So, I thought maybe two updates in one week would get me out of the dog house. Haha. This is Brooke's POV on last chapter mostly. So it was really easy to write. We're winding down people. Enjoy.

I don't own a thing. I wish I did. Things would be sooo different.



Seventeen we were too young,
To be thinking about the future.
To be worried about the consequence of fun. . .
It's just fun.

"Brooke Davis, if I walk in here and you're pacing, it's not going to be pretty."

Nathan's voice comes through the house and before she can stop herself from pacing a hole in the floor, he's at the doorway. He rolls his eyes, "God, you and Lucas really don't know when to stop the foreplay and just get on with it."

Before she can even respond to that, she's interrupted by her daughter streaking through the living room toward him. "Uncle Naaaaate!" she screams. "I missed you."

"How much?" he asks her, smiling.

"This much," she tells him, holding her little arms out as wide as they go. "Times a million billion and my daddy says that's a whole lot."

Without skipping a beat, she turns to Brooke and asks, "Mama, what's foreplay and when do you and daddy play without me? Daddy is Lucas, right?"

Nathan looks at Brooke in mocking shock, "Brooke, do you play without your little girl?"

"Shut it, you," she demands, finding her voice.

She reaches over to take Dee from her uncle when Jamie toddles in. He hasn't quite learned why people run yet. He's calm and takes his time getting from one place to another, no matter how excited he is. It bothers the Scott men; because they wonder how he'll ever play if he doesn't want to run.

"Daddy!" he exclaims, reaching his arms up to be held by Nathan.

"Sweetheart," Brooke starts to tell Dee, "Uncle Nathan does not know what he's talking about. Your daddy and I never play any games, of any sort," she clarifies, raising an eyebrow at Nathan. "without you."

Nathan isn't even paying attention to her anymore; since the second his son walked in the room, he's been having a quiet conversation with him about how much it hurts him to be away. Not that James can quite understand it, but he just needs him to know. Brooke understands it. She wonders if Lucas got like that with Delila when he was gone for all of those months when she was a baby.

"Good," her daughter smiles at her. "Because you guys are boring and the games would be no fun without me."

Nathan laughs at that declaration. "The kid's got a point, Davis."

She just swats at him and gives her daughter a kiss on the forehead, "That play room better not be a complete mess when I go back there. You two were supposed to be picking up toys," she tells the kids. "Clean up, clean up, everybody everywhere. Remember."

Jamie smiles and claps for his aunt, "Clean up, Clean up, everybody do your share."

She laughs. "That's right, Jim-jam. Do you want me to go check it right now?"

The cousins look at each other and Jamie squirms in his dad's arms until Nathan puts him down. And they run- even Jamie- back to the room with all the toys. Nathan laughs and mock claps for Brooke.

"See," she tells him smugly, "he can run."

He just continues laughing and then makes an offhanded comment about the hole that she's creating in the floor of this living room- with all of the pacing that gets done over his brother in here. "Nathan," she asks him. "I have Jamie for the night; what are you doing here?"

"Well, your strange sexual tension slash games sent Lucas to Haley who's helping him get on a plane to LA and so I was in my big house all alone and decided to come stop your nonstop worrying to let you know that he's going."

"He's going." She repeats it.

Nathan nods, "You okay?"

"Do you know why he's going?" She needs to hear it from someone.

"He's going to break up with Peyton to prove he loves you." That's not Nathan. It's Haley.

"Like he needs to prove it." That's Nathan. Brooke glares at him and then turns to Haley.

Uneasily, she asks, "How is he?"

Haley laughs, "He's pretty good; a little scared, I think. But mostly, it's like he was really confused and I don't know what happened, but now he's not."

"He's not anymore?"

Her best friend shakes her head no with a secret little smile on her face. "I love that I knew I'd find my husband here without ever even going to my house. What are you doing?"

"I came because I figured if Lucas was going to LA, something happened and Brooke would be here worrying." He smiles at Brooke, "And I was right."

Haley walks up to Brooke and wraps her up in a hug. "There's no need to worry, B. It's always been you."

"Always?" She has to ask.

Haley smiles at her, "I do believe that from the moment he realized he could have you, it was you. It's just that he was scared and you were scared. B, you have to give him a chance when he comes back."

Brooke nods. "What if it's not me? What then?"

"It is you," Nathan tells her. "It's time you let that sink in."

"You know," Haley laughs, "I think my husband has a point. Just repeat it to yourself. Lucas loves you."

"Lucas loves me." Brooke quietly repeats, "Lucas loves me."

"Tell it to yourself as many times as you need to," Haley warns her. "Just be prepared. He's coming back single and he's not going to back down."

Brooke just shakes her head and continues on, "Lucas loves me."

Yeah we grew up oh so fast.
Now we're longing for the innocence.
We swore ourselves would never pass.
But it has passed.

"Daddy's here!" her daughter's shrieks wake her up.

She runs down the hall, praying that Jamie slept through all of Dee's five am announcements. When she gets to the kitchen, Lucas is there cooking a very delicious looking breakfast. Delila has already quieted down and is seated at her chair and Jamie is in the high chair. He smiles over at her, "French toast, pretty? Or chocolate chip pancakes?"

She grins back, "Guess."

He, without hesitation picks up a plate, and sits it in front of her. French toast, already buttered and cut diagonally, drizzled with syrup and chocolate chips. Exactly what she wanted.

"Mmm," she sighs up at him. "I miss Saturday mornings at your mom's."

"I'd do it for you every day if," he trails off and turns around to serve Jamie his food.

If what? If he lived here, with them. If he wasn't with Peyton.

If he loved her.

Brooke wishes more than anything that he could just love her. And that she could just believe it.

Instead of even addressing it, she turns to Dee, who is shoveling pieces of chocolate chip pancakes into her mouth, and asks, "Did you sleep well, baby?"

"mmhmm," she mumbles, "Jamie woke me up though."

At least, that's what she thinks she said. It came out in a jumble with the pancake in her mouth.

Lucas turns and laughs, "Dee, don't talk with food in your mouth."

She looks up at him innocently and says, "But Mama asked me a question, Daddy."

"Swallow first, next time, Princess," he tells her, softly. "Mama will wait for her answer."

"So," she informs them, "we've got a long day today. We're gonna go over to the park; I thought we could have a picnic," she says just to Lucas, "and then we've got some shopping to do; grocery," again, just to Lucas, "and then we're going to have a movie night."

She claps her hands together to get the kids excited and jumps up and down a little in her seat.

If she's honest with herself, she loves weekends like this. A reason to pretend that she and Lucas are a happy little family. Babysitting their nephew and hanging out with their daughter. And they don't have a care in the world except making the kids and each other happy. She likes to pretend like nothing else exists. Now if only he could kiss her during these fantasy weekends.

She shakes the thought out of her head. No. She cannot think like that. They're friends. They're working hard on it. They already messed it up once and she can't do that to Dee.

She can't do it to herself. That rejection is just too much to bear.

She wonders if he'd do this with Peyton. Cook her breakfast and make funny faces at the kids and look at her like she's the only person in the room.

Is she special? Or is she just the girl here?

That's why she can't bring herself to send Dee over there. What if over there they aren't playing house? What if over there, they're building a home? What if she likes it better there? That would leave Brooke alone. Again. And Peyton would have everyone in the world that she cares about.

And she knows that Lucas says that he loves her, too. But what if he doesn't really? He has said it before. What if he just says that? What if the only reason he loves her is Delila and without her, Lucas wouldn't love her either?

She can't bear to find out. To find out that she really is unlovable and that the only people in the world she feels truly love her only love her by default. Because of her daughter or because they have to. Because there's no other choice.

"Hey, beautiful." Lucas looks concerned, "Where are you at?"

"Just thinking," she smiles at him. "This is nice."

He grins back at her, "This is everything. My baby, you, and our nephew. Great breakfast, because I cooked, thank you very much. Family, Brooke. That's everything."

She looks down. What if he has a family with Peyton too? What, then?

She doesn't want to know.

Won't you listen to the words I'm speaking?
Time could take this pain away and save us,
If we learn to trust again.

After Nathan and Haley leave, while still unrelenting about what she needs to do when Lucas comes home, she goes into the play room to help the kids clean up. She has to just trust in his love. How hard could that be?

Extremely.

She's not sure she'd live through it if she put everything into him again and lost him again. She's not even sure she's truly living now. She's surviving, yes. But she only truly breathes in those moments with him, where they're a family.

"Mama!"

"Auntie Brooke!"

Both kids scream for her when she walks into the pigsty that is the play room. "It doesn't look to me like you guys have even tried here."

She laughs looking at their poor exhausted faces and decides that this can wait until morning. "Hey, you guys look tired, how bout we do a team cleanup effort tomorrow and get ready to go to bed now instead?"

They both nod their heads up and down frantically, anything to get out of cleaning up their mess. "Okay, well then, let's go upstairs before I change my mind. Tubby time."

Forty-five minutes and one big bath mess later, she's tucking them into bed in the nursery. Jamie in the trundle bed that they keep for him and Delila in her big girl bed. "One story, guys."

"You choose, Mama." Dee smiles at her. "I like your choices."

They usually read chapter books, but when Jamie's over, since it's only one night, they make sure to have a story that can be finished. Brooke chooses "Goodnight, Moon."

Mostly because it's what Lucas always reads when he's here and she, all of a sudden, misses him terribly.

Lucas loves her. He does.

And she loves him.

Now I'm waking with the dawn.
And there's no rest with the hollowness.
That's moved into my soul since you've been gone,
Where have you gone?

This christening has been the day from hell. From the fiery, burning depths of somewhere that she never believed existed- until now.

All day long, her daughter has been clinging to Lucas as if he's the second coming. And all day long, she's been dealing with looks from all of these people- these people who are only a part of her family because she had a baby- that tell her that they couldn't disapprove of what she's doing more. They think she should just give up her life and go to be with him. When he clearly has a life that he's building without them.

A year away from home! She thought he'd be gone a couple of months and now he's extending it. She truly never thought he'd last this long away from Delila. Away from her.

"They aren't judging you, ya know." Karen's voice comes through her thoughts in a soothing way.

She smiles at her daughter's grandmother and reaches over to hug her. "It feels like they are."

The older woman shakes her head at her, "What you feel are your own judgments, Brooke. Not theirs."

"He's leaving, Karen," she looks up at her. "He's leaving, and I sent him away. What if he doesn't come back?"

Karen smiles a little at that, "Brooke, you couldn't keep that boy away from you and his daughter for anything else in this world. Honey, I wish you believed and understood that."

There's a pause in the conversation and Brooke wonders if everyone thinks he loves her. And she also wonders how they could possibly believe that after watching him with Peyton for all that time. He loved Peyton; it was obvious in everything he did. It had always been obvious.

"Sweetheart, I think you should think about going with him. Getting away from all of this," the woman who may as well be her mother gestures around the room, "It might be good for the both of you and your daughter. You could start fresh."

Brooke nods. She gets it. Really, she does. But she doesn't want to uproot her baby. They'd have to have her second birthday on the road. She feels her chest tighten with panic as she realizes that means that if she stays, Lucas might miss her second birthday. Before she can respond, Karen walks away. She sees her walk up to where Lucas is standing on the other side of the room. Dee is asleep on his shoulder and she wants so badly to go relieve him of having to hold her. She just can't bring herself to walk over to him. She can't do it.

"Bookie, Bookie," Lily is at her feet and reaching up to her.

"Hey, you pretty little thing." She coos, bending down to pick her up. "Where is your Uncle Dan at, huh?"

The little girl just shrugs her shoulders and points toward the stairs. "You sleepy, babe?" she asks her. "Or you wanna go lie down and watch a movie?"

Lils smiles and claps her hands so Brooke takes that as a positive response. She quietly walks up the stairs and goes into the room that Lily sleeps in here at Dan's house, when they're here. Turning on the tv and popping a DVD of Strawberry Shortcake into the player, she lays the little girl in her crib and gives her a soft little kiss. "Have a good nap, babe."

She stops at the top of the stairs and takes a deep breath, bracing herself before she enters the depths of torture again. As she descends, she takes in the scenes around her. Nathan and Haley are talking and laughing with Royal and May, who is holding her newly baptized grandson. There are little groups of people formed everywhere. Skills, Bevin, Mouth, and Rachel are in a group discussing something that seems serious. She'll have to remember to ask Mouth or Rachel about it later. And Lucas and Karen are right where she last saw them. By the door, which Dan is coming through as she reaches the bottom of the staircase.

Before she gets up the gusto to start circling the room again, making sure everyone is comfortable, Lucas is in front of her.

"Can we talk, Brooke?"

He looks hopeful, and she doesn't know what to do with that. Because she doesn't know where she is. She doesn't know where he is. She doesn't trust anything she could say to him.

So she turns him down, "I don't think that's such a great idea."

Because she doesn't.

"When will it be a good idea? When I'm halfway across the country? Will you talk to me then?" He looks aggravated with her and she can't blame him. But she can't stop herself from pushing him away either.

Or could she? She has to ask, "So, you're going then? A full year, Luke?"

Because she just doesn't understand it. A full year away from Dee, Jamie, and Lils. A full year away from Naley and his parents. She wouldn't be able to do it. How can he?

He nods at her and she can see his determination. "It's a lot of money, Brooke."

Money? That's what this is about? Money. To take care of them. Didn't he realize they need him more than they need money? She's trying to explain this to him, with her eyes, because she doesn't know how to say it out loud, when he breaks the silence, "Please, consider coming with me, Brooke."

"My life is here," she regrets it the moment it comes out of her mouth. She should've thought before speaking. So she tries to mend it, "Of course, you can see Delila whenever you want."

He's pissed. She watches as his nostrils flare and he tries to reign in his temper, without any luck.

Then without warning, he starts yelling at her, "I want to see her every day. I want to see you every day. What the hell do I have to do to prove that to you, damnit?"

She feels the eyes of every person in the room turning on them and she's glad that Delila is asleep somewhere. She read once that a child can feel negative energy, especially when it's coming from people who they're close to. She doesn't want Dee to ever feel the consequences of her bad decisions. Of her bad decisions.

When he realizes that she's too shocked to speak, he continues on, a little bit more controlled. "You know what," he tells her, "I have to go. I have a trip to prepare for. I can't be here anymore. You call me when you figure out how I'm gonna see her. Obviously, seeing you doesn't matter. Maybe it never did."

She feels like if she lets him go now, he'll never be able to look at her again. So she tries to get him to come back, calling out, "Luke!"

But he doesn't stop. He doesn't even flinch. She tries again, stopping just short of using his full name, "Lucas!"

When he turns, and locks his ice blue eyes onto hers, she loses all track of what she even wants to say. She just wants him to know that she loves him. That she wishes she could just jump into his arms and travel around the country with him. That she could believe that that is what he wants. But she can't. He has to understand that they can't just go back. Too much has happened.

She has to protect their daughter. She has to protect herself.

But she doesn't know how to say that. So she does the only thing she can think to do.

She apologizes, "I'm sorry."

But as he nods curtly and then turns and walks away, she knows it's not nearly okay.

And she has no clue how to make it okay.

I've got nothing left to give.
I've given all my gifts to you.
Now I've just got the bags from where I've been,
Where have I been?

After cleaning up the playroom and the dinner mess, she sits at her dining room table with a scrap book. One that she made a long time ago and avoids looking at most of the time.

She made it while she was pregnant, for her unborn child. She wanted the baby to grow up and know how much love created her.

There are pictures of her and Lucas all through senior year. She tries to decipher before the break up and after, and the only thing that really changed was her growing belly. And, of course, they didn't kiss afterwards. But they were still smiling. Still happy.

She never could bring herself to be pretend happy with him around. He always brought out the real smile in her. She sees that now as she sorts through the pages. Naley's vowel renewal. The Breast Cancer Awareness concert. The weekend at Rachel's cabin. The end of the summer beach party at the beginning of the year. The cheerleading competition. And then everything after the break up. Prom. Honey Grove. Graduation. The state championship. Everything.

It was one of the best and worst years of her life. She had love like she had never known with Lucas. And then it was gone. But in it's place, she was given the greatest gift of all. The gift of life inside of her. The beauty of being everything to this little baby.

She'd never change it.

But now, she needs to start trusting him. She needs to believe that he would never lie to her and that he hasn't been lying to her. She needs a sign that he always has loved her, as she's always loved him.

Her eyes land on a picture; the last in the book. Karen took it a couple of hours after Delila Grace was born. It's her, Lucas, and their newborn.

There they are. A team. She's looking down at her newborn baby girl and he's looking at her. She never quite noticed it before. She just assumed that Lucas was watching Delila too. But he's not. He's watching her and his eyes are full of the one emotion that she needs from him most of all. Love.

He once said that he was just in awe of her that whole day. All that pain and she never backed down. But he was wrong. He gave her that strength. He helped her brave the storm and afterward, when she was looking at the rainbow- he was looking at her.

How could she have never known this before?

Lucas loves her.

He always has. And tonight, he's going to prove it to her all over again.

That's a good thing, too. Because she's never stopped loving him.

And when he gets back, she's going to let him know.

So sorry they hurt us, so sorry they lied.
So sorry they left us, so sorry we died inside.
But I'm glad to be with you, I'm glad we survived.
And we'll be alright if we let it ride and just let it shine tonight.



So, what'd you think? Please review and let me know!

Thanks for reading as always :)

- Corey