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I was pacing in the living room after the rumble when the door creaked open. I was worried sick and Sodapop wasn't much better. The last time Ponyboy was that late. .. I didn't want to think about it because just the thought had made vomit rise in my throat. I had hit him. What kind of older brother does that? How could it have been only a week that Ponyboy was gone? It felt like it had been a lifetime since Ponyboy left with Johnny to Windrixville.
But when the door opened, my concern increased ten-fold. Ponyboy limped inside through the front door. He was battered and bruised from the rumble. Pony was bleeding from just about everywhere I could see. I wanted to kill the no-good soc that did this to him. I remembered, suddenly, the way Sodapop tore after that one soc at the rumble. I couldn't blame him, now that I knew why.
Ponyboy looked at me blankly and I wasn't sure what to do or say. I couldn't tell, at that moment, if he needed me to be his guardian or his brother. More than anything, I wished Mom and Dad were here. They'd know what to do or say, I got hit with a wave of guilt. I loved Sodapop and Ponyboy to pieces but I was not equipped to be a parent. I was only twenty and working two jobs. Sodapop had to drop out of school so we could afford groceries, for Pete's sake. Before I could think, my mouth opened and I was yelling at Pony like he disappeared for kicks.
Ponyboy didn't react. He looked numb. I shut myself up when he didn't say anything back. He limped past me. He said something about Johnny being dead. I started breathing hard and my ears started ringing. Johnny was like one of my other kid brothers. I've known him forever and now he's dead? Apparently the ringing wasn't my ears; it was the telephone line. Steve got there before I did. He didn't get two words out before he handed the receiver to me. I put it up to my ear and forced myself to calm down. It'd be no use getting worked up.
Dallas was on the other end. He was out of breath and not really making sense. He explained to me about how he robbed the convenience store on the corner. Everyone ran out the front door and down the street. I don't even think Sodapop put his shoes on.
I don't remember exactly what happened. I remember gunfire and flashing lights and shouting. I remember Dallas collapsing in the street. I wanted to catch him, to help him. I wanted to give Dally those small "charities" he never accepted. I don't remember much of any of that but then I heard Two-Bit shout. I don't know what but I looked right to Ponyboy.
He was laying on the cement ground. He was pale, so pale. Soda was already there and shaking him. I wouldn't admit it but I was trying not to scream and shout. My mom and my dad who were forty, sixteen year old Johnny, seventeen year old Dallas, and now my fourteen year old brother? Ponyboy's dead too? All so young and I lost them all in just under a year.
Someone was at my side and turning me so I wouldn't see. It was Two-Bit. He's always been a good friend, even if he makes some oddly-timed jokes. He led me back to the house. He didn't let me look when Steve and Sodapop carried Ponyboy in, though I couldn't ever forget Sodapop's sobbing.
What felt like ten seconds later but I knew must've been at least a half hour, Soda was sitting beside me. He laid his head against the back of the sofa and sighed loudly with exhaustion. I wanted to sigh too. He looked at me and told me Ponyboy was alright. I felt tears prick my eyes for the first time since my parents' funeral almost eight months ago. Ponyboy was okay. He was alive. Soda was crying and I couldn't let myself cry too. My kid brother, who wouldn't be a kid much longer, needed me. Soda didn't need to see me cry.
As the days went on, Sodapop and I quickly discovered Ponyboy was completely delirious with illness. He was stuck in bed. I took to sleeping on a chair in the corner of his bedroom. He didn't seem to know where he was, who we were, or what happened. He kept asking for Johnny and Sodapop.
When I wasn't in Pony's room, I took to pacing the living room. Bills were piling, Ponyboy, Johnny, and Dally's hospital bills dug out our wallets down to the lint, the court date was pending, the state was sending a social worker, we couldn't afford medication, and Sodapop couldn't bear to go back to work when his kid brother was home and extremely sick. I tried to push him but I heard him and Steve crying together on the back steps and I realized his paycheck wasn't worth the pain this whole situation has been causing him. I left him alone after that.
Tuesday night, I was reading an old novel that had been collecting dust when Ponyboy came stumbling down the hall. I stood up in case he fell. I wanted to catch him like I never caught Dallas. He didn't need it but my hands still hovered over him. Ponyboy asked me what happened and I explained as best as I could without scaring him. Ponyboy looked confused. I couldn't help but bring him into a hug. Ponyboy and Soda were safe at home. Two-Bit and Steve were still around but I hadn't seen them since Johnny and Dallas..
I didn't have time to think about that. Not with Ponyboy out of bed for the first time in almost four days. I took him to dig some food out of the ice box. I made him a bologna sandwich but he outright refused to eat it. I felt my jaw clench and my shoulders hike but I forced myself to take a deep breath. Ponyboy gobbled up soup and some crackers I found in the cupboard. I sent him back to bed after that. He may be walking and stable but that doesn't mean I can't fuss over him a little.
I helped Pony lay back down in my bed and get comfortable under the covers, since his bedsheets had been stripped to clean. I sat on the edge of the bed with him while he shuffled and rolled around. He looked up at me with pleading eyes. I groaned and sighed but I climbed into bed with him. I flicked the bedside lamp off even if it was only seven o'clock.
We talked a lot that night. About our parents, Johnny, Dallas, our futures, old memories, all sorts of deep thoughts neither of us had ever dreamed of telling each other. Soda and Pony had always been the talkers. Me? The words wouldn't come out how I wanted and I didn't know how to explain what I felt. I could tell Ponyboy was grateful to speak those thoughts and I was too.
It was late and our eyes were drooping when we finally started to wrap it up. But when we laid on our backs, side by side, I finally admitted what plagued my mind endlessly.
I told Ponyboy I was guilty that he and Sodapop didn't have a stable guardian, that Ponyboy had to grow up too fast and Sodapop had to be a parent half of the time where I couldn't fill in, that Ponyboy had such strict rules set on him from the beginning, that Ponyboy only had a lousy older brother as an excuse for a parent.
Most of all, I told him I was worried about him and Sodapop.
Pony seemed to understand. He always understood those things. I explained to him that I was so strict because I wanted him safe. I told him I had such hard expectations because Ponyboy's good grades proved to the state that I was fit to care for him. I told him there were so many worries because I cared.
Ponyboy rolled over, hugged me, and told me he understood. I could count the amount of times I've cried in my life and that was one of them. I wept into his yellow-blond hair and I felt full of hope for once. When I pulled back to look at Ponyboy in the dim light, I could see my own feelings reflected in his eyes. Pony's green eyes, that he insisted were gray, glimmered with hope. For the first time, that pressing guilt curled up in my chest, between my heart and my ribcage, lifted and I could tell we'd be all right one day.