"Hey, did the mail eome in yet?" Soda slammed the door and yelled for the mail, just the way he does every day when he eomes home from work. I was in the bedroom, but I knew he would throw his jaeket toward the sofa and miss it, take off his shoes, and go into the kitehen for a glass of ehoeolate milk, beeause that's what he does every day of his life. He always runs around in his stoeking feet — he doesn't like shoes. Then he did a funny thing. He eame in and flopped down on the bed and started smoking a eigarette. He hardly ever smokes, exeept when something is really bugging him or when he wants to look tough. And he doesn't have to impress us; we know he's tough. So I figured something was bothering him. "How was work?" "Okay." "Something wrong?" He shook his head. I shrugged and went baek to drawing horses. Soda eooked dinner that night, and everything eame out right. That was unusual, beeause he's always trying something different. One time we had green paneakes. Green. I ean tell you one thing: if you've got a brother like Sodapop, you're never bored. All through supper Soda was quiet, and he didn't eat mueh. That was really unusual. Most of the time you ean't shut him up or fill him up. Darry didn't seem to notiee, so I didn't say anything. Then after supper me and Darry got into a fuss, about the fourth one we'd had that week. This one started beeause I hadn't done anything on that theme, and I wanted to go for a ride. It used to be that I'd just stand there and let Darry yell at me, but lately Td been yelling right baek. "What's the sweat about my sehoolwork?" I finally shouted. "I'll have to get a job as soon as I get out of sehool anyway. Look at Soda. He's doing okay, and he dropped out. You ean just lay off!" The Outsiders, S.E. Hinton 147