Waiting, an o.c. fanfic

Waiting

The waiting room was crowded, but silent except for the clicking of heels as nurses walked by and the stifled sobs from a couple by the darkened window who were clutching to each other, their heads bent in silent prayers.

Seth and Ryan sat, each in his own world, across the room; though they were mere inches apart, it could have been feet; or even millions of miles. Suspended from reality, Ryan sat in silence, his face was stoic, his hair a mess, his clothes dirty and stained; he started straight ahead and only his eyes flickered every so often when a doctor came into the room to deliver news.

But it was never news about her. They still knew nothing and they'd been waiting for hours…though the hours seemed more like weeks or years.

Summer sat beside Seth, straight backed and with an expression on her face that clearly read 'Do Not Disturb.' She didn't need to hang up a sign to be left alone. Her mind raced so fast that she couldn't remember much of what she thought about. At one point she felt such anger and hatred that she wanted to punch something, but had refrained. It wasn't like her to display such emotions to the public. Her mother's voice rang in her head, 'We don't air our dirty laundry in public,' and though she often detested her mother, she heeded her words. She didn't have much choice to do anything else.

Seth's mind was like a movie screen, constantly replaying the same scene over and over. He saw the colors of the streetlamps, the darkness of the sky overhead and the silver of the moon vividly as he recalled what had happened. He saw her lifeless body lain across the dark alleyway and Ryan rushing over to her, bending to pick her up and as he did, her head fell back, limp. Seth had felt then that she was dead, had felt the dread in the pit of his stomach and the words float into his mind: It's too late.

Ryan could think of nothing more than her. His mind was stuck on her, as it had been ever since they met. She plagued him, haunted him, and at this very moment he hated her for it. He wished he could be released from the pain of her. Then, on the other hand, he wouldn't want to be anywhere else because it seemed, in such a small time, she meant everything to him.

Though three very different people, the three of them had the same thoughts.

Tijuana sucks.

Your life's hard enough
And you're not strong enough
To be bleeding from your heart
The strain has got too much
I feel you're loosing touch
You let your inner beauty slide
If I'm gone tomorrow
Would you feel my sorrow
Don't you know I'll be there
To the bitter end
Won't you be my baby

She had taken sleeping pills, and lots of them, and chased it down with alcohol. She had given suicide a thought, a fleeting one, and hadn't meant to succeed. Of course, she hadn't meant for a lot of things to happen…but they had.

They didn't know she'd been drinking, though they assumed she had, and had informed the doctor all they knew.

"Her father called her---he said he wasn't going to be home when she got back---"

"She saw her boyfriend making out with this tramp, and found out he'd been a manwhore the entire time they'd been dating. Bastard."

"She's been having a really hard time lately. She walked in on Ryan making out with this older chick who was almost my grandmother; her parents were getting a divorce, her mother's a moneygrubber, her father stole from his clients, they're loosing everything, and then she sees her boyfriend cheating on her."

Though they understood, or tried to at the very least, they didn't know why she'd tried to kill herself. And for all they knew, she'd succeeded.

'Cause I won't let you down
I only wanna be a part of you
No I won't let you down
I'll do everything you want me to
I'll never let you down
Each day I'm falling more in love with you
You been on my mind
But you're running out of time

The anger Summer felt was boiling in her little by little; she felt like a kettle that was about to burst. Everything was making her cringe and scowl. The little girl coloring quietly in the kid's corner, Ryan's brooding face that said to her 'It's all my fault' and she hated the guilt that brought upon her; Seth's rhythmic tapping of his foot against the rug as if he had too much energy and didn't know where to spend it. She wanted to slap him and also ask him to make her forget any of this had happened. Coop, she sighed inside her head, why'd you have to do this? To yourself? To us? God. It's not worth it. It's not worth loosing your life.

In the past couple weeks Seth had gotten closer to Marissa, and considered her to be an acquaintance, if not a full-blown friend, but he still couldn't help feeling out of place. He was stuck between the would-be-boyfriend, his best friend Ryan who was obviously head over heals in love with her and her best friend, whom he was madly in love with. It was not a fun place to be. It was literally like being stuck between a rock and a hard place. Seth hated metaphors. The only thing keeping him there was his legitimate feelings towards Ryan, Summer and Marissa; though he tried to forget it, he really did care about them. Even when all he wanted to do was go home, curl up into a ball and sleep. For hours.

Ryan kept repeating the same sentence inside his head, drilling it there so he wouldn't forget to remember it; however impossible that actually was. It's all my fault. It's all my fault. It's. ALL. My. FAULT. It wasn't his fault, there was no way it could be. He wasn't Superman, he couldn't save her. No matter how hard he tried to be a part of her life, it was up to her in the end and she hadn't chosen him. She'd chosen Luke, and look where that had gotten her. If Ryan could have turned back time, he would have, and he wouldn't have been in that pool house that night, and he would have stopped her from making the biggest mistake of her life. The biggest mistake that might have cost her her life.

Must have been a fight to keep your dreams alive
When you're aspiring to his walls
If he's gone tomorrow I won't feel no sorrow
Don't you know I'll bring you
A betting ending to your hapless story

The machine ate the coins and no matter how hard he kicked, the candy bar would not drop. Short of a miracle, he was out a dollar; and at this moment, a dollar was a lot. He wanted to kick it and scream at it, but he knew he couldn't.

The only thing keeping him from dissolving into tears and punching a wall was the fact that Seth was watching his every move, pity trying not to show on his face.

He dropped back down into his seat and muttered, "Fucking machine."

"They never work here," Summer stated, her voice sounding far-off.

Seth glanced at her, but she didn't take her eyes from the magazine in her lap; she was not reading it, merely using it as an excuse not to look at anyone else in the waiting area. There was an unspoken rule that none of them would talk about what had happened. It was far too taxing, and it made the situation that much more real.

Nobody wanted it to be real. They would settle for a nice dream, or a horrible nightmare. Either way, as long as it wasn't labeled real, they couldn't be hurt.

"We came as fast as we could," Kirsten gasped, running up to them and pulling Seth from his chair and hugging him tightly to her chest.

His voice came out muffled, "Mom, I can't breathe." Ryan wanted to laugh, to ease the tension, but found he couldn't produce any sound besides that of a weird sounding cough.

She released him back into his chair and hauled Ryan up to hug him as well. Sandy approached them, then, baring gifts of coffee and various snack foods. Summer quietly thanked him and took a coffee, but didn't make any move to drink it.

When Kirsten let Ryan go, he took a coffee and gratefully chugged it down, not caring that it burned his throat, his tonsils, his tongue and the roof of his mouth in the process. He had bigger things to worry about.

"Where're Jimmy and Julie?" Summer ventured, clearing her throat as Kirsten sat beside her and slipped an arm around her shoulders. It was a very motherly gesture that was sweet in thought but only made Summer want to weep uncontrollably.

"I don't know," Kirsten replied, sighing and crossing her legs; she glanced at Sandy, giving him a 'look' as he took a seat beside Ryan. "I tried calling the house, but no one answered. Jimmy's new phone isn't in yet and Julie's cell phone was turned off."

"I called her cell phone, she picked up. She said she'd be here." The words Summer spoke hung over them like a thick cloud of hostility and sadness.

"I've always hated these chairs," Sandy commented, obviously trying to lighten the mood. "They make my ass hurt after fifty seconds."

Ryan crumpled his empty cup, "They probably put them in assuming people wouldn't be waiting any longer than that."

"They wouldn't be," Seth said, "If doctors bothered to give updates every once in a while so that people wouldn't want to---" his voice trailed off and he sat back in his seat, looking horrified.

"They should put chairs like these under those 'no loitering' signs outside office buildings," Sandy said, to make up for the silence. "That way no one would want to loiter."

"How long have you been here?" Kirsten asked gently.

Seth sighed heavily, closing his eyes and leaning his head back against the bleached wall, "Hours. Days. Months. Years."

"Four hours and fifty six minutes," Ryan supplied darkly. "All we know what they told us."

Summer took over, "They said 'Wait here, kids. We'll tell you know as soon as we know anything.' That was right after we…got here. We don't even know if she's been seen yet." She swallowed and opened the tab of her coffee before taking several gulps.

"She must have been," Kirsten assured them. "They're probably waiting to tell her parents."

"They won't tell us, they won't take us seriously." Summer's voice was not whiney like usual, but distant, dark and sad.

A flustered looking Jimmy came into the room then; he had thrown on a pair of old baggy sweatpants and jogging sweatshirt and looked as if he hadn't slept for several years, let alone bathed. Kirsten, on instinct, stood up, but gave him a curt nod and sat back down.

"How is she?" He asked, looking at Kirsten, who wouldn't meet his eyes.

The three teens shrugged simultaneously and, not satisfied with this, he went to the nurses desk and began talking very loudly and angrily with a stern looking woman with a bun. "-----I'm her father for God's sake!"

And if he's gone tomorrow
I won't feel no sorrow
Don't you know I'll bring you
A better ending to your hapless story

It was twenty minutes later when Julie arrived looking well put together as usual, with Marissa's little sister in tow. She looked like she'd been dragged out of bed, and hadn't wanted to come.

With the small vigil, they sat in silence; no one looked at each other, no one dared breathe too loudly for fear they'd be put in the limelight and have to speak.

It was hell.

A hell built of regret, guilt and grief.

'Cause I won't let you down
I only wanna be a part of you
No I won't let you down
I'll do everything you want me to
I won't let you down
Each day I'm falling more in love with you
I'll never let you down

A doctor entered the room, mere moments after Jimmy's tirade, and looked at the group of them; there was no one left besides them, in that sizable waiting area that felt no larger than a breadbox.

He cleared his throat and ran a nervous hand through his graying brown hair; the tag that dangled from his scrubs spelled out the name, 'Dr. Robert Willington' and the picture showed a much younger looking version of the man that stood before them.

Eight heads looked up expectantly, each with a different look of concern on his or her face. Ryan felt his heart stop, Summer felt her breath catch in her throat, Seth, not normally religious, began to pray, 'Please let her be okay. Please let her be okay'; Sandy had never felt such fear in his entire life, he felt as if it were his own child in there, hanging in the balance; Kirsten wanted to seep into the floor and disappear, normally a strong woman, she felt she didn't have the strength enough to deal with this; Jimmy's grief and guilt was weighing heavily on him, and he felt he'd never be free of it, no matter what Marissa's outcome was; Julie remained indifferent, fully sure that her eldest daughter was perfectly fine and not feeling the least bit guilty for anything, it was blame she was feeling, and she was placing it on Jimmy.

"You're waiting for news about Marissa Cooper?" The deep bass voice of Dr. Robert Wellington rang through the nearly empty room.

"Yes," Julie was the only one to speak, the only one who could; she instinctively took her youngest daughter's hand in her own, giving it a little motherly squeeze.

Jimmy sniffed, though he was not visibly crying; his voice was that of a little boy, "Is she going to be okay?"

"We've pumped her stomach; I'm afraid there's very little good news, however. Marissa's body has gone into shock. It was very dangerous, chasing a large dose of sleeping pills with an alcoholic beverage. There's chance of recovery, however slim it may be."

Kirsten inhaled sharply, tears rimming her eyes, "What exactly do you mean?"

The doctor took a deep breath, hating delivering any sort of news that wasn't completely positive, "Marissa is unconscious. She's in a coma."

-Song used: "I Won't Let You Down" by Westlife on the single to "Hey Whatever"