The weekend flew by. Pony and I worked on homework with multiple distractions as Two-Bit, Dally and Johnny stopped by and hung out through out the days. Pony and I also had to get the laundry done while Soda and Darry worked all day at their jobs on Saturday. Saturday night Soda went out with his new girl. Her name was Sandy and he thought the world of her right from the beginning. Pony and I had a lengthy conversation about how she was a good distraction for Soda following mom and dad's death. We realized that Soda would have probably latched onto the first pretty girl he met just to get mom and dad off his mind. Darry and Kathryn spoke on the phone Saturday night, but they didn't get together over the weekend. I really hoped they would, I liked having another girl in the house.
On Sunday the weather heated up to sixty degrees and the gang got together with Shepard's gang for a mid afternoon football game in the vacant lot. We loved football. The boys played tackle and I got to play when I wanted to. As the invitation was offered to me I thought about what I should do. With my parents gone and my time with my brothers possibly limited I decided there was no time like the present. I wanted to try not to be so shy and to not waste so much time being scared of what others thought, or scared of failure. I decided to play, besides no one would hit me too hard or they would feel the wrath of Darry and everyone feared that, except maybe Sodapop. The game was fun. We played for hours and I caught one ball for a touchdown. James was there and he tackled me lightly a few times. I knew he was interested, but like Pony, I just wasn't planning on dating yet.
That night for dinner Darry sent everyone away so we could all be together, as a family. I think he was starting to get nervous about the court date, and as he got tense so did the rest of the family.
"Darry, did you talk to Kathryn yet?" I asked.
"No, I called, but her family said she had headed back to the dorms, and she can't get calls there." Darry didn't look up from his plate. Silence fell across the table for a few minutes. There wasn't much anyone could say or do. Darry looked up at me. "Do you and Pony have all your homework done?"
The question was so off the mark for how we were feeling that I had to look up at Pony before answering. "Yeah, we have it all done."
"Good, I want to check it all before you go to bed." Darry smiled and I realized he was just trying to bring normalcy to the evening. Tomorrow was going to be a hard enough night considering it would be exactly one week since our parents were killed. I couldn't imagine how empty my brother's lives would be if twenty four hours from now if I wasn't with them either.
"Do you all want to play a game after dinner?" Ponyboy asked. He loved games. Pony looked around at us. "I was thinking we could play Monopoly or something."
"Sure." I said, I stunk at the game, but I didn't want to think about going to sleep or having to wake up in the morning. Soda and Darry agreed to play too. When it came to board games were all pretty competitive, even Soda, especially during Monopoly. Darry always played to win, he watched everyone's moves and made sure we stuck to the rules. Sodapop could hold his own, but he had a habit of stealing. He rarely stole stuff from real stores but when it came to monopoly he couldn't seem to keep his hands out of the bank. Watching the bank was my responsibility and it had been for years. Mostly because Pony was too scatter brained to keep Soda's paws off the money.
We cleaned off the table and set up the game. Darry and Ponyboy always had to have the same playing tokens each time. Soda knew this and would hide them before the game started. Darry would then clobber Soda until he gave them back. Soda and I didn't care which token we had or if we won, Darry and Ponyboy did. Tonight's punishment for hiding the pieces was Soda was being held upside down by his ankles and tickled by Pony. Gosh Darry sure was strong!
The game lasted nearly four hours. I was the first to lose, no thanks to Darry's empire near New York Ave. Soda felt bad for me so he told me I could live in one of his little houses on Baltic Ave. "I'll let you live there because you have a good job as a banker and all." Then he laughed himself silly. Soda and I were homeless shortly after that, but Pony and Darry just left us to fend for ourselves on the street. For the last hour Pony and Darry went around and around the board exchanging cash till a fatal roll for Darry landed him on a hotel-laden Pennsylvania Ave. That was it for the game and Ponyboy was proud as a peacock that he had won. Darry let him gloat, but warned him he'd be back for a rematch. Pony grinned and left the table. "Losers clean up!" He sang out as he walked off to his room.
The three of us threw the game pieces into the box and I took it back to Ponyboy's closet shelf. When I walked into his room he was laying on his bed smoking a cigarette.
"Darry will kill you if he see's you doing that." I was too short to get the box to the top shelf so I threw it up there hoping it would stay on the first toss, it did.
Pony put out his weed and rolled on to his side. He was thinking about tomorrow, I could tell by his nervous expression. "I don't want tomorrow to come." He mumbled. "I don't see why the court gets to decide, we are doing just fine on our own."
I sat on the edge of his bed. "I hear ya. It's gonna be hard to sleep tonight." I mimicked Pony's nervous look as I sucked the ends of my lips in. "Pony….. if….."
"No ifs!" Pony demanded with agitation in his voice. "There aint going to be any need for them."
"Pony knock it off." I pleaded. "What if it does happen and I don't have time to say goodbye? What if they just haul me away?"
Ponyboy wrapped his arms around me and buried his face into the back of my neck. "Stop it Scout!"
I could tell Pony didn't want to talk about any of it. "Fine, I won't talk about it… but …I"
Pony squeezed harder. "I said stop it!" Just then Soda walked into the room and read the situation the wrong way.
"Wrestling match!" Soda yelped and jumped on top of both Pony and I.
"Get off me Soda!" I tried to yell through my laughter. Pony was able to throw Soda off, but Soda was right back up.
I wiggled free and Soda noticed as I tried to flee the room. "Get her Pony she's getting away!" How quickly the tables turned and Pony and Soda leapt from the bed onto my back flattening me to the floor.
"Darry!" I yelled for help. Two against one was never a fair fight.
Darry appeared in the doorway and laughed at us. He lifted Pony off the pile like a sack of fifty pound potatoes.
"Look out Soda you're next!" I laughed knowing Soda was in trouble. Darry grabbed a hold of him too. I stood up laughing at my brothers who were working on a plan to get Darry back, "Ha ha!" I teased.
Darry looked at me with a sly grin, "What are you laughing about? I was only getting them out of the way. You're the one in trouble now!" With that Darry flipped me head over heels on to the bed and tickled me till I ran out of breath. As the wrestling match came to a close I soaked up the moment while we were all smiling. Oh Lord I am going to miss my brothers!