Hello everyone! I hope that everyone had a good Labor Day. I just got back to school. I had gone home for the weekend, and thus got nothing done, and now I'm procrastinating even more. Oh well, it happens. Anyway, please review and let me know what you thought about this chapter. Thanks!

Disclaimer: The characters so do not belong to me.

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Sandy was aware that his son was a rambler. In fact, he was aware that Seth came by it naturally, and usually he could understand and follow Seth's long and roundabout train of thought, but that night when Seth and Marissa had come barreling into the kitchen talking about a thousand words per second, Sandy had no clue where Seth was going with this. But he did pick up on the words, Ryan and black eye.

"Wait, wait, wait, back up. What about Ryan and a black eye?" Seth took a deep breath.

"He has a black eye, and he said that he got it from some guys at school, but his arms are black and blue too Dad."

"And you think it's Dave?"

"Don't you?" And Sandy had to admit, that yes, he did think it was Dave.

"But where did you see Ryan?" Sandy asked and Marissa and Seth exchanged guilty looks.

"It was my fault Mr. Cohen," Marissa started. "I wanted to see him and I didn't want to go by myself, and Seth said that he would go and..."

"You went to Chino!? By yourselves? Seth, your mother is going to kill you. And me! Even though I didn't know anything about it."

"I know Dad, and we will tackle the mom problem later, for now, we need to focus on the most important problem. How do we get Ryan out of there?" Sandy shook his head.

"We can't Seth, he chose that. Do you think that he's just going to come back here?"

"We told him if he needed us we'd be here!" Seth argued.

"And you know that, and I know that, but Ryan won't admit to needing help until it's too late," Sandy replied. "The best we can hope for is that it's not too bad, that maybe he's telling the truth and to keep an eye on the situation."

"Dad!" Seth sighed audibly. "That's not good enough."

"Seth that's all I can do."

"Well that sucks like a cheap whore." At this, Sandy actually managed a laugh.

"I wouldn't have exactly put it in those terms, but yes, Seth, it does suck." They heard the front door open and Sandy glanced at the clock. Kirsten was home early. He was sure that she was going to spend as much time as humanly possible at the office.

"Hello?" She called.

"In the kitchen," Sandy yelled back. She emerged a minute later, and though she looked confused as to why Marissa was there, she smiled at three.

"I just stopped in to grab a bite to eat; I have to get back to the office. What's the matter?" She knew that they had been discussing something serious, she could see it in their stances. Marissa was biting her nails, Sandy was gripping onto the counter, and Seth's arms were pinned to his side, a clear sign that he had just recently been gesticulating wildly with them.

"Honey, the kids, although I wasn't aware of this," Sandy added that last part in, hoping that she wouldn't get as angry at him as he knew she was about to get. "went down to Chino to see Ryan."

"You did what?" Kirsten spun to face her son and Marissa, and they both had the decency to look frightened.

"We did, Mom, and we're sorry, but we have bigger fish to fry," Seth said calmly. "Dave's been beating on Ryan."

"I was going to ease her into that Seth," Sandy reprimanded. Seth shrugged.

"Is he okay?" Kirsten's hand flew to her mouth. She had known that this was going to be a bad idea letting him go back. Why hadn't she followed her instincts? Why hadn't they nixed the whole idea right from the start? Why hadn't they told Dave Atwood that Ryan wanted nothing to do with him?

"Black and blue, but still standing," Seth answered. "We have to do something Mom! He told us that it happened at school, but his arm is black and blue too. There's no way that it's happening at school. Can't we get him to come home? Can't we go to child services and tell them what's happening and that we want him back?" Kirsten felt her knees begin to tremble and all she wanted to do was to cry into her hands and wallow in self-deprecating pity. But Seth was giving her that look, she knew it well. Like he wanted her to sweep in and save the day. There was just one problem with dong that.

She had no idea how to save the day.

What could they do? Ryan wouldn't admit that it was happening, she knew that much to be true. He would just tell child services the same thing that he had told Marissa and Seth. That it had happened at school. That his parents, of course, weren't hurting him. So how did they get him out of there?

"Seth, can I talk to your father alone? Why don't you and Marissa go out and pick us up something to eat? And Marissa, call your father and tell him that you will be eating here tonight," Kirsten instructed. She was trying to take control the best way that she knew how. She would take charge right now, and that would make her feel better. Focus on the things that she could do, rather than those that she couldn't. Ryan fell into that second category.

How the hell were they supposed to get him out of there?

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Ryan woke up sore. He had forgotten to take the garbage out the night before, and he had paid for it. Living with the Cohens had made him soft. He had forgotten that in the Atwood house, if you didn't do what you were supposed to there were consequences. And they were harsher than just being scolded in a light and teasing manner, as Sandy and Kirsten always did when he or Seth forgot to do something they had asked them to do.

"Hey," Sandy would say when he came in and the two were playing video games and the dishes were still stacked up in the sink. "Is it my imagination, or were these supposed to be done when I got home?"

"Um well Dad, as wonderfully creative as your imagination is, this time, it is not you making it up, yes, they were supposed to be done. However, the ninjas were badmouthing us and calling us wimps and other names that are too harsh to be repeated, and we had to show them who was boss. As soon as we show the ninjas their proper place, we will be more than happy to wash your dishes and place them in the dishwasher where they will cleanse themselves, and of course we will put them in their proper cupboard when that cleansing process has been successfully completed." Seth never looked up from the screen where he had been battling the aforementioned ninjas. Ryan just looked up and shrugged at Sandy.

"Five minutes and then we'll get them done?" He offered.

"Okay, just have them done before Kirsten gets home. Because then I get the lecture on how I let Seth get away with too much just because he can talk his way out of any situation." Seth just nodded at this assessment.

"It is a gift for me, Dad, and a curse for you."

If he had spoken to his father the way that Seth had rambled on to Sandy, he would have a few more bruises to match the one on his face and the ones on his arm where his dad had grabbed him tightly and pulled him towards the kitchen where he demanded that Ryan clean it.

Ryan reached and turned off his alarm before it woke up his parents in the next bedroom. The walls in the house were paper-thin, and this came with two distinct problems. Dave and Dawn could hear everything that Ryan did, and he could hear everything that went on in their bedroom. From the yelling and screaming that he heard on some nights, to the sound of the headboard hitting the wall on other nights. And Seth thought he had it bad with the innuendo that Kirsten and Sandy were so fond of. And while Ryan had often mirrored Seth's disgusted faces when Sandy would comment on how beautiful Kirsten looked, or how he had tired her out the night before, he secretly enjoyed the comments. Unlike his parents, it was a healthy relationship. He knew that Sandy wouldn't tell Kirsten she was beautiful one day, and then turn around and scream at her and call her a whore the next.

Sandy would never lay a hand to Kirsten. No matter how angry he got at her.

Ryan grabbed his bag from the counter and hurried out of the house, meeting his best friend Theresa at the end of the driveway. She had been genuinely happy about Ryan's return to Chino. She had first hugged him, and then smacked him for not telling her where he had been for the past six months.

"I thought you were dead!" Theresa had yelled. "I go to your house and it's empty and you're gone! How do you think that made me feel? Did you think hey, I should call Theresa and make sure that she knows that I'm living in some swanky house in Newport and not lying in a ditch somewhere?" Ryan immediately thought of Seth and his assertion that there weren't really ditches where serial killers threw bodies of their victims.

"Get creative Mom," he informed Kirsten when they had come in late and she was still waiting up for them, a phone in one hand and a cup of coffee in the other. Ryan had felt guilty for making her stay up and worry, but Seth obviously had none of that pesky guilt.

"Okay, how was I supposed to know that you weren't cut into hundreds of tiny pieces in the trunk of some psychopath, who would later be involved in a car chase that would end with him being riddled with bullets and the discovery of your bodies? And of course, your father and I would have to go down to the morgue where the only thing that remained of you would be your teeth and maybe a finger or two, which we would have to put in a tiny little coffin and bury?" Seth just grinned at his mother.

"There Mom, that was better," he told her sweeping past to head up to his bedroom. Kirsten had groaned and dumped the rest of her coffee, given Ryan a quick hug, before telling him goodnight and going off to bed muttering about how Seth was too much like his father.

Ryan had reverted back to the way he used to be before Newport, and that involved being one of the only kids to dread the last bell of the day.

He didn't know why he put up with this still.

He could go back. He could call Sandy and tell him that he made a mistake that he wanted to live with him and Kirsten and Seth. He could say that he was sorry that he had even considered leaving in the first place. It would be easy. Sandy would surely take him back. But could he leave his parents? They were trying. Dave was at least apologizing after he had smacked him, and his mother was trying much harder not to drink herself silly every night. And they were doing this for him.

Could he really throw it back in their faces? Of course he couldn't. He would stay in Chino. He would stay with his parents and Theresa. He would try very hard not to associate everything everyone said with the Cohens. And he wouldn't go to dinner later that week like Seth had asked. Because that would just make it harder. This was a transition, and he had to stick it out. He had to make this work, and the only way to do that was to not see the Cohens, or Marissa for awhile.

At least until it didn't hurt to think about them anymore.

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"What do we do Sandy?" Kirsten asked as soon as Sandy picked up the telephone the next day. They had discussed it privately, and then a little more with Seth and Marissa, and they had come to the conclusion that there was nothing that they could do other than wait for Ryan to call, and try to keep an eye on the situation. But Kirsten wasn't having any of it. Sandy heard her toss and turn the entire night before, and he knew that it was the only thing on her mind.

"Maybe we go down there?" Sandy suggested. "Make him come to dinner with us? And maybe he admits that Dave's been hitting him? And maybe he tells us that he wants to move back in with us?" They both knew that it was a long shot. Even if they could get Ryan to come to dinner with them, there was no way that he would admit to that, or ask to move back in them. It was hopeless. And Kirsten hated hopeless. She hated when there was nothing she could do to fix it. It was her biggest pet peeve.

"I think the odds of that happening are slim to none," Kirsten moaned into the phone. She was silent for a minute, and Sandy knew, instinctively, that she was crying. He knew her too well. He knew that she was covering the bottom of the phone so that he couldn't hear her sobs.

"Honey, let me come get you," Sandy suggested. "We'll go out to lunch?"

"I have work to do," Kirsten argued half-heartedly. And it was true. She had plenty of work that needed to be done, and she knew that her husband did too. But she also knew that neither was getting anything done, and that even if they didn't go get something to eat, nothing would be done anyway.

"I'll be there in a half hour," Sandy said ignoring her.

"Okay," Kirsten answered. "I love you."

"I love you too," Sandy replied. "Hey, honey?"

"Yeah?"

"It's going to be okay," he told her.

"How do you know that?"

"I don't. But I promise you, I will intervene if things get too bad. We'll make sure that he's okay."

"I'm keeping you to that promise," Kirsten said.

"I know," Sandy said before hanging up the phone.

He would make sure that he kept that promise. For her. For himself. And for Ryan.

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Okay, well let me know what you think! You guys are the most awesome people in the world, really you are! And keep up that awesomeness (is that a word? Apparently it is, because spellcheck didn't catch it. You know what's ironic? Spellcheck says that spellcheck is misspelled. Hmmm. Anyway, I digress) and review again! Thanks!