S.E. Hinton owns. It's late here and Darry Curtis decided to pay me a visit. He'd been nagging at me all day, really. (That was a cheesy way of saying that I was just thinking of the Curtis brothers while listening to some sad songs today and I wanted to write about them).

I'm not much like Pony—his artistic side, for instance, where he could sit for hours and stroke colors into pretty skies and trees or thin black lines into a face, or jot down words to make a simple, heartfelt poem. For me everything is just fact and real, not some romantic, rose-tinted version that tries to make ugly truths a beautiful piece of expression. Pony sure likes to paint and write, creating stories on paper through a brush or a pen, and a part of me yearns for the same imagination, for some way to take my pain and use it, to make it...something else. He gets that from our Momma and I still got the painting of horses she made me when I was a little boy to prove it. He'd tried to replicate it not too long after she died, his way of reconnecting with her I guess. He said it was like he was holding her hand. I didn't understand it.

I love to read, don't take me wrong, but I take things the way they are and that's it: there's no metaphor in my life, no hidden symbolism I seek, no capturing of a sentence or moment delicately and thoughtfully on a piece of paper. If something hurts me, I move on with a solemn face and indifferent emotion. I remain unmoved by tragedy because that's the only way I know how to do things. I let my little brothers do all the feeling, forever the sturdy rock against vast, relentless stormy waves.

If I ever need to let off some steam, there's fighting, arguing, yelling, or just plain playing football and working out. No real diving into how I feel or letting it out directly. Ponyboy's envious of me because he thinks I got to know Mom and Dad better than him, and trust me, I know I'm damn lucky to have them until twenty instead of the tender age of thirteen. I could bawl for my brother, who at the peak of beginning manhood lost the two most solid pillars of his foundation, and got two younger, less experienced, not-as-sturdy ones in their place, who loved the hell outta him and tried really hard and that's all they got going for them.

Tonight, for example, the kid scrunched up his face when I mentioned at dinner how much Dad told me about his parents and how I wondered where the hell they were now, since he mentioned that his Daddy left him real young. I was joking around, suggesting that I oughta call the man up and demand he pay us for all those years lost that he should've spent on his son.

"Think about it, all those years piled up and I could get a real big check," I said, shaking my head, pretending like it could really happen. "You know, Dad used to make that -"

Pony threw his fork down with a huff, wrinkling his face. "You know, I don't really wanna hear too much about what Dad used to do. We all know what he was like. So stop rubbing it in what you know and we don't!"

Sodapop turned to look at the both of us, back and forth, lookin' like he was wondering why the hell he was being dragged into this. I was equally as surprised, as I was trying to be pleasant and just make conversation. It wasn't fun just hearing him laugh at all Soda's sentences. Lord knows the kids in school liked talking to me, ladies and guys alike, in fact, people used to damn well kiss my ass, so I couldn't see why my own brother couldn't just suck it up and pretend like I was doing something right.

"He ain't tryin' to rub anything in, Pony," Soda started gently, but he was only cut off.

"Dad never talked to me about any of that stuff," he whined, so passed any reasoning, only lost in a storm of things not being fair. "He and Dad got to do so much together, they went on trips and talked for hours, hell, he even gets to look like him, I can't stand it, it's so unfair..." he shook with rage at the nerve of me resembling Dad.

I tried to reach over to touch him, but he flinched away. "Pony, listen, I didn't mean to bother you. I'll shut up about Dad," I said. I took a deep breath, repeating, "I'll shut up."

I wanted to tell him that he got to know parts of them that I didn't get to explore for myself. That yeah, I got to know things he didn't, I got more time, but it ain't everything. He did so much with what he got with them. I should've been home more like he was. He was always here. He was their baby. I just wished he could see that, so maybe I could complain and whine like him for once instead of swallowing all the sadness...maybe one day he'd see that he got the sweet moments, the quieter ones that made his heart swell, I imagine, like making warm cookies with Mom or learning how to draw the perfect rose or watching Dad play the guitar softly while I bitched at him to not wait up for me when I went out. I would do anything to get those moments the same way he'd desperately cling to any extra year, month, or second he could get with them.

I can't even remember a time anymore when I wasn't focused on school, football, girls, or parties when my parents were alive. I hope to God that there was a time when I was better than that. Please let it be true.

Anyway, Soda had eased the tension. "Aw c'mon, we don't gotta shut up about Dad. Remember when he yelled at my teacher for hitting me that one time?" Pony sat up straight, intrigued, and I wondered how the hell this was fair. Soda could talk about Dad lightly and I couldn't? Jesus. "He'd broken my wrist just because I was talking a little when I wasn't supposed to. He up and got a ruler to smack me with, and when Dad found out, you better believe he drove all the way to school and demanded to break the teacher's wrist back..."

My father could tell stories too, and that's some kinda art, some other thing Pony was fond of, so I guess that's another way I fall flat. It's a way he'd let out his feelings, like my middle brother. They made things interesting, exciting. Like Sodapop, his arms would move wildly and his tone would lower to cause suspense or highlight the intensity, and rise to cause us to jump in our spot or die of laughter. Sodapop in particular likes to exaggerate. One time when we were kids we were playing football outside in the field with some of the neighborhood children, including Two-Bit and Johnny, and it was getting dark, so I reminded Sodapop that we were to be home before sunset. With a pout, he'd said goodbye to everyone, and we'd walked side by side to our home.

Seems like a normal story, right? Only the little bastard was so upset about leaving the game and his friends, he'd had it in his head to get me into trouble. The second we'd gotten home, he threw his arms around our mother and noisily pretended to sob on her shoulder, meanwhile my jaw had dropped open as he went on and on about what I had apparently done to him.

"Oh Mom, I'd just been playing with the boys and Darry was so mad that he got picked last to join a team that he'd grabbed me and slammed me down, Mom -"

"No I didn't!" I yelled, trying to pry him off our mother. He was seven though and had a strong grip, his fingernails digging into the poor woman's shoulder and I was afraid he'd hurt her accidentally. "I was picking the teams, what are you even yapping about, squirt?"

He continued as if he wasn't struggling against me. I realized he had to keep hold of her so she couldn't see his face because although he was attempting to sound pained, he was failing at keeping a grin off his face, probably wanting to laugh at himself and the situation he was creating. Seriously, you'd have thought that I was the one that wanted us home early. I swear, he's always been a drama queen.

Pony noticed, tried not to snicker.

Mom rolled her eyes and shrugged Sodapop off her. "If you don't stop spilling all them lies I'll let your father know when he gets home," she said sternly, but I noticed a small twinkle in her eye. She loved the kid and thought he was a gas, even if he was trying to frame me. I was never clever in that way, able to take life and spin it into something else. Pony can do it on paper, like I mentioned, with them poems.

I was fuming by the time Soda finished his story about the teacher and Dad, though. I was feeling hopeless as I ate my dinner, heart beating rapidly and heavy, just wishing I could fit in better with the kid. I wanted to open my mouth and pettily ask what the hell was so interesting about one of the thousand times Soda's been in trouble, but Pony was grinning now, and I thought, if he's happy, I'll shut up about it. I just wanted to know where I fit when I saw those two chatting like that. Even with dinner having been over for an hour now, I'm still wondering. My head's pounding so hard I can't think straight.

I don't even know what I'm getting at anymore. I'm just tired, lost in this whirlwind of loss and confusion and exhaustion. I'm so fed up with trying to be Mom and Dad when I don't got all the parts right, when I can't understand simple things about them that my brothers just get naturally in a way that helps them reconnect. I keep complaining, I keep wishing for more when I really should be more grateful because Dad and I were buddies and Mom was proud of me, but I can't help it. Sometimes I don't wanna be straightforward, I just want to fall back on toasty, comfy memories and sob into my pillow. I can't help but wonder why I didn't settle into the silent joys of life, the ones that were easy and less strict on facts, and just purely emotional. Why don't I talk about things that hurt me? Why can't I open up and be vulnerable to the very world I'm so terrified of?

Let me be for one second, dammit, I think to myself as I hear Pony crying in the other room. He has been doing so much of that lately, what with Johnny and Dallas being gone too, and this whole theme his teacher asked him to write. All I gathered was that he's writing about real experiences, and it's tearing him up, just about eating him alive. He cries in his room every night he writes it. The walls are thinner than he thinks, 'cause I sneaked a peak at the beginning of the theme and he said, 'You don't just cry in front of Darry.' Well, I can hear him. I don't know how to help him, and it drives me crazy to listen to him sniffle and hiccup, so I usually shamefully put on some music and allow it to drown him out, so that the only things that exist are the record and my voice accompanying it, purposely filling the whole home.

I just figured he had to get through it. When he would emerge swollen-eyed and red, the only affection I'd offer would be a pat on the back. The rest of it was practical, just the necessary things, like the glass of water and turkey sandwich I'd put on his desk when he went to the bathroom to wash his face.

"Pony, just write about something less hurtful," I'd snap at him, nearly downright beg him, later on. "I don't see why you gotta put yourself through all that. It don't make sense to me." He'd shake his head silently at my criticism, not bothering to explain to his angry big brother why he needs to express his truths the only way he knows how. Besides, Soda's the one that understands. What I wouldn't give to be like that.

"Darry, don't worry about it, I got it," Soda says as he leaps up from washing up at the sink towards the bedroom, yanking me back to the present situation. He slaps me on the back from my spot at the table. I feel so shitty.

I put on a record to lull my thoughts to smoothen roads instead of the bumpy, rocky direction they were headed. I let Frank Sinatra fill the room and attempt to fill my head, as he sings, "Usually in the morning I'm filled with sweet belonging, and everything is beautiful to see..." and instantly his love song has a different and more familial meaning to me, and now it belongs to us, the Curtises, and everything we have become.

It's just an awful, horrible lonely feeling sometimes. I know I had a lot in common with Dad, he told me so much about his life, I would tell him about my secrets (when it was appropriate), we would joke around like buddies...why do I feel like I missed something deeper? We had a close bond, I shouldn't feel so lonely...these jumbled thoughts are so silly, I should know better than to dwell this way...I'm smarter than this. I'm tougher than this, dammit.

"Sometimes I feel like a sad song, like I'm all alone without you..." I can't stop my tears from flowing if I tried. I can't bring my hands up to my face, my arms are so sore from working all day...I think they'd fall off if I raise them, they're so sore...they'd weigh more than I can carry.

If I close my eyes, I can hear the guitar and pretend it's Dad, like it's him and Pony on the couch all those months ago. In my mind, I can picture the moment, I can see myself decide to not go out like I did, and instead I'm sitting next to two of the three men I love the most, and I'm just letting Dad's strumming of the instrument engulf me with tenderness and lovely feeling...and it's not lonely. There doesn't need to be a reason for us sitting there, singing a sad song, we just want to because it feels wonderful and comfortable to melt into a puddle once in a while...

And I sing along with my father in my mind and in my heart, my eyes still shut, "Oh and in the night time I know that it's the right time, to hold you close and say I love you so..." I hear his voice within my own, deep and filling the room, the whole house, yet another night my baby brother cries and I can't reach him the way I want to. It consumes both his sadness and my own. I repeat the song over and over so I'm closer to those I want to be with instead of alone, in my own, stupid way.

x

"To be near you and how it is to touch you, oh paradise was made for you and me..." Darry's deep, full voice floats through the room throughout the hour, lulling Sodapop to sleep next to me, and making my heart swell at the warmth of the sound that I pray won't end. He does this every time the weight of the world threatens to pull me under, when I'm locked in my room and my head is filled with a sea of overwhelming memories, and he still finds his way to me. Intertwined with his comforting, heart-filled singing that effortlessly slips through the cracks of my door I can hear my father. I know in the morning I will find a glass of water and a turkey sandwich on my desk and I will pretend it was Mom who left it there, like always. Though Sodapop is the one that understands me, Darry, my guardian, my biggest brother, is the one that through time, loss, and even death, has managed to somehow grip every real memory and provide it into our everyday lives, bringing pieces of our parents to us, hoisting it on his back with every bundle of roofing, every pressure, and bringing us all back together.

Frank Sinatra's song "Like A Sad Song" was the one Darry was singing and is where the title of this comes from. By the way it killed my Canadian ass to spell colours like "color" so I hoped you enjoyed this. :')