Summer Adventures

Chapter 26

Bonding

XXX

"Darry, I'll be coming by tomorrow morning to do a final inspection before we go back to the juvenile court tomorrow afternoon. We got lucky, the judge didn't change the dates on us. I know this is a pointless question, but you will be able to make it, won't you?"

I agreed, that was not only a pointless question, but a stupid one at that. "Yes, I'll be there." I had already cleared it with Mr. Campbell that I was taking both tomorrow and Friday off. Once I had those court orders putting Pony back in my custody, I was heading down the highway to get him. Soda was getting Steve to cover for him at the station. I doubted it we would make it back before midnight... so I planned to find us a hotel along the way. There had to be one somewhere.

"Okay then, I'll see you around nine in the morning. Bye Darrel."

She hung up the phone and I did the same, looking straight into the eyes of Soda who was sitting on the counter staring at me, not just listening, but absorbing each word I said. Next to him was Steve, holding in his right hand one of those random small bouncy balls Pony had all over the house. I thought we'd found all of them, but every time I turned around, another just kept rolling out from some hidden nook in the house – like some silent reminder of who was supposed to be here but wasn't. The moment I answered the phone, though, Steve's hand instantly stopped in mid-throw, and stayed that way until now.

"Well?" Soda asked, finally talking.

"Nothing, Soda. Mrs. O' Donovan just wanted to let me know she was coming over in the morning around nine to check out the house in final preparation for the court hearing in the afternoon, that's all."

Soda looked at his watch. "Well, he'll either be back in our custody this time tomorrow... or he'll be lost to us."

The look on his face was not very comforting. Even Steve picked up on it, nudging Soda as he spoke.

"You know that kid ain't going anywhere but right back here. Darry's biggest problem won't be a dog that the kid'll want. Not after riding that horse for a month. Better clear out your shed, Darry, I bet the kid will somehow snag a horse out of this deal!"

"Not here he won't. The only pony coming home is the human type." I said, cracking a grin. I went to the living room, switching on the TV and picking up the paper. I needed noise in the house. It had been too quiet around here for far too long. I hoped... I really hoped that this was the last day of it. For all our sakes.

XXX

Looking out the window of my room, I had a nervous feeling in the pit of my stomach. Thunder was rumbling in the distance, and from the window of my upstairs room, the black nighttime sky was illuminated every now and then with intermittent lightening. Dark, billowy clouds hovered overhead. Rain was coming, but remained far enough away to keep the air here still. And stagnant. And given the darkness – foreboding. Everything added up leaving me more than a bit jumpy.

"Ponyboy?" Mrs. Nixon called from somewhere in the house. I got up and walked out of the room, pausing at the top of the stairs looking down.

"Yes ma'am?" I answered.

She came over and looked up, a wiry smile on her face. "Are you okay? Why don't you come on down here until this storm passes."

I looked over through my room and out the window at the approaching storm, then down at Mrs. Nixon again. "Okay, just let me get my book." The first drops of rain began to smack against my window as I retrieved the book, making me shudder as memories of the last storm I was in washed over me. I brushed it off and headed down the stairs. Halfway down, a clap of thunder shook the house, a bright bolt of lightening ripped the outside darkness in half, and the power went out.

"MOMMY!" Alex screamed. I dropped my book and nearly fell down the steps as my attention went from where I was going to why Alex was screaming, but caught myself in the railing in time to prevent myself from doing a blind header down the stairs.

I heard the scuffling of a kitchen chair, and Mrs. Nixon shushing Alex in the distance.

"She okay?" I called out, still trying to feel my way down the steps. With that book below me somewhere, I didn't want to slip on it and finish what gravity was trying to do naturally.

"She's fine. Storms scare her, but she's fine. Are you okay, Ponyboy?"

I managed to stumble my way down, finally making it to the bottom and holding my hands out; trying to picture the layout of the room in my head. I inched my way to the kitchen where I'd heard the chair scratching the floor. "Y'all in here?"

"No, Ponyboy, we're in the living room." Mrs. Nixon's voice called out from somewhere off to my right.

Another bolt of lightening helped me gain momentary orientation when the room lit up. The image burned itself on my retinas, and I was able to find my way over. I felt the couch and sat down just as another thunderous cracking boom sounded overhead, sending me to foolishly duck on impulse. Alex wasn't hiding her fear at all. In fact, she was about to come unglued. She was next to me on the couch, sandwiched between me and her mother and with lightening providing intermittent visibility, I could see her clutching her mother for dear life.

The storm seemed to worsen for a while, winds howling and rain pelting. I had goosebumps as I kept looking up at the dark ceiling, silently praying for it to stay intact. It seemed to hold up though. This was, after all, just a thunderstorm.... not a tornado. However, it sure had an attitude all it's own, with punches that kept even my toes curled up inside my socks. Just when it seemed to slow down, a massive explosion sounded right outside the front windows getting all our attention.

"Alex, honey, you're choking me. Loosen up a little...." came Mrs. Nixon's plea. "Honey, let me up... I need to check that out. Alex, please!"

But Alex wasn't letting go. I didn't blame her. If I were a few years younger and had my mother or Soda here – maybe even Darry as well, I'd be all hunkered down under their arms too. Since I was older though, I was expected to just pay it no mind … tough greasers weren't supposed to be scared of storms.

I put my hand on her back, "come here, Alex," I called, and a hesitant moment later she crawled into my arms, wrapping her small hands around me, burying her face in the crook of my neck. Just as Soda would comfort me, I did the same for her, rubbing tiny circles around her small back. Her mother got up, peering out the windows into the darkness.

"Lemme tell you a story, about a man on a boat..." and with that I launched into a cleaned up version of the Rime of the Ancient Mariner. I turned the serious stuff silly, earning a few giggles from Alex as she started to listen to me and not concentrate on the storm so much. Eventually, the storm died down, and Alex calmed down too. She kept her head on my shoulder but was relaxed in my arms, and the soft circles I'd made on her back settled to eventually just feeling her chest rise and fall against me.

"She's asleep, Ponyboy." Mrs. Nixon's voice softly whispered when the house was still and the storm had reduced itself to a soft patter of rain outside.

"I figured." I returned in kind. I didn't want to move. Alex wasn't heavy, and it was nice holding her. Sort of like having a little sister. It was admittedly strange having someone look up to me for advice and protection. I wondered if Soda or Darry ever felt like this concerning me... but I doubted it. I was pretty sure a fourteen year old grease brother was markedly different from a six year old sister.

"Let me get her to bed." Mrs. Nixon reached down and took her from me, carrying her upstairs and over to her room. I got up and looked out the front windows, wondering what that explosion sound was. I didn't see anything, just the darkness. The power wasn't back on yet, and since there was no reason to stay downstairs anymore, I headed up to my own bed.

Once settled under the sheet, I remembered something... something I was surprised I'd not thought of. The court hearing was sometime this week. I already knew I wasn't going to be told the date... just the outcome - if and when it happened. I wasn't going to the hearing, either. Mrs. O' Donovan would call and let Mrs. Nixon know if I was staying longer, being moved to a permanent boy's facility ... or going home.

I hoped that if I couldn't go home, I could at least express my wishes of where I wanted to go. If at all possible, and if she'd let me, I wanted to stay here.

XXX

"The place looks good, Darrel. Very good. About as good as I could ever hope for." Mrs. O' Donovan said as she looked around. I had to agree. The last time the place looked this good was when Mom and Dad were here. Repaired roof, new windows, fresh paint. I'd even taken out the coffee table and re-sanded it, smoothing out the circles from countless beer and Soda bottles left on it over the last year, then applied a new finish to it. Soda'd thought it was new the evening he came home and saw it, and I'd almost laughed.

I'd rolled the old stained and faded area rug up and stored it in the shed for now. Not having it on the floor made the room appear larger. Once Pony came back, I'd put it back down. It kept the floor from getting scuffed so much.

The kitchen also had a rather severe cleaning. I'd had to clean the fridge out myself just after the power came back on almost four weeks ago, at the start of all this mess. Soda wouldn't go near it. The smell had made him gag too much. It wasn't pleasant for me, either, but he really was having a hard time. "Don't leave the food in it to rot next time!" I complained as I chucked out a fortune in spoiled meat, milk, and other costly food items. Once the whole thing was empty, I had to use nearly a whole box of baking soda to clear the smell out of it. The water trap under it was another source of the putrid smell .... and even thinking of how fetid it was then was causing my appetite to go away now.

She checked out the bathroom and nodded... not much to say about it. It was scrubbed clean, just like the rest of the house, with Soda's and my shaving stuff for once put up in our rooms.

Our rooms were cleaner than they've ever been. Mine didn't need much work – just a dusting of the shelves and putting away of some tools. I usually kept my room neat and organized anyway, but that cleaning trait was not picked up by either of my brothers. And with them sharing a room since the week Pony'd starting having night terrors, their room had transformed into a sloppy mess that made me shudder to look in it.

I was on them weekly to clean it, but as usual they ignored me. Two days ago, knowing the inspection was coming, I had no choice but to go there. I knew the only way it was gonna get done right was if I stepped in to give Soda a hand. He was trying, but quite frankly, even Soda looked stumped with the magnitude of the mess. Pony had more books in his personal library than I think even I read when I was his age. They were everywhere, piled on his desk, in a stack by his side of the bed, some lost to the graveyard under his bed.

That graveyard was indeed a pit of no return. I found mates to socks long ago thrown out, a shirt so covered in dust that I wasn't sure what color it was, and even a pair of underwear. I didn't investigate further to see which brother of mine they belonged to. I just tossed them out with a look of disgust on my face. Soda simply grinned, turned a shade or two redder, and shrugged.

His side of the room and under-the-bed graveyard wasn't much better. He had his own collection of crap. Dirty oil rags, a lost DX shirt I was sure the replacement for had come out of his paycheck, and an assortment of outdated auto magazines could be found around and under the side of the bed where he slept. But that wasn't the worst part. Cleaning out from between the mattresses, I'd found a stag magazine on his side that he'd either obviously... or conveniently... forgotten about.

"Do you even have a glimmer of how much trouble I could be in if some social worker found this in here?" I'd asked, holding it up at him when I found it. "I have a hard enough time explaining why you two sleep in the same bed! No more of this, Soda. You wanna read these, fine, but not around Ponyboy. I don't need him getting his hormones jump-started by this. Got me?"

He'd nodded, that grin of his going into hyperdrive. "Yeah, I got ya. I just forgot it was there, is all. It's Two-Bit's magazine, anyway. You don't want that at his house, do ya? Might corrupt his sister!"

"The last person I am worried about corrupting right now is Karen Mathews. Let Two-Bit deal with her, we have to deal with Ponyboy. Just keep that trash out of this room." I'd said, annoyed.

Now, as Mrs. O' Donovan looked around, the rooms were spotless. She nodded and wrote stuff down. "You both have done a remarkable job. I'll do everything I can this afternoon, but it is up to the judge."

"Do you think he'll find a reason not to return Pony to us?" Soda asked, finally finding his voice.

She looked at him, doubt in her eyes. "I don't know, Sodapop. I can't think of one, but I won't make a promise I can't keep. We'll see. The hearing starts at two this afternoon. The judge will be hearing about all the kids that were removed that day. Not just the one's I'd had to remove, but all of them, one at a time. It may take a while. Each case is heard individually. I'd better get going, I have a lot of paperwork to fill out. See you both later... and don't be late. The judge won't like that."

She left the house, and Soda and I just stood there. That left another couple of hours to sit and wait.

And wonder.

And pray.

XXX

The sky was bright blue, cloudless. Sunlight streamed in my window hitting my eyes, waking me up. Outside, I heard the whinny of horses and the farming tractor already going. I wondered what time Mrs. Nixon got up, considering I had yet to wake before she did this whole month. I dressed and headed downstairs, glad to see the power was on. However, what was unusual was seeing Alex home. This was a weekday, why wasn't she getting ready for camp?

"What are you doing home, squirt?" I asked, heading to the kitchen to get something to drink.

"Hey Ponyboy!" She came and launched herself into my arms. I held her on one hip while downing a glass of juice with the other. "Mama said they can't take me today. Said the storm broke the camp ... so I gets to stay here and play with you! Ain't that great!"

I looked at her and nodded, then set her down. "Yup. Have you eaten breakfast yet?"

"Uh huh. Mama made me oatmeals. Have you ever had oatmeals?"

I remembered that warm glop Mom used to make. It wasn't bad, but never really was what I wanted. Always tasted like mush to me. No matter how much sugar you put on mush, it was still mush.

"Yup. I've had oatmeal. Are you still hungry?"

"Nope. After mama went out, I ate the rest of the watermelon too."

I was shocked, that was half a melon! The kid was gonna end up peeing all day!

"Well, I better get out there and help your mother. What are you gonna do?"

She looked up from her coloring books and crayons. "I'm gonna draw you the biggest picture ever! But don't look, it isn't finished yet. Don't look!" she squealed, covering what looked like a drawing of a horse with her chest as she lay across it.

I laughed. "I won't look. I'm going out now. You be good."

I headed up the path to the meet up with Mrs. Nixon, already hard at work in the stalls.

"So Alex gets a day off from camp, huh?" I asked, grabbing my pitchfork and starting in the stall next to her.

"Yeah, they called this morning. The storm damaged the building and turned the play fields into a mud pit. So, she gets to play hooky from camp. What's she doing?"

"I left her coloring something. I hope you didn't have any plans for that watermelon, she ate it."

Mrs. Nixon started laughing. "That sounds like her. Leave any fruit out, she'll devour it as soon as your back is turned to her. That's fine, I can get another one at the store later."

And for the next few hours, she and I did the same normal morning routine that I had become accustomed too. In the meantime, my thoughts ran away. I wanted to ask if she could take me in if the courts refused to let me go home, but I didn't know how to invite myself into her family permanently. With the court date looming sometime this week, my time for stalling was running out.

"Mrs. Nixon," I started.

"Yes, Ponyboy?" she answered absentmindedly as she worked.

"Have you ever considered.... um, well, adopting any foster kid you took in? Ya know... if the courts refused to return the kid home?" I kept working, not wanting to stop.. not wanting to give hope to the flutter rising in my stomach. Mrs. Nixon, however, stopped and looked straight at me.

"Ponyboy, exactly what are you trying to say?"

Her tone wasn't angry, it wasn't repulsive. It was genuine – almost hopeful. Still, I couldn't look her in the eyes. "I ain't saying anything. I was only asking. Asking if you had ever considered it? Adopting a kid?" I felt like a bear caught in a trap. I never should have asked. I looked up quickly, catching a glance at her. She had a concerned look on her face, eyebrows furrowed, like she was contemplating an answer. I should have known better. No one was gonna want a nearly fifteen year old hood like me. What was I thinking?

"Never mind, I was... I dunno.... I dunno what I was thinking." I picked up the wheelbarrow and started to roll it out of the barn. She came over and stopped me, putting her ungloved hands over mine and gently prying my fingers from the wheelbarrow handles. She pulled me to her and held me close in her arms.

"Ponyboy, I have no reason to think that you won't be allowed to go home. No reason at all. It's my understanding that your brothers are fighting tooth and nail to get you back." She took her hand under my chin, forcing my face to hers. "But if for some reason the judge won't return you, I would be happy to have you stay here."

Her voice was soft and sincere. She meant it. I felt my heart jump some. Mrs. Nixon felt my arms tense and release as I responded to her words, and held me tighter.

"You are loved by so many, Ponyboy. And even though I am not your mother, I would be proud to raise her son ... if that's what it comes down to. Now," she said, letting me go again, "set your mind at ease and go dump that. There is still a lot of work to do."

"Yes ma'am." I said, relieved. At least I knew I was gonna have someone fighting for me in my corner.

And a home to go to, no matter how all this panned out.

XXX

Calla Lilly Rose