Okay, so this is just an alternate (ish) version of the events that took place for L&P during the missing years on OTH. Even on a brand new account, I'm still having problems uploading, so if any of the paragraphs have been swopped around then I'm sorry- any spelling errors though, are all my fault.

Enjoy! :)

Peyton Sawyer was everything to Lucas Scott. Every cell in his body, every atom of his existence didn't deny this, and even if his head had told him that she wasn't right for him, he would have ignored it, because his heart was stronger than his head, and she was definitely in his heart. The lonely girl, the cheerleader, with the Comet, the soft, waving curls and the beautiful (albeit a little chickeny ) legs. He had always wanted her, even before they had ever spoke. In the years before they had become friends- although, had there ever been a point when they had just been friends?- he had studied her from afar with such an intensity that would no doubt have alarmed her and her friends if they had learnt of it. Peyton Sawyer was like an diamond, precious and beautiful and admired, but uncut; her past defined her but her future story was yet to be written. She was a gem that, upon first glance may have looked like all the others, but once you looked carefully, you could see that she wasn't. Peyton Sawyer was different. Maybe that was why he liked her.

Liked her? Loved her. He knew the truth, and so did she, and so did all of their friends and people like Jake, and Brooke, people who had stumbled along onto their path on their way to getting to the point where they could look at each other and touch each other and realise with infinite clarity- "This is the person I want to spend the rest of my life with."

That was what Lucas wanted. He wanted the proper family that neither of them had got to have; Peyton with the adopted mother lost at a young age, the father that she loved so much but saw so little, the biological mother who she had known for a short time but grieved so much for anyway - Lucas with the lovely mother, the father figure who was actually his uncle, and the biological father who had lived in a different world with a different family, his real family.

The biological father who had killed Keith, and made his mother so sad.

Who can look at somebody when they are a teenager and say that that is the person that they want to have children with? Maybe that wasn't the thought that Lucas had associated in all of his years of watching Peyton, but he had known that he wanted to spend the rest of his life with her. And, of course, spending the rest of his life with somebody meant the whole deal - the house with the white picket fence, the loved-up parents and the beautiful children. Yes, their children would be beautiful. And yes, they would never be completely typical. They had both been through so much in their lives, and maybe the lack of normalcy they had both endured would prevent them from leading completely 100% normal perfect family lives in the future, but everybody has their own ideas of what perfect is, each of them different.

And for Lucas Scott, spending the rest of his life with Peyton Sawyer was beyond perfect.

"I was pregnant, Luke!" Peyton shouted. The room fell into stunned silence. Lucas stopped, halted his frustrated movements of pushing his hands through his hair and stared at her. Peyton shifted in the chair uncomfortably, but she was too angry to just stop now. As soon as she had come back and found the jewellery box on the floor, she should have left. She shouldn't have waited around just so that he could propose, and she had to say no. It wasn't saying no, she reminded herself, I've only asked for more time. She needed time. The pain inside her was still so raw it hurt her sometimes to even breathe. He hadn't known. But now he did. She should have left the hotel room, left Luke behind before the words that she would regret, the words that she had hidden for months, spilled out of her mouth. She couldn't help it. She had had no intention to reveal it at all, it was her secret to keep.

But it was their baby. Our baby, she thought. It would have had Lucas's eyes, and his nose, and it would have loved basketball and drawing and music…

He had been rambling on about how they could make this work, about how she was already changing and he didn't want the next change to be her feelings for him-

"C'mon, Peyton, help me out here. I know that we can make this work. We've been through too much now just to let little things get in our way." His voice was pleading, pleading with her to make this work. Peyton ran her hands through her hair and exhaled, the little black ring box still on her lap as Lucas paced.

"These little things are our dreams, Luke. Your novel, and my music." She said wearily. Not now. Please.

"But, Peyton, look… this job isn't helping your music. You hate this job. I mean, what do you do? You get people coffee and deliver mail, and we both know that you were doing more than that at home. You're so much better than this. " He spoke softly, and carefully. He didn't want to hurt her, offend her or belittle her, but his mere presence was killing her and he didn't even know it. She had hidden it, since he arrived at her office, at dinner before she had been called away. She had played bright, sparkly Peyton, happy and holding it together in this big, strange city ; him being here made her want to break down in his arms and yet tell him to leave her alone at the same time. And he was so innocent to it all.

But now, it was late, and she was tired. She couldn't put on this front anymore.

She sighed, and tried a smile. "Well, I love you for believing that, for believing in me, but I have to prove that to myself. Luke, I have to believe in myself, too. I'm never going to be able to do that if I just give up and go home now."

"Even if it means that we could be together? Even if we could be married?" He was trying to persuade her, to convince her to see things from his point of view. It wasn't working. It made her feel guiltier. It made her feel even more dirty, and disgusting. Leave. Please, just go.

"Lucas…that's the thing." She implored him to understand. Right then, she just wanted him to go home, back to Tree Hill, so she could leave this hotel room and never come back. But some part of her, the part that wasn't numb with guilt and pain, the part that rejoiced when he surprised her at work (because he always saved her, and if there had ever been a time when she needed saving it couldn't have compared to this moment) didn'twant him out of her life forever. It crept through the part of her that just wanted him gone today, forget about tomorrow and the rest of the future. "We both have so much that we wanna do with our lives, like I said, and…I'm not saying no. I'm just asking for a year, is that too much to ask for? One year out of the rest of our lives?"

"A year? Peyton, we thought this would be "Just a year" and look at how it has turned out. We've seen each other three times in the last year and…and we go days without talking. That's what we've got to show for a year. The occasional meeting, a weekly phone call, and a few emails." He looked down at where she sat, his face softening, running his hands through his hair. He really was breaking her heart. "We've already grown so far apart. Who knows where we'll be a year on from now? I don't want to lose you, Peyton. We can make this work, just - just hear me out okay? This can work, I know it can."

Peyton tried to hold his gaze, but she couldn't. Frowning, and trying not to let all of the memories come rushing back to her, she looked down at her lap.

"W-what did you just say?" Lucas stammered. He stared at her without even blinking. "Peyton, what did you just say?"

Peyton looked up at him, then averted her eyes after seeing the intensity of his gaze.

"I was pregnant." She whispered guiltily. "When I came to LA. I found out when I was a few weeks along."

The look on Lucas's face was one of pure shock. This revelation had just about knocked the words out of him.

His hands painted confused, shaky circles in the air as he tried to grasp this. "You were pregnant?" He looked down at her stomach, flat as ever. Peyton swallowed and kept her face blank as she looked at the carpet underneath the bed.

"Not any more." She whispered dully. Lucas sank down onto the edge of the bed silently.

Minutes passed like this. Peyton watched Lucas anxiously. He looked heartbroken. Totally shocked. He had not been expecting this. Neither had she. She had no idea that he was coming, and no intentions of ever telling about their baby.

"Peyton…" She looked up at him, into his broken eyes. "Why didn't you tell me?"

Peyton swallowed. It was impossible to suppress these emotions. Tears fell down her pale cheeks. "I didn't…I didn't want to tell you over the phone. And then when you visited…" She let out a little gasp of breath, a breath that she had been holding. "I couldn't tell you, Luke. I just couldn't."

Peyton waited for the shouts. In the few times she had envisioned this, she had seen him shouting emotionally, demanding to know why she hadn't told him that she was pregnant, and why she hadn't told him that the baby was dead. Surely, he would be angry? Surely, he would call her a monster, all the words she knew she was? She was waiting now, almost impatiently. She had wanted an excuse for one of them to leave this hotel ever since the conversation started, and this was her excuse. He would shout, she would whisper her apologies, and then he would storm out, or throw her out. Either way, she could go home, and crawl into the shower and try, like every other night, to scrub the dirty feeling away from her skin.

"Peyton…" Lucas was on his feet, kneeling before her and pulling her into a tight embrace. Peyton wanted so badly to hug him to her tightly but she just couldn't.

She felt his fingers softly running through her hair as she breathed in his scent.

Anger, and her guilt, she could handle. But Lucas not being angry, holding her and comforting her…she couldn't handle that. "It's okay, sweetheart, I'm here. It's okay." He pulled away and looked her in the eyes; his own eyes were damp with his tears, as he gently brushed away hers with his thumb.

Peyton watched him in bewilderment.

"It's going to be okay. I'm going to look after you. "

"You can't-" Peyton whispered, her voice breaking. She wished more than anything that she could believe this, that she could just fall into his arms and let him take away all of her hurt but that just wasn't an option.

"I can, it's okay. I'm not going to leave you." He reached over and pressed a kiss against her forehead. "I'm sorry that you couldn't tell me. God, Peyt, I'm so sorry I wasn't here, I should have known." Why was he blaming himself? "But I love you and I'm here now. We can fix this, together. You don't need to be here alone. We can get a flight back to Tree Hill right away, and-"

"No." The word that escaped Peyton's mouth was so quiet that neither of them really heard it until she repeated it with more force. "No."

He looked confused. "Peyt, what-?"

"You haven't even been listening!" She cried, pushing him away from her and walking to the other side of the room. She heard Lucas get to his feet and approach her. She whirled round to meet his confused, and hurt gaze. "I don't want to go back to Tree Hill!"

"Peyton, please. Let me make this better for you-"

"What, you think this can be fixed by getting married, and having more kids? There are some things you can't fix, Lucas!"

"Peyton-"

"God, for once can't this be about me, and what I want? I am staying here, Lucas, and there's nothing you can do to change my mind."

"Peyton…" He began with a sigh. "You're upset, you've been through something terrible and I wish I could have been here to support you, but I'm here now-"

"Stop telling me how I feel!" She shrieked. "Stop telling me what to do! I'm sick and tired of not being in control of how my life works out, I should be able to stop these things-"

Lucas flinched. "You couldn't have stopped this, Peyton, these things just happen-" He reached out and cupped her face in his hands. "It's nothing you could have stopped-"

With a resounding smack, Peyton tugged herself free and slapped the man before her right across the face. He stared at her and lifted his palm to his red cheek, but didn't say anything. Peyton knew it wasn't enough. He would just put that down to her being upset, he wouldn't be angry, and God, the only way to ease this pain was to make him angry with her, so angry he couldn't hold back, so angry that he would just leave. This was the one thing she could control. Her next words were unexpected, for him, and especially for her. She was submerged in water, he was there, her knight in shining armour, but she was pushing him away, wildly clutching for the words that she didn't even know she had in her, and they were bitter and sour on her tongue, but they were out, and there was no taking them back.

"You don't even know what you're saying Lucas! I could have stopped this! I caused this!" She spat. His eyes widened but he still looked confused. "I killed our baby! I had an abortion!"