Chapter 10

Ponyboy dreams himself into believing that Johnny isn't dead. He simply can't cope with the truth.

Johnny was dead. But he wasn't. That still body back in the hospital wasn't Johnny. Johnny was somewhere else--- maybe asleep in the lot, or playing the pinball machine in the bowling alley, or sitting on the back steps of the church in Windrixville. I'd go home and walk by the lot, and Johnny would be sitting on the curb smoking a cigarette, and maybe we'd lie on our backs and watch the stars. He isn't dead, I said to myself. He isn't dead. And this time my dreaming worked. I convinced myself that he wasn't dead.