Behind the Clouds ✔️

001

December 1988

It had been a couple months since little Georgie Denbrough had disappeared. In that couple of months, more and more children in Derry were going missing. For Violet Hockstetter, she couldn't have become more alert in her life. Her seven year old brother, Ashton, was all she had left. She'd be devastated if he went missing.

Ashton wasn't feeling too well about it, either. After playing Monopoly three times with Georgie's older brother, Bill, the Denbrough household had gotten a phone call from Ms. Rognoli who was the last to have seen little Georgie Denbrough before he was taken.

The Hockstetter household was immediately called to take Ashton home. Violet hated seeing her classmate become the talk of the school. Bill was a good kid; got straight A's, took care of Ashton as though he and Georgie were both his brothers. Violet could only half relate. She'd been the talk of the school since her father died six years ago in a car wreck.

After that car wreck, the Hockstetter family fell, and they fell hard. Emmett Hockstetter's death was unlike the other tragedies that occurred in Derry. That crash made the Derry News with only one survivor being six year old, Violet Hockstetter. Angela Hockstetter began battling severe depression after her husband's death. She wouldn't leave her room. The first few months after his death scared Violet so bad. She tried to get her mother to do something, but the only reply she ever got was, "My Emmett's coming home."

Not long after that, their eldest child joined a gang. Patrick was merely nine years old, but he and his friends began to make other kids lives' a living hell. Henry Bowers, Victor Criss, and Reginald Huggins were the nastiest boys around town. Each of their families were quite infamous in town.

Oscar Bowers was the police chief of Derry, and not much of a father than people would expect, Ethan Criss murdered his wife, Ella, and his eldest child, Ryan, in front of four year old Vic, and while the Huggins family took Reginald in for adoption, sometimes they beat him senseless. Now the Hockstetter name would go down in the dirt, at the hand of a nine year old who found an odd way of grieving over his father's death.

Violet couldn't help but think about Bill and Georgie, as she passed the corner of Jackson and Witcham street on her way to school. She got shivers every time she passed the street corner, remembering the police cars pulled up on both sides of the street, as they searched for Georgie.

"Lettie! Wait up!" Violet looked up from her pink sneakers in the snow. Edward Corcoran was seen running down the sidewalk of Jackson, trying to meet with Violet at the corner. Violet stayed put with a small smile gracing her face. She could see Edward's breath as he began to pant the closer he got to his friend.

"God! I feel like an overweight, middle-aged man," Edward said, catching his breath, "What's up with you now? Every time you get to my corner, you seem to forget I'm on my way out." Violet gave a small giggle.

Edward Corcoran was one of the few friends Violet had since the accident. It's not that no one wanted to go near her or befriend her. It was out of fear of her brother. Patrick wasn't to thrilled the day Violet had gotten home from school with Edward Corcoran and Betty Ripsom in tow. Violet had gotten partnered with Betty in her fourth grade English class, and Edward and Betty had known each other since they were in diapers. Thus, it became them against the world.

"I don't really know," Violet replied in her soft voice. Everyone remembered the boisterous kindergartner before the accident, and this was not her now. "Your street scares me now."

Edward looked at her, bewildered. "Please tell me this has nothing to do with the Criss' new pit bulls. Mom swears she's gonna call animal service one of these days." Violet shook her head in response.

"Forget it," she murmured as they got one step closer to Derry Secondary School.