Hey everyone, this is my first one tree hill fic. I understand most people hate Peyton, and I hate the way the show portrays her too but it made me curious because I imagined a whole world behind her. There's so much they're not saying so I took it and added a twist. It involves all characters, but it's mostly from Peyton's perspective, and it's really a Peyton-Lucas romance, a mental/sensual/difficult type of affair…..but the pairing could change soon.
But then all love is
Luce
Midas
Click. Click. Click.
The web cam window wobbles for a moment, coming sharply into view. In front of it is a girl, nonchalantly trying to light up. She looks at the lighter, a little frustrated, and tries again.
Click. Click. Flame.
Satisfied, she takes a hesitant little drag, enough to start the burn on the cigarette. She coughs, two short hacks, and teary eyed, proudly stubs it out and tosses is in her Diet Coke.
From the background, a squeal. The face of a redhead suddenly comes into view, coming closer, than receding, smiling widely, sensuously.
"Hey you got it to work! You are totally an exhibitionist. I bet there's all these pervs watching you right now."
The screen wobbles again while the other girl rolls her eyes. She clicks a button and the loud guitars of Social Distortion blare out. The other girl quickly strips off her pants, and starts waving to the screen, hiding behind her hair, smiling sweetly, rolling her hips back and forth, hand on one hip.
"Ok Brooke, you're totally ripping off Mena Suvari in that American Beauty window videotape scene," laughs the blonde, grabbing her friend and sitting her down. Only their faces and shoulders are in view now.
Brooke spins around in her chair and sticks her foot up to the screen.
"Any foot fetishist out there?" she yells, giggling. Her mood swings, and she puts her foot down, grabs a notepad and a pen off the desk and grabs a pair of reading glasses from the nightstad.
"Nerd," she says to the blonde. Then, she clears her throat.
"This is Brooke reporting live on Channel Nine news. Today we're doing a special on web cam girls. Our first subject, Peyton, has agreed to give a glimpse into her life. Peyton, who are you?"
The other girls smoothes down her hair, her smile bright and peppy.
"Well Brooke, I'm a tortured, angsty, rather mediocre artist. I'm also a cheerleader who wants to quit. I also have slept with guys! Now I'm operating a webcam cause subconsciously, I want people to watch me!"
The redhead pretends to gasp, her hand over her mouth. With wide eyes, she turns her head to the screen and shakes is mockingly, making little tsk tsk sounds.
"Well, Peyton, what does it feel like to be a living, walking string of clichés?"
The other girl cocks her head thoughfully for a second, with an important, studious air.
"Can't really say. I've been doing it for so long. I must admit there are times when I enjoy it! After all, all my friends are same."
There is a short tussle and a squeal after this, but the camera shows only pink, fuzzy, flying random limbs.
The two faces pop up again, hair sticking up.
"Would you ever change, Peyton?"
The other girl pretends to concentrate for a moment.
"You know," she smiles blankly, "I don't think I really would. Who would really care if I did?"
The redhead falls silent for a moment.
She tosses down the notebook.
"This is boring now," she says. "Let's go review the new Cosmo."
Her face leaves the picture, and only the blonde girl is there now, staring at the screen.
"How typical of us," she smiles, a little sourly, anger emanating at the screen.
The webcam wobbles again, and turns off.
Across town, a blonde boy shakes his head and gets up from his computer.
She's alone now, because no matter how hard she tries, everything she touches turns ugly.
She's not like Lucas, who turns everything he touches into gold, into something good. A basketball. An art portfolio. Even Brooke.
She's the angry destroyer, tearing up and down the ranks, leaving corpses in her wake, burning flags and causing conflicts. That's just her style, she guesses.
Even Nathan, when she had him, was disgusting. He was terrible. But as soon as she let him go, he changed. He turned less guarded, more pliable, strangely sincere. She's not surprised. She knows she brings out the worst in people. As soon as she let him go and the Haley girl touched him, he turned to gold.
She's used to being used and using in return; this is a no strings policy, where she doesn't have to leave any significant anything behind. She just takes and they take, and both walk away having lost nothing in the process.
Then Lucas stood in front of her that night and told her to give.
And she was so confused.
The cafeteria at lunch is always packed. Her and Brooke and the other cheerleaders always sit at this table by the window in a better part of the cafeteria. This is how the school is designed, in blocks and quadrants of sociological layers. She remembers walking into the cafeteria freshman year, small and scared, looking at the mad rush around her and feeling a terrible sense of dread. That was the day she resolved she would not be pushed to the side by the whirl of this cyclone. She meant to get in the eye, the calm, whatever it took.
She had Brooke at least. Brooke with her sly smile, her determination, her cash, her quickly rising social status (or open legs), her relentless drive to dominate. She knew Brooke was just as scared as her, scared of being alone, scared of not being wanted. She was grateful for the strange affection Brooke had for her solely, for the friendship that placed her in the safe stratus of the social system.
Of course, no one else knew about the long, lonely afternoons Brooke spent alone in the house. About the revolving door of maids that slept with her father. About the fact that she got 200 dollars for every birthday since she could remember, and Christmases too. No gifts. About the fact that Peyton had been Brooke's only friend since grade school, when Brooke was shy and had thick glasses and braces. No one knew about the hours on end during junior high when they had practiced their cheers, burning to be somebody, burning to belong.
And they'd grown together. They spent hours running, they make protein shakes, they practiced cheers, they taught each other sex techniques, they spread and multiplied their influences until they were on top of the food chain and nothing could ever hurt them again.
But Peyton knows now she was wrong.
Even here she is worth nothing. Even here she is alone. Even here, Brooke understands her no more than she ever has. They both only know the hard loneliness that awaits each one of them outside each other's presence. Even here she has not stopped crying for her mother, for her everlastingly missing father.
This is all she has. She knows soon enough she'll have to leave this too, and then she'll be nobody again.
Lila Slater is perfect. She is co-captain of the team. She has perfect long, pale blond hair, porcelain skin and a rosebud mouth. She has a mother and father who come to all the games, bringing cookies for the team, going to church together, having breakfast at the country club with Nathan's parents. Peyton hates Lila Slater.
"Anyway, I think this whole Nathan Lucas thing is blow out of proportion. It's all anyone's been able to talk about forever, and I'm sick of it. I mean, if they were celebrities they'd totally be Paris and Nicky Hilton. I bet they made the whole conflict up just to get attention and social status," Lila is saying.
All Peyton can hear is the muted roar of the cafeteria.
"We never hear about anything else interesting. I mean, besides Peyton and Brooke's sexcapades," continues Lila, in that sweet, sly tone of voice.
Peyton can see Brooke cringe a little under the sexy smile and fake bravado she plasters on her face.
"I'm a contented girl, Lila. But it doesn't sound to me like you are. Perhaps, if you'd like to live vicariously through me, I'll tell you what I did last weekend," says Brooke smoothly.
Lila tosses her pale blond hair over her shoulder, slick waterfalls of it.
"No thank you," she says coolly, with that disgusting hint of a southern accent. "I don't think it'd be very classy of me."
With that, Lila and her cohorts exit, leaving Peyton and Brooke facing the rest of the table, who is watching them closely for signs of weakness.
Instead of leaving, Peyton and Brooke do what they have always done. Bending their heads close together, they whisper confidentially and smile mockingly, excitedly, hooding their blank eyes from the careful stares directed at them. As always, they achieve the desired effect: every girl at the table feels less cool suddenly, wishing they were in on the secret.
But Brooke and Peyton know they'll never have what Lila has. She's never had to sleep with anyone to get somewhere.
Their arms move in perfect tandem, while the pompoms make a sound like falling rain, like autumn leaves.
"H-o-t-t-o-g-o, the Ravens, are hot to go."
Clap. Spread Eagle. Cheer, cheer, cheer, smile a huge Vaseline on the teeth smile, shake those pompoms, flirt the skirt, do a slow cartwheel so everyone can check out your legs, your ass.
No wonder so many of these chicks have eating disorders, thinks Peyton.
These are Friday nights.
The only pleasure she derives is watching Lucas, the way he slides around the court, the jaguar slink of his muscles, the lanky-hipped, loose jointed way his body moves so quickly, like a quiet jungle cat. She likes the lean muscle on his arms, the tautness of his jaw when he concentrates, the way he never looks at her at all.
He only looks at the ball, he only looks at the basket.
This way, she is free to watch him.
And she appreciates that.
Of course, Brooke is watching him too. She's known Brooke long enough to remember how Brooke hurts her, and comes begging for forgiveness. Her survival instinct, her drive to conquer, to always be on top sometimes overrides even her friendship with Peyton. No matter. Peyton has never really trusted her anyway.
Besides, she doesn't even know what she wants.
She remembers clearly what she wanted the night of Nathan's party, the distinct, painful need to be possessed, to give something, to take and take from him and fill up that space that he had clawed out in her. She remembers the sharp thrum of want.
For now, she's content to watch him and pretend that he is still perfect, that he could never harm her, and the possibilities are still open. Lucas. Her tongue wraps around the word silently, before she realizes Brooke is watching her.
She turns away abruptly.
This is me, she thinks.
It's evening, and her room is lit dimly, resplendent in shadows. Her work is back up on the walls. She knows it's mediocre at best, but she's willing to be proud of it if that means that she'll improve her self esteem a tad. She could use more of that.
She steps up to her mirror, forgetting the web camera that she's left on.
Something slow and dark is playing. Velvet Underground maybe. She'd never let on, but she likes some of that slow, old stuff a lot. Still dark of course. Less anger though, more sadness.
She has no way of knowing that there is a blond boy in his room right now, watching her silently, feeling a cold sense of loneliness that emanates from the screen.
She sits in front of the mirror, folding her hands in her lap for a second. She closes her eyes, thinks of her mother, and says "Peyton," outloud. Her name. Peyton. This is my name.
Opening her eyes, she slowly peels off the camisole she is wearing and lowers her arms again. Her small breasts are nestled in a little beige slip of a bra with slightly worn lace trim. It's gotten too small for her. But she doesn't have money to throw away on lingerie, especially not now that Nathan isn't around to care or to give her money.
Her shoulders hunch a little awkwardly, bringing her collarbones in stark relief. She knows she should eat more. But sometimes she doesn't care about anything, particularly food. She's too miserable. And then there are the constant admonitions of Lila and the coach.
"Guys, remember Bring it On. Like they said, we're cheerleaders. We throw people in the air and fat people don't go as high. So just remember, the town is watching so you should literally be watching your ass."
Stupid Lila.
She tries to pinch an inch around her waist, without much success.
In his room, Lucas smiles sadly, chuckling a little at her morose expression reflected in the mirror.
She turns to the side, studying her profile carefully.
He feels something warm inside him, clawing it's way out, something spreading. She is so beautiful.
She pulls her hair back from her face, brushing it neatly, pulling at the snarls. Pulling open a drawer she takes out a pair of pearl studs and jabs them through her ears. She stands up straight, smiling gently.
"My name is Peyton," she says outloud again, her tone surprisingly gentle and polite.
He watches her, mesmerized, confused.
She is staring at the webcam. She's quickly coming toward it, a fuzzy, skin colored image, and her face comes into focus, pale and sharp.
"I know you're watching," she says simply, and the screen goes blank.
He falls back in his chair, frozen.
She sits on her bed and wraps her skinny arms around her bare stomach. A tiny smile spreads over her mouth, starting at a reluctant corner, as she pulls her lanky knees to her chest.
"I like that you're watching," she whispers, to no one.