The Aftermath

They didn't come after me, one of the (most probably Marissa) knowing me well enough to just let me go. I walked slowly, without purpose or direction, my hands deep in my pockets, my head bowed. When I came across a dingy 7-Eleven hidden away in the numbered streets I picked up a twenty pack of Blue Cherokees and a six bottles of Rolling Rock, the kid behind the counter not even pretending to care that I was only his age. I went and sat in the near by park, sitting on one of the few remaining swings reading the graffiti as I slowly drank from the green bottle.

I played through every conversation I had ever had with him. Constantly searching for some sort of sign that he was anything other than what he seemed to be.

I was in bed. I was still in the clothes I was in since returning from golfing. I didn't know how I got there, but I relaxed into the comfort that my bed offered me.

My eyes were aching for sleep and yet I was a million miles away from any sort of rest, despite having just woken up. I found myself sober, staring at the corner of my beside table as I remained curled up underneath my covers.

I played through every conversation I had ever had with him. Constantly searching for some sort of sign that he was anything other than what he seemed to be.

My brain dissected his choice of words, examined his actions, analysed his choice of clothes searching for some sort of sign that he was anything other than what he seemed to be. Everything came back to the hospital.

The hospital where I had watched, through the small panel of glass in the door, doctors restart Marissa's heart. The hospital where I watched Marissa get wheeled away into an OR. The hospital where I was sure Marissa was going to die. The hospital where I'd sat at Marissa's bedside, praying for her to wake up, until I was forcibly removed.

The hospital, the doctor, those words, the truth.

I played through every conversation I had ever had with him. Constantly searching for some sort of sign that he was anything other than what he seemed to be.


I woke up quickly and painfully when I was suddenly bathed in a pool of warm sunshine. As my eyes adjusted, I sat up and turned towards the light.

"Hey." Seth nodded, closing the door behind him allowing darkness to swallow the room once more, coming to lay besides me. "So Summer called-"

"There's no talking in this room." I told him, rolling over and going back to staring at the corner of my beside table.

"Okay, that's cool." I felt him sit up and I was covered in a blaze of annoyance when he put my beside light on. "But what does that say about me it girls pick the girl me over the me me?"

"It says you're too self involved and narcissistic." I sighed, pulling the cover out from under him and buried myself within it.

"You just said two things that mean the same thing." Barely had the words come out of his mouth when I shot back out of the duvet.

"Seth," I said his name through gritted teeth, "my friend is lying in a hospital bed having not taken an overdose. Do you mind if we do this later?" He ran his thumb and forefinger across lips as if zipping them closed before shutting off the lamp. "Thank you." I told him before sinking back down.

"Is she hotter than me?" I rolled over and simply glared at him. "I'm going." He sighed getting up. "Just before I go I have to ask you: why didn't you tell me?"

Having rolled back over, I found myself sitting up and hugging my knees as I squinted trying to find him in the dimly lighted room. "You shot who in the what now?"

"Summer."

"Oh," I rubbed my eyes and slowly crawled out of bed and grabbed a drink of water from the kitchen. I drained a pint class of water as I leant on the counter for support, before I replied properly. "I wanted to protect you." It came out barely more of a whisper.

"I've never really had friends before," I turned round and found him standing half way between my room and the outside world, "I don't know really what to expect from them, 'cept for what I've leant from TV." He paused and shook his head, as if he was going through what he was going to say next. "I guess I'm still getting used to this 'you having my back' thing." He patted the door frame before heading back towards the house, for the first time closing the door behind him shutting me back into my darkness.


I blinked repeatedly as I found that I bathed in light once again, forcing me to wake up from a sleep I didn't know I had succumbed too. The light went as quickly as it had come when I heard my door shut again. I felt a body slide into bed besides me and I relaxed as I felt her right arm pull me closer to her as she held me.

"Tell me. I won't go. I won't lie. I will only love you." She said, moving her arm until she had found one of my hands to hold, just as she held me.

So I did. I told her about my childhood, growing up with an alcoholic and a deadbeat. I told her about the day he got arrested and the night she first hit me. I told her about my teenage years, realising I was gay, about the girls, about the boys, about the violence I faced down and about Jodie and Theresa. Finally I told her about that night, about the car, about the cops, about jail. I told her about being kicked out, I told her about the phone call to Sandy and I told her about the first time I laid eyes on her and how I couldn't think of anything other than her.

She laughed, reminded me that I couldn't remember her name. I rolled over and told her that I was just playing it cool, she called me a liar. She pulled me closer to her by my belt loop of the pants I'd been wearing since returning from golf, and kissed me deeply, passionately, lovingly.

Slowly I removed the clothes, dropping them on the floor besides hers as we kisses, as we touched. Every action filled with want, desire, passion and love.


All I could hear was noise, a horrible noise, I couldn't find it, I couldn't work out where it was coming from.

Suddenly I was awake, my arm outstretched and my hand searching for the snooze button on my clock radio. The high pitched beeping didn't stop and suddenly my eyes were open and I was watching my clock tumble off my beside table.

"Fuck." I rolled over and threw and arm over Marissa. "Make the noise stop."

Her whole body moved as she rubbed her eyes, forcing them to focus. "Its my phone." She said simply moving to the edge of her side of the bed and fumbling around for her purse. I heard her fiddling about with her cell and then just as suddenly as it had come the noise stopped.

"We have ten minutes." She told me rolling back and into my arms.

"Till what?" I asked her, still rubbing my eyes trying to wake up.

"Till my alarm goes off again and we have to start getting ready for school."

"Oh its Monday." I nodded to myself, having lost all concept of time as a consequence of the weekend. "I'm not going."

She sat up by pushing herself up, resting a hand on my exposed chest. "You have to."

"I really don't." I told her, getting up and grabbing a hoddy from my wicker wardrobey thing, "I'm going to get a drink, you want anything?" I asked her as I pulled it over my head.

"Orange juice please." I nodded and opened my door, covering Marissa's naked form in a sea of sunlight for a moment before I closed it behind me and headed into the house.

I grabbed a mug and glass from the cupboard, before pouring a cup of coffee and heading over to the fridge to get Marissa's orange juice.

"How come you're not dressed, you're going to be late for school." Kirsten told me as she walked over to pour a coffee cup.

"I don't feel all that well." I lied.

"And this has nothing to do with Marissa in the pool house?" she frowned at me, pointing at the glass of orange juice on the counter before walking round the island to feel my temperature.

"Its for the Vitamin C."

"Okay, but can you ask Marissa to drive you and Seth to school Sandy and I have to head out to work." She told me as she headed back out of the kitchen. "And don't roll your eyes at me." She warned, calling out from the living room.

I grabbed a bagel and held it between my teeth as I carried the glass and mug back to my room.

"Thank you," Marissa smiled at me, taking the bagel and glass from me.

"I just need a shower and then I will be out," I smiled at her, sipping from my coffee, "Seth should be down in a minute or two." I told her pulling the hoddy off.

"So you're going to school?" Marissa smiled at me as she gathered her clothes.

"Kirsten wouldn't even pretend to humour me." I sighed, pulling out a shirt for her to wear.

"What the hell is CBGB?" she frowned at it.

"You want to go to school in yesterday's clothes?"

"And I'm dressing." She conceded as I took myself and my coffee into my en suit.


"Can't believe Mom wouldn't let me stay home today." Seth sighed as he rearranged his bag on his shoulder as we started up the steps to the main building. "She feigned feeling my temperature before sending me up to get dressed."

"She did the same to me." I nodded, holding open the door for Marissa and him.

"Maybe its because neither of you are actually ill." She smiled at us both, as we walked down the corridor to her locker. I leant against the lockers whilst she swapped her books about and simply looked at her. "Okay so maybe you have grounds for a day off."

"How do you do that?" Seth asked me.

"Do what?"

"Convey everything with a look." I merely shrugged, before nodding over towards the doors where Summer and Anna were walking in with cups of coffee. "Again!" he pointed at me before focusing on the main point. "Are Anna and I wearing the same outfit?" He pulled at his jacket as he looked back and forth between it and the girls. "I cannot believe I got dumped for the girl me."

"Could be worse," Marissa shrugged, closing her locker. "Could have been dumped for a water-polo player."

"Yeah like she would ever go out with a water-polo player." He scoffed. "Shh though they're nearly here and I need to act like I don't care. If one of you could kiss me that would work really well for me." Marissa and I simply simultaneously hit him round the back of the head.

"Ah," Summer smiled at us all, hugging her books close to her, "you can tell it's a Monday, Cohen's getting hit by girls."

"Summer decided the best way to get past the whole awkwardness post the golf house incident is to skip it altogether." Anna explained as Marissa, Seth and I all looked at Summer slightly opened mouthed, possibly even sharing my thought that Summer had amnesia.

"Alex didn't you need to go to you're locker?" Seth asked me.

"No, I got all my books."

"But I thought you wanted to get that thing." He smiled at me to forcefully, whilst kicking my leg.

"Oh yeah I do need to get my thing." I sighed, knowing that Anna was going to kill me in homeroom for following Seth to my locker to discuss his neuroses. "Were you ill the day subtlety was handed out?" I asked him feigning opening my locker.

"I thought that was-" he shook his head. "Look never mind about that, what we need to discuss is how I can show Summer that I don't care that she picked Anna."

"And you think the best way of doing that is by faking reasons to get out of talking to her?"

"Its Seth," Marissa smiled walking up behind him, "what do you expect?"

"Where are the other two?" I smiled back at her.

"Getting coffee, Anna's getting you one too."

"That's my girl." Marissa simply raised her eyebrow at me. "Well I mean my other girl." Marissa's hand moved to her hip. "I'm not getting out of this hole any time soon am I?" She simply shook her head.

"Atwood," Bendis had walked out of the reception area and round the corner to where the guys and I were standing, "Marissa and, uh, Seth I want you to meet our new transfer student, says you're all friends." He moved a step to the left to reveal Oliver standing behind him.

"He's not our friend." Marissa shrugged.

"I've never seen this kid before in my life." Seth nodded.

"Well as Social Chair, Marissa, you can show him round anyway." Bendis sighed at us before walking away.

"What's up guys?" Oliver smiled at us all. "I mean you don't call; you don't write…"

"You don't take a bunch of pills." I finished for him, a plastic smile covering my face as I opened my locker. I ripped down the map of the school I had tacked to the inside of the door and balled it up before throwing it at his head. "There's a map. Stay out of my way. Here endeth the tour." I told him walking away.

I found Marissa and Seth by my side as I walked into the nearest free class room. I dropped down into the nearest seat and simply shut my eyes to the world.

"For the first time in my life I'm wishing Luke had been around, simply so he could have shoved him into a locker." I sighed, rubbing my temples.

"What's he doing here?" I looked up and saw Seth looking out of the glass panel and into the hallway as he spoke to me. "I mean surely he doesn't think we would be his friends after that."

"I told him everything about Tijuana," I told Marissa biting my lip, "everything. He knows how that affected me." She sat down on my lap and leant her head on my shoulder. "Seriously, who would fake a suicide attempt?"

"You want to get out of here?" She asked me.

"Please."

"Lets go to L.A, we'll grab some lunch, maybe do some shopping." She shrugged. "Seth you too, its easier to avoid the girls if you're not in the same city as them."

"You had me at 'Lets go…'" he nodded, still looking out of the window. "Plus I think it will be an excellent way to reminisce about when you first got here." He turned away from the panel and smiled at me. "First stop on our pancake tour of North America."

"Technically it would be our second and I'm still all about the waffles." I smiled back at him, lifting Marissa from my lap and standing up.

"Pendent." He grumbled holding open the door for Marissa and I.


Seth dragged us to the Hard Rock Café for lunch and Marissa then dragged us round the shops. My escape from Oliver and school was less 'Ferris Bueller's Day Off' than I had imagined it would be and more just a weekend with my best friend and my girlfriend. That was until Marissa, laden down with bags of shopping from the boutiques, whispered something in my ear that I never thought she'd say.

We dumped her bags off in the car before I took control of her Range Rover and drove us to one of my old neighbourhoods; with Seth looking between Marissa and I confused demanding to know what was going on. I parked the car outside the shop where I'd got my first tattoo and got nothing but lectures from Seth, him telling me that his parents were going to kill me if I got another tattoo. Marissa simply turned round to him and told him something he never thought she'd say.

The bell of the door chimed as we all walked in, I took Marissa's hand and led her over to the rack of tattoo designs and flicked through them, the picture's metal cages clanging together as we waited to be noticed.

"Well if it isn't the famous car thief." I closed my eyes, instantly recognising the voice's owner before turning round. "You don't call, you don't write…" Jodie smiled at me, leaning on the counter in front of her. "Some way to treat your girlfriend."

"You're not my girlfriend." I sighed. "You were never my girlfriend. You are however the reason Theresa slapped me."

"Yeah, T told me about Thanksgiving. Heard you brought some princess with you to pick up a hot car."

"That would be me." Marissa nodded over at her before spinning me round and lifting the back of my shirt. "I want this tattoo, can you do it for me?"

"Hold your horses, Princess, just trying to see what my friend's been up to." Jodie smiled at her slowly before walking round the counter towards me.

"Those are my motorcycle boots." I pointed at her feet once she'd revealed them to me.

"You left them at Dave's." Jodie shrugged.

"You're screwing Dave now?" My hand was on my hip and my arm was gesturing wildly. "Are they any of my ex's you haven't slept with now?"

"Dave doesn't count." She scoffed back at me. "Besides the only girl I ever fucked that could remotely count as a girlfriend was T."

"Uh, guys?"

"What?!" I spat at Seth, still furious with Jodie.

"You Dave's a boy's name right?" I told Jodie and I timidly, whilst Marissa simply stood with her arms crossed and no doubtably rolling her eyes.

"Davina." I explained quickly brushing him off, turning my attention back to Jodie. "They're mine." I pointed at the boots again.

I watched her as she hoped onto the counter and pull at the heal of one of the boots before stopping and looking up at me, the book remaining in her hand and half way on her foot. "Trade you them for Princess's tattoo." She smiled at me. I looked between Marissa and the boots before nodding. "Hey Tom!" she called out to the back, a smile covering her face and the boot securely back on her foot. "Got a fresh one for you."


The tattoo parlour was hell. As Jodie redrew the tattoo so that could be xeroxed onto transfer paper I simply kept whispering to Marissa that we could go someplace else to get it. It got worse when she was in the chair, Jodie spent the entire twenty odd minutes interrogating Seth on my new life and Newport. The only thing that kept me from grabbing Marissa and walking out was the knowledge that she was getting a sixty dollar tattoo for a pair off boots I didn't think I was ever going to see again.

As soon as Marissa was back in the front room with Seth and I, the instruction sheet firmly in her hand, I had them following my trail back into the car. I started up the engine and Phantom Planet's 'California' came blaring out of the radio and I knew I was going home.

"This is the first song that played when Sandy picted me up from Chino." I told them as I drove away from Jodie and memories of a past life and headed onto the 101.

"Whatever, car thief." Marissa tried to stifle a laugh as she and Seth quickly moved to avoid my gaze.


"Can I borrow another top?" Marissa asked me as soon as Seth had opened the house door for us.

"The shirt is fine, I'm telling you." I sighed taking her purse from her shoulder so I could drop her car keys into it.

"Then why is it sticking to me?" She asked me pulling it over her head and inspecting the back of it.

"So that's what Marissa Cooper's underwear looks like…" Seth stood simply staring at Marissa's bra.

"Seth, I'm sleeping with your pseudo sister." She tutted at him before showing me the back of my shirt. "Is that blood? Am I bleeding?"

"Let me see." I told her, shoving Seth out of the way as I pulled down the hem of her pants

"Oh wow, no you're not bleeding." I smiled at the small of her back. "That is so hot." I told her as I fixed the hem of her pants and stood up again, batting Seth's hand away from trying to look himself. "You want a fresh top to wear though?" I asked her as she slipped my CBGB top back on. I took her hand to lead her though the house. "Plus I have a full length mirror you can check out your tat yourself."

"Think I should get a tattoo?" Seth asked, following us through the kitchen. "Maybe a crescent moon on my neck to show I'm a badass."

"You going to start wearing Alex's vest tops too then?" Marissa laughed at him.

"Please could you imagine Seth trying to be bad, he'd probably just end up 'steeling' one of his granddads cars to impress a girl." I stuck my tongue out as Seth, opening my bedroom door not paying attention to where I was going.

"What are you doing here Chino?" I spun round and found Luke moving my furniture and my room suddenly painted black.

"We thought you were going to be gone longer." Summer told me brandishing a power drill.

"Uh guys?" I frowned at them, "What are you doing?"

"I text them," Seth explained, "told them about your emo yesturday, that we were going to L.A thought it would be nice to show you that we all cared about you." He shrugged.

"All of us." Anna smiled.

I stepped further into the room and looked round it properly. My wardrobey thing had been moved to the far wall and above it had been tacked a map of California with pictures of the guys surrounding it, pieces of string linking the pictures to the town of Newport on the map.

"You left your wallet here." Anna explained when I looked at the picture of Jodie, Theresa and I all smiling at the Winter Fling with a piece of string linking us all to Chino. "Summer found the picture of your old friends and so we took it to that photo shop on Third..." she finished her sentence with a shrug as I looked at all the pictures they had linked to Newport. The was a picture of Seth and I before Cotillion, Marissa and I at the 'Kick off Carnival' and a couple of all of us.

I stepped up onto the raised level and walked round to where my wardrobey thing had been and found a drum kit had been drawn on the wall in white and grey paints to show up over the black of the walls, the bass drum having Newport written across it.

"You like?" Summer smiled nervously at me.

"I love it you guys." I beamed back at them. "All of you. Thank you so much." Marissa walked over to me and wrapped and arm around my waste.

"You can never go back now you realise," Seth smiled at me, "its going to take Mom and Dad ages to paint over the black."

"Why would I go back when this is my home?" I smiled back at him. I looked round the room once more before flinging myself down on the bed, soon to be joined by the others. "You really should have done Cooper's room first though, her's is just like a giant, badly organised closet."


R&R people, thank you. Circus.