Curate, connect, and discover
i have a headcannon that darry dies of AIDS in the 80s, because after sodapop and ponyboy left, during the 70s, darry would go up to new york for a week-a few months and would meet a guy (or a few guys) and sleep with them due to him having a lack of intimacy in tulsa because there was no obvious queer community. fast forward a few years (around 81-84) darry gets sick and figures out he has HIV and doesn’t tell anyone or try to get treated (not that there were many effective treatments in the first place) because of the shame he felt. he wouldn’t even tell his brothers. eventually it would develop into AIDS and darry would go back to new york to go to the hospital to live his last days out alone. in this time he’d get in touch with everyone, not to tell them of his impending doom, but to be able to have a connection with them before he passed. the last calls he made were to his brothers.