I keep thinking of Johnny whenever I hear Bohemian Rhapsody, so let's give this a try, eh? Nothing in this belongs to me.
It's still hard to grasp. That one night of what might have been fun turned into something much more sinister, darker, clawed and growling at him but always out of sight so that it didn't hit him until a bit after. When he was actually holding it in his hand, after he'd shoved the body off of him. After they all ran.
Then again, part of his mind always told him he'd end up like this. Desperate, a murderer and why? Because he hadn't defended himself the one time he should have. What would his mother say when she heard the news; that her son was a cold-blooded murderer.
"Knew he'd always end up like those no-good friends've his… I ain't bailin' him out."
She'd probably play it up a bit for the press when they came around. If they came around. It would be big news, but who wanted to hear the angle from the mother of the killer? It was all about drumming up sympathy for the victim, more sympathy than was really necessary if there was such a limit for the dead. He dropped his head into his hands, fingers running over his scar as if to assure himself he wasn't the one who started it all.
"Grease!"
Don't turn around; if you do they'll strike. Keep walking. One foot after another, right left right left.
"Greaser!" Engine revving, vulcanized rubber on the concrete, bringing up small rocks with it. "C'mon grease, we just wanna play."
If you run they'll run you down. Run you over. It'll save a lot of money on burial if you're smashed into the pavement, won't it. They'll scrape you off with a spatula and drop you into a hole. Any hole.
But your breathing quickens and your pace increases a bit until you're fast-walking. Laughter behind you. They're getting a kick out of this. Then running. Breathing in gasps, nothing matters except the house just a block away from the vacant lot. The vacant lot and that's all. Clear that and you're safe.
They have a car, and you're barely running faster than the vehicle. Quit smoking. Quit smoking and you'd be okay.
Car doors open, people run out, skin hits skin and in the end you're left barely conscious, trying to muffle your sobs against the pavement, quieting your screams with your fist as you bite down on it. A broken tooth, one loosened in the back. Wrist hurts, it feels like someone stabbed you in the face with something rusty and you don't have the energy to wipe the blood away from your nose which rolls down toward your mouth mixed with the tears and snot that you can't even wipe away.
You're in real bad shape.
Then of course, there had been the park. After he spent the next however-many-weeks hiding, tired of being so afraid but unable to step out of the web of fear and pain he had weaved for himself. Like a giant spider, poisonous but small.
Drowning Ponyboy. All you hear is your own gasping, see your friend thrashing around in the fountain and eventually going still. They forgot about you. All their yelling drills a hole into your head, going deeper and deeper until it finally hits a nerve and you get up slowly, hand reaching for the switchblade in your back pocket.
You didn't have it before. It could have saved some time.
The one with the dark hair doesn't even look at you when you approach, but his friend does. The one that looks like he doesn't even want to be there, all that uncertainty hidden under the anger, and he grabs his friend's shoulder, turns him around to tell him to move, but you stab.
"YOU FUCKING KILLED HIM."
It's one long, high-pitched scream, wavering as the body falls forward and the arms move toward the wound, pressing as blood flows through the fingers and falls onto the pavement. You can't move, and you fall as the body lands on top of you. Everyone's gone, and Ponyboy is in the fountain.
"Johnny?"
He looked up, fingers digging into his thighs, clawed, a monster. He really was a monster.
"Yeah?" His voice is a lot steadier than he would have liked. He sounded insensitive, uncaring, like it was a normal day for him instead of one of the worst days of his life. But he'd made it that way… there wasn't any going back. For a moment his eyes flitted toward the blurred scenery as the train sped toward Windrixville, where they would be spending the rest of their lives if the search was never given up.
Ponyboy toyed with the edge of his shirt. It was beginning to fray and he was pulling threads out of it and wrapping them around his fingers until they turned purple from lack of circulation. "Just… I dunno. What'd it feel like t'kill 'im?"
How did it feel? Blood pounded in his ears, filled his mouth and nose, dripped out a gaping wound in his chest and lifeless eyes were fixed on the dark, starless sky. The grip on his legs tightened, and he hunched a bit, eyes going blank.
"You okay Johnnycake?" Ponyboy put an arm around his friend's shoulders, looking disturbed at the way his friend appeared to be unaware of the outside world.
"I'm gonna die, Pone," he whispered, voice wavering just a bit with the emotion he had been holding back for what seemed like the entire evening. "That… that guy wouldn't die if they put 'im up there…" But they couldn't put him up in front of the courts because he was dead.
The embrace Ponyboy pulled him into tightened a bit, but he shied away. "Lemme go, man," he mumbled as he pressed his head to his knees and tried to make it seem like whatever battle was being waged in his head was not bad enough that he couldn't sleep.