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❛BE A MAN❜
CHRIS LIFTED HIS AVIATORS ON to his head as he stepped into Ben's house, admiring photos of his family on the wall. Most of them were of two women, who Chris assumed to be Ben's mother and aunt. There were also a few of him as a chubby little child as well as a man in uniform, who Chris assumed was Ben's father.
"Yowza, who's the foxy blonde?" Richie's voice came from behind Chris. He was staring at a photo of what looked like Ben's aunt-- who, quite frankly, was not attractive. The sarcasm in Richie's voice was palpable.
"Shush, Richie!" Chris whispered with a humoured smirk on his face, looking around to see if any of the others could hear them, though they were all filtering into Ben's bedroom.
"No, seriously, Chris. Who wouldn't want a piece of her?" Richie laughed. Chris shushed him, struggling to hold in his giggles. He grabbed the sleeve of Richie's green shirt, pulling him into Ben's room. The smiles dropped from the two boys' faces as they looked around.
"Wow!" Richie exclaimed, adjusting his glasses. The walls were covered floor to ceiling in newspaper clippings, old photographs, and all sorts of black-and-white pieces of history scattered in one teenage boy's bedroom.
"Holy Jesus," Chris breathed out in awe.
"Cool, huh," Ben shrugged with a smile.
"No. No, nothing cool," Richie said, walking up to the far wall. Chris rolled his eyes with a smirk at Richie's annoying attitude before walking over to Ben's desk, where Bill was busy admiring projector slides. Chris slyly picked up a journal on Ben's desk, sneakily opening it to read what was inside.
"What's that?" Stan asked from somewhere else in the room, but Chris was too busy flipping through journal pages to care.
"Oh, that?" Ben responded. "That's the charter for Derry township."
"Nerd alert!" Richie laughed.
"No, actually it's... it's really interesting. Derry started as a beaver trapping camp--"
"Still is, am I right, boys?" Richie interrupted. Chris snorted from where he stood, looking back over his shoulder to catch Richie looking to him with a smile.
"Ninety-one people signed the charter that made Derry, but later that winter they all disappeared without a trace."
"The entire camp?" Eddie said in disbelief.
"There were rumours of Indians but no sign of an attack. Everybody just... thought it was a plague or something. But, it like one day everybody just woke up and left. The only clue was a trail of bloody clothes leading to the well house."
"Jesus, you could get Derry on Unsolved Mysteries," Richie said, turning to gage Chris' reaction. Instead, he found Chris deeply invested in something he was reading. He walked up behind him, trying to see over his shoulder. "What's that?"
