Sleep, an outsiders fanfic

Sleep

Chemical Violets

I think the changes started subtle enough that at first, it was unrecognizable. Ah, who am I kidding? I was a wreck, and even through the haze of lies I told to myself, I could always tell. Lying doesn't always work. People lie because they want to believe something themselves. Maybe if just one more person believes their story, the person telling the lie will too. I decided when I started writing this to never lie in it. I think now that I've recognized the futility of lying I'll be okay. Acceptance is the hardest part, and it only gets easier after that.

Ponyboy sighed, crossing off the paragraph. That ending didn't work. Why write something he didn't believe himself? The rest of the story had been easy to write. It wasn't a lie. The ending was tricky, though. It always was. He tried again.

I'm not quite sure how to live my life without Johnny and Dally. I know that they're in a better place though—

But he didn't know that! He had no way of knowing if this were the truth, or if he was just telling another fallacy. How was he supposed to know what would happen next? He was living the story now. Ponyboy dropped his pen on the paper, leaning into his hands as he sighed again. It seemed like he had been doing an awful lot of that lately.

There was a knock at the door, drawing Ponyboy's attention from the sea of crossed out sentences. Sodapop was standing in the door frame. Normally he would've have had to knock, but Ponyboy had been sleeping in his own room again. Despite his promise not to fib in his theme, he never said anything about lying to those around him, and the idea that he wasn't having nightmares anymore was a pretty easy thing to say.

"Dinner's on, Pony." Pony almost wished Soda or Darry would've just yelled it to him across the house. They would've done it before, but lately everyone had been treading around him as though walking on eggshells. He could handle his grief and guilt. He didn't need their help.

The now-blonde gave a curt nod and capped his pen. There was a smudge of black ink where the pen had hit the paper. Ponyboy swiped his hand over it, unsure of what he thought he would've accomplished when he pulled his hands away. It wasn't better. Now it was just smudged and there was ink on the side of his hand.

Ponyboy sat silently through dinner. Two-bit and Soda were throwing little bits of the food at him. They eventually stopped after they realized that Ponyboy barely even notice anything hitting him.

A half an hour of pushing his food around his plate ensued before finally Ponyboy dropped his fork onto his plate with a clatter. The sound drew the attention of the four others at the table, and the youngest stood up, picking up his plate as he spouted an excuse of working on his theme. He really did need to. He was dying to see how his story would end. Once it was written, it had to come true, right?

He almost wished he had stayed at the table. The words he had written were staring at him. They were judging him on their placement—on the way he used them as pieces to construct phrases. It was near impossible to tear his eyes away, but finally his fingers curled around the pen and he began to write again.

I'm not sure how the story ends. I'm still living it. I don't think I can write the future. But I know the ending will be happy. It has to be. Life always gets better. No matter what.

But did it? If it did, then Johnny wouldn't have been killed by falling timber. If it did, Dally wouldn't have been shot down by cops who were too idiotic to recognize when a gun was loaded or unloaded.

Snap! The pen broke in his tight grasp, black ink flowing down his pale skin in ribbons. It wasn't the first time he had broken a pen while writing this. The theme was more stressful to write than he imagined at first. He should've just stuck to the zoo idea… That would've been better, in his opinion.

Why was it so hard to write a happy ending? Why was it so impossible to decide the course your life took? It seemed to Ponyboy that whenever he tried to amend the issues in his life and write a cheerful spin to it, something happened that made it worse than before.

He shook his hand off, the still-wet rivulets of ink flying about the room, leaving black specks around. Pony grabbed a different pen off of the corner of his desk and began writing, fast and angrily. His handwriting was quicker as he finally let the floodgates open.

What's the point of even trying anymore? You can't write your life. No matter how much we all want a happy ending, we can't have it.

I've tried. I've tried writing and rewriting to find an ending I was happy with, but every time I changed an ending, then other things started changing—things that already happened. Things that have to stay the same.

The only happy ending I can think of is if Johnny and Dally were alive, or if I were dead.

Darry was at his door now. Ponyboy froze, staring at a speck of chipping paint on his wall as he listened to his brother lean against the doorframe.

"Hey, Pony, you okay?"

"Fine." It sounded like a falsehood even to his own ears.

Ponyboy felt Darry's blue gaze on his back, but kept his eyes trained on the speck of paint. Finally, his elder brother sighed and pushed himself off the door.

"You should get some sleep, Pony. You seem real tired."

"Yeah, okay, Darry."

It was silent for a minute before Darry let out a small laugh through his nose. "And wash that ink off your hand, ya hear? That'll be a real pain to get off once it's dried." Ponyboy stayed silent, waiting for Darry to shut the door before he kept writing. Darry was right, he did need sleep. And for the first time in weeks, he didn't just need it, he craved it.

I'm not sure if I believe in an afterlife or a God anymore. It's kind of hard with everything that's happened. But I want to think Johnny and Dally have found a sleep where nothing, not even the Socs, can get them. Honestly? Darkness sounds better than an eternity of being me.

All I want is a distraction. I want to light a cigarette. I want booze. I want Johnny and Dally back… But more than anything, I want sleep. And maybe, just maybe, when I wake up, I'll never want anything again.

Ponyboy washed the ink off his hand slowly, before opening the medicine cabinet. He'd never get to sleep on his own, and he knew that. His dad used to have nightmares, so he had sleeping pills. They were nothing special, just over-the-counter stuff, so Ponyboy poured out a few extra.

He'd always taken more Advil than recommended, maybe he was just immune to high-dosages. Ponyboy stopped for a moment. Did he really want to find out?

He didn't think twice about it.

He poked his head into his brothers' rooms to say goodnight for the first time in months, but he was already getting drowsy and his eyelids were tugging themselves downwards.

Ponyboy climbed into bed with Soda, like he used to, curling up on his side. And he felt sleep pull at his mind. And he realized just how much he loved his brothers.