Bridgette Shepard was only six when she first laid eyes on Ponyboy Curtis. He was older and handsome and more mature at the ripe age of eight. He was exciting in those ways. He wasn't in the same gang that her brothers rolled with and that only added to his appeal. She loved her brothers to pieces but she didn't always like them. Ponyboy she liked.
So on that fateful day, as Curly tried to keep up appearances that he was tough and hard while also making sure his little sister didn't run into the street or do anything to hurt herself, Bridgette saw Pony being escorted to school by his older brothers. Darry, the oldest of the bunch, was going to his first day of high school. He had on nice, clean pants and a tight black shirt that showed off muscles that didn't even seem possible for a fourteen-year-old. He had a football in his hand and he would toss it into the air and catch it effortlessly. Soda was eating something and telling an animated story. Every once in a while, he would tear off whatever it was he was eating and hand a piece to his little brother. That little brother being Pony, of course.
Bridgette didn't think she had ever seen someone as handsome as Ponyboy Curtis. She really didn't. And that's saying something since Pony was standing right next to Soda Curtis, the best looking boy in town. Even at six, Bridgette could appreciate how handsome Soda was and why the other girls in town went crazy for him, even if he was only ten. But there was something about Pony.
Pony was trailing along behind his brothers, looking at the sky dreamily, accepting the bits of food from Soda without ever actually looking at him. He had a faraway look in his eyes that told Bridgette he wasn't really there. At least not mentally.
"What are you staring at?" Curly insisted. When she didn't respond, he followed her gaze. "Glory, Beej. You're too young to be into the Curtis boys. Stop it."
"I like his lunch box," Bridgette lied easily.
Curly glanced at Pony's lunch box, a simple blue one with a picture of the galaxy.
"Right, that's tuff," he said sarcastically.
The last thing she needed was for Curly to tell Tim that she liked a boy. She was only six but her brothers loved to give her a hard time about girly things, since she was the only girl and all.
Curly went off to be with his own friends the moment they reached school. He made sure Bridgette was safely on campus and that was about as far as his concern went. Bridgette noticed that Soda stuck close to Pony until the bell rang. They were joined by their other friends their age: Keith (who everyone calls Two-Bit), Steve, Johnny, and Dallas. Pony was the youngest at eight, though Johnny looked younger than him, and Two-Bit was the oldest. Soda and Steve started to wrestle and Two-Bit nudged Pony to get him to smile.
The only time Bridgette saw Pony was during lunch and recess. She watched him from afar the first week of school, studying his habits and hobbies. He always stuck close to his brother and friends and he liked playing sports. He was good at them, too.
After that first week, Bridgette decided that, yes, she loved him and she really should do something about it. So, as you do when you're six, she tossed aside any inhibitions or obstacles and walked directly up to him while he was playing jacks with the guys and took him into a hug. She didn't say anything or announce her presence. She just hugged him.
There was a moment of collected stunned silence from everyone, then a chorus of giggles. Once the giggles hit, Pony struggled and wiggled his way out of her embrace.
"What are you doing?" he demanded.
"I like you," she declared.
"Well, I don't like you. Now leave me alone."
Bridgette narrowed her eyes at him and crossed her arms. Pony looked at her, then at his friends for some kind of support. His friends just laughed and shrugged.
"Go get her, tiger," Two-Bit winked.
Bridgette took this as an invitation and gave him another hug. Pony groaned loudly and shoved her away.
"Hey!" Curly shouted. Bridgette smiled smugly at Pony. Her brother was here to stand up for her and he was going to be sorry for pushing her.
"She keeps hugging me!" Pony cried.
"Is this true?" Curly asked.
"Yes," she said stiffly. "I like him."
"You're too young to like boys," he scoffed.
"Am not."
"Are too. Don't be like the other girls in town," he said. Bridgette glared at him and balled her hands into fists. He turned to Pony and the boys, "Sorry about that."
"No sweat," Soda grinned.
"Who can blame her?" Two-Bit asked, looking at Pony admiringly. Pony slugged him on the arm.
"Come here," Curly demanded and grabbed his sister by the shoulder. He forced her to turn away from the group of boys and nudged her to walk forward. Bridgette could hear the boys giving Pony a hard time about it all. "What do you think you're doing?"
"I'm not doing anything," Bridgette pouted. "I like him."
"You're too young."
"Am not."
"Yeah huh."
"Nuh uh."
"Yeah huh."
"Nuh uh."
"Do we have a problem here?" Tim asked, coming up with two of his friends.
"Bridgette is hugging that Ponyboy Curtis kid. Says she likes him."
"I do like him."
"You're too young," Tim shook his head. "Listen to me, no more hugging him. Don't talk to him. Don't even look at him. You dig?"
"No," she huffed. "I do not dig."
"Well, learn to dig," he scowled. "Don't embarrass us."
She was too mad to respond so she just stomped her foot and stormed away.
As much as she disagreed with it, she did respect her brothers enough not to go around hugging Pony anymore. But she couldn't bring herself not to look at him. She would stare at him all the time at school and whenever she saw him around town. Pony noticed at first and glared at her or made a face at her every time he caught her. He got a hard time from the guys for it. But after a few weeks Pony practically forgot she existed. He had learned to ignore her so well that he just about forgot she existed.
Soda noticed, though. He noticed her hanging around the garage as he learned about cars from his dad while Pony sat on the curb. Or he would notice her as she just so happened to casually walk past the vacant lot on the weekends while the family played football. Every time he caught her, he would shoot her a warm smile. Bridgette liked Soda. He was different than any boy she knew. He was only ten, going on eleven, and he already understood and liked girls. He had a string of girlfriends before most people his age even realized relationships were an option.
"Where have you been?" Tim asked Bridgette after she came home from spying on Pony while he read in the park with his mom.
"I went to find Curly," she said casually.
"And?"
"And what?"
"Did you find him?"
"No."
"What have I told you about walking out on your own?" he sighed. "You're tough for a six-year-old girl but you're still a six-year-old girl."
"Being a girl has nothing to do with it," she argued with her nose in the air.
"Fine," he rolled his eyes. "But you're still six. No more running off by yourself. I mean it."
And when Tim spoke, Bridgette listened. She now she had to limit her Pony spotting to school and random coincidences around town.
This went on for a few years. The older Bridgette got, the more she learned to contain and control her admiration for Pony. She stopped trying to casually run into him on the playground and learned to hide her feelings to the best of her ability. Soda and their friends were all at high school so she no longer had his encouraging smile to give her hope. She when she was eleven, she decided to give up on him. Five years is far too long to waste time pining for someone who obviously doesn't care.
Only a year after she decided to stop liking him, tragedy struck and his parents died. It was just the brothers now. The entire neighborhood mourned, though no one showed it. You show your condolences but that's about as deep as anyone is willing to get.
Bridgette was in the same theater as Pony the day his life really turned upside down. She didn't try to be in the same movie as him. She wasn't following him around like she used to. It just happened and even though Bridgette swore him off, she couldn't help but smile to herself as she watched the back of his head more than she watched the movie.
As she promised, she called Tim after the movie and waited for him to come and pick her up. She watched Pony as he walked down the street and wondered where he was going or if he wanted a ride.
Of course, it was the next day that she heard the news. Johnny—sweet, innocent Johnny—had killed a Soc and was on the run with Ponyboy. The next week was a whirlwind of police, chaos, and uncertainty. No one knew where they were or if they were okay. Darry and Soda looked ready to fall apart at any moment. They weren't sleeping and they were constantly on edge.
It was a small relief when Pony returned a week later. Bridgette only got a glimpse of him as he was taken into the house. His beautiful hair was cut and bleached but he looked okay. The same couldn't be said for Johnny. Tim and Curly wouldn't take her to visit Johnny so she went on her own when she knew they would be busy.
"Hi, Johnny," she whispered, trying and failing not to tear up at the condition he was in.
"Bridgette," he asked in confusion.
"Yeah," she said sheepishly. She had never been close to Johnny, or anyone in his group. Mostly because Tim and Curly wouldn't approve but also because she was really trying to distance herself from Pony. The most contact she ever had with Johnny was when she would make a fool of herself in front of Pony. "How are you feeling?"
"Not bad," he said distantly. "Don't feel much."
"The drugs?" she guessed.
"Something like that," he said.
"You're a hero," she said. "You're all over the papers. People can't get enough of you."
"Yeah?" he asked and smiled the first real smile since she had been in there.
"Yeah," she nodded. "Look." She pulled clippings from the paper about him and laid them out so he could read them. "This one calls you a soldier of virtue."
"Soldier?" he asked quietly.
"Yeah. You fought to save people, didn't you? A soldier. A hero."
"That, uh, that really helps," he said. He inhaled sharply and winced. She reached out a hand to help him but stopped above his burned hand. "Thank you."
"Of course."
"Do you think you could do me a favor?"
"Anything."
"I really want to finish this book," he said and nodded towards a book on the table by his bed, "but I think I need some help."
"Say no more," Bridgette insisted.
"The page should be marked," he said, his voice already weaker than it had been at the beginning of their visit. Bridgette flipped to the page and noted silently just how many pages were left.
"Have you read it before?" he asked as he closed his eyes.
"Yeah."
"Then maybe you can just read me the important parts," he suggested. "And fill me in on the rest."
"Yeah," she agreed quickly.
And that was the last time she ever saw Johnny Cade. She read to him and told him what he missed and he thanked her, asked to have a piece of paper and a pen, and she left.
She never quite got over his death. Johnny was always the kid she knew as Pony's friend. The one that was tough but kind, if there is such a thing. And now she would never really know him. It bothered her to think back on her life, seeing him with black eyes he got from his dad while he laughed with the gang at school. He only ever looked truly alive and happy when with those boys. It was haunting.
"I want to fight," she told Tim that night.
"Absolutely not."
"We don't have that many people," she said logically. "I can help."
"One, you are a girl. Two, you are twelve. You must be stupid to even think about going to the rumble."
"I'm not stupid," she pouted. "I want to do it. For Johnny. For our kind."
"You'll be more help to us by sitting here. I'm serious. Don't come."
Like always, she listened to him like his word was set in stone. She sat on the couch, thinking about the boys fighting the Socs and hoping everyone came out okay. Everyone in the god forsaken town was screwed up about the whole ordeal and she had a sick feeling this rumble wouldn't do any good.
Tim came home with a broken nose and Bridgette knew the drill by now. She pinned him down and reset his nose. He shouted and cussed but eventually thanked her and went to shower.
The next day, Bridgette found out that Dally was killed by the police and Pony was in the hospital. Her first reaction was to panic, but Tim said the kid would be okay. He just needed rest.
She wanted to go visit him. She really did. And she might have done if it weren't for Tim's close watch on her lately. He wouldn't let her out of his sights. She didn't understand why he was doing it but she learned to accept it. It was for the best, anyway. She needed to get over him for real.
Bridgette and Pony were only a year apart in school, due to Bridgette working her ass off and skipping a grade or two. She was smart naturally but her parents were hard on her when it came to school. They must have realized their sons were lost causes and focused all of their expectations onto Bridgette. She had to have the best grades in class and she had have the best science experiment and history project. Anything less than the best was unacceptable.
Anyway, so even though they were a year apart, Bridgette still knew Pony was falling behind in school. He didn't even look like himself. He was a zombie going through the motions. He wasn't fooling anyone, especially his teachers.
Everyone treated him differently after the whole ordeal, too. They acted like he was trash, something to be feared. Everyone knew it was Johnny that killed that Soc and yet everyone steered clear of him. Bridgette wanted to reach out to him but she learned long ago that he wanted nothing to do with her, and she couldn't exactly blame him.
Slowly—very, very slowly—Pony snapped out of it and returned to somewhat normal. He would never truly be the same, of course, but there was a spark back in his eyes and he was smiling again. She missed that smile.