Hey There Stranger

4

🔥🔥🔥A/N🔥🔥🔥:

Warning- Exposition Heavy Chapter Ahead!

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Andy's sitting on his front porch when he pulls up. She asks him to sit before she starts talking. It all feels like a bad sign.

He wishes he could guess what was wrong, but if it's not Mr. Herrera's health worsening then he can't imagine what could have Andy acting so tense; cagey.

He braces himself. "What's wrong?"

Andy wrings her hands, she can't seem to decide where to keep her gaze and bites her lower lip. Finally, she sighs and looks at him head on. "Okay I'm not really sure how to say this so it's probably best if I just say it: Elena came to see me today. She found me."

Ryan's not sure he understands. Or maybe he doesn't allow himself to for fear he's wrong. "What?"

"Elena," Andy says again. "She came by the station today. She found me."

His brain feels sluggish and slow as he takes in the information. Inside, he can feel his heart start to beat fast. "Wait, Elena?" He can hear the disbelief in his voice, as well as the mounting excitement. "Like, like our Elena?"

Andy has to fight the sudden urge to be snarking and say, 'No Ryan, my dead mom Elena.' The blinding smile that started to spread across Ryan's face stops her dead in her tracks. "Yeah," she breathes fondly, "our Elena."

"That-That's great!" Ryan sounds so happy. He is happy, it's written all over his face; in the way his eyes light up, the way he's stumbling over his own words in his excitement. "I can't believe-how is she? What'd she say? What's she like?"

Ryan is so happy. Andy had been happy too, before she learned the whole story. She hates that she has to ruin it for him. She wishes she could just freeze this moment. She wishes they could live in this moment forever, where everything is good.

But this is real life and time marches on. Time marches on, and things aren't good. Ryan's looking to her for happy answers to all his questions, answers Andy doesn't have.

Time marches on and Ryan's smile starts to wane, because she hasn't said anything and that in and of itself is an answer.

Time marches on, and Andy can't figure out a way to soften this blow because there is no way to soften this blow.

So she just says it.

It's like blowing out a candle. Because all the light's gone, she's dashed away the brilliant thousand-watt smile that brightened Ryan's whole being and all that's left is empty vapor.

She focuses on what she needs to say because looking at Ryan will make her stop. She tells him everything from start to finish. It doesn't take long, and that feels terribly paradoxical.

It's funny-in an ugly ironic sort of way-that he asks all the same questions she did, in the exact same way she did. They share all the same objections and incredulities. It's comforting in a way, to know that they're on the same page.

( "What foster care? She's not supposed to be in foster care!?"

"No, this, this doesn't make any sense. This is wrong, this is all wrong..."

"She can't live on her own. She's way too young to live on her own! Who the hell lets kids live on their own?!")

Andy had hours to deal with and process this news. Watching Ryan go through it now is like an out-of-body-experience. She'd struggled with her decision not to talk to him immediately after what'd happened. Now she's thankful she waited, because she might've gotten him killed on the job for how overwhelmed she's made him; how distracted he would've been.