Author's note: yes, unfortunately, this is the last chapter in this story. It's just time. But I got plenty more up my sleeve, so don't sweat it.

Disclaimer: I don't own anything. At all.

Chapter 7: You and Soda Can Rock Out

PONYBOY'S POV

A couple days later, we were off to the doctor. I really wasn't looking forward to it, but when Darry threatens to tie you up and stick you in the trunk if you don't get in the damn car, you get in the damn car.

"Pony, hold still." Darry snapped. "You're makin' me nervous."

"Well, sorry." I muttered.

"What was that?"

"I said okay."

"That's what I thought."I dunno what the deal had been with me and Darry lately. Maybe we didn't have much to do with each other before now - it was only to be expected, what with six years between us - but he'd always treated me real nice when we did. Now you'd think I was Satan incarnate or something. He was always on my back about something or other. Dad never used to be like this. I mean, sure, he'd get mad at me, but he wouldn't yell at me. That's all Darry seemed to be capable of doing.

"Guys, chill." Soda said, turning up the radio and flicking through the stations, trying to find something he wanted. "Oh, hey, I love this song!" he suddenly laughed, and turned it up even more. Elvis Presley was singing his famous 'Jailhouse Rock', and Soda started singing along and bouncing around.

I usually thought of Dally when I listened to this song, but today, I thought the universe was taking some kind of poetic license. Like it was saying, yeah, Ponyboy, you go ahead and compare living with Darry to jail. It's the honest truth. You and Soda can rock out and just hope Darry doesn't put some kind of stop to that too, the bastard.

"We're here." Darry said, breaking into my thoughts. I reluctantly got out. I really hated these kinds of things.

When we walked into the doctor's office, the lady at the desk gave us a real suspicious, nasty look. "Can I help you?" Yeah, it was pretty obvious she didn't really wanna help us. She just wanted us out of here as fast as possible. For some reason, that made me sad. She didn't even know us and she already hated us.

"Yeah, I got an appointment with Doctor Simmons." Darry said, unphased by the treatment. He was used to it.

"Pone!" Soda hissed. "C'mere!"

I suddenly realized Soda wasn't standing next to us anymore and looked around. Where'd he go?

Oh. Of course.

Soda was over at the fish tank, practically glued to thing. He didn't seem to care that the only other people doing the same thing were a couple of five-year-old kids. I went over, looking cautiously back at Darry. He wouldn't make me stay and talk to the lady at the counter with him, would he? Even looking at the fish with Soda and some little kids sounded funner.

When he didn't react, I hurried over to Soda. "What?"

"Check these fish out!" he practically squeaked. "This one's all red." He tapped the glass with his finger right over where the fish was. I remembered hearing somewhere that you weren't supposed to do that and looked around quickly to make sure some grown up wasn't about to come get mad at us. Nobody was around. I turned back to the fish.

"How about this shiney golden one?" I said quickly, pointing at the flashiest fish in the whole tank. It really was beautiful.

"Oh, and the blue-ish green-ish one!"

"That's called turquoise, Soda."

"Whatever. Look at the purple one!"

"And the pink one!"

"Pink ain't a man's color."

"Good think I ain't a man yet, then."

"This black one's pretty tuff lookin'."

Darry interrupted our fun, the kill joy. "Guys, c'mon."

Soda sighed, then waved at the fish like a dork. "Be back later." And we followed Darry back to where the doctor wanted to talk to us.

He wasn't even in the room. Thanks for keeping us waiting, man. Really.

After we sat there for about ten minutes, a fat old man with a bald spot on his head came in. "Hello. I'm Doctor Simmons. I understand we're here to talk about…" He checked his clipboard and blinked in surprise for a minute before deciding not to comment on it. "Ponyboy Michael today?"

Darry nodded. "Yep."

"Which of you would that be?"

I didn't answer. I wanted to watch him play a guessing game for a minute. Besides, it wasn't my idea to come here.

"This one." Soda said, pointing at me.

Traitor.

The doctor sat down in his chair and faced me. "Hello, Ponyboy. I understand you've been having some dreams?"

I just nodded curtly. I wasn't giving more information than was necessary.

"Would you care to tell me about them?"

I shook my head.

"Ponyboy…" Darry said warningly.

"No, it's alright." The doctor held up a hand, still smiling. "I understand this might be a difficult topic for you, Ponyboy, but it will help to discuss it."

"How'm I supposed to discuss em if I can't remember em?"

"You can't remember what you're dreaming about?" the doctor said, startled. "That's unusual."

"This whole situation's unusual." Darry said. "Now what d'you think we should do about it?"

XxXxX

We were there forever. I swear, if it were up to me, somebody would've died. Anything to get out of there.

The doctor said I had too much imagination. Apparently there was a simple cure for this problem. Read more, draw more, and play football more. Okay, I could do that.

And I did. I went on living life, if it's believable. Even without my parents. Even with Darry treating me like I still went to preschool. I kept going.

Eight months passed. We fell into a pattern: Soda and Darry going to work, me, Johnny, Steve, and Two-Bit going to school. Dallas doing not even heaven knows what.

Johnny turned sixteen on March first, Steve turned seventeen on April fifteenth, Two-Bit turned eighteen on June 20th, and I turned fourteen on July 22nd. It was the first birthday since the accident, and, as I'm sure you can imagine, it was hard, but we made it through it. Soda and Darry did their best to make it special, help me have a good day.

Johnny got jumped and beaten half to death by some socs. Dallas hunted them down and beat them half to death in retaliation. He got caught though, and was back in jail again. He got ninety days. I swear, that guy'll never learn.

One day, I decided to go see a movie. It'd been a while. Maybe nobody could go with me, but that didn't mean I couldn't go by myself, right? Sure, Johnny'd been jumped, but that didn't mean it was gonna happen to me, did it?

The movie I saw had Paul Newman in it. I think he's real tuff. I sure wish I was more like Paul Newman. I sighed when it ended, wishing it could've gone longer, but all things come to an end.

As I stood up, the familiar feeling was on me. That dread, that knowledge that something was about to go horribly wrong. But it, couldn't could it? Enough bad things had already happened to us. Surely the universe wasn't that cruel. Besides, it was a nice fall day outside; what could possibly happen?

Yeah, that was the last time I discounted that feeling as me being paranoid.