New Fic: Cowardly Acts 1/4, The OC, Seth/Ryan
Cowardly Acts, by Fabella (wistful_fever)
The O.C., Seth/Ryan, NC-17.
Slash, Long, Future Fic.
Summary
Seth Cohen: twenty years old, unspecified major, neurotic mess.
Disclaimer
Not mine, no money, don’t sue, yadda, yadda, you know the drill.
Notes
This is set while Ryan and Seth are attending an unspecified college together, and likely to be made AU in the next couple of years. Also, I began writing this before a lot of the events of mid-season two took place (then took a long break from it, before returning recently), so it’s already AU in some ways.
A new part should be posted weekly, after the editing process.
Cowardly Acts, part 1/4, by Fabella
California had the kind of sunshine poets and hardcore musicians hated. It was always hanging around, glinting off the hoods of cars, glaring off sunglasses and smooth, tanned bodies that all looked like they’d been cut from the same magazine advertisement: glossy, paper-thin, drinks with the little umbrellas in hand. Seth Cohen was thin, Seth Cohen was tan, Seth Cohen sometimes liked drinks with umbrellas, but there wasn’t anything glossy about him unless he hadn’t washed his hair in a few days, and he took pride in his vaguely pathetic rich-boy emo-grunge.
At the moment, he was hiding from the sun inside a restaurant across from his apartment building. His sunglasses were lodged in his hair like a headband, holding the curls off his forehead, and he had his nose pressed against the glass, the better to stare at the sun creating all kinds of new types of cancer on bare shoulders that passed. He was smudging the glass, becoming acquainted with the restaurant manager’s creative language, developing a crick in his neck. He was waiting for Ryan to exit stage left, so he could run away screaming like the little bitch he sometimes thought he was.
Some people operated under the belief that Seth Cohen was a coward.
That was fine, because Seth Cohen also operated under the belief that Seth Cohen was a coward. Never let it be said that he was unaware of his own failings.
That was why he’d skipped class today in favor of moving all his crap out of the apartment. Ryan, coincidentally enough, had a class of his own scheduled when Seth’s departure from the premises was set to happen. He’d be angry, Seth realized, when he came home to an apartment with much more room and much less Seth. But in time, he’d hopefully realize what a grand gesture of friendship this was. And not kill Seth.
A couple walked by, their hands tightly knotted. She had her hair tied up in a french braid and wore a pale blue dress that matched her eyes. He had a white button-up shirt and a smile that hurt Seth’s face to look at. Safe, pleasant, normal. Seth scowled at them both with intense disapproval, using the Cohen Eyebrows to their utmost power, and the girl flinched when she spotted him, the creepy grunged-out guy with his face pressed against the glass, and hurried her boyfriend along, eyes down.
It wasn’t like Seth didn’t know what this would look like to Ryan, this just leaving, no notice, no deep conversation over cheerios and coffee-
“Please leave,” the restaurant manager begged, in a painfully controlled voice that sounded only slightly scratchy from the screaming everyone on the block had heard her doing in the bathroom only moments before. “You’ve been standing there for fifty minutes now, and I think I’ve been as patient as possible under these circumstances. Customers want to leave but they’re afraid of you.”
Seth didn’t turn around. “Just a moment. Deep thoughts.”
So he knew what this would look like, how Ryan would react, that it would probably hurt their friendship for a while. He also knew that it might be the one thing to save it. Circumstances had become severe enough to demand some action on Seth’s part, and unfortunately, the only reasonable solution Seth had been able to come up with was shaving off all his hair and pledging his allegiance as a monk. Since he was Jewish, he’d been stuck with the more unreasonable solution of hurting Ryan’s feelings really badly.
Next time, he was definitely going with the head shaving thing.
“Can’t you have deep thoughts somewhere else?”
“I like it here,” Seth said, nose on the glass. “I find it comforting.”
It wasn’t that he wanted to make yet another appearance on the list Ryan kept in his head to brood over. The one that often read: This person fucked off somewhere on this date and that sucked and I will hold it against them forever even if I pretend to forgive them, signed Ryan Atwood, Organizer of The List of They Who Left Me.
Outside, the sun persisted, and it was a stupidly nice day. Children played on the sidewalk in the sun, drawing with pastel chalks. Cars rolled by with their windows down, tanned forearms hanging out, fingers loosely holding lit cigarettes. An elderly couple sat on lawn chairs outside their building, waved when a woman passed, walking her dog. They lived in a lower income neighborhood, but a happy one-
“I’ll call the cops,” the manager said.
-allowing for the rare disturbance.
Seth turned from the glass door. A few of the customers were staring at him openly, the others were deliberately ignoring his presence. Near the potted plants, a little girl with the appearance of a Cindy Doll peered at him from around her father’s shoulder. Seth quirked a smile at her, and she quickly hid her face in her father’s neck. Ah, yes, frightening children, ruining friendships, all in a day’s work for him.
“I mean it,” the manager hissed. “You’re loitering.”
The manager, an angry woman in need of some counseling to deal with her own self-loathing, was now wielding a clipboard like the whip she’d probably deeply enjoy beating him with. Seth, weirdly, found he was a little turned on, and tucked a hand in the left pocket of his jeans to conceal the evidence of his interest. Oh, the woe of being attracted to domineering women. It never worked out.
“The sign says please wait to be seated.” Seth pointed to the chalkboard and wiggled his finger in emphasis. “I’m waiting. See? By the sign.”
Her square jaw twitched, bulldog-light in her gaze. In them, Seth read his imminent demise, and stepped back until his shoulders were against the door, smiling uneasily when she growled at him. Still, partially-erotic death by restaurant manager was preferable to death by Ryan any day. This woman, at least, didn’t know him well enough to want painful hours of torture involved. Ryan had known him for *years*. Wow, when he thought of it like that, he was in danger of death by Ryan every day.
“We’ve tried to seat you.” Spoken slowly, through her teeth. “Several times.”
“I prefer the waiting part, actually.”
“That’s it,” she snapped, her face twisting in a way suggesting there were places she’d like to put her clipboard that would result in a lot of difficult hours for him in the bathroom. “I’m calling the cops and getting your ass thrown out of here.”
And she stomped off, clunky black shoes smacking against the hardwood floor, apparently to make good on her threat. More people stared at him, having lost all interest in the soup of the day. Seth swallowed and turned to look out the door again, beginning to sweat under his AC/DC t-shirt. Prison or Ryan? Either had the potential to end with violence, blood, or angry gay sex. Decisions, decisions.
Luckily, just at that moment, the battered metal door at the front of Seth’s apartment building opened, and Ryan appeared on the sidewalk, his eyes briefly flicking over to where Seth’s car was usually parked, before bouncing away. He moved quickly, head down, bag swinging from his hand. He had started walking in one direction, and Seth raised his eyebrows when Ryan abruptly spun around, looking annoyed as he headed in the other, where his truck was parked. Must be preoccupied with whatever skyrise had crawled up his ass and lost its building permit this week.
Seth pressed his nose against the glass again, and definitely didn’t think Ryan looked good in those faded jeans and hiking boots. And despite the fact that the sun glinted off Ryan’s collar-length hair, Seth didn’t find it attractive or at all desirable. In fact, it irritated him, Ryan’s pretty hair, made him clench his fists at his side and curse under his breath at every song that had ever been written about California’s sun. California’s sun sucked. It was an annoyingly cheerful relative that had come to stay for the weekend, and never went away. It reminded Seth a lot of Aunt Hallie.
Seth watched Ryan climb in his truck and drive off, still displaying that distracted grimace from this morning. That grimace was a permanent fixture in Seth’s life lately. If Ryan wasn’t grimacing, he was picking a fight, and if he wasn’t picking a fight or grimacing, he was in Seth’s space, taking up all the air. Seth sketched a sad wave, glad that Ryan hadn’t noticed him hulking in the doorway, scaring children, because Seth wasn’t up for a fight. If Seth was forced to deal with Ryan just then, he might do something disgusting, like start crying.
Later, buddy, hope you don’t go Classic Atwood on me.
Seth slouched with his face pressed against the glass, catching breath he hadn’t realized he’d lost. Why was it that when a guy hit twenty, the world around him finally found its sense of ironic humor? Seth had been the one to push the idea of moving in together, and now he was the one ending it, despite wanting to cling to Ryan’s ankles and be dragged around wherever Ryan went, whenever Ryan went there.
“You have to go,” the manager said when she came back, two male waiters trailing sheepishly behind her. “As in leave, depart, exit, just go, please, I’m begging you, you’re leaving streaks on the windows and scaring my customers, just--”
“Okay, I’ll go,” Seth replied, taking pity on her plight. “Thanks for the spot by the door, and great hair, by the way, very early Madonna of you.”
He left her gaping.
Seth retrieved his car from the underground garage a block away, bringing it outside his apartment building. The keys were pocketed when he pulled them from the starter, and Seth sat there, taking it all in, this place he had come to call home. A boy bicycling up the sidewalk toward him, a man watering the plants in his window, the bench Ryan liked to sit at sometimes to watch cars drive by-that weird content look on his face when he noticed Seth walking down the sidewalk toward him, take-out in hand.
It was perfect here, in the way you always found yourself wondering which building was going to fall on your head first, but you had been happy here anyway, and you were going to miss it. Everything. But mostly him.
Seth rubbed over the flaking letters on his chest.
“Just do it,” he told himself, voice loud outside his head, then grabbed the boxes piled in the back seat before climbing out. “Get in there, get out, don’t get pulled in by the seductive powers of the new XBOX, you’ll be fine.”
A quick cut was the cleanest, Seth had heard. Or was it the first cut was the deepest? Anyway, something about a cut.
When he unlocked the door to the apartment he shared with Ryan and stepped inside, it became clear that the cut was going to be long and nasty, something out of a horror movie, with fake blood splattering everywhere, and women with big breasts screaming. Okay, not so much the big breasts, but everything else, yes. He wondered how he had ever believed it could be any other way.
Standing in the tiny yellow kitchen with its one window, the door swinging shut after him, he really was that little girl with the pigtails. The counter surfaces, the same bright yellow as the walls, were stained with endless coffee rings from day after day of drinking his first cup right there in front of the coffee maker. Since it usually only took him thirty-six seconds to finish it, and then he’d immediately start on the second cup, he hadn’t seen the point of moving away from the distributor of his greatest joy. Ryan more often than not took his coffee sitting down at their cheap fold-up table, eyes sleepy over the rim, both hands wrapped around his cup as he listened quietly to Seth ramble on. Seth tossed his sunglasses on the counter and sat his keys on the table, on Ryan’s side, and let his hand rest there, over the warm metal.
Last night Ryan had been sitting there when Seth said goodnight, working on measurements for one of his projects. Three months ago, Seth would have stayed up with him until it looked like Ryan would crash if he didn’t go to sleep, then Seth would have done his Jewish grandmother bit and dragged Ryan to bed, pushed him down and covered him up. Three months ago. Seth pulled his hand away from the keys.
Before Ryan 2.0, it had been a good year. Phenomenal.
Not perfect, maybe. There was that time when he’d broken two ribs trying to help Ryan carry the couch up the narrow stairwell. Even that had been kind of cool, once the doctors pumped him full of drugs, and he could banter with Ryan, who looked miserable and guilty for dropping the couch on him, about the value of battle scars.
“Maybe you could tell the story on a first date,” Ryan had suggested, pinching
Seth’s big toe where it was wriggling under the hospital blanket. “You could say you stayed in the hospital overnight for observation after your roommate assaulted you with used furniture.”
“Nah, no way. Totally second date material. Stop that.”
Ryan kept the toe captured. “Seth, you don’t have second dates.”
“Only because college women have yet to discover my hidden charm. And Summer spreads dirty, dirty lies about me being infectious. Dammit, that tickles. If I could get up without puking, I would so beat you with pieces of my broken ribs.”
Once they had moved everything in, things went smoothly. They tacked a Spiderman sheet up as a door for the bathroom, Ryan taught Seth how to use a stove for things like cooking, and sometimes Seth even did the dishes. Mom and Dad came by for a visit every few weeks, and though Mom wanted to find them a nicer apartment on the numbered streets, volunteering half the rent, Dad was on their side, insisting that living in a rundown shanty of a place would build character.
It became a running joke between him and Ryan.
“Ryan, I am not scrubbing shower grout.”
“But what about your character?”
“My character is feeling nauseous, thank you very much.”
For a year, Seth and Ryan had lived in harmony, with only the occasional glitch, like garbage duty evasion. They ate together, met girls together, did homework together, complained about their part time jobs together, watched Adult Swim together, fought over the funnies together, and nursed broken hearts together.
Maybe their togetherness was the problem.
Because one morning Seth had woken up, stumbled into the kitchen wearing only a pair of boxers and a nervous smile, and boy, the honeymoon was over. Ryan had twitched while pouring milk in his cereal, spilling cow juice everywhere, and at that point, enter Ryan 2.0, prone to yelling and, to mix it up a little, spitting while yelling. He and this Ryan 2.0 discovered they did not get along very well, and they’d been dealing with their mutual dislike of each other for about three months. Seth was done with that, over that, needed to move *beyond* that. Before Ryan 2.0 came home for lunch, preferably.
Seth put one box on the counter, and decisively began to take everything from the cabinets that he could clearly call his own. A lot of the stuff was too close to call, though, because he and Ryan had gotten it together, or he had bought it, but Ryan used it most of the time. The pots and pans, for example. He’d bought them on sale at a department store, but if they ate a home-cooked meal, it was usually made by Ryan, despite Seth’s budding ability to do more than shuck corn and heat up canned Spaghetti-O’s.
In the end, he left the cooking stuff, but unplugged the coffee maker with a sharp jerk on the cord, and bent, fitting it carefully inside the box with the Garfield and Snoopy coffee cups. Coffee was Seth’s domain. Ryan could bring him to court if he wanted to argue with him about it. They could schedule visitations with the coffee or something. And Seth could be bitter and resentful when Ryan called to set a date.
Seth left that box on the counter and scooted the other near the door, the box moving across the ripped-up linoleum floor with the resentment of a toddler denied a toy in the store, stopping and starting in fits. Turning to the stove where he’d sat his candles, he noticed the digital clock was wrong, and reset it, aware even as he did it that he wasn’t going to do this again. It wasn’t supposed to be a big deal, or make his throat ache, but yeah, he was doing his best imitation of a their clogged shower drain. It was a quirky clock, always running five minutes fast or five minutes behind, no matter how many times one of them adjusted it.
It’s a clock with character, Seth had told Ryan. Like us.
Because Seth was a freak, and he could never let jokes die, even when they were clearly dead already. Ryan let him get away with shit like that, and laughed anyway.
Seth put his hands in his pockets, and looked around. Not an hour had passed, and the kitchen was already Seth-Free, or at least Seth-In-A-Cardboard-Box. It was kind of chilling, like walking over a grave with your name on it or something, to see his stuff packed up and ready to be carried out in his scrawny arms. He’d felt a little like this when he’d moved out of his parents, this unbelief at what he was doing. This was his home. Where did he think he was going anyway? Sure, he had already arranged housing in the dorms with one of his friends from school, but that was nowhere to go, he’d already been there, that was going backwards.
Well, he’d go backwards, then.
The idea of time travel had always appealed to him.
“Soon we’ll have to part, pretty yellow kitchen with no extras,” Seth said, since Ryan wasn’t here to tease Seth about speaking with inanimate objects. The kitchen’s yellow face stared back at him sunnily. Little things that he’d miss. The chemistry book holding up one leg of the table, the glow in the dark planet stickers on the refrigerator. “But know this, I will always miss the view from your miniature window. The mornings won’t be the same without the alley cat of rat-eating fame and the naked old guy who enjoys a good banana every now and then.”
He pressed a kiss to the noisy refrigerator, which hummed at him in return.
Seth’s bedroom was right across from Ryan’s, about the size of a large walk-in closet. A narrow hall separated the two rooms, ending at the doorless bathroom. Really, the hall wasn’t so much a hall as it was a nook off the livingroom, but the sheer tiny-ness of the apartment had made it easy for them to talk without ever moving from their own beds. Or Seth could get out of bed, take four easy steps, and be in Ryan’s bedroom. Not that their was a whole lot of impulse late night conversation anymore, what with the wishing brutal deaths upon one another thing.
Seth left his bathroom stuff. Because he couldn’t go in there.
He wasn’t going to question why.
Everything in his closet had already been packed. The rest of Seth’s room, however, was going to be a challenge. There were dishes on every surface, a half eaten pizza dying slowly on his desk, and three weeks of laundry solidifying into a living creature on his floor. Not exactly a hovel, but pretty damn close. Ryan really would wish Seth a brutal death if he moved out and left his room a bio-hazard. But as Seth was bending to scoop up some of that mutated laundry, he stumbled, and had to right himself with a hand on the wall as his eyes began to water, burning traitorously, nostrils flaring to accommodate the sudden spreading of an aching pit behind his nose.
Fuck, fuck, double fuck. Stop it right now, he ordered himself. Don’t be a pussy.
“I don’t want to leave,” Seth said plaintively, to his lava lamp.
Truth. Standing there with his body leaning closer to the wall as his arm shook, Seth knew that regardless of the three hellish months he had already gone through with Ryan, he could unpack everything, and be sitting on the couch when Ryan came home, feet propped lazily on the table while he ate some of the dead pizza. And Ryan would see nothing wrong with that Seth, accept him as status quo, and they could pretend for a while more that they were still friends. Running away felt, for the first time, like the hardest option instead of the easiest. And Seth was King at the easy road, he was always coasting down it on his skateboard; it tempted him.
Then, when his palm slid sweatily down the wall as he stood under his own steam, he pictured Ryan’s face as he had left, the wrinkles waiting under Ryan’s skin for the right moment to stress themselves to life. Imagine seeing them pop out one day when Ryan was standing in front of the television, spouting something about Seth’s future when all Seth wanted to do was watch The Three Stooges marathon.
So, put the hurt in a box.
Pack it up with everything else. Leave it in an attic somewhere.
Seth cleared the floor first, shoving his dirty clothes randomly in boxes, then took the books off the bookshelf Ryan had built for Seth’s birthday. It didn’t make him pause, he didn’t even think about it; Seth’s mind was forcibly blank. The day of his SATs blank. When he filled one box, he moved to another, focusing only on the task. Sooner than he had believed possible, a year had been packed away, and his bed had been stripped so that it sat on the floor of his room with a mild frown in the form of a beer stain curving downward under two eye-like rips.
He was sweeping the floor when he heard the unmistakable sound of the door opening and closing. Seth froze, the broom gripped tightly in his hands, and his eyes slowly rose to his open doorway. A couple loud thunks followed, and a grunt of pain.
“Damn!” Ryan hissed. “What the hell?”
Seth winced, remembering the box he’d left in front of the door.
Well, the Ironist drawled in Seth’s head. You’re fucked.
If Seth were inclined to make noise, he could say honestly that this was the worst moment in his life, even ahead of being shoved in a locker with pee in his shoes, which had won its rank steadily for several years. Because Ryan was back, and Seth was still here, clutching a broomstick like a knife to shove in Ryan’s back, and Ryan was the opposite of stupid. It would be obvious to Ryan what was going on. Now Seth would have to see it on Ryan, what this did to him. If Seth had been trying to protect himself from anything-come on, Seth, be honest, Ryan would cut off his own hand before hitting you-it was seeing the consequences of his choice in real-time, technicolor action.
“What the fuck?” Ryan muttered, thin walls making it easy to hear.
Seth tensed up even more, holding the broom tight enough to endanger important arteries with slivers. His heart, which Seth swore had stopped beating, began thumping hollowly in the pit of his stomach as if he’d drank too much coffee.
“Seth, are you home?” Ryan called out.
Maybe if Seth was quiet, perfectly stealth, Ryan would do whatever he had returned to do and leave without noticing Seth. It wasn’t like Ryan was a Sentinel, or Wolverine, or a Mountie, even: Ryan couldn’t smell Seth or hear his heartbeat. Good plan, except Ryan had tripped over a box that hadn’t been there when he’d left, and that was a pretty big clue, even to someone without a single superpower.
“Seth?” The voice was closer.
Foiled again.
Damn, Seth thought wildly, and my undignified retreat was going so well, too.
Ryan’s footsteps sounded louder than normal, bass drum beats at a hardcore metal concert, and fear drugged Seth, froze him with its unbridled thrill, making his cock hard, his scalp itching as he wished himself impossibly away. Each step that brought Ryan closer squeezed the rope around Seth’s chest, and it banded tighter, hugging his breath away like a determined uncle. Seth could only clutch the broom, and wait for the fallout.
When Ryan appeared in the doorway, he looked remarkably un-2.0-like. He was just Ryan, in a pair of tight jeans, a faded shirt, and ratty hiking boots. He was the guy that never took off the hemp choker with silver beads that Seth had bought for him. That boy, the one that had lived in Seth’s parents’ pool house and befriended their schmuck of a son. And Ryan was smiling, damn him, surprised into being glad to see Seth.
“Seth, hey, I thought you left for...”
Ryan trailed off. His took in the room: the bare floor, the dirty dishes piled neatly on top of the dresser waiting to be taken away, the drawers pulled out and empty. The boxes. Boxes everywhere. The smile peeled away, leaving Ryan’s face flat, moved out, all emotion renting an apartment somewhere else.
“Class,” Ryan finished dully. “What’s happening here?”
Seth calves bumped the box behind him when he stepped back. It skidded across the floor, answering for him. Seth giggled loudly. Totally stealth. So, he’d done something really horrible in another life, right?
“Uh. Ryan,” Seth squeaked, and the barrier he’d learned to erect around his neurotic rambling shuddered open with little fight. “What are you doing here? I mean, this is your home. You should be here, obviously, you can be here whenever you want. But, I mean, normally you’re not here. Not right now. At this time of day. Unless the clock is wrong again. Ha. Um, so what’s up?”
“Class let out early.” Ryan’s lips barely moved. “What-Are-You-Doing?”
There was a pile of comic books sitting on Seth’s bed. Seth scuttled as casually as possible toward them, peering at them from the corner of his eyes. He wished he could bounce!-swoosh!-vanish! inside them, melt inside the bold ink until Ryan was gone. He could be The Boy That Runs Away A Lot, with sidekicks Anxiety and Sinus Infection. Sinus Infection had the detachable air purifier and everything.
Seth shut his eyes and wished. Hard.
When he opened them again, Ryan had that same hollow-eyed, vacant expression.
“I was gonna leave a note,” Seth said, weakly.
And Seth would have, once he figured out what to write. All he’d decided so far was what pen to use: the lucky one with the Superman torso and head at the top. After that, all he had in his head was blank paper, and the idea that he should apologize somewhere. Superman would think it was the right thing to do.
“A note?” Ryan’s shoulder landed against the doorjamb jarringly. He shut his eyes. “Jesus, Seth.”
Seth winced, looking away from Ryan’s face. Obviously should have gone with the carrier pigeon, he decided. All bird poop aside, it would have been less messy.
“I know, I know, notes are bad, but I couldn’t...”
Ryan’s eyes snapped open. “Couldn’t what?” He puts his hands out, gripping the sides of the doorway, skin under his fingernails going white. “Face me like a man? I should have expected you to pull this shit, Seth. You’re so spoiled. Something happens, and you run off, safe in your little bubble, where nothing real can touch you. You have to sneak out when my back is turned?”
“Yes!” Seth exploded in a fit of violence, throwing the broom to the floor. It clattered angrily and rolled to Ryan’s feet. “Because I didn’t want to fight with you about it! I’m so sick of fighting with you! I hate it! I *hate* it. And whatever, it’s not news that I’m a coward, we’ve all seen the streak running down my back, I get it, but.” Seth stopped and breathed, trying to calm down. He rubbed a hand over the back of his neck, over the sweat there, and lowered his voice. “You know I had to do this.”
Ryan shrugged jerkily and crossed his arms over his chest, turning his chin aside. Shut up tight. Surprise, surprise, Seth wasn’t going to get through the Atwood Automated Defense System. It was probably for the best. The shock would kill him if he ever did. Even with all the walls up, Seth knew Ryan well enough to see the hurt, to hear the ‘should have expected this’ cross Ryan’s mind.
“I don’t want to.” Seth caught his hand before it reached out, forcing it back to his side. “I have to.”
“Well, go then, by all means.” Ryan’s tone clearly suggested Seth better not try it. “You want to leave so bad, I’ll even give you a hand.”
Ryan snatched the nearest box with a wild grin, and lifted it, arm muscles flexing in that really cool way arm muscles did if they were more than rubber chicken wings. Seth observed warily, because Ryan could be scary occasionally. Like now, Seth thought, when Ryan turned toward him with that lethal grin and tipped the box upside down, tumbling its contents noisily to the floor.
“That’s helpful,” Seth said. “I guess I don’t need those CDs. Everything is about the MP3s now. And I can probably find another copy of that album on vinyl. If I sell my soul.”
“Aw, sorry.” Ryan gleefully tossed the empty box over his shoulder, careless of where it landed. “That’s all the help you’re getting from me.”
“Yeah, kinda figured, which is why the covert ops.” Seth fidgeted, nudging the pile of CDs on the floor. Everclear’s first album lay open. Seth saw his reflection on the broken cd, the crack splitting his indecisive face. Not meeting Ryan’s eyes, which made it easier to be casual, he said, “This doesn’t have to be some big dramatic scene. I’m sorry I hit a nerve, and I’m sorry I kept this from you, but it’s not like I’m vanishing from the face of the earth here. We’re still amigos. We’re family, actually, so you’re not getting rid of me.”
And, you know, I’ll send you a card or something, he silently added.
“Terrific,” Ryan said dryly. He was shivering as he smiled, small twitches. “But we won’t live together.”
“Pretty much.”
No more Saturday morning cartoons while Ryan did his homework at the table, bitching that if Seth didn’t turn the volume down, it wouldn’t be duck hunting season OR rabbit hunting season-it would be Shoot Seth On Sight season. No more Ryan with his feet on Seth’s lap, wasted from so many classes and snoring while Seth talked to Summer on the phone, not quite hearing everything she was saying because he was too busy stroking Ryan’s ankle under the soft fabric of his washed out jeans.
He’d been so wrapped up in getting out, he hadn’t quite wrapped his mind around what getting out meant. It had been easy to ignore leaving when he hadn’t left yet.
Ryan’s fingers were digging into his own forearms, clutching and pulling at himself as he had when he’d gotten that phone call in Portland. Ryan’s fingers-blunt nails, large knuckles-pulling at his skin like there was something dead in his pores.
It was over between them, wasn’t it?
The realization hit Seth between the eyes like an Acme Hammer.
His knees wobbled, his lips wobbled, and fuck if he didn’t feel his heart wobble halfway out of his chest. Ryan shivering so badly made sense now that it was happening to him, the emotions welling inside him faster than his body could handle. Was that grief? Was it relief? Was it giddy satisfaction that he could devastate Ryan so easily? Seth moved to the bare mattress and collapsed backward onto it, where at least it would take more effort from his lazy body to be a bitch and cry. He blinked at the ceiling. A poster of Wonder Woman smiled heroically down at him, oblivious to the rescue me signals he was sending out.
So. This sucked, this being face to face with Ryan thing, cutting the tie that had begun to suffocate their friendship so effectively.
“You’ll get used to the idea,” Seth said, when he could without whimpering. He sat up, his shoulders heavy and liberal with guilt. Ryan was still standing there, eyes settled on Seth with accusation, and Seth twisted his face away. “More space to yourself, no sock on the door, showering with hot water. Silence, dude. No more yelling witticisms through the walls when the only thing you want is sleep. Take a minute to imagine it. Sounds good, right?”
“Heaven,” Ryan drawled, voice pale. “You should have left sooner.”
The wall opposite was blank, but it had a bunch of pinholes in it from the posters Seth had taken down the other night. Ryan had caught him at it, and that would have been the perfect time to come clean about everything. That he was leaving was bad enough, Ryan didn’t do well with being left, but the sneaking and the lying was far worse.
“Remodeling,” he’d said. “Moving from puberty to adulthood.”
“You’re twenty, Seth.”
“I’m a late bloomer.”
“Whatever,” Ryan had snapped, switching from comedian to asshole before Seth could properly acclimate himself to the warmer waters. “You’re painting those walls, they look like crap.”
Ryan moved into Seth’s line of vision, swallowing Seth’s view of the wall. He did that betrayed face he was so good at, like an orphan or something, left by the side of the road to fend for himself. Seth opted to speak with Ryan’s shoes instead.
“Be honest, you’re sick of me anyway.”
He heard Ryan’s sharp breath, and then Ryan’s hand was around Seth’s arm, dragging him to his feet.
“Ow,” Seth said breathlessly. “Pinching.”
This was Ryan on anger, eyes narrow, nostrils wide, feet braced far apart. Caught up against Ryan’s body, Seth could feel Ryan’s heart pounding against the back of wrist. It was like when... no, Seth wouldn’t think about that, that was in a box in an attic somewhere too, with all the other boxes that had names like Princess Sparkles and Portland and The One With The Sapphic Hair.
“You know what, Seth?” Ryan said, right in his face so they were breathing the same air, fighting for nose space. “Just shut up.”
“I’m being honest,” Seth said, because he wasn’t good at shutting up, keeping a manly silence. Ryan should know by now not to even ask.
But Ryan looked about five seconds away from a seizure, and there was still enough space inside Seth beside fear and anger that he could fit concern.
“You’re not inside my head!” Ryan spat. “Since when do you fucking decide for me what I feel?”
Seth dragged his throat through a swallow. “Are *you* inside your head?”
Ryan blinked, his face lightening a few shades in surprise.
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“Nothing. Nothing.” Ryan’s grip had slackened, so Seth pulled away and grabbed one of the boxes at random, holding it between them. Something bubbled over on Ryan’s face as Seth made the barrier, violent and hurt. Like it wasn’t hard for Seth. Like this was easy for him. “What I’m trying to say, and not very well, is that I want us to be friends again. We rock when we’re friends. So.”
Seth hefted the box higher, moved it to his hip.
“So. Moving out is your solution.”
“Yeah,” Seth said. “Got it in one.”
Ryan laughed unhappily. “Really smart.”
“Sarcasm from you unnerves me. You can quit at any time.”
“We don’t all live to make you feel better,” Ryan said, smiling in an ugly way. “No, I don’t think I’ll quit being sarcastic. Expect a lot of it.”
“Fine.” Seth smiled just as unpleasantly. “I’ll come back for my stuff when you’re not here.”
“You really are a coward.”
Seth winced, and Ryan mirrored him, regret sweeping briefly across his features, then gone. Outside Seth’s window, a car drove by with music blaring, laughter drifting away with it. Ryan caught Seth’s gaze, all the pain there for Seth to see. Ryan did the hurt thing like no one else, and Seth *hated* it.
“Is this because,” Ryan faltered, face twisting, and Seth tensed up all over, head to toe, nothing working right. “Because of, of that, um, in the bathroom?” His throat worked, palms moving over the front of his jeans. “I know I shouldn’t have...done that. But I haven’t again, and you weren’t mad, so I don’t. Get it.”
“What?” Seth’s palms grew slippery, heart pounding in his throat. “Bathroom. What? No. I don’t. Think about. Bathroom.”
Ryan was all eyes. “Seth.”
No.
The box slipped out of his trembling hands, and he moved to catch it. Ryan’s hands somehow got there first, and he helped Seth steady it, their fingers overlapping, lingering, and Seth panicked, ripping the box and himself free.
“Oh, come on, Ryan,” Seth said desperately, spitting words out as fast as they came to his head. “It’s not like we’re breaking up or anything, I’ll still annoy you at every opportunity, stick to you like glue, gum on your shoe, be your best friend, you’ll be my best friend. I’m not *leaving*, I’m just--”
“Leaving,” Ryan said.
The word, in Ryan’s mouth, had history. Had its own reference book written somewhere in those rows of teeth.
Seth’s eyeball twitched. “I prefer presence displacement, but okay.”
There was a lull, not much else to say. Sun on Ryan’s hair, sandy blonde and combed neatly, and Seth allowed himself to eat the sight of Ryan up. Who knew when they would like each other again? Ryan’s eyebrows crumpled together. The choker shifted on his neck as he bit back words Seth was glad he didn’t say.
“Sorry,” Seth said again, and Ryan stiffened.
“You know what? Go. I don’t care.”
Ryan calmly left the bedroom, each step measured, closed for business. Seth trailed behind with his lonely box, grabbing his overnight bag on the way, following the tanned nape of Ryan’s neck with his feet and his eyes. He wondered if Ryan would take the choker off now, see it in the mirror when he went to take a shower and not want it anymore. When Ryan had first put it on, he’d been facing Seth, looking him right in the eye, but now he was walking away, writing Seth Sucks! on every list in his head, and that was not the card Seth wanted in his hand.
“I don’t want you mad at me,” Seth heard himself say, in a small, pathetic voice, and wished he could kick himself for being so needy.
“Really?” Ryan’s shoulders rose and fell as he continued walking. “Because I’ve been mad at you before, but I can’t even touch how mad at you I am right now.”
“I’m trying to do something good here,” Seth said, riding Ryan’s heels. “You’ll see that.”
Ryan stopped in the kitchen, pissed-vibes filling the small space. The vibes reached out from Ryan’s clenched fists, hooked Seth’s guts, and dragged him haltingly forward, until he was breathing on Ryan’s neck. Beyond Ryan, outside their window, the naked fat guy from many unpleasant sightings had reappeared, lounging in his kitchen in all his nude, hairy glory. He waved when he saw Seth looking.
Seth grasped at the opportunity to make Ryan laugh.
“Hey, look, it’s a beautiful day in the neighborhood.”
The first time Ryan and Seth discovered their unique view, they had been living in the apartment for less than a week. Ryan had been slapping jelly on his bagel while Seth poured them each a cup of coffee, quite happy with his pain pills and his life.
“We should get fish,” Seth had suggested cheerfully, and handed the cup to Ryan without looking. When Ryan didn’t take it, Seth glanced up, found Ryan’s jaw hanging open, bagel suspended partway to his mouth. “Ryan?”
“Naked,” Ryan said, sounding alarmed. “Naked, Seth. Naked.”
Seth followed Ryan’s gaze, then gasped and clutched his aching ribs as his eyes immediately focused on a big, round, bare ass.
“Oh gross, so very naked! Old guy! Old guy balls!”
“Maybe we should get curtains.”
Ryan tossed the uneaten bagel in the trash, brushing crumbs off his hands and the bottom of his shirt.
“Balls, Ryan!” Seth grabbed Ryan around the neck and shielded himself with Ryan’s shoulders. “Help me, I can’t see! I’m blind!”
Ryan’s laughter had bounced Seth’s head right off him.
Ryan didn’t laugh this time. He had turned, was looking at Seth. No, looking through him. He’d seen all there was to see in Seth, and he wanted off the ride, and by the way, his money back, too. Seth swallowed. Seth got that, understood that, but he’d always hoped Ryan would never figure out Seth was a big empty of nothing worthwhile.
“Never did get those curtains,” Seth said, attempting to smile.
“I’ll do it tomorrow,” Ryan said blankly. “Get out.”
“Right, right.” Seth fumbled for words as Ryan began backing him toward the door. Out in the hallway, the woman from next door strutted by, her beak nose up in the air, beady eyes fixed on them. She’d never liked them for some reason, even tried getting them kicked out for noise pollution. She could stare all she wanted, Seth was screwed here, fucked. “I’ll pay my share until you get another roommate. Okay? Okay, Ryan?”
“Thanks, Seth.” Ryan kicked the box on the floor. “Fuck you.”
The door slammed shut in his face. Seth flinched, staring at the solid, unwavering surface. Plain surfaces were great for reflecting. Especially when it was clear that he had lost his best friend who, asshole or not, was the pretty much the center of Seth’s selfishly limited universe. Seth reflected that it really, really sucked to be the girl in the pigtails.
“He shouldn’t slam the doors like that,” Ms. They Play Their Music Too Loud from 2C said, scowling at him as she unlocked her door. “This building is very delicate.”
Seth swivelled, slowly, and made it clear with his expression that her opinion counted about as much as the average voter’s in a presidential election. 2C’s eyes widened to saucer size. She caught her skirt in the jamb when she slammed her door behind her. He hardly cracked a smile as she tugged the cloth free without opening it.
Seth glanced at 3C, the rusted gold letter and number drooping sideways, and put the box in the crook of his arm, the bag over his shoulder. At the stairs, he turned back once, immediately spinning away again. The shadow of Ryan’s feet had stretched from under the door, edged across the hall like a second chance. By the time Seth hit the fourth step down, he was running.
***
To Be Continued (in a week-ish)
Feedback is deep pleasure. Pointing out my typos, because sister-beta and I do not have perfect eyes, is also nice.
The O.C., Seth/Ryan, NC-17.
Slash, Long, Future Fic.
Summary
Seth Cohen: twenty years old, unspecified major, neurotic mess.
Disclaimer
Not mine, no money, don’t sue, yadda, yadda, you know the drill.
Notes
This is set while Ryan and Seth are attending an unspecified college together, and likely to be made AU in the next couple of years. Also, I began writing this before a lot of the events of mid-season two took place (then took a long break from it, before returning recently), so it’s already AU in some ways.
A new part should be posted weekly, after the editing process.
Cowardly Acts, part 1/4, by Fabella
California had the kind of sunshine poets and hardcore musicians hated. It was always hanging around, glinting off the hoods of cars, glaring off sunglasses and smooth, tanned bodies that all looked like they’d been cut from the same magazine advertisement: glossy, paper-thin, drinks with the little umbrellas in hand. Seth Cohen was thin, Seth Cohen was tan, Seth Cohen sometimes liked drinks with umbrellas, but there wasn’t anything glossy about him unless he hadn’t washed his hair in a few days, and he took pride in his vaguely pathetic rich-boy emo-grunge.
At the moment, he was hiding from the sun inside a restaurant across from his apartment building. His sunglasses were lodged in his hair like a headband, holding the curls off his forehead, and he had his nose pressed against the glass, the better to stare at the sun creating all kinds of new types of cancer on bare shoulders that passed. He was smudging the glass, becoming acquainted with the restaurant manager’s creative language, developing a crick in his neck. He was waiting for Ryan to exit stage left, so he could run away screaming like the little bitch he sometimes thought he was.
Some people operated under the belief that Seth Cohen was a coward.
That was fine, because Seth Cohen also operated under the belief that Seth Cohen was a coward. Never let it be said that he was unaware of his own failings.
That was why he’d skipped class today in favor of moving all his crap out of the apartment. Ryan, coincidentally enough, had a class of his own scheduled when Seth’s departure from the premises was set to happen. He’d be angry, Seth realized, when he came home to an apartment with much more room and much less Seth. But in time, he’d hopefully realize what a grand gesture of friendship this was. And not kill Seth.
A couple walked by, their hands tightly knotted. She had her hair tied up in a french braid and wore a pale blue dress that matched her eyes. He had a white button-up shirt and a smile that hurt Seth’s face to look at. Safe, pleasant, normal. Seth scowled at them both with intense disapproval, using the Cohen Eyebrows to their utmost power, and the girl flinched when she spotted him, the creepy grunged-out guy with his face pressed against the glass, and hurried her boyfriend along, eyes down.
It wasn’t like Seth didn’t know what this would look like to Ryan, this just leaving, no notice, no deep conversation over cheerios and coffee-
“Please leave,” the restaurant manager begged, in a painfully controlled voice that sounded only slightly scratchy from the screaming everyone on the block had heard her doing in the bathroom only moments before. “You’ve been standing there for fifty minutes now, and I think I’ve been as patient as possible under these circumstances. Customers want to leave but they’re afraid of you.”
Seth didn’t turn around. “Just a moment. Deep thoughts.”
So he knew what this would look like, how Ryan would react, that it would probably hurt their friendship for a while. He also knew that it might be the one thing to save it. Circumstances had become severe enough to demand some action on Seth’s part, and unfortunately, the only reasonable solution Seth had been able to come up with was shaving off all his hair and pledging his allegiance as a monk. Since he was Jewish, he’d been stuck with the more unreasonable solution of hurting Ryan’s feelings really badly.
Next time, he was definitely going with the head shaving thing.
“Can’t you have deep thoughts somewhere else?”
“I like it here,” Seth said, nose on the glass. “I find it comforting.”
It wasn’t that he wanted to make yet another appearance on the list Ryan kept in his head to brood over. The one that often read: This person fucked off somewhere on this date and that sucked and I will hold it against them forever even if I pretend to forgive them, signed Ryan Atwood, Organizer of The List of They Who Left Me.
Outside, the sun persisted, and it was a stupidly nice day. Children played on the sidewalk in the sun, drawing with pastel chalks. Cars rolled by with their windows down, tanned forearms hanging out, fingers loosely holding lit cigarettes. An elderly couple sat on lawn chairs outside their building, waved when a woman passed, walking her dog. They lived in a lower income neighborhood, but a happy one-
“I’ll call the cops,” the manager said.
-allowing for the rare disturbance.
Seth turned from the glass door. A few of the customers were staring at him openly, the others were deliberately ignoring his presence. Near the potted plants, a little girl with the appearance of a Cindy Doll peered at him from around her father’s shoulder. Seth quirked a smile at her, and she quickly hid her face in her father’s neck. Ah, yes, frightening children, ruining friendships, all in a day’s work for him.
“I mean it,” the manager hissed. “You’re loitering.”
The manager, an angry woman in need of some counseling to deal with her own self-loathing, was now wielding a clipboard like the whip she’d probably deeply enjoy beating him with. Seth, weirdly, found he was a little turned on, and tucked a hand in the left pocket of his jeans to conceal the evidence of his interest. Oh, the woe of being attracted to domineering women. It never worked out.
“The sign says please wait to be seated.” Seth pointed to the chalkboard and wiggled his finger in emphasis. “I’m waiting. See? By the sign.”
Her square jaw twitched, bulldog-light in her gaze. In them, Seth read his imminent demise, and stepped back until his shoulders were against the door, smiling uneasily when she growled at him. Still, partially-erotic death by restaurant manager was preferable to death by Ryan any day. This woman, at least, didn’t know him well enough to want painful hours of torture involved. Ryan had known him for *years*. Wow, when he thought of it like that, he was in danger of death by Ryan every day.
“We’ve tried to seat you.” Spoken slowly, through her teeth. “Several times.”
“I prefer the waiting part, actually.”
“That’s it,” she snapped, her face twisting in a way suggesting there were places she’d like to put her clipboard that would result in a lot of difficult hours for him in the bathroom. “I’m calling the cops and getting your ass thrown out of here.”
And she stomped off, clunky black shoes smacking against the hardwood floor, apparently to make good on her threat. More people stared at him, having lost all interest in the soup of the day. Seth swallowed and turned to look out the door again, beginning to sweat under his AC/DC t-shirt. Prison or Ryan? Either had the potential to end with violence, blood, or angry gay sex. Decisions, decisions.
Luckily, just at that moment, the battered metal door at the front of Seth’s apartment building opened, and Ryan appeared on the sidewalk, his eyes briefly flicking over to where Seth’s car was usually parked, before bouncing away. He moved quickly, head down, bag swinging from his hand. He had started walking in one direction, and Seth raised his eyebrows when Ryan abruptly spun around, looking annoyed as he headed in the other, where his truck was parked. Must be preoccupied with whatever skyrise had crawled up his ass and lost its building permit this week.
Seth pressed his nose against the glass again, and definitely didn’t think Ryan looked good in those faded jeans and hiking boots. And despite the fact that the sun glinted off Ryan’s collar-length hair, Seth didn’t find it attractive or at all desirable. In fact, it irritated him, Ryan’s pretty hair, made him clench his fists at his side and curse under his breath at every song that had ever been written about California’s sun. California’s sun sucked. It was an annoyingly cheerful relative that had come to stay for the weekend, and never went away. It reminded Seth a lot of Aunt Hallie.
Seth watched Ryan climb in his truck and drive off, still displaying that distracted grimace from this morning. That grimace was a permanent fixture in Seth’s life lately. If Ryan wasn’t grimacing, he was picking a fight, and if he wasn’t picking a fight or grimacing, he was in Seth’s space, taking up all the air. Seth sketched a sad wave, glad that Ryan hadn’t noticed him hulking in the doorway, scaring children, because Seth wasn’t up for a fight. If Seth was forced to deal with Ryan just then, he might do something disgusting, like start crying.
Later, buddy, hope you don’t go Classic Atwood on me.
Seth slouched with his face pressed against the glass, catching breath he hadn’t realized he’d lost. Why was it that when a guy hit twenty, the world around him finally found its sense of ironic humor? Seth had been the one to push the idea of moving in together, and now he was the one ending it, despite wanting to cling to Ryan’s ankles and be dragged around wherever Ryan went, whenever Ryan went there.
“You have to go,” the manager said when she came back, two male waiters trailing sheepishly behind her. “As in leave, depart, exit, just go, please, I’m begging you, you’re leaving streaks on the windows and scaring my customers, just--”
“Okay, I’ll go,” Seth replied, taking pity on her plight. “Thanks for the spot by the door, and great hair, by the way, very early Madonna of you.”
He left her gaping.
Seth retrieved his car from the underground garage a block away, bringing it outside his apartment building. The keys were pocketed when he pulled them from the starter, and Seth sat there, taking it all in, this place he had come to call home. A boy bicycling up the sidewalk toward him, a man watering the plants in his window, the bench Ryan liked to sit at sometimes to watch cars drive by-that weird content look on his face when he noticed Seth walking down the sidewalk toward him, take-out in hand.
It was perfect here, in the way you always found yourself wondering which building was going to fall on your head first, but you had been happy here anyway, and you were going to miss it. Everything. But mostly him.
Seth rubbed over the flaking letters on his chest.
“Just do it,” he told himself, voice loud outside his head, then grabbed the boxes piled in the back seat before climbing out. “Get in there, get out, don’t get pulled in by the seductive powers of the new XBOX, you’ll be fine.”
A quick cut was the cleanest, Seth had heard. Or was it the first cut was the deepest? Anyway, something about a cut.
When he unlocked the door to the apartment he shared with Ryan and stepped inside, it became clear that the cut was going to be long and nasty, something out of a horror movie, with fake blood splattering everywhere, and women with big breasts screaming. Okay, not so much the big breasts, but everything else, yes. He wondered how he had ever believed it could be any other way.
Standing in the tiny yellow kitchen with its one window, the door swinging shut after him, he really was that little girl with the pigtails. The counter surfaces, the same bright yellow as the walls, were stained with endless coffee rings from day after day of drinking his first cup right there in front of the coffee maker. Since it usually only took him thirty-six seconds to finish it, and then he’d immediately start on the second cup, he hadn’t seen the point of moving away from the distributor of his greatest joy. Ryan more often than not took his coffee sitting down at their cheap fold-up table, eyes sleepy over the rim, both hands wrapped around his cup as he listened quietly to Seth ramble on. Seth tossed his sunglasses on the counter and sat his keys on the table, on Ryan’s side, and let his hand rest there, over the warm metal.
Last night Ryan had been sitting there when Seth said goodnight, working on measurements for one of his projects. Three months ago, Seth would have stayed up with him until it looked like Ryan would crash if he didn’t go to sleep, then Seth would have done his Jewish grandmother bit and dragged Ryan to bed, pushed him down and covered him up. Three months ago. Seth pulled his hand away from the keys.
Before Ryan 2.0, it had been a good year. Phenomenal.
Not perfect, maybe. There was that time when he’d broken two ribs trying to help Ryan carry the couch up the narrow stairwell. Even that had been kind of cool, once the doctors pumped him full of drugs, and he could banter with Ryan, who looked miserable and guilty for dropping the couch on him, about the value of battle scars.
“Maybe you could tell the story on a first date,” Ryan had suggested, pinching
Seth’s big toe where it was wriggling under the hospital blanket. “You could say you stayed in the hospital overnight for observation after your roommate assaulted you with used furniture.”
“Nah, no way. Totally second date material. Stop that.”
Ryan kept the toe captured. “Seth, you don’t have second dates.”
“Only because college women have yet to discover my hidden charm. And Summer spreads dirty, dirty lies about me being infectious. Dammit, that tickles. If I could get up without puking, I would so beat you with pieces of my broken ribs.”
Once they had moved everything in, things went smoothly. They tacked a Spiderman sheet up as a door for the bathroom, Ryan taught Seth how to use a stove for things like cooking, and sometimes Seth even did the dishes. Mom and Dad came by for a visit every few weeks, and though Mom wanted to find them a nicer apartment on the numbered streets, volunteering half the rent, Dad was on their side, insisting that living in a rundown shanty of a place would build character.
It became a running joke between him and Ryan.
“Ryan, I am not scrubbing shower grout.”
“But what about your character?”
“My character is feeling nauseous, thank you very much.”
For a year, Seth and Ryan had lived in harmony, with only the occasional glitch, like garbage duty evasion. They ate together, met girls together, did homework together, complained about their part time jobs together, watched Adult Swim together, fought over the funnies together, and nursed broken hearts together.
Maybe their togetherness was the problem.
Because one morning Seth had woken up, stumbled into the kitchen wearing only a pair of boxers and a nervous smile, and boy, the honeymoon was over. Ryan had twitched while pouring milk in his cereal, spilling cow juice everywhere, and at that point, enter Ryan 2.0, prone to yelling and, to mix it up a little, spitting while yelling. He and this Ryan 2.0 discovered they did not get along very well, and they’d been dealing with their mutual dislike of each other for about three months. Seth was done with that, over that, needed to move *beyond* that. Before Ryan 2.0 came home for lunch, preferably.
Seth put one box on the counter, and decisively began to take everything from the cabinets that he could clearly call his own. A lot of the stuff was too close to call, though, because he and Ryan had gotten it together, or he had bought it, but Ryan used it most of the time. The pots and pans, for example. He’d bought them on sale at a department store, but if they ate a home-cooked meal, it was usually made by Ryan, despite Seth’s budding ability to do more than shuck corn and heat up canned Spaghetti-O’s.
In the end, he left the cooking stuff, but unplugged the coffee maker with a sharp jerk on the cord, and bent, fitting it carefully inside the box with the Garfield and Snoopy coffee cups. Coffee was Seth’s domain. Ryan could bring him to court if he wanted to argue with him about it. They could schedule visitations with the coffee or something. And Seth could be bitter and resentful when Ryan called to set a date.
Seth left that box on the counter and scooted the other near the door, the box moving across the ripped-up linoleum floor with the resentment of a toddler denied a toy in the store, stopping and starting in fits. Turning to the stove where he’d sat his candles, he noticed the digital clock was wrong, and reset it, aware even as he did it that he wasn’t going to do this again. It wasn’t supposed to be a big deal, or make his throat ache, but yeah, he was doing his best imitation of a their clogged shower drain. It was a quirky clock, always running five minutes fast or five minutes behind, no matter how many times one of them adjusted it.
It’s a clock with character, Seth had told Ryan. Like us.
Because Seth was a freak, and he could never let jokes die, even when they were clearly dead already. Ryan let him get away with shit like that, and laughed anyway.
Seth put his hands in his pockets, and looked around. Not an hour had passed, and the kitchen was already Seth-Free, or at least Seth-In-A-Cardboard-Box. It was kind of chilling, like walking over a grave with your name on it or something, to see his stuff packed up and ready to be carried out in his scrawny arms. He’d felt a little like this when he’d moved out of his parents, this unbelief at what he was doing. This was his home. Where did he think he was going anyway? Sure, he had already arranged housing in the dorms with one of his friends from school, but that was nowhere to go, he’d already been there, that was going backwards.
Well, he’d go backwards, then.
The idea of time travel had always appealed to him.
“Soon we’ll have to part, pretty yellow kitchen with no extras,” Seth said, since Ryan wasn’t here to tease Seth about speaking with inanimate objects. The kitchen’s yellow face stared back at him sunnily. Little things that he’d miss. The chemistry book holding up one leg of the table, the glow in the dark planet stickers on the refrigerator. “But know this, I will always miss the view from your miniature window. The mornings won’t be the same without the alley cat of rat-eating fame and the naked old guy who enjoys a good banana every now and then.”
He pressed a kiss to the noisy refrigerator, which hummed at him in return.
Seth’s bedroom was right across from Ryan’s, about the size of a large walk-in closet. A narrow hall separated the two rooms, ending at the doorless bathroom. Really, the hall wasn’t so much a hall as it was a nook off the livingroom, but the sheer tiny-ness of the apartment had made it easy for them to talk without ever moving from their own beds. Or Seth could get out of bed, take four easy steps, and be in Ryan’s bedroom. Not that their was a whole lot of impulse late night conversation anymore, what with the wishing brutal deaths upon one another thing.
Seth left his bathroom stuff. Because he couldn’t go in there.
He wasn’t going to question why.
Everything in his closet had already been packed. The rest of Seth’s room, however, was going to be a challenge. There were dishes on every surface, a half eaten pizza dying slowly on his desk, and three weeks of laundry solidifying into a living creature on his floor. Not exactly a hovel, but pretty damn close. Ryan really would wish Seth a brutal death if he moved out and left his room a bio-hazard. But as Seth was bending to scoop up some of that mutated laundry, he stumbled, and had to right himself with a hand on the wall as his eyes began to water, burning traitorously, nostrils flaring to accommodate the sudden spreading of an aching pit behind his nose.
Fuck, fuck, double fuck. Stop it right now, he ordered himself. Don’t be a pussy.
“I don’t want to leave,” Seth said plaintively, to his lava lamp.
Truth. Standing there with his body leaning closer to the wall as his arm shook, Seth knew that regardless of the three hellish months he had already gone through with Ryan, he could unpack everything, and be sitting on the couch when Ryan came home, feet propped lazily on the table while he ate some of the dead pizza. And Ryan would see nothing wrong with that Seth, accept him as status quo, and they could pretend for a while more that they were still friends. Running away felt, for the first time, like the hardest option instead of the easiest. And Seth was King at the easy road, he was always coasting down it on his skateboard; it tempted him.
Then, when his palm slid sweatily down the wall as he stood under his own steam, he pictured Ryan’s face as he had left, the wrinkles waiting under Ryan’s skin for the right moment to stress themselves to life. Imagine seeing them pop out one day when Ryan was standing in front of the television, spouting something about Seth’s future when all Seth wanted to do was watch The Three Stooges marathon.
So, put the hurt in a box.
Pack it up with everything else. Leave it in an attic somewhere.
Seth cleared the floor first, shoving his dirty clothes randomly in boxes, then took the books off the bookshelf Ryan had built for Seth’s birthday. It didn’t make him pause, he didn’t even think about it; Seth’s mind was forcibly blank. The day of his SATs blank. When he filled one box, he moved to another, focusing only on the task. Sooner than he had believed possible, a year had been packed away, and his bed had been stripped so that it sat on the floor of his room with a mild frown in the form of a beer stain curving downward under two eye-like rips.
He was sweeping the floor when he heard the unmistakable sound of the door opening and closing. Seth froze, the broom gripped tightly in his hands, and his eyes slowly rose to his open doorway. A couple loud thunks followed, and a grunt of pain.
“Damn!” Ryan hissed. “What the hell?”
Seth winced, remembering the box he’d left in front of the door.
Well, the Ironist drawled in Seth’s head. You’re fucked.
If Seth were inclined to make noise, he could say honestly that this was the worst moment in his life, even ahead of being shoved in a locker with pee in his shoes, which had won its rank steadily for several years. Because Ryan was back, and Seth was still here, clutching a broomstick like a knife to shove in Ryan’s back, and Ryan was the opposite of stupid. It would be obvious to Ryan what was going on. Now Seth would have to see it on Ryan, what this did to him. If Seth had been trying to protect himself from anything-come on, Seth, be honest, Ryan would cut off his own hand before hitting you-it was seeing the consequences of his choice in real-time, technicolor action.
“What the fuck?” Ryan muttered, thin walls making it easy to hear.
Seth tensed up even more, holding the broom tight enough to endanger important arteries with slivers. His heart, which Seth swore had stopped beating, began thumping hollowly in the pit of his stomach as if he’d drank too much coffee.
“Seth, are you home?” Ryan called out.
Maybe if Seth was quiet, perfectly stealth, Ryan would do whatever he had returned to do and leave without noticing Seth. It wasn’t like Ryan was a Sentinel, or Wolverine, or a Mountie, even: Ryan couldn’t smell Seth or hear his heartbeat. Good plan, except Ryan had tripped over a box that hadn’t been there when he’d left, and that was a pretty big clue, even to someone without a single superpower.
“Seth?” The voice was closer.
Foiled again.
Damn, Seth thought wildly, and my undignified retreat was going so well, too.
Ryan’s footsteps sounded louder than normal, bass drum beats at a hardcore metal concert, and fear drugged Seth, froze him with its unbridled thrill, making his cock hard, his scalp itching as he wished himself impossibly away. Each step that brought Ryan closer squeezed the rope around Seth’s chest, and it banded tighter, hugging his breath away like a determined uncle. Seth could only clutch the broom, and wait for the fallout.
When Ryan appeared in the doorway, he looked remarkably un-2.0-like. He was just Ryan, in a pair of tight jeans, a faded shirt, and ratty hiking boots. He was the guy that never took off the hemp choker with silver beads that Seth had bought for him. That boy, the one that had lived in Seth’s parents’ pool house and befriended their schmuck of a son. And Ryan was smiling, damn him, surprised into being glad to see Seth.
“Seth, hey, I thought you left for...”
Ryan trailed off. His took in the room: the bare floor, the dirty dishes piled neatly on top of the dresser waiting to be taken away, the drawers pulled out and empty. The boxes. Boxes everywhere. The smile peeled away, leaving Ryan’s face flat, moved out, all emotion renting an apartment somewhere else.
“Class,” Ryan finished dully. “What’s happening here?”
Seth calves bumped the box behind him when he stepped back. It skidded across the floor, answering for him. Seth giggled loudly. Totally stealth. So, he’d done something really horrible in another life, right?
“Uh. Ryan,” Seth squeaked, and the barrier he’d learned to erect around his neurotic rambling shuddered open with little fight. “What are you doing here? I mean, this is your home. You should be here, obviously, you can be here whenever you want. But, I mean, normally you’re not here. Not right now. At this time of day. Unless the clock is wrong again. Ha. Um, so what’s up?”
“Class let out early.” Ryan’s lips barely moved. “What-Are-You-Doing?”
There was a pile of comic books sitting on Seth’s bed. Seth scuttled as casually as possible toward them, peering at them from the corner of his eyes. He wished he could bounce!-swoosh!-vanish! inside them, melt inside the bold ink until Ryan was gone. He could be The Boy That Runs Away A Lot, with sidekicks Anxiety and Sinus Infection. Sinus Infection had the detachable air purifier and everything.
Seth shut his eyes and wished. Hard.
When he opened them again, Ryan had that same hollow-eyed, vacant expression.
“I was gonna leave a note,” Seth said, weakly.
And Seth would have, once he figured out what to write. All he’d decided so far was what pen to use: the lucky one with the Superman torso and head at the top. After that, all he had in his head was blank paper, and the idea that he should apologize somewhere. Superman would think it was the right thing to do.
“A note?” Ryan’s shoulder landed against the doorjamb jarringly. He shut his eyes. “Jesus, Seth.”
Seth winced, looking away from Ryan’s face. Obviously should have gone with the carrier pigeon, he decided. All bird poop aside, it would have been less messy.
“I know, I know, notes are bad, but I couldn’t...”
Ryan’s eyes snapped open. “Couldn’t what?” He puts his hands out, gripping the sides of the doorway, skin under his fingernails going white. “Face me like a man? I should have expected you to pull this shit, Seth. You’re so spoiled. Something happens, and you run off, safe in your little bubble, where nothing real can touch you. You have to sneak out when my back is turned?”
“Yes!” Seth exploded in a fit of violence, throwing the broom to the floor. It clattered angrily and rolled to Ryan’s feet. “Because I didn’t want to fight with you about it! I’m so sick of fighting with you! I hate it! I *hate* it. And whatever, it’s not news that I’m a coward, we’ve all seen the streak running down my back, I get it, but.” Seth stopped and breathed, trying to calm down. He rubbed a hand over the back of his neck, over the sweat there, and lowered his voice. “You know I had to do this.”
Ryan shrugged jerkily and crossed his arms over his chest, turning his chin aside. Shut up tight. Surprise, surprise, Seth wasn’t going to get through the Atwood Automated Defense System. It was probably for the best. The shock would kill him if he ever did. Even with all the walls up, Seth knew Ryan well enough to see the hurt, to hear the ‘should have expected this’ cross Ryan’s mind.
“I don’t want to.” Seth caught his hand before it reached out, forcing it back to his side. “I have to.”
“Well, go then, by all means.” Ryan’s tone clearly suggested Seth better not try it. “You want to leave so bad, I’ll even give you a hand.”
Ryan snatched the nearest box with a wild grin, and lifted it, arm muscles flexing in that really cool way arm muscles did if they were more than rubber chicken wings. Seth observed warily, because Ryan could be scary occasionally. Like now, Seth thought, when Ryan turned toward him with that lethal grin and tipped the box upside down, tumbling its contents noisily to the floor.
“That’s helpful,” Seth said. “I guess I don’t need those CDs. Everything is about the MP3s now. And I can probably find another copy of that album on vinyl. If I sell my soul.”
“Aw, sorry.” Ryan gleefully tossed the empty box over his shoulder, careless of where it landed. “That’s all the help you’re getting from me.”
“Yeah, kinda figured, which is why the covert ops.” Seth fidgeted, nudging the pile of CDs on the floor. Everclear’s first album lay open. Seth saw his reflection on the broken cd, the crack splitting his indecisive face. Not meeting Ryan’s eyes, which made it easier to be casual, he said, “This doesn’t have to be some big dramatic scene. I’m sorry I hit a nerve, and I’m sorry I kept this from you, but it’s not like I’m vanishing from the face of the earth here. We’re still amigos. We’re family, actually, so you’re not getting rid of me.”
And, you know, I’ll send you a card or something, he silently added.
“Terrific,” Ryan said dryly. He was shivering as he smiled, small twitches. “But we won’t live together.”
“Pretty much.”
No more Saturday morning cartoons while Ryan did his homework at the table, bitching that if Seth didn’t turn the volume down, it wouldn’t be duck hunting season OR rabbit hunting season-it would be Shoot Seth On Sight season. No more Ryan with his feet on Seth’s lap, wasted from so many classes and snoring while Seth talked to Summer on the phone, not quite hearing everything she was saying because he was too busy stroking Ryan’s ankle under the soft fabric of his washed out jeans.
He’d been so wrapped up in getting out, he hadn’t quite wrapped his mind around what getting out meant. It had been easy to ignore leaving when he hadn’t left yet.
Ryan’s fingers were digging into his own forearms, clutching and pulling at himself as he had when he’d gotten that phone call in Portland. Ryan’s fingers-blunt nails, large knuckles-pulling at his skin like there was something dead in his pores.
It was over between them, wasn’t it?
The realization hit Seth between the eyes like an Acme Hammer.
His knees wobbled, his lips wobbled, and fuck if he didn’t feel his heart wobble halfway out of his chest. Ryan shivering so badly made sense now that it was happening to him, the emotions welling inside him faster than his body could handle. Was that grief? Was it relief? Was it giddy satisfaction that he could devastate Ryan so easily? Seth moved to the bare mattress and collapsed backward onto it, where at least it would take more effort from his lazy body to be a bitch and cry. He blinked at the ceiling. A poster of Wonder Woman smiled heroically down at him, oblivious to the rescue me signals he was sending out.
So. This sucked, this being face to face with Ryan thing, cutting the tie that had begun to suffocate their friendship so effectively.
“You’ll get used to the idea,” Seth said, when he could without whimpering. He sat up, his shoulders heavy and liberal with guilt. Ryan was still standing there, eyes settled on Seth with accusation, and Seth twisted his face away. “More space to yourself, no sock on the door, showering with hot water. Silence, dude. No more yelling witticisms through the walls when the only thing you want is sleep. Take a minute to imagine it. Sounds good, right?”
“Heaven,” Ryan drawled, voice pale. “You should have left sooner.”
The wall opposite was blank, but it had a bunch of pinholes in it from the posters Seth had taken down the other night. Ryan had caught him at it, and that would have been the perfect time to come clean about everything. That he was leaving was bad enough, Ryan didn’t do well with being left, but the sneaking and the lying was far worse.
“Remodeling,” he’d said. “Moving from puberty to adulthood.”
“You’re twenty, Seth.”
“I’m a late bloomer.”
“Whatever,” Ryan had snapped, switching from comedian to asshole before Seth could properly acclimate himself to the warmer waters. “You’re painting those walls, they look like crap.”
Ryan moved into Seth’s line of vision, swallowing Seth’s view of the wall. He did that betrayed face he was so good at, like an orphan or something, left by the side of the road to fend for himself. Seth opted to speak with Ryan’s shoes instead.
“Be honest, you’re sick of me anyway.”
He heard Ryan’s sharp breath, and then Ryan’s hand was around Seth’s arm, dragging him to his feet.
“Ow,” Seth said breathlessly. “Pinching.”
This was Ryan on anger, eyes narrow, nostrils wide, feet braced far apart. Caught up against Ryan’s body, Seth could feel Ryan’s heart pounding against the back of wrist. It was like when... no, Seth wouldn’t think about that, that was in a box in an attic somewhere too, with all the other boxes that had names like Princess Sparkles and Portland and The One With The Sapphic Hair.
“You know what, Seth?” Ryan said, right in his face so they were breathing the same air, fighting for nose space. “Just shut up.”
“I’m being honest,” Seth said, because he wasn’t good at shutting up, keeping a manly silence. Ryan should know by now not to even ask.
But Ryan looked about five seconds away from a seizure, and there was still enough space inside Seth beside fear and anger that he could fit concern.
“You’re not inside my head!” Ryan spat. “Since when do you fucking decide for me what I feel?”
Seth dragged his throat through a swallow. “Are *you* inside your head?”
Ryan blinked, his face lightening a few shades in surprise.
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“Nothing. Nothing.” Ryan’s grip had slackened, so Seth pulled away and grabbed one of the boxes at random, holding it between them. Something bubbled over on Ryan’s face as Seth made the barrier, violent and hurt. Like it wasn’t hard for Seth. Like this was easy for him. “What I’m trying to say, and not very well, is that I want us to be friends again. We rock when we’re friends. So.”
Seth hefted the box higher, moved it to his hip.
“So. Moving out is your solution.”
“Yeah,” Seth said. “Got it in one.”
Ryan laughed unhappily. “Really smart.”
“Sarcasm from you unnerves me. You can quit at any time.”
“We don’t all live to make you feel better,” Ryan said, smiling in an ugly way. “No, I don’t think I’ll quit being sarcastic. Expect a lot of it.”
“Fine.” Seth smiled just as unpleasantly. “I’ll come back for my stuff when you’re not here.”
“You really are a coward.”
Seth winced, and Ryan mirrored him, regret sweeping briefly across his features, then gone. Outside Seth’s window, a car drove by with music blaring, laughter drifting away with it. Ryan caught Seth’s gaze, all the pain there for Seth to see. Ryan did the hurt thing like no one else, and Seth *hated* it.
“Is this because,” Ryan faltered, face twisting, and Seth tensed up all over, head to toe, nothing working right. “Because of, of that, um, in the bathroom?” His throat worked, palms moving over the front of his jeans. “I know I shouldn’t have...done that. But I haven’t again, and you weren’t mad, so I don’t. Get it.”
“What?” Seth’s palms grew slippery, heart pounding in his throat. “Bathroom. What? No. I don’t. Think about. Bathroom.”
Ryan was all eyes. “Seth.”
No.
The box slipped out of his trembling hands, and he moved to catch it. Ryan’s hands somehow got there first, and he helped Seth steady it, their fingers overlapping, lingering, and Seth panicked, ripping the box and himself free.
“Oh, come on, Ryan,” Seth said desperately, spitting words out as fast as they came to his head. “It’s not like we’re breaking up or anything, I’ll still annoy you at every opportunity, stick to you like glue, gum on your shoe, be your best friend, you’ll be my best friend. I’m not *leaving*, I’m just--”
“Leaving,” Ryan said.
The word, in Ryan’s mouth, had history. Had its own reference book written somewhere in those rows of teeth.
Seth’s eyeball twitched. “I prefer presence displacement, but okay.”
There was a lull, not much else to say. Sun on Ryan’s hair, sandy blonde and combed neatly, and Seth allowed himself to eat the sight of Ryan up. Who knew when they would like each other again? Ryan’s eyebrows crumpled together. The choker shifted on his neck as he bit back words Seth was glad he didn’t say.
“Sorry,” Seth said again, and Ryan stiffened.
“You know what? Go. I don’t care.”
Ryan calmly left the bedroom, each step measured, closed for business. Seth trailed behind with his lonely box, grabbing his overnight bag on the way, following the tanned nape of Ryan’s neck with his feet and his eyes. He wondered if Ryan would take the choker off now, see it in the mirror when he went to take a shower and not want it anymore. When Ryan had first put it on, he’d been facing Seth, looking him right in the eye, but now he was walking away, writing Seth Sucks! on every list in his head, and that was not the card Seth wanted in his hand.
“I don’t want you mad at me,” Seth heard himself say, in a small, pathetic voice, and wished he could kick himself for being so needy.
“Really?” Ryan’s shoulders rose and fell as he continued walking. “Because I’ve been mad at you before, but I can’t even touch how mad at you I am right now.”
“I’m trying to do something good here,” Seth said, riding Ryan’s heels. “You’ll see that.”
Ryan stopped in the kitchen, pissed-vibes filling the small space. The vibes reached out from Ryan’s clenched fists, hooked Seth’s guts, and dragged him haltingly forward, until he was breathing on Ryan’s neck. Beyond Ryan, outside their window, the naked fat guy from many unpleasant sightings had reappeared, lounging in his kitchen in all his nude, hairy glory. He waved when he saw Seth looking.
Seth grasped at the opportunity to make Ryan laugh.
“Hey, look, it’s a beautiful day in the neighborhood.”
The first time Ryan and Seth discovered their unique view, they had been living in the apartment for less than a week. Ryan had been slapping jelly on his bagel while Seth poured them each a cup of coffee, quite happy with his pain pills and his life.
“We should get fish,” Seth had suggested cheerfully, and handed the cup to Ryan without looking. When Ryan didn’t take it, Seth glanced up, found Ryan’s jaw hanging open, bagel suspended partway to his mouth. “Ryan?”
“Naked,” Ryan said, sounding alarmed. “Naked, Seth. Naked.”
Seth followed Ryan’s gaze, then gasped and clutched his aching ribs as his eyes immediately focused on a big, round, bare ass.
“Oh gross, so very naked! Old guy! Old guy balls!”
“Maybe we should get curtains.”
Ryan tossed the uneaten bagel in the trash, brushing crumbs off his hands and the bottom of his shirt.
“Balls, Ryan!” Seth grabbed Ryan around the neck and shielded himself with Ryan’s shoulders. “Help me, I can’t see! I’m blind!”
Ryan’s laughter had bounced Seth’s head right off him.
Ryan didn’t laugh this time. He had turned, was looking at Seth. No, looking through him. He’d seen all there was to see in Seth, and he wanted off the ride, and by the way, his money back, too. Seth swallowed. Seth got that, understood that, but he’d always hoped Ryan would never figure out Seth was a big empty of nothing worthwhile.
“Never did get those curtains,” Seth said, attempting to smile.
“I’ll do it tomorrow,” Ryan said blankly. “Get out.”
“Right, right.” Seth fumbled for words as Ryan began backing him toward the door. Out in the hallway, the woman from next door strutted by, her beak nose up in the air, beady eyes fixed on them. She’d never liked them for some reason, even tried getting them kicked out for noise pollution. She could stare all she wanted, Seth was screwed here, fucked. “I’ll pay my share until you get another roommate. Okay? Okay, Ryan?”
“Thanks, Seth.” Ryan kicked the box on the floor. “Fuck you.”
The door slammed shut in his face. Seth flinched, staring at the solid, unwavering surface. Plain surfaces were great for reflecting. Especially when it was clear that he had lost his best friend who, asshole or not, was the pretty much the center of Seth’s selfishly limited universe. Seth reflected that it really, really sucked to be the girl in the pigtails.
“He shouldn’t slam the doors like that,” Ms. They Play Their Music Too Loud from 2C said, scowling at him as she unlocked her door. “This building is very delicate.”
Seth swivelled, slowly, and made it clear with his expression that her opinion counted about as much as the average voter’s in a presidential election. 2C’s eyes widened to saucer size. She caught her skirt in the jamb when she slammed her door behind her. He hardly cracked a smile as she tugged the cloth free without opening it.
Seth glanced at 3C, the rusted gold letter and number drooping sideways, and put the box in the crook of his arm, the bag over his shoulder. At the stairs, he turned back once, immediately spinning away again. The shadow of Ryan’s feet had stretched from under the door, edged across the hall like a second chance. By the time Seth hit the fourth step down, he was running.
***
To Be Continued (in a week-ish)
Feedback is deep pleasure. Pointing out my typos, because sister-beta and I do not have perfect eyes, is also nice.