The Outsiders - Three Brothers

30

Ponyboy struggled to stay awake for the whole day, not to mention the booze wore off after two hours - it had only been one drink and Darry got food into his system that helped sober him back up. He felt like someone had cracked his head wide open and he was in immense pain. He kept closing his eyes to block out the light and sooth his head a little, but Darry kept shaking him every ten minutes to mark sure he was awake.

Darry finally let him go to bed at eight PM. It was still extremely early, but Ponyboy had barely stayed awake to eat supper. And then he did fall asleep in the living room, his head falling against Darry's shoulder. "He's really tired. Maybe we can just let him go to bed?" Soda asked, he was sitting on the floor cuddled up next to Holly.

"Yeah, he seems to be doing alright. I guess it's safe to let him go to sleep now." Darry pushed Ponyboy gently, getting him to sit back up.

"No -" he started to whine, pouting and making everyone in the room smile at how cute he seemed. "Darry, I wanna sleep."

Darry smiled, half tempted to pinch Ponyboy's cheeks that puffed out. "I'm taking you to bed now. You want me to carry you?"

"Yeah." He put his arms out for Darry to pick him up.

"He's so cute when he's sleepy." Holly said as Darry stood and then picked Ponyboy up into his arms.

"Let's go little buddy." Darry carried Ponyboy to bed.
"You want one of the pain pills Holly brought? That booze is out your system by now."

"No. Sleep." 

Darry laughed, "alright. Just sleep." He sat Ponyboy in bed and started to undress him. "Arms up," Ponyboy forced himself to obey and let Darry slide his tee shirt off. Once his shirt was off, it fully revealed the purple and black bruise on his side. "Damn." He grabbed an oversized gray shirt and slipped it over Pony's head and then made him lay down so he could take off the kid's jeans. "Alright honey. Get some sleep. If you need anything come and get me okay?"

"Okay," Ponyboy mumbled as he was tucked into bed and fell asleep instantly.

An hour later, Dally came stumbling inside the Curtis home, beat up. "What the hell?!" Darry got up from his spot when he saw Dally's appearance.

Dally was just grinning as Soda stood to his feet, "Dally what happened?"

"I got Tim and some of his guys to help me hunt down those Socs. They ain't gonna be bugging us anymore."

"You went after them? After I said not to do anything stupid?" Darry said, shocked.

"Hey man. They were crossing the line! So we showed them what they had coming!" He wiped his face with the back of his hand, rubbing blood from his face.

Darry was going to yell somemore, but Soda interrupted, "your face is pretty banged up. I'll get the first aid kit." 

"Loosen up Superman. This is great. Now those bastards will leave the kids alone." Dally said after looking at the hardened look Darry gave him.

"You could've been arrested Dallas."

"Like it's anything new." Sodapop came out with the kit and made Dally sit down. "You should be thanking me. Now you don't have to worry about Pony getting jumped for the whole of summer break."

"Thanking you! You -!" He stopped, taking a deep breath when he started to yell. Soda opened the first aid kit and started to clean up Dally's face. "You can't just jump a bunch of Socs with the Shepards. It's not like a rumble, when they're in on it and won't go to the police. But you just jumped them!"

"You hurt anywhere else?" Soda asked.

"My hand is busted," he showed off his bloodied right hand. "Them Socs look real bad though." He smiled as he said it. "Shit - " his smile turned into a grimace when the rubbing alcohol was dabbed to the large cut on his busted up lip.