Stanley Uris sighs, and clicks the telephone receiver into place. Patty is staring at him, he knows, but all energy had gone out of him the moment Mike had cut off his greeting. Of course, Stanley hadn't been sure exactly how to greet the voice over the phone, a voice so familiar and yet completely foreign all at once, a voice he'd only ever known in the young, high-pitched tone of a child, a voice he'd never thought he'd hear again. And yet, it had all come rushing back to him as Mike began his long explanation, leading up to those two words. Only two words, he thinks now, two small, harmless words, Stan, why are you shaking so bad?

But he knows, knows they aren't small, knows they aren't harmless. One of those words changed his life once, he realizes. It's rushing back now, everything, cascading into his brain like a waterfall over a cliff, and he knows. Two words, determined to send his life to hell once again, just as one of them had once.

It's back.

It is back.

He had felt the blood drain from his face as the words had crackled out of the receiver, and while his paleness feels just as bad as it looks, he's glad for it. Memories are still flashing through his head, most only appearing for a second, the images fuzzy, like an out-of-focus camera. However, one image – or maybe it's several similar memories, Stan can barely tell by now – finds its way into his mind's eye so many times it becomes impossible to ignore, and it makes Stan gladder than ever to be paling in fear.

Blood. So much blood.

In some strange way, feeling the absence of the red fluid in his face is comforting, and makes him feel like whatever had drawn that blood in the past couldn't get to it now. He's still frowning, though – no amount of minor comfort is able to calm his mind, overflowing with more information than he'd thought possible.

He barely notices Patty speaking, and has to glance all around the room to locate her face. Fear is still gripping at his chest, even more so now, as he begins to realize how far away he feels, like he's no longer sitting in his cozy living room and is instead bouncing manically through his own history. He tries to keep his face calm, however, subconsciously tilting it down to avoid Patty's gaze. "Hmmmm?"

As he stares at his open hands, Stan freezes once again, watching two thin, white lines inch their way across his palms. They hadn't been there before, he knows, and they wouldn't be there less than an hour later, when Stanley Uris's body would be found submerged in a bath of water and blood, but now they took over the man's field of vision entirely. He feels his throat tighten, the air barely squeezing into his lungs, and he finds himself wishing for Eddie's aspirator, though he can't for the life of him remember who Eddie is and why the name sends yet another wave of goosepimples down his spine.

"Who was that on the phone?"

Again, he almost misses her words, and blinks twice to try and regain focus. "No one," he tells her when the question finally penetrates the haze of memories clouding his mind. "No one, really. I…" He glances down at his hands again, and winces at a sudden stinging in his eyes, the pain of sunlight reflecting off a piece of metal directly into his gaze.

No, not metal. Glass.

A shattered Coke bottle.

And again, blood–

"I think I'll take a bath." The words leave his mouth before they fully process in his mind, but Stan doesn't correct himself. He knows that Patty's concern will grow even worse if he falters, and that her worry is the last thing he needs right now – he's got enough worry of his own. No correction comes to mind, either, the landscape of his brain suddenly deserted, and so Stan puts on the most confident look he can and walks out of the room, away from Patty, but even more away from the looming question: what happens now?

And, to Stanley's surprise, he succeeds. With every step up the stairs, with every brush of his hand against the banister, and with the final click of the bathroom door locking into place, the future once again fades further and further into the back of his mind. But Stan isn't safe yet, he knows, because it isn't the future he's running from.

It's the past.

The shaking begins in his hands, and slowly works its way through his entire body, jostling the food from supper in his stomach and forcing bile up his throat. Then, sharp and potent, a strong buzz shoots through his arms, up to his head, and down straight into his soul. Stan buckles over, not in pain, but shock and memory – he's felt this sensation once before, this

(magic)

buzz, and he only has to wait a single moment longer before the memory hits, searing, white-hot pain in the core of his being.

The Coke bottle. The Barrens. His blood

(I swear too)

mixing with the others' as a bond is formed, and another broken–

Stanley can't take it any longer – he folds down over the sink and hurls. It feels good, releasing every drop of fear and doubt and shit that had flooded his mind since he'd picked up the phone, and allowing the last of the memories to trickle into his awareness. He's still buzzing, and the lines

(scars, they're scars)

on his hands are still there, but now they come with faces, with names. With joy, with hope, with love, with desire. With pain, with fear, with hurt, with terror.

With answers.

Come home, Mike's words ring out in his ears once again, and Stan can't help but shudder. Because, he knows, another voice spoke those words to him before, standing in the fading light of the sun with filthy clothes and determined faces. And because, he knows, he can't.

Stanley feels it in his bones before he knows it in his mind, and by then he's already opening the bathtub tap. He can't come back, simply can't. Can't face It again, can't face Derry again, can't face them again. Most importantly, he can't face himself again, can't relive the beautiful reality of the summer of 1958.

Stanley's shaving razor glints in the fluorescent bathroom light as the man slowly undresses, peeling off one piece of clothing at a time, and with them the layers of his life. His chest is bare, and he is standing in a suit at his wedding. His legs are exposed, and he's on the podium of his school's auditorium, taking his diploma from the principal's hands. He's naked, and he's a kid again, trudging through the Barrens with Richie Tozier on a June day, in search of adventure.

Into the bath he goes, and now the process is reversed, every inch of his body that submerges sending him charging forward through his history. But this time, he isn't alone. This time, he doesn't forget. This time, his friends are there, with him every step of the way.

There they are, Mike and Eddie helping him adjust the fancy tie he's wearing for his Bar Mitzvah. There they are, Bill and Ben supporting the ladder as he tightens screws in the clubhouse walls. There they are, sitting around a bar table as Richie hands him his first (legal) drink and rambles in a refined Pancho Vanilla Voice. And there they are, Bev teaching him the slow, graceful dance he'd need for the next day, when Patty would take Uris as her last name. What a wonderful life, surrounded by friends and family, smiles and laughter filling the spaces between.

And what a shame, Stanley thinks, that it couldn't – can't – be real.

Come home, Mike had said, but by now the words sound just as hollow as Stan feels. Derry may be home, but he wouldn't be coming there. Stan would be going, heading into the black hole of his past, and dooming his friends in the process.

The blade of the shaving razor is cold against Stan's skin, and he shivers slightly, then pushes down on the blade and draws it across his wrist. A moan of pain threatens to escape, but Stanley keeps his jaw clenched shut, and only winces. If he makes a sound, he fears reality will finally catch up to him, and he'll be forced to stop, to recognize the madness of his actions. So instead, Stan holds his breath through the pain, and when enough blood has welled up from the matching cuts across his wrists, Stan finally takes a breath, and dips his fingers in the red fluid.

Then, in five shaky strokes, Stan finally lets reality in, and then plunges under the water

(float we all float down here no don't float Stan)

to blur the word now written with his blood.

IT.

Come home. Come home. The words echo through Stanley's head as the water around him grows murky and red, and consciousness slowly drifts away. And, for the first (and last) time that evening, Stan wonders whether he should have listened, hopped from the phone call with Mike to one with his travel agents, squared his shoulders, and faced his past, faced Derry, faced It. I'm sorry, he wants to say, loud enough to reach the ears of the other six Losers, his friends, his family, and yet still intimate and quiet, confined to the walls of the small bathroom. I'm sorry, he wants to say, but instead, a small, humorless smile rises onto his face.

After all, it's too late to turn back now.

Come home, one last time before Stan finally drops into the darkness, and he wonders to himself if Derry really was home, and he smiles again. Only minutes before, it had seemed impossible to find an answer; now it was staring him in the face, clear as day. Derry wasn't home, but the people in it were.

And, Stanley figures, one way or another, he'll be seeing them soon enough.