Chapter Text
1989
“Darry?”
Darry frowned. “Soda? That you?”
“Yeah.”
Darry thought he heard a sound on the other end of the phone, something like a sob, something that could still make his heart ache after all this time. Even though Sodapop was 85, he was still, always Darry’s little brother. “What’s wrong? Are you okay?”
“Yeah. Yeah, I’m better than okay.” Soda’s voice wobbled, but Darry could hear the smile in it now. “We’re gonna bring him back where he belongs, Dar.”
“What? Who?” But he knew. He already knew. Could it really be? After all this time? After 64 years of missing him?
“Ponyboy. They’re finally, finally going to bury his coffin in the ground. In the Mammoth Cave Baptist Church Cemetery. Remember? Back where we used to go to church.”
“Yes.” Darry brought his hand to his mouth, feeling the tears slip over his hand. “I—I never thought I’d be alive to hear it. I thought they’d keep that awful coffin in Crystal Cave forever.”
“No. It’s finally over. And guess what? They want us to tour the cave again and bring him out ourselves. Us and our families. Do you think you’re up for it?”
Darry gasped through his tears. Walking wasn’t so easy anymore, but he could do it. And the terrain in that cave, from what he could remember, wasn’t the easiest, but with some boot treads and the help of his children and grandchildren, he knew he could manage it. He had to be there. He had to see his first baby out of that cave. “Yes. Yes, I will do anything to be there. Can you manage?”
“Yes. I will. It’s all I’ve wanted for six decades. I have to be there. Then I can die, when I know he’s safe in the cemetery."
Darry smiled wryly. “Dont be morbid.”
“Nah. But it’s a little true. I ain’t hankerin’ to die, not for a few more years, but I’ll be ready now.”
Darry chuckled understanding. “All right. When is this happenin’?”
The day quickly arrived when much of the extended family was scheduled to visit Crystal Cave and attend the final burial.
Darry’s kids and grandkids were already over, bustling about the house and the yard as they prepared to leave, and Sodapop and his family would be arriving soon.
Darry was in the living room waiting when he heard the knock on the door, and his brother was the first one inside.
Soda beamed. His skin had sagged with age, as had his posture, but he had never lost that innate sunshine about him, no matter how many years added onto him. Cane clicking across the floor, he walked over and sat himself next to Darry, sinking against his brother’s side. Darry put his arm around him, holding him close.
“It’s good to see you,” Soda said.
“You, too. How was the trip over?”
“Oh, fine. A little more than an hour. I’m sorry I don’t visit more. It’s gettin’ a little harder to travel, even just from Louisville.”
Darry nodded. “I know. Don’t blame ya.”
A few shrieks sounded, and two little boys came barreling into the room, shrieking in delight when they saw Sodapop. “Uncle Soda!”
Soda laughed, grunting as he pulled four-year-old Pony into his lap. He squeezed the shoulder of the boy’s six-year-old brother. “Why, if it isn’t Pony and Darrel! Goodness, where does all that energy come from?”
“Crystal’s comin’!” Darrel shouted, bouncing on his feet, referring to Soda’s thirteen-year-old great-granddaughter. “She’s gonna babysit while everyone’s at the cave!”
Pony pouted. “I want to go in the cave.”
Darrel’s shoulders sagged. “Yeah. Me, too. But Daddy said no.”
Pony tugged on Soda’s shoulder. “Can’t we come, too?”
Soda shook his head, smiling fondly. “No, baby. It’s not a time for playing, unfortunately. There are plenty of caves around for that that I’m sure Mommy and Daddy will take you to. This is a sad/happy trip.”
Pony cocked his head. “Sad/happy?”
Darry nodded, bopping his finger on Pony’s nose. “Your parents have told you who they named you after, right?”
The boy nodded.
“Well, he’s been gone a long time, but he was pretty famous. Our family used to own this cave, see? His body’s been down there a long time, in a coffin, but the national park says it’s finally time to put him in the cemetery. Your Uncle Soda and I are very glad. You’ve been to a cemetery before, right? You understand what that is?”
The boys nodded. “Yeah,” Darrel said. “We went to a funeral last year.”
“That’s right. It’s kind of like that. But just for us adults. Mostly for Grandpa and Uncle Soda here. I think you’ll have a lot more fun here with Crystal.”
“Oh. Okay.”
Pony started squirming, wanting to get down. Soda helped him slide off, and then the two boys were off running again.
Soda hummed, smiling as he rested his head against Darry’s shoulder. “Were we ever that young? It seems like a lifetime ago.”
“Dad,” Sodapop’s daughter poked her head in the door. “Hey, Uncle Darry. Are you two ready? We’re about to head out. Crystal’s comin’ in to watch the boys.”
Darry nodded then made his way to the bedroom to wish his wife goodbye.
Ida squeezed his hand and smiled. “I’m so happy for you, love. I know how long you’ve wanted this.”
Darry nodded, kissing her cheek. “Thank you.”
“Tell him hello for me. And that I love him.”
Darry’s face crumpled, and he drew her into his arms. She hadn’t even known him, but she’d been among the millions praying for him once upon a time. And she knew how much he meant to Darry, even after all this time. They’d had two children together, but Darry had once had a third. His first boy, one he’d always be grieving. Always in the back of his mind. And Ida had understood that from the start.
God, he loved her. He didn’t deserve her. Even after 58 years of marriage. She was so good to him.
Darry came back to the living room, smiling at Sodapop. “You ready?”
Soda nodded, grunting as he pushed himself up, helped by his cane. But the light in his eyes looked more bright and energized than ever. “Let’s bring our baby home.”
Even stooping, helped along by his grandchildren, Darry felt like he was twenty years old again, walking through Crystal Cave. He could almost hear Ponyboy’s voice echoing off the great walls, telling tourists the stories of the gypsum flower garden on the ceiling, the stalactites and stalagmites, and the sand floors many passages below, where he’d once found the footprints of ancient Indians. He could hear Ponyboy gushing about how he believed all the cave systems in the region were connected, he just hadn’t found the way yet. How everyone back then during the cave wars thought he was crazy. How after all this time, he’d been proved right. He would be so happy.
Darry hadn’t been here since he was twenty-four, right after he had sold the land. It was surreal to see again the cave Ponyboy had loved so much.
And then, he saw the coffin.
He’d never seen it before. In fact, he’d heard the body had worn through three already by the fifties, since so much time passed and so many tourists had made their way through. The lid was metal still, to prevent stealing, even though the cave had been closed for nearly thirty years.
Darry made his way over, Soda still sticking close to his side. Darry placed his hand on the lid, breathing deeply. “Hey, baby,” he murmured. “It’s Darry and Soda. We’re here to bring you home.”
Soda nodded, tears slipping down his weathered cheeks as he smiled. “This is the last time, honey. We’re gonna move you now, just once more, and then no one will touch you again. Ever.”
Darry kissed the side of Soda’s head, nodding to their family members that they were ready.
As pallbearers, Darry watched his and Soda’s grandsons carry the coffin out of the cave.
The brothers were asked if they’d like to look under the lid one more time.
Soda looked up at Darry, then Soda shook his head, leaning hard on his cane. “No,” he said definitively. “The next time I see his face, it’s goin’ to be full of life.”
Darry nodded his agreement, his eyes stinging with pride for the both of them.
If he and Soda were still on this earth, Darry believed it was for a reason. Maybe this had been it. If it was, he thought it was a very good reason.
The headstone had already been made and placed, and once the coffin was fully lowered, their children and grandchildren left them to be alone at the headstone.
Soda smiled sadly, looking at Pony’s name carved into the rock. “I wish Steve and Two were still around to see this. Skeets, too.”
Darry nodded. “Don’t worry, little buddy. They know.”
Soda looked at the plot, sighing contentedly. “He’s at peace now.”
Darry sighed, brushing his tears away. He himself could die at peace now, too. For 62 years, that awful coffin had displayed his forever-16-year-old brother’s body in the cave he had loved so people could gawk at him. And in the time it had been left empty, his brother’s body had been left there, alone. Since Darry had been 25 years old, he’d always had in the back of his mind that Pony’s body was being looked at and made a spectacle of constantly, and there was nothing he could do about it. And once that was over, that he was still down in that lonely cave that the national park was stubbornly doing nothing with. Even when Darry and Soda had asked if they could sue, even when the owner covered the glass lid in 1929, sealing the coffin after the body had been taken and found again, even when tour guides still let visitors take a peak under the metal coffin lid at the face for 25 more years, even when the national parks service had bought and closed the cave in 1961, Ponyboy’s body had still been down there. The Curtis brothers' pleas and wishes had not been granted.
He thought that when the body had been stolen, that would be the owner’s last straw. That he would finally give Pony’s body the burial it deserved. Especially after fate had used its power of irony to take his left leg, too, after all that time down in the cave, like his body was never intended to keep it.
Darry thought about that a lot. After all the care they’d taken to save that leg, it was lost to time now anyway. Intentionally, he wondered? He didn’t like to dwell on it too long. It made him sick.
But finally, the one thing Darry had wished for most in all that time was given to him. Undisturbed peace for the remains of his child.
It was almost ironic that he had wished for it so badly, even in recent months. Darry was 89. He knew he didn’t have much time left. Things didn’t come to him so easily anymore. He would see Ponyboy again soon enough. And then Darry wouldn’t care about frivolous, non-eternal things like earthly bodies and graves. He’d last told Pony, “See you later.” “Until next time.” At last, “later” was almost here. It was almost “next time.”
But until then, Darry would care. He had cared. And now, it felt like a weight had been lifted from his very soul.
“Darry?” Soda asked. “Are you glad?”
“I am,” Darry said, his voice breaking. “I’m so grateful. You happy? Even though it isn’t the place on the hill?”
Soda let out a breathless laugh. “Happy? I’ve wanted it for so long, I don’t even care that he’s buried here, just that he’s buried. But I think it’s a good place for ’im. He wouldn’t mind none. I mean—I know he don’t mind none now where he’s buried, but I think he would care that it matters to us, you know?”
“I know, little buddy.” Darry looked out at the land, knowing that only a mile or so away was the bluff where his parents were buried. He was glad that Ponyboy was close to them still. Even when he’d been down in Crystal Cave, Ma and Pa had been on the bluff nearby, watching over him, all that time.
“The stone is nice,” Soda went on. It was. It had his full name, his dates of birth and death, the day he became trapped in Sand Cave, and the day he discovered Crystal Cave. And the epitaph was lovely. “I like how the epitaph calls him ‘The greatest caver ever known.’”
Darry smiled, feeling tears in his throat. “I know he’d love that.”
“He would!” Soda made a sound that was like laughing through a sob. “It’s been so long. I just can’t wait to see him again. To see everyone.” He laughed softly again. “To think, we grew up to be crotchety old men when Ma and Pa never even reached half our ages. You think we’ll be slow and wrinkly up there, too? You think Pony’s just a boy still?”
“I really don’t know, baby. I couldn’t even start to guess.”
“Only Heaven knows how glory goes,” Soda said, chuckling.
Darry smiled, squeezing his shoulder. “I guess so.”
For the first time in 64 years, thinking about Ponyboy didn’t feel like unfinished agony. Finally, it felt like rest.