Disclaimer-Once again I do not own The Outsiders. S.E. Hinton does. Now that that's over with onto the story =)

Ponyboy stared down at his plate as he was forced to suffer through his older brother's cooking while Darry made a plate for Soda in case he decided to get up early. Ponyboy sighed and pushed some of the slightly burned eggs around on his plate.

"Don't play with it!" Darry scolded as he looked over at his youngest brother. "Eat it. You'll need the energy." Ponyboy didn't say anything. He stopped playing with his food (if that's what you could call it), but he didn't eat it.

Darry sighed and sat down at the table across from Ponyboy. He rested his cheek on his hand and stared off into Soda and Pony's room. He could just make out the outline of his brother from the kitchen. Soda's back was facing the doorway so he couldn't tell if he was still sleeping or not. He assumed he wasn't though. Soda never got much sleep because of the constant reoccurring nightmares that always seemed to plague his fragile mind at night.

"I better get going," Pony said suddenly as he got up off his chair.

"You didn't even eat your breakfast," Darry pointed out in more than an aggressive tone than intended. Pony gave him one of those, "Are you freaking kidding me," looks and stood there stubbornly, refusing to eat the foul tasting food.

"Eat," Darry instructed. "If you're late I'll just drive you. Your test isn't until fourth period anyways."

Ponyboy mumbled something under his breath that sounded somewhere along the lines of, "Oh my freaking God," and picked up his fork. He shoveled a mouthful of eggs into his mouth and glared at his oldest brother.

"Happy?" He asked with sarcasm after he had swallowed the vile tasting eggs that was his breakfast.

Darry didn't answer but he let his brother go. Ponyboy couldn't afford to be late again anyways. He was late enough from trying to stay home with Soda after he'd have one of his "really bad" nightmares.

"Ponyboy," Darry said to the brunette when he was literally halfway out the door.

"What?" He groaned with impatience. He just wanted to be left alone.

Darry waited a moment before asking his question. "Did … Did Soda have another bad dream last night?" Ponyboy winced at the mention of Soda's nightmares.

"He has them every night Darry." There was something dark in his eyes as he said this. "I gotta go …" And with that he left. Using a little too much force on the screen door as he did.

Darry sighed and looked over at the clock. He had to get going to work soon. He got up off the chair and slowly made his way over to Soda's room. He always resented this part of the day when he had to tell Soda he was leaving for work. He always felt so guilty.

"Hey little buddy," Darry said quietly, not really sure if his kid brother was awake or not. Soda rolled over so that he was facing Darry. Darry's heart sank in his chest when he saw the worry and silent plea in Soda's eyes. He hated leaving Soda alone but he had to go to work. He just had to. "I gotta get going Soda." Soda bit his lip and nodded.

As much as Soda dreaded being left alone he knew that they desperately needed the money, and now that he couldn't work very often it made it even harder on them financially.

Darry pushed some of Soda's light colored hair back and told him, "I'll lock the door on my way out."

When Darry got up to leave Soda wanted to grab his arm and beg him to stay. It took every fiber of strength in him to hold himself back and just let his brother go. Besides, Darry and Pony both took a large amount of time off from school and work just for him.

Soda wanted to cry when he heard the front door shut, and he wanted to scream when he heard Darry's truck start up and drive away.

After his brother's truck had drove off he waited in bed for a couple of minutes before getting up to check and see if the door really was locked. He knew that Darry told him he was going to lock it but people can forget to do things sometimes.

Soda quickly hurried over to the door and when he saw that it was indeed locked he relaxed a little. They never used to lock the door because they always wanted to have it open in case one of their friends needed a place to stay, but after Dally and Johnny died, and after the whole incident with "Who's name shall not be mentioned in front of Soda" they almost always kept the door locked.

Soda felt stupid and ashamed that he was always in constant fear that something bad was going to happen. A fight, a fire, a shooting … whatever. It all scared the hell out of Soda.

Soda sighed and decided to go into the kitchen and see if Darry had left a plate out for him. If he didn't he would just make one himself.

Soda smiled a little when he saw that his brother in fact did leave a plate out for him. He knew he was lucky to have such caring brothers as them.

Soda wasn't really hungry but he knew he had to eat, so he forced himself to. But after every couple of minutes his mind went back to the front door. Is it locked? He would wonder. What if I thought it was and it really wasn't?

He would mentally slap himself each time for this because he knew it was ridiculous to worry over such a thing when he had just checked it not even five minutes ago. But … he just couldn't help it. He was paranoid all the time now.

"Ya' know Soda … No locked door could ever keep me away from you."

Soda's eyes widened with fear and he dropped his fork on the floor.

Ooh suspenseful lol. So that's it for chapter three. It's a little longer than the other chapters but not much. I'm going to try and keep updating a lot but it's going to be difficult to do because of all the school work I have =/ It's fourth quarter so there's a lot of testing and sadly homework. I'll try my best though. I'd like to thank Steph36, ConfuzzledAtLife, and TheGizzYall for their awesome reviews =) I'd also like to thank ikedandude for adding me to their favorite authors list! Please review and tell me how I did =)