Darry and I quickly collected my things, just a few dresses, skirts, a pair of pants, blouses, a nightgown, two work uniforms, and one extra pair of shoes. I made sure to grab my underthings and stash them under a skirt in my arms so I wouldn't be flashing them all around the neighborhood or worse, in front of Darry. I also made sure I had the sock with the money in it and we climbed into the truck for the short drive to his house without saying goodbye to either of my parents.
I'd known that it had taken several months for Darry to move into his parents' room, but the boys had been excited about the prospect of having their own rooms so they'd talked him into it. Soda had moved into Darry's old room, the smallest bedroom, hoping that the familiarity of the same room would help Ponyboy adjust more easily. When Ponyboy's nightmares started, Soda moved back in with him and the small bedroom went unused again. That where we stashed my few possessions. After that, I didn't know what to do so I started supper.
"Hey, Maggie," Ponyboy walked into the kitchen. "You staying for supper?"
I swallowed back tears, "Yeah, I am," I said with a plastic smile. If he noticed, he didn't comment.
Darry came around the corner from his shower. "You know you can stay, right?"
"I know," I said, but we both knew I couldn't. Not for very long. My reputation would be ruined by morning so I made up my mind. "I'll stay the night and then figure something out tomorrow."
I couldn't look at him so I just concentrated on stirring the hash I'd thrown together. His hand on my arm made me jump. When I turned, my eyes were staring at his chest. He was so close. "I'm sorry," he said.
I opened my mouth to say something, but felt my chin tremble instead and the next thing I knew, I was in his arms crying into his shoulder. Even in my distress, I realized that I finally knew what it was like to be in Darry's arms. All circumstances aside, it was heaven.
I lost track of time and when we finally pulled apart, two faces were staring at us from the doorway of the living room. "Hey, Maggie," Soda said as if I hadn't just made a fool of myself.
"Hey," I nodded and wiped my nose on my sleeve. "You hungry?"
After supper, Darry and I sat in the living room and discussed my options, but we both knew I didn't have any. I didn't have any family close by, and everyone was struggling to make ends meet as it was. As I readied for bed, I resigned myself to the women's shelter. That night, the only crying that kept me awake was my own.
The next morning, I realized it was a fight to get a shower in this house. With three guys hogging the hot water, I barely got a lukewarm shower in time to get to work. Darry had gotten up before me and breakfast was ready when I got out of the shower. Two-Bit and Steve had materialized from somewhere and if they had any comments about the fact that I was there, they saved it for when I was gone.
"You ready?" Darry looked at me and I nodded. He, Soda, and I piled into the truck to go to work while Ponyboy, Steve, and Two-Bit got in Steve's car to go to school.
We were pretty silent in the truck, but the familiarity was comforting and I realized I'd even miss the old truck. Every time I climbed inside, I felt safe. I tried to keep my melancholy from completely taking over, but sitting in the truck between two of my favorite people, it was hard.
Soda must've caught on because he pinched my cheek when we rolled up to the DX. "You're gonna be alright, Mags," he said. "We'll make sure of it." He hopped out and headed inside.
I wish I had his optimism. I sighed as we pulled back onto the street and continued silently down the road. Darry drove right past the diner and I opened my mouth to remind Darry that I needed to go to work, but Darry spoke first.
"Mags, will you marry me?" It wasn't exactly the proposal of my dreams. Darry was looking at the road and I'm sure I was looking at him like he'd grown a second head or something.
"What?" I was surprised at my anger. "Darrell Shaynne Curis, Junior, if you're offering to marry me because you feel sorry for me-"
"I'm not," he was so calm it was scary. "Not entirely." Well at least he was honest. He pulled over and turned toward me. "Do I feel responsible for what happened?" he nodded. "Yeah."
"It's not your fault, you know," I said. "You didn't pull on my skirt and say all those inappropriate things." I felt my cheeks warm at the memory.
One corner of his mouth lifted in a smile, "But I did deck your dad."
I actually laughed. "Yeah, you did," I said.
He grew serious. "What would you do if you didn't marry me?" he asked. I didn't want to tell him so I kept my mouth shut. "Maggie?" He persisted.
I sighed. "I'm going to go to the shelter after work," I admitted.
"No way," he said with determination as he pulled back onto the road. "Maggie, you're my friend and you've done a lot for me and my brothers. I won't let you do that."
"Darry-"
Now he was mad. "Honestly, Maggie, I don't know if I love you or not, but I do know that I don't want to lose you," his grip on the steering wheel was so tight I was surprised he didn't rip it right off. "You deserve better than the shelter so I'm going to ask you one more time. Will you marry me?"
"Because I'm your friend and you don't want to lose me?" I asked. He nodded, staring ahead. I guess there were worse reasons to get married. "Not because you feel sorry for me or feel like you have to protect my reputation?" I despised pity from anyone. He shook his head. I weighed my options and knew this was definitely the better of the two. I sighed. "Okay," I nodded, crossing my arms over my chest and staring out the window. I was a lot less happy about it than I'd always imagined I would be.
So we went to the courthouse and stood there in front of a judge, Darry in his work shirt and jeans and me in my tan diner uniform. Really romantic, right? The judge took us through the basics, to have and to hold, blah blah. Darry surprised me by slipping a gold band over my finger and when I glanced at it, I realized it was his mother's. So he'd thought about this ahead of time, I realized, staring up at him in surprise.
I hadn't even thought about the fact that at the end, Judge Andrews would say, "you may now kiss the bride," and when he did, panic welled up inside of me as Darry looked down at me.
For a minute, I thought he wasn't going to kiss me at all, but then he bent toward me. I tilted my head back automatically, and his lips brushed against mine in a sweet, almost feather-light kiss. And that was that. Almost before I realized it, I was Mrs. Curtis.
And then the real romance began. We both went to work. Darry had missed too much a few months ago and I knew I'd be in hot water for missing the first two hours of my shift without notice. I wasn't sure where I stood in this marriage so I didn't kiss Darry as he dropped me off. I just said a lame thank you and got out.
"Where have you been?" Brenda, one of the other servers hissed at me as I clocked in and stashed my coat. "Billie's furious!"
Billie owned the place. He wasn't a bad guy and he wasn't a bad cook either, he just demanded hard work and punctuality. I found him in the back.
"Hey Billie," I wasn't nearly as afraid of him as I was my dad. "I'm sorry I'm late." He opened his mouth but my patience was wearing thin. I cut him off before he could say anything. "My dad kicked me out last night so this morning I went and married one of the only friends I have." I held up my hand to show off my simple ring. "I'll work over tonight to make it up to you."
Billie was so shocked, he closed his mouth. "You okay?" he asked.
Again, the last thing I wanted was pity from anyone, and I sometimes had a hard time differentiating between that and genuine concern. "I am now," I nodded quickly, steeling my features. "Thanks." And I headed to my tables like it was any other day. But it wasn't any other day and I knew it.
I wasn't sure what to do at the end of my shift. We hadn't talked about it, but I knew Darry well enough to know he wouldn't be happy about me walking home so I assumed he'd pick me up. I was right. I stayed busy until he stepped inside, then I grabbed my things in a hurry and headed toward him, almost afraid of making him wait. He held the door open for me which shouldn't have surprised me. He'd always done that, even when we were kids.
The drive home was silent, but this time the silence was uncomfortable. We'd never been awkward around each other, but all of a sudden, neither of us had anything to say. I didn't even ask him about his day. I wondered if marrying Darry hadn't ruined everything.
We went inside and discovered that not only did we not know what to say, we didn't know what to do either. There might as well have been eggshells scattered all across the floor and we were both afraid of breaking them. It was kind of funny because I'd been at this house almost as much as I had my own, even before Mr. and Mrs. Curtis passed away. Darry and I had worked together to cook and clean and it had never been weird. I hadn't needed any boundaries beyond the obvious "don't go into the bathroom if the door is closed". Now, I didn't know my place.
We stood together in the living room and I'm sure that if someone didn't know better they'd have thought we'd just met. It was that awkward. Fortunately, Ponyboy came down the hall.
"Hey," he said brightly. "What's for supper?" He stopped and stared at us for a moment and I watched as dread slowly overcame his features. "Mags?" he asked quietly. "Are you- are you going away?"
Ponyboy's fear broke the tension in the room and scattered the eggshells away. "Nope," I shook my head.
Darry went over and wrapped his arm around his brother. "She's stayin', kiddo," he said. "It'll take a little while for all of us to get used to it, but she's stayin'." He looked over at me and smiled and I found myself smiling back. As messed up as it was, I finally had a home. I wasn't sure of my place in it yet, but it was home. And it felt like it.
I started supper while Darry took a quick shower and Steve and Soda arrived before I was finished. They came into the kitchen and Soda poured himself a big glass of chocolate milk while Steve grabbed a Pepsi.
"Hi, Mags," they both said easily enough. Neither of them looked directly at me and I acknowledged their presence without looking up from the stove. Ponyboy came in and pulled himself up to sit on the counter by the sink.
"How was school and work?" I asked them while I stirred the chili.
"Fine," they said together.
I turned around. The left side of Soda's face was swollen and turning purple from his temple to his mouth. Steve's lip was swollen and his left eye was in the process of bruising. "Did you get into a fight?" I asked quickly. I went to the icebox and broke off two pieces of the ice block before wrapping them in towels and handing them each one.
Soda gingerly pressed the towel to his cheek. "Yeah," he said.
"What do the other guys look like?" I asked. They just grinned and I knew the'd won, but that didn't make me feel much better.
Darry came around the corner. "What happened?" he asked, concern crossing his features.
The boys exchanged another glance and I had to remind myself that I was only two years older than Steve. "We just heard some stuff," Steve scuffed his shoe across the floor.
"What stuff?" Darry asked.
When neither of them answered, I knew. "About me?" I asked. Ponyboy's dread was sweeping itself across my heart. Soda nodded and I pursed my lips. "From who?"
"Everyone," Steve mumbled. "At school and at work."
"What'd they say?" I asked.
"I told 'em you slept in the spare room," Soda said quickly. "Honest! I tried to stop it!"
So it was happening, I realized. The label I'd worked so hard to keep off of me, the one that only my own father had believed I should be branded with, was now mine whether I deserved it or not.
"Soda," I reached out and touched his shoulder. "It's okay. Thank you for sticking up for me." I smiled. "But you didn't have to get into a fist fight over it."
He grinned. "Yeah, I did," he argued. "That's what friends do."
"'Sides," Steve set the now empty Pepsi bottle in the sink, "if you'd heard what Carl Jenkins said you'd know we had to fight him and his buddies."
"Well, you won't have to anymore," I said, hoping it was true. It probably was. No one was interested in a married woman's reputation unless she stepped out on her husband. I'd be old news by the end of the week.
"Why not?" Soda asked.
"Maggie, you're not leaving, are you?" Steve asked. His brow furrowed.
"Nope," Ponyboy said with a grin. "She's staying for good."
Steve and Soda took turns looking at me and then Darry. I knew they'd connect the dots better than Ponyboy had.
"Wait," Steve pointed his finger at us. "You didn't…"
Soda grabbed my hand and looked at the ring. "They did!" His smile was ecstatic. "You got married!"
"Wait, what?" Ponyboy jumped off the counter. "You got married?"
"This morning," Darry nodded.
"Oh, man, I wish you could've waited for us," Soda's smile fell. "But I get it." The next thing I knew, he'd trapped me in a bear hug and before I could even catch my breath, Ponyboy and Steve were huddled around us too. Arms and elbows were everywhere, but it was the best feeling in the world.
In that moment, I realized part of the reason that Darry had married me. He didn't want the boys to lose someone else. They'd had enough of that. My heart sighed. He was always thinking of them before himself. Even if he'd been madly in love with me, he wouldn't have married me if the boys didn't like me and that was that. I was suddenly grateful that they liked me.
The boys let off of me and I realized I was crying. "Steve, you stayin' for supper?" I asked as casually as I could, turning back to the chili.
That got me a laugh from all of them. "Yeah," he said. "Thanks."
