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It was pity, and Johnny didn't want it. He hated being pitied, and that's all the gang was giving him. Pity for how he was raised. Pity for the abuse he went through. Pity for not having a way out. Pity for getting jumped so bad. That's all it was, and he wasn't going to stand for it.
Johnny had been avoiding the Curtis house, and really anywhere else he would run into the gang. He was glad it was summer, because at least then he wouldn't even have to bother avoiding them at school. He had even stopped sleeping at the lot or hanging out there in general. There were other places on the east side he could hide away at, even if it was scarier, and less protected than being around the gang.
He'd been keeping up the charade for two weeks now, and as much as he hated to admit it, he was feeling deprived from a lack of care. Nobody really cared for him. At least that was what his brain had been screaming at him for so long. The gang acted like they cared for the most part, and Johnny missed it. He didn't want it, but at the same time he did.
Johnny was tough. He could handle being alone. He'd done it for so long. The only real issue was he never really was alone. Someone was always there for him whether he realized it or not, but now as he hid in the most hood section of the East side, he knew what it was really like being alone. The run down, boarded up house he had called home base recently seemed to cave in on him, bringing him down and boxing him in.
He wanted the gang. He wanted their safety. He even almost wanted their pity. No, man. What're you thinking? You don't want nobody's pity. Just go to bed already. You have a long day of avoiding them tomorrow. Not that they're giving you a second thought anyhow.
As Johnny pulled the blanket over his shivering from, he couldn't know just how wrong he truly was.
***
"Where on this green earth could that kid have gone! We've searched just about everywhere on our side of the tracks, and it'd be the day when I find Johnny over there for nothing but school!" Dally paced the living room, his heavy footsteps shaking the room.
"We've been at this for two weeks now! Where else could he be hiding if not the West side?" Darry let his head fall into his hands, his fingers about pulling his hair out until Soda came over, releasing the brown locks from the grasp.
"Just calm down, Dar. We'll find him. And Dallas would you stop shaking the whole stinkin' house! The roof'll cave in if'n you stomp around too much longer!" There was the sound of a bedroom door closing, Pony walking into the room with a large, rolled up paper in his hands.
"I- I made a map. Well, tried to. It's of our side a town. figured we could use it to check of where we have and haven't looked yet..." Everyone left their respective seats and locations to surround the kitchen table. Pony spread the map out, dumping a handful of pencils on top.
"Pones... You drew this all yourself?" Soda traced his finger along the sketched-out streets, running carefully over the taped edges of the notebook paper.
"Uh-huh." It didn't take long before everyone had a pencil. The map was soon filled with circles and x's as they formed a plan to find Johnny. Turns out they hadn't searched the whole East side. Darry gave each boy an area to search. Every boy except Pony who volunteered to stay home just in case Johnny came back.
As Pony sat alone in the quiet house, he curled himself up in the blanket his mom had made for Johnny to use whenever he stayed over. It still smelled like his best friend. Tears trickled down Pony's cheeks as he tried to convince himself Johnny was out there. He hadn't left. He would come back. "Johnny... Please. Please come back... We need you. I need you."
***
Dally chucked the flashlight across the street as the light flickered out on him for the hundredth time. He watched as it bounced against the asphalt, hearing the glass dome shatter on impact. "So be it! I didn't need you anyway!" Dally punched the wooden siding of just another of the East sides run down, boarded up houses, and for the first time in his life he slipped to his knees, begging, pleading with the open air that surrounded him. "Johnny, please. Just quit hiding from us already, man. Quit hiding... from me."
***
"Nothing?" Steve paused in the middle of the intersecting roads he and Two-Bit were searching, daring to hope for some kind of sign that Johnny had been here. But what did Johnny have to leave behind?
"Nup. Not a thing." Two-Bit's head hung as he kicked at the loose stones on the road, shoving his hands deeper into his pockets.
"You don't think... don't think he left Tulsa? He wouldn't..."
Two-Bit pulled a hand from his pockets, clapping Steve on the back. "I dunno, Steve-o. I don't think he'd do that, but I just dunno?"
***
Why, Johnny? I don't get it. Why'd you have to go and disappear on all us like this? We miss you a bunch. I don't think you realize that. You never were too good at knowing how important you really are. Soda mentally confronted the missing boy, using it to cope with being alone in the dark. When he couldn't talk the ears off of someone, he ran his thoughts off to himself. But no matter how much he talked to Johnny in his head, it didn't bring the smaller greaser out of his hole.
***
Darry tried to keep his frantic thoughts at bay. His mind raced, but unlike Soda he was unable to channel it in any direction. It was just everywhere, and the only way to make it stop was by shoving it in a box to ignore until a later time, or never.
An involuntary shudder ran down his spine as he walked down the unlit streets. He had chosen the most "hood" section of town, not wanting anyone else in the gang to take it. Not even Dallas. He hesitated at the door of each house. Some were easy enough, the doors already pulled off the hinges.
He was halfway down the block now, his foot resting on the bottom step of another forgotten home. The door was shut to his chagrin, but he pulled himself up the steps, turning the handle to let himself in. The door surprisingly opened a lot easier than the others had.
Darry's flashlight shone into what was once a living room. A torn, moth-eaten couch A table with chairs thrown carelessly around and on top of it, some with broken legs. In the corner was a pile of clothes and blankets that Darry shrugged off until it moved. He almost jumped out of his skin until he saw it wasn't just any pile of laundry. It was Johnny Cade.
"Johnny!" He was there in an instant, ignoring the fact that his sudden movements paired with his size could frighten Johnny into running. He didn't run, but as he shot up, Darry knew all was not well either. Johnny retreated further into the corner he had been sleeping in, seeming ten times smaller than he already was. "Woah, kid. I'm sorry, sorry. It's just me."
"Darry? What- what are you doing here?" Johnny fell over his words, shocked that somebody close to him was in his new corner of the world.
"I'm looking for you, kid. What else?"
"You mean... you've really been looking for me?" Johnny's eyes fell. He had caused more trouble for Darry, taking up his time he could be resting, or spending it any other way than worrying over a little runt like Johnny.
"What else would I be doing if you were missing? It's been two weeks, kid. What were you thinking?" Darry sat Indian style in front of the dark-haired kid, noting how the blue shadows made Johnny look even more mysterious and dark as he lay huddled in the corner.
"I don't need pity..." If it was possible for Johnny to shrink further into himself, that's just what he did.
"Pity? Kid, we love you! The whole stinkin' gang is out lookin' for you right now! Everyone! Pony's the only one not physically on the street. He couldn't sleep with his nightmares. Got a lost worse. He thinks we don't know, but Johnny. He's been thinking he lost you too! You just can't run away on us like this. You savvy?"
Johnny lifted tear brimmed eyes up to Darry. "I- I'm sorry. I didn't know. I- I didn't want to keep being a burden."
"No. Johnny, you could never be a burden. C'mere. Let's get you home." Darry held out his arms, almost shocked at how quick Johnny was to fall into them. His tears were falling freely now as Darry pulled him close. "There now, kid. You're safe. I gotcha." Hoisting the boy up so he could stand, Darry made his way out of the now fully abandoned house, carrying his little brother home.
***
"How's Johnny, man?" Dally spooked Darry as he walked into the kitchen, his hands rubbing his eyes as he tried to focus two steps in front of him. "Woah! Hang on there, Superman. I think you need ta sit down or somethin'?" Dally hook an arm under Darry's shoulders, setting him down into one of the kitchen chairs. "You sleep at all?"
Darry's head rested on his arms that lay folded on the kitchen table, his eyes shut, but his mind fully alert despite his obvious lack of sleep. "Maybe a couple minutes? Johnny's got a fever. Must'a picked it up sometime this past week I s'pose. He hasn't hardly had nothin' to eat judging by how he scarfed down the green eggs Sod's made this morning."
"What got into him?"
"Said he didn't want pity." Dally scoffed at that, his eyes rolling heavily at the nonsense of Johnny's thoughts.
"Dumb, kid."
"Yeah, we all can be dumb at times. Johnny ain't exempt... And neither are you!" Darry had picked himself back out of the chair, and was now towering over Dallas, his index finger resting on the younger greaser's chest.
"Yeah, yeah. I know. I'm in the cooler enough to know I ain't the shiniest penny Tulsa's ever seen. Look, man, I just came to make sure he was alright. I'm gone now. And Dar."
"Yes?"
"You look after yourself too." With that, Dallas marched out the front door, letting it slam heavily behind. Darry just turned toward the task at hand, grabbing a glass of water and filling a medium bowl with the coldest water the tap would give him before trudging back to his room. Johnny lay there on the mattress, one arm slung over his eyes.
"Can yah sit up for me a sec?" Darry rubbed Johnny's shoulder, urging him into a sitting position before resting a hand on the other boy's forehead. "Still warm. Here take this." A little fishing in the nightstand revealed a bottle of aspirin, Darry uncapping the bottle and tapping one into his hand. Johnny gratefully took the glass, popping the pill to the back of his throat before swallowing it down with some water.
"Feeling any better?"
"Some..." Johnny's eyes fell to the edge of the blanket, his fingers picking at the loosening seams. "Darry?"
"Hmmm?"
"I'm sorry for making you worry bout me. It- I won't let it happen again."
"Don't say that now, kid. I'll always worry about you and all of my many brothers. Your family. It's my job to worry. Speaking of which. You need to rest. Get yourself back under those covers now." Darry tucked Johnny back in, brushing back the black bangs that hung in the younger boy's eyes.
"Can- can you sleep with me?" Johnny could see in Darry's own eyes how tired he was, and somehow, he knew Darry wouldn't go to bed for just anything.
"Sure. Make room." Both boys were out before much longer, and they were found that way by Soda and Pony, Darry with his arms around Johnny, protecting him even in their sleep.
"We'll let 'em sleep. Goodness knows they need it." Soda ruffled Pony's hair, dragging his little brother to the kitchen for a plateful of miscolored eggs.