Helpless

Life

(Pony)
Usually I couldn't remember my nightmares, but I knew every detail of this one. I stopped breathing, stopped altogether, and I couldn't move my limbs or open my eyes, but I didn't die. I heard people talking and moving around me, some weeping, and I felt my body placed in my coffin, covered and put in the ground, but I was unable to draw enough air in my lungs to scream as they buried me alive.

"I'm alive! Soda, Darry don't put me in the ground I'm alive!" I screamed, then instantly started coughing. Soda started beside me, shot up, turned the light on and grabbed a handful of tissues to cover my mouth with.

"Easy, Ponyboy," my brother murmured as I coughed. There were tears on my face and more following. "You're all right."

"Glory," I muttered when the fit had passed.

It was good to be home, although these weren't the ideal circumstances. The idea of staying in the hospital for the little time I had left had been unbearable. I needed to be here; this was my home with my parents, with my brothers. Soda tossed the bloody tissues in the trash and slid an arm around me. "Nightmare?"

I shivered against his chest, and he pushed my hair back and hushed me, in a comforting way. He'd been as supportive as ever; so had Darry, although Darry had also been quiet and almost shy around me. I needed to apologize, to tell him how miserable I felt that I had believed he'd called the state in to get rid of me, but I hadn't had the guts yet.

I'll have to get them soon, I thought miserably, because I absolutely need to make peace with Darry before I...leave.

"Pony, you okay?"

"Yeah," I mumbled. "Soda?"

"Hm?"

"Make sure I'm dead before you stick me in the ground, okay?"

"Shutup about dieing!" Soda nearly shouted.

"Sorry," I mumbled, turning away and closing my eyes. Soda had gotten me through a lot, but this was too much for him. That scared me more than death; I didn't know what would happen to him once I was gone.

My brother sat up abruptly, flung open the drawer on the nightstand and pulled out a pack of cigarettes.

"Sorry you can't smoke," he mumbled, lighting one without a word. I lay there watching him, stunned by the changes in him. His hands were shaking. He took care to keep his face turned so I couldn't see his eyes.

Not him too, I thought miserably. Soda was the most important person in my life and always had been, and I needed him more than ever now. Otherwise he'd end up like me and Darry. But as I watched my brother smoke and thought of everything he had said to me these past months, I realized what was going on: he was refusing to accept the truth.

We all were: not one of us had used the word dieing this whole time. But I am, I thought. And it's time we all just were honest about it.

"Soda," I said softly.

"What."

I took as deep a breath as my deteriorating lungs would allow. "I'm dieing, Soda."

"Shutup!"

"Please, Soda," I begged, "I'm scared. I need you. You said you'd get me through this..."

Soda burst into tears. I sat up and wrapped my arms around his waist, leaning against his back. He laid one of his hands over my clasped ones, sobbing and struggling not to. "Who's gonna get ME through this?" Soda whispered.

I just held onto him tighter, fighting not to cry, knowing that he loved me and that he knew I loved him.

"Pony," Soda choked on my name through his tears, "I don't know how to do this..."

"I don't either," I murmured, holding him tighter, "but I think it's gonna be okay."

Soda wiped his eyes, put out his cigarette, and turned slightly so I could hold him better. I didn't talk as he held me, stroked my hair, just held on tight, occasionally repeating what he'd been telling me all along: that it was going to be okay. For once, I was comforting him, and it felt good.

It was like settling my debts before moving on.