Hell & Back

Chapter Nineteen

"This is so stupid. Goddamn it. Why am I even here?" Eddie kept saying over and over as he walked up to the old Creel house. He looked around to make sure no one was around to see him go inside. The last thing he needed was to be back on the run from the police, was he even not on the run from the police? He never even thought to ask.

He walked inside the house and noticed the similarities from the ruins he seen in his mind earlier that day. "Welcome home, you bastard." Eddie said to Vecna, the monster had been quiet but he knew that he was still there. "It's just you and me, good thing your a bigger freak than me, we won't get bored." Eddie said lighting a cigarette "Don't mind do ya, to damn bad if you do."

He walked around the house, it looked like the family had just picked up and left. Except for in the dining room where the floor was still stained with blood. "Killed your mom and sister, huh, couldn't finish off your dad?" He was trying to piss Vecna off, keep him off of the other trail even for a moment. He hoped they would use this time to come up with a plan.

Eddie didn't hear anything inside his mind and was starting to think of other things he could do to anger the monster, when the front door slammed open. "Shit." He said thinking the cops had just found him. He pressed himself between the wall and china cabinet, they would see him when they walked in but he would see them first.

Eddie held his breath as he waited, he could hear the heavy footsteps but it seemed to only be one person. He heard them in the living room, he heard the sound of someone strum the strings of his guitar. "Come out Eddie." He heard a male voice say "You wanted to play, right?" Eddie tried to move silently but the floor creaked and the guy came walking into the dining room. "It's not very nice to hide." The voice said as he came around the corner.

Eddie seen it was the boy who had been watching Chrissy, his plan was working. "And just who in the hell are you?" Eddie said coming out from beside the cabinet. The boys face turned up into a smirk and his eyes which held a blank stare seemed to become alert. "Ahh, you have a puppet." Eddie said making sense of what was happening. "Possession, learning new tricks are you?"

"Not possession, more like mind control. Little Danny is still here just taking a backseat." Vecna said with a laugh. He was pacing back and forth in front of Eddie. Honestly he wasn't even paying Eddie much attention but he was here. "I didn't think you would be brave enough to come here, to my place." Vecna said stopping and looking at him "We are connected, remember? Where I go, you go so whether it's here or somewhere else the outcome is the same." Eddie said meeting his gaze. "That we are, my friend, that we are." Vecna said, sending chills down his spine.

Chrissy had watched him go, she didn't let herself cry anymore over it. They didn't break up, she kept telling herself. He had to go. She repeated the same thing over and over in her mind while she biked over to Nancy's.

She told them everything that had happened. Nancy was noticeably nervous since Vecna had shown her visions as well. Steve was the one who asked question after, he wanted to know where Eddie had gone and wasn't accepting of the fact that she didn't know. "He had to say something that would give a clue to where." Steve said more to himself than anyone else.

"We shouldn't be worrying about that." Chrissy said to everyone's surprise "We need to be concerned with how to get rid of Vecna or whatever door he opened....Eddie wont come home until he knows Vecna can't get in his head anymore." She finished sitting down on the stairs and fighting back the tears threatening to spill. She took hold of the necklace hanging around her neck and took a breath. "I just got him back and that monster will not take him away again." She said after a few moments, she hadn't realized she even said it out loud until Steve came and sat beside her "Eddie will not go back there alone, I won't let him, we won't let him." He said and put an arm around Chrissy pulling her in.

When Chrissy left she felt confident that this would be a temporary thing. Nancy and Dustin were still brainstorming. Steve had offered to take her home which she gladly accepted. She didn't want to be out walking alone in case that creepy guy was still around. She had a bad enough day without thinking about ominous messages from Vecna.

"Thanks for bringing me home." Chrissy said as they pulled into her driveway. "Everything is going to be okay, we have been through worse." Steve said giving her a reassuring smile. She tried to give one back but it didn't quite reach her eyes. "Are you gonna be okay?" He asked as she sat there working up the strength to go inside. She was not looking forward to sleeping alone. "I'll be fine." She said with a shaky voice. "It's just like reliving the past. Except this time he chose to leave." Chrissy shut the door before Steve could say anything and walked inside.

She went upstairs and showered. Now is not the time to breakdown she kept reminding herself. She wanted badly to be angry but she couldn't, she wanted to lay in bed and cry until it was over but she couldn't, and she wanted to go out and find him but she couldn't. What she could do was figure out a plan that would get rid of Vecna for good. Than they could move on with a life together.

Chrissy put on one of Eddie's shirts like always and crawled into bed. She let her mind wonder into dreams of the future, a future where Eddie was with her and they had their own home with a family and their friends could come over. A place where he could have a music room in and another for his Dungeon and Dragons games. Somewhere she could be herself, and find herself, while knowing that just by waking up she was making someone happy. Chrissy fell asleep with silent tears falling down her cheeks.

Eddie was sitting in the living room idly strumming his guitar and playing different cords while Danny/Vecna/One/Henry sat across from him. So far Eddie had listened to the whole story about him and Eleven in the lab being tested on and how he picked on her so she threw him into the Upside Down. And of course the walkthrough of how he killed his mom and sister than let them blame it on his dad. "Do you ever stop talking?" Eddie said with an exaggerated sigh "I mean damn, dude." He lit a cigarette and offered one to Vecna who waved a hand at him "Those will kill you." He said and Eddie only laughed "You will kill me."

The rest of the night he listened to Vecna go on about his hatred of the world and why he wanted it to crumple, because humans are weak and pick on people like him although he picked on someone like him. His end goal was to bring the Upside Down to this world so that a greater monster can take over. Finally Vecna fell asleep or at least shut up and Eddie let himself fall into his thoughts. He thought of Chrissy.

He thought about laying in bed beside her, her head laying on his chest and the feel of her hair brushing his face as she moved in her sleep. He thought of the way she breathed in her sleep and the way she would mumble his name. He could lay in that bed with her forever without complaint. He fell asleep missing the  sweet smell of roses and the warm of her small body pressed against his.