"Ciao, Dad!" I yelled, leaving the house and sprinting down the street. They were there, all of them, thankfully - it's not fun waiting alone on a street corner. In fact, it's downright dangerous. They were clustered around a lamppost, Maria, Sally and Frank sat on the wall, talking animatedly, Jasper and Josh stood next to them, sometimes joining in but seeming to mostly keeping to their own conversation. Actually, thinking about it, the joining in was probably just telling them to keep it down a bit.
And leaning against the lamppost, looking at his boots, a loner as ever, was Dally. I don't know why I first talked to Dally, helped him, all those years ago when he was being chased by cops and ran past my house. I got a can of stolen beer in payment. I've never regretted it, even now. After everything it's caused.
I yelled a hello to them and they all looked up, breaking off their conversations and smiling, even Dally. Though his had a bit of a grim set to it.
"You're late!" Frank called, and I frowned, glancing down at my watch.
"I would be in about.. 37 seconds." I called back, laughing at his glare. "You're just early."
Maria and Sal quickly clustered 'round me and started chattering away about some celebrity or another. I don't know, I didn't pay attention. Well, only enough to notice that they were too absorbed in their debate about how pretty someone-or-another is that they wouldn't notice me slipping under their arms and slowly drifting towards the back of the group, until someone grabbed my arm.
"Aoide." That was all that'd pass for a hello from Dally, just my name. I turned and smiled. He smirked back. It was a lot more caring than I'd ever seen anything from him before, lots more than he'd ever grace anyone with. My heart jumped a little, enough to snap me out of a daze.
"Are you sure you want to come? I mean, people're gonna get hurt, and we all know how you are with blood, Aoi." I almost shuddered by caught myself.
"I'll be fine." I almost snapped, hoping I sounded more confident than I felt. Dally was right. I am abysmal with it - even thinking about blood made me want to hurl. I tend to faint a lot - bad blood circulation, according to the doctors - and seeing blood petrifies me.
We were walking to the bus stop, all in a line, Maria and Frank leading, then Jasper and Sal, Josh, then me and Dally. We were supposed to be meeting my brother and his friends. And then.. We arrived.
"Dallas Winston. And my little sister?" His cruel laugh echoed in the shelter. It mocked me. Gone was the sweet, kind older brother I'd grown up with, replace with someone else, someone who meant nothing to me. I felt numb. "You sure have no taste."
I glared at him and it took everything I had not to charge, and smash his pretty little smile into a billion pieces. I realised the others had stopped as we approached the stop, until it was just me and Dally at the front of our queue, and of course it was too late to turn and run and hide behind someone. Traitors, betrayers. They knew what being near my dear brother did to me.
I was suddenly extremely nervous. Seeing Reuben was always awkward - he'd ditched us about ten months before, complaining about how boring we are and how much he hates us. It broke Mum's heart, and it was all I could do to stop Dad from going out to find him and hurt him, hurt him so bad. I could see it in his eyes. People talk about fires burning in people's eyes when they're angry, and they're right, to an extent. Dad's eyes had taken on a red tinge, probably because of a rush of blood to his head or something like that. He was glaring at anything and anyone. I stopped him. And now, I only saw Reuben to take messages to Dally, but never our parents. That made it even worse, the fact that I love the person who sent him over the edge. Every time I see Reuben now I'm reminded of that night.
Reuben wasn't what you'd expect of a gang leader, like Dally, almost too much like him. Tall, thin and wirey, just enough muscle to throw a mean punch, the both of them. Their real strength lay in speed, intelligence, ruthlessness. Neither'd ever back down from anything. Most think they're polar opposites, but I know different. They're almost exactly the same person. It's what makes them hate eachother so much.
I've always been left to be their middle man. I share their gift of intelligence. Both me and Reuben had been straight A students, advanced class for everything, though I put it to practical uses and stalked the library, whilst he just got drunk and partied and didn't give a damn about anything. Dally had dropped out long ago, but if he'd stayed, he'd have been amazing.
"Bennyboy!" I called, imitating his mocking tone. We all laughed. Reuben had considerably less willpower than me and two of his friends - I recognised them as the Carter twins - had to hold him back. They were huge and tall, massive and menacing, and almost never let Reuben out of their sight. They were almost bodyguards, really. Billy, the last in Reuben's gang, was back behind the three, in shadows. The rumours running around school were that Billy's dad was an international assassin, and even had a hand in President Kennedy's death. I scoffed at that, thinking Billy was just a quick boy with an affinity for shadows, nothing more. He didn't talk much, either. Actually, in all the years he'd been in my form, I don't think I've ever heard him say a word.
"Reuben, we aren't here to fight." Dally said, always a diplomat. "We need your help." I knew it hurt him to ask. To sink himself so low that he had to ask someone beneath him, a full year younger, for help. His pride was something he held dear. Even I couldn't hope to compete with it.
"I know, Winston. Your girl told me." I glared at him, tears beginning to prick my eyes. Was that all I was to him? Dally's girl? No longer his sister. Just someone he didn't like's girlfriend. He's.. impossible! I just carried on glaring, and probably would forevermore.
I could feel Dally's steely gaze on me and I turned my head, meeting his eye, and stared back until he gave up and clapped me on the back. I'd just proved a point, but I didn't know what it was. He asked Reuben if he'd join us again, and I didn't listen past that, but he and his friends clambered onto the bus after us when it arrived.
Me and Dally quickly took the back seat hastily vacated by a girl hardly older than me and two toddlers who looked so much like her that they could only be her sons and it made me both jealous and sad. They would have ruined some of the best of her life, but the way she looked at them was so adoring that you'd think that she didn't care, would never care. They'd gotten off when she'd seen us coming. Smart girl, that one. I should have run then, too, because what I saw next almost stopped my heart.
Dally was sat across two seats, propping his feet on top of one, with his bad resting between his knees, searching through the rucksack, and what he pulled out pretty much killed anything good I'd ever thought about him. I stared at the gun whilst he hurriedly assured me no one was going to use it.
"I want you to have it, just in case." I was shaking. I almost spat my refusal at him. How could he bring something like that so near me? How could he even have something like that? I wasn't going to be the cause of the pain, heartbreak and fear a single bullet would bring.
"You don't have to use it, but it's good for a bluff." A bluff? Why would I need to bluff? God, he didn't expect them to have guns as well? What had I gotten myself into? I stared, still shaking, rocking violently. So many things I wanted to say but couldn't. I wanted to scream, but the driver would notice. He'd call the cops, and they'd arrest, or even - God forbid - shoot my Dally. I settled for just a whispered no, letting all my fear seep into my voice. I was no longer trying to disguise it, pretending to be confident. I was terrified. My voice cracked and I'm pretty sure it was then that I started crying, because a few seconds later I felt the first drops falling onto my knee.
"Please, Aoi." His voice sounded strained, forced, and I hoped it was because he didn't want to force me into something I don't want to do. Even then, I knew I'd cave.
"It'll make me feel better." But not me. I was numb now, all over, not feeling anything, suppressed. My stomach turned in nots, I felt sick. But... anything for Dally. I betrayed myself, nodding to him.
He pushed it into my hands, accompanied with a line I recognised. Tolkien. "Keep it hidden, keep it safe." He whispered, and hugged me. I slid it into my own rucksack, nodding slowly. A contaminating presence filled my mind, and I realised that if we attracted the attention of the cops, and I got searched, they'd find it and I'd have no excuse.
That was what was on my mind when we arrived and the pressurised bus doors hissed open with a fooshing noise, and Dallas pulled me out and I knew my skin had gone white, bleached pale by my paralysing fear, and I could hear the others commenting on it, but as if from far away, like I wasn't me any more. I concentrated on putting one foot in front of the other and nothing else, until it really was all I could do to keep my screams and tears bottled up.
I grabbed Dally's arm and was about to beg him to take it back when we dropped out of the sunny pathways with parents and children playing games, couples sat kissing on benches, and other meaningless activities, whilst I was walking towards the pain and death hidden by one of Central Park's many woods.
Our battleground... So unlike those of books and movies, the worlds I sometimes lived in more than this one, a patch of open ground surrounded on all sides by trees, not open grasslands, prairies or plains. It hit me then. Not the threat of being arrested, that I could stand, but that there'd be blood. People'd get hurt. Christ, someone could die! I could die, or Reuben, or even Dally.
They were already there, the instruments to our doom. What was I thinking, coming here? They were outnumbered, at least, only six to our eight, and that's if you don't even count me and Sally and Maria. This looked like it would be easy.
"Tobias." Dally said, stepping forwards with Reuben following.
"Dallas Winston. Reuben Lewis." He sneered. "Well, won't this be fun. And you even brought us some entertainment for after we kick your butts!" He grinned a sadistic grin. I glared at him, but said nothing. He'd gotten Reuben's name wrong, too! ReubenGarth-Lewis, not just Lewis. Unless he'd decided to drop Dad's part of the name. I paled even more, if it were possible. Tobias turned to look at me.
"What's the matter, Girlie? Cat got your tongue?"
Dally lunged forwards and the fight began. It didn't take long for me to realise, we were, as Tobias put it so very eloquently, getting our butts kicked. I saw the one Reuben was fighting pull a switch on him and sliced at his arm. I looked away, a sick feeling of dread filling my stomach as I realised, even without looking, that it had sunk in.
Me and the other girls had quickly retreated to the edge of the glade, hidden by the shadows of the trees when Dally had started the fight. Even as I thought of him, he turned and shot me a grin as he punched someone's face in. His nose gave a sickening crunch as Dally's fist met it, and I looked away quickly, though not quick enough to spare myself the sight of the scarlet blood falling out of his nose and specking his lip. He let out a howl of pain, a haunting sound. I flinched.
Dally sped across the battlefield, smashing his foot into the back of one boy's leg. I gasped. The poor boy couldn't have been more than thirteen, probably not even that. He fell, and as he did, I saw the switch he was clutching, previously aimed at Frank and all my sympathy evaporated. I didn't like Frank all that much, but I don't know what I'd have done if he'd died...
And then Reuben was beside me, and I tried to turn to look at him, but he warned me not to and I remembered his wound.
"Are you okay?" I whispered, afraid to ask, but he was already away, whirling back into the fight like a dancer.
I searched the clearing for Dally, almost not noticing I'd opened my bag and was searching through it for Dally's... "gift". It was too late to stop when I noticed. It was in my hand, Sal and Maria looking at me terrifiedly, as if I was going to shoot them! Demented, the pair of them. I was aiming now, looking down the barrel. I had no idea how to aim, but I knew the basics of how a gun worked - pull the trigger, someone died. Was I prepared to do this? I shook my head.
But Tobias was creeping up on Dally, my Dally, and he was holding a blade, I saw with another sickening jolt. It was too late to call out, I knew. I know Dally too well. He'd spin round the instant he heard my voice, and he'd just get a clean slice across his neck and that would be that. The last thing I wanted. But also, if I shot Tobias wrong he'd fall on Dally, and that knife...
Oh, look at me now! Thinking about the specifics of how I was going to commit murder. What kind of person am I? I lowered the gun. But at that crucial moment, I fumbled, and I brushed the trigger, just the lightest of touches, but enough. The gun fired.
And I stared. The small - but steadily growing - flower-shaped spot of blood on Tobias' white shirt expanded as my vision contracted. That bit of blood filled my vision, and was the last thing I saw before what I'd know was going to happen hours ago happened and I fainted with a bloodcurdling scream.
I woke up breathing heavily, panting, panicking, still half trapped in the euphoric world of nightmares. I'd dreamt horrible things, terrible things, but I can't remember anything more specific than that because I'd already forgotten.
"Hey, Aoi." Dally whispered, his voice softer and more caring than I'd ever heard it. "We're getting you outta here." He frowned and I remembered. I'd killed someone. Shot him, killed him, ripped his life apart. A boy with a family, friends, a life, hopes, dreams. And now he was in Hell because of me. How was I so sure of that? He'd tried to knife Dally.
"Are you okay?" I asked, but I stuttered and it sounded terrible, and I don't know what he thought I'd said because I sank back into the bliss of a now dreamless sleep with no worry, no dead ghosts coming to haunt me, not even guilt.
I suppose it was a few hours later that I returned to the land of the living, and this time it was for good. I'd let basic psychological intuition take over, kick me up the backside and tell me to pull myself together in the time I'd spent lying on something rumbling underneath me, as if I was moving over rocks, for an hour, maybe more, before I opened my eyes and let the person clutching my hands know I was awake again.
Startled, I closed them, tried to lift my arms to rub them, but found I couldn't move them, so I settled for just opening them again and staring. Clutching my hands looking deathly pale was Reuben, Bennyboy, my brother. He did care. I must have goggled, or stared, or something, because he laughed.
"Relax, sis." And I did. I looked at him, his arm bandaged in gauze, and I remembered again.
"Oh my God, are you okay?" I asked, tiredly, but concerned. He chuckled lightly.
"'Course I am, when am I not? It's just a scratch." I glared at him. I could tell he was lying.
"Fine, fine. It's a deep cut, but I'll be fine, says Doctor Dally. And it doesn't hurt, which is always a plus." I choked. I'd completely forgotten him.
"Is he okay?" I asked, panicking. Reuben nodded. Thank the Lord.
"He's driving. He's got a shallow cut on his back, but that really is nothing. It'll likely scar though. But you saved him. Christ, kid, that was.. stupendous!" I muttered something that even I couldn't understand, but I reckon it may have been something along the lines of "No, it wasn't." I didn't feel like no hero.
Then I heard Dally's voice from the front. "Welcome to Tulsa, Oklahoma. Welcome home." And I smiled and squeezed Reuben's hand and he smiled too.
And I figure that's the end of the story, though it's not the end of everything. But that's all I've got to say.
~Aoide Garth-Lewis