love ; bill denbrough

14

Cass

"Well? Do you love her?" Richie pushed. It was blindingly obvious that I had a crush on Bill and apparently, the same goes for Bill himself.

"Richie stop." I gritted my teeth. Yes, I liked Bill. The last thing I need are my own best friends making it to awkward to be around him.

"Bill, it's a simple q-" 

"Kids!" The car door swung open. Perfect timing Mrs Denbrough. "Come on, quickly." 

We all got out of the car, I did so with the help of Bill, and we all followed Bill's mom. For once, Richie was quiet. There was a line, and even Richie knew he was dangerously close to crossing it. A blast of warmth hit us when we reached the automatic doors, following Bill's mother straight to the elevator.

"9th floor, Mike." She smiled as the young boy in front of her pressed the elevator key.

After what felt like hours of rising tension in the longest elevator ride, which in reality was only around 40 seconds, we reached 9th floor. Doctors stared in confusion as a group of children flooded out of the small metal box and ran down the hallway, scanning the clipboards outside of the patients doors.

"We've got a Diane?" Stan questioned, paused outside of a patients room. 

"Yeah that's her." I ran up to the huge white door that separated me from my mother.

"Jeez." Bill now stood behind me. "You look just like her, I think it's the hair."

"Holy fuck!" Richie shouted, earning disgusted looks from nurses around us. "Your mom's a milf!" 

"Keep it in your pants, Tozier. Not the time." Mike snapped.

"You guys can go in, she's just sleeping." A nurse stopped and gestured to the door softly, only to then then begin scuffing her feet over the linoleum floor, as she did before.

Before I knew it, my fingers were on the cold blue door handle, me and my friends barrelling into the room.

"Mom?" I put my hands on her shoulders. "Mom, it's Cass."

She took a sharp intake of breath as if she was startled awake, and her eyes had the same light they'd always had in them. "Cass." She sat up.

"Mom these are my friends." I pointed at all the boys and named them to my mother, they each did an individual salute, wave, nod.

"How'd you meet them all?" She asked, pulling the lid off of one of those hospital jello's and smelling it in disgust.

"Well, Bill's little brother was with Teddy when he, disappeared." I said, my mother frowning and putting the jello back onto her tray.

"Oh kid, i'm sorry." She smiled sadly at Bill.

"I-it's fin-ne, Mrs C-corcor-ran." He shut his eyes, shaking his head in anger.

"What's up?" I put a hand on his shoulder.

"I-I can't ev-ven talk to y-your mom without s-s-stutter-ring." He put his hands in front of his face, I knew he was probably going to cry.

"Bill," I wrapped my arms around him, pulling him in for a tight hug. "Bill it's fine, okay? It's fine."

He returned the embrace, digging his head into my neck. "My mom doesn't care about your stutter, no one does." I spoke quietly. I knew it was Henry Bowers that had made Bill think badly of his stutter.

"Henry s-sure gets a kic-ck out of i-t." He sniffled. 

"I'm sorry for my language mom," I began "But fuck Henry. Have you seen his hair? Billy I think your stutter makes you even cuter, if that were possible."

"Y-you're pret-ty cute to-o." I felt him smile into the crook of my neck.

"Come on, let's clean you up." I brought him out of my mom's room, closing the door behind me and pulling Bill to the floor's bathroom.

"Don't cry about something Henry picks on, Billy." I locked the bathroom door behind me. "Fuck. Henry is such an idiot, I swear to god I'm gonna punch him square in the face."

"Cass, we c-can't hit every-o-one when t-they're stupid."

"Why the hell not?" I pulled a paper towel out of the vendor.

"Because if w-we did, R-Richie would have a conc-cussion." He laughed, I did the same.

I put the paper towel under the cold faucet and wiped Bill's face, that was now free of tears. I had my hands on both sides of his face staring into his eyes, and they were staring right back.

"Come on." I snapped out of my daze, threw the paper towel in the bin and checked myself in the mirror, before grabbing Bill's hand and pulling him out of the cramped bathroom. "I wouldn't want Richie and Stan getting me in trouble with stories that aren't true."

We both walked down the fairly crowded corridor, down to my mother's room. "Wait." Bill grabbed my shoulder, stopping me from going in. "L-look."

I stared through the glass pane. My mom was in deep conversation with the boys, I couldn't read their lips, but the boys were nodding and smiling. Stan even did an evil laugh, one that could be heard from outside of the door. "They're, p-plotting?"

"Sounds about right." I pushed the door open, the 4 in the rooms eyes going wide as they  jumped into the nearest chair, Richie jumping onto my moms hospital bed with her.

"What's going on in here?" I asked.

"Nothing!" Mike shouted.

"It didn't look like nothing. What are you plotting?" I put my hands on my hips.

"We'll never tell!" Richie shouted.

"Kids." A nurse had entered the room. "You need to go now, but you can come back tomorrow. Visiting hours are 7am to 11pm."

"I love you, mom. I'll come back tomorrow." I kissed her cheek.

"Love you, mom!" Richie shouted. 

"See you tomorrow, Mrs Corcoran." Stan and Mike smiled.

"I hope y-you get well s-soon, Mrs C-c-corcoran-n." I held onto Bill's hand.

"Cass." My mother pulled me close enough to whisper in my ear. "You're gonna hate me but it's for the best. I can see you love him." 

"Wh-"

"Richie!" My mom called. "Don't forget to lock the door, otherwise it wont work."

"Lock the door, got it." Richie left the room, we all followed afterwards.

"What the hell do you think they were talking about?" I asked Bill when we got to a completely empty corridor. It was clear this was an unused area of the hospital.

"I'm n-not sure b-" Bill was cut off as Stan pushed us both into a tiny supply closet, Richie slamming the door behind us.

"Richie, lock it!" Mike shouted and before I could push the door open, I heard the bolt click into place.

"Bastard!" I shouted, slamming my fists onto the door, pounding and hoping Richie wouldn't keep my in the 5x5 foot room with my crush. "That's what they were planning." I huffed.

"W-why?" Bill asked.

"We know you love each other, you dumbasses!" Richie shouted.

"So you're staying in there until you tell each other how you really feel." Stan added.