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The first thing Johnny noticed when he woke up was a gentle rocking and then soon after, shouting. He tried to open his eyes, but they felt like they were made of lead and weighed a ton. He felt the light pressure of something on his face, but when he tried to reach up to pull it off, his hands stung and he found he couldn’t move them either. He felt a prick in the side of his arm and a few words that weren’t muffled by the fog in his brain and then he sank back into nothingness.
The next time he surfaced back to consciousness, the rocking was gone, but a flat beeping somewhere off to his left had replaced it. He could move now, though. Not very much. It was still hard, but he could move.
He opened his eyes first and immediately wished he hadn’t. The room he was in was very bright. Everything was white. He shut his eyes again.
Everything was white...he thought to himself. I must either be dead or…
…or in the hospital.
He opened his eyes again and now he could see that his second guess was the correct one. His room wasn’t very big. Only had enough room for his bed and a couple of chairs. To his left was the machine that made the beeping and some pools. Tubes ran from the poles to needles in his arm. There were two of them, each filled with a different colored liquid. He wasn’t sure what either were. He was on a strange sort of bed, his arms placed on cool towels on either side of him. He turned his head and saw his hands.
He couldn’t stop the sharp intake of breath that hurt his lungs as he saw his hands.
Burned. Badly. Almost all the way up to his elbows. He couldn’t see how far on his right arm because it was bandaged at the place near where it ended. Moving them hurt. Pulling them away from the cooling towels – though he had no idea how they were staying so cool – hurt. Doing anything but letting them lie perfectly still hurt.
Breathing through his mouth also hurt. It hurt through his nose, but it hurt less because there was a tube of oxygen running underneath. Through his mouth it seared his throat and his lungs flared with pain. It was this that first alerted him to the fact that there was something very wrong. That was when he realized he couldn’t feel anything below the waist. He couldn’t move his toes or his legs or feel them to know what had happened to them because he couldn’t feel them.
However, despite this, he noticed it didn’t hurt as bad as it might have – or should have after he saw how his hands looked. There was a button running from one of the IV drips. The button rested next to his hand, so he didn’t have to move it very much if he wanted to grab the device and press the button. He’d heard of them. It was a morphine drip. It startled him to see it. The only time he’d ever heard of it being used was for dying people since the stuff was highly addictive. Only people who were in a really bad shape used morphine.
He wanted to panic, but vague memories of the church, the fire, the beam falling on his back explained anything he might’ve wondered. His face twisted and, though it wasn’t burned, it still hurt the burns on his neck and shoulders as he did so. He wanted to cry. He wanted to scream and the worst part was that either option would just make things worse. The crying would aggravate his burned lungs, the screaming would aggravate his burned throat. All he could do was lie there in silence, holding his breath as tears ran down his cheeks, trying to control the sobs building in his chest.
He must’ve cried himself back into unconsciousness and done exactly what he’d known he shouldn’t because the next thing he knew he was opening his eyes and there was a doctor sitting next to him. There was a folder sitting on the table next to his bed. The doctor’s hands were clasped in front of him. He looked grave.
“Johnny, is it?” the doctor asked.
“How’d you know?” he asked in reply. His voice was hoarse, scratchy.
“Your friends kept saying your names when you came in last night. They told us which one of you was which,” the doctor explained.
That was when he remembered: “Ponyboy and Dally, they alright?” he asked.
“Yes,” the doctor replied, “but I need to talk to you about yourself.”
If he could’ve, Johnny would’ve clenched his hands into fists to brace himself for what was coming next, but it hurt too badly to even try.
The doctor gave it to him straight: his back was broken. Badly. Badly enough that he would probably never walk again. Not even on crutches. Him gaining any sort of feeling below the waist ever again was unlikely and if he did, it would be shocking. But worse than that were the burns in his lungs and on his body. His chest and lungs had gotten the worst of it. While his lungs hadn’t had direct contact with fire like his chest, hands, shoulders, neck, and legs had, the scalding air he’d inhaled had singed them enough that even if he recovered he’d have trouble breathing for the rest of his life as well. If he recovered enough for his weak body to be able to handle surgery, he’d need skin grafts on most of his burns and he’d be scarred almost all over his body for the rest of his life. And the worst part was none of this might not even matter anyway. His burns were so bad and his body was so weak that there was a very good chance he would just die.
That was why he wasn’t in surgery now, he realized. They thought it might kill him.
They were both silent with the doctor finished speaking. Neither one of them knowing what to say, but Johnny really did not know what could possibly be said? Sorry you’ll never walk again? Sorry I’ll be trapped in the house I hate with the people who don’t want me for the rest of my life? Just accepting it? Getting angry? Every reaction seemed like the wrong reaction.
Finally, the doctor stood and grabbed his file, saying something about having other patients he needed to talk to. Johnny didn’t say anything in reply. He wanted the doctor gone. He wanted to be alone. And the minute the door shut behind him, he felt that scream he’d suppressed earlier building in his chest. But he still couldn’t let it out and instead clenched his jaw, closed his eyes tight, and willed himself back into unconsciousness before he could start crying and, to his great surprise, it worked.
When he opened his eyes next, time had passed, but he wasn’t sure how much. All he knew was that now he was lying on his stomach. It turned out the reason the bed was so weirdly shaped was because it allowed him to be placed comfortably on either his stomach or his back. There was a mirror beneath him so that when doctors and nurses came into the room, he could see them without having to turn his head. His hands were still resting on the cooling towels. It occurred to him then that the reason he was on this type of bed was so his burns on his back could air out as well.
He started to hate the mirror really fast. They hadn’t thought to make it small so he wouldn’t have to stare at himself the whole time while awake and there was nothing else more interesting to look at, so he kept his eyes closed. He didn’t like looking at himself anyway in any event. He had to see every imperfection on his face including the scar left by the Socs that had jumped him. Eventually, keeping his eyes closed made him more tired than he already was and he fell asleep again.
When he woke up next, Tim Shepard was sitting in one of the chairs next to his bed and he was on his back again. He wasn’t looking at Johnny, though. He was looking through a newspaper. When Johnny opened his eyes, however, he shut it and turned to him.
“I came to see Dallas,” he said, “but when he told me what kinda state you were in I figured I might as well say hi. So...hi.”
Johnny swallowed. “Hi,” he replied, his voice still hoarse.
Tim nodded. He didn’t seem to know what else to say and Johnny really couldn’t blame him. If he knew everything the doctor had told him, what was there to say? He had a feeling he was going to be having a lot of visits like this and he wasn’t looking forwards to any of them.
Neither of them knew each other very well and, as a result, they didn’t have anything else to say to one another, present events aside. The fact Tim had said hi was more than enough and Tim knew it. He gathered up his newspaper and left.
Back to being all alone in his room, Johnny counted the tiles in the ceiling until he got tired again, something that seemed to be happening a lot lately and fell asleep for a few more hours. When he woke up, he was once again on his stomach and he cursed silently. The mirror was back too and it wasn’t any smaller. He wondered why he always ended up being asleep when they turned him over. Maybe they did it that way on purpose. A part of him was glad. Another part of him wasn’t, since he hadn’t gotten a chance to tell anyone to get a smaller mirror.
This time he was awake for far longer than just a few minutes and he had time to think about everything the doctor had said. The two things that kept sticking out were the fact he was most likely going to die and that even if he didn’t die, he would be crippled for life. He’d be trapped in that house with his parents and he wouldn’t ever be able to leave, not without someone to help him. He’d probably die there. He wouldn’t be able to escape his parents anymore when they hurt him. He wanted to cry about it, but it seemed all his tears were gone and he just felt a numbing horror instead.
He was sadder about the fact he might die. He was only sixteen. And yes, he’d thought about killing himself more than once, but that didn’t mean he meant it. He didn’t really want to die. He just wanted everything else, all the pain, panic, and agony to stop. But now it looked like even if he lived that wouldn’t be the case. How could he possibly hope for a painless, panic-less future if he was trapped in a house with people that hated him and loved to express this by hurting him? He knew that any of the gang would take him in if they could, but...could they? Could any of them? Ponyboy’s family couldn’t. Two-Bit’s parents weren’t much better than his. Same went for Dally’s family. He had no choice. He would be trapped there until he died or until a miracle came down from the heavens and magically healed his legs. He was pretty sure the former would happen before the latter.
Vaguely, he heard angry voices in the hallway. He couldn’t hear what they were saying from the distance they were at, but he recognized Two-Bit’s voice and his heart leaped at the idea of seeing him. A third voice joined in and immediately after the arguing stopped, the voices silencing. For a moment, Johnny thought the doctor had told them to leave, but then he heard footsteps.
“Hey, Johnnycake,” Two-Bit said, smiling broadly. He moved into Johnny’s line of vision, looking down at him through the mirror.
“Hey y’all,” Johnny replied, his voice still hoarse, as he saw Ponyboy standing beside Two-Bit.
They both looked horror struck. He wondered how bad the burns on his back looked.
“How they treatin’ you, kid?” Two-Bit asked.
Johnny opened his mouth to answer. It took more effort than he’d thought it would to say two things in a row and by the time he’d thought up an answer, Two-Bit was already saying something else.
“They got your picture here in the paper,” he was saying, placing the paper on the mirror where he could see it, “for being a hero.”
For a moment, all he could do was stare at it in silent amazement, his mouth open slightly in shock. A hero? He was being called a hero? Not even a week ago he’d killed someone and now he was a hero. Odd how one act of bravery that probably still would kill him had suddenly turned him into a hero overnight. He wasn’t sure how to feel about that.
He glanced towards the paper and saw the picture and for one brief moment the guilt was lifted and he was happy that for once in his life, he was seen as something other than worthless. He smiled weakly. “Yeah, that’s tuff enough, huh?”
“Guess you can look at it later,” Two-Bit said, pulling it away and setting it on the table beside his bed. Johnny wished he hadn’t, so he would have something to look at besides his own face once Two-Bit and Ponyboy left. “You want anything?”
“A book, man,” Johnny said, glancing towards Ponyboy. “Can y’all get me another one?”
Two-Bit’s brows drew together, but Ponyboy said, “I think he wants a copy of Gone With the Wind, so I can read it to him. Would you mind going downstairs and gettin’ one?”
For a moment, Two-Bit said nothing, his eyes on Johnny. He didn’t want to leave him. Johnny could tell by the look in both of their eyes they were half convinced he was going to die right here, right now with them watching and, if they weren’t careful, he’d be gone before they knew it.
He half wondered if they were right.
Finally, Two-Bit said, “Nah, they got a gift shop downstairs, I’ll go get it.”
Johnny wondered if he’d actually pay for it.
As Two-Bit moved past Ponyboy to get to the door, Ponyboy sat down in the chair Two-Bit had been standing in front of, but neglecting.
Like Tim Shepard, Ponyboy didn’t seem to know what to say, but unlike Tim Shepard, he wasn’t at a loss for words. “So,” he began, glancing around the room, searching for something to talk about, “Guess Dal’s gonna be okay. Me and Darry we’re gettin’ along real good now.”
A sudden sharp pain pierced Johnny’s chest. He winced and let out a weak groan, closing his eyes tightly before he’d quite realized what he’d done.
“Johnny, are you alright?”
“Oh yeah,” he replied, once he was sure his voice would come out as something more than just a gasp. “It just hurts sometimes. Usually don’t cause I can’t feel anything below the middle of my back. Pretty bad off, ain’t I, Ponyboy?”
He meant it to sound like a joke, but he could tell from the look on Ponyboy’s voice it didn’t sound like one at all.
“No, you’re gonna be alright, kid” Ponyboy replied, tears forming in his green eyes. He looked away for a moment as he tried to hold them back. A part of Johnny was glad, knowing if Ponyboy started crying he would too. “You gotta be. Couldn’t get along without’cha.”
“I won’t be able to walk again,” Johnny reminded him. He wasn’t sure why. Maybe he really did understand where Darry was coming from and just this once he wanted him to face reality too. “Not even on crutches. Doc says I busted my back.”
“You’re gonna be fine,” Ponyboy protested, the tears he was struggling to hide beginning to fall. He sniffed and looked away. “I know ya are.”
“Wanna know something, Ponyboy?” Johnny said, his voice shaking. “I used to talk about killing myself all the time, man, I don’t wanna die now. It ain’t long enough. Sixteen years ain’t gonna be long enough.” He blinked furiously, finding himself sniffing as well. “Hell, I wouldn’t mind so much if there wasn’t so much stuff I ain’t done yet, so many...so many damn things I ain’t see or nothin’.” He closed his eyes silent for a moment and in that moment everything he hadn’t done and wanted to do flashed through his mind all at once: going to a cabin, going to another state, seeing the ocean. He opened them again and went on. “That time we were up in Windrixville...was the only time I’ve ever been way from my own neighborhood.”
He winced again. Talking was exhausting. It took a lot of effort and made his throat hurt.
“Knock it off,” Ponyboy replied, not smiling as he sniffed again, his eyes swimming with tears. “If you get too juiced up the doc won’t let us see you no more.”
The door opened behind them and for a minute, Johnny thought it was Two-Bit, come back with the book, but it wasn’t. It was the nurse.
“Johnny,” she spoke softly.
“Yeah,” he muttered.
“Your mother’s here to see you,” she went on.”
For a moment, Johnny felt surprised. His mother? The mother who called him worthless daily and had beaten him with a broom handle before was here to see him? A part of him – a very large part of him – wanted to let her come in, let her hug him and hold him. Maybe she would now that he was dying. Maybe things would be different.
But they won’t be, he reminded himself quickly. She’s not here because she cares about you.
And the thought made the lump in his throat larger so that when he replied, it was in a moan, “I don’t want to see her.”
“It’s your mother,” the nurse protested. “She’s here to see you.”
Johnny closed his eyes and for a moment he felt so tired, he almost blacked out, then he forced his eyes open and said, “I said, I don’t want to see her. She probably just wants to come down and tell me about all the trouble I’m causing.” Anger filled him suddenly and he moved his hands, trying to sit up. “Why don’t you just tell her to leave me al –”
Pain stronger than he’d felt since he woke up in the hospital coursed through him, cutting him off. He let out a breath, shocked for a moment by the intensity of it. Then he clenched his jaw, struggling to work through it, his body shaking with the effort, but he couldn’t do it. The pain was too strong and in moments his jaw went slack he fell again into darkness.