Ponyboys eyes shot wide open at exactly 5:30 "Daddy, Daddy." He yelled unaware of the time. He yawned as he quickly kicked the old, worn blankets off his little frame. He was short for his age unlike his brothers who seemed to tower over him. He ran to his parent's bedroom, "Dad please wake up, you promised, dad!" and his father did wake up, as did the rest of the house. Darrel slowly got up and rubbed his eyes, straining to see his prize Elvis clock that he found in a yard sale a few years back. "Pumpkin" his father started, using his mothers nick name of him as a child "its 5:30 in the morning, everyone's asleep, now get into bed." Before he could get a chance to complain, Pony felt his father's strong arms around his petite body. In a total of 2 minutes he was tucked in bed and once again sound asleep.

The next time he woke up it was already 9:30 and he was the only one left in the bed. He slowly walked towards the kitchen. His father was sitting at the table reading a newspaper, his oldest brother Darry was across from him finishing his homework, his mother was making eggs and pancakes and his other brother, Soda, had his head in the icebox, secretly eating handfuls of chocolate cake behind his mothers back. "Dad can we go now?" Darrel looked at him over his paper and smiled "Now your mothers been in the kitchen for an hour making breakfast, what kind of husband would I be if I let all that food go to waste?" "Daddy" his youngest whined. "All right, we'll leave at 11, is that ok with you?" He looked over to his other sons " Do you two want to come too?" Darry barely looked up from his notebook "Too much homework" Soda's chocolate smeared face merged from the icebox, "Umm, I can't I promised Steve we'd go goof off at park." "You pick up a good one, ok Pon, one that won't poo on the rug and ruin my furniture" Pony stifled a giggle at his mothers comment. **~**~**~**~**~**~**~**~**~*11:15*

"Dad! Lets go" Pony whined. "Ok, ok let me get my wallet baby." "I'm not a baby!" Pony nearly shrieked walking out the door to the car. It took him a minute to climb into the new red pick up his father purchased a month before. It still smelled new, which was remarkable with three boys. FINALLY an hour, 8 doughnuts, and 3 rest stops later they were there.

"Yayyyy!!" the over eager child ran to the building with is father close behind. "I knew I shouldn't have given him so much sugar so early." Darrel muttered to himself. He pushed the heavy doors open and walked the lady behind the counter. She wore an old out of fashion poodle skirt with glasses, and her brown hair big, and puffy. Pony wondered how she got though the doors. She looked up from her magazine when they approached. "Hello what can I do for you today?" "Hi, my son is looking for a dog, were looking for one that is already trained. Do you have any of the sort?" "Oh yes we do" she said before her eyes landed on Ponyboy "Awwwwww he's soooo adorable!" the scary lady with the bad eye make-up said while pinching his cheeks, Pony's eyes rolled up to his father's and there was a look of horror. "Well" the lady said after sensing the child's discomfort, "the dogs are this way" she led Pony to room with about 20 different cages. There were so many how was he going to chose, he thought. His wide eyes searched everyone until he reached the last one. It looked empty but in the shadow he saw gray eyes looking back at him. Slowly a little gold colored dog walked to the child and licked his out stretched hand through the cage. "I want this one!" he nodded to the little ball of fur. The lady looked over her glasses "Well ok let me get Hank to come out and get him for you, ok sweetie?" she answered in a fake cheery voice.

5 minutes later Hank walked into the front room where a child (probably the owner he thought) was excitedly explaining the dog to his father. "Well, he must be yours. Now you take good care of him, ya hear?" When the child nodded Hank continued, "This is a very smart golden retriever, one of the smartest I've seen. He's about 4 months old, he was trained when he came in about a week ago." Hank turned towards his father and Pony just tuned him out when he started about eating habits. "Now if ya'll have anymore questions Sherry right here will give you a card with our number on it. Good luck kid" He took a moment to ruffle Pony's hair and went back to work. "Ok please sign here, here and here. and also right here." Sherry's voice informed them while pointing to various spots "And there will be also be a 50 cent tax fee." Pony watched his father take out the money and was about to hand it to the lady when he yelled "No! I want to pay, he's my dog." "Ok Pon, go ahead." Pony looked up at his father lost, pulled him by his shirt down and whispered in his ear "Can I borrow 50 cents?" The taller man looked down at his son and handed him the money, which then ended up in the hands of the smiling Sherry. "Ok here's your copy of the ownership paper and your all done." "I can't wait till Soda and Darry see him" Pony said when they were back in the car, his new puppy sleeping on his lap.





A/N Sorry this took so long, I'm really, really sorry. And thank you everyone for your reviews, it means a lot to me that you like this story.

Hey did you guys know that Frances Ford Coppola has announced that he is working on a new DVD version to be re-released hopefully next spring, and it will include ALL OF THE DELETED SCENES- LIKE 40 MINUTES WORTH!!! Well I know its coming out in the US but I don't know about anywhere else. I think it already came out in France, but I just can't wait. I've wanted to see the deleted scenes for a very long time. Well here's the link to the site so you can see it for yourselves. http://www.dvdfile.com/software/dvd- video/archive/2002/07_08.html

Anyway please review!!!!!! Tell me what you think!!!!!!