A/N: Drabbles dealing with Ryan/Marissa in the future. It's so easy to assume RM would have no problems if she'd gone to Greece and whatnot, and I do it too all the time, but I think they could've still had this fucked up hard to explain relationship as well. These drabbles aren't supposed to be related to each other, but if you want to see them as so, it works.

Each drabble has a corresponding song by The Script. I highly suggest looking them up.

As always, reviews are love.

We were thinking we would never be apart

With your name tattooed across my heart

Who would have thought it would end up like this?

- Before the Worst

::

He's got her only partially dressed in the back of his Range Rover, lips hovering over her tan shoulder, when she pulls back.

"What?" he asks breathlessly. Her hair is so carelessly mussed, framing her perfect face against the moonlight.

Marissa bites her lip as she stares at him, taking him in, blue eyes stormy and secretive. He stays quiet since he knows not to expect an answer.

She leans in to give him a kiss, tilting her chin so it rests against his, their noses right next to each other. She kisses him so sweetly it nearly makes him flip her over in the small seat of the car and kiss her properly. When she pulls away, Ryan puts his hand on her face, her cheek falling against his palm. Her eyes are resigned and she gives him a small smile.

He knows it's a goodbye.

He makes sure he fucks her hard after so she won't forget him.

We're smiling but we're close to tears,

Even after all these years,

We just now got the feeling that we're meeting for the first time.

- For the First Time

::

He awakes on a dreary Saturday morning to the light of a lit candle. His eyes widen in recognition and he curses fuck as he moves away from the flame.

"Oh relax Ry, it's like a foot from the bed."

He looks up and she's leaning against his mahogany dresser, cigarette lighter in hand, smirk etched on her face.

"Th' fuck you doin' here," he says, waking up, his voice groggy, eyes adjusting to the light coming in from the window. It's raining. The sky is light in contrast.

Marissa smirks again, pointing to the cupcake on his dresser. "Happy Birthday."

Ryan looks at the cupcake. He picks it up, blowing out the candle. He sets the cupcake back on the dresser. "Thanks," he mumbles. His eyes go to her, standing in his room, his fucking apartment, the one she left a month ago.

She moves to come toward him, but he holds his hand up, stopping her. He's facing her now, legs hanging off the side of his bed. His elbows lie on his knees. "What are you doing here?"

She shrugs noncommittally. "It's your birthday."

Ryan ignores what she says. "What've you been up to?" He gets a good look at her. She's wearing a plaid red shirt, one that hugs her curves in only a way Marissa Cooper could. Her dark jeans are tucked into these brown leather boots that make her legs go on for miles. She looks perfect. She always does.

Marissa frowns. "I didn't- let's not talk about," she pauses. "Me."

His glare is piercing. "You can't just leave and then come back and expect me not to, to wonder. What the hell, Marissa?"

She takes a small step back, sad face betraying her glowing appearance.

They stay quiet for exactly fifty-seven seconds before she lifts her eyes to meet his. "Can you at least eat the cupcake? I made it myself."

Ryan can't keep the grin from his face. He reaches for the cupcake and his nose scrunches up, lips pursing. "You did?"

She lets out a breathy laugh. "Yeah."

He eats it and gets white frosting around his mouth. His finger goes to wipe it away, but then she puts hers there instead and he's surprised by how close she is. She leans down so they're face to face, her knees on the floor. Her finger wipes most of the frosting away and she does about the sexiest thing she could do when she sticks her finger in her mouth and tastes the frosting. Ryan smirks. A dark glint sparkles in her eye and before he can comprehend what she's doing, she leans forward and licks the rest away from the corner of his mouth. His lips catch hers after and she yelps in surprise. Marissa puts her hands on his shoulders and he expects her to push him away, but she doesn't, only giggling slightly when his hands find her legs and he pulls her on the bed. She's feather light, but somehow, she ends up practically taking away his breath as she lies on top of him on the bed.

..

They walk in the rain after. He doesn't grab her hand and she doesn't reach for his.

Marissa walks through the rain like she's on a mission to find something. He follows behind her, always trying to figure her out.

She spins around in the rain, the hood of her sweatshirt useless, her face turned up to the now dark sky. She looks carefree, like she was born to look that happy.

"When are you leaving again?" he shouts over the thundering rain.

They say a few drinks will help me to forget her

But after one too many I know that I'll never.

- Nothing

::

He takes a sip of whiskey the night she packs up her luggage.

He doesn't drink often, usually to not tempt her, but he takes a long swig minutes after she's left the apartment, whispers of I'm sorry and you deserve better making him hate her.

But he doesn't hate her. Not even close.

He tips the glass upward again, the brown liquid burning his throat and making him come alive all at once.

To Marissa, he thinks, lifting the glass up in the air in her honour, drinking the rest in a matter of seconds.

Seth calls him, no doubt already hearing the news from Summer, wanting to ask him if he's okay, to tell him that it's not permanent and Marissa really just needs the space.

He's heard it all before. She said that last time.

Ryan doesn't pick up the phone.

He walks over to the liquor cabinet and picks up an old bottle of Absolut, remembers a Christmas party and a lost girl and new beginnings. He throws the bottle against the wall of their apartment, and watches the glass scatter in shards on the carpet, the cream-coloured walls wet from vodka.

The room smells like her.

He feels something constricting in his chest. Ryan's been around enough drunk people in his life to know that he needs to sit down and stop trying to think because his head hurts and his chest hurts and looking at pictures of them together in the apartment hurts.

She's everywhere he looks. There's a bottle of navy nail polish sitting on the coffee table with a plate of bagel crumbs next to it.

Marissa used to say, on those rare occasions when they'd open up to each other, that alcohol made her feel empty, a welcome empty into endless nothing. It chased away her thoughts and her feelings and made her fearless. Sometimes he'd catch her staring out the window into the dark night and he always wondered if she thought she was destined for more. Destined for more than him, if he was holding her back. He never said it, but she refuted his thoughts anyway.

He eyes a bottle opener in the shape of a Heineken magnet on the fridge door.

Alcohol makes him feel everything ten-fold. The pain, the regret, those things he's tried to avoid his whole life. It sucks. No wonder he doesn't do this often.

He thinks bitterly to himself that this is what heartbreak must feel like.

You took your suitcase, I took the blame.

Now I'm tryna make sense of what little remains, ooh

'Cause you left me with no love and honour to my name.

- Breakeven (Falling to Pieces)

::

He doesn't understand how she can pack up her things and walk out like it's habit.

Which, to her, it is.

Because the thought of leaving her never crossed his mind; not when they'd fight over something stupid and he'd walk out, slamming the door, not when she'd carelessly spilled coffee on the draft of one of his buildings, and not even when he'd found her letter from Cambridge saying she'd been accepted into their program, one he knew nothing about. Never.

She packs up her stuff and is eerily quiet as she does so, though he thinks she's crying because she sniffles as she packs, never glancing at him as he sits in the living room pretending to watch football.

He knows this once in a lifetime opportunity entwines with whatever problems she's too reluctant to talk about and how he doesn't want to talk about anything anyway. They're stuck and she's bowing out, something he'd always been afraid she'd do.

She's reluctant to tell him when she's coming back, promises she is, but doesn't know when. It means she isn't. Ryan purses his lips as he hears her in their room, his room now, wonders when they'll stop doing this, the back and forth, the broken promises and hopeful future. He wants the future they'd once mused about. But it's not like he's told her and he knows that's so much of the problem.

Marissa rolls her suitcase to the door and holds an L.L. Bean canvas bag in her other hand, tears dried on her cheeks, more threatening to come down.

He walks to the door. He shouldn't say goodbye. He doesn't feel as if he owes her that much. Gesturing to the bag in her hand, he says, "That's mine." She touches the embossed letters RA on the side of it.

It's cold and distant and exactly the way he wanted it to come out.

She bites her lip and looks down. "Sorry."

"For what?"

"Everything."

She leaves and he's left missing her. It's routine.

He knows it's his fault. It's his fault, always, and she tells him that every single time she comes back. This time, she takes two things of his.

So he waits for her.

I'll leave the door on the latch

If you ever come back, if you ever come back

There'll be a light in the hall and the key under the mat.

- If You Ever Come Back

::

She crashes through his door exactly the way she crashes through his life; breathlessly and irrevocably reckless. He opens the door for her and she smiles a small, charming smile that disarms him and wordlessly makes him pick up her bag and gesture for her to come in.

The walls are still the same colour as they were the last time she left. "I thought you were gonna paint these," she says lightly.

She's sun-kissed and tan and her hair is her natural honey colour, tendrils falling out of her messy ponytail, bangs carelessly swept to the side. She looks heartbreaking. He thinks it's fitting.

"I was," he says, distant. "But I didn't."

Marissa chuckles a little and he thinks it's at him but he doesn't say anything. He doesn't want to give her the satisfaction. She's the one that left him again.

"I like it like this," she continues, and he's surprised she isn't out the door already. "It's home."

Ryan lifts his head to look at her, his dark navy eyes searching her clear aqua ones. She looks pensive and like she's hiding something. She never completely changes. He lifts an eyebrow and tilts his head. "Home?"

She nods and braves a smile. She breaks his heart. But the thing is that he breaks hers too.

"It hasn't been your home for three months, Cooper," he says, brisk, focusing his attention on the maroon carpet of the apartment they used to share. He doesn't want to see her pout, no matter how genuine it is.

Marissa's lips part and she goes for levity. "My name's still on the lease."

A forced smile hits her lips, but underneath it he sees something genuine. She wants the air to be light and that's just not fair. He doesn't return the smile, but his frown lessens.

He wants to hate her. He wants to throw her out, wants to toss her Louis Vuitton duffel out the window and smirk in victory. He wants to finally be rid of her, wants to live his life without her in the back of his mind.

But he doesn't do any of it. He wants so much. He wants her. She smiles at him, a genuine smile that makes him hopeful. He knows her game but he knows one day she's got to be tired of running.

So he saunters over to the kitchen and opens the fridge, grabbing two bottles of Yuengling in one hand, his other clenching in a thoughtful fist. What's she doing here?

He decides that she's here and that's what he's wanted for the past three months anyway.

Ryan hands the bottle to her wordlessly and she takes it with a small smile, sitting on the couch they used to call theirs. She twists the cap off as he sits next to her. Marissa lifts the bottle to her lips but brings it down abruptly, smiling this cute smile that makes his heart beat out of his chest. "Is this a trick?" she asks, holding the bottle up. Ryan smirks a little, amused. "No."

They aren't touching and she wishes they were.

She slowly moves closer to him and watches him stiffen. But he doesn't move away, so she scoots over until her thigh is touching his. She leans her head on his shoulder. He still doesn't move away.

"Home, huh?"

"Yeah."

.fin.