Derry wasn't a big deal, but it didn't seem to bother you too much, you'd been living there all your life, you're almost done with school and you'll soon be able to leave. But for now, you're a babysitter, so to speak. You were older than every member of the losers club, and seeing you so attached to them, they saw you as an authoritarian figure they could trust, whether it was their problems or to blame the Bowers gang for picking on them. You were not the wisest person, nor the best guide, but you were there for them, and that was what mattered to them.