There was something about my girlfriend. I could loose all my control in seconds with her. "Your gorgeous." I whispered to her. I broke our kiss for a second.

She grabbed my plaid shirt forcing me into her. She slightly bit my lip, and I deepened the kiss. She was wearing one of those shorter dresses. It showed off her legs. It was tighter in her chest. I lost slight control of my hands.

"Holy, shit take that into the bedroom!"

We jumped apart. Maria stared down at the floor. She was so embarrassed. Her face was red. I ran a hand through my hair. It was a nervous habit. "When did you get back?" I asked.

Sunny shook his head at us. "Darrel, do we need to have the no girls in the house, while home alone apply to you too?"

I could feel my ears go red, the same way Pony's do when he gets mortified.

"I got back this morning. Clearly, I'm going to have to leave Pony in charge when I leave." He smiled.

"Shut up!" I snapped for the sake of having nothing to say about my situation.

" I think I should go." Maria said. She kissed my cheek, and didn't take her eyes off the floor as she walked past Sunny.

Sunny punched my shoulder. "Take it easy there. I was only teasing you."

"No, your right, it could have been bad if Pony or Soda walked in." Good lord that would have been horrible. I was supposed to set an example.

I watched as Sunny dug a piece of bread into the sauce she made. "Please, I wish my girlfriend would have grab my butt once in a while."

"Trouble in paradise?" I asked.

"There's no trouble because there is no paradise. We called off the engagement today." He took the ring out of his pocket and tossed it up in his hand. "You know what I want.? I want a home, where my brothers know that no matter what mistake they make, or how bad it is. They can always come home. That's unconditional love."

"What happened?" I asked. The guy nearly choked me to death for fighting with her. Now all the sudden he was all smiles as he came into the kitchen.

Sunny tossed his fedora on the table, and knelt down under the sink. He pulled out a bottle of Jack Daniels and poured some into a glass. "Are you drunk?" I asked as he then put the bottle back under the sink.

"Nope." He grinned. "I don't want social services coming in here and finding my whiskey, or better yet, I don't want Soda's hippie friends to take it. Or Two-Bit. And we couldn't seem to get our views in line. She is all about God, and Jimi Hendrix is the only god I believe in."

"Do you know Pony has been practicing with the football team all summer?" I asked changing subject. He was acting too strange to talk about Grace now.

Sunny burst out laughing. "He's a midget."

"He's almost Soda's height."

"Does he even weight 100 pounds?"

I shrugged. "I don't know. I think it will be good for him. He's just a kicker."

Sunny face dropped. He starred of in space for a second and then shook his head. "There is no way, even if he is Soda's height for him to make the weight limit. If he gets hit by one of those guys, or tackled. He could get his brains knocked out."

"I signed him in to play." I said. This wasn't how Sunny was supposed to take it.

"That was really stupid." Sunny slammed his now empty glass down. "Don't put him in danger, because your tickled pink that one of your brother's wants to follow in your foot steps. "

"He wanted to pay. You know how much hard work goes into football. I wasn't going to tell him no. Not after he put all those hours in. Not to mention he needs to venture out of his box a little."

He just shook his head at me. " I just hope he doesn't get hurt."

"Are you seriously in my senior math class?" Steve asked grabbing my schedule.

I watched everyone come piling into the hallway. You could hardly tell the greasers from socs. They were all hippies. I just wanted to put more grease on my hair. There was no way I was ever going to convert. "Don't worry, I don't cover my answers."

Steve smacked the back of my head. "Don't get cocky."

"Hey Pony. You looked good on the practice field yesterday." Angela Sheppard smiled as she walked by me.

"Thanks." I said back

Steve glared at me. "She has her sights set on you. You better watch out."

I didn't have time to respond because Two-Bit looped his arm around Randy Anderson's shoulders. "Hey there baby, how about a movie Saturday night." He cracked up laughing at his own joke.

Randy had turned into a hippie too. His hair was long. He grew his beard out. Today he had on bell-bottoms, with a fringed vest. It was way to weird.

"This ain't going to be a good year for me. All these boys with this extra long hair. I can't tell the difference between the females and the males!" Two- Bit opened his locked and adjusted his hair in the small mirror on the side.

"I'll give you a hint. The girls are the one's with boobs." Steve said.

"Hey Ponyboy, will you walk me to class? Those stupid baseball players outside my room always try to grab my rear. They won't do it if you are with me." Angie twirled a fraction of her hair around her finger.

"Sure Angel." I said. "See ya'll later." I said to Steve and Two-Bit.

"Sodapop! What's going on man?" Allen always said my name so weird. It was like he never could get over that it was really Sodapop.

"I saw Sunny yesterday! He went to my brother's house." Allen's brother lived in a giant green and orange house. His brother's did a lot of drugs. I was surprised Sunny wanted to do anything with him."

"He came home sometime yesterday from his trip. His article is in the newspaper if you want it." I still couldn't get into the whole reading thing. It just bored me way to much. "I have nothing that sounds good. I'm supposed to make a song, out of the scale. I can't figure one out."

"Want some creative juice?" Allen glanced over his shoulder. "I got some grass, that will take you out of your creative rut."

I grinned. "No thanks. I don't do that stuff. Not to mention if I got caught, Sunny would skin me, and Darry would ground me until I turned eighteen."

"Please all those writers, musicians and artist do it. I tried LSD this weekend. It isn't bad. The government just doesn't want us to have it. So they say it is bad. Jim Morrison does it, Jack Kerouac probably has. Besides, it's not like Sunny would tell Darry, or actually skin you." He said. I couldn't believe he could still function. He was a cool guy, but a little strange at times.

"You don't know my brother too well." I stuffed my sheet music into my folder.

"Why would he get mad? He bought weed off my brother."

I dropped my folder sending my sheet music flying all over. "No way. Not my brother."