The minute I said it, I knew it had been stupid. What did I think I was going to do, really? A five-foot tall kid against four six-foot plus tough hoods? I just didn't have it in me, though, to leave Darry to deal with them all on his own. I was just looking to buy some time, until Ben came back with Kevin, or Pony came home… until somebody... anybody showed up.
Strangely, the guys had stopped and somewhat respected the barrier I had made between them and Darry.
"Scout, do you know these guys?" Darry still had no idea who they were.
"They're the guys that scared me that time… they beat up Two-Bit." I was afraid to turn around to face Darry, not wanting to take my eyes off them. I was staring at the tallest guy, the one who had talked to me the last time.
"Yeah, well we're sorry we scared you, kid. But listen to your brother, get outta here. You aint gotta see none of this."
"No," I couldn't believe I said it again. I just couldn't – I wouldn't leave Darry. He was strong, but the odds just weren't fair. There was no way he could have taken all four of them on his own. I was banking on the fact that having a girl there might tame their tempers. I remembered wondering if maybe I had made my presense known at the park, that night with Bob, things might never have escalated as they did.
Darry came down the stairs and stood next to me, gripping my shoulder.
"You get inside," he hissed at me, "Now."
"Kid, we ain't askin', we're tellin'. We got business with your brother. Get lost." The tallest one was the spokesperson, I guessed.
Out of the corner of my eye I saw movement at the corner of the house.
"Four against one? You call that fair?" I asked the strangers. I had no idea where I was getting this courage. I heard the door open behind me and turned slightly to see Soda, looking haggard, standing on the porch.
"Darry… What's going on?" he asked.
"Nothing. Get in the house, Soda." There was no way Soda could handle a fight in his state. But he didn't move; he just stood, looking on. By this time Ben and Kevin had arrived and stood on the opposite side of me as Darry.
"Scout, get out of here, now," Kevin said.
"Now, Scout. Go!" Darry was yelling, and I heard Soda calling me from the porch. I had just turned to go up the stairs when I heard the tall one talk to Darry.
"This is payback for those jobs that should have been ours."
I heard the contact of fist against skin just as I saw another car pull up. I felt my heart sink as I thought that the bad guys had reinforcements, but I was surprised to see Ponyboy - along with Tim Shepard and his brother Curly - jumping out of the car, leaping the fence, and running to join in the brawl, in which both Ben and Kevin had already become fully entangled. Soda grabbed me with his good hand and held me, tightly, apparently afraid that I was about to join in.
What at first had seemed hopeless from our side suddenly seemed easy. With the arrival of Tim, he and Darry easily took one man each, and, in teams, Kevin and Ben and Pony and Curly each took care of one of the others. I had never really seen a fight like that before, and was horrified. I had never realized how much noise a punch or a kick could make, and I hated hearing the cries of pain as the people I cared about got hit.
Soda tried to bury my head in his chest, to shield me from the sights and sounds, but there was no way he was going to go inside. Soda loved fights.
After ten minutes or so of valiant effort on the part of the strangers, they had had enough and were scrambling over the front fence. Our side remained, rubbing bruises and breathing heavily, but still fully intact.
"You got lucky this time, Curtis," the tall one yelled as he hopped the fence.
"Oh, we'll be in touch!" Tim yelled as they drove away.
Soda let go of me and was giddy, yelling and running down the steps to slap the guys on the backs and butts with his good hand.
Darry didn't look much worse for the wear, and neither did Kevin or Tim, but Ben, Pony, and Curly had more than a few cuts and bruises to show for their efforts.
I just watched as they all congratulated each other, not even able to talk. I felt a very familiar feeling rising up in my stomach and taking residence in my heart and brain: fear. Now that it was over, fear replaced my adrenaline-driven courage.
Finally, Darry turned and saw me looking on. I probably looked terrified; I couldn't believe that harm had once again come looking for the people I loved, the only ones I had left. Until then, it had seemed as though Darry had totally forgotten that I was there, and that I had seen everything.
"Scout…" he began.
I wasn't going to lose it, not in front of Tim and Kevin, or Ben and Curly, even. I turned and disappeared into the house. I headed straight to my room and slammed the door shut behind me. I went to the bed against the wall and tore the covers back, jumping in and burying myself under them, curling up in a ball against the wall. Only then did I allow the tears to come.
"Thank you, thank you, thank you," I whispered, a quiet prayer of gratitude for the fact that nobody I loved was hurt. "Please, make it stop. Please, God, please. I need them. Please, just keep them safe." I fought to stop crying. I knew somebody would come after me soon. I was sick of being the big crybaby.
I wasn't mistaken. Not a minute later my door opened and I heard Darry's unmistakable footsteps coming toward my bed.
"Scout, everybody's okay," he said, setting his hand on the lump in my covers that was me, and trying to decipher where my head might be.
"Pony? And Ben? They're really okay?" He followed the sound of my voice and his hand finally settled on my head. He sat down and pulled back the covers.
"Yes. Everybody's okay," he said. "I'm sorry you had to see that."
I didn't respond. I was sorry I had to see it, too.
"Listen, Scout, the next time I tell you to get inside, you'd better do it. If those guys had even touched you, I'd have lost it. I probably would have ended up in jail, or something."
"I was just trying to make them wait… until somebody else came."
"Well, luckily that worked out, but seriously, Scout, if I tell you to go, you go, without an argument. I mean it."
"I didn't want to leave you. Four against one… that's not fair."
"Well if you want to look at it that way, six against four isn't exactly fair either. Sometimes that's just what happens."
"You would have gotten hurt if Tim didn't show up."
"Maybe. But that's not how it worked out."
"What if they come back?"
"They might. But you can't waste all your energy worrying about 'what if's. There's only four of them, period, and Shepards got a whole army. Now they've tried to get at me twice, and they've lost, twice. Eventually they'll get the picture that the payback just isn't worth it, and give up."
"How do you know there's only four of them?"
"I don't, for sure, but you'd think if there were more they woulda brought along some friends."
Involuntarily, my hand went to my forehead and I started to knead at it, closing my eyes. I realized after a second that that is exactly what Darry does when he is upset, and exactly what our dad had done, too. Darry saw it, too, and reached out, pulling my hand back.
"They won't hurt you, Scout. I don't think you need to worry about that. That's not why I told you to get inside. I just didn't want you to have to watch a fight."
"I know that… I was more worried about them hurting you." I realized that most guys wouldn't bother hurting a twelve year-old kid – much less, a girl – but even Darry couldn't take on four big guys, alone. It had been my concern for him that had made me stand my ground.
"I can take care of myself pretty well, most of the time," he said. I just stared back at him. He knew as well as I did that he would have come up on the losing side had not Ben retrieved Kevin and Tim arrived.
"Okay, maybe not against four," he relented. "Three, maybe," he joked, "but not four."
"Darry, there's nothing funny about this for me." I was kind of angry to hear him joking about it. "If those guys had really messed you up today, I wouldn't be allowed to stay here. You said it yourself, before – the state wouldn't let Soda be in charge. There's nothing funny about that thought, to me; actually, it scares me to death. I don't want to get put in a foster home while you're in the hospital."
He got serious again.
"You're right. I'm sorry. But Scout, these guys are idiots. They're mad because I do work better than they do and my quotes are lower, so I get hired. That's just life. I can't really control the way they choose to deal with it."
"I know," I said. It was just one of those things, like our parents dying, or me getting attacked, or Sandy losing her baby… it sucked but you had no choice to just deal with it and keep on trying to move forward.
Darry reached over and rubbed my back.
"C'mon, come out and say hi to your favorite weapons provider before he leaves." I looked up at him, not sure whether he had actually told Tim that he knew about him giving me the knife. I guessed it didn't really matter; if there were any bad feelings about it, I doubted they'd still be rushing to each other's aid in fights. So I assumed all was well with Tim and Darry.
………………………………
Tim was sitting out on the porch with Kevin, both drinking beers, while Soda lay on the couch, rehashing the fight punch-by-punch. Pony and Curly sat on the stairs, smoking. Ben sat perched precariously on the porch railing.
"Hey kid," Tim said, as I came out. He handed Darry a beer, which he accepted.
"Hi Tim," I said, going over to sit on the edge of the couch where Soda lay.
"So I hear you were gonna take on those guys, huh?" Tim was picking on me, but I didn't care. Once again, his most recent timely appearance just served to further cement his superhero image in my mind.
"That's right. I'm actually a lot stronger than I look."
"Yeah, I know," Tim laughed. He knew exactly how weak I really was from my knife lessons. Curly looked at him, confused, but Tim didn't clarify.
"Ben, you did pretty good out there," Darry said. "Kevin must be teaching you a thing or two, huh?"
Ben and Kevin exchanged glances.
"Maybe," Kevin offered.
Conversation continued about the fight for another half-hour or so, with Tim promising Darry that the message would be reinforced any time one of his guys saw the would-be attackers that they were not to mess with any Curtises, Darrel or otherwise. Finally, beer consumed, Darry remembered that Pony and I still had one more day of exams and ordered us both in to study.
"I'll cook, again," he said, "but don't be expectin' this all summer." He turned to the rest of the guys. "Anyone stayin' for supper?"
"Naw, we gotta go study too, our mom's gonna be home soon," Kevin said, shoving Ben down off the railing into the front yard.
"We gotta go too, Ma told Curly if the yard ain't mowed by nightfall he's gotta find a new home." Tim smacked Curly on the head.
"Okay, well, thanks, guys. I definitely owe you one," Darry said, herding Pony, Soda and me into the house.
"I'll talk to you soon, Darry… let you know if anything goes down with those guys," Tim called, as he got in his car.
"Alright, Tim, I appreciate it. Thanks again."
Tim drove off and Darry turned to me.
"Study time, little lady," he said, pointing to my bedroom.
"Me? What about Pony?"
"Pony and I have something to discuss, in the kitchen."
I looked over at Pony. I had forgotten all about the fact that he hadn't been home when Darry got home. I could only imagine how he had ended up in Tim Shepard's car, though I was glad he had.
"Now," Darry added, looking at Pony. He walked into the kitchen, and Darry followed him. It's not like we weren't all going to hear their conversation anyway - there was no door to the kitchen.
I went in my room and shut my door - well, almost shut it.
"Alright, Pony, so where did you go after school today?" Darry asked, not necessarily angrily, but not exactly pleasantly, either.
"I just had some stuff to take care of. I didn't realize how late it was. You couldn't have gotten home much before I did."
"That's not the point, Ponyboy. You were supposed to come straight home after school. You're fourteen years old, you can't just be wandering around without telling anybody where you are."
"I told Scout." I cringed. Why was he dragging me into this? He'd promised me he would be back before Darry.
"Then why did she say she didn't know where you were?"
"I don't know."
"Cut it out, Ponyboy. Were you going somewhere you shouldn't have been?"
"No, Darry, just… let it go, would you? Luckily, I ran into Tim and he gave me a ride home so we could all save your ass."
"Again, Pony, that's not the point. I want to know where you were. Lying about it is only going to get you in more trouble."
"Darry, it's not…"
"Scout, get out here," Darry interrupted him. I sighed. Pony had been covering for me lately, but I had no idea where he'd been. What was he even thinking? I was a terrible liar, most of the time. I slid off my bed and shuffled into the kitchen.
"I'm sure you heard our conversation." Darry was staring at me, knowing how hard it was to lie to his face. I never had, except about Steve, and that had been excruciatingly hard.
"Scout, do you know where Ponyboy was today?"
I hesitated, but just for a second. I stared at the wall right behind Darry, hoping it looked like I was looking up at him.
"The movies." I don't know why he would have been hiding that from us, but it was the best answer I could come up with under pressure.
"Okay, so let's say I buy that. What movie did you see, Ponyboy?"
Pony stammered for a second.
"That… uh… that Paul Newman one… Luke… Cool Hand Luke."
"Well, that's interesting, Pony, because I drove by the movie house on my way home tonight, and today's Wednesday, and you know as well as I do that they change the movies on Tuesdays. Cool Hand Luke isn't playing there anymore. And I don't think you saw The Graduate, either, because that's rated R. So where were you really, Pony? You better do your research better before you lie to me. Or to Scout, and then try to get her to cover for you."
I felt my cheeks turn red.
"Dammit, Ponyboy, where were you? I'm tired of playin' this game with you!" Darry's patience was fading fast. He looked at me, giving me another shot at coming clean. I just shrugged.
"The cemetery," Pony barely whispered. I heard him, but Darry didn't.
"What?"
"The cemetery," Pony spoke up this time. "I took the bus to the cemetery, to see Dallas and Johnny's graves."
Darry and I were both silent, and Soda must have heard, because he was suddenly in the doorway.
"Look, nobody ever even offered to take me, and I know you all thought I couldn't handle it, so I just decided to go on my own. But the bus cost more than I thought, so I had to walk home. Tim saw me walking and picked me up."
"Pony…," Darry started, "I would have… I just didn't think…"
"I know. You didn't think I was ready. Well, I was. It was just something I had to do. And if I'd said anything everybody would have started acting like my psychologist or something, so I just did it myself. It's done. And I'm okay. I didn't lose my mind, or anything."
I didn't know what to say. I had made my peace with Dally and Johnny being gone and said my goodbyes long ago. For Pony, it had taken longer – so long, in fact, that we had all forgotten that he hadn't ever been to their graves.
"I wish you would have said something, Pony," Darry said, sadly. "I would've taken you."
"I wanted to go alone. I needed to."
Soda came over and put his good arm around Pony, and Darry put his hand on my shoulder. Nobody spoke for what seemed like at least a minute.
"Actually, Darry, I lied about something else, too."
"What, Pone?" Darry didn't sound mad now.
"I had enough bus fare, but there was a guy selling flowers on the way there. I bought some to put on Mom and Dad's grave. That's why I had to walk."
Darry hesitated and then finally spoke.
"That was a good idea, Pony. A real good idea."
Darry nodded at him, and I knew that he saw just as well as the rest of us that Pony had finally had some sort of closure with the ghosts that had been haunting him for months.
And the living would go on.
.......................
A/N: Big thanks to everyone who checked in with me to let me know you are still reading. Your reviews are always greatly appreciated.