You had known Eddie forever.

Or at least that was how it felt — like your lives had always been stitched together by habit and fear and quiet understanding. You were the girl in the Losers Club with the emergency supplies: water bottle, tissues, bandaids. At first you told yourself it was just practicality. Then it became obvious who you were really packing for.

Eddie.

Back in the summer of ’89, in the sewers, when the air was thick and Pennywise’s laughter crawled inside your skull, it was your hand Eddie clutched when his chest locked up and panic swallowed him whole. You remembered the way his fingers dug into yours, desperate, grounding. You hadn’t let go. Not once.

Back then it was innocent. Survival-level innocent. You were all just scared kids pretending bravery. Bill led. Richie joked. And you watched Eddie breathe.

After It was gone, though, something shifted.

The others went back to being boys. Teasing returned. Stan and Richie laughed about Eddie’s fears like they were old jokes worn thin. You didn’t laugh. You stood between them and him — sometimes physically, sometimes with nothing but a look. Sometimes you protected Eddie from the world. Sometimes you protected him from himself.

By the time freshman year at Derry High rolled around, Sonia Kaspbrak tightened her grip.

Hormones. Bad influence. Dirt. Germs. Failure.

Eddie started suffocating in his own house.

And you became his refuge.

Richie was still his best friend — loud, familiar, safe in a different way. But when Sonia screamed about muddy shoes or grades or breathing wrong, it wasn’t Richie’s door Eddie knocked on.

It was yours.

Your protectiveness stopped being a choice. It turned instinctive. You noticed his hands shaking before he did. The way his jaw tightened before the panic hit. And Eddie — Eddie learned that your touch quieted the noise better than any inhaler ever could.

Now it was the middle of second semester. You were both seventeen. Derry High drowned in rain and gray skies that pressed low against the windows.

You sat in your room — the only place Sonia allowed him, so long as the door stayed open “a crack.” Biology textbooks were piled everywhere. Diagrams. Notes. Highlighters bleeding through pages.

You heard his pen before anything else.

Tap. Tap-tap. Tap.

Too fast. Too uneven.

Eddie sat hunched over the desk, shoulders curled inward like he was trying to disappear into himself. His face was pale, too close to the book. Sweat dotted his forehead, dark hair clinging to his skin.

“Eddie,” you said softly. “Breathe.”

“I am,” he snapped, voice already fraying. “I am, I just—if I don’t memorize the Krebs cycle I’m going to fail, and if I fail my mom won’t let me go to that med camp, and if I don’t go then I’m screwed, and—”

His voice climbed, thin and sharp.

You saw it coming before he reached for his pocket.

His fingers shook too badly to grab the inhaler.

You stood without thinking.

You moved behind him and placed your hands on his shoulders.

They were rock-solid with tension.

Eddie froze.

For a split second, his breathing stopped entirely. Then it broke loose in a long, trembling exhale, like something inside him had finally cracked.

“Leave it,” you whispered, thumbs sliding up to his neck, pressing gently, rhythmically. “Look at me.”

He turned in the chair.

For a moment, the contrast hit you hard. He wasn’t the fragile little kid anymore. His shoulders were broader. There was strength there now — real muscle under cotton and nerves. And yet his eyes…

Dark circles. That lost, frightened look you knew better than your own reflection.

He looked ten again. Like he needed someone to swear the monsters weren’t real.

Richie would’ve joked. Said something you being his mommy. Again.

Eddie leaned forward suddenly, pressing his forehead into your stomach. His weight sagged into you as if his bones had finally given up holding themselves together.

You wrapped your arms around him without hesitation.