I'm obsessed with your Ace and Darry stories 😭 could I request one where Darry comforts Ace during a tornado? They have to go to the tornado shelter which is dark and cramped and has Ace getting flashbacks? Just cute big brother Darry coded?
Thank you so much! I know this was from a couple weeks ago and I'm sorry this took so long but life got really busy and I just haven't had time. But I finally finished it! I hope you like this! Also, small TW for some implied and referenced sexual assault. If you are sensitive to that stuff, please stay safe!
The humidity was worse today.
It was the first thing Ace had noticed when she’d stepped outside of her house. The sky was quiet as well, darkened, like a monster lying in wait. It put her nerves on edge and made her brain feel fuzzy.
She’d had an easy enough time walking to the DX, though her tank top was entirely soaked and stuck to her back once she got there. It wasn’t uncommon in the glare of the Tulsa summer. But today felt… different.
“Hey Ace, thought you woulda slept in.” Steve said from the counter, hardly looking up at her from his magazine.
“Yeah, I thought you would stop runnin’ that fat mouth but I guess some things never change.” She quipped.
“Jesus, you’re on one this morning. Soda’s out in the garage, go bother him.” She nods, sticking her tongue out at him before heading into the garage. Soda was slid underneath a car, humming to himself, with a screwdriver in his mouth. Ace kicks his foot, effectively scaring him.
“Hey! I coulda dropped that down my throat you know!”
“You would have been fine.” She says, barking out a laugh.
“What are you doin’ here Ace? You usually don’t come in until later.”
“Why does everyone think I’m just some good for nothin’ bum who sleeps past two everyday?” She kicked him again before he could answer. They settled into a comfortable silence that had been practiced many times before. With Soda saying which tools he needed and Ace handing them to him without a word.
“Does the sky seem… wrong to you today?” She asked, unsure of herself.
“It just seems like something is gonna happen.”
“My Momma used to say that tornadoes always happen after it gets real quiet in the mornings. Maybe that's what it is.” A thrill of fear ran through Ace at that. A tornado? She’d been in a tornado one time in her life.
She can’t remember what happened but she knew it was bad. She could remember trying to get to the storm cellar but not being able to. She distantly remembered something about a guy too. She also remembered that she had managed to black out before anything happened. At least she thought that nothing happened.
She shook her head, trying to physically clear those terrible memories.
“Maybe.” He licked his finger and put it into the air, laughing when Ace kicked him again. “You don't’ gotta be scared Ace. Darry’s home today and our storm cellar works just fine.”
“I ain’t scared.” She resists the urge to kick him again but doesn’t for fear it might actually make her look scared.
They spend the rest of his shift mostly messing around, Ace pushing the anxiety about the tornado to the back of her mind. Outside was getting worse, the hot sticky stagnant air now whipping around and raining. They were in the middle of trying to throw circus peanuts into Soda’s mouth when there was a loud crash against the windows of the DX. Apparently the sign had been ripped off the front and blown back against the windows. Ace nearly jumped out of her skin, remembering the storm cellar in the Curtis home.
“I gotta go.” She says, dropping the circus peanuts and running out into the storm.
“Ace, wait!” She didn’t know who had yelled that at her but she didn't’ care. She was running like a bat outta hell down the street where the wind had picked up so much that it was hard to see straight in front of her. It was only three blocks to the Curtis home. Three blocks. She told herself, pushing through the wind. Not that she could even really feel her feet touching the ground. Ace didn’t think she’d taken one breath since she ran out. Not that she could really feel much of anything right now.
She ran up the steps of the Curtis home, slipping in and slamming the door behind her, panting like she’d just run a marathon. The storm cellar. The storm cellar! She had to get to the storm cellar.
“Soda? That you?” Darry came into full view then from the kitchen. He was still in his work clothes and he looked tired. Though his eyes softened when he saw her. “Hey Ace… you’re bleedin’.” She brought a hand up to her face, which came back streaked with blood. “What happened?”
“I don’t know.” The words felt thick in her mouth, like it wasn’t her saying them.
“Alright,” He said, like he was talking to a wounded animal. “It’s gettin’ pretty bad out there, so lets go down in the storm cellar just to be safe and I can clean ya up down there, okay?” She nods and lets him take her by the elbow, guiding her down to the storm cellar.
They sit in the dark for a little bit, with nothing but the wind whipping outside and rattling of the windows upstairs. The cellar is cramped but there is a small cot for a bed and some other pillows on the floor. With the fact that Darry isn’t saying much, Ace is left to her thoughts. She wishes he would say something but Darry was always the Curtis that was the most comfortable with silence. Soda would talk your ear off under the worst of circumstances and it was best not to get Ponyboy going on the movies currently in the theaters.
Ace wants to reach out or grab Darrys shoulder but she can’t get her hand to move. The wind whipped outside and Ace flinched violently, suddenly brought back to the only other tornado she’d been stupid enough to get caught in.
Ten years old and shaking. Still washing in the remnants of summer with her torn tank top and fading plaid shorts. She is on the way down to a communal storm cellar with various other adults from her Gram and Gramps neighborhood. The storm cellar was like the basement… but worse. Ace had been looking around for Steve but couldn’t seem to find him anywhere. Usually if she found Steve, it meant she could be safe. She couldn’t find him.
She tried to stick close to her Gram but Ace had gotten lost in the sea of adults. Before she could go in, she figured she should watch the people as they walked in. Maybe catch sight of someone she knew. She took a seat on the ground in the corner, her knees drawn up to her chin. She tried to make herself as small as possible, imagining herself as an ant looking through the rest of the big people. That’s when she felt a heavy hand on her shoulder.
“Hey pretty girl, what are you doin’ down here all alone?” Ace didn’t answer, her tongue felt heavy in her throat. She didn’t know this man. Seeing the silence, the man spoke again. “Such cute little shorts you’ve got on.” He began to stroke her thigh, grabbing at the button on her pants. “Everyone… is gone, just you and me.”
Ace quickly realized she was alone. The rest of the crowd had gone into the storm cellar, the tornado warning blaring down like it was from God himself. The door had been shut behind them, nobody remembered where she was, nobody would hear her if she cried out. That’s when the man had grabbed her.
Ace doesn’t remember much after that, mostly flashes of terrible things.
A hand on her mouth, her tank top strap ripping, hair being pulled, bruises on her ribcage and thighs, musky cologne in between rough kisses, trying to scream, the fight draining out of her, and wishing it would stop. Praying it would stop.
But she can’t really remember. Why doesn’t she remember? Should she want to remember?
But in the darkness of the Curtis storm cellar, the muffled whipping of the wind and Darry’s heavy breathing, Ace can’t help but feel like it’s happening again. She knows it's stupid, somewhere in the back of her mind, she knows it can’t be happening again, but her body doesn’t seem to agree.
Ace screws her eyes shut, tears leaking out and down the sides of her face, her breathing out of control. His hand was over her mouth so that she couldn’t scream and now she can’t breathe. Not with his hand over her mouth. She tried to scream for help that night. Didn’t she? Underneath his hand she had screamed for her Gram, Steve, her Gramps, Two-Bit, or even Sodapop. One of them would save her and if they couldn’t, they would try. Her body shook involuntarily wishing that his hands would just get off of her. She couldn’t seem to get them off. Too weak, too stupid, too small-
“Ace… baby you gotta look at me…” She couldn’t hear him over her own harsh breathing. “Ace!” Her eyes snapped open at that, looking up at Darry’s worried face. She can’t breathe.
“Dar… Darry…” She says shakily through gasped breaths.
“I’m here Ace, I’m not goin’ anywhere. Just breath, in through your nose, out through your mouth.” It was something his Momma used to say whenever Sodapop or Ponyboy got too worked up. Ace guessed that Darry had started using it too.
“I can’t… I just… I can’t-”
“Yes you can.” He interrupted, taking one of her shaking hands and pulling it to his chest. “Feel my chest and breath with me.” He started to over exaggerate his own breathing, willing Ace to breathe with him. Slowly, after some time, she begins to calm down. Enough to start hearing the wind outside instead of her heartbeat thundering in her ears again. It wasn’t happening again. Why did she think it was? How could she be so stupid-
“Ace? You okay?” Darry asks carefully, like he’s talking to a hurt animal. She puts a hand on her neck, feeling the air enter and exit her body in a more controlled way.
“I- I think so.” She drops her hand from his chest. “I don’t know what’s wrong with me.”
“I don’t think anything is wrong with you.” Darry gives her a questioning look and she can sense that he’s about to push. Darry was never one for unanswered questions. “What were you thinking about baby?” She looked at the dirty carpet then. Stained from Soda’s various snacking adventures and Ponyboy’s smoke breaks. Shame seemed to flood her body. Why did it seem so hard to tell Darry? What would he think of her?
“I’m sorry.” Ace couldn’t help the embarrassment that flooded her body.
“Hey now, none of that.” He was being gentle and that’s what made it all the worse. Darry wouldn't love her, not after this.
“I… It felt like the last time I was in a tornado.” She offered softly, still looking on the floor.
“Okay.” He said, obviously wanting her to keep going. “Ace… It’s like I always tell my kid brothers. There is nothin’ you can say that would ever make me walk out on ya.” She sniffles at that, trying discreetly, to wipe the tears off her cheeks. He picks up the first aid kit and pulls out some supplies. “Can I at least clean your face up?” She nods and he starts. “What happened to your face?”
“I don’t know.” She says honestly. “I was runnin’ over here and somethin’ musta happened.” She sniffles again and Darry smiles gently.
“Yeah, something.” He starts scrubbing the blood off and Ace can tell he’s trying to be soft, though it is pretty rough. Darry was big and that tended to make it a little hard for him to be soft.
“I couldn’t- I didn’t make it into the shelters at the last tornado… when I was ten I mean.” She says feeling like she’d admitted something dirty.
“What happened?” She wrestles with her hands in her lap, still not making eye contact. She was grateful that Darry was doing something instead of looking at her. His eye contact could be pretty intense.
“Some guy… a guy from the neighborhood found me.” He keeps silent, getting to the blood that had dripped down to her neck. “It was just… just us and he did…” She feels something of a sob bubble up in her throat but manages to push it back down.
“It’s okay, just take your time. I ain’t never gonna be mad atcha if that’s what you think.”
So she admitted all what that man had done under bated breath. She even admitted how scared she’d been. Darry looked more and more murderous by the second.
“I don’t even remember it Darry.” She cried, bringing a hand up to wipe at her eyes. “Not all the way at least.” He set the towel down and put a hand around her shoulders, pulling her close. “Should I want to remember it? Is it bad that I don’t?”
“No, it ain’t bad to wanna remember Ace kid. It happened to you after all.”
“I just don’t know what’s wrong with me.”
“Hey,” He said gently, shaking her a little bit. “I meant what I said before. Nothing is wrong with you. You got scared, people get scared all the time. It’s a completely normal thing, especially when something like that happens to ‘em.” She tried to nod, more tears falling from her eyes.
“You ain’t… You don’t…” She couldn’t get out what she was trying to say but it was something along the lines of asking if he still loved her.
“What that guy did was not your fault. I will always love you Ace, nobody is ever going to change that.” Ace couldn’t help grinning at that, the smile dropping as quickly as it came.
“Yes, I mean c’mon, you’re like my baby sister or somethin’.” She smiled again and he pulled her deeper into his side. It was like a breath of relief, he wasn’t going to hold this against her.
She couldn’t help the next thought that came. “We need to call Soda and Steve. They probably got caught at the DX. We gotta make sure they’re okay.” Darry smiled.
“If I know anything about them, they’re probably more worried about you. Runnin’ out like you did.”
“It’s okay, let’s give ‘em a call, okay?”
“Okay.” He goes to help her up, a genuine smile on her face. All… if anything, was forgiven. Ace would always have her big brother, no matter what.
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