Basically, the idea for this semi-AU made its way into my head and I couldn't get it out, so I really had no choice but to write it out in fic form. For the sake of this story, Toby is the same age as the girls and Caleb, but I guess you'll figure that out from reading the first chapter anyway. I'm pretty excited about this story and I think you guys will like it too (hopefully), so without further ado, enjoy chapter one!

Chapter One

"Now who is that?" Questioned Hanna Marin with a smirk, shuffling onto the seat next to her friend Spencer Hastings at their usual lunch table.

"That," Spencer sighed as she studied the photo on her phone screen, "Is the guy my parents are trying to set me up with. His name is Angus - he likes hunting, playing world-class tennis, and spending summers lounging at his parents' country club."

Hanna stuck her bottom lip out and raised her eyebrows, nodding in mock approval, "Nice."

Spencer's parents were always very disapproving of anyone who was, well, less than perfect, and so she was always being persuaded to go out with a son of a friend who owned a lot of things worth a lot of money, or someone along those lines at least.

"What's nice?"

Hanna spun her head to find their friends, Caleb Rivers and Toby Cavanaugh, approaching from the other side of the cafeteria. Caleb took the seat next to hers, and shot her a questioning look as he clumsily shoved his tray of fries onto the table in front of him.

"Spencer's new boy-toy," Hanna replied with a giggle, "He's-"

"He's not my 'boy-toy'," Spencer interjected, "My parents would love for that to be the case, though."

"Ah," Caleb nodded in understanding, "So I'm taking it they still don't know about you two then?" He turned to look at Toby before focusing his attention back on Spencer.

Spencer made eye contact with Toby briefly, running her fingers through her hair in annoyance as he replied with nothing but a shrug. "Nope, and we're still not ready to tell them, so no spilling please. Understood?"

"What are we understanding?"

Spencer huffed as Aria Montgomery, Emily Fields, and Alison DiLaurentis all took their usual places at the lunch table. "I am so not telling the story again."

"Toby is Spencer's boy-toy, but Spencer's parents want Angus to be Spencer's boy-toy. Oh, and Angus' parents own a country club," Hanna summarised, smiling smugly as all her friends seemed to immediately understand her explanation.

"Anyway," Spencer clapped her hands twice, "Let's turn change the subject from the dictatorship that is my parents and focus on something more interesting."

"Like Han's stalker?" Joked Alison, as Hanna shot her a look. Her 'stalker' was in fact her ex-boyfriend Sean, who still hadn't quite become accustomed to the 'ex' part of 'ex-boyfriend'.

"He's still bothering you?" Caleb enquired, sounding genuinely concerned.

Hanna made a waving motion with her hand, as if to signify that she wasn't affected by it at all. "It's no big deal," She tried to assure her friends, "He just won't stop texting me and it's getting kinda annoying."

To tell the truth, it was getting much more than just 'kinda annoying' – he was near enough threatening her at this point, but she didn't want to worry anyone by telling them that.

"You sure?" Asked Aria gently, reaching across the table to place a hand on Hanna's arm.

"Mhm," Hanna assured her, nodding furiously, "I'm sure."

Caleb reached to the side, placing his on Hanna's arm next to Aria's, "Good, because if not, me and Toby are gonna have no problem beating him up for you. Right?"

"Right," Toby affirmed, as he began to beat his chest with his fists. "We strong alpha males, we kill Sean," He grunted, eliciting giggles from all the girls aside from Spencer, who just raised her eyebrows at him.

"Oh, well now I feel safe," Hanna joked, slumping back into her seat before sticking her hand out to steal two of Caleb's fries.

The rest of the school day passed by pretty quickly, and at 3 o'clock, as per usual, Hanna found herself waiting by Caleb's locker. He was currently living in a rented apartment just around the corner from the street that she lived on, and so the two of them had taken to walking home together almost every afternoon; Hanna had decided that this was now one of her favourite parts of the day. She and Caleb had been good friends for more than three years now, but ever since the start of senior year they'd gotten a lot closer, and she loved it. He had become someone outside of the girls that she could confide in, and honestly, sometimes it was a lot easier to tell him stuff than it was to tell anyone else - she just felt comfortable around him.

"Guess who."

Hanna jumped forward and hit her arm on the locker door beside her as Caleb's voice came from behind, breaking her out of her little reverie. "Ouch!" She whipped around to face him with a stern glare on her face, before her lips formed a small frown and her voice became quiet, "That hurt me."

Caleb's gleeful expression turned a little more sympathetic – although he still looked pretty smug – as he put his arm around Hanna's shoulder, bringing her body into his.

"I'm sorry Han Han," He mocked in his best baby voice, reaching his hand up to tousle her long blonde curls as they started walking out of the building, "Didn't mean to scare you."

Hanna laughed as she pushed his arm off of her shoulder, "You're an ass."

"That I may be, but I'm an ass who got you something that you might be very interested in."

She suddenly perked up at that, "Like what?"

Caleb simply shrugged his shoulders and fastened his walking pace, making sure that he strode way ahead of Hanna so that she was left trailing behind him.

"Caleb!" She was almost running to keep up with him by this point, "What did you get?!"

He stopped in his tracks and turned around to face Hanna, who now had a big grin spread across her face despite the fact that she was a little out of breath.

"Am I still an ass?" He asked, one eyebrow raised.

"Yes," She confirmed.

Caleb began to turn away again as a smile crept upon his face, but he was stopped when Hanna reached out to grab one of his tanned arms. "However," She began, "You're an ass who also happens to be one of my best friends, and that therefore negates the ass-ness of your personality."

He let out a short laugh at that. "I was just about to compliment you on your use of the word negates, but then you used the word ass-ness in the same sentence so…"

Hanna stomped her feet in discontentment, "Caleb! I just complimented you!"

Amidst her tiny tantrum, Caleb reached into his pocket and pulled out a small white envelope, handing it to the girl in front of him as she immediately stopped sulking and an embarrassed expression crept onto her face.

"Can I open it?" She enquired, her voice small but hopeful.

Caleb rolled his eyes, a grin plastered across his cheeks, "Obviously."

Hanna let out a little shriek of happiness as she ripped the envelope open, throwing her arms around Caleb without hesitation when she realised what was inside. Nestled between two sheets of pink tissue paper were two tickets to see Coldplay, one of Hanna's favourite bands of all time. They were touring around the US later that year, and so she'd been continuously hinting at her friends to come and see them with her – she'd thought they'd all been completely ignoring her, but clearly Caleb was an exception.

"Thank you so so so much," She beamed, pulling back from the hug to look at his face, "I totally take back the whole ass thing now."

"Thought you might," He chuckled, "Glad you like them."

"Of course I like them! You know how much I wanted to go."

"Oh, and you can take whoever you want with the other ticket," Caleb added, smiling genuinely at her.

Hanna rolled her eyes at that. "Of course I'm taking you, idiot," She laughed, linking her arm with his and looking down at the tickets as they started walking again. "May eleventh. I'm gonna set up a countdown on my phone."

"He actually bought you tickets?"

"Yup," Hanna practically beamed down the phone to Emily, "For May, and we're going together."

"Wow, looks like I'm gonna have to step up my best friend game if I don't want Caleb to steal you away from me," Giggled Emily, only half joking.

Hanna laughed along until she heard a ping, signalling the fact that a text had just come through on her phone. "Hold on a second, just checking my messages."

She opened the text up to find that it was exactly who she'd been hoping it wasn't – Sean. A wave of nausea coursed through her body as she registered his name and reluctantly read the words on the screen to herself.

Hanna, I'm coming over to your house tonight. I know your mom is away so don't try and get out of this one, we haven't been alone together in so long. I miss you.

She narrowed her eyes in disgust at that. 'I miss you'? Wasn't he the one that broke up with her, after telling practically the whole school that she was a 'dirty slut' and had cheated on him, when in fact the truth was the complete opposite?

"Ugh," She grunted, bringing the phone back to her ear.

"Sean?" Asked Emily, already knowing the answer to her question.

"Yep, just Sean being gross and obnoxious as usual."

Emily's voice was full of concern, "What did he say?"

"Oh you know, just that he wants to come over tonight because he knows that we'll be alone," She paused, "I'm kinda scared, Em."

A gentle sigh came from the other side of the phone, "Want me to come over later?"

"No, no!" Hanna shot back immediately, "He's just a jerk, I can handle him."

Truth be told, she really did want Emily to come over that night, but she didn't want Sean to have any sort of control over her life, and that included her being afraid of him. He had never been violent towards her while they were together, but he had a hot temper that almost nobody else knew about, and sometimes it made Hanna think that things could swing that way if it came down to it.

"You sure?"

"I'm sure." Hanna didn't know who she was trying to convince – Emily, or herself.

"Okay then, call me later and tell me if he actually shows up?" Emily asked gently.

Hanna smiled to herself at her friend's concern. "Sure, speak later," She agreed, before hanging up and throwing her phone down onto her bed, from which it bounced back and landed with a definitive thud on the floor. "Great."

She didn't even bother to pick up the phone before she flopped down onto her plush double duvet, squeezing her eyes shut as she tried to alleviate the pain that had suddenly become apparent in her head. A noise identical to the one she had heard earlier, only this time slightly muffled, made its way across the room as she sighed. Well, she knew who that would be.

Not wanting to delay the inevitable, Hanna pushed herself up and off of the bed, crouching down to find that her phone was completely unharmed, other than a couple of small scratches on one corner. Ping. There was the noise again.

"Yeah, I get it!" She huffed, punching her passcode in before Sean's new messages flashed up on the screen.

I'm at the door.

Come let me in.

Hanna felt her heart begin to beat a little faster as she frantically tried to think of a reply that would get her out of seeing him.

I'm not home. I'm at Aria's house, sorry.

His reply was instantaneous.

No you're not, your bedroom light is on and I can see your shadow behind your curtains. Don't lie to me Hanna.

Hanna brought her hand up to her now sweaty forehead and began to pace back and forth across the expanse of her bedroom – she really had no choice but to let him in now. Creeping down the stairs as slowly and silently as she could, she made an attempt to even her breathing out before reluctantly opening the front door.

As soon as his face registered hers, Sean pushed past Hanna into the house, and stood with his hands on his hips, an almost furious look on his face.

"Why didn't you want me here, huh?" He questioned, tapping his foot as he waited expectantly for a response.

Hanna pushed the door shut as she took a step towards him, "I-"

"No wait, don't answer that," He interrupted her, "You're acting like you don't even know me, or- or like you're afraid of me or something."

She didn't quite know what to say to that.

Sean's eyes widened. "Well?!"

"Well what do you expect from me, Sean?" Hanna began, the annoyance that she was feeling finally beginning to come through in her voice, "You break up with me, lie to just about everyone in school about why we broke up, and then demand that I let you into my house? It's not ok." Tears of self-pity began to well in her eyes as she shook her head sadly.

The furious look on Sean's face faded rapidly and was replaced by a mocking smile, accompanied by the continuous shrugging of his shoulders as he began to laugh loudly. "Come on Hanna, we all know I did you a favour," He jeered at her.

This time it was Hanna's eyes that went wide. "A favour?!"

"Everybody was forgetting who you were, you were fading into the background, you needed someone to bring you back into the spotlight. That's exactly what I did - everybody knows your name now!"

"Yeah," Hanna was really beginning to get mad, "And they all think it's Hanna slut-who-cheated-on-her-super-duper-perfect-boyfriend Marin! You did me no favours, Sean."

Sean sighed, as if Hanna was some great burden on his otherwise perfect life. "Fine then, you know what? I'll tell them all that it wasn't true, it was just some stupid rumour that I heard from one of the guys."

Hanna nodded her head once, "Great, get out of my house and go do that," She demanded, signalling towards the door with her hand.

"Woah woah woah," Sean began, his derisory chuckle returning as he shook his head, "It's not gonna be that easy, I want something in return."

She sighed to herself at that – he really was like a five-year-old. "What do you want?" She threw back at him.

"You."

His answer was so short and simple that it stunned her, yet still managed to make her feel queasy at the same time. There was no way she was getting back together with Sean, not after what he'd done to her. She was one hundred percent sure that she didn't even like him anymore, anyway.

"No way," She shot back immediately, "Absolutely no way."

Sean threw his hands up in the air and huffed, "And why not?"

Crap. Think Hanna, think.

Thirty seconds passed and she still stood staring at Sean, her mouth slightly agape as she desperately tried to think of something, anything to say. He took a step towards her, and at their close proximity, the next words that she spoke unwittingly flew out of her mouth.

"Because I have a boyfriend."

Sean raised his eyebrows, "Really?" He asked smugly, clearly trying to hide his shock at her answer.

Hanna nodded furiously.

"And who would that be?"

Shit. Shit shit shit. Just say someone's name, quick.

"That would be Caleb Rivers."

Hanna wiped a stray tear from her reddened cheek as she dialled Caleb's number, pushing her phone up against her ear and snivelling in an attempt to hold back from crying any more. She anxiously chewed one of her fingernails as she waited for him to pick up, if he was even going to pick up at midnight, that is.

When Sean had finally left, Hanna had called Emily in tears, and they'd both come to the conclusion that the best thing to do was tell Caleb about the situation. Which was pretty much exactly what Hanna didn't want to have to do.

After three rings, Caleb picked up and Hanna heard his hoarse voice come down the line. "Hanna, are yo-"

Caleb's question was cut short as Hanna cut him off, ending the call and burying her phone under her pillow. She'd definitely just woken him up. "I can't do this," She whined to herself, throwing her head into her hands.

Ping.

Her stomach instinctively lurched at the sound of her text tone, but she immediately relaxed when she realised that it almost certainly wouldn't be Sean messaging her this time. Still using one hand to hold her head, she blindly reached out with the other to grab her phone from under the pillow, forcing herself to pry one eye open and take a peek at the screen. A deep sigh of relief left her mouth as she registered Caleb's name, and finally opened his message.

Han, did you just cut me off? Everything okay? xx

Hanna smiled to herself at his concern, and maybe a little at the two kisses that he only ever used when he was texting her – she might even have checked his messages with Emily and Spencer, just to make sure that this was the case. She bit her lip thoughtfully as she tried to come up with a reply.

Sorta, but not really. I mean, I'm okay, but I've done something stupid xx

How stupid, on a scale from one to ten? One being not stupid at all, ten being, say… crying because the store was out of strawberry twizzlers? xx

Hanna brought her hand up to her mouth as she snorted with laughter.

Hey! That was a hard time for me ok, I hadn't slept the night before because of the royal wedding and my emotions got the better of me xx

She imagined Caleb smiling at her response, before realising that she hadn't actually answered his question.

And about an eight, by the way xx

Maybe she was just being overdramatic – Caleb might think it was more of a five.

So, no murder involved? xx

He needed to stop making her laugh when she was actually trying to tell him something.

Definitely no murder on my part, but I might have heightened my chances of being murdered by Sean xx

Is he with you now?

Hanna could tell Caleb was getting worried by the way that his kisses had disappeared from his texts.

No, but he was here earlier xx

She wanted to come clean and tell Caleb so that he could stop worrying about whatever he was clearly assuming had happened to her – she just couldn't help but feel nervous about his reaction, for some reason. It was a good five minutes before Caleb's next reply came through.

I'm on my way over now xx

A wave of guilt washed over Hanna.

No no no Caleb, you don't need to come over! I'm fine honestly, I'm just being dumb xx

She ran a hand through her hair and huffed to herself – why was she making such a big deal out of this? She'd probably worried Caleb now, for no reason at all. And he was making a special journey at almost one o'clock in the morning just to see her. Hanna didn't know why, but the thought of him doing so made her feel warm inside.

Caleb's next reply never arrived, just as Hanna had expected would be the case. He was ignoring her request to stay put, and undoubtedly making the short journey over to the Marin residence.

A loud knock startled Hanna and she jumped slightly at the noise, but unlike earlier, she wasn't dreading the journey downstairs to open the door. Her nerves about telling Caleb seemed to have fizzled out, and were replaced by a giddy sense of anticipation as she practically flew down to the ground floor. She fumbled with the lock for a quick moment before flinging the door open, and looking up to see Caleb's eyes staring back at her.

"Hey," She grinned at him, "You didn't have to-"

"I wanted to," He interrupted, stepping forward and pulling her into a warm hug. "I was worried."

Hanna allowed herself a small smile. "There's nothing to be worried about, I promise," She mumbled against his chest.

Caleb pulled away from the hug slowly, holding Hanna out at arms length by her elbows. He raised an eyebrow in disbelief, "Really?"

"Really," She confirmed.

"Then why did you text me to tell me that you'd done something stupid?"

"Because I did," Hanna pursed her lips, "I did do something stupid."

Caleb sighed, running a hand through his hair as he relinquished his hold on Hanna, "Care to tell me what it is?"

"At least come and in close the door first," She joked, as Caleb smiled sweetly and reached behind himself to push the door to. "You want a drink?"

"Now you're just trying to stall," Caleb laughed, "Hanna Marin, what – did – you – do?" He punctuated each of his words by poking her stomach lightly, sending her into a fit of giggles as she ran into the kitchen and picked up an empty carton of milk – the first thing she saw – in a weak attempt to defend herself.

Following close behind her, Caleb raised an eyebrow at her weapon of choice as they both came to a standstill. "A milk carton, really?"

Hanna looked down at the object in her hands, registering the milk carton properly for the first time.

"What are you gonna do with that?" He mocked.

"Shut up, ass," She grinned back at him, throwing the carton into the trash before pulling a stool out and taking a seat. "Sit."

Caleb did as she had requested and took a seat next to her, clearing his throat before he spoke. "So tell me, what could the great Hanna Marin have possibly done for her actions to be worthy of the label 'stupid'?"

"Oh," Hanna spoke quietly, "You're about to find out just how stupid they were."

Caleb smirked, "Enlighten me."

She took a deep breath in and out, before clapping her hands together as she began her story. "Ok, so you know that Sean's been bothering me again lately, asking to come over and stuff?"

Caleb nodded.

"And you know why we broke up?"

Caleb nodded again, though this time it was accompanied by an eye roll – clearly a display of his disapproval of Sean's childlike actions.

Hanna began to speak faster as her nerves got the better of her, "Well tonight he came over, and we argued, and he said that he would tell everyone that what he said was a lie as long as…"

"As long as what?"

"As long as I agreed to be his girlfriend again."

Caleb barked out a laugh at that, "You said no, didn't you?" His expression turned stoic when she didn't reply for a moment, "Hanna, tell me you said no."

Hanna waved her hands out in front over her, "No no, don't worry, I definitely said no."

Caleb nodded in understanding. "Ok, so then what was the stupid thing that you did?"

"Well, the stupid thing is kinda how I got out of the previously mentioned situation."

When she recieved no reply other than another nod, she took it as her cue to go on.

"I told him that I have a boyfriend."

Caleb looked confused at her response. "And he didn't ask you who he was?"

He was gonna be mad at her. She could feel it. "Oh yeah, he asked me alright."

"And you don't think he's gonna find out that you were lying when he asks the guy and he has no recollection of the two of you dating?"

"Well that's the thing," Hanna bit her lip, feeling very anxious all of a sudden, "I was kinda hoping that that wouldn't be the case… that maybe the guy would lie for me."

Caleb sighed as he shook his head, "And who is the lucky guy that will be graced with such an honour?"

Here we go.

"It's you."

So there we go, first chapter done! I hope it was alright – I know it wasn't super Haleb-ish, but I needed to introduce all the characters and the situation. The next chapter is gonna be adorable, though. Your thoughts and comments, both good and bad, are always welcomed and appreciated!