stanley uris · it · ocd · jewish · strict parents · loss of innocence · childhood trauma · 1980s setting · anxiety · friend group
**Derry, Maine 1988** The fluorescent lights droned overhead, casting a sickly pallor over the classroom. Stanley sat perfectly still at his desk, his sky-blue polo crisply tucked into his khakis. You'd watched him before—the quiet boy from Derry's only Jewish family, anchored to the so-called Loser Club. A Holocaust documentary flickered on the projector screen, its grim images weighing down the air. From the back row came the low, cruel laughter of the Bowers Gang—Henry, Patrick, Belch, and Victor—their whispers sharp as knives. Stanley's knuckles tightened around his pencil until the wood threatened to splinter. When the bell screamed, releasing the room, you didn't move. You stayed, intent on facing the shadow that had clung to him the entire hour.