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THE LOSERS CLUB STOOD IN THE MEADOW BEHIND THE GRAVEYARD AND THE ROPE SWING, past the grove of ripe beech trees, beside the lake and the wooden birdwatching hut where Romy and Stan had seen IT a while before. However, everything seemed a little more golden, as Romy skipped through in her Freeses t-shirt. Bees pollinated flowers, and sunlight pooled on the water's surface, reflecting up back to the sky.
"I can only remember parts, but I thought I was dead," Beverly described what she had seen in her solo encounter with the clown, as he stole her and took her down to the sewers and the toy tower, "That's what it felt like. I saw us together, back in the sewer. But we were older, like, our parents' ages."
She imagined a time when she would be the age of her aunt. Thirty-four, with her dark hair in a bob and an often unlit cigarette drooping from her lips, ribbons of laughter hopefully still present in her russet eyes. All of Romy's life, she'd wanted to be older. She suspected that as soon as she was older, she'd want to be younger again.
Bill furrowed his brows, leaning in from his spot on a parallel log, "W-w-what were we doing there?"
Her auburn curls shifted as she shook her head, the memory beginning to weather over time. "I just remember how we felt. How scared we were," she looked down at her hands, "I don't think I can forever forget that."
Bill stood, picking up a shard of stained glass from the bed of grass beside his shoes, "Swear ... s-s-swear that if isn't dead, if it comes back, we'll come back, too."
That would be in twenty-seven years. She could be anywhere — in twenty-seven years, she'd be forty-one. She would be older than Meg; she could be married, with kids. If IT came back, she'd have people to protect. She'd never really thought about children, obviously, because she was fourteen. All our kids could all be friends, she thought, and hoped that it would be true, as the thought made her happy.
Beverly stood after Bill, sending a chain reaction for the other losers to stand also. Bill sliced open the palm of his hand, wincing as it parted his skin. Then, he went to Richie, and then to a reluctant Eddie with a casted LOVER arm. Richie had to bump him with comfort as the thought of transmittable diseases flaunted in his mind. Bill then went to Mike, to Stan, and then to Romy.
All she could think of was: we're all gonna get HIV from this, I swear. It seemed like a bout of pointless pain, and it seared as Bull dashed her palm. That's the point of a blood oath, she supposed, and as it stung and she watched blood trickle down her palm, she wondered if it would leave behind a scar.
He went to Ben and then finished with Beverly. The losers linked hands, and that was that, as blood dripped off of her fingers. It would be a matter of if, and extensively, when. Beverly said she'd seen them, all of them, so they'd all get around to returning someday. Perhaps she'd never leave Derry. Meg could get back on her feet, and she could live out her life in 27 Moore Street.
"I should go," announced Romy, ignoring the sear that made the nerve endings tingle, "My aunt'll be home from her first day at work soon, and I want to bake her a cake before she gets back."
"Yeah, me too," added Stan, his curly hair poking out from the bandages wrapped around his face (he'd told his mother that he had fallen victim to a particularly vicious polecat). "I hate you," his expression slacked into a smile, "I'll see you later."
"Uh-huh," agreed Romy with an upward inflection, who hobbled off to go and join him, hoping the cut on her hand would clot soon, as she didn't plan on staining her neat white t-shirt red.
"Bye, Stan, Romy."
The losers shared conspicuous looks. STAN AND ROMY SITTIN' IN A TREE, K-I-S-S-I-N-G!
She slowed to his pace, as they jumped over the haphazard roots that had been the subject of Romy's twisted ankles for one hell of a long time. Once the had passed the birdfeed and were out of earshot, she said blandly, "Should we make out, now?"
And then they laughed, the both of them, together: and to herself, she speculated that she'd found something she liked a little more than parties and attention and discos.
