Disclaimer: We own nothing.

Summary: Seth and Ryan get in trouble, and the Cohens + 1 are forced to examine and redefine their relationships. Takes place after The Countdown.

Authors' note: This story was co-authored by Maud and Walter. Many thanks to AKA for the thoughtful beta-work, and to NorthernStella and ctoan for the helpful advice.

Chapter 1

If Seth sighed one more time, Ryan was going to call the water polo team himself and invite them to the pool house for a wrestling match. Seth being mauled by a bunch of brainless jocks certainly couldn't be any harder to ignore than the dramatic whimpers coming from the other side of the room.

Seth sighed. Ryan snapped his book shut.

"Seth." Ryan glared pointedly at him. But Seth, Ryan sometimes forgot, was by now pretty much immune to his glares. He took Ryan's break in silence as an invitation.

"I am so bored," Seth said, dragging out the words into a whine.

"So do something," Ryan said. He opened his book and tried to find the page he'd been reading. Or trying to read.

"All right, what do you want to do?" Seth hopped up from his chair near the door and bounced on Ryan's bed. Ryan's pen and highlighter rolled off the bed and under a table. He scowled at Seth.

"Study."

"Dude, it's Friday night."

"Yeah. So?"

"So, let's do something."

It was Ryan's turn to sigh.

"C'mon, I know you're pissed about Marissa-"

"I'm not pissed about Marissa," Ryan insisted.

"Whatever, man. She totally ditched you tonight and you're sulking and now I'm the one paying for it."

"I'm not-"

"Yeah you are," Seth said. "So let's do something."

"You're not gonna talk me into that shark movie, Seth," Ryan said. He leaned over the side of the bed to find his pens.

"All right, so you're scared of sharks." Ryan lifted his head high enough to glare at Seth. Seth ignored him. "I don't want to see a movie anyway. Let's do something fun for once. We never have any fun, you know that?"

Ryan grabbed his pens and sat back down on the bed. Seth was still bouncing, but not quite as energetically as before. Ryan set the pens on his bedside table and closed his book again.

"Fine. What do you want to do?"

"I don't know. What do you want to do?"

Ryan glared.

"Got it. I'm in charge of entertainment tonight." Seth frowned thoughtfully at the bedspread. Ryan reclined back and crossed his arms over his chest. With any luck Seth would come up empty and he could go back to forgetting about Marissa and the party that he didn't want to go to anyway. "Yeah, I've got nothing."

Ryan raised his eyebrows and reached for his book again.

"Okay, looks like we're studying."

"No, c'mon, man, it's Friday night. Don't give up on Friday night. Let's-let's-I don't know, what'd you do in Chino on Friday nights?"

"We're not going to Chino."

"I know," Seth said quickly and then paused. "Except, well, maybe we could go to Chino-"

"We're not going to Chino, Seth."

"Fine, fine," Seth said, pouting. "You know, Marissa got to go to Chino. How come you never take me to Chino?"

Ryan almost had to laugh. Only Seth could somehow make Chino sound like a trip to Disneyland.

"Look, I'm not saying we should go to Chino," Seth said. "But you know, maybe you could give me the Chino experience. You can't take me to the 'hood, but you can bring the 'hood to me."

Ryan stared and Seth seemed to understand that he wasn't making any sense.

"Friday nights couldn't have been as boring in Chino as they are in Newport. So what'd you do? Raping? Pillaging? I know it wasn't all stealing cars and crashing them."

Ryan shrugged and considered the question. "I don't know. Mostly we just hung out."

"Hung out in pool houses while reading The Great Gatsby for a book report that's not due for two weeks?"

"All right," Ryan said, leaning forward, "usually we'd just get some beer and go somewhere and drink until the cops found us and chased us away."

"And have lots of sex, right?"

"We're not having sex, Seth."

"Okay, no sex, but the rest sounds good. Let's do it."

"No." Ryan opened his book.

"No? Why not? It's the perfect plan."

"Because it's a bad idea."

"It's a great idea," Seth said. Ryan sighed and closed his eyes.

"You're not going to let this go, are you?" he asked, eyes still closed.

"Nope," Seth said. "Come on, you owe me."

Ryan's eyes popped open. "I owe you?"

"You took Marissa to Chino. You owe me a Chino experience."

"Seth-"

"You're gonna punch me if I keep bugging you, aren't you?"

Ryan stared openly at Seth.

"Yeah, your jaw gets all tight when you're ready to hit someone," Seth said. "You don't really want to punch me, do you? So let's do this. Let's just hang out and get drunk like a couple of guys from Chino. You can study tomorrow night."

"Tomorrow night's Saturday."

"Yes, I am aware of the days of the week," Seth said.

"If we go out tonight, you'll let me study tomorrow night," Ryan said uncertainly.

"That's the deal."

"Fine," Ryan said, tossing his book aside. "Let's get out of here."

Ryan grabbed a jacket on the way out and was headed toward the back door of the main house when Seth let loose what sounded like a squeak from behind him. Ryan turned to find Seth standing near the pool, waving his hands furiously over his head and looking vaguely like someone trying to land an airplane. He also seemed to be whistling, or trying to. Ryan squinted at him in the dark.

"Dude, where are you going?" Seth whispered across the patio.

"In the house," Ryan said, refusing to lower his voice.

"Why?" Seth hissed.

"Why not?"

"Because we're sneaking out," Seth said, as though pointing out the obvious. He kept shooting panicked looks over Ryan's shoulder, toward the house.

"Why are we sneaking out?"

"Didn't you sneak out in Chino?"

"No."

"Oh." Seth lowered his arms and slowly crossed the patio. "You didn't?"

"Why would I?"

"Well, what if my mom catches us?"

"Catches us doing what, Seth?"

"You know…" Seth stalled. "Oh."

"Right." Ryan turned back to the house. He stopped when Seth grabbed the sleeve of his jacket.

"Wait." Ryan rolled his eyes toward the sky. "What if she asks what we're doing?"

"Tell her we're going out."

"That'll work?"

Ryan crossed his arms and puffed out his cheeks in frustration.

"Look, we have to tell your mom we're leaving. Otherwise she'll worry." He paused and thought about it. This parenting thing was still new territory for him. "Won't she?"

"Yeah, I guess."

"So come on," Ryan said, and he pulled the back door open. Seth hesitated before following.

Kirsten was in the main dining room, papers spread liberally around the table. Her hair was pulled back into a ponytail, and she was chewing on a pen. She looked up when Seth and Ryan walked in.

"Hi, boys."

"Hey, Mom." Seth sounded shaky. Ryan wanted to groan.

"What are you guys up to tonight?"

"Uh-" Seth started.

"We're going out," Ryan said.

"All right. Don't be late." Kirsten turned back to her papers and Ryan heard Seth sigh audibly behind him. They were backing out of the room when Kirsten looked up again. "Oh, Seth. Don't forget a jacket."

Ryan looked over his shoulder to see Seth, his eyes wide, and nudged him back with an elbow.

"Yeah, okay. I'll be right back." Seth grinned at Ryan and clapped him on both shoulders, then turned and ran toward the stairs. Ryan shook his head and smiled. When he looked back at Kirsten, the pen was in her mouth again.

"So, what are these? Floor plans?" he asked, leaning his palms on the table and turning his head to read the blueprints upside down.

Kirsten glanced up and smiled at him. "Yeah. These are the plans for a new development in Laguna. Most of the city's already built out, so the building codes are pretty restrictive. These plans need to be in by Monday morning and I've got to check every one of them."

"You don't have people to do that for you?" Ryan asked.

"Well, yes, of course we do. I just like to be thorough."

Ryan paused and studied her for a moment.

"You like this. Going over the plans, I mean. That's why you do it, right?"

He thought he saw Kristen blush.

"Yeah, that too," she admitted. She met his eyes and grinned. "Want me to explain it to you? Show you what you're looking at?"

Ryan nodded automatically, then thought better of it.

"No. I mean, you're busy, and you've got to get this done by Monday…"

"I could use the break. Come over here." She waved him to join her on the other side of the table. "These lines, here, with the hash marks? That's for-"

"Okay, buddy, let's go." Seth was in the doorway, zipping up the front of a sweater. Ryan frowned and glanced at Kirsten. She smiled.

"We can do this later," she said. "We've got all weekend."

"You sure?"

"Yeah," she said. "You guys have fun."

Ryan lingered over the blueprints a moment longer, then stood up and joined Seth.

"Thanks," he called from the doorway.

"You're welcome," she said. "Be careful, guys."

+++++

Seth bounced on his feet, rolling from toe to heel and back again, and tried to resist the urge to glance back inside the liquor store. Tried and failed. Ryan was still at the back of the store picking out the beer. He hadn't even bothered to ask Seth his preferred brand, because who were they kidding, Seth couldn't tell one beer from another and all things considered he'd probably prefer wine coolers. Not that he was about to admit that to Ryan.

He looked back inside again. Still at the refrigerators. Seth turned back around just as a middle-aged man in a suit stepped up to the curb. Seth nodded a hello and tried to look as casual as possible, which seemed more difficult than it should have been. It wasn't as though he looked overly suspicious. Nothing wrong with a 16-year-old kid with a skateboard hanging out in front of a liquor store on a Friday night.

Seth glanced back in the store. Ryan was at the counter. Finally. He resisted the urge to watch Ryan trying to buy the beer, and this time he won. Seth whistled and bounced on his feet some more, nerves making his stomach crawl. All of the pressure was on Ryan, but Seth figured he was an accomplice to the crime at this point—he wasn't technically purchasing the alcohol, but wasn't watching Ryan's bike aiding and abetting, or something like that? Seth watched a tall woman wearing far too few clothes for the time of year climb out of a Suburban. He'd never understand why Newport women insisted on driving such ridiculously oversized cars, but it didn't matter much when they had such ridiculously oversized breasts to match. Seth watched her walk into the store and almost didn't notice when Ryan appeared at his side. Empty-handed.

"Dude," Seth started.

"He said I look 25 but he needs ID anyway."

Ryan didn't look particularly disappointed, which meant he either really wasn't disappointed, or he had another plan.

"Want me to try?"

Ryan didn't even bother to answer that question with a look.

"He'll help," Ryan said, nodding toward a man in a UCLA sweatshirt walking toward the store. Without waiting for a response from Seth, Ryan crossed over to the man. Seth couldn't hear the conversation, but it didn't seem like more than five words had been exchanged before the man accepted cash from Ryan with a nod and disappeared into the store.

"That was easy," Seth said, and Ryan shrugged. He hopped on his bike to wait. A few minutes later the man stopped outside and handed Ryan a paper bag, then walked away without saying a word.

"Where's our change?" Seth asked.

"He was doing us a favor."

"Right."

Ryan passed the paper bag to Seth, who took it without thinking then stared at it and tried to push it back at Ryan.

"You want me to carry it? We're underage. What if I get caught?"

Ryan raised an eyebrow at Seth.

"You've got free hands," he said

"But I need unrestricted movement for balance," Seth said, flapping one arm around to demonstrate. When Ryan just stared at him in disbelief, Seth sighed and gave in. If he even so much as smelled a cop—and Seth wasn't entirely certain he'd be able to smell a cop, but the cliché sounded about right—he had every intention of dumping the bag and skating away as fast as his board would carry him.

"So where exactly are we going?" Ryan asked. He pushed off on his bike and drifted down the sidewalk, away from the liquor store. Seth gripped the paper bag in one hand and shoved off on his skateboard behind him.

"I don't know. Where'd you hang out in Chino?"

"Parks, usually," Ryan said. "Sometimes schools, or construction sites."

Seth perked up and opened his mouth to endorse option C.

"No," Ryan said before Seth could speak.

"C'mon, man, I know just the place."

"No construction sites."

"One bad experience in a model home and you're going to avoid construction sites for the rest of your life? And you want to be an architect?"

"There must be a park or something nearby," Ryan said.

"You're afraid, man. Face your fear. Fight it. Show Fear who's boss."

"I'm not afraid," Ryan said.

Seth pierced him with what he hoped was a skeptical glare, but was most likely neither skeptical nor glaring. Or piercing.

"Then follow me," Seth said, opting for his favorite method of convincing people, and especially Ryan, to follow his lead: not giving them a choice. Seth pushed off on his skateboard, hopped the curb and sailed down a very dark street toward the ocean. When he glanced back Ryan was right behind him, and Seth was glad there weren't many streetlights on this road because he really didn't want to see the look on Ryan's face right now.

They rode for about a mile before Seth turned into a quiet neighborhood, stopping at the far end of a cul de sac. He hopped off his board and kicked it up into his hands, and heard Ryan's bike screech to a stop behind him. Seth cringed at the squeak of brakes and looked quickly at the houses around them before reminding himself that really they weren't exactly doing anything wrong. Just yet. Ahead of Seth was a dirt road, and about 100 yards up the road was a chain link fence. Seth turned back to Ryan and nodded his head toward the road. Ryan frowned, clearly not happy with where the road would be taking them, and Seth pretended not to notice.

"I don't think this is such a great idea," Ryan said quietly when they'd walked to the base of the fence.

"Face the fear, man, face the fear," Seth whispered.

"I'm not afraid. I just have…bad luck, around construction sites."

"Once. You had bad luck once. Are you really gonna let one little house fire ruin construction sites forever?"

"Yeah, I think I am," Ryan said, and started to turn around. Seth grabbed him by the jacket sleeve, second-guessed that abrupt gesture when Ryan stared hard at his hand, then forced himself to keep it there. It wasn't like Ryan was going to hit him. Except at that thought Seth changed his mind and let go after all.

"We're already here. Let's just check it out. If you're still freaked out-"

"I'm not freaked out."

"Whatever. We can leave if you want. Okay?"

Ryan gazed wearily through the chain link fence, then took a deep breath and let it out slowly.

"All right."

"Great," Seth said. "You go first."

Ryan scowled at him but didn't argue, and unlike Seth, who would have asked for a boost to get started climbing, Ryan simply jumped up and in maybe two seconds had scaled the fence and landed on the other side. Seth stared at him in amazement.

"You've done this before," he said, nodding his head in appreciation.

"That surprises you?" Ryan asked.

"Yeah, I guess not."

Seth wasn't nearly as graceful, and he was fairly certain Ryan's palms hadn't been sweating so badly that he feared for his life at multiple points while climbing, but he managed to make it to Ryan's side without breaking his neck or even ripping a hole in his T-shirt. All in all, he was impressed with his own breaking and entering abilities. Until he realized he'd left the beer on the other side. Ryan apparently had been aware of Seth's mistake the entire time.

"Forget something?" he asked with that smirk that didn't show up very often but always made Seth want to smack him, if smacking wouldn't be guaranteed to earn him a much more painful smack in return.

"Damn it," Seth said, and reached out to climb back over the fence.

"I got it," Ryan said before Seth could get a foot off the ground. Ryan hopped to the other side and tossed the bag over the fence to Seth without a warning. Seth just managed to catch it before it the beer could nail him in the face.

"Thanks, man," he said.

"No problem," Ryan said, either ignoring or not getting Seth's sarcasm.

They hiked a little further up the dirt road and stopped in front of the first half-built home they came to.

"See, it isn't even a model home," Seth said.

"How can you tell?" Ryan asked.

"Let's go inside," Seth said, not giving Ryan a chance to argue the point any further, because honestly, who could tell which homes were models and which were just run-of-the-mill mansions.

This particular home was much less far along in the construction process than the home Ryan had stayed in, and burned down, several months before. The walls were open planks of crisscrossed wood. The floors creaked, the wood bending slightly beneath their feet. Seth headed straight for the stairs.

"This is awesome," Seth said quietly when he'd reached the second floor, where a giant balcony looked down over the entryway directly below them. There were no railings on the balcony yet, so Seth sat down and dangled his feet over the edge.

"Oh God, please don't do that," Ryan said, sounding sick. Seth turned around and glanced at him. Ryan was pressed back against the wall on the other side of the balcony, as far away from the edge as he could get.

"Come on, sit down, let's drink," Seth said, waving Ryan over. He set down the paper bag and pulled out a bottle of beer. Corona. Seth had no idea if it was any good or not, but all that mattered now was that he didn't have a bottle opener and he suddenly felt like a little bit of an idiot. "Hey, you got-"

"Seriously, Seth, don't even talk to me when you're sitting like that, on the edge, like 50 feet up."

"Dude, that is so not 50 feet."

"Seth."

"All right, all right, coming, Dad," Seth said, and climbed to his feet. Just for fun he tottered on the edge of the balcony for a moment, pretending to lose his balance, but Ryan wasn't biting and anyway he looked pretty pale in the very dim light.

+++++

"Damn it, Seth, will you put that flashlight away?" Ryan said. "You keep shining it in my eyes."

Seth waved the light in his direction, but Ryan noticed he was careful to aim below chest level.

"You haven't seen my giraffe yet," Seth said. "Trust me, Ryan, the giraffe is my masterpiece. I could retire on this giraffe."

"Uh huh," Ryan said, and took another swig of his Corona.

"Watch," Seth said. "Watch and learn."

He propped the flashlight on a cinderblock and positioned his hands in front of it. Ryan had to admit, Seth's shadow puppets were pretty good, probably because he had such freakishly large hands. But the more he drank, the worse they got, and his so-called giraffe resembled nothing so much as a lopsided saguaro cactus.

"You suck," Ryan said, throwing a bottle cap at Seth, who caught it gracefully in one hand and then promptly dropped it.

"I am awesome," Seth said, with great dignity. "But I suppose when you spend your formative years perfecting your right hook, you don't have much time to develop an aesthetic eye."

"Oh, you say another word," Ryan said, "and I'll be perfecting my right hook on your aesthetic eye."

Seth was just opening his mouth to answer when Ryan heard gravel popping on the drive outside. He set his beer bottle carefully on the floor, as far away as he could reach without actually moving. Seth clutched his bottle with both hands, his eyes wide. He opened his mouth again, but Ryan hissed, "Seth," and Seth nodded and swallowed, hard. Then they both noticed the blue lights flashing outside.

Ryan whispered, "Cops."

"My mom's going to kill me if we get in trouble," Seth whispered back. "And oh God, Ryan, your probation."

Ryan closed his eyes.

"There's a back door," Seth whispered. Ryan nodded. They both stood up, very slowly. When they heard the footsteps echoing on the floorboards below, Seth made a dash for the adjoining room and Ryan followed.