Thanks for sticking around guys and thanks for the reviews! Going to keep this A/N short and simple this time and get straight to it.

Disclaimer: I don't own any of the characters.

------------------

Pony

------------------

"Have you ever smoked?"

"…Duh."

"Drank?"

"Shouldn't you already know these things?"

"Any sexually transmitted diseases we should know about?"

"Come off it, Soda!" I shouted quietly.

"Sorry." He looked back down at the stack of papers still in his lap.

I sighed and went back to tapping on the side of my chair. Soda was a hazy mess, but I could tell that he was doing his best to make me feel better. That's the way it was between us. I'd try to make him better, and subsequently make it worse. Then he'd try to make me feel better about making him not feel better and the vicious cycle would go on and on. Brothers. Gotta love it.

I was kind of glad that I couldn't see his face, couldn't see the worry that I knew would be creeping beneath his eyes.

Soda, I don't deserve you.

It was strange, looking at the world through another person's eyes. When we had come to the hospital a few months ago, the bright gleam of the polished tiles had nearly blinded me, but now, to me at least, they were a comfortable gray mat on the ground. Off-white shapes walked back and forth clutching brown squares, most likely clipboards. Other colors were rushing to and fro, people coughing and wheezing their way from one end to the other. Hospitals bothered me. I hated them. Hated the lives they took away…

"Pony…boy Curtis?" A voice boomed from behind. I whipped around to see a mass of white. Soda lifted his head from his laborious studying of the last few sheets of paper that didn't really seem relevant… to… well, anything.

"That's me," I said softly.

There was a rustling of papers as the doctor flipped hastily through his clipboarded documents that Soda just handed him.

"Come this way." I couldn't tell whether or not he was smiling, but his voice had a pleasant lilt to it. I hated stressed out, agitated doctors. They hardly ever really checked up on you.

I stood up on my wobbly feet. I'd forgotten that they hadn't been working too well. Soda rushed up and grabbed my shoulders.

"Steady there, Pon'," he whispered, helping me down the hallway that the doctor had briskly walked down. He turned into a room, presumably, as it looked to me as if he had simply stepped through the wall.

"If you'll just get up onto this table," the doctor ordered, as we walked in. I could tell that he was smiling a great big ol' smile from the tone of his voice. Doctors generally always seem happy, I suppose, as to not scare away their patients.

Soda lifted me up onto the cold metal surface, though I honestly wouldn't have had much trouble getting there myself. I almost slapped him for treating me like some disabled toddler.

The doctor paused for a second and turned to look at Soda.

"What are you doing in here?"

"Huh?"

"Family?"

"Oh, yeah. I'm his brother."

"Alright, just checkin'. Now let's see what's going on here."

The doctor swung something off of his belt, kind of like batman's utility belt. A bright spark of light suddenly flashed in my right eye, then the other.

"Hm…"

The doctor's voice wasn't so chipper anymore.

--------------

Soda

--------------

I saw the doctor frown and instantly my breath got caught in my throat.

"What'd you get in your eyes?" he asked. How he knew that Pony had gotten something in his eyes was beyond me. But then again, doctors seemed to know their stuff pretty well.

"Hydrogen-peroxide."

"How'd you manage that?"

Pony's head unintentionally spun towards me, and for a second I felt like the smallest being in the entire world.

"Accident."

Pony…

"Look's like you got quite a bit on you. Let's see…" The doctor flipped through the forms I had handed him. "How's your vision?"

"I'm going blind, sir." I could tell Pony was getting a bit antsy. He hated hospitals.

"Maybe not so much," the doctor said with a slight laugh.

What're you laughin' at, bud?

The doctor turned off the… eye examining deal—I wanted to call it a stethoscope but then I'd be completely wrong—and stood up from his bent position in front of Pony.

"Well?" I asked, trying to mask the impatience in my voice.

"Well… he's not going completely blind, if that's what the two of you were worried about." I instantly let out a sigh and turned towards what I expected to be a relieved Ponyboy. He was just kind of staring at the wall, though, his eyes blank and emotionless.

"However, a layer of the cornea has been damaged by the hydrogen-peroxide. Normally, just a bit of it won't harm you, but it seems that he got more in his eyes than just a little bit."

"Right…"

Your fault, Soda.

"That would explain why his visions skewed at the moment. The damaged surfaces of his eyes aren't clear like they should be. It's almost like an intense case of color-blindness or incredibly bad eye sight." For a doctor, he didn't seem to use really technical words. He probably noticed that he was talking to a couple of greasers.

"At any rate, there's a new method of cornea transplant where we use healthy corneal tissue from a nearby eye bank to replace the central damaged tissue…"

I wasn't really paying attention to him at this point. Sure, it all sounded good… but expensive. Excessive money was a leisure us Curtis's didn't have. I looked back up at the doctor from where I had sat down as he continued to ramble on. Pony was still just staring blankly, his ears listening intently.

"…a bit of a risk."

"Sorry, what?" Apparently I had missed something important. Pony turned to look at the doctor. His brows were creased and his mouth was bent down at the corners.

"Yes, this new method, although fairly safe, has only been performed a couple of times at this institution. We could, however, send you to a specialist in Oklahoma City-"

"There's no way we could pay for it," I blurted out. I wondered why I was so concerned with the money issue. I would have worked triple shifts if that meant being able to pay for Pony to see again.

"Oh," the doctor said, a bit taken aback. "Well, like I said, we can do it here. It's a fairly simple procedure and shouldn't be too much out of your pocket. I'm sure your parents will help pay for it." He smiled genuinely at me. I knew he was trying to help, but he obviously didn't know our situation.

"That… won't be possibl-" I started to say when Pony interrupted in a thin raspy voice.

"What would happen if the operation went wrong?"

I noticed a bit of uneasiness flash briefly from behind the doctor's eyes as he turned to look at Ponyboy. He cleared his throat and stuffed his hands into his pockets.

What a complete change of appearance…

"Well… there's that chance that you'll lose your eye sight completely."

-----------------------------

I know development chapters like these are probably not much better to read than they are to write, but I swear the chapters will get more interesting! Hope you enjoyed! Don't forget to a leave a friendly/flaming review! My medical stuff might be off, but don't take that into account xD.

-J