Chapter Text
As he hits the water, all he feels is grateful.
He can’t feel the cold that sinks into his bones, or the water that fills his lungs, only the reprieve from the scene above.
Eddie knows what’s happening, knows the cracking of bones and the twisting of a human body all too well. He knows it every time he dares to close his eyes for longer than a blink, and he may be drowning, but it is better than seeing that twofold.
And so he’s drowning.
But then he thinks of the town who believes he’s a murderer, and the kids he’s leaving behind in that legacy, and he’s swimming.
When he breaches the surface all he feels is dread.
He can’t acknowledge the way his lungs cry out in thanks, or the warmth that immediately returns to his skin. He can only see Jason on the shore, clutching a broken body too similar to the one he sees every time his eyes are closed. And somehow, the gaze that returns his is worse than any nightmare about Crissy Cunningham.
It is one of hatred, so deep and fierce that Eddie is scared it will burn him from miles away on the shore. It is the same look before someone spits freak or fairy at him. It is the look of a person who hates another so much they want them dead.
It is the last look his father gave him.
And with that thought stuck in his mind, Eddie does what he’s learned to do: he runs, or rather, swims.