Disclaimer: S.E Hinton owns The Outsiders.
The next few weeks were spent packing. Mom and Dad were so excited that it sickened me every time I saw then smile or laugh. Finally it was time for us to leave. We spent the day before saying good bye to everyone we had known all my life. It was terrible. Saying good bye to Jack was probably the worst. He was my first real best friend and it made me sad that I wouldn't see him for a long time. We promised we'd write, even though we probably wouldn't.
We had to sell all our horses because Mom thought it might be too stressful for them to travel all that way, and no matter how many times Taylor said horses travelled these distances all the time, but she refused. It killed Taylor to sell them because she loved those horses like they were real people. The deal was that Alex, Heather, Taylor and I would go with our twenty one year old brother Ben, would drive us in his car to Oklahoma.
At first Mom and Dad weren't really pleased with the idea of all us kids going in the same car as each other but Ben said that they're making us move away from all our friends so the least they could do was let us go in the same car to Oklahoma. It's funny, a few weeks ago I would've laughed at an argument like that, but now it seems more serious that it actually is. The drive to Oklahoma was long and uneventful; we spent half the time sleeping, singing or playing travelling games. At the start of the trip, Taylor and Alex had us in stitches from all the jokes they were telling, but even Taylor got tired of joking around so she pulled out a book and started reading. I can't understand how she can read for that long, especially in a car.
When we arrived in Tulsa, I couldn't believe how different it felt to Texas. It didn't really look too different to where we were from; it just felt strange, a bit like we didn't belong here. I guess that's how the new kids felt when they came to our school, then it hit me, we were the new kids. On Monday, which was just a few days ago, we would be the people everyone was going to be staring at and judging. I felt my heart beat a little faster than usual; it always did that when I was nervous.
I took my mind off school by looking at all the houses. At the moment, we seemed to be in a poor neighbourhood. There were kids on the streets smoking and sitting on the curb. I had a feeling that this wasn't where we would be living, but I'd probably fit in better with these kids than the rich ones. When Bed pulled into a street around five or so minutes later, I realised that this must be the "rich" side of town and we were going to live in it. All the houses had big fences and elegant gates, and were very well kept on the outside.
Ben turned into a driveway towards the end of the street and got out. He walked over to the gate and pulled out a key from his jean pocket. Taylor leaned over me to try and see what the house looked like. I pushed her head down and looked. Standing before our car, behind the brick fence and black, iron gates was a big, white house with a dusty blue coloured roof. Ben came back to the car and drove through the gates. We had a driveway, even inside the gates. The house got bigger and bigger as we came closer. It also looked empty and cold. Not like our old house which always looked warm and friendly. Taylor was first out of the car, and I followed after her. She ran up to the side of the house and pulled herself up on the window sill. She peered inside the window, trying to get a glance of inside.
"Taylor get down from there before you kill yourself," Ben said lighting a cigarette. It made me wish I had one, but Ben would kill me if he saw me smoking. I didn't even know he smoked.
Taylor jumped down and walked over to Ben. She scrunched up her nose and looked at me. I change my expression and leant against the car, looking at the sky. She laughed and walked down the driveway.
"Follow her, make sure she doesn't get into trouble," Ben told me.
I nodded and walked down the driveway. Taylor has stopped luckily so I ran to catch her before she moved again. When I got down near the gate I saw Taylor looking at someone. I looked over to where she was and saw a red head girl who looked a few years older than us walking down the path on the other side of the road.
"Do you think we should say hello?" Taylor asked me.
"Why?" I asked her.
Taylor stared blankly at me and rolled her eyes. "Because when you first move somewhere new, meeting people and making friends is one of the first steps to actually belonging you fool," She said, "Unless you want to walk around with no friends,"
"Fine let's go and say hi," I said.
Taylor grinned and jogged out of the gate, pulling me by the arm. I looked back at Ben, Alex and Heather who looked really bored. I shrugged and pulled my arm free of Taylor's grip. The girl crossed the road and was walking towards the gate of the house next to us. She must have seen us because she stopped and looked over. She waved and smiled. Taylor waved back and I just smiled, I never know what to do when meeting new people.
"Hey, you new around here?" the girl asked us when we reached her.
"Yep, we just moved here from Texas. I'm Taylor Burke and this is my brother Daniel Burke, I'm pretty sure that he won't mind if you call him Dan though," Taylor said smiling sweetly.
"Oh right. Well I'm Sherri Valance, but you can call me Cherry. All my friends do because of my hair, it's a pleasure to meet you Taylor and Dan," Cherry said. She was looking at me; I looked at the ground and kicked the dirt pretending I didn't know, "Err does your brother talk?"
I felt myself go bright red. I thought I'd better say something before I looked too stupid. "Yeah, I do," I said. God smooth Dan, smooth, "Umm, you live in the house next door to ours?"
"I'm presuming that yours is the one with the blue roof?" Cherry said smiling, "If it is, then I do,"
I nodded smiling. She was very pretty, in a sophisticated sort of way. Lots of girls I knew didn't look like her at all. Cherry Valance had red hair and green eyes; she was also dressed in neat and classy looking clothes. There was a honk behind us. I turned around to see Mom and Dad pulling in our driveway. Mom poked her head out and waved at us. Taylor waved back and turned back to Cherry.
"Well I'd better go, Mom will be wondering where I am. I just went across to old Mrs. Lewis' house to drop off this cake and then I meet you two," Cherry said smiling, "Y'all had better go too, your parents will probably need your help. Maybe we can all hang out sometime,"
"Yeah that'd be good," Taylor said smiling, "Well see you around Cherry,"
Taylor waved and ran back to our house and disappeared behind the wall. Cherry laughed and brushed her hair out of her face.
"Your sister is very outgoing," she said smiling, "Sweet too. Do you have any other brothers and sisters?"
"Three actually, Ben, Heather and Alex," I said stuffing my fists into my pockets, "Taylor's the youngest so she's the baby, if you know what I mean,"
"Yeah, same as my cousin," Cherry said half laughing, "Well see you later Dan,"
"Bye," I said as she walked back to her house. She looked sad about something, almost as though something bad had happened recently. I shrugged the thought off and walked back to our house.