smile of his own, kiss the back of her head. A silent thank you, I love you, and response all at the same time.
Once again, someone had finally broken the barrier of the quiet, cautious boy. And he was grateful.