Alrighty. This one has been done for a few days, but I just haven't remembered to put it up. Hopefully you all enjoy. Thanks to Zickachik for the awesome beta job!

Disclaimer: The usual

Chapter 6

“Journal Entry, June 8th. The most embarrassing, mortifying thing happened this morning, and it wasn’t even to me, amazingly. Well, I guess it was involving me, but that’s not saying much when you consider it wasn’t me. Maybe this is the kind of thing I shouldn’t think about anymore…”

Yeah, if only I could completely erase the image from my mind. Unfortunately, it was a permanent imprint. I’d never had a photographic memory, but this was something worthy of Polaroid, apparently. I shut my journal around the pen I was using and sighed. Maybe if I just took a few minutes and processed it, I could get rid of the image. That meant starting at the beginning. At least that had been perfect…

It was so nice to wake up to the house being still, the birds chirping outside, and the heat picking up even though it was still morning. Rolling over, I glanced at the alarm clock and smiled. It was ten AM and no one had woken me for a demanding two-year old. Darry had to be at work hours ago and no one was expected to visit. It was nice to finally have the house to myself.

I guess I did feel bad about telling Two-Bit off about babysitting, but something good came of it. Mrs. Mathews, as in Two-Bit’s mother, seemed appalled that they were looking for someone when she was at home and could watch her only grandchild perfectly well. So, in my way of thinking, not only did I manage to reunite a grandmother with her grandchild, I also solved Two-Bit’s money problem. Not that he was getting out of paying me what he owed me, but the situation was better all around at least, since he wouldn’t have to pay his mother. I had the feeling he’d get smacked just for offering.

I groaned and stretched so my arms were hanging off the opposite sides of the bed. I suppose I would have laid there all day if my stomach hadn’t started talking. Darry and I had gone to the grocery store the day before so I knew exactly what I was having for breakfast – toast smeared with honey. It was a favorite of mine and you could tell that Darry was letting me have my way since I did pay for the groceries. Now, no dirty looks. I got everything he wanted, too.

Shuffling down the hall, I was intent on getting to the kitchen. I guess I should have been paying a little more attention, but this was pre-coffee Becca. I found I didn’t notice or learn much until after the jolt of caffeine hit my system. Darry hadn’t left any coffee, so I filled the pot, setting it to boil while I searched for the honey. Darry had a strange system when it came to putting things away. You’d think it would be with the peanut butter or something instead of with the canned soups. I hummed happily when I found it and set the container down on the counter.

I was a little more awake now and noticed for the fist time that the shower was running. I frowned, wondering who could be showering when everyone but me was supposed to be at work. I remembered that Darry liked to keep the front door unlocked incase someone needed a place to lay low or something, but did they take showers, too? I shook my head. I’d ask once he – because it was probably a he – got out of the shower.

The shower cut out a minute later and I waited long enough, in my opinion, for whomever it was to dry off before leaving the kitchen. I was barely out of the kitchen when I stopped in my tracks.

Reaching for the top shelf of the linen closet, in all his naked glory, was none other than Ponyboy Curtis. I gaped. He’d hit a growth spurt since I’d last seen him. Not that I’d ever seen this much of him before. He was tall, lean, muscled, and wet. I threw a hand over my eyes and mentally kicked myself for not leaving some clean towels in the bathroom. What? I assumed anyone taking a shower would be smart enough to get a towel first. I decided this was Darry’s fault for asking me to put them away last night.

“Oh, God,” I groaned, turning away since my fingers weren’t doing a very good job hiding anything.

There was a stumbled step and some cursing before the distinct sound of everything in the linen closet, including Pony, thumping to the floor. I turned back to look and smiled. He was buried in every towel and extra blanket they owned now. He blinked at me after making sure that all the important parts were covered up, even though it was a little late for that.

“Becca?” he asked, not sounding like he was completely sure I was who he thought.

His voice was deeper and his eyes were a little greener than the last time I’d seen him. He’d grown more into his looks, less boyish and more like Darry through the jaw, but he was going to be nineteen this summer, so that wasn’t so shocking. And he obviously had no qualms about running around the house in his birthday suit. At the thought, I looked down at the floor instead of him

“Hi, Pony.”

“God,” he sighed, blushing darker than I thought possible. “What are you doing here?”

“I'm here for the wedding.” I knew I was blushing something awful, too.

“That’s not until July!” he pointed out.

“I always spend the whole summer if I come to visit,” I pointed out. “Though, it’s usually spent with Steve, but he obviously has a new woman in his life. So here I am.”

“Here?” he asked, looking surprised.

“Yeah, Darry has a spare room,” I answered, undoubtedly needlessly since Pony lived here and knew there was a spare room. “He didn’t tell you?”

“I don’t think so, but I was working on this paper and…” he shrugged, picking up one of the towels off the floor and scrubbing his hair with it.

“I should…go check on the …coffee. You know, in the kitchen…” I suggested, stumbling over my words.

He nodded and I disappeared back into the kitchen to find the water was hot enough for the coffee. I could hear Ponyboy getting up and closing a door a moment later. The coffee was ready and I had a stack of toast on the table before Pony popped in, fully clothed. He was still blushing as he sat down at the table and helped himself to some of the toast.

“Coffee?” I asked and he nodded, accepting the cup in front of him.

Neither of us said much after that. What did you say to someone you’d gotten more than a decent look at? And in turn, what did you say to the person who saw every part of you?

“So, college?” I tried and he nodded.

“Yeah. You?”

“Quit when Steve came home, been working for Mark ever since,” I replied.

“Good.” He nodded.

I sighed. “Listen, I'm sorry about the whole hall thing. Can we just pretend we’re ok?”

“Yeah, I guess,” he offered with a shrug.

“Good.”

“...Like that worked. We spent the whole day sidestepping each other or sharing the living room in the afternoon. I was hoping Darry would come home from work early just so he could break the tension. I half got my wish…”

It was around four when I heard a car door close outside and someone coming up the front walk. Pony glanced up from where he was going through some ads in the paper and I set my book down. A moment later, Two-Bit walked in with Chrissy in his arms.

“Darony!” she shouted and I frowned.

“I thought that was Darry’s nickname?” I asked as the little girl climbed into Pony’s lap, causing the newspaper to flutter to the floor.

“She up and decided one day that saying both ‘Darry’ and ‘Pony’ was a waste of time since they live together,” Two-Bit offered. “So she put the names together. Dar-ony.”

I nodded. Now it made sense. I had no idea what she was saying before.

“She does that a lot. Me and her mom are now ‘Maddy’, which is a hoot when Rachel is about to blow her top.” Two-Bit grinned. “When’d you get in, Ponyboy?”

“Around nine thirty,” Pony replied, a slight blush on his cheeks. “I wanted to get settled back in before everyone got here.”

“You must have given Beckers here a shock.”

We both blushed then. Oh, he’d given me a shock alright, but it was nothing compared to the shock I’d given him. It had taken the pair of us at least twenty minutes to fix the closet again since everything needed to be refolded and the shelf needed to be fixed, too. Ponyboy even had war wounds in the form of three or four splinters I had tried to help him dig out. By the time I had scraped two of them out, Pony decided he’d rather wait on Darry. He was a big baby.

“I’ll definitely call first from now on,” Pony assured him, making Two-Bit look at the pair of us strangely.

“Beckers didn’t hit you with something, did she?” He asked, smirking at the thought. “Because she’s mean enough to do it.”

“Ass,” I accused, getting a wider grin in response.

“No.” Pony shook his head, pushing Chrissy’s hands away from where she was grabbing at his eyebrows with sticky-looking fingers. “We just surprised each other.”

“Yeah, I’ll bet you did. So, what’re we going to do tonight to celebrate your homecoming for the summer?” Two-Bit asked.

“I’m pretty tired. I was thinking a home cooked-dinner and some time at home with Darry…and Becca, I guess since she lives here.” He shrugged. “I figure we can do something bigger on the weekend.”

“Damn, and here I thought you college boys were supposed to be wild party-goers.” Two-Bit shook his head.

“Not those of us on scholarships,” Pony assured him. “We work hard, we show it, and we get to eat occasionally as a reward.”

“Kinda sounds like back when Darry was working two jobs.” Two-Bit shook his head. “It’s always the hard workers who can’t get ahead.”

“And he finally gets it.”

We all looked over at where Darry was standing in the doorway. Pony set Chrissy on the floor before going over to hug his older brother. Darry was smiling like I hadn’t seen him do all summer. And even though I had been listening to Darry talk about him all week, I saw in that moment how much he was looking forward to having his family home, even if it was only from an hour’s drive away.

“Good to have you home,” Darry greeted. “I wasn’t expecting you until tomorrow.”

“Well, I got sick of campus food,” Pony replied, smiling to match his brother.

“How’d your paper go?” Darry asked and Pony shrugged a little.

“Just another paper, you know? At least sit down before you get into the deep questions.”

Darry walked over to sit down in his chair while Pony sat down on the couch with Two-Bit who had his hands full with Chrissy.

“Darony!” Chrissy chirped and he waved at her causing a fit of giggles.

Notice how Becca the ex-babysitter didn’t so much as get a sideways look from that kid. I leaned in the doorway of the kitchen, thinking I could probably get dinner ready long before they had all caught up with each other. I shook my head. I had missed this. All that was missing was Steve. Steve was missing a lot these days.

“Kinda like being on the outside looking in, huh?”

I glanced over at where Rachel was standing in the doorway, having come in through the kitchen.

“I like seeing them all like that.” I shrugged. “I don’t feel left out.”

I was Becca and I was irreplaceable – Steve said it himself. I wasn’t insecure enough to feel left out because I had nothing to contribute to the conversation. Pony had told me all he could have throughout the day. Listening to it again was just plain boring. That and I really did enjoy watching them all visit.

“Well, then,” was Rachel’s answer. “As much as I would love to let Keith stay and chat, we have to be going.”

“Oh?” I offered.

“Every time I tell him we’re having dinner with my mother, he seems to turn up here.”

I wanted to chuckle at that. Of course he’d end up here. Mother-in-laws were to be avoided at all costs. It was a rule.

“Good luck.” I shook my head.

I decided that dinner really did need to get started and walked over to lean on Darry’s chair so I could fiddle with his hair until I had his attention. In retrospect, it wasn’t the best plan since he was very sweaty, but the best laid plans, as they say…

“Yes?” Darry finally asked, looking up at me questioningly.

“What would you like for dinner?” I asked.

“There’s a chicken in the fridge. If you could fry it up with some mashed potatoes and those canned beans, I think that’ll be fine,” Darry replied.

I wanted to groan at the meal because I swear, all they ate here was fried food, but I recalled Pony devouring many similar meals. Fried chicken was probably his favorite.

“Oh, and while I have your undivided attention,” I added, tugging gently on the strands of hair still in my fingers, “Pony has splinters you should pick out for him and Two-Bit has to go home.”

“What?” Two-Bit looked up from where he and Chrissy were “reading” a picture book and caught sight of his wife. “Oh.”

“Oh?” Rachel crossed her arms over her chest, giving Two-Bit a look to rival his own raised eyebrow.

“Yeah, I just remembered that I have this…thing.” He stood up, daughter in his arms.

“Thing?” Rachel asked and Two-Bit slumped a little more.

“Dinner with my Mother-in-law,” he sighed.

“Why do you always have to act like its punishment?” Rachel shook her head, leaving through the front door this time.

“Rachel. C’mon, you know I like your mother,” he called after her, but she didn’t answer. “Well, it looks like dinner with my Medusa-in-law is going to be even more delightful than usual.”

“Two-Bit!” I scolded.

“No, he’s not joking. His mother-in-law can turn you to stone with a look,” Pony offered, looking sincerely sorry for his friend.

“I’ve gotta run or she’s going to run over my foot again. Keep the weekend open! We have some serious partying to do!” Two-Bit pointed at Pony to empathize his point and rushed out the door.

“Well, I’ve seen whipped before, but that kind of takes the cake.” I shrugged. “So one fried chicken, coming up.”

“…I’d like to say that the rest of the evening was thrillingly entertaining, but when is my life ever entertaining or even thrilling? Things did brighten up once Steve called…”

Pony and Darry were doing the dishes. I don’t know what that amused me so much, but it did. Usually I did them while the boys goofed off, but they had insisted that whoever cooked had to leave the dishes for the other two. Sitting around in the living room with the paper while they did the grunt work was something I could definitely get used to. The pans the chicken had cooked in were definitely in need of some serious elbow grease and I was pretty sure the mashed potatoes that overflowed on the stove were never going to come off again. Needless to say, the boys had their work cut out for them.

I guess I was expecting them to do everything because I didn’t even move when the phone rang.

“Becca, can you answer that?” Darry hollered and I blinked.

“Me?” I called back.

“Get the phone!”

I jumped up to answer the phone, having no idea what to say. So, like a moron, I blurted out ‘hello’ in the receiver.

“Now I know why you’re not a receptionist.”

“Hi Steve!” I chirped into the phone. “Are you coming over?”

“No, I’m working on the books tonight,” he replied, a slight sigh in his voice like he didn’t want to be doing the books. “I thought I’d call and let you know.”

“Oh. Ok,” I replied, hoping I didn’t sound disappointed. “That’s ok. Ponyboy came home today, so we’ve been kind of busy with him around.”

“That’s good.”

Steve wasn’t much for talking on the phone. Steve wasn’t much for talking, period, but at least when you could see him you could see what he wasn’t saying. Did that make any sense?

“Listen, I have to go.”

“Will I see you tomorrow?” I asked and he sighed again.

“I have my meeting tomorrow night.”

I’d almost forgot that Steve met with drug addicts on Tuesday nights. It was the night that he was part of the support group rather than leading it, like he did on Thursdays. The big difference was that the Tuesday meeting was for returning soldiers and the Thursday meetings was for local youth. Steve seemed to connect with them for some reason.

And he says I don’t listen to him.

“Are you listening?”

Well, most of the time…

“What? Sorry. What were you saying?”

“I said that if you wanted to come tomorrow night, Jace did invite you along. We can grab a coke afterwards,” he offered and I smiled.

“I would love that.”

“Good. I’ll come for dinner around six. We have to be there before seven. Got it?”

“Yeah, I got it. See you tomorrow, then.”

Steve muttered something before hanging up the phone and I followed suit, still smiling to myself. Even though it had been an…odd start to the day, it had turned out just fine in my opinion.

Well, one of my personal favorite chapters in this story...

Any comments at all are welcome and flames accepted.

See ya in the funny papers!!

Tens & Zickachik