Eilidh MacGavin: Wow thank you for your kind review, yes I love my character development, and that tends to happen when you are with your lover and by yourself. Wendy and Johnny have lives that develop them. Which helps them grow with each other.
tomeii: Thank you for your kind words, I appreciate them. My condolences for your Aunt.
Guest: My condolences for your Grandma, thank you for reviewing.
Guest 2: Well that's an idea, I'll have to consider it.
Why 4 What: Wow, only a day! I'm impressed. That's quite a compliment.
Guest: I don't want it to end either.
Chapter XXVIII
S*S
It was only after the purple evening plunged into pure blackness that Wendy dared to slip out of the room she shared with Aunt Jeanie, slipping out of the cot Dad and Uncle Jerry had set up for her. One that honestly felt a little too much like a cradle for her liking as Connie had pointed out, snidely:
"It's perfect for you, Wendy. A little manager for the perfect child."
Wendy scowled at the memory, as she fumbled her way through the Woods home in the dark. There were more important things to deal with than her sister right now. Things like tidying up the mess Jerry and Jeanie had left all over the kitchen table from the funeral's reception. She didn't think Jeanie especially had a mind to bear it in the morning. And she couldn't stand of thought of Jerry having to do it. So she'd made up her mind to do it herself in the moonlight, quietly.
If you're going to do good, chey, do it like tossing a pebble into water, so said her Mama. Clutching at the railing, a blinded and wispy figure in the pure whiteness of her nightgown, she would've frightened any soul who'd seen her half to death. The fact that the wind was whipping dead leaves against the windows and rattling the doors didn't help. These soft knocks sounded almost human, almost pleading. Like someone wanted desperately to come in and warm up, and escape the November cold.
She shuddered, the specter of two little boys running about Windrexdville, hunting century-old ghosts, passed through her mind. Young and pale and eternal in time before vanishing into the night as the wind picked up, roaring like a flame. Like the house was on fire around them. Crumbling down-
Jumping with a tiny shriek, Wendy pressed both hands to her face and kept them there, until she felt her heart rate return to something resembling normal.
That didn't stop her hands from shaking, though.
S*S
They were still shaking a few hours later, when chased there by her own fright, Wendy finally snatched up the phone and punched in the number to the Curtis residence. A horrible feeling twisted her stomach as she listened to the Bring. For heaven's shake, what was she doing? It was six in the morning, the Curtis household would be asleep. As they darn well had earned the right to be after a week of hard work. And Johnny too, he had told her he'd be staying there for the weekend, safe and warm-
*Bring.*
And how much of a baby would she seem to him, to all of them, if a spook in the night made her long to hear his voice, even miles away over a telephone line?
*Brrring.*
She should hang up. Quickly. No harm, no foul-
*Br-*
"Hello? Who's this?"
Too late. Wendy winced at the sleepy, mildly-annoyed tone of Mr. Curtis, as it came to her ear, and shuffled guilty.
"Mr. Curtis? It's ah, me. Wendy," she muttered, shuffling. At once, Mr. Curtis' entire tone of voice changed, sparking into warmth like the butt end of his cigarette.
"Wendy? How yah doin' girl? We've missed yah over here. Someone a mite more than the rest."
"Um...I'm okay, I guess, sir," Wendy answered, sheepishly. "I'm so sorry to disturb you, but-"
A low, teasing hum echoed over the line. "Well Ah suppose Ah'm not the voice yoah pretty ears wanna be ringin' with just now-"
From somewhere in the background, she heard Johnny give an embarrassed plea for the phone and covered her mouth again to hide her own matching giggle.
"Give her hell, Johnnyboy," Mr. Curtis chuckled before there was the sound phone changing hands, with the crackle of the line. Wendy unconsciously began chewing her lip, her pulse picking up with the anticipation of wanting, wanting, wanting-
"Hey, Wendy," Johnny's autumn rasp sounded warmly in her ear, sparking a blissful satisfaction up and down the length of her spine.
"Hey yourself," she whispered back, that fool of a grin peeling across her mouth again. Safe and warm and sound. Just his voice could make her feel all things. Could make her so darn happy.
"Sorry I called you this early," she apologized again, as decorum demanded. Though by this point, she was hard-pressed to make herself truly sorry for it. And judging by the warm, pleasing note in Johnny's answering silence, he knew this as well. And that was good. Wendy wanted him to know it. All of it. Maybe one day, all of her.
"'S fine," he finally answered, more of that voice that was beginning to have the ability to curl her toes in delight. "Kinda hopin' ya would call. I uh...missed ya. Somthin' awful, Wen."
Wendy sucked in her breath on the other side of the line, wishing so badly that there was a better means of communicating. She loved Johnny's voice, but she wanted more of him than that. She wanted to see his face with his fine olive-tan skin, and his bangs as they enhanced his eyes. She wanted to watch his thoughts as they played on his features. And Johnny's thoughts were so wise for their age. They made him more handsome.
"I miss you too," she admitted freely, tightening her grip on the phone cord, and winding it around her fingers like a wedding ring. "Just...Just be sure to talk quietly, everybody is still asleep here."
"How long do ya think we have to talk, Wen?"
"Well, sun's hardly up, so I'd say 'bout half an hour before someone comes down for coffee. Is that okay?"
"Well, I'd rather have forever, but take what ya can get, right?"
By now, Wendy was mildly surprised that the glow in her cheeks didn't light up the Woods' living room. Delighted, she curled up further into the reading chair, not minding that her scrunched up nightgown piled at her waist, striping bare her legs.
"Right," she breathed in whisper agreement. "S-So what's new with you?"
S*S
"Not much," Johnny answered honestly. And there hadn't been. The most unexpected thing in his life so far had been her: with that gentle robin-egg gaze, ebony silk for hair, and the softest skin he'd ever touch; either with his slightly-shaking fingers or more often now, with his mouth. Giving him a damn good taste of her to boot. Vanilla and something flowery-
He shivered slightly, an unexpected if not wholely unpleasant surge shooting through him like a locomotive. All horsepower and fire. Coal and steam.
And Wendy.
He flexed his long fingers around the phone's grip, swallowing around his Adam's apple.
She called him. But something was off in her tone at first, he could hear that, even from the couch as Mr. C picked up. It had been her "slightly panicked" voice, the one she had when something had spooked her badly, and she was trying to talk herself out of being afraid. It immediately put him on high alert, 'cause that was how it worked now. Wendy's fear was his fear, and her fear always set off a pistol in Johnny's head, demanded that he -somehow-talk her down, smooth her out, drain that bubbling dread that could sometimes build up inside her. Make her better.
Honestly, it wasn't so unlike when Ponyboy got worked up about something or other. So he was an old hand at knowing how to deal with folks born with brains too big for their heads. Sometimes, if they got rattled, both Pony and Wen had a nasty habit of...untethering themselves from the world around 'em, and floated off into senselessness. When that happened, they could act like lil' kids who'd jumped into the deep end of the swimming pool. But through blind panic, forgot that they knew how to swim.
And yes, one summer, Ponyboy had actually done just that. Johnny had swum out and tugged him to like a noodle to the shallow end before it got worse.
Anyways-
"Hey Wen," he said, trying hard not to be too eager, but it was hard. "When ya get back...I wanna...lets do somthin' ya know? Just us. Whaddaya say?"
"I'd love that!" Wendy replied, in her gleeful, shy-like way that never failed to make him grin, lopsided and satisfied. "What ya got in mind?"
And that was another thing that was starting to make him crazy...ever since they'd started dating, Wendy had picked up his speech patterns, merging them into her own. And damn if Greaser slang didn't sound good coming from her lips.
"I'll tell ya when ya get here, Wen," he promised her, thoughts already turning, whirling. Planning it out. Then he let himself grow serious again. "And how are you, with ya family and all?"
A sigh came over the other end.
"Well as can be expected, I suppose...I'm just glad it's over with..." then Wendy paused. "But I shouldn't say that. For my Aunt and Uncle, it's never gonna be over ya'know? They lost their future. I just can't imagine it."
Something cold crawled over him then, and without thinking, Johnny's eyes flickered over to Mr. Curtis, who had taken his smoke into the kitchen under the golden light. The words in the silent house carried, and even in the faint light of his cancer stick, he could see the older man stiffen with some primal furor older than Man himself, maybe. And the brown eyes that Mr. C shared with Soda glanced down the hall to his sons' bedrooms, mouth pressed and muscles tight before forcefully loosening.
For his end, Johnny tried for a moment to imagine a world without the gang. No, not just without. If the gang had never existed he wouldn't know what he was missing. If they were taken away...he wasn't sure what that would do to him. His mind refused to let him imagine it.
Then he tried to picture a world without Wendy in it. And immediately had to backtrack because his brain just. Couldn't. Do. It.
Wendy had only been a part of his world for a couple of weeks as a girlfriend. A few months as a friend. But she was melted into him somehow, like fire and wood. He wasn't sure how normal that was. Or if it was even normal at all. He had no point of reference for this thing. Not from his friends. Sure as hell not from his parents.
The closest thing he had to an example was Mr. and Mrs. Curtis. And they had known each other younger and started liking each other older than Johnny and Wendy were now.
But those were matters for another day. Now-
"Given 'em time Wendy," he advised her softly, running his hand through his bangs with a sigh. "Sometimes...that's all ya can do."
She breathed on the other end. "I know...I...oh my Aunt's getting up. I gotta go, Johnny."
Disappointment swelled in him, but Johnny had too much sense to let it show. "All right, I'll let ya go."
And even saying it in that context brought a painful twist to his gut. From the silence on the other end, he thought it was a good bet Wendy felt it too.
"Will you?" she asked.
That made him smile, wry and determined as he shook his head, knowing she couldn't see him. But she read his voice cues better than morses code.
"Nah," he assured her. "Ya a keeper, Wen."
He could almost hear her smiling, pure and delighted. Golden like the sun. "Likewise...Bye."
That last part was almost a whisper.
"Bye," he answered. And blew out air as soon as he put the phone down. Jesus. H. Christ.
But damn if he didn't have a fool's grin on his face as well.
Mr. Curtis chuckled around his second cancer stick of the night, before raising his hands in slow applause.
"Bravo," he hummed. Johnny felt his neck heat up again. But he allowed a sheepish, cocky sort of toss to be added to his smile, like some gunslinger in a western.
"Not to bad huh, sir?" he asked.
"No son, not bad at all. Any slicker, an' ya would've been speakin' rainwater," Mr. Curtis crackled, eyes dancing. "But tell me, Johnny B. Good, just where and what are ya plannin' on doin' with that girl?"
Johnny blinked, then went to scratch the back of his head. "I uh, I'm spitballin' that sir."
Mr. Curtis sucked in his cheek and tutted. "Oh, no-no-no. That ain't gonna do. That ain't gonna do at all. Now ya listen hear-"
S*S
"Wendy Marie, what are you doing up so early?" was the first thing Jeanie Wood nee Allen asked her niece when she came down the stairs, tying her lavender kimono nightgown around herself. Real silk too, it was a gift from Jerry when he had been stationed overseas in Japan.
"I couldn't sleep," Wendy answered easily enough, pushing hair out of her face and using a cloth to lift the kettle she'd filled and set it on the table. "And it got to the point where I couldn't lay there any longer."
"Aw," Jeanie said, tired, but with a faded trace of her old good nature. Some had settled within her since the funeral, a completion of -not her loss, but of her denial of it. And in acceptance had come a greater level of peace in some ancient, deep place within her. Folks Jeanie's age came from hardy stock, born in a world of Depression and Peral Harbors and Omaha beaches. So they were darn well used to the fact that the people they loved were not permanent upon this earth. And yet the world turned, turned, turned.
And the only thing to do about it is straighten your spine and get busy living.
And remain yourself that the world is not a cold, cruel place...no matter what it took from you.
Jeanie accepted her tea from her niece, absently swishing a spoon around the mug as Wendy nursed her own, in the very same manner Mariska would; when the new bride would wake up early in the morning, and corner whatever member of her new family came down the stairs with a directory, determined to improve her English.
Jeanie snorted with fond remembrance. That young woman's personality had been divided between her daughters. Connie had the lion's share of Mari's brass, the bull-headed, take-no-prisoners defiance that allowed a seventeen-year-old girl to survive the hell that had stamped those damn numbers on her arm, like branding cattle.
But Wendy had Mariska's ever-melting heart. The heart that broke itself over and over and refused to harden. The heart that never stopped weeping for the family she lost. The heart that loved others to the bottom of its soul. The heart that glowed in Mari's eyes, whenever Frank had been away, and she'd just gotten off...talking...with...him...on the phone.
Oh...ohhoho.
Jeanie felt her eyebrow arch, and with a practiced slyness, she glanced over to her right. And sure enough, the telephone wasn't quite in the place where it had been last night. In fact, it looked hastily adjusted.
Well then.
Wendy hesitated as she moved to refill her cup, wisely not trusting the sudden small smile that crossed her aunt's face. Cause suddenly, little things about Wendy started making sense, her fidgeting all night, her humming West Side Story under her breath, without even realizing it.
"Is...is everything okay Aunt Jeanie?" Wendy asked hesitantly, looking as if she wasn't sure she wanted to know the answer. And by golly that was all Frank. It made Jeanie giggle snort. Because really now, she should've seen this coming. Wendy was a young lady now, and as pretty a-one as Mariska had been, even if she was a mercifully a bit quieter about it than Mari had been. Oh, Jeanie loved her sister-in-law to death, but Mari had been as vain as a peacock, she never went a week without buying a new hat or shoes or shade of lipstick. And took the attention she received from it as her casual due.
Vhy vouldn't they look at me? Mari had laughed, arm and arm with Jeanie. They knov a good thing vhen they see one I think.
Jeanie smiled fondly at the memory.
"Early morning conversation then hon?" she asked lightly. And did Wendy ever get a deer-in-the-headlights look. She desperately tried to play it off, but the poor girl had all of Mariska's ticks, right down to itching her wrist.
"I...I don't," Wendy fumbled, her sweet olive face turning slowly redder than the tomato soup her mother had prided herself in. Jeanie hummed again, feeling and remembering what it was to be young and giddy and over-the-moon for that one sweet person that belonged solely to you. She wondered just who this boy was.
But Jeanie was sharp enough to see that Wendy wasn't in any fit state to share that information just yet. If her hunch was right, even Frank was probably still in the dark. Maybe that was best too. Wendy was his favorite out of his children...most definitely out of his daughters. The thought of his second to oldest being noticed by the male population of the world might just send her brother to the next one.
Slow and steady then, Jeanie figured, holding up a hand. Immediately Wendy quieted.
"Sweetie, if you're not ready to share, ya don't have to," Jeanie assured her with a soft smile. "Every gal's gotta have a secret or two, hmmm? But if you ever need to talk... I'm only ever a phone call away. You hear?"
Wendy still looked Bambi-eyed, but her shoulders had relaxed, and Mariska's grateful smile slowly peeped out behind that fine black hair.
"I hear Aunt Jeanie...thank you."
Hey, here's an early Christmas present guys! Merry Christmas!