A/N This is actually a pretty short chapter, but I didn't really see what else I could include. The song used is 'The Conversation' by Motion City Soundtrack. There are only three chapters left of this story and I plan on finishing them within the next two weeks. Thank you for you reviews, enjoy!

Dedicated to sabotage0. You know why.

Ch. 13: Say you're sorry when you hurt somebody

Ryan did a pretty good job at avoiding Marissa the rest of the school day. She couldn't say she blamed him for it, but it hurt nonetheless. After spending virtually the whole break with him, it was hard adjusting to going a day without talking to him. He even managed to avoid talking to her in their Speech class since the teacher lectured on different types of listeners that day. She had tried to get him to talk to her by passing him notes, but he would just ignore them or crumple them up, never glancing her way. She wondered if they were still technically together since he hadn't said anything about breaking up.

Then there was Sarah, who made this all even more difficult. If she had been bad before, now she was a million times more annoying. At lunch she had sat beside Marissa and said, "I believe congratulations are in order. Good job."

Marissa glared at her. "You bitch. You ruined my life."

Sarah gave her a dramatic look of exasperation. "Why Marissa, what ever are you talking about? I just judged the bet that you agreed to do. I never meant..."

"Shut it, Sarah," Marissa interrupted, not able to tolerate her fake apologies. "You know what you did. You didn't have to tell him. You could have let me tell him, or better yet, you could have gotten someone to judge it without telling him about the bet." Marissa sighed and looked down at her untouched food. "You didn't have to ruin everything."

Sarah shook her head. "You can't blame me for telling him. You had how many months to break the news to lover boy?" She paused and then grinned. "Or ex-lover boy I presume?"

Marissa's eyes narrowed. "He hasn't broken up with me."

"Yet," Sarah taunted, a wide smirk on her face.

Just as Marissa was about to stand and give Sarah a piece of her mind, Summer sat down beside Marissa and gave her friend a concerned look. "Coop, you look awful."

She had no doubt that she did. She had spent a large majority of the day either crying or fighting off the tears, which made her eyes red and puffy. Her makeup had smeared countless times so she just stopped applying a fresh coat. Not to mention she felt horrible and heartbroken, two things that could make a person physically deteriorate and shrink in front of someone's eyes. "I know."

Summer wrapped an arm around her best friend and Marissa felt a fresh batch of tears pricking the back of her eyes. "I heard what happened. Everyone's talking about it."

Marissa glared at Sarah. "You said if I won you would stop talking about me."

Sarah shrugged nonchalantly. "Jude must have told them."

"Jude?" Summer asked, confusion written all over her face.

Sarah nodded. "Long story."

Marissa rolled her eyes. "This day just keeps getting worse and worse."

Summer sighed and rubbed her friend's back. "So I know this isn't the time, but..."

"You told me so," Marissa finished for her before she could say the words out loud. She sighed. "I know." Marissa looked away from her friends and saw Ryan walking. He looked up and their eyes met. She was about to wave him over when he diverted his eyes and walked away. With swollen eyes, she watched him go.

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Ryan's day was spent in a similar state. He couldn't believe he had let her so close to him, that he had let anyone close to him. He had always known he was supposed to keep people at a distance, that it was easier that way, so why did he let her in? Why did he tell her things that he didn't dare try to tell anyone else? Why did he let himself believe she was different than everyone else, that she just might actually be the girl for him? Why did he have to trust her with his heart, because he sure as hell didn't like the feeling of it being broken.

It was torture not being able to be near her. He would see her passing in the hallway or in a classroom and he just wanted to talk to her, for her to tell him that this was all a lie and she had never made a bet with Sarah involving him. Since he knew there was no chance of that happening, he did his best to avoid her. He needed a little time to think about this and evaluate what he was going to do. He would think with his head this time; he was done using his heart.

When school was over he found Seth waiting for him at his locker. Ryan walked up to him and quietly said, "Hey."

Seth nodded at him. "Hey."

Ryan put in his locker combination, his eyes darting back at Seth every once in a while. He opened the locker door and sighed, staring into the neat storage but directing his conversation towards Seth. "I'm sorry. I really should have listened to you."

Seth nodded. "Well, yeah, but you know better now."

Ryan didn't say anything. He pulled out his books and then softly shut his locker, turning towards his adoptive brother. "I feel really bad about it."

Seth shook his head and gave a wave of his hand. "It's not a problem. We can't help who we fall in love with, right?"

Ryan wanted to tell him he had no idea what he was talking about since he had never fallen in love, but instead he said, "Yeah. So we're cool?"

Seth nodded and slapped Ryan's back. "Of course! Now I know you're hurting, but I have the perfect cure." Ryan raised his eyebrows. "Video games. They're mind numbing and soothing."

Ryan rolled his eyes. "If you say so."

Seth smiled. "Come on, I'll give you a ride." They started walking away together when Ryan saw Marissa approaching. He felt his heart break all over again when he saw her, but he kept his face blank and eyes empty. His eyes connected with Marissa's and he found he couldn't look away, not this time. Seth looked between the two and said, "I'll be in the car."

When they were alone Marissa softly said, "I guess I'm not giving you a ride then?" He shook his head but remained silent. "Then when are we going to talk?" He shrugged but still didn't open his mouth. She let out a small, broken sigh and softly said, "Ryan, please talk to me."

He looked at her and then down at his shoes. "Seth is waiting. I should go."

She reached out for his hand but he yanked his away. "Please, don't go."

He sighed and looked behind her at the now empty hallway. "Marissa..."

She shook her head and her voice cracked as she said, "Ryan, I don't want us to be over. I never meant for us to end like this, or for us to end at all. I'm so sorry, but can't you at least try to forgive me? Please?"

He didn't look at her. "Seth is waiting." With that he walked away yet again, leaving a broken Marissa behind him.

When he got to the car he slid into the passenger seat and buckled his seat belt. "So..."

"I don't want to talk about it," he informed Seth.

Seth nodded. "Are you okay?"

Ryan stared straight ahead at the dashboard. "No."

"Well if you ever want to talk..."

"I know."

The silence was deafening. "So how's the new year so far?" Ryan gave Seth an 'are you serious' look. "Oh, right." More silence. "Um, so I uh, saw the latest movie down at the IMAX. It was pretty awesome for a dinosaur movie."

Ryan raised his eyebrows. "Dinosaur?"

Seth nodded emphatically. "Yeah, you see, it starts out with..." The rest of the ride home Seth talked about useless nonsense, giving Ryan a perfect distraction from his dramatic life.

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At six that night Marissa couldn't take it anymore. She had to know where things stood with Ryan, if there was any chance he could forgive her and they could continue with their relationship. As far as she was concerned, until he told her that their relationship was over, she wasn't going to give up. She couldn't, not when she knew he loved her back. So she made her way to the pool house and softly knocked before opening. She found Ryan and Seth playing video games, Ryan sprawled out on the bed she had spent hours laying in his arms on and Seth sitting on the floor with his back rested against the bed.

"Oh! Look at that, I just killed you! I think you're a bit rusty, Ryan. You need to get back in the zone." Their eyes both darted to Marissa. Seth immediately scowled, but Ryan just stared at her with that blank look he had mastered. "What are you doing here?" Seth asked, breaking the unbearable silence.

"I want to talk to Ryan," she softly said, her eyes never leaving Ryan.

"I don't think that's such a good idea after what you did," Seth said, immediately defending his friend and brother. "In fact, I think you should leave and never come back."

"Ryan and I need to talk about this," Marissa said, getting annoyed with Seth for speaking up because Ryan wouldn't.

"No, you need to get lost."

"Ryan doesn't need you talking for him," Marissa said, glaring in Seth's direction. He met her glare and the two angrily stared at each other.

"Fine, he'll tell you to get lost himself, right Ryan?" When Ryan still hadn't said anything, Seth broke the glaring match and looked back at his friend. "Ryan?"

Ryan hadn't taken his eyes off the girl he loved since the moment she walked into the door. He knew they needed to talk, that he couldn't avoid her or this conversation forever. "Seth, I think you should go."

"But-"

"Marissa and I need to talk."

Do you remember how we met?
Silhouetted by the lights...
You were drunk and tried to take a mental picture with your hands
I was thinking about that
And a bunch of other things
Stop looking at the floor...
I need to pour out this expansive dose of words

Seth looked at Ryan in disbelief. Ryan gave him a pleading look and he sighed. "Fine, I'll be in the house doing homework." He glared at Marissa as he walked past her, and slammed the door behind himself.

Ryan sat up on the bed and looked down at his hands. "You wanted to talk, so talk."

"I'm sorry," she started.

"You already said that."

She sighed. "I know, but it's true."

"Why should I believe you?" he asked, the anger in his voice startling her for a moment.

"Because it's the truth."

"But how can I know? You already lied to me once, right?" He bitterly replied.

"I didn't lie..."

He rolled his eyes and scoffed. "Well you didn't exactly tell me the truth."

She nodded and took a step further into the room, fidgeting with her hands. "Look, I know I messed up..."

"Damn right you did," he butt in before she could finish.

She ignored his comment and continued. "But I want this to work. I'm different than I was back then." He rolled his eyes. "I'm better."

"How can I possibly know if you're telling the truth anymore? Why should I even care?" He asked, his voice showing her just how angry he was at her. "Why do you deserve a second chance?"

"Because I love you!" She shouted. "Because I want to be with you! Because I am so, so sorry."

Her declarations of love did nothing for him. "I don't believe you."

She groaned in frustration. "What do I have to do to prove myself to you?"

He sighed and stood. "I don't know. I don't know what there is for you to do."

"There's always something that can be done, even if you don't want to admit it. This doesn't have to be over if you won't let it be," she protested.

He let out another sigh and softly said, "I never said it was over."

Her heart jumped. "Really?" she asked softly, hope filling her voice for the first time all day. "So you mean there's a chance..."

"I don't know right now," he admitted quietly. "You really need to convince me why staying with you is the right thing to do because right now is how angry I am at you." He paused to let his words sink in. "So you have the floor, tell me why I should be with you, why I should even consider forgiving you."

Marissa knew this was her chance, but she didn't know what he wanted her to say. She'd apologized countless times and it didn't seem to make him any more sympathetic towards her. She let out a soft sigh and sat on the edge of his bed, looking down at the ground. "I...I didn't mean to hurt you. I guess I wasn't really thinking when I started the bet with Sarah. It was the first day of school and we had already talked. Everyone had been talking about you, but I wasn't allowed to because my mom never let me look at, much less talk to outsiders. Everyone at school thought I was a snob, but I was really just afraid of my mom and what she would say or do. That's why it came as such a surprise when she ended up liking you.

"They were already all talking about you at registration, and that's the real reason I argued with you over the muffin. I don't even really like blueberry muffins, but I needed and excuse to talk to you without the whole school freaking out and talking about it, which they did anyways." She paused and smiled a little. "You were so cute and adorable – I wanted a way to be with you without everyone bothering us and getting on my case. When Sarah brought up the bet, I was all for it. She promised she would stop spreading rumors about me, and that was really the deal breaker. I got so tired of people looking at me like I was this horrible person, because I swear I'm not, really."

She looked up when she felt Ryan sit down on the bed next to her. Feet separated them, but it was the closest he had voluntarily been to her since he walked away from her that morning. She tried to contain the smile beginning to form. "So what happened after you two started the bet?" he asked quietly.

She shrugged. "Me and you started talking some more and you asked me out. Sarah kept telling me there was no chance I could get you to fall in love with me, but I stayed persistent." She looked at him and reached over for his hand, gently lacing their fingers together. To her surprise, he didn't pull away. She softly smiled, looking at him with love-filled eyes. "But then I stopped caring about the bet and just wanted you to love me because I was beginning to fall for you." Ryan didn't look at her, just continued to stare down at the ground. She gently squeezed his hand and softly pleaded, "Ryan, say something."

He looked over at her and the struggle in his eyes was enough to tell her he was thinking hard about this. Finally he said, "I love you." It was the first time he said those three words and her heart leaped with joy because he loved her back. She had never heard three more powerful or beautiful words.

"I know, and I love you and we can be together..." she said, her words coming out quickly. "We'll forget this whole thing ever happened and-"

He leaned in and kissed her gently, his free hand gently cupping the side of her face. She thought she was going to burst with joy because this obviously meant he still wanted to be with her. She kissed him back, letting her free hand tangle in his thick, blond hair and let herself get lost in his lips. Ryan pulled back and leaned his forehead against hers. His voice came out shaky as he softly murmured, "I love you, but I can't be with you."

I can't explain...
I need to be alone.
I know the timing isn't great
But these things, you just can't plan.
I just need a little time
So I can find myself again
'Cause I get buried underneath
All the things they think you are
And I'm too tired to pretend it doesn't hurt
To be left out

She thought she'd heard him incorrectly. "What?"

He carefully pulled his hand from hers and stood, backing away from her. "I can't be with you."

She didn't know if she was more shocked, hurt, or angry. "But the kiss..."

"Was a goodbye," He quietly said. He saw the hurt expression on her face and sighed. "Look, you hurt me."

"I apologized," she reminded him.

"You didn't tell me the truth. How do you think it makes me feel that I had to learn from some stranger what you did?" he asked, his eyes holding the anger he still felt.

"I couldn't bring myself to tell you the truth. It was too hard..."

"And telling you about what happened to me wasn't?" he retorted, his eyes narrowing. "I trusted you and you let me down. I can't forgive that, not right away."

"So that's it?" She asked, the anger flashing in her eyes. "You're just going to give up?"

He turned away from her. "Every time I look at you I get sick to my stomach at what you did to me. You didn't mean to hurt me, but it does because the one person that I trusted myself with went and completely lied to me and used me."

"I didn't use you!" she shouted, the tears beginning to form yet again.

He whipped around and glared at her. "Yes, you did. You used me from the second you saw me. You wanted to see what else was out there, so you chose the guy that everyone was talking about and looking at to prove that you could be different than everyone else made you out to be. You were tired of Sarah always saying things about you, so you used me by being a part of this bet. You wanted to make Sarah upset so you flaunted our relationship in her face whenever you had the chance." He breathed heavily, the anger overcoming him, the hurt overpowering him. "So don't you dare make yourself out to be innocent here."

"I'm not saying I'm innocent, I'm just saying I'm sorry!" she argued. "I love you, I have since you told me about your past. Maybe I did use you, but so what? I'm glad I did, because if we hadn't started out like that, we never would've made it to where we were on New Years." She sighed and fell back on his bed, staring up at his ceiling. When she calmed down she quietly said, "I gave you my virginity."

He sighed, the fight leaving with the breath he'd been holding. He walked over to her and sat down next to her on the bed. "I know, and I never meant to hurt you afterwards, but I just can't go back to how we were that night or these past couple of days."

She looked over at him. "I'm not asking to go back to how we were immediately...just that we try to make this thing between us work."

He lay on his back and stared up at the ceiling like she'd just been doing. "I want to, I really do...I just...can't. Not now...not yet."

A tear escaped her eye and drifted down her cheek to his bed, leaving one small wet spot. "If not now, then when?" she asked, so quietly that he almost couldn't hear her.

He took in a deep breath and then let it out. "I don't know," he admitted quietly. "I just need to be by myself for a little bit. Before I met you I used to have a good relationship with Seth and I would go down to Chino a lot more often..."

"I never meant to take that away."

He nodded and looked over at her. "I know, I'm not saying you did." He looked back up. "I'm the one that let myself get too absorbed in you. I need to go back to the way I was before you. I need to be a better brother and uncle." He paused for a long time, preferring to be silent for a little while. "I need to find myself. I went from being the dark, brooding guy to the one too absorbed in a girl. I need to learn how to be on my own before I can consider being with someone else."

"You never told me about this," she said, rolling to her side so that she was looking at him.

He nodded and met her eyes. "I never realized it until now."

They gazed into each other's eyes for a long time, neither wanting to break away. Finally he looked away and she quietly said, "So that's it? We're really over?"

He nodded and murmured, "Yeah, I think we are."

She sighed and closed her eyes, fighting back the river of tears that were threatening to fall. She stood and quickly said, "Bye then." She couldn't let him see her cry, so she quickly left.

He watched her go, his heart breaking into a million pieces. Then, even though she was no longer there, he murmured, "Goodbye."

I had a pocket full of dreams
But I gave them all to you
Now I think I want them back
So can you tell me if I'm crazy or confused?
Don't ever change
The way you are
I've never loved anyone more.

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Individual Replies:

Juzzy88: I'm glad you liked how it all went down.

Ninpinpin: haha, cliffhangers are kind of fun though.

Hpfangurl12993: I plan on updating faster in the future, but you never know. Thanks again for offering to talk to me, it means a lot.

Bwunnies: haha, sorry.

Elly: I'm glad you thought so. Did you see My Sister's Keeper?

Kellybby: You can't? I can, Sarah doesn't strike me as a very nice person..

oc_bunney: haha, yere you go.

Snowwygirl14: That line had been in my head since around the second chapter.

Marissa Davis: Long time no see! Lol, I'm glad you liked the sex scene.