A phone rang off in the distance but no one answered the phone call. The phone continued to ring and suddenly the lights to the house turned on. Lucas Scott emerged from his bedroom and found his cellphone lying on the couch where he left it after his serious talk with his soon to be ex-wife, Peyton Sawyer. The caller i.d read Haley James.
"Hello?" Lucas groaned into the phone.
"Luke, I have to tell you something." Haley sounded off on the other end of the phone.
Lucas' eyes searched for the time and found that it was five in the morning, "Hales! It is five in the morning where I am!"
"Lucas this is really important." Haley sighed heavily before continuing, "You might have to come back to Tree Hill."
Lucas knew whatever Haley was about to tell him was going to knock the wind out of him so he took a seat on the couch to steady himself for the bad news.
"What is it Hales?" Lucas took a deep breath to further steady himself for the bad news headed in his direction.
Haley remained silent for a few seconds, making Lucas even more nervous. "Julian was in a really bad car accident and…"
"And what Hales?" Lucas questioned.
"Brooke is a wreck and we all need to be there for her!" Haley continued after taking a deep breath, "They don't think Julian is going to wake up from his coma."
Every bit of sleepiness disappeared from Lucas' body as he absorbed Haley's bad news. "I'll be right there!" He quickly hung up the phone and raced to his bedroom to begin to pack his things.
With no hesitation Lucas began to pack up his belongings and he finished packing within less than an hour after Haley's haunting phone call.
"James!" Lucas whispered to his sleeping nephew. "James, wake up." He sat down on the edge of the bed his nephew was sleeping in.
Jamie woke up as he felt the bed sink down and rise up again. "Uncle Lucas?"
"James! We are going back to Tree Hill." Lucas peeled the covers off of his nephew, "Your Aunt Brooke really needs you right now!" He knew how close Brooke and Jamie were.
"What?" Jamie shot up in the bed, his head spinning from how fast he sat up.
Lucas smiled sadly and nodded, "Your Uncle Julian is dying from a really bad car accident and your mom wants you to be there for your Aunt Brooke. So do you want to leave right now or do you want to wait until the morning?"
"Let's go right now!" Jamie climbed out of the bed and began to repack his suitcase.
"I'll go wake up Sawyer since she is coming with us!" Lucas left his nephew packing in the guest bedroom as he crept into his daughter's bedroom across the hall.
Sawyer was lying wide awake in her bed. "Daddy, are we leaving?" She asked her father quietly. She'd heard the whole exchange between her father and her cousin.
Lucas sat down on the edge of his daughter's soft pink bed, "We need to go back to Tree Hill!"
"Is mama coming with us?" Sawyer asked with a hopeful smile.
Lucas smiled sadly down at his twelve year old daughter. "I'm sorry sweetie." He pushed her blond curls from her sleepy face, "Mama and I are not together anymore, you know that."
Lucas felt as if he had settled when he asked Peyton to marry him twelve years ago. His heart had belonged to someone else but Peyton seemed like the safe choice to make so he made it. When he found out Peyton was pregnant he was sure he'd be able to fall in love with her again but it never happened. He spent their entire relationship comparing Peyton to Brooke but Brooke had gotten married to Julian and the two had twins.
"So we can't travel like a family anymore?" Sawyer asked quietly as tears began to stream down her pink cheeks.
"It's okay!" Jamie came into the bedroom, "We are still your family and you can travel with us. We always have fun together, don't we?"
Sawyer smiled and nodded, "We do have so much fun."
Jamie gathered his tiny cousin into a tight hug, "So let's go have fun! First step to having fun is packing up your bag so we can go!"
Jamie picked up his cousin with ease and sat her back down on her two feet. Lucas watched his nephew with proud eyes. Jamie was not an average twenty-one year old young man. He was gentle and kind to everyone in sight.
"Daddy?" Sawyer called out from the back seat of Lucas' old red Mustang.
"Yes sweetie?" Lucas kept his eyes glued onto the road as he sped through the streets of California to the LAX airport.
"Were you ever in love with Aunt Brooke?" Sawyer asked.
The question took Lucas by surprise and he almost screeched the car to a halt. "That is a very long story." Lucas answered as he pulled into the parking lot of the airport.
"I can tell you the story once we get on the plane." Jamie whispered over to his young cousin.
Sawyer squealed as she clapped her hands together, "I can't wait for story time!"
The family speed walked through the airport as they barely made it to the gate of their late night flight back to Tree Hill. On the plane Lucas sat an aisle away from his daughter and his nephew.
Jamie kept Jenny comfortable as he began to tell her about her father's love story with their Aunt Brooke.
"They met in high school and instantly became an epic love story!" Jamie began his story.
Lucas listened in on his story as he pretended to be asleep in his first class chair across the aisle. Eventually Lucas actually fall asleep as he listened to his nephew explain to his daughter about his romance with her Aunt Brooke.
"Peyton took your dad away from Aunt Brooke!" Jamie was finishing the story when Lucas woke up.
Lucas reached across the aisle of the airplane and shushed the young man. "Don't tell her that part!" He whispered to Jamie.
"Why not? It's the truth!" Jamie defended his actions as he peeled his uncle's fingers off of his Letterman jacket. "You were with Aunt Brooke then Aunt Peyton stole you from her, right?"
"Who told you that?" Lucas questioned his nephew.
"My dad told me the whole story and my mom agreed to every detail." Jamie gave his shoulders a shrug, "Are you saying it isn't true?"
Lucas opened his mouth to deny it but he couldn't find the words. It was the truth. Lucas and Brooke had been happily together when Peyton lured him away from her best friend. Brooke wanted nothing more than for Lucas to be happy so she let him go because she truly loved him.
"Your Aunt Brooke, let me go because she wanted me to be happy even if that meant not being with her anymore." Lucas mumbled.
He now realized that Peyton never let him go. She refused to let him be happy unless it was with her. She even almost stopped his first wedding to his publicist, Lindsay Shaw.
"Sounds to me like Aunt Brooke really loved you." Jamie whispered to his uncle before turning his attention back on to his cousin. "Now where was I?"
Before Jamie could finish his story the pilot's voice came over the intercom system to alert the passengers of the plane that they were about to land. "I hope you enjoy your visit to this special little town town called Tree Hill!"
Lucas exited the plane with his daughter and his nephew following closely behind him. They gathered their bags from the bag shoot before renting out a rental car.
"I know you want to go home to see your mom and dad first…" Lucas said to Jamie as he pulled out of the parking lot of the airport in their rental car.
"I just want to go see Aunt Brooke!" Jamie interrupted his uncle's sentence, "She needs us right now."
Lucas nodded once and headed towards the town's only hospital. "Good choice." He mumbled to Jamie.
"Mom! I just wanted to see Aunt Brooke first." Jamie was on the phone with his mother, Haley, defending his choice to head to the hospital rather than going home to see his parents first.
Lucas and Sawyer stood outside the gray rental Mustang in the hospital's parking lot. Lucas was holding a sleeping Sawyer in his stable arms as he listened in on the one sides conversation.
"I'm sorry mom but I think Brooke needs me more than you do right now!" Jamie hung up the phone and climbed out of the rental car. "I'm ready to go in if you are!"
Lucas smiled nervously, "I'm ready." He had to stop to take a deep breath before proceeding to walk through the double doors.
"We're looking for Julian Baker's room." Jamie stopped to ask the receptionist once they reached the waiting room.
"Are you family?" The receptionist asked as she checked her records for a Julian Baker.
Lucas stepped forward, "This is his nephew…" He gave Jamie a solid pat on the shoulder. "And this is his niece. I'm his brother-in-law!" He smiled reassuringly at the skeptical nurse.
She took in the appearance of the children by Lucas' side and motioned to the right of her desk, "Julian Baker is in room 305A. But to warn you the sight of your brother-in-law isn't so pretty so be prepared."
Lucas and Jamie glanced at one another as they stood frozen at the receptionist's desk. Both men were hesitating to take a step toward Julian's room after the warning from the receptionist. They were nervous about what awaited them in the cold, dark hospital room.
Jamie let out a heavy sigh before he took a small step forward, "Brooke needs us!" He reminded his uncle before his small steps turned into long strides down the hall towards Julian's room.
Lucas remained frozen as he watched his brave nephew make his way down the long hallway. He took another deep breath before he followed Jamie's lead.
Jamie stood outside of the closed door. He waited patiently for his uncle to catch up to him but before Lucas could make it down the hallway the door to the room opened.
"Jamie?" Brooke squealed loudly at the sight of her godson. "What are you doing here?" She pulled the tall male into her arms. "I thought you were in California visiting your Uncle Lucas during your summer vacation from school?"
"Hey Brooke!" Lucas managed to get passed the lump that was forming in the middle of this throat.
The sight of Brooke made his heart drop down into his stomach. It was apparent that the woman had been crying because tear strikes were visible in her make-up. Although, that seemed to be the only messy thing about the woman. Her hair was pulled up into a neat bun on the top of her head. Her sweater was ironed and draping over a pair of dark blue leggings. Her leggings were neatly tucked into a pair of brown Ugg boots.
"Luke?" Brooke croaked out when she saw her old high school boyfriend standing in the middle of the hallway with a blond haired child holding on tightly to his hand. "What are you doing here?"
Lucas smiled nervously, "I could not, not be here after hearing the bad news about Julian."
Brooke smiled sadly as she glanced over her shoulder at the dark hospital room where her husband lied unconscious from a car accident.
"I'm so glad the three of you are here." Brooke bit down onto her bottom lip, trying to fight back the tears that were building up in her eyes. "Thank you!"
She turned and led them inside of the hospital room. Jamie fought back the urge to gasp out loudly when he got his first glance at his Uncle Julian. He swallowed hard as he took in the sight of the battered man.
Julian's face was scratched and burned from the car wreck. His car had caught on fire before the firefighters could free him from the tangled metal. Most of his face was in bandages after many hours of surgery to try and fix his appearance.
"Oh god Aunt Brooke!" Jamie pulled his aunt into his arms, "I'm so sorry!"
Brooke gave her godson a tight squeeze before releasing him, "We're going to be okay!" She took Jamie's face into her hands. "Julian is going to pull through and make it out of this depressing room."
Brooke was losing faith in her husband's recovery more and more every day. The doctors already informed Brooke that they did not believe Julian would pull through and come out of his coma. Brooke was keeping him on life support because she knew couldn't handle losing him.
"I can't lose him." She turned to Julian and her strength disappeared as her knees gave out underneath her. Her body crumbled onto the cold floor next to her husband's hospital bed.
Lucas pushed Sawyer into Jamie's arms and he nodded for Jamie to step out into the hallway. Jamie obeyed his uncle and took his sleeping cousin outside.
"Brooke!" He pulled the distraught woman from the floor, "Brooke!" He held her against his chest. "Everything is going to be alright."
Brooke cried into his chest, "How do you know that Luke?" She pulled herself away from his hold, "Look at him! He isn't going to make it Luke but I can't handle losing him. I just cant!" She gave a slap to Lucas' chest, "I can't keep losing people."
Lucas was not fazed by the weak slap to his chest. "Brooke, you don't have to go through this alone." He watched her with sad eyes. "You have Haley and Nathan. Jamie is here for you and so am I!"
Brooke held back more tears as she wiped away her tear-stricken face with her fingers. Lucas moved her hands away and he began to wipe away her tears.
"What about your life in California? You can't just give all that up so come back here to look after me." Brooke stood still as he wiped away her tears.
"That is not a tough decision at all. Being here for you means more to me than any life in California." Lucas held her wet face in his hands, "Let me be there for you!"
Brooke sighed heavily before melting into his arms, "Thank you." She whispered into his chest as she stared at her husband.
"There is no need to thank me. I love you Brooke Davis…" Lucas glanced over at Julian, "Baker."
Brooke pulled back from their embrace, "I love you too Lucas Scott-Sawyer!"
Lucas frowned, "I didn't know the man changed his name to match his wife's last name?"
"I was just acknowledging Peyton's presence. Why didn't she come with you?" Brooke asked.
Lucas looked down at the heavy brown boots upon his feet, "Peyton and I are getting a divorce. I didn't get a chance to tell her about Julian before I jumped on a plane with Jamie and Sawyer to be by your side."
Brooke's brown eyes widened, "A divorce?" She squealed as she took her seat back at Julian's bed side, afraid of her knees giving out again. "What happened? Last time I saw you two…" She thought back, "You two were so happy with the birth of Sawyer."
Lucas nodded his head slowly as he leaned against the wall, "Things change and so do people." He peeled his eyes off of his brown combat boots. "I realized I made a mistake when I choose Peyton."
"You mean you want Lindsay back?" Brooke kept her eyes on a bruised and battered Julian.
"No." Lucas laughed nervously, "I never loved Lindsay the way I loved Peyton but I never loved Peyton the way I loved…"
A knocked sounded off on the door and Jamie stepped back inside.
"Sorry! Sawyer woke up and she started asking for you." Jamie pushed opened the door further and Sawyer raced inside.
"Daddy! I woke up and you weren't there." Sawyer ran into her father's arms.
Lucas caught his daughter and rested her on his hip. "Hey baby girl. I'm right here don't worry!"
"Hey!" Brooke waved to the small blond girl with big hazel eyes, "I'm your Aunt Brooke."
"I know!" Sawyer smiled widely, "Mama used to talk about you all the time and she would show me pictures of you two together before bed time. Aunt Brooke?"
Brooke smiled, "Yes?"
"Can I ask you a question?" Sawyer climbed out of her father's arms and she slowly made her way over to her aunt.
Brooke pulled the young girl into her arms, "Sure! You can ask me anything."
Sawyer looked from Jamie and her father. "Is it true that my mom stole my daddy from you?"
Brooke choked on a laugh, "Who told you that?"
Sawyer pointed her tiny index finger over to her cousin, Jamie, who was standing near the door to the hospital room. Jamie pretended to look around the room for another person to blame it all on.
"I don't know what she is talking about!" Jamie laughed nervously. "I never said such a thing!"
Sawyer gasped, "Yes he did! He told me on that airplane that we rode to get over here."
"Well do you want to know the truth?" Brooke peeled her stare from Jamie.
Sawyer nodded silently.
"Are you sure you want to know the truth?" Brooke asked the ten year old girl.
"I'm sure!" Sawyer crossed her hands over her heart, "I'm so sure!"
Brooke smiled sadly over at Lucas, "I was in love with your father but so was your mother, and your father chose to be with your mother over me."
Sawyer pouted, "I like you Aunt Brooke! You're honest with me." She turned to her father, "Why didn't you choose Aunt Brooke?"
Lucas couldn't find an explanation to give to his daughter so he remained silent and gave his shoulders a stiff shrug. "I don't know honey."
Lucas and Brooke locked eyes for several moments but a feeling of guilt washed over Brooke so she pulled her eyes from Lucas' eyes. She turned her attention back to her ailing husband.
"How can I still feel like this towards him while my husband lies in his bed dying?" Brooke thought to herself.