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It all started when I left my English essay on the table in the kitchen. Well, really it started because Soda forgot to put the chocolate cake away and it was sitting out in the kitchen when I got home from school. Or, I guess you could say it started way back when I walked out of that movie house thinking about Paul Newman cause that’s what the essay was about and why I was carrying it home from school in the first place. But I already wrote about everything that happened after that so let’s just say it started with the cake.
I saw the cake when I got home from school and I was already mighty hungry for something to eat. Being proud of yourself makes a fellow hungry I guess, and I was feeling pretty proud of myself just then.
It was just before school let out for the summer and my English teacher Mr. Syme asked if I could stay back a minute after class ended. I said I guessed I could even though I really wanted to get home cause I knew Two-Bit wanted to go out and have some fun. But Mr. Syme had been awful nice to me about my grades when I did so poorly for a while so I guessed I probably owed it to him. After that he took a book out of his desk and gave it to me.
“What’s this?” I asked.
“It’s yours, Ponyboy” he said, smiling like I gave him a million bucks or something. That’s my name, by the way if you haven’t read my essay already and don’t know. It’s not a nickname, it’s real, on my birth certificate and everything. My older brother’s name is Sodapop, but my oldest brother is named after my dad so his name is just Darrel but we call him Darry. “Remember the contest?”
“Contest?” It took me a minute before I remembered it. A week after I turned in my essay for English class, the long one about everything that happened after I walked out of the movie theater, Mr. Syme had pulled me aside like he had just now. He asked if he could submit my essay to some-or-another writing contest. I said he could do what he wanted with it and tried to be nonchalant like it was something people asked me all the time.
I felt pretty good about that and it was nice to be feeling good about something, especially back then. I wasn’t doing so good back then. I don’t know if I can say I’m doing much better now, but I guess the whole world don’t seem always gray anymore even if it still aches in my gut like I ate a bad hamburger every time I think of Johnny Cade.
I miss him so much that I have to fight real hard not to bawl like a baby every time I think about him. Even now I feel like that and it’s been months and months. Sometimes it doesn’t work even if I fight the crying, and then Soda will come up behind me a rub a hand up and down my back real slow like if he’s gentle enough it’ll make Johnny come back. It never does, but feels pretty good. It feels pretty good too when Darry comes over wraps his arms around me, sometimes a little awkward at first, and we just stand there like if we hug long enough Dally and Johnny might come whistling through the kitchen for some cake.
Darry’s real big and solid and warm and it makes me feel small but not in a bad way, even though I am pretty close to fifteen and I’m growing up. It’s a little strange from Darry, but not in a bad way neither. I’m glad of it, even if it’s a little more awkward than with Soda. I didn’t used to think I could cry in front of Darry at all, let alone get a hug out of it. They’re both real good at not bringing it up again when I cry and not treating me like a kid because of it, but I still try not to do it too much in case they change their minds.
Anyway, I felt good about Mr. Syme and the contest thing. I didn’t expect to win or anything, but it was nice to know that he thought the essay was pretty good. I forgot about it after a while, though, and it had been months since then.
“The contest,” I said again, as if I hadn’t forgotten.
“You’re a finalist, Ponyboy,” Mr. Syme said. “There’s still another round to go before they decide the winner. But all the finalists get a bound copy of their submission.”
“Like a book?” I asked, a little stupidly, holding it in my hand like it was from an alien.
“Yes,” Mr. Syme said, nodding at the book in my hand.
“Oh,” I looked down at the book for a minute. It was real nice, as nice as any of the books from the library or school, and brand new too which you couldn’t say about any of those. It didn’t have a title, but it did have my name, Ponyboy Curtis, stamped across the spine in black ink. I opened it and the spine cracked softly. I felt a shiver on the back of my neck and another one when I saw the first page. I knew those words real well.
When I stepped out into the bright sunlight from the darkness of the movie house, I had only two things on my mind…
But instead of my messy handwriting and smudged notebook, the words were marching across the page in neatly printed letters on crisp paper. It looked like a real, honest-to-god book. The kind that you could sell or something. I closed it carefully and suddenly wished I’d washed my hands more recently than I did.
“Thanks,” I said to Mr. Syme. I wondered if he thought I would act more excited. I was trying to be cool, and I don’t think jumping around like a maniac would help matters much. “How— uh— how many other finalists are there?”
“There are twenty finalists in all.”
“Oh,” I said. That was kind of a lot of people. “How many people in the contest?”
“I don’t know exactly,” Mr. Syme said. “But it’s a pretty famous national contest open to all high schools in the US. So, well over ten thousand I would imagine.
My jaw must’ve dropped somewhere close to my chest because Mr. Syme chuckled and patted my back.
“Congratulations Mr. Curtis,” he said. “You should be very proud of yourself.” He handed me another notebook. “Here’s the original essay as well.”
I’m pretty sure my sneakers grew wings and I flew home instead of walking, holding that book close to my chest the whole way. By the time I got home I worked up quite an appetite and the chocolate cake was sitting out. I tossed my things onto the table— not the book though, that I went and put in my room right away. Everything else could wait for chocolate cake.
After I ate about a quarter of the cake, Two-Bit came prancing in. He rubbed his knuckles on my head hard and broke off a piece with his fingers, dodging when I tried to smack him.
“Golly kid you look like you could float up to the sky, what happened?” he said through a mouthful of cake. I didn’t really want to say because I wanted to tell Darry and Soda first so I kinda just shrugged and tried to look mysterious about it. “Well don’t tell me then.” Two-Bit pretended to sulk but it wasn’t too long before he was pulling at me.
“They’re starting to fill up the pool, you wanna go watch and see if we can sneak in while it’s not yet full?”
“I dunno Two,” I said. Once upon a time I woulda said yes, but I hadn’t been feeling like doing things like that for a while. Breaking rules just to break them wasn’t as fun. “I mean, yeah let’s go check it out but I don’t think I wanna go in. It’ll be real cold you know…” Two-Bit opened his mouth but whatever he was gonna say got swallowed down and he just nodded.
“That’s alright Ponyboy, you can hold my clothes while I streak in.”
I didn’t know if I was grateful or mad he didn’t call me a wimp or something like that. He would have before. Before all that with Johnny and everything. And it wasn’t like he treated me super gentle or anything, but it wasn’t like Two-Bit to think twice about saying anything and the fact that he did it around me meant something. I just didn’t know if I liked it or not. I didn’t think that I did but I didn’t say anything and just went with him.
It was pretty funny to watch Two-Bit strip down to his boxers and streak through the pool, especially when he started getting chased and couldn’t get back to me and his clothes. He ended up running down one of the bigger streets, sopping wet with only just enough clothes to barely be decent. I jogged behind with the rest of his things and saw where he ran off to. By the time I got there I was laughing so hard I could hardly breathe and Two-Bit was grinning too even though he was shivering a bit with the wet and lack of clothes.
“Give ‘em here, quick Pony,” he said. I gave him the clothes and tried to catch my breath from the laughing without much success. He was grinning when his head poked through the hole of his shirt.
“Glory Pony, I ain’t seen you laugh like that in a while.”
“Yeah well I ain’t seen you run down the street naked in a while,” I said. Two-Bit looked affronted and clutched at his chest like he was trying to hide lady-parts.
“You didn’t see nothing!” He grinned again and tipped his head. “Come’on let’s get some Pepsi, I’m buying.”
“Awful generous,” I said suspiciously. Two-Bit didn’t usually buy me things. I looked at him but suddenly he was looking at me funny. His eyes were kinda blurry and soft and his grin seemed a little realer, like a smile more than a grin. He looked soppy and I told him so. His mouth sharpened back into a grin which felt more comfortable.
We hung around for a while with the Pepsi because Two-Bit actually paid for them so we didn’t need to run. That was another thing that was different. He probably wouldn’t have paid for them before and still wouldn’t if he wasn’t with me.
After a while just shooting the breeze he said he should get me home, ‘else Soda and Darry would yell at him. I didn’t mind. I wanted to see Soda and Darry anyway because of my big news.
When I got back Darry and Soda were both home already. Soda was complaining that his stomach hurt, real whiny cause he wanted someone to pet him. He got Two-Bit wrestling him to the floor instead. He’d been complaining about it on and off for a few days about it. Soda picked up bugs the easiest of any of us, which is funny because you would think it would be me. He got over them real fast though, when I got sick it took me forever to get better. Darry got sick maybe once every two years and usually just tried to soldier through it.
Soda was whining loud enough that I went and got mom’s old heating pad for him.
“No chocolate cake for you,” Darry was saying when I got back. “Not if you’re gonna whine about your stomach so much.”
“Come’on, Dar,” Soda whined some more. He saw me with the heating pad. “At least one of my brothers loves me,” he said, all dramatic like he was acting on stage. Soda would probably do pretty well acting on a stage. In the movies too, and not just cause of his good looks. He would be real good as an outlaw or a cowboy or maybe both and would probably like to get shot and die with lots of blood spurting out and everything.
“You eating with us, Two?” Darry asked. Two-Bit shook his head.
“Nah, I got somewhere else to be. Thanks though. Don’t die, Soda.” Soda gave him a rude gesture that Mom would have scolded him over if she was still alive. Darry just scowled at him though, as if I hadn’t seen him do before too.
“Let’s eat, then. Pony, clear your things off the table.” I took my school stuff and dumped them on the kitchen counter instead. We sat down for dinner. It was mac n’ cheese surprise today, which was code for Darry cutting up vegetables real small so we could pretend they weren’t there. He did a good job, but it was kind of hard with mac n’ cheese because you always knew that the little green pieces weren’t anything else except little pieces of broccoli. We were mostly too hungry to care though, and Mom had brought us up to eat vegetables without saying too much about it. Darry used to be the one to complain the most.
“Almost done with school, Pony, just about one more week, huh?” Soda said, pounding me on the back.
“Yeah,” I said. I was pretty sure Soda was more excited about school letting out than I was. He liked that I had more time to hang around in the summer. I liked it too, but I also liked school. I figured this was as good a time as any to tell them the news. “I got some news today.”
“What kinda news?” Darry asked, curious.
“I’m a finalist in a contest. A writing contest.”
“I didn’t know you joined a writing contest, Pony,” Soda said, almost hurt. I usually told him everything.
“I forgot,” I said. “And I didn’t really. Mr. Syme was the one who asked me if he could submit my English essay that one I wrote—“ I didn’t want to say ‘after Johnny died’ cause it hurt, but they knew. “He asked me if he could submit it and I said yes. I didn’t think it would do anything, but he told me today that I got chosen as a finalist.”
“That’s amazing, Pony,” Darry was smiling real big. Soda was too, but that wasn’t quite as unusual. “How many finalists are there?”
This was the part that I knew would get them and I tried not to grin too early.
“Mr. Syme said twenty out of over ten thousand since it was open to every high school in the US.” I sat back and watched my brothers’ jaws drop down to their chests. It was fun.
Darry looked like his eyebrows might crawl right up into his hair.
“No kidding?” Soda breathed. “Are you having us on?”
I shook my head. Then Soda was yelling and pounding me in my back and Darry was up and scrubbing his knuckles through my hair. By the time they were done my hair was sticking out all over the place and my shirt rode up to my shoulders. I pulled it back down and couldn’t stop grinning.
“I’m real proud of you, Ponyboy,” Darry said. I felt like my heart might beat out of my chest.
“I knew you were smart,” Soda crowed, “one of the smartest kids in the country I guess. When do you find out the winner?” I shrugged. “I dunno. But they gave me my essay all bound up real nice. That feels like a good prize to me.”
Soda started chatting again, but I looked over at Darry. He was looking at me and his eyes were wide and soft. It was kind of uncomfortable but also I wanted him to look at me like that all the time.
We finished dinner and Soda suggested we go get some ice cream to celebrate.
“What about your stomach?” Darry ribbed, and Soda scowled at him. We all went and got ice cream, and they let me get a double scoop of chocolate, with fudge on top. I guess we were all pretty happy about it. I mean, we all knew that I was good at school but I don’t think any of us expected me to be top twenty in the country in anything. That was what Soda kept repeating.
“Twenty out of ten thousand,” he kept saying in awe. He said it with a big mouthful of ice cream. “Twenty out of ten thousand.”
After a while Darry said we should get back. Soda wanted to ride bikes a while and I did too, but Darry was tired.
“Pony has homework,” he said.
“Come’on, Dar, just for tonight,” Soda begged. “It’s a celebration for Pony.” The bikes had nothing to do with a celebration but Soda was real good at using anything to wheedle his way. Darry got soft and said okay, but only as long as we were back by nine and I did my homework and was in bed by ten. He left because he wanted to be asleep by nine.
Soda and I rode around for a while and had a lot of fun. We even ran into Steve and Soda bragged to him about my essay. I could tell Steve was impressed even though he was casual about it, cause he offered me a smoke.
Finally me and Soda went home. I was pretty careful about keeping Darry’s curfews after everything that went down before.
We got home and we were still kind of hyper. We tried to be a little quieter in case Darry was already asleep, but when we walked in, he was sitting at the kitchen table, looking down at something.
He looked up and he had an odd look on his face. Like he gave someone a present and they threw it on the ground and stomped on it.
“Dar?” Soda said. “Something wrong?”
I looked down at the thing he was looking at and my heart dropped. I knew what it was exactly.
“Why are you reading that?” I said. I kind of yelled it I guess. I dunno why. Something in my chest felt wrong and it felt easier to yell. It didn’t feel good though, not when Darry’s face twisted a little more and he pushed away the papers.
“I’m sorry Ponyboy, it was laying out and— and it had that stamp,” his voice trailed off and got quiet. Darry didn’t get quiet most of the time, especially not when he was upset about something. He got loud usually. Not quiet. I went over and grabbed the notebook. It was mine. The one I’d first written the essay in. Sure enough, there was a stamp on the front that i hadn’t noticed before. It said “YOUNG AMERICAN VOICES CONTEST: FINALIST” in big red letters. I dunno how I missed it. It wasn’t hard to see how Darry noticed it.
“You shouldn’t be going through people’s things,” I snapped and wished I wouldn’t. It wasn’t fair and it wasn’t nice.
The problem was, after seeing Darry’s face like that and seeing him reading the essay, I remembered some things suddenly. I wasn’t feeling too good about the fact that Darry was reading it.
It was a real personal story and I wrote in it some things about Darry that I didn’t believe anymore but that I did back then. They were important to the story and to understand the things I learned. I wasn’t proud of them, but they were part of the truth and I put them in.
Truth be told, they were real mean, the things I thought and said back then. I didn’t put them into the essay to be mean, I put them in to tell the truth. But they were still mean.
I never meant to show Darry the essay, never thought there would be a reason to. And if there was, I would have expected it would be me reading it aloud like I did sometimes with books if Darry and Soda were feeling generous or just not feeling good and needed some distraction. That way I could have just skipped over the parts I didn’t want Darry to hear.
But it was too late now. He’d read the essay, at least the first part of it, and that was where all the mean stuff was. I knew he’d read that stuff because of the way he was looking at me, careful and bewildered and hurt.
I felt absolutely terrible. But I didn’t know what to do. I just snatched all my things and said something about privacy, and then went off into me and Soda’s bedroom.
I tried to do my homework, but all I could think about was Darry reading those words that I wrote. I didn’t even believe them anymore, not at all. If there was one good thing that came from that whole mess it was me and Darry. We still had troubles, but we were friends now. Like we had been before Mom and Dad died, but a lot better than that even. I loved him a lot, I knew he loved me. I think I would have rather died then let him read that stuff that I thought back then.
Soda came in after a while. He was quiet, peeling off his jeans like they were made of something real valuable that he didn’t want to mess up. He folded them and put them on top of the dresser. I’d never seen Soda fold clothes in his lifetime without Darry half throwing them at him. He looked at me finally and my heart damn near sank to my toes. Maybe through my toes and under the bed.
Soda didn’t get disappointed too often, not in anybody. He was so understanding that I didn’t think it was possible for him to be disappointed. He always saw the whole situation so well that it was like he was the person and knew exactly why they did it. Even with bad things, he said, people always did it for a reason. And even if it wasn’t a good reason, he could understand it most of the time.
That’s how it always was with me anyway, which is why it felt so bad the way his eyebrows scrunched over his brown eyes, reflecting the lamp next to our bed. I could even see his lashes, long in a way that made girls’ hearts flutter. It wasn’t an angry look, but you best believe I wished it was, cause angry is a lot better than disappointed. If you don’t believe me, you’ve never had someone really be disappointed in you before. Angry is loud and hot but it’s over in a flashbang, but disappointed is something you’re pretty sure you’ll never fix again.
That’s how Soda looked at me, and he wasn’t meaning it to make me feel bad. He was meaning it because he didn’t understand.
“You gonna get in bed?” I asked. My tone wasn’t that nice because my heart was somewhere on the floor collecting dust and rolling around with missing socks because we didn’t sweep under there often.
“Ponyboy,” Soda said slowly. “I know that you and Darry had issues back then. You know I know that, and you both had good reasons for the way you felt. But—“ he cut off for a moment and his eyebrows crinkled just a little more. “Did you have to write those things down like that?”
He said like that in a sort of way that I knew exactly what he meant. He meant the way I didn’t just say I didn’t get along with Darry, but the way I described him so viciously. There was one thing in particular that kind of haunted me that I knew Darry had read in that essay. The thing I said to Cherry Valance when she asked about him.
He’s hard as a rock and about as human. He’s got eyes exactly like frozen ice. He thinks I’m a pain in the neck. He likes Soda but he can’t stand me. I bet he wishes he could stick me in a home somewhere, he’d do it too, if Soda would let him.
I would never have told him all of that to his face. Even back then I would never have said it to him, and I might have told myself it was because I was scared but even back then I think I knew at least a little bit that it wasn’t true at all.
I don’t know why I didn’t say all that to Soda, I think it all hurt too much and I felt so sick every time I thought about Darry’s face. Soda just sighed a little and pulled on his pajama pants.
“I’m gonna go talk with Darry for a while, okay? I think he’d appreciate that. You go on to bed, you understand?” He had his hand on his stomach again and I knew it was probably just because of that bug but it felt like it was because of me.
I understood well enough. Understood that Soda wasn’t keen on being around a disappointment like me. I just layed down and pulled the covers over my head. Soda sighed again and the lamp clicked off. I heard him pad out of the room in his bare feet. He really never did like shoes, not even slippers.
I said my prayers like I did when I remembered to, and then said them again for Soda and again for Darry. I figured they probably forgot, but I hoped as long as God heard three prayers from our house he would count it as okay.
The house was quiet, especially without the sound of Soda breathing next to me. I didn’t mean to listen particularly but it was hard not to hear. My heart stopped a little when I heard it.
It sounded like crying. Words that were low and choked with the gunk that builds up in the back of your throat when you want to just sob but you’re trying not to but the sobs keep coming anyway. It wasn’t the way Soda cried, all sniffly and kinda whimpering when it got real bad. It was Darry crying.
When I tell you, I felt so sick I nearly puked all over my bed. Maybe I would have too, but I was listening so hard, trying to make out the words. I couldn’t, just the low rumble of them, cut off after a minute by Soda’s muffled voice. I knew that tone of voice in particular. Soda used it when I was really sick or sad or when he found that puppy once that the socs had been bullying.
I’d never thought he’d have to use that voice on Darry. Specially not because of me.
I didn’t sleep real well that night, even when Soda did come back. My ears kept twitching like they were listening out for if there was anymore crying in the house, even though there wasn’t.
When I did wake up my head hurt the way it does when you don’t get enough sleep to get through the day. There was clanking around in the kitchen so I knew I wouldn’t be the first one awake, but I didn’t get up yet. I listened until I heard both Darry and Soda’s voices. I didn’t want to be alone with either of them, though maybe both at the same time was worse. I got dressed and went into the kitchen.
“Morning Ponyboy,” Darry said. He was making eggs and he didn’t turn around cause he was busy flipping them. His shoulders were rounded but I didn’t know if I just noticed them then or if he was sad.
“Morning,” I said. Soda was sitting at the table, kinda sprawled out over it with his head on one arm. He didn’t look like he slept much more than me.
It was quiet besides Darry scraping the spatula in the pan. I hated the quiet but didn’t want to be the one to break it, so I just sat still.
I should have apologized right there and then, and explained everything and told Darry that I didn’t mean any of those things any more and I don’t think I really ever meant them. But like I said, I didn’t sleep too well, and my head was hurting, and— well. That’s all excuses, I guess.
The truth is, it’s real hard to apologize about something. Maybe one of the hardest things you can do, even if you feel real bad about it. Even if you know you’ll feel a whole lot better if you apologize it’s still hard, and that’s why I didn’t do it. I know it was cowardly. I knew it was cowardly as I sat at that table waiting for breakfast.
Darry came over with the pan and a few plates and set them down. He spooned out the eggs and gave them to me and Soda. Soda didn’t really move though, didn’t even pick up his fork, and his face wrinkled a little.
“Still not feeling good?” Darry asked. His brows wrinkled up as he looked down at him. Soda shook his head but didn’t say much.
It was only then that I realized how bad he looked. I was so wrapped up in my own head I didn’t even notice that Sodapop - probably one of the bounciest people I’ve ever met - was laying on the table hardly saying a word. That wasn’t normal at all.
Darry walked around the table and laid a hand on Soda’s forehead. He had big hands and they probably could have covered most of Soda’s face.
“You don’t have a fever, Pepsi-Cola, why don’t you try just a little? Doesn’t have to be much, but a little something in your stomach might help.”
Soda heaved a sighed but sat up and took his fork.
Mealtimes when it was just me and Soda and Darry were generally pretty quiet most of the time, just because we were always hungry and focused on our food more than anything else. So that was one thing that felt normal. But by the time Darry and I polished our plates, Soda had only eaten a half piece of toast and was still looking pale.
“Soda—“ Darry said, but he couldn’t say much more before Soda jumped up suddenly and ran toward the bathroom. Darry and I looked at each other, forgetting all about the essay and everything as we heard Soda getting sick.
Soda wasn’t like Darry who didn’t want anyone around if he was sick like that, and he wasn’t like me who did want somebody around but was too embarrassed to ask. Soda always wanted someone nearby if he was feeling sick.
“That boy loves some TLC,” Mom used to say, which was just her way of saying that Soda liked to be coddled a little. He didn’t need it, he just liked it. He was never embarrassed to hug her or when she kissed him on the head, even in front of all of the other guys. Sometimes he leaned down to get another one.
I wanted to go help Soda, he always came and sat by me if I wasn’t feeling good, but the problem was that I get a little woozy sometimes if I see someone else get sick. Darry knew that well enough so he stood up and headed for the bathroom while I began clearing the plates.
I heard him knock once on the door before pushing it open. It creaked a lot so I could hear him open it. Then I heard him pull in a breath real fast and swear.
My heart jumped in my chest and I nearly dropped the plates on the ground. It didn’t help that Soda made a noise right after that, and it sounded like a hurt animal.
“Darry,” he said, and his voice cracked in half. I knew something was really wrong. I put the plates down and ran so fast I slid on my socks and ran straight into Darry who was still standing in the doorway. When I looked in I could see why he swore.
“Don’t look, Ponyboy,” Darrel said, but I already saw it. There was blood in the toilet, a lot of it, and there was blood on Soda’s face too. I think I was so scared I didn’t have time to get more than a little woozy before Darry pushed me away. Not hard, more like he didn’t want me to get sick too. He looked at me and his eyes were wild. He looked like he did when I first saw him in the hospital after everything with Johnny and Dally. Wild and scared and like he wasn’t a grown-up, just a kid like me.
“Go start the car, Pony, we’re taking him to the hospital. Grab a bag or something too, in case he gets sick again.”
I ran and did what he asked. Darry didn’t take long to come after me and he was carrying Soda in his arms like Soda was a baby or something. I scrambled in the backseat and let Darry lay Soda down until his head was in my lap. Soda was holding his stomach and curled up real tight like he’d been kicked in the middle. Darry reached to close the door but he stopped for just a moment, looking me directly in the eyes.
“You gonna be okay back here?”
“Yeah,” I said, because what else could I say? “Let’s go.”
We got on the road. Soda moaned every time the car bumped, even though Darry was driving as careful as he could while going fast. The roads weren’t good in our neighborhood so there wasn’t much he could do.
“You’ll be okay,” I said, even though I didn’t know if it was true at all. I don’t know how much blood a person can lose, but it looked like an awful lot of his hadn’t stayed inside of him where it belonged. But it was something Soda would say to me so I tried it. I don’t think I did it as well as him. “Let me know if you’re gonna puke again, okay?” I looked down at the bag in my hand. My knuckles were white and my hand was trembling so hard I wasn’t sure I would be able to hold it steady if he needed it.
He didn’t need it, not the whole way to the hospital. Darry had to carry him inside again because his stomach was hurting so much he couldn’t stand. There was still blood around his mouth and I tried not to look at it, but it was hard. The blood seemed extra red because the rest of his face was so white. The nurses looked real worried when we told them, and they got a bed out real quick and laid him on it.
He got sick again and there was a lot of red everywhere. A lot of nurses and doctors came around suddenly and they wheeled him away, but there was still some left on the floor.
I must have started swaying or something because suddenly I felt Darry put his arm around me.
“Dammit Pony,” I heard him say, but he sounded kind of far away. He smacked my cheek a few times. “Don’t you dare pass out on me!”
He sounded scared so I took a really deep breath and didn’t.
We sat in the waiting room for a long time. Long enough that I thought everyone at school was probably done with PE, which was right after lunch. Finally, a doctor came in and called for the family of Sodapop Curtis.
I think he might have recognized us, cause his eyes were soft.
“Is he dead?” I asked. I wanted it straight if he was. The doctor shook his head.
“No, no, he’s ill but he’ll pull through.”
I felt Darry stagger against me for just a moment before he straightened up again. We were standing close enough that I could feel something like that.
“What’s wrong with him?” Darry asked. His voice was hoarse and it was the first thing he’d said since he told me not to pass out hours ago.
“Ulcer,” the doctor said. “It’s progressed pretty far and ruptured this morning.”
That sounded really bad to me and if the doctor hadn’t already said Soda would pull through I might’ve started bawling.
“But he’ll be okay?” Darry said.
“Yes,” the doctor nodded. “He’s young and healthy. We’ll keep an eye on him here for a few days and he’ll have to watch his stress, and his diet especially for a while. But he’ll heal up well.”
It was good news, but my heart still sank when I heard Soda would be in the hospital for a few days. The hospital was expensive. Real expensive, and I knew it.
Soda and Darry made enough money for us to live. Even just a little bit more if we were careful. But they saved up all of it, and said it was for me to go to college. They wouldn’t hear of it when I tried to argue about their money. I didn’t have any sort of problem with that money going to Soda if he needed it, but I knew it would bother Darry and Soda. They were real excited and proud whenever they talked about me going to college and if they lost all of that money they saved I knew it would tear them up a little.
There wasn’t much I could do about it but I still felt bad.
After the doctor answered a few more of Darry’s questions he said we could go back and see Soda for a few more minutes as long as we were quiet and careful with him. I’m pretty sure no one in the history of the universe had ever been told to be careful with Sodapop Curtis. As soon as we got into his room though, I could see why the doctor had said it.
He looked real bad. So bad that for a second I thought the doctor was lying and he’d died already. He was laying there and his eyes were closed. They’d cleaned up the blood on him, but his skin looked even whiter than it was before. Probably it was because of the white sheets and the hospital gown and all that, but I didn’t think about it then. All I saw was how his eyes were closed and his sick color and the way he looked small in the big hospital bed like a little kid or something. Johnny had looked like a little kid too, laying in his hospital bed before he died.
I don’t know what happened but all I know is that suddenly it was awful hard to breath and a voice I didn’t know said something sharp and I was being tugged around a lot. Next thing I remember I was sitting on a chair. Darry was crouching in front of me so his face was level with mine and he was holding my hands.
“Ponyboy,” he said. His eyes were cool blue and steady, even if they were worried. “Sodapop’s okay, Pony. He’s okay.”
“Johnny,” was all I could say. I wanted to explain more, about how Soda looked like Johnny so that meant if he wasn’t dead he would be soon, but I couldn’t.
“It’s not the same, Pony,” Darry said. “It’s not the same, I promise. Soda’s okay. The doctor said.” Someone else crouched down and spoke to Darry. He pulled away a little, but looked like he didn’t want to. When I looked up, a nurse was standing there. She was pretty. Not exactly like Cherry Valance was pretty cause her face wasn’t the nicest one I’d ever seen, but she was real pretty anyway because she smiled a lot.
She was smiling at me, even though her eyes were sad.
“Hi Ponyboy,” she said, and her voice was gentle. “Come walk with me for a minute will you?”
I stood up, and realized I had something in my hand.
“What’s this?” I asked.
“Juice,” she said. “For your blood sugar.”
I didn’t know what that meant but I liked sugar pretty well so I drank it. We walked through the hospital hallway and then she took me outside in a little garden at the back. We sat there quietly. Flowers were blooming and it was nice outside, not too hot but not too cold either. Bees were buzzing around and you could hear them if you were as quiet as we were.
“You probably don’t remember me, Ponyboy because it was a while ago and you had a lot going on, but I remember you. I helped your friend Johnny when he came in. He wrote a letter to you and I helped him write it.”
“Oh,” I said. Not because I didn’t know about the letter, I knew all about that. I guess I was surprised to meet the person who helped him. I don’t know why I was surprised but I was.
“Your brother Sodapop isn’t sick like Johnny was,” she said. “I know because I’m a nurse. You don’t have to worry.”
“He looks real sick though,” I said.
“Yes,” she said. “But he’ll be okay. I’ve seen a lot of sick people and I know he’ll be okay.”
“You knew Johnny wouldn’t be okay?” I asked.
“Yes,” she said, and her voice was gentle like she was talking to a little kid. “I did. But I made sure he wasn’t hurting too much.”
“Okay,” I said. “Thanks.” I don’t know what I said thanks for. I guess for making sure Johnny wasn’t hurting too much and he could write the letter. “Is Soda hurting?”
“A little,” she said. “Not as badly as before. We’ll make sure it doesn’t hurt him too much.”
“What is it?” I asked. “What’s an ulcer?”
She explained to me then. That it was bleeding in the stomach and that sometimes being real stressed can make it worse and that he would have to eat bland foods for a while. I asked a lot of questions. I think I surprised her with how many, but she answered all of them as best as she could and said she would ask the doctor about the rest and let me know if I wanted to hear them next time. After a while we walked back inside.
When we got close-ish to Soda’s room, I could hear him and Darry talking.
“—lot of money, Darry, and I’ll be alright. Let’s just get out of here.”
“No, Pepsi-Cola, you’re staying right here until the doctors say you can leave.”
“They’re not gonna do much anyway and Pony’s college—“
“We’ll worry about that later, for now you stay here.”
“But—“
“Sodapop Curtis,” Darry sounded mad. “If I catch you so much as putting one foot out of these blankets I will skin you alive and there won’t be enough or you left to argue about it. You hear?” I guess Soda heard because he didn’t say anything. “It’s bad enough,” Darry grumbled, “that you won’t tell us when you’re own stomach is eating itself out of stress—“ I looked at the nurse and she shook her head as if to say that wasn’t what was happening and Darry was wrong. But she’d told me enough about an ulcer that I knew it was kind of true. The image turned my stomach.
“Darry,” Soda interrupted. “If you’re gonna make me stay, you gotta go him with Pony tonight, okay?” Soda sounded worried. “They won’t let him stay the night and you can’t leave him alone.”
“Soda—“
“No, Darry, you can’t and you know it. He’s just a baby, he’s our baby brother and you can’t leave him like that. I’ll be okay for the night and you can come back and visit in the morning.”
I didn’t like that at all. I didn’t like that Soda was right I didn’t want to be on my own, and I didn’t like that it meant Soda would have to be on his own, and I didn’t like being called a baby at all. But when I looked over at the nurse, her eyes were so soft they could have been butter melting all over pancakes on a Sunday morning.
“Your brothers take very good care of you, Ponyboy,” she said and she laid a hand on my shoulder. Then she knocked on the door and opened it to let me in.
Soda was sitting propped up in bed and gave me a grin. It was weaker than usual, a lot weaker, but it still had a little of his craziness in it. Suddenly I felt so good I didn’t care about anything.
“Ponyboy!” He yelled like he thought he was the only person in the world and suddenly found me.
I ran to him so fast Darry had to swing an arm around me and pull me back so I wouldn’t squish him. He didn’t stop me from climbing on the bed though, after he scolded me to be careful. I pushed up next to Soda.
We had a grand old time after that. As grand a time as you can have when your brother’s in the hospital. Darry rang Two-Bit and Steve to tell them what was up and they came too, and for a while it was a regular party. Besides Soda in bed and complaining about the food they were giving him, it was pretty fun. Eventually Soda looked tired though and the nurses kicked out the other boys and told me and Darry we had only a few more minutes.
I climbed back in bed with Soda and he wrapped his arms around me. He had a plastic band around his wrist and it itched at the back of my neck.
When Darry said it was time to go I pretended I didn’t hear him. Soda laughed a little but Darry said, “Ponyboy Curtis,” and sounded no-nonsense about it so I got up. I looked back as we went out the door and Soda was laying against his pillows looking white again. I think I would’ve run back in there if Darry hadn’t put his arm around my shoulder and pushed me out of the hospital.
He messed my hair as we walked out into the parking lot to the car.
“Soda’ll be okay, Pony.”
I think he was saying it for both of us, not just for me. “You’ll see him tomorrow after school.”
“I don’t need to go to school, it’s just a week left, Darry—“ Darry looked at me hard and I didn’t argue anymore, but mostly because I started making a plan.
Dinner was quiet but Darry made something good. I don’t remember what it was, but I remember he tried hard. We went to bed earlier than usual, I think because we both felt like the sooner we went to bed the sooner tomorrow would come and we could see Soda.
I didn’t fall asleep though. I flipped back and forth and back and forth but the bed was so big without Soda in it that it might as well have been the whole ocean. I can’t sleep in the ocean. Every time I closed my eyes I saw the way he looked that morning, all pale with blood at the corners of his mouth and his eyes deep like they might fall into his skull and rattle around there. It got so bad I started shaking a little, and at that point I didn’t much care for anything except someone to say it would be okay. I got out of bed and took my pillow with me.
“Darry?”
I felt bad waking him up. He opened his eyes and squinted at me. I guess I must have looked real bad and pathetic or something standing there with my pillow because he made some sort of noise deep in his chest and seemed more awake suddenly. He sat up and pulled the blankets back a bit, patting next to him. “Come’ere Pony,” he said, kinda low and grumbly because he’d been sleeping.
Maybe I should be embarrassed about the way I ran at him and pushed up close to his chest, but I wasn’t then. He didn’t do anything to make me feel like I should be embarrassed, just wrapped his arms tight around me and pushed one hand through my hair at the back of my head. He pressed my face against his neck and just scratched the tips of his fingers through my hair.
“Darry?” I said again after a while. He hummed and I could feel it against my chest because we were pressed so close. “I think that if Soda died too… you know after mom and dad and Johnny and Dally… I think I would probably just die too. No kidding.”
Darry’s fingers paused for a minute before they kept going.
“Sodapop’s gonna be just fine, Pony. There’s no use in thinking about such things.”
“But don’t you think so too?” I pressed. I knew Soda was probably going to be okay, but I wanted to know what Darry thought if he wasn’t.
“No,” Darry said after a long while. Long enough that I knew he was really thinking about it. “I wouldn’t die, Pony. I still got things to live for even then.”
“What things?” I asked. It surprised me because he kind of laughed a bit, to himself. He tugged at a piece of my hair a little.
“Ponyboy, for someone with so many brains you sure are dumb sometimes,” was all he said.
I didn’t know what to say to that so I pinched him. He yelped and pulled my hair again.
“You gotta stop doing that, Pony.”
I’d been pinching people a lot lately, just cause it was kinda fun and it made a point real well. We both got quiet after that.
But it got me to thinking. I guess he was wrong about the brains being no use because I figured out what he meant pretty quickly and then I felt real bad again. I didn’t want it to be the way it was about the essay and also I was real sleepy, so I said what I wanted to say.
“Darry?”
“Hm, Ponyboy?”
“I guess I probably wouldn’t die unless Soda and you both died.”
He let out another sort-of laugh. “Neither of us are going to die, Ponyboy, go to sleep.”
“Okay,” I said and I went to sleep listening to Darry’s heart.
The next morning when Darry came into the kitchen I had breakfast all ready.
“I think you should sleep over with Soda tonight,” I said while I served out eggs. “I’ll be okay alone for a night or two.” I didn’t think I would be that okay alone for a night, but I had a plan.
Darry looked doubtful. “Ponyboy—“
“Darry, really. Soda needs you too, yeah?”
It was true otherwise Darry would have said so. I knew it was killing him like it was killing me not to be there with him all the time. I mean, Soda was kind of grown up, but also he was just a kid too. I knew he couldn’t want to be all alone while sick in the hospital any more than I would.
Darry looked like someone was making him choose between his arms and his legs but eventually he agreed. I went off to school and tried not to think about how I wasn’t going off to the hospital to see Soda.
At lunchtime I snuck out and left a note in Cherry Valance’s locker, asking her to meet me after school. I was pretty sure that she would, even though we hadn’t talked much since Johnny died. But she sometimes nodded to me in the hallways when she saw me. It was kind of brave of her, even though things weren’t so bad between the greasers and socs anymore. Don’t get me wrong, they were still pretty bad, greasers and socs still hated each other. But it was a little different too. Different enough that Cherry could nod at me without worrying that it might get me killed or her disgraced. It was still brave of her though.
I waited after school and she came by pretty quickly.
“Hi Ponyboy,” she said. If I didn’t know better I’d say she sounded almost nervous.
“Hi,” I said. “Thanks for meeting.”
“Of course,” she said, and ran her hands down her skirt, brushing off some kind of dust that I couldn’t see. It was pretty, blue and white. She was always dressed pretty. “How have you been?”
“Okay,” I said. “I’m a finalist in a writing contest.” I didn’t mean to tell her that, but it just kind of came out. I wasn’t trying to brag at all. I guess I just knew that she would know why that was important. She did.
“Really? That’s amazing, Ponyboy, I’m proud of you.”
‘I’m proud of you,’ she said. Not ‘I’m happy for you,’ or ‘good job.’ I wasn’t sure what to do with that so I just smiled.
“Thanks.”
“Could I read it?”
She must have seen in my face the way my heart flipped in a scared kind of way because she said quickly, “it’s okay if you don’t want me to.”
“I do,” I said quickly. “But… I don’t know. Maybe if it wins, okay?” That probably wouldn’t happen so it would be alright.
“Okay,” she said. She adjusted her book bag on her shoulder. “Is that what you wanted to tell me?”
“Oh— no,” I said. “That wasn’t it. You still volunteer at the hospital, right?”
“Yes,” she said, frowning kind of confused. “Why?”
“My brother Sodapop’s in the hospital. He’s got an ulcer.”
“Oh.” Her mouth was round. “That’s tough, Ponyboy, I’m really sorry. He’ll be okay though. An ulcer is painful but it won’t kill you.”
“I guess,” I said. “But I need help sneaking in so I can stay overnight with him. They won’t let me otherwise.”
“Your brother Darrel can’t stay with him?” She looked worried.
“He can,” I said. “But I want to too. It’s Sodapop.”
Her lips pursed up a little like she was thinking and I could tell she wasn’t totally convinced.
“Ponyboy, Sodapop will be back soon and he’ll be okay, I promise, don’t you want to—“
“Please, Cherry,” I said. I made my eyes all big and sad like a puppy dog. Soda did that and it worked for him all the time, especially with girls. It wasn’t hard for me to do because all I had to do was think of Soda in the hospital and my eyes kinda wanted to do that anyway. I guess it worked because Cherry Valance folded faster than a lawn chair.
“Okay, Pony, I’ll help you. Just don’t tell anyone I did, if you get caught.”
“Yes ma’am,” I said and gave her a salute which made her smile. “You don’t even have to do nothing, really. I just need you to tell me if there’s some place to hide. I’m going to visit him after school and then when I leave I’ll hide in the hospital near his room and wait.
“You really are something, Ponyboy,” Cherry said, shaking her head. She tilted it and looked at me a little. “I miss you, you know. I know we only ever really talked that once or twice but I think about you a lot. Every time I look at the sunset.”
I didn’t want to tell her that I thought of Johnny the most when I looked at the sunset, and besides I did think of her too. So I said, “We could talk more sometimes if you want to. Not at school, ‘course, but we could meet sometimes and talk.”
“I wasn’t sure if you would want to,” she said softly. “Because of… Johnny and all that.”
I was quiet for a minute because it always hurts to think of Johnny.
“You didn’t kill him,” I said finally. “Where can I hide in the hospital?”
Cherry was a real one because not only did she tell me where to hide but she also told me where they kept the snacks for the volunteers. She said it wouldn’t be stealing because she just wouldn’t have any the next time or two she went so I would just be having her share. It probably wasn’t polite to take a lady’s food, but I knew I’d be mighty hungry with all the waiting, so I just said thanks and went off to the hospital.
Everything went real well. Soda was happy to see me, and even more happy to have someone new to complain about his bland food to. Darry was sick of hearing about it. I did some of my homework, reading it aloud to Soda cause he was bored enough to want that. I tried to teach him some things but it didn’t really work. Soda ain’t dumb but he doesn’t care about schoolwork at all. He liked it when I read aloud from the Robin Hood book I brought along, as long as I skipped all the boring parts which was about half the book.
“Darry, what if we just went off and lived on the woods like Robin Hood? Stole from the Socs and gave it other people? We could build treehouses or something.” He was real excited. Darry just snorted and said,
“What woods?”
There weren’t enough trees to make woods in Tulsa.
I put up enough of a fight when they told me to get out so that it wouldn’t be suspicious and as soon as I left I went and hid in the closet Cherry told me about. It was pretty boring in there, but I was smart enough to bring along a flashlight so I could read. I did end up eating Cherry’s snacks.
After a pretty long while I decided it was safe. It was dark outside when I opened the door. Cherry said there would only be a few nurses and it shouldn’t be hard to sneak around them. It wasn’t.
I got to Soda’s room and opened the door as quietly as I could. Soda and Darry both looked at me. I swore under my breath because I’d been thinking they would be asleep.
“Don’t use that language,” Darry scolded. “What in the living hell are you doing here, Ponyboy?”
“I snuck in,” I said. “I’m sleeping here.”
Darry looked like he was about to say something but Soda said,
“Come’on Darry. You know we’ll all sleep better if he’s here.” Darry knew it was true so he didn’t say nothing, just settled back on the couch where he was sleeping. I climbed up with Soda, being careful of the wires that were connected to him.
He sighed next to me so I knew he was happy I was there.
I woke up in the middle of the night. I wake up in the middle of the night lots of nights so that’s not unusual, but Soda sleeps like a log. When I turned over his eyes were open.
“Soda?” I said, quiet because of the nurses and also because Darry was sleeping.
“Hm?” he said.
“What are you so stressed about?”
“What’dya mean, Pony?” He frowned. There was a light on the street outside of the hospital and it shone through the curtains so I could see some of his face. It looked like moonlight. Soda looked real handsome in the streetlight-moonlight, and you couldn’t tell if he was paler than usual because that kind of light makes everyone look ghostly.
“The doctor and nurse said that stress is what can make ulcers really bad. What are you stressed about?”
“Nothing too much, Pony,” he said. “It was probably something else for me. It’s not always stress.” But I knew he was lying. Soda didn’t lie very well, especially not to me.
I pinched him. He yelped a little and we both froze to see if anyone heard it. When we didn’t hear anything he turned back to me.
“What was that for?” he hissed. Why you pinchin’ me when I’m sick?”
“Cause you’re lying,” I said. “You don’t want to tell me why you’re stressed.” He got serious again then and looked uncomfortable.
“It ain’t that, Ponyboy. It’s just that…” he pulled in a breath and let it out slow. “We all got our own worries, yeah? You shouldn’t have to worry more than you gotta. Especially not you.”
“Why especially not me?”
“Because—“ he frowned. “Dammit Pony you know I’m not good with words.”
“Cause I’m fourteen?”
“Well— yeah cause you’re fourteen.”
“I’m almost fifteen.”
“Yeah, well, I’m older than you and that’s my job.”
“It’s your job to worry about people younger?” I asked.
“Yeah,” he nodded.
“Golly, there’s a lot of people younger than you in this world,” I said. “I don’t think you’re worrying enough for all of them.” Soda rolled his eyes way back.
“That’s not what I meant and you know it, Ponyboy Curtis. Stop being a brat.”
“I’m not trying to be a brat,” I said. “I’m just trying to make a point. What’s the other reason that you worry about me and not all the other people in the world?”
“Cause you’re my brother, stupid,” Soda said. He blocked my hand when I went to pinch him again.
“Yeah, well you’re my brother too,” I said. “So I can worry about you.”
“No, because I’m—“
“Older, I know, but you worry about Darry too, don’t you?”
Soda was quiet at that. Then he let out another breath.
“Sometimes I wish you weren’t so brainy, Ponyboy,” he said, real soft.
“Sorry,” I said, but I wasn’t. Soda was quiet for another while after that and I didn’t say anything because I didn’t think Soda would if I did.
When he did say something his voice trembled a little.
“I miss a lot of people, Pony,” he said. It came out like a breath. “I miss Sandy a whole lot. Even now I miss her, and I know I shouldn’t because she didn’t treat me right—“ I tried not to make any surprised noise at that because Soda had never once let anyone say anything against her, even when she moved away with another man’s baby after he offered to marry her anyway. “—But I still miss her. And I miss Mickey Mouse too, ain’t that stupid? That horse got sold seven years ago now,” he tried to laugh a little but it didn’t come out like a laugh. “And I know this ain’t fair to say to you cause you miss him so much more, but I miss Johnny. And Dally too.” I nodded but didn’t say anything. Soda still looked handsome in the light, sort of like an angel a little bit. But his cheeks were wet all over. “I miss mom and dad the most though,” he said, way down deep in his throat. The bed shook a little and then again and I could feel the way his shoulders were heaving. “It’s real hard sometimes without them,” he cried. “No, not sometimes. All the time.”
“I know,” I said, because I felt the same way all the time. I told him that. Soda cried for a while but he stopped eventually and scrubbed the tears off his cheeks.
“Golly maybe I should do that more often, it felt pretty good,” he said. His voice wasn’t altogether happy yet but it was good to see it coming back. “You got any worries for me, Ponyboy?”
As a matter of fact, I did.
“I feel bad about the things that Darry read,” I said, even quieter than before just in case Darry woke up. “I didn’t want him to ever read them. I didn’t think he would see that essay, and I didn’t think about it when I told you. Otherwise I woulda said I would read it to you and taken them out.”
Soda hummed a little.
“That’s not even all the things I wrote,” I continued, getting more upset the more I thought about it. “I wrote nice things about him too, more at the end. When I started understanding a little better.”
“Pony, you dummy,” Soda said then. I frowned. I wanted him to be serious. He was serious about it before.
“What?” I said, surly. He tugged at a piece of my hair.
“Let him read the whole thing then. So it’s not out of context. Let him see that you don’t feel that way no more.”
“Oh,” I said. It sounded easy now that Soda mentioned it.
“Yeah ‘oh’,” Soda said. “I swear, you and Darry are the two biggest idiots I’ve ever seen in my whole life. I don’t know how Mom and Dad managed to have one smart son between the two of you.” He winced, then, before I could pinch him, and held his stomach. That scared me.
“Your stomach hurting again?” I asked, and looked around for the button to call the nurse. I didn’t care if they would throw me out or what. Soda grabbed me and pulled me back down.
“Just a little, Pony, it’s normal they said.”
“You sure?”
“Yeah.” But he still held his stomach.
“You want me to rub you?” I asked. He did that for Darry all the time when his back hurt and I figured it couldn’t be much different. Soda looked at me a second. Maybe he was surprised that I offered since it was usually him offering things like that, but then he nodded.
“Yeah,” he said. “I’d like that.” He lay back and I rubbed at his stomach pretty gently. It didn’t feel different, not like it had a lot of blood or was eating itself or anything. All I felt was him breathing.
“Your hands are nice and warm,” he said after a while, opening one eye and looking at me. “You’re almost as good as mom’s heating pad. I guess I’ll tell Darry we should keep you around in case the heating pad breaks.”
He grabbed my hand when I went to pinch him. “Hey!”
“I’m not doing it anymore,” I said.
“Come’on, Ponyboy,” he weedled. “It was just a joke. You do a real good job, probably as good as I would.”
I did it again because I would do anything Soda asked me too, really. He feel asleep after that and I guess I must have too because when I woke up the pretty nurse was looking down at me and the way my hand was resting on Soda’s stomach. Her eyebrows were stern but her lips were stiff in a way that said she might be trying not to laugh.
“Ponyboy,” she said. The light was streaming in but Darry was asleep on the couch. “Did your older brother know you snuck in here?”
“Darry was already asleep,” I lied, because there was no reason to get Darry in trouble too. “I just slept next to Sodapop real quietly, I promise.”
“I’m sure you did,” she said. “You’ll need to be going along to school though, and I need to check your brother over.”
I was glad to get away without any more of a scolding. I thought about coming back the next night, but me and Darry both figured that they would be checking now that they knew I tried. Two-Bit volunteered to sleep over at our house, and I guessed I was okay with that. I wasn’t so worried that Soda would die during the night or something.
Soda came home the next day. He was pouting when I got home from school because Darry wouldn’t give him any chocolate cake cause of his strict diet.
“How much do you love me, Pony?” he asked. I said not enough to give him any chocolate cake and then cut myself a big piece. He didn’t like that at all and said to Darry that we shouldn’t be eating any cake if he couldn’t, out of solidarity cause we were brothers. I ate the rest of my cake real fast in case Darry agreed, but Darry just laughed and cut his own piece of cake. It was funny to watch Soda pouting like that.
I felt bad about it later though, especially after he only had oatmeal for dinner. I cut a little piece and brought it to him when Darry wasn’t looking. He gave me a big old grin and took it.
“I knew you loved me really, Ponyboy,” he said. He took a big forkful but then he stopped and looked down at it. He looked at it for a little while and then looked up at me.
“Guess I probably shouldn’t, huh?”
“Guess probably not,” I said. He pushed the plate back into my hands.
“Well you’d better take it away quick then, before I change my mind.”
I didn’t have any more chocolate cake for two weeks until he did, which was almost as hard as if I didn’t smoke for two weeks. I smoked a little more to make up for it.
After two weeks, Soda and I were sitting outside.
“You ever let Darry read your essay?” He asked. I shook my head. I kept wanting to give it to him, but it scared me. Not because of the stuff I wrote about him, just because it’s scary to watch someone else read something I wrote. It’s hard to explain why unless you write things too. Just take my word for it that it’s not that fun. Maybe cause I feel like the realest I am is when I’m writing and it’s not easy to let some see when you’re the realest. I didn’t know how to explain that to Soda though, but somehow he understood like he always does.
“You could do it today,” he said. “It’s Sunday, he don’t got nothing better to do.”
“Guess I could,” I agreed. He was right. There wasn’t any good reason to keep putting it off.
I gave Darry the essay after lunch. Not the notebook copy but the nice one that looked like a real book. Then I slunk away because the thought of watching him read it was just about the scariest thing I could think of. I kinda walked around for a while. Maybe the whole afternoon, I don’t know. I thought about getting a Pepsi but I didn’t because my stomach was feeling kinda nervous. Even though I wasn’t watching Darry read it I still knew he was and I couldn’t forget it even when I tried.
I finally went back home when it started getting on towards dinner time. The closer I got, the more my hands started sweating, until I was sure that if someone handed me a switchblade it would slide right out of my fingers like butter. When I got in sight of the house I could see Darry sitting on the front porch step. He was looking at something in his lap. It was the book, I saw as I got closer. But it was closed. He looked up when he heard me coming and my stomach kind of flipped a bit. His eyes were watery and there were honest-to-god tears running down his face. But he smiled at me as I got close and stood up and then suddenly he had his arms wrapped around me real tight.
I wrapped mine around him and squeezed hard. I couldn’t squeeze as hard as he could, but I hoped maybe he knew that I was trying to make him feel the same way I felt when he did that. Small in a real good sort of way, like it’s Christmas morning and nothing is ever going to hurt you and there’s nothing to worry about ever. I think he did because he laughed against my hair and it sounded wet.
“I love you, little brother.”
“I love you too, Darry,” I said. Golly, but it was easier to say it when he said it first. It came out so natural and I wondered why I ever thought it was hard at all. I felt kinda cowardly that I waited for him to say it first, so I went on. “I love you a lot, and I know you do a lot for us. And I don’t believe those things I said anymore at all and I’m real sorry I ever did because it wasn’t fair and—“
“I know,” he said and he snuffled again into my hair. “I know, honey, it’s not all on you.” He sounded a lot like Soda. I guess we were both sounding more like Soda these days. “A lot of it’s on me too. But we don’t have to worry about that anymore, huh?”
“No,” I said. “We don’t have to.”
We talked for a while after that. Darry had questions about my essay. Good questions, like he’d thought about it a lot. It was easier to answer them than I thought it would be.
It was strange, talking to Darry about the things I felt like I could only say to Cherry and Johnny and Soda. It was different too, because he really didn’t think about them in the same way I did— but he got them still. He just thought about them differently. I remembered that he’d gotten into a good college on scholarship and that he was good at schoolwork too, even if he didn’t read as much as I did for fun.
He told me that he thought I felt things differently from anyone else he knew, but that he understood it better now after reading the essay. He said that I wrote it well and that he felt like he was reading a real book, except that the bad parts hurt more because it was me.
He didn’t say anything about the mean things I said about him.
After a while, Soda peeked his head out through the door.
“We ever having dinner?” he said grouchily.
“You could always make yourself something instead of waiting for me to,” Darry said, but it wasn’t sharp or anything.
“I was busy making cake,” Soda said. He’d convinced Darry to let him have cake tonight, even though it was a day or two earlier than the doctor said. Darry let him because Soda said that if eating cake a day or two early was what killed him it would probably be a pretty good way to go anyway. I thought that sounded like a mighty fine way to go, personally.
We were enjoying our cake after dinner when the phone rang. Darry got up to get it but he came back a few seconds later.
“It’s for you, Pony. Your English teacher?”
School had let out the week before so I didn’t know why he could be calling, but I went to the phone anyway.
“Hi Mr. Syme.”
“Hello Ponyboy,” he said. He sounded happy. “I’m sorry to bother you after school’s out, but I think you’ll want to know.”
“Want to know what?”
“I just got word, just now, Ponyboy. You won the contest.”
“What?” I was pretty sure I couldn’t have heard correctly.
“You won, Ponyboy. You got first place.”
“Wow,” I said. I was so stunned a feather could have knocked me right over.
“It’s amazing!” Mr. Syme said. “I always knew you were excellent. I’m very proud of you!”
“Thanks,” I said. “Is there a prize or something? Cash?” That would be pretty tuff if I got money out of it.
“What? No— Ponyboy—“ well that was a little disappointing, but I still had the book I guess. Maybe they gave more books to the winner, and that would be cool too.
“That’s okay, I—“
“Ponyboy, the prize is a college scholarship. You get a full ride to any school you want.”
I must’ve dropped the telephone because fell down and I only caught it just in time by the cord.
“You being real?” I asked when I finally got it settled against my ear again. “No joke?”
“No joke, Ponyboy.” I could hear Mr. Syme’s smile in his voice. “Full ride to college. Room and board too, you won’t have to pay a cent.”
I’m not sure what I said to Mr. Syme after that but when I walked back into the kitchen I ran into a chair. Soda and Darry were both looking at me, their eyes wide. They probably heard me drop the phone and ask Mr. Syme if he was kidding.
“What’s up, Pony?” Darry asked. I sat down and looked at my cake.
“I won the contest,” I said. I thought about pinching myself because maybe this was all just a dream. “The writing contest.”
“Hey!” Soda shouted, “Yeah you did! My baby brother!” He smacked me on the back and Darry was grinning so hard his whole face looked like a big smile.
“That’s not all,” I said. I halfway didn’t believe the words I was gonna say. “I get a prize too.”
“What prize?” Darry asked.
“College,” I said. “A full ride scholarship to anywhere. Room and board too, we don’t have to pay a cent.”
Then the kitchen went quiet. Darry and Soda’s eyes were so round they could have popped right out of their heads.
“For real?” Darry asked. “Everything covered?”
“That’s what Mr. Syme said,” I said. I could have cried at the look on his face. I think I watched my older brother get ten years younger, right in front of my eyes. He looked like he was twenty-one like he should be.
“Well that—“ he said, “that’s amazing.” He let out a long shaky breath. “Don’t have to pay a cent, huh?”
“Not one,” I said.
Darry stood up suddenly and hauled me into a hug. I was getting used to it now, we’d been doing it so often. Used to it in the way that it wasn’t awkward anymore. I didn’t think I’d ever be so used to it I wouldn’t love it.
Soda came around the other side too, and then all three of us were hugging and yelling a little and maybe someone cried, I don’t know. We kept doing that until we tripped and Sodapop fell against the table and put his hand in the cake.
None of us cared though, we just howled in laughter while he licked it off his hands and then he shoved his hand against my face and got chocolate all over it. That started me getting cake in his face and— well. We spent an hour cleaning the kitchen from what happened after that.
It was late by the time we finished, but since school was out, Darry was a lot less strict about bedtime so we all sat on the porch.
“Johnny would be proud of you too, you know,” Darry said.
“I know,” I said. But it was nice to hear it from him.
“I wanna read it,” Soda frowned. Darry and I looked at him, surprised. Soda didn’t like reading anything, it was kind of hard for him.
“I’ll give it to you if you want,” I said.
“Okay,” he said. “How many pages is it?”
“I dunno,” I said. “Maybe a hundred?”
“A hundred?” He looked mournful. “Okay, but it might take me a while though, Ponyboy.”
“That’s okay,” I said. “Let me know if you need help.” We settled back into silence until I remembered something suddenly. “Damn,” I said. Darry flicked my ear, scolding.
“What is it?”
“I told Cherry Valance she could read it if I won.”
“So?”
I turned on him and scowled.
“So— I called her pretty in it! Now she’s gonna read that.”
“She’ll like that, probably,” Soda said. “Girls like being called pretty.”
“They like it when you call ‘em pretty,” I groaned.
“True,” Soda said. “They do like that. You’re real smart, Pony.”
I pinched him.