Muffled voices spoke angrily downstairs, waking me up from a deep sleep. I groaned and flipped myself over on my stomach, pulling a pillow over my head in an attempt to block out the noises.

Footsteps sounded through the hallway outside of my door, and then a few knocks, followed by a familiar voice. "Diana, you awake?" Dallas asked from the other side.

Although I was happy to hear his voice, I am not a morning person. "No!" I groaned in response, closing my eyes and holding the pillow tighter around my head.

"I'm coming in," Dallas said before turning the doorknob and opening the door to my room. I heard his boots as he walked across the creaky, wooden floor. I should really learn to lock my door. "What are you doing?" He asked, sitting at the edge of the bed.

"What does it look like?" I remarked a little too rudely. "Trying to sleep!"

Dally chuckled, ignoring the fact that I just snapped at him. "Get up," he said, pulling the blankets off of my body. I groaned, blindly reaching for the covers, but he must've thrown them on the floor. I curled up into a ball, still refusing to get up. "Fine," Dallas huffed.

I snickered under the safety of my pillow, until he yanked it out of my hands, tossing it to the side. "Hey! Hey! What're you doing?" I exclaimed as Dallas grabbed my hands and pulled me to my feet.

"Let's go," he said, ignoring my protests.

"Go where?" I asked. I had a feeling this had something to do with the arguments I heard coming from downstairs, and it was too early in the morning for me to get involved in more shit.

"Downstairs," Dallas replied simply. He grabbed my hand and dragged me along through the hallway and down the steps to the bar.

The whole Curtis gang along with Buck, Sandy, and Evie stood in the center of the bar talking to one another as my eyes traveled around the room, completely shocked at what I saw. There were eggs throw at the front windows, the whites and yoked dripping down the dirty, stained glass. Every chair had at least one broken leg, and the tables were all knocked over carelessly. There were red solo cups thrown around the room along with multiple different liquor bottles that were drained of its fluid. Multiple Ropers mascot stickers were superglued to the countertop of the bar, and as the cherry on top there was red writing graffitied onto the floor:

GO BACK TO WHERE YOU CAME FROM, GREASER SLUT!

Yeah, I guess I had that one coming.

"What the hell happened in here?" I asked to know one in particular. Dally and I had walked over to the crowd of people and joined their conversation.

Darry sighed, pinching the bridge of his forehead. "I told you guys to think before you act," he lectured disappointedly.

Buck was fuming with anger as he pointed an accusing finger at me. "Did you know this was going to happen?" I put my hands up in surrender, taking another glance at the destruction of the room. It looked like a tornado hit the place.

Buck glanced at Two-Bit and Steve too, knowing that they were also involved in the prank from yesterday. The two greaser boys shook their heads nervously. It wasn't any of our intentions for this to happen.

Regardless of our answers, Buck rolled his eyes and crossed his arms over his chest, huffing angrily. 

"Come on, man, she didn't know," Dally said, defending me. He glanced down and met my eyes, waiting for a response.

I sighed and broke away from him. "Well," I trailed off with a guilty frown, rocking on the ball of my heels uncomfortably.

"Why didn't you warn me!" Buck asked, his voice raising loudly. His eyebrows knit together and a small vein popped out in his neck.

"I don't know!" I exclaimed. "There was all this Jerry and Wagner shit- I was stuck in a locker for two hours!"

"Some friend you are, Diana," Buck muttered under his breath, but everyone seemed to hear it and had anxious looks on their face, knowing that I was pissed now. I'm a lot of things, but a bad friend isn't one of them.

"You got somethin' to say, Buck?" I hissed, voice laced with venom as I took a threatening step forward, on the verge of throwing hands.

Dallas must've sensed my growing anger. "Diana-"

"Sh!" I cut him off. My dark eyes narrowed at Buck as he continued speaking.

"I kicked out someone else just to let you live here, and then you stab me in the back like this," Buck fumed, waving his hands in the air. His face contorted downward in a look of pure anger.

I could feel my blood begin to boil, and my face heat up as it colored my pale skin to a crimson red. My fists clenched and unclenched in an attempt to keep me from punching Buck. I was always one to speak my mind and fight back, but hitting friends wasn't something I enjoyed doing. "I didn't do shit to you!"

"Open your damn eyes! My bar is completely trashed because of some childish prank you pulled last night," Buck shouted, his voice at full volume now. In my defense, it wasn't my intention for this to happen, and I sincerely had no idea the football team was gonna come for the bar. "You're reckless and you never think about other people!"

"Lay off, Buck," Dally ordered lowly. He grabbed my hand and pulled me back to his side defensively.

"Are you seriously on her side?" Buck asked Dallas, a look of betrayal displayed on his face. I kind of felt bad for Buck because I would hate if my friend chose someone over me, but I was happy that he sided with me.

"You got a problem with that?" Dallas spat, shooting daggers into Buck with his eyes.

"Un-fucking-believable!" Buck exclaimed. He turned on his heel and stomped over to the egg covered door, swinging it open aggressively and walking out of the bar. Everyone in the room watched his figure walk off down the street, leaving behind an awkward silence in the room.

"So, uh, good morning, everyone," Two-Bit announced with a silly smile on his face. It was moments like these where I was glad Two was my friend. He always knew how to brighten the mood by saying or doing something funny. A few people laughed but the quietness of the room remained.

"No offense, but why are you all here?" I spoke up, refusing to reveal that Buck's words had actually hurt me.

"We heard that the football team trashed the bar," Sodapop explained.

"I brought everyone here to help clean up," Darry continued. I sent him a lopsided smile, which he returned with a nod. "Look, you guys might've made some poor, stupid, and really not thought out choices.."

"But?" Steve questioned. He wore a hopefully expression, waiting for Darry to continue.

The oldest boy shrugged as he said, "Oh, no, that was it. You guys are dumbasses."

"Fair enough," Two-Bit said with a nod, while the rest of the gang laughed in agreement.

"Alright, why don't we get to cleanin' this place up?" Darry suggested. "Trash what's ruined, salvage the rest."

With a few huffs and reluctant looks from Two-Bit, Steve, Dallas we searched the bar for cleaning supplies. In a closet in the back room, where Buck usually sleeps, there was a mop, broom, dustpan, a few rags and buckets, along with multiple different cleaning chemicals. With the big group we had, it was easy to split the tasks between everyone. Ponyboy and Johnny teamed up collecting all of the trash around the room, while Darry set the tables back up and took the broken chairs out to his pickup truck in hopes of either repairing the legs or selling them to buy new seats. Sodapop and Sandy began wiping down one side of the windows with Steve and Evie, who took the other half of the egg covered glass. Two-Bit, of course, insisted on cleaning up the alcohol bottles, drinking the remaining sips in each one before discarding the glasses into a trash bag. Dallas and I worked together on scrubbing the floors of red spray paint, but the words were nearly stained to the wooden floors.

"Hey," I spoke up, breaking the comfortable silence between Dally and me. Besides small chatter amongst each pairing and the distant radio playing random songs, it was very peaceful in the bar.

Dallas hummed in response. His dark, brown eyes drifted to meet mine and I felt like I could melt under his gaze. "I, uh, just wanted to say thanks.. Ya know, for siding with me. I know you and Buck go way back, and he's probably pissed right now. Hell, I don't even know where he went," I rambled. It was an awful habit of mine when I was flustered or at a loss for words.

Dally chuckled softly, and sent me one of his infamous smirks. "You talk too much," he said.

I rolled my eyes, and shoved his shoulder playfully. "I do not," I stated, although I knew it was true. Dallas and I shared a brief laugh. I was happy he was here to lighten the mood of the current predicament I brought upon Buck's bar. If I were in Buck's shoes I think I would be angry too, so I didn't blame him too much for turning on me. I made a mental note to talk to him later, hopefully make amends with him.

"I'm starting to think spray paint is against me," I huffed as I rubbed the red markings on the wooden floors. The paint barely washed off, and it was starting to dawn on me that we either needed stronger chemicals or more help scrubbing the floor.

"Yeah?" Dallas asked with a small smile and a short laugh.

"Mhm," I said with a nod. "It's got me in trouble every time. Even gave me this." I dropped my rag on the floor and pointed to the scar on my jawline.

Dally's eyes lingered on the thin, white line that etched across the lower half of my face before meeting my own eyes. "I noticed that before," he said. "What happened?"

The memory was fresh in my mind as I thought back to that one day that was truly a series of unfortunate events. "I was fourteen. It was almost midnight and I decided that vandalizing some brick wall in a random alley would be the perfect cure for my boredom. Unfortunately, my timing was poor and just as I finished spray painting, a cop walked by and caught me. At first, he was just going to arrest me, but of course, I spoke back and he didn't take it too well. He got a few good hits in before my jaw split open, leaving this," I explained further by tracing my finger over the line of my scar. I left out the part of the story where James saved me. Him and I go way back, but the day he stumbled out from the side door of the coffee house was the day we became good friends.

Dally nodded in understanding and gave me a look of sympathy. "Does it hurt?" He asked, running his hand along my jaw.

My breath hitched in my throat and my face heated up. "Not really," I spoke absently.

"What about this one?" Dallas asked shifted his gaze over to the other scar that had recently been etched onto my face.

"No," I said, my eyes dropping from his. I knew how he'd react if I told him the backstory behind this scar, and with everything that's going on right now it didn't seem like a good time.

"What's the story behind this one?" He asked curiously. When I didn't answer, he raised his eyebrows in concern, his stare seemed more intense as I remained quiet. "Diana," Dally addressed sternly. He was always so persistent and everyone knew that Dallas Winston got whatever he wanted.

"I was with Pony," I started hesitantly. "We got jumped, it was nothing." It was blatantly obvious that I was lying. I felt bad lying to Dallas, which was why I never did.

"Who jumped you?" Dallas questioned. I knew he wasn't going to give this up unless I told him. "Diana, tell me."

I huffed and rolled my eyes. "You're so irritating," I muttered. "It was Bob and Randy. The same day they handcuffed me to that fence."

"Those were the guys who jumped you and Pony?" Dallas asked, realization slowly hitting him. He's a pretty smart guy, so I was surprised it took him this long to piece everything together.

"That wasn't the first time," I admitted with a sad sigh. "Those guys have been after us since I got here." It was starting to feel like all of the socs had a personal vendetta against me, specifically. The feud between the two social sides was starting to feel like a back-and-forth battle to see which side could take the most hits and still come out alive. As this cat and mouse cane continued though, the attacks began to become more violent and hateful. Sooner or later someone was going to get hurt.. or worse.

"Why didn't you tell me?" Dally asked. He wore a stony expression to hide what he really felt, but his dark, amber eyes always gave it away.

"I can take care of myself," I replied.

Dallas scoffed. "You think I don't know that?"

"I know you do," I said. "But you don't have to worry about me."

Dally rolled his eyes and tossed his rag to the side. "That's your problem," he said, standing up. I gave him a confused look. "You never let people look out for you."

"And you're so different?" I remarked.

"That's not the point," Dallas huffed.

"Then what is?" I exclaimed.

"If you told me, I could've done something," Dallas explained.

I shrugged. "It's fine, what's done is done." Except it wasn't fine, and what's done is not done because that was only the beginning to a war between socs and greasers. "Hey, where are you going?" I called out to Dallas as he stood up.

"Out," he replied, walking away and leaving the bar. I watched as he walked down the street, an angry glint in his eyes.

After the argument I had with Buck and that confusing conversation with Dallas, I think it's safe to say that I'm definitely not a morning person.