"But Darry! You said you'd go!" Ponyboy cried as Darry drank from his glass of water.

Darry sighed; he really didn't want to go to the hospital; not when even more bills were getting posted and money was getting tighter and tighter.

"Ponyboy, I'm fine. Quit worrying about me." Darry said sternly, and Pony huffed.

"But you said-" Ponyboy started, but Darry held his hand up.

"I don't want to hear it, Ponyboy!" he snapped, and Ponyboy folded his arms and glared at his older brother.

"Don't give me that look." Darry ordered, and Pony sighed.

"Your eyes look worse. The yellow's gone darker now." He told his brother, but Darry didn't want to hear it.

"It'll heal." He stated, and Ponyboy frowned.

"You need to go the doctor's, Darry. It'll get even more worse if you just leave it." He tried, but Darry shook his head.

"If it does get worse, which it won't, I promise I'll go to the hospital. But I'm not gonna waste money when there's nothin' wrong." He said firmly, and Pony frowned again. "Now, I'm gonna be late for work. And you'd best head to school."

Ponyboy grumbled but did as he was told. He knew there was no way that he'd be able to convince Darry to go to the hospital unless there was something seriously wrong with his oldest brother.

Ponyboy stumbled into home room one minute before he would get a late tick on his record.

Mr Leopold scowled; he didn't like greasers at all.

Ponyboy sat down in his place next to Lawrence, another greaser but not a hood, who was busy scribbling down in his notebook. When Ponyboy sat down next to him however, he quickly shut it and smiled at his friend.

"Hey Curtis, how's it goin'?" he asked. Ponyboy sighed.

"Not good." He muttered, and Lawrence frowned.

"Why not? Family issues?" Lawrence said, and Pony nodded.

"You could say that. Law, you know when your mom…well when she was sick last year, were you going to take her to the hospital earlier but she refused?" Ponyboy questioned awkwardly. He didn't really like bringing up his friend's mom; she had died a little over four months ago from ovarian cancer.

"Uh…I don't really remember." Lawrence answered honestly, and Ponyboy rubbed his temples.

"It's just because I'm a little worried about my brother, Darry. He isn't looking too good, and he's got jaundice. Do you think it could be anything serious?" Pony said, and Lawrence shrugged.

"Could be. He should really go the hospital to sort his jaundice out though. Otherwise he'll be stuck with yellow sclerae, and not many people like yellow sclerae." Lawrence chuckled, but stopped when he saw the annoyed expression on his friend's face. "Sorry." He muttered.

"It's okay." Pony sighed; Lawrence often found himself saying the wrong thing at the wrong time.

"Everybody answer your name for registration." Mr Leopold grumbled, taking out the red folder that lay on his desk. He then opened the folder and pulled out a white sheet of paper with all of the students' names on.

"Elizabeth Abbot." He called, and the blond haired soc answered yes. However, Mr Leopold dropped the sheet of paper on the floor. "Oh dear, I need a pen." The teacher muttered, as if it was all of the students' fault.

Ponyboy groaned; home room always seemed to drag on.

XXX

"For goodness sake!" Darry thundered when he dropped another bundle of roofing. What was up with him today? He usually had no trouble carrying roofing, yet today he felt like he'd never carried a bundle in his life.

"This is the third time today you've dropped a bundle, Curtis!" Andrew, Darry's boss, shouted.

However, when he took a closer look at Darry, he noticed how pale his employee looked.

"Maybe you should take the rest of the day off, Darry; you don't look too good." Andrew stated.

Darry rubbed his aching eyes, and Andrew saw the jaundice.

"Jesus, Curtis! You gotta go get that checked out; yellow eyes aren't normal!" he exclaimed.

Darry was about to protest, but Andrew stopped him.

"Relax; I'll still give you your pay check for the rest of this week, as long as you get those eyes checked out." Andrew told Darry, and Darry couldn't argue.

"Thanks, Andrew." Darry smiled, and got into his truck.

"No problem, Curtis." Andrew smiled back, and then returned to the house that he and his colleagues were working on.

Darry breathed out heavily as he backed out of the drive; he was glad that he had a boss as understanding as Andrew.

When Darry got home, he decided to have a shower to try and soothe his aching muscles. His back had started hurting a lot more lately, yet he didn't know why; he tried to carry less roofing but his back still ached. And his stomach…it felt as if something was eating away at his insides.

Darry cringed before stepping into the hot shower. He was also starting to sweat more, and again he didn't know why; he always felt very cold nowadays.

As the water fell on his bare skin, he suddenly felt a shooting pain through his head and then one even more powerful shot through his stomach area.

"Ah, what the hell?" Darry winced.

He started seeing black and blue dots clouding his eye sight, but figured that the water must have just been too hot, or at least he hoped.

Once the oldest Curtis had towelled his body and hair dry, he made his way into his room and put on some pajamas. They were very thick; since Darry felt very cold.

Darry sat down and switched on the TV to some Bewitched reruns and made himself comfortable on the sofa. Or at least tried to; his stomach and back were both aching and he couldn't seem to stop the pain.

"Screw this." The greaser muttered, and stumbled into the kitchen to find some aspirin.

He found a box of them sitting on top of the microwave and sighed in relief; they usually didn't have aspirin in the house since Pony took most of them.

Darry took three of the pills and then set the box of aspirin in the cupboard where it should have been, and then made his way back into the living room. The pain in his back and stomach still wouldn't go away.

After an hour of lounging on the sofa, Darry's stomach and back pains still hadn't gone away, not to mention his head was throbbing like there was no tomorrow.

Darry sighed and stood up. It was only 2 pm, but Darry decided to get a start on dinner. He had skipped out on lunch as well as breakfast; he really didn't feel well, and he doubted that he would be eating dinner tonight, but he knew that his little brothers had to eat.

While Darry waited for the chicken cook, he suddenly felt another shooting pain go through his head and stomach, except this time they were a lot sharper, and were continuous.

Darry prayed silently that his pains would stop, but they showed no sign of stopping. He clutched the counter, and a wave of dizziness hit him. The oldest Curtis groaned before throwing up on the floor.

"I haven't even eaten anything…" Darry shouted, and then he vomited again. Darry wasn't concerned about vomiting; he was more concerned about cleaning up the mess on the floor.

This actually wasn't the first time he had had episodes like this; they started about three weeks ago. But he couldn't tell Ponyboy and Sodapop; they'd be worried about him.

Once Darry was certain that he wasn't going to throw up anymore, he walked into the bathroom to find some cleaning products. The scent of bleach made Darry dizzy, but he knew that he had to clean up the mess so Soda and Pony wouldn't find it.

The oldest Curtis left the bathroom with the cleaning items, but tripped over the arm of the couch. He didn't get up from the floor; he had finally fallen asleep.

Thanks to Pony'sgirlfriend for the idea!
I'm not sure I like how I've written this chapter, I hope you all find it okay.
I'll be updating pretty soon, so have no worries if you're enjoying it so far! :)