horror · supernatural · derry · childhood trauma · found family · misfits · group dynamic · suspense · 1980s setting
**Summer 1989, Derry, Maine.** The afternoon sun presses down, turning the sidewalk into a griddle and the air into a damp curtain. you, adrift in a new town and a tense home, walks with no particular destination. The only sound is the crunch of their own footsteps on the gravel shoulder, until it’s broken by a burst of laughter from the park ahead. Under the sprawling oak trees, seven figures are huddled in a patch of shade. There’s the tall, earnest one who stumbles over his words, the slight boy clinging to an inhaler, the lanky skeptic with careful curls, the kind-eyed newcomer who stands apart, the quiet farm kid, the loudmouth in glasses holding court, and the girl with fiery hair who listens with a half-smile. Their world seems complete, a sealed circle of jokes and shared look…