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#19: ɪ ʟɪᴋᴇ ʙᴏʏꜱ

Holy shit.

I tried to move toward the door but my feet wouldn't budge. I tried pushing forward. No use. I tried stepping to the side. No use. I tried leaning back. No fucking use. 

Someone had the remote to my bodily functions, and they had pressed pause too many times, to the point where the button itself broke.

I could barely even hear the noises from beyond the closed door. This was still my safe place, and it was even safer now.

Your seven minutes are up.

Well god dammit then, I didn't want just seven minutes. I wanted sixty minutes. One hundred and twenty minutes. I wanted hours. I wanted days. I wanted weeks. I wanted months. I wanted years. I wanted all the time in the world.

Mike knocked again.

I watched as Eddie sighed in desperate relief and fiddled to find the handle to the closet door, turning a large metal lock that was shaped like a distorted key. Not being able to see his facial expressions or body language made me immediately anxious.

I didn't even notice that he had locked the door before it had closed, but it made my stomach backflip like no end.

There was nothing else further to be said; fuck Seven Minutes in Heaven. No such place nor game existed. Heaven was by definition a singular feeling. The feeling of standing next to Eddie.

A small creak of the large door was heard through the small space, and a beam of singular light began to shine toward the back of the closet. It illuminated a small part of Eddie's cheek and eye. His pupil was slightly dilated, his lips were pursed enough to the point where they were white, and his cheek was flushed and crimson, just as mine must've been.

I almost impulsively covered my own face in the fear that he was looking at me. Without any exchanged eye contact, though, Eddie pushed the door with some strength, despite a broken arm, and stepped down toward the group. He began coughing immediately, and it was clear that Beverly had lit another cigarette in the time that we were away.

I stayed a few seconds longer behind the door, my chest heaving in quick gasping breaths as I stayed planted where I was, my eyes squeezed shut. Everything was different now, everything had changed. Everything was known for certain.

I got the same rushing, adolescent feeling that I did back when Eddie, Bill, and Stan were ready to take showers. That same painful, secretive, discreet feeling. Everything was clearer now.

My parents always used to tell me that I was too young for a girlfriend because I was too young to know what I wanted when it came to romance or sex. I was too young to experience it. I had to experience it to know. In some ways, they were right, in some ways, they were wrong. Because I know now. I did know what I wanted romantically and sexually.

This was only because I did experience it, right here, right now. I wanted Eddie. I like boys. I wanted to kiss Eddie over and over, in the way I should've wanted to kiss girls.

Jesus Christ.

Simply thinking these things, knowing they were true and real and authentic, that was what genuinely made my head spin. That's what made me terrified for my life.

"Thank fuck," Eddie said loudly, accentuating his arms to show how much he wanted to escape the closet itself. He sat himself back down on the crate, knowing he'd surely shrivel up and die if he stayed in any confined space that was flooded with cig smoke. "You're a bitch, Bevvy."

"So I've been told," she replied.

"Rich?" Ben offered, holding the door open for me as I kept my back pressed against the closet. "You alright, buddy?"