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Mike calls Stan again, just to be sure.
He thought Stan’s voice sounded so distant, like he was already gone, farther away than the miles between Maine and Atlanta. Mike calls Stan again. Patricia Uris is the one who answers. She tells him that Stan went to take a bath, and her voice sounds strange, strangled, and she’s whispering to herself, he never takes a bath at this hour, and then she tries to open the door and then Mike hears something falling (maybe the phone, he realizes when he hears the echoes of her rushed footsteps) and then, and then.
Mike hears Patricia scream and the call is cut off.
Tell Stan to come home, the fortune cookies says.
Bev calls Stan again, because Mike is too nervous to do so.
Patricia answers. Bev’s voice is soft, Patricia’s is shaking. She explains that she found her husband in the bathtub, bleeding. They’re at the hospital now. Stan is going to be okay. “He needs to come to Derry,” Bev says, and everyone can notice how much she hates herself for saying it.
Bev closes her eyes while Patricia is arguing, her voice more shocked than angry. They all know she’s right. They can’t fight her. They can’t try to convince her.
But Stan needs to come and when Patricia hangs up, Bill looks at them and says, “He’ll be here.”
Stan has bandages on his wrists and Ben is the first one to hug him.
“I’m sorry,” Ben whispers. Stan hugs him back. Suddenly, the seven of them are holding onto each other, and they are all crying. Stan thinks he could spend the rest of his life without seeing them, but his heart tells him otherwise.
Here’s the thing. He loves them. He made a promise. He also loves his life, his wife. He was scared. And now he is here. New scars matching with old ones.
“We love you,” Mike says and Stan can hear in his voice the unspoken forgive me.
“You always took care of us,” Eddie is smiling, hand on his arm. Stan smiles back at him. He still feels so distant, as if he’s seeing everything from inside a cage. It’s so weird, be here again. To be with them again. There’s a room in his heart that wasn’t fully shut off, but now is wide open. And they’re all inside, his best friends, the best people he has ever met.
Stan wonders how different their lives would be if they kept contact. He thinks of himself, a teenage boy, afraid that a friendship like that could end. It didn’t end. It was only asleep, is all.
“I’m still afraid,” he says, his voice small. He feels Richie’s hand on his shoulder.
“We all are.”
Stan looks at his arms. Bandages. Patricia didn’t want him to go. She was right. He told her this was something he had to do, a promise he could not break. He remembers he was the one to make them promise to come back. Shame builds up and burns inside of him.
“I think I… I forgot, but not… not completely,” he explains to Mike. “When you called, it took me a second to remember who you were, but then everything came back. The fear. The monstrosity of it all. How I could not believe what was happening, not because it was terrible, but because it was offensive to… to my sense of reality, I guess,” Stan stares down at his shoes.
He doesn’t want to meet Mike’s eyes. He thinks about Mike waiting years and years for them to come back, or to finally leave Derry. He thinks about Mike all alone, all this time. He thinks about Mike calling him again, because he felt something was wrong. Did he deserve a friendship like that?
“I’m sorry,” he murmurs, still not looking up.
Mike’s hand is on his chin. Then, on his cheek. “You came,” his voice is as soft as Stan remembers. He thinks about the way Mike put his arm on Stan’s shoulders when he was afraid to enter the Neibolt house. It’s the same boy, the same eyes. “That’s all that matters. And I’m sorry for calling you with such bad news. I wish things could be different.”
“Me too,” Stan replies. But they’re not, they both think.
Eddie is bleeding a lot.
Stan holds him.
“I… I have to tell him,” Eddie says, his breath shallow. “I have to, I have to tell him…”
Richie’s eyes stare at the distance, as do Bill’s. Their bodies are there, but their minds are far, far away. Wandering somewhere in the universe. Stan tries to shove that thought aside. He can’t think about the absurdity of what they’re doing or else he’ll never stop. And Eddie needs him.
Stan presses his shirt firmer against what was left of Eddie’s arm. “You will,” his voice scares him. It’s not soft, it’s determined. He feels like he was never so sure of anything in his life. “When this is over, you’ll tell him.”
“He has to know I… I…,” Eddie’s eyes are full of light, like this is the sanest he’s ever been. Stan is not crying, but Bev is. Ben is trampling on Its eggs. Mike, Bill and Richie are biting Its tongue. He loves them. He loves them so much.
He knows all seven of them are going to see the sun shine again. Together.
“He will know,” Stan reassures him. “You’ll tell him.”
They’re in the hospital. Richie is on Eddie’s room. Bill and Ben went out to buy something to eat. Bev is sleeping in a remarkably uncomfortable position. Mike is looking through the window. Stan is breathing, in and out.
“It’s over,” Mike says, turning to him. “Look at our hands.”
Stan looks. No scar. He feels tears on his eyes. It’s over.
“We couldn’t do this without you,” Mike sits by his side. Stan smiles, shakes his head. “I’m serious. Thank you for showing up.”
“The thing about being a loser is that you don’t have anything to lose, right?”
Mike laughs. “Right, but you had. And you came after all.”
Stan feels something growing in his chest. And then, Mike is hugging him and they’re crying because they’re happy, they’re relieved and they survived. Once again, and for all, they survived.
Stan looks at them and they look at the sun.
Richie is holding Eddie’s left hand and Eddie is grinning, not ashamed, not afraid. Ben is hugging Bev, chin on her shoulder. Bill looks like Atlas would if they took the world from his back. And Mike, Mike is shining. His best friends. The best people in the world.
He remembers when he was a kid, the fear of being left behind, Eddie grabbing his shoulders and saying they would never leave him. He remembers the dead kids he saw, a vision so nightmarish that he was certain that it still haunted his dreams. He remembers Mike telling him about the giant bird that It became to attack him. He remembers shaking his head and telling Mike the names of all the birds he knew and loved, hoping that Mike would love birds as well.
When he blinks, they’re all looking at him. Smiling.
“What?,” he asks, but he’s smiling too. It’s impossible to see them, so happy, and not smile.
“Stan the Man,” Richie says, messing up his hair. “I’m just… glad we’re all together.”
He thinks about them as kids, creating the most beautiful and the most terrifying memories of his life. He thinks about all the love and the joy he felt, despite the fear. He thinks about birds, little birds, flying together, protecting each other. Flying away, and then going back home again.
“When we’re together, I feel like we’re invincible,” Ben voices all their thoughts. “I’m happy we all came back. I was so… petrified. But now I don’t want to be away from you guys anymore.”
Stan remembers the day they made the promise, when he said he hated them and then laughed to show it was just a joke. His heart felt heavy that day. Now it’s just a little bird inside his chest.
“I love you,” he says, because it’s true and because they’re alive, together, after years apart.
They hold hands. Home, again.