A/N: Thanks to the people who reviewed so far! I must warn you, though, not to expect frequent updates – even though school's winding down for the year, the amount of stuff that I still have to do is amazing. I anticipate updating, on average, every four or five days. If it goes beyond this self-created "deadline" and I haven't updated yet, you have the right to nag me about it. Until I pass that point, enjoy the second chapter! And please continue to R&R!

Disclaimer: I don't own Marissa, Summer, Seth, Ryan, or anyone else in the O.C. If I had to pick one to own, though, I would pick Ryan. (Who wouldn't? Look at those biceps!)

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Chapter 2

Marissa furrowed her brows in concentration as she guided the silky fabric under the needle. Sewing was relaxing. At first it had been awkward, frustrating and slightly annoying – she couldn't get the seams to go in a straight line or look remotely professional, and her fingers were afraid of the sharp point that threatened to pierce them with its rapid up-and-down motion. Gradually, though, she had come to love the steady rhythm that oversaw the whole process: the hum of the machine, the continual thrusting of the needle and the smooth motion of her hands all working together to produce a completely original piece of clothing to add to her growing collection.

She bit her bottom lip in anticipation. This latest one was going to be good. The mere idea of the pink cocktail dress had prompted her to pull out a pen and start scribbling a sketch on her airplane napkin, and when she had finally sat back and surveyed her inspiration in two-dimensional form, a shiver had run up her spine. On paper, it looked like something you would see on a runway in Milan, or on the red carpet at some fancy Hollywood event. She could only imagine what modeling in Italy would be like…her heels clacking down a runway…cameras flashing everywhere…smiling and turning around so everyone could see the intricacy of her very own designs…

"COOP!"

Marissa was abruptly yanked out of her modeling fantasy and brought back to the reality of her apartment. She hastily flipped the switch on the machine and spun around to face Summer, who looked slightly irked.

"Sum! You…kinda scared me."

"Sorry. I only said your name, like, five times."

"Yeah, no, it's ok…I was kind of zoned out…anyway, what's up?"

Summer looked as if she were about to say something, then noticed for the first time that Marissa was sitting in front of a sewing machine. "Wait…you're going to do your sewing in here? I thought you would work on your line somewhere else on campus, like the fashion design building or something."

"No…at UNC I did all my work in my dorm room, but now that I'm living in an apartment, I have a lot more space, so this actually works out better for me. Is that going to be ok, though? I mean, I know the noise can get a little annoying."

"No, sure, it's fine! You just have to promise me that you'll make me a totally adorable top, and I will be cool with it."

Marissa grinned. There was a reason Summer was still her best friend. "I think I can manage that."

"So, anyway…" Summer began. "Do you want to eat soon? We could order something, hang out, watch old DVDs, you know…just have a girls' night before classes start and everything gets crazy again. I haven't had Chinese food in, like, forever."

"Uh, weren't we going to have dinner with Seth tonight?"

"Yeah, we were, but he – can't. Anymore. He…has to finish reading that one book for his English Lit class. You know Cohen. He's awesome at talking about what he's going to do and very bad at actually doing it." Summer laughed nervously and quickly fixed her gaze on something fascinating outside her window.

Summer was an aspiring actress who had been a big hit on local stages, but Marissa could still read through her demeanor to tell when something was up. "You know, it's kind of weird that I've been here for four days and I haven't seen him at all yet. Are you two okay? If something happened with you guys, you can tell me."

"Oh, no, we're totally fine! He's just got a lot of work to do, so I'm trying to give him his space until he can get everything done. And he's been helping his new roommate move in, so he's been kind of occupied with that, too."

Summer was still fidgeting, so Marissa knew that she hadn't told the entire truth. However, she decided that further questioning right then wasn't likely to produce any answers, and that irritating her best friend was not the greatest way to kick off their first year of living together. She'd bring it up later, but for the moment, she let it drop. "Ok then…Chinese sounds really good."

"Great! Which season of The Valley do you want to watch?"

Not a tough choice. "Ah…One. Definitely. I can't put my finger on it, but for some reason, that season was just…"

"Better? Yeah, I know what you mean." A beeping from Summer's purse interrupted their reminiscing. She pulled out her phone and stared at the screen, slightly taken aback. "Hey, Coop – I'm gonna take this out in the hallway. Can you order the food?"

"Yeah…sure." Marissa watched as Summer closed the door behind her. Something was definitely going on. She hoped to God it wasn't that Summer and Seth were fighting again. The last time they'd gotten in an argument, she'd picked up her phone to hear Summer in the middle of a full-out rant on the other end, and only by holding the phone a foot away from her ear had she been sure that she wouldn't sustain any considerable hearing loss. Summer went through stages when she and Seth fought: first she'd be pissed off and go into one of her rage blackouts; next, she'd be depressed and would cry that things weren't working as well as she wanted them to; and finally, she'd go into denial and walk around insisting that, Who needed a skinny little Jew who was in love with the sound of his own voice? Not her. She spent her time until she and Seth inevitably made up alternating between the last two stages, and driving Marissa slightly insane in the process. Not that Marissa's old coping mechanism of drowning herself in loneliness and vodka had been more effective, but at least it had kept her from transmitting her pain to her friends. And besides, she didn't really drink that much anymore. Having grown up in Newport Beach, the novelty of alcohol had worn off for her by the time she'd arrived at college; seeing people act like total assholes and throw up all over themselves was getting a little old. She had more important things to do. Like work toward becoming a big-time designer and a fashion icon. And worry about the state of her best friend's relationship.

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Summer closed the door behind her and began walking down the corridor in a whirl of anxiety. Why the HELL had she mentioned that Seth was getting a new roommate? Would it have been that hard to come up with a lie that was just a little further from the truth? Obviously, she knew that Ryan and Marissa had to see each other eventually – she couldn't avoid her boyfriend for the rest of the semester for the sake of protecting her best friend from the knowledge that her ex was half a mile away, not 3,000. Marissa was already a little suspicious, and she was right. At some point, Marissa had to see Seth, which meant that she would soon thereafter discover Ryan. But that time didn't have to be now. And Summer fully intended to keep Ryan and Marissa separated for as long as possible.

She flipped open her phone. "Hey! Where are you?"

"The question is, where are YOU?"

"I'm coming out of my apartment building. What's going on?"

"Oh, ok, perfect. Now, close your eyes, and take 100 steps forward."

"Cohen! You dumbass! I have to cross the street! Do you want me to get hit by a football player driving his brand-new SUV? Not only would I be in the hospital, but I'd have to live with the stigma of giving Matt Leinart and co. bad publicity. Everyone would hate me."

"Fair point. But cross the street first, and then will you promise to do what I tell you?"

Summer sighed and smiled as she reached the other pavement. Seth was probably about to do something cheesy and romantic, like he'd done a million times before. And yet somehow, the gestures thrilled her every time. "Ok, I'm across."

"Close your eyes for real this time, and keep walking forward until I tell you to stop."

"You better not walk me into a tree, Cohen, or I'll give you a bruise even worse than the one I gave you last week."

"You know, at this point, another bruise like that one is sounding pretty good. Considering we've barely been in the same room all week, let alone the same bed. But my thigh's feeling much better now, so if…"

"Cohen."

"Right. Anyway, your eyes aren't closed. You can't walk forward until your eyes are closed."

"Again, you are SO cheesy!" But Summer obeyed with a smile and began blindly strolling across the campus lawn with her phone held up to her ear.

"Ok…stop. Now turn about 90 degrees to your left, and walk until I say otherwise."

"Can I stop yet?"

"Not yet…wait…ok, now."

Summer opened her eyes to see Seth, sheepishly grinning and standing under a large oak tree with a cell phone in his left hand, a bouquet of a dozen red roses held out in his right. He snapped his phone shut as her smile grew wider and wider, until she was positively beaming. "Cohen…they're gorgeous!" she said in a small voice, before accepting them from him and meeting his lips with her own. Heaven, she thought. Moments like these reminded her why she had the most perfect boyfriend on the planet.

"There's something else in there…just a little back-to-school present," he said. Seth grinned again. He loved knowing that he could still delight her with the little things.

Summer peeked among the saffron-colored flowers and pulled out a few pieces of paper that had been poking out from behind the stems. "Death Cab tickets!"

"Yeah, they're for Friday night. I figured since I missed them last time they came to Newport, we could catch them now. They're playing at Troubadour in West Hollywood."

"This is going to be so cool!" Her giddy excitement faded, though, when she fanned the tickets out to find…four. Summer narrowed her eyes and looked up at her boyfriend suspiciously. "Cohen…four?"

"Ah, yes." Seth's face looked a little too innocent.

"So you, me, and…?"

Seth decided to answer her unasked question, rather than to beat around the bush for another five minutes. "Come on, Summer, we have to tell them. You know that they're gonna know eventually!"

"Yes, Seth, but "eventually" does not have to be right now!"

"Ok, so say we don't tell them. What happens if they run into each other on their own? It's a pretty big campus, but it's a possibility, and if that happens, won't they be more mad that we didn't tell them than they will be upset to find out that they're living in the same area code?"

"It's just…I kind of wanted to delay them meeting for as long as possible."

"Summer, it's not gonna work that way. I mean, Marissa can't spend the entire year never setting foot in my dorm room. And when she does, all she'll have to do is pull open a drawer filled with nothing but wife-beaters to know that he's here."

"Seth, it's just…they're both happy right now! You remember what it was like when they broke up. It was bad. So bad that if you had told me then that they'd spend the next two years not speaking a single word to each other, I wouldn't have been surprised. They both came out of it really hurt. And I don't want them to start reliving everything again, and you know they will. He'll spend the rest of the year brooding, and she'll spend the rest of the year being depressed. It won't be good for anyone."

Seth almost couldn't handle her looking at him that way, pleading with her big brown eyes. But he knew he had a point to make somewhere. "You're right," he conceded. "No one said this was going to be easy. But you know you can't hide them from each other forever. Them meeting is pretty much inevitable right now. And, I don't know…maybe once they get over the initial shock, they'll be able to come to terms with everything and finally get over each other. That's something they need to do, and we're here to help them do it."

Summer let out a long, slow breath. Normally, when she knew she was defeated, she'd still try to fight back and would find something ridiculous to say to counter Seth's logic. This, however, was a little too serious for playful banter and verbal foreplay, so she caved. "Fine. I'll tell her soon."

"Good. Just –maybe not before tomorrow, you know, 'cause she's probably a little nervous about her first day, and doesn't need anything to add to her stress."

"Right. So, we have to promise to keep them apart for at least 24 more hours. Then we'll figure out a way to break it to them."

"I promise." Seth looked at Summer. Her face was still etched with lines of worry. He ran his hand through the back of her hair and touched her forehead to his lips, then put his arm around her to reassure her. "Everything's gonna work out. Don't worry."

She shook her head in resignation. "I can't help it. It's Ryan and Marissa."