This one is kinda depressing in parts and funny in other parts...enjoy lol. For everyone who keeps saying they want Miley and Peyton to meet...be patient! :) Dedicated to: SaritaHsM, Mz Fizzle, smileeex8,smileymee16, B u t t e r c u p d e v i l, lcxx916, nileyfan1, JustJulz, nienlovesjonas,mcandnj61106, rubberducky, iluvjb4ever123, xlivingtolove, and someone with no name. Love you guys!

Disclaimer: Nothing's mine, unfortunately...


Sun. August 14, 2013, Nick's Parents' House, Hollywood, California, 9:04 a.m.

There was a tense silence in the room, the only noise being 101 Dalmatians on the television. Peyton seemed to be engrossed in the movie, but you could never really tell with her. The last time her grandparents had spoken to her, she was undeniably pissed off at them, her father, and apparently the world in general. She had barely spoken a word in the two hours it had been since her father called with a big announcement – Daddy was very busy and she would be going home with his girlfriend until he could pick her up. Evidently, said girlfriend was not well-liked. Peyton argued with her father a bit, and begged him to make time for her no matter what he was doing. And when he said he couldn't, she slammed the phone down and threw herself on the floor, and for the first time since her 'terrible twos' phase, she kicked and screamed and threw an all-out fit.

Half an hour later, when all involved had recovered from the trauma and Peyton was sitting at the kitchen table tearfully eating some ice cream, she looked up and told her grandmother in a very tiny voice, "I don't wanna stay with her."

Denise Lucas couldn't exactly say she was looking forward to it either. From what she knew of Selena Russo, she was not fit to take care of a child. Far from it, actually. She was definitely the party type and pretty snobby, too, and according to Peyton, she hated children and couldn't cook. How her son had ended up dating her in the first place was beyond her. But now, he was leaving her in charge of his child... "I know, Mom, but she offered and I couldn't find anyone else on such short notice. This is really important, you'll understand when I have time to explain it..."

She sighed. She certainly hoped it was important, because if Peyton's reaction was any clue to the events that would follow, one of those girls would be dead by the end of the day. But, she thought with a smile, as she looked at the four-year-old lying on her stomach in front of the T.V., whispering secret plots to her teddy bear and kicking her legs in the air behind her, if I know my granddaughter at all, it will be Selena.

The stillness in the room was broken when the doorbell rang.

"Oh, no, Cruella de Vil is here," Peyton mumbled to Chewie, and her grandfather chuckled under his breath. He grabbed Peyton's backpack from beside the door and nudged her shoes towards her with his foot. "Come on, Sweetheart," he urged, and she shook her head, looking close to tears again. "Do it for your daddy."

Mumbling something else into her teddy's ear, Peyton reluctantly stood up and slipped on her flip flops, taking her backpack from his hands. She told her grandparents goodbye, trying to make the hugs and kisses last so she wouldn't have to leave. Finally, Denise opened the door.

"Took you long enough," Selena muttered, not even looking up from the phone in her hands. Peyton gave her grandparents a look that said, 'see, I told you! Don't make me go with her!'

Selena ended her text conversation and slid her phone back into the pocket of her shorts – how she managed that was a mystery, seeing as they were so tight they looked painted on. She looked around at the two adults but neither of them said anything, so she turned to Peyton.

"Come on, kid, don't look so sad. We'll have lots of fun," she said with a fake smile. Peyton glared, planting her tiny hands firmly on her hips.

"Look," she said, in an adorable voice that surely meant business. "You might as well stop pretending, because you stink at it. You and I both know we're not gonna be having any fun. Let's just go."

And with that, the little girl thrust her backpack into Selena's arms with a surprising force, and walked right out the door, leaving the three stunned adults to stare after her.

Sun. August 14, 2013, Lucas Residence, Hollywood, California, 9:04 a.m.

She was confused. She was somewhere so familiar, and yet she couldn't remember ever being there. She knew that she was sitting in the passenger seat of the car, and yet it felt like she was outside of the car instead, watching the scene unfold.

She was watching a younger version of herself riding in a car, and a young boy driving. Both of them must have been about sixteen or seventeen. She was surprised at how young she looked, and even more at how genuinely happy she seemed to be.

But what shocked her the most was that her younger self was heavily pregnant. Her hands rested instinctively on her bulging stomach and every once in a while she would smile and run her hands over it to soothe the kicking baby. The boy gave her a loving smile every once in a while. She knew she recognized him, but she couldn't remember who he was...

All of her senses seemed in tune with the senses of the young girl in the car. She could feel the cool air conditioning blowing against her face, causing her hair to tickle her neck. Her mouth tasted strange – something like ice cream, in a weird flavor that she surely would have found disgusting in the present day, but now it tasted wonderful. She could smell her own sweet perfume and a subtle hint of the boy's cologne, and somehow the two scents mixed perfectly together. Her ears registered the sound of soft music on the radio, playing the last notes of some song she recognized vaguely from a few years ago.

That song ended and another one started, and the young girl smiled excitedly. "I love this song!" she giggled out, reaching out to turn up the volume. She sang along, her lovely voice mixing with the voice of the singer, and threw her hands up, moving her body with the music.

The boy smiled at her, jokingly singing along as well, tapping out the beat on the steering wheel. He turned his head to look at her for a minute and she flashed him an over-exaggerated flirty look that matched the mood of the racy song. He laughed and after a second she cracked up too, and she reflected on how much she loved simple moments like this.

The events that followed happened so quickly she could hardly register them. There was the sound of horns blaring and screeching tires, and the boy snapped his head forward to face the road. He gasped and slammed on the breaks, but it was too late. She whipped around and looked out her window just in time to be blinded by a set of headlights and nearly deafened by a shrieking horn. The only thing that entered her mind after that was pain. Pain all over. She screamed. Her hands flew to her stomach, trying to protect her unborn child.

She heard the boy calling her name and she tried to answer him, but her mind couldn't process any words. Nothing but pain. Pain and fear. The bright lights all around her were fading to black. She was still trying to scream, though she didn't seem to be aware that she was, pained gasps being the only thing escaping her mouth. She tasted blood, running into her open mouth from various spots on her head. She clutched at her stomach tightly, feeling her precious baby moving around wildly, distressed.

The last thing her mind processed was the boys lips pressed tightly to her ear, his arms wrapped around her shoulders, his tears and blood dripping down onto her face, mixing with her own. "I love you," he gasped into her ear, and she wanted so badly to tell him that she loved him too, but she couldn't move her mouth. Too painful. Everything was fading, fading. She could no longer hear anything other than the boy's words. She couldn't see anything at all, and she wasn't sure if her eyes were closed or if she had been blinded. She felt the boys touch leaving her as well, fading into the distance just as everything else, and that was the most painful of all. She tried to grasp onto him and hold him to her, but somehow she knew that she wasn't moving her arms, no matter how hard she tried. "I love you, I love you," he was repeating, as if he didn't know how to say anything else.

She could no longer feel his arms around her. She felt like she was falling, falling deep into some bottomless pit, and the sound of his voice was gradually leaving her. She couldn't feel his hot breath against her ear anymore, or his tears falling onto her skin. She couldn't feel anything. The pain was gone, but at the same time it was the most painful and terrifying thing she had ever experienced.

"I love you, I love you," the boy continued to say, sobs threaded in between his words, as his voice faded and faded out until she could no longer hear it.

And then, everything was black.

Miley woke with a start, gasping as she set straight up in bed. She couldn't breathe. Her throat was dry; it felt as if she really had been screaming the way she did in her dream. And maybe that was the case. Her whole body felt weak and numb, and she shot her hands up to her head, gripping her hair, as if to assure herself that she could move her limbs.

"Miley?" someone mumbled from beside her, and she turned to see a pair of arms and a mop of curly hair struggling to get untangled from the sheets. Any other morning she probably would have laughed, but now she only sobbed, feeling her tears running down her face rapidly, landing on her lap like raindrops as the previous night's events rushed back to her and she remembered how she happened to be in a bed that wasn't her own.

Nick took one look at her and was instantly awake and alert. "Miley? What's wrong? What happened?"

"Nick," she gasped out, launching herself into his arms so forcefully that he fell back against the pillows with a somewhat-pained grunt. He caught her, though, and held her tight, and that was all that mattered to him.

"What's wrong?" he asked again, as he felt her tears on his neck, her head buried into his shoulder. He rocked her gently, as if she were a small child. He rubbed soothing circles on her back and whispered calming words into her ear, and slowly she stopped shaking and fell limp in his arms, still crying quietly but no longer gasping or sobbing.

He was hit with an epiphany and gently asked, "Reliving last night?"

She was quiet for a moment, as she gently moved away from him so they were no longer tangled together and she was facing him instead, her eyes closed tightly as if that would keep the bad images out. Her nightmare would be too complicated to explain and she didn't want to relive the horror of having to tell him about it, so she went with the obvious lie.

It was only a dream, she told herself as she nodded in answer to his question, another tear sliding slowly down her cheek.

Nick reached out and gently brushed it away, and the simple gesture was so loving and tender that she opened her eyes and stared lovingly into his. Very suddenly she realized how gorgeous they were. The most perfect, beautiful shade of brown, and a lovely twinkle that made her feel calm and tranquil and yet wild and spontaneous at the same time.

Slowly, she pulled her eyes away from his bottomless brown orbs. The feelings she got when she looked into them scared her. It was something like comfort, friendship, and pure joy all together, along with a hundred other emotions she couldn't place. It was strangely familiar to her. It was a bit like the way she had imagined love would be.

But of course, that couldn't be what she was feeling for this man. She had just met him last night.

"Listen to me," he told her gently, and she looked back up into his perfect eyes, which were burning with a powerful passion she thought she recognized, but wasn't sure where from. "They can't hurt you anymore. They're locked up behind bars; they got what they deserved. I will never let them hurt you."

His eyes were burning into hers so intensely it was almost painful, but she couldn't look away. "I will never let anyone hurt you."

It wasn't a promise he was sure he could keep, nor was it one that she expected him to keep. But he meant it just the same. And for some reason she simply couldn't explain, she believed him with everything in her.

She leaned forward and allowed him to pull her into a hug, and without the other noticing, both of them savored the moment.

I love you, she thought suddenly. She wasn't sure why or how that thought entered her mind, and she didn't know if it was even true. But she couldn't help thinking it. Suddenly she was hit with a realization that made her gasp.

It was Nick. A younger version of him. In the car. In her dream. Trying so hard to protect her, holding her tight in his arms, crying out that he loved her...

It was a weird realization. But it comforted her. They pulled apart and she looked into his deep brown eyes again.

I love you, I love you.

"You're amazing," she told him sincerely. Then she smiled lightly. "Are you my guardian angel or something?"

Nick gave her an odd smile – kind of coy and sneaky, but with a hint of sadness to it.

"Something like that."

Sun. August 14, 2013, Selena's Loft, Hollywood, California, 12:37 p.m.

To say that Peyton was unhappy would have been the understatement of the century.

She was bored, she was angry, she was annoyed, she was hungry, and most of all, she was feeling sad and neglected. Her daddy, the wonderful and loving king of her world, had promised he would be back in the morning, and he wasn't. He was too busy for her. He dumped her off on someone else as if she were unimportant, or at least less important than whatever he was doing.

She wondered again what exactly that was. At first she had assumed it was something to do with his work, but then she had decided that couldn't be it. He had no problem taking her to work with him when necessary and all of his co-workers adored her, so he wouldn't have had to leave her with somebody else. Then she thought maybe somebody in the family was very sick and he had to go take care of them. But in that case, somebody would have told her and they would have talked about it for a long while, in that careful way that grown-ups reserved specifically for discussing sensitive subjects with children.

She considered a few other scenarios, and then she angrily decided it didn't matter. No matter what it was, it wasn't supposed to be more important than her. How dare he leave her with that...that meanie. She was his princess, after all! And boy, when her daddy did finally come back for her, he was going to get it.

But she didn't enjoy being mad at her father. It made her feel sad and just plain rotten, the way she did when she knew she had done something wrong. She didn't want to think about it.

So, instead she focused on annoying her babysitter.

"I'm bored," Peyton whined for the millionth time in twenty minutes. She normally didn't have trouble entertaining herself, but not when the person who was supposed to watching her blatantly ignored her and expected her to entertain herself. Didn't she know anything about how a child's mind worked?

Selena glanced up from her magazine, but only for a second. "Do I look like I care?" she scoffed. Peyton shrugged.

"Don't you have some toys in your bag or something?"

"I played with them all already."

Peyton pouted slightly as she felt her stomach rumble. She was starving, but far too proud to ask Selena to feed her – she probably wouldn't even if she did ask, and if for some reason she did, it probably wouldn't be edible.

Selena rolled her eyes. "Go take a nap or something, then."

"No! Naps are for babies!" Truthfully, Peyton did usually take a nap sometime during the afternoon, but she wasn't about to tell Selena that.

"God, aren't you like three?" Selena said, clearly annoyed. Peyton interrupted and informed her that she was actually four, but she didn't care and therefore ignored it. "You are a baby. Go take a nap and leave me alone."

Outraged, Peyton opened her mouth to protest, but then closed it as she felt a certain part of her brain start working. The same part of her brain that her father swore she must have gotten from Uncle Joe and the one that was responsible for almost everything she had ever done that had gotten her in trouble.

"Actually, I am kinda sleepy. I'll go take a nap."

Selena was shocked, but tried not to show it. "Well, good. But I don't want you messing around in any rooms alone. Sleep in the hallway."

"Okay." The little girl toddled innocently across the living room to the hallway, hugging her teddy bear and faking a yawn as she turned the corner out of Selena's sight.

She giggled a little, giving Chewie a sneaky smile as she whispered her plan into his well-loved ear.

If there was one thing she knew for sure about Selena, it was that she wasn't very smart. She would assume Peyton was fast asleep in the hallway and wouldn't bother to look for her sneaking around the house.

Her plan turned out to be a very satisfying success – made all the more so by the look on Selena's face when she discovered her in her bedroom, almost an hour later. Peyton was having a blast when this happened, jumping on Selena's bed, the half-empty bag of potato chips she'd had for lunch laying on the bed beside her, wearing one of Selena's dresses over her clothes and her face covered in make-up that had been a lot of fun to experiment with. She'd colored on the fashion magazines that were now scattered across the floor, and had obviously played dress up with several other outfits, because they were all over the place. There were crayon marks and sticky little handprints – sticky with what, Selena didn't even want to know – all over the walls.

Selena didn't say anything when she opened the door. She slowly walked over to the bed and yanked Peyton off of it, and calmly carried her to the bathroom to scrub off the makeup. But she was far from calm. Only one thought played in her mind:

This little bitch was going down.

Sun. August 14, 2013, Lucas Residence, Hollywood, California, 1:09 p.m.

Miley couldn't help but feel that she had overstayed her welcome. Nick had rescued her from four drunken bastards who had almost stolen her virginity. He had allowed her to spend the night at his house when she was scared to be alone. He had slept by her side and cuddled with her, which she was sure must have been awkward for him. He had made her breakfast and even lunch. He had comforted her when she needed to be comforted. She couldn't allow him to go to any more trouble for her.

So now, it was time for her to go.

"Are you sure you're ready to be alone?" Nick asked after she'd announced this. "I really don't mind if you stay a little longer..."

Please stay, he wanted to beg. Please. I don't want you to ever leave.

She gave him a sincere smile. Honestly she would have loved to stay longer, but she knew when it was time to leave. Taylor was probably going crazy by now, and she knew she needed to get away from Nick before she got too terribly used to him. Living by yourself is a lonely existence once one becomes accustomed to living with someone else.

"No," she insisted. "You've done so much for me already."

He nodded sadly, trying again to tell her it was no trouble, but she knew it was. They stood there quietly for a moment, both wanting to speak but afraid to hear their own words. "Thank you again," she whispered finally. "For everything..."

He smiled at her. "Don't mention it," he told her lightly, but sincerely at the same time. "Do you want a ride back to your hotel?"

She shook her head, even though she would have loved one. "No, thanks. I'll take a taxi. Gotta get used to being alone again," she joked.

They hugged goodbye. And then before either knew what was happening, she was gone.

Nick sighed to himself. When he thought of all the emotions that involved his life without Miley, the word "lonely" never came up. He didn't consider himself alone – he had his brothers and his friends and, most importantly, Peyton. But now, standing on the porch all alone as he watched his true love leave him, Nick Lucas was incredibly lonely.

He closed his eyes for a few minutes, letting the events of the past two days fully sink in for the first time. As amazing as it all was, it was also kind of depressing. He lost her again.

Better to have loved and lost than to never have loved at all, he thought. But it wasn't any consolation.

Finally, he shook the thoughts out of his mind and concentrated on the one girl in his life who he loved as much as he loved Miley. What was Peyton doing right now? Did she have Selena tied up in a corner? He chuckled lightly; he wouldn't be surprised. Or were they actually getting along?

This time he laughed out loud. Fat chance.


Peyton is such a little evil genius; I have so much fun writing her character haha. And we still don't know where Joe and Taylor are... ;)

Virtual cookies for everyone who reviews!