Disclaimer- I stupidly forgot to mention that the bar scene last chapter was obviously not mine, so I am disclaiming now before anyone sues me.

A/N- So we got a fifth season! yay! and in the words of a certain Karen Roe, "Can I get a woot woot?" Even though we have a much-anticipated seaosn five, I'm still very happy to know that lots of you would still browse fan fiction :) I didn't want to stop writing Brucas, so I'm glad I will still have an audience :) Major thank you's to you lovely, lovely reviewers for last chapter (and of course all the other chapters before that.) I'll take this oppertunity to advertise (yes, this promotion crap again) my new one shot 'All Mayhem, No Marriage' It's a Brucas as always, and now I will just shut up.

Enjoy this chapter! xxx


Bubblegum Cherry Pie

Chapter 12: Liquorice Tears

"You lied to me."

It's only early morning, and Lucas isn't prepared for the arrival of such confrontation from a very pissed-off-looking Brooke. She's wearing her cheerleading uniform, yet another reminder that Lucas has a basketball game tonight, where his father will be watching his every move.

"I don't know what…"

"You're not staying at your cousin's house."

"I.." He stutters, but Brooke cuts in yet again.

"I live down the same fucking street as Nathan. He's one of my best friends so did you not think that I would find out?"

Her tone is icy cold, and Lucas hangs his head in shame as he realises that his world is about to come to crushing blows with the force of nature that is Brooke Penelope Davis. He feels guilty for his lies, and the way she kissed him after thinking the whole thing was her fault.

In some respects, Lucas figures, it is her fault. But he wouldn't have changed anything about the past few months.

"I'm really sorry Brooke." Lucas begins, squinting his eyes as she simply shakes her head.

"It doesn't matter." Brooke practically waves it away.

"So we're cool?"

"Yeah." She shrugs. "I suppose I'll just see you around."

----

Lucas should have guessed that "I'll just see you around" would mean no more kissing, no more letters, no more cutting classes and sneaking around. But being too naïve, he hadn't, and the idea of not seeing Brooke Davis in the same way is almost too much to bare.

He wonders how it is, that she can sit in History, barely an arm stretch away and not talk to him. He wants to send her the notes they used to write, back when things were supposedly less complicated, just to make her smile and turn around and forgive him in an instant. He wants her to entertain him with her paper games about what his favourite number is, and what his favourite sexual position might be.

He doesn't have one of course (a position, not a number) because the only girl he's ever kissed properly is her, and there's no chance of him venturing to another girl's bed any time soon. Hell, he hadn't even ventured to her bed.

Lucas questions whether if he told her everything right now, about his Mom and the post-partum depression she suffered, about Dan and his incessant bullying and favouritism of Nathan, it would make a difference. He wonders whether if he told her about his Mom's campaign, about how she's so wrapped up in it that family means nothing to her not now, not anymore, that she would start sneaking over to Dan's house, cheering him up with midnight sleepovers and afternoons on the beach.

But Lucas isn't going to tell Brooke any of this, because he's not sure she'd even bother turning around if he asked it of her. She was fine before they'd had any contact, and another friend or boyfriend just wasn't something she was in desperate need of. He already knew the competition he faced every single day for Brooke Davis' affections-her head cheerleader power combined with beauty and ridiculous sexiness made her the target of teenage boys' lust.

To her, he's nothing any more special than the next guy.

----

"Look man." Nathan addresses Lucas in the boys' locker room. "About that thing with Brooke, it wasn't me that told her."

"What do you…"

"I know about your little story about where you're living."

"How do you…" He's cut off again, but he's getting answers faster this way, so Lucas can't care.

"She told me. Said you were living with your Aunt in Cleland Heights as a punishment for seeing her." Nathan tells him, rolling his eyes at Brooke's description of their stolen moments together. It had made her smile. It had made Nathan feel sick.

"Then who told her?"

"Dan."

"Dan? Why would it matter to him that I was seeing Brooke?" Lucas asks bewildered.

"Because he seems to have some sort of vendetta against you. Sorry dude, I just thought you should know."

When Lucas was younger, he would question why Dan was being so horrible to him, why he seemed to take every available opportunity to make him miserable, and why he would swig whisky straight from the bottle in his den after dinner.

Now, too many years of silence later, Lucas had figured out the answers to those questions. Karen getting pregnant ruined his chances of becoming the basketball star he had always wanted to be. Demanding that he do the right thing, Karen had made Dan be there for her and Lucas, financially. No longer being able to afford a college tuition and private basketball coaching, Dan had been forced to go into car sales, eventually making a name for himself as a dealer.

He took every opportunity to make Lucas miserable, because he hadn't wanted him there, not when he had managed to build a life with Deb and his younger son Nathan. Lucas being present in the Scott household had destroyed Dan's idea of a perfect family, because he was the illegitimate child that was only forced upon him because of Karen's illness. He was only supposed to stay for a couple months.

Lucas had stayed there for eleven years.

"Hey Lucas." Nathan asked. "You okay?"

"Fine." Was all he could mutter, before that adrenaline pumping in his body took over, and the team made their way out onto the court for their important game to reach the next round.

----

They won. But she doesn't congratulate him the way she did the last time. Instead, Brooke stands sullen on the sidelines as Peyton kisses Nathan, and the other girls crowd around their respective boyfriends, the singletons simply joining in anyway.

He catches her eye, shinny brown from across the court, hoping for a smile. But Lucas doesn't get one, instead, he just watches quietly as she exits the gymnasium, seeking solace in the comforting showers in the girls' locker room away from prying eyes and over-analytical supporters. She doesn't want to be questioned, not now. Not when she's questioning her own actions anyway.

Lucas doesn't party with the rest of the team at Skillz's house. He shares a car ride with Dan, trying to block out his constant criticisms of his jump shot, and after that, his boasting about Nathan's.

Instead, when he returns home, (Dan's nonetheless) his bedroom becomes his haven, his sanctuary, the blue paint mirroring that of the bedroom he used to occupy back at his Mom's house. There, it's silent. He can imagine the fun Brooke will have at the after-party. She had fun before him, and that's not going to change after him. Lucas Scott isn't fun. Brooke Davis is. She can have her fun without him. He can't have his fun without her.

He dresses her in a daring skirt tonight, a way above the knee, showing off skin that's tanned and silky smooth with a halter neck top to match. It's bright pink, almost dark pink silk, complimenting the very dark brown of her skirt, and he teams her outfit with a thin scarf around her head, leaving a few strands of tousled hair to frame her petite face with the rest flowing around her shoulders. She's giggly tonight, grabbing his hand when she sits herself on his lap, a little away from the speakers so that they can have 'their' time. She pushes his hand from her knee, a little further up her leg to the hem of her skirt, his fingertips tickling lightly as she bends a little to kiss him, lip gloss smearing but she doesn't mind.

She whispers that they're good together, removing all doubt from his head, because she really is kissing him, her arms wrapping around his neck to allow her fingers to play with his hair-lighter from days spent with her on the beach.

She's smiling, dimples emerging, raspy voice filling his ears as she tells him she'll be right back, she just needs to go dance to this song with Peyton. They have a routine, she says.

Brooke's dancing. He can't get enough of the way her body moves against the beat, rubbing across Peyton every now and again, a smile escaping from the blonde's mouth, a gasp escaping from Lucas'. He chugs a little of the beer she's given him and continues to watch, lips slightly parted for when she comes back to meet them with hers.

Her skirt is beginning to ride up. Lucas is starting to wonder whether if she continues dancing in this manner, she might expose the tiny bikini she's wearing underneath. He imagines her telling him that if he's good, she might let him see it later. Later is too far away. Lucas doesn't want to wait.

"Did you like my dancing?" She asks him, eyebrow kinked in the way she always does when she's trying to be cute. Lucas nods, telling her that of course he does, but he likes it better when she's dancing with him.

"Then come on." She whispers in his ear, the hairs on his arms and neck standing up on end as she leads him to where she's just been dancing, a few jealous looks on guys' faces, a very happy look on Lucas'.

Of course, his daydream is too short-lived, because when he gets to the point of a few girls removing their tops, continuing to dance in bikinis and skirts due to the hot Summer night, Brooke included, Nathan knocks on the door, home a little too early for usual, and a little too sober.

"Brooke's one of my best friends." He tells a slightly confused Lucas, grabbing the soft basketball from the corner of his brother's room, throwing it effortlessly through the net. "She doesn't date guys, not normally, not for longer than a week."

Lucas doesn't want to imagine her with other guys. He's gotten used to the idea of her being with only him, kissing only him and curling up in department stores with only him.

"And she's never one to miss a party, especially not after a game we won."

"I'm not sure what you mean." Lucas tells him, eyes narrowed into a squint as he tries to fathom what Nathan may be telling him.

"She wasn't there tonight Lucas, and ever since she found out about your little fairy story, she's not been exactly…"

"Cheery?" Lucas offers.

"Right. And when she's not cheery, Peyton thinks there's something wrong."

"So…"

"So when Peyton thinks there's something wrong, she tries to talk to me about it, and I'm kinda crap at that sort of stuff." Nathan tells him, rubbing his own forehead a little roughly. "And if I can't figure out what it is that's wrong, Peyton doesn't want to…" He trails off, eyebrows raised. "You know…"

Lucas is about to shake his head, but then suddenly gets it, his own eyebrows raising. "Oh."

"Yeah, so if you could explain…"

"Explain what?" He snaps. "That I lied to her because I was afraid that she wouldn't like me if I told her I'm Dan Scott's illegitimate reject of a son? That my Mom's more bothered about her campaign than about me, and that the last seventeen fucking years of my life have been a completely false appearance?"

"Um…" Nathan's not quite sure what to say, shrugging his shoulders. "Maybe leave the Jerry Springer crap out. But you could tell her you're sorry?"

Lucas nods, a little embarrassed, yet at the same time, knowing that a simple 'I'm sorry' isn't going to cut it for Brooke Davis.

"Thanks." Nathan replies, exiting Lucas' room as he calls, "And for the record, Peyton thinks Brooke really likes you, you know?"

Maybe it's supposed to make him feel better, hopeful even. The fact that Brooke could possibly like him even half as much as he likes her, an aid to boost his morale. Yet all he feels is darkness. In his blue room, crying blackened tears, liquorice tears for the life that was kind to him only once, (in the way of allowing him to meet a certain Brooke Penelope Davis) and that took everything away from him when he least deserved it.


Okay, so I was thinking for the next chapter, I would write more from Brooke's point of view, just to allow you lovely readers an insight into her thoughts. It will be the only chapter from her point of view, so what do you guys think?

Please review, love Gracie xxx