MATILDA, eddie munson.

038.

"woah, woah, woah, eddie!" dustin hollered, watching the boy hold a knife to steve's throat. "stop! eddie! eddie.. it's me. it's dustin. and look," the young boy said slowly, pointing to the girl behind him. "matilda."

eddie's eyes followed the boy's fingers, landing on tillie. he sighed in relief. "mattie.."

"this is steve," dustin continued, eyeing the knife to his friend's throat. "he's not gonna hurt you, right, steve?"

"right, yeah," steve whispered.

"steve, why don't you drop the oar?" dustin suggested, and the boy did so.

eddie tightened his grip on steve and dustin couldn't seem to loosen it, so tillie realized she needed to step in. she slowly stepped over there, until she was in eddie's eyeline. "hey, eddie.."

she could hear eddie's shaky breath through his words, as he looked towards her. "i-i didn't kill her, mattie. i would never do that to you. you have to believe me."

"i do believe you," she told him softly, watching his hold on steve gradually loosen. "but you have to believe me when i say that we're here to help you. we're not with the
cops, we don't want to hurt you. we just want to help, okay? we're on your side."

nodding, eddie let steve go, and instead lifted his hands up and rubbed his face as he moved and slumped down onto a box. the rest of the group slowly approached him, thankful that matilda had managed to calm him down.

"eddie, we just want to talk," dustin told the older boy gently, kneeling down in front of him.

"we want to know what happened," robin said.

eddie sniffled. "you won't believe me."

"try us," max shrugged.

matilda stayed at the back, her arms crossed over her chest as she listened to eddie recount the story.

"she wanted to buy drugs from me," he started, shocking tillie from the first sentence. "i offered her weed, but she wanted something stronger. so, i told her to come to my place and i'd be able to give her some."

"i'm sorry, chrissy cunningham wanted drugs?" steve asked, earning looks from the others telling him to shut up. "sorry, just wanted confirmation.."

"she came to my trailer, waited in the living room whilst i tried to find it," eddie continued. "i went to my bedroom to look for it, i found it and when i came back into the living room, she was in a sort of trance. she had her eyes shut and she was just stood there. i tried to wake her up, i tried everything, but she just didn't respond."

matilda felt nauseated as she listened to eddie talk about chrissy's final moments alive. she felt tears piercing the back of her eyes, but tried to blink them away as she didn't want to show emotion to those around her.

her mother always said that emotion showed weakness, which is why she'd warned tillie not to cry in front of the officers earlier that day after the news of chrissy's death. the woman had to keep up her reputation of being a strong and flawless woman.

"her body, just, like, lifted up into the air and, uh," eddie continued with his story, and fear was evident on his face. it was clear he was still traumatized by whatever happened. "and she just, like, hung there. in the air."