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Ponyboy knew something was wrong from the minute he woke up to an empty space beside him. Soda loved to sleep in, and if he didn’t he was usually shaking him awake and dragging him into whatever mischief he had planned for the day. The Curtis house was always alive with clattering noises and laughter. Today it was silent. He wasn’t even sure if his brothers were home, despite them both having taken the day off work. It was just that unnervingly quiet.
Pony crept downstairs, trying to appease the growing dread in his system and just make sure Darry and Soda were okay. Maybe they’d gone out for groceries or something and left a note on the kitchen table. That would be an easy explanation for all this, right?
They were both still home. Ponyboy watched silently as the two leaned into each other on the couch, heavy with a weight he could feel more than he could see. Silence was unbecoming of Darry and Soda. Now he knew for sure- something was definitely wrong. The anxious pit gnawing at the edges of his stomach grew wider. He took a step into the living room apprehensively, but neither of his brothers looked up. It was like they were trapped in their own little world of suffering, one Pony was too far away from to even perceive.
“Guys?”
Soda’s head snapped up, and he gave him a brittle smile.
“Mornin’ Ponyboy,” he said. His voice sounded oddly strained.
“Is everythin’ okay?” he asked nervously. This was far out of the depths of what he was used to in this new home of his. Soda looked at Darry like he wasn’t sure he was allowed to answer, but Darry just nodded with a sad look in his eyes. He took a deep breath.
“It’s, uh . . . one year. Today,” Soda told him.
Ponyboy’s heart squeezed like he’d just clenched his first around a sponge completely soaked with tears. He hadn’t known.
“We don’t really like to talk about it, but if you need anything, we can still help out. We just might be a little . . . off today, honey, that’s all.”
“Oh,” he said quietly.
“Why don’t you go hang around with Two-Bit for a little while?” Soda suggested, “You should go enjoy your weekend. We ain’t gonna be too much fun right now.”
Pony wasn’t too fond of the idea, but he nodded anyway. He knew that today his brothers were probably reliving the worst moment of their lives over and over again. If him going away and not bothering them for a few hours could help ease some of that pain, he’d do it, no questions asked.
“I can call him up,” Ponyboy said, moving to look at the numbers written on the back of a receipt Darry had taped to the fridge the week he arrived. For emergencies, he’d said. He knew this wasn’t an emergency in any sense of the word, but reading and dialing the Mathews household off that list still felt like the best thing he could do right now.
-
It wasn’t long before Two-Bit came knocking (he never knocked on the door, just threw it open and got yelled at by Darry). Pony cast one more lingering look at his brothers before he gently closed the front door. Darry had smiled at him weakly. Soda didn’t even bother to try. Even after leaving the house, the heaviness lingered on him, and judging by Two’s uncharacteristic quietness he knew why. He was probably feeling it himself; normally he’d be talking Ponyboy’s ear off or raring to go stir up some trouble somewhere. At the moment, though, he was just wandering aimlessly while Pony followed him around like a lost kitten.
He could hardly bear the silence by now- he’d been suffocating in it since the minute he’d gotten up. Maybe it had even started earlier without him realizing it. Ponyboy had heard tales of some faulty homes that leaked gas as their unsuspecting owners slept. The comparison seemed really stupid even as he thought it, but sleeping in that silence could have been the same way for him. He was exhausted in a way he could only be after a poor night of sleep. He hadn’t even realized he’d been sleeping so well until now. I wonder how well Sodapop sleeps now, he thought. Is he giving that up for me, too? Pony had been so relieved to get a good night’s rest that he neglected to even think about how that might have affected his older brothers.
“This way, Pony,” Two-Bit said, and he turned to correct his course. He didn’t notice the look of concern in his friend’s eyes.
“That’s a lot a’ thinkin’ yer doin’ there, Ponykid.” He nodded absently, already retreating back into the recesses of his own mind. He couldn’t help but feel guilty now. What else had Darry and Soda been forced to sacrifice just so that they could take care of him?
“Hey. Earth to Ponyboy,” Two said, snapping his fingers in front of his face. “You’re starting to freak me out a little.”
“Sorry,” he replied, “I’m just . . .”
“Thinking? Yeah, we’ve been over that,” he deadpanned.
“Sorry,” Pony said again, the tips of his ears looking a little redder than usual. Two-Bit sighed and stopped walking so suddenly that Ponyboy almost continued straight into his back.
“I changed my mind,” he said, “Let’s go somewhere else.”
Pony hadn’t been under the impression that they’d been going anywhere at all. Had he been a little more lucid, he might’ve asked exactly where somewhere else was supposed to be, but he wasn’t, so he didn’t.
“Pit stop,” Pony heard, “Wait here.” So he stopped without even taking a look at the gas station sign. The smell of gasoline made his head feel funny. Well, his head already felt funny, but this was definitely making it a lot worse.
He was real lucky that they were pretty far into the East Side (at least, he was pretty sure they were), ‘cause if a Soc had come he could’ve decided to beat him half to death and Ponyboy would’ve been beyond black and blue before he noticed.
“Here, Ponykid.” Two handed him a glass Pepsi bottle. “Let’s put some pep in that step.” He nodded numbly, taking the drink. It was colder and wetter than he expected it to be, reminding him of a dog’s nose. They kept walking. It was taking a lot longer than he thought for them to get to . . . wherever it was they were going. The bubbles in the soda woke Pony up a little, and he realized he wasn’t quite sure what was going on, nor did he know where they were.
“Is this still the East Side?” he wondered aloud, too busy looking around to notice the slump of relief in Two-Bit’s shoulders. He hadn’t even noticed there was tension there in the first place.
“Nah,” Two responded, “We’re further out than East and West. This is just the woods. You dig them, yeah?”
“Yeah,” Ponyboy said, “I do.”
“I figured today might be a bit hard on you, too, so . . . I dunno, go stare at them leaves or something. Whatever floats your boat, kid.”
“Oh,” Pony said, feeling oddly warm, “Uh, yeah. Thanks. Thank you.” Two-Bit nodded and messed up his hair, smiling softly as he did so.
He spent the next three hours or so exploring the woods around him, sometimes listlessly and sometimes with so much fervor he felt like he might explode. Two was always a few steps behind, ready to make sure he’d never stray too far. It was a bit nice- he didn’t try to make Ponyboy talk about what was on his mind (though honestly, he probably already knew) and just let him wander to his heart’s content. With no sketchbook for him to capture the sights with, though, he quickly lost interest in each scene; by noon, he’d resorted to sprawling out on the grass and staring at the sky above while Two flipped his long black-handled switchblade back and forth between his hands.
“Be honest,” Pony said, “Did you know Soda was gonna put you up to this today?”
“It was Darry, actually,” he responded, “But yeah, I did. We all sorta figured it’d be a hard day. Didn’t want to leave you to fend for yourself.” Pony hummed in acknowledgement, then another silence lapsed over them. As he thought some more, a new fear slowly began to creep up on him.
“Do you think they wanted me out of the house?” he asked quietly. He was afraid of what the answer might be, afraid that his presence could be causing the two people he loved most that were still alive to feel any sort of pain. Selfishly, he hoped that sending him away hurt for Soda and Darry just as much as it hurt for him to leave them in that state.
“Kid, I think sendin’ you off was the stupidest thing they coulda done,” Two-Bit said, sitting up. Pony quickly followed suit, brushing dead grass off his back as best he could. “It ain’t on you, Ponyboy. I swear it.”
“Then why?” He stared at a small hole in the ground. Was there a seed in there? Was it growing taller each day, or would it never reach the surface?
“Pony-” Two started, but he was cut off by Ponyboy shoving his face in his hands.
“I just don’t know what to do,” he admitted. “I want to be there for them like they’ve been there for me.” Two-Bit leaned onto him, resting an elbow on his shoulder.
“You don’t hafta do anythin’ to pay them back. You know that, right?”
Ponyboy sighed. “I do, I just . . . I want to, y’know?” Two nodded.
“I get that,” he said, “I feel that way a lot. Dar an’ Soda do so much for me, for all of us, an’ it just feels like you can never make it up to them.” Pony nodded. “But that ain’t how love works, yeah?” he continued. “You just gotta help out where you can. It don’t gotta be anythin’ big- just be there for them when it counts, ya dig me?”
Wow, was all Ponyboy could think for a moment. Sometimes he got so caught up in the way Two-Bit wanted everyone to look at him that he forgot the way he actually was. He had an intelligence that could only be gained from the years of mistakes that lingered behind his stormy gray eyes.
“Yeah. I dig you,” he responded.
If the best way to help Darry and Sodapop was to be there for them, it was awful that he’d agreed to leave them alone. But then again, they hadn’t really been asking him to leave- it seemed more like they didn’t want him to see them like that. He decided that if they couldn’t ask for help outright, he’d just have to do what Two-Bit had told him; Ponyboy would be there for them when they needed it just like they would always do for him. After all, when he hadn’t been able to communicate his needs to his brothers, they’d still found a way to give them to him. He thought about his first day with them, about the way they’d handled his nightmare so gracefully. About how Soda and him started sharing a bed a week or two in just to get them to stop- that was what being there looked like. Not intruding, never intruding, but . . . being present.
“Now, I think it’s been long enough,” Two-Bit said, “Let’s go save those two from themselves.” Pony nodded.
-
Despite the hours that had passed outside the house, the inside looked exactly the same as they’d left it. Soda and Darry hadn’t even bothered to get up and turn the lights on. Ponyboy doubted they’d eaten anything, either. They weren’t asleep, but they weren’t . . . present.
At first, Ponyboy wasn’t sure what exactly he could do to break his brothers out of their shared trance. He was decently confident they’d noticed him and Two coming in at the very least, since he’d seen two pairs of matching eyes flit to the doorway at the sound of their arrival, but he doubted they really registered it. It reminded Pony of the way he was the first few months after his parents’ deaths, a state he’d briefly fallen back into earlier this morning; a state he’d still be trapped in were it not for Two-Bit.
Two-Bit, whose face was struck with a mix between shock, horror, and a slowly rising grief of his own. Pony looked to him, then to his brothers, then to him again. He tugged on the side of his shirt.
“Come on,” he whispered, “They seem hungry.”
-
Darry and Soda had spent the whole morning in a daze. In fact, Sodapop hardly remembered the days leading up to this one either. Every feeling, every thought, he blocked out in favor of thinking nothing at all. Distantly, he was grateful his brother had thought to get Ponyboy out of the house (the mere idea of not having a tangible reminder of his safety made Soda’s limbs start to tremble), because he really didn’t know if he could handle someone asking him for anything right now- even if anything included something as simple a request for him to get some rest. His heart hurt with the guilt of him needing to send Pony away for even a moment.
He really was a horrible brother.
-
Darry had been drifting for a long time. He remained in a state somewhere between asleep and oblivious, understanding nothing but the warm weight of Soda’s head on his chest. It was the only evidence he had to support the idea that he was even alive at all. What was being alive, anyway? How could life mean anything when it was so surely followed by death?
He awoke, truly awoke, at the smell of cinnamon and bread wafting into the living room.
Darry blinked. Sodapop was still with him, so who was cooking? There was definitely a familiar movement in the kitchen, one that he desperately wanted to investigate, but the fog that had cleared away from his mind hadn’t yet left his body- his limbs felt heavier than they did after a full day’s work, and on top of that there was the full weight of a person on him. Luckily, Darry didn’t have to keep guessing for long, because soon his baby brother appeared in the doorway. He’d turned a light on in the kitchen; the way it bathed his hair from the back gave the illusion of a halo.
“Ponyboy?” he asked, voice raspy from the combination of crying and a lack of use. He got a small, guilty smile in return.
“I know I’m s’posed to be away right now,” he said, laying two full plates down on the coffee table, “But you two looked like you could use something to eat.”
Darry looked down at the food. One was normally colored. The other was bright pink. Without even realizing it, he let out a short, weak, but genuine chuckle. Sodapop raised his head at the noise and the motion. He must have fallen into some sort of fitful sleep without Darry noticing. Or maybe he’d just gone catatonic again.
“Oh,” he mumbled, eyes moving from the French toast in front of him to the silhouette of his little brother. Pony smiled bittersweetly and gave him a small wave, nodding to the plate of pink food in front of him.
“You should eat while it’s still warm,” he said simply. Soda, still a little out of it, nodded and pulled a small corner off the fluffy bread. Darry watched as he gingerly placed it in his mouth. Neither of them had ever tried Ponyboy’s cooking, but they all knew that wasn’t the true reason for the tentative nature behind each motion.
“It’s good,” Soda rasped, “It’s real good. Thank you, honey. I-”
He cut himself off with his own cries.
“I’m so sorry . . . We just left you, and I . . .”
“I forgive you,” Pony said like it was the simplest thing in the world- maybe it was for him. He pulled a blanket from the side of the couch and draped half it around Darry’s shoulders, then the other half around Soda’s.
“You two let me cry like a little kid whenever I felt like it,” he said, looking Darry right in the eyes, “I think it’s about time you two get to have a go at it, too.”
And that was all it took for him to be done for. Now both of them had devolved into one giant, sobbing mess, one that Ponyboy didn’t deserve to have to handle. Regardless, he stayed, eventually managing to squeeze his way between them. Now, with his chin on Darry’s shoulder and his hands around Sodapop’s, he softly hummed an unrecognizable tune to them. It was so quiet, so peaceful, that Darry almost forgot why his heart was aching so painfully in the first place.
“Where did you learn to do this, kid?” He heard Two-Bit ask through a blanket of sleepiness. He hadn’t even realized he was so tired. He felt Ponyboy shift atop him slightly before he gave his answer.
“I learned it from watching them.”
Darry felt his heart grow fuller as he drifted off all the way. Pony really was their guardian angel.