The O.C.

At What Price Love?

Author: Alba's Room

A/N: I don't know how I really feel about this or if it makes sense but I couldn't do anything else to it without changing it completely. Reviews welcomed, even flames. This chapter is set in the future and therefore is before the events of the next few chapters.

Summary: Kirsten's not perfect. Far from it. In fact, she's quite normal. Selfish, even. If you tell her she can't have something, she has to have it regardless of the cost. It's the way she's always been.

Disclaimer: I don't own The O.C. or its characters. That honour goes to Josh Schwartz.

Prologue:

Sometimes there are things that happen in life that you can't predict or choose. There are things in life that happen that kill you and there are things in life that make you stronger.

And then there are the things you do choose. The things that rock your foundations and change your life. The things that only people who are selfish choose.

Kirsten Cohen knows this better than anyone. But anyone who looks at her wouldn't see it. This thought makes her want to laugh.

From the outside, she looks perfect. That's what she wants people to think. She has an adoring family, a beautiful house, more money and power than she knows what to do with. More men than she knows what to do with. But that parts the secret. That's the one fatal flaw in her life. Her one drawback.

She likes men. And men, well, men like her.

And why wouldn't they? She's tall, skinny, blonde. Her clothes do nothing but emphasize what she has and what she likes to do with it.

But she's a tease. It's a known fact she only sleeps with an average of one out of fifteen men she flirts with. And it's a known fact there's only three she keeps going back too.

Jimmy. Sandy. Carter.

It would kill her if the boys ever knew. If Seth or Ryan came home early one day and found her with another man. If Sandy knew, well, she didn't think it would bother her so much. He wasn't exactly perfect himself. She knew he'd slept around before. She figured it was her right to do the same.

She wasn't always like this. She hadn't always fallen in love with a new man every week. She hadn't always slept with other men. She'd once been quite good, quite perfect. In fact, it was Sandy who'd changed her. She'd been a virgin before she'd met him. She'd been unaware of the effect her body had on men, been unaware what complete pleasure and abandon felt like.

She'd lost that pretty quickly. All it took was in, out, in, out, in, out. A few back arches, a few screams, more moans, and that was it.

She suddenly knew what it was like to be loved and relieved. She knew what it was like to be wanted, to be needed, to have power.

And she wanted it all the time.

And they got married and she was told she couldn't have anyone but him. That was Sandy's first mistake. Never tell a Nichol what they can't have. It only makes them want it more. And they always get what they want.

And it seems they never get what comes coming to them. Karma doesn't bite them in the arse. They do that themselves.

Sandy knocked on her office door late at night, not long after she'd been loved and relieved by a distressed Carter. It would be their last night because she'd realized something that night.

"Hey," Sandy called out quietly. Kirsten sat on her desk, her blouse still unbuttoned and falling around her waist. Her white see-through bra made her seem almost childlike and innocent. She gazed slowly up at her husband who made his way to her concerned.

"I'm so sorry, Sandy," she whispered, looking away. She looked up at him. "I never wanted you to see me like this."

"I wonder why," he said, anger finally showing in his voice. "I don't think you should come home tonight. I don't think you should come home ever."

"Sandy," she cried out, standing up. She raced over to the door and blocked his exit. He stood in front of her and they looked at each other. She placed her small, delicate hands on his face, and pulled him into a passionate kiss. He fought her at first but then he imperceptibly sighed and gave in. She walked around him and pushed him hard into the doorjamb. He opened his mouth to talk but she whispered into his mouth making him delirious. "Shh. Don't talk."

Kirsten took his hand and she led him over to the desk where he finished peeling off her shirt and her bra. And as they had sex on the cold, hard desk, she knew the answer to the question she had been asking herself since she met him.

At what price love?

And the answer was herself. She was the price she paid for her love. Her body was what she paid to keep her husband close to her.

All she wanted was for him to notice her, to really see her.

And it had cost her body and her soul but her plan had worked.

And it was all his fault because if he had loved her from the start and told her she could have anything she liked, she would have really been the perfect wife.

If she were standing in front of a jury of her peers, she would tell them not to judge, or let the person who had not sinned cast the first stone. She would admit that the decisions were hers to make, that she chose to sleep with other men, but she would explain why and they would understand.

Sometimes there are things that happen in life that you can't predict or choose. There are things in life that happen that kill you and there are things in life that make you stronger.

And then there are the things you do choose. The things that rock your foundations and change your life. The things that only people who are selfish choose.

Kirsten Cohen knows this better than anyone. But anyone who looks at her wouldn't see it. This thought makes her want to laugh.