After I left the arcade I went to see Angel.
When I came into Angel's room she was over by her window with it open and she was smoking, but it smelt funny.
"Angel… is that a cigarette?" I asked, closing the door behind me and leaning on it.
She turned around to see me with a shocked expression on her face. "Yes, of course." I could see now she wasn't lying; I knew what pot looked like and what a cigarette looked like. That was a cigarette, "It's some new, cheap kind my girl friends have been getting," but I still wasn't convinced that it was only tobacco in that cigarette.
"Ok." I shrugged. I didn't ask for a cigarette like I might have normally, and she didn't offer. She got my drift but neither of us was going to say anything about it.
We sat in silence for a few minutes. Then Angel put out her cigarette and closed the window.
"Ugh. I wish those dumb Brumley boys would lay off Liz." Angel growled, positioning herself across the bed from me.
"Yeah, they jumped her again today I think." I said. That Evie chick is really desperate; if she was the one who planned this…
"Mhm." Angel nodded. "Some kid from Brumley named Danny got in a fight with her; I heard from Tyler Terrell who happened to walk by as Curly and Billy came to her rescue. They took her to Tim, I think."
"Yeah, she was just talking to him at the arcade when I left there a little while ago."
"Sounds about right." Angel agreed.
I nodded. "Maybe you should let the guys know… She won't tell them on her own and Soda and Steve'll want to know."
"Yeah, I think I'll head over to the DX now."
"Ok, well then I'm off I guess." I got up and left, waving to her in her window as I walked down the street and she put her "going out of the house" make-up on.
I loitered around The Dingo for a bit until Stacy's friend Bob came over on his break and bought me chocolate shake and French fries.
As I watched his bright green eyes over my chocolate shake, a thought formed in my head.
"You know, maybe Stacy was right." I said, sipping my shake again.
"Pardon?" He said shaking himself, and focusing his eyes on me again. I quickly glanced sideways but didn't see any slim-wasted, big-chested girl in sight.
"Maybe you're not that bad. Stacy said you weren't."
"Really? She did?"
"Yep." I looked over my shoulder and saw Billy and Curly with a few from Tim's gang in a corner booth. Billy was watching me. "And she's right. You aren't that bad; you're actually a pretty good guy." I smiled. "We could be friends." I finished my shake and grabbed my last handful of fries "But you're going to get fired if you keep buying girls food. So, here's my first favor for you as a friend." I dropped some change on the table and a couple dollar bills.
I had a feeling that Bob's friendship would be useful;a link to Brumley was what I'd wanted all along, wasn't it?
When I got back home – home, I like the sound of that that, – Toria was lying on the couch with ice on her abdomen. I went into my room and read about half of one of my books before I heard someone come in the door and I went out to the living room.
I went and sat down on the couch at Toria's feet. "Because you have ice on your abs and little Ms. Angela Shepard stopped by the station and said she heard it through the grapevine that Curly and Billy saved your butt again." Soda said to Victoria.
"Well she's right. And yes Tim knows and I think he's going to do something about it." Toria answered, sitting up mostly now.
"And if he doesn't?"
"I don't know I guess that leaves me to find Smith on my own doesn't it?" Smith? Who's that?
"Yeah or tell Dally when he comes back." Soda said.
"That'll work." Tore agreed half-heartedly. I refrained from rolling my eyes.
A little later when no one seemed to be paying attention, I pulled myself out of my thoughts; no longer able to detain my curiosity.
"Toria?" I asked quietly, I wanted to be sure no one else was paying attention, but not seem to suspicious. Pony was watching me out of the corner or his eye, but no one else was aware I had said anything, though if Dally was here he'd be watching my every move.
"Yeah?" She looked up at me. Gosh, her blue eyes are so pretty. I wish mine were more like hers and not so much like Dally's.
"Who's Smith?"
"What?" She asked me, confused.
"Soda and you mentioned someone named Smith earlier." This was just a hunch; but I thought it was worth looking into.
"Oh, Nathan Smith." Toria answered, understanding. "He's the leader of Brumley." She said with a slight hint of venom in her voice.
"Ah…"
"Why?"
"No reason, just wondering." I'm so going to check into this. It's possible… Right? I discovered Dally and Toria when I came here… so this wasn't soo far fetched.
Was it?
Later that night,this guy Blade, one of the PR guys Victoria owed, came to take her to Jay's for dinner.
Steve went to "show up" like he was apparently allowed to, and the gang was boring.
Darry was opening mail; bills, and looking a little overwhelmed, and Pony was reading Johnny some article from the newspaper, a wanted ad I think? Soda had kind of zoned out, like Two-bit, watching the boring show that was on the TV.
I ended up reading my book for the evening, and managed to finish it shortly after Steve came in, and a bit before Victoria came in.
As soon as Toria walked in, Steve took her in his arms and checked he over.
"If you were watching as diligently as I know you were you'd know he didn't touch me the entire night." She answered, slightly annoyed.
"Who drove you home?" Two-Bit asked.
"Tim Shepard."
"Thought so. Jackie said Angel told her Tim was going."
"Did you have a good time?" Darry asked.
"Yeah, he's a nice guy for the most part, the ride home was a little rough, but that's to be expected." Toria answered.
"How are you feeling?" Steve asked.
"What do you mean?"
"You heard me, how ya feeling? Angel told us about Danny."
"I'm alright. Curly and Billy chased them off and made me go see Tim." Victoria looked at me warily as she said this.
"What'd he do?"
"Told me to take care of myself and walked me back here. I really hope he figures out how the boys from beating me up." Toria informed us.
"I told Evie yesterday..."
"I know, Steve, I know. But there's not much she's going to do to stop it just yet. Neal says she's still angry and it'll take some time before she's over it. I think Tim's gonna talk to Nathan Smith, Brumley's gang leader, and make him put a stop to it but..."
"Yeah, it'll end soon." Steve said. "I hope." He added in an undertone.
"I hope it does Steve I really do." Toria sighed.
Two-Bit left the house about twenty minutes later and Steve a half an hour after that; after a long good night.
I followed Toria, Soda and Pony back down the hall on my way to bed after we said good night to Darry. "You really think Evie will just give up?" Soda asked.
"Not like that. It's gonna take something major before she'll stop." Toria answered.
"What kind a major?"
"I don't know." Toria sighed. "Good night, Soda."
"Night Tator." He kissed the top of her head and slipped into his room.
Toria collapsed on top of her bed after she changed and just lay there staring at the ceiling. I quietly slipped into bed after I changed and turned on my side, curled around Jetty, and looked out the crack in the curtains at the night sky.
Darry came in shortly after to say goodnight again.
"Good night Victoria." He went over to her side of the bed.
"Night, Darry." She answered as he pulled her sheet up over her.
"Good night Emma." Darry said, looking down at me some what sympathetically, though, it beats me why. He should have been sympathetic towards Toria and all these guys being on her back about her fighting. Its wasn't even fighting but more self-defense, yet they still got mad at her for doing that. It's the stupidest thing I've ever heard; getting mad at someone for them saving their own ass.
"Night, Darry." I whispered through a tired smile.
He ruffled my hair, gave Jet a bit of a pet, and left.
I fell asleep shortly after the thought of Darry and his table full of bills crept into my mind.
-The next morning Pony and Johnny invited me to go to the movies with Toria and them. But I declined with a thank-you.
Sometime after I finished half a book, I wandered out of the house and to the park.
When I was sitting on the swings, a cute little girl with bouncy brown curls and bright blue eyes that looked like they were just soaking the whole world up, came over to the swings.
"Hi!" She greeted enthusiastically, struggling to get up on the swing beside me.
"Hello." I smiled.
"My name's Misty. I'm five." She said, distracted from the swing for a moment, holding up four fingers.
I laughed. "Hi, Misty, I'm Emma."
Just then a tall, handsome, dark-haired teen with blue eyes and a strong, muscled build, came up to Misty and showed her to hold up one more finger. His clothes were slightly fancier than the gang's, and I assumed he was one of those "socs" that Curly had told me about. But personally, I didn't understand, or care about, the local stereotypes of "socs" and "greasers".
"Five fingers Misty, remember? One, two, three, four, five." He counted off her fingers slowly.
"Onetwofreefourfive!" She jumped up and down, laughing and clapping her hands. "Help me up Jonah! Help me, help me! Pleeeeasse?" She said, patting the swing, looking up at the dark haired boy, her blue eyes sparkling.
"Okay," He lifted her up under the arms and set her on the swing, "Here ya go. Hold on tight." He warned.
He went behind her and pushed her on the swing. She kept squealing 'higher, higher!' and giggling with glee.
I smiled and the heels of my converse dug into the sand as I gently rocked myself on my own swing.
After a short time of being pushed on the swing, Misty wiggled off and ran to the jungle gym.
The dark haired boy huffed and sat down on the swing.
"I take it she's a handful?" I laughed slightly.
"I'm just tired today."
"Yeah, baby-sitting can be a pain, huh?"
Just before he was about to answer Misty ran up. She must have heard my question, because she answered it for him.
"He's not baby sitting me. He's my eagle guardian now." She said smiling up at me with her sweet toothy grin.
"Legal guardian, Misty." The boy – Jonah? – corrected her.
"But that's what I said! Eagle guardian." The little girl protested. The she saw another little girl and her mom over by the slide and ran over to introduce herself.
Jonah shook his head and chuckled.
"So, you're her eagle guardian, huh?" I looked over at him, leaning my forehead against the chain on the swing.
He smirked, but then the corners of his mouth dropped. "I have legal custody of her and our brother. Our parents died in a freak car accident about 8 months ago."
"I'm so sorry." Then a thought occurred to me. "How old is your brother?"
"Mark's sixteen."
"Wow. A six year old sister and a sixteen year old brother. And you're what, like eighteen?" I asked, amazed at how he held it together.
"Twenty, actually. I just celebrated my twentieth birthday before my parents passed." His blue eyes clouded slightly with a distant, faraway look.
"Is it hard?"
"Pardon?" He shook himself and blinked away what might have been tears.
"With your parents gone. Is it hard having to look after your siblings? Don't you ever just wish you weren't alone – had someone to help you?" I wondered how he did it. That's a big responsibility for someone his age.
Jonah looked over at Misty laughing and playing ring-around-the-rosy with the other little girl. He smiled. "Sometimes. But it's worth it."
I nodded, suddenly understanding how – rather, why – he did what he did everyday.
After a while, the little red-headed girl had to leave, and Misty came back over to us.
"Time to go now, kiddo." Jonah announced to his little sister as he stood up off the swing.
"Jonah, is Emma coming home with us?" Misty asked.
"No, Misty. She has to go home to her own house for lunch, or her parents will wonder where she is." He replied.
"She has parents?" Misty asked.
Jonah smiled at the little girl sympathetically.
"Actually, my parents aren't here, either. My mom is in another city far away and I don't have a Daddy." I said.
"Who looks after you?" Misty asked, interested that I shared the same circumstance as her.
"Well, my… brother. And his friends."
"Just like me! Kinda…" Misty laughed.
"Your brother, huh?" Jonah asked. I was sure he knew Dally; everyone seemed to – but I hope he didn't make the connection. Not that it's possible tonot make the connection, with how much we look alike.
If he did, he didn't say. But he did give me a bit of a strange look.
"Well, Misty," Jonah said, turning back to his sister, "we have to go now. Its lunch time and Mark is going to be looking for us."
"Okie-dokie." Misty said. "Bye, Emma!"
"Bye."
"See you another time?" Jonah asked as Misty grabbed his hand and started to drag him away.
"Definitely." I nodded, happy that I had made even more friends. Maybe I could manage life in Tulsa…
After Jonah and Misty, my new friends, left, I wandered around to the part of town that I thought was Brumley turf. Not that their turf was necessarily as wide-spread as Tim's.
When I was wandering around and looking out for any guy from Brumley, I bumped into someone. The person grabbed a firm grip on my shoulders; and I looked up to find Curly Shepard.
"You know, you and your sister really don't get it do you? Always wandering town you're going to get yourselves into some serious trouble." He growled, annoyed, as he turned me around and dragged me in the opposite direction from which I was headed with an arm around my shoulder.
"You really don't realize how much that kind of mindless wandering makes you vulnerable." Curly continued to complain in a tone that seemed like he was trying to imitate Dally or Tim.
"You seriously doubt me and my own self-defense that much?" I rolled my eyes, starting to get annoyed myself at his ignorance towards Victoria and me.
"Yes! You're a girl. And just a kid, at that. You can't take care of yourself; and when you're wandering town like this, we can't really protect you like we would like to and try to."
Okay, now I was seriously just pissed, and obviously my eyes had darkened to the dark blue, almost black colour that they changed to when I was very angry, because when I pushed Curly's arm off me and whipped around to stand in front of him he looked actually pretty scared. "Mister Curly Rob Shepard, I am not a kid. I grew up in New York City and have been in a gang since I was about 8 years old. And what does being a girl have to do with anything? I learned self defense from one of the best gang leaders in my neighborhood at the time, and can fight as good as you or any other guy from the gang. Not to mention I could easily kick your butt any day. I also happen know my way around Tulsa by now, and know exactly where I am and where I'm going." Not entirely true; I wasn't sure where I was going, but I knew where I was."And who exactly do you mean by we?"
Curly recovered from the colour change of my eyes and looked right at me with a serious stare. "Look, that may be true but we – Tim, the guys at the Curtis', Billy and I – just don't want you to get hurt; we're just worried, Em. We're just trying to help." He sighed.
"You mean, you guys are worried about Toria, and you are unnecessarily worrying about me wandering about town because Toria does that and gets hurt sometimes?" I shook my head, "You guys really should lay off her. All she's been doing is protecting herself from the guys that have been jumping her lately. Relax, your guys' only job in this is to get those guys off her back and stop them from jumping her all the time. And I'm fine. I pay attention to where I'm going." I finished with a bit of surrender.
"Yeah, that's fine. But you're still coming home with me." Curly took a firm grip on my wrist and started walking, dragging me with him. I tried half-heartedly to wrench his hand off, and if I was really trying I could have easily (just possibly with a partially broken wrist – for him, or me if I did it wrong.) gotten away, but I just let it be after a while and walked beside him.
He looked down at me and realized I had given up and fully surrendered. "Can you please let go now? It's actually really starting to hurt." I looked up at him. It was the truth, too.
He let go of my wrist and I followed him home.
When we got there, Tim was sitting on the couch.
"Hey Curly, what's… Oh, hey Emma." Tim said seeing me when he looked up at us.
"Hi." I looked away, annoyed. Why was Curly doing this? I was perfectly fine wandering by myself.
"Emma was wandering around the edge of Brumley turf mindlessly." Curly said, pushing me towards Tim. I rolled my shoulders, and tried to shake him off and move away, but he just shoved me in front of Tim.
Tim sighed as Curly poked me again closer to Tim. "Curly stop!" I snapped, "Get your paws off me. I get it, you want Tim to see me, and he does. Stop it, jeez."
"Thanks, Curly, you can go now." Tim said just firmly enough.
Curly did and left the house.
When he did leave, I sighed and flopped down on the couch; but on the other end from Tim, I still wasn't sure if he had an attitude with me.
He looked over at me. "So, wandering town are you? Such a lawbreaker!" He joked. "But really, what were you doing on Brumley turf?"
"Not sure." I shrugged. "Hoping to make a friend, I guess."
"Well, just be careful." I nodded. "You know Curly means well. He's just uptight because Liz was wandering around earlier."
"What's the felony in that?" I asked.
"She was wandering around aimlessly, and she's been kind of out of it lately."
"Yeah, I noticed she seemed kind of distant, but I don't know what she's normally like…"
"Not like this. She's a pretty happy girl." Tim informed me. "Anyways, I ran into her and I guess everything caught up with her because she broke down and I had to take her to our headquarters."
"That warehouse?"
"How'd you know about that?" Tim looked quizzically at me.
"That warehouse on Madison Street?"
"Yeah, the one Todd found."
"Oh, is that what he's telling you? I actually found it; the first week I was here I stayed there for a few of the rainy days."
"Huh. Well, I took her there and she cried herself to sleep and slept for a while. She left after a while once she woke up."
"So that's why Curly is so uptight about my wandering." I understood now. "I thought it had something to do with Tori and everything lately."
"Yeah. It does."
I began to fiddle with my locket as the silence suddenly became awkward.
"You know Em, I'm sorry for being sort of uptight lately towards you. I've just been worried about Toria and busy with some stressful gang stuff." Tim said relaxing a bit.
I looked at him for a bit, then moved over to his side of the couch and wrapped my arms around his waist in a hug. "It's okay." I squeezed him, and he hugged me back a bit.
"Well, how about I walk you home now?" Tim said as we pulled away.
I smiled and nodded and he walked me back to the Curtis'.