A/N So I know I have a million other stories I could be writing, but I just felt the need to write something new first. I got the idea from Robert Fulghum and his 16 things that we learned in Kindergarten from his book. I have never read the book, but I've heard of it. Basically every chapter of this will contain some one of those 16 things...meaning there are in fact 16 chapters (unless I miscounted, which is highly possible). Anyways, I hope you like this. R/R, enjoy!
Chapter 1: Share Everything
Marissa Cooper had never been fond of new kids. Being born and raised in Newport, she'd been brought up believing that an outsider was someone that didn't deserve her time. She was Marissa Cooper, after all. The only thing her parents wanted her focusing on was her education and social status, both of which would be destroyed if she let herself befriend every new wannabe newpsie that arrived at Harbor High. Therefore, whenever there was a new kid, she made sure to steer clear of them. Her mother always told her not to talk to strangers.
However, though she wasn't entirely fond of the new kids, she was completely and utterly fascinated by them. Each one brought a new story; new experiences that no one had ever dreamed of. One guy named Adam Richards used to live on a ranch in Texas before his parents hit the lottery and decided to move to Newport in California for a change of scenery. He spoke with a slight southern accent, and she'd always been a little interested about it – and him – but he wasn't from around here. He was a nice boy, but not the one for her. At least, that's what her mother, Julie Cooper, had said.
Then there was Rachel Valdez, the girl from Las Vegas with a rich grandmother who lived in town. She had always seemed extremely nice to everyone from day one, and had a happy, easy smile that others liked to look at. She wasn't the most beautiful girl in the world, but she wasn't exactly average. With her long, dark brown hair and deep green eyes she was an instant target for the jocks at school. However, though raised in Vegas, she was completely plain and innocent. She wanted nothing to do with the promiscuous boys at school.
Because of her mother, what she was taught, and what was expected of her, Marissa never got to speak to the new kids. She was known as the most beautiful but snobby girls in school. Everyone wanted to be her, but everyone secretly spoke about how bad a person she was. She was completely aware of this, and though it hurt, she couldn't do anything about it.
Marissa Cooper had never been fond of new kids, but not for the reasons everyone might think. No, the reason she didn't like them had nothing to do with them personally, but what they represented: everything she could never have, and everything she desperately wanted.
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School registration hadn't even started yet, but Ryan Atwood was already having a horrible day. He'd slept through his alarm, burned his bagel, and almost ran over a poor old lady walking down the street with Seth Cohen chattering about everything and yet nothing to the point that he thought his head would explode with annoyance. Seth may be his adoptive brother, but he was starting to get on Ryan's nerves, especially when everything else seemed to be going completely and horribly wrong.
"Poor lady, did you see that, you almost hit her!" Seth exclaimed as Ryan missed the lady that had mysteriously appeared in the street. "See, I told you, buddy, I am the best driver of us two. I should be driving you, not the other way around. I have been going to this school since freshman year, and I wouldn't have hit that old lady there. This reminds me of a story this one kid told me in the Comic Book Club about his mom and their older grandma. It's actually pretty funny –"
"Seth! If you say another word I swear I will stop this car and make you walk the rest of the way to school," Ryan threatened, finally giving in to the anger that he'd been harboring all morning long.
"Whoa, someone's feisty this morning. Did you wake up on the wrong side of the bed? I hear that happens sometimes to people...or let me guess, you're nervous about registration for school?" Seth said with a smirk. When Ryan didn't reply he mocked, "Ryan Atwood, scared of school! Who would've known!"
"Seth! What did I tell you?" Ryan threatened, giving his new adoptive brother and friend a death glare. "I will not hesitate for a moment."
Seth laughed and rolled his eyes. "Too bad we're already here!" He waited for Ryan to park and then they both got out and grabbed their bags from the back. Ryan stood next to his friend and looked at the large campus in front of him in amazement. There were a few guys passing a soccer ball back and forth to each other and some girls watching them from the grass a little ways away. Some people were reading under a tree and others were walking and laughing with old friends, trying to get caught up on everything that happened over summer break. It was a high school campus, but it looked more like a really expensive college to him. "Pretty boring, huh? I keep telling my parents I want to go to a new school, but they just don't listen."
Ryan rolled his eyes and shook his head. "Are you serious? You go here, and you think it's boring?"
Seth nodded and looked at his friend with a raised eyebrow. "Yeah, it is. I mean, look at it; it looks like something out of a brochure. People shouldn't live like this..." The two of them started walking and Seth asked, "So, what was your old school like? You never talk about it, or anything for that matter. It's kind of weird, really...."
"It was...different," Ryan replied, thinking of his old school. He quickly shuddered and looked at Seth, who had stopped walking. "What?"
"Don't you think it's weird that my parents adopted you at the beginning of the summer, and I still don't know a single thing about you or your old life?" Seth asked, squinting at him because of the sun shining in his eyes.
"You know a lot about me," Ryan replied, brushing off Seth's comment.
Seth scoffed and said, "I know that your last name is Atwood, you came from Chino, your mom abandoned you, you suck at video games, and you almost hit an old lady this morning." He paused and then added, "Oh yeah, and your school was apparently 'different.'"
"What more do you need to know?" Ryan asked, his shoulders going ridged, his voice growing tense.
Seth sighed and softly said, "Come on, buddy. I'm your brother now...your best friend. Stop shooting me down. I want to know about your old life. What's Ryan Atwood hiding in his past that he doesn't want anyone to know?"
Ryan flexed his jaw and looked down at his black boots for a moment before looking back at Seth. "My school was about a fourth of the size of yours. The building was gray and no one stood in front of it because sometimes guys from the local 'gangs' drove by and did some shady stuff. The classrooms were crowded but no one paid attention and the teachers hardly knew how to teach. The inside of the school wasn't much better than the outside. The lockers were breaking apart, the pain on the walls was more gray from dirty hands touching it than it was supposed to be, and people had written messages everywhere with sharpie." He sighed and asked, "Satisfied?"
Seth grinned and said, "Come on, let's go register so that we can get back home." Together they walked on and when he didn't comment on what was just said, Ryan slightly smiled and decided that maybe talking to Seth wasn't so bad after all.
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"OMG, have you seen the new kid?" Sarah Fisher asked Marissa, trying to contain her giggles. "He is like, so hot."
"Don't you say that about every new guy you see?" Marissa asked with a roll of her eyes. Sarah wasn't exactly the best judge of who was good looking and who wasn't. "Besides, who is this new kid?"
Marissa's best friend Summer Roberts walked to them and asked, "What are you two talking about?"
Sarah quickly turned to Summer and said, "Marissa doesn't believe me when I say the new kid is hot. Summer saw him, isn't he gorgeous?"
Marissa looked at her best friend and raised her eyebrows. Summer smiled sheepishly under the scrutiny and said, "I have to agree with her on this one, Coop. The new kid is by far the hottest guy here. You should go see him. He's hanging out with Cohen at the lounge."
Marissa's eyes widened. "Wait, he's hanging out with Seth Cohen?"
Summer's nose wrinkled in disgust as she nodded. "Yeah, apparently they're, like, brothers now or something. I don't know the whole story, but my step mom heard from some other lady at Yoagalates that the Cohens adopted this guy. No one knows where he's from because they're keeping pretty discreet about it."
"That's weird," Marissa commented, a frown on her face. How could she not have known about this? She did live next door to the Cohens, after all. She hadn't seen anyone new next door...or maybe she just hadn't been looking.
"No, what's weird is that you have no idea who I'm talking about," commented Sarah. "You'd think you'd notice such a guy living right next door."
Marissa rolled her eyes and said, "I don't do the whole, 'look at the new kid' thing, in case you haven't noticed."
Sarah nodded and rolled her eyes dramatically. "Yes, we all know that Princess Marissa Cooper doesn't hang out with or acknowledge the new kids because she's afraid her mommy will disapprove. Pretty bitchy move, if you ask me."
"No one asked you," Summer butted in on behalf of her best friend. "So if I were you, I'd shut it. Now."
She looked at Summer and then Marissa and said, "Whatever, I have some sweet eye candy waiting for me in the lounge, see ya guys!"
Marissa watched her walk away and then turned to Summer who offered her a sympathetic smile. "Don't listen to her. She's just upset because she knows she can never have the new kid."
Marissa shook her head and sighed. "No, she's right. I am a bit of a bitch to the new kids."
Summer was quiet for a moment before saying, "Actually, you're not."
Marissa sighed and said, "I don't need you to lie and try to make me feel better."
"I'm not, believe me," her friend said. "But in order to be a bitch, you'd have to acknowledge them first, and you don't. So technically..."
"Okay, I get it," she said irritably. She sighed once more remained silent for a little bit. "I just, my parents..."
Summer nodded and put her hand gently on her friends arm. "I know, Coop. I understand, it's just that no one else does."
Marissa nodded in agreement. She couldn't put into words what her mother expected of her because no one would ever understand why she let it bother her so much what her mother thought of her. She'd tried countless times to explain it, but no one sided with her, which she could also understand, even if it was hard. Marissa Cooper was weak in every way: that was the true story. She wasn't strong enough to stand up to her mom and tell her she was wrong about the outsiders of Newport. "I don't even understand sometimes," she admitted softly.
Summer's phone started buzzing and she quickly pulled it out of her purse. "It's Jake," she said, giving her friend a pleading look. Jake Norman was the guy Summer had been crushing on the whole summer.
Marissa laughed and said, "Answer it. I'm going to go pick up my books and get some breakfast in the lounge." She watched as Summer quickly flipped open her phone.
"Hey, Jake, what's up?" As Summer talked animatedly on the phone, Marissa silently made her way to the lounge alone, as always.
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So far things had been going fairly well for Ryan. He'd gotten his schedule, locker, books, and now all he needed was some coffee and a better breakfast and he'd be a happy person. Well, moderately happy. Seth was off talking to some of his friends, leaving Ryan all alone under the scrutiny of pretty much everyone in the room. Everyone wanted to know who the new senior was and where he'd come from. He'd picked up that much from a few snippets of conversations that didn't die down fast enough before he'd passed by the person. However, despite all of this, if he had his coffee and a blueberry muffin, he'd be okay.
He made his way up to the counter where they were giving out the free coffee and muffins due to the special day, and quickly grabbed some coffee. He took a swig and cringed as the hot liquid slid down his throat. He never put sugar or milk into his coffee, preferring to have it black. Seth had made some weird comment about it the other day, saying that Ryan was a "weird one." Ryan could've cared less, not really letting what others said about him affect him much. If he'd learned anything from the first seventeen years of his life in Chino, it was that you don't let others get close enough to really get to you.
He was about to reach for the last muffin when someone else did, resulting in both hands on the muffin at the same time. He lifted his eyes to the body that matched the hand and saw what was possibly the most beautiful girl in the world staring back at him, as corny as that sounded. He stared at her and she stared at him, neither saying anything, both of their hands on the muffin. Ryan didn't know why he said it – maybe it was the fact that he'd had a pretty shitty morning, or that his body seemed to feel all funny around this gorgeous girl standing in front of him – but suddenly the words, "I believe you're touching my muffin," came out of his mouth, resulting in the eyebrows of the mysterious girl raising and a smirk to form on her too-perfect face.
"Oh, is that so?" She asked, her voice amused.
"Yes, it is," he said, glancing at her hand on the muffin and then back at her face, making a point.
"What makes you so sure the muffin belongs to you?" She asked, her tone still amused, the smirk on her face only growing.
"Well, I saw it first," he said, mentally kicking himself for saying something so stupid.
She bit her lip, probably to hide her laughter, and said, "What makes you so sure that I didn't see it first, or we didn't see it at the same exact time?"
"You have a point there," He admitted with a slightly playful sigh, "But you know, it's still my muffin."
"Mhmm, and why is that?" She asked, a small smile on her face.
"Well, I'm more hungry than you are, so therefore I deserve and will eat this muffin," he informed her with a pleasant nod.
"Oh, really?" she asked, her voice giving away her inner-laughter.
"Yes, see, I am starving..."
"But so am I.," she refuted.
He pretended to stop and think about this, and then said, "Okay, I have a plan. We will both give our reasons for needing the muffin, and then whoever has the better reasons will get it, okay?"
She shrugged and nodded, her eyes still shining with an obvious amusement. "Okay, shoot."
"Well, I am having a pretty bad day," He started, only to be interrupted by her.
"So am I."
His eyes grew challenging and he said, "I slept past my alarm."
She shrugged and said, "My sister ran into my room and made me fall off the bed. I have a bump..." She pointed to a spot on the side of her head covered by her hair and winced as she touched it, "right there."
He leaned a little closer to her and said, "I burnt my bagel."
"My dad decided he was going to make me French Toast...in the oven," she shot back.
"My adoptive brother won't shut up, and it's driving me crazy."
"One of my friends basically called me a bitch."
"I can see why, considering you won't let a poor guy take a muffin," he joked, his eyes sparkling teasingly.
She rolled her eyes and said, "Whatever, do I win?"
He shook his head and said, "Everyone is staring at me and talking about me behind their backs and hands because I'm the new guy."
She shrugged and said, "That's nothing; I get stared at and talked about every day."
He was curious about this, but decided not to comment on it. "I almost hit an old lady this morning when driving to school."
Her eyes slightly widened, but then she said, "I almost hit my dog this morning."
He stared at her for a moment, taking in her challenging yet intriguing eyes and light brown, almost blonde hair before smiling and asking, "Want to split it?"
She smiled a little and shrugged. "I guess so. I probably wouldn't have eaten the whole thing anyways. Breakfast really isn't my thing..."
He laughed and rolled his eyes, but looked up and down her body. Judging by how skinny she was, he decided that what she said was probably true. He grabbed a plastic knife and cut the muffin in half, then let her choose which side she wanted. She bit into her side of the muffin the same time he bit into his and looked at him quickly before diverting her eyes away. "So..." he said, wanting to know more about her, but not sure how to ask. He was experienced with girls when it came to sex, but when it came to a normal conversation he was scared to death.
"I should probably be going. I still have a bunch of stuff to do," she said, finishing her muffin off and throwing her trash away.
She started to walk away. He wanted to stop her and tell her that he was glad she had talked to him, even if it was just because of a stupid muffin. He wanted to tell her he wanted to know more about her little sister and why everyone talked about her behind her back everyday. He wanted to know her dog's name and what breed it was, but he could never and would never say such a thing to anyone, so he instead said, "I never got your name."
She stopped in her tracks and stood there for a few seconds before shrugging and saying, "It doesn't matter, anyways," and officially walking away from him.
He took his last bite of his muffin and watched her leave, ignoring the stares of what felt like a million people on his back.
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Later that day Marissa was sitting next to Summer on her bed flipping through some gossip magazines. After registration they had hung around with some of their friends before going to the beach for one of the last days of tanning they would be able to do on a week day. Summer casually said, "So I saw you talking to new guy today."
She shrugged and said, "We were arguing over a muffin."
Summer let out a short laugh and then bit her lip. "Wait, are you being serious?"
She nodded and smiled at the memory. "Yeah."
"So you compromised your belief that acknowledging new kids is wrong because of a muffin?" Summer asked with a raise of her eyebrows. "It must have been a good muffin."
"Not really," she replied honestly, flipping through the magazine in front of her.
"Exactly what type of muffin was this?" Summer curiously asked a few minutes later.
"Blueberry," Marissa said with a small smile, knowing what was coming next.
"Wait, you don't even like blueberry muffins!" Summer exclaimed. She grinned widely and said, "You sneaky girl..."
"I was very hungry," Marissa said neutrally. She looked up at Summer and then grinned widely. "Or maybe I was just looking for a reasonable excuse to talk to the new guy without people getting the wrong idea."
Summer laughed and said, "You, Coop, never seize to amaze me."
She laughed and said, "I know." They grew quiet for a couple of more minutes before she added, "And Summer..." She lifted her eyes to her best friends' brown ones with a wide grin on her face. "Sarah was right: he is hot."
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Ryan spent the rest of the day with Seth playing video games about pirates, ninjas, and Star Wars. That night at dinner he sat next to Seth as they all ate dinner at the Cohen table. "So, Ryan, how was registration?" Sandy asked carefully.
Ryan shrugged and said, "It was fine."
Seth rolled his eyes and said, "I love how you describe things, Ryan. You're so descriptive." He turned to his dad and said, "Registration was registration; it was boring as hell."
Kirsten glared at her son and said, "Seth, don't say hell at the dinner table."
Seth sighed and continued to eat his food. Sandy turned back to Ryan and said, "So it was fine. Can you see yourself going there?"
Ryan shrugged and slowly said, "Yeah, I guess. It's just a lot different than home."
"Different how?" Kirsten asked, looking at him with motherly blue eyes that his own mother never had. He had to quickly look away.
"Just different," he said softly, leaving everyone but Seth wondering what exactly he meant.
