Work Text:
fifteen minutes in
Bill Denbrough is about ninety-seven percent sure he’s trapped in an elevator with a vampire.
Sure, maybe his brain is fried from taking two final exams in a row, or maybe he’s spent too many nights hidden under the covers, flashlight illuminating the pages of whatever fifty-cent horror story he’d picked up at the bookstore that week. But the evidence is all there, really. The boy, smaller than all the other strangers Bill is stuck with for God knows how long, is pale as shit, with bluish-black circles that scream hey, watch out; i might be dead! smeared under each eye. Bill thinks he might be a newbie; every now and then he’ll catch the boy not breathing for longer than would be comfortable for a normal person, like he’s forgotten it’s something he needs to do. Only when their eyes meet, and they both blush a borrowed red, does the boy start breathing again, only to stop a few minutes later. And he gives off a weird smell too, like the harsh metallic that sticks to your fingers if you handle a quarter for too long, or the sharp antiseptic of a hospital waiting room. And Bill should know what vampires smell like considering he’s a vampire, too.
Another of the elevator’s prisoners, the boy to Bill’s left, coughs and Bill is dragged from his thoughts back into the awkward silence of reality. The light flickers dimly overhead, like an out of shape marathon runner on their last mile. There are seven of them stuck inside the small space, seven sorry suckers trapped inside the most boring place on Derry University campus. The owner of the cough, a tall, lean handsome guy wearing cowboy boots and jeans, like he’d just stepped out of a scenic horse ranch somewhere South instead of the lobby of the science building. He’s leaned against the same wall of the elevator as Bill, books pressed carelessly against his thighs. He smiles at Bill apologetically, like coughing is something to be sorry for, and the way his eyes shine with sincerity makes Bill want to ask if he has experience riding anything other than horses. Instead, he simply smiles back, careful to keep his teeth hidden away.
“Do you mind?” the (probable) newbie vampire snaps. Bill turns to get a good look at what he’s talking about. Newbie sits criss-cross applesauce on the floor, his sweatshirt thrown haphazardly underneath him like a picnic blanket. He’s staring daggers at another member of their unfortunate party, a lanky dude with dark, wild hair that curls in sporadic chunks around his face, making his skin seem paler than Bill suspects it actually is. He’s leaned against the wall, headphones in and eyes closed, obnoxiously bright Hawaiian shirt entirely out of place in the dull, grey elevator. His foot is the only indication he hasn’t fallen asleep; it’s bouncing restlessly against the floor, entirely out of speed with Beach Samba, which Bill figures has been playing overhead long before the elevator was constructed around it.
“Do you mind?” the suspected vampire asks again, voice a little louder. Bill thinks for a moment that he’s dressed a little cheerily for someone he figures is long dead; his DIY tie-dye t-shirt is way too big for his small frame, and is tucked messily into bright yellow Nike shorts that show off his long, well-shaped legs. He looks like an art student, but the leaning tower of economics and math textbooks in his lap suggests he hasn’t had time to pick up a paintbrush in quite a while, if ever.
The only girl of the group gently nudges Headphones with her elbow. She smiles softly when he opens his eyes and moves her head in Nike Short’s direction. Headphones’ eyes stay on hers a little longer than necessary, but Bill doesn’t blame him. With hair like gentle warmth on a breezy summer day and bright eyes that dance with something other that Bill can’t quite define, it would be difficult for anyone to look away.
Thankfully, Headphones eventually does. “Huh?”
“I said, do you mind? You’re shaking the whole elevator with your foot. It’s giving me motion sickness.”
“Oh,” Headphones grins apologetically. “Sorry.”
He closes his eyes again, and Bill can see that after a moment his mouth starts moving slightly, singing silently along to whatever song he’s listening to. All is still for a moment, and then Headphones’ foot starts bouncing again.
The second to last member of the seven, reading a well-worn book Bill figures has seen much better days than this one, chuckles, shaking his head. He’s as good looking as the rest have been, almost impossibly so, with a strong jaw that does nothing to damage the softness of his features and dark skin and warm eyes. The last of the group looks through the corner of his eyes at Nike Shorts and smirks at the anger he finds pooled in the small boy’s features. He is handsome too, despite the sickly almost green color of his skin. His hair is a curly, faded gold, like hay that’s been left too long in the sun and his eyes are bright and intelligent, in stark contrast to the delicate, ill look that radiates from, well, everywhere else. He looks like someone who’s been wondering around the contagious disease wing of a hospital for a while, searching for a bucket to kick. The rest of the group, unconsciously or not, has put as much distance between themselves and Sicky as possible. He sits on the floor, knees tucked under his butt, picking mournfully at a loose thread on his backpack.
As Bill considers them all, he is struck with the sudden thought that none of them are entirely human. Otherness radiates from each of his elevator companions like sparks flying from a bonfire; bright and beautiful.
“Do you fucking mind?” Nike Shorts hisses again.
Bill sighs; this is going to be a long night.
thirty-five minutes in
Ben Hanscom is well acquainted with quiet.
Silence has been his closest friend since he was old enough to know he should have one, and though he’s grown out of his inability to make small talk with strangers and acquaintances he is still no stranger to sitting alone with himself, one on one. It seems, however, that not all of his fellow passengers on this elevator ride from purgatory are as chummy with quiet and silence as he is; the boy in the tie-dye shirt fidgets anxiously in his spot on the floor, eyes flying around the room, landing on faces like a fly landing on its next meal. The boy in the Hawaiian shirt is fidgety too, but in a softer way, like he’s had more practice being quietly impatient. He’s lost in his music, head bopping to some crazy beat none of the rest of them can hear. And every now and then, the prettiest lady Ben has ever seen sighs a soft, impatient sigh that Ben swears is giving him goosebumps. The first time she did it, Ben looked up at her and their eyes met, and he blushed so deeply he could feel the rush of blood pooling hot and bright in his cheeks. And now it’s become a game; she sighs, their eyes meet, Ben blushes, and she smiles. Ben decides maybe being stuck in an elevator isn't such a bad thing, if he gets to keep looking at that smile.
There’s only one thing; Ben Hanscom is well acquainted with quiet, but not so familiar with the delicate art of being confidently quiet in such close quarters with a bunch of total strangers. He clears his throat, smiles apologetically when the boy next to glances at him. Surely, someone should say something. He looks down at his watch. They’ve been sitting (and standing) in silence for almost forty minutes now. If they wait any longer, won’t it be too late to say anything at all? What if they’re trapped in here all night, and by the end of it leave total strangers? And if they pass each other in the halls, or on campus, do they nod? Smile? Say something?
He clears his throat again. You’ve gotta say something, Ben. Anything. He looks down at his watch. Forty-one minutes.
“Uh,” he starts. Five sets of eyes meet his own. The last are still closed, until the lady with the pretty smile gently nudges the boy in the Hawaiian shirt and now its six. “Uh…” Ben racks his brain for something to say, anything at all. He almost comes up empty and starts to resign himself to another forty, fifty, sixty minutes of awkward, claustrophobic silence when he remembers the few sticks of gum hiding in the pockets of his backpack. “anybody want some gum?”
one hour and twenty minutes in
It’s not long after Ben offers up his last sticks of gum that introductions are made, and Mike Hanlon finally gets a good look at the souls of the six other people in the elevator.
It takes a lot longer than it normally does to see them all; none of them wear their souls on their sleeves, no, Mike can see they’ve all been too hurt to bare them so easily. But once names have been exchanged, they all seem to loosen up, and Mike begins to really see them.
“Anybody else need to take a shit?” Richie’s voice, clear and strong, fills the lull of now comfortable silence that had fallen over the group. Richie’s soul is fireworks on the Fourth of July, small moments of meaningful silence and electric charm. His headphones lay abandoned on top of his backpack, and his nervous fidgeting has long stopped.
Mike looks around to gauge everyone’s reactions. Bill Denbrough, liberal arts major, junior like the rest of them, smiles and shakes his head, fighting back a laugh. His soul is a strong, dark red. It is stupid bravery and a deep love for something that has long been lost. Ben Hanscom, future architect, does much the same, rolling his eyes just a little. His is a solid and unwavering orange. It is humble confidence and selfless curiosity. Beverly Marsh, seamstress extraordinaire, makes as if to throw something at Richie, possibly her phone, and he ducks with a wild, ecstatic grin. Beverly’s soul is a forest green, caring and passionate. It is battles that have not yet been won and knowing kindness. Eddie Kaspbrak, business major, tilts his head against the cool metal of the elevator wall and closes his eyes with a sigh, but Mike can see a small smile working its way onto his face as he does so. His is a bright purple, fierce in its compassion and bruised with hurts that will not fade easily. And finally, Stanley Uris, accounting major, smirks, his eyes bright with familiarity. His soul is a pale, orderly blue. It is nights huddled close around a campfire and quiet strength.
Mike takes a good long look at each of their faces and the bright, colorful lives contained behind them and wonders for a moment how seven strangers managed, in an hour of mostly silence, to become fast, familiar friends. There is nothing self-conscious about the way Bill laughs deep and readily at something Ben says, nor anything that suggests any of them are really strangers in the way Eddie and Stan keep sharing knowing looks of affectionate exasperation. In a way, Mike feels as though he’s known each of them before, and he can tell by the familiar way they look at each other that they feel the same. They seem right together- like seven books that fill up a single row in a bookshelf perfectly, leaving room for no more and no less.
There’s something else too, something that makes Mike smile. Almost none of them are entirely human. He can see it in the way they move, the way they speak. Others are more human than the rest, warmer and full of life, and Mike assume they feel it because they’re sitting close together, Ben and Richie and Beverly. The others, Bill and Eddie and Stan, are dangerous and cold and fairly dead, but no one seems to notice, and if they do, aren’t as bothered by it as they probably ought to be.
Mike makes eye contact with Beverly and smiles. She smiles back, her eyes questioning, like she’s on the verge of solving a difficult puzzle.
“No shit, though, what are we gonna do when one of us has to take a piss?”
“Duh-duh-did you f-forget your bag of adult diapers in your d-dorm, T-Tozier?”
“Real funny, Denbrough. I vote we piss in Big Bill’s backpack. Everybody in?”
“Keep your piss where it belongs, will ya?” Eddie murmurs. “Just because the elevator’s not moving doesn’t make it your personal toilet. And they’re gonna get us out of here any second now, anyway,” Eddie frowns, like he doesn’t necessarily want this to be true.
Richie scoots forward on his butt until he’s sitting right in front of Eddie, and for half a second Mike worries that Eddie is a little too hungry to be so close to someone so warm, but then Richie is ruffling Eddie’s hair and Eddie doesn’t seem any more dangerous than he did before. “You gettin’ ants in your pants, Eds? Tired-a starin’ at Bill’s ugly mug for so long?”
Eddie pushes Richie’s hands away and shakes out his hair. “Tired of listening to your shit, Tozier.”
There is a quiet pause, and all of them wait anxiously for something to happen. And then Eddie says “and don’t call me Eds” and they take a collective sigh of relief and Richie laughs, a bright, clear sound. And for the final time Mike decides that yes, they must have known each other in some other world, some other time. And they must have really loved each other, too, in a way no one else has ever loved before. He wonders how well they will love each other now, in this world.
one hour and fifty minutes in
Thirty minutes of animated conversation and untamed laughter pass quickly and they’re sitting in a tight circle in the middle of the elevator, with Beverly Marsh squished between Mike and Stan, between light and decay.
“Let’s go ‘round the circle and tell the group a little bit about ourselves, shall we?” Richie grins.
It takes Beverly’s brain a second to register that Richie’s said anything at all; she’s been busy trying to figure out just what everybody’s deal is. There’s something off about all of them, the way their energies bump and dance against her own. The answer is right on the tip of her tongue, waiting to be realized, but sits just out of reach, like she’s missing some vital piece of information. “Huh?” she says after a moment. “Didn’t we already do that?”
“I’m taking about the juicy stuff, Bev my dear. Something interesting.”
“We already know all about your incontinence, Rich,” Stan deadpans. “Doesn’t get more interesting than that.”
“Weren’t we going to play truth or dare?” Ben says, laughing.
“Wuh-wuh-we can do buh-buh-both,” Bill catches each of their eyes, eyebrows raised. Does that sound good to you? Beverly is surprised at how willingly they follow his lead, how quickly they nod their heads yes.
“Who wants to go first?” Ben asks.
And so they launch head-first into a game of truth or dare, with Richie and Bill thinking of more dares than Beverly thinks should be possible in such a small space, everyone else sticking to truths unless they think of something good. The questions start out small at first: a boring mess of tell me something embarrassing thats happened to you recently and what was your first kiss like and then Eddie picks truth and Bill nervously asks him this:
“When did you d-d-die?”
The elevator is silent for a long moment, and then something in Beverly’s head goes pop! like the sound of a gum bubble bursting and she understands what is so different about the boys that make up their tiny circle. She shudders; surely Bill must know too, that none of them are entirely human. She wonders if he is scared, to be on the verge of being known. She looks into his eyes, strong and firmly settled on Eddie, and decides that he is not.
Richie coughs anxiously. “When did he what now?”
Bill blushes, like he’d been sure of his words before but is now wishing he could take them back, like a kid who raises their hand high hoping the teacher will call on them and then gives the wrong answer when the teacher finally does. “You’re d-dead, aren’t you?” he turns to look at Stan. “You tuh-tuh-too, right?”
Eddie blushes back. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Don’t you?” Mike prompts, and his voice fills the room with a calming warmth that makes them all sigh.
Richie coughs again, almost choking this time, and Ben pats him comfortingly on the back. “Could someone tell me what the fuck you guys are talking about?”
“I thought,” Bill stutters. In his eyes is a frantic question, and Beverly meets his gaze and answers it for him; you are right. “I mean, aren’t most of us duh-duh-dead?”
Richie stands up. “Whoa nelly, am I going crazy or is this the set of The Walking Dead, and not a fucking elevator?”
Stan sighs. “I guess I’m dead.”
Mike raises an eyebrow. “You guess?”
“I feel dead. But here I am.”
“Vampire?” Bill asks hopefully. Beverly fights back a knowing smile.
Stan shrugs. “Zombie, I suppose.”
“S-s-so, you eat puh-puh-people?”
He shrugs again, blushing this time. “It happens.”
Richie runs a worried hand through his hair. “What the fuck are you guys talking about?”
The rest ignore him. “I’m dead t-t-too,” Bill says excitedly. He scoots forward, closing the gap made by Richie’s absence. He opens his mouth to show the group his teeth, pointing at the sharp fangs near the front. “‘Ampire. ‘Ee?”
Mike and Beverly ooh and awe appreciatively. Eddie scoots even further in the circle to get a closer look, his eyes bright with excitement. “I’m a vampire, too!” he grins brightly, his smile full of white teeth and fang.
“Holy shit,” Richie wheezes. “I’m stuck in here with a buncha looney tunes.”
“I’m a witch,” Beverly announces proudly.
“With, like, magic and shit?” Eddie breathes excitedly. Beverly nods, smiling. “That’s so fucking cool.”
Bill’s eyes turn to Mike. Mike takes a deep breath and smiles, nervous. “I don’t think you have a word for what I am. Angel is the closest thing I’ve found.”
They all nod; Mike being an angel, or something close to it anyway, is the most easily believable thing any of them have heard all evening.
And then all eyes are on Ben, last in the circle of monsters and more-than-humans. Beverly thinks he looks nervous, like suddenly this elevator is the last place on Earth he would rather be, and she has the urge to reach out and stroke his cheek until all the worry and anxiety in his face melts away.
“I’m not supposed to say it,” Ben mumbles, shuffling in his spot on the floor.
“Wuh-wuh-we won’t tell anybody,” Bill consoles. He looks around at everyone. “Right?”
They nod. And for the same reason they’ve felt so close to each other since the beginning of this strange elevator journey, Ben believes them.
“Werewolf. That’s what I am, I mean.”
Richie laughs a scared, hollow laugh. He stabs frantically at a few of the elevator buttons.
“Wow,” Eddie breathes, excited now. “Do you really turn into a wolf and all that shit?”
“Yeah,” Ben smiles sheepishly. “Sometimes.”
Before Eddie can ask any more questions, Bill turns to Richie. “Wuh-wuh-what about you, Rah-Richie?”
Richie looks back at Bill, face pale. The terrified look on his face, that of someone who’s just been told monsters are real and is having a hard time thinking of reasons for it not to be true, makes Beverly laugh; already every single one of them would walk through Hell itself before hurting him. “What about me?”
“You’re not a vampire or anything?” Beverly asks.
“Nah,” Bill smirks, his voice full of affection. “My buh-buh-bet’s on ta-ta-troll.”
“Goblin,” Ben smiles.
“Frankenstein,” Eddie adds, eyes still bright with excitement.
“Ogre,” Stan contributes, considering Richie thoughtfully.
“I have no idea what you’re talking about,” Richie croaks, face almost as green as Stan’s, and crumples gracelessly to the floor.
two hours in
After they’ve made sure that Richie is all right, that he hasn’t died of shock and is just lying on the floor now to soak everything up, the elevator fills with the sounds of vibrant conversation and laughter. It sounds, well, it sounds like old friends catching up.
And now Beverly is peering into Eddie’s mouth, pressing a thumb against the sharp point of one of Eddie’s fangs and discussing the types of magic she can do. And when Eddie asks, very softy, if she could do a tarot reading for him some time, she smiles sweetly and answers yes, yes I would love to.
And Ben and Bill are in a heated debate over the accuracy of the Twilight movies. And they both love the movies, sure, but there is not an ounce of accuracy in any of them. And when Bill asks if he can ever see Ben transform Ben blushes a deep red but nods yes frantically anyway. And it doesn’t take a genius to see that Twilight got it wrong, that vampires and werewolves are not enemies after all.
And Mike and Stan talk softly about the nature of life and death, of what it means to be living even when one is not, or has never been, alive. And Stan makes a dry joke he expects to flop but Mike laughs, a beautiful warm laugh that stops the chatter in the elevator dead in its tracks.
And then Richie is getting up, and his eyes run over the six of them warily. And he searches for something in each of their faces, the truth perhaps, or maybe a sign that he’s not going crazy, and once he finds it he breathes a short, shaky breath and then makes his way over to Bill and Ben and easily joins in the conversation, even though he hasn’t seen a single Twilight movie.
two hours and thirty minutes in
They’re back in the circle now, pressed tighter together than they were before. The laughter has died away; in its place is a quiet, attentive silence as they listen to each other tell their stories.
Bill goes first, and his story is this:
“It happened in ‘76, when I was eighteen and my brother, Georgie, was eleven,” Bill’s face contorts with painful surprise, like he hasn’t thought of this memory in a long, long time. “Our folks were out, and Georige wanted to watch Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory, I think, but I wanted Jaws. We were still arguing about it when something broke in. Georgie asked me what was happening, and as I dragged him into the bathroom and laid us both flat in the bathtub, I thought about what I could tell him, to make him feel better. But I couldn’t think of anything. By the time morning came around,” he smiles a short, apologetic smile, like he knows he’s left out the part of the story they most want to hear but can’t bring himself to say it. “Georgie was,” he stutters now, for the first time since he began to speak, “guh-guh-gone and I was d-d-d-d-different.”
Ben is next, and his story is this:
“I guess you could say my family’s got this weird gene. It skips around a lot, so nobody’s really sure when it’ll pop up again. But by the time I was a kid my mom started noticing that stuff was off, different about me; I’d get real angry at small things even though normally I was a real sweet kid, stuff like that. And then one day I was, I was this fucking wolf, and it was crazy! But my mom knew what was going on, and she helped me a lot,” he smiles and his eyes go fuzzy with homesickness and affection. “I love her like crazy.”
Eddie is next, and his story is this:
“This is like, really fucked up. I know how fucked up it is so don’t, like, say anything, alright? But my mom was always real worried about me as a kid, that I would get really sick or something like that. And so one day, when she got… tired of worrying about me I guess, she paid some guy to do this to me. So, that’s how it happened. That’s it,” his face pinches, goes pale and distant. “But sometimes… sometimes I get this feeling that she did it just so she could keep me around, so she could worry about me forever,” he laughs a tight, nervous laugh and Beverly reaches out to rub soft, gentle circles on his back. “But that’s crazy, huh? It wasn’t like that. She wouldn’t have done it… ‘cause of that. Right?”
Stan is next, and his story is shorter than the rest:
“I have no idea how this happened to me. I remember dying, and I remember waking up again,” his mouth pinches into a thin, worried line. “but I don’t remember any of the in between parts. And now I eat people. Crazy, right? I feel like I should remember something,” he shakes his head, and then he looks into Bill’s eyes, as though he might find his lost memories inside them. “I should remember. But I don’t. Thinking about it too long makes me feel sick, so I would rather not. Who’s next?”
Mike is next, and his story is too complicated to tell in words alone:
“I was sent here to watch over humanity, make sure you guys don’t do anything too disastrous,” he chuckles, like he’s made a joke. “Or maybe just to watch, to see what happens. You all are so, so beautiful. You can do so much, be anyone you want to be,” he blushes. “I’m not really supposed to be here, exactly. In college. But I guess I kinda got distracted, and ended up here anyway. And now I’m glad I did.”
Beverly is next, and her story is this:
“My story is kinda like Ben’s, I guess. This sorta thing, magic, runs in my family,” she shrugs. “I was born knowing things about the future I shouldn’t know, being able to make things happen with my words. My mother taught me specific spells, how to read tarot cards, stuff like that. How to be responsible with my gifts and use them to help others, not hurt them. My father, well,” she smiles an angry, wistful smile. “didn’t.”
Richie is last, and his story is this:
“Now… on the day I was born, right? The nurses, they, uh, all gathered ‘round,” he ignores a groan from Bill. “and, listen to this, this is where it gets really good, they gazed in, like, wide wonder at the joy they had- hey! Ow,” he complains, rubbing his arm where Beverly had pinched him. “Alright, geez. I don’t have, like, a cool, sad story like the rest of you. I grew up with good folks, played too much XBox, ended up here. And now I’m gonna die in this shitty elevator with you freaks.”
They smile at each other, and each of them think of the story they are going to tell, together, sometime in the distant future. And they’ve only known each other, in this universe anyway, for around three hours now but they can all feel themselves hurtling towards something powerful and lovely. Something that involves mattresses pushed together to make enough room for them all to lay down in the same space at once, something that involves late nights spent talking just like this, with gentle touches that turn into something more. Something messy, but something good. Something worth dying in a thousand shitty elevators for. Something like love.