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The ground is warm and carpeted. Which, thank God, means Mark has some chance of getting to sleep tonight, despite the heavy clamminess in the air that makes his skin feel too thick and his clothes damp.
Downstairs, the music plays loud, and Mark can hear people laughing. Bits and pieces of conversation filter in- a woman says something about horses, a guy tells an old joke about Frenchmen, Buck Merril raves something unintelligible that Mark assumes is about the races.
Mark rolls over, trying to block out the sound. It wouldn’t normally bug him all that much. Tonight it does.
“Quit movin’ so much,” rasps a voice from above him. It’s Dallas Winston, stretched out on top of the sheets of his twin bed.
“Sorry, man,” Mark mutters. He’s not really sorry, but he’s not stupid, either, thank you very much.
“Shuddup,” Dallas grunts. He’s half asleep, so Mark gets why he’s annoyed. But at least Dallas has a bed.
Mark knows he shouldn’t complain though, really. Better to sleep on the floor with this strange man who’s meant to be his brother than in a bed locked in a concrete cage.
Mark shivers in the clamminess, and wraps his arms around himself. It’s been two weeks since he ran here from Douglas, and yet he still gets nervous at the thought of everything. What a joke.
-
Glasses clink as Mark puts them back into their shelves.
“So how long is the kid plannin’ on bein’ here?” Buck says, as if Mark can’t hear him.
Dallas rolls his eyes like a long-suffering old man. “Who the fuck knows. He’s in some type-a drug wrap. Could be a while ‘fore the fuzz are off his tail.”
Buck’s brows raise, and his eyes dart to the splintery wooden floor before jumping back up to stare at Mark.
“What type-a drug wrap?” He says, voice hard and suspicious.
Mark scowls, trying to keep his eyes on the pint glasses so that he doesn’t roll them harder than Dallas did. “Low-grade speed…y’know, amphetamines,” he answers flatly.
Buck scoffs. “Pussy,” he says, giving Dallas a crooked grin. “Speed ain’t shit.”
Doesn’t Mark know it.
“And yet here he is. Jesus, man, kids an’ pigs both. So fuckin’ sensitive,” Dallas grins back. His eye teeth are pointed. Mark runs his tongue over his own teeth, feeling the slight sting of their points. He curls his upper lip, and stares at his reflection in the glasses- with a start, it hits him that his teeth look exactly the same as Winston’s.
Mark has never looked anything like Bryon, no matter how he wished he did back when they were kids. Bryon is tall, has always been tall, dark, and sturdy. If he were less lazy and had more ambition, he could go for the football team. Mark is real short. He wouldn’t call himself small anymore nowadays, because he likes to think he’s tacked on enough muscle to be called sturdy, at least, but that’s a new development. He used to be small. Real small. It doesn’t bug him, but maybe it used to. He doesn’t remember. Or tries not to. Something like that.
But Dallas…Mark doesn’t really look like Dallas, either. Dallas is tall too, taller than Bryon, and a helluva lot taller than Mark. But he’s slender. No. That’s generous. He’s practically a skeleton. He’s all sharp lines and angles, and although Mark isn’t a very big guy, he’s pretty damn sure he’s got at least forty pounds on Dallas. He couldn’t look more different from Mark if he tried. They both have blonde hair, but Dallas’s is pale, stringy, and straight. Mark’s is dark-gold, a wild mess of thick curls that not even the toughest grease can tame. Dallas’s skin is so light it makes Mark wonder if he’s actually a vampire, while Mark’s gets tanned easily and is spattered with freckles. Mark’s always been told his gold-brown eyes are big- Curtis described them once as “deceptively innocent,” and Mrs. Douglas used to call them “cherubic.” Meanwhile, Dallas’s eyes are cold, ice-blue slits, peering out from underneath eyebrows so much darker than the hair on his head that Mark is honestly convinced he dyes them.
And yet they have the same teeth of all things.
The mysterious cowboy who Dallas calls “dad” must’ve had real distinct teeth for it to be the one thing Mark has in common with him. Teeth of all goddamned things.
-
“So you’re the Dally two-point-O we’ve all been hearin’ so much ‘bout, huh?”
Mark gives a tight grin. “Sure. And you’re old man Curtis.”
Darrel’s brows rise, and he looks like he’s trying to formulate a response, but whatever he was gonna say is interrupted by Dallas giving Mark a swift, hard blow to the arm.
“Show some respect, kid,” he hisses. Which, well, there’s a funny statement coming from Winston. Mark’s not sure he’s ever even heard of the guy treating anyone with any type of respect. So Curtis’s brother must be a real big deal.
Darrel, for his part, just looks amused. “Lordy, Dally, you’re sure wound up.”
“You would be too, dealin’ with this punk.”
Mark wrinkles his nose. He thinks he’s been being pretty damn well-behaved, relatively speaking. Winston just doesn’t like him.
The blonde Curtis brother, sitting on the arm of the Curtises’ shabby couch, chortles. “Jesus, ya sound just like Buck Merril, man.”
“Aw, shut your mouth, soft-drink,” Dallas says, giving him a nasty look that would make most folks shut their traps and lock em too, with a deadbolt of steel.
Soft-drink just laughs. “Ignore ‘em, kid, Dal gets mean real easy.”
Oh yeah, I’ve noticed, is what Mark would say if he were just a little bit more keen on the idea of gettin’ a shiner. Instead he says “Hey, I guess I’d be real mean too if some punk kid showed up on my doorstep.” Folks tend to like when their perspective of events are validated, whether Mark is agreeing that his social worker’s right or calling Angela Shepard a bitch because it makes Bryon all warm and fuzzy and all. (Or did. Whatever. Mark still isn’t sure how to think about Bryon. So mostly he doesn’t.)
Sure enough, Dallas seems to calm himself at that, losing the scowl and jutting his chin out at Soft-drink. “Yeah, the bastard better count himself lucky. If his brother was a Soc or somethin’ instead of me, he’d get thrown right back to the pigs.”
Mark snorts. “Man, can you imagine that? A Soc prolly ain’t even heard of the type-a pussy drugs Douglas turned me in for.” That isn’t true. Half the kids Mark sold to were Socs-turned-hippies. Other hoods just usually don’t have the dough. But Dallas hates the Socs ‘bout as much as he hates the pigs, and the good Lord knows Mark ain’t never been above lying if it gets him where he needs to go- namely, right now, far away from the revolving stack of photos of people that Dallas pins to his dartboard as targets.
Dallas grins, kind of, almost. “They get a headache an’ think they’re high,” he agrees.
“You could sell ‘em ground up drywall in a pill capsule- so long as ya call it LSD, they think they’re trippin’,” Mark nods. He’s talking out of his ass. He’s probably taken plenty of lousy fake drugs himself, honestly. Dallas doesn’t need to know that. For the first time, Dallas looks kind of…amused by Mark. Non-irritated.
Darrel Curtis, on the other hand, looks suddenly very worried.
“Not that I’d do that or nothin’,” Mark adds hastily, remembering what Ponyboy had told him about the social workers that were always watching for some reason to send Pony into a boys’ home. Hanging around a guy hiding from the law might just do that. “I quit sellin’, sincerely.”
Darrel still doesn’t look thrilled, but just about then, Ponyboy’s car pulls into the driveway, and the topic is dropped.
-
“Y’know, when my folks were ‘round, I wasn’t allowed in here,” Curtis (Ponyboy, not Darrel or Pepsi) says thoughtfully, running his finger along the peeling wallpaper of Mark (and Dallas’s) room.
“Woah, you’re such a rebel,” Mark deadpans, shooting Curtis a grin. “What drove you to these abhorrent actions?”
“Abhorrent?” Curtis repeats. “I didn’t know ya knew that word, thought ya couldn’t read, man,” he smirks.
Mark sticks out his tongue. “I’m a man of special talents, dickweed.” Then he takes a drag of Curtis’s cigarette and says “…and it’s Principal Johnson's favorite goddamn word.”
“Ah, truth comes out,” Curtis says, flicking Mark in the forehead. He snatches his cigarette back.
Speaking of Johnson- “Hey hey, how’s Rogers High been without me in it?” Mark says, trying to stay casual and all, like he ain’t dying to know.
Curtis hums to himself as he considers it. “Well,” he starts, “uh…Angela Shepard chopped all her hair off, said she was sick of it.”
Mark tries and fails to stifle a laugh. Lying about it. That’s just like Angela. What a bitch. “Oh, she wasn’t sick of it, I’ll tell ya that,” he giggles. “I mean c’mon, she looks real good with her hair all short too, so it ain’t like she can be mad at me, y’know?”
Curtis’s eyes widen. “You- wait, wait, you’re sayin’ you gave her a haircut, man?!”
“Me and Bryon got her drunk, and yeah, chopped the damn mane off,” Mark says, grinning at the memory. He’d felt real original for that one.
“Jesus, Mark, that’s…that’s so fucked, man,” Curtis says.
“Hey, don’t forget, she gave me this, so I reckon we’re even,” Mark says, pointing to the scar on his temple.
“Oh…yeah,” Curtis frowns.
“I mean, it’s not like I enjoyed ruining her look and everything, just…y’know, gotta make sure she knows not to fuck around anymore,” Mark says, which is a half-lie, because honestly he enjoyed cutting the bitch’s hair off very much. And he’d do it again any day. The only thing about it that kinda bummed him out was when she started crying and rambling about how much her life sucked. That had taken some of the fun outta it. Even now when he thinks about it he feels a bit disappointed. He’d thought a gutsy girl like Angela Shepard was so broken that she was invulnerable, almost. Real shame that even she has her limits.
‘Course, he doesn’t say all that to Curtis. If Curtis is anything like Bryon- which he is, even though both of them hate the other, they’re both so thoughtful and sensitive- then he’ll think the fact that Mark relishes fucking with Angela is a sign of some serious issues. (Which…yeah, probably Mark does have some serious issues. But who doesn’t? Curtis sure does, and Bryon’s got even more!)
“Yeah…right, sure,” Curtis nods, taking it in stride.
“But what else? Do folks miss me?” Mark says.
“I mean, sure, plenty. Oh! Get this! Bryon broke up with Cathy! Ya think I oughta ask her out?” Curtis says, glancing at Mark excitedly.
“Ohhh…right…Cathy Carlson…they broke up? No kiddin’?” Mark says, feeling his eyes widen.
How could Bryon break up with Cathy? …Wasn’t Cathy why he sold Mark out to begin with?
Mark swallows his feelings and says “You can try to ask her out. Do what ya want.”
“I mean, she said no to me before, but that was ‘cos of Bryon, I reckon…” Curtis trails off, thinking about it. “I mean, I sure hope that’s all. She really is cute.”
“Sure she is,” Mark mutters.
“And she’s got ambitions, you dig me? All that time she spent in that school…on her own money, too.”
“How do you know all that about her?”
Curtis’s face flushes, and he rubs the back of his neck. “Overheard her tellin’ a friend ‘bout it,” he admits.
“Eavesdroppin’ on her conversations, are ya? You’re down bad, kid,” Mark says, trying to sound supportive.
“Aw that’s rich, hearin’ you callin’ Pony ‘kid’, kid,” says Dallas. Curtis jolts like he’s been electrocuted. Mark doesn’t, but inwardly, his heart races. They’d both missed Dallas’s arrival.
“Speakin’ of eavesdroppin’! Glory, how long have you been standin’ there?” Mark says.
“What’s that phrase…speak of the devil, eh, man?” Dallas grins, lighting a cigarette.
“We weren’t talkin’ ‘bout you though,” Curtis mutters. Dallas ignores him, and shucks off his beat-up black leather jacket.
Mark sorta remembers that back when Dallas was still in school, he wore a brown leather jacket. He’s not sure where that one made off to, but it was a whole lot cooler than the basic black one. Mark used to think about ways to steal it, even hiding out in the locker room during Dallas’s PE period in hopes of picking the lock…but naturally, Dallas never bothered showing up. Mark has to suppose that that makes sense- the idea of Dallas Winston in gym shorts sounds as bizarre as the idea of not being friends with Bryon. (Yet still, a year ago, Dallas Winston in gym shorts at least seemed possible. Losing Bryon didn’t.)
“I’ve been standin’ long enough,” Dallas says, which isn’t really an answer. “Is it true you’re the one who fucked with Shepard’s kid sister?”
“Sure,” Mark says.
“Good. The bitch had it comin’,” Dally says. He takes a drag of his smoke, and flicks Mark’s forehead. (Hard.)
“Ow.”
“Mean cut she left ya with, man. I’d cut her up too…” Dallas sighs, stifling his smile. “But uh. You’d better keep yer mouth shut tight ‘bout that.”
“Why? I ain’t scared of her,” Mark snorts.
“Yeah, but you’re scared of me. And I’m on real good terms with Shepard right now, so you’d better keep the damn peace or I’ll shove a lead pipe up yer ass.”
“You’re on good terms with Angela?” Mark says, wrinkling his nose. “How?”
Dallas and Curtis speak over each other.
“Good terms with Tim—”
“Good terms with Tim, asshole.”
“Oh,” Mark says. Well, he knows he’s never been the brightest. “I’ll keep the peace, no problem.”
Anyway, when the hell is he gonna see the Shepards anytime soon? He’s in hiding.
-
Dallas and Tim are playing cards across the way, and Mark is in the back of a bar full of Shepard gang punks.
They’re looking for a fight or something, yelling about a rumble- Mark can’t be bothered to care very much. This isn’t his gang. And anyway, he’s busy staring at Angela.
She’s under the arm of some big dude, some big guy named Richard but called “Rogue” or something stupid like that, who is saying something to Mark that Mark isn’t listening to. That isn’t the interesting part. The thing that catches Mark’s attention is the look on Angela’s face.
Or, well, the fact that there isn’t one at all.
She just sits there, staring into the seat in front of her, eyes glassy and dead like a China doll’s. Her hair hangs short around her ears, less choppy than it was when Mark finished with it a few months ago. A guy next to her who isn’t her husband squeezes her thigh- which, yeah, is tempting, glory, her legs are amazing, soft-looking but well-formed, and damn near lethal in those fishnet stockings— and yet— nothing. Not a trace of care. Of anger. Of that fight that he’s so used to from Angela. She just sits still, like she isn’t in there at all. It’s so…spooky.
Is she high, or is she…broken? Mark thinks queasily, and against his will, he thinks about M&M, whose eyes must’ve looked empty like that after his bad trip.
Lord knows Mark didn’t slip the kid no LSD…but he sure didn’t stop him, either. God, it wasn’t that he didn’t want to, just- well, he…he forgot.
(Put it out of his head)
And every time he seemed to remember, every time that little voice in his head started to nag, it just…didn’t seem to matter much. Everyone was doing hallucinogens…why would it fuck up the kid? Everyone was doing it. Everyone.
And yet now M&M is probably as catatonic as the living dead girl sitting in front of him.
Mark swallows back something like bile and tears his eyes away from Angela, or that— that shell of a thing that used to be Angela.
It wasn’t Mark’s fault though. It wasn’t. Sometimes folks have bad trips, and if Bryon is so smart, then he’d have put a stop to it himself. It isn’t fair to blame Mark, is it?
“You’re Winston’s kid brother, ain’tcha?” Asks Richard or Rogue or whatever he calls himself, and Mark notices then that he’s had his hand out across the table to shake for a good minute now. He shakes it, resisting the sudden and strong urge to wipe his hand on his jeans afterwards.
“He’s…” Mark says. Yeah, I mean, my momma cheated on my poppa with his daddy, so we’re re-al close doesn’t sound like the right thing to say, but brother sure as hell doesn’t sit pretty in his mouth either. “We got an ol’ man in common,” is what he settles on.
Rogue tilts his head back and laughs the type of gut-laugh that would come off as jovial if it weren’t for spaced-out Angela on his arm. Mark gives a smile from lips that feel numb. Oh, he’s got no love for Angela, that’s for sure, but it’s so goddamn…weird seeing her like this. Wrong.
“Mark Jennings, pleestameetcha,” Mark says.
“Jennings. I dig that. Here, Jennings, you met my lady? Say hi, Angel,” Rogue says, tilting Angela forwards.
For the first time tonight, Angela’s dark, hollow stare meets Mark’s eyes. “We’ve met,” she says. Her voice rasps. Must be ‘cos of the scarf tied ‘round her throat.
So the angel does speak.
Her eyes take him in for what seems like a first time tonight, and he’s almost pleased when he picks out a familiar glimmer of hatred glaring at him under her empty expression.
“Yeah…we have,” Mark agrees, feeling mildly relieved, or something close to it.
Rogue seems to raise an eyebrow at that.
“Nothin’ much. She dated my— this guy I knew,” Mark clarifies, not wanting Rogue to pulverize him under the false impression that Mark has, at any point in time, fucked his wife.
(Not that Mark was ever opposed to that- Angela is one of the best looking girls- hell, one of the best looking people in general- that Mark has ever seen. Including the milky-thighed calendar girls and the scantily clad Socials. She’s downright stunning, she really is.)
(Not that Mark would do it though anyway. He sort of hates Angela.)
Rogue nods. “Ah. Yeah…that Douglas kid, right?”
“Yep,” Mark says flatly.
“Now Douglas, there’s a real weird cat,” Rogue starts, and Angela’s nose wrinkles in a way that Mark is sure his own nose is mirroring.
They’re saved from the topic of Bryon though, thank God, because Curly Shepard, Angela’s brother stumbles over.
“Ricky, man,” Curly is saying, “back me up, I got a Brumley asshole to tear up out back. All y’all.”
Rogue- or Ricky, if Curly is worth listening to (which he rarely is)- looks uncomfortable. “That ain’t no place for a lady,” he says, although it is, in Mark’s opinion, a swell place for a lady like Angela. His forehead is still fuckin sensitive. He thought he was gonna die that night from her bottle, he really did.
“A lady? Who, Jennings?” Curly says, bursting into high, obnoxious laughter at his own lousy joke. “I sure don’t see no other ladies here!”
Angela rolls her eyes, subtly enough that Mark’s pretty sure he’s the only one who noticed it. Mark himself just gives Curly a tight, sarcastic grin.
“In that case, Curls, I reckon I’ll wait here while y’all fight it out, no sweat,” Mark says.
“Will you?” Rogue says seriously. “Keep an eye on her while I go?”
Mark blinks, startled. “Uh…fine,” he says, half-glad to be off the hook.
Curly snorts. “Okay, m’am.”
Conjuring up his most charming smile, Mark gives Curly a middle-fingered gesture that expresses his feelings real succinctly. Curly pays no mind though and disappears into the throng, his gang members in tow.
“So it’s just you and me then, eh, babe,” Mark begins, but Angela gives him a lovely gesture of her own. Mark shuts his mouth.
Dallas saunters over then, waving a crisp ten-dollar bill.
“Dig this, buddy,” he says, sliding into the booth next to Mark. “Shepard put his money where his mouth is tonight.”
“You won?” Mark says.
“Sure I did,” Dallas says unconvincingly.
Mark glances over at the table where Dal was sitting a second ago, and sees a half-finished poker game, and an empty chair where Tim had sat. It takes him an embarrassing thirty seconds to recall that Curly had demanded backup just a minute ago. ‘Course Tim would back his kid brother. That makes sense. And what a perfect opportunity for Dallas.
“You got an audience, y’know,” Mark whispers, nodding at Angela.
“Hm? Aw, she don’t mind, d’ya, baby?” Dallas grins.
Angela glances at him and her brother’s ten dollars as if registering them for the first time. “You can steal his car for all I give a fuck.”
“Nice language for a lady, huh?” Dallas says to Mark conversationally. “The Shepards are really very charming people.”
Angela just scoffs and doesn’t say much else. She touches her scarf, reminding Mark of loosening a tie. (An action he’s seen on TV plenty but has never done himself— he doesn’t think he’s ever owned a tie.) Not that it matters either way…the point is clear, she wants both Dallas and Mark to fuck off.
“C’mon, let’s blow this joint ‘fore someone shows up who does mind,” Mark suggests. “G’night, Angela,” he adds, giving her a wink.
Angela’s only reply is scowling harder. Yikes. Marriage has turned Angela Shepard into quite the hardcase. Then the anger is gone and her expression returns to that far-off vacancy.
For a split second, Mark wants to tell her she oughta run, get outta Tulsa and never look back, that he liked her better before she was weird and quiet and empty. He wants to see old sassy, smirking, bitchy Angela again, even though he couldn’t stand her. Because this Angela, while more tolerable, is all wrong.
‘Course, he’s not an idiot, so he tears his eyes away and looks at his brother-thing. To his surprise, Dallas reaches over the table and ruffles Angela’s short hair.
“See ya later, Angel-baby,” he says, smiling wolfishly. “Take it easy.”
That apparently snaps her out of her gloom, because she half-smiles. “Timmy’s gon’ be real mad about that money, man.”
“You gon’ tell him?” Dallas grins.
“Of course not, Dally,” she says, and her expression gets a bit wiley. “I hope he gets mad enough to crash his car an’ die.”
“Glad to help the cause then, kid,” Dallas says, and sweeps into a sort of bow. “Catchya at the stables later?”
“You betcha,” Angela says, and for the first time in Mark-doesn’t-remember-how-long, she smiles for real.
Then Dallas pats her on the shoulder and heads to the door.
Mark lingers a minute longer, staring at Angela. She is scowling again. For some reason, his heart sort of pangs.
So he looks away and follows Dal.
-
For all he tries, Mark can’t seem to get his mind off Angela, which honestly is a welcome relief to having his mind stuck on Bryon.
“What was her deal back there?” Mark asks, once they’ve come back to Buck’s.
Dally looks down at him, brows flicking up. “Hm? Who, Angel?”
There’s a clink from the bar, and Mark sees Sylvia watching him with her eyes narrowed. She hasn’t exactly warmed up to him. He assumes it’s because she thinks he is an idiot. She has decent enough reason to, anyway— because, well, because she asked him to grain the horses.
Now, Mark has been living and working at Buck’s for a bit now, and so he knows (now) that graining horses means to give the harder working ones shitty-looking grass pellets for their extra nutrients or whatever.
Mark hadn’t known that back then.
He’d brushed their fur with fresh-cooked oatmeal.
Sylvia had yelled “What the fuck were you thinking?!”
He’d said he didn’t know, ‘cos when she was yelling, he really didn’t remember. Later he realized he’d been picturing the goopy shit he’s heard of chicks getting at spas, and assumed “graining” was some type of fancy coat treatment. (In his defense, he’d only ever had brushing-related horse chores so far at the time!) ‘Course, his reasoning doesn’t ultimately matter; Sylvia thinks he’s stupid.
Mark pretends he doesn’t notice Sylvia’s glare. “Yes Angela,” he presses. “She always like that these days? ‘Cos that was fucked, man, seriously fucked!” Mark exclaims. After ignoring the tension for the whole time he was at the damn bar, it feels cathartic to just say it. Cathartic as hell.
Dallas shrugs. “She fucked around and found out. It is what it is. She’s just lucky she lost that damn baby, else she’d be worse off, I reckon.”
Mark blinks, and sputters “No, but Dallas, did you even see her? It was scary, man! I just— God, it’s lousy seein’ Angela like that, y’know?! What did they do to her?!”
Sylvia gives a little hmph from behind the bar. When Mark turns to look at her, she’s knelt down to pick up a bottle.
He waits for her to stand again and says, daring her to disagree, “Well, c’mon, it is fucked, you know that same as I do, dammit, no matter what he says,” he nods at Dallas. Dallas shakes his head, looking at Mark dismissively like he is a stupid kid who just doesn’t get it.
Sylvia nods. “Yeah, Mark, it’s fucked.” She glares at him, dark eyes like ice. “And y’know what? You don’t get to fuckin’ talk about it.”
“What?” Mark says, stunned.
“Angela’s told me ‘bout you. Don’t think you can fuck with her and then get all mad when it works.” Sylvia snaps.
“I— what?” Mark says, stomach twisting.
“Aw, lay off, Sylvie,” Dally sighs. “You don’t mean when he cut her hair, do ya? ‘Cos that ain’t why she’s all frigid now, we both know it, don’t be such a bitch.”
Sylvia scoffs and flips him off. “Don’t you fuckin start, Dallas.”
“I only cut her hair ‘cos she cut my head,” Mark adds, suddenly fiercely defensive, even though just a bit ago he was fully aware that he’d done Angela wrong.
“You got her drunk and had your way with her, just like a thousand men I know,” Sylvia mutters.
“That’s not fair,” Mark argues. “I didn’t— Christ, you make it sound like I—” his face flushes, and he can’t finish the sentence. “I— And God knows I didn’t knock her up and trap her, not like her fuckass husband.”
“Ooh, look at you, better than that goddamn abuser, let’s getcha a medal,” Syvia mocks.
“Aw both of y’all are crazy, Rick’s fine, and Angela’s a dumb kid who learned her lesson,” Dallas scoffs.
Both Mark and Sylvia break their standoff to glare at him.
“She didn’t learn a lesson—” Mark starts.
“You don’t know nothin about Rick, Dal!” Sylvia says at the same time.
“She’s like- like- on a bad fuckin trip, man, and she sure as hell can’t get off! That ain’t no lesson, that’s- that’s just a goddamn prison!” Mark finishes, so worked up that he can’t get words outta his mouth. Since when does he even care a bit about Angela Shepard?!
“Cool it down, ladies,” Dally mutters, recoiling.
Sylvia looks murderous, and Mark has to resist the urge to scream.
Dallas rolls his eyes and strikes a match on his little Catholic medallion. He lights a cancer stick (a Winston, of course, because try as he might to prove otherwise Dallas Winston is really just a dumb kid same as Mark), and says “Look: Angela’s a bitch who gotcha a concussion and a buncha stitches, and a mean mean hospital bill. She’s also a kid in a shit situation. Look at you, Jennin’s— you only get to hang ‘round bars, and even then, only when there’s a goddamn getaway car nearby, ‘cos Lord knows if they took a ya to prison you’d get fucked right into next week— hey, quit looking like that, you know it’s true. You’re also a kid in a shit situation. Same as Angel-baby, you got yer goddamn self into it, and that’s how it goes, for you and her both. That’s how shit went down. So quit fuckin whinin’!”
Mark’s face, already pink, goes red at the comment about jail.
Fucked into next week?! “You can’t be sayin’ that, man,” he says hotly.
Dallas gives him a look like I do whatever I want. Fucking jackass. What kills Mark is that really, Dallas can do exactly that.
Mark used to have that attitude. He wonders where the hell it went.
Now Dallas looks at Sylvia. “And as for you— all the feminine-isam bullshit about abuse is bull. Angela’s no saint, and we both know she’s probably got exactly what she deserves. I like the chick, don’t get me wrong, but Lord, she is such a cunt, you can’t blame a guy for—”
That’s as far as Dallas gets before Sylvia throws a bottle at him.
It shatters on the floor in a million pieces, which fly everywhere faster than a blink of the eye. It went long and isn’t actually close to Dally at all, but he jolts back a foot anyway in a moment of panic. Mark wants to think that is funny, but he himself leaped up onto the bar to get away from the glass shards that he is really not in danger of at all.
“Get out!” Sylvia snaps. “Get out and come back when you've cleaned your goddamn mouth and cleared yer fuckin’ eyes!”
“Holy hell, you little—” Dallas says, his eyes wide as moons. He looks like he wants to jump over the bar and tackle her. For a second, Mark thinks he will.
But amazingly, insanely, Dallas listens. Muttering curses at Sylvia under his breath, he storms out, slamming the door behind him.
Mark exhales, feeling his hackles lower.
Sylvia prods him dully in the shoulder with the handle of a broom. “Off the bar, kid. No shoes on the tables.”
Mark slides off the countertop and onto the splintery wooden ground. Now that he’s looking at where the bottle landed— by the door, while Dally was standing ten feet away by the piano— he can see that Sylvia probably wasn’t aiming for Dallas at all.
Sylvia heads over to it, broom in hand. “I prolly shouldn’t’ve done that,” she says mildly.
“Prolly,” Mark echoes.
“I would do it again, though,” Sylvia adds, sounding more like she is reassuring herself than Mark. “I’d do it again.”
“Yeah,” Mark agrees.
“He can’t talk that way,” Sylvia asserts. “I dunno where the fuck he gets off, talkin’ to me that way.”
“Yeah,” Mark says again. “He’s crazy,” he says, trying not to sound overly placating.
“It’s just— he doesn’t understand, you know?” Sylvia says, her voice a bit too trembly to come off as genuinely light. “He just— he doesn’t get it. He’s not…he’s not there.”
“Neither are you,” Mark says stupidly. “I mean, but you get it though, I bet, ‘cos Angela…you’re close, and all.” Good save, buddy.
“Damn straight,” Sylvia agrees. She collects the broken amber-colored glass, big shards first. “He thinks Dick-wad’s okay ‘cos he ain’t real aggressive. Well you know who’s aggressive? Dick-wad’s fuckin sperm-giver.”
Mark doesn’t follow. “His…Johnson…mm, that’s not what you’re talkin about, huh.”
“His father. He lives with him. The assholes and Angela, all together in a goddamn trailer. Happy fuckin family.”
Mark’s heart sinks, and he sort of hates himself for caring. He doesn’t want to feel bad for Angela. He really doesn’t want to at all.
And yet he can’t help it.
“She gets mouthy, and he uh…he don’t like that,” Sylvia says softly. She touches her neck, gripping her throat like it’s sore. “He don’t like that at all.”
“Oh,” Mark whispers, feeling sick to his stomach. “Oh.”
“He got real mad ‘bout that haircut, too,” Sylvia says, her voice so quiet Mark has to strain to hear it clearly. “He loved her long, curly hair….” Mark thinks of the ruby-red scarf around Angela’s neck…
Oh. Oh no.
Mark can’t think of anything to say that won’t get a bottle thrown at him, so he kneels down and helps Sylvia clean the glass shards.
-
Mark doesn’t think about Angela again until a few days later, while he’s in the barn.
The arena isn’t empty, and Bolt, Sylvia’s buckskin Mustang, is outta his stall. Mark expects Sylvia or her friend Evie to catch his eye over the rail, and his hand is already half-raised to wave, but then– Mark freezes, greeting dying in his throat.
The girl on Bolt’s back has short, short black hair, and the arms coming out of her flannel are dark, warm brown.
Angela.
She is driving Bolt over the jump, rising and falling like an extension of the horse. Mark pictures the horse-men from Greek vases, and Christ, if he were an ancient peasant seeing someone move so fluidly with the rhythm of the animal, he bets he’d assume they are the same beast, too.
It’s an awe-inspiring image, watching them jump. Angela’s face is blank with focus, but there’s a smile in the corners of her mouth. When Bolt leaps, Mark can almost believe he is a pegasus, taking off from the ground on big, feathered wings.
He has always known Angela is pretty, but right now she is something better than that. Something more powerful. Something leagues away from the china-doll at the bar.
She meets Mark’s eyes as she lands, and coolly ignores him, urging Bolt up into a run. The giant beast listens, following her every command.
Mark swallows as she races by him, dust kicked up in his face.
He’s never seen anyone look as powerful as Angela looks at this moment.
Then he thinks of her red scarf, thinks of her father in law with his hand around her throat, thinks about how she’s got nowhere left to run except here.
He backs up, and retreats into the barn loft, telling himself he has to gather hay, or something.
He doesn’t wanna see Angela anymore.
-
“I didn’t know Angela rode,” Ponyboy says, when Mark recounts the story to him.
“Well, she does, I guess, but that’s not the point— just, like, I gotta avoid the barn now, I think,” he says, wrinkling his nose.
“Pussy,” Johnny Cade teases, but he’s smiling, so Mark knows he means it gentle. “Is that really why you’ve been optin’ for dish duty these past couple-a days? Really, man?”
“Aw fuck off, man, I know where I’m not wanted, that’s all,” Mark grins.
“That’s never stopped ya before, why the hell would ya let it stop ya now?” Dallas says, from the other side of the room. Mark hadn’t realized he was listening and is kind of embarrassed to know that he’s revealed that he’s being a chickenshit to his not-brother. It’s not so bad with Pony and Johnny, who probably think he’s a chicken but are at least nice to him. But with Dal…every point of weakness seemed to end up filed away to be prodded at later, and Mark’s never much liked being known, not in that way, at least.
“I’m unpredictable,” Mark quips, playing at “unbothered.”
Dallas scoffs and returns to his drink. Sylvia is still giving him the silent treatment after their fight, so he’s taken to sitting in dark corners and brooding, and joining in conversations just to insult Mark in various ways. He gets cheerier when she’s not nearby, but right now she’s tending the bar, so Mark is catching every shot Dallas can drum up.
Johnny adjusts his jacket, which he is wearing despite the heat of late April. (Mark gets the feeling that somebody’s happy that Dally and Sylvia aren’t speaking. Honestly, all he can say is “good for Cade, man, good for Cade.”)
“Y’know what would be really unpredictable?” Johnny says, a spark of laughter in his deep-black eyes.
“Shoot,” Mark says, figuring he can take requests.
“If you quit hiding from her and apologized.”
“No!” Mark protests.
“No way!” Pony choruses. “Johnny, she tried to give me a concussion for rejectin her! I feel bad for her, sure, but Mark ain’t gonna apologize, that’s bogus!”
“Yeah! And she gave me a concussion for real!” Mark agrees.
“Okay, okay, sorry I said anythin, man,” Johnny chuckles, rolling his eyes good naturedly.
“Yeah, c’mon, man,” Mark scoffs. “Apologize…yeah, shit, you’re funny, man.”
But ideas have a way of taking root whether one wants them to or not.
And lying awake in bed (on the floor) at night, Mark can’t get it out of his head.
He just keeps thinking about how pretty she was on that damn horse, and how scary she was in the bar.
That and the fucking red scarf.