✓ 𝗦𝗘𝗘 𝗧𝗛𝗘 𝗟𝗜𝗚𝗛𝗧, reddie

viii. the end

THE END!

　 ҉    MAGGIE TOZIER felt something far beyond happiness when she held the house phone to her ear, listening to the airy voice of her old friend. "Hello?" The voice asked, and she could practically see the honey colored hair and flushed, freckled face. "Hello? Anyone there?"

Coughing and blinking out of her blissful trance, Maggie shakes her head and says, "I'm here," With a nervous breath, she breathes out, "Hey, Harriet." She hasn't spoken to the woman since just a few years after her son had gone missing. They were so close, so gentle with one another. She could remember them as teenagers, smearing crimson lipstick over their mouths before they left the house. Maggie used to always wear edgier clothes than a lot of the girls her age; her parents complained about it, but they didn't do much else, so she always slid a leather jacket over her white shirt and put on some black boots over her feet. In her youth, Harriet was different; she wore light dresses and always pinned her hair back.

She was beautiful, Maggie remembered. She would always be.

"Maggie?" The gentle voice asks, shocked to hear from the old friend after over ten years. Maggie grins widely, whispering an affirmative. "Hey, Mags," Harriet says carefully, almost sounding relieved to hear from her friend, "How've you been, doll?"

"I'm okay," Maggie responds, smiling widely, feeling like it was the seventies again, "Hey, listen, we need you at Derry, okay?"

Harriet's breath audibly hitches, and rather it's a good or bad inhale, Maggie doesn't know. "Should I be scared?" Harriet asks, nervously laughing, and Maggie settles on bad. She shakes her head, and then realizes it's a call.

"No! No, but Hare, you need to come. It's, like, really important," She says carefully, not wanting to reveal anything over the call - it's too impersonal, she knows, and part of her is simply too nervous to form the words, "Please."

"Okay, yeah," Harriet breathes out, and Maggie is reminded of when she convinced her to go to a party one time; the way her hair swayed as she nodded her head, the way her glossy lips parted in confusion. "Hey, it's late, but I'll see if Frank and I can drive up tomorrow, yeah?" She asks, and Maggie feels as if she's the one who should be nervous.

"Yeah," Maggie sighs, and she can practically see Harriet's smile. "Yeah," She says again.

┉ ❦ ┉

"Nervous?" Richie asks, settled next to his small friend - boyfriend? - on the cotton white couch. They hadn't discussed their relationship; mostly, they just kissed and cuddled, and it was pretty awkward on Richie's end. Not as awkward as the night before, before their second kiss, though. Eddie, from where he sits leaning against the arm rest, turns wide eyed to his friend and nods his head. His mother, his real mom, is on her way from where she lives an hour and a half away, in Portland, and his heart is beating so hard that he feels sick. He opens his mouth to speak, but then there's a knock at the door, and he immediately tenses.