Title: Lost Chances - An epilogue.
Rating:This chapter PG13...the first two very much NC17.
Beta: melanie39 any mistakes are mine though as I 'fiddled'. :)
Disclaimer: I don't own The OC, Ryan or Benjamin McKenzie.
Story: Dark and depressing AU set after season 2's finale. Ryan runs to LA after Trey's death.
Notes: For m3kane...waves to the lurker and several other people who asked at the time for an epilogue to this story. :)
Lost Chances
Epilogue
Sandy
He hadn't told Seth and Kirsten where he was going. They didn't need to know, not this time. This was his third body in as many months and he didn't think he could put them through the pain again. Those few hours of utter fear that it might be Ryan were worse than anything he'd ever encountered before so God only knew how his wife and son felt.
The first time he'd gone to I.D a body had impacted on all the family. That teen had died of hypothermia. It seemed inconceivable with the mild weather they'd been having but then when you were cocooned in Egyptian cotton on a soft sprung mattress it was hard to think how cold it actually got out in the night air. It brought home how much danger Ryan must be in, living rough, if he was living on the streets. They didn't know that for sure. Ryan had simply vanished. It was the not knowing that was killing them all.
That first time they'd convinced themselves that it wasn't Ryan …no way… but until the sheet had been pulled back Sandy hadn't been able to take a single easy breath. The rush of oxygen that eventually flooded his body made his head spin. He'd first felt elation that he wasn't looking at the face that they'd come to care so much about, but then followed the deep depression that they were still no nearer to finding Ryan.
The second body had been somehow more shocking as the kid lying on the gurney had looked so young. That kid had died of an overdose under a freeway bridge.
Every time a young blond, John Doe showed up Sandy's private investigator made sure that Sandy knew about it. He hated that Perry felt he needed to know, it was like the guy already had it pegged that Ryan was not going to make it on the streets. Pushed to the back of Sandy's mind was a thought, a thought that he didn't want to come to the surface.
The old Ryan would have survived against all odds.
But that Ryan was no more and the thought that it was them…the family that was to be his last great white hope…that had squashed any last vestiges of fight that the boy had through their own unwillingness to read what was going on in his mind. And that thought left Sandy traumatised.
He felt guilt more than anything, guilty that he'd been so locked up in his own thoughts and troubles that he had neglected the one person who it would cut the deepest.
Ryan.
A boy who'd only ever given of himself and expected nothing in return.
A boy who'd tried so hard to fit into their home.
A boy who should have expected more from them.
They had failed him.
Sandy felt the heavy hand of culpability resting squarely on his shoulders every day since he'd gone. When Ryan had desperately needed help and understanding he'd only focused on his wife's alcohol problem and hadn't given Ryan's situation any great thought. He assumed Ryan would just power through like he always did.
The worse thing was that he knew that he'd let his disappointment…no, that was the wrong word, he'd let his disgust show and that had effected Ryan, a boy who'd needed approval and reasurrance from him at that bad time. The coroner's report had blind-sided him and he'd found it difficult to separate the quiet, studious and often funny boy from the monster - as he'd perceived at the time - who'd kicked his brother's body so hard that it was the worst case of post-mortem violence the medical examiner had ever seen.
It was only after Ryan had left that Sandy had seriously re-evaluated his reaction. Ryan was acting out of years of frustration and hurt and in the cold light of day who was Sandy to say that he wouldn't have lost it like Ryan had done if he'd found out that someone had sexually assaulted Kirsten? Sandy knew that he'd do anything to keep her safe…. and Seth. It was a shame that he had temporarily forgotten that Ryan needed protecting just as much.
Sandy had been blind to just how much his and Seth's avoidance after Trey's death had affected Ryan until it was too late.
He'd give anything to be able to turn the clock back. There would be so many things he'd do differently. The first would be not to turn his back on someone so fragile because that's what Ryan was…fragile. It had taken Ryan leaving to realize that his apparent innate strength was just an illusion. Ryan had been as fragile as a spun sugar cage and they had all worked to smash the delicate threads until all that was left was powder.
Sandy had been the first to kick him when he was down, then Kirsten with what she'd said to him at the intervention. Sandy had seen Ryan's face fall at her hurtful words but he hadn't done anything. Then finally Seth had added his own kick, Ryan's proxy brother and best friend had also turned his back on him.
Seth had admitted that Ryan had scared the shit out of him that night. That incarnation of Ryan had scared them all but they had stupidly lost sight of the fact that it was still Ryan. The same boy who made pancakes and grilled cheese for them all, who would do anything for anyone, who had never raised a fist to anyone who hadn't threatened first.
Sandy pulled his car over into a space and turned the engine off. He needed time. He leant his head back and shut his eyes. It was strange. Part of him wanted this over as soon as possible but part of him wanted to run…to run and not have to enter the cold, sterile building in front of him, even though he'd convinced himself that this once again was going to be a wild goose chase, a precaution and nothing else.
They didn't even know for sure Ryan was even in the city.
What did depress Sandy was the lack of interest from the police. It seemed that if a John or Jane Doe looked older than a high school kid then they didn't waste much time on finding out who they were. And even though this case would be a murder investigation, it was a fight or mugging between two vagrants and that somehow didn't matter as much. The different precincts had their own problems in this city; drugs, prostitution and gang crimes were the priorities. The death of a vagrant did not rank high on their lists.
All he knew about this kid was that he had long blond hair, weighed about 140lbs and had been a victim of an assault with a deadly weapon. The PI had said he was in the right age bracket that they were looking at but the weight was all out for Ryan and the description could have corresponded with about ten percent of the population of the USA. Sandy was only doing this to rule out any possibilities, he'd promised Seth that no stone would go unturned and if that meant having to do …this, then that's what he'd do.
He got out of the car and walked to the office. It was more of a cubby really. No effort had been made to make the place look inviting. The last morgue had been the same. Sandy supposed that no effort was required for the dead. He rang the bell and a tall skinny man came into view. Sandy filled out the necessary forms giving the police missing person's case number and all relevant information. It was sad that even something like this was so fraught with procedures. Apparently there were some people who got a thrill from looking at death so now people had to get a dispensation from the police to view. What the hell was the world coming to?
He was shown to a corridor and told to wait. Sandy leaned against the wall and laced his fingers together. This part was torture…the wait. He shut his mind off and stared at the crack in the linoleum. His cell phone ringing shook him out of his torpor.
It was Perry with a lead, a good lead this time. Finally after so many dead ends. Apparently according to a source a boy matching Ryan's description had spent several nights in a hostel near Corona. He'd been quiet and had mentioned to someone that his father was in prison. Sandy felt excited. Corona was a place Ryan knew. It would seem more likely that he would go back to a place that was familiar to him. Sandy could never see Ryan in a place like L.A. He flipped his phone shut just as the morgue attendant waved him into a room. It felt redundant now. Sandy had such a good feeling about this new lead. He wanted to be on his way…on the road to Corona. He'd find Ryan and he'd be able to put his family back together. That's what they needed. Without realizing it Ryan had become the glue that stuck them together and now that Kirsten was home again they needed Ryan to complete the picture. This time they would make sure Ryan knew how important he was to them all.
The room smelt of formaldehyde and a stronger lingering odour that Sandy chose not to dwell on. He nodded that he was ready and the starched white sheet was lifted away from the body shaped lump that lay on the trolley.
Sandy stared.
This wasn't right.
Sandy swallowed and stepped forward.
His world crumbled in that split second.
It didn't look like Ryan... but it was unmistakably him.
His hair was lank and greasy, no longer the sun bleached blond that he remembered but a dull darker shade now.
His skin was ingrained with dirt. No effort had been made to clean him up.
But it was the thinness of Ryan's profile that shocked Sandy the most. Ryan had weighed a good 170 pounds of solid muscle before he'd left. Now he was little more than skin and bone. He was a mere transparency of his former self.
Sandy felt numb.
He couldn't even begin to think what Ryan had been through.
He felt sick.
Tears welled in his eyes without him noticing and he started to shake.
He could see the ugly raised 'y' incision on his torso. It dissected down through the violent knife wound on his stomach. It stood out harsh, angry and red in an otherwise colourless surface.
It was most likely clear on his face, Sandy thought, that this was no stranger. The attendant looked expectantly at him, probably wanting to fill out paperwork now that they had a name.
But Sandy didn't want to look away. It seemed like a final insult to Ryan somehow. One more rejection.
How was he going to tell Kirsten and Seth that he'd found Ryan?
How would he even begin to tell his son that his best friend was never coming home again?
Sandy reached out his hand and laid it on Ryan's cold arm.
"I'm sorry," he whispered. "I'm so sorry."
But it was too late.
They had driven him away and now he was gone forever.
Their lives would never be the same again.
It was over.
Fin.