Title: Prom Nights

Author: Phoebe

Rating: PG-13

Summary: Ponyboy and Angela getting to know each other, and falling in love at the same time.

A/N- Alas, the first Angela/Ponyboy fic. Many of you may think I'm crazy, but I'm not the only one following Ponyboy/Angela, right, Lorelai: )

Disclaimer: Ponyboy Curtis, Angela Shepard, Curly Shepard, Tim Shepard, Two- Bit Matthews, Steven Randle, Dallas Winston, Johnny Cade, Darryl Curtis, and Sodapop Curtis all belong to S.E. Hinton. Coke belongs to Coca Cola. Inc., Monica, Jimmy Pickens, Caroline Matthews, belong to me. 'I Want You To Want Me' belongs to Cheap Trick and the plot belongs to me.

This Fic is dedicated to Lorelai Anastasia, because I probably would have given up on Outsiders fan fic a long time ago without her encouragement. And, thanks to her, I have so much support for all my works! Thanks so much, Lorelai!

If you had told me twelve hours ago that I would be sitting on a swing at the local elementary school kissing Ponyboy Curtis, I would have told you were trashed.

Then again you probably would have been trashed and just had a lucky guess because no one can tell the future. But here I am, in my bluish-gray prom dress with his jacket around my shoulders, leaning over to kiss Ponyboy Curtis.

A lock of my blue-black hair fell into my face, and Ponyboy's hand gently lifted to push it back behind my ear.

I don't think I've ever felt as loved, as cherished as I have in the past several hours. After a lifetime of being second best, I was number on in someone's life. If only for an hour, a minute, a second; I was number one.

I've had the feeling of being second best pretty often. Second best to my stepfather, my brother's girlfriends and to gang fights. Second to hold-ups and jumpings and drag races. Second to best friends, girls with hippy, LSD- doing kid brothers, and to my eldest brother's dignity.

But now I wasn't second best. I was the first, the most wanted, the most loved and cherished.

And for the first time, I, Angela Marie Shepard, know what it means to fall in love.

I was sitting along at a table, looking off into space and tapping my foot in time to the music. I came with a date but he was off the second someone told him there was drinking in the parking lot. My brother, Curly, whose in the same grade as me after being left back, took off about a half hour ago with his girlfriend, who I, for once, actually think is pretty decent.

I glanced around the school gym that been decked out in balloons and streamers, looking for nothing imparticular. I smoothed out my dress which ended just before the knee, wanting to look my best for no one. Looking up again I saw Ponyboy Curtis sitting at a table by himself, darting his fingers back and forth through the fire of a candle, the same habit I have whenever a flame is lit. He must have noticed me looking at him because he glanced up in my direction. Our eyes met for just a second before I looked away, but I could tell he was still looking.

I knew he had gotten up and was coming toward me before he sat down in the vacant chair to my right. To be honest I was surprised when he sat down, I mean, he hates me. And from what he's heard about me, I don't blame him.

“Hey.â€ﾝ I said quietly and meekly. He said ‘hi’ without looking at me. Ponyboy was staring off to the right wall of the gym where the cheap band the Student Council had hired was playing. There was an awkward pause until I knew I had to say it, he needed to now. "Hey, listen," now he looked at me, directly in my eyes. "I know what you've heard about me and all but you gotta know it's not true. I never did nothing' to hurt you and it was all misunderstandings. All of it.

"From the beginning, I didn't break up with Bryon Douglass for you, I did it for myself. A relationship where you're either all over each other or hating each other isn't a relationship. And, well, if you want honesty, meeting you was the motive to end it. You were hanging out with Curly one day and you were so shy and sweet and I realized that there are guys like you, guys who are caring and gentle and are genuinely good people. So, I didn't necessarily break up with Bryon for you, just someone like you.

"Secondly, I never told that guy to beat up one you the night of the school dance. He had asked me out a few times and I turned him down because he was exactly the opposite of the sweet and caring guy and I'm not looking for someone like that. But then when it got out that I had a thing for you, he went after ya. I don't know why he did it, maybe he was real angry or he thought I would go out with him if he fought you; I don't know.

"Now you probably don't believe all this and I really don't blame you. I just want you to know the truth, because you're nice enough where you deserve it."

He looked kind of stunned when he said, "That's a lot of information for sixty seconds." I smiled shyly and to my surprise (and joy), he smiled back. "Truthfully, I had a feeling of it all along. I don't like believing things about people unless I'm positive they're true."

"That's a pretty good way to be." I said, still smiling. He was smiling a little smile, too, which evaporated any awkwardness that once existed.

We sat there for a couple of second before he started talking again. He practically had to yell though, because the band had started a fast song and must have turned up the speakers.

"Ya wanna get out of here?" Ponyboy asked, I nodded, grabbed my purse and walked out with him.

We walked in silence through the school. I always find it scary being in the school at night. Whether at school dances or school plays, dark empty hallways that are usually bright and crowded always creep me out.

He opened the main entrance door for me, something that not many men have done for me in my life.

We didn't really say much on the way to the small diner on the corner of Pickett and Sutton. We started talking almost the second we sat down in a booth in the back. We drifted between idle, general topics before we really started to talk about ourselves. Ponyboy told me about how his oldest brother was getting married in August and his other brother was planning on asking his long-time girlfriend to marry him before the year was out. He talked about two friends that he had grown up with and was very close too both had serious girlfriends. I could tell he felt out by this. Like everyone was growing up and leaving him behind.

He told me how he was going to college back east in the fall and how he had gotten an academic scholarship that helped out a lot.

And some of the things he told me I wondered if he ever told anyone else. Like how he was told his parents were killed and how he dealt with two friends deaths within a couple of hours of each other.

Each of his stories led into another. He was saying how he and his oldest brother, Darryl, who he called Darry, didn't get along a couple of years ago. Then he told me about his parent's death.

"I was walking home from school and was cold but I didn't have a jacket with me. I didn't really feel like going home because I knew the house was empty and I hate being alone. Darry would be at work, Soda would be working at the gas station (the he was still part-time) and Mom and Dad were at my aunt's house visiting, or so I thought.

"I walked into the house and was really surprised. The whole gang was there, and no one was talking. I immediately looked to Soda, and when I noticed he was crying I was really started to get scared. It was a couple of seconds before anyone noticed me in the doorway. I think Two-Bit saw me first.

"When Soda saw me he jumped out and hugged me, so hard I almost couldn't breath. I heard him mumbling something and when he kept repeating himself I heard him more clearly. He was saying "They're dead, they died" and I wasn't sure who he was talking about until he said, "Mom and Dad, they're dead, they died."

"And ever since then it's just been me, Soda and Darry. But once Darry gets married, Monica will be there, too."

"You like her? She okay?" I asked, unsure of how he felt of her living there.

"Oh yeah, she's great. She's from a middle class area but she knows the deal about the east side. Monica's real cool with everything. I think she lightened Darry up a bit. He's faster to let things slide. And Monica's pretty cool in a way where she shows interest in your life without being nosy."

"That's gotta be nice."

"You got some nosy people in your life?"

"Nope, I know people who don't show an interest." And thatss how we got started on my life. I told him how my father ran out on my family when I was three. Curly was four and Tim was ten. I knew he was probably curious about the same thing that everyone else was, so I decided to clear him up on the subject.

"Then last year, things started happening and I was kinda feeling lost in the crowd, ya know? Tim was getting into more trouble and Curly had just started dating Caroline Mathews, who I think is the little sister of that Two-bit friend of yours", he nodded and smiled a little at this, "and he was kinda wrapped up in her and all. I guess I was kinda desperate for attention.

"So one day Tim's twenty-five year old friend Jimmy Pickens came over looking for him. I was the only one at home and I told him he could sit and wait for Tim if he wanted to and he did. Then we started talking, he was real flattering and all, and one thing led to another. Biggest mistake of my life.

"I remember afterwards, lying there next to him, wanting to cry so bad but wanting to let him think that I was strong. I was humiliated and ashamed and at the point, I wanted to die, more than anything, I wanted to die. I got dressed and walked out of the room into the kitchen hoping he would just stay where he was.

"I was upset and I felt so sic that I went to the bathroom a few times thinking I was gonna throw up. Jimmy got dressed and left within a few minutes, and then I started to replay the last hour in my head before I realized, 'Tim'. Tim would find out and then he would be ashamed of me. I've always had this want to live up to Tim's expectations of me, and this blew any chance I had of it.

"And then the next day it dawned on me that he didn't use anything. So every single little thing worried me. I felt a little nauseous, 'Oh my god, I'm pregnant'. I have a headache, 'Oh my god, I'm pregnant', ya know?

"And still, to this day, I don't know how Tim found out because I sure as hell didn't tell him. Jimmy probably got drunk or stoned and it slipped out and got back to Tim.

"Tim came over to our house and freaked out on me. He was yelling and screaming, but I knew Tim to well to believe it. He gets like that whenever he's real upset or disappointed. I knew he was disappointed in me and that got me crying so much that I was having trouble breathing.

"Then when he stopped yelling everything was quiet; no one said anything. Then I got mad, too. Tim acted as if I did it purposely to hurt him. So I started yelling at him, too. And then in the mist of it all I said I was pregnant. Why? I don't know. But he stopped yelling, was as quiet as he's ever been, shook his head a bit, and walked out of the house."

"Wow." He said, in slight awe.

"Yup, me and Tim have got matching tempers." A few seconds passed before I started talking again. "So when my mom and stepfather found out I was pregnant, they made me marry Jimmy. I fought with them over it again and again and I thought Tim would be on my side, but Tim didn't come back to the house for weeks. He was so mad that he didn't even want to see me.

"After me and Jimmy got married, we lived in his parents basement. We didn't have a wedding or anything, just got married at the courthouse. It was probably kinda of comical, though, every time he came near me that night I practically kicked him away. And that very night I found out I wasn't pregnant. I couldn't believe it. I walked out of the bathroom feeling, well, I don't really know what I was feeling. I was happy; I didn't have to be married to Jimmy anymore, I was pissed at my parents; they made me marry Jimmy. Overall, I just felt like I had reached the end, that what I could possibly do next, ya know? Kinda like 'what now?'.

"So in the end, I got divorced, moved back home, and haven't since Jimmy since. My stepfather was happy that I had left home; one less of my mother's kids to put up with. One night he came home drunk from work and he started yelling at me. I don't really remember exactly what he said, but after a few minutes of this, he hit me. Right across the face, it left a big bruise. I was so scared I ran up to my room and locked the door thinking he would follow me up and kill me. I leaned up against the door and sat down, crying. This was my life. Everyone though my life was so easy. My brothers were known through the city for being hoods. I had almost any guy I wanted. I was tough and knew how to fight. But this was my life. Parents who couldn't stand me, a stepfather who hated the sight of me and brothers who were never around.

"I told everyone in school that I had gotten into a fight, and everyone believed it, it wasn't out of character for me. Then a couple of days after that Tim came over. He said that it was because he had nothing to do but I think he had found out about me and Jimmy and was coming to patch things up between himself and me.

"When he saw me, he somehow knew that I wasn't in a fight. Tom knew where I got the bruise from and told me and Curly to go outsider and get in his car. I always listen to Tim so I did and Curly is one of those people who act now and ask questions later. Sometimes gets him into trouble. I heard Tim screaming at my stepfather from inside and when he came out to the car he didn't say anything, he was too mad.

"Things were like immediately fixed between us. I was crying, and Tim; he reached up and brushed them away. I'll never forget that. He's tough and all but he's sweet sometimes, too.

"So ever since then me and Curly have been living with Tim. I got a job waitressing to help him out with the bills and stuff, and Curly's getting his money the illegal way." We both half-laughed, half-smiled at this. This person, sitting across from me in the tacky old diner booth, really and truly understands me.

The people at the diner were starting to give us dirty looks, probably because we were there for an hour and a half and hadn't ordered anything but two cokes. We decided to leave the diner and walk around town for a bit. It was pretty chilly out and me, with my sleeveless dress, was freezing. He must have noticed this because he gave me his jacket. This boy keeps adding to his good points.

We stopped at the elementary school, finding seats at the swings in the playground. We didn't talk much for a moment or too, personally, I was too happy to talk. The night was perfect that it didn't need any more words.

I felt the hand of mine that was resting the swing's chains being covered with a larger one, soft and gentle. I turned to look at him, and he leaned in and covered my mouth with his own. It was sweet and caring, and hesitant at first. Once I responded and gave him my permission, he deepened the kiss, running his tongue across my teeth and taking hold of my other hand and running his thumb across the top of it. Ponyboy's other hand moved to the small of my back, pulling me closer. We broke away for a second, and I couldn't help but break out into a smile, and I was relieved to see a grin fall over his face too. We then both leaned in simultaneously for a second kiss.

And now I'm here, sitting on the swing, kissing the, what I know now, is the love of my life, and am enjoying every second of it.

A/N- Be a dear and review, hm? Reviews always help for a sequel….