Disclaimer: FOX owns the characters, but I own the story line.

I wrote this chapter three different times trying to come up with one that didn't suck so much ass, so hopefully you like the final result. Thanks for all the reviews so far.

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It's only a matter of a few hours before I sit straight up in bed, my breath catching in my throat as I struggle to pull myself from the depths of my nightmare and back into the real world around me. Luckily there's no sign of the Cohen's around, and I let out a dramatic sigh as I let my body fall back onto the bed, exhausted both emotionally and physically.

My head is pounding painfully due to a severe migraine as I go over everything that's been happening the past few days, and I feel the sudden urge to just crawl back under the comforter on my bed and fall asleep for the next few weeks in an attempt to get rid of all these thoughts and flashbacks of my past.

Before I get a chance to put my plan into action, someone knocks lightly on the pool house door, and without waiting for me to answer, they walk into the dark and dreary world that I've created around myself.

Seth looks at me somewhat surprised as he walks in, like he didn't expect me to be awake for the next few days, and an awkward silence fills the room as he opens and closes his mouth, trying to think of something to say since he apparently came unprepared with any sort of dialogue, something totally unlike Seth.

"I didn't mean to bother you, mom and dad just left for a meeting over the wet lands property and it was a little too quiet in the house. If you want me to leave though…"

I cut him off by waving my hand in the air before he can even finish his last statement, and a small grin spreads across his face as he closes the door behind him and sits next to me on the bed.

"I'm sorry I haven't been such great company for the last few days, my mind has kind of been in other places lately."

My attempt to break the silence doesn't get very far as Seth turns his head and stares at me blankly, something definitely plaguing his mind as he seems to be having his own conversation in his head.

"Seth…"

As I pull him from his thoughts, he shakes his head as if to get rid of the voices and looks at me apologetically before holding up a stack of comic books that he brought in with him. He silently hands me the latest Legion comic, but I set it down between us quickly before grabbing the comic book out of his hand that he's trying to read and throwing it on top of the Legion comic.

"Don't treat me like this Seth. Don't look at me like you're seeing me for the first time."

He looks only slightly stunned at my outburst and shifts uncomfortably next to me as he opens his mouth to speak, his voice a little louder than I expect.

"Maybe that's because until a few days ago the only emotion you really showed around here in Newport was anger; all the fights you get into and shit. Of course there's the rare occasion when you smile or laugh, but until I saw you flip out at the hospital the other day, I figured that maybe you just don't like living here, or maybe it's going to take a little longer than a few months to 'break out of your shell'. But after seeing that and all the outbursts since, it makes me wonder if you'll ever be happy where you are now."

He takes a deep breath after finishing his rant, and I stare blankly in front of me, trying to process everything in my already screwed up head.

"Ryan, I know everyone else is afraid to say it, but she's gone. She left you not once or twice, but three times, and this time she took an innocent kid with her and she's not coming back. She's not here anymore, but my mom and dad are, so give them a chance. And I know all of this sounds cheesy or whatever at the moment, but in the sixteen years I've known my parents, they've never been this torn up over anything."

Before I get a chance to say anything, Seth grabs the comic he was reading previously and stands up, leaving the pool house as he shuts the door quietly behind him.

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(Sandy's POV)

The house is quiet when Kirsten and I walk in, much like the way it was when I walked in the day that Ryan found out that his mom had died, but now that I think about it, it was this quiet almost everyday before Ryan came here. For a kid who doesn't talk all that much, he sure does make the house feel a lot less empty, whether he and Seth are doing something they shouldn't be, or just playing video games in the living room.

"I'm going to go check on Ryan and make sure he's doing okay. He should probably get something in his stomach before he gets sick."

I nod my head and give Kirsten a quick kiss on the lips before she walks through the kitchen and out the back towards, heading in the direction of the pool house as I go up the stairs and stop in front of Seth's door.

I knock quietly before opening the door, and he looks up from his comic book as I walk in and sit on the edge of his bed. He looks at me for only a split second before going back to his reading material, and I can immediately tell he did something that he really shouldn't have ,but I decide to avoid the question for the moment.

"Why aren't you outside hanging with Ryan? I'm sure he's a little lonely out there by himself."

He shrugs his shoulders, and although he never pulls his eyes from the comic book, I can see the slightly guilty look spreading across his face like a wild fire.

"I uh, already went out there and talked to him. He wasn't much in the mood for company, so I left him with some of my comic books and came back up here. I guess it's going to take him a little longer to get over his mom than I thought.

The last sentence catches me off guard, but before I can question him about it, I hear Kirsten running up the stairs before coming into Seth's room breathless.

"Ryan's… gone."

I look at her shocked as she struggles to catch her breath, and my head immediately snaps to Seth as he stares at his mother with wide eyes, the look of guilt becoming more evident.

"Seth, what did you say to him?"

"What? All I did was tell him to give you and mom a chance. Dawn was never really a mother to him in the first place, I don't see what the big deal is."

"What the hell do you mean 'big deal'? She was his mother and no matter how poor of a job she did at it, that still means something to Ryan. You can't just replace a parent over night, especially when they just died."

"Sandy calm down, I'm sure Ryan just needed to get out, he's been stuck in the house for the past two days."

Kirsten tries to ease the tension in the room as I stare angrily at Seth, and he looks back at me slightly scared, something I've never seen in him before. My guilt manages to catch up with me in a matter of seconds, and I quietly apologize to Seth as I walk out of the room and down the stairs to go in search of Ryan.

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I know the chapters are short, but I'm supposed to be studying for my finals that are in two weeks, and I also have three papers that are due next week.

More coming soon. Don't forget to review.