Change of Heart

The next morning, I got up pretty late, around eleven. Immediately, I threw on my gray Mickey Mouse shirt and a pair of jean shorts. Then, I darted into the bathroom to brush my teeth.

"Good morning, lazy butt," Soda greeted as I walked into the kitchen.

"Good morning," I repeated, laughing. "Why aren't you at work?"

"Day off," he grinned. "It was real slow yesterday, and I stayed after Steve ditched, so I'm getting rewarded. I even get paid for today."

"That's tuff," I commented, starting to cut a piece of chocolate cake. It worked out really well that the Curtis brothers were so crazy about chocolate because I was too. Maybe not quite as much as them, but it was pretty close.

I sat down with my cake while Soda started cooking me some eggs, since he was up before me. The rule was, whoever got up first had to make breakfast for everyone.

"So..." Soda trailed off a few minutes later, smirking at me.

"Where are Pony and Sammy?" I questioned, knowing what was next going to come out of his mouth. I wanted to keep that on the down low as long as I could.

"Movies. Don't change the subject." He put the plate of eggs down in front of me and sat down, dragging the chair at the head of the table and dropping it to my right.

"There was no subject yet," I argued. "You just said, 'So...'."

"Ugh, don't get technical. Anyway, as I was saying." Soda cleared his throat dramatically before continuing. "Dally came by about a half-hour ago."

"Oh?" Taking a bite of my eggs, I refused to look at him in case my face gave anything away. I was pretty bad at hiding my true feelings.

"He was lookin' for you."

"That's weird." A smile started playing at the edge of my mouth, so I bit my bottom lip to try to suppress it.

"C'mon," he stretched out the word so it lasted quite a few seconds, "tell me. What's going on?"

"Nothing. Dal's just a creep."

"Then why are you smiling?"

I wiped the look off my face and got up to throw my plates in the sink. "I'm not."

He tried a different approach. "It's pretty strange, how you're not telling me nothing when Dally flat-out told me that y'all are going out."

"He did?!" My voice was almost a squeal, that was so shocking.

"Sure. He also told me that he's madly in love with you."

"See," I chuckled, "Now I know you're lying."

"Does that mean you are going together?"

"I didn't say that."

"You didn't deny it either."

We stared each other down for a minute before I sighed and said, "Kind of."

"What do you mean, 'kind of'? From where I come from, it's either you are, or you aren't."

"It's not like we've gone on a date or anything. We just kissed once."

"After you bailed him outta jail?"

"Maybe." I tried to remain mysterious, but my face turned pretty red, messing up everything.

"That means yes. God, I never figgered you for a girl to go for Dally."

"Neither did I," I answered honestly. "He's different from the other guys I've dated. Way different."

"Whoa, whoa. Hold up." Soda put his right hand in the air, signaling me not to say another word. "How many guys have you dated, Sophie?"

"Uh, four," I remembered, blushing again. "In the technical sense. My first boyfriend was in my sophomore year of high school, and that lasted about a week and a half. We didn't even kiss. Then, the summer before junior year, I dated a guy who worked at the local pizza shop, and he was two years older than me. We didn't get really serious, but I cried a little when we broke up at the end of the summer, since he had to go back across the country to Massachusetts to start his first year at Harvard."

"You went from a kid who went to Harvard to Dally?" Soda interrupted incredulously.

"Not directly." Thinking about it, I realized how strange that really was. What opposites. "But anyway, the boy that asked me to my junior prom and I went out for almost a year, but he cheated on me, so I dumped him. And then, just in April, I went with a kid who went to the local college, but he was boring."

"So you dumped him too?" I was a little surprised that Soda was so into my past boyfriends. It wasn't a very impressive list, nor was it interesting.

"No, actually. He said that I was a bad listener and didn't care about anyone's feelings but my own. Sorry that I didn't want to hear him drone on about rocks, so I zoned out."

"Rocks?" Soda burst into laughter. Glad he was amused, 'cause I sure wasn't at the time.

"He was a collector," I winced slightly, remembering the time he'd brought a few on one of our dates. He kept them in his pocket and put them on the table, describing each one in detail, while I just sort of glazed over my eyes and nodded occasionally, mumbling, 'Uh huh.' Not fun.

Soda started howling louder, not able to breathe too well. "Wow, I can't believe you actually went out with a guy like that."

"Neither can I. I was actually going to break it off with him the night he dumped me, so that worked out well for me."

"Pretty cool."

"So what about you, Pepsi-Cola? What about your thousands of girlfriends?"

Soda bit his lip. "Ummm...In sixth grade, I went out with a girl for a couple for days. In ninth grade, I got my first kiss from a girl named Linda, and we went out for a few months. Then, in tenth grade, right before I dropped out, I got Sandy. Then..."

I could see he was hurting, so I put a hand on his shoulder to stop him. "I know the story, you don't have to tell me."

He nodded. "Anyway, am I the only one who knows about you and Dally?"

"Other than Dally and me," I confirmed. "Though, I, uh, told Darry I liked Dally a couple of days ago."

His eyes widened. "You told Darry?!" The alarm in his voice freaked me out a little bit.

"Um...yeah... Is that bad?" My face started heating up again since Soda was inferring that I made a huge mistake.

"I can't believe you did that!" Soda slapped his forehead with his palm, leaving a slightly red spot.

"What?! Why is that such a big deal?!"

"Haven't you noticed? Everything makes sense now. When did you tell Darry that you liked Dally?" He was firing the questions at me, as if I was being convicted of something.

"Right before I found out that Dally was in jail. Why?"

"Ugh. You're so friggin' stupid."

"What? God damn it, Soda. You better tell me or I'll kill you."

Soda let out a loud, pathetic sigh. "You are such a dumb-ass."

"WHAT DID I DO?!"

"You told Darry that you liked Dally."

"Yeah, I got that, thanks." I rolled my eyes. "I meant, why is that such a big deal?"

"How have you not noticed? Darry likes you!"