Johnny was never angry, not usually. He would turn it inward, and hold his head in his hands and say he wanted to kill himself. That scared me, because I thought he meant it.
We were as close as brothers, the whole gang was. But truthfully I didn't feel all that close to Steve, he was more Soda's friend than anything. I didn't feel all that close to Dally, he was too scary and too violent. New York had got into him. I didn't feel all that close to Darry, he was too burdened with everything since my parents died, and when he saw me all he saw was a mouth to feed and someone who needed to keep their grades up to get into college on a scholarship. That left me with Soda, Two-bit, and Johnny.
It was after school and I walked down to the vacant lot, just to see if I could play a quick game of football or something, but no one was around. I lit a cigarette and wondered what to do next when I saw Johnny walking toward me. Before he reached me I saw the anger burning in his eyes, and it kind of surprised me.
"Hey, Johnny," I said.
"Hey," he said quietly, but there was that edge of anger. He stood a little ways away from me and lit up a cigarette, cupping his hand against the slight wind. Sometimes I forgot that he was two years older than me, because he was so small and he was in my grade. That was because I got moved ahead and he got left back.
I was thinking of the little fight me and Darry had got into today, him harping on me about my grades and about track and about everything, about forgetting shit everywhere and being disorganized and he was basically on my case. Mom and dad had never been like that. I tried to remember that Darry hadn't been doing this as long as they had, and that he was a lot younger than mom and dad, but it still seemed like he was plenty older than me. It still seemed unfair.
I could usually talk to Johnny about this stuff, he'd listen, at least. Johnny had plenty of his own problems and wasn't usually much help, but it helped having someone listen.
"Man, Darry is really on my case," I said, inhaling a deep drag of my cigarette. Johnny glanced at me, scowling. Had I ever seen him scowl? I had, I'd seen him mad, but not often. But he was mad now, I could tell by the darkness of his eyes. He had the collar of his jean jacket flipped up, and his black greasy hair was hanging straight into his eyes and he kept flipping it back.
"He just won't let up, man," I said, flicking my cigarette high into the air, watching it arc down into the street, a little spray of sparks coming from it.
"Oh, yeah?" Johnny said with disinterest, and I glanced at him now. His lip looked a little swollen today, and I thought I saw a redness by one of his eyes, redness that would probably develop into a nice black and blue by the weekend. It was nothing new. His old man knocked him around pretty good.
I sometimes focused on my own problems and didn't notice that other people had them. I did this mostly with Soda, because Soda was the one I blabbered everything to. He was usually pretty good about it, listening and being all helpful and everything, but once in a while he was dealing with his own shit and I was being oblivious. I thought I might be doing that to Johnny now.
"I'm sorry, just going on about me. Are you alright?" I said, seeing how his shoulders were hunched up, how tensed he looked just standing here smoking in the lot, how he would take these shuddery breaths.
He looked at me quick, and now anger wasn't just simmering somewhere beneath the surface, it was blazing in his eyes. But I wasn't so sure it was anger exactly directed at me. It kind of was, which was puzzling, but not exactly. Maybe Johnny would open up and talk to me.
"Hey, what's wrong?" I reached out to touch his shoulder and he jerked away from me, the anger still blazing in his eyes.
"Nothin'," he said, moving away, his head down, smoking the last of his cigarette.
I watched him walk away, so skinny, his jeans hanging off of him, the jean jacket hanging down to his waist. Further away I could clearly see the redness around his eye and his rapidly swelling lip.
I don't know what made me go after him and push things. Sometimes it was better to just leave people alone. But I figured he was my friend and maybe he needed to talk to someone. Maybe I just went after him because I was in the mood to talk, and I didn't really consider his feelings.
"Johnny, wait…" I said, grabbing his arm, and I felt his muscles tense up even more in my hand, piano wire muscles.
"What, Ponyboy?" he said, shrugging out of my grasp, flipping his hair out of his eyes, reaching for another cigarette but finding none, he balled up the empty pack and whipped it to the ground.
"What is it? What's wrong?" I said, having a fair idea of what was wrong but asking anyway.
He didn't answer, just shook his head, touched one finger to his swollen lip. I saw his nails that were all bitten down, the skin around them ragged from his gnawing on them.
"Look, you can talk to me, I tell you enough of my problems…I mean, you can tell me what's wrong," I said, feeling the anger coming off of him in waves.
The afternoon light was getting dimmer, and the slight wind blew and rustled the leaves over our head. I thought of Darry making supper now, and how I wished he'd back off for awhile. I couldn't take all his nagging.
"Johnny, c'mon," I said, after a while of silence.
He looked straight at me, his eyes narrowed a bit. It didn't occur to me that this was a severely neglected and abused kid, depressed and suicidal, and most likely he'd just left his house after a beating. I knew these things, but I didn't think of things this way. I thought of him as just my buddy Johnny, quiet, shy to the point of phobia, the gang's little pet.
"What do you want me to say, Ponyboy?" he said, his words quiet but somehow edged with steel, "Do you want me to tell you what's wrong? What good will that do? The things you complain about…" he trailed it off, shook his head.
"What's that mean?" I said, anger edging into my own words.
"It means, shit, Ponyboy, Darry is on your case because he worries about you and cares about you and wants good things for you, can't you see that? Who the fuck cares about me? Not my parents. They don't give a shit about me. You see this fat lip and black eye? That's the fucking least of it. Today, after school, he…"
He stopped talking and looked past me toward his house, maybe seeing all the terrible things that had happened to him there. I just stood next to him, stunned. He was right about Darry, of course, and I always forgot that Johnny was smarter than people gave him credit for, like teachers. Teachers thought because he didn't read so great that he was dumb, but it wasn't true. He got things, he understood things on levels a lot of people didn't.
How could I complain about Darry to Johnny? That was pretty thoughtless. I knew his parents didn't give two shits about him. I knew he was always getting beat, I saw the bruises and the shiners and the swollen and cut lips, and I saw the way he flinched away from every sudden movement.
"And I know it ain't your fault that you're so good in school and all," he said, "but you don't know how much I wish that I was like that. I got kept back a year cause I'm dumb and I can't read for shit, and none of it makes any sense anyway, and I can't concentrate on any of it. I miss so much school that I'm probably just gonna end up dropping out and then where will I be, huh? In college like you? I can't go to college, I couldn't do that kind of work, so I'm just gonna get a shit job around here and start drinking like my old man…I ain't gonna be any better than they are, it'll all repeat, I'll have kids or a kid that hates my guts as much as I hate my fucking parents…"
I listened, I'd asked for this. I'd asked him what was wrong, and I'd never thought it through like that, either. Johnny was smart, but not book smart, not get into college smart. What he said would happen would happen, or else he'd get drafted and shipped off to Vietnam.
He sat on the curb, looking off to the side. I sat next to him.
"Gotta cigarette?" he said, and I handed him one. He lit it, his hands shaking slightly.
"That's why I say I want to kill myself. Maybe being dead would be better than that, maybe being dead would be better than getting hit all the time. I wish you knew how good things are for you, and I know your parents are dead and all, but they were pretty good parents and you still got your brothers, and you're so smart that you'll go to college and be anything you want to be, but I'll be stuck here. I shouldn't have got so angry with you but sometimes I can't help it because I'm so jealous of you,"
He looked at me with this defeated, apologetic look, the anger nearly gone. He squinted his eye that was reddened, and I saw that it had started to water slightly and to swell. That eye would be a mess tomorrow.