Paul is shouting so loud, Bev wonders if he’s trying to wake the entirety of Oklahoma. It’s the only explanation she can think of.
“Paul, please.” Beg bevs. Her words have no effect. It seems like nothing will slow him down. “You have to quiet down. Someone will hear you!”
Someone will hear you calling out for a boy, she doesn’t say. Someone will hear you screaming your throat raw for a boy and everyone will figure out why. She was supposed to keep an eye on him tonight. She was supposed to watch him, keep Paul out of trouble until he sobered up. It was Bob’s job, but Bob was gone and there was nobody else to fill the vacancy. Only Bob and Bev knew who broke his own heart over. And now Bev was the sole survivor, Paul’s keeper.
Paul wrenches his arm out of her grip. “Let me go! I want to talk to Darry! Darry!”
Darry. Paul must’ve really been hosed if he let that one slip. In the months after everything had gone down between them, Paul only referred to him as Darrel. An attempt at distancing himself from it all. Typical Soc move, pretending to be above it all no matter how much it really hurts. But Paul was doing a shit job at it.
This type of thing had become a sort of routine at this point. Paul would have a little too much to drink, call up Bob, say something relatively alarming, and Bob would rush over. But Bob’s gone, Bev reminds herself. He’d passed the baton to her posthumously, and she was doing a terrible job, no different than Paul.
She needed Cherry or Marcia, but they weren’t talking to her too much these days and she couldn’t really blame them. She’d been a crappy friend, blinded by injustice and following the crowd. She’d thought it was injustice at the time, what happened to Bob. Now she didn’t know what to think. Or who to go to.
Or how to keep Paul in one place, somewhere in her line of sight. Damn football player, Bev thinks, running after him. So much for being above it all. Chasing Paul down a dimly lit street throws that coolness right out the window.
Paul finally turns towards Bev, stopping for the first time. “Bev, please. Please take me to see him. I promise I’ll be better after. He makes me better, Bev, I gotta see him.”
Paul’s no poet, but he breaks her heart all the same. She can see the ache in him, she can feel it really. It comes off Paul in waves, this vicious desperation. The sight of it is almost enough to make her sick. Bev looks away. She’d never handled wanting well.
“Alright, honey.” Bev says softly. “I’ll take you.”
If his words hadn’t done it, his smile would’ve been the thing to send Bev over the edge. She feels sick all over again. She shouldn't do this. To set Paul up to fail with that look on his face, dopey smile and eyes all lovesick, is cruel. And she is setting him up to fail, she knows this.
There’s no way Darrel is going to let him in let alone hear him out. Too much bad blood has passed between them. Plus, Darrel’s no fool. Even Bev knows he wouldn’t endanger his brothers by letting a drunk Paul into his house. Paul wasn’t a real threat, regardless of how fast he was, but Bev knew it wasn’t physical harm that Darrel would worry about. Losing face in front of his brothers, his makeshift sons, was one of his biggest fears. According to Paul, that’s what had broken his heart in the first place: Darrel’s lack of action and Paul not being able to wait anymore.
Bev tried to take everything Paul told her with a grain of salt, seeing as it only came out when he was drunk, but this? This she believed. Maybe she should take him to Ace instead. She was Darrel adjacent, wasn’t she? But Bev knows that visit would only satisfy one of them.
Ace.
Bev couldn’t explain their relationship and she didn’t want to. They’d caught each other’s eye. Something about Ace pulled Bev. It hadn’t been easy to gain even a morsel of Ace’s trust, but Bev found herself wanting to earn it. She wanted to be worth Ace’s attention and to snag her attention in turn. After a few false starts they’d started spending time with one another. All hesitant trust and sneaking around late at night, meeting up only at night. Only when nobody was watching. It was still dangerous, Bev knows this. But Bev craved the closeness, she needed it. With Bob and the girls gone in their own different ways, with Paul tending to his own wounds, Bev needed someone all her own. Someone who wanted her back. She still wasn’t too sure if that person was Ace, but Bev hoped it was.
The greaser deaths had rattled her more than they should have. She hated them, didn’t she? On principle, Bev was supposed to hate them. Hell, she watched as Paul held one of them down and she hadn’t done a damn thing. She’d laughed as the boy in the overalls screamed. Those two boys dying had gotten to her though. Somewhere between the night of that awful rumble and the fallout from the rest of those boys' deaths, she’d begun to wonder what it meant to be a Soc. If someone like Ace could catch her eye, then what did it all mean? What had she done all this for?
The answer was Bob. She’d done this for him.
Paul knew Bev was different, the same way she’d know he was different. And in turn, so did Bob. Bev still isn’t sure why Bob kept their secret, and now she’d never be able to ask. Bob’s loyalty is what made her turn on Cherry. Bob had kept her secret and Cherry had thrown everything on a tilt. That must have meant something. It had to. If it didn’t, then she had taken sides for nothing. She had tried to give Bob the loyalty he’d given her, but he’d ended up dead in the end anyway. Bev had thought it meant something profound at the time, a friend keeping that big of a secret, but was it?
She regrets everything, every choice she’d made since Bob had died. The side she picked, the friends she lost, the things she’d sat by and watched happen. Every damn thing.
Except one.
Ace.
“You’re really quiet,” Paul slurs. Lord help them both. “Are you mad at me?”
Bev resists the urge to roll her eyes. Drunk Paul was a menace, oversensitive and ridiculously strong. She puts the thought of Ace aside for now. She doesn’t have time to think about what they’ve been doing or what any of it means. She needed to focus on Paul, stupid drunk Paul.
“No, I’m not mad at you. I’m just tired, hon. How much further are we gonna walk tonight?” She asks. She should’ve chosen tennis shoes tonight rather than the powder blue heels she’d slid on. Paul patrol always called for flats.
“It’s just up here. The one with the porch light on. Oh wait, the porch light is off. That’s dumb. Darry always leaves it on for me.” Paul tells her.
He must be delirious, Bev thinks. He must be so drunk he doesn’t remember anything that’s been going on. Not even the Lord could save them tonight it seems.
“That’s good, Paul sweetie.” Bev says. “You can lead the way, but I’m gonna need you to hold my hand the rest of the way. I, uh, don’t love the dark.”
It’s a lie. Bev hadn’t been scared of the dark since she was a child, but the last thing she needed was Paul getting ahead of her again. What’s one more white lie if he won’t remember any of it tomorrow? Depending on how this night plays out, Bev really hopes he’ll forget it all.
Paul slips his hand into hers, giving it a squeeze for good measure. Bev wonders if her work here tonight qualifies her for some kind of job in childcare in the future. That’s all drunk Paul Holden really was, a weepy child.
Paul gives her hand another squeeze, urging her forward. Against her better judgement, Bev follows Paul up the street.
-
By yet another stroke of bad luck, it isn’t Darrel that opens the door. It’s the younger brother, the hero. Ponyboy, Bev recalls. The catalyst. The boy’s eyes widen as he takes in the two people standing on his porch.
“Heeey,” Paul says, trying and failing to sound sober. Bev tries her best to pass her sudden laughter off as a cough. It’s funny, really it is. She has to be able to find humor somewhere in this trainwreck or she’d go off the deep end. Paul dragging her to this house on the other side of town in the middle of the night, only to be met with another obstacle. It was pretty damn funny, in some sense.
“Oh no, not him. Not again.” Ponyboy whines. Oh yeah, this had to be the youngest, Bev decides. “What are you-”
“You’re letting out all the cool air, kiddo. What on God’s green Earth is so entertaining about our porch tonight?” Darrel interrupts. If he’d left the porch light on, he’d have been able to make out the two figures on his porch, but he hadn’t. All his brothers, his people, were home. There was no reason to leave a light on anymore.
Bev watches it all play out. Darry’s realization, Paul’s misplaced joy, Ponyboy looking like he wished the Earth could just swallow him up right then and there. That makes two of us, Bev sighs.
“Ponyboy,” Darrel says, ice bleeding into his voice. “Go finish your homework in your room.”
“But it’s 10:30 at night.”
“Now.” Darrel commands. He doesn’t yell. He doesn’t have to. His tone is stern enough that Bev wonders if she should go and do her homework too.
Ponyboy takes another look at the three of them before sighing and finally departing.
“Worst taste in the family, I’ll tell ya that.” Ponyboy mutters as he grabs his school bag and heads towards his room.
“I heard that!” Darrel shouts. “Little asshole he’s becomin’, huh?”
He freezes up after that, finally fully registering the company in front of him. She doesn’t miss the distance Darrel keeps between himself and Paul. More than an arm’s length apart, just out of Paul’s reach. Something flashes on his face, too brief for Bev to decipher, and then he’s all ice again. None of it seems all that funny anymore.
“Are you mad? You seem mad.” Paul says, breaking the silence. God, he was wasted.
Bev doesn’t think Darrel’s going to answer. He looks braced for a fight, ready to slam the door in their faces and be done with all of this. But then Darrel looks at Paul, really looks at him, and some of the tension bleeds out of his frame. It’s subtle, Bev doubts she’d be able to tell if she wasn’t so focused on him, but it’s a start.
“Yeah, Holden. I’m a little mad.” Darrel says.
Paul’s face scrunches up, like a confused child. “Why didn’t you leave the light on, Darry? You always leave it on for me.”
Darrel goes stiff again. Bev wonders if she imagines some of the color draining from his face, or the way his hands grip the doorframe a little tighter.
“Go inside and get yourself a glass of water, Paul.” Darry commands again. Even drunk, Paul knows not to argue.
“Okay, Darry. I’m real happy to see you.” Paul says and heads inside, clumsy but upright. It should be a relief to have kept Paul safe this long, but the look on Darrel’s face is anything but safe. Bev wonders if he feels as sick as she does watching this disaster unfold.
“What the hell were you thinkin’, bringin’ him here?” He asks. “Showin’ up in the middle of the damn night with him boozed up like that? You got a lot of n-”
“Darrel, I’m sorry.” Bev interrupts. “I know it was wrong to bring him here, but I didn’t know what else to do.”
Darrel shakes his head. “There’s a million other places you could’ve taken him. I barely even know you, Beverly. You never shoulda ended up on my front porch.”
“Where else could I have taken him, huh? Bob’s dead. He usually handles this kinda thing. He never would’ve let it get this far. His parents, jeez, if anyone knows about them it’s you. You know what they’d do if they came home to him like this.” Bev pleads. She needs Darrel to understand how they got here. She needs him to get it.
Darrel is silent for a moment and Bev thinks she’s lost him. She’s ready for him to kick both her and Paul out, leaving her to pick up the pieces all alone. She can’t do it tonight. She can’t get Paul home in one piece. If she was lucky, they’d both end up dead in a ditch somewhere.
“This kinda thing? You mean..” Darrel trails off. He looks miles away from here, somewhere at the start of it all. It had been good, Paul had relayed that much. All stolen glances and illicit meetings. The novelty had worn off after a while. They just couldn’t give each other what they needed, so Paul walked and Darrel didn’t stop him. According to Paul at least. “His parents. They’d either pretend like it wasn’t happening, or they’d put their hands on him.”
“Exactly, they’d make sure he’d regret it either way and I can’t let that happen, but I don’t know what to do. I’m not Bob, I can’t do his job. I’m scared, Darrel.” Bev admits. Making a confession like that to a stranger, a greaser no less, turns her stomach. Bev is supposed to be better than this. She’s supposed to keep it all together. She was supposed to handle this.
“He can’t go home like this.” Darrel agrees. A small burst of relief floods through Bev’s chest. He wasn’t sending them off, but she knew he wasn’t happy either. “Son of a bitch, what do you want me to do here? My brothers are home. How am I supposed to explain his drunk ass being parked in our living room?”
“I don’t know. Just please, talk to him.” Bev begs. “Just talk to Paul so we can all finally move forward. If he gets closure, maybe that’ll be it. Maybe we’ll never have to see each other again, Darrel.”
“As enticin’ as that sounds, that still leaves me with him tonight.” He says. Darrel looks back towards the living room, towards Paul. The other brother, the handsome one, is sitting on the couch next to Paul. Darrel takes a step forward as if to separate them, but stops at the sound of their laughter. Bev peaks in around Darrel at the two. His brother and Paul are laughing at some cartoon on the television, sitting next to each other like old buddies.
Darrel looks ill at the sight of them. Like seeing them palling around is too much for him. Like the weight that Bev has felt all night, for months even, has made its way to Darrel now too.
“Yeah,” he says, running a hand through his hair. “I’ll talk to him.”
He sounds like he’s trying to convince himself of something, that maybe a talk could really just be a talk. That Paul showing up at his door didn’t mean anything. Bev finds herself having to look away from this boy too. The look on Darrel’s face brings back the sick feeling from earlier. Too much was happening on his face, and she didn’t feel like it was her business to watch.
“Look,” Darrel starts. His voice was almost back to normal. If Bev didn’t think too hard about it, she wouldn’t hear the strain. “I’m gonna take him in the kitchen and I’m gonna talk to him. You can come in and wait. Then that’s it, okay? I can’t give him anything else.”
Bev nods in agreement, her heart lodged somewhere in her throat. It was heartbreaking for them both all the same. Paul, who she’d given hope to, whether she meant it or not. Darrel, who she’d ambushed without knowing. Someone was leaving a loser tonight, and Bev didn’t want to think about who it would be. “Darrel.”
He stops a few steps into the house, not turning, but still there listening.
“Don’t hurt him. I know he hurt you, he’s told me everything, but he can’t change that now. He’s been so messed up lately. Just please, let him down easy. Please.”
The only acknowledgement he gives is a slight nod. It’s enough, Bev thinks, it has to be enough. She watches from the door frame, not ready to fully enter the house, as Darrel stops in front of Paul. He places a gentle hand under Paul’s chin, tilting his head up, and motions towards the kitchen with a slight jerk of his head. Paul takes the hand on his chin and slips one of his hands into it. Darrel startles, but he doesn’t let go. He gives Paul that at least. Darrel’s brother is good enough to ignore the entire thing.
“Hey.” He greets her. Sodapop, she remembers, that’s his name. “Is there anyone I can call for you? I know they might be a while. Is there anyone I can call to help?”
Bev doesn’t have to think. “Yeah, there’s someone you can call.”
-
Ace doesn’t live far. Bev is shocked to realize just how close she lives to the Curtis house. She’d never been to either of these houses, never planned on it really, but she was content to wait here.
Ace is there in the blink of an eye and Bev is all the more grateful for it. She’s grateful to Sodapop too. His offer of a phone call, a life line. His total lack of judgement at the sound of Ace’s name coming from Bev’s mouth. His comfortable companionship as they wait for the final guest to arrive at their very shitty party. She’s not sure if she’d have been able to feel gratefulness towards a greaser a few months ago. She’s glad she feels it. She’s glad to feel anything these days.
Another thing that surprises Bev: Ace doesn’t knock. She enters the Curtis house like she owns the place. How much did she really know about Ace anyway? They’d been sneaking around for weeks and Bev had been trying to get through to her longer than that. Their first meeting hadn’t gone smoothly. Frankly, neither did the next few. Bev had seen her at the drive-in a handful of times before she worked up the nerve to say something. She’d been insane to even try.
But, Bev had always known what she was. She’d never be like Cherry or Marcia, no matter how much she tried. She was different and locking eyes with Ace at the drive-in only drove that point home for her. Ace was beautiful, the thought lodged itself in between her ribs, threatening to choke her up at any second.
Bev hadn’t even been sure why she was so dead set on approaching Ace. Call it guilt or curiosity, but whatever it was, it pushed her forward. Standing in front of this girl, and that’s all she was, any attempts at being aloof vacated Bev’s body. How could she be cool in front of this girl?
Ace had asked her what her problem was, leaving Bev stumbling over some insignificant apology. She wanted it to matter, God knows why, so she tried again. Something about not knowing each other, which only led Ace to let Bev know just how well she knew her already. All the greasers probably knew her as the girl who burned their friend. She shouldn’t have been surprised, but she wanted it to be different. Bev wanted a second chance this time.
So, she pushed on again. Through a cuss laced apology, through Ace glaring daggers at her, through the rejection. She hadn’t expected the other girl to forgive her. She was tough, maybe even tougher than the boys she palled around with, and Bev knew nothing she could say would get through that armor. But God, did she wish it would.
She admitted to the guilt the next time they crossed paths, hoping it would buy her a few more minutes with the other girl this time. She’d learned her name was Ace that day too. Or at least, that’s what her pack had called her. The guilt doesn’t move her.
Running into Ace again was pure luck, but only on Bev’s part. She didn’t think Ace felt all that lucky. Bev apologizes again, for ending up in Ace’s path and fucking her day up, but she doesn’t seem all that angry this time. So Bev tries her best, grasping at something like honesty, and tells the other girl that she’s interesting. The only girl in a group of boys, toughest of them all, and it had pulled Bev in. But she wasn’t going to push anymore. She needed Ace to know that she wasn’t going to bother her anymore or get in her way. She’d never meant to cross that line.
Ace doesn’t walk away this time. Offers something up about respecting Bev for actually asking and giving her an opportunity to say no. Bev had known better than most what it was like to be a girl with no way out. No way to say no without worrying about retribution. Something breaks that day and the next time they run into each other, it’s on Ace’s time. Time and place determined by her, making its way to Bev some way or another. Their first meeting on even footing.
Ace. Bev really hadn’t expected her to get here so fast.
Soda rises to meet her, doing some complicated handshake when they get close enough. Bev stands too, suddenly feeling extremely out of place. What had she been thinking? Calling Ace here this late was ridiculous. She should’ve handled this on her own. She should’ve-
Ace’s arms wrapping around her shakes Bev from her thoughts. It takes her a minute to return the gesture, but she finds herself fully leaning into it once she does. For the first time tonight, Bev feels calm.
They don’t normally do this, the hugging, but somehow Ace had known she needed this. She’d taken one look at Bev and thrown her arms around her. The thought of Ace being able to read her that easily is equal parts thrilling and frightening. She had spent so long trying to play every damn thing off. Nothing could touch her if she didn’t let anything close enough. The fact that Ace had so easily seen through the facade, that she’d even tried, lit a fire in Bev’s chest. It was progress, wasn’t it?
“I’m gonna go see if Ponyboy needs help with his homework.” Soda says. Bev had almost forgotten that he was here. For a split second, she’d thought her and Ace had been the only people in the whole damn house.
“It’s almost 11 o’clock at night.” Ace says, pulling back from Bev.
“Time is really more like a suggestion, like stop signs.” Soda answers with a shrug. He backs away from them, towards the bedroom, tripping over the coffee table in the process.
Ace shakes her head at her friend’s clumsiness, settling down on the couch was an ease that Bev craves. She wants to be comfortable somewhere. She wants to have that kind of ease with someone else.
“It wasn’t easy, you know? Trustin’ all these boys.” Ace says, somehow knowing just where Bev’s head was at.
“How’d you-”
“You’re uncomfortable. I can tell by the look on your face,” Ace shrugs. “But you want to be, don’t you?”
Bev only nods, mouth dry at the frank analysis. She’d never thought herself an easy read. She was a closed book, locked up and stored away in a box deep in the attic of some old house. She wasn’t sure what to do with it all.
“Bev, why did you call me?” Ace asks.
Why did she call Ace? She could’ve called anyone in the world, so why did her mind immediately jump to some girl she’d only known for a month or two.
“Why’d you come?” Bev asks back, finally sitting back down. She wants them to be on a level playing field here. If that means meeting Ace at her level, then so be it. She would try.
“I asked you first, and don’t pull some, ‘I asked you second’ shit. You could’ve had them call anyone for you. Any of your soc friends could’ve gotten you outta this. Why me?” Ace presses.
Bev knows the wrong response will cut the tentative trust between them, if she could even call it that. She wasn’t stupid. She knew fooling around with someone didn’t equal love. It didn’t even have to equal like. Bev knew that hate could bind you to someone all the same. She hated Bob, she knew that now, and she was still tied to him. Even now, Bob still had his shitty ghost hands all over her life.
She wanted it back now. She wanted to fucking move on.
“I knew you’d come.” Bev says simply. There’s no reason to overcomplicate it. She hadn’t thought of any of her Soc friends first because she knew they wouldn’t have come here. Not for her and not for Paul.
Ace nods, like it’s really that simple. Bev knows it isn’t, none of this is, but Ace’s easy acceptance is bandage over tonight’s wounds. She feels like she can breathe, fully and deeply again. It’s better than Darrel’s wary acceptance or Soda’s silent companionship because it’s from Ace, and she’s all Bev has eyes for here. Bev wonders if anyone else would ever compare again. She doubts it.
“Thank you. Ace, I-”
“Darry, I love you.” Paul says, voice rising from the kitchen.
Bev’s stomach drops, head in her hands in an instant. What a shitty friend she was. She’d been so distracted by Ace’s presence alone that she’d forgotten why she ended up here in the first place. Paul was hurting and she’d thrown him to the wolves. Bev prays for an easy break. A clean easy break.
“Yeah, well. It’s not any kinda love I can fully wrap my head around.” Darrel says back. “Whatever kinda love you have for me, I don’t get it. Make me get it, Paul.”
It’s nothing really, but it’s enough to make her glance towards the kitchen. Darrel hadn’t sent him away, hadn’t raised a hand to him at the confession. Could they really get past it all? Would love be enough to get them through to the other side? Bev hopes it will. She knows she shouldn’t, for both their sakes, but she really hopes it will.
“Thank you.” She tries again, hand reaching towards Ace’s. They didn’t do this either. Casual touch was saved for people in love, and Bev wasn’t foolish enough to believe it was love. She just prayed it wasn’t hate. She couldn’t let hate tie them too. A clean break for them too tonight. Bev dreams of a clean break for herself too.
But Ace grabs her hand back, surprising her again. “Look, I don’t know what we’re doing here. I haven’t known what this was since it started and I’m not in the business of getting taken advantage of. But I wanna trust you, Bev.”
“Trust me. Ace, you can trust me.” Bev pleads. “I know it’s not that simple and I know there’s not a large margin for error here, but I really want you to trust me. I don’t know what this is either, but you dropping everything and coming here for me? You not hesitating to grab me the second you got here? I know what that kinda thing costs you. I know it doesn’t come easy for you, but it’s something I wanna know more about. I wanna know what all this means, but only if you do too. I’m not gonna pull you under if you don’t want to get pulled.”
“Bev-”
“So, look.” Darrel interrupts. Both girls almost hit the ceiling at his entrance, trapped in their own world again. Darrel tilts his head in confusion at the sight of them. “Uh, hey Ace. Look, I’m gonna let him sleep this off here. Beverly was right. I can’t send him home like this. His parents will either kill him or not notice at all, which will kill him anyway. He’s gonna stay with me tonight.”
Shock isn’t the right word to describe how Bev feels. It’s not big enough to really describe it all. A strange mix of astonishment and that oh so familiar guilt. She’d only heard about Darrel through the grapevine. Only Soc opinions had formed the picture of him in Bev’s mind. He was cold. He was closed off. He was brutal.
But standing on his porch in front of Paul, keeping a safe distance between them, Bev had finally seen Darrel for what he really was. The distance wasn’t to keep from striking out at Paul, it was for Darrel’s own protection. If he could only stay far away enough, Paul wouldn’t pull him in again. He could finally let go. He was lost. He was found.
Bev aches for him, for this greaser boy with a heart just as broken as Paul’s. Paul had broken more than his own heart it seemed. He hadn’t been all alone after all.
“Is everything okay now?” Bev asks. Her voice sounds strange to her. Raw, as if she’d been the one screaming all over town tonight. Ace’s hand tightens around hers. Giving away comfort for free like it didn’t cost her half her soul. Bev wonders what it would be like to give over half her soul. She’d do it maybe. She’d do it for Ace.
“I don’t know exactly.” Darrel admits. It’s hard not to notice the pain now that she knows to look for it. She wonders if she’ll ever be able to be apathetic again. She hopes not. Not when letting go gives her this much.
“We’ll deal with it in the morning.” He continues. “When he wakes up. Y’all are more than welcome to crash here tonight. I know you probably don’t wanna let him get too far out of your sight after all that crap.”
“No,” Bev agrees. “I really don’t.”
Darrel nods. “Was he really yellin’ for me? He told me how y’all ended up here. Kinda.”
His voice is low and doubt-filled when he asks, like he can’t quite fathom the idea of someone causing a scene for him. If he only knew, Bev thinks.
“Yeah, Darrel. He’s been yelling for you for a while.” Bev says. She hopes he can read between the lines. He used to know Paul better than anyone. Hopefully, he still did.
“Alright.” He says. Bev knows that’s the end of it for tonight. She’s starting to understand just how much it cost him to let Paul in again. She wants it to be worth it, for all of them. No more drinking til’ he was sick, no more walls and barriers. “Ace, you know where the extra sheets are.”
“Yup.”
Darrel turns to go, gathering Paul from the kitchen and shooing him towards an open door. He stops in the doorway, not quite turned away from the girls. “And uh, no funny business.”
He closes his door before the comment hits them both.
It should embarrass Bev, but it only startles a laugh out of her. Red in the face and clamping a hand over her mouth like a kid. Ace is laughing too and the sound of it almost undoes Bev. Clear and high. Beautifully imperfect.
“I meant what I said earlier.” Bev says after she calms herself down. She would have loved to laugh with Ace all night, but they needed to see this conversation through. Bev needed to know where to go from here. “The ball is in your court, Ace.”
She’s put herself out there. There’s no taking that back now. It could blow up in her face in a second and she’d still have no regrets. Bev will never have any regrets when it comes to Ace, no matter where they end up.
Ace smiles, slow and slightly amused. “Then I guess we’re just gonna have to see where this thing goes, won’t we Bev?”
It’s everything she’s wanted for weeks and more. Reaching out to this girl over and over again, begging her to reach back, and tonight she has. She’s pulled Bev close and doesn’t seem like she’s going to let go anytime soon. What a privilege to be trusted by Ace after all the sins she’s committed. What an honor.
“And I don’t care what Darry says. We’re sharing this stupid couch.” Ace laughs.
Beautiful, Bev thinks. Beautiful.