Trouble |The Outsiders|

01. Ordinary People

September. 1965.

Tulsa, Oklahoma was full of ordinary people living their ordinary lives. Some people lived on the Westside of town and had nice clothes and cars, some people lived on the Eastside and didn't have those nice things. But for Abigail Mason, it didn't matter much. All she cared about was the roof over her head, and her family coming home safe every night.

The floorboards creaked as she crossed the threshold into the house and tossed her apron onto the couch before dropping her purse beside it. The house was silent, it would stay that way for the next hour or so until Daniel, Danny as he preferred, would come home. By that time Abigail would have already made dinner and finished the dishes, she'd probably have the floors swept by then, too.

It would take a while until their father came home from work, he stopped at Buck Merrill's bar nearly every night and had a drink before coming home. Neither Abigail nor Danny minded though, he had been doing that since they were young.

Abigail brought her fingers to the top of her head and removed the pins that kept her long hair into a tight bun as she crossed the floor to the kitchen. She didn't mind working at the Dingo, a popular diner in town, after three years she knew what to expect on her nine-to-five workday. Her apron permanently stunk of coffee and bacon grease, the number of times she'd twisted her ankle carrying a tray was too high to count, but it paid the bills and kept them happy.

Rinsing a leftover bowl from the morning, she hummed an imaginary tune to herself. Dad said the music bugged him, always being so loud in the morning, so Abigail had taken it upstairs three years ago and sat it on her desk. He never complained about it again, but his children understood the real reason he hated the music.

Abigail was seven when her mother left. Some days, like today, she felt young again. Like she was walking back into the house, Danny's hand wrapped in her own, with no one waiting for them. She had woken up one night to her mother whispering furiously into the phone hung on the wall, a packed suitcase in hand. She crept down the steps as her nightgown swished against her shins until she was standing in front of her mother.

Abigail could still feel the way her hand cupped her cheek, the way her soft voice floated through the midnight air. "You're a big girl, aren't you, Abigail? You can get ready in the morning and take Danny to school, can't you?"

She was quite proud of herself the next morning, she had managed to make breakfast, get dressed, brush her hair and teeth, and do all the same for her little brother. They walked to the corner when the clock read seven forty-five and caught their school bus. Eight hours later Dad was still at work, and Mom was nowhere to be found.

Even ten years later, Abigail wonders what would've happened if she said no. If she told her mother she couldn't take care of herself and Danny. Maybe if she asked where she was going instead, she would've stayed.

Abigail thinks her father misses her the most. He misses the way she'd dance through the house with Danny on her hip when he came home from a long day at the lumber yard, he missed the special pancakes she made every Sunday. No matter how hard Abigail tried, she knew she'd never make those pancakes the way her mother did.

Danny was fifteen now, he'd be sixteen in May, Abigail turned seventeen two weeks prior. He didn't think of their mother much, he didn't remember her. Dad had taken down all the pictures they had of her a week after she left, that's when he realized she wasn't coming back. The only thing he could really remember was dancing in the living room one night when Dad came home. Then again, the only face he recognized was his sister's.

Abigail smiled to herself as she heard the familiar squeal of tires as Danny hit the brakes of his bicycle. The front steps creaked as he climbed them and pushed the front door open.