Book: It. Page 1

- You'll think I'm crazy. But this is all my fault, mostly...
Kay punched across the polished table of mahogany. He heard a sound like a gunshot from a small-caliber gun. Bev jumped.
- Don't you dare speak, ' said Kay. Her cheeks were burning, hazel eyes blazing with anger. - How old are we friends with you? Nine? Ten? If you ever say that you're to blame, I'll puke. Understand? Now I almost threw up fucking. You're not guilty of anything, and I had not been to blame, you to blame never. Don't you realize that almost all your friends knew that sooner or later he will hurt you, maybe kill?
Beverly looked at her wide-eyed.
And your biggest fault that you continued to live with him and allow to happen what happened. But now you're gone from him. Thank God that he protected you. And here you are, with the broken nails, cut leg, with traces of strap on the back and tell me that you're to blame?!

- He didn't beat me with a belt, automatically lied Bev... and the searing shame, her cheeks flaming a desperate blush.
- If you were done with Tom, you should also end the lie - calmly said and Kay looked at Bev for a long moment with such love that Bev was forced to lower his eyes. She felt in her throat, the salty taste of tears.
- Who do you want to cheat? - still quietly continued Kay. She leaned across the table and took the hand of Bev. - Sunglasses, blouses with long sleeves and collar deaf... Maybe you managed to fool one or two of your customers, but you can't fool your friends, Bev. You can't fool people that love you.

In the period when it achieved the greatest popularity among feminists, she was accused of using archaic chauvinistic laws, making it chop off his business husband and all that she relied on the law to the last cent.
- Bullshit! - once said Kay Beverly. - Those who carries this stuff, never slept with Sam Cakovice. Tyknut a couple of times, to have fun and finish - that's the motto of Sam. The only time he stood for more than seventy seconds when he jerked off in the bathroom. I cheated him, I just got compensation for suffering.

- Where are you? What happened?
- I'm in Seventh and Eleventh streets, at the corner of Strahlenden and some street. I... Kay, I walked away from Tom.
Kay quickly excitedly shouted into the phone:
- Great! Finally! Yay! I'll come get you! Son of a bitch! Piece of shit! I'll come get you in the fucking Mercedes! I'll hire the band! I...
- I'll take a cab <...> But you will have to pay at the counter. I have no money. Penny.
I'll give the bastard five bucks for tea, ' exclaimed Kay. Is fucking the best news after the resignation of Nixon! Now, you and I, girl, have a drink or two and... She paused, and when she spoke again her voice was absolutely serious. It was so much kindness and love that Beverly felt like crying.
- Thank God, you finally decided, Bev. Thank God.

"So, you never experienced the joys of motherhood?" I asked her.
"Going in July, she said. - Are there any more questions?"
"Yes, - I answered, - when you changed your mind about what to have children in this shitty world is immoral?"
"When I met the man who was not a shit" - she said, and hung up.

Anxiety and desire. The difference between "can" and "want" - the difference between an adult who calculates the cost and a child who just pays and goes, for example. The difference in the world.

The best form of sleeping pills. Knigolyub. And no more fits of pique.

How sometimes kids hate adults for their power. How I hate you!

Eddie opened one of the great truths of childhood: the real monsters - the adults.

And you should know when it comes to photos, the story ends.

My father told me that God loves the stones, house flies, weeds and poor more than any other of His creatures, because He created so many of them.

It's instinct, babe... and, for that matter, I believe that the instinct's the iron skeleton under all our ideas of free will.

If fiction and politics ever become interchangeable I going to kill myself, because I don't know what else to do. You see, politics is constantly changing. History - ever.

But when you grow up, everything changes. You no longer lie awake in bed, hearing the rustling behind a Cabinet or like someone scratching at the window. When it's really something beyond any logical explanation, the circuit overloaded, the elements overheat. You start to get nervous, shaking, wiggling and wagging, your imagination jumps from one to the other, nerves are shaking like a cowardly chicken. And you can't associate this state with what has happened in your previous life. You can't take it. You go back to this again and again, playing your thoughts like a kitten playing with a ball on a string. Until finally not go crazy, or not removed to a place where you no one cares.