This chapter was written by ForeverSmiles

Vern couldn't get to the treehouse fast enough. He was huffing and puffing and the pennies inside the jar made unnecessarily loud noises as he ran, calling more attention to himself. People gave him strange looks, but he was Vern Tessio, so he was used to getting weird looks from others. When he approached the treehouse, he tucked the jar of pennies under his arm and climbed the ladder, racking his knuckles on the bottom of the treehouse.

"That's not the secret knock!" Chris Chambers's voice rang out, slightly irritated. Almost three years and Vern still hadn't bothered to learn their ridiculous secret knock.

"It's Vern! Lemme in!" he chirped, still out of breath and the door to the treehouse flew open and the jeering face of Teddy Duchamp appeared.

"Come on, get up here. We're playing cards and we need another man."

"You guys...you guys...holy shit, man..." Vern gasped as he hauled himself into the treehouse while trying to not drop his pennies. "Look what I found!"

"Your pennies?" Gordie Lachance asked, looking bewildered.

"Yeah! My dad found them while he was cleaning the porch! Can you believe it?"

"Hold up. You've been looking for those pennies for years, and then your dad finds them by accident? What does that say about you, Vern?" Chris teased, grinning like a madman.

"That he really is as slow as we thought! Or maybe God just hates him," Teddy said.

Vern just stared at them while they were joking. What was the matter with his friends? He found his pennies. His pennies had been found. By him. To be spent freely! Couldn't they see the beauty in this?

"So what do you guys want to spend them on? We could go to the mall," Vern suggested and Teddy scoffed and rolled his eyes.

"The mall is for girls and faggots."

"It is not!"

"The mall is so gay it's not even debateable."

"Well, fine! I guess you don't get to help me spend all this!" Vern cried, holding up his pennies and Teddy just scowled in defeat.

Which is how all four of them ended up at the mall.

"Teddy's right. The mall's gay," Gordie said after they wandered around for an hour, not able to find anything that Vern wanted to buy.

Teddy threw his hands up in exasperation. "Thank you!"

But Vern wasn't paying attention. He was staring off in the distance, his mouth trying and failing to form words while he clutched his jar of pennies to his chest. Emma Wilson. Annie Pollard. Kelly Hightower. More importantly, Kelly Hightower. Soon to be Kelly Tessio, he corrected himself, his heart swelling as his friends turned to see what he was staring at.

"Damn." Vern wasn't sure who had said it and quite frankly, he didn't give a fuck. He had been crushing on Kelly Hightower ever since third grade and just the fact that she was walking up to him right now-talking to him? Was she talking to him?-was a guarantee that he would die a happy man.

"Is he mentally retarded or something?" Emma asked Chris, gesturing to Vern and only then did he realize that Kelly was standing in front of him, speaking to him.

"Huh?" he squeaked.

"I said, where'd you get those?" Kelly repeated, pointing at the pennies.

"Um. They're mine."

"She can see that. That's not what she asked," Annie snapped but Kelly just shushed her and turned back to Vern.

"That's a hell of a lot of money you got there. Want to get something to eat?"

Vern's heart almost stopped.