THE BEGINNING
Chapter Ten
No matter that I don't have much to pack, I still roll out of bed way before first light to start. A bundle of nerves I arrange and rearrange what little I have, folding my one sweater and tucking it in between my old dresses, just so. Then I yank it out again and start over, smoothing the wrinkles and picking at an errant thread.
I tie my hair back, even though Darrel prefers it loose, but today it's in no kind of condition to be set free. I notice my eyes appear larger in a face that's been whittled down. My reflection stares back, a reminder of what I've seen and where I've been.
I walk to the window and look down on an empty street, and there's nothing to do but wait. I wait for headlights to splinter the dark. I wait for Darrel. To bring my life back to me. I wait for him...
May, 1944
My heart gallops, breath shaky when I sit on cold porcelain and pull my panties down. My knees open just enough for my stomach to wither when I see again the disappointment of clean white cotton. I wipe and check the toilet paper, willing my blood there, staring hard until traces of pink imaginations begin playing tricks.
It's been two months since I last bled. Six weeks since Darrel promised he'd pull out, three weeks since he ran off again for New Orleans to find work once the fields were seeded, and two days since my father did the unthinkable.
I shiver in the gray of a hollow morning and remember how to breathe.
To wait on something you know in your bones ain't ever gonna come, that's a dreadful way to pass the days.
But the wait, all this, it's my fault really.
Darrel's voice is raspy against my neck, "God Maggie, I'm gonna come," and before he can scramble to pull away I lock against him and hold him close, hold him for dear life. He can't pull out now.
"No," is my whispered whimper, "I want you inside me. Darrel. Always."
His final thrust is deep and my nails scratch down his back when I arch to feel the pulse of his warm release, to taste the sweat on his shoulder and to hear him breathe my name and God's.
And it's all my fault. My glorious fault.
xXx
All the ironing's finished, my dresses are hung and Daddy's slacks pressed just how he likes them, when I escape the hot kitchen to take a walk up by Cane River. The Spanish moss is welcoming to sit beneath, to read my letter once again, and I skip a stone but miss, the gray shale sinking beneath the riverbed where the currents really start picking up. And I know good and well where these waters run, all the way down into the bayou, where the Curtis shack sags low against time and grief.
The two sons are all that's left of that family now, and everyone says of the oldest Curtis boy and his wild shenanigans, "Guess Shaw ain't had enough bad fate, he gotta go and tempt his own." But Shaw Curtis happens to be his little brother's hero. Had Darrel heard them speaking like that of his only brother, his best friend, they wouldn't get away with it.
Some say they're a family cursed by the hexes of an evil voodoo. And I've seen Darrel himself throw his head back and laugh when he agrees, playing along with the caramel skinned women who try to break the black magic spell. From the market stalls where they sell their wares, they beg him to wear the gris-gris amulets they offer up and hang around his tanned neck. And in my eyes, Darrel's as different and exotic as those Creole ladies who still speak their French and live among the restless spirits that walk this genteel parish.
After stirring up all their intrigue, the curious eyes of the townsfolk follow his easy gait. And he carries himself home from the old square, with a certain pride of where he comes from, comfortable in his skin and his name, and relaxes into the swamp country that has always managed to sustain him, even through her harder seasons.
Daddy snatched my tongue when I was little and threatened to cut it off if I ever mentioned voodoo again inside our walls, and he swore this while standing among the crucifixes and the candles of patron saints meant for warding off a Catholic kind of evil. My father doesn't believe the Curtises are as cursed as they are trash, and worse, being that they're only a mere two generations deep in Louisiana, as outsiders.
I wouldn't dare tell my father about Darrel's outlaw kin, moonshine bootleggers from the hollers of Tennessee. Though anyone would be entertained by Darrel's animated and magnetic storytelling of both the lawmen and the crooked, and his rendition of how his great-grandaddy Capshaw ran south to escape them Appalachian hills like his tail was on fire. I'd imagine even Daddy might grin at these wild adventures, so long as his daughter wasn't smitten with the boy who told them.
"That boy, he ain't our people. Not our kind at all." And the more Daddy goes on about him, the more I want that outsider.
Four more days till Darrel comes back home, from what I can gather in his postcard. Its ink has bled in some places, where it must've met a rainstorm between here and that dirty French Quarter, but I can make out his untamed handwriting, his wisecrack that he has more faith in the Pony Express than our postal service, and his countdown until he comes back to me. Even his written words cry out with lust. Something deep in my womb rises to meet it, throbbing to be filled with him again, then aching because it can't.
I cringe thinking of his split knuckles and the punches he's willing to take for such little prize money, and a thug's life he's forced to lead when he's working the most corrupted of streets. Oh how I long for him. I breathe for him. I live for him.
Knowing my father sneaks through my things, I throw the postcard into the river and watch it gracefully round the bend, drifting toward those magnificent and beautiful curses of the backwoods that have given me Darrel Curtis.
I wait for him...
I'm an hour behind schedule. I wanted to make Oklahoma City before morning rush, but our late night of spent emotion and promised coke floats took its toll on all of us. I could hardly rouse Darry from his sleep to let him know I was hitting the road, so I left him a note and deposited a sleeping Pony in his bed.
The rising sun has my eyes burning and my cap pulled low. And though I'm hellbent on getting to her, I think I'm more nervous now than I was the night I drove to her daddy's to pull her out of that house and out of Louisiana. More nervous even than the first time I went back, to visit Shaw through the glass partition inside Angola. My brother I cherish, locked behind a life sentence in the toughest of penitentiaries.
June, 1944
The grass looks like it's walking from all them leaping grasshoppers, and Shaw comes up slow behind me, sipping his beer and then pointing the bottle neck at me.
"I ain't asking', I'm tellin' you Darrel, getcha affairs in order and get out while you can, 'fore they start aimin' fingers at you, understand?" His hands are nicked all to hell and I'm not sure if the blood is someone else's. "I don't want you anywhere near my mess."
I think about Maggie and how I'd feel if our love was forbidden not by just one man, but a hundred or more, marching and violent behind their torches and cowardly cloaks.
I don't ask him what he's done but I know after this, it's only bound for worse, and I spit against the ground they singed.
I stand beside my brother, always have, always will.
Even in the light of the day those crosses burn right there inside our eyes, and as long as I live I won't forget the horror, the devastated look on his face when we ran out of our home and watched the hateful flames shoot up and lick at the sky their warning.
Cause half this parish knows Shaw Curtis been sharing his bed with a Creole girl.
xXx
"Maggie, honey, you 'member Tug from the cotton farm? And that oil jobber he told me 'bout up 'round Tulsa? I wanna leave tonight. With you baby." I flex my stiff fingers and blow on freshly busted knuckles.
Her voice sounds far away on the telephone. "Just up and leave?"
"Good as time as any," my laugh is quiet and more of a question, "right darlin'?"
I can hear her breath through the line, rapid from her gunfire impulse to say yes, but her words are measured and sincere. "Any time, anywhere Darrel, I'm yours. But..?"
"Don't you worry. I'll handle your daddy."
The hounds of hell or the devil himself couldn't hold me back from her. I bite back a growl that erupts from the thought alone. There's no length I wouldn't go for my girl and our baby. I'd hunt down and kill the soul that tried to take either. And I don't think I've been more dangerous.
"I'll be ready and waitin'," she tells me with the confidence of a seasoned gambler, and all her chips are in.
I race to get to her, before the first siren ever screams, before the morning story catches on an evening wind.
I spot him, right there slinking sideways between two parked ambulances. He's here. He made it. And he's loping up the concrete steps, taking them by twos, and my heart's beating faster the closer he gets. I look down from the third story window and see him as I did for the very first time on Market Street, only now he's made even more beautiful because our boys are everywhere inside him, behind his eyes and wrapping his bones, dancing all throughout the steady pulse of his strong veins. He takes off his ball cap and opens the door for a hurried lady, giving her a respectful nod and I'm sure a kind hello, then runs a quick hand through his hair right before he disappears into the building entrance below me. And he's as captivating as he ever was.
I reach for my clasp, and let my curls fall loose around my shoulders.
It takes time to sign in at the front desk and get clearance to take the elevator. I step out into the hallway but can't seem to walk beyond my door I lean against, while the butterflies swarm my stomach and my eyes gaze on the bronzed arrow above the elevator shaft as it starts from one and rounds its pointer to three. I feel faint and close my eyes, listen for the tired ding and the orderly who slides the cage doors open.
I open my eyes in time to see him scan the signs, figuring out which direction to go since I'm in a different room than when he left me here. He turns his head and spots me, and his face, his whole aura lights up and sparks all those butterflies of mine into exploding fireworks. He makes his way down my hall, and he's somehow taller than I remember, and it's a wonder I haven't melted, that my knees haven't failed me and I haven't slid boneless all the way down to the cold tile, but it's that sexy grin that holds me up, those eyes that lock and lift me, pulling me to stand and turn to face him.
I'm not quite sure he's really here until I hear him saying, "There's my girl," and he's sounding out everything that means home. And he's got all of me before he ever sweeps me up into his rugged arms, my feet now dangling high above the sterile floor and I grasp the back of his shirt into my fists.
"I'm sorry," is tucked somewhere inside my soft crying, and he's quick to shush me.
"Ssh, no, no baby," he whispers and puts me down easy, wipes my tears with tender fingers, "you don't gotta be sorry. Don't even say that," and his eyes are racing all over me, exactly how he does whenever he checks the boys to see if or where they're hurt. And once he realizes my tears are falling on lips that smile, he breathes in satisfaction and bends to kiss me, his hand tangled through my hair. And I'm back where I've always belonged.
"That's way too much cereal Soda. You're never gonna eat all that. Put some of it in Pony's bowl so it don't go to waste." I hold the carton away and won't pour him any milk till he minds me. He scoops up the smallest handful, but gets a good dose of my burning eyes, and he's shamed into filling up two fists for our little brother's empty bowl.
"Hey," Pony whines and holds his nose, "I don't want no cornflakes," but neither of us listen to him while I dole out milk for three cereals.
We eat in an early morning silence, all of us in our underwear, and their smacking and chewing's getting on every last one of my nerves. I'm so tired, and remembering my science book, I imagine 206 of my bones wearing down to a fine powder. And all I want to do is lie in bed. But I know that I can't.
"Dad says we all gotta scrub up good and wear clean clothes for when Ma comes home." My chin rests on my palm. "And put the den back together too."
And how quickly a set of chores can dampen their excitement for Mom's return. Their groans and complaints and we-don't-wannas somehow make me feel a little better. A little lighter. I drink the milk from my bowl and head to the couch to put back the cushions.
It's there where I see Mom's broken Mary. She's now on the piano, sitting right beside her own head, but she hasn't stopped praying. The taste of guilt is sour and almost makes me gag and Soda's suddenly beside me, his hand up on my shoulder.
"I sure would hate for Jesus to see what you've gone and done to his mom." He's shaking his head sadly, because he's already pretty sure Jesus can see everything anyway and his own brother's on the fast track to Hell. "I can help you glue her back together Darry..if you want," And I look down at Soda, and I wince against my intense feelings, the overwhelming appreciation for him that almost hurts me when I hear his kind offer.
And we spend the next half hour with a jar of Elmer's and the broken Virgin, tongues out in concentration, fingers poised, carefully lining the head to fit exactly along the cracks, situating and re-situating and situating all over again, until we both stand back and are satisfied with the end result.
"Just leave her be while she dries," I snap at Pony who gets too close.
Soda, screwing the lid on the mason jar, must've found some of his nerve to ask me, "Why'd you say that last night anyway Darry? Why don't you want Ma to come back home?" At least he had the decency to wait until Ponyboy left the room.
I study my toes, watch them bend and grip at the worn carpet beneath, while Soda waits for an answer. And all I wanna know is why am I the only one around here who wants to act like the last several months, the last year just didn't happen? But I think about what Dad told me about respecting Mom, and not just to her face but around my brothers. After all he's been through, I guess that seems pretty fair. I hem and haw and try to find my words, work at piecing something together. "I..didn't really..mean.."
Both our heads jerk around to the sound of splitting glue and porcelain tumbling against the table, and the Mother's lost her head again and now the break is even worse.
"Oh no," Soda's bringing his hand over his mouth and he looks heartbroken.
But all I feel anymore is fury, swift and striking. I point at Soda, my finger aimed dead center of his sun soaked face, just below his summer hair that's sweeping into his warm and forgetful eyes. "You know good and well why I don't want her here Soda," and my sudden cruel turn only baffles him. His face screws up in confusion. And I repeat what he already knows or should anyway, my voice low and my words cryptic, "You know exactly why."
After Dr. James goes over a few things at our discharge meeting, after I'm clear on the medication she needs to keep taking, after he tells me how they unearthed some of Maggie's past trauma and that she needs to continue her therapy back in Tulsa with Dr. Sherman, after he lists the behaviors I need to watch out for should her depression come back to steal her again, I'm finally shaking his hand and showing my gratitude for all his help, for the promises the good man kept.
But it's when Maggie falls apart at their goodbye is when I realize the depth of where they've been. And I wonder all that she told him but can't seem to tell me. Her own husband. I'm quick to brush away that schoolboy twinge of jealousy and remind myself that Dr. James gave me back my wife. The boys' mother.
I hold her suitcase and her hand as we walk out of the doors of this asylum and I can't believe the difference in the way we're leaving from the way we showed up that terrible morning. How I had to carry her in this place, how desperate and frantic I was, how lost Maggie was to all of us.
I open the car door for her and get her situated, take my seat and grip the steering wheel to hold myself back. To keep from reaching over and sliding my hand between her thighs and letting it rest there while I drive, like I always have, in that spot reserved for me. But I know she's still fragile, I know I have to be careful with her, and be happy she's come this far.
But I want all of her back. If it were up to me, I'd take her to a motel bed this instant and undress her and spend the afternoon taking her all in, all the secret parts of her I've missed for so long. But I know that's not where we are right now. She's still recovering. She's been through the mill and then some.
"You're beautiful babe, ya know that?" And she smiles over at me, and I take her hand and pull it to my mouth to kiss it, then intertwine with her fingers, letting our hands come to rest on the console between us, and that's a start.
We talk about the boys for most of the drive, and I tell her all the funny things they've done and said, but I know it's hard for her to hear how much they missed her. I make sure to remind her that we're going home now, and we can start up where we left off and in time, and all this will come to feel like some faraway dream..
It already feels like a faraway dream. The past two years of my life is lost to a crippling fog.
Our fingers intertwine and I have to hold back from puling his hand where I need it. What I really want is to be naked beside him. To feel safe against warm skin and muscle. To find who we used to be, who we always were.
To be alive and sure and young...
I lock against him and hold him close, hold him for dear life. "I want you inside me. Darrel. Always."
But I'm a mental patient, and he'd probably only think I was acting crazy or manic. Dr. James told him to keep an eye out for that didn't he?
He's so gorgeous and he's mine, and I can't reach out and have him.
I watch my name on his skin, moving with his bicep as he switches gears.
On impulse I tell him, "Don't you know I dreamed about you? Every night."
His smile stretches like a lazy cat. "Darlin' you can't even imagine how I dreamed 'bout you."
And I hope his dreams were as dirty as mine, but I don't say that.
xXx
Thirty miles from Tulsa and I'm ravenous. For my babies. My pull to them is painful and primal and Darrel isn't driving fast enough. Get me to them dammit. My nerves are shot and I need a cigarette. My breathing is rushed and I put my hand against my chest that's struggling and feels hot to the touch. My God. I need Ponyboy to sleep against me. I need to kiss Darry's forehead. I need Soda to call me Momma. So bad it makes me nauseated. I imagine myself ripping off my dress and tearing through the streets of Tulsa, screaming like a mad woman until I make it to my door.
"You okay babe?" Darrel's eyeing me, concerned. And I know we're almost there and I count and find the pattern of the slats in the air vents, and I'm starting to steady out, but I'm still jumpy.
"You think I can make it up to them?" I ask him out of nowhere, so he doesn't have a chance to give a prepared answer. I want him to be honest.
He doesn't hesitate. "Of course. They're children. Your children." He's sure it's as simple as that. But there's one child he hasn't brought up today as much as the other two and that's the one who's scaring me.
"Even Darry?"
A split second tell. A pause, a shift only I could detect before he assures me, "Yeah, even Darry." And I nod like I'm satisfied with his answer, while a mountain of worry builds strong inside my gut, boulder crashing over boulder.
Our little house comes into view.
The sound of gravel summons two little boys outside.
They fly off the porch, with hands outstretched, joyful shouts of "They're here, they're here."
I race to reach them, to devour and take them in, breathe them in. I am them and they are me.
And it's not lost on me how clean and put together they are in neat clothes, their hair combed, both of them looking sharp as tacks, like they've stepped out of the Sears Roebuck catalog. And I'm fully aware how much effort it takes to pull that off with these two.
There are so many things they say they want to show me, and I'm being pulled inside by tugs and shoves and snakes and snails and puppy dog tails.
And there, up in the corner of the porch, stands the third little boy, my beautiful child who hovers just outside all the excitement, his hands in pockets, with watchful eyes and a grave expression. And I can tell he's getting a subtle but stern reminder from his daddy about how he should behave. But I don't want him to have to do anything but what comes natural. And real.
And real is the only way my Darry could ever imagine being. He defies his father and walks into the house without a word.
But not once did his eyes ever leave me.
A/N: The Outsiders by SE Hinton
So sorry to inundate you with so much backstory. But hey, you did get to see the exact split-second Darry Curtis was conceived so that's something right? I hope that makes up for it :) Thank you to all those who are still reading!