Okay, wow, thank you so much for the reviews. Now, I finally have the next chapters all planned out. I wrote majorly over the last few days. I mean, I have two chapters done and ready. I'm planning about 21, 22 chapters. I think that's enough. And I'm kind of doubting on having a sequel to this, because I have nowhere to go with it. But hey, if you think I should, I will. You just might have to give me more ideas. Okay, here's the new chapter!

"Well, who should go up?" Sandy asked Kirsten. They had to talk to Seth, but neither really wanted to. Seth would be nervous, definitely with their decision.

"Not me," Kirsten said immediately.

"Well, I don't want to," They both knew Seth had a tendency to run when things got bad.

"How about both of us?" Kirsten suggested.

"No one to stop him when he tries to run," Sandy got rid of that idea.

"So..." Kirsten still didn't know.

"Rock paper scissors?" Sandy tried.

"Sure," Kirsten gave in. They each put one of their hands into a knuckle, playing the game. "Rock..."

"Paper..." Sandy looked up at Kirsten.

"Scissors..." She stared at him. Talking to their son had becoma a choice of chilod's play.

"Shoot."

Both looked down at their hands. Kirsten held a strong rock, Sandy a flimsy peice of paper. They had both chosen what they thought the other would choose.

"Damn," Sandy put his piece of paper over and he sighed. "Can't we both go up there?"

"He's gonna listen to you easier," Sandy commented.

"How so?" kristen didn't believe her husband.

"You were with him at his weakest," Sandy told her. He had been shocked when Kirsten told him what Seth had done. It was the thing that made him feel like a bad parent. Sandy knew he had to talk to his son, but Kirsten needed to more.

"Exactly. He doesn't want to talk to me now. You should," kristen knew she wouldn't get out of this.

"Just go talk to him. I'll be outside the room waiting for you," Sandy assured his wife.

"Don't. I'll be fine. Go check on Ryan. Make sure he's okay," Kirsten looked out from the living room to the pool house, where the shades were drawn.

"Okay. Good luck," Sandy let go of Kirsten's hand.

"Thanks," Kirsten walked out of the room and into the kitchen. She noticed something that wasn't right. "Did you do something to the phone?"

"No. Why?" Sandy went into the kitchen to see what Kirsten meant.

"It has duct tape on it," She held up the phone, with its' red back to Sandy.

"How'd that happen?" He walked closer to inspect the phone.

"I think it has to do with what we heard earlier," Kirsten commented.

"I never thought Seth to be the phone destroying type to me. Ryan always seemed that," Sandy took the phone from Kirsten.

"I thought that too, but there's always a first time for everything I suppose. I'll have to talk to him about that too," Kirsten really did not want to have this conversation with Seth.

"Yep. Hate to miss it," He added sarcastically.

"Don't. Why don't you have it instead?" She looked eagerly at her husband.

"Kirsten..." Sandy started.

"I know. But when are you gonna talk to him?" Kirsten kept procrastinating.

"Um...how about when he goes?" Sandy suggested.

"And when is that gonna be? It could be a while before he goes. We have to set it up..." Kirsten was careful not to raise her voice too loud so that Seth didn't hear.

"It won't take a while to set it up. He has to go soon. He can't not go," He replied.

"I know. Just talk to him soon," Kirsten sighed and walked out of the room. She started up the stairs, trying to plan how to tell Seth. She didn't want to do this.

Seth's door lingered in front of her, and she didn't knock on it. She was afraid to. But she had to. Her knuckles slightly pounded on the white door.

"Seth?" Kirsten remembered the last time she did this. It didn't end well.

"Yeah?" Seth answered the call. So far so good.

"Can I come in?" Kirsten braced herself for the trouble.

"Sure," She had gotten farther she had on Thursday. Maybe this would go better.

Kirsten turned the knob and walked inside, not sure what to expect. She found her son sitting on his bed. She could envision him as eight years old.

When Seth was little, and they had moved to Newport, Sandy and Kirsten tried their hardest to help him adjust. She knew all the moms of the kids in Seth's class, but the only one who ever had a kid that went to one of Seth's birthday parties was Julie Cooper.

Julie and Kirsten were close friends, and Kirsten always tried to get Seth and Marissa to be friends, but it never worked. Seth had only once been invited to one of Marissa's parties, and he went, much to his own dismay. After that one, according to Julie, Jimmy had a problem with co-ed parties. Kirsten never believed it.

Seth had always been the outcast, even in Berkeley. He didn't have any friends there either. Kirsten always wondered if it had been something she did, and she wanted to know how. Why didn't Seth ever have any friends? Why had it taken Ryan to come before Seth finally opened up and ultimately bottled inside himself? What would life be like if Ryan hadn't come into their lives?

"Hey," Kirsten greeted her son carefully.

"Hi," Seth gave his mother a quick smile.

"How do you feel?" She could see the scar on his head. Kirsten wished to be back in a time where she could trust her son, not constantly worry about him.

"Fine," Seth was feeling a little better now since he had laid everything out to Summer.

"Do you know what happened to the phone?" She began. She knew Seth had to be the culprit.

"Sorry about that," Seth didn't look up at his mother.

"What happened?" Kirsten sat on Seth's bed.

"Got pissed at myself," Seth answered. He knew that there was an ulterior motive to this talk. He knew Sandy and Kirsten had reached a decision. Seth might as well start packing now.

"Well, at least you didn't take the anger out on yourself, just the phone," She tried to make her son feel better.

"And the wall," Seth informed her.

"What?" Seth pointed to the dent without looking up. "Oh."

"Sorry," He apologized.

"It's fine. Doesn't look like you threw it that hard," Neither spoke for a bit, Kirsten took in Seth's room. Band posters were everywhere, most of them she didn't know. There was the surf board Sandy and she bought him in hopes he could meet some new people. He learned to surf, but only with his dad.

They sent Seth to camp every year so that he could make a few friends and they could have a nice break. Seth was miserable the whole time and he would call, begging them to take him home. Sandy would make Kirsten refuse and he would have to stay there for another three weeks. They gave up sending him to camp after a few years.

Sandy knocked on the pool house door. No one had seen much of Ryan lately.

"Come in," Ryan could see through the drawn shades. All the lights were out in the pool house, Sandy almost thought Ryan wasn't in there.

"Is it okay if I turn on the lights?" Sandy walked into the dark pool house.

"Oh yeah, that's fine," Ryan sat up as the bright lights lit up the perfect room with the misplaced teen in the middle of it.

"Now, why are you lying awake in a dark pool house?" Sandy sat next to Ryan.

"I was gonna sleep, but I could sleep, and I was too tired to get up and turn on the lights," Ryan explained.

"So you couldn't sleep, and you're too tired to get up? That's a little...strange," Sandy commented.

"Yeah," Ryan agreed.

"So what's up? What's new?" Sandy knew Ryan would be a little easier to talk to than Seth.

"Nothing really," Ryan answered.

"How did the visit to Summer go?" Sandy was feeling so behind in everything.

"It was good other than Marissa telling about Seth, and Summer flipping out, and then I told Summer all about my experience with Willow Creek," ran had become sick with telling that damn story.

"You did? Wow, thought you'd take that to the grave," Sandy joked with him

"Yeah, well," Ryan hadn't slept since being in the hospital.

"Have you had any cravings? You can tell me," Sandy looked over at Ryan.

"I sort of have. I mean, it's been on my mind a lot, so it might just be that. I don't know," Ryan did crave it, a lot actually, but he learned not to have it. It almost destroyed his life before. His life was a lot better now, he wasn't going to ruin it.

"Yeah. I did stuff when I was younger. Never to your extent, though. You know, I smoked a few joints back when I was in college. At least you don't have to learn that lesson anymore. What did you do when you were..." It was incredibly strange sharking drug stories with his son. Sandy couldn't believe he was talking about it.

"LSD, acid," Ryan answered depressingly, he regretted the whole thing. What good came out of it? Nothing.

"Never tried that. I'm not saying I tried a lot of stuff..." Sandy tried to dig himself out of a hole.

"I got ya," Ryan told him.

"What does it do?" Sandy mentally hit himself. Had he actually asked a former drug addict what kind of high a drug gives you?

"It gives you one hell of a fucked up trip," Ryan informed Sandy, then noticed his mistake. "Sorry."

"I'll let it slide this time. Just don't speak like that around Kirsten. She'll wash your mouth out with soap. Literally," Sandy warned.

"I won't. Don't worry," Ryan assured Sandy.

"Good. So. What else is new? Any new girls? You and Marissa seemed close yesterday morning," Sandy remembered that. It seemed so long ago.

"It's not happening. We fought. Twice," Ryan didn't quite want to think about the fights. "It involved a lot of accusations. I kinda lost it."

"Hmm...you losing your cool. That's pretty new," Sandy joked to his son.

"Wow, your sarcasm is in ful mode," Ryan commented.

"Well, I've been fighting with Kirsten, oh, all day, and I finally got a break. She's up talking to the other one," Kirsten hadn't let up with the argument all day.

"Seth?" Ryan said.

"Yeah, that's his name. He needs some help. A break from everything," Sandy told Ryan.

"So then he's gonna go to..." Ryan asked.

"Yeah. It's the best thing. He's gonna hate it. Doesn't do well with this stuff," Sandy answered.

Every second upstairs in Seth's room felt like a year. Kirsten wasn't saying anything, neither was Seth. He just wanted his mother to tell him about his New York trip and leave him to his own misery.

Kirsten was procrastinating, she didn't do that a whole lot. She always did her work, right when it was assigned. Did this count as work? Obviously not, otherwise, it'd be done by now.

She didn't know how to word it. Seth would take it to the worst level, she supposed. So how could Kirsten word it nicely? There was no way.

Kirsten began to think of her own mother. She had always been good with words. Kirsten missed her so much.

It had been a while since Kirsten really thought hard about her mother. Hailey looked so much like their mother, Kirsten barely at all. But their mother had been the best. Kirsten remembered the time when her mother tried to teach her how to cook. Her mother had left the room no two minutes before the smoke alarms were going off and everything was in flames.

Over ten years had passed since Kirsten's mother passed away. Seth had been way too small to really understand what was happening, Kirsten was both happy and mad about that. Seth didn't have to know, but he should've.

Kirsten remembered when her mother was in the hospital, near the end. They had moved to Newport, and Kirsten was working for her father. After school, every day, she would pick Seth up from school and take him to the hospital, and her mother would watch him while both Kirsten and Sandy worked. Her mother enjoyed the alone time with her only grandson, most of the times, Kirsten would walk in the room to see Seth asleep in his grandmother's arms. The one day Kirsten took a camera with her and got a picture of her sleeping son and mother.

When Kirsten's mother died, it had been a sad time for everyone. Seth didn't understand what happened, and Kirsten tried to shield him from it. But she couldn't. Caleb wanted Seth to attend his grandmother's funeral. So Sandy and Kirsten dressed him up in his little suit and sat him between them in the front row.

Kirsten barely got through the ceremony, and by the end of it, Seth was sitting on the other side of her and she was falling apart in Sandy's arms.

Seth was the only kid there, and he probably paid the most attention since he didn't understand any of it. But his eyes were always up front, they never strayed, except when they looked over to Kirsten and he would smile to her and she would attempt to smile through her pain.

Seth was even there when they laid his grandmother into the ground. He put a single white flower on her casket. Kirsten wished back then that she didn't understand what was happening. But Seth did understand that his grandmother was gone, and he felt lonely. But until he laid the flower on the casket, he thought he'd see her again.

"Bye Grammy," He had said as Kirsten broke down. Sandy watched his son say goodbye, come over to them and hug his mother's leg.

Seth actually did remember a lot of this, he just blocked it out of his thoughts. He had never seen his mother so sad than on that day. That memory was probably the most prominent Seth had from when he was little. He remembered some of the times sitting on the hospital bed, next to his sick grandmother as she told him stories. He loved those stories. It had been the hardest when Seth got picked up on the next Monday and Kirsten had to fill some last papers out with her father at the hospital. Seth ran off to his grandmother's room and found it empty. He remembered climbing up on the bed and finding he was the only person there.

Seth's grandmother died on November 1st.

Kirsten looked around Seth's room, trying to place herself in the right time. Gosh, she missed her mother so much.

"Mom? Are you okay?" Seth saw his mother was crying.

"I'm fine. But we need to talk," Kirsten wiped her eyes. She looked over at Seth, who glanced up for only a second.

"About?" Seth knew a lot was going to change. He didn't want it to though. He wanted to run back in time, all the way back to Valentines' Day of last year. That where he swore everything started.

No, first he'd run back to when he hit Mitch. He'd apologize. Life would hopefully go on the same and Seth would stop Theresa from taking that catering job and seeing Ryan. He wouldn't have sex with Summer, even though they did end up together. That way, he wouldn't hurt her.

So when summer would roll in, Ryan and Marissa would be happy, and Seth and Summer would flirt until November, when on the first day of that month, the shooting would make them realize they loved each other. All four of them would be alive and happy, and get through the horrible tragedy. That's what would happen.

No way. Everything would be different than that. And plus, Seth was a terrible runner. He wouldn't be able to change all of that.

"Everything," Kirsten wasn't ready.

"Figured," Seth moved to the side of his bed, next to his mother.

"Seth..." Kirsten started, but didn't say a word after that. She loved her son to death, and this was something she vowed never to do. This was an easy escape.

Seth just wanted to get through this. He was petrified of what to come. Would his parents send him to New York? They couldn't, not this far into school. Of course, he had missed a whole lot of it already. He hadn't applied to colleges. Could he still? Or would he be taking a year off. He had no clue.

Kirsten continued trying to word this correctly so that Seth wouldn't freak. He always overreacted about thins. She hoped Sandy got Ryan and they were blocking the exits.

"Mom?" Seth looked at his mother, who fell out of her thoughts.

"Hmm?" She looked at her almost grown up son, confused.

"You wanted to talk about stuff?" Seth knew his mother sometimes had a bad case of procrastination when it came to confrontation. He constantly did. He avoided it at all costs.

"Right, well, this is for the best..." Kirsten wished she had forced Sandy to come up here. He could have explained it better. Actually, he probably could've at least explained it.

"What'd you pick?" Seth just wanted to know if he needed to start packing.

"Pick what?" Kirsten didn't understand that Seth had heard his parents fighting.

"If I'm going to New York or not," Seth answered.

"You heard us?" She knew she had yelled too loud.

"The neighbors could hear," Seth looked down.

"Seth, you have to understand..." Kirsten started.

"Mom, I don't think it's a good idea. I mean, it's avoiding everything. I'm losing it, and it's probably best to ship me away to, like, Willow Creek, not because Summer's there, but because I think I need a permanent stay with a straight jacket," Seth rambled.

"Seth, I don't think you're crazy," Kirsten put her arm around Seth.

"I sure as hell do. I mean I'm hearing voices in my head, and come on, I tried to kill myself twice, how doesn't that count as crazy? Mom, I'm fucking insane. Clinically insane," Seth continued to ramble.

"Seth, you're not insane..." Kirsten just barely didn't yell at Seth for his cursing.

"Yes I am. Next thing you know, I'll be seeing things. Like, a person standing somewhere that you get pissed at and want to punch, but there's no one there," Seth could stop rambling.

"Seth, stop," Kirsten said and Seth got up.

"No, Mom, I need to be committed and put in a straight jacket and shoved into a padded room because I'm so screwed up," Seth kept going.

"Seth, you're not screwed up," Kirsten really opened a pandora's box.

"Then why did I try to kill myself two times?" Kirsten made him sit down, and he refused to look at her. He liked to avoid eye contact with the person he was telling his heart to.

"I don't know," Kirsten was near tears thinking about what Seth said.

"Exactly, I'm crazy," Seth was really afraid of what he was saying.

"You are not crazy, Seth. Every teenager goes through this," Kirsten tried to help.

"So every teenager is in a school shooting and gets shot and falls in a coma for almost two months? And every teenager has their ex try and kill themself and then they get shipped away? So after that, every teenager tries to kill themselves twice?" Seth asked her.

"Seth, stop this," Kirsten begged.

"Stop what?" Seth finally looked over at his mother.

"Saying you're crazy when you're not. You're going through depression, that is not insanity. Please, just calm down. You're gonna get through this all. Because we decided that..." Kirsten paused before answering.

So, I think I'll stop there. Tell me what you think should happen, and maybe I'll please you and maybe I won't. So, if you want a sequel, please tell me and I'll try to figure out what it would be about. And, hopefully you got the hint about Seth's grandma and that date...hmm...maybe you didn't. And maybe you took the hint about Ryan? Oh, I have plans for him. You guys asked for it, and I'll give it to ya! So, please review, I love reading them. It makes my day!