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He concentrates on pulling himself up and out of Neibolt, on the feeling of cold stone under his fingers. Not of Eddie's cold, lifeless body slung over Mike's shoulders.
He doesn't doesn't know how Mike is doing it, or why.
He just knows Richie had begged and begged and insisted that Eddie couldn't be left alone in that place.
It's too scary down here, it's dirty, we can't leave him he needs help he's just hurt, he's hurt please.
Mike had stepped forward instantly, maybe something about him and Richie being too hopeful for their own good.
Mikey...
Bill tried to communicate, he's dead Mikey, we can't climb up with him, he's dead and it's going to hurt so much more to see it in the light.
But what if? What if Bill? I can't take him away from Richie, knowing there's a chance for them to...
The walls start crashing in, Mike bends down to Richie and whispers something in his ear making him stand and stumble back where Ben catches him and Bev clutches his arm. Then Mike picks up Eddie's body like it's nothing.
Bev leads the way, followed by Ben who has to pull Richie up to stop him looking back at Mike. Bill is last, to make sure Mike doesn't fall behind and because it feels right that way.
He doesn't know how Mike carries Eddie's body the whole way out, how they all make it outside and sit by the trees catching their breath. Away from the dust of the collapsed Neibolt house. Mike did it.
Seeing Richie cling onto Eddie's body in the dark, hands covered in his blood, seemed to have sparked something in him. Maybe it's the power of friendship.
It's more likely the weight of guilt but he doesn't like to think of that.
Bill feels the guilt too, he thinks back to the pact they had made as kids and how he had chained them all to this fucked-up town. They even have the scars to prove it.
He looks at his hand to trace the jagged line but it's not there. He quickly checks the other hand to make sure he didn't get the wrong one but sure enough it's vanished.
Completely gone.
"Guys, the scar on my hand, it's gone." He tries to tell them all but they won't hear him.
Richie clutches onto Eddie, his hand on the back of Eddie's head, pulling his face into his shoulder, his knuckles scraping the tree Eddie is propped up against.
Mike looks to Bill, his eyes are wet and Bill wants to hold him but he can't move. Mike seems to read it in his eyes though, he moves over, not touching but standing so close that they could.
They all circle around Richie and Bill was right, it does hurt more in the daylight. He tries to focus on his mysterious vanishing scar instead because it's too awful to see them like that.
They should be bickering, like last time they fought It. Even after defeating a killer clown they still had it in them to argue and laugh. Now he thinks about it, it was rather like pulling pigtails on the playground.
Not this time though. Richie doesn't joke this time. He doesn't do a stupid impression and look to see if Eddie's laughing. Why it took all this time for Bill to realise Richie loved Eddie, he's not sure.
Mike sniffles beside him, watching them on the ground and Bill thinks he knows why it took until now for him to understand. It hurts and it hurts and it hurts.
The worst part is Richie's face, crumpled and so unlike himself that it's almost too much to cope with. Eddie just lays there.
He'd never thought anything could hurt more to look at than Eddie's dead body except wait... he'd started to call him just Eddie like he was a person again not a...
"Richie, look," he tries to speak loud enough to get through.
"Just give him a minute, Bill." He hears Ben tell him from where he's stood with his arm around Beverly, her head tucked into him, crying.
Bill ignores him.
"Richie, your hands, they're clean, look," he tries again, "look at him, Richie." He pleads.
"What?" He finally pulls away from Eddie and Bev gasps.
They all look at Eddie's shirt, no longer covered in any blood at all. You might even say it was clean.
None of them say anything, Mike shifts closer to Bill, shoulders touching as they watch Richie pull up Eddie's shirt with trembling hands.
It's just a stomach, just skin and flesh and no gaping hole from where a clown had shoved it's giant claw inside and flung him against the rocks.
"Dude, what the fuck? Why are you undressing me while I'm asleep? That's fucking creepy, even for you." Words fill the air so quickly they all know it's him. Nobody else can speak that fast.
They had been too focused on his torso they hadn't noticed his eyes open.
"Sorry, I thought you were your mom." Is all Richie can say, of course it is. What else is there?
"My mom is dead, asshole, do I look like a corpse to you." Eddie rolls his eyes.
There's a beat of silence and Bill expects Richie to make a joke. But he doesn't. They all just stare.
And then Richie breaks. He chokes out a sob that tugs at Bill's heart and drops his head onto Eddie's chest.
"He's not serious is he? Ok Trashmouth, you can stop now, we get the joke." But Richie doesn't stop, "Is he actually crying for real? What the fuck is going on?" Eddie genuinely looks confused, like he doesn't know.
Nobody can say anything because what can you say to someone you thought was dead only moments ago, and they don't even realise it. It's so silent, just Richie's heartbreaking sobbing clawing at their necks.
"You were dead, Eddie. I dragged your body out of Neibolt. You died." Mike says because he's the only one who can talk right now.
"That was real? I thought I dreamt it." Eddie's eyes are so wide they look like they're about to fall out.
Richie lifts his head up now, reaching for Eddie, he puts his hands on either side of his face. Surprisingly Eddie doesn't even flinch.
"You're ok. You fucker. You stupid fucker. You're ok." Richie studies Eddie's face closely, like he's worried it's his last chance.
"This tree is leaking sap all over my clothes." Eddie looks right back in Richie's eyes and Bill thinks they're communicating some unspoken thing.
"I don't care." He rubs his thumb on Eddie's cheek. Something passes between them.
"Neither do I." His head inches closer.
"I hate you, I've been in love with you for 27 years and I fucking hate you." Richie's voice is softer than he's ever heard before.
"Me too, you idiot, me too." Eddie smiles in a way nobody ever should after being killed by a clown.
"I thought I never got to tell you, I thought I lost my chance." Richie whispers but it's so empty in this town they can all hear him.
"You will if you don't kiss me right now."
So he does. He kisses him hard and deep and holds him too tight, just in case he slips away.
"I love you." One of them whispers, it doesn't matter who.
As they watch Richie cry and Eddie grin, clinging onto eachother, Bill feels a brush against his hand.
He looks up to his left at Mike who doesn't even need to say anything for Bill to know.
He doesn't have to think much either before he grabs Mike's hand properly, squeezing tight to communicate something.
Bill leans his head against his shoulder reaching for Mike's other hand to examine it. He strokes the blank palm smiling.
"It's really gone. Like the hole in Eddie's stomach, it's like it never happened." Bill finally speaks.
He tries not to think about summer '89 and if they had killed It back then, maybe Georgie would have climbed his way out of the sewers and come home.
Mike seems to be wondering something similar.
A crackled ringing comes from Mike's pocket, his mobile somehow still working.
He doesn't let go of Bill's hand as he pulls out the phone to see who's calling.
There's no caller ID but there is a call location.
Atlanta, Georgia.
Richie and Eddie get up. Ben and Beverly move closer. Mike and Bill clutch their hands together harder. They sense it, even if Mike is the only one that knows.
Stan.
Mike whispers it so quiet they shouldn't hear it at all but they do.
Maybe because the feeling passed between six forty-year-olds, standing covered in sewer water and dust, has more meaning and volume than anything that's ever happened in Derry, and anything that ever will happen.
Holding onto eachother and letting go of the past.
He answers the phone.