No one would ever be as cool as Nate , Lucas thought dejectedly as he laid in bed staring at his ceiling. He had watched movers hauling boxes and furniture into the home of Tree Hill's newest residents all day. He wondered who had bought the house, if they had any kids his age. He knew no one could be as much fun as Nate. He wasn't sure what he was going to do without his best friend across the street. He knew that Nathan's family had only moved a couple of blocks away, wanting to downsize after their oldest son had left for college, but it still seemed so far away.
His dad had told him earlier that day that there was a party on Saturday at the new neighbor's house. He had said that the Sawyers, that's what he had called them, also had a kid. A little girl. What was he supposed to do with a little girl? His little sister, Lily, was four the last time he saw her and she didn't like to do anything cool. All she did was play dolls and dress up, he wrinkled his nose at the thought. Girls were so dumb. All the girls he knew would always giggle and whisper when him and Nate were around, if the boys ever asked them to play they'd scrunch up their face and tell them that they had cooties. He didn't have cooties. At least, he didn't think he had cooties. What were cooties, anyway? Girls were so confusing. No, he definitely didn't need another little girl.
He looked out his window and starred at the night sky. Saturday was the 4th of July, that meant fireworks. He hoped he'd still be able to see them with the party going on. He looked across the street and noticed a light on in the room that faced his. There was someone on the balcony, he guessed it was the little girl. He sat up and scooted closer to the window. He couldn't see her features. She was sitting on a little white wicker chair next to a white wicker table, she was writing something on a notepad. For a second he wondered if maybe she was missing her best friend too. He sat there watching her for a few minutes, when she looked up and did something a girl had never done to him before. She waved.
Saturday turned out to be a perfect North Carolina summer day. Well, if you could forget the humidity that is. It was clear and sunny, a perfect day for the beach. It was also the 4th of July, that meant fireworks. Lucas had always loved fireworks.
"Hey dad," Lucas said spotting his dad at the table reading the newspaper. "Can we go to the beach?"
Keith looked over and smiled at his son, already dressed for the day in basketball shorts and a sleeveless shirt. "Not today son, we have that party at the Sawyer's tonight. We've got to go to the store and find something to take." Lucas solemnly nodded. It was days like this when Lucas thought he needed a mom. She could make something cool to take to the party and he and his dad could go shoot hoops or hang out at the beach.
He went to the living room and flopped down on the sofa to watch TV. He'd watched two episodes of Transformers before he was bored. He grabbed his ball and headed outside. He shot around for an hour while trying to think of something else he could do to make the day go by. This is so boring , he thought. If Nathan were here they'd be having a blast. Nathan had always been better than him at basketball but they had a lot of fun playing together. They'd play one on one or HORSE, they could play for hours and still not be ready to be done. Or they'd go to Nate's and swim in his back yard. Lucas wished he had a swimming pool in his back yard. There was plenty of room, they certainly didn't use the yard for anything. They never had parties and they didn't have a dog. He climbed up in his tree house and just sat for a while, even that wasn't as fun as it had been with Nathan.
"So, whatdaya say? Go get changed and we can head out. I figured we'd go pick you up some new shoes before we head to the grocery store." His dad had come out of the house looking for him.
"Awww, what do I need new shoes for? These are great." He said pointing the Jordan's on his feet that barely held the upper to the sole.
Keith just smiled, "I figured if I bought them people could say I at least made an effort to keep you properly clothed." They both knew that they had nothing to worry about, but Lucas also knew he'd lose this argument. So he grabbed his ball cap and they headed out the door.
Three hours later Lucas stood in front of the big white house with his dad waiting for someone to answer the door.
"Keith, how's it going?" a tall man asked as he pulled the door open.
"Not bad, Larry, how about yourself?"
"Good, good. Keith this is my wife Ana. Ana, this is Keith Scott, he lives across the street." Larry pointed to the house he was speaking of.
"Oh how nice. Is this your son?" she asked, but without giving time for response, followed with, " Why don't you run upstairs and find Peyton, she's dying of boredom or so she tells me."
Lucas followed Keith into the house filled with not quite sober adults. He walked around aimlessly for a few minutes before climbing the stairs. He didn't have a hard time finding the bedroom he'd seen the girl in earlier that week, it was the same room Nate's parents had used. He wondered briefly why she had the big room in the house.
He stopped at the door and knocked. Not getting an answer he turned the knob and waited for the onslaught of pink walls and flowered bedspreads. He stepped in and suddenly thought that maybe he was in the wrong room. This room was red. Dark red. With a big black four poster bed up against one wall. In fact, all of the furniture was black. He looked toward the far end of the room and noticed the balcony doors were open. He walked that direction and stopped when he saw her. Yup, she was definitely a girl. He took her in from the back, not really sure what to say. Her hair was long and curly and pulled back in a loose French braid. He noted that she was kinda tall, but still shorter than him, and really skinny. She had on a white sun dress and he noticed that her legs hanging out underneath kind of made her look like she was standing on toothpicks. He tried to choke the laugh that came up at the thought.
She spun around at the cough behind her. That's when he noticed her eyes. Huge green eyes. Almost like a cat. Emeralds, are what his mother would have called them. "Hi" he squeaked.
"Who are you?" she asked.
"I'm Lucas Scott, I live over there" indicating like her father had earlier. "Are you Peyton?"
"Yeah."
"Oh." He waited for her to say something and when she didn't he continued. "So, whatcha doing out here? I thought the party was downstairs."
"It's just a bunch of old people," she grumbled turning back around. That's when he noticed it; the notebook that she had been writing in the days before. Only she hadn't been writing, clearly not.
"Did you draw that?" he asked, pointing to a picture of a house that looked a lot like his own. There was a little boy in the window waving. Much like he had.
"Yeah" she again replied but flipped the book shut. "You want to go outside?"
"Can we do that?" Lucas asked.
"Why not? It's not like we're skipping town, we're just going outside."
"Your parents won't care?"
She cocked an eyebrow at him and breezily replied, "It won't take you long to figure out that my parents never care." With that she was gone, and all he could do was follow.
He followed her to the back yard and watched as she started pulling her dress off.
"What are you doing?" he thought she was nuts.
"I'm going swimming, "she looked at him like it was the most obvious thing in the world. "Don't you want to?"
"I don't have my swim suit" he replied, disappointed. He would have brought it if he had thought that there was a chance of getting into the cool water.
"Neither do I" she replied easily as he watched her dive into the water in nothing but her underwear.
"What are you doing? Someone could walk out and see you."
"No one's going to walk out. Besides who cares?" she looked up at him innocently. Lucas just shook his head. He'd never quite met a girl like her. He stood there for a few minutes before taking off his shoes and socks and dipping them in the edge of the pool. The heat was starting to get to him. The collar of the button up shirt his dad had made him wear was starting to stick to his neck. Shrugging his shoulders, he pulled his clothes off and jumped in to join her.
They were shrieking and laughing having a blast in the warm summer night heat. True to her word, no one so much as looked out the window. All he could think was that Nathan's mom never would have let them do this. He smirked at her and went to push her head underwater. She came up sputtering, fire in her eyes as she took off after him. He headed towards the stairs with Peyton right behind him. He reached the top step of the pool when they both heard the explosion.
Peyton shrieked and Lucas laughed, knowing well what it was that had erupted. He saw the fireworks reflect off of her eyes before he pointed up. She was such a girl, all scared he couldn't help but shake his head. She looked up at the night sky with her mouth hung slightly open. "What is it?" she asked in awe.
"Fireworks" he replied, both of them sitting down at the edge of the pool. "Haven't you ever seen fireworks before?"
"No. They're beautiful." She whispered.
Another round went off and Peyton grabbed his hand at the noise that they emitted. They sat there hand in hand until the show was over.
Maybe Nathan moving wasn't such a bad thing after all Lucas mused before tossing Peyton back in the pool.
The rest of the summer went by quickly with Peyton around. Lucas had learned that she was seven and starting the third grade. He was going into the fifth so they would be in the same school. He secretly hoped that they would have the same recess so he could make sure the other kids didn't pick on her.
They hung out at her house a lot while her parents were away and Keith was at work. Lucas still couldn't get over that they would leave a seven year old at the house by herself. He had talked to his dad about it and Keith had told him to have her come to their house when her mom and dad were gone. So, that's just what he'd done and she'd practically lived with him since the night he met her.
He didn't mind her hanging out. She liked to watch him play basketball and hang out in his tree house, which she had dubbed "the fort". She'd drawn several pictures for him to put on the wall, saying it made it homier to have things on the walls. He didn't think it needed to be homier, but he sure wasn't going to argue with her. The night before school started they had made a pact in the fort to stay friends no matter what. He had walked her to the door that night and she held his hand tightly. He knew she hated going home. He stopped at the front door and she turned around and looked at him sweetly.
"You're my best friend, Lucas Scott. Don't forget that when you get to hang out with the big kids."
"You're my best friend too, Peyt." He looked at her like she'd gone a little crazy.
Then she leaned up and quickly pressed a kiss to his cheek. She had closed the door before he could think of anything else to say. He pressed his palm over the place her lips had been as a grin spread across his face. Maybe all girls weren't crazy.