Hello fellow Outsiders fans! I'm deciding to write another chapter. I watched The Outsiders last night and saw Soda. I was happy he wasn't all beat up. Lol. Anyway, I was at my grandma's all day and became bored and decided I'd write another chapter when I got home. Here it is, chapter 14 for ya.

Chapter 14 Wrong Recovery

SODA'S POV

It's been about a week since I got home from the hospital. They had me stay one more day. I left Tuesday after everyone was done with school. I'd much rather be at school than the hospital though, but now I'm back to school it's the other way around.

Anyway, I didn't get to go to the ball. My friends went with my approval. They felt really bad about going without me, but I said to not worry about me and have fun. I stayed home by myself with Robert which was no good. I got more beatings, but not as bad.

Today's Wednesday and school's going on. I'm in Math which I greatly struggle in. I struggle in all my classes, but this is worse in grades. The only classes that I pass are auto mechanics and gym which are my two favorite classes. I do okay in English with Mr. Jackson's help.

We're learning about substitution and other ways to graph. It's not that bad, but I still struggle. Steve's in my class, so it goes by pretty fast. The only good thing about it is Steve. It's also the last class of the day. That's another reason to hate math. I always worry in math about what's gonna happen at home.

There's only three minutes of school left and I'm getting really nervous. I can feel my eyes getting wider every second as they do everyday around this time. It's ridiculous. My teacher, Mr. Tristan, doesn't even notice or say anything. Can't he see that I'm scared? Oh well, I don't want all the attention anyway. That could get my butt busted at home. I don't even know if I can call it home.

"Have a great rest of your day, class. I'll see you guys tomorrow," Mr. Tristan tells us right before the bell rings and we put our books away in our bags.

I get to my locker and get all my homework out. I shut my locker and head on my way to my some called home. I wish school was going on.

I walk home with Steve, Two-Bit, Johnny, and Dally. When we get to our neighborhood, we head our separate ways. Steve and I head one way as the other three head the other.

"What'd you do?" he asks pointing to my black eye.

"I have no idea. I fell on my face, but it wasn't very hard," I say as if I can't believe I fell flat on my face.

"You're so clumsy," he mutters. I think he's trying to play along, but he doesn't believe my story.

"I never did ask you. How was the dance?" I ask to get off the subject.

"It was good. It would've been better if you were there. We were missin' ya," he says patting my back which still hurt from last week, but I try not to cringe.

"It was those stupid Socs faults," I say shaking my head. I hate lying to my best friend, my friends, and my brothers.

We got to our houses and tell each other our good byes. He heads down to his house and I head up to mine a little hesitantly. Home's where the heart is. It used to be that way, but not anymore. It's a dangerous place for me.

I walk through the door, and head up to my attic room. I get up there and lay on my mattress to do my homework which I struggle with. I'm so glad we had a worksheet in Math because there was only ten problems. I got done with English and that's all I had thank goodness.

After an hour working on the Math, I head down to start my chores which are scrub the floors, sweep, do laundry, make dinner, and fold the laundry. I decide to do the laundry first since it won't take to long to do. I do that and then start dinner. They want turkey manhattans so I make it. While that's going, I fold the laundry that's dried.

I hear the door slam and the last three people I wanna see come in. What time is it? I look at the clock and see that it's five fifteen. I should've started dinner first. I'm in deep trouble now.

"I'm hungry," I hear David complain coming in the door.

"It's not quite ready yet," I mutter a bit annoyed. At least they get to eat a nice meal while I eat a not so nice meal of peanut butter and jelly sandwiches or some sort of sandwich.

"What'd you say to me, punk?" he asks ferociously grabbing the collar of my jean jacket.

"It ain't ready," I spit at him which is not the smartest thing to do.

"Look here Derek. I see a stupid grease ball in my grip. Do you?" he asks looking at Derek.

I gulp in nervousness.

"Yeah! I also see a coward!" he laughs hysterically.

"I see that too! Aren't you Greasers supposed to be tough and all? You sure aren't," he laughs.

That made me mad. I'd show them how tough I am if Robert wasn't standing in the corner watching. Literally, I wanted to punch their faces in right there and now and make a run for it. I give them an evil look instead.

"Look at the coward trying to look tough. Isn't that cute," he baby talks me. My temper's about to jump off a cliff or something, but I control it.

"Get the food done," they order me while giving a punch at the same time, but on different sides of the face and leave.

I turn around and tend the food hoping it'll be done soon. All of a sudden I feel a firm grip on both shoulders. It feels like my shoulders are about to bruise or my stitches might come out. I get turned around forcefully.

"You start your part time job at my Marathon tomorrow after school, boy. You come here, make dinner, and head off to work after you serve us dinner. Do you understand?" he basically orders me.

"Yes, sir," I mutter not making eye contact with him.

"Get the DAMN dinner DONE!" he half hollers, punches me in the temple, and heads to the living room with a whiskey in his hand. Today's gonna be beautiful, not!

The dinner's finally done after ten minutes and I make them each a turkey manhattan. I set the dinner and tell them that their dinner's done. They come and sit at the table. As for me, I go over to the kitchen and clean up the mess and sit in front of the counter thinking about my brothers and friends.

I miss my brothers so much. I haven't seen them since they came to see me in the hospital. Steve always lets me know when they're coming over which is basically every night. The next day, he'll tell me what I missed and keep asking me what's going on because they know I love my brothers and that they're coming over. I remember when we were younger, Darry would always say that he and Pony would always be there for me. We were always there for each other. We were probably as close as brothers could get.

Before I know it, they're finished eating. That means I have to go clean up their mess. I do, and then hit the floors. I sweep up and then scrub them. It wasn't very fun at all. I'm just glad I didn't have to do the bathrooms tonight. I'd scrub the floors any day over cleaning the bathrooms.

It's been forty-five minutes, and I've managed to get the floor done. I'm done for the night so I head for the door. I look around and see Robert downing his whiskey, which is his favorite. I open the door, but someone with a hard grip throws me back and slams the door.

Without thinking, I run as fast as I can up to my attic bedroom. I grab Cherry Coke and sit down shaking squeezing the teddy bear against me. At the same time, I hear heavy footsteps tromping up the steps. I bury my head into my legs while holding Cherry Coke close to me.

Robert comes storming in. I look up trying not to cry and his hand flies in the air. His hand is opened wide with his fingers spread apart. His arm comes down full speed and strikes me in the neck. He turns around and takes a drink of the whiskey while I cuddle up against the wall. I look and the whiskey's gone. The bottle goes up and breaks against my face. I feel the blood coming down my face. He throws the empty bottle at my feet and grabs me firmly by the arm and drags me to the top of the steps. Before I know it, I'm at the bottom of them. I was thrown down the stupid steps! He grabs me again, drags me to the door, and throws me outside.

"STAY OUT!" he yells again.

"FINE!" I yell back and head to Two-Bit's.

Mrs. Mathews and Darry know how to stitch people up.

There you go. I hope you enjoyed. Please review.