Title- Dealing with It

Chapter Title- The Day After

Disclaimer- I do not own The Outsiders

Reviewers-

Tikagem- I couldn't update super fast. Hey, it looks like you're my only reviewer. Those other people suck! J/K, I love those other people. Its school is horrible. I hate it and it's stealing my reviewers and they won't let me torch them. Oh well… I must go onto the story.

Note- The awfully important author's note is at the bottom. The rest of this is my hopeless rambling. School, Arghh, it sucks! Except Chem. I have it with one of my best friends and it rocks!

Nate and I walked to school alone. Josh wasn't waiting at the corner. I was really nervous. I hoped he didn't hate me. I hadn't made things clear on the phone last night. I wondered how 1, 5, and 7 periods would go. Nate told me he had to go meet somebody and left. I could see him walking to Josh. I could tell he was. Nate was considerate like that; he would never bring over somebody that would make me uncomfortable. I decided to go into the school building. I couldn't believe how fast the news had spread. Did Josh say something, did Nate?

"I heard he dumped her for a rich chick."

"No, she dumped him because he made a pass at her mother."

"Assholes, he was using her to get to her brother. She caught them kissing. They're gay!"

I spun around at the last one and punched the girl's jaw. I instantly recognized her. Her name was Janice Something. Well, something wasn't her real last name, I just don't remember it. Well, anyway, her name was Janice and she was the weakest girl in history. You could poke this girl and she would start wailing. I instantly regretted acting on impulse. I knew for sure she'd tell the principal. It was funny that she was so weak; I heard her dad was so tough. Well, not anymore. He got into crack and shit. I swear I've never seen the guy when he wasn't stoned. Shepard that was her last name. Janice Shepard, her dad was Tim. I don't remember her complete story. We tried to be friends once, but that didn't work out. Her crack head dad was really weird. He kept making these rude remarks that I didn't want to hear.

"You bitch," she whimpered, on the verge of crying. I walked away, quickly into the class. She left in the opposite direction. She went towards the principal's office.

First period, the teacher gave us a pop quiz. God, I had missed so much school. I was struggling. I always struggled in school. I was only in the advanced class because Nate was. After that whole thing in kindergarten, we had to be in class together. Nate flew through the regular classes with such ease that they couldn't keep him in them. I was pulled into the advanced classes. I was trying to sneak glances at Nate's paper. It was hard to do without getting caught. Nate sat in a weird way. I tapped my fingers on my desk, and Nate knew what it meant. Occasionally, he started sliding his paper over. He understood that if I failed, he got put back into regular classes with me or we got split up.

Then there came the knock. It was a light tap on the door. I jerked my head up, like everybody else and watched the teacher open the door. Standing on the other side was the principal's secretary. 'Oh, please, don't be for me,' I thought. 'Please, don't say Veronica Curtis.' I watched the secretary talk to the teacher. As she nodded her head, her gray bun bobbed up and down. The teacher turned towards me and pointed. She signaled for me to go over there. I got up and walked over to them.

"Veronica Curtis," the teacher said, "you need to go to the principal, get your stuff and you'll finish the test tomorrow." I nodded and got my bag from the side of my desk. I followed the secretary to the office.

I had been in the office a few times. The secretary pointed to the chair across from the desk and handed me a stack of papers. I knew these papers by heart. I filled them out quickly and almost threw them at her. I caught myself and nicely placed them on her desk. She just nodded and pointed to the principal's door. I opened it up.

"Ah, Ronnie, how long as it been?" Mr. Jones, the principal, asked me. I smiled. Okay, I had been in there more than a few times.

"Little more than two weeks, I believe," I answered him. Mr. Jones was the only adult in this school that didn't call me Veronica or Miss Curtis. I really respected him for that and other reasons. He always acted like my friend when I was in trouble and he never called my parents. I either got detention or a day of ISS, but that was all. In Junior High School and Elementary School, I was suspended at least once and my parents were called, like, every other day.

"That's a pretty long stretch there, isn't it? Anyway, Ronnie, could you tell me why you're here?" He asked, sitting down in his big leather chair. I sat across from him in my chair. It wasn't really my chair, we just called it that. Nobody else could sit on it; he kept it in the corner and dragged it out when I was sent in.

"Well, Bob, may I call you Bob?" I asked.

"Ronnie," he said in a warning voice, "my name isn't Bob, you know that. I'm not your neighbor, I'm your principal."

"Okay, Mr. Bob, here's how I see it. Either I punched some girl or I mouthed off to a teacher, you tell me."

"Why do you instantly assume you punched a girl? I know you've punched boys before. Anyway, yes, you did punch a girl. I think I'm going to give you one day of In-School Suspension and I'm going to have to notify your parents about this one."

"But, but, Mr. Jones, you can't do that, you just can't!" I whined.

"Ronnie, I've let you off easy for a lot of things. I really need to notify your parents just once." I looked at him.

"Fine," I sighed, "only 'cause you're only giving my ISS for this." Most people would have gotten regular suspension or two days worth of ISS. Right from the start, and I don't know why, Mr. Jones always was nice to me.

"Can I ask you one thing?" he asked me.

"Yeah, sure, whatever," I answered.

"Why?" he questioned.

"Why did I hit Janice? I'll tell you why! She called my brother and friend gay! Okay, and she doesn't even know them that well and it's not true!" I shouted. I got up and walked out of the office. I didn't take too long in the office; I only missed a half a period. I guess I was mad at Mr. Jones for calling my parents. I knew I was in for it at home. Normally, we would have talked about how my schoolwork was going and things that were going on at home. Hey, I never told him about my OCD! I turned around and went back into the office.

"Mr. Jones," I shouted. He put his finger to his lips to tell me to be quiet. He pointed at his ear, he was on the phone. I knew it was with my mom. Today was one of her days off.

"No, Mrs. Curtis, one day of In-School Suspension is fine. I don't think she needs anymore. We can't have her miss anymore school and I really need an adult to supervise her. You and your husband both work. You will not take off from work; she will sit in my office where she will be doing work. There will also be teachers around incase she has any questions. I'll talk to you later Mrs. Curtis. Good-bye," he said and hung up the phone. "Yes Ronnie?" he asked, looking at me.

"I never told you why I was absent."

"I've heard Ronnie, OCD, that's nice. You really need to get to class. I have work to do."

"Mr. Jones, c'mon, why can't we talk?"

"Ronnie," he warned.

"Fine, bye," I sighed and walked out of the office. I slammed the door and stomped to third period.

The rest of the day was fine. That is until I got nervous around lunch. I didn't know what to do. Nate already informed me that he was sitting with Josh. I wanted to sit near Josh as well. I didn't hate him; I still wanted to be his friend. Josh was waiting for Nate at his locker.

"Hey man," Josh said to Nate.

"Hey," Nate said back.

"Hi," I said nervously and waved to Josh.

"Ronnie," he said, "I need to talk to you." I felt his hand slip into mine as he pulled me away to an empty classroom.

"Yeah," I said.

"About last night," he began.

"I'm sorry, it felt right at the time," I cut him off.

"No, I'm not mad at you. My dad is actually happy. He said I could hang out with you guys but I had to date a West-side girl. But, I don't like any West-side girls, I like you." I blushed.

"I like you too," I said softly.

"I heard about Janice," he mentioned.

"It was nothing," I said, blushing more. He slipped his other hand into mine. The next thing I know, we were face to face and his lips briefly brushed against mine. I backed up quickly, startled.

"Oh, I'm sorry," he mumbled, looking at his feet.

"Don't be," I whispered. I kissed his cheek. "What does this make us?" I asked him. I really wanted him to say we were together again.

"Together," he told me as he hugged me. We walked towards Nate, hand in hand. I was smiling and so was Josh. When Nate saw us he smiled. We headed to the cafeteria and things went back to the way they were the day before. Josh stealing my cookies and the three of us talking about nothing and everything. I smiled for the rest of the day, even as my mom flipped out at me for hitting Janice.

Here's an important author's note on the bottom! Before you review saying I'm an asshole about the homosexuality remark or a homophobe or something, hear me out. First, I must say I have nothing against homosexuals, or bisexuals for that matter. The only reason I added this was because, hey, it's around the 80's. You know, that whole big thing with HIV/AIDS being the 'gay' disease. It was something that most people disapproved on. I only added it because of that, and I had to have a reason for Ronnie to go down to the principal's office. I knew she was going to hit somebody, but that was the only thing I could think of that would piss her off that much. So, once again I have NOTHING against homosexuals or bisexuals.

"Veronica," Winnie called. "I made a pretty picture for you!" Josh didn't seem to care that she was probably coming closer, neither did I. She shouldn't come into this room. "Nathaniel," she shrieked. I broke away from Josh and stared at her. Why did she come in here?

"Yeah Winnie?" he asked her. Then he looked up and saw me blushing. I was cherry red and I started to giggle.

"What are you doing in Auntie Jessica's room?" she asked. She never said Uncle Sodapop. I never heard her say it. She never said Soda or Sodapop at all. Maybe she didn't like that name.

"Nothing, uh, don't worry about it," I told her.

"I know what you were doing, you were kissing. Ew, gross," she said. "I'm gonna tell!" she yelled and started to run around the house. Nate looked at us and laughed.

"Sucks to be you," he told me. I gave him the finger. Josh laughed at us arguing.

I brought back Winnie… I love that little monster. LOL, anyway… if you wanna talk to me AIM: gcbabe1891 and my Yahoo! IM is on my user look-up… just click my name and scroll down… it's there!