Chapter Text
Ponyboy has no idea how long he’s being do this, but he’s really fucking sick of it.
He wakes up once again, with a gasp. He doesn’t sit up, instead laying his head down and staring at the ceiling. He needs to come up with a plan for the day. Something to fix what’s happening. It would be way easier if he understood what was happening.
Pony gets out of bed, careful to not wake Soda, and walks to the bathroom. He turns the light on as he walks in and takes in his appearance. His hair is short, blonde, and choppy. Johnny should never become a barber.
He never could anyways, since he keeps dying. Pony almost laughed, but he didn’t want to make enough noise to wake up his brothers. Johnny kept dying and nothing he did fixed it.
And he’d tried so many things. He's tried so many ways to keep Johnny alive. He tried everything he could think of. He told Johnny that he was a hero and everyone was proud of him, he told the boy that he was his best friend and he couldn’t lose him, he’d even stayed with Johnny all day one day, keeping his mother out of the room and comforting his friend. But nothing worked.
Because in reality, nothing Pony said could fix Johnny's injuries. A few words of encouragement wasn't going to heal all of Johnny wounds.
Johnny died around nine P.M. after the rumble every single time, and there was nothing he could do to stop it. And then Dally would die.
Well, Dally didn’t die everytime, but it was often enough that Pony considered that a constant as well.
He had started keeping track, in his head, everything that stayed the same.
Steve and Two-Bit always came over in the morning, Johnny always died, the Greasers always won the rumble, and Dally always lost it after Johnny died.
Pony sighed and ran a hand through his hair. He looked back into the mirror, staring at his left eyebrow. Just above it, there was a new scar.
That was also a constant. Everytime Pony woke up, whatever injuries he had gotten the day before scarred over. The newest scar was from the rumble, some broken glass had nicked him and caused a decently deep gash.
There were a lot of other scars from previous days. Or loops? It’s weird referring to the days as ‘yesterday’ or ‘the day before’ because technically it was all the same day. It hurt Pony’s head to think about too much, so he didn’t.
He had two small circle scars, one on his shoulder and the other on his lower stomach. He remembered what they were from vividly.
He was running faster than he had ever run in his life. Being the star of the track team helped him as he ran after Dallas. The sound of sirens approaching mixed with the footsteps behind him. Pony ran just in time to see Dally pull the unloaded heater out of his jacket and point it around wildly. Two cops stepped out of their car, holding their own heaters up.
When Dallas points the gun at the cops, Pony runs faster. He runs up to Dally and pushes him out of the way. The sound of two guns going off echoes in his ears as he feels two bullets hit him.
He stops, looking down first at Dallas, and then at his own shirt. The old track shirt he was wearing was steadily gaining a deep red color.
"Ponyboy!” Dallas stood up and yelled his name, only for Ponyboy to fall down.
“What the fuck! He’s a kid! What the fuck is wrong with you?” Dallas turns to the cops and yells, calling them every name under the sun while panicking.
“Dal?” Darry ran up to Dallas, panting out his name. He stopped when he saw Pony on the floor.
“Honey? Pony?” Darry sank to his knees as he shook Pony, but it didn’t change anything. Pony was bleeding out from two bullet wounds that were meant for Dally.
But that was his goal. Maybe if he couldn’t save Johnny, he could save Dally. Even if Pony couldn’t save himself, he could still save someone.
(Maybe if Pony died instead he could finally rest. He was so fucking tired.)
“Love ya, Dar.” Pony says with a small smile. Before he died, passed out, died , he heard what was left of the gang yelling. They all overlapped each other, so Pony couldn’t understand anything. But he smiled anyway. At least he saved Dally.
But he hadn’t. Pony had woken up again and all had gained was two new scars and a headache. He’d tried many other times to save Dally, but it never worked. He was really fucking tired and running out of ideas.
He’s considered telling someone a few times, but who would he tell? No one would believe him. Hell, if he hadn’t been living through this, he wouldn’t have believed himself.
Everyone would think he was crazy or had a concussion from the fire and write off his concerns for paranoia.
(Soda might believe him. Maybe Darry would. Maybe his brothers could help him get out of this repeating hell.)
Pony sighed again and took one last look in the mirror. All the scars on his face were barely noticeable if you weren’t directly looking for them.
If anyone said anything about his new injuries, he’d just tell them it was from the night when Bob was killed. No one would have any reason to doubt him.
He turned the light off and walked out of the bathroom, heading to the kitchen. He tried to always be in the main area of the house when Two-Bit and Steve arrived. He enjoyed seeing them every morning.
He may not get along with Steve the best, but the mundane morning of teasing and talking always helped him get his mind off of what was going to happen later that day.
It was also because he enjoyed seeing everyone so happy. Well, they weren’t always happy, but no one was afraid. (Except Ponyboy. He was afraid because he knew what was going to happen)
Steve wasn’t sobbing in the lot, raising his hands in surrender so the fuzz didn’t shoot him too. Two-Bit didn’t look back at Pony every second to make sure he wasn’t about to pass out. Darry would smile and laugh and worry about Pony, but not because he was scared Pony was going to be the third member of the gang that they would lose. He was just always worrying about Pony. Soda would make jokes and laugh and sling an arm around Pony because Soda loved him, not because he knew that Johnny and Dally were going to die.
In the morning, everyone was normal and happy and no one was dead. At least, not yet.
As Pony pulled out a pan for the eggs, he thought about today. He needed to come up with a plan for the day.
What was he going to try to fix? Should he not intervene with anything, just let the day play out as it did the first time and see if he’ll wake up on a Sunday instead of Saturday again? Maybe he’ll try to save Dally again. (Maybe he’ll take a bunch of Aspirin and pray that he doesn’t ever wake up again.)
So many options.
“Look at the blond-headed monkey!” Two-Bit puts a hand on Pony’s shoulder and turns the younger Greaser towards him. Pony pretends to scowl and goes through the familiar conversation.
“I know I look lousy, no need to rub it in.” He really needs to plan something for today, but for now, he’ll enjoy the little peace that comes with the morning.