Deja Vu Part 2/?
Another fic for my ‘table’. The prompt is ‘familiarity’.
Rated: T
Disclaimer: I don't own the O.C. characters or actors. This is a work of fiction and not meant to infringe on any copyrights.
Summary: It’s September in Berkeley, California. Ryan encounters someone from his past that will turn his freshman year upside down.
Unbetaed: (Because I don’t have one.)
A/N: I don’t know how accurate the time line is between when Oliver was institutionalised and released. I went with three years, but I could be (and probably am) wrong, so my apologies and if anyone wants to figure it out I’d be happy to change it.
“What are you doing here, Oliver?”
I managed to keep my voice even and to look him in the eye, ignoring my instinct to beat his face to a bloody pulp.
I was older and wiser this time around and I wouldn’t play into his hands, I wouldn't give him that edge.
“I go by Owen now, Ryan. For all intents and purposes, Oliver Trask died at the Four Seasons.”
“What do you want?” My jaw was clenched tightly, but I kept my fists at my sides.
“I was taken to a hospital in Monterey. It looked more like another Four Seasons than a loony bin, but I was being watched every minute of every day. I went along with it. Every day I woke up with a smile plastered on my face and did everything those idiots asked of me. I was released three years later- a walking pharmacy, but I was free.”
“What do you want?” I repeated.
I didn’t really care what had happened to Oliver after he was taken away; I just wanted to know why he was back in my life- my room, more specifically.
“I’m getting to that. I burned all of my belongings- Oliver’s belongings, that is- except for the photograph that had kept me going for the past three years. I made some phone calls, money changed hands and Oliver slowly faded away… then I hired a private investigator to find Marissa Cooper.”
“What do you want?” I asked a bit louder.
I was getting impatient now, and my mouth had become very dry- too dry to swallow the lump that was beginning to form in my throat.
“He found out that she had been killed- in an accident, riding in a car that you had been driving.”
“That’s right, Oliver. She died- in an accident. It’s over. Done with. Coming to Berkeley, finding me… it won’t bring her back.”
I couldn’t be truly angry at Oliver. He was just a sad, troubled guy, with no one to lean on.
I felt sorry for him, if anything- but that didn’t mean I wanted him around.
It dawned on me that although the grief and guilt surrounding the accident was still there, it was muted somehow. It was just a reproduction of the original- the colours less vibrant, and the brush strokes were absent.
I don’t know if I time heals all, but it certainly helps. The redness and swelling goes away, leaving just a scar and a memory.
“I know.”
His voice was calm and even, which made me a bit uneasy. Unstable Oliver was unpredictable, but familiar. Who was this guy?
“Then why did you come here, Oliver?”
I refused to call him ‘Owen’. I wouldn’t validate his lie.
…
Unstable psychopath or not, he’d really done his homework. From transcripts to criminal record, Oliver Trask had all but disappeared.
I wanted to call Sandy, I needed to call him- but I couldn’t.
One call to the Cohens, the Dean’s office, or the police and something bad would happen. I didn’t know exactly what the ‘bad’ thing would be, but based on Oliver’s twisted smile, I knew I didn’t want to find out.
If anything happened to him, something even worse would happen to the Cohens, or to Taylor (apparently Oliver had a French hit man on speed dial).
I was to behave as if nothing out of the ordinary had happened. I was to go to classes, turn in my assignments and keep in touch with my family. I was to give no indication that my dead ex girlfriend’s mentally unstable stalker was my new roomie.
In a fight you just react (and I have pretty fast reflexes), but Oliver was waging a war of attrition and my reserves were getting low. I was constantly on edge, and being as I was required to spend every night sleeping in the dorm with Oliver, I wasn’t getting many z’s.
It was difficult to eat; when you’re in fight or flight mode, your appetite kind of takes a back seat. I choked down the cafeteria ‘food’ when I could, but my jeans were definitely sitting lower on my hips.
I had a secret and it was swallowing me whole.
Seth would call from Providence, and Taylor from Paris, both sounding glad to hear my voice as I gave them the abridged version of “Ryan Goes to College”. They were both doing well, missing me and looking forward to Christmukkah, but happy.
Sunday dinners with the Cohens were especially painful. Looking at Sandy and Kirsten and telling them everything was going great, my face smiling convincingly to support the lie.
Everything felt like a lie, now.
…
At the end of October, Mike and Adam told me there was going to be a huge dorm party on their floor (the one above mine) for Halloween. I figured this would be pretty similar to the parties thrown every weekend, only some of the people might be in costume.
I wanted to pass, but I said I would think about it.
I wasn’t that into the party scene- even if Oliver hadn’t shown up, I don’t think I would have gone. I had gone through my beer drinking and carousing phase years ago and I didn’t want to do my Monday morning lab with a hangover.
That night, Oliver showed up clutching a flyer for the Halloween party.
He wanted to go. He wanted us both to go.
Up until then I’d managed to keep Oliver separate from my new friends. He wasn’t in the architecture program, and even if he went to the gym I never saw him there. Spending hours studying in the library together, and going for coffee before class had brought me closer to Mike, Adam and Alana.
Adam was the Halo champion of Bowles Hall, but it was fun playing him, and every once in a while he’d let me win a game. I missed videogames without Seth around, and escaping to a virtual world was exactly what I needed sometimes.
Mike was a jock.
Not in the Harbour sense of the word, but if I had to fit him with a label that would be it. The two of us played on the same intramural soccer team, and he was always up for a one on one game of basketball. He was less than an inch taller than me, and we were pretty evenly matched.
It was nice to leave any thoughts of Oliver on the sidelines and just run and shoot and score.
After I’d destroyed a fictional parasite with Adam and gotten an endorphin rush with Mike, it was nice to kick back and relax with Alana.
Alana was different than most of the girls I had known growing up, but in a good way. She was smart and witty and genuinely kind. She exuded a quiet confidence that reminded me a bit of Anna Stern if I had to make a comparison.
Up until then I’d always had an excuse prepared in case one of my friends wanted to come into my room, and during the day I kept as far away from Residence as possible.
…
On the evening of the thirty-first of October I was invited to the Cohens’ house for dinner. I knew Kirsten really wanted me to see Sophie in her costume, and the party wouldn’t start until around eight anyway, so I agreed to come.
Sandy picked me up around five and we made the short journey by car to the ‘Berkeley house’; even though the Cohens no longer owned other property (in Newport Beach or anywhere else), the name had stuck, and I figured Sophie would call it that one day too.
“Hi Ryan, it’s so good to see you,” Kirsten said, beaming as we came in the door.
She was holding the tiniest Cohen, clad in a tiny yellow and black striped sleeper. Sophie got a bit bigger every time I turned my head- at least it seemed that way. I saw her almost every week, but I could see her becoming more and more of a ‘little person’ as time went by. Seth wouldn’t even recognize her come Christmukkah.
“She’s a bumblebee! See, there are little wings on the back,” Kirsten added, turning her daughter to show the back of the costume.
I grinned at Sophie, who smiled back in the relaxed, tolerant way Theresa’s cat used to when her cousins pushed it around in a baby carriage.
Dinner was good, and for once I was hungry. They had ordered Thai food- takeout from my new favourite restaurant.
“You look thinner, Ryan. Are you getting enough to eat at school?” Kirsten wanted to know.
“Yeah, but I’m playing soccer again, and I’m really busy with classes,” I said, my fingers crossed under the table- which I know is childish and doesn’t absolve the lie, but I’ve been doing it since I was a kid and it’s kind of a habit now.
I would totally have failed a polygraph, but Kirsten seemed to believe me. Sandy gave me a sideways glance of the variety I am known to give, but (like me) he didn’t say anything.
We finished the meal in silence, but it was a comfortable silence, which was weird since hardly anything had felt comfortable lately.
I did the dishes (all three plates) and then took some pictures of Sophie in her costume to send to Seth. This turned into Kirsten taking pictures of me and Sophie with her camera, individually and then together, then of Sandy with the two of us. Next Sandy took pictures of us with Kirsten, before setting the timer and placing the camera on the bookshelf behind him before coming to stand with us for a final shot.
I discretely checked my watch, and I don’t know if it was because he saw me, but Sandy offered to give me a ride back to campus soon after.
We drove slowly down the street, mindful of the little witches and skeletons roaming the neighbourhood with outstretched pillowcases.
“I remember Seth’s first Halloween in Newport- he was a ninja. I was looking over his candy at the end of the night and found a wallet in the bag. I returned it across the street the next day- apparently Mrs. Barker-Platt had thought it was a hold up.”
I snorted, imagining our slightly senile former neighbour opening her door to a pint sized ninja.
“I remember trick or treating in Fresno. Trey was supposed to take me around the neighbourhood, but as soon as we were out of sight of our house he started lighting firecrackers. We met up with a group of his friends and toilet papered houses, cracked eggs in people’s mailboxes. The next day at school I couldn’t figure out why everyone else had so much candy.”
Sandy laughed, and turned into the parking lot where he had dropped me off. I expected him to drive away after I’d jumped out, but he turned off the engine and unbuckled his seatbelt, indicating that I should do the same.
“It’s a nice night, want to go for a bit of a walk?”
“Uh, yeah okay,” I answered, slightly suspiciously. But I figured the party wouldn’t start for at least another half hour, and with Taylor in Paris, Sandy Cohen was my next choice for a moonlight walk.
“So, kid… how are things? I know we talked at dinner, but I wanted to ask again- how are you doing?”
“I haven’t gotten all of my midterms back, but the ones I have I did okay, I got a 92 in-”
“I’m sure you’re doing well academically, and I’m proud of you, I really am, but I wanted to know how you were doing. How are you adjusting?”
I wanted to tell him right then and there; I wanted this nightmare to be over.
I shrugged my shoulders indifferently.
“I’m okay. I have a few friends in the program to grab coffee with and hang out. I’m playing intramural soccer, which is fun and it’s a nice break from studying.”
“That’s good, kid. Kirsten and I want you to get a good education, but we want you to have fun too. The college years were some of the best times of my life, and I hope they are for you too Ryan.”
“Uh, yeah.”
If this was the time of my life, I shuddered to think what horrors awaited me after I had my degree.
“You’re sure everything is really okay? Nothing is bothering you?”
We had done a circle around the Residence and were coming back to the car. I stole a glance at Sandy- at his face. His eyes were kind and he looked concerned.
I shook my head, fingers crossed inside the pocket of my jacket, and gave him a final wave as he got back in the car. I stood there in the parking lot until his headlights had faded from view.
TBC
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