Disclaimer: I still don't own them…Damn.

Author's note: So everyone knows, I really do mean to update my stories more than I do, but something always seems to come up, so I apologize for that. I kept thinking about and rewriting this chapter, because I wanted to get it "just right" or as close as I could to how I kept imagining it in my head at work, because, hey, they might be able to make me get up at five a.m. for work, but they can't keep me from thinking of Breyton! Anyway, thank you to everyone who reads this, and I especially want to thank everyone who reviews. I appreciate it so much. I hope that you enjoy this next bit! :)


Brooke surveyed her friend for a moment, "You okay, Blondie?"

Peyton blushed once she realized that she was caught staring, "Sorry." She blushed a shade deeper, "You were in my dream," she admitted.

Brooke grinned, "A good dream?" The blonde looked puzzled, as though she was contemplating it, before simply shrugging. "Does that mean you're okay?"

Peyton took in Brooke's expression and the soft stroking of the brunette's hand on her hip all at once. She grumbled and rolled back over, facing away from Brooke. "Haley talked to you didn't she?"

There was a pause, before Brooke tentatively ventured in with, "So what if she did, Peyton? She's our friend." This time the blonde's grumble sounded slightly like a growl. "I'll tell you what; I'll go make some coffee before we have this conversation."

"Oh yes, surely we can't have serious a conversation without our coffee; I'd hate to fall asleep during it…" It made the blonde even more grumpy that Brooke wasn't eager for 'the talk' either.

"I'm going to ignore your sarcastic tone and pretend like you just agreed with me. It's sleepy Peyton talking, so she's grumbly. Coffee will help." Brooke sounded cheerful, and Peyton fought the urge to put the pillow over her head. After she heard footsteps leave the room, she allowed herself to put the pillow over her head, blocking out the irritating sunlight. Stupid Haley and stupid conversations.

Peyton ignored the thumping she heard in the room, assuming that if Brooke really wanted to have the conversation, she would let the blonde rest until the coffee was done. She probably just wanted shorts or something. Needless to say, she was surprised when she heard a voice. "What do you think you're doing, Peyton?"

Before the blonde could reply a second voice hissed, "She's sleeping!" This voice was male, while the first was distinctly female.

"She is not sleeping. She's avoiding me."

"I'd avoid you too!" There was a thump followed by the male voice again, "Ouch! Jesus, do you really have to hit that hard?"

Wait. Peyton Sawyer recognized these voices, but it couldn't be…"What the…" The blonde opened her eyes and removed the pillow from her head to find herself face-to-face with Dream Brooke and Dream Lucas. She hissed, "I'm awake! You two aren't supposed to be here."

"I told you she was awake," Dream Brooke gloated to Dream Lucas.

"Why are you here?"

"Technically, we can go into any sort of dream," Lucas explained.

"This is a daydream," Brooke continued.

"Real Brooke can't see us, Peyton." Lucas answered her question before she had asked it, and it kind of freaked her out. Having one hallucination, when it was herself, was bad enough, but Dream Lucas and Dream Brooke were even more irritating.

"Stay out of my head!"

"Technically, we can't do that." Peyton frowned at him. "We're part of your mind, since you conjured us up in the first place. Therefore, we have a direct link to your thoughts."

Dream Brooke was getting bored with their conversation, so she sighed dramatically until the two of them stopped to look at them. She glared at Peyton, "The point is what do you think you're doing?"

"Waiting for coffee?"

"You were not going to bring the conversation up. The real me had to mention it. We had a deal, P. Sawyer. You have to try."

"She's not wearing a wedding ring," Lucas offered.

"She usually takes off her jewelry before bed," Peyton explained. "When we were younger, we made friendship bracelets with elastic bands, and we slept with them on, showered with them on, did everything with them on…then one night, Brooke was having a weird dream, and she twisted or turned…anyway, she managed to move just right, so that the elastic band snapped, and the beads went everywhere…The next day, I came over to help her look for them, but the "P" was gone…"

Dream Lucas pieced the story together, "Hence her trying not to wear jewelry to bed?" Peyton nodded. "What were the bracelets supposed to say anyway?"

"Yours said 'Brooke Forever', didn't it?" The blonde wasn't sure if Dream Brooke was just reading her mind, or if she really knew that's how it went, but either way, she was right. "And Brooke's said, 'Peyton Forever'?"

Peyton nodded and Dream Lucas grinned. "What great bracelets for 'best friends.'"

"We were seven! And 'Best Friends Forever' was too boring for Brooke."

Dream Brooke grinned, "Of course it was."

"The point is she wouldn't have worn the wedding ring to bed, because she wouldn't want to lose that, and she probably wouldn't want to freak me out more since Haley talked to her."

Dream Brooke persisted, "You still need to talk to her."

"Just ask her about her weekend."

Peyton made a face, "You mean her wedding?"

"You can use a different word."

"Use…'ceremony'," Dream Lucas suggested.

"Peyton!" This time the voice came from the next room; it was the real Brooke Davis.

"You have to go!" Peyton hissed, but the others were already gone, just a figment of her imagination.

"Uh, excuse me? I am not leaving; I brought you coffee." Brooke raised an eyebrow at Peyton. "Are you sure you're okay?"

The blonde couldn't help the blush that crept up her face at that. "Sorry, I didn't mean to say that to you, I just…weird dreams. You disrupted them though, so thanks."

Brooke obviously brightened slightly at this, seeming to accept it, and handed over the second cup of coffee. There was a long moment of silence, filled only with sips of coffee. Half of her cup was gone before Peyton found the courage to murmur a question asking about how Brooke's ceremony had been.

This time, the brunette broke out in a grin. "It was excellent! Well, once everyone got their acts together, then it was good." Peyton began to stop listening to the words and just focused on smiling; she would not let Brooke know how unhappy she was about it.

"And how were your…clothes?" She couldn't bring herself to ask directly about the dress.

"Amazing!" Peyton began to wonder how the brunette could be so happy about it all; well, obviously she was happy, but the blonde wished she could tone it down a bit for now…"Everyone loved what I was wearing, of course, which was one of my originals, but the rest of the clothing was amazing too."

Brooke was lost in her thoughts, and so was Peyton for a moment. She was dwelling on what she thought Brooke's dress would look like when her mouth asked a question without registering it with Peyton's brain first, "Can I see the ring?"

The brunette blinked slowly, confused, "You wanna see the ring?"

"Yeah," Peyton murmured, feeling more awkward by the second. "If you don't wanna show me that's fine too, but I was just trying to…" The blonde paused to catch her breath and blink back tears. It was not fine. It was so far from fine that fine was not even visible in the distance, but she didn't want Brooke to know that. After a moment she continued with, "It's just that I'm supposed to be your best friend, Brooke, and I wasn't even there!"

Brooke hesitantly looked away from the blonde and up to the ceiling, over to the wall, down to the floor, and then finally back to Peyton, obviously feeling lost and out of place. It was a nervous habit that Peyton noticed. "I didn't know you felt that strongly about being there."

"I know it was under weird circumstances, considering who you were with, but I'd still want to be there…"

"I know Millicent doesn't usually go with me, but…"

"You brought Millicent with and not your best friend?"

"Well, she had been talking about wanting to go to Chicago, and she really has been working hard, while you don't even work there." Brooke raised an eyebrow at her friend. "Are you sure you're okay?"

"Chicago?"

"Chicago. The windy city. You know? Where we opened a new store over the weekend; it was the opening celebration. I wasn't even supposed to have to go, but the clothes got sent to the wrong city at first, and then the building wasn't quite ready, and so they called me to come and try to pull everyone together. I'm sorry I didn't leave a note, but they called me an hour before I had to leave, but on the way out, I ran into Haley, and she said that she'd talk to you."

"Haley never told me that…" Though, honestly if Peyton were to think about it; Haley may have told her that. The blonde had a bad habit of tuning her friend out whenever she came to visit recently.

"Really? She promised me again that she would when she called me when I first landed in Chicago to…tell me about Lucas." Again, if Peyton were to think about it, Haley, maybe, probably, sorta, told her where Brooke was, but the blonde's mind didn't hear much after the story about Lucas and Las Vegas. "I'm sorry I didn't call you, Peyton. I focused on getting the store together, and that was all I focused on for a few days. I thought it would be a conversation to have in person instead, so as soon as the store actually opened, I got a flight back to Tree Hill."

"You came back for me?"

Brooke rolled her eyes at her friend. "Actually I came back right after the store opened, because I ran out of clothes."

"Oh."

"Peyton!" The brunette stopped her rant for a moment to smirk and lightly roll her eyes. "It was the opening of a clothing store, I had clothes. I was kidding. Yes, I came back for you, Friend." Peyton couldn't help the tears that came after the brunette told her that. She couldn't help the way that Brooke's arms wrapped around her in a hug either, or the way that the brunette's voice vibrated so amazingly against her hair when she murmured into it. "Oh, P. Sawyer, I'm sorry. I'm so sorry. But, Lucas did try to marry her once already…"

The brunette tried to remind her friend of that casually, and it was only then that Peyton realized Lucas still got married, just not to Brooke. "He married Lindsey?"

Brooke couldn't help the, "Who else?" that slipped out of her mouth. She cringed when she noticed the tone that she had used on the blonde. "Sorry, but yes, he married Lindsey in Las Vegas. Apparently they had realized how they didn't want to be apart, and his being spontaneous showed her that he really…did care…I'm sorry Peyton."

The blonde was crying again, and even she wasn't really sure why. It might have been for losing Lucas, once and for all, but then again, she was more concerned about losing Lucas as a friend. She was pretty sure that her crying was more at her rashness in assuming Brooke had married Lucas. "I should have known you wouldn't get married in Las Vegas."

"Why would I get married in…Oh my God! You thought I married him?" Peyton just nodded into Brooke's shoulder. Brooke pulled back far enough to see into Peyton's eyes. "I would never do that to you, and I already have my wedding planned out; it does not take place in Las Vegas." She almost snorted out a laugh, "Seriously though, P. Sawyer? You thought I married him?" The blonde nodded again, still crying, and Brooke pulled her friend back into a hug. "I'm sorry I didn't come home sooner."

The blonde allowed the words to flow through her mind. Brooke didn't marry Lucas. Brooke had come home to her. Brooke…oh my God, Brooke's hands were doing this magnificent little rubbing motion on Peyton's back in an effort to calm her down, and Peyton could feel Brooke's breath as she inhaled and exhaled into her hair. "Brooke," she mentioned the name softly, but at their closeness, hugging and still sitting on the bed, the brunette heard.

"Yeah?" The brunette pulled back a few inches to study her friend's face again, and Peyton ignored the confused look on Brooke's face as she leaned forward and kissed her right cheek. Brooke smiled hesitantly at her, and then Peyton leaned forward and kissed her lips. It was a soft kiss, but somehow the blonde wasn't surprised when less than a moment after the kiss started, Brooke returned it. It was soft and sweet and somehow innocent; it was magnificent. Peyton began to feel her pulse quicken when Brooke pulled back and opened her eyes. A second later, Peyton opened her own eyes to stare into Brooke's confused ones. They were the right color this time, but they were clouded over. "What the hell was that?" Not the response Peyton was hoping for after the kiss to say the least. Brooke got off of the bed and took a step back from her friend. "Seriously, what the hell was that?"