[Richie definitely winces a bit at the alcohol, his eyes scrunch up, but beyond that, there's no real reaction. It's difficult to have normal reactions to pain after everything the two of them had been through. It smarts but that's about all he can say for it, his hands are already a little black and blue, bruising over some of the knuckles because of impact.]

It still fucking happens. I just want to be with you, y'know? I should be allowed to be with you.

[The last part is spoken mostly to himself, he pulls his phone out with the hand Eddie's not working on, and there are six new messages from his PR consultant, his manager, shit on twitter, so much for keeping a low profile.]

This might be a bad time, but I'm not seeing much room for recourse. I'm gonna have to tell people why I lost it, and that means you might have to be in the picture too. Is that okay? I know shit's still pretty fresh, but I want to make it clear I'm not on some fluke out of control binge or something.