"Hey Dallas where you been hiding?" Sylvia asked as Dally walked into Buck's.
"I ain't been hiding any where" Dally replied taking a seat at the bar.
"Well I haven't seen you around much"
"If you must know I've been helping a friend," Dallas said taking a swig of beer that was just placed in front of him.
"You mean the Cade kid?" Sylvia said in annoyance.
"His name is Johnny and yes that's who I'm talking about. What's it to ya?" Dally growled.
Sylvia walked behind Dally and put her arms around him rubbing her hands up and down his chest.
"Dally you spend too much time with that boy you need to let him solve his own problems. I mean so what his old man knocks him around every now & then he's not…"
"SO WHAT, SO WHAT what do you mean so what?" Dally interrupted. "And it ain't every now & then it's almost every damn day." Dally said taking her hands off him. He turned and glared at her.
"It's EVERY fuckin time he goes home. So what she says. I swear Sylvia sometimes I just don't understand you. Johnny's my friend and will ALWAYS be my friend...
"Awe come on sugar I don't want to fight lets go to your room and I'll make it up to ya"
Sylvia said putting her mouth on Dally's neck. Dally mumbled something, grabbed her hand and they went up stairs.
Sylvia came down stairs shortly after Dally had left.
"Hey Sylvia" one of her friends yelled.
"Hi Alice how's it going?" Sylvia asked sitting down at the table to join her.
"What's got you so down in the dumps?" Alice asked
"Johnny Cade "Sylvia said in disgust.
"What about him?"
"Dally spends all his time with him."
"So" Alice replied in confusion.
"So Dally's always got to be with him because his father alw…THAT"S IT!" Sylvia said in excitement.
"What's it?" Alice asked
"Cade's father, I bet he could keep the boy out of my way."
"Now why would he do that for you? I mean there's nothing in it for him."
"Maybe there is." Sylvia said with a huge smile as she was getting up to leave.
"Where are you going?"
"To make Mr. Cade an offer I'm sure he won't refuse" Sylvia smiled unbuttoning the top button of her very tight blouse.
"So we have a deal?" Sylvia asked as she picked her clothes up from the floor.
"Yeah, we got a deal honey. Just make sure you keep your end of it." Peter Cade said as he reached for his bottle of beer from the nightstand.
"I'll be over every Tuesday & Thursday night. Can you be sure Johnny will be out of my way?" Sylvia asked as she finished getting dressed.
"Oh don't you worry about the boy I'll enjoy keeping him out of your way." Peter said as he went over to her, grabbed a handful of hair then kissed her hard. He loved the way she kissed him back just as hard. "And I'll make sure he's out of OUR way too."
Johnny was on his way home from Ponyboy's house. It wasn't as noisy anymore at home, since his Mom ran off. Yeah his Dad still got drunk and beat the shit out of him. But since his Mom took off at least he didn't have to listen to them fighting.
It was dark when he got to his house, his dad's car in the driveway, maybe his dad was busy with one of his whores he brought home. A hobby he started when Johnny's mom left. Johnny walked in the house quietly but stopped cold when he heard the all to familiar "Come here, boy"
"Where you been?" he said coldly. As he walk up to his son.
"Umm…at a friend's house." Johnny said. His father never cared before where he was.
"Oh really..." He said as he backhanded Johnny hard enough to knock him to the floor. "Boy you ain't got no friends."
"Dad please" Johnny begged from the floor, not sure, if he should protect his stomach or his head from the next hit that he knew would come.
"There are going to be rules for you now boy," his dad said as he circled around the boy enjoying his son's fear of him.
"Rules?" Johnny asked looking up.
Just as Johnny looked up his father grabbed a handful of hair and growled "Yeah boy rules and you are going to follow them. Do you understand?"
Johnny, to scared to say anything just stared at his father fearfully.
Slapping Johnny across the face but still holding his hair his father started to speak again.
"Rule # 1 never ignore me boy. Do... you... understand?"
"Yes" he whispered.
"Good. Now that your mother is gone someone needs to take care of this place. Someone needs to make sure my dinner is on the table every night. Someone has to have a cold beer waiting for me when I get home. Do you know who that someone is?" Johnny's father said as he pulled Johnny from the floor by his hair and dragging him through the filthy house.
"M..m.me?"
"See now maybe you're not as stupid as I thought." Peter Cade said as he punched his son in the stomach and letting him fall to the floor.
"Now do you know what will happen if you don't follow my rules?"
"Please I swear I'll follow the rules. Please dad." Johnny begged.
His father smiled and then grabbed him off the floor stripped off his jacket, ripped off his shirt and threw them across the room. "Now, Jonathanwhen I call your name this is what you are to do. You are to put your hands on the nearest wall and stay there facing the wall until I tell you to move do you understand?"
"Yes sir" Johnny whispered.
"Good. Now get me a beer boy." His father ordered.
Johnny did as he was told and handed his father a bottle of beer. His father shoved it right back at him and yelled, "What are you an idiot? Open the fuckin' thing before you give it to me"
"Sorry" Johnny said as he hurried and opened the bottle and gave it back.
"You are not to leave this house without my permission. Is that understood?"
"What about school?"
His father stood quickly and glared at his son. "Did you not hear me when I said you are NOT to leave this house without my permission? If I find out you went out, called someone, or had someone over you WILL regret it for a VERY long time. Do you understand that JONATHAN?"
Johnny quickly went to the wall and did as his father had told not to long ago.
"My, my, my it didn't even take ½ an hour before you had to get up against the wall, now you just keep staring at the wall until I tell you to move." His father said as he grabbed a fistful of hair, pulling his head back to look him in the eye. "Do you understand that?"
Johnny whispered a fearful "yes" as his head was slammed into the wall he was facing.
His father let go of Johnny's hair and said "Don't you move."
Johnny could hear his father's belt being pulled through the loops on his fathers pants and he knew then what he was in for.
SMACK
Johnny didn't even have time to prepare for the first blow. It came so quick and hard he couldn't contain the cry of pain.
"Shut up boy I do not want to hear a word from you when your being punished. "
Johnny whimpered.
His father continued to hit him with the belt. Johnny lost count after 20.The tears ran down his face as he tried to hold in his cries of pain. He prayed that Dally would stop by and help him. But he knew that was not going to happen tonight because Dally had gone to Buck's with Tim Shepard and his crew.
Johnny could not take it anymore he screamed out in pain and he slowly fell to the floor and all the while his father still hitting him with the belt. Johnny was sure his old man was going to beat him to death tonight. Then everything went black.