Lucy resolved to be thoroughly unaffected by her encounter with Dallas Winston at the Dingo, and later that week, when Sadie tried to cajole her into talking about it in the lunchroom, she plainly refused.
"I'm only asking you, Lucy," Sadie said. "When Dally finally came around to us, he talked to everybody but you. Am I supposed to believe you weren't at least a little bothered by that?"
"You're supposed to believe I hardly noticed because I didn't," Lucy said. "As a matter of fact, the only reason I'm aware of it now is that you keep reminding me."
"I think it's pretty hard to feel slighted by Dally," Lilly said. "I mean, I was pretty sure the only person he really cared about was Johnny."
Lucy looked at Lilly for a moment. As annoyed as she was, she had to admire the kid's spirit. It would have been easy for Lilly to turn in on herself—to turn quiet, meek, or paranoid like Johnny. That just wasn't Lilly. Lucy never could figure out why. She used to think it was because Lilly spent so much time with Katie and the rest of the Mathews family, but that couldn't be it. Johnny spent nearly all of his time with the Curtises or with Dallas Winston. He was still quiet. He was still afraid. Lucy tried to ask Sadie about it once. All Sadie could manage was, "They go easier on her."
From then on, Lucy made it a point to protect Lilly as much as she could.
"Well, I wasn't the least bit interested in talking to him, so it wouldn't have mattered if he ignored me or not," Lucy said.
She folded her arms across her chest and leaned back in her chair, always at the head of the table. It seemed wrong—she, the interloper, at the head of the table. Maybe that was why they'd always put her there. They wanted to remind her that she stuck out.
"Anyway, Jane, seems Soda's finally over his mourning period," Lucy said. "Is that right?"
Jane beamed from her carton of milk. After gulping it down, she daintily set it back on the table (It was fascinating to watch a greaser girl like Jane Randle correct her behavior like that.). She paused for a moment, as if she were in a movie.
"He wants to go back to the drive-in this weekend," Jane said. "Just us. Steve doesn't know, so don't tell him."
"You'd have to imagine he'll figure it out, Janie," Katie said. "He's gonna ask his best friend about girls, and what's his best friend gonna do? Lie? That ain't Soda."
Her green eyes flickered over to Lucy, absentmindedly staring at the cover of a well-worn copy of Jane Austen's Persuasion.
"Seems more like Dallas, if you ask me," Katie finished, trying to force Lucy to look up.
When Lucy finally did look up (The four pairs of eyes fixed to her face pressured her into doing so.), she looked directly at Katie and said, "I don't know what you're talking about, and I don't know why you would connect it to me."
Katie turned to Lilly, and the two of them shared a laugh. Lucy preferred to think she didn't know why they were laughing. Sadie, sensing Lucy's thoughts, leaned over in her seat and whispered, "The very fact that you have to say you don't know means you know, and they know that."
Lucy turned up her nose. She wanted to tell Sadie so much, but she could only say, "I think what you just said breaks the record for 'most times the word know was said in a single sentence.'"
Sadie sighed, and Lucy chose not to hear her.
That night, Dally stumbled into the Curtis house to get patched up after another run-in with Tim Shepard. As he tried to leave, the four siblings ambushed him with the questions he least wanted to answer. Sadie told her brothers they had to interrogate him immediately after his phone call, and they, with varying reluctance, agreed.
"Look, Dal, we're all real sorry Sylvia broke it off again," Sodapop said. "But you ain't like me. You don't need to mope awhile after you get ditched. Why'd you act like that at the drive-in?"
"Yeah, I've seen you talk dirty to all kinds of girls," Ponyboy chimed in. "Our kind, Soc girls, any type of girl. You hardly said a word to any of the girls the other night."
"It doesn't seem like you," Darry said. "But I'm not so sure that's a bad thing."
Sadie shot her eldest brother a look of daggers. He bowed his head and backed right off.
"What am I supposed to say to you all, huh?" Dally said. "Am I supposed to say 'I'm sorry' for not dirty talking to our friends' sisters? I ain't gonna do that if I don't feel like it. And since when do you all care who I bring home at night? Huh? That gives me the creeps, man."
He made his way to the door, but Sadie jumped up and blocked the doorknob. He looked at her, unsure of whether it would be inappropriate to rip a girl's arms off. He'd crossed a number of lines, but he'd never hit a girl before. With Darry sitting in the armchair, eyeing him with the same contempt Sadie had shot him earlier, he decided it wasn't worth it to find out tonight.
"I just want to know what you and Soda were talking about when he found you by the bathrooms," Sadie said.
Dally's eyes wandered over to Sodapop, who looked at Dally like he didn't know what Sadie was talking about. After all, he hadn't told her.
"Soda didn't tell me a thing," Sadie said. "I know what I know because I know it."
Dally paused, thinking back to that pair of dark blue eyes glaring at him from behind the bathrooms at the Dingo. He smirked.
"You know what, Sadie?" he said. "I think that last thing you said breaks the record for the most times somebody's said the word know all at once. What do you think?"
Sadie had to bite her lip, this time to keep from smiling.
"There has to be one of us girls you'd be willing to take for a test run," she said. "I mean, except for me, because…"
Sadie didn't finish, and Dally didn't know why. The truth was that Sadie Curtis was considered to be plain. She was Sodapop's twin, but it didn't seem that she had his charisma. Where girls flocked to even catch a glimpse of Soda, boys never seemed to get very close to Sadie. The only boy who gave her any time of day was Johnny Cade, and Sadie was sure that was because he was Ponyboy's best friend, nothing more.
"Well, because my brothers would kill you," she finally said.
"It's true," Darry said. "At least, I would."
"But what about Jane? Jane's very pretty, don't you think?"
Dally shrugged. "Jane's blonde."
"What do you mean, 'Jane's blonde?'" Sodapop asked, bewildered. "How is 'blonde' a problem on a face like that?"
"The problem is she spends all her money trying to stay blonde," Dally said.
Soda frowned. "Well, you can't have her, anyway. I'm taking her out this weekend."
"I think it's real cute you think that'd stop me, man."
Sadie tightened her grip on the doorknob again, sensing that Dally was going to grab for it again. He knew he could pick her up and toss her aside, but something told him he shouldn't. It was more than just Darry's punishing eyes now. It was much more than that.
"What about Lucy?" Sadie asked. "She's pretty, and she's smart."
"Smart?" Dally asked. "What do I care about smart?"
"Well, you're smart, stupid. And if you're gonna stand here and tell me you've never though of Lucy that way, I'm gonna stand here and call you a damn liar."
"I ain't lyin', sweetheart. I never thought about your little friend that way. Now, can you maybe, please, let me go? Thank you."
Sadie looked toward her brothers for advice. Soda was hanging onto every last bit of the drama, Darry had gotten up and started to straighten up the kitchen counter, and Ponyboy looked bored out of his mind.
"Let him go," Ponyboy finally said. "I think that's all you're gonna get out of him tonight."
Reluctantly, Sadie stepped aside and let Dally go free. He left without saying a word, but when she thought about it, Sadie really didn't mind. She closed the door, took a seat on the couch next to Sodapop, and told him the truth.
"They're just too similar," she said.
"Hmm," Soda replied. "I think you're right."
He stood up and held out his hand for his twin to take it. Confused, she agreed.
"Come on," he said. "If I'm gonna go out with Jane this weekend, I wanna look tuff, but not so tuff Steve will suspect I'm up to something before Jane's ready to tell him."
"You're really gonna keep this from him?"
"I'm not really itching to be dead any time soon, here, Sadie, and that'd be a real quick, easy way to make sure I never see our next birthday."
"Well, maybe I want that. I'm tired of sharing a birthday cake with you."
"Yeah, yeah."
She followed him, all the while trying to decide whether she'd tell Lucy how similar she and Dallas really were. No, she would keep it to herself.