Decision to Leave the Body

After the confrontation with Ace Merrill's gang, the four boys—Gordon Lachance, Chris Chambers, Teddy Duchamp, and Vern Tessio—stood in the rain beside the body of Ray Brower. The storm had passed, and the clouds were breaking, letting spears of sunlight through. Chris, who had just fired his father's .45 pistol to drive off the older boys, climbed the embankment and sat down beside the others. He was covered in mud, his hair standing up in spikes, the only clean parts of his face the whitewashed circles around his eyes. He looked at Gordon and said, "You're right, Gordie. Nobody gets last dibs. Goocher all around, huh?" Gordon nodded. The goocher—four tails from a coin flip—had seemed like bad luck at the dump, and now it felt like the final verdict on their whole expedition.

The Decision to Abandon the Body

Chris, still shaking from the confrontation, told the others they could not take the body back. He argued that if they did, Ace and his gang could make up any story—they could even say the four boys had killed Ray Brower. Teddy protested, saying he wanted to be a hero, but Chris reminded him that a criminal record would keep him out of the Army. Teddy's face crumpled; he asked if that was true, and Gordon, feeling like a liar, confirmed it. Chris laid out a plan: they would walk back to the trestle, then leave the tracks and come into Castle Rock from the other direction. If anyone asked, they would say they had camped on Brickyard Hill and gotten lost. Milo Pressman and the man at the Florida Market knew better, but Chris said they could claim Milo had scared them off. Vern worried about what would happen if their parents talked to each other, but Chris dismissed it, saying his father would still be drunk. The plan was thin, but it was all they had.

The Walk Home and the Weight of the Secret

They began the long walk back to Castle Rock, moving in double-time, not talking. Gordon was thinking about the body they had left behind—the bruise on its face, the caked blood, the way it was beginning to bloat. He thought about the bluebottles circling in the sun, and the gassy smell. He remembered that Ray Brower had gone out to pick blueberries with a pot or a pail, but they had not found it. The boy must have thrown it away somewhere along the tracks as his fear grew. Gordon would later think of going back to look for that pail, a fantasy that would haunt him for years. They walked all night, scrambling down the embankment twice to avoid freight trains. By the time they reached the trestle over the Castle River, it was seeping daylight. Chris looked at the trestle and said, "Fuck it. I'm walking across. If I get hit by a train I won't have to watch out for fuckin Ace Merrill." They all plodded across, and no train came.

The Return and the Aftermath

They reached Castle Rock a little past five o'clock on Sunday morning, the day before Labor Day. They climbed the fence at the dump, pumped water, and drank until they could hold no more. Then they walked—limped—back into town and stood on the sidewalk in front of the vacant lot, looking at their treehouse so they would not have to look at each other. Teddy said he was going to sleep until school started on Wednesday. Vern agreed. Chris whistled tunelessly and said nothing. When Teddy awkwardly offered peace, Chris's tired face broke into a sweet, sunny grin. "We did it, didn't we? We did the bastard." Vern worried that his brother Billy would beat him, but Chris said it did not matter. Gordon walked partway home with Chris, and Chris told him he would never get out of Castle Rock. Gordon tried to argue, but Chris was insistent. They gave each other skin at the corner of Gordon's street, and Chris walked off, laughing, as if he did not have a care in the world. The story of what they had done never came out. None of their parents ever found out what they had been up to that Labor Day weekend. Milo Pressman never spoke up. In the end, Ace Merrill must have made an anonymous phone call, because the location of the corpse was reported that way. The four boys kept their secret, but the adventure had already begun to pull them apart. Teddy and Vern drifted away, finding new, younger kids to boss around. Chris enrolled in college courses, fighting against the expectations of his family and the town. Gordon went on to become a writer. But the decision to leave the body—to abandon the plan and walk away—was the moment the magic corridor closed, and the rite of passage ended not in triumph but in a quiet, shared understanding that some things could never be undone.