A/N – So…I changed the rating in hopes of getting some more reviews…please? Sounds desperate…but I kinda am! If we can get to 15 I'll put another chapter up this weekend!

You're not alone

Together we stand

I'll be by your side, you know I'll take your hand

When it gets cold

And it feels like the end

There's no place to go

You know I won't give in

No I won't give in

1960 - 10th Grade

After the incident at the dance two years earlier I had lost most of my soc friends. Cherry and Marcia were still nice to me, but no one really went out of their way to hang out with me anymore. Honestly though, I was ok with it...real friends loved you despite choices you make, and I had those.

In addition to those amazing friends I had a second set of parents. My father had been spending more and more time out of town, which had increased my mothers drinking quite a bit. So, I more or less lived at the Curtis house, going home to sleep and change clothes. Mrs. Curtis had given birth to 3 boys, but to look at her house you would have thought it was 6 sons and a daughter.

While the Curtis's had no more money then anyone else in their neighborhood, they had more then enough love to go around. Their parents didn't drink; they worked hard and loved their kids (and the strays that their kids brought home).

Soda's other best friend Steve was often at the house now, escaping his own abusive parents, and getting fed as his mother never seemed to have food in the house. Ponyboy was now in the 8th grade, and a real sweet kid, smart, and sensitive...a dreamer. His best friend Johnny also depended on the Curtis parents for love and support, his own parents being drunk and abusive (see a pattern here?).

Lastly was Two-Bit, no one could really remember where he had come from. He had just shown up one day and never left. His own family was a lot like mine, no one ever hit him but they left a lot to be desired. His old man had left town a few years ago and while his mother had a steady bar-tending job she was like my mother and spent her life in the bottle. Didn't leave a lot of time for cooking or cleaning.

The house was always loud, and full of people, but there was always plenty of food on the table and most importantly laughter.

xxx

"Soda, what's the square root of 123?"

"How the hell should I know?" Soda looked as frustrated as I felt. Math was not a strong point for either of us, but at least I did well in the rest of my classes...Soda only did well in gym and auto shop.

"Because we're in the same class!"

"Doesn't mean that I stay awake for it! I hate math, I'm no good at this school thing."

"Alright, let's take a break. Maybe Darry can help us when he gets home from class?" Darry had graduated from high school the year before along with my brother Matthew. They were both playing college ball at University of Oklahoma Tulsa, Darry lived at home to save money, but my brother was living on campus, giving me a little more freedom to do as I pleased.

"Ya...maybe..."

"Come on, let's play anywhere but here." I said climbing on Soda's bed and patting the space beside me.

"You act like we're still 12 Ali Cat" Soda laughed as he came to sit beside me. "Come on" Soda stretched out to his full length on the bed dragging me down with him. I lay down next to him with my head on his shoulder. "You start."

"Hm...if I could be anywhere but here I would be...on a Hawaiian beach, getting a tan and drinking drinks with a little umbrella in them!"

Soda laughed.

"Alright, your turn!"

"Well...if I could be anywhere but here I would be on a Hawaiian beach, getting a tan and drinking a beer."

"That was my answer! You need to come up with your own!" I whined laughing.

"I don't want to go anywhere but Tulsa, so if you go somewhere I'll go there."

"You suck all the fun out of my games!" I pouted.

"I'll give you fun!" Soda jumped up, pinning me beneath him to the bed and tickling me, after almost 7 years as best friends he knew all the spots to hit and he soon had me screaming and begging him to stop.

The door opened suddenly, "Soda, come out in the living room please." Darry turned and left as quickly as he appeared.

Soda collapsed on top of me, "Man, there is no way we were being that damn loud..."

I shoved him off me and onto the floor "Come on, let's just get this over with."

We dragged ourselves into the living room ready to get yelled at for being loud, or fooling around or something. However when we looked into the living room to see Pony crying on the couch, and Darry looking upset we knew it was more then us roughhousing.

"Hey..." Soda said quietly announcing our presence.

Darry came towards us, taking Soda by the shoulders "Soda...I...Mom and Dad...their gone..."

"Wh-what do you mean gone?" Soda stammered. As the realization hit me of what Darry was trying to say tears welled in my eyes.

"There...was a car wreck this afternoon...they died on impact..."

Soda stood still looking at Darry for a moment, without turning he reached back looking for my hand. I quickly stepped foreword taking his hand in mine and holding it tight, both of us needing the physical contact to ground us in the moment. Finally Soda nodded and moved to the couch our fingers still laced together, sitting down next to Pony and wrapping his free arm around him, letting him cry into this shoulder.

Darry, never having been one to be good with emotions moved into the kitchen to deal with his grief while his brothers cried on the couch. I personally had never lost someone before, never experienced death and the emotional numbness that comes with it. I had no idea what to think, what to do, so I just sat there and held Soda's hand.

xxx

The next few days were the hardest of my life, and I still have no idea how Soda and his brothers made it through. The whole gang was devastated, everyone felt like they had lost parents that day and as a group we grieved hard over the love and support that was now missing from our lives.

If it was possible I started spending more time at the Curtis house then I already was. Getting there early in the morning and staying later then was safe, but everyone, soc and greaser alike knew what happened, and granted me safe passage through the neighborhoods.

I took the week off from school with the boys, if nothing else I made sure that they stayed fed, even if they often weren't hungry enough to eat much of it. I still went home to sleep as my mother would have had my hide for staying at their house, but I left each morning as soon as I could.

Coming down the stairs the Friday morning after their passing my mother was standing near the bottom of the stairs. "Where are you going?" She asked quietly. I wasn't sure if this was going to turn into a fight or not, but I wasn't going to lie.

"I'm going to the Curtis's, I'll try and make it home for dinner, I promise."

My mother was quiet a moment "No, that's ok, I think those boys need you more right now then we do here...but will you please take this over for me? My mother held up a box, which contained a large lasagna, apple pie, rolls and my mothers homemade applesauce.

"Wow...mom...thank you so much, this is wonderful"

"It's not much, just what I could put together yesterday...I know you've been trying to keep those boys fed yourself...and I know you were really close to their parents...I thought you might need sometime to not worry about them as much and focus on yourself."

"Ya...I've been hiding in the kitchen cooking most days...I just don't know what to say to make Soda feel better...not that he's going to feel better anytime soon, it's just killing me to see him in so much pain."

My mother reached out and gave me a rare hug "He just needs you to be there for him right now, your doing exactly right. Now, here are the car keys so you don't have to carry all this...I don't want you driving to late though, so try and be home by 11 tonight ok?"

"I will, thanks mom."

When I got to the Curtis's everyone was sitting in front of the TV watching Mickey looking forlorn and so unlike the jovial brothers I was used to.

"Hey guys"

"Hey Ali" came a chorus of responses.

"My, um, mother sent over some food, I'll put it in the fridge ok?" Not knowing what to else to do I disappeared into the kitchen where I unpacked the food into the fridge and then began scrubbing down the counter.

"Ali?"

I turned to see Soda standing in the kitchen door. "What's up?"

"I just...I miss you."

"I've been here everyday Soda."

"But you've been in here, like you've been hiding from all of us or something."

"I guess I kinda have been...I just don't know what to say or do, everyone's so sad and I hate that ya'll are hurting so badly and there's nothing I can do to make it better." As I spoke each word came out faster then the one before it as my eyes welled up with tears that threatened to spill over. I had felt the need to be strong for them all during this week, but had no idea how to do so.

"I...I just need you with me right now Ali Cat, it makes some of the hurt go away." Soda opened his arms up to me and I walked straight into that hug, holding him tightly as we cried together.

A little while later Soda pulled away from the hug and rubbed his red eyes, "I can't do this anymore, let's go out tonight, let's forget about all this for awhile and pretend everything is normal."

"Ok...what do you want to do?" At this point I would have agreed to go to the moon if that was what Soda wanted, I'd try anything to make him smile again.

"You've been begging us for years to take you to a party at Bucks...doesn't seem a much better place then that to forget."

"Alright...my mom wanted me home by eleven because of the car, so I'll have to ask her if I can stay out later..."

"Just ask if you can drop the car off and spend the night here...we'll make up a reason for you to stay."

I wasn't so crazy about the idea of lying to my mother...however there was no way I could tell the truth, and like I said I would do anything to make him happy right now.

"Ok, lemme give her a call."

I dialed our home number and waited while the phone rang "Hello" hiccup

I sighed, I wasn't sure if this would go better or worse with her drunk. "Mom, it's Alice."

"Hi Alice, hiccup what do you want?"

"Um, the boys really need to get out of the house so we were gonna go down to the Nightly Double but we're going to get out really late so I was hoping to drop off the car and then stay the night here...on the coach" I added quickly.

"Keep the car, see you in the morning." click I stared at the phone in disbelief before setting it back in its cradle.

"What'd she say?"

"She said to keep the car...and then she hung up on me..."

Soda smiled, "Looks like we're gonna go to Buck's tonight!"

"As long as Darry says it's ok...he is kinda in charge now..."

"He'll say yes, he went to these all the time when he was our age, sides I don't think he's going to say no to much right now."

A/N – The song is Keep Holding On by Avril Lavigne. So…a party at Bucks? Hope our girl knows how to hold her liquor! Remember pushing that little button to the side gets you another chapter sooner then next Friday!