Disclaimer- I own nothing

Author's Note: Okay so I really need to calm down with these updates. I have been going crazy and writing a chapter for something for the past few nights. But I have truly missed it and you all are definitely worth it. Now I have debated beginning A Lingering Kiss for awhile now and I was even going to let my sister write it but she is kinda spacey and would never sit down and actually start… so I decided to finally take this story back up again. Yes I know I have 2 other stories in progress but I am very comfortable with Simple Love (especially since that is somewhat coming to a close) and I know how that story is going to end so that's not a problem. And One Love, I totally wing it every chapter but right now that story is more emotion and beginning plot than anything and I know where I am going for the next few chapters. Anyways I will stop rambling (like I always tend to do) and begin this.

Now I am not sure if any of you exactly remember how this story exactly went (I was only 3 chapters in before I deleted it) and neither do I … I never saved it on my computer so I am truly 100 percent starting over.

Now I will officially end this note.

-Lily

*This chapter is dedicated to every person that messaged me and ever asked for me to write this story again! Thank you all :)


Light and airy, the sun stroked grass that danced gracefully in the breeze and glistened off the windows of cars, parked in busy lots and freshly paved driveways. It was a happy day, one of those mornings that you wake up and instantly feel at ease, the summer smile imprinted along your face, and your tanned body itching to feel the soft air's embrace.

The iced tea was already sitting on the porch and a friend already occupying one of the white painted rocking chairs. The house smelled of laundry detergent, a scent that leaked outside and mixed calmly with the honeysuckles dangling brightly from the bushes. Flowers sang loudly as their pedals reached further to the clouds and dogs wagged their tails wildly, their tongues dangling happily from their mouths.

One of those perfect summer days, where flip-flops line the pool deck and children splash in the refreshing blue water. Parents take a spare moment from their day and appreciate the other, fixing a broken marriage or commemorating an everlasting love. Babies are born on these kind of days and weddings are celebrated with waves sparkling along the beach in the distance. Death keeps its distance and simply observes as life goes on, and for moments at a time, there is nothing but peace and serenity. Friends come home from vacation and neighbors bring over cookies simply because they've been too busy to stop by for a visit in awhile. Relatives call to check up on each other and families sit down to a picnic. Lovers hold hands by the lake and dance their fingers along their partner's palms.

These are those summer days that students long for as the school bell ticks away their time and denies them such joy.

These are those summer days that the world stops to enjoy.

These are those summer days.


"Nathan!" Brooke yelled as the brunette turned quickly towards her, an inch for the red door that stood dimly under the sun.

"What Brooke?" he asked aggravated, glaring towards the petite girl, standing in a pair of shorts that hugged her hips and elongated her legs.

"Are we going to talk about this or are you just going to storm off like you always do and bury yourself in basketball?" she questioned honestly.

"Sorry that I don't want to stick around on this lovely day after what just happened. It's not exactly something I want to talk about," he told her, turning back to the door as she placed a small hand on his broad shoulder, causing him to turn back around, clearly still upset.

"I said I was sorry," Brooke apologized softly, leaving her hand along him, glancing into his burning eyes. "I don't know what else to say."

"There's nothing to say, which is why I'm going to leave," he said, shaking her off of him. "Just, I'll call you later or something."

"When later?"

"I don't know okay Brooke. But right now I need to go to work and then go to the gym."

"I," she began, looking towards him sadly, knowing that there truly wasn't anything to say, he was right about that, but that didn't mean she necessarily wanted him to just walk away angry. They had both learned from experience that, that never worked. "Just please stay."

"And do what, Brooke? Watch a movie?" he asked softly, his eyebrows slightly pinched together in desperation.

"No we can," she began, racking her ideas for something, anything that would just take the two back moments ago, "We can get something for lunch and then I'll watch you play basketball," she suggested.

"I should probably just head home," he said, walking out the door as Brooke followed him, leaning against the frame.

"I thought you had to go to work," she corrected and he nodded, shrugging his shoulders.

"That's what I meant."

"You know, Nathan," Brooke said after a moment, "I didn't do anything," her voice floated through the thin air and he sighed, knowing he wasn't getting anywhere fast. But she was tired of this, the constant fighting and the struggle to make everything better. She loved him; there was no doubt about either of their love for each other. But they wanted different things, and they couldn't comply with each other's desires.

"I'm not blaming you, Brooke. Actually I haven't said anything except that I need to go and if I am late for work, my boss isn't going to be thrilled when I tell him that my girlfriend wanted to talk. So please, I promise that I will call you later tonight and," he said, his voice becoming soft as he walked towards her with a smile, reaching out his arms as she gently folded her body along his frame, "How about I take you to dinner tonight? We can go to that little Italian place you like so much," he told her, looking down into her sparkling eyes, green under the sun's gaze.

"Are you paying?" she smiled as he chuckled and nodded.

"Have I ever made you?"

"No," she bit her lip, "But I wouldn't want to agree and then find out that I have to pay for my meal at that cute little place with the cute little menu and the cute little chocolate cake with the fudge down the sides," Brooke smiled, tasting the desert in her mouth as the taller brunette just shook his head in disbelief.

"You're crazy, you know that?" he asked as she agreed with him.

"In a good way though," she added.

"Well I wouldn't date a crazy person that was crazy in a bad way," Nathan reminded her.

"Those people need to be love too though."

"You are right," he nodded in agreement, "Just not by me."

"No, you're all mine," Brooke looked at him, wrapping her arms around his neck as he tapped his finger lightly on her nose, as she lifted her toes to support her weight and gently kissed him.

"And I wouldn't want it any other way."

"So," Brooke waited for a moment, searching his eyes as she spoke, "you promise that you're okay, you're not mad?"

"Brooke," he spoke softly, staring straight into her anticipating eyes, "I'm not mad. Frustrated, yes, but mad, no," he admitted as she nodded in understand, kissing him softly as she pushed him backwards with a laugh.

"Make the reservations for 6," she winked, leaving him along the sidewalk to her house as he just laughed.

"Whatever you say," he joked, unlocking his car as he stepped into the front seat, watching as she closed the door and left him alone. But he waited a moment before turning on the car as he saw the door handle move and she poked her head out from the house with a youthful grin.

"I love you Nathan Royal Scott," she called to him, one dimple visible through the positioning of her face.

"I love you too Brooke Penelope Davis," he said honestly, watching as her smile grew and she turned back into the house, disappearing behind the door that left him blocked from the house.


The slow tear slid from her eye as she locked the door behind her, the watery liquid gathering in the corner of her naturally hazel eyes and remained there as she sniffed them back, not wanting to break down, not wanting to be left alone with her thoughts. That was always a very dangerous thing.

But she looked around the house, neatly decorated by the trendiest interior designer money could buy, and a scent that screamed of store bought air freshener. It was empty; other than her presence that floated throughout the house as the day went on, moving from her bedroom, to the kitchen, out the door, back in the door and to the kitchen, and then to her bedroom. It was a constant routine. But she needed constant, especially when she was alone, something she hated, something she feared.

Fighting with Nathan had become constant, something that she could always rely on, not that it was something she wanted to. However similar they were, through their partying and social status in high school, they were also very different. Both of them wanted more out of their relationship, Nathan desiring the physical, and Brooke dreaming for the emotional. She wanted the guy that would hold her from the darkness as night settled around her and her parents argued on the floor below, refusing to come to the agreement that a divorce would be the best thing for all of them. She wanted the kind of guy that would save her without needing to be prompted, but rather it was his first instinct to put her first and himself second. She wanted the kind of guy that surprised her with flowers and hugged her body so close that if she closed her eyes she could imagine them as one person. Not that Nathan couldn't be her knight in shining armor or other half, but part of her knew that although she loved him, he was not the person that was going to tuck her away at night after a long day, or carry their child through the park with an ice cream cone glued to their messy mouth. Brooke loved Nathan, with her whole heart she did. But there was something missing between the two, and maybe if she would just give in to what he wanted they would be closer, but there was something stopping her, and that is what their argument always came to, the roadblock.

He had been patient, after all the two had been dating for a little less than a year. By this time they should have already had sex, made love until the morning sun tickled the windows and reminded them of how much love was between them. They should have pressed their bodies so tightly to the walls that the plaster screamed for a breath. Nathan wanted her, all of her, but every time his finger dipped too low or her shirt rode to high, she was up, off the couch with her arms across her chest. And he never pressured her into having sex, never begging her just this once. He always understood.

And their argument was never that they hadn't made love and celebrated their relationship in such a romantic gesture. But why they hadn't, why she was never able to move past the base they were on, and why whenever he went just a little too far she was halfway across the room.

The reason…his name rhymed with puke and to Nathan, he was equivalent to just that. Luke. Or moreover, Lucas Scott, a disgrace to the last name that Nathan, himself, carried proudly. Their story was known around Tree Hill, the whispers of how Dan had chosen Deb rather than Karen, how he had chosen Nathan rather than Lucas. And that is how his life had always been, Nathan was always used to being chosen over his blonde half brother. He was always the first pick, except in one case, Brooke Davis.

Brooke and Lucas had always been best friends; inseparable since the time on the bus he tied her pink shoes before they held hands through the door to 1st grade. And from that moment it was the two of them against the world. Lucas shared his lunch when her mom was too hung over to pack a sandwich for her 7-year-old daughter, and she always colored his pictures in art when he would rather look at pictures in basketball magazines. Whatever one wanted, the other had, and if they didn't, they would go out of their way to find the next best thing.

They were best friends, inside and out.

The thing about being so close though, is that attraction is bound to erupt, or at least that is what Nathan was convinced of. He was never satisfied with Brooke's constant denial that she and Lucas were simply friends. No guy could just be friends with her without seeing how perfectly clothes seemed to hold her body. Nobody could deny how one day she was just a skinny girl and over one summer, she was a woman and a good-looking one at that. There was no way Lucas Scott spent the night with someone that every guy wanted, without ever trying something.

And that is why Nathan and Brooke fought, because once upon a time, she had a best friend, and he happened to be a guy, and happened to share his last name. Because Nathan couldn't seem to realize that a girl and a guy could be friends without wanting to rip each other's clothes off and embrace the other's beauty.

But Brooke could only deny so much without knowing that deep inside she was more hypocritical than any person she knew. Because there were times, when she absentmindedly let Nathan touch her for a second too long, simply because her eyes flickered to a familiar face, one that had burning blue eyes that smiled right into her. When she let Nathan slide his hand up her skirt, along her leg, because sometimes it had the same texture of her best friend's, someone that she hadn't seen in the longest time.

Brooke knew that the reason her and Nathan fought so often was because of her and how she just couldn't seem to let go of the past and the fact that he had moved, just packed his bags and separated from her 3 years ago. Maybe she should just accept the fact that he wasn't coming back with his flashlight to shine in her window late at night to beckon her from her bed before the two got cell phones.

But even if he was still living across the street, what is to say they would still be best friends, that they would still tell each other everything no matter how embarrassing it might be. After all, everything else had seemed to change within the time span of 3 years, what is to say their friendship wouldn't have?


Author's Note: Well this is the first chapter and I am 100 percent sure this is basically completely different, minus the note about the flashlight and how the shone in each other's windows. But I honestly couldn't remember how I started the other version but I remember the concept. So I really hope you enjoyed and that there is still an interest in this story.

Please review and let me know if you enjoyed it! Also I reposted the link (in my profile) to this video I had made a while ago in case you were interested in watching it again.