Disclaimer: We do not own Susie Hinton's boys or the world she created, we just play. We also do not own "Shiver" by Maroon 5.

This chapter is a missing scene following chapter 31 of Tender Is The Night.

I shiver when I hear your name
Think about you but it's not the same.

The wind whipped around the side of the roadhouse, driving rain into her face and plastering her hair to her cheek. She leaned against the wet brick wall listening for Dally to get back into the car he stole and disappear. She was shaking to her core, afraid that he might run after her and force her back into that car with him. The engine roared to life and she heard gravel being flung as the tires kicked it out from underneath them. She waited until she couldn't hear the car over the rain before she let herself relax even a little bit.

Ellie's legs felt like jelly, and it was taking all the strength she had to stand upright and not collapse in the puddle she was standing in. Her eyes burned with tears and her arms ached from where he'd grabbed her. She knew he didn't mean to hurt her like that. Dally was drunk and in a bad mood, and she knew she didn't do anything to help matters, but he had really scared her. And now he had completely abandoned her at Buck's without a ride home.

Wearily, she looked up and scanned the cars parked in the lot. There were so few cars there that she could nearly count them all on one hand. To make matters worse, she didn't recognize any of them.

Stealing a peek around the corner, she double-checked that Dally was really gone and then forced herself toward the door. On shaky legs, she walked up the steps and pulled the door open. A warm breeze encircled her, pulling her inside where the music wasn't nearly as loud as every other time she'd been there. Taking a step inside, all she wanted was a phone.

XXX

Monty had been nursing his beer far too long. The damn thing had gone warm - not to assume that it was actually that cold to begin with - but still, warm beer tasted like piss. He'd just ordered a second when he heard the door open and had taken a long drink when he noticed Will Bridges slide out of his booth and head in that general direction.

Monty shifted a little on his stool to get a better angle of what caught his attention. He set his beer down as he watched Will try to back Ellie O'Hare into a corner. Will loomed over her, and his hands were holding a beer and far from her for the moment. Every time she tried to step around him, he blocked her path and took a step closer. Monty slowly made his way toward the stupid kids' game Will was trying to play.

"Where's your boyfriend?" Will asked Ellie. He took another step closer to her.

"Back off, Bridges," Monty ordered.

Will turned around and faced him. Monty kept his face serious and unreadable, and he kept his eyes on Will, hoping the little broad was smart enough to get herself out of the corner while she had a chance.

"What if I don't wanna back off?" Will asked, a cocky look on his face.

Monty shrugged, and leaned back on his heels. He knew from experience that Will was a dirty fighter and always had been, and this would only drive him to pick a fight. It was better to pick the fight with Monty than Ellie, though.

"'Cause lemme tell you something," Bridges replied, inching closer.

Monty saw Ellie dart from around him from the corner of his eyes and she had her hand on the door, ready to bolt when he gave the word go.

"What's that?" Monty asked, an interested grin on his face.

"As far as I can tell you're the only Shepard in here and I got four boys sittin' over there, itchin' to knock some sense into that head of yours."

Casually, Monty looked over at the Tigers at the far table. He knew they were there. That was the whole reason he'd hit up this hellhole in the first place. Someone had to keep tabs on Will and his boys.

"Oh," Monty said thoughtfully, lighting up a Kool. "Now, let me tell you something, Bridges. Why don't you let me have the little broad for right now, and you can have Buck's all to yourself tonight. Deal?"

"What the fuck kinda deal is that?" he snarled. He glanced back to where Ellie had ducked to the door. "What do you want with her, anyway?"

Monty always kept his switch in his back pocket, right where he could easily to it. By the time he pulled it out and flicked it open, Will hardly had time to react. Monty grinned when the blade made it to his throat before he even flinched at the action.

"You're going to leave the little broad alone," Monty told him matter-of-factly. "She don't want what you're dishin' out. Not from your hand or from your pants. You can be sure that if Tim gets wind that you so much as looked at her, you're gonna get your balls handed to you."

Will raised his hands in mock surrender. It was only to get Monty to back off, which he obliged. He slid the blade back into his pocket and nodded to the Tigers who were standing tense and ready to pounce.

"Same goes for you boys," Monty said, putting his hand on Ellie's shoulder and leading her out the door. "See y'all later."

He noticed when he opened the door for her that she seemed tensed up when she should have been throwing herself at him, thanking him for riding in and saving the day. By the time they were outside, she was dragging her feet as he led her toward his car. She hadn't uttered a word and she'd barely looked at him. He'd gotten a good look at her though, and she looked awful.

"Right there," he said, pointing to his Chevy. She hesitated as soon as he took his hand off her shoulder, and he was quickly losing his patience. And Monty prided himself on his patience. He had to with all the idiots he dealt with in Tim's gang.

He opened his door and stared at her, but she was staring at the ground.

"What?" he asked, exasperated. "Need me to open the door for you? It's unlocked. You just pull the little handle there. It's real easy. Even Curly knows how to do it. Bridges probably does, too, but I'm not sure."

She still wasn't looking at him, but he could tell she was pouting.

"Hey, I ain't got all night to stand out in the rain with some chick I don't even know. If you want to stay here and let Will take you home, that's your business, but it's not going to be my fault when you end up in worse shape than you're already in."

Ellie finally met his eyes and, with her lips set in a frustrated line, she jerked the door open.

Monty put up his hands. "Whoa, baby. This car ain't a toy."

He climbed into the driver's seat and cringed when she slammed the door shut harder than necessary.

"You sure you weren't the one that keyed Tim's car? You seem hellbent on wrecking mine," he muttered.

She still didn't respond, which was fine by him. Her silence was irritating, though, by the time they reached Tim's house.

"All right, humor me," he said, taking in her soaked, disheveled appearance after he parked the car. "How'd you end up at Buck's all by your lonesome?"

For the first time since she got into the car, she actually looked at him.

"Dally," she said, the name nearly getting lost between her lips and the stagnant air between them.

"Dally brought you?"

She nodded.

"Where'd he wander off to, then?" he asked.

Rubbing her arms, she said, "He picked me up after work and brought me there. He just left me."

Those were heavy words. Monty looked up the street to see if Tim had materialized. Much to his chagrin, he hadn't. Sighing, Monty turned back to her and noticed the blood dribbling down her scraped knee. He started patting around in his pockets and checked around the floor. Seeing nothing of use, he reached across her into the glove compartment. Her entire body flinched violently away from his sudden movement, and for a second he thought it was a good idea for her to shut the door so hard. Otherwise, the girl would've fallen right out into the rain the way her right knee slammed into the door.

"Easy there," he replied, holding up a stack of napkins from Jay's. "Just looking for these."

He rolled his window down, and held them out in the rain for a while until they were wet.

"Here," he said, offering them to her slowly, not wanting to scare her again. She was already a big enough mess.

She looked at him dumbstruck, and Monty nodded toward her knee.

"Oh," she said quietly.

She pressed the wet napkins against her knee and looked up at him. "Thanks."

"No sweat," he replied, lighting up another Kool. As he smoked, he contemplated leaving things at that until Tim got back. He could deal with the dumb kid; it wasn't Monty's responsibility. He couldn't help it, though. "Do you realize how close you got to serious trouble tonight?"

Her eyes went big, a mixture of fear and utter confusion. She started to shake her head, and she said in a rush, "Dally woudn't have done anything to really hurt me. He was just pissed off and drunk and I didn't really think – "

Monty cut her off. "I mean with Will Bridges."

"What do you mean?" she asked.

"I mean, he's a bad character and with you bein' Tim's girl and all, you just about ended up on the wrong side of somebody else's stick," he said plainly.

Ellie blushed at the analogy but looked nervous at the same time.

"He was just there when I walked in," she babbled. "I was just gonna use the phone. I didn't know he was there."

"Just watch yourself. Don't walk nowhere by yourself or anything like that. Bridges is a dangerous cat and a hell of an asshole, to top it all off," he told her.

Monty thought he was seeing things when she cracked a little smile.

"You mean like how Dally and Tim are dangerous? I know they're tough and all, but come on," she said.

Monty looked at her seriously. "Remember last year when that girl got shot at the Dingo?"

"Yeah," she said, her eyes getting wider. "What about it?"

Monty shrugged slowly, looking out into the rain.

"That was him?" she asked. He looked back at her and noticed her face was no longer flushed with embarrassment but pale with fear.

"No one knows for sure, but Bridges was there that day and I happen to know that he has this habit of sometimes carryin' a heater," he told her.

He thought she had gone pale before; now she was the color of a sheet.

"But who was the girl? Was it someone he knew and didn't like?" she asked. She sounded like she was sizing herself up to the girl who got shot, and Monty was glad he was scaring some sense into her.

"She wasn't anybody as far as I'm aware. I think she just got in the way or something," he said, flicking his smoke out the window.

"In the way of what?" she gasped.

Monty laughed. "Don't worry about it. Just steer clear of him and you'll be okay."

She nodded slowly and stared blindly out the windshield.

XXX

The rain had stopped by the time Tim pulled up behind Monty's car and Ellie fidgeted. She would have rather Monty drive her home, but she didn't push it when he brought her to Tim's house instead. Though, when Tim finally pulled up from wherever he had been, she started to get nervous all over again.

Monty looked at her and said, "Stay here a minute."

He was out of the car before she had a chance to reply.

Leaning over, she watched Monty walk up to Tim's car from the driver's side mirror. They leaned against the car, talking about something that she knew didn't relate to her. Tim didn't look toward Monty's car, and Monty didn't motion toward it. Monty finally waved her way when a loud knock came on her window. Startled, Ellie looked up, her heart pounding in her ears and saw Curly grinning like a fool at her.

Ellie rolled the window down. "You scared me," she chided.

"Whacha doin' in Monty's car?" he asked, wagging his eyebrows.

"Nothing," she said, straining her eyes to see out of the mirror again. "What are you doing out?"

Curly shrugged and leaned into the car through the open window.

"Tim and me had some stuff to take care of," he said. Ellie could hear the pride in his voice.

"Did you get it taken care of?" she asked, rolling her head so that she as looking at him again.

"More or less," he replied. He looked her up and down. "Man, what happened to you? You look like you been through a tornado or somethin'."

Between Dally and Will harassing her and Monty trying to scare the living daylights out of her, Ellie hadn't considered just how ragged she looked. Curly started laughing at her like it was some big joke when she turned the rear view mirror in her direction.

Her hair was a wet, tangled mess and between her scraped knee and soaked shoes, she tried to imagine what Tim would say. More though, she wondered how he would react to Dally taking liberties with her and hurting her to boot. Part of her wanted him to seek Dally out and knock some sense into him; the other part just wanted him to ask her if she was okay.

She hated not knowing what to expect. She was in a strange neighborhood with boys she wasn't sure she completely trusted. Even if Steve or Darry or even Two-Bit gave her a hard time for going to Buck's, at least she knew she would be safe with them. They were her friends. These guys certainly weren't friends yet; she didn't know if they would ever be. She just knew she wanted her own friends at the moment.

XXX

Tim hitched up his collar and lit a smoke, nodding at Monty as he came over.

"How'd it go?" Monty asked.

"Pretty well," Tim replied. "That shit was right where you said it was."

"Good deal. That'll keep 'em off of our turf for awhile," Monty said.

Tim nodded, taking a drag.

"Yeah, but they'll have more 'fore too long. That's too much cash that we sent up in smoke, but it's cash they ain't gonna make on my turf," Tim said confidently. "Did you lose Will or something?"

Monty shook his head and motioned toward his car. Curly was leaning into the passenger side window.

"Not quite," he said. "Your girlfriend showed up."

"Showed up where?" Tim asked.

"Buck's," Monty told him. "Bridges was there with Livingston and a couple other guys when she walked in."

"By herself?" Tim asked. He hoped she didn't get it into her head to find a way to Buck's to find him for some reason.

"Yeah. She said Dally was hassling her and left her there. You can bet Bridges was all over that when she walked in the door. Thought it would be fun to play a game of Back Shepard's Broad into a Corner," Monty explained. Annoyance dripped from every word. "I had to pull my damn knife on him."

Scratching his brow with his thumb, Tim digested the information and looked toward the car. Ellie wasn't supposed to be getting into shit between him and the Tigers, but she'd walked right into Will Bridges' radar.

"Christ," Tim muttered. "How'd he even know I was seeing her?"

"Seeing her? I told him that to get him to back off, but I didn't think you were serious about any of this," Monty retorted, still annoyed. "Are you still doing this shit? She's a fucking kid, Tim, and we got bigger fish to fry."

If anyone else in his gang – forget about anybody outside it - had said to that to him, he would have knocked them flat on their ass, but he let Monty have it. If there was anything Tim knew, it was that Monty knew his shit and thought clearly when Tim couldn't. That wasn't often, however, and Monty just didn't understand the fight he had with Dallas. Besides, she was a cute broad. He wasn't wasting his time on nothing.

"You think you have to fuckin' remind me of that?" Tim asked, tossing his cigarette butt away.

Monty backed off a couple of steps.

"All I'm tryin' to say, Tim, is if she's worth all the hassle?"

"You saw Dally at New Year's. Hell yes, it's worth the hassle," Tim replied. In all actuality, he didn't know how far this would go and for how much longer, but he didn't really care. They succeeded in fucking with Dally's mind once; anything now was just extra. "Thanks for watching out for her."

"No problem. You can pay me for babysitting later," Monty replied, barely cracking a grin.

Tim flicked him off and sauntered off to relieve Ellie from having to listen to whatever Curly was laughing about.

"Go make sure Angel ain't doin' something she ain't supposed to," Tim ordered Curly, yanking him back toward the sidewalk.

"She ain't," Curly replied, looking at him sourly.

"How the fuck can you know that if you ain't been inside yet?" Tim asked.

He mumbled something under his breath and started walking up the lawn, dragging his feet the whole way.

"You did good tonight, Curly," Tim called after him. Curly's face brightened, and he walked a little faster toward the door.

"I know," he called back with a grin before he walked inside.

Tim turned around and rested his hands on the door of the car, looking down at Ellie who shifted uncomfortably.

"Hey," she said, her voice faint.

She looked awful, but he didn't tell her that.

"Let's get out of here," he said, stepping back and pulling the door open.

She slowly got out of the car, and he tried to take in her appearance as they walked back to his car without her noticing. He opened her door for her, and she seemed surprised when he didn't say a word about how she looked.

He was surprised himself.

XXX

Ellie picked at her nails until she thought she pick them clean off. Tim hadn't said anything about how she looked, or about Dally for that matter, which had been both good and bad. Maybe he didn't want her to feel bad. Maybe he knew she had already had enough trouble for the night. But then again, maybe he was just waiting to get back home so he could laugh about it with Curly. Lord only knew what Tim would say to Monty after all of this.

"Do you always walk right into trouble, or does trouble follow you around?" Tim finally said after they left his house.

She sighed. "I think it's a little of both anymore."

"What was Dally's game earlier?"

Ellie shrugged. She wasn't itching to relive it all and have Tim think she was stupid for putting herself in that position. She wondered if she had suddenly gotten stupider judging how things were going in her life. She liked to think she hadn't always been so dumb.

"Just looking for a fight, I guess," Ellie replied. "Like usual. What were you and Curly doing?"

It was Tim's turn to shrug. "Nothing big. Just keeping an eye on everything."

Ellie glanced at him from the corner of her eye. "Curly made it sound like it was a big deal."

Tim shook his head slowly. "Dumb kid. He jus can't keep his big mouth shut." He looked over at Ellie. "It don't concern you, so don't worry about it none."

"Is it about Will Bridges?" she asked quietly. No one but Monty had ever let her in on how dangerous the guy was, and now she was scared. Troubles with Socs felt miles away after the mess she had just gotten herself into.

"It may be. Maybe not," Tim replied with a shrug. "Why are you so nosy?"

Ellie turned her attention to the road, sighing in relief as he pulled to the curb in front of her house. "I was just curious."

"Well, you oughta cut it out," Tim said. "Being curious got you to lookin' like this, didn't it?"

Ellie felt her cheeks burn and fumbled for the door handle. "Thanks for bringing me home."

"Hey," Tim called after her. Reluctantly, she leaned back into the car.

"How about I pick you up from school tomorrow and we get some burgers or something?" he suggested.

"I don't know," Ellie said slowly. She considered everything that had happened since she had first gone out with Tim. "I seem to get into an awful lot of trouble when I'm with you."

Tim chuckled, flashing his first grin of the evening. "I think all the trouble you got into tonight was your own doing. We'll get some burgers, maybe some fries, and I can guarantee you won't look like … " He trailed off and half-heartedly gestured to her. "Well, like you do now."

Ellie finally nodded. "All right."

"Good deal. I'll pick you up tomorrow, kid," he replied. She shut the door and he peeled off down the street.

As Ellie walked in the house, she tried to decide what in the world she was going to wear for a date with Tim. By the time she made it to the bathroom, she wished she hadn't. She looked like an even bigger mess in the light of the room than she did in Monty's car, and she couldn't imagine how Tim had managed to keep a straight face. No wonder Monty was treating her like a kid. Her hair was a wreck; she even had skinned knees, for God's sake!

Walking back to her room, Ellie tossed her bag on her bed angrily. She was tired of getting the shitty end of the stick, and it was time it stopped. Pulling open her closet door, she took a long, hard look at her clothes. She was going to have to make a few adjustments, but she was finished letting Dally push her around and letting Monty treat her like some kid.

She didn't have a lot to work with, but she was sure she could do something with what she had. She eyed the blue plaid skirt she'd discarded before the New Year's party and held it up against her waist. With a smile, Ellie realized she didn't have to do much to make the changes she needed.

You look at me,
I look at you,
Neither of us know what to do.

A/N: Is Ellie finally digging herself out of her slump? Stay tuned to both News and Tender to find out.