**Say What You Mean Out Loud**

~ T E N ~

What are you afraid of?

Greyson Elliot was staring at Eddie's inhaler, actually considering grabbing it and taking a hit.
Could it help her breathe?

"Okay so let me get this straight..." he talked faster than a freight train.
"It comes from wherever, and eats kids for like, a year? Then it goes into hibernation?"

Grey reached for his inhaler but he slapped her hand away, and she shoved it in her pocket.
"Well, what if it's like... what do you call it..." Stan twiddled his thumbs.

"Cicadas." Grey said. "The uh, the bugs that come out every 27 years."
Mike leaned back on the bench, and she looked at him, squinting her eyes in the bright midday sun.

"My grandfather thinks this town in cursed." He said.
"He says that, all the bad things that happen in this town are because of one thing... an evil thing that feed off the people of Derry."

Feeds? Wants to eat us?
Grey brought her foot up on the bench and picked at the edge of her bandages.

"But it can't be one thing. We all saw something different."
But a lot of them did see a clown.
Even if there was something else before it.

"We all saw something different... maybe it can tell what we fear most, and that's what we see."
Grey brought her other foot up on the bench and hugged her knees, fussing with the ends of her sleeves.

"I saw a leper." Eddie huffed. "It was like a walking infection."

"But you didn't." Stan's argument sounded less like sound reasoning, and more like blatant ignorance.
"Because it wasn't real."

Was he trying to convince the group, or himself?
"None of it is."
Grey already knew which.
"Not Eddie's leper, or Bill seeing Georgie... or the lady I keep seeing."

Grey looked up and frowned at him.
"She hot?" Richie smirked.
Stan frowned at him, with one of those angry 'WTF' type faces.

"No Richie! She's not hot!" He shouted.
Richie shrugged.
"Her face is all messed up."

Bev ran a hand through her hair, and Ben looked down at his shoes.
"None of this makes any sense. They're all like bad dreams."

"I don't think so," Grey shook her head.
Mike nodded. "Yah, I know the difference between a bad dream and reality."

"What'd you see? You saw something too?" Eddie asked them.
Mike's animated appearance faded.
"You guys know that burned down house on, Harris Avenue?"

The losers looked up at him, holding fearful expressions for what he was about to tell.
"I was inside when it burned down."

Grey frowned and put a comforting hand on his shoulder, urging him it was okay to tell the rest.
"Before I was rescued, my mom and dad were trapped in the next room over. They were... pushing and pounding on the door.... trying to get me."

Mike stared down at the ground, with a sense of fearful memories filling his glazed over eyes.
"But it was too hot." He shook his head.

"When the firemen finally found me... their hands had been burned down to the bone."
Eddie fiddled for his inhaler.

Mike turned to Grey expectantly.
She glanced at him.
"What did you see?" He asked her.

She shook her head.
"I... Henry."

"Bowers?"
She glanced at Eddie with a sarcastic expression.
"No, Henry Garfield. What do you think?"