First of all, OH MY GOSH. WOW. THAT'S JUST...WOW! 3 reviews? IN AN HOUR OR LESS?! *faints*

Thanks so much to Amanda, FrankElza, mycookiegirl, panda182, and Pony'sgirlfriend for reviewing – your requests are currently being written. In the meantime, I thought I might throw out another chapter.

This one's set when Darry, Soda, and Ponyboy were kids. Darry's twelve, Soda's eight-going-on-nine, and Ponyboy just turned six. It's told in third person because I'm pretty sure that something from the point of view of a six-year-old would be...uh...interesting, to say the least.


Bike

"Happy Birthday!" Ponyboy's family exclaimed. They uncovered his eyes to reveal a hand-me-down bike with a white ribbon on it. Even though everyone knew that it had been Soda's until now, Ponyboy didn't care. His face broke out in a gigantic grin.

"A bike!" he yelled. He ran towards it and petted it. "Wow..." he breathed. All the while, the smile didn't disappear from his face.

"Look, Ponyboy," Soda said, coming forward. "It even has a basket for puttin' your stuff in. You could carry 'round your football while ridin' your bike!"

"Whoa!" Ponyboy said, rubbing his fingers over the rim of the basket.

"And here," Soda continued, pointing to a metal object on the handlebars. "This is your own bell!" He pushed a lever on the side of the bell and it rang. Ponyboy gasped.

"This is so cool!" he exclaimed. "Thank you, Soda!" Ponyboy hugged Soda tightly.

"Don't thank me," Soda laughed, "thank Darry! He's the one who got the basket and bell on there."

Ponyboy ran over to his oldest brother and threw his arms around him. "Thank you, Darry," he whispered.

Darry, shocked at first, stood there awkwardly before hugging him back. "You're welcome, Pony. Happy birthday."

Pony looked up at him. "Can I ride it? Please?"

"Sure," Soda said, "Darry and I'll teach ya! Won't we, Dare?"

"We sure will!" Darry smiled. Ponyboy ran back to the bike and swung his leg over the seat so that he could sit on his new bicycle.

"Is this how ya do it?" Pony asked, somewhat confused as to why he wasn't moving.

"That's half of it," Soda laughed. "You forgot 'bout the kickstand." He bent down and lifted the kickstand. Ponyboy would've fallen right there, but Darry held on to the handlebars.

"Now, Pony," Darry said seriously. "You could hurt yourself, so be careful. What you're going to do is keep pedaling, but don't forget to turn. Don't go too slow or too fast and you should be good. Ready, we'll be right behind you." Ponyboy nodded. "On three, ready? One...two..."

"THREE!" Sodapop pushed Ponyboy's back and the boy flew down the driveway.

"Sodapop!" Darry exclaimed.

"Sorry, Dare," Soda grinned. "I guess I don't know my own strength!"

Darry and Soda hurried after Ponyboy, who'd turned so that he was riding down the road. From a distance, he looked like a professional, but his brothers both knew that he had a good chance of falling. Sure enough, he hadn't gone further then twenty feet when he hit a bump in the road and went flying off of the bike.

"Pony!" Soda shouted. The brothers doubled their efforts to reach him, which didn't take long. Ponyboy sat up just as they reached him. Tears threatened to spill from his eyes.

"You alright, Ponyboy?" Darry asked, kneeling down beside his younger brother.

"Yeah," he said, but his lip quivered. "I'm okay."

"You're leg don't make it look that way," Soda told him. When Ponyboy fell, he must've scraped his knee. He had a pretty bad scuffmark that had started to bleed.

"Can you stand up?" Darry asked. Ponyboy, not trusting his voice, shook his head.

"I'll run and get some stuff," Soda said, turning and running back to the house.

"D-D-Darry?" Ponyboy asked.

Darry looked back at him. "Yeah, sport?"

"It h-hurts," he said, the tears starting to fall. "It...it really hurts."

"It's okay," Darry assured him. "It's just a scrape – you're gonna be fine."

"Yeah?" Ponyboy looked up at him.

Darry wiped a tear from his face. "Yeah. Just fine. Then, you can get up and keep goin'. You got further than Soda did on his first time."

"I did?" There were still tear tracks on his cheeks, but he'd stopped – at least for now.

"Yeah," Darry chuckled. "Soda didn't even make it to the street! He smacked his face into a pole before he could get there."

Ponyboy laughed. "Did he get hurt?"

"Naw," Darry said. "He got a bloody nose, but that was it. He was too dizzy to try again until the next week!"

Ponyboy laughed again, like there was nothing more hilarious in the world than his older brother smacking his face on metal. Darry smiled.

Soda came running back with a box – their first-aid kit. "You know how to use this?" Soda stopped when he saw Ponyboy laughing and Darry smiling. He frowned. "What's so funny?"

The look on Sodapop's face only made Ponyboy laugh harder. Darry even started to chuckle. Sodapop was thoroughly confused, but he handed Darry the box.

"Okay buddy," Darry said, "Settle down. Let's get you all patched up."


*FANGIRLING FANGIRLING FANGIRLING FANGIRLING FANGIRLING*

I love the brothers. So much.

So much.

Next up is a request – but I won't tell you which one! If you have any ideas and would like me to write them in, go ahead and review!

R&R!