Trying to keep this from being a cliche. Tell me what you think. Everyone appreciates reviews.
There is no floor 13, there's not even a second story
you got one to tell and it's sad as hell
promise that forever we will never get better at growing up and learning to lie
"Angela Shepard, I swear to God!"
There was a slam, and the two girls sitting on the old patched comforter winced. They looked at each other, picking at fingernails and trying not to giggle nervously until the curvy, raven-haired beauty stormed back into the room, a scowl on her face.
"I hate when she yells," Angela said, flopping down on her back between her friends' crossed legs. "Especially when people are here."
"My mum never yells," Kristie said. "She just makes me feel real guilty. I do everything for you, and this is how you say thank you," she mimicked. "Two-Bit never gets shit, but I get a trip."
"Darry just … gets scary." What Robin Curtis really wanted to say was, "at least y'all got a mum," but she didn't like anyone feeling sorry for her, and she didn't like the awkward silence either. Nobody ever knew what to say to a kid who didn't have parents anymore.
"She said y'all gotta be outta here before she gets home. She said we're gonna have a family dinner tonight." Angela snorted. "I ain't seen hide or hair of Curly since the weekend so I don't know what she's expecting…"
But Kristie and Robin put their shoes on anyway, and promised Angela they'd see her tomorrow, and left.
"Darry's working late tonight," Robin said when they got through the Shepard side of town and were in their own neighbourhood. The whole east side of Tulsa, Oklahoma was rough, but the land that the Shepard gang ran through was almost as bad as the River Kings' over to the north.
"I can't," Kristie said, already sensing where Robin was going. "Mum's finally home for once, she said she'd take me to the movies."
"Me and Ponyboy then," Robin said, and the girls giggled at the idea of either Ponyboy or Robin being able to make a meal that anyone would want to eat.
At the Mathews duplex, Kristie said goodbye, and Robin kept on her way alone. It was the height of summer, the first week of August, and there was already sweat pooling at the small of her back and beneath her bangs on her forehead. It was going to be a cold fall this year, she could tell. Indian summers started slow, but this heat wave had come on like a shot in the middle of July, and would be gone just as quickly by the time school started up again in September.
Robin dragged her feet, walking slow, kicking rocks. She stopped to admire a ladybug on the pockmarked sidewalk, pet a cat with a loose string collar, check out the tan line that broke her long thin legs apart at mid-thigh. She was only five foot five but had legs for days, with the same kind of build as her big brother Sodapop – thin, soft without fat. Where Soda had muscle though, Robin had a small chest and hips that no one could call childbearing even in their wildest imaginations.
A ten-minute walk turned into a half an hour, but it was still only Ponyboy at home when she got there. He was out on the dilapidated front porch, smoking a cigarette in the sunshine in his bare feet. He smiled when he saw her, and she smiled back – he didn't much like being alone.
"Darry called from work," he said when she was close enough to hear. "Said he'd be home at seven. An' Sodapop is workin' a double-shift."
"Fair enough," she said, stealing the last drag of his cigarette before stubbing it out on the railing. She hated smoking filter, but no one would buy her a pack and she didn't much like stealing. Darrel caught her at it once, taking a pocketful of half-cent candy when she was twelve, and he'd got right up in her face and scared her so bad with stories of girls' homes and going out-of-state that she never dared to do it again.
"A good man don't want a girl who smokes," Ponyboy teased, following her inside. They let the screen door swing shut but left the oakwood open to tempt a nonexistent breeze.
"Aw, shut it," she said, aiming and missing a punch to his arm. But she was smiling.
"I made spaghetti."
"You warmed it up. Darry made it yesterday."
Ponyboy shrugged, sat down on the couch and grabbed the paper and pencil he'd been working with. There wasn't much on it yet, but it looked like another scenery picture. It would be good, like all the other things he drew and painted and coloured, but sometimes Robin wished he'd do a little more than just mountains and lakes and fields full of corn. She knew he did portraits sometimes, but nobody got to see those. Just like nobody got to read the short stories he scribbled either. They were all in the top drawer of his and Sodapop's desk in their bedroom, and even though it didn't lock, nobody opened it. They didn't have much, but they had each other – and that meant trusting each other, no matter what.
His dirty bowl was already in the sink, but the burner was on low, keeping it warm for her. She took a small serving herself, ate it at the kitchen table alone. She had started taking free dance classes at the community center, and even though her instructor said she was a natural talent, the other girls said she probably wouldn't get anywhere with it if she kept loading up on carbs and chocolate. They all had tight stomachs and lemon water.
Robin was turning off the burner and rinsing off her bowl when the telephone rang. She jumped; they didn't get a lot of phone calls on this side of town, but she scrambled to answer it anyway. Sometimes if Sodapop called from work, she could promise to pay him back – even though he never made her do it in the end – and he'd bring home a bottle of 7Up for her.
"I got it," Ponyboy called from the living room.
"Nope!" Robin yelled, sliding on sock feet over the linoleum floor. She jumped when she reached the living room carpet, catching Ponyboy around the waist. They fell to the floor with a loud thump in a struggling pile.
"Hey!" Ponyboy shouted as Robin scrambled over him, using her hand on his face for leverage. "Robby!" He sounded mad but he was smiling, so Robin stuck her tongue out at him before picking up the receiver.
"Hello?"
"Hey, it's Angela. Are your brothers home?"
Robin glanced behind her. Ponyboy had gone; she could hear him in the bathroom down the hall, trying to fix the hair she'd mussed up in the fight.
"Just Ponyboy. What's up?"
"Can you come out? To the nightly double? You an' Kristie. I'll meet you there at eight, okay?"
Robin looked nervously over her shoulder again. Darry was due home before that, and Sodapop would probably show up too. If she left now she could hide out at Kristie's though. Darry rarely ever let her go out late if she wasn't already at someone else's house – even in the summer.
"Yeah. Have you called Kristie?"
"Nope."
"I'll get her," Robin said. "She said her mum was gonna be taking her out tonight, but …"
Angela finished her thought. "But when is Kristie's mum ever home when she says?"
Robin sighed. "Yeah. We'll see you at eight."
"'Kay." And the line went dead.
Robin slipped her feet back in her sneakers – Ponyboy's hand-me-downs from years ago, scuffed and old and dirty, but the rubber was still intact.
"I'm going to Kristie's, okay? Tell Darry!"
Ponyboy called back, "yeah fine," but she shut the door behind her before he finished. It was six o'clock now. That gave her and Kristie enough time to dig through Kristie's mum's makeup before they went out.
Long, light brown hair streamed out behind her when she started to run. She passed by the vacant lot, where Johnny and Dallas Winston were sitting, sharing a cigarette. Dallas wasn't frowning but he was swearing a blue streak, telling another story about his on again off again girlfriend, so Robin didn't stick around to say hello, just waving as she rushed by.
She avoided going past the DX gasoline station, instead going through the tall grass of the park, circling around the fountain once before slowing her pace and walking the last two minutes to Kristie Mathew's house.
Like she and Angela predicted, it was just Kristie home alone when Robin got there.
"She went to the bar after work," Kristie grumbled, inviting Robin in. "But she got a new red lipstick."
x x x
At ten past eight, Kristie and Robin met Angela at the back fence of the drive-in. The sun was sitting on the horizon, but its dull watery light was nothing compared to the glow of the movie screen beyond the chain link. The air was still warm, muggy, wrapped around their skin like a blanket.
They snuck in. It would have been easy to pay the admittance fee but it was easier to pull up the broken bottom of the fence and slither through on their stomachs. That's what most of the greasers did; the ones who paid were the ones trying to impress a date or who were on probation and didn't need something little like this to put them over the edge and back in jail.
"George is here tonight," Angela explained once they were through. She brushed off her skirt and teased her hair with her fingers. When her friends only gave her empty looks back, she cocked an eyebrow. "George Campbell?"
"Oh," Kristie said, then wrinkled her nose. "The senior? From the high school?"
"Yeah!" Angela said happily, now that someone understood. "The one who came to Ruby's birthday last week."
"He's got a flat nose," Robin said.
"Dallas Winston has a towhead, but you still wanted him to play spin-the-bottle," Angela shot. Robin shut her mouth, and became busy with a stubborn blade of grass on her blouse.
Without another word Angela marched off. Robin and Kristie followed behind. It was something they had done many times for her, and that she would do for them if either of them ever got the guts to try and hit on a cute boy. It made Angela look popular – her two best friends at her side, never alone when she didn't want to be – but approachable, because they weren't all in a giggling group that no one could penetrate.
At least, that's how Angela explained it.
George Campbell was sitting at the back row with his curly brown hair slicked back with too much hair grease. Instead of looking tuff he just looked oily, but he shone with confidence, and Robin couldn't deny that the smile he shot Angela when he noticed her was a ten out of ten.
"Shepard!" he called, waving them over. "Your brothers lettin' you out this late?"
"No one lets me do anything, I do what I want," she replied with a sultry smile. She sat down in the seat next to him gracefully. "What's in the cup?"
"Little bit of everything," he said, handing it to her. Then he turned to one of his buddies. "Three Cokes, huh?"
The guy scrambled off to get them.
Angela shot her friends an impatient look, so they sat down beside her and they took the cups of Coke mixed with the mystery drink in the glass bottle when they were passed down. It tasted disgusting and burned going down, but it settled well in the stomach.
"This smells like the crap Two-Bit drinks," Kristie said and put her cup aside. Robin kept a hold of hers, starting out with slow sips; she finished even before Angela did, and someone passed her a new cup, and more drink, and who really cared what movie was playing tonight anyway because they didn't pay and George's blonde friend was actually kind of cute.
x x x
It was cold now. The wind was blowing, and the tears streaking her face felt like they were freezing on her cheeks. It was hours ago that she lost Angela, and Kristie had gone home before she even finished her first drink.
The back of the car. Leather seats. Not much room. He turned the heater on for her but her skin was still covered with goosebumps. Fingers traced her collar bone. She giggled.
No. She said no. She wanted to keep her pants on. It was cold.
I'll turn the heat up.
No.
Her shorts wouldn't button anymore. The button was gone. She grabbed them by the belt loop every few steps and pulled them up over her hips again. They zipped, but they were too big. Pulled them up over her hips again.
Down her legs. On the floor of the car. It's warmer now, see? Shoes off.
Where'd she leave her shoes?
"Hey, kid! You're goin' in the wrong direction."
Robin jumped, looked around with wide eyes. Eyes pink from crying. It was a car. She flinched – but it wasn't a mustang. It wasn't a black mustang with white racing stripes. It was a T-Bird, and the blonde in the driver's seat was taller, more muscular.
"Hey, Curtis!" Dallas pulled the car over when she didn't stop walking and hopped out. "Robin! Hey, kid, hold on."
He caught up to her easy, grabbed her arm. He didn't protest when she pulled away because at least she stopped walking. And in her head she thanked him for not asking her what was wrong or what happened.
"Get in the car, come on kid. Darry's goin' crazy over you bein' gone."
Darry. What time was it? Did Ponyboy tell him where she'd gone?
The T-Bird was chilly. All the windows were down. The heater was off. The clock said three in the morning. Was it really three in the morning?
Robin wiped her eyes. Mascara streaked on her fingers, and she wiped it on the car seats. This was Buck Merrill's T-Bird. Dally borrowed it a lot lately, since he won big in a rodeo for Buck and the guy was feeling charitable towards him. You had to take advantage of Buck's charity while it lasted because it didn't last long.
Last long. It won't hurt. I'll be gentle.
It wasn't gentle. It lasted long.
This time she let Dallas touch her. He helped her out of the car, but let go of her the minute they reached the front porch. She hitched her shorts up again. Dallas didn't do many nice things for people. He did nice things for Johnny, but only sometimes. He did nice things for her, but only for the gang. His gang. She wasn't part of their gang, but they were all brothers and brothers looked out for each other. Even if that meant rounding up stray little sisters.
Darry's furious look didn't last longer than it took Robin to get through the door. Then he pulled Dallas aside, into the kitchen, and Sodapop took his place.
"Robby? Hey, whoa, what's going on?"
Ponyboy was in bed. She could see the lamplight in the hallway; he was reading, probably. He was worried about her but Darry would have sent him to bed. He shared a bedroom with Sodapop now, instead of sharing hers.
Finally the tears started coming again. They burst from her eyes, and Sodapop rushed her up into a hug before she could even kick off her shoes. He whispered things in her ear, things that meant nothing but he'd been doing it for so long, ever since she was born by the way Darry told it.
"Let's get you to bed, baby," he said.
"No," she mumbled through tears. "No, no, no…"
No.
Don't be a goddamn tease.
Don't, I said don't.
You don't mean that. You wouldn't'a come with me if you meant it.
Sodapop picked her up. He was stronger than he looked, and she weighed less than he'd imagined. Ponyboy looked out the bedroom door questioningly, but her eyes were drooping shut and Sodapop shook his head and mouthed, "tomorrow." He took her into Darry's room and dropped her on Darry's bed and she couldn't even remember watching him walk back out, she was so tired.