Disclaimer: I do not own the O.C.

Chapter 4 – Jealousy

They had been back at school now for two months, the same amount of time Seth and Summer had been together. Summer sat in class tapping her pen on her desk. She was watching the clock slowly tick, getting closer to lunch. Summer sighed. She was so bored; math was her least favourite subject, which sucked because she was actually quite good at it. But who cares about linear equations? When would she ever need that?

"Ms. Roberts?"

Summer snapped back into reality. "Uh, yeah?"

"Do you know the answer?"

"Umm… add -2y and 2y to eliminate y…" she guessed.

"Very good Ms. Roberts, but I hope you will pay attention next time because you might not be able to bludge your way through the next time I ask you a question."

Summer blushed and tried to pay attention to Mr McFarlane's monotone voice, but just ended up staring blankly into space again. She started doodling in her notebook, and found herself writing Seth's name over and over.

After what seemed like forever, the bell finally rang, signalling the end of class and the start of lunch. Summer was glad that she had lunch period with Seth, Marissa and Ryan. She went to her locker and put her textbooks away.

Seth came up behind Summer and wrapped his arms around her waist.

"Hey Summ," he said, kissing the top of her head.

"Hi," she said turning around and giving him a kiss on the lips.

"Let's go meet Ryrissa." Seth said.

"Why did you nickname them that? You know they are two separate people."

"Yes but they are so rarely seen separated so I decided to save time by shortening their two names to one name so that instead of saying 'Ryan and Marissa' which is like, five syllables, we could say 'Ryrissa' which is just three syllables. Well it would be quicker if I didn't have to explain it."

Summer hit Seth in the stomach.

"You are such a dork. You know you would've been killed for having an idea like that in Chino."

"Yes, well we aren't in Chino now are we Summer?"

Summer shook her head and took Seth's hand.

Seth and Summer walked over to their usual table to find Marissa and Ryan kissing.

"C'mon now people this is where we eat, you can do that behind closed doors." Seth said, and the couple broke apart.

Summer giggled and sat down opposite Marissa, with Seth sitting next to her.

"See I told you. Sometimes it's hard to see where Ryan ends and Marissa begins."

Summer made a disgusted face.

"What was that Seth?" asked Marissa.

"I said I see Ryan's food is near its end and Marissa's begins…" Seth rambled off.

Marissa and Ryan had matching faces of confusion and looked at Seth strangely.

"So Seth and I are going to the beach later, you guys wanna come?" Summer asked, changing the subject.

"Sorry, I've got soccer practice." Ryan said.

"Yeah, and I don't want to be a third-wheel, so I'll just go watch Ryan."

"Okay. Rachel Godfrey's having a party tonight. Do you wanna all go to that?" asked Seth.

"Yeah sure," said Summer, and Marissa and Seth nodded.

"Awesome its gonna be massive."

Seth and Summer walked hand in hand down the near-empty beach, eating ice-creams in silence. That silence was soon broken as they heard a voice calling out to Seth.

Seth turned around to see a tall, blonde haired girl waving at him.

"Who's that?" Summer asked, as Seth attempted to hide behind her. It was too late; the girl was already on her way over to the couple.

"Hey Seth," the girl said, throwing her arms around Seth and completely ignoring Summer. "How are you?"

"Uh… hey Jessica. When did you get here?"

"Yesterday. My dad got transferred back to Newport so I'm living here again."

"Oh, that's great."

Summer coughed on purpose, reminding Seth that she, his girlfriend, was still there.

"Oh, Jessica, this is Summer. She's my girlfriend."

Jessica looked Summer up and down, then gave her an icy "Hi."

"Nice to meet you," Summer said in a matching tone.

"So, are you going to Rachel's party tonight?" Jessica asked.

"Yeah, we're both going." Seth answered.

"Cool. See ya there." Jessica gave Seth another hug, gave Summer another glare, and turned to run back towards the pier.

"So Cohen. Who the hell was that?" Summer demanded.

"Um… that was Jessica."

"Yeah, well who is Jessica?"

"Well she was kind of my… uh…well, we kinda hooked up this one time right after me and Holly broke up and before we got together and I'm sorry I didn't tell you but she moved like after it happened so I didn't think I would ever see her again. But now she's back."

Summer rolled her eyes and continued walking down the beach, Seth following after.

Seth and Summer walked into Rachel's huge house, filled with heaps of people dancing and making out. The music was deafening as Seth and Summer made their way through the house, finding drinks outside.

Before long, both Seth and Summer were wasted, dancing and grinding on the dance floor. Summer found Seth's mouth and kissed him hard and long. They pulled away, out of breath.

"I have to go to the bathroom." Summer said, as she began to walk through the crowds of people to find it.

Seth was left alone, so, even though he knew he shouldn't, he went to get another drink.

On his way there, Seth was intercepted by a drunken Jessica.

"Hey baby," she said, slurring as she spoke.

"Hey Jess."

"Remember that time we hooked up? That was so great." Jessica continued, as she wrapped her arms around Seth's neck.

Seth tried to hold her up, but being unstable himself, wasn't doing a very good job.

"I really, really like you. I don't care about Spring or whatever her name is. Will you kiss me Seth?"

Summer watched all this from nearby. 'That bitch is not going to steal my boyfriend,' she thought, as she marched up to Seth and Jessica.

"Do not answer that question," she said to Seth before turning on Jessica. "Who the fuck do you think you are? You know that Cohen is with me, and you try to hit on him at the beach, and now you want to hook up with him here? That's not gonna happen, skank." Summer grabbed Jessica's arms and pushed her off Cohen.

"What are you doing bitch?" Jessica yelled, slurring and stumbling trying to stand up.

"I am getting you away from my boyfriend. Go find some other random you can fuck."

Jessica, too incapable to think of anything to say, ran at Summer, knocking her to the ground. A very bewildered Seth watched as his girlfriend began to beat the shit out of the drunken girl who had taken her down. By now, most of the people who were sober enough to know what was happening, were watching the two girls wrestling on the floor. Summer threw one last punch and got off of the ground. Jessica tried to get up, but due to pain and intoxication, found it too difficult to stand.

"Don't come near him again!" Summer yelled at the girl on the floor, before taking Seth's hand and walking out of the house.

Seth drove the couple to Summer's house, barely saying anything the whole way. He parked the car in the Cohen's driveway and looked at Summer as she looked at him.

"Cohen."

"Summer, you didn't have to hurt her. I wasn't going to let her kiss me."

"What, so now you're upset that I hit her because she was trying to steal my boyfriend? You know what, if that's how you feel, then you can go back to the party and kiss her." Summer went to get out of the car, but Seth stopped her.

"Summer, I love you."

Summer hesitated, and could tell by Seth's expression that he was hurt by this.

"No, that's cool you don't have to say it back." Seth said, suddenly interested in his hands.

"It's just, I've never said that to anyone before. Seth you know how my life's been. And because of how I've been raised, it makes it hard to trust people. Everyone I have trusted has either left or betrayed me." Summer was close to tears at this point.

Seth took her hand. "Summer. I am not going to leave you. I love you. And I don't care that you haven't said it to me. I can accept that you're not ready yet and I can wait until you are." Seth kissed Summer deeply.

"You wanna stay over?" asked Summer when they pulled away.

Seth smiled and got out of the car.

This was a bit of a random chapter, pretty much just to fill up space between last chapter and next chapter. Please review, I've already half-written the next chapter so I'll update really soon.