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Pony goes down while Darry’s still trying to get the sound of gunfire out of his head. He’s got his eyes squeezed shut so they don’t accidentally linger on the broken body of the boy under the streetlight and he’s forcing himself to take careful, measured breaths when Two-Bit cries out “Glory, look at the kid!”
Darry’s eyes fly open just as his baby brother collapses, and all of a sudden, he’s running in slow-motion, trying in vain to close the distance between him and Ponyboy before the kid hits the concrete. Two-Bit makes it there first, catches him before he can get banged up any worse, and by the time Darry’s beside them, Two’s got Pony close to his chest, cradling his head in his arms.
“He’s sick,” Two-Bit’s saying when Darry and Soda kneel down next to them. “Shit, he was—he was running a fever before the rumble but he made me swear I wouldn’t tell ya, so I—”
“Ponyboy,” says Soda, reaching out to shake his brother’s shoulder. “Pony, honey, wake up.” Darry puts a palm to Pony’s forehead and finds that Two’s right; the kid’s burning with fever.
“Ponyboy!” Soda tries again, his voice becoming more hysterical the longer Ponyboy stays slumped in Two-Bit’s arms. “Shit, honey, you gotta wake up!”
“Steve!” Darry calls, and when he looks up, Steve’s there, face still blotchy and tear-streaked but set in determination.
“What do you need?” he asks, and Darry fishes in his pocket for his keys.
“The truck,” he says, hoping he doesn’t sound too frantic. “I need you to go get the truck, Pony needs a hospital.”
Steve just nods, holding up his hand and nabbing the keys from midair when Darry chucks them his way. “On it, boss,” he says, before turning on his heel and heading out of the lot.
Darry turns back to the situation at hand. Soda’s still trying desperately to rouse Ponyboy from his unconscious state, shaking his shoulders even more vigorously than before. “Be gentle with him, Soda,” Darry says, taking Soda’s hands in his own. “He’s gonna be okay.”
Soda just stares at him for a moment before letting out a choked sob. Darry sighs, bringing a hand to rub Soda’s back before he turns his attention back to Two-Bit, who’s been gently tapping Pony’s shoulder, repeatedly calling his name in an attempt to bring him back to consciousness.
“Can you give him to me?” Darry asks, and Two-Bit nods, shifting Ponyboy’s unconscious body forward into his brother’s arms with a gentleness Darry hadn’t expected from him. He’s looking down at Ponyboy when Soda lets out a strangled exclamation of horror.
“Oh, shit, he’s bleeding!” cries Two-Bit, and Darry feels his stomach drop. Two-Bit’s overalls are soaked with blood where the side of Ponyboy’s head was nestled into his chest, and the right side of Pony’s head is a mess, sticky blood plastering his bleached hair to his neck like hairspray.
“It’s probably worse than it looks,” Darry says, fighting to keep his voice steady. “Head wounds bleed a lot.” Before he can put together a plan of action, Two-Bit’s pulling off his shirt and pressing it to Pony’s head in an attempt to stem the bleeding.
Pony lets out a weak groan, and Darry’s heart skips a beat.
Soda cups a hand to Ponyboy’s cheek. “That’s it, honey,” he says, his voice trembling. “Come back to us, Pony.”
Just then, the truck barrels into the empty lot and Steve comes tumbling out, Darry’s keys in hand. “Let’s get the kid in the back,” he says, and Darry nods.
Getting Ponyboy to the truck is no small effort. The kid’s built like a twig, but he’s still a hundred and ten pounds of dead weight. Darry finally gets him laid down in the back of the truck with his head in Soda’s lap, Two-Bit’s discarded tank top pressed to his temple to staunch the bleeding. As he rounds the truck to enter on the driver’s side, Two-Bit and Steve pile in behind him without a second thought. Steve hands him his keys from the passenger’s seat and Darry puts the car in drive.
-
“Soda?” Ponyboy’s voice cuts through the silence. They’re three minutes out from St. Francis Hospital and his voice is slurred and confused but Sodapop chokes out a teary laugh in spite of himself.
“Yeah, baby, it’s me,” he says, fighting back tears as he runs a hand through Pony’s hair. “I’m here. You’re alright.”
Pony hums, seems to think a bit, and then asks, “Wh’re’s Johnny?”
It’s like all the air has been sucked out of the truck. Steve and Darry go silent in the front seat and Soda feels Two-Bit stiffen beside him.
“He’s not here right now, honey,” Soda says, his voice strained with the effort of holding back a sob.
Ponyboy looks at him curiously and Soda feels sure that he’s going to ask about Johnny again, but his baby brother just asks “Why’re you sad?”
Soda gives a choked cry of surprise. He rubs his thumb over Ponyboy’s cheek, still nervous about the noticeable heat that lingers beneath his skin. “Because you’re very sick,” he says softly, “and you gave us all a scare.”
“Oh,” Ponyboy says. His eyelids are drooping, and Soda can tell he’s about to slip away.
“Everything’s dizzy,” he mumbles.
“I know,” Soda says. “I’m sorry, baby, you’re gonna feel better soon,” he tells Pony, but the kid’s out cold by the time the words leave his brother’s mouth.
Soda fights back another sob. He feels Two-Bit’s hand on his shoulder and lets a couple of tears slip down his cheeks before pressing a kiss to Ponyboy’s forehead.
“I love you,” Soda whispers. “I love you, I love you, I love you,” he says, repeating himself again and again, natural as breathing, until they reach the hospital.
-
Pony comes back to himself in the waiting room, as they’re cleaning up the gash on the side of his head with a couple of wet rags provided by the unphased triage nurse at the front desk. The kid’s laying across a row of chairs with his head in Soda’s lap as Darry kneels beside him, wiping the last of the tacky blood from his temple. He groans as his eyes flutter open.
“Hey, little buddy,” Darry says. “How you feelin’?”
“Mmm… bad,” Pony mumbles. “‘S cold.”
“You’ve got a bad fever,” Soda explains, gently stroking Pony’s hair. “So you’re really hot, your body just thinks you're cold.”
Pony lets out a wordless whine as a shiver runs through him. Darry sighs. “We can try to find you a blanket—” he starts, but before he can finish, Steve’s shrugging off his jean jacket and holding it out from where he sits on Soda’s other side.
Darry meets his eyes. “Thank you,” he says softly. Steve nods wordlessly, and Darry turns back to Ponyboy, draping the jacket over his shivering frame. “Say thanks to Steve for the blanket, Pony.”
Pony just groans. Steve huffs a tired laugh.
“You hangin’ in there, Ponykid?” Soda asks softly, and Ponyboy hums in contemplation.
“I don’t feel well,” he says.
“I know, honey,” Soda tells him. “I’m sorry.”
“I don’t feel well,” Pony says again, an edge of panic to his voice. He tries to pull himself up to a sitting position and Darry quickly eases him back down into Soda’s lap.
“Woah, kid, take it easy, okay?” he says, but Pony’s fighting him, trying desperately but in vain to get himself vertical.
“Let him up, Superman, he don’t look so good,” says Two-Bit, starting to get up from his seat on the floor. “Looks like he might—” He’s cut off by Ponyboy wrenching himself out of Darry’s arms and vomiting onto the white linoleum floor.
“Oh, shit!” exclaims Steve. Soda lets out a cry of surprise as Darry catches the kid by the shoulders and helps him into some semblance of a sitting position. Ponyboy gags again, splattering the floor with sick, and Soda brings a hand to his back, rubbing circles over his spine.
“That’s it, Pony,” he mumbles. “You’re alright, kid, we gotcha. Do what you gotta do.”
Ponyboy lets out a helpless whine before dissolving into empty retches that bring up nothing but stomach acid.
“I know, honey,” Soda murmurs. “I got you, baby, you’re alright.”
For a while, Pony sits there silently, panting dizzily as Soda rubs his back and whispers gentle comforts in his ear. His face is tear-streaked with the effort of vomiting up his dinner, his cheeks are flushed with fever, and Darry doesn’t know if he’s ever seen the kid so sick.
“Let’s get him sitting up,” says Two-Bit, when it looks like Pony’s stomach’s settled down. “Get the kid a sip of water.” He steps over the puddle of vomit on the floor and holds out a paper cone of water, seemingly producing it from nowhere. After Soda and Darry have got Ponyboy upright on a chair of his own, Two-Bit places the cone in his shaky hands.
“Not too much, now, just wash that taste away, okay?” he advises, guiding the drink to the kid’s mouth so he can take a sip. Ponyboy obeys compliantly. “That’s it, kid,” he says. “Now why don’t I hold onto this in case you want more?”
“Ponyboy Curtis?” calls the triage nurse, and Darry lets out a sigh of relief.
-
By the time they get an IV in his arm and a dual diagnosis of a stress-induced fever and a minor concussion, Pony’s out like a light, looking so fragile in sleep that Darry’s almost afraid to touch him as he puts a hand to his cheek to check his fever again.
It doesn’t exactly give him any new intel. The kid’s still burning, but Darry can’t tell if his temperature’s gone up or down since the last time he checked. He wishes his mother was here, knows she’d know what to do. He’s in over his head trying to take care of her baby, and he knows his rough hands and hesitant attempts at comfort are a poor replacement for her soft, golden touch.
“I’m sorry, baby,” he says, stroking the kid’s sweaty hair and cringing at how bleach-damaged the brittle strands are between his fingers. “I’m so, so sorry.”
A gentle hand finds Darry’s shoulders from behind. “Sit down, man,” Two-Bit tells him, gesturing to the chair he’s dragged over to Pony’s bedside. “Take a fuckin’ breath.”
When Darry doesn’t move. Two-Bit practically manhandles him into the chair, rolling his eyes as he does. “You’re no good to the kid if you worry yourself to death,” he says.
“Where’s Soda?” asks Darry, when he looks around the room and finds his middle brother absent.
“Got himself all worked up when they brought out the needle,” Two-Bit explains. “Steve took him outside to try and calm him down.”
Darry nods. “Is Steve okay?” he asks, suddenly remembering the sickly purple bruises that he had seen working their way up the boy’s ribcage just an hour before. “His ribs, are they—”
“He’s fine, Superman,” Two-Bit assures him. “Got him some ice, he’s doing just fine. Think he’s more worried ‘bout the kid than anything,” he says, letting his gaze wander to where Ponyboy’s lying, out cold on the hospital bed. “Glory, he looks little.”
Darry nods, blinking back the tears that prick at his eyes.
“Shit, Darry, he’s gonna be okay. Strong fuckin’ kid if I ever knew one.”
Just then, the door opens and Steve and Soda enter the room. Steve’s got one hand gingerly holding a bag of ice to his ribcage and one curled around Soda’s shoulders, guiding him through the doorway and up to Pony’s bedside.
“He doin’ okay?” Soda asks softly as he kneels down to examine the kid closer, scanning him for any injuries or defects that might have come into existence during the five minutes he was gone.
“Doc says it’s just a bad fever and a minor concussion,” Darry tells him. “They’re gonna get some fluids in him and admit him overnight to make sure he’s alright, but we should be able to take him home in the morning.”
Soda nods, not taking his eyes off of Ponyboy when he says, “Two and Steve, you guys should head home.”
The boys start to protest, but Darry shakes his head. “Steve, you gotta rest if you want those ribs to heal. Two can drive you home and we’ll call if we need anything, alright?”
“You sure y’all good over here?” Steve asks.
“We will be,” Darry confirms. He grabs Steve’s jean jacket from where it had been discarded by the side of the hospital bed after Ponyboy got his hands on a real blanket. “You can stay at our place,” he says as he presses the denim into Steve’s hand.
“I’ll be back tomorrow; you guys want me to bring you anything?” asks Two-Bit.
Darry shrugs. “Think we’re okay,” he says. “Get yourselves on home now.”
The boys nod solemnly. “Hope Pony feels better,” says Two-Bit, and then they’re gone, closing the door behind them and leaving Darry and Soda to stand vigil through the night.
-
Soda’s almost drifted off to sleep when Pony lets out a strangled scream. He feels a bolt of fear run down his spine and practically catapults himself up out of his chair and to his brother’s side.
“Wake up, Pony,” he says, shaking his shoulder as gently as he can. The kid cries out in fear and Soda finds himself growing frantic. “Ponyboy, wake up!”
“Ponyboy,” Darry says, his voice strong and firm. He takes Pony’s face in his hands. “We need you to wake up, okay?”
The kid’s eyes fly open with a gasp and he sits bolt upright, trembling violently as he fights for desperate gulps of air.
“Woah,” Soda says, squeezing Ponyboy’s shoulder. “You’re alright. Just take a deep breath for me, okay?”
“Where’s Johnny?” Pony asks, and Soda feels a desperate wave of grief roll over him, so strong that he has to squeeze his eyes shut and breathe through a surge of nausea.
“He’s not here right now, baby,” Darry says, echoing Soda’s words from the car ride, and Pony looks bewildered, glossy tears collecting on his eyelashes.
“Dad?” he says, and Darry suddenly feels like he’s had the wind knocked out of him, like he’s laying on his back and gasping for air, desperately waiting for his lungs to work properly again. He sees Soda freeze in his periphery as he stares into Ponyboy’s glassy eyes.
“Hey, Pony,” he says softly. “Did you have a bad dream?”
Pony nods. “Think so,” he says. “Can’t remember.” A couple of tears roll down his face and Darry wipes them away with his thumb. The kid’s still too hot, his cheeks too pink with fever, and Darry lets his hand linger, brushing the sweaty hair from Pony’s forehead.
“That’s okay,” he says. “Why don’t we just try and take a couple of deep breaths, and then maybe it won’t feel so scary.”
Ponyboy nods, and Darry takes the kid’s hand and guides it to his own chest, taking in a deep breath and hoping Pony can’t feel the way he’s trembling all over.
“That’s it,” he says, when Ponyboy copies him. “Good job, baby. You’re alright.”
“I don’t feel well,” Pony says simply, and Darry squeezes his hand.
“You’re very sick,” he explains. “Your body’s very tired and it’s trying to make sure you give it some rest.”
Ponyboy nods again, and Darry can see his eyelids drooping. “Go to sleep, baby,” he says. “You’ll feel better in the morning.”
Ponyboy closes his eyes and Darry leans over to press a gentle kiss to his forehead. “I love you,” he whispers, and Ponyboy hums sleepily in response.
As soon as it becomes clear that the kid has drifted off to sleep, Soda bursts into tears, unable to hold back any longer.
“Woah,” Darry says, taken aback by the sudden display of emotion. “What’s wrong, little buddy?”
“Everything’s fucked,” Soda manages through his tears. “Dally’s gone and Johnny’s—” and here he cuts himself off, unable to speak the words into existence lest Ponyboy somehow overhear. “—and Pony’s so sick and I just—” he chokes out a sob. “I want this to be over!”
Darry makes his way over to where Soda’s sitting on the floor and wraps the kid in a hug, cupping the back of his head in his hand as his brother collapses into him. Strangled sobs tumble from his mouth as he buries his face into Darry’s shoulder.
“I want Mom,” Soda says softly, and Darry’s struck by a deep, lingering ache in his chest as his brother repeats himself even more desperately. “I really, really want Mom.”
“I know, buddy,” Darry mumbles, pressing a kiss to the top of Soda’s head. “I know, kid, I want her too.”
“Why does it always happen to us?” Soda asks, and Darry shakes his head, blinking back tears of his own.
“I don’t know, baby,” he says. “I don’t know.”
-
Pony wakes up only once more in the middle of the night, so cold he can’t stop shivering, and Darry tries frantically to drape more layers over the kid before Soda finally climbs into bed beside him and holds him until he drifts off to sleep. Come morning, the pair of them are fast asleep, even with the sun streaming through the blinds into their room.
Darry’s not gonna be the first to wake them up, because Christ knows Soda needs his rest just as much as Pony does. The kid had valiantly (and idiotically) fought off sleep for as long as he could last night in an attempt to keep Pony safe, but had finally surrendered somewhere around five in the morning, leaving Darry alone to stand guard over what’s left of his little family.
A knock at the door shakes Darry out of his own mind. “Come in,” he calls, speaking softly so as not to wake his brothers.
The door opens and a girl walks in bearing a tray of food, her red hair tumbling over the front of her candy-striper pinafore. “Hi, I was told to bring—”
She cuts herself off when she sees Ponyboy in the bed, and Darry suddenly recognizes the girl, remembers the way her boyfriend used to drag her around town and show her off like a fancy new car, sharp rings on his knuckles and his varsity jacket draped over her shoulders. The emotion on her face as she looks at his baby brother in the hospital bed is unreadable, and Darry stands up, placing himself as an obstacle in her path.
“Hi,” he says, and Cherry turns back to him, her face apologetic.
“Sorry, I—I was supposed to bring breakfast, and I—I can just put it here, I just—”
She stops, placing the tray on the little table by the door. “Is he alright?” she asks softly.
Darry nods. “Yeah,” he says, his voice rough. “He’s just got a bad fever.” He takes a breath. “It’s been a rough week.”
Cherry nods, nervously twisting the silver band on her ring finger. “I’m really sorry,” she says, and Darry can tell she’s blinking back tears. “I’m just—about everything, I’m so sorry.”
“Ain’t your fault,” Darry says simply.
“Ain’t his either,” she tells him. “Or Johnny’s,” and Christ if that name doesn’t just sucker-punch him with grief, “But the boy whose fault it is isn’t around anymore to apologize, so I figured I might as well do it for him.” She twists her ring again and Darry becomes suddenly certain that it was a gift from the boy with the varsity jacket and the reckless grin.
“Thank you,” says Darry, and Cherry nods, her gaze drifting back to Pony and Soda in the hospital bed.
“Ponyboy’s a real good kid,” she says.
“I know,” Darry tells her, and she spares him half a smile.
“Ain’t too many boys in this town who take the time to look up and watch the sunset,” she says. “I think he sees beautiful things where no one else is looking.”
“He’s special,” says Darry softly, and Cherry nods in agreement.
“It was nice to meet you,” she says. “I hope he feels better soon.”
Darry nods and watches Cherry leave before turning his attention back to his brothers, both still dead asleep in a bed clearly meant for one. He checks in on Pony’s fever, brushes Soda’s hair out of his face, and for the first time in a while, he gives himself a moment to breathe.