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Chapter 6:

Breaking Down the Walls

Part 2

"I'm leaving, Darry."

Pony sits before him, the pain from speaking those three words clear on his face. There's a lot more to this... his mind screams.

There has to be.

A grim silence falls as he asks, "Leaving for what?"

His youngest brother's leg bounces up and down from where he sits. The pain in his face travels to his eyes, and when their eyes lock, it's like Darry's taken to a whole other world.

It's days of pain. It's weeks of pain. Hell, it's years of pain, all coming together on the sound of his voice.

"For war," Pony's voice cracks, and the sheer sound of it makes his heart skip a beat, "For 'Nam."

"War," he echoes, his tongue feeling heavy in his mouth.

Pony nods grimly. "Yeah, Dar... War."

"You..." The words are bitter in his mouth; like bile. He tried to swallow them down, but they still come up and make themselves known. "You can't be serious."

"Leaving in about a month or so," Pony states. He says it casually, almost like it's nothing; almost like he wanted it to happen.

The door to his cell opens before Darry can say anything more. Together, he and Pony look to the open space, where Soda stands with his hands in the pockets of his jeans. Apparently, that's Pony's cue to exit, as his youngest brother rises from his seat and makes his way over to him.

They share a look. Soda places his hand on Pony's shoulder and grips it tightly, like he'll disappear if he lets go at the wrong time. Pony simply nods before looking back at Darry, giving a small, almost unnoticeable wave and letting the door shut behind him.


Soda

"Soda..."

At the sound of his name, he took a step forward towards his brother.

"Darry." The name came out as a sigh; a heavy, almost painful sigh. It hurt his heart, his chest, and his thinking; his mind flashed to images of the three of them, running around in the yard. It flashed to the three of them, sitting beside their parents, laughing at something a younger Soda had done.

It flashed back to simpler times – to happier times. To times that were so distant from what they lived now.

"You can't let him –"

"He's made up his mind, Dar." The words came crashing down on his fake reality. Everything blurred, shifted, and altered itself, revealing what he'd been blind to all along:

Pony was leaving, and he might never come back.

"Change it, then!" Darry hissed, his eyes burning with malice. Not towards him; not even towards Pony. It was malice towards himself – towards what Darry had become.

He placed one of his hands on the back of the chair before him. With the other, he rubbed at his temples as if he had a sudden headache. "I can't," he muttered, and the words were loose and broken and cracked as they came from his lungs. "Not this time."

"This is a matter of life and –"

"I know the risks," he interjected sharply, staring Darry down. His hand dropped back beside the other, and together, they pushed and tensed against the chair. "I know the stakes. He does too, Darry; he has to know them."

Darry simply stared at him, completely dumbfounded. His eyes were burning with pain, but even as it intensified, Soda continued. "There's no trying anymore. At least not with this."

For a moment, Soda lacked a response from Darry. Then, like all the pain in his eyes had moved to his lungs, he spoke it all in the form of words. "Can you guarantee he'll come home, Soda?"

His heart took a turn down a dark alley; his mind became clouded, and almost like he was drunk, he slurred out the words, "You know I –"

"Can you or not?"

Soda paused to let silence filter through the room; through the vents and through both of them, almost like a calming mechanism. "No," he murmured softly, and watching the pain... the raw, ungodly amount of pain, of anger, and of sheer agony resonate back in Darry's eyes caused him to do something he'd been told countless times not to.

He walked over to Darry, got down on his knees, and looked at his oldest brother in absolute helplessness.

"I can't guarantee it. I can't, and yet I want to be able to tell you he'll come home..."

Darry sensed his discomfort; his attempt at being strong. "He might not," he breathed, and Soda shut his eyes and let his emotions rise above all control.

"And if he doesn't," Soda sucked in air as if the room were being drained of it. "We..."

"Shut up," Darry ordered sternly but softly. With as much room he could grasp with being handcuffed to the chair, he reached out and put his hand on the top of Soda's head. "We'll cross that bridge when – if – we get there. But we won't, Soda." He looked deep into Soda's eyes, and the largest amount of sincerity – of normalcy – burned bright in his green eyes. "We won't get there. I promise you."

Almost as if the universe were confirming their worst fear, the room went black with the hushed sounds of footsteps coming into the room.


Kat

"I need to talk to you."

Soda's eyes immediately went to Darry, who he was still seated beside. Darry sighed, looked at her for a moment before turning back to Soda and nodding. Soda got to his feet and hastily followed her out, where she stopped just short of a large, barred window, where the sun's evening light poured through and warmed their skin.

He didn't even give her the chance to talk. Instead, he demanded shortly, "What's this about?"

"Molly," There was a pause to allow that to sink in, and then she was going again. "I'm worried about her."

"Aren't we all?" Soda asked heavily to the air, seeming bored.

"About her emotional and mental state, Soda," Kat stressed, reaching for his wrist and holding it in her hands as to not let him get away. "This whole thing... It could make or break her, and I think it's –"

"It's breaking us all," Soda dismissed, which propelled her aggravation. "Especially Darry and me."

"No shit," she huffed, rolling her eyes, "But this concerns her, too; and me." She took a step forward, closer to him, but Soda avoided her eyes and continually looked to Darry's cell, where his eyes burned like he wanted to go back in there. Like he wanted to escape from her. With a sigh, she squeezed his wrist and whispered, "Soda... Look at me. Talk to me. Be normal with me."

He didn't return anything, to which she narrowed her eyes on him and spoke harshly. "Cut the shit and look at –"

The moment his eyes met hers, she stopped along with the world. "What's in your hand?" he asked roughly; timidly. There seemed to be a war going on inside of his head – between his heart and his mind, and nothing was being spoken.

"Nothing," she said quickly, furiously tucking her hand into her back pocket to try and let go of the object she held. Soda scoffed and reached behind her, grappling with her for a moment before ripping it out of her pocket and sending the small, completely harmless object to the ground. Kat licked her lips nervously, watching as Soda's eyes went between the ground and her own gaze, his mouth open in silent shock.

"W-What," He seemed to lack words, which made her smile a tad inside, "is that?"

"A ring, dumbass," Kat said sarcastically, reaching down and picking it up. She twisted it back and forth in between her fingers, letting the dark gold color shimmer in the sunlight and the small, yet crystal clear diamond nearly blind her. "I figured it was Pony's, and he was going to make a move on Molly..."

"Yeah," Soda's breathing quickened, almost as if he'd been running a marathon and was trying to catch his breath. "About that..."

"And so, you know, with Pony being an idiot most of the time, I thought he'd dropped it. I wanted to be a good person and give it back to him." She looked back to him and found him smiling, yet trying to hide it. Her heart skipped a beat and she raised an eyebrow, asking, "Soda... Why are you smiling?"

"No reason," he muttered, coughing to try and break it.

"I know that smile... That's the one you pull when you did something and I wasn't –"

She stopped; froze in time. She stared at the ring, then back at him, then at the ring...

No. No. No.

"...supposed to find out."

The smile on Soda's face grew. He took a moment to collect himself.

No.

He took his hand and intertwined the two of them for a moment, pressing his forehead against hers.

No.

Slowly, quietly, like the world was waiting for the right moment to implode on itself, he got down on one knee.

Yes.

"You know," His voice was quiet and full of nerves, but even so, his eyes were calm and his stance was proud. "I've waited a long time for someone...anyone, really, to love ever since she died."

Kat knew that by 'she', Soda meant Claudia. Claudia... The one girl she always thought Soda would never get over; the one girl she swore would have Soda's heart, his entire being and the entire idea of marriage - of remarriage - on hold.

"There are a lot of things I've done; good and bad. There are a lot of things I've loved and I've lost..."

A pause. A breath. A look so deep, so heartfelt and warm and passionate...

"You have always been the one thing I can't lose."

She could feel herself crying. She could feel the hot tears running down her face, creating streams of ink from mascara below her eyes. But through all of that; through all of the pain and the loss and the love she felt for other people, for herself...

It all faded on one question. One question that shook her, deep within her darkest depths and within her hardened core. It shook her and ravished her, feeling like she was finally being ripped at the edges, her seams falling to the ground in threads...

She felt alive.

"I know a jail isn't really the best place to ask this kind of thing, but... Katherine Marie White," Soda grinned from ear to ear, beginning to rise to his feet and face her completely. "Will you marry me?"

She spoke the first word that came into her head. It was quiet, barely audible, but the way that Soda's eyes lit up and Pony came around the corner, staring at the two of them, the word shook the walls and broke her heart in a loving way.

"I never thought you'd ask."

And as she spoke, she couldn't help but hope that Claudia was seeing this - that she was okay with it.