Hello! So the idea of a gender-bent version of Ponyboy was not my idea. I recently read a novel, Bad Girls Never Say Die, which was supposed to be a sort of gender-bent version of The Outsiders, and although I enjoyed the book, I wanted something closer to the actual plot. When I started brainstorming this, I just couldn't leave the idea alone. So here is my version. I hope you enjoy.

A Good Liar

1. How it All Started

If pressed, Pony Curtis would say that the whole thing started because of a fight with Susie Matthews, who had been her best friend since they'd sat together in church back before the two of them had started first grade, swinging their feet and flipping through a hymnal they couldn't read. On Susie's other side had been her big brother Keith, who hadn't started going by Two-Bit just yet, and who she would always just think of as Keith. On Pony's other side had been Sodapop, swinging his own legs and staring around the church, obviously looking for something to occupy his mind other than the sermon, since that wasn't working out too well.

The two of them had met before, of course, since Mrs. Matthews and her mom had been good friends, and since her big brothers were friends with Keith. But it wasn't until that day, when their moms had placed them in the middle of their brothers in the hopes that it would finally get the boys to be quiet, that the two of them had really become friends, and they'd been best friends ever since. All through school, up until Pony was bumped up a grade right before her parents died, they were almost always in the same class. Then in high school, when their only class together was art, Pony convinced her friend to try out for the track team so they could have something to do together after school.

And that, Pony thought as she made her way down the school hallway alone, was why they'd fought.

Shifting her backpack further up her back, she stopped at her locker, putting in the combination and dropping the books off she wouldn't need for homework, then locked it back, figuring she'd be walking home alone, even if it made Darry mad. Susie hadn't waited for her after class, walking right out of the room as soon as the bell had rang, and now Pony pulled the crumpled up piece of notebook paper out of her pocket, glancing over it before ripping it up.

She knew what it said anyway.

"I'm quitting track."

Pony still felt the hurt…the overwhelming fear, that she knew was stupid, but she couldn't stop herself from being afraid. Susie was her best friend…her only real friend! And the season had just started! Bad enough that she would graduate a year before her only friend…that she would have to go to college alone, and hope that her friend picked the same school after a year apart…

First her parents, then her brothers, Darry to stress and bills and work, and Sodapop to Sandy and Steve, and now…now Susie.

Her eyes burned but she blinked back the tears, not about to cry in school like a baby.

She'd just stared at her best friend from across the table, eyes wide, before Susie had pulled back the paper, scribbling on it while the two of them had pretended to work on their sketches.

"I don't like it, and I'm not even any good."

"That's because you don't try!" Pony had scribbled, underlining the last word, and Susie had rolled her eyes, writing her response and shoving the paper back towards her.

"I knew you'd do this! You act like we have to do everything together!"

Pony had just stared at the paper, then her friend, before wadding it up in a ball and going back to her work, eyes burning and knowing she couldn't talk to her without crying. The hurt was like a knife in her chest, and all she wanted to do was go to the bathroom so no one would see her so upset, but school was over and the bathrooms would be full of other girls doing their makeup and talking about their weekend plans. At best, they'd ask her if she was okay. At worst, they'd think she was a baby and talk about her behind her back the second she left the room.

As she stepped out into the bright light of the afternoon sun amidst the other students all racing to the parking lot, she knew that she wasn't going home…not yet. She hated that house now, with the reminders of her parents and stacks of bills that Darry was struggling to pay and her brothers' friends always around, playing music too loud and laughing and yelling and living their lives, as if her parents weren't dead. As if everything was fine.

So, figuring she had some time before she actually needed to be home, she headed for the movie house.

Pony had always liked the movies, although she usually went with Susie, or lied to Darry and told him she was going with other friends since her brother didn't like her walking around town alone. He always said she didn't pay enough attention, and besides, now that he had custody, she always had to ask him to go places and tell him who she was with and what they would be doing. But Sodapop couldn't sit still for a movie, and Darry didn't like them, not that they'd ever go together anyway. So that sort of limited her options. Not for the first time, she thought she should try to make more friends…maybe then, she thought as she settled into her seat in the back of the movie house, Susie pulling away from her wouldn't seem like such a betrayal. But the girls in her class were all older, and most of them had boyfriends, and none of them seemed to want to hang out with a girl who was a year younger than them. She could always try and spend time with the girls her own age...most of them had liked her, but they hadn't been real close or anything.

Pony managed to focus on the movie, losing herself in the story and watching Paul Newman, two of her favorite pastimes, but as soon as the movie ended and the lights came back on, her mind went back to her friend. It hadn't just been that note…it had been everything…weeks spent in classes with older kids who didn't talk to her, or if they did, it was to make smart remarks about her raising her hand in class, or getting good test scores. It had been watching Susie talk to other girls in the hall when she'd walked past, and being too afraid to join in.

And it had been the last eight months…memories of her last Christmas with her parents, and her fourteenth birthday only a month ago…her first one with only her brothers. She'd told them she didn't want a party. Honestly, she'd planned to ignore the whole day entirely, not wanting to turn fourteen when her parents would never again be there to celebrate with her, but she'd woken to one of Sodapop's cakes with the too-sweet icing, and a card with a few dollars inside from Darry, who'd been nice the whole day, not getting on her even once. Their friends had come by too, Two-Bit with a birthday card and Johnny with a book.

Gone With the Wind.

Her and Susie had spent the afternoon together in her room while the guys had played cards in the living room. They'd painted each other's nails and talked about school and it had ended up being a good day...the first one in a long time. But the whole day, in the back of her mind, she'd known that her parents would never be there for another one of her birthdays.

"Hey there, sweetheart!"

The words made her jump, yanking her out of the memory, and she glanced over at the guy leering at her from the car window. She glared at him, then continued walking, her heart racing.

"Hey, I'm talking to you!" he snapped, revving the engine, and she lifted her middle finger. It was safer to walk with Susie, and if she couldn't find someone to walk with, she was supposed to call her brothers or one of their friends to see if they'd walk with her or give her a ride, but she wasn't about to call Keith, her best bet, when she was in the middle of a fight with his sister. As far as she knew, Dallas was still locked up, not that she knew where to even find him, and Steve didn't like her, so she wasn't going to call the DX.

Besides, she wasn't a little kid. She was Darry and Sodapop Curtis's little sister. She was tough...not a greaser, but a girl that spent most of her time with them. She could handle herself.

"Bitch!" the guy shouted at her, driving off, but her heart still pounded, hands shaking at her sides.

Sometimes, she wished she wasn't a girl. Darry didn't keep nearly as short a leash on Soda as he did her, and she was sure that he'd care less about her going places on her own. But at the moment, she was grateful that she wasn't a boy. She knew all about the rumbles her brothers and their friends got into with the socs from the other side of town, and she knew that sometimes guys got jumped when they were walking alone, but both sides usually left the girls out of it. Especially when those girls had big brothers like Darry and Soda, who'd never lost a fight.

Pony hadn't made it three steps into the house before one of said big brothers poked his head around the kitchen doorway, brows furrowed like always.

"Where have you been?" Darry demanded, and she hitched her backpack up over her shoulder, not meeting his eyes.

"Movies," she told him simply, wishing she could tell him about the boys who had driven by her and called her nasty names, or the fact that Susie apparently had new friends and didn't want to be hers anymore…but she couldn't talk to Darry about that stuff. Those were things she could have talked to Mom about. Or Sodapop…but Soda was always busy now, working or hanging out with his friends or Sandy, who she tried not to hate. She wanted to be happy for her brother…but she couldn't make herself like his girlfriend, no matter how friendly she was.

"On your own?" he asked, but she didn't stop on her way to her room.

"Yeah." There was no point in lying. Not when he could find out for himself so easily.

He sighed, looking exhausted. "Pony, I don't want you walking around town by yourself."

She hesitated at her door and bit back every retort that came to mind. He let Soda do whatever he wanted. Even Susie was allowed to walk around on her own for the most part. Pony never got into trouble and she didn't get into fights like him and Soda…her grades were perfect and she kept the house clean…why couldn't he just leave her alone?

Instead, she nodded. "Yeah. Okay," she told him flatly, not turning around.

"I've told you that before. You never pay attention! You've got to get your head out of the clouds…it's like all you ever think about is movies and books."

She tightened her jaw, glaring at her bedroom door. "I've got homework, Darry," she told him before he could keep going, impatience slipping into her voice, and he huffed out another sigh.

"Yeah, alright. Go on."

And with that, she stepped into her room, shutting her door behind her.

Unlike the rest of the house, which she and her brothers tried to keep pretty clean to keep the people from the State off their back, her bedroom was immaculate. Her bed got made every morning. Her art supplies were all stored neatly in a shoebox she and Susie had decorated a few years ago which lived tucked under her bed. Her clothes were hung up or folded, her shoes lined up neatly by the door. Sometimes, it felt like that room was the only thing she had…the only thing she could control…could make perfect. Her family was broken. Half the time, she felt like she was broken too. But this room…well, at least she could do this much.

Pony sat at her desk, pulling out her folders, all perfectly labeled, and then her homework, doing math first, then the reading for social studies, and then science. Darry would want to check over her work, but she wasn't about to seek him out and ask him to look at it. If he wanted to check her work, she thought bitterly, he could come to her.

The second half of the last school year had been hard. After their parents, Darry had gotten custody, and at first, he'd been pretty understanding, but that had only lasted a month or so before he'd been reminding her how smart she was…how she could get a scholarship and go to college if she would just apply herself. And as the months had passed and he'd seemed to grow more and more distant…more and more wrapped up in his own worries, she'd finally seen a way out.

Get a scholarship. Go to college. Get away from her brother and be free.

She hated thinking like that. She hated how hopeless it all felt…how her big brother hated her, and how he didn't want her around anymore. She hated feeling like a burden to him in her own home. But he'd made it abundantly clear that he didn't want her. And so, at the beginning of the school year, lying in her bed the night before her first day of school, she had decided that she wouldn't give him a reason to complain about her grades ever again.

And so far, it was working.

But even that wasn't good enough. Now she was reading too much, or she spent too much time at the movies, or out with Susie. It didn't matter what she did…she'd never be good enough for him.

So why even bother trying?

Pony told herself she didn't anymore. She always had been a good liar.

Soda carried the conversation at dinner, telling them all about his day at the DX and asking her questions about school that she answered with one-word answers. Darry didn't seem to notice how quiet she was being, and she was glad. The last thing she wanted to do was accidentally say something to get herself in trouble. It was safer to just stay quiet when it came to Darry.

Stay quiet. Do good in school. Get out.

"Steve and I are going to the game tomorrow night…"

Pony blinked, pulled out of her thoughts, and she spoke before she could really think about the fact that Steve was going too…she could put up with Steve for a few hours. "Can I come?"

Immediately he looked sorry, and her heart dropped. "Sorry, Pone. We're taking Sandy and Evie."

She just nodded, going back to her dinner. She should be used to it, she told herself. He was always with Steve or Sandy these days. It wasn't like he wasn't nice to her…Soda was her favorite person in the whole world. But she guessed it was more fun to hang out with his girlfriend or his buddy than to spend time with his little sister.

Pony did the dishes since Darry had cooked, Sodapop cleaning up the kitchen, and as soon as she was done, the last dish dried and put away, she headed back to her bedroom, dropping onto her bed with her book. It wasn't like Darry was going to let her get away with going anywhere, especially after she'd walked home from the movies, even if it wasn't a school night. He was usually more relaxed on weekends, but she'd already made him mad once, and she didn't want to risk it again so soon. She didn't have anywhere to go, anyway. Susie was the only friend she ever hung out with outside of school.

So instead, she lost herself in Gone With the Wind.

The knock at her door almost an hour later startled her, and she glanced up from her book.

"Yeah?"

"Hey, kiddo." Soda grinned at her from the doorway, poking his head in.

She should have known it was him. Darry almost never sought her out unless he was upset with her. Or he wanted to check her homework.

"What are you up to?"

She held up the book, making him grin as he stepped into the room, dropping onto the bed beside her and draping an arm around her shoulders. She huffed out a sigh, putting her book down and figuring she wasn't going to get any more reading done, not that she minded too much.

"I'm sorry you can't come tomorrow," he told her softly, knocking his shoulder against her, and she shrugged.

"It don't matter."

"Maybe Sunday we can do something, huh? Just me, you, and Darry."

She wrinkled her nose. "Darry doesn't want to do anything with me." She didn't want to do anything with him either, but that was beside the point.

His face fell. "Sure he does, Pone. Hey," he murmured, shaking her a little. "Don't be like that. He don't mean it when he yells and stuff. He's just got a lot to worry about, you dig? He loves you a lot. He's real proud of you, Pony."

She couldn't help rolling her eyes as she stared out her window. Darry wasn't proud of her. Half the time, she thought he probably regretted getting custody of her in the first place. But when Soda was silent, she shrugged, not wanting to hurt his feelings. "Yeah. Okay," she muttered. She knew that Soda believed that, but he didn't get it…she didn't think he could.

Darry was different with him.

"I'm proud of you too, you know," Soda told her softy, and her eyes did fill then, her teeth digging into her lip. She dropped her head on his shoulder, sniffing softly and missing their mom so bad it hurt. She could have talked to their mom about Susie, and about school and fighting with Darry, and she would have held her and promised that everything would be okay. And if their parents were alive, Darry would still love her, and maybe she wouldn't have even fought with Susie, and Pony wouldn't feel so alone all the time.

But at least she still had Soda.

"Thanks," she whispered, closing her eyes and trying not to cry on his shoulder like a little kid.

He squeezed her shoulders hard, leaning his head on hers. "Love you kid."

"Love you, Soda."