Strawberry flavored

05

"Boys, for Christ's sake, are you really going to get in there." Elizabeth felt disgusted as she analysed the lengthened and darkened sewer tunnel.

It smelled like old blood and wet rubbish. It had a type of algae hanging from the entrance and walls of the tunnel. The floor had a few centimetres of dirty water that looked between yellow, brown and black, and had remains of bags coloured black because of the dirt. It was dark, Elizabeth (and the boys, too, she supposed) could only see about five meters of the tunnel for the dark blacked out the rest of it, which was long; it reached the townhall.

Elizabeth's boots were soaked from the water of the stream they had been walking on. She decided she was not gonna keep insisting after those knuckleheads; she took her shoes off, sat on a wide rock and watched the boys make a fool of themselves.

"Beth, w-we might f-f-find something." Bill stuttered.

"My mum's gonna kill me. You're making me walk through graywater—"Eddie said and Elizabeth interrupted him.

"Edward, are you mad? Don't go in there." Eddie stood on the entrance of the tunnel next to Stanley, breathing anxiously through his aspirator.

He started arguing with Richie. Elizabeth and Stanley sighed.

"Doesn't smell like caca to me, señor." He raised a black, incredibly clean bag that spilled water with a wood stick and threw it to Eddie.

"Richard, stop, okay? Just stop." Elizabeth spoke tired.

He didn't. Richie made a few jokes, still. It wasn't until Richie said something supposed to be funny that had happened to him when he was with Bill that she realized he was not there.

"Guys, where's Bill?"She inquired getting up and closer to the tunnel, staring into the darkness. "Bill?"

The other boys all peeked into the tunnel noticing, too, that Bill was nowhere to be seen.

"Bill, this isn't funny. Bill?" Eddie called.

Elizabeth felt panicked that he had got stuck somewhere in there.

And then they heard splashes, all breathing out the fear that had consumed their lungs.

"You can't make jokes like that. You could've just said 'I'm going inside' or something... Wait, what is that?"Elizabeth, just like the others observed the shoe he was carrying.

You could recognize the white and pink colours of the shoe, even under the layer of black and gray dirt that covered it. She could assume it was a girl's. There were some letters scribbled inside in blue ink.

"Shit. Don't tell me that's...?"Stanley started.

"No. Georgie wore galoshes."

Wow, Elizabeth thought, he didn't stutter.

"Who's sneaker is it?" Richie looked at the shoe on Bill's hands. "It's Betty Ripsom's'."

"Oh, shit." Eddie cursed. "Oh, god. Oh, fuck. I don't like this."

"Since when do you curse?" Beth snickered.

"How do you think Betty feels? Running around these tunnels with only one frickin' shoe?" He chuckled; the rest of them stared at him seriously.

"What if she's still here?"Stanley asked.

Bill started walking inside the tunnels again.

As Elizabeth stared at the shoes, she could see small, yet visible if you paid enough attention, spots of blood around the shoe.

"That's blood. Do you think she—"She was interrupted by a set of splashes approaching them.

She had meant to ask if they thought she could still be there, dead or alive. Poor her if she was just walking around the sewer with only one shoe.

She felt devastated for a split of second until she saw the boy.

Or a kid, he was. He was running from something. Elizabeth realized the stains of blood on his gray shirt and ran to him.

"Holy shit! What happened to you?." Richie approached the boy, too, just like Elizabeth.

They boy let himself fall on the set of rocks of the streaming with sweat pouring down his whole face.

"Wow, what happened?"She wanted to show comfort but she felt dazzled by the blood. It had the same effect to her as if she was a vampire; she was not gonna drink it, she just liked seeing blood and injures.

Soon, Bill shook her shoulder and tilted his head, which movement Elizabeth understood perfectly: They had to help the poor guy.