Hide or Fight

Chapter 3 - Almost.

Soda's POV

I watched my little brother leave the room, contently going to go help Johnny with his homework. Pony's lucky, he doesn't have to be dealing with all of this relationship bullshit. I absentmindedly bounced my leg, my breathing kind of unsteady. Darry eyed me worriedly.

"You okay, kid? You're acting like a cat on hot bricks..." Darry spoke up. "You didn't get into any trouble, did you?"

"No," I said before speaking quietly. "Not the type that you're thinking of." I prayed to God that Darry didn't hear that last part.

"Ah, is it... uh, boy trouble?" He asked a little uncomfortably. I cringed internally. Darry is still trying to get past my inevitable queerness. He shifted uncomfortably. "So, uh... you... wanna talk about it?" he questioned.

"Darry, you don't need to do this," I told him. "Just wait until you're more comfortable with this whole... me being gay thing. I mean, I'm still trying to get used to it myself."

Darry let out a relieved sigh, "Oh thank Jesus. I thought I was gonna have to alter my 'When a Man Loves a Woman' speech."

"Oh, please, it just makes it even worse when you try to help, so just don't," I told him gently. I love Darry, so much, but he needs to work on his pep talks because all they do is leave me even more uncomfortable and confused than I was to begin with.

I would have heard Darry's reply, but Two-Bit nearly busted my front door off of its hinge, so that wasn't really an option.

"Nobody better be in the bathroom because I really need to piss!" Two-Bit screamed, barging into the house like it was his own. It kinda was, considering how much he came over.

It wasn't that much of a surprise, though. We always kept the door unlocked for the gang. We all have pretty rough lives and every once in awhile you just need to escape home life for a night. I wake up to find someone on our couch nearly every time one of us has one of those nights. Anyway, we don't need to worry 'bout burglars 'cause we don't have anything worth stealing.

Dally came through the door soon after, following behind Two-Bit, but he took a different course inside.

"Stop screaming, you asshole, or I'll smash your fucking face in. I have a headache," Dally growled as he walked into the living room where Darry and I were. I mentally sighed in adoration. Even when he was absolutely pissed off and wanted to smash someone's face in, he looked extremely hot while doing so.

"Hey Dally, Sodapop," he acknowledged. I watched him approach the extra chair and collapse in it with wide eyes. He gave me a subtle look and I knew what it meant. It was an "I want to talk to you" expression. I gave him a knowing glance and we both waited for the right moment. Well, it was more like we were waiting for whenever Two-Bit would come back from the bathroom. With Two-Bit in the room, Darry would barely notice that we were missing.

We sat there in an awkward silence for a couple of minutes, staring at the television. At least that's what we were doing to Darry's knowledge. Dally and I were really just talking to each other with our eyes, trying to decipher what each look really meant. Speaking to another person is hard without words. I was relieved when Two-Bit came stumbling back in, clearly hungover. He started talking nonsense to Darry as Dally and I slid out of the living room.

We both walked out of the house, wordlessly. We continued on a little further, to block out Two Bit's occasional yelling of absolute nonsense. I grabbed a smoke from my pocket and quickly lit it as my heart started beating in anticipation.

Once we were far enough away from the house, Dally grabbed my arm and pulled me into his chest, resting his hands on my waist. Wordlessly, I wrapped my arms around his shoulders and looked into his blue eyes, holding my cancer stick away Dally's hair behind his head.

"I want you to be mine," he whispered to me.

"Okay," I answered, knowing that he knew that I wanted the exact same thing.

"I want to take this slow," he whispered again, earning the same reply from me. He leaned down and placed a gentle kiss on the crown of head before he spoke again, letting his warm lips run over my skin, "I want to treat you right. I want to take you on a date, I want to cuddle with you at night, I want to spoil you, and I want to fall in love with you."

"Okay."

Dally's POV

We held hands until we reached the front door, and Soda stamped out his smoke before we went inside. Everyone was back in living room, including Johnny and a shirtless Pony. Huh... I wonder if they were... never mind, I don't want that thought in my head.

"Hey, where did you two run off to?" Pony asked with a smirk once we were noticed by the gang.

I swear I'm going to kill you, Ponyboy Michael Curtis. "Nothing, just talking," I responded. Darry looked at the both of us as Pony and I threatened each other with our eyes, obviously confused.

"Am I missing something here?" Darry asked. Yeah, you are actually missing a lot. Speaking of which, you should really pay some more attention to your brothers.

"Heh, no, you're not. It's nothing to worry about, Dar," Pony replied, giving me a fake smile. He had a hand on his hip, waving at the question like it was the most ridiculous thing ever with the other. Darry didn't seem to pick up the fact that the smile was forced, so he turned away from us. We were still quarreling silently, and eventually, Ponyboy got bored of it. He dropped his hands from his hips letting out an exasperated sigh.

"You know what, Dally, I'm done with this conversation," he said, beginning to leave the room. He tried to grab Johnny on his way out of the room, who slipped out of his grip and made a small noise of disapproval. Pony gave Johnny a pleading look and Johnny started out the door again, with a teasing look on his face. Pony grunted and followed him shortly after.

"What was that all about?" Soda and Darry's expressions asked each other. I just smirked, knowing that Pony and Johnny weren't the type of "friends" that they suspected.

If only they knew.

Darry sat on the couch with his hands behind his head, relaxed, and tuned into the TV. Soda and I walked into the kitchen, and he asked me, "Do you want anything to drink?"

He opened the short fridge and bent down to look into it as I responded, "Yeah, what do you have?"

"Uh, well... you know what, I'm too lazy to read all this, there's way too much stuff in this damn fridge," Soda grumbled. "Just come and look."

Being the cheeky little fella that I am, I walked over to the fridge and stood right behind him. He was still bent over, and I wrapped my arms around his waist as he stood, holding a beer in his hand. He ignored my arms for the most part as he grabbed the bottle opener on top of the fridge and popped the cap of his Corona. He turned around in my arms and took a sip of his drink, his eyes never straying from my own. His calloused right hand was resting on my chest.

When he pulled the bottle away from his lips, I lifted my right arm and took the bottle from his left hand that fell onto my chest. I took a sip of the cool liquid before placing the bottle behind him on top of the fridge. My hands rested on his hips and my thumbs rubbed small circles on them. Slowly, I began to move my head closer to his. I rubbed my nose against his before slipping mine to the right, leaving our lips only a breath apart.

Moving closer, our lips just barely skimmed together, almost touching, before fucking Ponyboy ran into the damn kitchen, making Soda and I jump apart.

"Oh, sorry guys, I didn't know you two were in here doing... whatever it is that you to were just... doing," Pony says with a wide, smirkish grin over his face.

I let out an audible growl as I glared at Pony, and you know what he did? He fucking laughed, grabbed a bag of chips from the counter, and left the damn kitchen.

It was quiet for a moment before Soda spoke, "Well... I guess we really are gonna go slow, huh?"