It's been a long time since I posted two weeks in a row, so yea for Christmas Break. Hope everyone is having a happy New Year.

50

Nathan reluctantly took his seat on the bench as he looked up at the glowing red lights of the scoreboard. The Ravens were down by 9 with just under a minute to go in the second quarter and frankly, if it wasn't for his brother, Nathan knew the score would be even worse. He'd played terrible so far, bad enough that Whitey had just taken him out and sat him on the bench for the last two minutes. He grabbed a drink and wiped the sweat off his forehead as he glanced across the court to see a look of concern on his father's face. Of course, that seemed to be his primary expression these days as their hastily built world crashed down around them.

He sighed and glanced up in the stands further to see Tiffany sitting near the top. She sent him a little wave and smile, as if she wasn't at the root of most if his problems. He wanted to strangle her skinny little neck. Instead, he scowled and looked down at his hands, squeezing them into fists when he saw them start to tremble. He fought to squash the shakes, knowing he had to get control of himself.

"Nate," Lucas tapped him on the shoulder, grabbing his attention, "come on, it's half-time."

He looked up to see that the buzzer had rung while he was in another world and most of his teammates were already half-way to the locker room. He shook himself out of his haze and slowly stood to follow his brother. He had made his way across the court and was just entering the hallway when Whitey pulled him aside.

"Where are you Nate?" the frustrated coach pointed to his head, "because it's certainly not here. If you can't get yourself back into this game, let me know so I can put someone else in who gives a dang."

"I'm sorry coach," Nathan rubbed a hand down his face, knowing he deserved the scolding, "I'm trying, I just…"

Whitey sighed, deciding maybe he was being too hard on a kid that really just needed a break, something to go his way for once. Nathan was a good, strong, young man, but even the broadest of shoulders could only carry so much. If any part of the rumors he'd heard was true, he could understand why the boy seemed like every minute was a struggle. He took a deep breath and reined in his temper.

"Listen Nathan, I've heard some rumbles about what's going on and I understand if you can't go back out there, but you need to tell me if you're going to be able to pull it together. Are you okay?"

"I'll be fine," he shrugged it off as no big deal. He wasn't going to make any excuses, even if every fiber of his being was screaming for him to give up and get far away. He knew he couldn't do that. There were too many people depending on him to figure out a way to get through this without letting them down, "You can count on me."

"I hope so son," Whitey shook his head, pulling his tie even looser, so it hung to almost mid chest, "I'm not going to lie, we need this game. We can't lose any more if we want a sure shot to make the playoffs."

Nathan nodded despite the way his heart was hammering in his chest and was prepared to follow his coach through the entrance when he felt a hand on his bicep from behind.

"Nathan," he turned just in time for his wife to pull him into a hug. "Are you okay?"

"I am now," he pulled her closer, feeling her head resting just under his chin. His heartbeat slowed and he could almost feel strength come back to his tired limbs. Somehow, just having her in his arms made everything slow down and seem like it was going to be okay.

"As soon as she walked in I started to lose it," he finally admitted, knowing he didn't need to explain who, "I'm not sure I can do this Hales…"

"That's crap," she pulled away to look up at him, and saw his despair turn to surprise at her tone. "Listen to me Nathan Scott, you're letting her win."

Nathan started to deny it, but she persisted, "You're stronger than her, than all this. After everything else I've seen you do, all the time you've put into this game for moments exactly like this, this should be a piece of cake. You can do this. I believe in you."

Nathan thought about all the time he'd spent practicing in the hot sun and the freezing cold, all the heckling he'd endured and the hazing. He'd spent hundreds of hours playing when his friends were partying or going on dates, all for times like this. Haley was right, how could he let one girl throw him so far off his game? The court had always been his sanctuary and he needed to focus and take it back.

"I really needed to hear that," he leaned his forehead against hers and took a deep breath. He could hear his coach talking on the other side of the door, but even though he knew he needed to get in there, all he wanted to do was stay in her embrace. He pulled away and stood up straight, "I better go in there so Whitey can chew me out with the rest of the team."

Haley laughed, "Remember, he's all bark."

"I'll remember that after running a million suicides tomorrow," Nathan groaned at the thought, his normal response bringing a smile to his wife's face.

"I love you," she said, starting to walk away before turning back "Hey Nathan," he popped his head back out the door before it slid closed. "Give us something to cheer for, okay? Brooke's going to drive me crazy if the game stays so boring."

His face lit up in a smile and Haley was sure she could see his confidence flowing back into him. He gave a slight bow, "yes ma'am."

BREAK

Haley ran to meet Nathan on the court as soon as the buzzer sounded, the Ravens winning by 3. "You played awesome," she threw her arms around his neck. "I'm so proud of you."

"I played decent for half the game," he countered, seeing Dan heading their direction from the stands, "I'm just glad we won. The team deserves it. They played their butts off."

Dan walked up and placed his hand on his son's shoulder. "Good Job Nate," he cast his eyes around for his other son, "that was a big win. Bear Creek has given us trouble the last few years."

"You can thank Lucas for this one," Nathan saw the blonde Scott at the same time their father did. "He played great."

"He did," Dan agreed, "but they still wouldn't have won without you. How are you?"

Nathan shrugged, getting tired of answering that same question over and over, "I'm dealing. I just wish we could fast forward and get some answers."

"Yeah, too bad we can't just skip to the end and find out what happens," Lucas joined them at center court. "This waiting sucks."

"Actually," Dan's eyes lit up. "That's a great idea."

The three young Scott's looked at him with identical, confused expressions. "I need to go," he said, pulling his coat on over his shoulders. "Lucas, take your mother home please? I'll call you later."

"What was that about?" Haley asked, looking between the brothers as the elder Scott quickly disappeared into the crowd. They looked at each other and then back at her.

"Who knows?" Lucas answered. "With our dad, it could be anything."

Rachel leaned back against the couch and closed her eyes, willing the monster headache pounding through her head to recede. It felt like every part of her body hurt, but she was trying not to take the prescription pain medication any more than she had to. It made her woozy and she didn't like anything that made her control over her surroundings slip. Unfortunately, Tylenol didn't always cut it.

She thought about Nathan for what must have been the millionth time already that day, unable to focus on anything else while she was laying in his living room. Is that what he'd felt like when he'd been drugged? Like he was there but had no control over his body? Had he been completely helpless? Had Tiffany done things to him against his will? The questions just kept asking themselves over and over in her head until she thought she'd go crazy with the lack of answers.

She'd been terrified and fought with every breath to escape that kind of assault the night she was hurt and it had been a near miss. She didn't want to believe she had sided with someone that might have done that or something very similar to someone else. She'd just been so sure that as a man he had to have been the one in the wrong, the one who put himself above everyone else's wants and desires. She'd grown up with enough examples to believe that's the way it always was, but the more time she spent with the Scotts, the more she was starting to realize her initial assessment had actually been right. It would've taken more than just "taking the edge off" to make Nathan cheat on Haley and at his size, it would've taken a decent amount of any drug just to reach that point. If Tiffany had really done something so terrible, something Rachel herself had nightmares about and railed against men doing, what else was she capable of doing…or lying about?

She thought back to the first couple of times she'd seen the girl and tried to remember what she'd overheard. She'd been talking about bamboozling some guy, but she didn't remember details since it hadn't been important at the time. Had it been Nathan even then? Was she plotting against him even before she knew she was pregnant? Or had she been screwing another guy over as well? The more she thought about it, the more convinced she was that she was an idiot for ever putting any faith in what the woman had said.

She wished there was something she could do to help, but the girl hadn't told her anything incriminating or she wouldn't have believed her innocence. Still, she was devious and smart enough to figure something out. Maybe she could think of a way to find out the truth once and for all.

As soon as he walked in the door, Nathan threw his bag on the floor and headed for the shower, "How'd the game go?" Rachel asked as he walked past. "We won," he said, his voice terse as he grabbed a towel from the closet and continuing without stopping.

Haley entered a minute later, sighing as he picked up his bag and moved it to the chair, "You need anything?" she asked the redhead as she walked over to the fridge to grab a drink.

Rachel shook her head no, "Nathan was in a mood," she frowned, "I thought you won?"

Haley nodded, "it was a lot closer than it should've been, but they pulled it out." She took a long drink of her water. "Tiffany showed up. It didn't go over so well."

Rachel grimaced at the thought. She could only imagine how Nathan felt seeing the woman. If things had happened the way she was starting to believe they did, she was amazed Nathan had been able to play at all. Every time she so much as thought about the man that had attacked her, her whole body shook and she felt like she was having a heart attack. She was convinced that Nathan had actually suffered the fate she'd narrowly avoided and seeing the perpetrator on his turf had to have been rattling. Even if they hadn't happened, Nathan had to have been equally angry about the accusations that had quickly taken over his life.

Rachel closed her eyes and made a decision. She didn't like apologizing. In fact, she couldn't remember more than a handful of times in her whole life she'd forced herself to do it, but it was the least she could do after everything they'd done for her.

"I'm sorry Haley. I believed everything she was saying…" she made her way to her feet. "I'm usually more discerning, but she really played me and… I messed up. I wanted you to know that I'm sorry that I've made things harder for you."

Haley stopped for a moment, too worn down to carry a grudge, "Apparently she's good at playing people," she looked toward the bathroom and Rachel could see the hurt in her eyes. "It's not your fault. Besides, it's probably good to know what she's planning."

Rachel still felt angry with herself, maybe even more because Haley was so easy to forgive her, "We still don't know enough. I could try to find out more. She hasn't told me much, but if she believed I was on her side, then maybe…"

"You can barely walk," Haley pointed out, amused by the offer from the girl who had been a thorn in her side for months. She guessed it was proof that you really did catch more flies with honey, "I'm grateful for the offer, but I think we should just leave it alone for now. Going after her might just stir up even more crap and," she looked at the door and felt tears start to form, "I don't know if he could handle any more."

Tiffany smiled, running her hands down her scantily clad body, "Like what you see?" She didn't wait for a response from her audience before walking toward the bed, knowing she wasn't going to get one. "Of course you do," she continued, grabbing the man's hand and placing it on her breast, forcing his fingers to contract and squeeze the firm orbs, "You've always had amazing hands. So strong and…rough."

Nathan fought to pull his hand away, to yell for help, even just to close his eyes but found he had no control of his body.

"Look over here baby," he felt his head turning against his will and he saw Haley, spread out on the bed next to him. He renewed his fight to move as his mind raced for some way out. There had to be a way to stop her, if only he was smarter, if only he hadn't been so sure that he could handle her, this wouldn't be happening.

"I brought you a present, but she's been a very bad girl," Tiffany pulled a knife from the top of the bedside table and traced it down Haley's bared throat, pressing it just hard enough to leave a trail of blood. "She took you from me and she had no right."

He could see Haley's eyes pleading with him through her tears, begging him to do something to stop her pain, to make everything okay again, but he didn't know how. He couldn't get his body to move, couldn't even send her a message to let her know that he loved her or that he was sorry.

"If you had made better choices, this wouldn't be happening. I want you to know that her pain is your fault. I want you to remember that you did this to her, even after I tried to give you an easy way out," she climbed on the bed and knelt next to Nathan, putting the knife in his hand before taking that hand and using it to stab Haley in the chest. "You killed her."

Nathan woke with a start, his toned body already drenched with sweat and his limbs weak. His heart was racing and he didn't feel like he could breathe as he stumbled his way into the bathroom and vomited, his body convulsing over and over until all that remained were dry heaves. When he finally felt he'd regained some control, he opened the cabinet under the sink and pulled out a cup and a bottle of mouthwash. He cleaned out his mouth and spit in the toilet, his body too tired to rise and use the sink.

"God," he cried when he finally got his breathing back to a relatively normal pace, tears streaming down his face as he leaned back against the cool tile wall. "Please help me, I don't know how much more of this I can take."

Haley came in a moment later, "again?" she simply asked, sliding down to put her arm around him. "You can't keep doing this Nathan, you need to talk to someone."

"I talk to you," he reminded her, as though that would fix things.

"I'm glad you do," she agreed, "but you need a professional. It seems like they're getting worse." She could see that he wanted to brush it off again and even though she felt terrible about doing it, she knew he needed a push, "It's scaring me."

He let her statement settle and knew she hadn't said it lightly, which made it hurt all the worse. He sighed and admitted that she was right, although he would never tell her that. The first couple of nights they'd been bad enough with Tiffany doing things to him, things he had no way of stopping. He'd woken feeling dirty and disgusted with himself, barely making it to the bathroom before vomiting for what seemed like hours. At the time, they were so vivid that he'd even wondered if they were memories that he'd repressed coming to the forefront. He'd managed to talk about them with Haley, at least a little, her patience and love coaxing the words out. She'd been amazing as always, comforting and caring for him even though he knew the words and pictures had to hurt her as well. He'd made it through the next night without any problems and had thought they were gone.

Then the dreams took an even darker turn with Nathan being held a prisoner in his body, unable to even blink his eyes as people he cared about were hurt, tortured, or in tonight's case killed right in front of him. Sometimes, he knew in the dream that it wasn't real, but it never helped him to wake up or to stop the pain from tearing him apart.

Each time, he woke up in a panic, unable to think or breathe, sometimes barely making it to the bathroom before he lost everything he'd managed to eat. It was getting bad enough that he was afraid to even go to sleep at night. If he wasn't so tired, he would've just stayed up to avoid taking the risk this would happen again.

It was spilling over into his waking life as well, making him exhausted and irritable. Since the nightmares started, he'd missed two days of school, and thus two days of practice, playing poorly enough that they'd almost lost their last 2 games despite playing against inferior opponents.

He shook his head, despite knowing his wife was right. He'd never been a very trusting person, how was he supposed to tell such personal, horrifying things to a stranger? "I can't Haley," he willed her to understand, "It makes me start to freak out again just thinking about it."

She sighed, having fully expected that response, but she wasn't going to give up this time. It was too important to just let go, "Is there someone you trust, someone you could talk to?" she pulled his face up to meet hers. "I know you're not telling me everything and that's okay, but is there someone you think you can? Even if they're not a pro, it might help just to get it all out."

Nathan leaned his head on her shoulder and they lay there quietly and thought about it, "I think maybe I know who to talk to."

"I'm not any kind of expert," Whitey came from around his desk as Nathan explained to him what was going on, "but I sure can listen if that's what you need."

"I don't know what I need," Nathan admitted, leaning forward and placing his elbows on his knees. "I just know that I can't go on like this. It's not just me it's hurting."

Whitey walked over to his door and locked it, "Then let's talk."

"I feel so helpless," Haley admitted to Lucas, "there's something seriously wrong and I can't do anything to help."

"You're there for him Hales," Lucas put his arm around her shoulder, "I'm sure that helps more than you realize."

"Maybe, but they're getting worse, not better. I can't even imagine what he's going through,"

"Maybe he should go to a support group or a therapist," Lucas offered.

"I already suggested that and he was adamantly against it. He needs to feel safe and those places just don't do that for him. When all this came out, I was so selfish and naïve. I was concerned about if he cheated or how a baby affect our lives or if I could trust him… I never even stopped to think about how violated he would feel. I mean, men don't like to use the word, but if she's telling the truth about the baby, then…"

"Yeah," Lucas said. "I know. He could still press charges."

Haley nodded, "but it won't take any of it away. It'll always be there.

"I actually think it might be easier to deal with if I did remember," Nathan ran a hand through his hair. "Not because I want the memories obviously, but the wondering and imagining is killing me. Ever since I looked up what can happen under the influence of those drugs, my mind is like walking through a minefield. Every night it's different and except for the ones with other people in them, any of them could be what really happened."

"And if nothing happened?" Whitey asked. "You said you were sure originally that was the truth."

"Then she still violated my mind, my sanity with these accusations," Nathan stood up and started to pace. "My life was complicated before this, but I guess I took the good parts for granted, because now I'm seeing what messed up is really like."

"What are you going to do about it?" Whitey asked.

"What can I do about it?" Nathan's eyes furrowed. "Until we find out if the baby is mine, we don't have any sure way of knowing and even if it's not, then it's still possible that something happened."

"That's not what I meant," the coach frowned. "You're acting like a victim…"

Nathan threw his hands up in the air as if to say "duh," and the coach continued, "I know, but that doesn't mean you need to act like it. You've given her power over your whole life until that baby is born. You need to take it back."

"You make it sound so easy, but it's not," Nathan was getting angry.

"I didn't say it was easy," Whitey stood up too, "but most things worthwhile aren't. Where is the kid that I first met, the one that had already defied the odds so many times? Did you get to be a top level basketball player by taking it easy? Has working things out with your father and brother been easy? Has switching schools and living away from your mom been easy?"

Nathan shook his head no every time, not sure where the coach was going with all this.

"But you did it, all of it and you are still thriving. Just because it's hard doesn't mean you can't do it," Coach explained.

"But I can't…" Nathan argued, "I don't know…"

"Yes you can. I'm not saying it won't be difficult or that this isn't something that I wish you didn't have to face. I have no idea what you're going through, but I've been through enough in my life to know that the most important thing right now is to make a decision."

"What decision?" Nathan looked up at him, knowing he probably wasn't going to like what the old man said, but also wanting someone to give him some kind, any kind of solution.

"You have to decide what's most important to you and focus on that. SO which is it? What did or didn't happen that night or the life you still have right in front of you?"

"Of course it's right now, that's a stupid question," Nathan was clearly annoyed.

"Was it?" Coach lifted an eyebrow. "Right now, you're dwelling on the pain and uncertainty you're feeling, and that's totally justified, but it's not what you need"

"Of course I am, how am I supposed to just forget this happened?" Nathan threw his hands up in the air, "it's not like I want to relive it every night."

"Listen, I've been through some pretty painful things before," Whitey stayed calm, despite his player's temper, "The best way to get through it is to stop worrying about things you can't change and focus on what you still have, what is worth living for."