Disclaimer: I own the OC. That's the sentence only Josh can say, because he owns it all. I only own this story.

I always get the most nervous of the reactions of people after placing the first chapter of a story, so thank you for all your nice reviews.

Don't worry, niem, I didn't expect anyone already to understand the italics...but you'll find out in the eh... fifth chapter I think.

He sneaked into his house. His mother was standing in the living room with a cuckoo-clock in her hands. It was broken, the little brown wings of the cuckoo were broken. His mother had a worried expression on her face. He knew for sure that expression wasn't only there because of the cuckoo.

With every step he made he felt his body protesting by pain. His sides hurted the most of all, but he wouldn't give into the pain. He had to be silent, he didn't want to be seen by his parents like this. He went to the nearest room where he could see the damage and closed the door behind him.

He blinked his eyes a few times before he got used to the glaring light of the bathroom. He looked in the mirror at his reflection. The pale, hollow boy with blood-covered clothes he saw scared him. He touched the corner of his mouth to wipe away a line of blood. The black-eye concerned him the most, unlike the other bruises on his body he could hide.

What kind of excuse would he make up today? His parents were already distrustful since the first time he got some bruises. It was dim outside, that meant the evening was about to begin. Maybe he could stay in his room the rest of the day, pretending to make home work, refuse to eat something and he could leave early in the morning to school without being seen by his parents. Thinking about his father and mother he knew they would only get more suspicous and check up him in his room anyway.

He looked again to the black-eye in the mirror. It was really big, unless his parents had lost their eyes this morning, they would see it. He needed a patch to cover this, he let this idiotic idea slip out of his mind. It was going to be even harder to explain something like that, not to mention how striking he would look.

His reflection disgusted him. He didn't want to be this person, he had never asked to become this person. The mirror and his hate gave him an idea. The satisfaction to have an explanation gained the victory over pain. He saw himself falling into pieces just before he closed his eyes to protect himself for the incoming pieces.

His first gaze, after he opened his eyes again, went to his fist with which he had broken the mirror. A large piece of glass sticked in his hand. He watched the dark red liquid slowly flowing down his skin. A couple of small pieces of glass were cutting in his face through which some drops of blood appeared on his head. The most of the rest of the mirror had landed in the zink.

It didn't hurt him as much as he had expected. The pain was nothing compared to the feelings of belonging nowhere he faced everyday.

"...Seth?"

He turned round and looked straight into the frightened eyes of his mother who had heard the ominous, clanging sound of the falling mirror. It took her some time before she could process the sinister scene in front of her. She didn't know what happened, but she truly hoped it wasn't one of the thoughts that was whirling in her head.

For a moment he felt guilty seeing tears welling into her eyes, then this feeling of guilt was overwhelmed by his own fear. Would she suspect something? Would she know what happened? Would she know what he had done? To his relief he saw she was watching at his bloody hand, which meant his black-eye didn't matter anymore.

"The mirror fell," he said, while he felt the piece of mirror burning in his hand.

Friday

"Is Sidney home?"

"Sidney?"

Kirsten looked in confusion at the girl with dark brown hair in a pony-tail who was giving a very annoyed look back at her like she didn't want to be here. A bit surprized at the confusion of Kirsten, Summer wondered if she had made a mistake. Was she at the wrong place? She quickly looked aside seeing a glimpse of Marissa's house and with some new found confidence she started to explain who she needed.

"A curley Jewish boy."

Kirsten realized the young girl meant her son, just when she was about to answer, the discussed curley Jewish boy already was in the hallway.

"It's for me, mum," he said, smiling a bit akward to his mother.

Seth's mother looked astonished from the one child to the other. Her son never had brought anyone over to their home before. She had hoped for that day he finally did, she had never expected it would be today though and especially not that the person would be a girl. She observed the girl and started to realize something.

"You have a girlfriend, Seth?"

"No," Seth and Summer said at the same time.

Seth wondered if his mother could have said anything more embarrasing. For the first time he was glad he never had any friends to bring over to this place who would meet his family.

He dragged Summer along to the living room to get away from his mother. They sat by the table and Summer began to unpack her schoolbag which was filled with all kind of history books.

"Any idea what we're going to chose as subject, Sem?" she asked, while she looked deeply into her bag to make sure nothing was left inside.

"Seth."

"What kind of historic figure is that?" Summer frowned at him.

"Me... I mean you called me Sem. My name is Seth."

Summer sighed. Seth didn't know it was because she was annoyed or embarrased or maybe both.

"Gee, what's up with your name? I'll just call you Cohen then."

He shrugged his shoulders as answer, as long as she didn't gave him a contemptuous term as name, he would be okay with it. He brought his attention back to their history project and looked at the many history books Summer had laid on the table. The one seemed to be - if it was possible - even more boring than the other.

"I've got something for you."

He looked with horror at his mother who was standing in the door-way with a bowl filled with home-made brownies. The brownies she had made yesterday and given to him with a proud smile. He had to admit, the sweet chocolate pastries looked delicious, how they tasted however was a different story.

Kirsten put the bowl of brownies on the table and smiled at the young girl. Then she looked aside at her son. She couldn't help worrying whenever she saw him. The sadness in his eyes and his attempts to pretend he didn't exist concerned her more than she ever could have thought.

She wanted to ask the two children if they wanted to drink something, but when she saw her son looking scared for about what she was going to say next, she decided it would be best to leave them alone and left the living room.

Summer looked keen at the brownies and it didn't take long before she reached out her hand to the bowl.

"Trust me on this one, don't touch that brownie. You can read all about the man who lived more than four days after eating one of my mother's cookings in the Guiness Book of Records," Seth warned her and she pulled back her hand without taking a brownie.

She looked surprized at him and smiled. It was the most beautiful thing he had seen. She smiled, she didn't smirk. She smiled with him, not at him. He gave her a silly grin in return, while he felt his cheeks getting red.

"What's that?" Summer asked after a while, when they both had been turning the pages of the books to find a suitable subject.

"What?"

He expected she had seen something surprizing in one of the lesson-books or an embarrasing decoration in the livingroom.

"That!" to his surprise she pointed at the wound in his hand where the piece of glass had been. He had been very relieved the scratches and grazes on his face were light and someone could only see it when this person would be standing very close to him. However the wound on his hand had become a long darkred cut which was hard to miss. Until now he easily could have hidden his hand out of sight, but he had forgotten all about his hand when he had started to read in the books.

"Oh, nothing... the mirror," Seth mumbled.

He wanted to spend as little time as possible on this subject of conversation. But Summer's curious look made him realize he couldn't switch her attention to something else now.

"The mirror attacked me. I should have seen it coming. He always has been jealous at my looks and he had to see me everyday. If you think about it, you can't blame him really."

Seth looked tensed at her. Would she be satisfied with his joke or would she ask more questions just as long till she would know every little detail? Summer seemed to doubt about the same two options. Finally she dropped the book in her hands.

"You know, you're weird, Cohen. Weird and pretty funny," she smiled, while she grabbed one of the other books on the table.

He blushed again, not knowing how to react to a compliment.

The rest of the afternoon he made as many jokes as he could think of and she seemed to like everyone of them. It was a long time ago since he had had so much fun. Meanwhile their project was really proceeding. They lost all count of time so that when the moment came Summer looked at the clock, she immediately began stuffing in her books in her black bag. She hastily walked out of the Cohen's house mumbling something that sounded a lot like See you later, Cohen.

Suddenly Seth thought Mrs Lenor was the best teacher of the whole wide world. He promised himself that from this day forward he would always pay attention to all of her lessons, which definitely meant he couldn't fall asleep anymore in her classes.

He looked at Summer from behind the window. She didn't look back at him because she was running very fast only thinking about the time, but it didn't bother him at all. I'm Cohen. I'm weird and pretty funny. He said to himself with a smile, repeating the words in his head over and over.

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She turned the key in the lock as silent as she could. The oaken door cracked a bit when she opened it. It was a quarter past seven, she should have been home for dinner more than an hour ago.

Summer walked on tiptoe in the hall. It was dark, only the lamp in the kitchen seemed to be lit. She moved slowly, because she was scared to fall on something she couldn't see. She dropped her pink bag on the floor. Just when she was near her bedroom, she was startled by his voice.

"Where have you been?"

She turned round and looked at her father's face. He was a big dark figure standing right in front of her. It was hard to see his facial expression because of the weak light that hardly was to be seen in this space. However she clearly smelled the scent of alcohol that surrounded him.

"The library," she said too fast to make it believable.

He knew she lied and she knew he knew. She looked round for help, for her mother, but she didn't see anyone. Automatically she stepped back, away from her father. He took hold of her arm, so she couldn't run off.

"Where have you been?" he asked again, but this time on a more threatening tone.

Not one single answer could have saved her, so she didn't say a thing. Saying that she had been working on a history project with one of her class-fellows would probably raise his frustations. For a few seconds they kept looking at each other in silence. Summer tried to walk to her room, but he still held her arm.

Suddenly let go of her arm through which she fell stonehard on her left knee. An enormous thrust of agony droned through her leg. She looked at him with her big brown eyes which were filled with fear. He held up his hand, ready to work off his anger at her for the second time. She closed her eyes and held her own hand in front of her face for protection.

"Leave her alone."

Summer opened her eyes again and saw a second figure in the darkness. This figure was smaller and less threatening than the one that was standing right in front of her. It was the figure of her mother. Her father directed his attention to his wife. Summer got up from the floor and went to her room, while she still felt the pain in her knee by every step she made.

She closed the door behind her and lay down on her bed. She burried her face in her pillow, trying to ignore all the screaming and dins that were coming from the hall. The tears were coursing down her cheeks. She wondered how long it would take before she would ran out of tears.