I picked up the phone book and called my English teacher.

“Mr. Syme, this is Ponyboy. That theme—how long can it be?”

“Why, uh, not less than five pages.” He sounded a little surprised. I’d forgotten it was late at night.

“Can it be longer?”

“Certainly, Ponyboy, as long as you want it.”

“Thanks,” I said and hung up.

I sat down and picked up my pen and thought for a minute. Remembering. Remembering a handsome, dark boy with a reckless grin and a hot temper. A tough, tow-headed boy with a cigarette in his mouth and a biter grin on his hard face. Remembering—and this time it didn’t hurt—a quiet, defeated-looking sixteen-year-old whose hair needed cutting badly and who had black eyes with a frightened expression to them. One week had taken all of them, And I decided I could tell people, beginning with my English teacher. I wondered for a long time how to start that theme, how to start writing about something that was important to me. And I finally began like this: When I stepped out into the bright sunlight from the darkness of the movie house, I had only two things on my mind: Paul Newman and a ride home. (179-180)