Notes: Continuation of "Taste Test / Killing With Kindness". In the book, Criss nearly joins the Losers.

...Why not? :D


"Sharpie"

K+ (for language)


Bill Denbrough blinked and froze, halfway through penciling in the letter V, as - without warning - the black Sharpie landed atop his notebook. The marker rolled, bounced over the spiral spine, and came to a stop.

He frowned. The freshman already had an inkling who had borrowed it (without asking), but upon its apparent-return, he was willing to forgive that.

For a price.

He sat back, twisted around in his chair.

"What were you doing with that?"

The creature halted midstep, then glanced belatedly back over his shoulder.

Then, just as smoothly, looked away.

"NotHing."

Georgie sat on the bedroom floor, with his back against the closed closet door. He smiled and said nothing. Held in his cupped hands, the quivering tan-and-white hamster could only squeak and hide its face as Pennywise took a seat beside the boy. Somehow, he managed not to jostle their surroundings in the process.

"Good. Now you can hold Tim."

Conversely, the gangly entity held up a flat palm, in refusal. The other arm, he folded across his chest.

He was still looking away, brows held low. The expression was dually downcast and considerate at once.

"No. KeEp him for noW, GeorgIe."

Sitting at the desk, Bill frowned and raised an eyebrow.

Just what did he miss out on hearing about during that snack run?


A few days later, he figured it out.

"Denbrough."

Bill flinched. His locker closed with a light clank.

Hidden in the narrow space behind the door was a flat-faced Victor Criss.

Sneaky bastard.

The freshman breathed in and swallowed, hard. Uttering his first kneejerk thought out loud could only land him in more trouble. He managed not to step back, to make his nerves too obvious.

"Victor, hi."

Nerves.

Why bother feeling nervous?

If he was in any trouble at all...

This has something to do with the Sharpie. It has to.

"Sorry," Criss deadpanned, sounding anything but genuinely contrite. "I didn't mean to startle you."

"It's... okay. I m-must not have heard you." Trying to appear casual, Bill shrugged into his backpack straps. All at once, his schoolbooks seemed about ten pounds heavier.

Truthfully, the hallway was quite busy. A hectic din of shouts, shoe soles squeaking against linoleum, and slamming lockers sounded off all around them. Most of the students were on their way out after the day's last bell. Only a few dozen or so stayed for the official afterschool study hall.

Others went to the library.

As Bill had intended to.

But now, it seemed, he would be a few minutes late joining Beverly and Ben.

"Yeah..." Criss's sharp eyes slid away before refocusing on his 'target'. "Mind if I... talk a moment?"

If I minded, I'd be long gone already.

Let's see if Bowers is waiting around a corner somewhere.

Bill almost glanced away.

On his peripheral, he saw It.

There was a brief flash of yellow light from the horizontal slats of his closed locker.

From that, Denbrough knew he had backup.

There was nothing the sophomore could pull that wouldn't go unchecked - immediately, if not later.

"All right." Bill nodded in the vague direction of the exit. "Walk and talk, then. I've got somewhere to be."

"The library?" Criss pegged it with the first try. "I should've guessed." Undissuaded at how he had done just that, he followed as Bill threaded his way toward the nearest staircase.

"You meeting someone there?"

"Someone"? Not, "the rest of your Loser pals"?

"Yeah," Bill admitted, in return for the lack of spite the slightly-older boy spoke with. He seemed to be behaving... unusually civil.

"I won't take too much time, then. It's... about something that happened at the library, actually."

Picking their way down the stairs, Bill waited until they had reached the ground floor and ventured outside.

"W-what would that be about? You need a study buddy?"

They walked along the thinning-out concourse, toward the sidewalk.

"No," Criss denied, a little more sharply and too much akin to his old self than Denbrough liked to see. "I just wanted to know- Hanscom, what was his gag?"

"Gag?"

"With the balloon?"

Bill turned back, raised an eyebrow.

The balloon?

Criss frowned at the muted prompt, but explained. "It was... tied to my bike. With the word 'sorry' written on it. And that was after the new kid cornered me in one of the study rooms. I know he runs with you."

Knowing there was no snowball's chance Ben could ever corner someone about anything, not with malicious intent, Bill almost rolled his eyes. The calling card and exactly who had left it was obvious enough to any of the Losers. Instead, he brushed distractedly at his trimmed bangs.

"I'm afraid I don't know anything about that, Victor."

The younger boy froze at the feeling of a hand clawing into his shoulder.

Spinning him around.

"Bullshit."

Criss' dark, aggressive eyebrows, so contrasted against his combed-over blonde locks, were lowered, the better to match his narrowed eyes.

"The thing stayed."

Bill almost gaped.

This factor, he hadn't counted on.

He blinked.

"Wh-what- "

"After I cut the string. The damn thing, stayed, there. It didn't float away."

Way to muddy the waters, even in an apology, Pen.

You might as well have made the thing follow Victor home like a lost puppy.

Bill shook his head, brushed at his bangs again.

"Look, whatever it did or di-didn't do, Ben couldn't have had anything to do with it."

"Bull - shit. Everyone knows the new kid's one of your gang now. If anyone knows what he's been up to- "

"Y-you can ask him yourself," Denbrough interrupted, in a newly-dredged-up bout of fearlessness. He put on his bravest face, standing up to the once-bully who suddenly seemed all the less intimidating without the likes of Bowers or Hockstetter at his side.

"And e-even if you didn't, what's the problem? You have something against balloons?"

At that Criss snorted, rolled his eyes. "Balloons are for kids, Denbrough. I just..." He paused long enough to shrug - with only his left arm. The irritation seemed to leave him in that moment. "I don't know. I wondered if... it was him, I guess."

Bill waited.

When the older boy failed to offer more, he shrugged back.

"A-And if it wasn't, what's wrong with a nice, annonymous gesture? It may have just been someone's idea of a late sympathy card."

The eye nearest him glanced over before angling away again. "Pft. Yeah, better late then never, I guess..."

More than you got from Henry, I'm sure.

On a whim, Bill hazarded taking a half-step closer.

He thought about declaring as much, but that would be like throwing more fuel on a simmering spark.

Best not.

Not right now.

"Was there anything else?"

Without looking up, Criss stepped back.

"No, I... I guess not. See ya."

The sophomore turned away, headed in the opposite direction from the library.

Denbrough watched him go.

At the end of the block, the blonde-headed figure vanished around a hedge.

Bill blinked, spying new movement.

There, perched very obviously atop the stop sign at the same corner, was a bird.

A big one.

It was a blue-black-feathered crow.

With white patches.

For a moment, Bill swore it was staring his way.

The next moment, he was certain.

Nothing, indeed.

Then the magpie took off, white-shouldered wings flashing in the afternoon sunlight.