Perfection

Chapter 12: Eddie

After Richie got to his house and they crashed for the night, he was happy. He rarely dreamt, so his nights were mostly peaceful.

Tonight was not a peaceful night.

Eddie hasn't gone through anything too traumatic in his life, except his mom lying to him his whole life about some pills. But if he had a dream, it was a nightmare. The same nightmare.

He always dreamt of the color red. He saw red balloons floating above the water in the Quarry. Red balloons following him, like they were stalking him. Red everywhere. He didn't have any idea why it was red. Why not yellow or blue?

Some of the balloons read "I Heart Derry" on them, the ones that you'd get at a carnival or street fair or something. Eddie started to get a feeling the balloons meant something. Like he escaped something and his was the aftermath. He felt as if he had dodged fate, as if something horrible was to happen to him and his friends. Something with red balloons.

Tonight, the balloons replaced the clouds. He and Richie were walking, hand in hand, peaceful. Then everything went red. Blood red.

Eddie looked up and saw balloons instead of sky and clouds. The sun shown through the balloons, casting a red glow over everything, even Richie's hair looked a bit red.

Eddie let go of Richies hand and ran. Ran as fast and as far as he could to get away from the red. He was so sick of the red.

Eddie stopped. He didn't realize where he was until he looked up. That old creepy house on Neibolt Street. "Ewgh," Eddie's entire body shivered, and he looked up in front of him. He saw Richie, smiling down at him. But it wasn't Richie.

Richies face and glasses were broken, clown makeup painted over his beautiful freckles. Blood dripping down his boyfriends glasses. Eddie gasped in horror and ran into the gross house. He went over to left, and saw a paper in a pile of cobwebs.

He picked up the paper and read:
                                 MISSING TEEN
                                   Eddie Kaspbrak
                                          Age: 16
                                       Height: 5'5
                                 Weight: 200.5 lbs
Why the hell was he missing? He wasn't missing, was he? This was a nightmare, he knew he had to wake up soon. Why was he 200 pounds? He wasn't 200 pounds.

Eddie looked down, and his shirt was stuffed with red balloons. They floated out from underneath the pale blue fabric and into a ring in front of the small boy. When the balloons finished aligning themselves in a perfect circle around Eddie, everything stopped. Silence.

Then he heard footsteps. Richies footsteps. "Hey Eddie? Where are you?" Richies voice echoed in the halls of the horrible house. The tall boy emerged from the hallway behind Eddie, and ran into the circle where he was.

The clown makeup had gone away, his glasses were fixed. Normal Richie. Eddie slumped down into a pile of limbs and clothing with Richie. He started to cry, and the balloons started to pop one by one. Pop. Pop. Pop.

When it came to the last balloon, it floated until it was in front of Eddie's face. Then it exploded into blood.

Eddie screamed in horror.

He jolted awake and realized that Richie had fallen asleep with his head in Eddies hair, his arm around his waist. Eddie was in love with the way his boyfriend had fallen asleep, then it dawned on him that Richie had his hand underneath Eddie's shirt.

He still wasn't recovered from the nightmare. The clown makeup. That was the first time the clown makeup had been in his nightmare before. He would try to forget about it at all costs.

He was automatically in panic mode, Richie's hand underneath his shirt, and from the dream. He chose to be concerned about Richie first. He was fat, no one could see his hipbones, or his collarbones. Richie was a pretty heavy sleeper, so Eddie took about 3 minutes to lug his huge arm and head out of the way so that he could get up.

He went over to Richie's duffle and found his inhaler. He took a few puffs of the air, and then tucked the inhaler back into Richie's bag. He walked to the other side of the room to grab his phone, and checked the time.

                                     4:27 am

Ugh. Eddie was awake enough, so we went into the bathroom. He grabbed the scale from under the sink, being quiet so Richie nor his mom could hear him. He evened out the scale on the tile then stripped. He didn't want the weight of his clothes on him.

The small boy let out all the air in his lungs, and stepped onto the scale.  137.9.

Eddie realized he hadn't eaten all day. He wasn't hungry either. Anorexia was easier than it looked. He looked at himself in the mirror, proud. He knew being proud of his accomplishment was wrong, but it made him feel good. He wasn't 200.5 pounds.

He put back on his pastel sweatshirt, and left his jeans in the bathroom. His mom had always told him sleeping in jeans would stunt your growth. He knew he shouldn't believe her, but he would give nearly anything to be taller. He tiptoed back into his room to find Richie rubbing his eyes and groping Eddies bedside table to find his glasses.

Eddie was thankful his sweatshirt was long enough to cover everything from his thighs up, he wasn't ready for anything yet. He grabbed Richie's glasses off his desk and shut his bedroom door. "Looking for these?" Eddie whispered, handing Richie his glasses. "Eddie, you left and I got worried and I thought you had left the house and-"

Eddie just smiled at Richie. He was genuinely worried. He would have gone out at 4:30 in the morning to look for him. He cared.

"Well I'm here," Eddie said. "I wanna sleep again, I'm tired." He really didn't want to sleep yet, he knew the nightmares would probably come back. They only happened every once in a while, but they were horrible when they happened.

"Me too, Eds," Richie yawned. "Me too."