all i wanted , bill denbrough

nine . . . "put the map back."

⎯⎯ chapter nine.

"THEY SAY THEY FOUND part of his hand all chewed up near the standpipe." stanley spoke to the group as they all stared at at eddie corcorans missing poster.

"he asked to borrow a pencil once." ben added. winnie shuttered. bill walked towards the poster, flipping the paper up to show betty ripsoms poster.

"it's like she's been f-forgotten because corcoran's missing."

the brown skinned girl looked down at her shoes with a guilty expression. winnie and betty were somewhat friends. they had science class together and would always be partnered up together. so, her feelings were hurt really badly when she went "missing."

"is it ever gonna end?" stanley asked. winnie snapped her head over towards richie as he was shouting at a tuba player. she rolled her eyes.

then, eddie walked over with two ice cream cones. "what are you guys talking about?" he asked. "what they always talk about." richie retorted, grabbing his ice cream from eddie.

"i actually think it will end." ben started, "for a little while, at least." winnie furrowed her eyebrows at his words.

"what do you mean?" beverly questioned. winnie stood next to bill to hear ben better, bill looked at her through his peripheral.

"so i was going over all my derry research and i cleared out all the big events. the ironworks explosion in 1908, the bradley gang in '35, and the black spot in '62. and now kids being..." he paused, winnie looking at bill through her peripheral. "i realized this stuff seems to happen..." "every 27 years." both bill and ben said at the same time.

ben took a deep breath before shifting his gaze towards beverly for a second.

"okay, so, let me get this straight. it comes out from wherever to eat kids for, like, a year? and then what? it just goes into hibernation?" eddie summarized for his own being.

"maybe it's like... what do you call it? cicadas. you know, the bugs that come out once every 17 years." stanley interjected, attempting to not jump to the worst conclusions.

"stan, i doubt that cicadas are coming out and eating kids." winnie replied, looking up at him from the spot on the bench as she sat in between stan and mike.

mike then spoke up, "my grandfather thinks this town is cursed. he says that all the bad things that happen in this town are because of one thing. an evil thing that feeds off the people of derry." winnie turned her head to look at the boy.

"but it can't be one thing. we all saw something different." said stan. "maybe. or it knows what scares us most and that's what we see." mike explained.

"i- i saw a leper. he was like a walking infection." eddie informed. "but you didn't. because it isn't real. none of this is. not eddie's leper, o- or bill seeing georgie, o- or the woman i keep seeing." the curly haired boy stuttered in fear.

"she hot?" winnie snapped her head to look at richie, sending him an intimidating glare. "no, richie. she's not hot! her face is all messed up. none of this makes any sense! they're all like bad dreams." stan exclaimed, only doing so due to him being scared.

mike looked up at stanley, "i don't think so. i know the difference between a bad dream and real life, okay?" mike stammered, dismissing stans doubts.