I swallowed hard, listening to Darry. I couldn't believe he wasn't so mad at me for getting Pony into all this trouble.
"Uh, Darry, is Dally there?" I said, glancing at the clock. I didn't know how long I'd get to be on the phone, but I figured they'd burst in and tell me to get off at any moment.
"Yeah, he's here. Hold on," he said. I heard the phone clatter down on a table, I heard all the rustling at their end. I just waited. I wished I was there at their house instead of here.
"Johnny?" It was Dally, alright. He sounded half mad and half worried.
"Yeah, Dal," I said, my voice this whisper.
"Are you okay?" he said, sounding more worried than mad. I swallowed hard, that question again. I closed my eyes. I was pretty far from okay. I saw the kid I killed almost every time I closed my eyes, saw the blood spreading under him kind of slow, saw the way his face looked. When I thought of that I didn't even care about being here, it didn't matter. But being here was making me feel so trapped and crazy. I was bored and I was scared and I wanted to leave. I didn't like these clothes and I didn't like these staff people watching me all the time and I didn't like answering questions.
"Yeah, I'm fine," I said, but I thought Dal knew it was a lie. But what was I supposed to say?
"Johnny…" he kind of hissed my name, and now he sounded more mad than worried.
"Listen, Johnny, the papers are saying it's manslaughter. That's what they're saying they're probably gonna charge you with. So, don't get all worried about the electric chair, you know? You don't have a record or nothing, it was self defense. Okay, Johnny?"
"Yeah," I said in that same choked little whisper. What Dal was saying was kind of making me feel better, a little bit. I felt a little better if I thought of it that way, thought that it was self defense. Those guys came looking for us. I didn't want that to happen, not any of it. I was sorry it did.
"Time's up," another staff person said, tapping his watch. I looked up at him and nodded.
"Listen, Dally, I gotta go,"
"Alright. Take care, kid," he said, and he sounded sort of sad now. I hung up the phone and went back into that room with the T.V. and kids just hanging around, flipping through the hand book.
"You talk to Dally?" Pony said, glancing over at me.
"Yeah,"
Maybe I felt a little better. Maybe I could get off easy, easier than I thought. I didn't want to spend the rest of my life locked up. But I still kind of felt like I deserved to.
It was the same routine as yesterday, we went down to the dining room and ate and cleaned it all up and watched more T.V. and then took a shower and got ready for bed. I looked at my hair, how long it was, and it would look better with grease in it but it was still long. I didn't want them to cut it. I knew it would get cut tomorrow.
"Lights out," they said, and they flipped the lights off and I climbed into bed. I couldn't fall asleep, though. I couldn't stop thinking of everything, worrying about everything. What would happen? There was court to worry about and Ponyboy to worry about. What if they took him away from Darry and sent him to some boys' home? This whole thing wouldn't look good, maybe. The courts might think Darry wasn't a good enough guardian since he got into this kind of a mess.