Disclaimer: I don't own the Outsiders or "God Says Nothing Back" by the Wallflowers.

A/N: These are a series of one-shots written to accompany mars on fire's "Holding Back the Years." These have been read and approved by her, and offer another point of view that doesn't necessarily fit within the larger story. Please read her story first -- it is incredible, and this one will make more sense if you do, I promise.

I want to thank Susie for creating such an incredibly vivid world, Mars for letting me play in her sandbox and SoConfusinglyAmazing for helping me find a song that fits.

This chapter, featuring Angela Shepard, corresponds with chapter four of "Holding Back."

xxxxx

"... last night I could not sleep at all/ I hallucinated that you were in my arms/ to be in your heart/ I filled my own ..."

Angela watched through the screen as Tim strode away from her stoop with that distinctive spring-heeled gait of his. Everyone in the Shepard gang had tried to copy it from Curly to her own husband, but no one could do it quite like Tim.

Her brother was a force of nature -- he changed things, but nothing changed him. She had a feeling Tim being back in Tulsa was going to change things for her, and Angela hoped they'd change for the better, but she had learned through bitter experience Tim's hand in her affairs sometimes blew up in her face.

Take her marriage to Ray, for instance. On her own, she would never have demanded he marry her when she thought she was pregnant that first time, and even if she had, Ray would have laughed in her face. Considering she ended up not being pregnant after all, that might have been the best possible outcome. However, Tim had decided she and Ray would get married, and they did. When Tim decided a thing was to be done, it was.

Now she was stuck in a marriage, while not completely loveless, had started out badly and had just gotten worse. She knew Ray was cheating on her with what seemed like half the girls on the North side, while he went upside her head when he so much as suspected she was looking at another man. Angela figured if he ever discovered Alona was Jimmy's daughter, neither she or Jimmy would be long for this world, and she was scared half to death over what Ray would do to Alona.

Still standing in the doorway, she rocked Alona, frowning reflectively. Untroubled, the baby gazed up at her with wide eyes and reached up and patted her cheek with a pudgy pink hand. Looking down at her daughter, Angela smiled briefly. Alona was such a pretty baby.

She hoped Tim would keep his nose out of her business this time around. She knew he got into her business out of love -- or obligation -- but he'd been gone for a good long while. She had suspected he wouldn't like the way she was living, and he hadn't. Tim would just have to deal with it, though. He'd been gone a long time, and things had changed.

She heard a wail from the livingroom and hurried into the room just in time to see Ray-Ray shoving Charlie to the floor and snatching a Matchbox car out of his hands.

"Ray-Ray!" she snapped.

Whirling around, he gave her his best wide-eyed, innocent look.

"I saw what you did to your brother," she scolded him. "He's littler than you, Ray-Ray. Quit picking on him an' give him back the damn car. Your daddy's bought you maybe a hundred of 'em, anyways. Go play with another one."

Ray-Ray tipped his little face up to hers -- a rounder, smoother and more innocent version of Raymond's -- and gave her a sad, soulful look. His big brown eyes were heart-melting.

"I want to be good, Mommy," he said.

Angela sighed; this one was too much like his father already, and Ray-Ray was only six.

"Give it back, Ray-Ray."

Pouting, he thrust the car at Charlie, then stalked off to sulk in the corner.

Angela sat down on the worn out old couch and gave the five little boys in living room a tired glance.

She probably wasn't the best mother, and she knew Ray wasn't a good father. Her boys wouldn't grow up with the advantages a boy growing up on the South side would, even if their dad bought them any toy they whined to get; they would probably grow up to be hoodlums, like everyone else in both her and Ray's families. Even worse, Angela worried the boys would grow up to be just like Ray -- charming as hell, but only concerned with what they wanted or needed. Ray didn't give a damn about anybody else or hurting someone to get his way.

After all, Ray had no problem with hurting Angela's family. He'd already gotten Curly tossed in prison, and he wasn't shy about letting Angel know it. Sykes owned this town, and he gave Ray free rein to pretty much do whatever he wanted -- that was how Ray put it around, anyway.

All Angel knew is Curly had pissed Ray off with his efforts to keep the Shepard gang together, and he'd been pacing around the house in a fury for months, mutteringly darkly he was going to take care of Curly. Angela had tried to warn Curly Ray was up to something, but he didn't pay her any mind. Once Curly had been taken in on a weapons charge that seemed suspicious as hell to Angela, Ray had been all smiles.

It was no secret Ray hated her brothers. Angela suspected half the reason he stayed with her was because it pissed Tim and Curly off her marriage had turned out so badly. What did they expect, when Ray had been forced to marry her?

She knew she was stuck -- four little kids and no money outside of what Ray gave her meant she had no way out. Sometimes, when it was really bad, she hated Tim for trapping her in this situation.

Tim was so casual about suggesting she leave -- like she was stupid and had never thought of it herself.

Angela had tried to leave. Once.

Before she'd become pregnant with Ray-Ray -- the children really were her curse, chaining her to Ray -- she'd blown town and headed for Bixby. She was tired of Ray fucking everything with a pair of tits.

Ray had found her. She remembered it like it was yesterday.

She was lying on the hotel bed, watching a gameshow. It was sleeting, and the icy rain was hitting the window, making little ticking noises. Curly was showing up in a day or two with some money so she could head out to Houston. She wasn't staying anywhere near Tulsa; she knew Ray would charm her back home. He was an asshole, but he knew how to make a girl feel like she was the only one in the world, when he put his mind to it. He knew just how to play on the little sentiments and use little romantic gestures.

When the door had first swung open, she hadn't even looked up. After all, she was expecting Curly.

"Shut the door, Curly," she had said, still watching a overweight woman leaping up and down with joy over winning a new Buick. Angela had been faintly amazed she was getting so high off the ground. "You're going to let the rain in."

She heard the heavy smack of a sopping wet leather jacket being thrown into a chair.

"Quit tossin' shit arou --" she said, sitting up and turning toward the man in the doorway.

Ray stood posed in the doorway, leaning into the frame with his shoulders, his arms crossed and biceps flexed. The low light from the bedside lamp glinted off the Rolex on his wrist and the thick gold chain around his neck. His shoulders were taunt, and she could see the angry throb of his pulse at the base of his throat. There was rain in his hair, and his A-line tee was sticking to his chest and stomach.

"Ray," she said, dumbstruck.

He looked at her, his dark eyes burning with fury.

"You don't leave me, Angela," he said. "I'm the one who does the leaving. You won't forget again."

Even in the August heat, Angela shivered at the memory and held her drowsing baby tighter. Ray had beaten her badly enough to scare her -- beaten her so she couldn't resist when he had sex with her afterwards. Angel couldn't have even crawled away from him, she was so hurt, and she certainly couldn't fight him off. She must have looked a sight and, even all these years later, she was baffled at the thought he wanted to have sex with her when she was like that.

Ray's lovemaking had always held a sense of urgency and an edge of wildness and it was something she had always enjoyed, but this time, it had only hurt. Sometimes she wondered if what he had done was rape. He knew it was hurting her, but he was her husband, and she was so scared she hadn't said no.

In the middle of it all, he had looked down at her, his expression still an angry mask, despite his panting and urgent thrusts.

"You ever leave me again, and I'll kill you," he had said, before closing his eyes and throwing his head back as he reached his climax.

Nine months later, she had given birth to Ray-Ray.

Tim had never even asked her if she wanted to marry Ray, and sometimes, she hated him for pratically giving her to Ray. Then she felt guilty for thinking that way about Tim. He'd been more a father to her and Curly than their own biological father, who'd left when Angela was so young, she only had the vaguest memories of him. Hank didn't even come close to being a father. She guessed that left Tim, and Angela wondered Tim's life would have been like if he didn't have to run around after her and Curly all the time.

She popped the bottle out of Alona's mouth; the baby's eyes were heavy-lidded, and she was drooling. She was still worried about Tim's reaction to finding out about Alona's father. Angel really hoped Tim wouldn't cause problems with Jimmy. They weren't together anymore, but that didn't mean she didn't miss him.

If Ray was wild and urgent, than Jimmy was sweet and tender. Jimmy cared about her; he had always treated her so nice. He made her smile. He made her feel special, beautiful, desirable. When Jimmy did it, though, it was for real, not to manipulate her, the way Ray did.

Jimmy had been angry when she'd broken it off. He wanted her to leave Ray and go be with him. He'd even told her he would take care of Ray's sons; Jimmy wasn't prideful and didn't hate her boys for their daddy's mistakes.

She still remembered his look of helplessness when she told them they were through.

On really bad days, she pretended to herself she was married to Jimmy and wondered if they would have ended up together without Tim's getting into her business all those years ago.

Sometimes she wondered if Jimmy had been in love with her. She tried not to wonder if he was in love with her now, just like she tried not to drive past his place when she was down that way.

She frowned, looking out over the cluttered livingroom blankly. Tim had seemed so angry about Alona being Jimmy's daughter. He just didn't understand; it wasn't Jimmy's fault. Angela had to break it off with Jimmy for his own good. If Ray ever figured out that Angela was in love with him, he'd kill Jimmy in a heartbeat.

A lot of things had been done to her, and she had survived them all, but that was the one thing she couldn't survive.

" ... love says nothing back/ but I told you so/ I told you so ... "