Johnny's car is almost thrumming in place when Ponyboy gets within arms reach of him. "Hey, Johnny. I didn't know you were coming by here tonight."

Normally, Johnny Cade couldn't scare him. They grew up together, two pups who were always destined to be close, to be friends. Ponyboy had been there when Johnny had lost his first tooth and they'd excitedly wondered about the tooth fairy together. He'd been by his side when his parents had missed another recital or when Johnny had gotten rejected by one of the girl's he liked when he was twelve.

Johnny had been there for him when his parents died, had been trying to make him smile and cheer up. Just weeks ago, they'd gone to the beach together, and Ponyboy had felt twangs of normalcy again.

Only, he doesn't think that's the Johnny looking at him now, with darting black eyes, with a tight grip on the front car door. The Johnny that's looking at him now has Bob Sheldon and Randy Adderson and David Billings in the back seat, all of them with their own eyes on Ponyboy.

He wonders if they'd be doing this, if they'd be here like this if they weren't there. Wonders if they were alone, would Johnny be looking at him in such a hostile way? Would they be this tense together as Johnny grips the wheel, revving up the engine to a half roar, saying, "I wanted to pick you up, make sure you weren't gonna walk home and get accosted by one of those bums."

One of the worst things about being a Soc — something he wished he'd said to Dallas — was that showing concern of any kind without a real motivation to it wasn't something done at all. There's a real note of worry in his voice that Ponyboy is sure he never wants Bob or David or Randy to hear. The way that his eyes dart over to him, there's something at the bottom of his eyes that has a real shine of concern there, shows that kid that Ponyboy could call a friend.

The rest of it, is the problem. First being that it doesn't take a rocket scientist to know exactly who told Johnny about this — Ponyboy's fist clenches, looking at the crowded back seat.

He has no choice here. He has to get into the car, and he does so, coming around to sit in the passenger seat. The car still feels almost entirely new, at least the part of it that doesn't scent like the cologne that Johnny had insisted on getting himself. The one that claimed it would make him scent more like an alpha, than a beta.

Ponyboy shifts uncomfortably, glancing at the rearview mirror as Johnny puts the car in drive, kicking up what he knows is an unbelievable amount of dust in the air as they move out of the parking lot. Bob glares at him from the backseat, and Ponyboy wishes he'd never run into him. "I'm fine, Johnny. I don't need an escort or nothing."

"Not what Bob said," the way his mouth twists around Bob tells Ponyboy that he was on the edge of a stutter, something that Bob knows nothing about, the soft underbelly of Johnny he'd never reveal for fear that they'd all use it against him. He moves the car around the normal long line, barreling past everyone else to hit the street. "Was that greaser really bothering you earlier tonight?"

It feels as if ice has been dumped down Ponyboy's back at the way Johnny says the word greaser, at the anger and disgust there. There was no way that he was getting out of this now, as the car barrels into the main road, the headlights bright as they drive.

If they were alone, Ponyboy thinks that this conversation would be easier. The concern would feel realer, and not coated in anger that someone lower than him were approaching him. Instead, Bob hops into the conversation before Ponyboy can stop him with, "It's a new one, hearing him say you two were on a date. Where's he gonna take you, to a body shop?"

The laughter that feels the car is sharp, humiliating — not for Ponyboy though. It's for Dallas, the way that David chimes in with, "A body shop if you're lucky. I heard Dallas Winston fucks broads in barns most of the time."

That is enough for Ponyboy to feel the blood roaring in his ears. "I'm not talking with you three in the back of the car." He raises his voice, and for the first time in a long time, he reminds them of who he is, of what he could be, taking on that imperious tone that Darry prided himself in, the tone that Ponyboy had never enjoyed and yet needed right now. "Johnny, I wanna talk to you about this alone. They don't have anything to do with this — I don't think it's proper for them to even be in the car with me like this."

It's all he can muster up to remind them that they were all trying to compete for his attention, to remind them that the only person who could be on any sort of equal footing with Johnny was him, and him alone. Not even saying their names should be enough, Ponyboy keeping his eyes on Johnny.

It's a gamble, he knows.

Not just because he's reminding them of his station — it's because you never could really be yourself around another Soc. You could never drop your barriers, be who you really were. They weren't tightly knit packs like greasers who looked out for each other.

If he pleads with Johnny, if he begs, if he tries to ask them as who they were to listen to him, it wouldn't work. The revelation, the stark reality of it is awful. If he tries to get Johnny to act like the friend he remembered him to be, it won't work either. It will make Johnny look weak, susceptible to an omega or even make it seem as if Ponyboy has chosen him.

That reminder is just as bad. It's what he's almost indicated, and to cover his tracks, Ponyboy adds, glancing at the backseat full of people he'd never trust, "Just for a few minutes — Darry and Soda know Johnny, better is all."

It's not the smoothest landing, and Ponyboy thinks that if his expression breaks, they'll all push back. Instead, Johnny nods. "C'mon. We'll park here, just get out for a couple of minutes." He brakes the car, half banking at an unfamiliar park.

A park, Ponyboy sees, is in greaser territory. Shit.

Dallas laughs and Marcia laughs too, edging on that piglike snort she hated yet was always a sign that a joke was really good.

Any other time would have Cherry chiming in. Instead, she is miserable, grateful for the fact that her house is now only a few steps away. All she's been thinking about on the walk to her house, back to her lonely bedroom, is that none of this was fair. All the planning she had done, all the careful coordination with Marcia to make sure that Dallas saw Sylvia for who she really was, the money she had scrimped and saved to look good from the top of her hair to the soles of her feet had all been wasted the moment Ponyboy Curtis had shown up in that butter yellow shirt of his.

Everything was out of her hands now, definitively — all due to one rich little omega who thought he could do anything, be with anyone. What had she done to deserve this? What had she done to always be the bridesmaid and never the goddamn bride?

Insult to injury, his scent is all over Dallas. He hadn't taken his jacket back, his bare arms pale, muscled in a way that Cherry would've loved to touch.

This night has been a disaster. That wasn't including the fact that she had to go and clean up before her parents could take stock, and Cherry speeds up as they finally reach her yard. "Sssh, ssh. Don't know if Mama's up."

"She probably ain't," Dallas stops, glancing between Marcia and Cherry. "You going off on your own?"

"Yeah," Marcia waves to them both. "I'll see you tomorrow!" She makes a sign with her fingers for the telephone — what a good friend Marcia is. Cherry knows she'll call in the morning, and she and Dallas watch as she goes to her house only two more down.

Which has her attention back on him. She makes her way up her porch, back to her shitty little house and her shitty drunk mom. "I got a date tomorrow, so I'll see you guys before or after depending." Dallas grins wider, full of confidence and happiness and pride and all Cherry wants to do is cry.

In her head, she thinks Why is it any and everyone but me? Why didn't you ever look at me the way you look at bitches like Sylvia or Barbara Jenkins? Why do you want to be with a soc like that?

Those are all things she can't say to him, won't say to him. All things she swallows down to smile and say, "Thanks for walking us home, Dally. I'll see you tomorrow."

He lifts his hand, waves with that big grin of his, and he hops off her porch. Cherry watches him go, hearing cicadas around her, the sound of a train in the distance, a distant horn honking.

Then she uses her key to get inside, close the door, and once she's sure her mother is still drunk asleep, she goes to her room, sits on her bed and bursts into tears.

The car door slams shut.

Ponyboy is finally, finally alone with Johnny. Not the Johnny that is friends with Bob and Randy — the Johnny who was his childhood friend first.

(The Johnny who never told him about the letter.)

He waits for Randy, Bob, and David to go up the hill, over where the fountain is. Ponyboy leans back in the seat, letting air wash over them both, the windows down. He can distantly hear them talking, laughing near the fountain. Ponyboy clenches his fingers on his knees and glances at Johnny.

Unlike before, he seems more relaxed with them out of the car, with their odious presence gone. Here, he looks more like the Johnny Cade that Ponyboy has grown up with, the one with big eyes that sometimes reminded him of a puppy, the one who sometimes bit his nails nervously before a test he didn't understand.

Not the Johnny that was always armored up, always afraid to let any weakness show around the other Socs. Not the one who slathered himself in cologne so that he could try to read as alpha. The Johnny in front of him talks carefully, slower than before. "Was Bob telling the truth or not? You and Dallas Winston — were you two really together at the drive in?"

His voice is calmer, which makes Ponyboy relax. "It wasn't a big deal, Johnny. We just ran into each other, decided to stay together the whole night." There's a bit of a white lie in that, and still, Ponyboy doesn't seek to say more, not yet. He needs to gauge how Johnny is now, with the way that he licks his lips, the way his shoulders stiffens.

"That isn't the word he used, c'mon, Pony," Johnny locks his dark eyes on Ponyboy's face. "You know you can trust me, right? We've been friends our whole lives. If he did something to you —"

"Did something?" He pushes back, knowing everything that word something could mean. "Johnny, don't be crazy —"

"I'm not crazy for thinking something is up with a greaser like that being around you!" Usually, Johnny isn't like this with him, isn't this pushy. Right now, his voice is taking on an angry, desperate tone that Ponyboy has never heard before. "He's in and out of jail, he stalks girls, he even tried to hit on some Soc girls a few months back. Good girls, not that greasy trash he hangs out with. "

The more that Johnny talks, the more he uses those insults, the angrier Ponyboy gets. "You didn't think Cherry Valance was greasy trash when you talked about her before your cotillion." He remembers Johnny looking at her walking past, at her red hair. "Don't act like you're so different —"

"You're just a kid, you turned fourteen a few weeks ago!" The aggression is enough that Johnny's scent changes, Ponyboy startled at how sharp Johnny's voice becomes. "You shouldn't be out here, with people like Dallas Winston! Just cause I looked at her doesn't mean that I walked up to her." Johnny's voice is oddly desperate, and Ponyboy doesn't know why it makes it so painful to look at the way that Johnny's jaw is clenched, at the real worry there that Johnny feels.

It's wrong, is the thing. It's wrong that Johnny is worried about him, as if he'd ever been in genuine danger from Dallas Winston at any point at all in the night.

It's all so stupid, he thinks. So stupid that they all were just teenagers in one place together, who had to fight over stupid shit like this, put up walls and pretend to be who and what they weren't.

"It was a date, Johnny," Ponyboy says firmly, feeling cold drift into the car from a sharp draft. That makes Johnny's eyes widen comically in his face. "I had a date with Dallas, he didn't force me to do anything I didn't want." He fingers the jacket he's still wearing, defiant. "He didn't force me — he cleaned my clothes, he kept his hands where I wanted them and he kissed me, Johnny."

A pin could drop and it would be heard in the car.

Ponyboy can see Johnny's face go blank with confusion, and he stutters the way he always does when caught off guard, "Wh-What?"

"He kissed me. And I wanted it. Every time we kissed," Ponyboy doesn't break eye contact from Johnny, doesn't stutter, doesn't do anything but make himself clear. The letter's words ring in his ears again, and he continues without thinking, "I know you, Bob, all of them just think of me as someone to have, someone you want just cause my family has money. None of you have that claim on me, and neither does Dallas. I should be able to go out on one date with someone who I want whenever I want to, without any of you thinking more about what you might get out of it. We ain't married, we ain't engaged, and acting like we are isn't gonna make me want you!"

Now shouldn't have been the time to say it, to push against the letters, to mention them. It just comes spilling out of him, all at once, the words just spewing out of him. "I thought we were friends Johnny — not that you thought of me just as a meal ticket, going behind my back to my brother!"

The stunned look on Johnny's face is so sharply different from what Ponyboy has been expecting, the way that veneer of how he should be has finally cracked — cracked into something upset, devastated for a moment. "Ponyboy, it's not about being a – a meal ticket —"

"I have known Ponyboy since we were children, always keeping his interests at heart," he spits the line out the way he's been wanting to do for days, flings it right into Johnny's face. "I wish to court Ponyboy at your earliest convenience. You remember you wrote that, right? Darry's earliest convenience. Not mine." His fingers reach for the cold handle for the car door. "We aren't friends, we aren't engaged — I'm going home by myself, and I'm gonna stick to a boy who doesn't see me like someone he can just buy."

He doesn't know how he gets out of the car, how he stumbles out into the cold, getting his footing. All Ponyboy knows is that his feet hit the pavement hard, his hear pumping into his ears.

"Ponyboy!"

Johnny calls out and Ponyboy bites out, "I'm going home! And I'm going to the Dingo tomorrow, with Dallas Winston and there isn't anything you can do about it!"

It's satisfying, it feels so good, and it hurts, too. To look at the boy who he'd thought of as his best friend for years, who he would've happily gotten engaged to if only Johnny had actually asked, if he had cared.

He hadn't, though. Ponyboy walks towards the darkness, of the street, to the path out of greaser territory. He's going home.

He doesn't hear Bob Sheldon say, You're not letting him leave are you? You're not letting him go to that greaser?

He doesn't understand in that moment that Johnny makes a choice. A choice that will have so many consequences, spiraling out for decades. That Johnny knows that he is a lone beta, who has money and now no real friends. That Johnny Cade can't afford to look bad, can't afford to lose, that he has so, so much anger inside of him that it overrides any sense at that moment.

He doesn't understand that Johnny Cade has had enough.

All Ponyboy knows is that he is alone for almost ten minutes, two streets over when he hears the sound of a car engine revving. And that when he turns his head, he doesn't see one of those decade or older cars that greasers drove.

What he sees is a 1964 white Lincoln, with Johnny at the helm.

The car revs, jerks towards him.

All Ponyboy can do is turn and run.