{semi charmed life} reddie

{the big apple}

Stanley Uris let his forehead press against the car window as the Georgia landscape whizzed past them, Patty occasionally glancing towards her fiancée and smiling to herself. Ben Hanscom was reading a newspaper outside the car rental store, sun shining on his face and smile on his lips at the lingering smell of vanilla on his clothes. Bill Denbrough wadded through the multiples of unpacked cardboard boxes, and knocked on the locked bedroom door at the end of the hallway. Mike Hanlon dropped a couple quarters into a payphone in Metro station and punched in the number he had written on the ripped napkin.

Richie Kaspbrak had his three year daughter tossed over his shoulder, rushing through the family's New York townhouse making over-excited airplane sounds. Frankie shrieked in joy as her father dipped her suddenly, Eddie smiling happily as he reached out and answered the ringing telephone. "Hello, you've reached the Kaspbraks'."

Mike gave the payphone an odd smile as Eddie's phone came through. "Hey, uh, Eddie? It's Mike."

"Mike!" Eddie cried in a sharp, pitchy voice. Richie looked up from where he was dangling Frankie upside down and gave his husband an amused smile. "I take it if you're calling that you made it into the city alright then!"

Mike laughed nervously, looking around the barely moving ridiculous traffic and the buildings that were nearly so large that Mike wasn't sure if he was really even seeing the tops of them. He certainly wasn't in Maine. "I sure hope so, or I've crossed over into some terrible alternate dimension of Derry that I really don't want to give that much thought into."

Eddie laughed with him over the line, as the buzzer signally the ringing of their door bell rang through their home. "What is this, Grand Central Station?" Richie laughed as he tossed a giggling Frankie onto their couch like a football in the touchdown zone. "I'll get it."

Eddie nodded at his husband as he turned his attention back to his conversation. "Good, good. You've still got a few hours before meeting with the real state agent your work gave you, right? You going to do any big city exploring before then?"

Mike gave a nervous chuckle, smiling against the phone. "I don't know. It's just... big, you know? I'm starting my life over from scratch. I just... It'll be nice to do these things with somebody there."

Eddie leaned against his kitchen counter, phone pressed against his ear. "Welcome to the Big Apple. Nothing is ever going to be the same again."

Richie padded to the front door, his tiny toddle of a daughter hurrying in her small legs to keep up with her daddy. He turned the handle and yanked the door open, taking in the person standing on his front step with their whole life surrounding them in suitcases.

Beverly Marsh looked up at him from under her lashes, fiddling with the straps on a backpack that Richie recognized from high school. "Is your and Eddie's invitation for a place to stay still open?"

→  →  →

"Baby...." Bill banged his head against the locked bedroom door. "Will you please open the door? We need to talk about this." The silence on the other edge make the anxiety in Bill's stomach swill and sour, making the man unable to ignore how he was now only moments away from reducing to his childhood stutter. "Please, Audra. Please."

It had been radio silence from his pregnant girlfriend since Bill had told her the night before that he was setting out from Derry. The conversations had been dim and unlively since she'd taken off to their New York apartment in the middle of the night, but Audra had not answered the phone even one time since hanging up on Bill with a simple "Okay" as he told her he was ready to come to their new home. It seemed the Bill having finally arrived hadn't changed his girlfriend's stance on potentially never speaking to him ever again.