~"...Mom would talk to him and make him grin in spite of himself. '"You've got quite a mom,'" Dally used to say. '"She knows the score."' She could talk to Dallas and kept him from getting into a lot of trouble."~

The Curtis boys weren't the only ones who suffered when Madeline Curtis died in that car accident. No one suffered quite as much as them, but Dallas Winston was certain that the only other one who came even close, if not even more acutely, to feeling what they were feeling was himself.

When he'd come to Tulsa when he was eleven, Johnny Cade had been the first to accept him after the older, bigger and significantly meaner boy had stopped some bullies from beating him up. Johnny had then introduced him to an eight-year-old Ponyboy, who had promptly dragged him home to introduce his family to his new friend. Sodapop Curtis had been overjoyed to have another boy close to his age, though he and Steve Randle were inseparable. Darry hadn't always been so serious. He used to be exactly like Soda and good friends with Two-Bit, who had apparently been born with his nickname.

His initial meeting with Mrs. Curtis hadn't left a very good impression on the woman, who had been less than pleased when Ponyboy had gone to her, asking what certain words meant. When she had learned he heard them from Dally, she'd pulled the young boy aside quietly and told him in a stern tone she would not tolerate that sort of language around her sons, especially not her youngest. He'd told her exactly what he thought of that. She'd given him an unimpressed look and told him flat out that she didn't care he thought of her; he would respect her rules while in her home or else.

Dally hadn't been sure how to respond to that. No adult had laid it out so firmly with the confidence that he would listen to them just because they said so and he'd faltered a bit for a response before settling with an appropriately subdued "Yes, ma'am."

Dally had been left with a lasting impression of respect for her and for the next five years found himself in their home more often than not. Mr. Curtis had taken Dally on excursions, treating him like his own son, something else Dally was unsure how to deal with: he mostly sulked while on the trips because he wasn't sure what else to do, certain that sooner or later the Curtis' would get sick of dealing with him and he'd be left to fend for himself, again.

But the one that really seemed to make a difference in his life was Mrs. Curtis. Out of all of them, it seemed like she was the only one who could talk him through his rages, calming him down and keeping him from something stupid. It had actually been her idea that they start leaving their door unlocked so if the boys needed someplace to stay so they wouldn't get in trouble. Steve, Dally and Johnny had been the ones to take them up on the offer the most.

She noticed that Dally seemed particularly protective of Johnny and encouraged the relationship. The two boys had taken to each other like ducks to water: Johnny gave Dally someone to watch out for and to take care of, effectively curbing a fair amount of his aggressive streak; Dally gave Johnny the grounding the force in his life, the reassurance that someone would always be there for him and to watch out for him. Johnny may have been the gang's pet, but Dally was his protector.

She was the only one to see him cry. He'd had a little cousin, Amy, who lived back in New York. He'd been close to her and two years after his family moved to Tulsa, he'd gotten news that she'd been in a hit-and-run, lingering in the hospital nearly two weeks before falling into a coma and then dying.

She was the only one to ever hold him, stroking his hair and murmuring soothing words as he sobbed. He knew that Mrs. Curtis always had a long to-do list to take care of while the boys were at school and her husband was at work, but when he'd shown up outside their house, red-eyed and barely sniffling she'd brought him inside without a word and sat down on the couch, pulling him into her lap, ignoring the fact that he was thirteen-years-old and not a little boy and just held him, like his own mother should've done.

Not that he would've let her. She had no interest in her son. When she did, it was to manipulate. Dally had learned all the tricks from her. When he met Sylvia, he knew she didn't care about him, but that was all right. He didn't want to care about her. She was there to remind him that people, no matter who they were, always left.

The gang, as of yet, were the exception to that rule. Darry looked after all of them…almost as crazy as Sodapop, but he used his head more. Two-Bit didn't care who you were or what you did; if he considered you friend or family, you were in and he would stick by you no matter what. Soda and Steve were in constant competition with each other, but it was friendly and while Steve was more stand-offish, Soda was less picky about who his friends were and had claimed Dally as one. Steve, by proxy, accepted anyone Soda considered a friend. He didn't have to like you, and he'd let you know if he didn't (something Dally appreciated about Steve…you always knew where you stood with him), but he'd stick by you for Soda's sake. Ponyboy and Johnny were the babies of the gang, never mind the fact that Johnny wasn't much younger than Dally, only by a couple months or so, but they were the ones everyone looked after. Ponyboy, especially. Dally couldn't count the number of times someone had had to yank him back by the scruff of the neck because he'd almost walked out into oncoming traffic because he wasn't paying attention. Dally looked after them just as much as they looked after him.

Mr. and Mrs. Curtis were also the exception. Dally was always welcome around their home and he took advantage of that, shamelessly. He watched his mouth and manners around Mrs. Curtis…she was a lady and deserved every ounce of respect he could give her. He imagined that she deserved more than the greaser neighborhood they lived in. He could picture her in a large mansion, dressed in fine clothes and running a household of servants seamlessly.

Dally felt like he could talk to her about anything…from school (which he hated) to his old life in New York (which he tried to avoid talking about as much as possible). He would skip school to go talk to her and she listened. She always had time for him.

When he received news about the death of the Curtis parents, he felt like he'd lost the closest thing he had to a mother. It sent him on a downward spiral; the only thing really keeping him grounded was Johnny. When they died, Dally bottled every ounce of his grief and hid it away, leaving only angry, bitter emotions. He turned those to protect. The Curtis' trusted him to protect the younger boy, so he did. It was all he had left.

The Curtis boys weren't the only ones affected by the death of Madeline Curtis. Dallas Winston had lost more than they ever could have imagined.

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It surprised me that there weren't really any stories centered around Dally and Mrs. Curtis, so I wrote this one to try and give a little more insight on their relationship and what Dally lost when the Curtis's died. Also, I'm not sure if the names of their parents ever got mentioned so for all intents and purposes, Mrs. Curtis's name is Madeline.

This is my first Outsiders fanfic, so be nice!

Read and review, please!