Finally reposting this.
Disclaimer- I do not own The Outsiders, its text or its characters. Certain portions of this fic include quotes from the text. These quotes are not my own.
"Music, when soft voices die, Rose leaves, when the rose is dead,
Vibrates in the memory -
Odours, when sweet violets sicken,
Live within the sense they quicken.
Are heaped for the beloved's bed;
And so thy thoughts, when thou art gone,
Love itself shall slumber on". - Percy Bysshe Shelley
Work had been difficult that day. Sherry had spent the majority of it nauseous and with a tension headache that had not disappeared in two years. Still, she stumbled through. As the nausea dissipated, she readied herself to go home for the evening. Sherry walked in the door and sat her briefcase down, kicking off her shoes and heaving a sigh of relief. She flexed her toes, moving her feet around in circles, thankful to be out of the heels. She walked into the entranceway and down into the kitchen. She grabbed the blue teakettle from the Maplewood cabinet and walked to the sink to fill it with water to boil. Setting the stove on medium, she placed the kettle on top with a bag of chamomile tea inside, and went to see if her husband was in his office.
The office was in the smallest room upstairs. It was a dimly lit space lined with bookshelves filled with the spines of dusty books he never read anymore and an antique desk with a typewriter that had scarcely been touched. Sherry peaked her head in. "Ponyboy?" he was not there. Sighing, she turned the lights off and walked to their bedroom, gingerly fingering a closed door to the right. He was not home.
She went back downstairs and poured her a glass of tea, grabbed a day old slice of coffee cake from the fridge and sat down. She blew on the tea and took a small sip. Sighing she prayed her husband would come home before sunrise this time, if he made it home at all. The way he drank these days, sometimes Sherry was surprised her husband could even drive.
A little? You call reeling and passing out in the streets a little? Bob I told you I am never going out with you while you're drinking, and I mean it. Too many things can happen while you're drunk1
Sherry shuddered at the memory, jarred from it as the front door slammed open and shut. She set her mug down, stood up and walked into the living room where her husband was struggling with his coat.
"Pony?" she asked, "Ponyboy." He turned to her. His eyes were bloodshot and his breath reeked of whiskey.
"Dam coat." His fingers, normally nimble were missing the silver clasps of the buttons and he tried to yank it off from the sleeves.
Sherry closed her eyes and took a deep breath. She walked closer to her husband, unbuttoned the first button of his coat, and gave him a gentle smile. "Here let me help you."
He pushed away her hands. "do it myself, not baby," he muttered still slurring.
"Pony"
He shoved her away. Sherry reeled a bit but planted her feet firmly on the ground. "I said I can do it myself." He growled.
"Fine, just fine." Sherry threw her hands in the air and left him to his own devices. She headed back into the kitchen and sat down with her mug. Sherry took a sip and sat it down, and ran her hands through her hair.
She heard loud curses coming from the living room and a crash as her husband tripped on the rug on his way to the couch. Sherry sighed. What had happened to the sweet guy she had married who loved to read books and watch sunsets, to the kid she found herself so easily able to confide in, like nobody else before. Had they really fallen so far?
I wasn't trying to give you charity, Ponyboy. I only wanted to help. I liked you from the
start... the way you talked. You're a nice kid, Ponyboy. Do you realize how scarce nice
kids are nowadays?2
She loved him of course, he was her husband. She could not imagine not having him lying beside her, the sound of his voice ringing softly in her ear. The gentleness of his touch when he was sober used to send shivers of delight down her spine. He was never sober anymore. Now, she almost hated the feelings of his hands against her body.
Pony rarely got violent with her. Bob has knocked her around few times, as had her boyfriend during freshmen year of college, but Ponyboy never touched her, not when he was sober, only when he was drunk. Mostly he yelled, said hurtful things that Sherry knew he only half meant. One time though, in a fit of rage he had called her a whore, among other things, then he had pounded on her, leaving whelps and bruises. She nearly had broken her arm and he had disappeared for nearly a month. When he came back, he cried for days afterwards, begging her to take him back. She did and he had not hit her since but he still was drunk more than not and lost his temper in fits of rage. That night, they made love to one another, it was the first and only time in more than four years they had and it had been horrible.
Sometimes Sherry found it so hard to believe that the same hands that had left so many bruisers and contusions were the same hands that had once caressed her skin gently, that had written her beautiful poems that told her how much he had loved her. Oh how she had loved him then, still loved him even now.
Sherry set her mug in the sink and looked outside the small window and out to the stars. She recalled warmly their first date.
She had been a junior in college, at Brown University, and surprised to come in the bookstore and find the ghost from her past working there. She had ignored him for years after the trial. There were to many bad memories to visit and there were already rumors all ready starting that she had a thing for hoods. Back then, Sherry had been too obsessed with her image, something she now regretted. For years, before that day Sherry had nothing to do with Ponyboy. She had heard in a roundabout way that he lost a brother in Vietnam but she'd never come with a casserole dish or sympathies.
So she was shocked and slightly embarrassed to see him there in the most unexpected of places. He'd gotten to be very handsome. His hair was ungreased now and back to his natural red brown. His eyes were more green now, sad and kind. He seemed just as surprised to see her as she was to see him. When after a little while he asked her on a date, more of an outing really, she was even more surprised.
He took her off to a field at night, laid out a blanket and pulled out a basket dinner, some chicken he had made himself and some potatoes, mashed hot and fresh from a local restaurant. He provide instead of wine, two glass bottles of Pepsi. "Sorry," he had told her, "I don't drink." She only wished it was still true.
He was a perfect gentleman, just like that night at the drive in six years prier. He laid down on his back and pointed out the constellations in the sky, telling her stories about how they came to be. He shined brightly as they did, dimming only when he spoke briefly of his dead brother. "I miss him," he said, "I miss him every day." And she held him as he told her all of thoughts just as he had walking from the drive inn, all of his joys and his fears. And Sherry knew, she wanted to keep this feeling, the ease that came when they were together. Sherry had a horrible habit of picking the worst men for herself but she knew, knew she could fall in love with Ponyboy Curtis, was falling in love with him already.
Sherry walked into the living room. Ponyboy was staring blankly at the television. Her heart ached for him. She walked to his side and sat down beside him, wrapping her arms around his shoulders. He hunched over. "Sorry," he said, "so sorry," apologizing for earlier.
Sherry kissed his cheek. "I know." She stood up and hoisted him to his feet from under his arms. "Come on, let's get you into bed." She said rubbing his back. "You'll feel better with some sleep."
"Not sleepy." He mumbled, but he was, she could tell. She kept hold of his arm, hers under his as they stumbled up the staircase. There was time when they always walked like this, steady though, as he held onto her in a crowd, whispering funny things in her ear. She used to love to bring him to business dinners with him on her arms or to go with him to a signing of one of his books. The way he would look at her and then say in front of everyone how beautiful she was made her heart flutter. He had not called her beautiful in two years.
She laid him gently on the bed, removing his shoes and socks, and then his pants. She moved his feet onto the mattress. She grabbed the quilt from the edge of the bed and placed it over his body, up to his chin. She leaned over and kissed his forehead, running her hands through his hair; he was already asleep. "Oh Pony…" Asleep he looked so young and innocent. She bit her lip. "I love you," she whispered.
Sherry walked back into the living room and leaned down to straighten the living room rug. She stood up and winced as cramps filled her stomach. Sherry eased herself off the ground and walked over to the mantel where her wedding picture stood. She smiled. Ponyboy was so handsome; He was wrapping his arms around her. She remembered his heart beat against her back, their hearts beating in time as one. She never heard his heart beat in time with her own anymore. It was as if that part of him had died.
He was not the man she had married. He did not talk to his brother though she called him often. He would never talk to his friends Keith or Steve. He called them hypocrites. Keith had stopped trying to talk to Pony eventually. "Listen I love the kid, you know I do; but I can't see him like that."
Steve who had been even more messed up on heroine for a time, then her husband had ever been on alcohol, came for a visit once, he was a drug councilor now. "He's going to have to do this on his own. We can try to help but we can't make the decision for him. Call me when he decided he wants to start using his head again."
Sherry closed her eyes and decided it was time to go to bed. She climbed next him and nuzzled against his warm body, wincing at the smell of whiskey and smoke. She hated when he smelt like that. It always made her think of Bob and thinking of Bob only emphasized just how messed up their marriage, their whole relationship really was.
Sherry leaned over and kissed his cheek. "I love you," She said again, before turning off the light.