It was you when we first met eyes
It's been sixty years, and yet Soda swears he can still remember walking into school for his first day of the first grade and meeting Steve's eyes across the classroom. Steve had given him a toothy grin – missing one on his right side – and walked over.
He doesn't think there was a moment of silence that day. They talked from the moment they walked in that door to the moment Soda's mom came to pick him up.
He'd wanted to bring Steve home with him, he remembers. He's mine now, he'd told his mother, and if he comes home we can keep on playing!
Janet had laughed and pulled his hand, telling him he could see Steve tomorrow.
It was you in the city lights
The first time Soda got to go out alone, it was with Steve in eighth grade. He’d gotten permission to walk around with him after school so long as they came home for dinner.
They stayed out until dark and the neon lights from store signs shone off of the grease Steve used in an unsubtle attempt to look more like Darry. They ran around the field and watched cars go by and talked until they couldn't anymore.
Then they lay down in the lot and told each other what felt like monumental truths, even if they were just childish, secret dreams about wanting to get out of that place.
It was you when I almost lost control
The police officers close the door behind them and Soda crumples. He curls in on himself, back pressed against the wall, arms wrapped around his legs to make himself as small as possible. His whole body is shaking with sobs.
"It's okay. You're okay. Come on, Soda, it'll be okay. I know it. We'll get through this."
A warm hand is on his shoulder, pressing down because Steve knows that light touches make his skin crawl.
Darry's staring at the closed door in shock. He hasn't moved an inch.
The sound of Ponyboy throwing up reaches the living room and Johnny isn't anywhere Soda can see so he must be with him.
Two-Bit's walking up to Darry tentatively and Dally's sitting on the couch, muttering to himself
And Soda's parents are lying on some train tracks somewhere, torn to pieces and dead.
But there's a grounding hand on his shoulder and a calm voice whispering in his ear.
He takes a shuddering breath through the sobs.
It was you through the darkest times
"We there yet?"
"Just a bit further."
Steve drives for maybe five more minutes before pulling up into a field.
Soda steps out of the car and stumbles a couple feet forwards.
"How do I–"
"Whatever feels right." The car door closes behind Steve.
Soda looks around him. A wide field, empty except for him and Steve. There's a forest in the distance and a mountain to his left and the sky is overwhelmingly blue, and it's beautiful and it's wrong because his baby brother is missing and wanted for murder and the world has no right to be beautiful right now.
Tears spring to his eyes and Sodapop screams. He screams for his little brother, alone and lost somewhere only Dally knows about. He screams for a baby and its mother who doesn't love him. He screams for Bob the Soc – he knew him –, who was just seventeen. He screams for himself, heartbroken and missing his little brother and mourning his parents and wanting to help his big brother desperately and being so completely useless.
At some point his screams turn to sobs that wrack his body and make his head pound as he buries his face in the crook of Steve's neck.
Steve's hand is on his neck, his thumb rubbing back and forth in a weak effort for comfort. His other arm wraps around Soda's waist and he whispers quiet reassurances.
It was you that would make me shine
Ponyboy told him once that he never sparkled like he did when he was with Steve. He said that something about him seemed to just glow whenever he talked to him, and after that, Soda could never help but notice that he felt lighter around him.
He never struggled to think of what to say, how to appease him. Just talking to Steve about something: his brothers fighting, his fear of failure, Sandy... It made it go away. Just talking to Steve made everything better.
It was you that I hold on tight
Steve starts coming over at night when they’re in tenth grade. Dally saw him sleeping in the lot once, and once the Curtises found out that he was kicked out almost once a week, they offered him a couch and a roof immediately.
But tonight... tonight something's different. Because usually Steve makes sure to be quiet so as to not wake anyone, but tonight he was loud enough that Soda got up and out to bed to see what was the matter.
And tonight Steve's on the couch and he's shaking like Soda's never seen him, arms wrapped around a cushion as he stares at the door.
Soda makes sure his steps are audible as he walks towards him.
"Hey, Stevie," he says softly. Steve doesn't react to the hand now on his shoulder. "You okay?"
Steve shakes his head, the movement less stable than it should be.
"Oh, honey." Soda sits down next to him on the couch and wraps an arm around him. Steve takes a long, shuddering breath and returns the hug, burying his face in Soda's chest.
The next morning Soda has a crick in his neck, a stiff back, and a couple weeks' worth of teasing from the gang, but the small spot of dampness on his shirt and the tentative smile on Steve's face is worth it.
I swear I always knew
It's small and informal and just barely legal now, but Soda's watching Steve walk down the aisle, because when they were twenty Steve told him about what it was like, always being "Soda's friend" or "the other one", the one that girls didn't care about and no one noticed, and it's been Soda's mission since then to get everyone to see what he sees when he looks at the breathtaking beauty walking towards him.
He's mine now, he thinks again, sixty years later.
It's always been you
