Chapter One

Dad used to call me 'Daisy,' on account of I was always in a daze and beautiful and delicate like a flower. That's what he said. He didn't mean it in a mean way. Dad was never nothing but kind and gentle with me. I guess he was so tough he didn't have to act like he was and didn't care one way or another if I was or not. Maybe it was because he'd already had two tough sons and wanted a girl anyway, or maybe he was just the sort of man who understood things for what they were. I was real lucky. Most guys like me - boys who are kinda soft, who like poetry and art, who'd rather pick flowers than fights - their dads don't understand. So even though I only got to have a dad for 13 years, I was lucky in that way.

No one else ever called me 'Daisy,' and I don't think I'd like it very much if they did. What people did call me was pansy, especially when I was younger. They did mean it in a mean way. I never talked to Dad about that. Even if he didn't care if I was tough or not, I kinda wanted him to think I was, you dig? But I'd talk to Mom, and she'd tell me that pansies were strong plants, strong enough to survive a deep frost in the dead of winter and still bloom. She was right; Mom knew just about everything about gardening. She could get anything to grow.

I guess what I'm getting at is that I've always been different. I can't remember exactly the first time I realized it. Maybe it was when I was seven and Mom took me and Two-Bit's little sister, Brenda - Mom used to babysit her all the time - to Sleeping Beauty. That night Darry told me I couldn't talk about boys like I was talking about Prince Phillip. Or maybe it was when I was twelve and my notebooks became full of sketches of Rock Hudson and Marlon Brando. I don't know. There were a lot of things between the time I was born and the first time I fell in love that should have clued me in. But I always felt out of things. Maybe I knew all along but didn't want to.

You don't always know what's gonna mean something to you later when you go back to try to tell the story of your life, but sometimes - somehow - you do. I don't know the exact instance I knew what Mark would mean to me, but it wasn't long after we met.

Like most people, I didn't really know Mark. He was a greaser from our side of town, but we hadn't gone to the same junior high. And we weren't in any of the same classes, once we got to Will Rogers. He was part of some younger outfit. Even though most of them were probably older than me, I thought they were just rough boys who wanted to be JDs. So when he shouted, "Hey, Curtis!" Two days after I got back to school after that mess in September, I wasn't thrilled.

But I still turned. The halls were filled, but I'd been given a wide berth since I'd been back. Normally the halls were so crowded I'd have to shoulder my way through between bells. Now though, people made room.

Mark reached over to grab the railing at the top of the staircase. I crossed my arms over my chest. People were staring. "That's some tough shit about Cade and Winston." That was close to heartfelt condolences, between two hoods. "Cade was a good kid. We were in remedial English together."

"Yeah," I said.

He lifted his chin, and leveled me with an assessing squint. Mark was distinctive looking. I don't think anyone would've called him handsome exactly, but with his cat-like gold eyes and hair to match, he was striking.

"See, Curtis, my brother's old lady says we should make friends with you. She read about y'all in the paper, and she's a sucker for orphans," - he flashed a grin at me. I had to look away; he was like the sun - "and it might be the death of me, but what can I say? I like living on the edge. So, I thought I'd come over and make friends."

I didn't have much to say to him then. So I left.

I didn't think too much about Mark for weeks. I was still kinda turned off then, but that would change soon enough.

It was the Saturday before Christmas break, I had turned in my theme to Mr. Syme. Letting all that out helped a little, but I still felt like I wasn't quite awake yet, plus I was worried about Mr. Syme reading it. Right after I handed in that stack of composition books, I was thinking writing about the zoo wouldn't have been so bad. Seeing all those caged animals was a personal experience. Why didn't I just write about that?

But things were getting a little closer to okay for a while. My grades picked up. I joined wrestling to get in shape before the track season started up. Also, Darry told me I had to do a winter sport. They were short on wrestlers in the lower weight classes, anyway.

The gymnasium smelled like stale sweat, when Soda came to watch the Saturday morning dual meet. Of course, Steve came too. I wished he hadn't. He spent the whole time looking up at the ceiling, bored. But Soda liked it. He told me he liked it a lot better than Cross-Country where they had to watch me run into the woods and wait for me to come back around.

I was good at wrestling. I could break out of almost any hold. Almost. I had yet to lose a match, and Soda was pretty proud, hollering like crazy. It turned out that growing up surrounded by greasers who at any moment might decide to jump out from behind the closet door to pin you was good training for folkstyle wrestling.

The last match (against a guy with big ears from Central) for me during the meet was the closest I got to losing. We had to go into a tiebreaker period. The other guy's dad was there and he was shouting orders my brain didn't have time to register but my opponent's body was snapping to meet the commands. He had me on the ground, with my left leg pinned under both his sweaty knees - which ain't painless, let me tell you - and my right leg pressed up between both our torsos. I struggled to keep my shoulders off the ground and get any leverage through my right leg. I twisted to try to get it around his shoulders. The thirty seconds was surely almost up. He slipped, for a second, and suddenly I was on top of him, sitting on his upper chest, my shins keeping his back flat on the mat. I leaned back, and he trapped my head between his thighs. If it weren't for the time limit, the other guy might have had me, but the escape I managed happened without a second to spare, so the ref lifted my arm as the victor.

Soda clapped obnoxiously loudly. I grinned at him. I love winning.

On my way over to Soda and Steve, I passed by the big-eared kid and his teammates. Somehow through the excitement of the gymnasium, one voice cut through. "How's it feel, Schmidt? You went up against a murderer and lived to tell the tale."

I kept walking. "I'll just grab my stuff from the locker room, Soda, and we can head out-"

Steve wheeled around. "What the fuck are you staring at, kid?"

I blinked at Steve's outburst, then noticed Mark Jennings there a little ways away, leaning against the gymnasium wall. Mark didn't seem to mind Steve's greeting. In a smooth motion he pushed himself off from the wall he was leaning against to approach us. "I had Saturday detention, but I walked by, and this seemed more interesting. You're a good fighter, Curtis."

"That's wrestling, not a fight."

"Tomato, tomahto. So, you going to Keller's party tonight?"

I was about to say no. I didn't even know who Keller was, but Soda slapped a hand on my shoulder and said, "Course he is!"

"Go out with your buddy. I'll tell Darry when he gets home." He nudged me and gave me an encouraging look. I didn't tell him Jennings was hardly my buddy. I think he knew anyway, but he'd been worried about me becoming a recluse. So sending me off with Mark Jennings seemed like a dandy idea, if it'd get me out. When I needed more prodding he said, "Relax and have fun, looks like your friend can teach you somethin' about that."

If only Soda had known the things I'd learn from him, he'd come to regret it.

Once when I was twelve, Gina Redman - Evie's kid sister - and Donna Lewis invited me and Curly Shepard to Gina's trailer to make-out. No one else was home and no one turned on the radio. I sipped a warm beer, while Gina drank three bottles in silence. She was thirteen, I think. She led me to the room she shared with Evie, where we stood about a foot apart, only connected at the mouth. Wondering why anyone would possibly like having an extra tongue flopping around theirs like a wet bass on the line, I waited for her to stop. Then she burped in my mouth and it tasted like bile, so I jerked back. We looked at each other, and then she reached for my zipper. I pushed her away. She started crying and asked if I thought she was pretty. I said yes, even though she wasn't, especially with her smudged circle of eye makeup drooling down her cheeks. I left out her window to avoid Curly and Donna who were on the couch in the living room, but before I did I heard Curly ask Donna through the hollow bedroom door if he could suck on her toes. It was a weird day. Soda laughed when I told him about it.

Now I was fourteen, which made her fifteen, and she was the only person I knew at Keller's party. Besides Mark, who had deserted me as soon as we arrived, like he hadn't been the one to invite me. I think the kids there mostly went to Hale, like Gina. I didn't really fit in here.

Someone kept playing the same Rolling Stones' single over and over again. Don't get me wrong, The Rolling Stones are tuff enough, but couldn't they at least flip it over to the b-side, instead of just resetting the needle. I was about ready to lose it.

I sipped my beer. Gina was already so loaded, she kept touching me like girls do when they drink too much. She reached over and touched my hair, which was ungreased. No one used hair oil anymore. "You should come over and Evie will fix up your hair. She's in beauty school."

Gina's hair was bleached now, frayed and fragile. If Evie had done that, I didn't want her near mine. It was almost grown out anyway.

I tried to fade into the background, but she kept pulling me forward to introduce me to people who already knew who I was. It's obvious when someone hears my name, and they don't react or mishear it as Tony or something. Two-Bit said I was Tulsa Famous. There wasn't anyone in Tulsa who didn't know about my family and what had happened in the fall. That was uncomfortable, having people know the worst things that had ever happened to you. To be defined by it. Maybe we're all just collections of our own tragedies, but that didn't mean I wanted people to know mine. Some things are private, or at least they should be.

I made up my mind to beat it out of there, but I froze in the doorway of the kitchen. Mark was sitting at the table with four other guys playing poker, coins piled at the center of the table.

Mark's face lit up when he saw me, which made the whole kitchen brighter, and offered a commanding reprieve. "Williamson, move. Curtis is sitting there."

And just like that Williamson rose, and I took the seat next to Mark. Someone dealt me a hand.

He leaned over to my ear, like we already had a secret. "See," - his voice was soft, his breath warm - "I can make people do whatever I want."

I could barely hear his words. I could not tell you if they were a secret, a promise, or a warning.

There was no going back, after that.