Title: Breaking up is hard to do

Author: Joy

Email: Julianna@ziplip.com

Rating: PG-13

A/N: Sorry for delay. Massive migraines have invaded my world. For five days straight I dealt with the same frickin' migraine. Needless to say I have to see a specialist on Monday. Fun for me!

A/N2: And before anyone asks yes my migraines and amnesia are linked. Like I said, fun for me.

19.

Haley sat in her own room alone for the first time in what seemed like forever...where no one was waiting on her or reading to her. She was just by herself in her room. She felt tired and listless as she looked about her. It was like she had been away from this room since September.

With the knowledge that Nathan Scott was the big secret everyone was avoiding, Haley began to remember incidents more clearly but not always fully. There were times she wondered if this was just her life now...missing time, conversations, and experiences. Experiences...the word stuck in her head. Haley became very afraid she wasn't a virgin anymore. After all she had been dating Nathan Scott.

It was sad really. The guy that had visited her at the hospital wasn't Nathan Scott...just Nathan. But somehow she just couldn't let herself think of him in that way. He had to remain Nathan Scott, basketball player and prick, in order for her to not wonder about him. I mean, why would she have dated him? Haley stared at herself in the mirror and tried to get over the feelings of fear that loomed.

Being with Lucas made things better and worse. He was so patient and loving with her. She could never doubt that she was the sun and moon in his eyes...because he remembered. Lucas remembered the last few months; the weird relationship things and the separate friends stuff. He remembered when they didn't talk so much...but more than anything he remembered the winter break where everything changed.

Everyday Lucas would look at her like maybe today was the day she would remember falling in love with him and everyday it broke his heart a little more when she didn't remember. Haley was beginning to feel guilty that she couldn't remember and Lucas felt guilty that he was making her feel that way. Problem was Lucas knew that Haley did have feelings for him; she just wasn't in love with him. The 'eureka' moment was gone and so everything else felt sort of forced. It was funny because at the hospital she clung to him like a lifeline but now that she was home she was shy of him.

A soft knock came at her door, causing Haley to turn around. "You okay honey?" her mother asked.

"No...not really." Jessica motioned for them to sit on Haley's bed. "It's like the last few months have been a dream and I only remember bits and pieces." She ran her hands through her hair.

"What do you want to know that you can't tell yourself?" her mother asked.

"Huh?"

"Your journal honey...read your journal. It should tell you what you were thinking and feeling."

"Yeah but...I don't like what I was feeling," Haley admitted quietly.

It took Jessica a moment to catch on. "Are you afraid that if you read your journal you will develop feelings for Nathan?" The teen nodded. Her mother sighed, "Haley, you and Luke have known each other a really long time. You love him. It's a fact...like your birthday." Haley stared at her mother.

"Look honey, you and Luke got where you are because for a little while you didn't have each other. You realized what you were missing. Nathan is the reason why you fell for Lucas."

"How do you know? Luke said we didn't together until the night of the accident," she inquired.

"Yeah but honey...you spent your entire winter break with one another and blew everyone else off. You were at his house or he was here almost every moment of every day. He was your touchstone when you broke up with Nathan. He always gave you space when it came to Nathan even though it killed him a little every time he saw you together...You need to talk to Lucas about this."

"I know...but I don't know how."

"How about you start with, 'Lucas I love you and want everything to be perfect,' and end with, 'but I'm afraid if I start letting myself remember I might like Nathan again.' He's not stupid Haley. He knows something is wrong."

"I hate this. I don't feel like I can relax or be or..." she said as she started to move about.

Suddenly her mind filled with Lucas's voice, "Relax," she remembered he had whispered as he helped her line up her shot on the basketball court. He had moved her hips into the right stance and rubbed her shoulders. "It's supposed to be fun." Haley was remembering one of the moments they were together on break. She could still feel the way his body fit behind hers as he laid his arms over top of her arms before shooting. "See... Fun," he had said hotly right below her ear.

"Honey," Jessica called.

"Sorry," Haley bit her lip.

"You remembered something?" The teen nodded. "A good something?" Haley nodded again. "Good...Lucas is on his way over. Spent time together like you would have before you started dating. You'll start feeling it."

Another soft knock came at the door and there was the boy in question...gray hooded sweatshirt, hair in all array, and a cautious smile on his face. "No one answered so I tried the door."

Jessica walked to her daughter's CD player, which was set near the door where Lucas stood. "You are always welcome...but you know that," she said with a smile. She riffled through CD's as she continued, "My daughter, Lord bless her, and I were talking about the doctor's statement that her memory would come back more easily if she would relax." Jessica triumphantly held up an instrumental CD and put it in to play. "Now your mission, should you chose to accept it, is to aid my daughter in that process..."

Luke smirked, "Just don't self destruct on me."

She chuckled and kissed his cheek as she left the room, "Might try reminding her how to use her feet. The formal is fast approaching."

The words lingered in the air as Haley shrank into herself, seeming to be smaller than she actually was. Lucas looked on with worry and sat on her bed next to her immediately. "What's wrong, hun?"

She swallowed nervously, but when Lucas reached out his hand to touch her face she moved off the bed and wrapped her arms around herself. Now Luke swallowed nervously. Haley had been a bit skittish at first at the hospital but since she came home...scratch that- since she re-met Nathan she had been distancing herself from him.

Lucas knew what he had to do although he hated it and the mere thought brought him to tears but if there was any way for them to remain friends he had to do something now before things got worse. So Lucas took a deep breath and said, "Haley I think we should break up."

Haley turned toward him in utter shock, "What? Why?"

His face crumbled, "Because I'm losing you. I can't even touch you in the normal way I used to without you pulling away..." He grit his teeth hard, "I know you don't remember but the night we got together, I told you I could handle anything but you bailing on me. And whether you want to admit it or not you are so far from me that you aren't talking to me, you aren't all there when we are together, and..." his voice cracked and he cast his gaze from her. She could see his heart was breaking as he spoke. Lucas met Haley's eyes and began again whispering, "You won't even let me touch your cheek."

Lucas shut his eyes and let tears run down his face, "I told you before we started this that I had a lot more to lose than you did. I have mom, Keith, basketball, and you. I told you that night that I would give up basketball as long as I knew I could keep you forever, and it's killing me to see you afraid of me."

Haley was next to him in a minute. The whole time he was talking she was flashing between the present and their discussion in front of the hearth. She decided that what worked that night might be best employed again. Haley sat on Lucas's lap, wrapped her arms around his neck both hands on the nape, and she kissed him long and slow.

Lucas pushed back a bit, "Don't...Please don't. Lets just..."

"Shut up Luke," Haley said with a smile. "So this time it wasn't a moments hesitation. It was a real hesitation. You can live with that." Luke's eyes went big with the implication of her words. She was beginning to remember that night. "I'm not scared of you...I'm not," Haley said looking directly in his eyes. "I'm scared of me."

"What? Why?" he repeated her earlier sentiments.

Haley stood up and paced a bit to the soft instrumentals in the background. "I understand dating you. That makes sense… I love you. You love me. That makes senses too...Nathan does not make senses. And I'm just afraid that if I let myself remember him or us as a couple it will mess things up with you and I now...and I don't want that," she said looking at him. "No matter what I have been acting like toward you and how irrational the behavior may be...its not you... I want this. I do. I just don't know when I started wanting this." Lucas looked on in curiosity. "I don't remember how we got here and I don't remember when we weren't talking all the time so it seems weird on my end...cause hey went to sleep with a best friend and woke with a guy in love with me." There was a stressed moment where they both stared.

Lucas rose to his feet to stand before her. "I am, you know? -In love with you," he whispered as he leaned down to kiss her.

This time she didn't pull away at all. "I know," she answered and pushed herself up into his lips. Haley reached an arm up and twined in the back of Lucas hair before running her tongue along the seam of his lips. Lucas's eyes opened in shock for a second as he gasped allowing Haley to gain the access she wanted. He closed his eyes again and slid his hands to the small of her back bringing her closer to him.

Lucas was overwhelmed with emotion. It felt real. They felt real and right again, for the first time since the accident. He pulled away just enough to say against her mouth, "I love you Haley. I love you so much," before diving back in taking control of the kiss.

After only a moment Haley pushed back a fraction to whisper, "I love you too," and then begin kissing anew.

Luke pulled away from Haley to look into her eyes, "Please don't say that to make me happy or because you think you're supposed to. That's a lie on the worst scale. Please don't do that to me...I would much prefer a 'maybe someday but not yet' than a lie to spare my feelings." His eyes begged her to understand.

Haley smiled softly and stared him directly in the eyes, "I love you Lucas...and now mine is more honest than yours because I said it to you not mumbled against my lips." Lucas's eyes got big again. "I remember Luke...not everything...but enough. I know I love you." A smile spread across her face that he hadn't seen since before the accident...even probably before break.

Lucas couldn't help himself. He laughed, picked Haley up and twirled her around the room. Haley laughed hard, "Stop, stop, stop Lucas. You're making me dizzy."

"Sorry," he said brushing her hair behind her ear. "Just excited." She smiled that wonderful smile again. "I should break up with you more often...could have saved myself and you some really uncomfortable visits."

She shook her head, "Nope. The world is right on time. I needed to remember at my own rate. I don't think I would have remembered before now. I needed to get my head together about what I was really afraid of."

"Haley, don't worry about remembering Nathan...You liked him. He liked you. There isn't a lot to it besides the normal teenage angst slash romance stuff... I'm still confident you would choose me," Luke said with his hands wrapped around her waist.

"And I don't need to worry over Peyton or Brooke because they were just new and different, right?" Haley asked with a raised eyebrow.

Lucas grimaced, "So...how much of my bad behavior do you remember and how much were you informed of?"

"Enough...but I do remember you telling me that I was worth 100 hundred Peyton's in love with you and 1000 Brooke's naked in the back of your car. So I'll take you at your word."

Luke smirked at her and Haley smirked right back before tugging him forward with his shirt for a kiss.

"Love you," he said as he held her tight.

"Love you too..." Haley rested her head on Lucas's shoulder and knew she was exactly where she was supposed to be.

Tbc...

A/N: Sorry guys I've caught up with myself so I have no more written ahead chapters that means it will be longer between chapters. Luckily I am on the tail end of the story two or three more chapters left.

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