Notes: Follow-up to "Close Call". Takes place before "Taste Test".
"Post-Op"
T (for language)
Eddie sighed, idly spinning the overturned bike's front wheel in somewhat-fond remembrance. The spokes made a weak, slow-paced ticking noise as they rotated.
It was more than the rear wheel was capable of.
There was a Trans Am-fender-shaped ding in the frame. Silver gleamed where the black paint had been scraped away. The right pedal was still missing.
His bike was in worse shape than him.
At least, physically.
Right now, the brace on his right wrist was the least of his concerns. Getting mobile again was the biggest.
Even if he wasn't in the best position to do anything about it.
How?
He wasn't entirely sure what he was doing, anyway. The few tools he had strewn about the grass were purely for show. He knew enough about bicycles to patch tires, mend brake cables, and that was about it. This kind of repair was well out of his league, and budget.
Maybe it was for the better, him being stuck at home until further notice. This was the first venture out into the yard he had dared in a week. Even then, he kept to the shaded, tree-lined side of the house, hidden from clear view of the neighborhood.
He didn't want the rest of the Losers to keep their distance, but right now, it wasn't that they had frozen him out, either. Just that getting past Sonia Kaspbrak was nigh impossible. Eddie didn't blame them for withdrawing after the first five unsuccessful tries.
He couldn't. Not one iota.
That aborted meeting was at the back of all their minds. And the reason why it had been curttailed, even more so. Everyone was sticking close to home now.
Bowers was still on the prowl.
Only in that sense was Eddie remotely thankful for having an overzealous-guard-dog-of-a-mother.
With the worst of his injuries healed, Eddie squeaked by on the excuse that he had simply crashed his bike. How he had crashed it was irrelevant. Sonia didn't know, much less care to. One look and, wordlessly, she had shoved him into the passenger seat.
They returned home two days later, long after the doctors declared the once-break was nothing more than a mild wrist sprain. But not after completing a full battery of exhaustive testing and unnecessary exams.
And that had been a week ago, now.
There was only so much he could do to stay busy.
Sonia forbade him from using the phone.
"Trying to fix your bike behind by back? That deathtrap is better off broken, Eddie, as are you for not being able to go anywhere."
Not her exact words, but they were approximate enough.
Every book in his room, he had read thrice. There was nothing new on TV. All the board games in the house required at least two players, and Mom wasn't willing to oblige there. Solitaire was a reliable fallback at first, but after he had won ten consecutive hands, Eddie had stopped. This was not the kinda activity you wanted to excel in, especially not so early in life.
Most infuriating was the fact that, the one person who could visit him - for whom bullies and overprotective mothers were of no consequence - hadn't.
That was... annoying, to say the least. Goodness knew Eddie had endured far longer spells confined at home with no consequence in the past.
But even as little as ten seconds consisting of a "how are you, Eds" would be such a relief from this monotony.
Not to mention...
"What kept you?"
Eddie gripped the useless wrench in his hand, drummed it against his opposite palm. His eye never wavered.
Without making so much as a hint of sound, Pennywise crouched down beside him, balanced on his fingertips and toes. His expression was remorseful, resigned.
Like he knew there was no avoiding the wrath about to be let loose on him.
He practically invited it in.
Lashing out, Eddie grabbed the clown by his pale jaw.
He kept his voice down, but hissed through clenched teeth.
"Answer me, Dingles. You can do that much, right?"
Pennywise glanced away, his morose expression faultering, before he dared to look back.
"I'm sorRy, Eds."
Sighing a heavy, aggravated sigh, Eddie let go, pressed the same hand to his forehead. "And quit apologizing. It gets pretty hollow-sounding, pretty fast, when you don't back it up with anything."
At that, Pennywise said nothing. For a moment. Then he simply dropped into a sitting position with a soft thump on the grass, long legs splayed before him.
"You mean, heRe, or... out on tHe road?"
God. Even when he isn't dancing for real, he's dancing around a tricky subject.
This conversation was not bound to be a short one.
Eddie scowled. Long-festering frustration had left him feeling bold, vindictive. Being unfairly cooped up had him craving release. He was long past feeling grateful for the healing spell that had been cast upon him.
Now, he wanted some answers. Closure.
Blasted peace.
He gestured with the wrench, talking with his hands as much as anything else. "Both, Einstein. I didn't hallucinate that delayed-arrival crap you pulled. Every time Georgie's about to sneeze, you're there, ready to hold a finger under his nose. Every time Beverly needs a cigarette, pocket change somehow finds its way into her pants. Why didn't I get the same consideration, then or now?"
"...You reaLly want to know?"
"Kind of, a lot, yeah!"
Pennywise cringed, fingers pulling restlessly at the inner edge of his collar. "It's juSt- I knoW how easily... freakEd out you can get, EdS. I can't not knOw. Most days, you're so sensitiVe. I didN't- want to maKe it worse. I was afRaid I'd hurt more tHan help."
'Disbelieving' didn't begin to cover Eddie's initial reaction.
Instantly, his hackles stood back on end.
"That's it? You were worried you'd do more harm than good? That's why you stayed away so long?"
Then and now?
"For now, yeS." Pennywise's eyes diverged, the way they sometimes did as if he had neglected keeping them on track. "YouR mother was- "
"Don't talk about her."
It wasn't that he was feeling defensive. Not about Sonia, not at all.
Rather, Eddie was sick of being stuck in her proverbial shadow.
Every minute of every damn day.
For a week.
He was sick of being coddled.
By anybody.
Least of all, this... thing. This infuriating, not-human, dolled-up mockery of life.
"When?" Eddie snapped. He tossed the wrench over beside the upside-down bike.
"What do yOu- "
"When did you sense the trouble? When Belch's car hit my bike?" With his good hand Kaspbrak pointed to the still-visible scrapes on his chin. "Or when my face was getting up close and personal with the asphalt?"
Pennywise stared down at him, unblinking, unmoved by the boy's dramatics. No one had ever asked the clown to explain, much less confronted him on the mechanics as to how his senses worked. Would he elaborate, or sweep it under the carpet marked "cosmic know-how only"?
"At the coRner."
"What...?"
"When they turned the corNer, and spotTed you," Pennywise admitted, his voice as vacant as his expression. "That'S when I knEw."
"And you... you didn't try to stop it?"
The blank sheet crumpled. Maybe It was picking up on the boy's repressed anxieties.
Or maybe it was all him.
He fumbled again in explaining: "There wasN't- I couldn'T- There was nothing to be doNe. Not without endaNgering you."
More than I was already? Nothing? Absolutely nothing? You can manipulate the very fabric of Derry, but you couldn't stop a Trans Am with a blown oil line or a flat tire or something?
"You're unbelievable." Eddie shook his head, and he held up a hand before the clown could retort. "No, I mean it. You're really, completely un-fucking-believable, man. All the things you claim to be able to do, how you've helped us, and the one time I need you to do something, for me, you don't. And why? Because you think it'd give me a little fright? I can handle fear, you moron."
And it was that insult that struck the proverbial match.
Pennywise blinked, blue eyes centering abruptly.
"No, you can'T."
Eddie blinked in return.
He breathed in, held it.
They stared each other down.
No.
No, his palms weren't starting to feel a little sweaty.
No, those weren't his ever-jumpy nerves beginning to twitch.
"Yes, I can."
His resolve was as rock-solid as before.
No, his voice wasn't starting to crack.
In one smooth, near-levitating motion, the clown crawled forward, over his own legs. As if it took him virtually no energy to accomplish the feat.
Within a second, he was there, directly above Eddie, leaning down, painfully close. He stood between the boy and the sun behind the trees, throwing his face even deeper into shadow.
Save for the glowing eyes.
"No, you can'T."
The insistence didn't sell his words.
The near-instant feeling of dread did.
The world on their peripheral seemed to slow to half-speed.
Eddie's brown eyes went wide, round. He reared back on reflex, elbows wobbly as he tried, unsuccessfully, to keep himself from toppling backwards onto the grass.
He just managed not to scoot away.
Fear.
Like the pain. How he took it away-
Now he's-
Undaunted, Pennywise leaned in, closer than ever. He braced his hands flat against the ground beside Eddie's shoulders.
With a weak, protesting yelp, Eddie laid flat against the ground, hands poised before him. It felt like a vain gesture already. What little, pathetic good they would do to fend off this creature- shield himself against the imposing presence- from whatever he was intending-
"W-what are you- "
Less than three inches of air separated their faces.
Pennywise's irises flushed yellow, from the inside out.
A soft growl overlaid his words.
"Now try and say you'Re not afrAid."
Eddie quailed, even as he wouldn't- couldn't- look away.
For a split second, he was sure he could see himself, reflected in the shine of those eyes.
"I- don't- You- "
"I spared you, Eddie. By letTing you get hurt, I spared you frOm seeing something far more teRrible, had I interveNed in the way you think you wanTed. Something I could have erAsed as easily as your pain, but between the two, the phySical pains leave the lesser marks behind. On your miNd, on your sOul, on everything."
A gloved hand seized the boy's chin, firmly.
The eyes burned and changed shade again, darkening to a molten orange.
"Would you rather I hadn'T?"
Eddie gasped deep, held his breath.
He didn't. He didn't know.
He didn't know what he would 'rather', not when there wasn't any 'rather' that could have possibly been better.
Then he swallowed, whimpering softly at the unfairness of it all. How he couldn't look away, how he couldn't get away from home, how even his eldritch friend was somehow caught betwixt some moral cosmic dilemma when it came to deciding how to spare him more hurt.
Weirdly enough, Eddie also thought of school at that moment. The school he had been indefinitely-excused from while he 'mended'. His assignments, the essays, were the first comparison he drew.
Like erasing a word written in pencil, a pencil that you had pressed too hard against the paper...
You could only erase so much. The lead could be buffed away.
The imprints that were left behind on the page...
You couldn't erase those. You could write over them, but if you looked - really looked - you would always see them.
More often than not, though, you just ended up starting over with a fresh sheet of paper.
And it wasn't like Eddie Kaspbrak could just save up enough money to toddle down to the department store and pick out a fresh set of 'sanity' like it was a new outfit.
Still looming over him, Pennywise squinted. He tilted his head slowly to one side, then he let go of Eddie's chin.
It was a look of almost-satisfaction.
That a harshly-delivered lesson had been absorbed, albeit reluctantly.
And not without a small amount of regret at having to take the brutal tone he had.
His eyes softened.
Eddie understood.
"DoeS that make enough senSe for you?"
Gradually, the air cleared. The smog-like atmosphere of tension lifted, like the atmosphere after a storm had blown itself out.
And rather than leave the boy there, cowering on the ground, Pennywise offered Eddie a hand, which was very reluctantly accepted, and helped him sit back up. His eyes darkened back to a cool, neutral blue.
Then they sat side-by-side, regarding each other in awkward silence for another moment.
With a rattling sigh, the clown wrapped his arms around his knees, gaze distant. "I'm sorRy for not doing moRe, Eds. For stAying away. But you didn'T know what yoU'd be asking of me."
"I- I- we only don't know because you won't tell us," Eddie stammered, voice thin and trembling (albeit less than the rest of him still was). "Is it really that bad- "
With a sharp turn of his head, Pennywise glared down at him again, eyes narrowing.
"Never mind."
If he says I'm better off not knowing, maybe so.
After all, knowing too much is usually the cause of my hysteria.
But you can't just not-
"You asKed me to not."
Eddie blinked, befuddled anew. "What?"
Frowning, Pennywise offered the waiting half of his reasoning up for consideration. "The buLlies. I wanted to go afTer them. You asKed- told me to stay. So I stAyed."
Only because I... I didn't want you to leave.
That was before I knew you could heal anything.
But, still... you did stay.
"Things could have been worSe, EdS."
With that said, the air seemed to remember to fill the void it had vacated between them.
A gentle breeze stirred the trees above their heads like it finally thought the scene safe to return to.
Fingers running over his wrist brace, Eddie supposed it could have been. Worse, that is. Besides avoiding death, he had avoided needing a legitimate visit to the emergency room. He had avoided having to explain the lunacy that was Henry Bowers trying to run him down.
He had even avoided some schoolwork as a minor fringe benefit.
Silver linings, right?
"Th-thanks, then. I'm... I'm sorry, too. Just, being stuck here, looking at this every day- " Eddie gestured toward the bike, still standing broken before them. The apology sounded as lame as he currently felt. "It was on my mind."
Pennywise stared intently at the damaged frame, eyes shifting back and forth. Apparently talked-out, he had zeroed in on the next most pressing matter present in the yard.
Then, after a moment's contemplation, he sat up, crawled closer to it.
Hesitating one last time, Eddie followed on his hands and knees.
He almost hoped.
He almost dared to hope that the entity's healing feat would work on inanimate objects.
"I don't suppose you found- "
Producing it like a slight-of-hand card trick, out of thin air, Pennywise suddenly held up a rugged piece of plastic.
Its cracked reflector plate still shone.
"You mean tHis?"
Eddie balked, but not unhappily, recognizing the part instantly.
The missing pedal.
"Yeah, that's it! Can you- "
Grinning smugly, Pennywise laid a hand against the black frame.
"Already thoughT of it, EdS."
