AUTHORS NOTE!: TRIGGER WARNING: HINTS OF SEXUAL ABUSE/MINORS:

If you must pass this chapter, Gordie and Chris visit with Vern, and learn the real reason why Billy was thrown out of the house.-SDA

Castle Rock was still unfriendly in some ways as they remembered it. Chris and Gordie dressed up decently for their arrival. Vern Tessio planned to put them up at his place with his wife, Earlene. As Chris drove up in his old yellow Ford Pickup, Vern waited outside with his oldest boy, now 3.

Vern was still fit, but was growing a belly of his own. Even though he worked at the fire department, he was as timid and soft spoken as he always was, with his moments of perkiness. Vern was also balding a little and had traces o clock shadow.

"Chris! Gordie!" Vern put his son down and walked up to meet them, shock coming across his face. Gordie had long hair, and dressed like he was about to hop in a drum circle while high on reefer, Chris was looking like a clean cut All American boy.

"What the hell did college do to you? How did Gordie turn into the rebel and you, turned into the man?" Vern laughed with his belly coming up and down. Gordie giggled, "I thought Earlene was the one expecting?" Chris laughed and Vern turned beet red. "Aw c'mon, this is what home cooking gets you." Chris snickered and said "maybe I should have gotten Bev knocked up." Gordie gave him a cross look. Chris laughed, and looked at Gordie with a particular smile. (I have you, Why settle for less?)

"Boys!" Earlene came out of the house, holding a one year old girl and very pregnant with bun number 3. Poor girl could barely walk, trying to waddle out of the house to see her two classmates, who were sophisticated city gentlemen.

Gordie reached for and held the little girl.

"That's my lil girl, Maggy Mae, and the boy here is Ted." Vern said as he tousled the Lil guys head.

Gordie said "she's so cute" as the little one gurgled in his arms, with her mop of brown hair, grabbing at Gordie's fingers. Chris looked at him, and saw an image of him being a great dad.

"So Teddy…"Gordie asked, as he put the toddler in Vern's arms. "Heather called us and let us know."

Vern sighed and said "I asked Heather to look you up. She said she would."

Gordie and Chris looked at each other with a tinge of sadness, and looked at Vern who looked real upset. Earlene hugged him.

Ma Tessio was walking up when she saw both Chris and Gordie and hugged them as well.

"How is Julie and her new husband in Florida?" Ma Tessio asked genuinely, since her and Gordie's mom did like one another.

"She is great ma'am, we are gonna go visit her in a few weeks."

Ma Tessio then looked at Chris, and spoke very quietly. "Are you gonna visit yer ma? She has been really lonely, since Camille and Sammy went to live with your uncle Paddy, while Richard stays away because of the issues she has with Dawn, who's a sweet girl, I don't understand it.

Chris spoke with confidence. " I can't, not after what Eyeball did to me, and she let it happen."

Ma Tessio sighed and said "even if it is love, it's still pleasures of the flesh, however, I think it wasnt mercy or worry that caused him to do what he did, it was shame on him. I kicked my boy out but it was shame of different kind, a shame that can't be ignored."

Gordie coughed. He liked Ma Tessio and how she could put things in perspective, and she did. Eyeball only attacked Chris due to his own feelings and about how it would affect him. Not Chris. Not Joanne. Him. It didn't matter, Eyeball didnt care about Joanne, he was too busy building his own life with Dawn in Derry.

—-

Vern, Gordie and Chris walked by the old school that afternoon. Vern grinned because his two best friends were with him. 7 years have gone by. And all their memories were there. As they walked, Gordie asked about Billy. The story he got was more than he wanted.

"My lil brother Stanley lives with my aunt Sheila in Bangor, there's a reason for that. He is traumatized by the house."

Chris looked confused "Why is that? What did he do?". Gordie couldn't quite believe it.

For Gordie, it wasn't that hard for him to put the pieces of the puzzle together. "Since Stan was 5, Billy boy was …." Vern cried. Vern was usually sensitive but it explained a lot of things. How Billy wouldn't mess with Vern after he hit puberty and filled out, and how he turned fire red when Gordie told him about his ma in the shop. Gordie felt at that moment if he knew then what he knew now, Billy would be picking his teeth up off the ground.

"Is that why he was locked up?" Gordie asked, telling Vern about the incident at the shop in hit the tree nearby with his fist. Chris felt hot white anger. Like Gordie, he would have fought him. Billy was a monster.

Gordie hugged Vern. "I'm sorry, that's shitty, but why would he do that?" Chris yelled. Gordie remembered Lilly's letter. Billy wasn't a queer or a fag, he was worse. He was a libertine. He would fuck anything with legs, he didn't care.

"Vern, how would you have known?" Chris asked.

Vern turned white and cried again. Gordie punched Chris in the arm, who recoiled and slapped his head. It hit him a little too late. "Gee Mr. Lawyer, can't you see the wood from the tree?"

Gordie put his arm on Vern's arm and squeezed.

"Vern knew. It happened to him too, right?" Gordie asked.

Vern's memories opened like a floodgate. ….He punched the tree so hard his knuckles started to bleed. Chris peeled him off and embraced him. Into Chris's shoulder, Vern cried. "That motherfucker. If he gets near my kids, I'm killin him."

Gordie wondered to himself, had any of them had a normal childhood?