Title : Mothers and Sons
Author : Helen C.
Rating : PG-13
Summary : Dawn and Ryan, and their twisted relationship. Also, Theresa and Ryan and their slightly less twisted relationship.
Disclaimer : The characters and the universe were created and are owned by Josh Schwartz. No money is being made and no copyright or trademark infringement is intended.
AN1. This one was inspired by brandywine421's awesome breathe out, breathe in.
Many thanks, as always, to the ever awesome joey51.
Mothers and Sons
Helen C.
Chapter One
Sometimes, the rare few times he allowed himself to think about it, Ryan berated himself for not being able to learn the damn lesson. It seemed like it was never going to sink in, like he was never going to stop rushing to the rescue.
No matter how many times he told himself that he wouldn't go help Dawn the next time she called, he still ended up going.
His head kept yelling at him, "No, don't go, nothing good can come out of it!" but his guts didn't listen. He didn't know how to listen to her screams and not try to do something.
Trey had never been able to, either. That's why he left.
Away from home, it had been easier for him to tell Ryan to be smarter and to cut his losses, but Ryan knew the truth. Knew that if Trey had still been around, he would have been doing the same thing Ryan was trying to do.
Even after years away from her, even after she had abandoned him and they hadn't talked to each other in months, Ryan still went.
It wasn't even really a matter of learning the lesson.
It was a matter of not wanting her to pay too high a price for her mistakes.
It was a matter of wanting to take care of his mother.
It was a matter of not wanting to live with the guilt that would certainly eat him alive if she was hurt, or worse, because of his inaction.
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Ryan spent a lot of his teenaged years promising himself, or promising Trey, or Theresa, that of course, he'd stop running head first into danger just because Dawn had bad taste in men and couldn't date someone nice to save her life.
Theresa once told him that for someone who asked those around him to keep their word, he was sure quick to forget his own promises. Her tone was bitter that day, but then she had spent the day holding Ryan's head as the after effects of the concussion made him throw up every half hour, so he allowed it.
She wasn't wrong.
He betrayed everyone—including himself—by doing this.
Everyone except Dawn, and that's what no one seemed to get. He was stuck between betraying his friends and betraying Dawn.
Yes, it sucked that Dawn won each and every time, but Ryan always considered it to be the lesser of two evils.
Trey and Theresa weren't in any physical danger.
Dawn was.
Trey and Theresa would forgive him, maybe even understand.
Dawn wouldn't.
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Ryan was nineteen the first time he had to promise the Cohens that sure, of course, he wouldn't go see her alone again, not even if she called for help.
He meant it that time, too.
It had been too close a call—and on Christmas, no less. Because, of course, Dawn had to screw up everyone's holidays, not just her own.
Ryan had been enjoying the peace, for once. He was almost happy in Berkeley, he felt more like a student and less like a fraud with each passing day, and coming back to Newport for the holidays was more enjoyable than he would have thought.
If only Seth had been able to pipe down, even a little, things would have been damn near perfect—and yes, how could he have believed for a minute that things would stay this easy? It wasn't like past experience hadn't taught him better, many times over.
It hadn't happened in so long. Maybe that was why he let his guard down. He hadn't heard her cries covered by the shouts of whoever she was fucking in so many years and he had allowed himself to relax.
Until the phone rang as he was standing in the kitchen, trying not to yell at Seth (who was definitely feeling the holiday cheer) and thinking about how good it was to be home. The fact that Newport was now home didn't even surprise him anymore.
He took the call mostly to get a reprieve from Seth's constant chattering.
Later, Ryan would gripe at the irony.
He would have been willing to put up with a lot more of Seth's babble to avoid hearing her mother scream at him, begging him to come, crying over the phone, AJ's infuriated voice in the background.
"Man?" Seth asked when Ryan hung up on a hurried promise to be here as fast as possible.
"I'll be back in time for dinner," Ryan said, making his way out.
Seth tried to follow him, but Ryan mercifully beat him to the car.
Later, he'd thank Whoever the hell was in charge Up There for that small favor.
The one good thing to come out of all this was that at least Seth hadn't been there to witness the tail end of one of AJ's tantrums.
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Ryan arrived in Chino just in time to witness the last round of the mostly one-sided fight between Dawn and AJ.
At least he was sticking with the glorious Atwood tradition of having screwy holidays; obviously, not even prolonged exposure to the Cohens was enough to cure him from the habit of getting involved in fights or other illegal activities.
"What the fuck are you doing here?" AJ snapped when Ryan entered.
The reply flew before he could think about it. "Nice to see you too."
The punch that earned him made his ears ring. Damn, but the man had gotten faster in the last three years. What the hell did Dawn see in him anyway? Of all the losers she had fucked over the years, why did she keep coming back to this one?
"You just never learn, do you, kid?" AJ said, his low tone threatening.
Once upon a time, Ryan would have hurried to the door upon hearing that tone, and would have spent the night at Theresa's, at Trey's, or even on a park bench.
Anything to avoid AJ when he was in that kind of mood.
"Whatever," he whispered, looking down, hoping against hope that maybe AJ would ignore him if he looked unthreatening.
That kind of strategic thinking had never made a difference in the past.
It didn't this time either.
Ryan never could remember most of the fight that followed—if one could call it a fight.
He may have been stronger and faster than he had been at sixteen, and yes, he got a few punches in, but it was pitifully inadequate against AJ's fury-fuelled efficiency.
A few flashes remained burned in Ryan's memory.
The look on AJ's face when Ryan spat at him—a mistake that earned him many painful bruises, but so worth it.
Dawn, crying softly in a corner.
AJ kicking him in the legs.
Dawn begging from her corner.
AJ hauling Ryan to his feet, dragging him to the door, pushing him out.
Through the glass door.
Then, at last, blackness.
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When they got the call from the hospital in Chino, Sandy thought that it was almost ironic. When Ryan had first come to live in Newport, Sandy had dreaded getting that kind of call, and had been sure that one day, it would come.
But the days had passed, and it hadn't happened, and of all the scraps Ryan had gotten into during his four years with the Cohens, none was due to a man almost three times his age kicking his ass.
Small mercy perhaps, but Sandy had seen the pictures in Ryan's file, and he had taken out some of them before giving it to Kirsten, because she didn't have to see that.
Under the circumstances, and even if the fallout had been hellish in every possible way, Sandy would have taken even the fight with Trey against ever seeing Ryan injured that way again.
And then, as things had finally settled down and Ryan was making a life for himself in college, this happened, and suddenly, Sandy couldn't help wondering if anything ever made any difference at all.
He would probably never ask Ryan why he had done that, in large part because he suspected the answer and didn't want to hear it confirmed. But he had to wonder if four years with the Cohens had had so little impact on Ryan that he still felt that he had to do things like this on his own.
It wasn't a matter of not knowing any better.
It wasn't a matter of Ryan not being able to control himself.
It was a matter of Ryan refusing to allow Dawn to hit rock bottom if he could help it.
And yes, Dawn's rock bottom would probably be an ugly and scary place, and yes, she would certainly be hurt in the process, but selfishly, Sandy almost didn't care.
All that mattered was that his family, his son, was safe.
And he'd never say so to Ryan.
He didn't want to lose the kid, and that kind of thinking would only drive Ryan away from all of them.
"Sandy?" Kirsten asked from where she sat, hunched over on a spectacularly ugly plastic chair.
He turned to her. "Hm?"
"Are you all right?"
He would have loved to laugh at her question, but he didn't. She meant well, but damn it, if a doctor didn't arrive soon with some news, Sandy couldn't be held responsible for what would happen.
Surely, anyone would understand that, right?
Just as he was reaching the point where he was going to start yelling, a doctor entered the room, chart in hand.
Sandy shared a look with Kirsten then went to meet the man, bracing himself.
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Three days after his latest encounter with AJ, curled up on a hospital bed, Ryan told Sandy, "I'll never try to help her again."
Part of him was ashamed for going in the first place, and getting his ass kicked yet again.
Being sixteen or nineteen didn't seem to make much of a difference.
In the grand scheme of things, it seemed like Ryan was just destined to be used as a punching bag by AJ, no matter what.
Part of him was bitter at the idea of spending yet another holiday in the hospital.
Part of him was angry at Dawn for calling him in the first place, and then going back with AJ once Ryan had been injured for her—she always went back to them, but fuck, when would she learn?
Right, probably at the same time he did…
Never.
Lots of parts of him were clamoring for attention, all battling each other, and making his head spin.
Mostly, he was angry at himself.
He should have learned to better control his instincts by now.
He should be able to avoid being sent to the hospital.
He had apparently managed to raise his arms when he had gone through the glass door, which had probably saved his eyes.
Parts of his face and his arms were covered with cuts, some deep, some not, some of which would have left scars without Dr. Roberts' intervention.
Seth tried to joke about Ryan's new found taste for plastic surgery.
No one laughed.
The scars would need time to heal and fade, Dr. Roberts said, almost apologetically.
Ryan didn't mind.
Not too much.
At least, he wouldn't spend the rest of his life looking like a freak show. If such a thing had happened three years earlier, he would have had to live with it, and fuck if that didn't make him even angrier.
How many times had AJ almost destroyed his life?
Once upon a time, dying didn't really scare Ryan. What terrified him was the certainty that one day, one of these scumbags would go too far and leave him blind, or render him a vegetable, or stick him in a wheelchair for the rest of his life. And if that happened, Ryan knew that his family wouldn't be able to take care of him—with no money and no outside support system, he'd be left in the hands of the government, and probably spend years, if not the rest of his life, in an institution or on the streets.
How many times had Dawn turned a blind eye on the situation?
How many times had Ryan risked serious injury to save her?
Looking at Sandy's worried face, Ryan silently promised himself that he would never put the Cohens through this again.
Kirsten blinked back tears every time she saw him, kept touching him, as if to reassure herself that he was still there.
Sandy looked resigned, as if he had always known that such a thing would happen, as if he had prepared himself for such a time to come.
What was worse, they were both being so damn understanding about Ryan's need to help his mother that it was driving him insane.
He would have preferred yelling. Threats. A stern talking to.
Anything but this compassion, this damn support that they still gave him freely after what he had done.
"I swear, I won't go see her again," Ryan repeated.
It didn't matter if he didn't keep his word to himself, but the Cohens deserved better.
"Okay," Sandy said.
He didn't sound convinced—not that Ryan blamed him.
"I'll call the cops and let them deal with her. But I'm done walking in there and…"
And getting the shit kicked out of him.
And fearing for his life.
And risking spending the rest of his life scarred, or incapacitated.
Sandy smiled sadly, and said, "I know, son."
"I will," Ryan swore—to himself, and to Sandy, who had put so much energy into helping Ryan survive his youth.
"I know."
TBC