hackthis_archive ([personal profile] hackthis_archive) wrote2004-01-07 01:23 pm
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This is not what I’m supposed to be writing.

A few days ago [livejournal.com profile] andariell wrote some SV to the Counting Crows ‘A Long December’ which a) was brilliant and b) threw me because I’d been contemplating using the same song for some O.C. stuff. When I told her this, she said it shouldn’t deter me. So.

For Andy.

When December Falls


And it’s one more day up in the canyons
And it’s one more night in Hollywood
If you think you might come to California...I think you should




Ryan’s sticks his tongue out for one second to catch the tiny flakes that fall out of a hazy gray sky, and his first snowfall tastes like smog and dirt. Sometimes he thinks he’s never seen the city any other way. Gray. Dark. Impersonal.

The antithesis of California living.

He hunches his shoulders a bit, pulling his coat tighter around his body, but the cold cuts through as though he’s wearing nothing at all. He’s not too tough to know when he needs a scarf and hat, and this sort of winter is something he’s not sure he’ll ever get used to, but he’ll have to try. He doesn’t really have much choice.

This is the decision he made.

Bright lights. Yellow taxis. The constant pounding of people crushing other people just to get by.

This is a life he already knows; New York is just on a larger scale.

Newport was a bubble. It wasn’t “the real world,” and Ryan does best in the real world.

It’s best to hide in plain sight.

He looks around at the people shuffling down the streets without looking at their surroundings and knows that he’s not the only one. In a city of strangers, he belongs, and that’s what makes this okay.

The wind picks up, and the snowflakes blow around him as though he were a figure in one of his mother’s snow globes.

When the light changes, he flicks away the cigarette that’s been burning between his fingers and crosses the street.

His boots leave slushy prints that will soon be gone.


*




It doesn’t snow where Ryan comes from, and he tells himself that this is why he went to school here, out east, because he was desperate for something different. Someplace where he wasn’t ‘Chino’ or ‘Trey’s little brother.’

Here, in the city, he can be whomever he wants.

He tells himself that his decision had nothing to do with Marissa. Or Teresa. Or Seth. Or anybody else.

He tells himself that NYU is a great school, because it is. If he does well here, he can do anything; he can go anywhere. He can take care of the people who took care of him. He can bring Sandy that pastrami he likes at Chrismukkah, and he can buy Kirsten nice things with the money he’ll eventually earn.

He’ll be able to take care of himself. That’s all he’s wanted for as long as he can remember.

He doesn’t like to think about how Seth looked when he announced his decision.

He doesn’t like to think about how Marissa yelled that he was abandoning her.

Instead he thinks about how proud Sandy and Kirsten were.

Instead of thinking about his mother, he thinks about how far he’s come.

He doesn’t call Newport much. He thinks it’s better this way.


*



Ryan chose to disappear, to go where people brush by him as though he’s not even there, and he’s not sure if this comforts him or distresses him. Sometimes he wants to be seen. Sometimes he’s glad he’s not.

In most of his classes he’s just a Social Security Number and that suits him just fine. Nobody knows him, and he doesn’t have to live up to any expectations.

He tells himself this is why he left in the first place. It was easier to go away than pretend, because he did love her. He does love her. He just loves other people, too, and he wasn’t expecting that at all.

Every time he thinks he has what he wants; he finds out he wants something else instead.

Maybe this is why the only photograph in his apartment has both Marissa and Seth.


*



He doesn’t announce that he’s coming home for winter break. He doesn’t ask for a plane ticket. Instead he takes a Greyhound from Port Authority, and it takes him three days to cross the country.

He arrives at the Irvine bus station late on Christmas Eve, smelling of smoke, sweat and other people. There’s no closer bus station to Newport.

He has a taxi driver take him home, except he makes sure to be dropped off at the gate for reasons that escape him at the time.

Newport is where he's from now, even though he tries to convince himself otherwise. And as he walks the mile and a half home, he peels off the layers of clothing that east coast living requires.

By the time he hits the driveway, he’s wearing a tee shirt and jeans, and it’s like he never left.

The lights are out when he walks up the foot of the driveway, and he can hear the clinking of glasses and the stilted laughter coming from the Cooper's backyard. The Annual Christmas Party is in full tilt without a doubt. In his mind, he can see Summer and Anna and Kirsten and Sandy. He can see Seth’s grandfather and Mrs. Cooper. He can even see Marissa and Oliver.

He thinks they’re probably dating by now, even though he hasn’t asked. He minds in a vague way that he tries not to think too hard about.

There’s fake snow in the living room, and his stocking is up, which makes him smile. When he looks closer he sees the card a fraction away from disappearing inside, and in Seth’s loopy scrawl all it says is: Just in case you come back, I’ll be around.

Ryan stares at the card for a long time, and when the stairs creak behind him, he’s not really surprised.

“Aren’t you supposed to be at the Cooper’s Christmas Party?” he asks, turning around, and smirking at Seth’s pajamas and tee shirt.

He’s missed the strange sounds Seth makes when he’s amused. “Dude, I’m all dressed. I was just sitting around waiting on you. I know how you New York people like to be fashionably late.”

“You knew I was coming back?”

“Everybody comes home for Chrismukkah,” Seth says.

“Maybe it’s not about Chrismukkah,” Ryan points out. “Maybe I just wanted to see you.”

Seth’s smile is all the things that New York will never be. Warm. Safe. Home.

Sometimes Ryan wishes he had never left.

Sometimes, like now, when Seth’s hugging him, he pretends he never has.


-end-


Improv: crushed, bright, pound, bubble, smoke provided by [livejournal.com profile] serialkarma. This is for you, too, munchkin. And Jess. I’m glad you’re mobile.

Inspired by A Long December by Counting Crows, Bright Lights by Matchbox 20 and these images that [livejournal.com profile] callmesandy dumped on me.

[identity profile] blueandomlettes.livejournal.com 2004-01-08 03:15 am (UTC)(link)
Wow. So I've been lurking around here for a lil while now, reading everything, but this one totally made have to delurk and commment. It was perfect even if Ryan and Seth aren't together :-p. Is it cool if I friend you? cause lord knows imma keep on checking this out and friending you just makes it that much easier :)

[identity profile] hackthis.livejournal.com 2004-01-08 10:44 am (UTC)(link)
Wow. So I've been lurking around here for a lil while now, reading everything, but this one totally made have to delurk and commment. It was perfect even if Ryan and Seth aren't together :-p. Is it cool if I friend you? cause lord knows imma keep on checking this out and friending you just makes it that much easier :)

I don't mind at all, and welcome to the party. Alcoholic beverage? Cookie?