Chapter Text
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I wake up groggy and disoriented. The last thing I remember is running with the gang to meet Dally at the vacant lot, and he’d jerked that heater out of his waistband…I gasp and sit up so sharply that I feel like I’m about to throw up.
“Whoa, easy, kid,” a rough voice says, and Dally is in front of me holding me still. “You gotta take things slow.” As he looks at me with concern in his normally cold blue eyes, my memory comes rushing back. I notice that there is a sheet spread out on the floor at the foot of my bed. Had he been sleeping there all night? Why didn’t Darry give him the couch? Where’s Soda?
I must’ve said something or whimpered their names, because now Soda and Darry are on either side of me. Soda gives me a tight side-hug and Darry pushes my sweaty hair back from my forehead with a cool hand. Dallas has backed up to stand outside the door—so we can have brotherly privacy, I guess—but I can’t stop looking at him, making sure he’s really here. I hadn’t realized before how terrified I’d been about him dying like Johnny…I bite my lip and feel myself start to cry.
“Shh, shh Pony, it’s okay. We’re here. It’s okay.” Soda sits on the bed and hushes me, hugging me to him the way he’d held Johnny after we’d found him beaten in the lot…thinking about that just makes me cry harder. Darry moves to my other side and strokes my head soothingly with his big strong fingers. I feel myself getting calmer and then before I know it I’ve re-closed my eyes. I’m awful tired.
The next time I wake, I don’t feel sick. I’m actually ravenous and my mouth is dry as sandpaper. I pan my eyes around the room, wondering if I’d dreamed that last time I’d awoken… “Dally?” I call hesitantly. I hear a grunt and then a scraping sound, and his tufty blond hair appears at the end of my bed above those laser-like eyes of his. “Oh, good. You are here.” He snorts.
“’Course I am, kid. Until your brother boots me out or you’re back on your feet, I ain’t leavin’.” His voice gets softer. “Can’t pay you back that way after you told me I had to stay.”
“I called you an idiot!” I remember and my eyes grow wide. “I’m sorry, Dally, that wasn’t too tuff of me.” He squints at me and then actually starts to laugh.
“Nah, don’t apologize, Pony. I WAS bein’ an idiot that night and someone needed to tell me that. If it’d been Darry, I might’a smacked him around a bit, but you…” his voice trails off and he reaches over and ruffles my hair. I feel myself blush. The only person he’d ever shown that kind of affection to before was Johnny.
“Thanks, Dally.” I say quietly. He nods shortly.
“What’s this I hear about smacking me around?” Darry is standing in the doorway. Looming is more like it, actually. “After I offered you bed and board in this little house of ours?” He shakes his head slowly and seriously. “I’m hurt, Dallas Winston.” We all go silent until Soda pops his head around the door—and Darry’s—frame.
“You want me to get you a tissue, Darry?” My oldest brother scoffs and grabs Soda in a headlock. The four of us bust out laughing. Dally falls flat on the floor out of sight because he’s laughing so hard. Darry gives Soda a noogie and pushes him away, still chuckling.
After we’re all laughed out, Soda comes over to me. “How you feelin’, Ponyboy?”
“I’m pretty good. Not so tired anymore. How long was I out?” Soda thinks for a second.
“Well, the rumble was on Saturday, right?” Darry nods.
“And today’s Tuesday. You’ve been asleep and delirious since that night.”
Boy howdy. I’m never going to be able to make up all the school I’ve missed. “What was the matter with me?”
Darry shakes his head at me. “I told you you were in no condition for a rumble. Exhaustion, shock, minor concussion—and Two-Bit came blubberin’ over here with some tale about how you were running a fever before the rumble and how it was all his fault you were sick. He was pretty torn up that night.” He stops, and Dallas, still sitting on the floor, continues,
“Yeah, we all were. Glory, kid, you had me—you had all of us—scared to death.” He clears his throat, realizing the words he just said, and none of us can speak for a minute. I try not to remember how Johnny was such a good buddy, how he hadn’t wanted to die, how he’d told me to stay gold. …What had he been talking about? I couldn’t figure it.
After a period of silence, Darry clears his throat. “If you’re feelin’ okay, Ponyboy, do you want anything to eat?”
“Yeah!” I hadn’t thought to ask for food yet. “I’m really hungry.”
“I should think you would be. How ‘bout some mushroom soup?”
“Gosh, that’d be just fine.” He nods and grins at the eager expression on my face, but before he can go to the kitchen Dally stands up.
“Darry, you stay in here with him. I’ll go make it.” Darry looks at him gratefully. Soda smirks.
“You sure you know where the soup is, Dally?” Dallas cuts his eyes at him.
“Yep. Sure do, Sodapop. I know where the can-opener is too—right next to the place you always hide that extra slice of cake for yourself.” Soda’s eyes widen and Darry chuckles.
“You heard him, Pepsi-Cola. Dally already knows where everything is.” My brother saying that makes me happy. In our house, Dallas Winston finally feels at home.