𝗖𝗥𝗨𝗘𝗟 𝗦𝗨𝗠𝗠𝗘𝗥

⁀➷ EPILOGUE

CHERRIES AND COOKIES

"HOW ABOUT THIS one?" Elaine flipped the magazine around to show Bill as they sat on her couch, her legs thrown over his lap "it even comes in green, we could get matching."

He looked at the picture of a bikini model on the page and let out a dry laugh "ha-ha you're hilarious, Lanny. You should become a comedian!"

"I'm still waiting for your answer..." she poked his cheek and he rolled his eyes while slapping her hand away.

But as she continued to pout, he huffed "yeah, yeah. It'll look great on you or whatever."

Even though it wasn't the response she wanted, Elaine took it and hummed in agreement "you're right. But since you don't wanna match, I might get one for Cherry."

Cherry popped her head up from where she lay on the floor, her paws crossed over one another elegantly. "Not you, I'm talking about my bike."

Her ears fell down limply making Elaine coo out lovingly in a baby voice "I'm just joking girl, of course we can get matching."

The dog sprung to her feet and ran over, hopping onto the couch that they were sitting on. She tried to lick at Elaine's face, but she leaned back as far as she could go causing Bill to let out a loud snort.

That caught Cherry's attention and in a second, she was on his lap, stumbling to happily slobber over his face. Now Elaine was laughing, watching as he cried out for help.

A pair of footsteps came from the stairs and Elaine saw her mom run into the room, gasping when she saw Cherry both on the couch and Bill "Cherry! Off!"

The dog cowered away and off the couch, her tail between her legs as she hung her head. Bill shook his head, leaning forward to scratch behind her ears "no, no it's fine Mrs. Young. We were just having fun."

Elaine's mom nodded her head hesitantly and smiled over at him "you want cookies? Yeah, I'm gonna go make cookies."

"Actually mom, we're heading out anyway." Elaine shared a look with Bill and they both looked back up at her suspicious face "we won't be back for a while, so don't wait up."

She nodded slowly, watching as they rushed to jump to their feet and run out of the door. Mrs. Young called out something about being back in time for their joint family dinner, but they were too far away to hear.

Bill grabbed onto her hand, laughing when Elaine exclaimed that it was cold from the winter weather. March was one of her favorite months; it wasn't quite winter, but it definitely wasn't summer. Just cool.

The two slowed to a stop when they ran into the town center, walking past the high fashion stores as they both window shopped (more like Elaine did for both of them as she pointed to things "that would look great with your red flannel").

They stopped at the large building that sat next to the small town's only ice cream shop and Bill took the first step, tugging Elaine along behind him. She wanted to prolong the walk up the long stairs, hating how eager her boyfriend looked.

"Hey, why don't we go get ice cream first?" she went to turn around, but Bill pulled her farther up the stairs "I'm really in the mood for ice cream now. We could get one and share it like those weirdly cute couples, we could be that couple!"

He clamped a hand over her mouth, towering over her from the stair above hers. She hated how he had gotten a major growth spurt in 10th grade and then he also lost his stutter at the beginning of 11th grade. So a lot of girls in both his grade and hers were hoping that the two would break up, but Bill only had eyes for her and Elaine wasn't blind to it.

"Come on, Eileen," she rolled her eyes at the song reference, "if you don't get it, I'll go get it."

Sucking in a breath and holding it for a few seconds, she shook her head "no, I've gotta do it on my own."

 "That's my girl." he grinned, locking their hands as he pulled her back up the stairs again and through the door of the postal office. The pillars had been slightly intimidating, and the usually confident Elaine wanted to crawl into a hole and stay there for a while.

The woman at the front desk chewed on her gum loudly, twirling a ginger strand of hair around her finger as she stared at the clock on the wall behind them. Elaine cleared her throat and did it again when the woman ignored her.

"Yes," she rolled her eyes as if it wasn't her job to help them, "what can I do for you lovely folks?"

"Well aren't you a ray of sunshine?" The 12th grader kept on a paperwhite" smile, the sarcasm clearly shining through her sweet tone, "I was supposed to have gotten something in the mail today?"

"Name?"

"Elaine Cynthia Young." she rested her elbows on the high desk, resting her head on her folded arms. She had been up all night with Bill, anxiously biting at her lips as he tried to calm her down.

The lady, Lilith Gray (as it read on her name tag), popped her gum and pushed back from the table lethargically. She stood up, disappearing into the back room with her flip-flops pounding on the floor. Who wears flip-flops during March?

She reappeared with 2 manila-colored packages, both addressed to Miss Young, and dropped them onto the space in front of Elaine. She fished a few coins from her pockets and handed it to the woman, quickly grabbing the mail as she and Bill made their way out of the postal office.

Elaine didn't know if she wanted to open them or just toss them under her bed and never look at them again. But with Bill's reassuring hand in her free one, she sighed.

The two sat at the same picnic table they had only 2 years before with the others and turned to face each other, their legs on either side of the bench. Beverly had never come back from visiting her aunt's house and eventually cut off all connection with the others, almost as if she had forgotten about them.

Annabeth was heartbroken, but she stayed, planning to finish off high school with Elaine before they could hopefully go off to the same college. They were lucky to still have each other after the traumatically cruel summer at the end of their 10th-grade year.

But Stan hadn't lasted that long, he had moved away a year after the events. He had never been the same after the encounters with Pennywise. None of them were, but none were affected as badly as the boy.

Eddie was pretty much the same, moving all the way to Massachusetts halfway through his 10th-grade year and none of them had heard from him since. Same with Ben, he relocated to New Hampshire only half a year after the events of IT.

Richie was still there, but he grew distant after Eddie had left, becoming somewhat of a loner and not bothering to talk as much as he used to. Elaine has heard no sexual or snide comments come from his mouth when her and Bill would rush into the lunchroom with messy hair and crumpled clothes. 

And she had never felt so uncomfortable about him being silent.

They would sometimes see Mike riding around on his bike, but since he was still homeschooled and they didn't have much of a reason to talk anymore, they didn't cross paths that much. It was mostly just Bill, Elaine, and Annabeth.

Henry Bowers was arrested shortly after the others (excluding Elaine and Stan who had vanished from thin air) for the murder of his father as he caught sight of police in front of his house. His minions split up, dwindling off and becoming loners as well since they had no leader and no one wanted to be friends why psychos.

Henry's brother, Johnny, still sometimes popped up at Elaine's locker to ask if she wanted to come to a party that his friends were throwing. Sometimes she'd say yes and bring Bill and Annabeth along, drinking whatever shit they had in the kegs.

As for Greta Bowie and her creep of a dad, she got nicknamed the new "slut" when she was caught giving Mr. Brown a blowjob for an A+ in math. He got fired and a new female math teacher was hired, Greta was shunned by everyone and lost all of her friends.

Elaine kind of felt bad for her, but now she got to experience what Beverly had gone through for years. 

With Greta's reign being over, her little friends started being nicer to others and eventually split into other friend groups. So 12th grade had been pretty chill and smooth for Elaine and her classmates, with no drama or killer clowns ruining their year.

And so as Elaine held the key to her future in her hands, she slowly slid her index finger under the seal, cutting it off. Her and Bill shared a nervous glance as she pulled the paper out.

Elaine's eyes scanned over the paper, sighing when she read the first few words. Noticing her sullen expression, the boy frowned "Did you not get in?"

She shook her head, but couldn't contain the growing grin as she began to nod her head, throwing her hands up into the air as she yelled out "I GOT IN!"

Multiple onlookers stared at the two as Bill practically leaped into her arms, almost knocking them off the bench, and squeezed her so hard she couldn't breathe "oh my god, I'm so proud of you!"

"Thanks, Billy Joel."

He pulled back, a disgusted look on his face "you're horrible at nicknames. Never do that again."

She rolled her eyes before sliding the other manila folder over to Bill and chewed at her lip "you open it, I'm too nervous."

The newly pink-haired girl bounced onto her feet, appearing to be stretching as she nervously moved around in place. She shook out her hands, knowing that this was the college that she really wanted to go to with Annabeth. 

And it was only 2 hours away from Derry, Maine...and Bill.

He held the letter in his hand, reading the words slowly as his girlfriend paced in front of him. She stopped when he gasped and turned to face him "wait, don't tell me! No, do actually. Actually, don't! Do, I don't know!"

Bill leaned back against the picnic table and raised an eyebrow "you done freaking out?"

"I don't know, am I?" 

He looked at her shaking hands and wild eyes "hmmm, I think I'll give you a few more minutes."

She groaned and wiped the sweat from her clammy hands on her mom jeans, running a nervous hand through her pink-streaked hair "ok, I'm ready. Hit me, Billy. Not literally, I mean figuratively as in like-"

"Ok, ok, I get it babe (I physically cringed while writing that nickname. The only nicknames I like are the ones that insult me like "my little gremlin" or "I get it, dumbass." But sadly, they aren't that type of couple. That would be more of a Richie x Elaine relationship and they aren't a thing in this.)" he placed the paper face down on the table behind him and beckoned her closer.

Elaine hesitantly stood between his legs, eye level with his forehead (yes, he's that tall), and patted both of his cheeks, squishing them. He leaned away from the contact "do you want me to tell you or not?"

"Hmm, give me 2 to 3 business weeks" she grinned, patting his head gently "but ok, give it to me Denbrough."

He reached behind him and handed her the letter, watching as she slowly skimmed the page before her eyes widened and she squealed, jumping into his arms. He chuckled, rubbing her back as she celebrated getting into the college she wanted to.

Maine's College for Liberal Arts.

"I'm going to college, I'm going to college, I'm going to college!" Elaine sang slightly offkey as she did a small victory dance in front of a smiling Bill who stared adoringly at her large grin. She held out her hands, waiting for him to give her his hands before pulling him up with her.

"Who's going to college?"

"You are..."

"I can't hear you! Who's going to fucking college!"

"My girlfriend!" a few people looked to them and he threw his arm over her shoulder "Hey, you lovely two old people. My girlfriend is going to college!"

"That's great!" the husband yelled back, giving them two thumbs as Elaine and Bill fell into a fit of giggles.

She held his face in her hands, placing a quick kiss on them as she pulled away with a soft smile "and, I'm only going to be 2 hours away. Which means that I can drive down here on the weekends, maybe pick you up from school on Fridays if I go over the speed limit."

"Please don't. I've seen you drive a car, and I would rather have an alive girlfriend, it's a better experience." he shivered jokingly, pressing a kiss to her forehead before pulling her into a hug. "But, you have to promise you won't forget about me once you make it big as a famous director."

Elaine gasped, pulling away "I would never!"

"Good, cause I love you too much to let you go." he laughed, but his eyes showed that he was 100% serious as they memorized each other's features. 

"guess what?"

"what?"

"I love you too much to let you go, too."

authors note!

OH MY GOD, SO I WROTE THE EPILOGUE AND NOW I'M SITTING HERE LIKE "what am I supposed to do with my life now?" IF ANYONE ACTUALLY READS THE WHOLE BOOK, YOU HAVE MY HEART AND I OFFER MY HAND IN MARRIAGE FOR SITTING THROUGH MY SHIT WRITING.

Fun fact: did you know that The Mortal Instruments was actually a Draco x Ginny fanfiction on Wattpad? Yeah, me neither until my sister told me and now I can't unsee it.