freaks of nature - stenbrough

-28-

unedited
—

Stanley knocked on the Denbrough's front door. He waited for a few moments and it opened. Sharon smiled at him and immediately hugged him.

"Oh Stan, its so good to see you again!"

Stanley smiled and hugged her back.

"You too, Mrs Denbrough."
"Please, call me Sharon!"

Sharon pulled away and let Stanley in.

"Where's Bill?"
"He's upstairs in his room, he's on bed rest."
"Can I...?"
"Of course, honey. Stay as long as you like."
"Thank you, Mrs- Sharon," he smiled.

Sharon just offered a friendly smile and returned to Georgie who was in the living room. Stanley looked at the stairs and swallowed. He took a deep breath and began walking up them. Each step made his heart pound harder in his chest, the same way it had pounded when they cuddled before everything happened.

You can't fall for him again, don't do this to him. Don't do this to yourself, you're just going to get hurt, is what he kept telling himself over and over.

Bill's bedroom door was open so he couldn't even take a few more breaths are making it to the top of the stairs without Bill seeing him.

Bill smiled at Stanley and he felt his knees become weak. He was fucking beautiful. Stanley smiled back and walked into his room.

"Hey," Stanley smiled.
"Hey."
"How are you?"
"T-tired, and you?"
"Better now I'm with you."

Stanley sat next to Bill on the bed and felt his smile permanently plaster itself to his face. He couldn't stop. He couldn't remember the last time he was this happy.

Bill slowly reached his hand over to Stanley's and intertwined their fingers. Stanley curled his fingers over and held his hand back.

"I missed you," Stanley said.
"I m-missed you too."
"Bill- um, what was it like there? What'd they do?"
"Th-they forced me to h-hunt down mutants using C-Cerebro. They didn't f-feed me and wh-when I started r-refusing, they l-locked me away and w-waited for me t-to die."

Stanley glanced down at Bill's hand in his. It was frail and skinny. He slowly rubbed his thumb other the side of Bill's hand.

"I'm sorry. I should've come for you sooner."
"It's okay, St-Stan, I'm here n-now."

Stanley looked back up at Bill. Bill was smiling at him softly. Stanley could see the hurt behind his eyes. He knew the soft pain in his back wasn't pain Stanley was feeling, but it was pain from Bill.

"Are you okay though? And you know you can't lie to me about this."
"Truth is...I th-the last time I f-f-felt something that w-wasn't pain was wh-when you c-c-came to visit me in th-the hospital."

Stanley somewhat understood how he was feeling. All he'd felt since he lost Betty was hurt. He had the small rush of joy when the Toziers asked him if he wanted to be adopted, but apart from that, all he'd felt of agony and loss. Without thinking, he leant forwards and kissed Bill. He put his spare hand on Bill's cheek. Bill froze up for a moment before weakly kissing Stanley back.

He was expecting the spark he'd felt the first time they'd kissed when escaping the MHA, but all Stanley felt was guilt. Bill leant back and broke the kiss.

Stanley opened his eyes to find his vision was blurred by tears.

"I'm sorry," he choked out.

His hand lingered on Bill's cheek as Bill took both his hands and pulled Stanley into a hug. He put one hand in his curls and the other around his back. Stanley's hand fell and loosely hung on Bill's shoulders as he buried his face in Bill's chest.

"I'm sorry," he continued to cry, "I'm so sorry."
"Hey," Bill said softly, "it's okay, you're okay."
"They took her," he sniffed, "they took Betty."
"We'll g-get her back. You kn-know we can outsmart th-those idiots."
"They killed her, Bill, they murdered her right in front of me," his words were muffled.

Stanley continued to sob into Bill's chest as Bill held him close.

"We'll get through this, I promise, Stan."