Disclaimer: I do not own The Outsiders or the song Violence Fetish by Disturbed.

Saturday, March 12th, 1966

As with all high school football games Steve and the guys attended, their attention was not in any way on the game being played.

Dally had taken off looking for Sylvia, having been told by Curly Shepard that she'd come to the game with some other guy. Dally had been pissed and Steve half expected him to come back with at least a black eye.

Pony and Johnny were sitting in the seats on which Steve and Soda were leaning, quietly talking about some movie they had seen the night before. For once Steve didn't mind too much that Pony was there; he and Soda weren't with any girls tonight and, because Johnny was there too, Pony had kept fairly quiet and out of the way.

Two-Bit was standing next to him and Soda, occasionally adding to their conversation about the Pontiac that they had worked on that day while chatting to every greaser that walked past and keeping an eye out for Kathy at the same time.

Steve continued talking to Soda about the engine of the Pontiac for a few minutes before heading to the john for a piss. Making his way through the crowd, he pushed a couple kids out of his way and walked into the tiny brick room.

He quickly relieved himself, did up his jeans and walked to the falling apart sink to wash his hands. Scrubbing hard in a vain attempt to get some oil stain off of his hands, Steve realised that if Two-Bit was waiting for Kathy then his chances of not seeing Anna that night were fairly slim. It didn't bother him too terribly; they had been getting along alright the last few days, but he still didn't particularly want to see her.

The door to the small room banged open as Steve finished rinsing his hands and turned the tap off. His temper rose as he watched Evie and Bobby Miller pull away from each other and straighten up in the doorway. From how disheveled her blouse was and the amount of lipstick residue on his mouth and neck, it was obvious what they had been doing.

Steve resisted the urge to yell at them. He knew he had a temper, he'd been told plenty of times, but he had enough pride to keep himself in check. He flipped up the collar on his jacket and stuffed his hands deep in his pockets, keeping his face completely void of any emotion, despite the sudden heaviness in his chest that he chose to ignore.

"Steve." She gasped his name and Steve hated that it didn't sound the way it used to when he had her gasping in pleasure.

"Evie." He practically spat her name, doing his best to put all his hatred for the situation she'd put him in right then as well as the situation she'd put him in with Anna into his tone.

"Um." Her wide eyes glanced from the floor, to the toilet, to Miller, to anywhere but him. "How are you?"

"Just peachy," he said.

Evie nodded. "Right, well good. Um … See ya."

She made a hasty retreat out of the bathroom, pulling Bobby Miller along behind her and Steve scowled the minute they were out of sight. Grabbing his comb out of his back pocket, he ran it roughly through his hair a few times before shoving it back in his pocket.

Clenching his fists, he paced for a moment in the small space, needing to somehow get his anger out before leaving the bathroom. His knuckles itched to hit something, to have some kind of violent contact with anything.

"Bitch," he said furiously before pulling back and punching the brick wall in front of him. "Bitch."

XXXXX

He'd done his best to wash the blood away but it just didn't stop coming. He wriggled his fingers slightly as he walked back to the guys, eyebrows drawing together at the pain. He was glad that he hadn't managed to break anything; that just would have made his fucking night.

Ignoring the pain, he continued flexing his fingers at his side, putting in as much movement as he could. He needed to get used to the pain and get some normal feeling back in his fingers before he reached his buddies. They didn't need to know that he'd cracked a little and stupidly punched a brick wall. They'd all understand, even Dally considering how many guys he'd punched over for just lookin' at Sylvia. But hitting someone and hitting a brick wall were pretty different and Steve didn't really want them knowing exactly how upset he was.

He finally made his way to where he'd left them all and swore inwardly when he saw Anna talking with Soda. The last thing he needed was having her around. He wasn't in the mood for her doing her best to annoy him and giving him that stupid grin when she managed - which she always did.

He thought about ignoring her and going to sit with Johnny and Pony but decided that'd just encourage her.

"Hey," he said and stood next to Soda, leaning against Johnny's seat.

"Hey, Stevie," Anna said, grinning over at him.

Steve ignored her. "Where'd Two-Bit go?"

Soda shrugged. "Off somewhere with Kathy."

"Leavin' you here with us," Steve said to Anna, unable to mask his annoyance.

"Yes," she said, still grinning.

"An' you're happy about that?" he asked.

She laughed. "Aw, Steve, why wouldn't I be happy to be left here with you?" she asked, blatant sarcasm radiating from her voice.

Steve shrugged and said nothing. He just couldn't be bothered bantering with her; he was pissed off about Evie and his hand was burning with pain.

"What the hell?" Anna closed the few feet between them and grabbed his wrist.

"Hey!" he said, wanting to pull his wrist back but not willing to risk the pain.

"What the hell did you?" she asked as she and Soda peered at his hand.

"Nothin'," he said.

"Bullshit."

"Shit, Steve. That looks pretty bad," Soda said.

"You need to ice it," she told him as Two-Bit and Kathy arrived.

"Ice what?" Kathy asked.

"Since when are you a fucking nurse?" Steve asked, ignoring everyone else.

"It might be broken," she said, staring up at him.

"It ain't broken. See?" Steve clenched and unclenched his fist while she still held his wrist, pushing away the wince of pain as quickly as he could.

"What the fuck did you do?" Dally asked, walking up to them sporting a split lip instead of the black eye Steve had been expecting to see.

"It's nothing," he said and made a pathetic attempt at getting his hand back.

"You need to ice it," she said again, holding on to his wrist tighter.

"You get in a fight, Steve?" Johnny asked as he and Ponyboy appeared from behind them.

Anna snorted. "Sure, with a brick wall maybe." She stared at him, stunned, when he didn't immediately deny her accusation. "Jesus, you punched a brick wall, didn't you?"

"Shut the fuck up," Steve said and, disregarding the pain he knew it would cause, yanked his hand away from her.

He'd had enough. It was bad enough her being there in the first place, now she'd gone and made what he'd done obvious to all the guys; guys who had really bad fucking timing.

"Fuck off, Anna," he said, "or I'll start thinking you actually like me, what with all this fussing."

Soda chuckled. "Yeah, what's with that, Anna?"

Anna shrugged. "Habit, I guess."

"Habit?" Soda asked.

"Who do ya think cleans Danny up after every damn fight he gets in? My dad?"

Steve fought the urge to say it obviously wasn't her mother.

"That reminds me," Dally said, "I just got into it with one of Shepard's boys."

"Which one?" Steve asked, happy with the change of conversation.

Dally smirked at him. "Bobby Miller."

XXXXX

Steve was more than a little pleased when Anna and Kathy decided to go grab a Coke and walk around for a while. Admittedly, she had laid off him as soon as the subject had been changed, simply telling him to ice his hand when he got home, but he had seen her giving him sneaky looks all night. As if she was trying to catch him in pain.

'Course he was in pain but he wasn't going to let her see that. His whole hand was throbbing and already starting to swell. He couldn't see, due to the dried blood, but he was pretty sure there would already be bruising too. What he'd never tell Anna was that he would definitely be icing it when he got home. Not because she'd said he needed to, just because he needed the use of his hand for work.

The pain in his hand wasn't really his biggest problem though. As much as he tried, he couldn't get Evie and the picture of her and Miller out of his head. He'd caught them in time to see them pulling away from each other and to see how close they'd been.

He hated that she had moved on; first with Terry Armstrong, now Bobby Miller. Sure, she wasn't going steady with either guy, but that was hardly the point. The point was that she had wanted to date other people and that's exactly what she was doing.

Steve pushed away the thought of what else she may be doing with them. He didn't want to think about that. He had been Evie's first and, though he was sure she wouldn't go sleeping around, he had also been sure she wouldn't break up with him. If she was gonna go around dating guys like Bobby Miller, who knew what else she was going to do?

Steve rubbed the knuckles of his good hand as best he could with his bruised one, about ready to hit something else. At least her date with Armstrong obviously hadn't gone well. Not only that but he hadn't had to see that one. Her date with Miller, on the other hand, was clearly going rather well and he'd had to deal with seeing them together.

He was starting to wonder why he even wanted her back. She had moved on and he should be doing the same. He didn't want to, though. He wanted Evie back and, as far as he was concerned, she could keep dating all those guys; it didn't matter. He'd get her back.

"Hey."

Steve looked at Soda who was sitting next to him. He was staring at something near the front of the stands and he had a calm look on his face. His eyes were cool and he was sitting slightly hunched in his seat. Steve looked towards where Soda was looking and saw three of the four guys who had come into the DX the other week.

"Any reason they've been glaring at you for the last two minutes?" Soda asked.

Steve smirked and flipped up the collar of his jacket. "The ugly one in the middle is the owner of the Mustang I was tellin' ya about."

"No kiddin'." Soda grinned. "Reckon they're gonna start any trouble?"

Steve stared back at the guys and smirked. "Na," he said. "At least not here. They're on our side of the stadium; they'd hafta be pretty stupid."

"Well, they're Socs ain't they?"

Steve grinned. "Good point."

"Ya know," Soda said, throwing him a reckless grin, "I wouldn't mind too much if they did. It's been a while since I've been in a good fight."

Steve grinned back. "Me too, buddy; I'm just about itchin' for a fight, but it ain't gonna happen tonight unless they start it. I'm kinda useless now." He held up his bruised hand.

Soda grinned at him. "You were crazy doin' that ya know?"

Steve shrugged. "Probably."

"I s'pose you're right though," Soda said, turning back towards the Socs, "tonight's no good. You can't use your good hand, Two-Bit took off after Kathy and Anna, and Dally took off with Pony and Johnny. I'd be on my own."

"Good thing they don't look about ready to start somethin'," Steve said.

"They look pretty angry though." Soda was glaring right back at them but Steve could see he was fighting an amused grin.

Steve looked at the guys and narrowed his eyes. They obviously wanted to come up and start something with him and despite his bad hand he wanted them to do it - badly. He wanted to get in a fight, let off some steam. He was willing to beat the shit out of some Soc because he wasn't about to let his feelings about Evie and Miller - Evie in particular - be shown by beating the shit out of Miller, which was what he really wanted to do.

"Who're the shit eaters?" Two-Bit asked, pissing Steve off when he and Kathy took the last two seats next to Soda, leaving Anna to sit next to him.

"The guys who followed Steve," Soda said.

"Wait, they followed you? How come?" Anna asked.

"Trust you to stick you nose in," Steve said, ignoring her question.

She rolled her eyes at him. "I know the one in the middle," she said, turning to look at them.

"What? How?" Now that was interesting.

"I watched Curly Shepard kick the shit outta him for hassling Angela."

"What the fuck? How old is Angela, twelve?" Steve asked as the guys turned and started walking off.

"Thirteen, but what's the difference? It's still disgusting."

Steve nodded in agreement. Only a sick bastard hit on a fucking kid.

"So why'd he follow you?" she asked him.

Steve didn't know if it was that he was so angry about Evie or that he'd had enough shit for one night, but he decided not telling Anna would just cause more trouble than he could be bothered with.

"He reckons I took his hubs," he told her.

"And did you?"

"No," he lied.

She laughed. "You're lying."

Steve shrugged. "He a good fighter?" he asked.

"Curly took him easily enough once he got him alone," she said and paused for a moment. She looked in the direction the guys had gone, looked back at Steve and smiled. "I don't think you'll have any trouble taking him, even with a bad hand."

XXXXX

For a few minutes there, Anna considered telling Steve again that he needed to go ice his hand. Thinking it through though she figured it'd just cause more moodiness from him which would cause her to get fed up and result in another fight between the two of them and she did not want to fight with him tonight.

She'd had a great day looking through magazines and gossiping with Kathy, followed by the two of them and Danny going to Grandpa Joe's for dinner. Having to spend some of the night with Steve and dealing with his stubbornness over his obviously sore hand wasn't going bother her. She'd been in such a good mood that she'd given up their argument about his hand pretty quickly and just a few minutes ago had been feeling generous enough toward him to give him a compliment on his fighting.

She was not about to let Steve Randle ruin the good mood she'd been in all night, even if he wasn't being particularly nice to her. Anna rolled her eyes at that. Nice was still not a word she associated with Steve. Through some kind of unspoken agreement, their truce had been put back in place after their driving lesson. She had accepted his roundabout apology and she figured he realised she had been trying to be nice with the talk of his mother. But, with their previous truce lasting only two weeks, she wasn't holding her breath about this one lasting.

In saying that, Anna was going to do her best to make this truce last. She was sick of arguing with Steve. In the past it had been fun and the only way she could best him at anything. Now, spending so much more time with him than she used to, fighting with him was becoming a chore.

"I'm gonna go get a Coke," Soda said standing up. "Anyone want anything?"

Two-Bit, Kathy and Steve put in their orders while Anna stood up.

"I'll come with you," she said.

She and Soda chattered happily as they made their way out of the stands towards the food and drink stands near the entrance. It was strange to her that she got along so well with Soda when his best buddy couldn't stand her but she supposed with always getting along in the first place and all the double dates she and Soda had been forced together on with Steve and Evie, it wasn't too surprising.

Soda stopped mid-step halfway to the drink stand. "And that'll be why Steve punched the wall," he said staring toward two people who were practically wrapped around each other.

"Evie," Anna said, not loud enough for her cousin to hear. She turned to Soda. "You think he saw them?"

Soda looked annoyed. "Yeah, I do."

Anna didn't understand two things. One, why her cousin was making out with someone as greasy as Bobby Miller. Of course she'd never understood why she used to make out with Steve either but even he was better than Bobby. And two, why Steve would want Evie back after seeing them go the way they were. She mentioned the latter of the two to Soda.

"I love my cousin, I really do. But I do not understand why Steve wants her back," Anna said. "She ain't exactly being shy about having moved on."

Soda shrugged and continued to stare in Evie's direction as they continued past her and towards the concession stands.

"I don't really get it either," he said. "But it's what he wants, and I'm pretty sure he'll get it."

"You are?"

Soda grinned at her. "Oh yeah," he said. "There's a good reason Steve's so damn cocky about everything. There ain't a lot he puts his mind to that he don't get."

Anna nodded her understanding but still didn't get why Steve would want Evie back.

A/N: Thanks to RileysMomma for beta-reading. Thanks for the reviews I've got so far, please keep them coming.