Disclaimer: The O.C. is property of Fox.
Author's Note: The end is nigh-ish.
Ryan stared at the ceiling, his boredom and impatience growing in direct proportion to the constant ache in his side. The dilapidated clock on the wall was creeping ever closer towards noon; he'd slept, he'd eaten a suspiciously lumpy and disturbingly vibrant bowl of red Jell-O, a nurse had liberated him from the I.V. and other medical crap and he had absolutely no intention of staying here a second longer than he had to. If it weren't for his distinct lack of clothes, Ryan would have been wondering through the corridors in search of an exit fifteen minutes ago, but he'd had a scoot around the room and there was no sign of them. Now clothes and no doubt a final friendly, probably embarrassing chat with Ed was all that stood between Ryan and a friendly, probably embarrassing chat with Sandy, Kirsten and possibly Seth, but at least it would be back at the homestead, instead of in weird smelling room with curtains from the land that taste forgot.
Ryan tried to ignore the increasingly irritating tick of the clock as he waited. He had a bizarre yet strong urge to literally twiddle his thumbs, which would be fine except for the fact that his left was trapped in the huge orange cast. It had been barely twelve hours since he'd had it, most of which he'd been asleep, but it was already getting on his nerves and going on past experience it would probably be at least six weeks before he could lose it. At least when he'd broken his foot it hadn't made much of an impact and he'd gotten so zippy on his crutches that he could even play soccer, after a fashion. Now he looked like Robocop and couldn't even scratch his nose. This sucked.
All of his life Ryan had hated waiting, but hanging around hospitals had to be at the top of his list. Seth had disappeared on a mysterious errand and Ryan had insisted he'd be fine whilst Kirsten and Sandy grabbed some breakfast from the cafeteria. Kirsten in particular looked more than a little rough around the edges. Ryan suspected that despite everything that had happened, ironically he'd probably had more sleep than any of them since last night. And he was still pretty tired. It'd been so long since he'd had any trouble with the whole asthma thing, he'd forgotten how exhausting it could be when it flared up. He hoped it wasn't going to be a regular fixture from now, though he doubted it would be; including last night he could count the number of times it had troubled him on one hand. And maybe a finger or two on the other. Despite that, Ryan had a strong suspicion that Kirsten and Sandy were going to take a little more convincing. That was if they ever re-emerged from the cafeteria. Given his run-in with the radioactive Jell-O, there was a strong possibility that they wouldn't. As if sensing his thoughts of home, the door to his room swung open.
"Dude, move on over; casa Cohen has a new resident champion and it is I," said Seth as he barged cheerfully in to the room, carrying a pair of shopping bags in one hand and Ryan's battered sneakers in the other.
"I come bearing clothes," he said triumphantly, dropping the bags on the bed and the shoes on the floor.
"Awesome," said Ryan enthusiastically as he pulled himself to a sitting position. He looked at the Gap and Old Navy bags on the bed. "Hey, what happened to my clothes?" he asked Seth, a little puzzled.
"They've gone to the great cotton field in the sky," he answered, "I asked, but they kinda had to cut them off you." Seeing Ryan's face fall, Seth added, "Although I do have these," retrieving Ryan's watch, choker and leather wrist band from his pocket and placing them on the bed.
"Cool. Thanks man."
"No problemo. So, I went shopping."
"In Chino? Where?" said Ryan, amused by the notion of Seth fending for himself in the wild.
"Well, I may have made a little diversion," admitted Seth, knowing full well what Ryan was thinking, "I went to a mall, about twenty minutes from here, hence the longitude. But!" he continued buoyantly, "I am returned, and I have pants, so we can get your street-fighter ass out of here."
He opened up the Gap bag and pulled out two loose fitting plain t-shirts, one white, one rusty red, a three pack of socks, two pairs of boxers and some khaki pants.
"Chinos for Chino," grinned Seth, pushing it.
"Thanks Newport," replied Ryan, not missing a beat, "I'll pay you back."
"Forget about it. Consider it an early Chrismukkah present."
"A whattiker?" asked Ryan, reaching for a pair of the boxers and pulling them on under the covers while Seth tactfully became very interested in the pattern on the curtains.
"All in good time, my friend, all good time. So do you think someone actually designed these or just got drunk and hurled all over them?"
"No idea," Ryan said as he reached for the chinos, pulling the tags off with his teeth, "I'm just glad to be getting out of here."
"You okay?"
"I had tubes where no man should have tubes," Ryan said as he twisted round on the bed and struggled into the pants.
"Yikes," winced Seth, turning back to Ryan again and hopping up on the bed to sit next to him. He nodded towards Ryan's cast, "So, you went for orange. I always went for yellow."
"Why yellow?" asked Ryan, as he zipped up the pants, relieved that they fit.
"Oh, you know, yellow, it's bright, sunny... And it reminded me of Summer," Seth babbled, causing Ryan to grin at his friend's unabashed geekiness. "I know. Dork. Sometimes I'd think about falling off on purpose for the sympathy vote."
Ryan looked questioningly sideways at his friend.
"Skateboarding," Seth elaborated, "In my rebellious phase I wouldn't wear wrist guards."
"You still don't," Ryan replied, his voice muffled through the red t-shirt as he bit through the tags.
"Yeah, but I'm better at it now. Two years since my last breakage. I should get a pin or something. Why orange?"
"Orange County. Chino was yellow," said Ryan as he untied his gown and let it fall.
"It's like we're twins. Next time I'll get orange."
"Or you could not fall off."
"I thought I was the dreamer."
"No, you're the weird one," said Ryan amiably, reaching for the t-shirt.
"I prefer to think of myself as eccentric. Holy crap, Ryan," said Seth suddenly, seeing the angry black-blue bruise snaking its way across his friend's ribs. Ryan looked down, a little surprised at just how gross it looked.
"Note to self, avoid crowbars," he mumbled, reaching for the red shirt.
"Yeah, sounds good," said Seth, his concern for his friend clear in his voice. Ryan kept quiet, unsure of what to say. The conversation was in danger of becoming a little heavier than he felt he could deal with right now. Almost as if he was reading Ryan's thoughts, Seth broke the silence.
"So, I hear you've met Genghis Cohen," he said, hoping he sounded sufficiently light-hearted.
"Uh-huh. Your dad was really mad," said Ryan, re-thinking his approach to the shirt as it tried to strangle him.
"You know he never meant to go off on you, don't you?"
"Yeah, I know."
"Because he feels really bad about the whole giving you an asthma attack thing, which, granted, wasn't a barrel of laughs for you either."
"It's okay, Seth. He didn't know. Besides, it pretty much surprised us both. It's not like a regular event."
"But you're okay now, right?" Seth asked, a few awkward seconds later.
"Sure," replied Ryan, reflexively, as his head finally emerged from the t-shirt. Seeing Seth's dispirited expression, he immediately felt bad. After all, he was only showing his concern. For perhaps the first time ever, Ryan made a conscious decision to be open with him and looked his friend in the eye.
"Yeah, I'm okay. Things were kinda scary, at the garage and last night. The car stuff, the bad fights, I thought I'd left that in Chino. It's just a little weird, to have someone worry about me. Before you guys, I never really had anyone watching my back, 'cept Trey. And that wasn't exactly textbook. It's just hard sometimes to figure all this new stuff out. And now the old stuff's catching up with me, it's harder," Ryan sighed and glanced down at the floor for a moment before looking back at Seth, "You know?"
"Kinda," replied Seth equally touched and flustered by Ryan's unexpected honesty, "It's sorta hard for us too. But, you know, two heads are better than one. Even if one of them's mine."
"Even then."
"And besides, you're fine now, right? I mean, you're not going to turn blue on me or anything?" he asked, only half-joking.
"Wasn't planning on it," said Ryan, glad that his honesty had not scared Seth off, "I feel better than I look."
"That's a relief, 'cause you look like crap, man. I mean, what with the two for one shiners, gout-ish nose and the bionic arm..." Seth babbled, "And I have to say that paisley gown was not a good look for you."
"Thanks, " Ryan said dryly.
"Hey! Showing compassion here," said Seth defensively.
"Yeah, it's overwhelming," Ryan teased, enjoying watching Seth squirm.
"Granted on me, it does come across as sarcasm, but still. Glad you're okay."
"Me too."
Seth and Ryan remained quiet for a moment, each content to share a small smile of understanding. Finally, Seth reached over between them to the Old Navy bag that still rested by Ryan's side and pulled out a black hooded sweatshirt.
"So, I didn't know whether to get the gray or the black, but then I thought, 'Wait up, I'm shopping for Ryan and black hides blood so much better,' so I went for the classic," he said, before biting off the tags as Ryan had with the other clothes.
"Thanks man, it's great," said Ryan reaching for it, "Hey, fleecy- nice." He threw it slightly to maneuver his right arm inside, before attempting to pull it over his head and promptly succeeded in colliding skull with cast with an audible thunk. "Ow," he grunted, inexpertly trying to rub his head with his good arm.
Instinctively, Seth hopped off the bed and moved round to Ryan's side. "Here," he said, extracting Ryan's head from the sweatshirt and helping him start over, "Let me help you." Gently, Seth slid Ryan's injured arm inside the sleeve, wiggling it up until his hand peeked out the end, before lifting the sweatshirt over Ryan's head and pulling it down, straightening out the creases.
"There you go," he said, as Ryan re-appeared before him, "Next up, socks. You want stripes, pattern or plain?" Seth asked as he opened them up.
"Stripes are good," replied Ryan, the act of letting Seth help him feeling totally natural and oddly safe.
"Stripes it is," said Seth, sitting down in the chair next to Ryan's bed and taking his left foot on his lap, "Wiggle," he instructed, pulling Ryan's sock on and then switching feet and doing the same with his right.
"Hey Ryan," said Seth, as he took the first of Ryan's shoes and slipped it on his friend's foot, "I'm not saying you have to, but you know you can talk to me about stuff if you want. The old stuff."
"Yeah, I know."
"Or the new," said Seth, reaching for the other shoe, "You know, as long as it doesn't involve watching the WB or painting each other's toenails,"
"Deal."
"Cool. All done," said Seth, standing up and joining Ryan once more on the bed. The two almost-brothers sat quietly, contentedly swinging their legs in circles. Things were looking up.
Ed headed wearily down the corridor towards Ryan's room. He had to admit there was something about this kid that had gotten to him. It wasn't just that he'd been dealt a rough hand, although he clearly had, but round here that applied to most people who came in through the door, Ed included. If he really thought about it, he suspected the real reason he'd stuck around was because he could sense that Ryan was at one of those moments were his life could go either way; keep struggling on and hope that the forks in the road become more infrequent, or just give up and give in to a life where dreams dried up like the proverbial sun-baked raisin. Even in the few short hours he'd known him, Ed could see how hard things were for Ryan right now, and how many people wanted to make things better for him, despite the odds.
Problem was, it was probably going to get a lot worse for Ryan before it got better. Even though it would be another six months before he officially graduated, Ed had already seen it dozens of times before. Kids like Ryan, coming through the doors on a regular basis that were too often in the wrong place at the wrong time, and each time they arrived with fewer people to hold their hand and a little less hope in their eyes. But somehow Ryan had managed to find himself with a shot, a real shot at breaking out of the circle and really making something of himself, just like the man who'd stayed up all night holding his hand. Ed was determined to do the best he could to make sure that if, or more likely, when things got bad again for Ryan, that man would still be there.
Sandy waved as Kirsten's taxi pulled out of the car lot. As much as she wanted to stay, truth was, she hadn't felt as hungover as this since her college days and she hadn't drunk nearly as much last night as she had done at a average dorm party. Still, it had been made obvious as she and Sandy had visited the first the cafeteria to get some breakfast and then the ladies where he'd held her hair back for her as she'd thrown it all back up again that her wild child nights were over. Hence, loading her up in a taxi to get back home to shower, change and sober up a little before Sandy and the kids came home. The last thing Ryan needed right now was another drunken parent. Kirsten wondered when she'd got so old; Seth had grown up before she'd barely had time to notice it, particularly in the last few months. She still found it hard to believe that she was old enough to have a sixteen-year-old child and now somehow she had two.
Ryan had definitely brought out the best in Seth, his recent Casanova tendencies notwithstanding; somewhere beneath the comic books, video games, the sarcasm and the pop-culture cluttered rhetoric, for a long time there had been had a friendly, considerate and surprisingly mature teenager trying to get out. Kirsten had no doubt that if asked, Ryan and Seth would probably have thought of Ryan as the big brother in their quasi-sibling relationship. After all, on the surface, it made sense; Ryan had a wider range of life experience, a self-reliance and highly over-developed sense of responsibility, but Kirsten knew better. Ryan was what he was because he had to be, and it had always been that way, not because he'd matured into it; before you could be an adult, first you had to be a child and Kirsten didn't think he ever had been, not properly. But Seth was helping him tap into it.
Seth was not the only person in the house to eavesdrop, and often she had listened in to the two of them talking; hearing Seth asking after him, how soccer was going, giving him tips on how to survive Harbor, filling him in on which teachers he absolutely should not get on the wrong side of and which he could impress no end with a little extra reading. Every time she stumbled on one of their conversations, it made her feel regret that Seth had never had the chance to really be a big brother. He'd have done a hell of a lot better job than she had with Hailey, or Marissa was doing with Caitlin and frankly she thought it would be a miracle if that kid came out the other side of puberty without some serious issues. But more than regret, Kirsten felt guilty; that it took her so long to trust Ryan, to realize that like Seth, he was just a kid trying to figure out how to fit, only in substantially more difficult circumstances. Tonight wasn't helping any.
Closing her eyes to shut out the spinning world, Kirsten made a silent promise with herself to make more of an effort where Ryan was concerned. For too long now she'd been content to let Seth and Sandy lead the way, whilst she'd remained in the background. And she could make excuses for it, or she could just admit that she needed to do more, whether it be going with him to see his brother, or offering advice about the mysterious mind of the teenaged girl, or just talking to him more about stuff. When Dawn had left Ryan, she had said it was because that way he ends up with a real mom. As soon as he got home, Kirsten was going to do her level best to prove it.
"Hmm," said Ed, his face an inscrutable mask as he examined the peak flow meter in his hand, "Last time," he said handing it back to Ryan.
"What do you want from me, blood?" said Ryan, in mock exasperation, taking it.
"I already got that last night, replied Ed, ignoring him. There was another whooshing noise as Ryan complied and blew in to the meter again, still managing to scowl. From his vantage point of sitting next to Seth on the other bed, Sandy couldn't help but smile at Ryan's sullen childishness. It was good to see he had it in him. Ryan grumpily handed the gadget back to Ed.
"Happy now?" he grunted.
"420 again. Which is not as good I'd like, but better than it was."
"What should it be?" asked Sandy, dodging a glare from Ryan.
"Roughly somewhere between 480-520. But considering your ribs and that you had two attacks in twelve hours, it's okay. Before last night, when was the last time you had an attack?" Ed asked, making a note on Ryan's chart.
"When I was twelve, maybe? Eleven? I don't remember exactly."
"Hmm," said Ed, his cynicism plain, "Do you remember why it started?"
"My mom hit me with a baseball bat," Ryan said impassively.
"No way," exclaimed Seth, his aimless leg swinging coming to an abrupt halt. He looked over at Ryan, who shrugged.
"She thought I was a burglar. And she was kind of drunk."
"And before that?" Ed breezed on.
"I'd pretty much grown out of it before I left junior school."
"Ever brought to the emergency room?"
"Once, when I lived in Fresno, I was like six," said Ryan. Seeing Ed's inquisitive expression he sighed and elaborated, "My Dad was arrested for armed robbery and I had bronchitis. Stressful day. It wasn't that bad really, my brother panicked."
"Other than stress anything else make you wheeze?"
"Sometimes if the pollen's really high or I get a really bad cold, but that's like never. Nothing else. And last night was a one-off, I was wound up kinda tight."
"Yeah, Dad's really obnoxious like that," Seth chirped, his eyes twinkling roguishly.
"Thanks, Seth, that really helps with the guilt," Sandy said, playfully bumping his shoulder into his son's.
"Seth, shut up," said Ryan, only half-joking, before turning back to Ed, "It's only been when things have been really bad," he explained, "I'd kind of been bottling some stuff up for a while, it wasn't anyone's fault."
"You exercise?" asked Ed, ignoring the half-hearted bitch-slapping going on around him.
"Soccer, running from Seth. Never problems. Ever." Ryan replied, with a stony glare at Sandy, as if daring him to suggest he should take it easy.
"You smoke?"
"Uh, not officially," Ryan admitted sheepishly as his stony glare was returned by Sandy, accompanied by a full display of looming eyebrow action, "But it never made a difference."
"Well, I am officially ordering you to quit," said Ed authoritatively.
"Me too," said Sandy, eyebrows converging, "No excuses."
"Busted," mocked Seth, prompting Sandy to playfully scuff him across the top of his head, "Ow!" he exclaimed before getting the hint and shutting up.
"Considering your history, I don't think there's any need for you to take regular preventative medication, but that'll be down to your family doctor to determine. In the meantime," Ed said, writing out a note on his pad, "here's a prescription for Proventil, it's a reliever inhaler; I don't care how good you're feeling, you take it with you whenever you go out, just in case."
"Whatever," said Ryan, watching suspiciously as Ed wrote out more prescriptions.
"Don't argue. This was a wake up call, kid. You're sixteen going on seventeen, not seventy. You feeling tight-chested, or wheezy, or short of breath for whatever reason use the inhaler. You feeling stressed, talk to someone about it. Pretending you're fine won't help either situation. Don't make me come up to Newport to kick your ass; I don't have a car and the bus takes forever."
"So I can go now?" Ryan said, his patience well and truly dissipated.
"You can go now. To bed. Directly, not passing go, not collecting $200, you get me?"
"Not a problem," said Ryan, surprising the others, "I'm kinda beat."
Seth jumped off the bed and pulled his dad to his feet, "I'm sure I've got a movie or seven hundred that we could watch. Or I just got Driver three... huh," he said, looking at Ryan's immense cast, "I'm guessing Playstation's out."
"Guess so. Unless I'll learn to play with my feet."
"It's not as hard as you think," Ed interjected, only to receive a raised eyebrow from Ryan, "When I said I'd been there myself I wasn't kidding."
"Or you could always embrace a good old-fashioned book," chipped in Sandy.
"Yeah, Dad, whatever," Seth teased, "I'll pull out my Sega Megadrive, we'll have Sonic fun."
"Cool," Ryan replied, itching to leave. Sensing it, Ed handed the bundle of prescriptions to Sandy.
"Inhaler, antibiotics, painkillers, sleeping tablets for tonight and tomorrow," he said, pretending not to notice as Ryan rolled his eyes, "I've made arrangements so you can go to HOAG out patients for your stitches and their fracture clinic for your arm. I got an appointment for you in four weeks time; with any luck, they'll reduce the cast to below your elbow. Yeah," he said, seeing Ryan's face light up, "I thought that might make you happy. If your fingers get blue or tingly before that, get yourself down there. You don't want bits of you dropping off on top of everything else."
"Does it have to be this big?" Ryan asked Ed pleadingly, not caring how whiny he sounded, "I promise to be careful, take it easy." Seth and Sandy snorted unanimously, dropping into silence when Ryan shot the briefest of dirty looks in their direction, "I will. Please?"
"Give it up, kid," said Ed, not swayed, "It was a simple break, but high up. You were lucky not to need surgery. And you've got hairlines in two of the bones in your hand. The longer cast will stabilize both. As will this," taking a sling from the chair by the bed and slipping it round Ryan's shoulders to take the weight of the cast, ignoring Ryan's glacial scowl as he did so, "Put it this way, you wear the sling, your bones knit faster and maybe in four weeks time you get thumb and elbow back."
"Lucky me," said Ryan, hoping off the bed. After a moment's hesitation, he offered his hand to Ed, "Thanks, you know, for... well, everything."
"You're welcome. Do me a favor and don't come back?" said Ed kindly, shaking the boy's hand.
"We'll do our best," said Sandy following Ryan's example. Ryan made for the door, with Sandy hustling Seth after him, as dragged his heels, looking uncertainly as though he wanted to speak. After a moment he stopped and turned to Ed.
"Can I ask you something?" he asked awkwardly.
"Sure," replied Ed, slightly unnerved by the way Seth was staring at his head.
"About the hair; from one curly fry to another, how do you get your hair not to frizz so much? 'Cause I've tried everything, mousse, gel, mud, wax, some weird gum, I draw the line at straighteners, but otherwise I'm open to anything, magic potions, naked bacchanals, anything. Help me."
Ed couldn't help but be amused by Seth's bumbling, "I wish I could," he answered kindly, "But I just got older. Sorry."
"Never mind," Seth sighed, "Thanks anyway."
"You're welcome."
"See, this is why you're the weird one," said Ryan to Seth as he reached for the door, pausing as his gaze fell on the cracked clock on the wall, "I can't believe it's nearly one o' clock already."
"Cool, lunchtime," said Seth, his thoughts already turning to take-out.
"Any turkey left?" Ryan asked hopefully.
"Not exactly," said Sandy, "It had a slightly worse Thanksgiving than you did."
"What did you do, set fire to it?" asked Ed cheerfully as he followed them out of the room and down the corridor.
"Something like that," replied Sandy.
Ryan shrugged, before something in his memory triggered, "Hey, I thought you were off at eight," he asked Ed.
"I was," Ed answered, "Thought I'd stick around," he said, stopping outside the door to the staff lounge. Seeing Ryan's expression soften he sighed, "What can I say? I'm a sucker for a happy ending."
"Give me time," said Sandy, mussing up Ryan and Seth's hair with a grin, before wrapping an arm around each of them and hugging them close, "Happily ever afters all round."
So there you go. Upward spirals, bright golden hazes, shiny stars and happy endings are all hopefully on the horizon. Well nearly, there's at least one more chapter to go. Possibly one and an epilogue. A few shout outs:
Twoppers: Through your reviews and just being around your collective giddy creativity have re-awakened my writing. It has been dormant for too long, so thank you.
TeacherTam: I'm glad I'm not misrepresenting something that has obviously had a big impact on your life. Fortunately not mine. If I've swayed, please let me know.
Miss Suga: For helping me define Ed. The minute you mentioned his hair, his character became so much clearer to me!