In that second what Soda and Dally and Two-Bit had been trying to tell me came through. Darry did care about me, maybe as much as he cared about Soda, and because he cared he was trying too hard to make something out of me. When he yelled “Pony, where have you been all this time?” he meant “Pony, you’ve scared me to death. Please be careful, because I couldn’t stand it if anything happened to you.”
Darry looked down and turned away silently. Suddenly I broke out of my daze.
“Darry!” I screamed, and the next thing I knew I had him around the waist and was squeezing the daylights out of him.
“Darry,” I said, “I’m sorry…”
He was stroking my hair and I could hear the sobs racking him as he fought to keep back the tears.
“Oh, Pony, I thought we’d lost you… like we did Mom and Dad…”
That was his silent fear then- of losing another person he loved. I remembered how close he and Dad had been, and I wondered how I could ever have thought him hard and unfeeling. I listened to his heart pounding through his T-shirt and knew everything was going to be okay now. I had taken the long way around, but I was finally home. To stay.

S. E. Hinton, The Outsiders

Pg. 87-88

(via theghostking)

reblogged from branstrk
originally posted by branstrk