"Hi, my name's Marcia."

"We could go to the drive in? How 'bout that?"

"But they said they'd come back home today!"

"Don't do this. Please, don't."

"Your parents left… and they're never coming back, they said. At least that's what their note said."

"She said she doesn't want pity!"

"I'm sorry. You're probably wondering who I am. My name's Evie."

"This is what I said on our first date."

"How was your date with Soda?"

"I came here to see a movie and I'm gonna see a movie!"

"You'll always be my little princess, no matter what."

"Well, would like, continue being my girlfriend?"

"Am I showing?"

"The only thing I'm allergic to is a bee sting, and even then, it isn't too bad of an allergy."

"Why don't we go to the DX? Seeing Sodapop always makes you feel better cause he knows how to make you laugh."

"You weren't in the best place a while before you were in the hospital…"

"Aren't you Cherry? From the West Side?"

"Is Cary Grant trying to kill Joan Fontaine, Mom?"

"Maybe it's some weird, delayed reaction to shock."

"A little? You call reeling and passing out in the streets 'a little'?"

"I wasn't trying to give you charity, Ponyboy. I only wanted to help."

"Can you see the sunset real good from the West Side?"

"I was perfectly fine with being a recluse."

"But sayin' it without meanin' it as good as breaking up with someone."

"I'm saying that… I love you."

These were just some of the things that were popping into Cherry's head. Her brain was all over the place, yet she felt paralyzed, and she couldn't figure out why this was happening or what was going on. Every time she would try to move- which she didn't have a lot of chances to try with everything flying and popping into her head- it was like something was holding her back. She just couldn't figure out what is was that was actually holding her back. And it was driving her nuts.

"Is she gonna be alright?" Cherry heard in a familiar voice, but couldn't quite make it out at the moment.

"It's kinda hard to tell right now," another voice above her said, though this one wasn't familiar, "But her breathing is good, so that's definitely a good sign. I can promise you that."

Cherry wasn't quite sure, but even with the feeling of being paralyzed flowing through her body, she thought she felt something wrap around her hand- at least what she believed to be was her hand- and squeeze it tight. The first thing she felt for a while.

-/-/-

Steve was Evie's left side. His right hand was wrapped around her left hand, his left hand on top of her forehead. She had already woken up, but was still barely conscious, and had been fading in and out of consciousness. She was also shaking, so much that she reminded him of a small dog. It didn't help the situation at all that the EMT said her legs- along with a few different areas of her body- were practically covered in blood.

"You're gonna be alright," Steve said in a voice that was so quiet that only he could hear it, "Both of you will be. You have to be."

The EMT looked up at Steve's words, which he magically heard somehow, with a confused look on his face. "Both of who?" he asked.

"She's 'bout four months pregnant."

The EMT seemed to get tense at Steve's words. The man got up from his seat in the ambulance and to the EMT in the passenger's seat. Steve couldn't quite hear what the man was saying to the other, but based off of his reaction, he had an idea that it wasn't too good.

"What's wrong?" Steve asked a bit nervously.

"I didn't know she was pregnant," the EMT answered, "And cause of the accident, I wanna make sure nothing bad happened to her or the baby."

"What're you saying?..."

"The way the accident was, and the impact of that new airbag, something may or may not have happened to the baby more than her."

Steve felt his heart beat quicken at the EMT's words, already faster than it already was beating- probably wasn't healthy for his heart to beat at fast as it was now, even for only being eighteen. At this point, both him and Evie had grown attached to their unborn child. After all the past weeks, and everything that had happened over the summer so far, it was kind of hard not to grow attached to the baby. And now, if something happened to the baby in the car crash, he didn't know how he would be- and that especially went for Evie. If something happened, he knew she'd think it was her fault, and she'd be mad at herself for letting it happen.

"Please be ok," Steve whispered desperately.

-/-/-

Soda looked down at Cherry. She was motionless with the exception of her torso rising up and down slightly, showing that she was breathing. But even with her breathing fine on her own, the EMT had still placed an oxygen mask over her nose and mouth to make sure that she was still breathing. And that if for some reason she could no longer breathe on her own- though the EMT said that was unlikely with how well she was breathing on her own- the mask was already there to help her.

Every so often, Soda would see Cherry make a face or slightly move her head side to side; though that could have just been the gravity of the ambulance. He could definitely tell when she would make a face, but it was always one that seemed to be of either confusion, discomfort, or fear. Either way, between the faces she made and the slight movement of her head, it was a weird comfort to him, taking it as a sign that she was responding to things.

"Does she have any health conditions or allergies that you know of?" the EMT asked, gaining his attention.

Soda looked up. "Uh, yeah," he answered, "I'm pretty sure she's allergic to bee stings."

"Ok. Anything else? Health conditions or something? Just so we already have an idea when we get to the hospital."

"Well, at the beginning of the summer she got a concussion and temporary amnesia."

"Do you what it was caused by?"

Soda hesitated a bit. "If I'm right… let's just say she had been dealing with depression."

The EMT nodded a bit, sadly. "Has she fully recovered from the amnesia?"

He shook his head. "No, not yet. Is that a bad thing?"

"To be honest, it's not great," the EMT answered, "But it's not terrible. Cause then we can't really be sure how her memory's gonna be when she wakes up. Get what I mean? She could either be right back to where she was at the beginning of the summer, remembering everything and the amnesia's gone, only remember certain things, remember everything except a few things. It could go any number of ways, ya know?"

Soda nodded. "Yeah," he answered, "Yeah, I got it."

-/-/-

Ponyboy and Lily sat on the front steps of the house Curtis house, both finishing up specific things for their summer reading projects. They both had to read three books for the summer, but they were different from each other, of course. But since she was a grade above him, if he needed any help with his project- which was unlikely- she could help since she had already done the projects he was currently doing.

The two looked up when the sound of the phone ringing from inside the house started. Ponyboy got up from his place on the steps, placed his notebook and books on the edge of the porch, and walked inside the house. Lily tucked a strand of her naturally blonde hair behind her ear and watched through the screen door as he walked into the house and over to the phone.

Lily continued to listen as he talked on the phone. "Hello?" Ponyboy started, "He's not here, he's at work. I'm his youngest brother… no, he's at work, too… what do you mean? I saw him leave this mornin'… oh, is he alright?... both of 'em? That's real weird… oh! Oh, man, is everyone alright?... oh, man." He let out a sigh. "Yeah, I'll be right there. Thanks… yeah, I'll tell my older brother what happened." Then he hung up the phone.

"Everything alright?" Lily asked unsurely as she stood up from her spot on the porch.

Ponyboy shook his head. "No," he answered with a sigh, "There was a car accident right by the DX 'bout an hour ago."

Her eyes widened a bit. "Oh my gosh… are Steve and Soda alright?"

"Yeah. Yeah, they're fine. They weren't near the accident when it happened."

"Wait, if they're alright, what happened?"

"One of the cars in the accident was Evie's. And both Evie and Cherry were inside the car. They're at the hospital now and Soda and Steve are with them."

Lily's hands flew to her mouth in shock. "We need to go there right now to make sure they're both ok."

Ponyboy nodded and the two dashed away from the house and started toward the hospital on foot, making sure they stopped where the oldest Curtis brother worked to tell him what happened.

-/-/-

Marcia folded her last couple articles of clothing and placed them neatly in her suitcase. Once she finished placing her clothes in the bag, she zipped the bag shut and placed it on the floor. She then went over to the drawer in the room, took out her smaller and more personal belongings, and packed them all into her smaller- yet still spacious- duffel bag.

Before Marcia placed the items in her bag, she caught sight of the cards her two little cousins had given her at the beginning of the summer to give to Cherry. She placed her items on the bed and gingerly took the two handmade cards out of the bag. She opened them both and inspected both cards in their entirety as a small smile formed her face. She put the cards aside, placed her belongings into the bag, then placed both cards gingerly on the top before closing the bag shut.

"I hope she doesn't hate me after leaving her alone like that," Marcia said to herself quietly, "I can't lose my friend."

Update. Update. Update. Update. Update. It's that time of the two weeks (I update all my stories every other week from Wednesday, Thursday and Friday- it's on my calendar.)

I told the next chapter spelled disaster. Did you believe me? I have no idea, but yeah- here it is.

Hope everyone had a wonderful Galentine's Day (if you don't watch Parks and Recreation, you probably have no idea what that is. Simply go online and look it up, and you will find what it is) and a great Valentine's Day, even if you are single (if you are, as of 2-17-2016, I understand cause I've never had a boyfriend and my crush had to move out of state with his family, but anyhow).

Oh also, just for a laugh after the sadness in this chapter- go on youtube and search "north and south book 1 – orry and brett in the study" and if you don't want to watch the whole video, skip to 4:10 and watch up to 4:15. That's the funny part, not everything else in that scene, only 4:10 to 4:15 is funny even though the whole scene is supposed to be dramatic. You will be laughing your head off at those five seconds, I promise.

Oh by the way, those beginning quotes in italics, some of them were from the original "The Outsiders", one or two were from the movie, a few were from this story, and a few were new ones. So yeah. There ya go.

Anyway, hope you enjoyed the chapter, and peace from all the hippies of the world! =^-^=