Three months.
Dallas isn't going to be let out until February. Johnny kicks at the side of the Curtis house and then jerks his leg back when he realizes what he's doing. He turns around sheepishly and gives Darry a guilty, fearful look. Darry frowns at him and Johnny kneels down in the freshly raked grass and begins wiping off the dirt smudge that the bottom of his shoe left on the wall. He feels a hand on his shoulder, a gentle squeeze, and when he looks up again, Darry says, "Don't worry about it, kid." Johnny stands up. He swipes the dirt at the knees of his jeans and shoves his hands in his pockets.
"Ninety days in county," Steve repeats, shaking his head in disappointment. It's been three days. It didn't take long for the judge to decide that one.
"That's not fair," Johnny says bitterly, the words escaping him before he can hold them back. His hands inside his pockets squeeze, but there's not enough space to make for fists. "Should be illegal to keep him in there that long." He kicks at the dirt this time.
"Dally's in there because he did something illegal, Johnny," Darry explains with patience.
"I know, but, but...three months is a long time." His voice wavers off at the end of that sentence. None of the boys know about his involvement. Dallas hadn't mentioned it at the trial, and Tim and his outfit aren't exactly the type to go bragging about what they've done or rat him out, not when the police are still looking for the other culprits.
"He broke into a store and looted half the merch," Steve announces, as if they didn't already know. "With his record, three months is a godsend. At least he took the plea bargain and got it dropped to a misdemeanor, but damn, Dallas never uses his brains."
Johnny's never talked back to one of the boys, but he can't let Steve get away with insulting Dallas like that. Not when the only reason Dally got caught in the first place was because he came back for him. "Least he's got brains, Randle," Johnny shoots with malice.
"Least I've got balls."
"Yeah, blue balls." It's Pony. He's stepped between the two of them, and now a part of Johnny regrets not keeping his mouth shut. The two of them will use any excuse to insult each other, and Johnny hates it when his buddies argue. He hates it even more than he hates being caught between his folks fighting.
"Watch it, Pony," Darry warns. "And who the hell taught you to speak like that? Do you even know what that means?"
Pony's flushing a dark red now. "I know what it means!" But he insists with such intense conviction that it is obvious he doesn't know exactly what it means beyond the fact that it sounds vaguely sexual and insulting. Johnny can see the look of relief cross Darry's face. He guesses, even if Pony is well aware of the basics and probably a lot more (considering the fact that he hangs around the gang and his older brother is the most sought after greaser in town), Darry hasn't given him the talk yet.
"I'm sorry, Steve," Johnny offers. "I'm just upset about Dal."
"It's okay," says Steve. He doesn't apologize, but he doesn't need to. Johnny started it, and anybody with a modicum of sense knows not to start with Steve, whose temper rivals Dally's. And Johnny can shrug off being insulted. That's nothing new for him.
Ponyboy wraps his arm around Johnny's shoulder. "Don't worry," he says. "Dal will be out soon, you'll see. He always is. And besides, you know last time he was bragging about how he practically ruled the place."
Johnny swallows, but he doesn't say anything about that. Dally brags about a lot, but it doesn't necessarily mean he's telling the truth. Johnny's heard stories about jail. Stories that make his skin crawl. But he's not going to ruin the illusion for Pony, who takes Dal at his word.
"Look," says Darry, "we're all upset. But Dally's gonna do his time, and when he comes out, we'll throw a party. I'll even let Pony stay up on a school night if he comes back on a school night. How's that?"
"Promise?" Pony asks.
"You got it, little buddy. Now, who's up for some football?"
Darry divides them up: Big Curtis and Little Curtis (Ponyboy is not happy about that descriptor) versus Johnny and Steve. They're short Two-Bit, who's at a party somewhere, and Soda, who's on a date with Sandy, and of course Dallas, so this time the game is even more like a mess of tossing and tackling, with less of a pretense of plays and plots and order than usual.
Johnny likes sports, so long as they're not competitive or taken seriously. Even if he ain't a great runner, and even if he's small enough that the only person he can reasonably tackle is Pony, he always looks forward to a good game of football with his buddies. He likes to run and run until the only thing he can feel is lungs collapsing and his muscles spasming and his legs giving out. He gets that rush where his body exists without his mind, and his normal fears and doubts and self-recriminations disappear underneath the sensation of wind moving against his face, the hard pound of the ball bruising his palms as he catches it, the soreness in his triceps after throwing the ball too forcefully and too fast, over and over again. And he likes the contact, the roughhousing–the tackling and being tackled–best of all. Not because he's a sexual deviant. Johnny knows it has nothing to do with that. He just likes it, in a way he can't describe. Outside of Pony (who's always ready to offer a hug), football is basically the only touching he gets that isn't violent.
A few minutes in, Pony jumps up on Darry's back in an attempt to tackle him (even though they're technically on the same team), and it turns into a makeshift piggyback ride. Ponyboy kicks at him in embarrassment, but Darry doesn't relent. Steve throws the ball in their direction, and after Pony catches it, he tosses over his shoulder towards Johnny. But Johnny doesn't throw it back. Today, he can't find it in himself to enjoy it.
He dropkicks the ball with all the force he can muster, and the ball soars far away, past the onetime merry-go-round with the seats rusted off so sharply it's like a spiked wheel. The ball disappears in the distance under the uncut grass, and Johnny shoves his hands into his pockets. He sighs, and pulls out a cigarette. No one goes to retrieve the ball. All four of them gravitate towards each other, as if the game has naturally ended.
Pony slides off of Darry. His cheeks are flushed and his gleeful, embarrassed grin is replaced with a frustrated sigh. "We're in the middle of playing. Come on, Johnny! You can smoke anytime."
Johnny shrugs. "Guess I don't feel like playing today is all. Sorry to spoil the fun, Pone. I think I'm gonna head home now."
"But Johnny-"
"Leave him be, Pony." Darry's voice is quiet but firm, leaving no room for argument.
Johnny looks away, because he can't stand the worried glances Pony's giving him. He knows why, too. It ain't merely disappointment that the game is over. The two of them passed his house on the walk home from school, and they heard the sound of something being banged around in there, which is never a good sign.
But he just can't goof off with his buddies while Dally's serving time for him. He can't.
#
Johnny stops in his tracks the moment he steps in his front door. It doesn't look like his house. The mess of dirty laundry and knickknacks that clutter the entrance has been cleared away. And the bookcase that had been flipped over about a year ago during one of his father's rages has finally been put upright; dime romances books and back issues of Time magazine are organized on the shelves as if they'd never been disturbed. In fact, a lot of the furniture has been rearranged. That must have been the loud noises he was hearing. And the floor's been vacuumed. Johnny follows the sound of the radio (a barbershop quartet harmonizing a jingle: "You stop pay-ing the elbow tax, when you start clean-ing...with A-Jax!") into the kitchen.
His mom is at the sink, yellow rubber gloves ending at her elbows. She couldn't look more beautiful if they were white silk, and she were wearing a ball gown instead of a food-crusted apron. She hears him enter, looks up at him, and smiles, and Johnny offers a shy smile back. He notices the yellow remnant of a bruises beneath her left eye and feels a twinge of guilt that he wasn't around to stop that. That's the catch in avoiding his home: his old man will swing at her if Johnny ain't around to swing at. And even though when his Ma is drinking she gives as much as she gets, considering the size difference, and the fact that she's a woman and should be protected, it will never be a fair fight.
He hasn't seen the house this clean in–if he can remember correctly–at least two years. And he hasn't seen that sort of smile on her face in maybe an equally long time. There's always ups and downs and lulls and rushes in this house, though. Just usually not as extreme as this one. Sometimes, when his dad has got Jesus back, and both of his folks are making an effort, there's dinner on the table and a lot of talk about changes that are gonna be made. But it never lasts longer than a week, even if every time Johnny convinces himself that this time will be the one to turn their family around for good.
"Found something in your schoolbag." Johnny tenses. Even if he doesn't catch anger in her tone, the words are ominous. He wonders if she's tricking him by acting nice. If she's found something illegal. Maybe one of his buddies left something in there by accident. He wonders if she's already called the cops on him.
His mom turns off the faucet, peels off the rubber gloves, and heads over to the (newly sorted) piles of paperwork on the kitchen table, where she hands him a sheet of paper. It's his quarter report card, handed out shortly before he stopped attending tutoring. It's been sitting squished at the bottom of his schoolbag for these four weeks, but now, the wrinkles have been flattened out.
English C+
American History C-
Algebra I B+
Earth Science B-
Shop A
"Not bad," she says. She stares at him, but she's not doing the scornful up-and-down that he's accustomed to. It's a judgmental stare, but one in which the judgement's been reserved for a later time, like she's still testing out his worth instead of immediately finding him wanting. He doesn't bother to tell her he's doing significantly worse now. He doesn't want to spoil the moment.
"Well, it's the second time around, so guess I oughta be passing. Gotta be a retard not to," Johnny answers, careful not to accept the near-compliment, offering criticism before she can get to it first.
"Why didn't you tell me you were doing better in school?"
Johnny swallows. She sounds hurt. Actually, honestly hurt. Johnny can't make sense of it. The same woman who spends every day ignoring his existence, the same woman who–on the rare occasions she bothers to notice he's alive–is keen to remind him how much she wishes he'd never been born and how typical it is that he's grown up to be a useless criminal just like his father and how she can't wait until he gets locked up so the state can pay for him instead of her being forced to fork over all her money to raise him...
He doesn't have an excuse for hiding something he's proud of, except the fact that so long as this accomplishment was private she couldn't find a reason to take that pride away from him. That's not a truth he can share without hurting her further, so he looks down at his feet and shrugs.
"Why don't you talk to me, Johnny?"
Johnny licks his lip. His throat is dry.
"You know..." His mom has that far-away, defeated voice she gets sometimes, when she thinks about the olden days. "...you were a colicky baby. I used to rock you as you screamed and screamed. You never shut up, no matter how hard I tried–bottles and pacifiers and bouncing you on my lap. I used to get so frustrated. All I wanted was peace and quiet, all I wanted was to be left alone, and every hour, all day and all night long, there you were, wailing at the top of your lungs. But ever since you were old enough to talk, you've barely said a word. Funny how things change. Well, I guess it's not funny."
He wonders what she's trying to get at. If it's a round-about apology, or another accusation. He thinks she might be trying to pull words from him, but he doesn't know what words she wants to hear. He doesn't say anything.
"After you were born, the doctor told me I couldn't have any more children," she adds.
Johnny stiffens. That's news for him. It's not something he's ever even guessed at. He has always figured he is an only child because his parents are intelligent enough not to make the same mistake twice. He figured it was a choice. He has to force back a sharp, irrational guilt, and the only way to curb it is to repeat in his mind: it's not my fault, it's not my fault, it's not my fault. But it kind of is.
"I used to think that was God's way of punishing me, for having you out of wedlock."
Johnny shoves his hands into his pockets. She's never talked about his baby years before. That's the only blessing that comes with being queer, with being so abnormal he can't even make kids: he's never gonna accidentally knock somebody up. He's never going to be forced to find out he's become his old man.
"Am I..." Johnny struggles with the words. "Do you...do you still think I'm your punishment?"
"Johnny, listen." She takes the report card back in her hand and shakes it in front of him. "This is proof. Proof you can do better." It doesn't escape his notice that she avoids answering his question.
"You've obviously been trying harder. So I'm going to try harder, too. We are going to pull this family together. I mean it. We are. Do you know where your father is right now?" She doesn't say 'your father' in that derisive way he's all too familiar with. She says it with violent admiration, as if recalling long-lost feelings. "He's back at one of those meetings. I think it's going to work this time, Johnny. I really think it will."
Johnny nods. But he's heard this speech before and he doesn't know if he believes her.
"If you could only stop hanging out with those delinquents... Johnny, you're throwing away your life. When I was your age-" But she cuts herself off before she starts the lecture. For as long as Johnny can remember, that has never happened. Maybe at the moment she's too consumed with the memory of the big mistake she made at his age–him–to judge.
Johnny slumps into a seat at the table and pulls his hand through his hair. He's so mixed up. First, Dally's gone and now his Ma is talking to him and actually being kind and he has no idea what to make of it.
"Guess you're not gonna have to worry about that for a while," he mutters. He hates how pathetic he sounds.
"What do you mean?" Her voice is quiet. She takes the seat across from him. She reaches out for his hand, but Johnny intuitively slides it away from her.
"My best friend got locked up," he mumbles into hands. He doesn't know why he tells her. He needs somebody, anybody to talk to right now. And she...she seems to care about him. She really does. "I ain't gonna see him for a couple months."
"Not the little one?"
Johnny shakes his head.
"The mean-looking blond?"
Johnny nods. "Yeah."
"Well, good riddance. You know what Barbara had to say about to me about him when she saw the two of you together?"
"Nothing good, I'm guessing."
His mom gives him a wry look. "If that's how you want to phrase it. He's a criminal, Johnny. A worthless criminal. I'm sick of you wasting your potential by hanging out with white trash thugs-"
"Yeah, well you don't know what he's like around me!" Johnny's words rush out in sudden anger. He doesn't know why he's lashing out when his mom is being so nice, except he can't tolerate anyone insulting Dallas. Not ever. "You have no fucking idea," he continues bitterly, careless of the consequences. "He's a good guy. A good buddy. And he's a thousand times better to me than you've ever been."
She goes white. "Johnny..." she starts warningly. If it's possible, her voice sounds white, too.
"I'm sorry, Ma." But this is not something he can take back. He's essentially pissed on the olive branch she just handed him. "I'm real sorry. I didn't mean it. I didn't mean to yell at you. I didn't mean to swear. I...I just miss him. I don't care that he's a criminal, okay? He's my friend..."
She closes her eyes.
"Am I in trouble?" he asks, voice cracking to a higher pitch on that last word. "I fucked it up again, didn't I?" He holds back from breathing, because he knows if he lets it out, he's going to sob. He won't let himself cry. Not in front of her. In several seconds, he has calmed down enough to trust himself to breathe again. He's always been good at controlling himself.
His Ma doesn't answer him. Instead, she says, "I used to think you were like your father. But you're not. Not at all." That might be the nicest thing she's ever said to him, but there's a tinge of panic in that sentence, and Johnny knows she hadn't meant it as a compliment.
"You're like me. Like I used to be. Wrapped up in somebody else's shit–someone stronger, someone better. Somebody you think is going to save you. Well listen, kiddo, no one's gonna save you. That's not how the world works. And let me tell you something, you have a hell of a lot better than I ever did." And just like that, Johnny can hear the shift in her voice, from loss and regret, to the blaming fury it always returns to. "You are such an ingrate. At least I try for you. You have no idea what the real world is like. How good you have it in this house. Do you think any of those delinquent friends actually give a shit about you? You think they wouldn't just leave you cold the moment you inconvenienced them?"
She waits for his answer with crossed arms. "Well, do you?" she repeats, viciously, vengefully enjoying this, because she knows what his answer will inevitably be.
Johnny swallows. "Yeah."
"Yeah what?" she presses, thinking he means, 'Yeah, they'd leave me cold.' She wants to hear him admit she's right. She wants to hear him admit he's got no one. She makes him say it often enough that this is a familiar script.
Johnny rubs his sweaty palms against his jeans. "Yeah, I think they actually give a shit about me." He can't look at her when he says it, but he can say it. He can actually say it. He believes it, too.
She laughs, bitterly. "Oh, that's just hilarious. Hilarious. You know what, if these friends care so much about you, Johnny, then why don't they feed you, why don't they clothe you, why don't they shelter you? Huh? Who does that for you, Johnny? Who?"
"Half the time they do," Johnny bites out.
His mom pushes back her chair; she stands up. "I can't have you in this house right now. Get out."
Johnny presses his hands against the table to stand up and escape, but he's not moving fast enough for her. "Get out!" She's shouting this time, and her words sound wet. She's crying.
Johnny's pushing out his chair with the back of his knees, rising to get the hell out of there, when he hears the sound of footsteps behind him. His breath stops short and he feels the familiar whisper of fear creep down every bone of his spinal cord. Johnny has spent his life silently slipping by on tip-toe, sneaking out or up to his bedroom hoping no one will notice him, avoiding every beam and step that creaks–he's memorized them. But these are the footsteps of a man who's not afraid to make an entrance, who doesn't worry if his sound will wake or disturb or interrupt. His father's home.
Johnny is suddenly well aware he's in the center of the room, left exposed. He sees his Ma catch his look of terror, and she quickly swipes the tears off of her cheeks. No matter their animosity, when his mother is sober enough to act reasonable, they've always abided by the same code: don't set his father off. But the damage is already done. Her eyes are watery and red, and there is no way his old man is going to miss that. He's always examining her, seeking out her flaws so he find something new to comment on.
"How was your meeting?" his mom asks. Johnny's back is turned away from the entrance of the kitchen, but he can feel his father's presence.
He turns around and steels himself. "Hey dad," he says, eyes trained to the floor. It's been mopped, but there's a thin layer of gray-sticky matter at his feet.
"Well, somebody finally decided to come home," his dad greets with sarcasm.
"Yeah."
"Yeah," his dad mocks, using Johnny's deflated tone. "Sometimes I think that's the only word you know. Dumb kid," he mutters. He makes his way to the refrigerator, opens it up and starts rummaging inside. Every second his old man doesn't look up at his Ma, Johnny feels a second closer to relief.
"I cleaned the house while you were out," his mom says. And just then, Johnny realizes she's right–in her voice, he hears his own desperation to be found pleasing.
"Looks great," his dad says, not glancing up from the fridge. "Like a palace. Like the goddamn Taj Mahal."
His old man is trying to be nasty, but he's not far from the truth. Johnny's heard the Taj Mahal is nothing more than a huge coffin, pretending to be something nicer. Mausoleum. Randy taught him that word. He forcefully pushes that memory aside.
"Hey, Carol, what'd you do with the meatloaf we had in here?"
"I threw it out. It went bad."
"Like hell it did. I was gonna have some tonight." He stands up and slams the fridge. And then his eyes squint as he stares at his wife. "You've been crying." It's not a question. "What are you keeping from me?"
"Nothing," his mom says quickly. Too quickly.
"Christ! Boy, what'd you say to upset your Ma?"
Johnny shoots a look at his mom, hoping she has an excuse ready for him. A friend is sick. Or, I saw a sad program on television. She's had breakdowns over smaller things than that. But she doesn't come to his defense. Her silence is confirmation.
"Think I feel like dealing with your shit tonight? I had a hard day at work, and I made a lot of progress at the meeting. Not that you'd actually pull your head out of your ass long enough to care about anyone else but yourself."
Johnny takes a deep breath. He counts as he tries to plan the exact words that will come out of his mouth. "Come on, dad. It was just an argument. It's over. It's all okay now."
"You think it's okay to make your mother cry? The woman who gave birth to you?"
This is coming from a man who makes her cry on a weekly basis. But he says nothing in his defense. As true as his comment was–the gang does takes on the burden of her neglect, no matter what relationship she likes to pretend they have on the rare occasion she's in a 'making this a real family' mood–he knows admitting the truth hurt her.
Johnny doesn't vocalize the truth. Not the truth about himself, not the truth about his folks. He doesn't even let himself think about the truth too often. Whenever his Ma is in the mood to play make-believe, he jumps in right with her, eager to make up for lost time. But now, he has a new truth that trumps all others. His buddies love him. Dallas loves him.
And he's sick of living in denial, sick of going back for more hurt so he can survive on the fantasy of his folks wanting him. Sick of justifying their actions, sick of racking his brain for all the reasons he deserves it, because as long as he deserves it, what they do to him is not wrong. It's discipline. When he can't find another dozen excuses for deserving it, the reason he always comes back to is the fact that he's a queer. Being queer has always meant that at his core, he is disgusting and wrong and deserving of punishment. He still hates himself for it, but he doesn't want to anymore. That's new, too. Dallas accepts him. Even knowing the truth, he accepts him. So if he trusts Dallas–and he does–he can't be that bad of a person, bad enough to deserve the treatment he gets, the treatment he accepts.
He's not ready to break ties. He doesn't know if he'll ever be. He loves them too much to leave them. But at least now, some small part of him can recognize what his buddies have been trying to get through to him all along. Shoot, what even Randy had been trying to tell him, as much as he doesn't want to think about Randy, either.
This is wrong.
The sudden revelation, the sudden acknowledgement, makes him want to vomit.
"You got that blank idiot look on your face again like you're a goddamn mute or something. You listening to me?"
Johnny nods. "Yeah, dad."
"There you go with that 'yeah' again. Go get the two-by-four. You're not gonna get away with disrespecting your mother. Not tonight. Not when both of us are trying to make things work here. I'm not gonna let you ruin it."
Johnny gulps. He stays put.
Usually when his dad is licks him it's because he's gotten liquored up and lost control. That's over with one or two good kicks or socks to the gut. But there are enough times when his dad is half-sober and pissed at Johnny (or, more accurately, the world), so he orders Johnny to bring him the two-by-four and makes him count as he beats his thighs and back. The whole process is more humiliating than painful, because compliance, not violence, is the object. Johnny is good at compliance.
When his dad orders 'go get...', Johnny does. He's so used to the ordeal that once he comes back with the beam, he heads directly to the kitchen and leans over counter without being told. When the whippings come, he takes them in silence.
"Didn't I just tell you to go get the two-by-four?" his dad asks, incredulous.
Johnny nods, still looking at the floor. "Yeah."
"We-ell?" It comes out more shocked than anything else.
Johnny can't bring himself to say no. But he's stubbornly refusing to move, despite his better judgment. The primal part of his heart is beating the familiar fast, frantic warning: go, go, go. But he doesn't listen.
"Well?" His dad shouts. Johnny jumps at the sudden, intrusive sound.
He nods and quickly rushes out the door of the kitchen, into the hallway, through the living room, and out his front door. He circles around to his overgrown backyard and cautiously eyes the wood beam where it leans against the shed. Johnny looks at the beam. It's been raining and the wood is soggy. He looks back at his house.
And then he hops the fence.
He knows he'll be back. And he knows that running away, however temporarily, is not the bravest of actions. But even if he can't bring himself to fight back or talk back, just for tonight, he's not going to let himself put up with that treatment. He's run before, but those times, it was fear, not defiance, that drove him away.
Johnny feels the freedom of a good, exhausting run as he denies the protests of his thighs and smoker's lungs and leans his freezing nose into the drizzle of the rain. And even greater than the pleasure of the run is the comfort of having a place to run to. He doesn't stop running until he bounds through the Curtises' front door.
He doesn't knock. He doesn't need to.
TBC