Trade Mistakes

15

Things weren't going well at home. Everything was changing. I'd gotten my stitches out and my cast off. Pony had been spending less and less time at home. Darry and Pony had been fighting a lot. It was really taking a toll on Soda, and I would never admit it, but it was on me, too.

One night, me, Darry, and Soda were up waiting for Ponyboy. It was well past midnight.

"Where have you been?" Darry demanded the second Pony walked in.

"I fell asleep in the lot,"

I wished he hadn't been so honest. I really did. Pony was getting chewed out and neither me or Soda had anything to say. He kind of deserved it, but maybe not so harshly.

But then Darry did something none of us ever thought he would do- he hit Pony.

Everybody was silent for a moment before Pony stormed out. I followed him. No one tried to stop me.

I walked with him and we found Johnny and went to the park. There were too many thoughts in my head to think straight. I wanted to cry, but I refused to. Johnny and Pony were talking, but I couldn't hear them. Maybe I just didn't want to hear them.

It was cold out. I was shivering. I hadn't thought to grab a jacket. Johnny was really the only one dressed for this weather.

Just when I thought things couldn't get any worse, a few Soc's showed up. I could barely focus on what they were saying, but then one grabbed me and the other three started beating on Pony.

Johnny's POV

Me and Lizzie were both yelling for them to stop, but they wouldn't listen. They were drowning Pony, they were going to kill him. I flicked out my switchblade just as Lizzie pulled free from the grip of the one holding her.

She threw herself at the one trying to kill Pony and he let go, startled. I grabbed Pony by the back of his shirt and pulled him away from the fountain.

"Lizzie- no," he gasped.

"Oh, god," I whispered. The Soc who'd grabbed her had thrown her down so hard at her head slammed against the edge of the fountain. A sickening crack echoed around the park.

I could hear police sirens in the distance. The Soc's all panicked and split.

Lizzie was laying deathly still. A dark puddle of blood was spreading from her head, and she was as pale as a sheet of paper. Ponyboy kneeled down next to her, and her blood soaked into his jeans.

"Lizzie?" He whispered. She didn't answer. "Elizabeth? Come on, wake up. Please wake up."

"Ponyboy," I said quietly. "I don't think she's..."

"She's gotta be okay, Johnny," he sobbed.

There was an ambulance. He insisted on riding with her to the hospital. I think she was dying. They let him go with her.

Darry and Soda don't know what happened to her, I realized. I had to get to their house fast. I wasn't sure if Lizzie would even make it to the hospital. I turned and started running as fast as I could. There was blood on my shoes. I couldn't get the vision of her laying so still. I burst into their house and saw that everyone was there, now.

They all stared at me. Oh, god, what the hell was I supposed to tell them?

"Johnny... why's there blood on your shoes?" Dally asked.

"We were at the park, and we got jumped, and they almost killed Pony, but they didn't, but I think- I think they really killed Lizzie. They're going to the hospital."

Sodapop's POV

When me and Darry got to the hospital, Pony was sitting in the waiting room, alone. Blood soaked his jeans and his shoes and his hands. He was staring at the floor, bouncing his leg nervously.

He looked startled when he saw us. "I'm sorry." He said.

"Don't be." Darry replied. "This is all my fault,"

"We're not playing the goddamn blame-game. Not now." I shook my head. "I'm tired of it. You two... you two have issues and you're gonna hug it out."

And so they did. We all hugged.

But after that, we had nothing to do but wait and see if Lizzie would be okay.

.

"I'm afraid that she died."

None of us said anything. There was a long time where nobody spoke.

"I'll leave the three of you to process that." The doctor said before he walked away.

Lizzie's POV

"I am not dead." I said firmly, sitting up suddenly.

One of the nurses screamed and I stared at her angrily. "I am not dead!"

A second nurse had run out to get a doctor.

"How the hell is that possible?" The first nurse asked, bewildered. "Doesn't your head hurt?"

"Why wouldn't it hurt? I cracked my skull on a fountain, of course it hurts."

She nodded, seemingly in a daze. "Of course. The doctor will be along soon, he'll stitch your head right up."

The doctor came in a moment later with the second nurse.

"I'll be damned! Nurse, inform her family immediately." He instructed. "I don't see how this could be possible... as soon as your head is stitched, I'll have to do some tests, of course, too."

Everyone seemed to be shocked. I wasn't. I was just angry. Hell, I hardly believed that I even died at all.

He made me do a writing test, a walking test, a strength test, a vision test (which I failed spectacularly without my glasses), and a speech test.

"I don't believe it, you passed all of them. Except the vision test...?"

"Yeah, I don't have my glasses."

"Ahh." The doctor looked over his clipboard. "Well... you're in practically perfect condition. Just take an aspirin anytime your head bothers you too much and have your brother bring you back in a few weeks to get your stitches removed."

My shirt was still bloody, and there was blood in my hair and on the back of my neck, but I'd stopped actually bleeding.

As I walked to the waiting room, I could hear a nurse expressing her disbelief about me. A few nurses stopped to stare at me as I walked.

The second I was in the waiting room, Pony, Soda, and Darry all hugged me. "You know, you're gonna get blood on y'all, right?" I asked.

"That's the last thing we're worried about right now," Darry said.