Early for Two
"I can't go. I'm going to have to stay here," claimed Brooke dramatically. She was sitting cross legged on her bed, her hair tied messily tied back, her face free of makeup, looking decidedly unBrooke.
"You can go. You'll have a great time," I said soothingly.
"I can't! The only reason I wanted to go was to meet guys, anyway," she said.
I sighed and flopped onto the bed beside her. It was past midnight, the day before she was leaving for Vassar. She'd been perfectly fine during our day together but had called me out of bed in panic.
"Don't you want to go away and be independent? Don't you want to get out of this place?" I asked her.
"I should've gotten married. You are, and you don't have to leave," she said accusingly.
"Brooke! Haley and Nathan are moving to California!" I reminded her.
"Mouth will probably take one glance at a big city slut and leave me," she said.
"Have you met Mouth? For that matter, have you seen Mouth? And why would he prefer big city sluts to small town sluts?" I asked. She glared at me and wrung our her hands anxiously.
"I'm not ready! Please let me stay home with you!" she said. It occurred to me that she was acting like she was talking to her mommy the day before the first day of school.
"You are ready! You've been ready for a while," I reminded her.
"I'm not ready! I need to stay home," she whined.
"You've been continually telling me how bored you've gotten with home for three months now," I said. My eyelids fluttered closed. I had been sick lately, throwing up and needing lots of sleep.
"You shouldn't be here. You're so sick, and that's been going on for months," she reminded me.
"Like a little less than a month. Remember it started pretty soon after prom, when he wasn't even around?" I asked her.
"Yeah. Let's go out," she requested. "Just one last time."
"I shouldn't. I don't think getting drunk when I'm sick is a good idea," I said.
"Especially considering last time," she said. Last time we'd gone out I'd gotten my husband, Jake's, jersey number tattooed on the small of my back.
"It turned out okay," I said sleepily.
"I wonder if Luke will find anyone at school?" she asked, looking sideways at me. Luke was my first love. He'd almost broken up my marriage, but part of me wanted him to find someone none the less.
"Come on, he's him," I said. I glanced guiltily at her. Brooke and I had been best friends since forever, but he'd almost broken up our friendship when he'd begun to date Brooke and then me simultaneously. She had been in the dark about this-I had not. We were fine now though. I was married to Jake and acted as a mother to his daughter, and she was happily dating Mouth, a geeky boy who worshipped her. It was the first time she'd ever been friends with a boy before dating him-before she'd begun to date Luke, she'd just flirted constantly with him.
"I'm going to get lonely Peyton! I'm going to have to make new friends!" she whined again.
"You're not going to be that lonely, Mouth will be there," I reminded her. But she was determined to be miserable.
"Yes, but hadn't we already decided that he was going to fall for a New York whore?" she demanded.
"Brooke. Mouth. Is. In. Love. With. You." I said, slowly and clearly. She shrugged.
"I'm going to miss you and Tutor Girl so much," she said.
"I'm going to miss her too. I don't know what I'll do without you guys," I said, voicing my fears about being without my two best friends for the first time.
"You have Jake, who's always going to be there. And you have Jenny. You guys will continue to be perfect family together and you'll love it, Mrs. Jagielski," she said, slightly bitterly. Brooke envied Jake and me, I knew, for our marriage, which had started out so rocky. It had only been three months, but her parent's marriage had never been strong.
"Yeah, but there's a lot of things I can't talk to Jake about. And even more things that I can't talk to Jenny about," I defended myself.
"Yeah. Like the new guy you like, or the sex you had, or the⦠oh, wait, no you aren't allowed to do any of that," she said. A wave of nausea swept through me. To steady myself I got up off the bed and walked to her desk. Her mirror was over it. It was adorned with pictures. I saw me, her, Haley, Brooke, Nathan, Luke and Jake. Mouth also began to star. I saw all of us on Prom night. I saw a group shot. An old photo of Brooke and me and Haley as cheerleaders. Luke and Nathan being brotherly in their basketball jerseys. I saw lots of pictures of Nathan and Haley just after they'd gotten married, at their wedding party in our junior year. I saw me and Haley and Brooke on my wedding day, holding my daughter Jenny. Had it only been three months ago?
"I'm going to miss everything," she said. I walked back to her and hugged her to me.
"Nothing's going to happen. You're going to come back in November and everything will be exactly the same. Jenny will probably start some kind of day care, but Jake and me will be totally normal, Haley and Nathan will probably come and visit, being just slightly more tanned. We're not going to be any different," I promised.
Famous last words.
Author's note: Okay, so maybe I couldn't bring myself to wait for this. Read 'Sacrifice' if you haven't, this is the sequel.
