Disclaimer: I don't own The Outsiders
A/N: Another one thanks to inspiration from incense and peppermints, although she doesn't know it yet...
I ain't scared of much. No, scratch that, I ain't scared of nothin'. If I don't do something, it ain't gonna be 'cause I'm scared to, but 'cause I just don't wanna, savvy?
So, not going in there ain't got nothin' to do with being scared.
It ain't that cold out here by the trees and I can smoke without getting any static. I tried that once before in one of these places and you wouldn't believe the ruckus it caused.
There sure are a lot of people in there.
I was already here when they arrived. Nobody noticed me. People walked up in twos and threes and headed inside quick, out of the rain. The cars from the funeral home were real shiny, waxed up good, so the raindrops just kinda bounced away.
I don't like rain on my face, so I had to wipe it off, from time to time.
I was gonna go over when I saw the guys arrive, but I figured they got enough to deal with already.
Darry looked like his face'd been frozen solid, like he was made of ice or something. I seen something like that look on him before a rumble and, glory, no one had better get in his way. He's mighty tuff.
Soda was just about holdin' it together, but the little one - the kid – man, that was hard to see, he was bawling already. I ain't judging, they got every right to come unglued.
Something ain't right about a world where shit like this happens.
When it got to time to take them in, I wondered - how you decide who to carry? And who gets to do the carryin'? I couldn't tell which box was which from over here. Darry was on one, Soda the other an' I seen Randle and Mathews step up, along with some guys I didn't know. Maybe from Mr C's work.
Who the hell knew Mathews even had a suit?
For a second it looked like Ponyboy was gonna be left on his own. But Soda kinda tucked him in with him, although he was too little and too out of it to really help.
I spent some time carving on the tree bark 'til I remembered she wouldn't've liked that. She tried to grow stuff in their yard all the time. Mostly it got kicked or stomped or run over, not on purpose, just when we was playin' hard.
She tried though. She kept on trying, same as she kept on trying to keep the house nice, or their clothes clean. Shoot, she even washed my threads sometimes. An' Johnny's. Patched 'em up, like she patched us up.
I used to act like that was nothin', but I'm a liar. She knew that. She knew the score all round, Mrs C.
She knew when I said I'd been in jail, I meant juvie. And when I said I'd been ten, I meant twelve. She knew that it was still bad news, that it was a cold, hard world waiting when you get outta that cold, hard place. She knew that under all the bullshit, it was still bad enough.
You learn not to care, you learn not to feel, you learn not to give away any more of yourself than they already took. I learned. She knew that, too.
I told her stuff I never told no one else.
Fuckin' rain, still in my face.
Soda says they're gonna stay living at the house. Keep out of the boys' home. I hope so. From what I hear, them places ain't much better than juvie. They don't deserve that. In some ways, it don't matter when a kid like me goes in. We're used to no one giving a fuck, but they got better to compare it with, it'd probably kill 'em. Well, maybe not Soda, he can handle himself. But it'd harden him.
She wouldn't like that.
Shit, they're comin' out already, I wasn't gonna stay for this part.
Soda's not holding back no more, I can see the tears running down his face. Next to him, the kid's not even pretending to help, he's hangin' on to Soda like he might fall down without him. Randle's gotta be doing most of the lifting on their end.
The graves were already dug when I got here.
It's too far away for me to hear anything, I wouldn't wanna anyways. What the hell can anyone say that would make this ok? The whole deal is totally fucked up.
Why is my old man still kickin' around? Or Johnny's folks, for Chrissakes? What kind of world lets fuckin' screw ups like that stay around to beat up on their kids but takes good people like Mr and Mrs C away?
The kind of world that ain't worth living in, an' that's the truth.
The kind of world that you might as well kick to the curb, before it deals you another crappy hand.
No one wants to hang around much, there's a whole lotta hand shaking, but eventually it's just the Curtis boys left and I see 'em holdin' each other up. Guess they'll be doing a lot of that.
I dunno what it'd be like to have brothers. Real brothers. I know the guys got my back if I need it , but at the end of the day, when it's me against the world, I'm on my own. It's been like that for as long as I can remember. Maybe that was changing, but not anymore.
It don't make no difference now what I do. I reckon I was just believing things could change, because of what she said to me on my birthday. It mattered to her, what I did. I tried. Hell, I ain't been picked up by the fuzz in two months, that's some kinda friggin' record.
But it don't make no difference now.
That's what you get for believing, that's what you get for caring, you get it all ripped away in a twisted heap of metal at the side of the road.
It ain't worth it.
Even the Curtis boys are gone now. It's getting dark. I'm so cold it takes a minute to get moving. That's all that holds me back, it ain't like I'm scared to go over there.
Two guys are shovelling the dirt. Quick and sloppy, like they just wanna get it over with. They're yakkin', jokin'. Just another day's work. One of em's got a weed dangling out the corner of his mouth, ash falling down.
I'm up on 'em before they notice me and I rip it outta his mouth, then I'm back outta range, with my blade out to let them know I mean business.
"Show some fuckin' respect," I snarl.
They look at me, eyes wide with surprise and fear.
"I mean it," I warn. "You better do the sharpest fuckin' job or I will hunt you down, capiche?"
They nod and start again, more carefully this time, glancing at my blade.
One of the flower arrangements has fallen over, the flowers are getting covered in dirt. She wouldn't like that. I stand it up. These are like the ones she tried to grow.
I leave them to it, 'cause I'm real cold now and I got somewhere to be, not 'cause I can't take it no more.
I gotta wipe my face one last time as I walk away. I didn't notice that the rain had stopped.
If you haven't already, check out incense and peppermints's great take on the funeral from Darry's perspective in 'Thoughts Derail'. She mentioned a couple of the gang being there and I just started thinking...who wasn't in the church and why?