Ah, and something else. Caleb never died. It's important for the first part of the story. Plus, Seth has a little sister, but I already mentioned her in chapter one.
Okay please keep the reviews coming, they really mean a lot!
The Pain Of Being Left Behind"So Craig left you again? You know what I think?" Jenny Carlton, Summer's best friend since college freshman year asked and popped another french frie in her mouth, swallowing it down with some diet coke.
The two girls were sitting in their favorite little diner on the college campus which was run by one of their best friends, Chris Walker. Chris was a few years older than them and had skipped college in his fifth semester because he had fallen in love with one of the other students who had wanted to discover the world and had been going backpacking through the countries of South Asia.
Unfortunately, their relationship hadn't quite turned out right and Chris had been moving back to Chicago and had opened his own little diner. He had a few lovers now and then but nothing serious. Everyone who knew him always joked about him having a crush on Seth, a thing that Seth didn't really consider as funny. But to all of them he was one of the sweetest friends you could imagine.
As Chris overheard Summer's and Jenny's conversation he sat down next to them and put a hand on Summer's arm who shoved her salad around on her plate.
"He left? Again? That guy's spending more time with his colleagues than he spends with you." He said and shoved Summer's butt so she moved more in the bench she was seating in.
Jenny nodded enthusiastically, her black ponytail swinging from left to right as she did so. "See, that's what I already told her. She needs to get rid of him, I mean a man who loves his colleagues more than his girlfriend... helloooo?"
Summer still hadn't looked up from her food and listened to her two friends discussing her love life. She didn't want to tell them, but she was tired of other people telling her that Craig was work-obsessed and she should go get another man. After all, it was still her business, right?
"Darling, you should have so stayed with Jenny in the dorm instead of moving in with him." Chris said and stroked a strand of Summer's dark brown hair behind her ear. "That way you wouldn't be alone all day."
"Whoa Chris that was exactly what I wanted to tell her just before you came here. High fives, buddy." Jenny exclaimed and offered Chris her right hand to high-five her.
Finally Chris realized that Summer still hadn't said a word in their discussion about her and Craig's issues, and he laid a comforting hand on her shoulder. "Hey, hun, you haven't said anything." He stated and looked into her eyes.
Summer did her best to avoid her friend's stare. She was just too pissed right now from everybody else talking about her love life to reply.
Jenny noticed that and reached over the table for Summer's hand. "Hey baby, it's okay. He's gonna be back soon. And he really loves you." She said and gave her a sweet smile.
Finally, Summer looked up and sighed. "Yeah, that's true." She said and took a sip of her diet coke when her cell phone that was laying on the table started to vibrate. When she saw the caller ID her gaze immediately lightened up.
She flipped the cell phone open. "Hey baby." She sung into the receiver, twisting a strand of hair around her finger. "Yeah, I miss you too."
Jenny and Chris made faces to each other, Jenny sticking her finger in her mouth to pretend like she was vomiting.
Summer decided it was best to ignore her friends and focused completely on the conversation with her boyfriend instead. "Yes?" she laughed and looked out of the window. "They say it's the rainy city."
Chris motioned to Jenny that he had to go on working and stood up, placing a kiss on her cheek as he left the table. Jenny tried to concentrate on her food instead on the love talk between Summer and Craig but she couldn't help but overhear the bittersweet couple talk the both of them seemed to have.
Summer giggled some more. "From the windy city to the rainy city. You don't leave anything out."
Jenny rolled her eyes and popped one last frie in her mouth, rubbing her hands on a napkin when she saw how Summer's gaze darkened all of a sudden. "You need to stay HOW LONG?" Summer exclaimed and her eyes widened twice their size.
Jenny frowned and stared at Summer intensely to find out for how long Craig would be gone this time.
Summer shook her head and gasped for air. "I can't believe this." She mumbled, trying her best to control the fury that was rising inside of her. "You said it's only gonna be for one week! How come it's three all of a sudden?"
Jenny bit her lip as she heard the word "three". It was really not funny anymore for how long Craig was away since his success at the company had started to kick off.
Summer pressed her lips together and nodded to herself, fumbling with the hem of the tank top she was wearing. "Mhm."
Jenny tilted her head to find out what was the topic of the discussion now, without success.
Summer sighed and looked out of the window again. "Sure. Talk to you then." She said, sounding mad and offended at the same time.
Jenny watched Summer closing her eyes, sighing once again. "I know. Bye."
Summer flipped the cell phone shut, her eyes closed. After a few moments she looked up and faced Jenny, plastering a smile on her lips. "Are you finished? I need to get studying for my English report."
Jenny sighed and nodded. "Yeah, finished." She grabbed her purse but hesitated to stand up. "Are you okay? Cuz, I don't know, you seemed really upset."
Summer shrugged and stood up. "He needs to stay three weeks instead of one. No big deal. I'm used to it."
Jenny still didn't seem to be convinced and went over to her friend, linking one of her arms through Summer's. "You don't have to do that." She said with a serious look on her face.
Summer frowned and shook her head. "Do what?"
"Pretend like you're fine and everything's great and funny and that shit."
"Jen, I... really don't wanna talk about that right now." Summer replied and started to walk out of the diner, pulling Jenny with her.
"Okay but you know that you can talk to me whenever you feel like it, right?" Jenny asked and tilted her head.
Summer tried not to look her best friend in the eyes and nodded. "Yeah." She said and stopped, pulling her arm out of Jenny's grip. "I know."
Jenny nodded contently and smiled. "Good." She placed a kiss on Summer's cheek. "I'll call you tonight. We can go see a movie."
Summer smiled and nodded. "Sounds great." She replied and closed her jacket. "If I'm not at home try my cell. I'm meeting Seth for the report."
Jenny smiled and raised her eyebrows a little. "Sure. Seth." She said and smirked. "I should've seen this coming." She mumbled to herself so Summer couldn't hear it.
Summer waved and turned around to make her way for the elevated train.
"Hey Summer!" Jenny yelled and Summer turned around again. "And stop studying so much." Jenny hissed. "You're turning into a bookworm."
Summer shook her head and smiled, waving to her friend before she started to make her way home... into an empty apartment.
"So when's your plane gonna be arriving? I just want to make sure that your Dad's gonna be there to pick you up." Kirsten Cohen asked her son who was laying on his bed in his Chicago apartment, his girlfriend for three years, Amy Warren laying half on top of him, her hand twisting his curls around her fingers. And with the enjoyable view on Amy's bare back Seth found it extremely hard to concentrate on what his mother was saying.
"Umm, don't quite know." He mumbled and traced the long scar on Amy's upper back that she had kept since a complicated operation of her scapula. A major motorcycle accident after her High School graduation had given Amy the scar, and when she had first met Seth, she had had her difficulties to show herself to him with this – as she called it – huge beauty "mistake". But since it had always been Seth Cohen's specialty to break women's inner shells Amy had presented him the scar after they'd been dating for a while – and ever since then, it was Seth's favorite place to stroke her when they were making out.
"Then go and look at your plane ticket." Kirsten ordered and Seth rolled his eyes. "I'm busy now, mother."
Kirsten paused for a while and Seth heard the tiny voice of Lilly, his little six year old sister, in the background. "Honey, you can't talk to him right now. Now please eat your sandwich, we're leaving in a few minutes." Kirsten said to her while Seth concentrated on kissing Amy's neck.
"So Seth, would you please go and check your ticket for your arrival time?"
Unfortunately, Seth couldn't hear his mother anymore, since his hand that was holding the phone receiver had slipped down on Amy's back in the direction of her butt.
"Seth?" Kirsten asked, this time a little louder than before.
The couple didn't react since they were both occupied with kissing each other.
"SETH EZEKIEL!" This time, Seth and Amy stopped kissing and stared at each other, Seth raising one eyebrow and looking down on Amy until his gaze reached the phone receiver in his hand.
Amy giggled a little and rolled off of Seth, stretching her arms above her head, and Seth reddened when he put the receiver back to his ear. "Mom?"
"What were you doing?" Kirsten asked in such a shrill volume that Seth needed to hold the receiver some inches away from his ear.
"Umm searching for the ticket." Seth replied and winked at Amy who was still laying giggling beside him.
"So when does your plane arrive now?"
Seth frowned at the harshness and impatience in his mother's voice and motioned for Amy to hand him his plane ticket from the nightstand. He turned the ticket around and smiled. "Umm yeah, plane's arriving at eleven." He finally replied and threw the ticket over to the nightstand again.
"Okay then, your father's gonna pick you up… do you have a present?"
"Present for me?" There was the tiny voice again and Seth rolled his eyes. He had booked a flight the next morning to visit his family and celebrate his sister's sixth birhtday. Some might have considered it a huge investment to fly across the country for the birthday of a five-year-old girl, but even if Seth acted like Lilly was bugging him most of the time he couldn't deny how much he really loved her. And seeing the huge brown eyes of his little sister open the rollerblades he had gotten her would be reward enough to fly home.
"I told you to finish your sandwich Lilly." Kirsten ordered in her typical motherly way, and Seth laughed. "Let her talk to me." He said and Kirsten sighed.
"We won't get anywhere anytime soon if she doesn't finish her sandwich right now Seth, and-"
"Mother I only wanna talk to her. I see her so rarely these days, so why would you deny me the pleasure of hearing her voice?"
Amy giggled again as she listened to Seth, and Seth could practically hear his mother roll her eyes at the other end of the line.
"Fine then. You two are impossible." Kirsten finally gave in and handed the receiver over to her daughter who pressed it tightly to her ear.
"Hi Seth!" she chimed, still chewing from a bite of her sandwich.
"Hey pumpkin-head." Seth replied and started to play with a strand of Amy's hair. "How does it feel to be almost six?"
"I lost a tooth." Lilly replied, completely ignoring what Seth had just asked her. "And Mommy told me to put it under my pillow for the toothfairy to get it and when I woke up the next morning the tooth fairy had given me a hundred dollars!"
Seth's eyes widened three times their usual size. "You got HOW MUCH?" he yelled and blinked twice. "Let me talk to Mom."
"Do you have my present yet?"
"None of your business. Now gimme Mom." Seth ordered and Lilly sighed into the receiver dramatically. "Men." He heard her say.
"Seth?"
"Mother, is it true that the pumpkin-head got like a hundred bucks from the so-called toothfairy?" Seth asked, still a bewildered expression on his face.
Kirsten cleared her throat. "Yeah well, the toothfairy should maybe use a flashlight next time he's rewarding Lilly for losing her baby teeth." She stressed the words "toothfairy" and "he" in a manner that left the only conclusion that Seth's Dad had been mixing up the dollar notes, and Seth shook his head.
"I wonder why the toothfairy never mixed up the money for my baby teeth." Seth said and Amy raised an eyebrow.
"The toothfairy was way younger then and didn't need reading glasses to distinguish one dollar notes from hundred dollar notes." Kirsten replied. "So honey, your sister and I really need to go now… we'll see you tomorrow."
"Yap, see ya tomorrow. Bye Mom."
"Bye honey."
Seth pushed the red button on the phone and leant over Amy to kiss her neck, Amy noosing her arms around his head, pulling him closer to her.
"Mmm you really need to go?" she mumbled and kissed his forehead while Seth was still working on kissing every single inch of her throat.
Seth lifted his head a little and shot her a confused look. "When? Tomorrow?"
Amy nodded and started to massage Seth's neck.
Seth frowned and sat up a little. "It's my sister's birthday. Of course I have to go." He said and watched Amy lowering her eyelids.
"What's going on with you?"
Amy shook her head and smiled. "Nothing. I just… forget it."
Now it was Seth's turn to shake his head. "Seriously. I wanna know what's wrong with visiting my family."
"Nothing's wrong with that. I'm just gonna miss you, that's all." Amy answered and smiled again.
Seth smirked and nodded, rubbing his chest. "Yeah, I'm worth missing." He said proudly and Amy shook her head as she pulled him down to her again, hugging him tightly.
"I love you." She whispered in his ear and closed her eyes.
"I know." Seth replied and his grin faded. He felt Amy nodding and sighed.
That was one thing they were doing – Amy always told Seth she loved him but he wasn't able to tell her those three words back. At first Amy thought of it as funny when Seth started to compare them to Sam and Molly from "Ghost" where Sam had never been able to tell Molly that he loved her – only at the very end when he was dead he had managed to confess his love.
But now, after almost four years of dating, Amy found it kind of strange that Seth hadn't told her he loved her only once. And Seth felt kind of embarrassed for that too, but he had loved only once in his life, and no matter how strong the feelings for Amy were – they had never reached the high he had felt while being with Summer. And that was the reason why he had never told her he loved her. Because he just wasn't sure if he did.
And Amy wasn't stupid – she knew the exact reason why Seth couldn't tell her those three words – but she had decided a long while ago not to give up hope that one day she would hear the words that meant so much to her coming out of Seth's mouth. And until that day finally arrived she needed to be patient.
A few hours later the phone in Kirsten Cohen's office started to ring for what felt like the hundreth time today. With an unnerved sigh she picked up and identified herself.
"The Newport Group, Kirsten Cohen speaking."
"Chambers Cohen & Darcy, Sandy Cohen speaking."
Kirsten smiled when she heard the voice of her husband and leant back in her desk chair.
"Hey Sandy. How's work today?" she asked and started to massage her left temple with her free hand.
"Good, as usual. I just called to see how you are doing. Any news from the hospital?" Sandy replied.
Kirsten sighed. "I talked to them like five times within one hour. From the way things look now he's gonna be released for Lilly's birthday."
"Have you talked to Seth yet?" Sandy asked.
"Yeah, his plane's arriving at 11 a.m. tomorrow."
"Good. But I meant... have you told him about... you know. Your father."
Kirsten rolled her lips inward and closed her eyes. "I couldn't. Lilly was there."
Sandy sighed. "We need to tell them about their grandfather."
Kirsten nodded to herself and started twisting the phone wire around her fingers.
"That's true, Sandy, but..." she hesitated and sighed. "We shouldn't ruin Lilly's birthday by telling them that their grandfather's gonna die."
"Seth's grown up. He deserves to know the truth. And he's gonna freak when he finds out that we didn't tell him." Sandy said.
Kirsten nodded to herself. Deep inside herself she knew that Sandy was right. They had tried to hide Caleb Nichol's cancer from their eldest son for so long, and now there was no hope left for him... and Seth still didn't have a clue about what was really going on with his grandfather. And neither did Ryan.
"I promise we're gonna tell them." Kirsten said. "But not this weekend. Not on the day Lilly's been looking forward to since her last birthday."
Sandy sighed again and shrugged. "If you say so. I'm picking up Thai for dinner. I'll be home at eight."
"Okay. See you at home. Bye." Kirsten answered and hung up before Sandy could even reply.
She leant forward and propped her elbows on her desk, taking her head in her hands, and thinking about what her husband had just told her. Her father's cancer had been discovered over one year ago, and by that time it had already spread across his whole body. His case had been hopeless then, and it was even more hopeless now. And Kirsten couldn't say why, but she had tried to keep this serious piece of information as far from her children as she could.
Well, it was okay that Lilly didn't know, Kirsten doubted that at the age of almost six, she would understand the whole importance of the problem. And she was almost sure that Ryan already knew what was wrong with her father, after all, he wasn't stupid. But Seth still didn't have a clue about what was going on, and for some strange reason Kirsten was afraid to tell him the truth about his grandfather.
Caleb Nichol was Newport's cockroach, but he was still a good grandfather, and Seth and Lilly loved him dearly. Telling her children that their grandfather was about to die was one of the most difficult things Kirsten Cohen ever had to do.
And she just wasn't ready to tell them.
Next chapter: More Bounce…In California