fic - challenge fic
ctoan's 3rd annual OC Sentence Fic Challenge
For diva5256 (who is awesome) who asked for: Ryan goes on a downward spiral at Berkeley and Kirsten helps to get him back on track.
Disclaimer: Um. Yeah. They're not mine.
AN: I have another sentence of diva's in the works but I haven't finished it yet. This one may have an epilogue eventually. Betaed by ctoan the magnificent. Happy birthday, chick!
Kirsten put her coffee mug down with a clink, glancing at the clock on the microwave. 9 am. The house was silent apart from the gentle hum of the air conditioner. Sandy had left for work two hours ago.
She loved seeing him excited about his job again but he brought the bad cases home with him, along with the good.
She knew he called his friend at Berkeley at least once a week to check on Ryan’s grades. Working in the juvenile system had brought back a lot of his concerns about the future of kids like Ryan.
Ryan.
He’d been stoic and silent, obeying Julie’s outrageous request for him to stay away from the funeral, even after Volchok had been arrested. Sandy had told her how his face was completely blank as he gave his statement to the police. Seth had been beside himself trying to draw Ryan out and had seemed almost relieved when they’d said goodbye to him at the airport.
At least Seth had Summer. She was a resilient girl, determined to recover from the loss of her best friend and Kirsten knew Seth was safe with her.
But Ryan was all alone. He’d been away for two months and he hadn’t come home once. He stalled them every time they said they wanted to come and visit.
It was 9am. Sandy wouldn’t be home until after 7.
It was time for her to pay Berkeley a visit.
------------- * -------------- * -----------
She left several messages for him without getting a response and found herself wandering the campus where she’d spent 4 good years of her life, where she’d fallen in love with Sandy. She had a lot of good memories from this place. She wanted Ryan to have good memories, too.
Nostalgia was all well and fine but the bad feeling in her gut only deepened with every moment that Ryan didn’t call her back.
The students going in and out of his dorm let her in without question and she was glad she’d opted for jeans and a simple v-neck. She didn’t want to look like a narc.
Ryan had a single on the third floor, thanks to Sandy’s ability to pull strings and she took the elevator, trying to ignore the rowdy atmosphere in the hall and the overpowering smell of stale beer. His room was at the end and the music was pounding when she knocked on the door.
It took three attempts but the music finally waned and the door opened.
“What?!” Ryan growled, but his anger immediately dissipated when he recognized her. “Kirsten?”
She barely recognized him. His eyes were dull and he hadn’t cut his hair or shaved, adding years to his age. Dark circles rimmed his eyes and his face was almost hollow.
“Oh, honey, let me in,” she said, pulling him into a hug.
“What are you doing here?” he asked, patting her on the back, his entire body stiff with tension.
“I tried to call you. Can you turn that down a little?” she asked, motioning to the stereo that was still echoing angry guitar riffs. She stepped into the messy room as he fumbled with the stereo.
The poolhouse had always been neat and orderly, but this…was a whole new world. There were whiskey bottles lined up on top of the dressers, arranged neatly like bowling pins. There were clothes piled around the laundry basket and a pile of crumpled cigarette butts by the windowsill. The bed was unmade and books and papers were everywhere.
“I wasn’t expecting you, I was studying,” he said, his eyes flitting around the room, taking in all the things that he expected her to scold him about.
She closed the door and put her arm around him. “I was in college once, Ryan. Come on, relax and sit down.” Something seemed wrong. All her motherly instincts were screaming at her. It was clear that Ryan wasn’t taking care of himself. He’d lost weight and looked worse than he had during the whole time she’d known him.
“What are you doing here?” he asked again and she realized he was shaking. It didn’t seem to be because of her presence, it seemed to be something that he was doing automatically. She wondered if he always shook and if she’d missed it when he was living at home.
“Well, you won’t come home for the weekend and I was a little worried about you.”
“Sandy checks on my grades, I’m not failing, I’m passing everything,” he said quickly, staring at the floor.
“I’m not worried about your grades. How are you?” she asked. It was only one and she’d wanted to take him out to lunch, but from the aroma on his breath, it seemed like he’d already drank his lunch.
“I’m fine,” he said.
“Honey, you haven’t shaved and you look like you haven’t slept in days,” she commented.
“I sleep, I go to class, I do my homework…” he replied softly. “I’m getting by.”
She studied him, his tired eyes, his rumpled condition. “You don’t look it. You look like you’re falling apart.”
“I’m fine. Just…trying to keep up with everything.”
“Let’s go out to lunch.”
“I have to finish this paper…” he protested. She noted his repeated mention of his grades. Like he thought grades were more important than his health. Like they were all that Sandy was worried about.
“The paper can wait. I want you to come out for lunch with me. Right now,” she insisted.
“I can’t, Kirsten. I have class in an hour and I still have to fix my footnotes,” he said.
“They can wait. Come on.”
***** **** ******
Kirsten noticed how twitchy Ryan’s hands were as he cradled the coffee cup to his lips. “All right, honey. I need you to be completely honest with me right now. You’ve always been honest with me.” She knew she sounded serious, but the longer she spent with him, the more concerned she became. She continued to study his haggard face until he met her gaze.
“Okay,” he whispered.
She had so many questions spinning through her brain, she hardly knew where to start. “Have you been sleeping?” she asked first.
He shook his head silently.
“Drinking?” It was a touchy subject between them - but she had to ask.
“A little.”
“How much is a little? Glass of wine? Bottle of wine?”
“Shots. All day. Night, too,” he mumbled with a shrug, not looking at her now.
Kirsten tried not to let her concern show. She’d never known Ryan to be a drinker, despite her first impressions. She knew Seth smoked pot occasionally and had a few bouts with alcohol, but Ryan had never come home drunk.
“It’s harder than I thought it’d be. Just being here…like, I can’t seem to get into a rhythm, I’m all out of sync and there’s no one…” he started quietly, the words spilling out as he shakily put the cup back on the saucer.
“Tell me,” she urged, impulsively taking his hand across the table.
He sighed heavily, but didn’t pull away. “I think…I think that I don’t like it here. I don’t…I don’t feel good, Kirsten.”
The waitress came and put down their meals but Kirsten wasn’t hungry anymore.
“I’ll be all right. I just need some time. I’ll focus on my classes, stop drinking…” he said, straightening his shoulders and pulling his hand away gently.
“No,” Kirsten said. She had to do something, now.
“What?”
“I think you should take a leave of absence,” she stated.
“What? No…I’m okay, I can do this…you’ve already paid and…” he protested but there was no conviction in his eyes. Just the new…deadness in his eyes. It was such a stark contrast to the desperation in his voice.
“Honey, we want you to enjoy college, to learn - not be miserable…”
“I can’t go back to Newport…”
“Ryan, Sandy and I are here for you. You have to let us be,” she urged, looking at him pleadingly.
“I know you’re disappointed…” he whispered.
“Oh, Ryan, I am so proud of you, every day. You have done so much, come so far…but you’ve got to realize when you’ve reached your limit. It took my whole family confronting me about my drinking for me to realize that I needed help.” She lowered her voice. “I think you need help, honey.”
He went completely still. His shaking ceased and he lowered his gaze to the table.
“Ryan.”
“Are you sure? Like…I can try harder,” he whispered. She had never known anyone to try harder than Ryan Atwood.
She laid a folded 20 on the table and stood up. “Can you tell me honestly that you don’t want to come home with me?”
He slowly slid out of the booth and stood beside her, shaking again. He noticed her studying him and met her eyes. “I can’t seem to stop. I’ll…I’ll come home.”
She put her arm around him. He was coming home, she still had a chance to fix whatever was tearing him apart. “It’ll work out. You just need time to heal. Everyone grieves differently.”
“I don’t know why I can’t do this…” he admitted as they walked.
“Ryan, we all need a little help sometimes. One step at a time.”
He took an unsteady breath. “Okay. Maybe I just need to try something different.”
*-*-*-*-*
She spoke softly into her cell phone to Paul Glass and he promised to take care of withdrawing Ryan from classes and giving him a leave of absence. She knew that it was short notice and that she’d only spent an hour or so with Ryan before making the decision, but she was sure that it was the right one. She could see it in his eyes.
She wasn’t Ryan’s legitimate mother, but that mother hadn’t even come to Marissa’s funeral. Dawn’s idea of supporting her son in his time of grief was to send a small bouquet of flowers that Julie wouldn’t even let in the church. Kirsten was the mother that had come to college to find a Ryan that she didn’t recognize, but instead of walking away, she was going to make sure that he was all right. Dawn had expressed in some of her letters that she didn’t even know the Ryan that she saw in Newport, that he wasn’t her son anymore, that she would never get a second chance with him. Kirsten had her second chance, after the intervention and she was still planning on using it.
Ryan needed her this time. ‘I don’t feel good’, he’d said. That was enough for her.
She glanced back to where Ryan was stuffing things in his bag. He wasn’t folding them or neatly putting them in the bag like she was used to him doing - he was crumpling and cramming.
“Are you sure you’re okay to fly?” she asked, closing the phone.
He hesitated. “As long as you don’t laugh when I throw up.”
“I promise not to laugh,” she said, picking up one of the bags.
He was quiet in the taxi and throughout the tedious check-in process. But he let her hold his hand when the plane took off.
It wasn’t until the plane leveled out that he spoke, in a voice so low that Kirsten had to strain to hear. “I was going to call,” he said. “But I’ve caused so much trouble and you and Sandy have done so much already and you guys seem to be doing so well…and Sandy always calls about my grades so I know he’s worried that I’m going to waste everything you’ve given me…but…I just…I can’t stop thinking about it. About Marissa and everything I did wrong…”
She let go of his hand and slid her arm around his shoulders, wanting to give him tangible evidence of her affection. “You did your very best. I’ve never known you to do anything less. The accident was not your fault. I know I wasn’t there and I can never understand what you’re going through but I know that it was not your fault. You are not a doctor or a stunt driver…”
“I hear you…but it doesn’t change the way I feel…” he whispered sadly. “Everyone in Newport thinks I killed her.”
“That’s not true, Ryan. Kevin Volchok was convicted and Julie Cooper is persona non gratis since Neil caught her with Jimmy at the Mermaid. No one blames you. Except yourself,” she added.
“Kaitlyn calls me sometimes,” he said, changing the subject slightly to avoid the rest of the questions that she was ready to ask at the first opening.
“Really?” Kirsten was surprised.
“She hates it there. She said Dr. Roberts offered to let her stay with him and go to Harbor. Julie’s not coping really well and she says Jimmy…she says she thinks he’s in trouble again,” Ryan added. “It’s like Marissa all over again.”
“I don’t talk to Julie anymore. I recently found out some things that I can’t forgive. But I hope that Kaitlyn makes it through unscathed,” she replied. “Kaitlyn is not your problem, okay?”
“You and Sandy have done so much for me,” he said.
“Not enough. Not nearly enough,” she muttered. “Close your eyes. There’s no one in the seat behind you, just lean your seat back. We’ll be home soon.”
Ryan actually seemed to respond and leaned the seat back, but not far enough that she had to remove her arm.
She wanted to call Sandy to prepare him but didn’t want to let Ryan out of her sight or do anything to scare him off. He was fragile and skittish, in her eyes anyway, and she didn’t want to break this tenuous trust. And considering Ryan’s interpretation of Sandy’s continued monitoring of him from afar, she wasn’t ready to let him out of her sight until he accepted that she was here for him.
She felt Ryan relax finally into sleep. He was so exhausted that he even slept through the landing, stirring only when she shook him gently while pulling her arm back to her side. “We’re home. Well, almost.”
He was quiet again as they maneuvered through the airport and the parking deck, not speaking until she pulled the Rover through the familiar gates.
He let out a soft sigh. “Thanks.”
“For what?” she asked.
“Bringing me home,” Ryan replied.
“Will you shave? Shower?” she smirked, needing to lighten the mood.
He smiled slightly. “Yeah.”
“We still need to talk,” she added.
“I know. I think…maybe I should talk to someone,” he stated unevenly.
Kirsten’s heart ached. She knew how much that admission had to cost Ryan and she knew that he was really hurting to even have to ask. “Okay. We’ll find someone. I think that’s a good idea.”
She parked behind Sandy’s Lexus.
“I should talk to Sandy first,” he said suddenly.
“He’s going to understand,” she said.
Ryan made no move to get out.
“He loves you. I know what you think, but Sandy only kept check on your grades because he didn’t think you’d like it if he called you every day,” she said. “Come on.”
He opened his door and they left his bags in the car, going inside through the open front door.
Kirsten smiled when Sandy glimpsed her from the stool at the counter. “Hi.” His eyes widened when he saw Ryan and he immediately got to his feet.
Ryan stiffened beside her but Kirsten could tell that Sandy was seeing the same thing she’d seen back at Berkeley.
“Hey, Sandy,” Ryan murmured faintly.
Sandy didn’t reply at first, wrapping him into a warm embrace and looking at her over Ryan’s shoulder, concern lining his face. She gave him a knowing nod.
“Ryan, the ‘freshman 15’ is supposed to mean you gain 15 pounds,” Sandy said, releasing him but not taking one hand off his back, guiding him to a seat at the counter.
“Ryan’s going to come home awhile,” Kirsten said quickly.
“All right,” Sandy acknowledged, patting Ryan between his hunched shoulders until he looked up. “I always want you to come home when you need to. We’ll never turn you away.”
“I know,” Ryan whispered. “But you guys are paying for me…”
Kirsten hated the way that money was still such an issue. She wanted Ryan to accept his place in their family, with their financial security.
“Kid, you know money’s not a factor. You’ve gone through so much in the past two years…you don’t have to prove anything to me. I want you to be okay.”
Ryan finally seemed to relax from Sandy’s calm words.
“Why don’t you go shower and change clothes? We’ll have dinner outside tonight,” Kirsten suggested, waiting to see Ryan’s reaction, for a spark of any kind of emotion in his eyes other than guilt and depression.
“All right. I’ll get my stuff,” Ryan said, shuffling out of the kitchen.
Sandy came to her side and she leaned against his supporting warmth.
“He looks awful,” Sandy confessed.
“He said he ‘doesn’t feel good’. That he can’t sleep, he drinks all day…he just trembles, Sandy,” she said. “We should have never let him go.”
“He seemed fine…but…he’s definitely not fine,” Sandy said as Ryan walked across the patio carrying his bags.
“He said that he thinks he should see someone.”
“He said that?”
“Yeah. I’m really worried about him.”
Sandy held her tightly. “You’re a good mother.”
But she didn’t feel like one. Not when she’d missed all the signs that one of her sons was falling apart.
Hopefully, she’d be able to redeem herself when they helped put him back together.
Part Two