In which her summer is corrupted with terror, and only a group of boys could ever convince Vinnie Bailey to believe.
[stanley uris x oc]
"WE'VE GOT TO GET IN TO GET OUT"
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" A Cruce Salus. "
The wind wasn't blowing very hard that day, she observed, and that made her worry. It made her feel like something bad was gonna happen, and it wasn't going to be another kid going missing.
Even as Vinnie walked to school the usual chilling breeze of morning didn't pester her body for a trace of goosebumps. It was still, it was silent, and it was unnerving. She cursed her luck as she so often did and walked to school faster than she intended, not necessarily eager to start the day but instead to end it.
But most of all, she was eager to find out what this feeling was that was giving her itchy feet.
She tried her best to convince her mom she was sick earlier that morning. She coughed and faked a fever and even mixed together corn and old food to make fake vomit, but her mother had only looked at her with disappointment and sighed. Vinnie wordlessly hauled herself out of bed before her last day was ruined by the incessant bickering between her and her mother, as it was almost every other day. And when she really, really thought about it, staying home and helping her run errands for the chapel would be infinitely worse than attending one measly old day of school.
The eighth grade class of Derry Middle School was handed their report cards on the same day as always. The same dreary last day of school, and every year Vinnie would pass with flying colors, and every year Henry would cheat his way out of summer school. Her day had drawn on long enough by the time she regretted not skipping; her boredom getting the best of her and feet bouncing in anticipation. She couldn't wait to get out, to play in the lush light of the barrens and be free to do what she wanted every day.
Except for Sundays, of course. That was her mother's day to pick what they would do, and it was always church and prayer- occasionally, after church, they would go visit her brother who resided in a house up the hill. A house named Juniper Hill and was filled with almost every other loony in Derry. The visits were only on her bad days, though. Vinnie thought that her mother only took her to that ratty building as punishment for her behavior, which was more often than not described as unholy. When they were there her mother would gush and fawn over her favorite son, 'why can't you be more like him?' she'd always ask desperately.
But Vinnie didn't get it. Why would she want to be more like him? He was the one who was kept behind a bulletproof window at all visiting times. He was the one who had a long long sentence in the loony bin; not her. She wasn't the one who went spouting religious bullshit like the crazy bastard he was-
"Magdalen Bailey!" her teacher snapped. Mrs. Shoveu (who Vinnie cleverly named Mrs. Shove-It) was vicious and a bit too strict to be a public school teacher. And Vinnie, who prided herself on early rebellion, hated the old woman and that scrunched up faces of hers. She stood up, ready to receive the slip that confirmed her promotion to the following year, but some unwanted voice behind her mentioned that it wasn't her turn just yet.
