Girls Don't Cry | The Outsiders

Nine

"Candy."

"Mm?"

"Candy, wake up."

"Wuuut, go away!"

"Candice, it's important!" Someone shook me, making me jump and sit up too quickly. I swayed a little, my vision going spotty from how fast I sat up.

"What," I groaned. "What time is it?"

"It's seven-thirty. But this is important. Have you seen Ponyboy?"

"Huh?"

"Ponyboy. He ran out last night. Have you seen him?"

I shook my head.

"Wh-why would Pony come by here?" I asked around a yawn, stretching and popping my back. I groaned in satisfaction.

"I don't know. Darry and I have been up all night looking for him. We're so worried."

"Why would he not come home?"

Sodapop sat down on the edge of the bed. "I don't know. It was all an overreaction. Ponyboy said he'd fallen asleep in the lot on accident. With Johnny. Well, you know, he came home. I guess I was asleep because next thing I knew I heard Darry startin' to shout at him. I stepped in, told Darry to quit it and he got after me and Pony tried to get between us and--jeez, Darry feels awful. I've never seen him so upset with himself. But Pony, he--he ran out and we haven't seen him since. But we're scared, Candice!"

"Why are you scared?" I asked dumbly. "Pony's probably with Johnny. Come on, how much trouble could they have gotten into?"

"I don't know. I heard there was some kind of a commotion down at the park. But, shit, if the police get involved, they're not gonna take too well to us with Darry and they'll put us in a boys home."

"Shit, Soda. I don't know where he'd be, but believe me, I'm gonna help out as best I can. You better believe that."

"Yeah," he said.

"Candice--" Soda and I looked up to see Arnie in the doorway. "Sorry to barge in. You know I'd usually knock. Did you hear what happened down at the park last night?"

Soda and I both shook our heads.

"Well, I was coming home from the bakery--there's donuts in the kitchen, by the way--but they've got that whole place police taped off. Lotta blood. I heard it was one of those Junior Douches."

Arnie said there's two kinds of JDs. There's the Juvenile Delinquents, which is what you'd call someone like anyone of the greasers; then there's Junior Douches, which is what you'd call any of the socs. I thought it was pretty clever, and very humorous.

"Shit," I said. "Do you know who?"

"No. I didn't get too much. I just asked a cop what was going on. He just said a kid got stabbed."

I shuddered.

"God. What coulda led to that?" I said.

"Only one person we could ask."

That one person happened to be Dallas. I got dressed in some jeans and a t-shirt and pulled on one of the flannels I'd stolen from Sodapop a long time ago. I was real bad at accidentally stealing shirts. In fact, most of the shirts I owned probably weren't even mine. Who's sleeveless top is this? Oh, that might be Steve's. And this hoodie? Probably Ponyboy's. I stole from everybody.

The thing was, it was never on purpose. I'd just grab a shirt to borrow and take it home, forgetting I even had it on and then I'd just never return it. A shameless crime. I'm sure if any of the guys stayed over at my place, they wouldn't have to worry about if their shirt got dirty (not like they did, anyway), because they could just take back one of the many I'd stolen.