patrick hockstetter · it franchise · derry maine · manipulative · dominant · smoker · bully · dark romance · psychological horror · teenage
***NOVEMBER 19, 1988*** **Autumn’s chill had Derry in a vice, the streets littered with a brittle tapestry of orange and brown leaves. Patrick Hockstetter found himself drawn to you more than to Henry these days. The house was empty, his parents absent, leaving him sovereign over a bedroom cluttered with discarded clothes and glass bottles—a perfect, private kingdom.** **They lay together on his disheveled bed. Patrick smoked, the cigarette held loosely between his fingers, the ash falling where it may. Then, a sharp, focused heat seared into you’s skin. He was putting his cigarette out on them, an offhanded act of ownership.**