#martrip

the marbit implications are insane but so are the martrip angst opportunities oh my lord im gonna lose it

he watches bev and brill who somehow are still tough skinned and thriving. he follows brill to his grave sometimes and listens as brill talks to him and pours one out for him. on the rare occasion bev goes to visit his grave he listens to her call him a stupid idiot through sobs and he longs to comfort her

he watches marcia and his heart aches for her when she starts pulling away from trip because he knows how much they liked each other. he use to think they were a (better) version of him and cherry

he watches chet who goes looking for more fights a lot more often. he watches chet a lot if only because he sees himself a lot in him and he’s scared chet is going to join him real soon.

he watches melvin and sergei a lot too. he hardly knew them but they were the same age as ponyboy curtis and kinda just wants to make sure no one goes after them like he did the curtis kid

most of all, he watches cherry. they broke up and that was probably the scariest moment in his life, including when he got stabbed. not doing right by cherry is probably his biggest regret. he regrets bringing the liquor to the drive in that night, he regrets even going to the nightly double drive in period.

but he watches cherry go through the motions after he died. he watches their friends blame cherry for his death wishing he could say something because it was never cherrys fault. he was blindsided by rage and liquor that night but there wasn’t a single part of bob that blamed cherry. because the thing is he knew he was being irrational, he knew it was absurd to get angry at cherry for talking to a little kid but bobs always been jealous when it came to cherry and he’s always been quick to fly off the handle even when he’s sober. so no, his getting angry and going after those kids and getting himself killed was never cherrys fault and it pissed him off when everyone accused cherry.

(i got besides myself cough cough)

bob watches cherry and how she goes through the motions. he watches her through herself back into her school and volunteer work. he watches her when she goes in her backyard to watch the sun rise every morning. he watches her take away their beach boys albums and put them in a shelf in her closet.