Porcelain

Chapter 40

Dally wandered around looking for somewhere to spend the night. He'd overstayed his welcome at Buck's, and he didn't feel like going to the Curtis' because he didn't feel like having to talk to anyone.

He'd been drinking again, and everything seemed fuzzy. He didn't know what to do with his life, so he was keeping himself from having to figure it out.

He found his way to the park where he could fall asleep under a tree for the night.

He wished he'd gone after her. He was dumb. Life had given him a chance to make a good choice and he'd slapped it out of the way. He usually tried to live his life without getting attached to anyone. Johnny had been the exception, but he wasn't even able to save him. And now, he had let himself get attached to the fellow Greaser, and here he was paying for it again.

She had told him to come find her, but he wasn't sure if he could. Would he really be able to just show back up and have her let him back into his life? Would they act like nothing had happened? That would be unbearable.

He saw that someone was already asleep under the tree.

"Get out of my way," he said trying to sound harsh but slurring his words a little.

"Make me," the other person's voice spat back. "I was here for, you're gonna have to fight me for it."

He threw a kick towards the person's ribcage, but he underestimated how alert they were. They leaned and dodged his kick, and while he was off-balance from the kick, they lunged up and grabbed his arm, bringing him slamming to the ground.

As he fought to steady himself, the other person pinned down his legs and fought to pin his arms as well.

He got in a solid punch to their nose, and they returned the favor, hitting him squarely in the eye. They hissed in pain as their nose started to bleed and punched him in the jaw before rolling off of him.

"Dally just take the damn tree, it ain't worth this much of a fight."

He froze. That voice... That was the voice that had been haunting his dreams.

"Estelle?" He asked quietly. He didn't want to get his hopes up, but goddamn, if that was her, if she was really here...

He was immediately flooded with shame, if that was Estelle he'd good as broken her nose. Nothing she hadn't done before, but it still wasn't a very good greeting.

"Sorry, you can-" he started, but when he looked up, she was gone, her form already melted back into the shadows of the night.

_____
Estelle hurried towards the Curtis house, muttering angrily to herself as she walked. Her arms and legs were covered with bruises and a few cuts, and her nose was gushing blood. Not anything new to her, but in the light of "taking better care of herself" she forced herself to go to the Curtis house and clean herself up.

She stomped in the door, slamming at she walked. She winced at the noise, feeling bad that she obviously woke up the entire house, but she was injured. If they didn't care they could go back to sleep.

A few moments Darry appeared, looking quite nonchalant, but she could tell he was on edge.

"It's just me," she said, walking towards the bathroom.

"What happened to you?" He asked bluntly, in no mood for bullshit.

"Little fight. I'll be fine."

"You sure? Your nose doesn't look too good."

She looked at him. "Well no shit, I'm pretty sure it's broken."

"And your nose is already pretty damn crooked."

"Darry, I'm extremely offended. Don't you know I'm insecure about that?"

He rolled his eyes. "My point is, are you sure you know how do fix your nose?"

She nodded.

"And will you actually do it?"

She paused, before nodding and continuing to wipe the blood from her face and hands.

"Liar."

"No, I'm just learning to accept my crooked nose."

Darry just walked over to her and grabbed her head and swiftly popped her nose into alignment.

She recoiled and punched him squarely in the chest. "Fuck you for that, you could have at least warned me!"

"But then you would have tensed up, and that would have been bad."

"Whatever."

"Who did you get in a fight with, and why? You've only been back in town a little while."

She waved her hand in a dismissive way. "Doesn't really matter, it was just some Greaser over the tree over in the lot."

"Why were you there in the first place when you know you've got a place here?"

"Cause I didn't want to be a burden on y'all, I wanted to be independent this once. But I guess I learned my lesson," she winced, putting band-aids onto her cuts.

"You're not a burden. Did you see who it was?"

"Not really, it was dark," she said, not meeting Darry's eyes.

He gave her a sharp look. "Was it Dally?"

"Yes," she admitted.

Darry softened his glare. "And how are you, after seeing him after all these months?"

"I'm fine, it's okay. Since it was dark, and he was drunk, it wasn't like were were talking or anything, and-"

Darry's face hardened back into a glare. "Quit lying, are you okay after seeing him again, especially like that?"

"Will you keep a secret, Darryl?" She asked, finally meeting his eyes.

"Yes." He replied solemnly.

"I'm pregnant," she whispered calmly. "I'm gonna have Dally's baby. And I don't know how I'm ever going to tell him. It hurt to see him like that, Darry. I've seen him drunk before, but it feels like I've let him down. I thought, I thought I could save him, I guess. Now he's just suffering. And in a few more short months, I'm gonna have his child." She turned to Darry, tears glistening in her eyes, threatening to fall. "How could I do that to him? It's the final blow. I thought I could give him his life back. But now I'm just giving him more reasons not to want to be here! I hurt him, Darry! I hurt him the worst someone could! How do I have the audacity to say I ever loved him, when this is the state we're in?"

Darry didn't answer for a moment. He was taking in all of the information he just heard.

"You're pregnant, and you thought it was a good idea to spend the night out in the open? There are a lot of dangerous people around here, and you of all people should know that," he said.

She laughed humorlusly. "I am the dangerous people around here."

Darry scowled. "Not anymore. You gave that up when you left town. You need to learn to watch out for yourself."

"Look Darry, I may not have been out roughing it on the streets in a couple months, but that doesn't make me some little patsy. I've eaten like a normal person and I've been doing farm chores. This is the strongest I've been yet."

"Being strong doesn't matter when people have knives or guns."

She laughed. "Don't worry, I got that too," she said, patting her jacket pocket.

Darry sighed in exasperation. "What I'm trying to say is, you need to keep yourself out of danger, and you need to start taking good care of yourself, it's not just you you're looking out for now."

"Then why didn't you just say it?" She replied sarcastically. "I know, and tonight was a mistake. But at least I came here instead of trying to tough out the night, right?"

"Yes, that's very good," Darry said, throwing pillows and blankets onto the couch. "Ponyboy grabbed your stuff for you, it should be out there too. You should change, you've got blood all over your shirt."

"Thanks. For all of it."

Darry just smiled and left the room.