Author's Note: I've gotten so accustomed to putting up an AN that even when I don't know what to say, like in this one, I still have to put one up. Um, I always believed with OTH that if you're going to bring a character in for us to care about, you should let us know how they're doing now and then. This is something I plan on doing. I like to keep everyone updated the way that I'd like for things to be.

I hope you enjoy this chapter. There's a kinda cliffhanger at the end of it but only because I have a lot planned, and if I wrote it all in just the one chapter, it would be way too long. So I decided to cut it in half and use the rest for the next chapter. Don't hate me! It'll be up soon, promise :)

Thanks again to everyone reading! I'm so humbled by all of your kind comments.

Sway

Chapter Four

"Follow Through"

"I don't know, Haley." Brooke Davis slowly shakes her head as she looks down at the little girl on the pink changing table. Penny has most of her fingers in her mouth as she watches Brooke and her god-mother, Haley James Scott, talk back and forth.

She's a pretty self sufficient child, Brooke has come to learn. She always watches the people around her, curious about their words and actions. She's an observer. Sometimes Brooke wonders what Penny thinks behind those bright eyes. She places her hand atop her rounded belly. Only two more months to go.

She hopes that her daughter will be just as curious about the world as Penny is.

"What's there to know?" Haley asks as she watches Brooke with Penny. Things had been tough on all of them when they lost Peyton. But everyone just made a little more room for the baby she left behind. And no one had done that more than Brooke Davis. Haley knows the look on her best friend's face and puts her hands on her hips. "I think you two need each other right now. With Julian working so much and--"

But Brooke doesn't let her continue. Well, her hormones don't. Tears well in her dark eyes and she immediately tries to hold them back.

Haley sees and her face falls. "Brooke?"

"I'm sorry." She says as she shakes her head. "Can you finish her up? I need some air."

Staring, Haley only manages to blink a few times before she steps in and takes over Brooke's spot. "Brooke--" She tries again, but it's too late. She already waddled out of the room. As she sighs, she hears Penny start to grumble. Her pink lip juts out and Haley swears she's looking in the direction Brooke just left from.

"Alright, peanut." Haley says as she resnaps Penny's onesie. "Let's go find Aunt Brooke."

* * *

"Let's go see Aunt Brooke!" Haley's voice is soft and musical as she bounces an eight month old little boy on her hip. His basketball themed diaper bag hangs from her opposite shoulder as she walks up to the white front door.

The infant on her hip has been in a foul mood most of the week thanks the new teeth he was cutting. Haley thought a little trip out of the house would help him. The moment they were in the car, the smile had spread so far across his that Haley had been surprised she hadn't thought of it earlier. When Jamie was a baby, he loved riding around in the car, especially when he wasn't feeling good. It only made sense that his baby brother would love it as much.

She lifts her hand and knocks on the door. As soon as she calls out Brooke's name, her little boy grunts, like he was trying to repeat his mother. She giggles and looks down at him and his big smile. He babbles incoherently as they wait for the door to open. "Oh is that so, mister?" She asks.

He squeals and hides his face in her shoulder.

Haley's hand rubs his back slowly as the front door swings open.

Brooke's face widens as she claps her hands together. "If it's not my favorite person in the whole world!"

"Well no one can say you don't know how to make someone feel welcome." Haley says as she grins widely.

"Huh?" Brooke looks over at Haley and then shakes her head. "Oh. Not you, Hales. I was talking to my little boyfriend!" She scoops Brian into her arms and walks him into the house. As his face lights up, Brooke remembers just how much she loves having babies in the house. Sure it was crazy when both Grace and Penny were young, but she loved it.

She spreads kisses all over his little, chubby face, and ignores Haley for a minute as she flops down on the couch with her god-son. He has the most infectuous laughter. He looks just like his father, down to his eyes and nose. She makes kissy faces at him as he puts his hands on her face. His tiny body shakes with giggles until a random hiccup surprises, and distracts, him.

"I feel all left out." Haley playfully complains as she walks into Brooke's house and closes the door behind her. She puts the diaper bag down on one of the chairs then walks over to the couch and sits beside the two of them.

Brooke hangs her head to the side, looks at Haley, and grins, "Do you want kissy faces too?" She asks as she blows a couple in her best friend's direction.

"Maybe I don't feel that left out."

Brooke grins as she lets Brian curl his hands around her fingers. He hasn't quite gotten the hang of standing yet but he tries. If you hold his hands, he'll rock back and forth and bounce--or as they called it--dance.

Haley crosses one leg over the other and turns to the side. She rests one hand on her temple, her elbow on the back of the couch to keep her up. She eyes her son, who enjoys the attention from his god-mother, then looks to Brooke. "Alright, spill."

"What?" Brooke asks. She refuses to turn to Haley. This way she can at least pretend nothing is botherin her. But the truth is, she spent the whole night with thoughts of the afternoon in the park streaming through her head. She was sure now that there definitely was some leaning involved.

She remembers watching his mouth as he laughed while she cleaned the ice cream off.

Haley reaches out and puts her hand on Brooke's knee. "Hey, you're my best friend. I know that look on your face. Not to mention the not so subtle 'come over now' phone call." Jamie and Andre were spending the afternoon playing video games in the Fields' home, and Nathan had gone out to meet up with Lucas not long before she got the call from Brooke. "What's going on?"

It's like a bandaid, Brooke figures. That's not saying if she had kissed Lucas it would be painful. Or would it? "I.. may have.. possibly.. almost--" Her face squishes up a little and she decides to just spit it out. "--kissed Lucas."

* * *

"Wait a second." Nathan catches the basketball once it bounces off the backboard. He knows Lucas well enough to know that when he starts missing shots, he was really deep in thought. He turns the ball in his hands but doesn't stop the amusement in his voice. "You almost kissed Brooke?"

Lucas's eyes grow larger as he looks over to his daughter and Grace. They were paying no attention at all as they chatter happily with each other. He brought them some sidewalk chalk so they got to paint the Rivercourt.

He steps towards Nathan, "Keep it down. I don't want them to know."

The younger brother bounces the basketball once and then looks up. Who would have thought his older brother would come to him for love advice? He chuckles, "So what, it's been too long and you need some pointers?"

He turns to the net and without much thought at all, tosses the ball. It bounces off the square on the backboard and sinks through the net with a crisp swoosh.

Lucas chuckles, "Trust me when I tell you, I will never come to you for pointers about kissing Brooke Davis."

"Why? Because you spent enough time doing it?" Nathan counters as he jogs for the ball. Once it's caught, he passes it to Lucas, who passes it back.

"Yes." He answers easily. As he realizes what he said, he clears his throat. "I mean, no. That's not--" He lets out a puff of air and knows that he was already doing exactly what he said he would never do. "What am I supposed to do, Nate?" He feels completely helpless. He checks on the girls and then turns back around. "I shouldn't be trying to kiss her. We're not like that."

Nathan rolls his eyes, "Oh come on. That's bull and you know it."

"What's that supposed to mean?" He asks.

Despite the question, he feels his stomach tighten. All he's been thinking of was how pretty she looked the day before. She had this glow when it came to her motherly duties. Her eyes sparkled with laughter as she wiped melting vanilla ice cream from his chin. He remembered how the sun framed her face. Before he knew it, she was staring up at him and he wanted nothing more than to cup his hands on her cheeks and crash his lips against hers.

"You know exactly what it means." Nathan says simply. He watches the way his brother's face turns up, eyeing the smile that rest upon it. Nathan surely knows that smile. He's seen it on Lucas's face more times than he can count. It's his 'thinking about Brooke Davis' smile. "You and Brooke have been attached at the hip since Penny was born." He shrugs once. "To be honest, I'm surprised you haven't kissed her yet."

Lucas looks away and closes his eyes. He has to swallow past a knot before he stumbles over his words. "She's with Julian." He says quickly.

"That punk's never even around." Nate answers just as quickly. "And you know Brooke deserves better."

Scrambling for something else, Lucas spits out, "What about the girls?"

"Like they don't already consider the four of you a family." He points towards where the two of them are sitting. "Do you even see what they're drawing?"

He hasn't looked yet but when Nathan points it out, he does. In various colors, there's two grown ups, a man and a woman, and two little girls. "That--could be anyone." He says, even though he sees the grown up woman has dark hair, much like one of the young girls.

Nate snorts, "Luke, come on. That stick figure looks just like you!"

He smiles but just looks down. "What about Peyton?"

* * *

"What about Julian?" Haley asks.

The two girls are sitting on the back porch as twilight settles on the city. With the sunset barely visible over the tree tops, the sky dances in beautiful shades of pink and purple. If you look hard enough, you can see the stars start to shine through. It was Brooke's favorite time of day.

"I don't know." She whispers as she rubs her palm slowly along her swollen belly. "I know what he's going to say. I know he's going to think it's a bad idea." Part of Brooke knows she shouldn't be considering Lucas's offer. Just earlier he told her she should move in with him. At seven months pregnant, Brooke was barely self sufficient anymore.

He worries about her being alone while Julian's away, he'd told her.

"What do you think?" Haley questions as she rubs her hand slowly against Penny's back. The infant had refused to go to sleep, Haley noticed, until she was sitting out here with Brooke. She already has a connection to the baby, and vice versa.

Brooke just shrugs. She doesn't want to think about this but she knows she has to handle it. "I think.." She starts. She wants to make sure her words come out the way she wants them to. After a few passing moments, she stops trying. "..I'm tired of being alone, Haley." Her nose is red from keeping the tears at bay. "Julian's gone all the time. And it gets so quiet in the house at night."

She looks down at her belly when she feels the baby inside kick her. She smiles though. She likes knowing, and feeling, her baby. She whispers to the little girl who still doesn't have a name. Julian never has time to go through the baby names books with her.

Pressing her lips together, she shifts a little. "I want to." She admits in a small voice.

"Then do it, Brooke." Haley keeps her voice down so she doesn't wake Penny. "You're very pregnant and Lucas is right. You shouldn't be alone. Julian loves you. He'll want you to feel safe."

"Yeah," she mumbles under her breath. As if on cue, the front door opens and she hears Lucas's voice. "Out here." She calls then turns to Haley. "Quick, give me the baby."

Haley just shakes her head, "You can't hide behind her, Brooke."

* * *

"You can't hide behind her, Luke."

Nathan takes another shot, easily sidestepping his brother. After he dunks the ball, he turns and sighs. "Oh, well now it's not going to be fun to kick your butt if you aren't even trying."

Lucas makes a half-assed smirk and then walks towards the wooden table. He hears Nathan follow him as he finally sits down. He remembers the night he found the painting of the comet on the court. I will always love you, it said. Now, years have passed, and it was all but faded. He could barely see it. Much like he could barely see everyone's signatures from the night of their graduation. It was all just gone, as were the people they had been back then.

He looks over to Penny and Grace, who were now hopscotching along the three point line. "I'm not hiding behind her." He says with a sigh.

"Luke.." Nathan puts the basketball down between his feet and leans back.

"I'm not." He says with more conviction as he rests his elbows on his knees. Then he sighs, "Okay. Maybe I am." He admits. "A little. But I have to. We were married. Isn't it a little too soon to be thinking about someone else?"

Nathan doesn't say anything for a minute. The truth is that Peyton has been dead for a long time. Penny's birthday was only a week away. It will have been five years. "Alright, I'm going to say something and it's gonna really make me sound like an asshole but I think maybe you should hear it." He waits to see if Lucas is going to tell him not to say anything. When he doesn't get anything, he continues. "You had a thing with Peyton at the beginning of junior year, then again at the end of senior year. You ended up breaking up while she was in LA and you didn't even get back together until your impromptu trip to Vegas. Then she was pregnant, you got married, and she was gone."

Lucas can replay all of that in his head. But for the first time in a long time, when he thinks about high school, he thinks about Brooke. "What's your point?" He asks, full of surprise at the images that have come to his head.

"My point is, Luke, she died. That doesn't mean you did." Nathan nods over to where the girls were playing with each other. "Penny is proof of that. All that time you spent with Peyton? You spent just as much with Brooke. Not to mention that you two haven't gone a day in the past five years without seeing each other. I just think that, if you have feelings for Brooke, you shouldn't be afraid of figuring them out." He leans forward and asks, "Is this the first time you've thought about kissing her?"

He considers what Nathan asked for a moment and then pushes himself up from the bench. "I think I should just talk to her." He easily side-steps the questions. "If she's not even interested then there's really no point to be worrying about this." He clears his throat and as he watches his brother's mouth open to ask his question again, Lucas quickly turns. "Grace! Penny! Let's go. It's getting dark."

He needs to get home.

* * *

It's getting dark as Lucas walks out of the house and into the back yard. He smiles, "Look at that, it's my three favorite girls."

Haley smiles though she sees the look on Brooke's face. She stands, "Make that two." She says as she hands Penny to Lucas and then gives him a kiss on the cheek. She knows that they will have a lot to talk about. Secretly, she was rooting for Brooke--but that's not something you say outloud.

"I'll call you later." She smiles as she walks out.

Brooke nods, "Thanks for everything." Then she waves and puts her hands back on her belly.

Once Haley's gone, Lucas excuses himself. He walks back inside to put his sleeping daughter into her crib. He whispers a soft 'I love you' as he brushes the back of his fingers across her soft tuft of hair. She's his life, his reason for being. Nothing could be better than that.

As he reaches for the baby monitor, he sees a picture beside her crib. It was one of him that he hadn't even realized was taken. He was sitting on the couch with Penny when she was a newborn. He looked tired but still in awe of the beautiful creature in his arms.

Brooke must have taken it.

He smiles, then takes the baby monitor and heads for the back porch again. He only stops to grab a fresh, red apple from the basket on the counter, and a knife from the drawer. He walks out to the backyard and sits in the chair that Haley had vacated. "Penny's down for the count." He says as he puts the monitor on his chair. He doesn't even think about it as he starts to cut up the apple.

"Yeah, she fell asleep pretty easily. Haley's got that comforting mom touch."

When Lucas holds a sliver out to her, Brooke's mouth immediately starts to water. She thanks him and takes it, sinking her teeth into the fruit instantly. The juices fill her mouth and make her eyes roll into the back of her head. "Oh God, that's so good." She holds out the other half of the slice. "Here, take a bite."

Lucas smiles and leans in to chomp the piece from her grasp. As he chews, he makes happy noise, then starts to carve her another piece. "So, have you thought about my offer any?" He sees the look that crosses her face and hands her the second slice. "I know it's a lot to ask but I really don't like you being alone."

She wants to tell him just how much she doesn't like being alone either. Instead, she just smiles. "Don't lie, Lucas. You only asked me to stay because if I didn't, your house would be a complete mess and no laundry would get done. I'm not a live-in maid, you know." It was just a defense mechanism though. It wasn't easy for Brooke to admit that she needs--no, wants, help.

Lucas knows this because he knows Brooke. He has seen her do it a million times before. She needs to be the one who's needed, not the one who needs someone else. So he plays along, "You're right. I should know not to lie to you." He hands her another slice.

She points it at him with it. "That's right. I'll always figure you out. However, considering that I love my beautiful god daughter, I'm willing to sacrifice."

He chuckles, one good, rolling laugh that brought light back to his face. Brooke hasn't seen that light in such a long time. "Well good. I don't know what I'd do without you, pretty girl."

The smile that crosses her face also makes her cheeks redden in realization. It's been a long time since Lucas has called her that. She lowers her eyes for a moment and decides not to say anything about it. She just takes a bite of her apple and figures things don't need to be complicated right now.

* * *

It's so complicated.

Why does it have to be complicated?

Does she make things more complicated then they need to be?

Brooks huffs as she rests her chin on her palm and looks down at baby Brian in his bouncy chair. She taps her fingertips against her cheek and makes a face at him. "Just so you know, when you grow up, don't do something like this. If you're going to kiss a girl, you should just kiss her. It will be so much easier than maybe kissing someone and letting them sit around to wonder whether that's what you were even going to do in the first place."

He gurgles a response and then giggles, his face wide in amusement.

"You're enjoying my pain, aren't you?" She asks.

Brian cooes happily, claps his hands together and presses them to his mouth.

She can't help but melt at his little face. "You're gonna be a little heart breaker one day, Brian Royal Scott." Brooke Davis leans in easily and kisses his chubby, slobbery cheek. She loves him as much as she loves her older god-son. All she can do is smile around them. Jamie's getting so big now and even Brian grew a little more every day. It makes her think how big her own child was getting.

The doorbell sounds, followed by three knocks.

Brooke hops up. "Who's that, Bri? Is that your mommy?" She gives his tummy a playful squish and then gets up. 'That was fast,' she thought. Haley had gone out not too long ago to pick up Jamie from Dre's house. But it wasn't that long ago.

She walks to the door, turns the knob and slowly opens it. "We've been waiting for--" Her sentance falls short as she sees the man standing in her doorway. Her chest tightens and she's sure her heart stopped.

"What are you doing here?" She asks.

The only reaction she gets is two hands on her elbows that pull her forward into a pair of warm lips.

AN: Here's a fun game. Where does the baby's name come from?

Thanks as always for reading. I hope you enjoyed. Please review, good or bad, just don't be cruel! * Rosie