Chapter 6: Solace In Friendship

After having the nightmare which seemed so real, Thomas began to be consumed with the fear and mystery of the evil clown monster and it's hold over Derry. He was also starting to wonder if the nightmare was somehow more than just something he dreamed, because the next day he could still smell the putrid and acidic odor from the old woman's vomit in the hallway outside his parent's room. Thomas did not know who exactly he could talk to about his experience, as he knew his mother and father would not believe him. He had an idea of someone he could ask though- his friend Franklin Denbrough, who he had not seen for a week since school had been shut down. But as fate would have it, Thomas and his father and mother were due to make a trip to the Denbrough Farm the next day. His father and Mr. Denbrough had arranged to make a two-day trip to Bangor to a horse auction, and the boys would stay at the Denbrough's farmhouse with their mothers. It would be Thomas' chance to confide in Franklin what had happened in his nightmare.

The farm itself was on the northeastern edge of Derry, near where the Canal that passed through the town drained into the Penobscot River. The farm was once a sprawling tract of land a few generations before, but over the years the Denbrough family had downsized the property by selling off tracts of the land to the Derry Town Committee. Franklin had told Thomas on several occasions that when the time came for him to inherit the family farm, that he would sell the rest of it and move to downtown Derry and open a gunsmithing shop on Kansas Street, which was starting to become a profitable business venture for some of Derry's businessmen at the time. It seemed trivial to Thomas for a boy his age to be concerned already with adult affairs, but to each their own, he concluded. After their fathers had loaded up into the Denbrough's wagon and departed, Thomas and Franklin went out to the plot of dirt beside the garden to play a game of horseshoes. Thomas decided to tell Franklin about his nightmare right then, and the seriousness in his eyes were enough to convince Franklin that he was not pulling his leg. Thomas was surprised when Franklin began to tell him of strange things that had been happening to him as well. With a solemn voice, Franklin began...

"Well, I don't know how to explain it exactly, but I've seen the clown a few times too. Mostly I've seen him in the mornings on the way to school and in the afternoons on the way home. At first it was a little strange, but nothing scary- I would see the clown beside a building or beside a tree, and he would just stand there and wave at me. I always had this feeling that there was something bad about him though. I thought maybe he was just some man that was passing through, like perhaps a traveling circus performer or something of that sort. I didn't get really scared until he called me by name though- one morning I saw him on the way to school and he said my name and told me there was a magic show in the Barrens, and he wanted me to come with him to see it. And Thomas, you know how much I love magic tricks with cards and illusion; I wanted to go with him. But that bad feeling I had about him came back, and I got scared and I took off running and I didn't stop until I got to school. But all of the times I saw him, he never looked horrible or like a monster with sharp teeth, but there was certainly something wrong about him, something very creepy in the way he acted."

Thomas felt relief to know that he was not alone in his fears of the clown, and he said "We're friends Franklin, and we will figure this out together. There must be something about children that the clown likes, and it's obviously bad. I think we now know what has been responsible for kids that have been killed. But how do we keep from ending up like them?"

Franklin said "We don't even know what it is, Thomas. What if it's some kind of monster, and it's right here in Derry? From what you told me about your nightmare, it's obviously more than just a clown. And who knows? Maybe it wanted you to have the nightmare, maybe it somehow arranged it so that you would have the nightmare. And if that's what it did, then it's obviously something that is much more powerful and smart than us, and what is stopping it from getting us anytime it wants? I don't think it's something that we as children can fight, and we certainly can't tell our parents because they will just think we're crazy or possessed. And this...monster is obviously the reason why all of those children disappeared last summer and fall too, and that was about a dozen children, which added to the recent ones, makes it around 17 dead or missing children. So tell me Thomas, if none of them could manage to live when this monster showed itself, what makes you think that we can do any better?"

Thomas thought about it and said, "Maybe we have an advantage the others didn't- maybe they trusted the clown or they thought he was just a nice man in a clown suit, and he used that to capture them. But we know that he's bad, so maybe we can keep away from him until he goes back wherever he came from. We don't have anything to fight him with, so our best chance is to stay on our guard and stay away from him. School will probably reopen in a couple of days, and when we get back we can warn everyone else in our class. Maybe if everyone avoids the clown, he might get discouraged and leave Derry. I think it's our only chance to keep from getting ourselves killed."

And with that said, the conversation between the two boys was interrupted by their mothers calling them in the house for an early lunch before the afternoon chores began. As they walked back toward the house, Franklin seemed to hesitate. When Thomas looked back and asked him what was wrong, Franklin looked at him with a mixture of fear and resolution, "Thomas I noticed that you keep referring to the clown, or whatever it is, as a he." With a puzzled look, Thomas said, "yeah I guess I do, what's your point?"

Franklin said quietly, "Its not a 'he' or a man..it's a...

it's an IT."