I believe that this chapter solved a hideous block that had plagued me along with the disgusting reality of going back to school. It stars a little rough, but I think I've got it how I want it in the end. Thanks so much to reviewer kay.note because it's probably thanks to them that this chapter came out. And to Angelus1 for writing like she does. I shall still say that nothing here belongs to me, and I would still like to ask you to review. And as always, peace and love...

"Be good. I love you, sweetie."

"I love you too."

Summer kissed the top of Chris's head and knocked on the door. Marissa with a towel wrapped around her pushed the door open, smiled when she saw it was Summer, and walked away with the door still ajar.

Summer walked in, Jenn and Chris behind her. Brendan came running down the stairs and nodded when he saw it was Summer.

"Oh. Hi."

"Hi."

He looked like he was going to say something for a second, but walked off with his cell phone still pressed to his ear. Summer shrugged and walked into the kitchen; Marissa was standing in front of the mirror, working a comb through her wet hair. Summer sat at the kitchen table and grabbed a nail file from the center of it.

"Thank you so much, sweetie, for doing this." Summer worked off the edge of her middle finger.

"Oh, yeah, sure. What are you guys actually doing?" Marissa dropped the comb on the counter and sat across from Summer.

Summer shrugged. "I don't know. Getting dressed up and going to dinner."

"Who's going?"

"Um, me. Ryan, Mr. Cohen, Mrs. Cohen, and...Seth." Summer filed her nail farther down, soft flecks landing on the table.

Marissa nodded and leaned back in her chair, pulling her knees up with her. Summer held the file in front of her and stared at Marissa. Marissa stared back.

"What?" Summer lay the file on the table.

"You were staring at me."

"So? You were staring at me."

"I didn't say anything about anyone."

"But you were going to."

"No, I wasn't."

"Sure."

"What would I say anyway?"

"I don't know."

"Because you're over him?"

"Exactly. I don't care about Cohen, and I don't care that I have to spend a whole night with him."

"Cohen? God, that was such a long time ago. High school."

"Yeah. Right. So, I'm going to go. Thank you, Riss, Ryan says so too. Have fun."

"We always do. Bye, honey."

Summer got up and hugged Marissa, dropping a quick kiss on her cheek.

"Wait, um, could I ask you to do me a huge favor?"

"Yeah, sure, what?"

"At, like, 9, could you call me? Just to break any kind of...I don't know, tension? That might be there?"

"Oh, yeah, sure."

"Thank you." Summer kissed her cheek again and walked out. She mussed Chris's hair on his way in and hugged Jenn as she came running behind him. As Summer got to the door, she shouted behind her, "Bye, Brendan!"

"Bye Summer! Have fun!"

"You too!"

Summer closed the door behind her and crossed her arms lightly beneath her breasts. She had to go through with this. She had promised Mrs. Cohen that she would, and so she really had to. Ryan would be there to rescue her from too many awkward silences, but she was going to have to see him. Try not to stare. For a week, she had ignored him pretty well, while still always noticing when he paid her any attention. But she was going to have to talk to him. She had to get dressed.

Summer opened the door to the pool house, revealing Ryan squinting his eyes, turning a Cosmopolitan to the side.

"What's that?" Summer threw her keys on the bedside table and took off her jacket.

"How many erogenous zones are there?"

"Depends on whom you ask."

Ryan was barely listening to her, his brow still furrowed, his lips gently forming numbers, trying to count in his head. Summer kicked off her shoes and fell onto the bed next to him. Upon being ignored, she threaded her head underneath the magazine and grinned.

"Hi. Why are you in here?"

Ryan finally looked down at her and shrugged.

"Why aren't you dressed?"

He shrugged again.

"Go."

"In a second. I'm almost done." He pulled the magazine over her head and let his eyes fall back into concentration.

Summer rolled her eyes, but crawled off the bed. "Don't look up."

"Uh-huh."

She pulled her shirt over her head and stepped out of her jeans. Standing in front of her closet, she browsed through the dresses she had, nothing just right. She pulled a blue floor length with a boat neck out and held it up to her.

"Ryan."

He looked up.

"You weren't supposed to do that. Anyway, what do you think?" She swirled the skirt, briefly flashing her finally tanned thigh.

"It's nice."

"Nice?"

"Really nice?"

Summer groaned and muttered, "Look down again." She put the dress back and kept looking. She settled for a dark wine dress that went down to her knees and had a sharp triangle cut out in the center of the neckline, Ryan still looking at the Cosmopolitan. She thrust a pillow at him, hitting the magazine and caving it towards him.

"What?"

"What do you think?"

He looked up and nodded twice. "Yeah."

"Yeah?"

He nodded again. "Yes. It's...it's good."

"Okay. Now go get dressed. You're going to be late."

Ryan rolled off the bed and closed the door softly behind him. Through the glass, he could see Summer twisting her hair up, but letting it fall back down. She grabbed at least five different lipsticks, holding them up, but putting them back down. Carefully shaking his head, Ryan left her to go through the same ritual with everything possible.

Seth sat on the floor of Ryan's room, staring at the wall in front of him. Ryan ran a few fingers through his hair, glancing at Seth every now and then. Seth wouldn't look at him.

"So...nice weather."

Seth finally turned his head around to Ryan's grin. He rolled his eyes and spun his head back around.

"Sure."

Ryan fixed his sleeves and opened the door. He looked back at Seth, still staring directly in front of him.

"Are you coming?"

Seth snapped his head up and nodded. "Yeah." He got up and followed Ryan out the door.

Kirsten smiled at the two of them, grinning farther as she saw Sandy walk up behind them. He put a loose arm around both sons' shoulders and grinned. Kirsten laughed.

"You're all so handsome. Where's Summer?"

Ryan slowly nodded. "Still getting dressed I think."

"Would you boys please go get her?"

Ryan shrugged and grabbed Seth's shoulders, directing him to the pool house. Kirsten smiled gently at Sandy and slipped her hand down to his waist.

"I haven't seen you in forever."

"I know." He kissed her nose and they walked together out to the car.

Ryan knocked lightly on the door. "Open." followed and he opened the door. Seth slumped in behind him, his hands stuffed down into his pockets. Summer had finally fixed her dress the way she wanted and gotten her hair to behave. She had just lost her shoes.

"Two seconds. Two. I...two seconds." She put up one finger, but quickly switched it to two and bent down on the floor to search under her bed for the missing footwear. Ryan bobbed his head and sat on the desk chair, Seth hovering cautiously beside him. Summer crawled over to the closet and finally pulled out two very high satin shoes.

"Yes. Okay, let's go." She flashed a quick smile and walked past the two of them without a reaction to the guy still not sure how he should be standing.

Marissa sat on the couch. Brendan sat on the chair. Jenn sat on the floor in front of the coffee table. Chris sat in between Marissa's legs on the floor in back of the coffee table. 8:23. Marissa was sure of that; she had checked her watch at least four times in the last minute. Chris yawned; Brendan yawned.

"So...when do you guys get back to school?" Brendan asked, swinging his legs around to dangle off of the chair's arm.

Jenn shrugged. "Soon. Too soon."

Brendan nodded and leaned his head back onto his hand. Marissa faintly smiled at him, leaning back herself so her head touched the couch. Chris stood up and crawled onto the couch beside her, leaning his head on her lap. Her hand absentmindedly ran through his hair that was starting to curl in the humidity. Her fingers gently pressed down on his head, and slowly he fell asleep. 8:45. But it was summer. So he had an excuse.

It slightly amused Seth that he was now considered one of the 'adults.' This was an 'adults only' dinner. It was kind of cool. Summer was sitting across from him, next to Kirsten and Sandy. Ryan sat next to Seth, watching the waitresses go by in their short black skirts. Kirsten and Sandy were whispering things to each other, obviously very happy to be out of the house together for the first time in a long time. Since Seth had left, Sandy had seemed to stay at the office later and later. But he was there now, an arm tightly around his wife, her head sometimes grazing his shoulder. They were still in love. No matter how late he came home. Summer sighed.

"Excuse me." She got up from the table and walked in the direction of the bathroom. She sat on the sofa beside the door to the bathroom, relieved to be away from the complete awkwardness that was outside of Sandy and Kirsten's world. She picked at her nails, scratching away the polish that had started to flake a few days ago.

Sandy kissed the top of Kirsten's head, her head rolling up so the kiss landed on her lips. She returned his kiss, her hand finding the back of his neck. Seth shivered.

"Uhh...I...ugh, bathroom."

He walked away from the table, opening the door before noticing Summer. He stood in front of the sink, creating a pool of cold water in his hands. He splashed his face and wiped off excess water with his hand. He looked up into the mirror, noticing how it looked like he was playing dress up. He could wear suits and ties, he had before. But this just didn't look comfortable. Lived in. Like someone put it on him and he just stood still the whole time. Like it didn't fit him no matter how perfect the measurements were. He had to get out of this restaurant.

He opened the bathroom door and stopped when he saw Summer staring back at him.

"Hi." She murmured, keeping her eyes locked on his.

"Hi."

He stared at her a second or two longer and softly sat next to her on the couch, finally breaking their eye contact.

"They're in love." Summer spoke with her eyes on the door to the men's room. Seth nodded.

"It's pretty lucky, you know?" He replied, turning his head to look at her again. She saw his head move out of the corner of her eye, so moved her head too and nodded.

"Yeah."

He pulled his lips into his mouth and nodded even slower. "It, uh, it doesn't happen to everybody. Or...if it does, they don't know it."

"Yeah."

"To find someone that you can love that much is just...luck."

"Mm-hmm. And then there's the chance that they won't love you back."

"Or that they love you too much."

"But that's just a lot of bullshit, isn't it? You don't not want to be with someone because you love them too much."

Seth turned his head down to look at his tie, tight against his throat. "I don't know."

Summer tilted her head so that she could still be looking at his face. "But sometimes...you just slip. Even if there's such a good chance that that person doesn't love you back, you can't really help yourself."

He looked so young, his eyes so big. He looked a little scared, a little sad, and a little excited at the same time. Summer bit her lip and silently leaned forward to catch his mouth with her own. His hand glided down her silky cheek and rested on her jawbone, pulling her head in even closer. One of them moaned when her lips parted at the presence of his tongue, but it got lost in the rush that was running to both of their heads. Her hand was on his knee, gently massaging his pant leg, not really sure what to do. It was so weird how she could be such a different person, and him too, but still he knew what to do to make her heart race faster than she ever believed it could've gone again. Since he had left. His hand slid down her neck, pausing slightly at the edge of the neckline of her dress, and decided to slip down to her side. She opened her mouth further.

"Summer? Sweetie, are you...oh. Sorry." Kirsten's eyes had widened, quickly turning away from her son and her...Summer.

"Kirsten. Um, yeah, is something wrong?"

Kirsten spun back around, blushing increasingly by the second. "No, um, your phone rang. It's, uh, Marissa."

Blushing even harder, she extended the phone to Summer and walked away. Summer pulled it up to her ear, and tried to let out her breath as quietly as possible. "Hello?"

"Sum, hey. How are you, okay?"

"Uh, yeah. Yeah, um, yeah."

"Are you sure? You sound nervous."

"No."

"Is he, like, right there? You know, next to you?"

Summer's eyes darted quickly back to Seth and she nodded. "Yeah."

"Is he behaving himself?"

"Yes."

"I don't need to come and kick his ass?"

"No, you don't."

"Okay. Good. So, having fun?"

Summer glanced back at Seth. "Um...yeah. More than I thought."

"That's good. Here, uh, Chris wants to talk to you. I'll make him keep it short."

"Um, yeah. Okay."

Summer heard quiet rustling and her son's voice come out much louder than Marissa's.

"Hi Mom."

"Hey, Chris. Are you having fun?"

"Yeah. I took a nap."

"Really? Were you tired?"

"I don't know."

"Okay. Just make sure you have enough sleep left for tonight, okay?"

"Yeah, okay."

"How's Aunt Marissa?"

"She's good."

"And Uncle Brendan?"

"He's good too. He showed me how to use his remote control."

"Oh, that's good. How's Jenn?"

"She's fine. I think. She's talking to Aunt Marissa."

"Is something wrong?"

"I don't think so. Just girl talk."

"Okay, honey. I miss you."

"I miss you too."

"And I'll see you soon."

"Okay. Bye Mommy."

"Bye honey."

Summer listened a second longer to hear Chris hang up the phone. She hung hers up too and looked back over at Seth. He blushed lightly too.

"So, um, we should probably go back."

"Yeah. Okay."

He took her hand to help her up and they walked back to the table for more awkward, forced conversation.

By eleven, Summer and Ryan had gotten to Marissa's house. Ryan draped Chris around his neck since he was sleeping and Summer took Jenn's hand. She gave Marissa a quick hug and kiss and Brendan a smile. Ryan kissed Marissa too and shook Brendan's hand. They walked relatively silently out of the house and got home after putting Jenn to sleep too and without waking Chris. Ryan held Chris in one arm and Jenn in the other, giving Chris to Summer at the door to the pool house. She carried him in and lay him down on the bed, placing a kiss on his forehead.

She slipped out to the main house and passed Seth in the doorway. She smiled lightly and he smiled back, but they both kept walking. Summer fell asleep on the couch, watching Letterman with Ryan; Seth fell asleep upstairs in his room listening to his playlist and re-evaluating the line "You're the closest to heaven that I'll ever be, and I don't want to go home right now."