Times Change [UNDERGOING EDITS]

Chapter Nine

I woke up the next morning feeling exhausted. I slouched into the kitchen and sat down. Darry put a plate with a slice of chocolate cake in front of me. We had cake almost every morning. In the beginning, we had to beg Darry to let us start having cake for breakfast. He caved in easily. Darry usually had coffee in the morning while Ponyboy and Sodapop just had plain chocolate milk. I however, had half coffee and half chocolate milk. I'd be a zombie if I didn't have just a little coffee in the morning.

Sodapop set my drink in front of me and I mumbled a thanks.

"Do you want eggs Allison?" Darry asked. I shook my head no. The boys all had their eggs different ways, but I didn't often eat eggs in the mornings. I usually stuck to just cake.

I pushed back my chair and headed back to my room, taking my mug of chocolate-milk-coffee with me. Tossing on a sweater and a pair of jeans, I did my usual minimal makeup and tied my tennis shoes. Then I grabbed my backpack and headed outside to Darry's work truck, where him and Soda were waiting for me.

We pulled up in front of the school and I jumped out of the truck. I waved to my brothers as they drove off to work. I headed to my first class, trying to avoid attracting attention. But I gained judgmental stares nonetheless, just about everyone had seen the news article outlining our whole situation.

I felt someone bump my shoulder and looked up to see Two Bit, he was the only one I still had school with besides Steve. But Steve didn't show up half the time, so I couldn't count on him to be around. With Johnny and Pony gone, Two was all I had left on the school front.

"Hey Sissy," he smirked, "We seem to be pretty famous huh?"

"Not the type of fame i'm lookin' for Two Bit," I mumbled. I had always been really shy at school, same as Johnny, I didn't have many friends outside the gang.

"Ahh, I forgot you and Johnnycake ain't to fond of attention," he teased.

I raised my eyebrows at him, "Really? I wouldn't have guessed. Me and Johnny are kind of the center of attention now." I sighed, "Well, if he were here."

He laughed, "Then you will get the great honor of being escorted to your history class by none other than Two Bit Mathews himself." I rolled my eyes but accepted his offer. 

When we got to my history classroom he bowed, "M'lady has been delivered to her destination safely."

"You're so full of crap, Two Bit," I smiled, punching his arm.

"I'm wounded!"

"Get to class, Mr. Mathews," my history teacher, Mrs. Burns, sighed.

"Mrs. Burns, a pleasure as always," Two said smoothly, bowing once more. "Bye, Ally, see ya later," he said, wandering off.

I shook my head, "Sorry about him, Mrs. Burns."

"Don't worry about it, he's not in my class anymore, I don't have to deal with him," she replied. "And Miss Curtis, I read the paper, I understand this whole situation is pretty tough on you. And I want you to know, I'm here if you need someone to talk to."

"Thank you, ma'm," I smiled.

My good mood quickly evaporated as I took my seat at the back of the room. I was getting a lot of dirty looks from the Socs in my class. They all usually ran together. And I had made myself a whole bunch of enemies over the weekend. This was going to be a long day...

~~~~~~~~~~

The day went by and I felt like going home and passing out on the couch and sleeping for a month. It couldn't get much worse than this. I had spent the whole day avoiding the stares, barely escaping confrontations with Bob's friends.

Cherry had come to my rescue when I had been cornered by a few Socy girls who had been taunting me, blaming 'my sort' for the death of their friend.

"I know you aren't to fond of me, Allison," Cherry told me. "But your brother and Johnny, they're real nice guys. And as much as I hate to admit it, Bob was asking for that fight," she said, with tears beginning to brim her eyes. Cherry walked away without another word, leaving me speechless.

I wandered out to the parking lot and easily found Two Bit leaning against his old Chevy.

"Grease" Some Socy guys shouted at us, snickering as they sped past in their fancy convertible. I flipped them off before jumping into the passenger seat of the truck.

"Shitty day," I mumbled as we pulled out of the parking lot.

Two Bit nodded, "Managed to talk my way out of about a dozen fights today."

"Never knew you to back out of a fight," I commented.

"Figured we didn't need to draw any more attention to ourselves."

I nodded. We spent the rest of the ride in silence. Two pulled up in front of my house and I grabbed my backpack and hopped out of the truck. "Bye Two."

Once in the house and out of Two's sight, I ran to my room and fell into my bed. I started crying, it was going to be hard without my brother and Johnny. Johnny had always been there for me when I was experiencing high levels of anxiety, he had always had a special way of calming me down. I had always relied on Johnny to keep me calm when no one else could. And now he was gone, and there was no one there to talk me through it. I've already lost both my parents, and now I might lose Ponyboy and Johnny too.