[ It's been three months since Derry. Since the Losers Club (barely) survived their second showdown with It in the cistern, since they dragged themselves out of the muck and ruin of Neibolt, since they weathered Eddie's damn near-miraculous recovery and Stanley's literally miraculous resurrection. Three months since they turned their backs on the town that never knew the price they paid to save it, three months since they tried to return to their lives, three months since Beverly took control of hers. Three months since she called Dean from that hospital corridor, still covered in blood, and talked about monsters. Three months full of more phone calls and texts just like that one, less and less about monsters and more and more about the mundane. (Stories, music, the things they like, don't like; dumb pictures, funny pictures, the burger they had for lunch, the leftovers for dinner. Anything. Everything.) It's been three months since they became friends.
But that doesn't make the monsters are any less real.
It's been three months since Derry but the nightmares haven't stopped. They all have them now, not just Beverly. She and Richie talk the most, sharing the shitty honour of being caught in the deadlights, but they don't have the monopoly on good old fashioned trauma and the Losers chat is full of late night texts. They don't say why they're up at 4 AM sharing corgi compilation videos or a running commentary of Guy Fieri's Triple D marathon; they don't have to. But somewhere down the line, Beverly felt a little — guilty — for weighing the others down with something she's grappled with for 27 years. Somewhere down the line, she started texting Dean the same stuff. Somewhere down the line he, unlike her friends, pointed out the timestamps. Somewhere down the line, he told her, Call me anytime and Bev, thinking back to that shaky hospital phone call, doesn't feel ashamed when she accepts the offer. Usually, they talk like they do during the day (or he talks and she listens until her heartbeat settles). But sometimes, when she can't catch her breath enough to manage even that, Dean plays music over the line, soft strumming guitar and bluesy 70s cassettes — and it helps.
Tonight is one of those exceptionally bad nights. The kind where Beverly fumbles for her phone in the dark and taps on Dean's name before she's even fully awake, fully out of whatever murky, cold place she'd believed herself to be; she can still feel the icy grip of fingers on her throat when the call connects, voice ragged with memory and sleep and tears. ]
Dean? [ Normally she'd text first. Maybe she'd meant to. But she's running on instinct (fighting the instinct to run — or maybe she is running — towards or away, can't tell). ] You there?
📞
But that doesn't make the monsters are any less real.
It's been three months since Derry but the nightmares haven't stopped. They all have them now, not just Beverly. She and Richie talk the most, sharing the shitty honour of being caught in the deadlights, but they don't have the monopoly on good old fashioned trauma and the Losers chat is full of late night texts. They don't say why they're up at 4 AM sharing corgi compilation videos or a running commentary of Guy Fieri's Triple D marathon; they don't have to. But somewhere down the line, Beverly felt a little — guilty — for weighing the others down with something she's grappled with for 27 years. Somewhere down the line, she started texting Dean the same stuff. Somewhere down the line he, unlike her friends, pointed out the timestamps. Somewhere down the line, he told her, Call me anytime and Bev, thinking back to that shaky hospital phone call, doesn't feel ashamed when she accepts the offer. Usually, they talk like they do during the day (or he talks and she listens until her heartbeat settles). But sometimes, when she can't catch her breath enough to manage even that, Dean plays music over the line, soft strumming guitar and bluesy 70s cassettes — and it helps.
Tonight is one of those exceptionally bad nights. The kind where Beverly fumbles for her phone in the dark and taps on Dean's name before she's even fully awake, fully out of whatever murky, cold place she'd believed herself to be; she can still feel the icy grip of fingers on her throat when the call connects, voice ragged with memory and sleep and tears. ]
Dean? [ Normally she'd text first. Maybe she'd meant to. But she's running on instinct (fighting the instinct to run — or maybe she is running — towards or away, can't tell). ] You there?