Chapter Twenty-Five:


Sighing, I opened the front door and trudged inside the house wearily, letting the door bang closed behind me.

I winced at the noise, which drew Darry in from the kitchen. "There ya are," he muttered, coming towards me. "Sodapop cooked dinner, we were just about to sit down and eat."

"Sorry," I said, stifling a yawn. "Got held up."

"S'okay," Darry grunted, stepping forward to take my jacket for me.

"What are we havin'?" I asked, shrugging my bag down onto the couch. "Green pancakes?"

Darry shook his head, a frown creasing his face. "Chicken and rice," he replied evenly.

Startled, I lifted my head to fix him with an incredulous look. "Regular chicken and rice? Nothin' different or strange about it?"

Darry nodded wordlessly, and I knew now why he looked so disturbed. Soda is as original as his name, and whenever he's the one in the kitchen, our food usually ends up coming out looking like something out of one of those Sci-fi movies Two-Bit loves watching. It almost always tastes good, so we've learned to live with his creative culinary skills, besides it's kind of fun not knowing what he'll think up next.

"He was smokin' this afternoon when I got home, too," Darry added grimly, and I bit my lip. Soda hardly ever smoked, not unless he was anxious or upset about something, or trying to look tough, of course.

Great, I muttered to myself. Just what I need. After a hideously long day at work, all I'd wanted was a nice peaceful evening, but if Soda was all twisted up about something, things wouldn't stay quiet for long.

I instantly felt bad for thinking that way, especially when my brother was obviously upset about something, but I couldn't help it. It had been a week since Steve found out about my double shifts, and I'd worked every day since. I was tired, my head was killing me, and I had a stack of homework that was threatening to topple down on my head. I wanted to scream in frustration.

Instead, I asked, "Where's Ponyboy?"

"In his room," Darry answered, glancing past me towards the closed door of the bedroom Pony and Soda shared. "Workin' on that theme essay Mr. Syme assigned him." His eyes narrowed sharply, "Or at least he'd better be," he muttered gruffly.

I sighed, brushing a loose strand of hair behind my ear. "He still hasn't gotten any work done on it?" I asked.

"Nope," Darry shook his head. "At this rate, I'm beginnin' to wonder if he ever will."

"Want me to talk to him?" I asked wearily.

"Let me handle him," Darry replied, blowing out a long hiss of air. "The way he's been actin', he ain't likely to listen to any of us, but I'm gonna have to try and make him see reason somehow."

"What about Soda then?"

Darry shook his head. "Just let him be for now. Ya know how he is, he likes to keep things to himself- kinda like you, princess."

I gave him a sheepish smile, partly to cover up my own discomfort at the unintentional reminder that I was keeping quite a bit to myself these days. "Yeah, okay. I'm gonna go give Soda a hand, why don't ya go get Ponyboy for dinner?"

"Let's see if he's really doing his homework or not," Darry mumbled under his breath as he stalked past me towards the bedroom.

Not waiting around to see what the answer was, I headed for the kitchen, pausing in the doorway when I saw Soda stirring the rice absently, a distant look on his face. Swallowing, I called out, "Need some help?"

Soda shook himself free of whatever reverie had taken hold of him and shrugged. "Ya could set the table if ya want."

"Sure," I nodded, and walked over to the cabinets to pull out the plates. I glanced over at Soda as I hunted for the silverware, and I had to bite my tongue to keep from saying something. He looked about as depressed as he had right after Mom and Dad's accident, and I hated seeing him like that. But Darry had said to give him some time, so that's what I was going to do.

A few minutes later Ponyboy and Darry joined us, Pony grumbling to himself as he dropped down into his chair at the table, and Darry clenching his jaw tightly, clearly annoyed with our little brother. His expression was stony as he marched over to the refrigerator and pulled out the chocolate milk, so I grabbed four glasses and sat them on the counter for him. He gave me a small look of gratitude, then glared at Ponyboy before starting to pour the milk.

I groaned to myself, knowing this dinner wasn't going to end well.

Soda was quiet throughout the entire meal, which was even more disconcerting than hearing he'd been smoking or eating normal colored food. More than once I exchanged a concerned glance with Darry, but he just shook his head, signaling me to leave it alone.

After dinner Ponyboy dumped his dishes in the sink and headed for the front door.

"Ponyboy?" I called, a little sharper than I'd meant to, and he turned to scowl at me.

"What?" he demanded impatiently, sounding as surly as one of the Brumly boys.

"Where do ya think you're goin'?" I asked, trying to keep my tone neutral, even though I had the urge to throttle him at the moment.

"Out," Ponyboy grunted, and started for the door again.

"Like hell you are," Darry snapped. "You're goin' to sit down and start that theme, kid."

"No, I'm not," Ponyboy said petulantly. "I'm goin' out for a ride."

"I don't think so, pal," Darry said angrily. "You've been puttin' that homework off for too long. Now get your tail in there and start workin', before I skin your hide."

"What's the sweat about my schoolwork?" Ponyboy shouted. "I'll get a job as soon as I'm out of school anyway. Look at Soda, he's doing okay and he dropped out. So you can just lay off!"

"You're not gonna drop out," Darry argued. "Listen, with your brains and grades, you could get a scholarship, and we could put you through college."

Ponyboy snorted, and I pressed my lips together tightly. Yeah, we could put him through college, especially if he got a scholarship. With the money I'd been saving up, he could probably go even if he didn't get a scholarship, but not if his grades keep slipping.

"But school work's not the point," Darry continued. "You're living in a vacuum, Pony, and you're going to have to cut it out. Johnny and Dallas were our buddies, too, but you don't just stop livin' because you lose someone."

I drew in a sharp breath of air, startled to hear Darry bringing them up, especially after he'd been the one to insist we make sure not to. The doctor had been real clear about how fragile Ponyboy was emotionally, and that talking about Johnny or Dallas or any of the events that took place that week was a bad idea. It would only shake him up.

But maybe Darry was onto something. Everything else we'd tried so far had failed, maybe what Pony really needed now was a good shaking up.

"I thought ya knew that by now," Darry snapped. "You don't quit! And anytime you don't like the way I'm runnin' things, you can get out."

"You'd like that, wouldn't you?" Ponyboy snarled. "You'd like me to just get out. Well, it's not that easy, is it, Soda?"

He glanced over at Soda as if he expected him to take his side, but Soda had gone pale and white, his eyes glossy with feverish tears, and he was shaking something fierce. "Don't..." he rasped, his voice quaking. "Oh, you guys, why can't you..."

He trailed off, overcome with emotion, and bolted out the door before anyone could stop him.

"Soda!" I called after him, frightened by his behavior, and then turned to look at Darry for answers. He reached down and picked up an envelope that must have fallen from Soda's pocket, and his face went blank.

"It's the letter he wrote Sandy," he said quietly, and then lifted his gaze to meet mine. "Returned unopened."

"I'll kill her," I muttered under my breath, and right then I very well might have.

Ponyboy frowned, clearly disturbed by Soda's reaction, and just as clearly confused by what was going on. He hadn't been here when Sandy left town, and the only explanation he'd been given had been that she'd gone to live with her grandmother in Florida. No one had bothered to fill him in on the real story, and right then I was wishing someone had. Maybe Darry and I should have told him, but I reckon we were trying to let Soda tell him himself when he was ready.

Now, though, Ponyboy needed to know the whole story, and it looked like it was up to us to tell him.

"When Sandy went to Florida..." Darry began slowly. "It wasn't Soda, Ponyboy. He told me he loved her, but I guess she didn't love him the way he thought she did, because it wasn't him."

"You don't have to draw me a picture," Ponyboy muttered uncomfortably, and from the pitiful look in his eyes I knew that he understood what Darry was trying to tell him.

"He wanted to marry her anyway, but she just left," Darry said, shaking his head in dismay. "He cried every night that week you were gone. Both you and Sandy in the same week."

"It tore him up," I added softly.

"Come on," Darry said, setting the envelope down on the chair and starting for the door with a grim resolve on his face. "Let's go after him."

"Yeah," Ponyboy agreed, and together we hurried outside, letting the door bang shut behind us as we bounded down the steps and took off down the street.

Before leaving the diner I had changed back into my school clothes, for which I was suddenly very grateful, because running in a waitress' dress and shoes would not have been easy. My jeans and sneakers were much better suited for chasing down runaway brothers, and the button-up plaid long-sleeved shirt I had donned over my white camisole top kept me warm enough in the slightly chilly evening air.

All three of us were decent runners, but Ponyboy has always been the fastest. Even out of shape from his ordeal, he still had the best chance of catching Soda, and we all knew it,

"Circle around and cut him off," Darry ordered Ponyboy. "We'll stay right behind him."

"Right," Pony nodded, then took off at an angled sprint.

We were gaining on Soda, at least enough that we could see him up a hundred yards or so ahead. I don't even know if he realized we were after him or not, he just seemed wrapped up in running. I've had days like that, when you just want to run and forget about everything else. Mostly after Mom and Dad died, when it all just felt like too much, you know?

Out of the corner of my eye, I spotted Ponyboy weaving through the trees in the distance, and Soda must have seen him, too, because he started to veer off sharply, but Ponyboy was already on him. Hitting him with a solid tackle that would have done Darry proud, he took Soda down to the ground, and they were both still laying there gasping for air when Darry and I came running up a moment later.

Soda grunted, sitting up and wiping the grass from his shirt. "Ya should have gone out for football instead of track," he mumbled.

"Where did ya think ya were goin'?" Ponyboy asked, still sprawled out on his back next to him.

"Good question," I said, giving Soda a weak smile as I dropped down beside him. Darry lowered himself to the ground across from us, peering at Soda with a concerned expression.

Soda shrugged. "I don't know. It's just... I can't stand to hear ya'll fight."

Have you ever had a moment where you just feel like a complete and utter jerk? That was one of those moments for me. I had another reason for working as much as I did, one I didn't even admit to myself until right then, but as much as we needed the money, I also just didn't want to be around to listen to Darry and Ponyboy hollering at each other. I'd never realized how badly it was hurting him to hear all that arguing all the time.

"Sometimes... I just have to get out or... it's like I'm the middleman in a tug o' war and I'm bein' split in half. Ya dig?" Soda sighed, fiddling with some of the grass blades beneath his fingers. "I mean, I can't take sides. It'd be a lot easier if I could, but I see both sides. Darry yells too much and tries too hard and takes everything too seriously, and Ponyboy, you don't think enough, you don't realize all Darry's giving up just to give you a chance he missed out on." Soda leveled Ponyboy with a serious look, trying to make him understand what we'd both known from the start, but what Ponyboy had never really seemed to grasp. "Lizzie and I are old enough that we probably could have worked somethin' out with the courts to get out on our own, so he could have just left us to fend for ourselves and stuck you in a home somewhere so he could work his way through college."

And sometimes I wondered if maybe he shouldn't have. It was unfair, to saddle him with this much responsibility, to dump three kids in his lap and force him to work so much and so hard that he was getting old too fast. Maybe that was another reason for working as much as I did, to try and lighten the load on Darry's shoulders, to carry my own weight as much as possible, so that he didn't have to struggle to provide for me.

"Ponyboy, I'm telling you the truth," Soda insisted, pleading for him to listen. "I dropped out because I'm dumb. I really did try in school, but you saw my grades. Look, I'm happy working in a gas station with cars. You'd never be happy doing something like that. And Darry, you ought to try to understand him more, and quit bugging him about every little mistake he makes. He feels things differently than you do."

That was the truth, Ponyboy felt things differently from just about everybody I'd ever met. He was as original a person as Dad was.

"Golly, you two, it's bad enough having to listen to it, but when you start trying to get me to take sides..." Soda rasped, tears welled up in his eyes. "We're all we've got left. We ought to be able to stick together against everything. If we don't have each other, then we don't have anything."

I swallowed hard, my throat suddenly painfully dry.

"If you don't have anything, you end up like Dallas... and I don't mean dead, either," Soda shook his head. "I mean like he was before. And that's worse than dead. Please," he begged, wiping his eyes on his sleeve. "Don't fight anymore."

For a long moment we all sat in silence, Soda sniffling and trying to stop his tears, Ponyboy staring down at the ground with his lower lip trembling, me biting my lip as tears blurred my vision, and Darry watching us all with concern evident in his eyes.

"Sure, little buddy," he said softly. "We're not going to fight anymore."

"Hey," Soda directed a tearful smile at me and Ponyboy. " Don't ya'll start cryin', too. One bawl-baby in the family's enough."

"I ain't cryin'," Ponyboy protested, even as tears threatened to spill down his cheeks.

"Well, I am," I said with a hoarse laugh that sounded more like a sob than I would have liked, and flung myself at Soda, wrapping my arms around him as tight as I could. He was startled for a moment, then hugged me back, and we clung to each other for a long moment, trying to calm our roller-coaster emotions.

I felt a hand touch my hair gently but deliberately, and I lifted my head to see Darry gazing down at us both with a gentle expression on his hardened face. "Don't worry," he said, cracking a weak smile. "We won't tell anyone."

Choking out a laugh, I let go of Soda and sat up, wiping my eyes on the back of my hands. "If ya do, I swear me and Soda here will jump ya both, right, Sodapop?"

"Right," he agreed with a rueful smile.

"So it's settled, then," I said, rocking back on my heels. "Darry will try not be such a stiff, and Ponyboy will try not to be such a punk."

"And what about you, huh?" Ponyboy shot back.

I gave him a smug look. "Unlike you two cretins, I don't cause trouble."

"No, trouble just seems to find you," Darry muttered.

"I think Lizzie ought to come clean about what she's been up to these past few months," Soda said quietly, and when I looked over at him he met my gaze evenly. There was nothing challenging in his eyes, but he was prodding me to tell them just the same.

"Steve tell you?" I asked calmly.

Soda shook his head. "He didn't have to, I figured it out on my own a long time ago."

"So why didn't ya rat me out?" I wanted to know.

"Figured ya had a good reason for doing what ya did," Soda shrugged.

"And just what is it that ya did, Elizabeth?" Darry demanded seriously.

Sighing, I decided I might as well get it over with. "I've been workin' double shifts at the diner all semester."

Darry's face scrunched up into one of confusion. "When the hell have ya been able to find time to..." he trailed off, and his eyes narrowed sharply. "Ya aren't divin' are ya?"

Ponyboy blinked, and turned to stare at me incredulously, blatantly shocked.

"No," I confessed softly, my gaze lowering to the ground. "I'm not."

"Dammit, Lizzie," Darry shouted. "What were ya thinkin'?! Divin' is what's gonna get ya into college!"

"Not sure if I'm goin' to college or not yet," I shrugged, and Darry's expression turned even more murderous. "Besides, we need the money."

"We're gettin' by as it is," Darry snapped. "You let me and Soda worry about money, ya hear? All ya need to worry 'bout is school."

"Darry, maybe-" Soda began gently, but I cut him off.

"I've got over a thousand dollars saved up," I informed them, and all three of my brothers looked at me in surprise. "That's enough to pay for at least two years of schoolin' for Ponyboy at just about any college in the country."

For a long moment there was an uncomfortably tense silence hanging in the air, which was finally broken by Soda. "See? Told ya she had a good reason," he offered with a faint smile.

"Is that why you've been working so much?" Darry asked, somehow managing to keep his expression completely blank of emotion. "To save up college money for Ponyboy?"

I shrugged, not really feeling like explaining myself any further.

"Lizzie, you shouldn't be-" Ponyboy started to argue.

"Hush up, kid," I said sternly, not bothering to look away from Darry. "It's my money and I'll do what I like with it. You're goin' to college, and that's final. I won't have ya settlin' when ya could go places in life."

Darry was looking at me strange, like he'd never seen something quite like me before, and it was more than a little unnerving. There was something evaluating in his gaze, not really judgmental, more like appraising.

After a long moment, he shook his head. "Ya always did take after Mom," he murmured.

"If ya ask me," Soda observed evenly. "She takes after you, Darry."

I could tell that had never occurred to Darry before, and he gave me a long look before he nodded absently. "Looks that way." He narrowed his eyes, giving me a stern look that made him look remarkably like Dad. "I ought to skin your hide for pullin' a stunt like this, Elizabeth, but I ain't gonna. I reckon you use your head more than I realized, just not always in the most orthodox of ways.

"That's an understatement if I ever heard one," Soda snickered to himself.

"And I reckon you can keep workin' some extra shifts is it means that much to ya," Darry continued, ignoring him. "But you're gonna have to cut back some on hours, cause you're gonna go to Coach Durham and do whatever it takes to get your spot back on the team."

I opened my mouth to protest, but Darry gave me a sharp look, holding up a hand to silence my objections.

"If ya have to, work somethin' out with him so that ya can miss some of your practices," Darry said with a grunt. "But you're not goin' to throw away your own future for Ponyboy's. If ya decide not to go to college, that's fine, but it won't be because ya couldn't get a scholarship. Now, midterm grade reports are comin' out soon, am I gonna have a nasty surprise when yours arrive?"

"No," I said, annoyed that everyone automatically seemed to think that. "My grades are all fine. Nothin' lower than a C, just like I promised. In fact, I reckon I might have pulled off nothin' lower than a B this quarter, but I ain't sure."

"Fine," Darry nodded. "But if your grades start slippin', you're gonna quit the diner and focus on school, ya hear? I'm only gonna give ya one warnin'."

"Okay," I agreed.

"And no more secrets, ya hear?" Darry demanded. "That goes for all of ya'll."

"I hear ya," I sighed.

"That goes for ya'll, too," Darry informed Ponyboy and Soda. "No more secrets, and no more fights, not if we can help it."

They both nodded.

"Good," Darry said, and just like that it was settled. Ponyboy and Darry would still disagree and bicker from time to time, they were too different not to, but they'd try to work together now, instead of fighting each other the whole way. And as for me and Soda, well, we'd just have to learn to share our problems with the rest of the family a little bit better, now wouldn't we?

"Well, I'm cold," Soda announced, pushing to his feet. "Let's go home."


A/N: Don't worry, there are a few more chapters left in this story :) Hope you guys enjoyed the latest update!