I was the first one awake the next morning, and, when I grabbed the clock, I was surprised to see that it was almost nine. The rain was still coming down heavily, and the combination of the darkness and the steady sound of rain had kept us all asleep longer than I would have expected. Usually, I don't sleep very well in a strange place, but for some reason, despite being awakened by the storm, I had slept really well. I quietly got out a change of clothes and everything else I needed and went into the bathroom to take a shower. It felt good to wash away the accumulated grime of two days of traveling, and, changing into clean clothes, I felt like a new person. I couldn't wait to get home. Soda had told me we'd have about seven more hours of driving to reach Tulsa.
By the time I emerged from the bathroom, everybody else was awake.
"Mornin', sunshine!" Two-Bit said, jokingly.
"Morning," I said. "I guess we all must have been pretty tired, huh?" Soda rarely slept past seven-thirty or so.
"We have to be out of here by ten," Two-Bit said. "You get the bathroom next, Sandy. You girls take longer. Me an' Soda'll be quick."
Sandy took her bag and went into the bathroom. When I heard the water running, I sat down on the bed next to Soda.
"What's she gonna do, Soda? I mean, what if her parents won't let her stay? Where's she gonna go?"
"I'm not sure. I guess we're just gonna have to wait and see what happens. She wants to be in Tulsa. She didn't have any friends in Florida, she was miserable."
"I know. I'm just worried that she won't have anywhere to stay. I mean, you know she can't stay with us."
"Oh yeah, your caseworker would have a field day with that," Two-Bit piped up from where he was sitting in the chair.
"We'll just have to take things as they come, Scout. We don't know how her parents are gonna react when they find out the truth. I'm sure by now her grandmother told them that she's coming back, so they've had time to think about it. Hopefully we can all discuss it like adults, and work it out."
I realized that, in fact, neither Soda nor Sandy were adults. And Two-Bit was, which seemed completely backward.
"Remind me next time we're all four sharing a hotel room not to be the one sleepin' in the chair," Two-Bit whined. "My back's killin' me."
"That's because you're an old man," Soda said, jumping on him and causing the chair to topple over backward. They continued to wrestle on the floor, not stopping until about five minutes later, when Sandy opened the bathroom door. Two-Bit threw Soda to the side, leaped up, grabbed his bag, and ran into the bathroom, slamming the door behind him.
"Beat ya!" He yelled from inside.
"He's nuts," Sandy said, laughing, and nobody argued.
We all managed to be washed and ready before ten, and braved the monsoon-like rain as we all ran out to the car and threw ourselves in. Even in the ten seconds it had taken to get to the car, we were all pretty much drenched.
"Nice weather they have here in Mississippi," Two-Bit said. "Let's get the hell out of this state!"
"I'm not gonna argue with that," Soda said, as he peeled out of the motel parking lot and headed back out toward the highway.
The traffic was slow, with the rain coming down in sheets, making it difficult to see. After about four hours of driving, we entered Arkansas, and we pulled off the highway to get some food. As we sat inside the diner, I had a strange feeling - like something was missing - until I realized that it was only that it was so quiet without the constant drumming of rain on the car that we had been listening to all morning. We ate quickly, and I know all of us were equally sick of being cooped up in the car. The weather certainly wasn't helping our moods, either. Even Two-Bit seemed to have run out of entertaining things to say. I called Darry to let him know where we were, and we got right back on the road.
Soda was on edge because the driving was so tedious, and, after skidding through puddles and nearly hitting guardrails several times, he made me switch sides with Two-Bit so I could put on the only seat belt in the back, and made Sandy move over to her side of the front so she could buckle up, too. Two-Bit immediately fell asleep on the passenger side, and Sandy started to drift off as well, leaning against the door. Soda and I were the only ones still awake to celebrate when we finally crossed back into Oklahoma. Normally, it would be about two more hours of driving to get home, but with the bad weather Soda guessed it would probably take almost three.
I was determined to stay awake so that he would have somebody to talk to, and we found plenty to talk about. As we got to the outskirts of Muskogee, which was about an hour outside of Tulsa, we were talking about Pony and how lucky he was to be able to draw and write like he does. I was debating telling him about the thing Ponyboy had written about our hands, and how all of us had different talents and gifts that our parents had helped us develop. I wasn't sure if he would be mad if I told Soda about it, so I didn't, really.
"Pony feels the same way about you, Soda, you know - how you know how to fix cars and stuff… he admires you for that."
"Nah, Pony's got the talents. That's just a job." He came to a stop at a red light.
"It's a skill, Soda. God knows, none of the rest of us can do anything with cars, certainly not Pony. I heard you trying to get him to help you fix up this car." Soda laughed, as the light changed to green.
"We're all just good at different things. So stop talking like you're dumb, because you're not."
"It's just…" He never got to finish the thought.
Before I knew what was happening, there was an explosion of metal against metal, as another car crashed violently into the passenger side of ours. Instantly, our car changed from moving forward to rolling, sideways. My head hit again and again against the doorframe as I felt the car roll once, twice, three times before skidding to a halt on its side, passenger side down. I was hanging, half upside-down, by my seatbelt.
There was noise – the sound of the rain on the car, the creaking and groaning as parts of the now broken car settled, the spinning of wheels in air now rather than against the road – but the lack of man-made noise scared me to death. Nobody in the car made a sound. It was a silence I recognized, and one that scared me – a silence I had heard once before, in the hallway on the night the cops came to tell us that our parents had been killed. It was a silence that meant sadness, death. I couldn't stand another second of that silence.
"Soda!" I screamed, looking around while frantically trying to undo my seat belt, which was proving next-to-impossible with my hanging weight pulling against it. Two-Bit was crumpled at the bottom of the car, not moving at all. I could see blood on the door window under him, although I wasn't sure where it was coming from. I couldn't see Soda or Sandy at all.
"Soda!" I screamed again. "Sandy! Two-Bit!" Just as I yelled Two-Bit's name, I managed to unhook the seat belt and came crashing down on top of him. This elicited a groan, but he didn't answer me when I shook his shoulder.
"Two-Bit, c'mon! Wake up! Please! Wake up!"
By this time, people who had seen the accident were gathering outside the car, and I could feel the car shaking as they climbed up it. A face appeared in the window at the top. I wondered what had happened to the glass and realized that it was all around me, and on me.
"Are you okay?" the strange face in the window called.
"My brother… in the front, the driver…is he okay?" I was screaming at this stranger. He didn't answer.
"Give me your hand!"
I did, and he pulled me up and out the window, handing me down to someone on the ground. I ran around to the front and stared through the smashed windshield at Soda and Sandy, both still in their seat belts.
"Soda! Answer me, Soda! Please!" I begged, banging on the window, and quickly becoming hysterical when there was no response.
The bystanders were trying to calm me down, to pull me away from the car, but I fought against them, climbing back up the car get to where he was. I stuck my hand down to grab his, and was relieved when I called his name one more time and I felt him squeeze my hand the slightest bit. I sat there, on top of that car, in the pouring rain, holding his hand, until the paramedics came and loaded me, kicking and screaming, into an ambulance.
A/N: I might stop Complexity here and start a new sequel under a new title... I'll post an author's note as a chapter here to let you know if I do. Don't worry... I'm not stopping Scout's story, just continuing it in a less-than 40+ chapter sequel. This is just very... long!