Lunch was absolutely delicious and everything I knew I needed. We both treated ourselves and decided to get milkshakes with our burgers, something that we probably both regretted when we completely drank them in just a few sips. Throughout our entire lunch, we just laughed and talked about everything. I told her about California and my family, and she told me about Derry and how living here was. I noticed one thing about her...she didn't talk much about her dad. She said her mom had left them both, but when I asked what he was like, she just mumbled a 'he's okay' and switched the subject to school. I didn't push her though, I could tell something wasn't right. I'd just have to trust that she'd open up whenever she was ready to.

When we were finished, I paid the waitress and we went on our way. As we were walking down the street, I saw Bev looking deep into thought. Something had to be wrong. "Hey, are you okay?"

She looked up as if I had just caught her off guard and she sighed. "Yeah...well, this is kind of awkward."

I raised my eyebrows at her. "What is it?" God, she was probably going to say that she didn't want us to be friends or something. Just my luck right? Gain a friend and lose a friend. Woo.

"Well, I uh- I kind of started my period this morning...I think. And I need to go buy some...supplies," you could see just how uncomfortable she was talking and even thinking about it. "And I don't really know what to get, so I was hoping that maybe you did and you could help me?"

"Yeah, definitely! I mean, I'm no expert. I just had my first period like three months ago, but I can show you what my mom got me. Maybe it'll be the same for you." I said, following her down the street until we came to the front doors of Keene's Pharmacy. I put my bike out in the front of the store and walked up to the door, opening it. "Let's go."

She followed me into the store and straight ahead we could see Gerta sitting at the front desk, right where all of the medications get refilled at. Bev grabbed my arm and turned to the right, walking us passed the first three aisles. When we got to the feminine care aisle, we walked down and came to a stop in front of the many, many different and colorful options. "Okay, so...what should I get?"

My eyes skimmed along all of the products, even I felt extremely overwhelmed. I don't know how she would have been able to do this without me. Which brought on the guilt. I at least had my mom to help me...she doesn't. "Well, my mom told me to go with whatever I was comfortable with. If I didn't plan on swimming, she said I could wear pads." I grabbed the box of always pads. "but, she said if I did, I'd have to use a tampon." I grabbed the box of always tampons and held them both in front of her. "If we're being honest, I'd go with the tampons. But it's really whatever you'd feel more comfortable wearing."

She looked in between the two choices I held out for her. I could tell that I was being pretty much no help in helping her decide, so I sighed and put them both back. I guess it was back to the drying board. "Let's go with these," she reached out and grabbed the box of tampons I was just holding and looked at them. "Yeah, these."

"Bye Dad!" Greta said.

"See you later Greta!"

Bev and I looked at one another with wide eyes and realized we should probably leave before Greta was to make some kind of scene. Bev dropped the box of tampons as we went to move, but I picked them up and we darted out of the aisle to go to the next one, only to see Greta walking down that one. We tried the next aisle and Bev came to an immediate stop, causing me to bump into her and drop the box. "Bev what the-" I turned to see Bill, Eddie and another boy standing there with a bunch of medical supplies in their hands. Bev elbowed me and looked down and I quickly bent down and picked up the box of tampons, handing them to her behind my back.

Bill looked at us suspiciously. "A-Are yu-you two o-okay?"

Bev and I exchanged looks before looking back at them. "We're fine!"

"What's wrong with you?" Bev added, hiding the box more behind her back in case they could see any part of it.

"None of your business." The curly headed boy behind Bill and Eddie said.

I looked at Eddie who looked quite funny holding all of the medical supplies. "There's a kid outside and he looks like someone killed him." He blurted out.

I raised my eyebrows and looked at Bev, who looked just as curious. "We need some sup-supplies but we don-don't have enough money," Bill replied, his voice low as Eddie and the curly headed boy looked behind them to see if Mr. Keene was paying any mind.

I dug into my pocket for the remainder of my change from lunch and handed it over to Bill. "It's only $2.75, but it's all I have left."

She looked at all of them and then looked at me. "We can help, this is what we're going to do. You guys are going to continue to pretend like you're shopping, and we'll go up to the counter and distract him. When we give the signal, you run. Got it?"

"Steal-" Bill covered Eddie's mouth, giving him a look before taking his hand off. "Stealing?" He finished, in a harsh whisper before looking at me. "Your dad is a police officer! Isn't this against your embedded moral code or something?!"

Bill, Bev, and the curly headed boy both looked at Eddie and I with confused looks. Probably wondering how we know each other. Before I could reply, Bev grabbed my arm. "Come on, let's go. Make sure you pay attention for the signal."

Bev and I walked all the way up to the counter, where she placed the box of tampons onto the counter proudly as if she hadn't been hiding them behind her back just a few moments ago. "Bev, what are we doing?" I whispered under my breath while Mr. Keene still had his back turned to us.

"Helping," she whispered back, putting on a smile as Mr. Keene turned around. "we're ready to check out!"

"Will this be it for you girls?" Mr. Keene smiled, looking at the box of tampons. His smile was creepy. Like, make your skin crawl, hairs on the back of your neck stand up, kind of creepy.

"I like your glasses, Mr. Keene. You look just like Clark Kent." Bev said, keeping the smile on her face.

I looked back at Mr. Keene who was laughing and touching the glasses on his face. "Oh, I don't know about that."

"Can I try them?" She asked, leaning towards the counter.

It was then I figured out what she was doing. She was going to make him take off his glasses so he'd be basically blind enough to not notice the boys sneak out of the store. Mr. Keene looked a little timid to agree. But he soon took off his glasses and handed them to her. "Sure."

Bev placed them onto her face carefully before looking up at him. "Well, what do you think?"

I was starting to get incredibly uncomfortable with how Mr. Keene was acting towards her. I mean, he's my mom's age and he's starting to get all...flirty with Bev and she's my age! "Well would you look at that..." he said, leaning over the counter. "You look just like Lois Lane."

"MR. KEENE!" I interrupted, stopping the interaction before it made me more uncomfortable. Bev gave me a 'what are you doing?' look and I subtly shrugged my shoulders. "I-I'm Danielle Merritt. Carol and Kenneth Merritt's daughter."

"Carol and Kenneth Merritt..." He said, turning his attention to me. "I don't think I know-"

"Carol Kaspbrak." I sighed, looking out of the corner of my eyes to see the boys still standing there with their supplies. "You guys went to high school together? My dad is-"

"OH! Carol and Kenny, okay now. Wow..." He looked at me for a few seconds before his creepy wolf grin returned. "You are the spitting image of your mother in high school."

I forced a smile onto my face and looked at Bev, nodding at her. "Well here you go-" She went to hand him his glasses back and completely knocked over a stand that was holding eye drops off of the counter and onto the floor behind it. "I'm so sorry Mr. Keene!"

Bev and I turned to look at the boys and I waved them away. Eddie bumped into a display before running out of the store with his friends and Bev and I turned out attention back to Mr. Keene. She smiled at me before swiping a carton of cigarettes off of the counter. "Alright girls, that'll be...$3.80."

Bev placed her $4 onto the counter as Mr. Keene handed her the plastic bag. "Keep the change and thanks again, Mr. Keene!" She said as we began to walk away.

"Have a nice day, girls! And Danielle, tell your mother hi for me!"

"I will!" I smiled, waving at him before turning back and looking at Bev. "Absolutely not."

"Thanks for doing that with me...both things actually." She said as I grabbed my bike.

"It's what friends do." I smiled, as we began to walk away from the store. "Hey, Bill!" I called out, waving at the boy who was already looking in our direction.

He stood there, almost in a daze until he caught eye of me waving. He waved back and kept in place as we made our way over to him. He looked like he was trying to say something, but his eyes were glued to Bev. I smiled at the two of them when Bill brought out the $2.75 I had handed him in the store. "H-Here."

I shook my head and smiled. "That's okay, you can have it. It can go towards your future medical supplies fund."

"Oh my God," Bev said, turning to our left and walking down the alley. "Ben from Soc?"

"What the hell happened to him?" I asked, looking at Bill before following Bev into the alleyway.

"You have to suck the wound before you apply the bandage, this is 101!" A kid with shaggy hair and big, black-framed glasses said, looking down as Eddie patched up the kid on the floor.

"You don't know what you're talking about," Eddie replied, readying the bandage he was going to press onto the kid's stomach.

"Are you okay? That looks like it really hurts." Bev said, approaching the group of boys, who looked off guard to see two girls and Bill standing with them.

The boy looked up at her with a smile on his face. "Oh no, I'm good. I just fell."

"Yeah, right into Bow-" Eddie reached out and hit the glasses kid in the leg. "What?! I was telling the truth!"

"Shut up Richie. Stan, can you hand me the bifocals already?" Eddie sighed, as the curly headed boy from earlier, whom I'm presuming is Stan, handed him the glasses from a second fanny pack.

"Why do you have two fanny packs?" I laughed, looking at my cousin.

"I guess you haven't met Eddie yet. He's our very own hypo-" The boy with glasses went to say until Eddie hit him in the leg again. "Uh OW?!"

"Are you sure that they got the right stuff to fix you up?" Bev asked, a smile on her face as she looked at the three boys who we just helped shoplift from the store.

Bill looked at her and nodded. "Yeah, I think we got all the stuff covered."

"Sure, maybe we'll see you around or something," Bev replied, looking at me. "You ready Dani?"

"Yeah, I've gotta get home anyway," I said, looking back down at my cousin who still had his back turned to me.

"Well yeah, w-we were thinking about going to the q-qu-quarry tomorrow if you guys wanted to come," Bill said, looking at us both...his eyes lingering on Bev just a little longer.

I looked at her and nodded, shrugging my shoulders. "I'm down to go."

Bev smiled at him and nodded. "Alright, thanks. Good to know."

"We'll see you guys later," I replied, as Bev and I turned to walk out of the alleyway and back onto the main street. "What now?"

"I was thinking about going home. My dad will be heading back from work soon, don't want him to think I've gone missing or something." She said, half-heartedly while looking down at her bag.

"You can come to my house you know. We can just pig out and watch repeats of Full House and The Wonder Years. Maybe even stay for dinner and my mom and I can drive you back home?"

She shook her head. "That's okay, maybe another time. My dad's pretty strict about when I need to be home. Today was fun though."

"Yeah, okay it sounds good! I feel bad for that kid though, did you see that carving on his stomach? I wonder how he got that."

"Probably from Henry Bowers no doubt. H for Henry, he's such an ass." she rolled her sighs. "Want to meet by the Paul Bunyan statue tomorrow at noon and head over to the quarry?"

"Yeah! That sounds great." I smiled, getting onto my bike.

"Alright, I'll see you tomorrow Dani!"

"Bye!" I smiled, looking down the alleyway to see the group of boys talking amongst themselves. Eddie looked over in my direction and saw me, but Richie, formally known as the boy with glasses, looked over and slapped his arm, gaining his attention back. I turned my bike into the direction where I was headed and looked back down the alleyway to see them all collecting their bikes to ride off down the other way. Richie looked back at me and I looked away, immediately riding off on my bike.

Needless to say, today was quite the adventure. Had a run-in with Bowers, got saved by Bev (who turns out is actually my literal friend), had some pretty good food, shoplifted from Keene's pharmacy, saw a boy with an H carved in his stomach bleeding pretty good...and got invited to hang out with the group of boys at the quarry...whatever that is.

I guess my mom was right about this place. Derry is no ordinary town.