Feelings

(10)

Soda Pop

Me, along with everyone else in the house, ran to the sound of the screaming - Pony's room.

At first, we were scared to come near him because he was thrashing so violently and screaming for someone to stop hurting him and someone to help him. Darry and I tried grabbing him to stop him for hurting himself but he scratched Darry until blood came from his wound. Darry murmured a few curses but he didn't stop trying to hold down our younger brother. Darry didn't step back until Pony started to waking up. By then, Pony had already dug his nails deep into Darry's skin. Pony had only slapped me a couple of times when he was waving his arms around trying to get us off of him.

"Stop! Don't hurt me! Please!" He screamed and cried. He curled up into a ball and held his hands up.

What kind of nightmare was he having? Did he think we were going to hurt him?

"Pony, it's me, Soda. Your brother."

He finally stopped screaming but when he looked up from his knees, I saw his tears and he was shaking like a earthquake. He wiped away his tears once he realized who we were and that we weren't going to hurt him.

I reached out to him to bring him into my arms and he flinched as if I was going to hit him. I just ignore it along with the pain in my chest and brought him into my embrace. It hurts knowing that I can't really do anything to make the pain go away. I don't want Pony to feel like this. I could tell that Darry felt the same way. We both thought that these nightmares were over. The last time he had these horrible dreams was more than a year ago, during the hearing. I could understand that those nightmares were probably caused by all of the incidents happening all around him during the time but now? I don't know what could have caused it except maybe it was something that happened when he was out in the streets. But still, what could it be?

I could only try to comfort my little brother in these moments. I don't know what else to do.

"Is he going to be ok?" Darry asked.

"Yeah, just go back to bed."

"I'm sorry for waking you guys up," Little Pony mumbled into my shirt. He reminded me of when he was younger and would always hide his face in my shirt.

"Don't worry about it. Just get some sleep," Darry said as he scooted everyone out of my room.

I laid down with him and held him tightly against me. "What was your nightmare about?" I don't know why but this dream was worrying more that all of the other ones. . .

. . .but I found out why.

Pony explain to me everything that happened the day of the hearing. He said it in such a perfect description that I just thought about how sick those bastard were. I wanted to kill them. As tears ran down my face I realized why Pony made all of those 'mistakes' in his life. Those 'mistakes' were seen as correct in his eyes because of what happened to him.

At the end, his words slurred with sleep and I was sort of thankful. I didn't know how much pain I could take. Each one of his words were as painful as the blows he took that day. I wish that I had knew sooner. Maybe he wouldn't have had to suffer so much. What hurt me the most was when he said that it had happened for about two months after the hearing and that no one was there to save him.

After hearing that, I couldn't sleep. I needed to do something. So when it was morning, I got up, leaving a sleeping Pony in the bed and I called a family/gang meeting without Pony. I told the Gang what happened to Pony. They felt the same way as I did. A few tears were shed and I ended the meeting by saying, "Don't act differently around, Pony. We don't want him to act like he's an outcast in the one place he thought he belonged."

***

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-DMBW