The Devil's Back Porch is a slang term for the shithole that is West Dallas. But more specifically, it's a stretch of dirt road that runs alongside the dilapidated parts of the Trinity Bridge. Parts of it have been washed away by the river floods, destroying its usefulness as a road. It's so tangled with such a mess of trees and shrubs that it's hardly recognizable as a road at all. Which, Courtney guesses, is the whole point of meeting there.
The Barrow gang wait in their newly stolen Ford as the minutes tick to noon. Harold takes apart a toolbox he stole from the general store and categorizes which pieces are missing.
"I left my other toolkit in Joplin," he murmurs when Courtney inquires. "It was my grandpappy's."
Courtney picks apart one of the handful of flowers she picked off the side of the road to bring to her mother. Duncan puts a hand over hers to still her fidgeting as Heather opens a bottle of whiskey in the backseat and passes it to Al.
At five past noon, there comes a knock on the back window of the car. Courtney turns to the sound and has her gun out in seconds, but there's no one there. There's another more playful tap, on Duncan's window, and Courtney whirls around to find a pretty young woman with a black-haired bob, around Courtney's age, pointing her fingers at Duncan in the shape of a gun.
"Bang bang," she smirks. "You're dead."
Courtney stares; Duncan grins. He jumps out of the car and envelops the woman in a fierce hug, then spins her around as she laughs.
Jealousy spikes between Courtney's lungs like glass.
"Didja miss me?" the woman asks when Duncan puts her down.
"Sure I missed ya. Like I miss a toothache," he jokes, messing up her perfectly arranged bob. "When didja cut this?"
She shoves him. "When I moved ta the 20th century, Duncan."
Courtney stiffly exits the car and walks over, her eyes sparking at the use of Duncan's given name. She puts her hand in his, eying the dark-haired woman with a challenge. The woman looks amused, and something in her expression is vaguely familiar.
"This her?" the woman asks.
"That's her," Duncan says, pride buried in his voice. "May I introduce Missus Courtney Bonnie Jones. Courtney, my sister Gwen."
Gwen, wearing a blouse and riding breeches, fake curtsies with an invisible dress. "At long last, the gal who's whipping my big brother inta shape."
"Well, someone's whipping someone," Duncan jokes.
"Kinky," Gwen says.
Al and Heather exit from the backseat of the car to greet the figure who tapped on the back window, an older blonde woman with Duncan's blue eyes, starting to crinkle around the edges.
"I'm sorry," Courtney says tersely, "Duncan never mentioned having a sister." She looks Gwen over, trying to find Duncan in her features. They have the same shade of black hair and share something in the way they smile, like they own the world and no one can take it from them.
Gwen elbows Duncan hard in the ribs. "See that? See what happens when you don't boast about me ta all your pals?"
"The end times are upon us," he says. "Go say hi to yer other brother before he changes his mind about who his favorite sister is."
With a chuckle, Gwen bounds over to her mother, Al, and Heather.
Courtney looks at Duncan, eyes narrowed.
"You never mentioned a sister."
"Half-sister," he corrects. "And it never came up, doll. Don't get upset."
She and Duncan walk over to the group as Gwen launches herself onto Al's back with a cry of, "Think fast, Bucky!"
Al grabs her by the arms and spins her around. Duncan and Al's mother, looking sprightly for her weathered hands and wrinkles, straightens out Heather's plaid dress affectionately and asks her about her family in California.
Duncan politely interrupts, and his mother turns to hug him, despite the fact that her son is a foot taller than she is.
"Ma, there's someone I want ya to meet," he says, nudging Courtney forward. Courtney extends a hand.
"It's nice to meet you, Mrs…um..."
Courtney falters. Was she Mrs. Barrow? Mrs. Clyde? Did Gwen even have the same last name as either of her brothers?
Duncan's mother brushes away the question with a easy swipe of her hand.
"Darling, we're all family here. Ma will do me just as good as anything," she says, and pulls Courtney into an unexpected hug.
Courtney fumbles on the proper way to embrace the older woman. But when she pulls back, Ma is smiling at her like she hung the moon. Courtney smiles back for the first time in days.
"Duncan!" Gwen calls from up on Al's piggyback. "Look who else came out ta see you!"
She releases a hand from around Al's neck and whistles. A dog barks from somewhere in the trees, and a large black rottweiler comes barrelling through the underbrush.
"Scruffy!" Duncan drops to his knees and doesn't care in the slightest when the dog bowls him over in his excitement.
As Al and Gwen jog over to play with the dog, Ma looks Courtney over, putting her hands on either side of Courtney's face. "Bucky told me all 'bout yer ordeal. How ya feeling?"
"Fine," Courtney lies. "Just a little banged up."
"She got shot," Heather elaborates.
"Where?" Ma asks.
Courtney tentatively lifts her blouse to show the dirty bandages. Ma tsks loudly and shakes her head.
"That there is a foul number the coppers did on ya," she says, letting the blouse drop back down. Turning to Heather, Ma adds, "Why don't ya start setting up the picnic, Heather? Bucky tells me yer cooking has improved."
"She's only burned down one kitchen since we last talked," Al calls from where Scruffy is licking him mercilessly.
"Either I've gotten better or your son's taste buds have gotten more desensitized," Heather says, kissing Ma on the cheek in a rare burst of affection, before turning towards the car to start unloading.
"Gwyneth! Boys!" Ma calls to the three siblings who are dirtying themselves on the soiled riverbed in an attempt to wrestle each other and the dog. "Ya'll ain't children no more! Get up outta the dirt before a bird mistakes ya for earthworms! Bucky, help yer wife unload the car. And will somebody introduce me to the poor ginger still sitting by his lonesome in the Ford?"
"That's Harold. He's our driver," Courtney says as Harold jumps out of the car and jogs over to say hello. "Let me go help with the things—"
Ma holds Courtney in place. "Don't go nowhere. Gwyneth! Let yer brother play with Scruffy and bring the med kit before we sit down to eat."
"It's really all right," Courtney tries to say, but Gwen picks up a small leather case from the side of the road and comes over, looking significantly more dirty than she had when they made their introductions.
"Sure it is," Gwen says with a patented Duncan smirk. "I'm a nurse. Let's see what we can do 'bout this bullet wound business."
Gwen and Courtney sit in the backseat of the stolen Ford as Gwen carefully stitches up Courtney's side. Every pinch of the needle hurts, but it's no bullet. Leaning up against the window and nursing a flask of whiskey for the pain, Courtney watches across the road as Duncan talks to his mother on the picnic blanket they have stretched out. Heather sits beside him, listening to the conversation Courtney can't hear, while Harold helps Al pick ticks off of Scruffy.
"So. You and Duncan," Gwen says, continuing to dab medicine and stitch Courtney's skin.
"Yeah," Courtney says, not looking at Gwen's work.
"You been running with him long?"
"Since the spring," Courtney says vaguely, because telling her the exact date and time might sound a little obsessive. "Something like eight months now."
Gwen makes a noncommittal noise of approval. Outside the car, Duncan says something somberly to his mother, who nods. He hands her a stack of letters, bound with twine.
"You from Texas?" Gwen asks.
"West Dallas, yeah. Right around the corner."
"Don't have much of an accent for West Dallas," Gwen notes.
Courtney drains the flask and refills it with the whiskey bottle Heather had left in the backseat. "I moved to downtown as an adult after I got a job at Dallas Bank. I taught myself to speak without it. While I'm sober, anyway."
Gwen makes that noncommittal sound again. The next pass of the needle makes Courtney wince.
"You don't seem to have much of an accent either," Courtney says.
"Kicked a lot of it at the hospital," Gwen explains. "The fancy Northern doctors that teach us there rubbed off on me."
Just then, Courtney's side spasms. She screws her eyes shut and drinks deeply straight from the whiskey bottle.
"So. Nursing," she grinds out. "How's that going?"
"Swell, as you can see," Gwen jokes. She pauses, holding a cloth to the half-stitched wound. "We never run out of sick people in these parts. My Pa was a doctor. Or so Ma tells me."
Swerving to avoid the touchy subject of Ma's lovelife, Courtney jokes, "So no criminal business for you?"
Gwen doesn't laugh. "Duncan and Bucky send back enough money to keep Ma and me in the clear, else I might be singing a different tune."
Courtney winces. So much for avoiding touchy subjects.
"But how 'bout you?" Gwen asks without missing a beat. "What gets a banker inta robbing banks?"
Duncan looks over at the car just then, at Courtney, his eyebrows creased with concern. Courtney smiles at him encouragingly, masking her discomfort. He smiles back, a half smile he saves just for her.
"I got tired of being underappreciated," Courtney says by way of explaining everything.
"Well good on you, no one in this family knows the meaning of the word," Gwen chuckles.
As the tipsiness starts to settle in, Courtney puts the whiskey bottle down and shoves the half-full flask into her dress pocket. She keeps quiet as Gwen starts stitching again and turns her wedding band to keep her fingers busy. Outside, Scruffy bounds around the picnic blanket and pokes his nose into the basket. Ma reaches in and tosses him a biscuit.
"You have a lovely family," Courtney murmurs.
Gwen shrugs. "Eh. The loveliness comes and goes. 'Specially when you're the youngest of six and some siblings I won't mention by name like ta volunteer you to piss off neighborhood dogs and jump inta shallow creeks headfirst."
Courtney laughs despite herself.
From the picnic blanket, Duncan cups his hands over his mouth, and shouts, "If ya stitch her up any tighter, Gwen, she ain't gonna be able to move!"
"Hold your horses! I just finished!" Gwen shouts back, putting on the final bandages. "There. Good as new."
Gwen helps Courtney sit up and then hugs her unexpectedly, as Ma had done.
"It's nice ta have another sis-in-law," Gwen says warmly. "With these two dolts as brothers, I never had much experience with sisters."
"Um, I have a sister," Courtney says into Gwen's hair. "She lives in New York."
Gwen pulls back and punches Courtney's shoulder in jest. "And now you've got one more that lives in Dallas."
Don't forget to keep an eye on Cid-Vicious's DA page, as we are doing our best to get chapters and story images up as simultaneously as possible! And a special thanks to Contemperina for acting as Beta for MGB all this time (without any credit. UNTIL NOW)