Chapter Text
When I stepped out into the clutter of the main room from the darkness of my bedroom, I had only two things on my mind: breakfast and my plans for the day.
“Ponyboy!" Freedom called from the kitchen. Well, it’s not a proper separate room, in the sense that one of the sides just led straight into the living room — which also had the dining table on the other side. It was a pretty small apartment, but I had grown to love it.
"I’m here, I’m here,” I grumbled, sidling up to peer over her shoulder at the oats she was stirring for Joss. They looked nauseating to me, but hey, I’m not two and a half.
I’d eat anything Freedom put on my plate though. She took me in after I woke up with no memories on the bus to New York, even though she’s got two kids and her stepmother to look after already. I can’t imagine anyone else who would do something that good, not that I know of.
She and her brothers have all got these tuff nicknames. Not me though, I still wasn’t fully convinced Ponyboy was even my real name; there was a tag on my jumper that said so, but anyone mean enough to send a kid my size on a bus on his own, is easily mean enough to play a joke like that, I figured.
Freedom came from Freda, I think, but not even Ma Preacher called her that. She’s a real cool chick, with the biggest hair anyone’s ever seen. It’s natural too, I’d see her wake up with it, all puffy like she’s got a gallon of hairspray in it. We were both already taller than her, but she wouldn’t hesitate to tear us a new one if me or Toss went too far.
Toss is her little brother, twelve-going-on-thirteen and kind of gangly looking already, skinny and tall. He’s pretty friendly but loses his temper easily, and then calms down quick too and it’s all cool again. It could get a little much sometimes. We got along great though.
If it weren’t for him, I reckon I’d have ended up in some no-funds home for runaways or homeless kids. Instead, Toss brought me home one night and Freedom just never let me leave. They even sorted out a bunk bed in Toss’s room for me just like that. I was pretty out of it still at that point, but I can still remember Toss telling me to just shut up and go to sleep when I tried to thank them for it.
Jossy’s the youngest. I don’t know many two-year-olds, but he was by far the sweetest I’d ever seen. Sure, he whined a hell of a lot, but it was all worth it when he laughed, because believe you me, that uncontrolled giggle could make anyone crack a smile. He even got Margit out of her moods sometimes. Margit was the only one left who called him Joseph, and she still called Toss Thomas as well.
Like I said, no one called Freedom Freda. Freda’s a name for proper ladies and artists; Freedom’s far too cool for that. Eighteen years old and looking after Toss, Joss and I like it’s nothing, and looking after Margit too.
Margit isn’t right in the head. It’s not the worst around, she just forgets everything and switches her emotions up quick, quicker than Toss even. I never found out what happened to make her like this, though I reckon she’s alright, because she never did nothing bad to me or the kids. I know she lashed out at Freedom a couple of times, but that’s just because she was scared, and besides, Freedom’s real good at dealing with it all.
“Morning, kid, sorry to wake you," She greeted briskly, tucking a dollar into my shirt pocket. "We need eggs, bread and a quart of milk. I’m going shopping for real later so don’t worry about anything else.”
It was about as abrupt a greeting as any from Freedom. She always had things to do, or places to be, whether it be work or the shops. She worked at the department store every day except Sunday, coming home at least a few hours after Toss and I did. Before I got signed up at Toss’s school, I would stay home with Jossy and Margit, and because I was on summer break I did as well, but most of the time, the old lady upstairs came creaking down.
Ma Preacher’s husband was the pastor down at the Baptist church and she’s another cool lady. Of course, she’s also a grizzly old bird but she always had penny candies in her pockets if you caught her after dinner and I know that sometimes the leftovers she brought down weren’t made by accident.
Anyway, I flicked Toss’s ear as I passed him on my way out, where he was watching cartoons on the sofa. He yelped but didn’t retaliate more than a dirty look.
The area was pretty rough, so I walked with eyes on a permanent swivel and feet ready to run. I knew the people around pretty well since January, but even so, everyone in that area could’ve done with that little extra cash — and some people were angry about it — so I was always wary of muggers. A couple of Freedom’s buddies had a bit of a rep though, and because I was known as another one of her little brothers by that point, that protection extended to me.
The guy in the store nodded at me and I nodded back. I came down for quick shops every now and again, but in general, we’d go to the big supermarket all together when Freedom got paid.
I still think she was pretty amazing for supporting all five of us on her salary — I also had a job as a busser in the diner on the corner on weekends and Toss did the paper round — but there was always something in the apartment for us. I became pretty good at cooking in just those six months, especially improvising what we had.
Speaking of eating, by the time I got home, I was starving. Jossy was having his breakfast on the couch with Toss, but Freedom had disappeared; I reckoned she’d gone to change for work. I helped myself to the off brand cereal we always kept in the cupboard and then stood behind the sofa, just as engrossed in the TV as the other two boys. I didn’t find the animated stuff all too funny anymore, but they felt nostalgic in a way, like something just out of reach.
Eventually, while the credits were rolling I asked Toss if he wanted to go out today. “I’ll stay at home with Jossy and his mom,” I offered. I was only a year older but I still felt like I had to take responsibility and let him have some fun.
Toss blinked and then his face split into a wide grin. “You’re a real pal, Pony. We can go out together tomorrow when Freedom’s back, yeah?"
"Sounds like a plan,” I agreed, and then he was gone. I looked down at Jossy and Jossy looked up at me. Like I said, he was a real cute kid. All three of the Brown siblings were fair and blonde, but Jossy had these big blue eyes, where Toss and Freedom’s were a sort of brown. Still cool, but not like their youngest’s grey and blue kaleidoscopes.
“Can you get the book?" — he always liked to listen to me read — "With Winnie?”
I hesitated at first, because Winnie the Pooh was in Margit and Freedom’s room and I wasn’t sure if Margit would mind me coming in at that particular time. Sometimes she minded, sometimes she didn’t, I had no way of telling.
But I never could’ve refused that face. “Sure, just let me…” I trailed off, dropping our dishes off at the sink as I passed. Then I knocked on the only still closed door in the entire flat.
Margit opened the door abruptly, as if she’d been standing there already, just waiting for someone to knock. When she saw me, confusion flashed in her eyes as she struggled to place my appearance among her jumbled memories. Eventually, something clicked and she smiled brightly, just like Jossy’s smile.
“Ponyboy!" she exclaimed, throwing her arms around my neck and embracing me tightly. I patted her on the back awkwardly until she pulled back, suddenly concerned. "Ponyboy, shouldn’t you be in school today?”
“We’re on summer break, ma’am," I reminded her gently. I tried to channel Freedom or Ma Preacher’s patience when talking to Margit, but it was hard. I never really knew what to say or how to treat her. Sometimes she was very clever and just like anyone else, but she’d also have to stare at a window for several minutes before figuring out how it worked.
"Oh, don’t you go ma’aming me, I’m only twenty-eight!" She laughed, before stepping around me to go and coo over Jossy. It was like she’d just suddenly forgotten I was there. At least it gave me the opportunity to duck into the room and grab the kid’s book.
Margit was having a pretty good day actually. No, a great one, once she got into the rhythm of things. She and I each read different characters out for Jossy, we took him to the park and it felt like she was aware enough to push him on the swings while I watched attentively, she ate the entire thing when I made sandwiches for lunch — Jossy also went down for his nap with no argument. I wondered if that was how Freedom felt when one of us was doing well, that warm pride that settled deep in my stomach.
Toss came home a couple hours later. Margit saw how grungy he looked and sent him to wash straight away, which he was so surprised by, he didn’t even argue.
I just snorted, without looking up from my book. It was one of the Dickens, the sad one with the little girl and her grandad. Freedom had given it to me from her shelf of books that she’d already read. She wasn’t a huge reader, not like me, but she liked books enough to have discussions on the ones that she had read and also to encourage Toss to enjoy reading too.
“What was that, huh, greaser?" he replied, leaping over the back of the couch and on top of me. I’ve got a pretty good build for my age but he had winded me with the impact. "You think I smell bad too?”
“Get off me, you little—” We rolled onto the ground, grappling until I got him into a headlock. I didn’t bother trying to get him to cry uncle, instead just shoving him off and saying, “Glory hallelujah, you do stink!"
Jossy was watching us with his arms crossed. "You can’t fight Toss, Pony! He’s got skinny bones!”
It took us all a second to realise what he meant and that he was repeating what Freedom said when we started tussling.
“Y’all are too bony to be fighting each other like that," she’d say, or alternatively, “Y’all are too skinny," despite the fact that neither of us were unhealthy, not with how hard she worked to keep the food on the table.
Even Margit started laughing then, and Toss jumped up to swoop Jossy up as well. “Don’t worry, Josster, I’m plenty strong enough!” He proved this by swinging the kid up onto his shoulders worryingly high. I stuck an arm out to catch anyone who might fall but in the end they were both fine dancing around the room to Toss’s rendition of Twist and Shout. I think the Beatles are pretty rank honestly, an opinion which everyone else in the apartment chose to violently disregard for peace of mind.
There was still time to go out and do something tonight, although we’d have had to wait until Freedom came back. Instead, after Toss had cleaned himself up, we played cards and Jossy drew with his crayons.
“Look," he crowed, holding up an obnoxiously colourful set of stick figures against a grey background. ”It’s us! It’s our family!"
A few months earlier, that would’ve made me freeze up and glance between Margit and Toss, waiting for one of them to protest. By then, I knew that neither of them would. I had been accepted as a Brown, I was enrolled in school as Michael Brown — we’d figured they wouldn’t allow Ponyboy and since I couldn’t prove it was my real name, I just picked Michael because it felt right.
“You got that right, little man!" Toss hollered back, holding his cards up in salute.
I leant over to look at the waxy paper closer. “Gosh, you’re getting real good at drawing now, aren’t you?” Honestly, it just looked like any other two year old’s stick figures, but at least I could tell that Freedom was the one with long blonde hair, Toss was the one with short blonde hair, Margit was the one with long brown hair and I was the one with short brown hair. I figured that was good enough observation skills.
“I’m taller than Ponyboy though,” Toss pointed out, leading to a side long look from both of us; the kid must’ve picked it up from me sometime along the way.
“We’re the same height,” I said, deadpan.
“No, we ain’t, stand up right now and I’ll prove it to you!”
It was a long time before I conceded that he was barely half an inch taller than me, by the end of which, Freedom had gotten home. She looked tired, but not tired enough to not be able to cross her arms and raise her eyebrows at us.
“What are you two fools doing?” she asked, the door not even locked behind her yet.
Toss grinned. “I’m taller.”
I scowled, but muttered, “He is a tiny bit taller,” almost under my breath.
Freedom laughed and came full into the flat, dropping down to sit on the floor for Jossy to crawl into her lap and hug her. “Don’t worry, Pony, I’m sure you’ll get your growth spurt soon.”
“Says you, Mrs five-foot-three,” I replied, not worried in the slightest about her taking it to offence. She never got mad when we talked back at her, unless it was particularly ungrateful. Also, she’d never tolerate actual cruelty — we could dig fun at each other as much as we liked but the moment it was intended to hurt, she’d shut it down lickety-split.
“Well, you certainly ain’t getting seconds,” she huffed. I then apologised profusely while she laughed some more.
Dinner was Kraft Mac & Cheese that Freedom said was because she couldn’t be bothered to make anything else, but we all knew it was because it was Margit’s favourite. I had no problem with it either and it meant we could all eat at the dinner table together for once, rather than Margit going off to eat in another room.
The earlier threat was not enforced as two boxes had been made and that meant there was enough for both me and Toss to have another portion.
“You’re a growing boy,” Freedom agreed sombrely when I asked, “I guess you’ll need it if you ever want to be taller than Toss.”
I was quite obviously outraged and made a point of grumbling about how Toss was taking too much, since he didn’t need to grow any taller. Toss stuck his tongue out and flicked a piece of pasta at me.
“Don’t do that,” interjected Margit. “Freedom made an effort to cook this food for us and we’re very grateful.”
Freedom looked surprised, but I noticed the pleased tilt to her mouth as she looked down at her bowl. It was always a better day when Margit was doing well.
It all calmed down after that and me and Toss were able to do the washing up and drying respectively without splashing too much water on each other and hitting each other with the dishcloth too many times.
We watched The Jackie Gleason Show until Freedom had to put Jossy to bed, and we had to turn the television so it didn’t disturb him. You could hear everything through the walls in that apartment. Margit decided to turn it too, meaning we had to be extra quiet so it didn’t stress her out.
“Who do you think would win in a fight, James Bond or Mary Poppins?” Toss whispered, staring up at the ceiling. There was a crack running through the paint, or maybe the ceiling too.
“Mary Poppins wouldn’t fight no one,” I whispered back — I was pretty engrossed in a sketch from earlier in the day of Margit pushing Jossy on the swings. The perspective I remembered the scene from was from behind so you couldn’t see Margit’s face, but Jossy was looking over his shoulder and smiling at his mom. It felt worthy enough to go in my real sketchbook with the nice paper.
“But she’d totally win, right? Because she’s Mary Poppins,” he mused.
“And 007 wouldn’t ever fight her either,” I said, only glancing up when the phone began to ring. We both looked at each other, about to call for Freedom. She appeared almost immediately anyway, presumably not wanting the ringing to wake up one of the others.
“Hello?” She answered it suspiciously. We didn’t get many calls at this time of night, but her face cleared up pretty quickly. “Awful late for you to be calling, Dallas, don’t you know I gotta put Jossy to bed?”
Toss oohed loudly, as if Freedom hadn’t just said about how Jossy was already asleep. She motioned for him to be quiet as she listened, but his holler showed only the barest effort to keep down the volume. “Freedom’s got a gentleman caller!”
“Shut up,” she hissed, covering the transmitter with her hand before returning to the conversation with this Dallas figure. “Uh-huh…Yep.”
“Golly, we don’t got space in this apartment for another charity case!” I called out, at least slightly softer than Toss’s.
“Not you too, Ponyboy.” She forgot to cover the transmitter this time, instead pointing her finger at me sternly. She then put her hand over her eyes as if we’d stop existing if she couldn’t see us.
Slowly though, her hand fell away again and she turned to look directly at me with an unreadable expression. “You what…? No…Yeah…Six months ago.” We could only hear one half of the conversation but both me and Toss stopped grinning as well. It was obvious she was talking about me and not just introducing me either.
“No, he doesn’t know…Can’t remember anything before the bus over…Yeah, he started palling around with Toss, so I figured I could take him in…Do you wanna…? Just give me a minute.” She put the phone down on the side table but didn’t hang up. My heart was beating like I was about to run into oncoming traffic when she came over to sit down beside me.
In that moment, Freedom looked just as young as she was, her hands lying limp in her lap. Her eyes were just as wide and shocked as Toss’s and mine, but when she looked over at me, something seemed to almost harden in hers, like she had just come to a decision.
“I just want you to know that whatever happens going forward, I love you like you’re my own little brother and I will be there for you to do whatever you need,” she told me, as serious as I’d ever seen her. “…An old friend of mine called Dallas Winston is on the phone. He lives out in Tulsa, Oklahoma and he says that he knew a thirteen-year-old called Ponyboy Curtis who went missing about six months ago.”
I just stared at her, unable to speak. I didn’t recognise the name Curtis but what did I know? I also couldn’t remember any Dallas Winstons.
“He wants to talk to you, is that alright, hon?” She never called me ‘hon’. It was only ever Jossy that I heard her use it for.
I nodded, mouth dry from hanging open dumbly. Then I stood up and went over to pick up the phone, gulping down the storm of emotions that I was feeling but couldn’t name.
“This is Ponyboy,” I managed to whisper, glancing over at Toss and Freedom’s nervous expressions.
“Boy howdy, kid, where the hell have you been?” The voice crackled through.