Strange as IT Seems

Chapter 8: Hawkins

"T-That was weird, w-wasn't it?" Bill asks as the Losers club sits at the local playground next to the school after the bell had rung.

The rest of the school day went by pretty smoothly after the bullies had been scared off by some unseen force and a girl on the other side of the chain-link fence. Beverly was let off with a warning for punching one of the jerks in the face since it was her first day at school. She was also told that fighting would not be tolerated at Hawkins Middle School. This seemed rather hypocritical considering students of the said middle school had started everything in the first place. She simply nodded and said that she would behave before thanking the office for giving her a second chance and for not calling her foster family. But still, there was a lot of what happened that still plagued the group. What they had seen defied all kinds of explanation and considering that they'd battled a shape-shifting sewer clown last summer, that was saying a lot. Now, they waited on Ben to get out of signing up for a bunch of clubs, none of the extracurriculars being offered seemed to interest the rest of the group.

Bill continues to push his little brother on one of the swings while Eddie sat on the other one. Stan sat on one of the platforms that led up to the rest of the play structure and Richie sat backwards at the entrance to a metal slide. Beverly sat on the monkey bars, allowing her feet to dangle over.

"Dude, it was the weirdest thing I've ever seen," Stan says, still staring out to where they had seen that girl. He looks more haunted than the rest of the group.

"Seriously?" Richie questions. "The weirdest thing you've ever seen?"

"Just shut up Richie," Stan snaps and turns around to face the rest of his friends.

"G-Good, it w-wasn't just me then," the stammering leader of the group says.

"Where the hell did that girl come from anyways?" Eddie asks.

"Maybe she's homeschooled," Beverly suggests.

"Don't understand why if there's a perfectly good school right here," Stan points out.

"She did come near me though," Richie explains.

"What? When?" Eddie demands.

"Before you dorks came to join me for lunch, I was sitting with my back to the fence and she came and tapped me on the shoulder, calling me Mike. Apparently, I look just like him, but more handsome of course."

The group rolled their eyes in annoyance.

"Focus Richie Rich," Eddie says. "Did she say anything else?"

"I didn't exactly take being given a heart attack well, so I kind of got mad for a moment and she was like deer in headlights. She began to leave until I told her I was only joking around."

"S-Sometimes it's hard to tell the difference," Bill says.

"I did get her smile though and then I guess she went off to find this Mike guy."

"I think it was the same Mike who helped us earlier today," Beverly mutters. "I did see the resemblance."

"Only without the glasses," Eddie nods in agreement.

"She was a weird kid, scares very easily, but apparently she was able to scare the shit out of those assholes,"

"Richie, l-language!" Bill barks, as Georgie is still present through everything.

"Push me higher Billy!" the youngest says in excitement, the foul language not affecting him in the least.

Apparently, the younger Denbrough brother didn't have quite as an eventful day, but he came out of the first grade proudly holding a drawing of... a dog or something, it was hard to tell, and he looked forward to having his mother hang it up on the refrigerator. He told his brother all about his teacher, Mrs. Creed, who had two cats, one named Judd and another named Church the Second. She also had a young son named Gage. He talked all about his classmates and how one girl gave him a pudding cup since he didn't have anything besides a sandwich since his mother had yet to go shopping.