Disclaimer: I do not own The Outsiders.

A/N: Hey, y'all! I hope you're having a fantastic week. Summer is almost here! I've had so much free writing time, it's wonderful! Life is so great! Enjoy this chapter! I love y'all! Tell me what you think! Have a blessed day!

Chapter Five

I got used to a certain sense of belonging, the way I grew up. I had a group of people that I grew up with and that group rarely changed. We looked out for each other all the time, made sure everyone was safe. It was different for the girls than for the guys though. They fought together. They bled for each other. We were just what they came back to, after they returned from the battlefield of Socs and Greasers. That made them a lot closer to each other than to us sometimes. I know it sounds crazy, but I used to be jealous of how often Soda would break off our dates to go rumble with some Socs across town. I understood that they fought for pride and for territory. A lot of the time, the rumbles would be payback for one side jumping a guy from the other. They usually started between two people who just happened to bring their friends along.

Rumbles could get pretty nasty, even if it was just a fair fight. I knew too many guys who died in them. Maybe it was just a guy thing. Because sometimes I'd sit on the Curtis' couch, waiting for the boys to return, with Evie and Sylvia sitting next to me and Ponyboy sitting across from us, just staring-he was too young to fight then- and we would all be biting our fingernails, praying that nothing would go wrong, that everyone would come home and I would think about how I'd never understand it. At times like that, I just wanted to scream at all of them and tell them that it was all so stupid! So pointless. Nothing they did would make a difference. No matter who jumped who walking down the street or who hit on whose girl or who was in the wrong place at the wrong time. It didn't matter what they fought about. Nothing changed! Greasers still came home greasers and Socs went home Socs. It was all so useless, I sat there and I felt like I would explode. I just wanted to scream, do anything. What was the point in living, if that was all our lives were about-the neverending fued between Socs and greasers?

The boys always came home bleeding, sometimes with a broken bone or two. Two-Bit was usually smiling but you could see something else in the other's eyes. The adreneline that fueled them before the rumble was gone, leaving a defeated look, even if they won. I could have sworn that they knew that they weren't changing anything by fighting but I think it's all they could do, all they knew how to do.

It made me want to cry.

They were wasting their lives. We were all wasting our lives. And we all knew it.

It just wasn't fair. And I scared myself sometimes when I thought about it. Sometimes I felt like I cared way too much about all of it; the anger built up inside me until I couldn't contain it anymore. At other times, I didn't care about any of it at all and I couldn't even see the point of living.

I still had my head on Soda's shoulder. He was whistling Why Do Fools Fall in Love with a goofy grin on his face. His wheat gold hair was slicked back, but a few pieces fell around his face lazily. I smiled softly and closed my eyes for the rest of the ride, trying to remember why it was all worth it. Soda put one arm around my shoulders and I relaxed, almost.

...

I rushed into my first period class. The tardy bell rang just as I sat in my seat. I let out a deep breath. I had made it. My teacher, Ms. Handel, looked over her glasses at me with a disapproving look. I gave her a sheepish smile. She shook her head but didn't say anything, which was more than I could say for Tom Derby, who sat behind me.

Tom and I hated each other. We always had. I'm not sure when it all started. There was just something about him that really creeped me out. When we were back in grade school, he was the leader of the group of bullies that made going to school torture. He scared me more than anything, but I'd never let him see it. I pretended that nothing he did bothered me. I waved away his insults about my clothes and my family. But they really got to me on the inside. I used to give my dad any excuse to let me stay home. He never let me, though. I think he really hated me being around the house. So every day I went to school and faced Tom and his gang. As the years went by, Tom lost his gang to Tim Shepard and his reputation as the toughest guy in school to Dallas Winston. He didn't have much but he could still get under my skin. He leaned over his desk.

"What happened to you?" He whispered in my ear. "You and that boyfriend of yours get a little rough last night?" I felt my muscles tense and I gripped the edge of my desk. I wasn't going to get angry. I wasn't going to say anything. I heard a few boys chuckle behind Tom. "Answer me when I ask you a question." Tom said. I looked up at Ms. Handel. She still sat at her desk. We rarely did anything in her English class. She didn't care enough to teach us. She labeled us all as lost causes and was our babysitter every day from seven-thirty to eight-twenty. I hated her for that. It was no wonder that half of the kids in the class could only read and write at a fifth grade level. No one cared. I watched her turn a page in her book, some steamy romance novel about a sea captain and a stowaway girl. I bit my lip. I knew I wasn't going to get any help from her. I turned around and faced Tom. I didn't say anything, I just stared at him.

I wished that Evie was in the class with me. Sometimes she really bugged me, but she really knew how to handle guys like Tom. She always had a smart reply that left Tom speechless and everyone else laughing until they cried. She seemed so comfortable with herself and everything was a joke to her. Evie was probably my closest friend. I knew everything about her and she knew everything about me. We were always together at school and we hung out after because she dated Steve. Everyone assumed that we were best friends but the funny thing is, we weren't. I can't really explain it, but we just didn't click the way that everyone thought we did. It wasn't Evie's fault, I guess it was mine. People just weren't my thing.

"Are you stupid?" Tom growled. " I asked you a question. Ain't you gonna answer it? You really should." I turned away from him and crossed my legs. My right knee stung a little. I looked right at the front board and tried not to think about anything. But my mind was racing a hundred miles a minute. Tom had the shortest temper of anyone I knew. He was even worse than Dally. And I knew Tom could be violent. He made me watch him and two friends jump Two-Bit once. It's the only time I gave him a reaction. He had two of his older brothers pin my arms against the wall. I remember trying to scream for what seemed like hours. Two-Bit was a good fighter but he hadn't been in shape. I don't think he could have taken all three of them down even if he had been anyway. I hated myself for not being able to help him. I still feel guilty about that sometimes. He was real messed up by the time they were done with him. It's the worst I've ever seen him.

Tom grabbed my right arm and yanked it back toward him. I'm not proud of what happened next. I pride myself on being calm, rational, tough even but when Tom grabbed my arm, I screamed. The room went dead quiet and I could feel twenty pairs of eyes on the back of my neck. I looked up at Ms. Handel but she hadn't even taken her eyes off the page; she must have turned her hearing aids off. Tom was still holding my arm when the vice principal, Mr. Packer, rushed into the room. I tried to pull my arm away from Tom, but it hurt too much.

"Who screamed?" Mr. Packer's shrill voice asked. He stood with his feet spread apart and his fists on his hips. He tried too hard to make every inch of his five foot four build be intimidating. The other kids slumped in their chairs and started to talk to each other. That was the great thing about being a greaser. While you might not get along with anyone in the room, nobody ratted anybody out, especially not to the likes of Mr. Packer. It was a kind of code, I guess, a set of unwritten, unspoken rules that everyone followed and I knew that not even Tom would open his mouth to say anything.

Mr. Packer's face turned red. He stared at Tom first and saw my arm. Tom quickly let go and I pulled it slowly to my side.

"Now, Mr. Derby." He said. "I'd like you to walk with me to the principal's office." Tom stood up angrily and walked to Mr. Packer. Saying no to him would bring the cops into school and nobody wanted that so Tom didn't say anything. But as he left the room, he sent me a look that said, watch your back, I'm coming after you later. And he did.