All day Sunday the seven of us sat and moped. Both my parents were at work, Johnny went back home, Travis was at his friend, Danny's, house, and Max was at a play group thing with his friends. So nobody of my family knew I was with the boys.
We were all at Keith's house. Alone. The just the seven of us, sitting in complete silence. Two-Bit was always the first person to wake us up from our trance and if it wasn't him, Dallas would. And Two-Bit wasn't in the mood to cheer us up. Soda checked the clock. It was eleven o' clock in the morning.
"I gotta go check on Mickey." Soda said getting up from off the floor. Mickey was short for Mickey Mouse. Mickey was a horse at the stable where Soda worked. Man did he love that horse and that horse loved Soda and Soda only. Whenever I went to visit Soda, Mickey would tug on my shirt or chew my hair.
After Soda had first gotten the job at the stable, I had gone to visit him every day after lunch. I sometimes went by myself or with Ponyboy, he was the only one interested in going. Soda always ate in the barn where Mickey stayed. So, while he ate I, or Pony too, would visit him.
The third day on the job was the first day I went to accompany Soda. When I got there, the first thing he did, besides greet me, was introduce me to Mickey Mouse. He looked like a friendly horse and that he would do no harm but boy was I wrong! I went to pet Mickey, Soda showed me the proper the way to approach him, and Mickey freaked out. It startled me as much as it startled him. So, Mickey didn't like me from the start.
At the end of his shift, he started to put the some things away and I leaned up against Mickey's stall door. I watched Soda clean up. There was a weird chomping sound in my ear but I ignored it because I figured it was just Mickey eating. Soda looked at me and his eyes widened.
"What's wrong?" I asked and I turned around and saw nothing behind me but Mickey. He was chomping away on… my shirt! I looked at my shirt and half the collar was chewed off.
"Typh, I'm so sorry! I can buy you a new shirt." Soda offered.
"It's okay. I'll just go. See ya later." I jammed my hands in my pockets and walked back home.
It started to get late and I had to go home soon before my parents got suspicious. The time was five-thirty and Soda wasn't back yet. He normally came by my house at four-thirty, then left and went back to his house at five. Pony, Darry, and I all took off to go home. Pony and Darry went to the stable and I went back to their house. Steve, Keith and Johnny stayed behind.
I walked inside the Curtis house and found Soda on the couch. I went to sit next to him when he walked away. I followed him into his room.
"Soda, how come you didn't come back to Keith's house? You had us all worried." I asked.
"Mickey… Ron wants to sell him." Soda mumbled.
"So somebody bought him?"
"Not yet, but there was some people there today looking at him." Soda explained.
"Ah, I'm sorry. Maybe we can buy him for you." I offered.
"Yeah, because my parents would let me own a horse." Soda joked, still depressed.
"You can keep him in the stable."
"Come on, Typhani. You know we don't have that kind of money to buy a horse." Soda reminded me.
"Well, I'm sorry about Mickey. What did you do all day if Mickey was being looked at by those people?" I asked.
"I did what I normally do to take of Mickey and at the end." Soda said. "Mickey doesn't like anyone but me and even you know that." I nodded in agreement. I remembered the first time Mickey chewed off my collar. Soda all of a sudden broke down into tears. Pony came into the room. He saw Soda crying. Pony went to console him and I left.
"Soda in there?" Darry asked, running into me in the hallway.
"Yeah." I walked past him, head down.
I didn't know how my life could get any worse. Soda was depressed, Dallas was gone and my parents are always bugging me about my friends.
One week later, Ron sold Mickey Mouse and Soda cried so hard. Pony told me he was gonna try to raise money to buy Mickey Mouse but he knew that would never happen.
The rest of the school year, without Dallas was long and miserable. Continuously would my dad yell at me, Soda whining over Mickey and the loneliness without Dallas. Pony tried to save up as much money as he could to buy Mickey Mouse but for one, he just couldn't raise enough money to buy a horse. We all pitched in to help buy Mickey but we got too lazy to do things around the house to earn money. Then, Pony just gave up and told Soda that we tried. Nobody saw Soda cry over Mickey. Just Pony and I.
The day was Saturday in the month of July in 1961. Pony's birthday was today and he was having a small party with his closest friends. His closet friends were: Darry, Sodapop, Keith, Johnny, Steve and me. Things were still miserable, so this is why the party was small: Pony didn't make any new friends. It was okay, this "friends only" party. We goofed around a lot and ate almost all the snacks. At the end (well, technically it's not the end) we all spread across the living room floor from being so full of food. Johnny and I were spread eagle on the couch and everyone else was on the floor. The door opened suddenly. I was too tired to even open my eyes to see who it was.
"Come on, Typhani. Let's go." It was my father, ruining my life… again.
"What? Why now?" I whined.
"Typhani, let's go!" Dad didn't even answer my question. He just wanted to get me out of there. He didn't even want me to go to the party in the first place.
I jumped off the couch and next to my father. Nobody dared to say anything in the presence of my father. So, the two of us walked out with no good-byes.
Home. We finally arrived. I was obviously mad at my dad but I wasn't in the mood to get into another fight with him. I didn't have that kind of energy. Actually none of us had the energy for fights between the seven of us. We might have had the time of our lives at Pony's party but tomorrow everything would go back to normal and we would all be miserable.
"Typhani, sit down." Dad pointed to the couch in the living room. He came to sit beside me. I looked away, afraid to face the truth that lay ahead.
"Dear, your mother and I have discussed this very thoroughly. And the verdict is we're moving." He explained.
"Are you trying to ruin my life? I am not moving!" I screamed.
"Typhani calm down. You'll still be able to be with your friends, we're just gonna be living in a different part of town." Dad added.
"You promise? There's no catch?" I asked.
"There's no catch. You'll go to the same school and see the same people." My dad didn't seem happy. I knew there was a catch. My dad couldn't lie about that. I wasn't stupid.
"I'm moving." I told the boys. "My dad wants to move us to a bigger house."
"So you aren't gonna live across the street from us anymore?" Steve asked.
"Guess not." I shrugged.
"Go figure, we're moving too." Soda commented.
"Dad has finally decided to move us out of the country. We just can't afford to live out there. But we will live across the street from you guys. Well, everybody but Typhani." Pony added.
"Great." I sighed.