Disclaimer: I only own the people not mentioned in the book

Author's Note: This is my 2nd Outsiders fic and I know it sucks as of right now. But bear with me. Thanks!

Chapter 2

            "So what was your other family like?" Steve asked Hazel as they made their way over to the Curtis house. He hadn't really mastered talking to her yet, being the—notice the sarcasm—amazing conversationalist that he was.

            "They were…nice," Hazel replied uncomfortablely, "We didn't have much money either."

            Steve laughed bitterly, "Mom thought she was doing such a good thing, giving you away to such good people. Look at how that turned out."

            "The Smith's were good people!" Hazel shot back defensively.

            "Yeah? Why are you here then?"

            "I didn't do it! I didn't do the shit they said I did! And if my parents were still alive, they would've defended me until I got let off the hook!"

            "Still alive?" Steve stopped walking. Hazel froze in her tracks, realizing exactly what she just said.

            "They died, okay? They died and that's why we didn't have much money."

            "We?"

            "Do you have to know everything about me?" Hazel shot at him. Steve blinked a few times, taken aback, before he shrugged in his careless manner and opened the door to the Curtis household.

            "Soda, Darry, Pony! Is there anyone here?!"

            "I'm right here, you don't have to scream," Pony was sitting on the couch, reading. As usual. Steve scowled at him. Pony just looked over his shoulder at Hazel with curiosity.

            "Who's she?" he asked Steve.

            Ignoring him, Steve replied with another question, "Where are Soda and Darry?"

            "They should be back soon." He glanced at Hazel again and she, in turn, edged a little closer to Steve. There was something about this boy that got Hazel both intrigued and a bit frightened. His eyes held it all. It was as if he knew so much, seen so much, but didn't know anything at the same time. The door creaked and in walked two older boys that Hazel registered as mystery boy's older brothers. Steve moved to the side to let them and so did she. Trailing them was a loud boy. A very loud boy.

            "Good afternoon, everyone!!!" he yelled, announcing his entrance. Immediately, Hazel liked him.

            "Hey," were the scattered replies. The loud one seemed to be the only one with any energy left in him.

            "Who are you?" he asked bluntly, spotting Hazel. For the first time, mystery boy's two older brothers noticed her presence.

            "You guys," Steve cleared his throat, "this is my sister Hazel." It was so silent in the room after he said that, the dripping of the water droplets in the sink could be heard.

            "You have a…sister?" muscle man, the one who looked the oldest, inquired.

            Steve nodded, "Yeah, it's a long story."

            "We've got time," movie star, the real good-looking one, shrugged plopping down on the couch next to mystery boy. The loud boy dropped onto the floor watching Steve intently while muscle man leaned his tall figure against the frame of the door. Hazel watched her brother struggle to start the story.

            "Well…you see…what happened was…she was adopted by another family," he finally blurted out, "And this happened when I was like six or seven. I don't really remember much of her though. She's two years younger than me so she was four. We were going to go bankrupt and we didn't really have the money to feed all four of us. My mom never thought to ask any of y'all for help; she don't like charity much you know that," he swallowed, "so she thought that by putting one of her kids up for adoption, it would end up being a win-win situation. She put Hazel up because she was still young and could forget about the miserable beginning of her life once she got older. I was already in school and I already had friends. It would be too strange for me to leave so Hazel went. We never heard from her since the day she was adopted by the Smith's, a nice family with just one son." That seemed to be all that Steve was willing to tell.

            "So…why are you here?" mystery boy turned to Hazel.

            She shrugged, "I got into some trouble," she began speaking for the first time since she and Steve had arrived at the Curtis house, "I mean, I didn't actually do what they accused me of doing, but I lost the case. Instead of sending me to Juvy Hall, they sent me to live with my biological family. My parents, I mean my adoptive parents, died a few years ago in a plane wreck. My older brother and I lived my ourselves. Along the way, we found a bunch of orphans and we hung around them."

            "What did they accuse you of doing?" muscle man asked.

            "I don't really want to talk about it." And that was the end of that conversation. The boys introduced themselves. Ponyboy, the mystery boy, Sodapop, the movie star, and Darry, the muscle man, were brothers just as Hazel had guessed. Two-bit, the loud boy, was not his real name; it was Keith. But apparently, nobody called him that.

            "We had two more buddies," Soda explained, "But they died a few months ago." Hazel nodded and showed signs of sympathy. It seemed a little strange to her that so many deaths had taken place. Darry had told her that he and his brothers lost their parents to a car accident. She wondered to herself if any of the rich people ever had these kinds of problems. When her parents were alive, she didn't remember having to hear about all these deaths. The Smith's weren't exactly rich people, but they weren't poor. They were in the middle-class and pretty well off. After the death of Mr. and Mrs. Smith, Danny and Hazel were left to fend for themselves. Eventually, they lost all their money and sold the house so they wouldn't starve to death.

            "I can show you around the neighborhood if you want," Ponyboy offered Hazel when he noticed she looked a little bit lost even in his house.

            "It's okay," Steve jumped in, "I was going to take her around right now. Come on, Hazel. We'll see you guys around."

            "Thanks anyway," Hazel said to Pony as Steve was pulling her out of the house, a little confused as to why he couldn't come along if he wanted to. But Pony didn't seem fazed. He smiled at her and waved.

            "One thing you have to know," Steve said straight off the bat, "is that I never really had experience being a brother before."

            "It doesn't take much. You'll learn," Hazel assured him.

            "I'm sure I will. Another thing is that there ain't nothing you can do about Socs, or Socials if you want to get technical."

            Hazel was confused. Steve sighed and launched himself into a full explanation on what the socs were and why they were bad and stuff like that. It was all foreign to her, but Hazel listened anyway.

            'We never had so many complications dealing with social classes back at home,' Hazel thought sullenly to herself, 'Then again, this is home now.'

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