Ponyboy Michael Curtis. Fourteen years old, freshman in high school. Poet, writer, and the occasional sketch.

He was thirteen years old when he realized his parents weren't immortal.

It had been raining that day. Right after a beautiful sunset, a trickle of rain turned into a steady downpour. Sodapop had told their father he had to replace the brakes soon, but he'd only laughed his son off.

It had been raining that day.

And their brakes didn't work.

He wouldn't move from that bed for a week, lying on his mother's side and having Sodapop and Darry curl around each other in comfort. It wasn't comfortable, but no one cared.

Ponyboy stopped sleeping in their room the day his mother's pillow stopped smelling like her, and out of sad curiosity, he asks Two-Bit, "Why couldn't it have been one of us? Why couldn't it have been me?"

Two-Bit, in a moment of seriousness, looks at Pony with sad eyes. "Parents aren't meant to be childless."

"Oh," is all the thirteen year old says, and he continues to burrow into Keith's side.

"I never got to say goodbye," he tells Johnny sadly, drawing in the dirt with a stick. He is perching on an old tire, his knees tucked under his chin. He didn't bother to grease his hair at all today. Or yesterday, for that matter.

"I know, Pony," Johnny says, just as sadly. Mister and Missus Curtis were real fine folks. Real good to him.

"It was their anniversary," he says, not for the first time.

"I know."

"I never got to say goodbye, Johnny," he's wiping his eyes roughly with the worn jacket his mother gave him for his twelfth birthday. It's near threadbare, and the sleeves are getting too short to be worn soon.

"I know," Johnny repeats.

"Soda?"

"Yeah, Pony?"

"Is the state gonna take us away?"

Sodapop drew away from his little brother to study his young face intently. "Who told you that?"

"I overheard Steve and Dally talking. They seemed awfully stressed."

"Don't worry your cute little head, honey. Darry's gonna get papers for us, and we'll stay together."

"Is that why you both dropped out? Cause of me?" The boy seems upset, so Sodapop drags him into his arms, carding his fingers through the clean hair.

"If we can stay together, Pony... school don't matter none. 'Sides, I was ear failing all my classes anyhow."

"What about Darry? Will he still play football with Paul and the others?"

"No, Darry has to take care of us, and I'm gonna help him, savvy?"

Ponyboy looks up at Soda, worried green eyes surprising his older brother. "But who's gonna take care of Darry?"

His older brother stopped running his fingers through Pony's hair. "I don't know," he admits.

He and Dallas Winston are walking down the street together, when out of nowhere, he admits, "I don't remember what she smells like."

Dallas stops to look at him weirdly, "What?"

"My mother," Pony says, "I don't remember what she smells like."

Dallas sucks on his weed for a minute, before putting it out with his heel. He motions with his head for the younger boy to follow him. They head into a store Pony had never been in, and the older boy hardly seems to know his way either, so he figures it must be a Soc store or something. Dally plucks a bottle from an aisle they'd been looking for for three minutes, all under the careful, suspicious eye of the cashier. "Here," Dallas says, handing him the bottle. "Go on, smell it. I wanna make sure it's the right kind."

Ponyboy, eyes flickering between the older boy and the bottle that fit nicely into his palm, takes a sniff. "It's this one," he says quietly, tears pricking his eyes.

"Go pay for it," Dallas tells him, handing him a bill and some coins. As Pony turns to do so, he says, "Uh, kid. Just remember... greasers don't cry for nothin', alright?"

"Okay, Dally."

"Steve," Ponyboy says one day, when he and his brother's best friend are left alone, Soda helping a customer.

"What?"

"I asked Two-Bit a few weeks ago, but why wasn't it one of us?" It's a simple question, no longer lonely and sad, but it makes Steve stop short and think.

"We all have a story," he says hesitantly. "And that would've meant that your story would've ended too quickly."

"Oh," Pony says. "Thanks, Steve."

"Happy birthday, kid." His hand is rough in Ponyboy's greased up hair, but he appreciates the effort of kindness.

He doesn't cry anymore, because he's a greaser. He was born a greaser and raised a greaser, and greasers don't cry.

But you still can't blame him if his thanks come out a bit watery. It's the first birthday that his parents don't attend, but it's not the last.

Ponyboy Michael Curtis has been fourteen for a month and a week or so when he visits Dally's grave. He sets a tiny bottle down on the flat grave and lays down a few flowers he's handpicked, because Dallas thought that flowers were for broads but has always been secretly fond of the small daisies that grow on the roadsides.

"Thanks," he says, his voice rough. "Can you give this back to her for me?" Pony draws in a shuddering breath and continues, "I know you said that greasers don't cry and that I should harden myself to the world, and I'm trying, but... it's raining so fucking much, y'know?" Gently touching the gravestone, he wiped his face with the back of his hand. "Bye Dal, see ya soon. Take care of Johnny for me, savvy?"

Then he looked into the clear sky and said, "Let's hope this weather clears up soon."