Author's Note: Happy New Year everyone! I saw Rob Lowe on TV tonight while watching all the NYE in NYC stuff and got the urge to finish this chapter tonight, haha. I hope you don't find it too awkward, I am a bit sleep deprived. Sorry it's a little short, but the next chapter will be longer. Also things are going to pick up again in the next chapter! Please review! Also stay safe this holiday. :)

Chapter Twenty

An Outlet

That night Soda slept more soundly than he had in months. There were no nightmares that he could recall and he didn't even begin to stir until almost noon the next day. Soda rolled over, still half sleep and tried to burrow deeper into the blankets. His eyes flew open as a sharp pain flew through his knee as he tried to bend it without remembering his injury. Well that was one way to wake up…

Soda's eyes wandered around the familiar room. The space next to him was empty; Pony must have already gotten up. He carefully stretched a little bit before shifting himself and letting his legs slowly fall over the side of the bed so that he was sitting up. His cane was leaning against the nightstand and he reached over and grabbed it, the handle starting to feel a bit too familiar in his hand. But as he started to stand he winced again. He remembered Darry telling him to take it easy and he didn't want to make things worse right now. As he listened carefully he could hear low voices coming from the living room.

"Darry?" he called. "Pony?"

A minute later the door creaked open and Steve stuck his head in. "How about Steve?" he asked with a smile.

Soda laughed lightly. "That'll work too," he said. "Could you help me out to the living room? My leg is still pretty sore from yesterday."

"Well, well, Sodapop Curtis is actually asking for help," Steve said with a laugh as he walked into the room. "Guess we should be lookin' for flying pigs next."

Soda playfully punched his arm as he approached. "You get mouthy and it won't last long," he warned good-naturedly.

Steve helped Soda to his feet and Soda leaned heavily on his friend as he limped out into the living room. Pony and Two-Bit sat around the coffee table, obviously the three of them had been in the middle of a poker game.

"Morning, Soda," Pony said as Steve help him down into the recliner. "You hungry? You missed breakfast."

"Starved," Soda said. He glanced around. "Where's Darry? Didn't he have today off?"

"Yeah, he said something about having errands to run," Pony said as he headed for the kitchen. "He should be back soon."

Pony made sandwiches and Soda joined in their very intense poker game, the object of the game quickly turning into figuring out who was cheating and how. Darry returned some time later and they managed to convince him to join in. It was nice having everyone together for an afternoon having fun. It was a much better day than the day before.

Soda managed to stay awake through dinner this time, but couldn't stay awake much longer. He was still so exhausted of all the restless night he had since returning home. He woke up several times until Pony finally came to bed. He vaguely wondered why Pony had been up so late, but the thought left his mind as he threw a protective arm over his little brother. In the next moment he was sound asleep.

XxXxX

Soda was up early the next day. He heard voices coming from out in the living room. He found it a little odd that Pony was already up, since Darry had already said he could skip school that day. He wasn't too concerned at the moment though. He was very comfortable and wasn't in a hurry to get up yet, playing with the idea of maybe trying to go back to sleep for a while.

As he was shifting around he heard a soft knock on the door. He gave a grunt to indicate that he was awake.

"Hey Soda, we got a surprise for you," Pony said, sticking his head into Soda's room.

Soda laughed lightly. "Why do I get a surprise?" He pushed himself up into a sitting position.

"Call it a late birthday present," Darry said from behind Pony. "We missed getting to celebrate your last birthday with you."

Soda nodded. He was fully aware that his nineteenth birthday had passed while he had been deployed. He hadn't been aware of it on the actual day, his platoon had been in combat most of that week, but later in the week when he finally got his mail – his mail always came in bundles since Pony would write him every day but Soda would only get them every few weeks – there had been a card that Pony, Darry, Two-Bit and Steve had all signed. It had felt strange when he had realized that he had been nineteen for days and hadn't even known it.

Soda shifted himself around so that his feet touched the floor and grabbed his cane. Darry walked into the room and helped Soda to his feet, but he was starting to walk better now after resting for a whole day. "I'm okay," he assured his big brother as he limped on his own, aided by his cane of course, and he followed Darry and Pony through the house. They went out to the front porch and Soda immediately spotted the surprise. It was very hard to miss. There was a dark brown punching bag hanging from the roof of the porch that had definitely not been there before. Soda stared at it for a moment, feeling surprised that the old porch could hold the weight.

"I think it'll help you," Darry explained. "I feel like a lot of your frustrations are pent up right now. It's natural for you to be frustrated by the situation. You need an outlet."

"When did you even do this?" Soda asked, a smile playing on his lips.

"Last night while you were sleeping," Pony said smiling.

"Yeah, it was stressful trying to do it quiet enough so as not to wake you," Darry said with a laugh. "Luckily your bedroom is on the other side of the house."

Soda limped forward to stand right in front of the bag. He gave the bag a light punch with his right hand and felt a very satisfying thud.

"We got you a stool," Pony spoke up, pointing to a high stool that sat on the other side of the punching bag. "Well, Two-Bit got it. We didn't ask where from." The three of them all chuckled.

"You can sit on the stool so you can use both hands," Darry said. "But you can also try and balance standing. It might help strengthen your leg muscles if you do that every once and a while. Just promise you won't overdo it."

"I won't," Soda said with a smile. He limped around to the stool and pulled in closer to the bag as he sat down and placed his cane up against the house. He took a couple of light practice swings, solidly hitting the bag and causing it to swing lightly. Then he wound up and really punched hard, causing the bag to jerk violently. It felt good. Finally there was a physical activity that he could do on his own.

Darry walked over and placed a hand on Soda's shoulder. "I gotta get to work, little buddy," he said. "Don't go overboard."

"Thanks Darry," Soda said, grinning. "Really, thank you."

"I told you we'd work through this," Darry said, giving him a light pat before turning and heading out to his truck.

"You really like it?" Pony asked, smiling.

"You're gonna have to drag me away from this thing," Soda laughed, throwing a few more punches. He felt an amazing sense of freedom just being able to use both hands like this. This was never something he would have thought of as a solution. He was trying to suppress all of the anger and violent feelings that he still felt and all those feelings had finally exploded and he ended up attacking his little brother. He never would have thought of looking for an outlet for all this anger. But now that he really thought about it, it seemed like such a simple and obvious solution.

He knew he simply couldn't thank his brothers enough. They had stuck with him through everything when it would have been so easy to cast him out. Darry no longer had any legal responsibility for him, it would have been logical to toss out someone he thought to be dangerous in order to protect the kid brother he was still legally responsible for. Instead both his brothers were intent on helping him through this.

He couldn't ask for a better family.