East West Sunset - A Darry Curtis Fanfiction

Chapter Five

"You be careful in that town, Diana Jean, you hear?"

"Yeah, Mom, I will."

"Keep out of trouble and you'll be fine."

"Mom, since when have I ever been trouble?"

"You've been trouble enough, more than you know!"

"Mom!"

"So, do you work at the auto shop?" I asked Soda. I felt at ease around him, so I decided to try and make conversation.

"Naw, I work at the DX." He swung his arms slightly when he walked, making his gait more like an exceedingly attractive swagger. People stopped walking to stare at him as he went by; I supposed because he looked so fine and they weren't used to it. I felt a little protective of him, though, and stared down any girls who got too close. I was already feeling jealous and I'd only just met the guy. Pony looked at me in amusement.

"So why were you at the shop then?" I asked him, a little confused.

"I help out there sometimes if the boys can't get something right. Sometimes they'll pay me for it, sometimes they won't. It don't matter to me, I just like the cars," Soda said and gave me a playful wink.

I grinned at him and glanced away. "Surely a guy like you has a steady girl," I noted, glancing surreptitiously at him from the corners of my eyes to see his reaction.

Pony cleared his throat loudly. "Touchy subject," he hissed to me through clenched teeth. I felt instantly contrite, especially as I saw Soda's sensitive brown eyes fill with pain.

"Naw, I... I had a girl, but I just broke up with her not too long ago," he said sadly. "She was no good."

"A rotten cheat, you mean," Ponyboy retorted indignantly. "She's already got two kids down south and neither one of them is yours, Soda."

It blew me away that someone would cheat on Sodapop Curtis, of all people. "Was she out of her mind?!" I asked, copying Ponyboy's incredulous tone.

Soda gave me a sad grin. "There's no way to tell for sure that she cheated..." he said disbelievingly, but even he knew his words were weak.

"There's evidence enough," Pony said and turned to me. "This broad he was seeing for years, Sandy, she basically got knocked up by this other guy a couple years ago, so her folks sent her down south. They were pretty ashamed of her. Soda was all for giving her a second chance, though I don't know why-" here he broke off, giving Soda a disbelieving look- "driving down to see her sometimes, sending letters, stuff like that."

"I really did think she felt bad and would change, but I guess I was wrong," Soda mumbled. "Last time I went to see her she told me she was pregnant again. She told me it wasn't mine."

"Soda broke up with her on the spot, and drive right back to Tulsa," Pony finished triumphantly.

I felt bad for Soda. Retelling the story about Sandy had made him shrink into himself and lose confidence. His swagger was less pronounced now, and his eyes had lost their sparkle.

"That's what you get from messing around with those greaser girls," Pony muttered under his breath.

What Soda did next happened so fast that I couldn't do anything to stop it. Soda whipped around to face Pony, who blanched in fear and tried to duck away, but it was too late. Soda grabbed the neck of his shirt and slammed him hard against the chain link fence we were walking beside. I flinched, startled and slightly in shock from seeing the raw anger on Soda's usually tranquil and sensitive face. Pony shrunk away from Soda's rage, a hurt look in his eyes.

"You don't ever say that again," Soda growled. He sounded kind of like Darry. "You hear? Greasers aren't bad. Hear me, Ponyboy Curtis?"

Pony nodded as his lower lip trembled. He looked young and innocent pinned this way by his angry brother. Soda released him at last, and he leaped away from us. 

"You're just like how Darry used to be," Pony said in an upset tone before running away.

Soda's face softened in regret as he watched his little brother dash away. "I'm sorry you had to see that," he said to me gruffly. "Usually I don't have to..." He trailed off, leaving me wondering what he was going to say. Did he usually threaten Pony, or was this just a one-time occurrence? I didn't know, but I didn't like what I had just seen. I slowly edged away from Soda as we continued on, keeping to my side of the sidewalk.

"Pony's an impertinent kid," Soda said to himself.

"He's sixteen," I said. "That's hardly a kid."

"What?" Soda looked up at me.

"I said he's sixteen, right?" I reminded him.

Soda looked surprised. "Yeah, I guess. I don't know. I guess I can't see him as anything other than my kid brother." He chuckled. "I remember how he and Johnny Cade used to look up to me and the other guys like we were gods or something." His voice saddened. "God, I miss those days."

"Who's Johnny Cade?" I asked, wondering if there was another member of the gang that I hadn't met yet.

Soda squinted at the horizon. "He used to be in the gang."

"Why did he leave?" I asked.

"He didn't leave." Soda looked at me. "He died."

I almost stopped clean in my tracks as the gravity of this simple sentence hit me. "He- died?" My voice scaled up a few octaves in shock.

"Yeah, two years ago, in a fire. He and Ponyboy were hiding up by Windrixville, and- well, it's a long story, one that Pony tells best," he admitted. "That was one crazy year, I tell you what."

This new information made me nervous. Someone had died because they were in this gang? Suddenly I was beginning to rethink my decision to stay with Darry, Soda, and Pony that night. "I-- that's-- that's terrible," I managed to say.

Soda nodded. "It was. I mean, it is. Pony still misses him, I think. The rest of the gang does too. He was like a little brother to us, our pet, and honestly, probably the favorite."

We had finally reached the Curtis house again, and while I felt bad for Soda, I was happy to leave this depressing conversation behind. Soda opened the gate for me and held it open like a gentleman as I walked into the small front yard. I saw more flowers in the dirt, planted in painstaking rows at the front of the plot, near the fence. "Who planted those flowers?" I asked Soda, pointing to their pastel blossoms, which were wildly bobbing in the September wind.

"What?" he asked as he spun around to look at me.

"Those flowers." I pointed to them again.

"Oh." He peered over my shoulder at them and shrugged. "I don't know. Darry, maybe?"

"Darry?" I repeated, shocked. He certainly didn't seem like the gardening type, at least not from what I'd seen of him so far. 

"Yeah, probably. He likes to be outside."

Outwardly, I only shrugged and seemed to accept it, but on the inside, I was fighting back a wave of tenderness. It was weird to think that this rough and tough greaser who had more scars on his little finger than I had on my entire body would do something as delicate as plant flowers, but the more I got used to the idea, the more endearing I found it to be. It was really adorable to imagine him kneeling in the dirt, gently pressing daisies into the soil with his big strong hands. I blushed.

"Ah," Soda said, noticing my pink cheeks and raising his eyebrows. "Got a crush on Darry, have you?"

"I-um-no," I blustered in dismay. I took a deep breath and controlled my pounding heart as I tried again to answer. "No, he's not really my type," I said more coolly this time.

Soda studied me carefully, his brown eyes slowly regaining their twinkle. "If you say so," he grinned skeptically and teasingly.

"Whatever." I rolled my eyes and gave him a playful shove before following him inside the house, where Pony and Darry were waiting.