Disclaimer: The OC and its characters are owned by Josh Schwartz and Fox. I am just borrowing them.

Author's note: First, I would like to apologize for taking so long to update this story but after the discussion on TWOP about grammar, tags and the need for a beta, I was scared. So, along came KissingChaos, the wonder beta, and helped me. She performed beta duties on the first 3 chapters and I have attempted to reload them. Keeping my fingers crossed on that one! And she has worked beta magic on this chapter as well. Despite what she says, KissingChaos is indeed a "Grammar Goddess". So, if anyone is still interested here is Chapter 4:

Memories

Kirsten handed the keys to Ryan as they exited the restaurant and walked towards the Rover.

Shyly smiling as he took them, he pushed the unlock button. "Thanks."

Kirsten climbed into the car, snapped her seatbelt and watched as Ryan got into the car. He adjusted the driver's seat to the proper distance for him, then moved on to rearview mirror, checked the passenger side mirror, and the driver's side mirror, moving it around until it was in just the right spot. He then turned the radio off, and checked the air conditioning settings. Kirsten watched in amusement as he went through everything on the checklist of a driver's education course. After he had finished with all of the pre-driving preparations he leaned forward slightly and with great concentration--noted by the tongue stuck firmly in the corner of his mouth--carefully put the car into reverse. As he turned to make sure the way was clear for backing he caught Kirsten's eye, she was smiling and he saw movement of her hand. Glancing down past her face to her hand that was tapping her seat belt, Ryan's face blushed as he realized in all of his careful preparations he had forgotten to put on his seatbelt. He turned around, put the car back into park and still blushing snapped his seatbelt in place.

"And you were being so careful," Kirsten said with a chuckle.

Ryan hung his head in mock shame and then looked at her from the corner of his eyes. "I try."

He turned around in the seat once again looked to see if it was clear to back, seeing that it was he pushed on the gas pedal but the car didn't move, so he pushed a little harder. For just a second, he couldn't guess what was possibly wrong, but one glance at Kirsten and her hand covering her mouth to stifle a laugh, he knew he had forgotten to put it into reverse.

Embarrassed now, he jumped back around in the seat and turned off the car. "I give up." Pulling the car keys from the ignition, he dropped them in to Kirsten's lap.

Instantly regretting her laughter, she grabbed the keys from her lap and held them out to him. "Oh, no….I'm sorry. You drive. I shouldn't have laughed." Covering his hand as he reached for the seatbelt lock, she said, "Ryan, I'm sorry." And she was sorry, even if it had been adorable watching him take his driving duties so seriously.

With a stubborn shake of his head and his lips drawn tightly, he pushed her hand away. "Yeah, I know. It's just…I wanted to do it right."

"Sweetie, you were doing fine. Believe me, you have nothing on me when I was a teenager. If you agree to drive, I will share." Looking up at her through his blond bangs, he thrust his hand palm up in her direction. A wiggle of his fingers let her know that he now wanted the keys back. "Okay, I'll drive."

A smile crossed Kirsten lips as she handed him the keys. "Thanks. And I really am sorry."

"You don't need to be." After putting the car into reverse, Ryan gripped the steering wheel with his left hand and turned in his seat to look out the rear window. Pausing as he turned back towards the windshield, his eyes met Kirsten's and he gave her a small smile. He had never driven her anywhere and for some reason it felt like a very important responsibility.

As they pulled out into traffic, Kirsten said, "When I was sixteen I hit a gas pump."

"What? A gas pump?" Ryan shook his head in disbelief.

"Well, I didn't really hit it, hit it. I had just gotten my license and I was driving my mom and myself to the club. My car was running low, on fumes really. So I pulled into a station. And well, I turned wrong or something as I approached the pump because I kind of bumped the corner of it."

"Bumped the corner?"

"Actually, I didn't hit the pump itself. I hit one of those concrete, yellow pole thingies they have around them. You know, to keep people like me from hitting the pump and causing big explosions."

Ryan's eyes opened wide as he tried to imagine the scene of Kirsten was describing to him and he grinned at the thought. "Seriously?" he asked. "What did your mom do?"

Kirsten crossed her arms and hugged herself as she recounted the story of her mother's reaction. "Well, I turned and looked at her. It was like slow motion, really. She didn't say much. Just looked at the pole and then at me. Like she couldn't believe that a daughter she raised could be that clumsy. She got out of the car and walked to the front. And then she said, 'Well, another life lesson learned today.' And then she laughed and said she couldn't wait to see me explain it to my father." Bringing a hand up to her face, she pulled a few stray hairs back behind her ear and she gave a soft laugh at the memory of her mother.

"That's it. She didn't yell?" Ryan's eyes never left the road and his hands remained gripped to the steering wheel.

"Nope, she never yelled. I can't remember my mom yelling. She was pretty easy going. She had to be. I mean, you have met my dad." Kirsten paused as memories of her mom and the special relationship they shared surged forward in her mind. God! It had been a long time since she had talked with anyone or shared any memories about her mom. After the funeral, it had been too difficult to talk and it physically hurt to think about everything that was wonderful about her mother. But now it felt good, the memories actually made her laugh. Would Seth, and even Ryan, one day laugh at special memories they shared about her? She hoped she had been that kind of mother to Seth, and that on some level, she had touched Ryan.

Ryan noticing the long pause and worried that Kirsten would begin crying. He really would hate it if Kirsten began to cry. He didn't handle crying girls very well. "You okay?"

Kirsten looked in his direction. "Now my dad. He wasn't happy. Not at all. He didn't yell. He just told me how disappointed he was, which can really be worse sometimes."

"Yeah." Ryan nodded his head slightly but his eyes never left the road.

"He told me how he thought I was a better driver than that and how it could have been dangerous. You know the kinds of things parents say."

"I bet you didn't drive for a while, right?"

"No, I was driving the next day. No way was my mom going to let him ground me from driving and she always won the battles."

They rode in silence for a few minutes as Ryan maneuvered them back onto the interstate. Kirsten was feeling quite good about the connections she was making with this new son, and she ventured a question about his past.

"How did you learn how to drive?"

Ryan hesitated before he answered, it was very apparent to her that he was expecting to travel along in silence for a while. "Um, what?"

"You know, who taught you how to drive?"

"Trey, my mom, Dan. I guess. Different people."

"I taught Seth to drive. Seth refused to drive with Sandy. I think it had something to do with Sandy hovering over the steering wheel and gasping at every turn."

"Sounds like Sandy." A smile crossed Ryan lips. If he had ever taken the time to imagine Sandy teaching him to drive, that is exactly what he would have imagined. His foster father would have covered every possible scenario and how to prevent it through defensive driving. Sandy could actually be quite the mother hen sometimes.

"After Seth got off car restriction for calling Sandy an overbearing, self-esteem destroying ass; I took over driving instructions. Who's Dan?" After the conversation in the restaurant, she was feeling more at ease asking him questions, but she knew that she would still need to be cautious.

"Uh, one of my mom's old boyfriends?"

"Oh, yeah."

"Yeah, I was actually only fourteen but he would let me drive around the neighborhood and pull his car in and out of the driveway. He was a good guy."

"Sounds like it. What about Trey and your mom?"

"Trey, mostly. My mom not so much." Most definitely not his mom, she was too often unavailable to teach him anything. Trey had let him drive, even before he had his learner's permit. Fortunately for his mother, that skill had come in handy a couple of times when she was in need of a trip to the hospital.

"Did you ever run into anything like a gas pump?" She looked at Ryan closely, wanting to catch any sign that this conversation was causing him too much stress.

"Once, but it wasn't really my fault. I'm a good driver."

"Oh, really. So, what was I then?" Kirsten laughed and put her hand on her hip in mock indignation.

"No, I mean. You're a good driver." His hands twisted on the wheel.

"Relax, I'm joking here. I wasn't a very good driver. I ran into many more things than the gas pump. I bumped into our garage door. I drove too close to my mother's car and scraped my mirror all the way down the side of her car. Would you like me to keep going? It's actually quite funny. I have no idea why my parents continued to let me drive."

"No kidding."

"So, what did you do?"

"I--bumped into the back of a car."

"That doesn't sound too bad. Did it cause a lot of damage?"

"Not to the car." Ryan tilted his head and shifted his shoulders in an attempt to relieve the tension he was feeling. Tension brought on by the memory of his first and only car accident. How could he have known that AJ was backing out at the same time that he was pulling into the driveway? It would have been helpful if AJ had his lights on. He could still feel the terror that seized him as the enraged man tore open his car door.

What could she say to that? Kirsten could only stare at the boy next to her in the car who had held his hands in the perfect 10 and 2 positions and never exceeded the speed limit by even a mile since leaving the restaurant. Ryan rarely shared anything about his previous life, but when he did she never knew what to say. She had grown up with the gift of security. Spoiled, sure. But never she never questioned that her parent's first priority was her safety. To Ryan, safety and security were a luxury. "AJ's car?"

"Yeah?" He gripped the wheel a little tighter and his body tensed, not sure if he could handle sharing more of his history with Kirsten. Sympathy was not something he needed. He just wanted to help her plant her damn flowers, not bond over his screwed up life.

She watched as his hands twisted tightly on the steering wheel. Sometimes he could be hard to read but not now. This conversation was making him very uneasy and he was not hiding it very well, but she risked one more question. "Were you hurt badly?"

There was only silence from the other side of the car. The muscles in his forearms tightened and his jaw clenched. It seemed to be a struggle for him to even form the words that he spoke. "AJ wasn't much on talking things over."

With that she knew there would be no more information coming from Ryan. He had opened up as much as he was going to for now. She suddenly felt silly and shallow. As a teen she had whined at how unfair her parents were for grounding her when she broke one of their rules. It was just something that she thought every other child was granted on the earth. Even as an adult, she had contributed generously to foundations to help abused children but she had never allowed the reality of it settle in her mind. It just happened somewhere out there in the universe and not in her world.

Looking out the window, Kirsten realized that they were not very far from their destination. "We're almost there. About 20 minutes, I think."

"That's good."

Unwilling to let the car fall into an uncomfortable silence again, Kirsten jumped right into the next conversation. "Ryan, I've been wondering. Do you like to draw? I mean, you've said that you are interested in architecture and architects usually like to draw."

"I draw sometimes." Ryan wondered where this discussion was going, because he was not up for anymore rummaging around in his past.

"Really? That's good to know." Kirsten made a mental note to make sure that he had all of the art supplies he needed to draw, paint or chalk or whatever he liked. "Have you always liked to draw?"

He could see where this was going. "I don't know."

Accepting that this was going to be mostly one-sided, Kirsten asked, "Did I ever tell you about the time that Seth had to do a book report in the fourth grade? It involved drawing a picture of two of the main characters in the story. Well, Seth hated to draw. Still does. Actually, he hated most of the art projects they did in school. His story was about a boy and a baby duck." Kirsten laughed at the memory of Seth complaining throughout the book report assignment. "So, Seth proceeds to draw a stick figure and then a capital cursive S. He puts a beak on the S and then adds feet down at the bottom. When Sandy pointed out that the S-duck was about 3 sizes bigger than the boy. Seth snatched the paper away from Sandy and wrote on the picture, 'The boy is standing in the distance.' We never questioned him again about his artwork for the book reports." Both she and Ryan shared a laugh at the Seth they both knew. They continued down the road with Kirsten talking and Ryan nodding occasionally. And he liked it that way.

tbc