A/N! Okay, so here we are. Thanks so much for the reviews, you guys are so great! I still think chapter 3 sucks, but this one isn't so great either. I think I'm losing it :S Anyway, enjoy!

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Chris stuck his head in Jessica's refridgerator. "Jessie, you have no food. And that's okay. Except I'm hungry."

Jessica came up behind him and stuck her head in too. Together they surveyed the shelves. "Hmm. You lied." Jessica reached in and pulled out a pot of butter. "Here we go."

Chris looked at her. "You want me to eat butter?"

"What's wrong with butter?" Jessica asked indignantly.

"Nothing," Chris said. "Except generally people eat things with butter. Like, uh, I don't know. Bread."

"Oh," Jessica said thoughtfully. She padded over to the other end of the kitchen and opened a cupboard. "No bread. But we have chocolate muffins. Want to try those?"

Chris thought it over. "Sure." He walked over to join her and noticed something else in the cupboard. "Hey, marshmallows! Let's melt them."

"Okay, Chris," Jessica deadpanned. "Let me build a campfire in the middle of the kitchen floor. Could you hand me some kindling?"

Chris made a face at her. "No, stupid. Don't you have any candles? I thought all girls had candles."

"No," Jessica said. "I have no candles." She frowned. "Oh, I do have a wax figurine thing that I made of Teddy," she offered. "Would that work?"

"Like a voodoo doll?" Chris asked.

"Yes, except it didn't work. I melted off his head and he's still a boy with a head."

"Hmm, we could try melting his dick off," Chris said thoughtfully. "Anyway, it could work."

/////

It was midnight. The treehouse still smelt of burnt hair, but it was almost pleasant to Gordie now.

From now on, he thought dreamily, the scent of singed human will always remind me of Elizabeth Hart.

"Uh, that's sweet, Gordie," Elizabeth said hesitantly from besides him. "But I'd prefer it if you were to associate me with something less... serial killer-esque."

"What?" Gordie turned to her. Oh, man, he thought sadly. She's insane.

"No, I'm not!" Elizabeth was staring at Gordie with something akin to fear.

"You're not what?" Gordie asked her carefully. Wasn't that how you had to deal with insane girls? Speak carefully, Chris had told him once, and never make any sudden moves.

"I'm not insane," Elizabeth said impatiently. "And I appreciate the concept of associating me with the scent of burnt person, but I'd rather you think of me when you smell, like, roses or something."

"How did you-"

"You were talking out loud!" Elizabeth cried. "And you had this weird look in your eye, like you were going to feed me to, I don't even know, Jessica."

"Oh. OH," Gordie said, understanding. Man, I really need to get this to myself! Out loud! To myself! Out loud! thing figured out.

"Yeah, really," Elizabeth muttered. "So, anyway. You'd just finished telling me about when Chris saved Teddy in the tree. Teddy sounds crazy."

"He is," Gordie said thoughtfully. "I mean, he's crazy sometimes, yeah. But even though he's an asshole a lot of the time, he cares about his friends a lot."

"You still see him a lot?" Elizabeth asked.

"Not so much," Gordie said, leaning back. "Chris and I still see Teddy and Vern at Blue Point from time to time. If we're all in there together, we sit and shoot the shit with a shake. But mostly it's just kinda, 'Hey, how you doin'' when we pass in the halls."

"I'd like to meet them," Elizabeth said. "Does Jessica hang out with them ever?"

"Uh, from time to time," Gordie said. "Vern had a thing for Jess a while back, and Teddy and her hate each other with a passion. So it wasn't necessarily a good idea for us to hang out together, seeing as Chris wants to castrate Vern whenever Vern's within a mile of Jess and Jessica wants to castrate Teddy... Most of the time."

Elizabeth laughed. "Hey, you know what we should do?"

"Run naked through Castle Rock?" Gordie suggested hopefully.

Elizabeth gave him a weird look. "Uh, maybe you and Chris could do that later."

"Yeah," Gordie said automatically. Elizabeth raised her eyebrows and Gordie hurled mental rocks at God and his vocal cords. Obviously they were still playing, thanks a lot, yeah. Gordie's writer's imagination saw his vocal cords saying (through whatever their own voice was) "I'll see you Gordie's interior monologue and raise you a 'Gordie isn't gay but let's make him sound very much so!'" God was probably down to his ride, because surely God was on Gordie's side.

Actually, probably not.

"Uh, Gordie?"

"Oh!" Gordie squeaked. "Yeah, I'm here. What? I'm not gay. No, sir. I have only ever thought about naked girls! And they're hot, too!"

Elizabeth cleared her throat. "Okay."

"Glad we got that straightened out," Gordie nodded self-righteously.

"Anyway," Elizabeth continued after a short pause. "We should play truth or dare."

"Strip truth or dare?"

Elizabeth shrugged. "You can strip, if you like. But it's pretty cold in here-"

"Never mind!"

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Chris and Jessica sat on her bedroom floor, melting marshmallows off the burning wax effigy of Teddy in a bowl and dragging chunks of chocolate muffin through butter. Jessica's tiny demon dog Jacques was watching them suspiciously.

"This is really pretty good," Chris said happily. "Hey, you know what we should do? Play truth or dare."

Jessica glared at him. "Clothed truth or dare. My dog is in the room."

/////

"Truth or dare, Gordie?"

"Truth."

"Hmm." Elizabeth mulled it over. "Okay. Have you ever peed your pants because you were so scared?"

Gordie squirmed. "Once. Kind of. Me and Chris and Teddy and Vern were on this train trestle bridge, the one over the Royal, you know? Anyway, Teddy and Chris were in front and Vern was crawling like the wet end he is. And I could hear noises and I turned around and there was this huge-ass train coming right at us. I nearly fell off the fuckin' bridge."

Elizabeth leaned forward. "So what happened?"

Gordie suddenly realized that this was his chance to talk himself up. "I, uh, yelled at everyone else to go ahead, and I stood in front of the train, daring it to stop. The train driver was all like, 'Get off the tracks, kid!' and I was all, 'Make me!' He started honking the horn, and I was all, 'Oh, please, buddy. My horn is twice the size of yours!' and-"

"Gordie?" Elizabeth interrupted.

"Yes?"

"This is truth or dare, not lie-your-ass-into-a-coma and dare."

Gordie winced. "Point taken. So I cried like a girl and peed my pants a LITTLE. A LITTLE, Ms. Hart."

/////

"Truth or dare, Jessie?"

"Dare."

"Okay," Chris said enthusiastically. "I dare you to-"

"No, wait," Jessica said quickly. "Truth."

"Hey, you can't change your mind!" Chris cried.

"Yes, I can," Jessica shuddered. "I remember when you dared Gordie to take off his pants, run into the Blue Point Diner and throw them at Francine Tupper. And you made him do it."

Chris laughed hysterically. "Damn, that was cool! But no, I'd be nicer to you. You're my girlfriend and I looooooove youuuuuu."

Jessica grinned at him. "Yeah, you'd dare me to take off your pants, and like I said, my dog's in the room. TRUTH."

Chris pouted. "FINE. Okay. Hmm. Okay. Who would you rather make out with, Gordie or... uh... Vern?"

Jessica scowled. "I hate you!"

Chris grinned. "I hate you, too."

"Gordie, I guess," Jessica said reluctantly. "God, I cannot believe you asked me that. What kind of boyfriend are you?"

/////

"Truth or dare, Elizabeth?"

"Truth."

"Are you ever going to pick dare?"

"Not since you dared me to strip naked and dance to 'Lollipop' by the Chordettes, no."

"It was just a suggestion!" Gordie said defensively. "Hmm, let's see. Um... If you were in a burning house, and your mother and father were in separate rooms, and you could only rescue one of them, who would you rescue?"

Real good, Lachance. Real hot. If Chris knew you were spending the night with the girl of your dreams and playing truth or dare, and asking about her parents... God! Shut up!

"Neither," Elizabeth said.

Gordie blinked. "Huh?"

"I would leave them both to die," Elizabeth said calmly. "My parents are assholes."

"They are?"

"Yes," Elizabeth said with a quiet intensity. "They're two rich bitches who never wanted kids and let me and my brother know it by moving us from place to place without ever asking where WE would like to go, drinking themselves into oblivion before we've even gone to bed, spending all their money on themselves, not acknowledging our birthdays and telling us every time either of us fucks up that we were both mistakes and that my mother would have aborted us if she'd known. For Christmas last year, they bought each other cars. My and my brother bought each other gifts and got nothing from them. I gave my mother a vase that I made and she got drunk and used it to spit in."

Gordie didn't know what to say. Elizabeth wasn't crying or anything, but her face was white and her eyes emotionless.

"I'm sorry," Gordie said, awkwardly, sincerely.

"Me too," Elizabeth said, quietly, sadly.

Gordie scooted over and put his arm around her.

Some vague part of his mind said, Score!

Gordie told it to shut up.

/////

"Chris, truth or dare?"

"Dare."

"Okay, truth."

"Hey!"

"Shut up!" Jessica thought for a moment. "I hate this fucking game! I don't even know. When did you last cry?"

Then Jessica wished with all her heart that she'd thought before she spoke, because Chris's jaw tightened and the laughter went out of his eyes.

"Never mind," she said quickly. "Forget it."

"No, it's okay," Chris said in a low voice. "Most kids would just answer that normally, so why shouldn't I?"

"Chris," Jessica said helplessly. "I didn't think. I'm sorry, sweetie. Let's just eat our marshmallows. You want to help me form a penis out of wax for Teddy?" She busied herself with that bizarre task.

Chris acted as though he hadn't heard, staring at the floor. "Jessie," he said quietly.

Jessica turned reluctantly. "Yeah."

Chris looked at her, his eyes shining with unshed tears. "My dad's started beating on my mom again."

Jessica took his hand and held on tightly.

"Yesterday I went home," Chris continued thickly. "And I went into the living room and he was standing over her, kicking her. They were both drunk. And she was screaming at him and he just kept hitting her, so I went over and tried to pull him off, but he just..." Chris pulled up his shirt and showed Jessica the huge bruise on his ribs. "And then my mother ran out of the house and he ran after her. I couldn't move for a while and then Debbie came into the room, and she was crying."

Jessica held her breath. Deborah was Chris's seven year old sister and the reason he kept going home.

"Had he-"

"No," Chris said, cutting Jessica's question off. "He never hits Debbie. He just scares the shit out of her." Chris sniffed and rubbed his eyes. "God, I'm so sick of this shit."

"I know," Jessica said, stroking his hair. "I know you are."

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As the night went on, the laughter eventually returned to the treehouse and to Jessica's room. Elizabeth and Chris both needed some time to recover, which they got, and then they forgot their troubles as best they could. Gordie comforted Elizabeth the way he would comfort Chris (without the fart jokes) and Jessica comforted Chris the way she had done whenever he had needed it over the last three years.

At seventeen and sixteen and fifteen, you may not know all about the world, but you know enough about love and kindness. The four teenagers knew more than most.

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A/N: Wow, I wrote that real fast, so any typos, etc, I'm sorry! I'm soryr it goes from happy to sad so fast too. Please R and R, I'm sorry if this chapter wasn't so good!