Std disclaimer: I don't own anything about The Outsiders (book or movie, characters, TV scripts, or anything else)

I woke up in Darry's lap, Soda hunched behind the wheel, peering into the stormy darkness. I hurt everywhere but tried not to groan as the truck squeaked and bumped over the badly pitted back roads. Even though he drove only as fast as he dared (which wasn't too fast, given that the storm had kicked up again) it was still too jarring for me. Darry's voice was as calm as he could manage. He kept saying stuff like,

"Easy, Pony. You're gonna be okay..." and "We're almost there…"

I just turned my face into his shoulder. I was awful tired, even after all the sleeping I had done. And then the truck slammed hard into a pothole and the world fell away again.

I kept fading in and out. Felt sort of like being on a carousel, dizzily watching for that one reference point…like the person waving at you from the sidelines, and everything else just a quick, crazy blur. Images, flashes of things came and went. Bright, fuzzy light. A doctor in a wrinkled white coat bending over me with one of those pen lights like on TV. A woman's voice…

"-blood sugar's dangerously low…"

There was input from Darry and Soda, too, though it seemed to come from a mile away.

"It's probably been a week since he's eaten anything…"

"…just sort of gasped and passed out," Soda was saying to someone. "Back of his shirt's all bloody, too."

And then Darry with that tightness to his voice again. "…took a barn door across his back in the tornado….sent him into a post face first…a couple times, and then landed on his back."

The gurney was moving. A count of three, and then they set me down on a hard surface. A buzzing. I opened my eyes. I guess I looked bewildered, because a woman with a kind face said,

"It's okay, sugar, we're just taking some X-rays."

I closed my eyes again. I was so tired. I drowsed, half unaware of the world while still registering some of the conversation around me.

"How long was he unconscious initially?"

"I'm not sure," Soda said. "Felt like forever."

Darry chimed in. "Maybe twenty minutes," he said. But he sounded unsure.

"That popping you heard was most likely a spontaneous correction of the separated shoulder…muscle spasms…concussion…shock…suture the gash on his back…bruising and swelling…"

I tried to follow everything the doctor was telling them, but, glory, it seemed like the laundry list was never going to end. If I'd been a car, he'd have told them to just get me to a wrecking yard.

When I next became aware of anything again, there was an IV needle taped to the back of my hand, and the doctor was back, giving instructions. "He'll need one of these about every six hours. You'll need to take him to your family doctor in about ten days to get those sutures pulled out of his back."

"When can he come home?" Darry asked, his voice gruff.

"As soon as he can hold a coherent conversation," the doctor replied. "Being a little foggy from the pain medication is one thing, but until he stops losing and regaining consciousness, he's not going anywhere."

I listened to this with my eyes closed. I wanted to open them, because it meant going home. I didn't like hospitals much, not after Johnny. And especially not after Soda. But they might as well have been stitched shut, too.

It was all a big blur. I don't even remember leaving the hospital, but Darry told me later that they wouldn't release me until I stayed awake and made some sense. Funny thing is, he says I had a nice long talk with our social worker, who stopped by at Simpson's request. Just another attempt by Mr. Chairman to sponsor a juvenile delinquent into a "healthier environment". According to Darry, I told her all about helping Rossey, thinking Darry hated me and that he'd turned me over to the state on his own. I told her I went to the barn hoping Rossey was there, because if my brother didn't want me anymore, I'd just as soon he shoot me, too. Darry almost couldn't get that part out. It choked him up some. But like I said, I found that all out later. Because, of course, it made things worse. Made Darry look like some kind of hard case, when it really should have just made me look like a stupid young kid who didn't understand the sort of worries put upon a guy who had to step up into a father's shoes with no more notice than it took for a quick union of opposing metal on a storm-slicked road.

No, I didn't remember actually leaving the hospital, but suddenly I was back in the truck, like I'd been dreaming the X-rays and the IV, my head tipped over on Darry's shoulder, staring at the blotchy, rain-spotted windshield. I didn't hurt anywhere anymore. Everything took a lot of effort, though, and I felt sorta…detached from everything.

"Darry?"

"Hmm?" He was sleepy next to me. Guess Soda was driving again.

"Are they gonna split us up?"

"No."

"Are you sure?"

"I won't let them," he told me, though I figured even he knew he had no real control over that. But he needed to believe it just as much as I did right then, I guess.

When we got home, my muscles weren't working at all. I might've been afraid if it wasn't for that floaty, devil-may-careness that held me. Darry hauled me out of the truck as if I weighed no more than a sack of potatoes.

"Jesus," Darry swore softly, "if he loses any more weight, we'll have to tie a rope around his ankle."

"Man," Soda yawned, "he looks bad."

"He'll be okay. You heard what the doctor said."

The screen door squeaked, and Darry hitched sideways to keep from knocking my head on the frame. That's when someone shouted,

"Glory! What happened to Pony?!"

"He's okay, Two-Bit," Darry repeated wearily, just like he'd said to Soda.

"He looks stoned!"

"He pretty much is," Soda agreed soberly. "Doc's got him on enough muscle relaxers to put a horse down."

Two-Bit's voice followed us through the house. "Where's his clothes?"

That's when I realized I was wearing a hospital gown and there was a band around my wrist.

"Doctor cut 'em off. His shirt was torn up, anyway."

And then I went back to only hearing pieces of things as Darry eased me down onto my bed.

"…needs most is food and rest…"

"…barn. Cherry saw…thought she was crazy, but we'd looked everyplace else…"

"…talk about this in the morning?"

And then the light went out, and I went with it.