Tiffany went through the first three weeks off her marriage without seeing much of Sean. It was just easier that way, so she'd work all day and night at the station and then go home for dinner and quiet time with Doug. She wasn't thinking about Sean every minute of every hour of every day, and she was looking forward to going on her upcoming honeymoon with Doug. He had just wrapped up another year of research, at which time he always had to report to the powers-that-be on the project in New York City.
She would have gone with him on the trip to the Big Apple, but with a two-week vacation coming up, she felt guilty about neglecting her own workload, so she stayed on in Port Charles and at the brownstone. Now she was home alone every night, but she started trying out some recipes. When she perfected her sister's favorite meal from childhood - chicken cutlet - she invited Cheryl over.
"So how are things going with you and Robert?" Tiffany asked.
"I think we're kind of getting along rather nicely," Cheryl said.
"I'm surprised you could fit me into your busy schedule in that case," her older sister said.
"I had to find out how married life was treating you," the younger sibling responded.
"Pretty good. I have to admit I wasn't sure how it would go, I've been kind of used to being on my own for about half my life. But Doug's very easy to get along with."
"As opposed to?" Cheryl asked.
Tiffany shakes her head. "No one. I just meant we don't butt heads at all."
"Kind of hard to butt anything when he's not here," Cheryl said.
"Well we'd spent every free second together for three weeks, I kind of like having the place all to myself now," Tiff said. "And then I started trying out some recipes ... before you make fun of me, I do remember some from when we had to cook as part of our chores."
"I have to admit it tastes pretty darn good," Cheryl said.
"I'm glad you like it. I gave up the 11 o'clock news for you tonight so I could start working on it," Tiff admitted.
"Well, it's really ... aaaaaaargh!" Cheryl cries out in pain.
"Cheryl? What is it?" Tiffany runs to her sister's side.
"I don't know. It really hurts bad."
"I'll call for help." Tiffany carefully guides Cheryl into the living room and lays her down on the couch. She grabs the phone off the end table and calls 911. "Yes, I need an ambulance at 1726 Lakefront Terrace. It's my sister. She's having debilitating pain and she only has one kidney. Please hurry."
She hangs up and goes back to the couch. She lifts Cheryl's head and puts it in her lap. She tries to keep both of them calm.
A half-hour later, they're at the hospital and Cheryl's being examined by Alan Quartermaine. As Alan comes out to the lounge to tell Tiffany about the threat to Cheryl's life, Sean spots them as he arrives with Anna, who he volunteered to give a ride for her checkup. The grave look on Tiffany's face concerns him greatly and after he escorts Anna to a different floor for her exam, he returns to the lounge to try and find Tiff. But she's no longer there.
"Did you see where Tiffany went?" Sean asked when Alan walked by the nurses station.
"I know Cheryl wanted to see Robert, she might be trying to get a hold of him," Alan said.
"I'll see what I can do on that front, I might be able to help," Sean said. "Is Cheryl going to be all right?"
"I really can't say anything about her condition," Alan said.
"That bad?" Sean asked.
Alan's look confirmed what Sean needed to know.
"I'll try and find Tiffany too," Sean continued and headed for the elevator.
Tiffany's on the roof of General Hospital trying to catch her breath. Sean opens the door cautiously and he breathes a sigh of relief at finally finding her.
"Are you all right?" he asked, crossing to her with concern.
"This is my fault," she said, looking off in the distance.
"It's not your fault, Tiffany," he said.
"You don't understand, Sean. She only has one kidney because of me. Because of what I did to her - an accident - when we were kids."
He waits patiently for her to continue.
"We were just having one of those fights that sisters and brothers always have. I'm not even sure what it was about. Cheryl could probably tell you..."
Tiff freezes up as she realizes that at the moment Cheryl can't tell anyone anything.
"So I grabbed this bat, I was still yelling after her, but she had turned away. And I just threw it," she said, starting to crack. "And it hit her ... in the back ... she keeled right over. It didn't even look real. I thought she was faking. She always did that - played hurt so I'd get in trouble. ... But I really hurt her. It was stupid. I've replayed it so many times in my head. I hit her ... and she was in the hospital for weeks."
Sean's just listening supportively, trying to brush away her tears, but then a new flood springs up.
"They wouldn't let me go in her room. They said I was too young. But I knew it was because they blamed me. I blamed me too. ... Then the day they wheeled her into surgery ... she had all these tubes coming out of her. She looked like a doll Cheryl had stuck all these pins into - like a voodoo doll. I think it was supposed to be me. She wanted me to suffer, but instead she's the one who had all these things sticking out of her. ... And it was my fault."
Tiffany starts crying harder and breaks out of Sean's grasp. "Don't worry about me. You should be worrying about her."
"I'm worried about both of you," he said.
"I don't deserve it."
"You were just a kid. It was an accident."
"Which she's still paying for today," Tiff said. "Do you know what it's like to be responsible for an innocent person's pain?"
"Actually I do," Sean said, thinking long and hard about his own personal history.
Tiffany looks up at him with big puffy eyes and she knows he's telling her the truth and not just what she wants to hear.
"There's quite a lot of that in my former line of work," he admitted.
"Is that why you gave it up?" she asked.
"Partly," he said hesitatingly.
"There's so much that you never would have been able to tell me," she concluded.
"And there was kind of a lot that I still want to tell you," he added.
She stepped back, aware that there was considerable subtext going on between them at the moment. "I'm married," she said.
"You know, I think I could accept that a lot better if you looked happy. But you don't look like yourself at all. You look haunted, almost desperate."
"My sister's in the hospital."
"You started looking this way a long time before now," Sean said. "At the wedding in fact. I should have grabbed you and run out of the front door of the church."
A faint glint appears in Tiff's eyes, the recollection that she wanted that to happen on her wedding day.
"This is what I mean. Just a slight hint that we belong together and you light up like a match to a stove," he said.
"You don't think you're just seeing what you want to?"
"I'm not just seeing what I want to - I'm seeing what's there. ... You're feeling closed in ... claustrophobic. I know that feeling all too well, remember? And I don't think it's the fact that you're married. I think it's the fact that you married him."
Tiffany's grief is turning into irritation. "You don't know anything about our lives."
"I know more than you think I do. ... just from looking at your face."
They're having a bit of a staredown when Doug pops into the doorway. He swiftly moves over to his wife. "You OK, honey?" he asked, leading her back inside. "I came as soon as I heard."
Sean shakes his head at seeing the way Doug coddles her. He follows them inside.