Oh brother I can't, I can't get through
I've been trying hard to reach you
Cause I don't know what to do
Oh brother I can't believe it's true
I'm so scared about the future
And I want to talk to you
Yeah I want to talk to you…
Talk-Coldplay

"Luke, hey Luke! Wait Up!" Lucas immediately stopped walking in the parking lot as he heard someone call his name. He turned around to see Haley coming towards him.

"Hey!" She greeted once she reached him.

"Hey, so what's going on?" He asked as they started walking.

"Nothing much. I'm just going to head home."

"Oh."

Haley noticed his lack of conversation and found it weird. Whenever Lucas was silent like this there was always something wrong, something that he didn't want to share, but she would just get it out of him anyway.

"You know it's so weird calling Peyton's home," She said with a laugh, "But I guess I can since I've been living there for two months."

"Yeah…" He trailed off, his thoughts suddenly going back to Peyton. Last night was probably the worst thing that could have ever happened to them. He was still confused about it even after he kept replaying the situation in his head.

It was then that Haley noticed how distant he was being right now. She couldn't take it anymore. Between him and Peyton both she couldn't get a word out of either of them. Maybe their silence had to do with each other.

"What's on your mind?" She decided to ask him, hoping to get some kind of answer from him.

"Have you seen Peyton in school today?"

Haley sighed, so that was what this was all about… Peyton. She wondered what mistake did Peyton or Lucas make last night.

"Yeah, earlier at the library, but that was it. I know she told me that she was going to come in late today because she wasn't feeling well, but that was all."

"Oh." He said flatly. He couldn't help but feel that she wasn't "feeling well" because of him.

"You know she came up to my room last night in tears—she was crying for a couple of hours and I still don't know why. She wouldn't tell me what was wrong at all."

So he was right. He was the reason. He messed up their friendship.

"This is all my fault."

"What? Peyton not feeling well isn't your fault. It was probably the pizza we ate after you left— it had pineapples and raisins on it," She made a sour face, "It made me a little sick, too—"

"I told her that I loved her last night." He came clean about the events of last night. He couldn't hold it any longer. Besides Peyton, he could always talk to Haley and now that he ruined things with Peyton, Haley was the only one he could talk to.

"You did? Lucas that's great!" She shouted happily, finally one of the admitted how they felt. She expected him to be happy, but he his somber mood didn't change. She then pieced all together, both of their moods today and Peyton coming into her room crying—now she was sure it didn't end well.

"I thought she felt the same way I did so I kissed her and then she ran away—she said she was sorry." He didn't want to talk about what happened last night, but he felt he had to.

"Lucas I'm sorry, I really am." She gave him a pat on his shoulder. She had never seen his blue eyes look so sad.

"I messed everything up Hales. I ruined our friendship, but I just had to tell her. I couldn't hold it in any longer, being with her everyday, watching her laugh, holding her when she cried—it was just getting to be too much. I thought—I thought she would feel the same way, but she turned away." He said, his voice full of sadness.

Haley didn't understand, she knew how Peyton felt about Lucas and now she knew how Lucas felt about Peyton. Why Peyton turned him down was beyond her.

"But Lucas I'm sure Peyton didn't know what she was saying—what she was thinking. She's probably just scared, you know with everything that happened with you in the past and now the whole Jake situation. Maybe she's just afraid to open up her heart again. You have to give her time." Haley was speaking from experience. Ever since she and Nathan got the annulment she wasn't sure if she could ever love again. She was afraid of getting hurt and even though the circumstances weren't the same, she knew Peyton probably felt the same way.

"There's nothing I can do about it now. I can't take back what I said, I'm not even sure if I want to and most of all I ruined our friendship. I don't know what I should do, Hales." They stopped walking once the reached the café.

"You hold on, Luke. That's what you do, you hold on. Don't give up on her." Lucas nodded and then disappeared into the café. Haley was right; he wasn't going to give up on her yet.

"C'mon Peyton!" Larry practically yelled at his daughter who was far behind as they walked to the café.

"Daddy can we please go back home or I could show you Tric or something, please." Peyton pleaded. She didn't want to go to the café. She was sure Lucas would be in there and she didn't want to see him. She even skipped her first two periods at school so she wouldn't see him. Last night had to be the biggest mistake she had ever made in her life. He had told her everything she wanted to hear, everything she had wanted him to say for the longest and she just pushed him away. Why did she always feel the compelling need to push him away whenever they were getting so close? She could still feel the impact of his kiss and the sweet taste he had left in her mouth had plagued her all night. She had wanted nothing more than to tell him that she loved him, too, but she didn't. She just couldn't do it and she didn't know why. She was just scared… scared to let him in again.

"Why don't you want to go the café sweet pea?"

"I—"

"Are you still feeling sick? Because if you are we can just go on home, I can say hi to the others later."

Peyton didn't want to lie to her dad, "I'm fine—it's nothing. I'm just a little antsy that's all." But she did it anyway.

"You sure?" He asked once the reached the café.

"Yeah… I'm fine." She gave him a small smile as they walked in.

"Good," He smiled happy that his daughter was okay now, "Why don't you go get us a booth while I go say hello to everyone." Peyton nodded and watched as her dad went over to the back and immediately started talking to Deb and Karen.

She walked over to an empty booth and sat down. She let her eyes wander over to the back, where she met eyes with Lucas, who was currently wiping the counter. She watched as he took off his apron and started walking over to where she was. This wasn't happening. She knew it was a bad idea for them to come here. She didn't want to face Lucas, not right now.

"Hey." He spoke softly as he looked down at her.

She hesitantly looked up at him and offered a small smile, "Hey."

"Can I?" He asked as he pointed to the seat opposite her.

"Sure." She watched as he sat down. Everything was becoming so tense between them.

"I um… I didn't see you at first period today…" He took the opportunity to start a conversation hoping to ease the tension between them.

"I wasn't feeling well."

"Are you okay now?"

"Yeah… I'm fine." She lied, actually right now she was feeling sick to her stomach. She didn't like when things were like this between them, but it was her fault and she didn't know how to fix it.

"Can we talk?" He asked, still trying to ease the tension between them, but it wasn't working.

"I wouldn't want to distract you from your job—"

"I'm on break." He wasn't going to let her get herself out of this one. This was something they needed to do.

"Oh… okay then. I guess we can talk." She said hesitantly.

"Good." Was the only thing he could think of saying. He didn't know where to start.

"Lucas, about last night—"

"I'm sorry."

Peyton was confused. Wasn't she the one who was supposed to be apologizing? None of this was his fault. All he did was open his heart up to her; she was the one that stepped on it… she was the one that needed to apologize.

"You are?"

"Yeah, I am." He was lying. He wasn't sorry for anything he had done last night. He meant what he said and he wasn't going to take it back, but if doing so meant having Peyton as his friend back, then he just had to do it or atleast pretend he did.

"No Lucas, you don't understand. I'm the one that's supposed to apologize. I'm sorry for running away like that, I just—"

"It's okay, Peyton. It really is." Although he didn't want to do this, he was willing to put everything in the past if she was.

Peyton sighed defeated, "I just—I want us to be friends. I hate us being like this."

"I guess I want us to be friends, too." He was lying again. Yes, he wanted them to be friends, but he was afraid just being friends with her again would be to hard. He wanted all of her—he wanted her heart, but right now he just had to listen to what Haley said. He had to give her time.

"Good. So last night—that kiss—we were just really caught up in everything." She didn't want to do this. She wanted to tell him how she felt, but she was just too scared.

"Right." He said while nodding.

"So it didn't mean anything, right?"

Lucas locked eyes with her before responding, "It always does."

Are you lost or incomplete?
Do you feel like a puzzle?
You can't find your missing piece
Tell me how you feel
Well I fell like their talking in a language I don't speak
And they're talking it to me…

Days had passed and Lucas' words were still ringing in Peyton's head. It always does… what kind of answer is that? She knew what kind of answer it was; it was like the one she gave him after what happened, or what almost happened at the motel. She didn't really like feeling like this, but she missed Lucas. Even though they had agreed to remain friends, their little chats in the hall, the jokes at lunch, the visits after school had basically all stopped. She had said more words to Brooke than himthis past week, who even stopped by a couple of times to see "Papa Sawyer". He did come by once this week for dinner, after her dad had invited him over, but even then he had said more to Haley than he had to her. She was to blame of course, and she wanted nothing more than to tell him how she felt, but it was too late.

So now here she was sitting at the table with her dad, it was Saturday afternoon and he was leaving tomorrow. She would miss him a lot, but he promised he would either call or write almost everyday. She knew he wouldn't keep the promise, but just hearing him say it was enough for her. Since he was leaving tomorrow, she decided it would be best to finally talk to him about the Elizabeth thing. She didn't want to know, but she had to.

"So chicken what did you want to talk about?" Larry asked, wondering why they were suddenly sitting at the table in a serious manner.

Peyton didn't know where to start. What was she going to say? Oh hey dad you know there's this lady claiming to be mother, I think she's a lying bitch, but is she really my mother? No she couldn't say that… she needed more time to think, but that was time she didn't have.

"You know a lot has happened since you've been gone…" She tried to choose her words carefully. She didn't want to say the wrong thing.

"Like what? You know you can talk to me about anything."

"Um… well about four months ago this lady she wanted to do an interview on me, you know about Tric—"

"Chicken, that's great!" He said with a smile, but she shook her head. It wasn't great at all.

"She said she wanted to interview me and we met up at the café and we talked about a lot of things, but then I don't know—something happened and I started getting these creepy IMs from someone—"

"Well did you tell the police?" Now Larry was getting worried. If he knew about all of this he wouldn't have thought leaving her alone in the house for months was still safe.

"No—but that's because they went away. Anyway to make a long story short, this woman… her name is Elizabeth," She watched as her father practically cringed at mention of her name, but she let it go, "And she wasn't—she isn't a journalist… she says… she says that she's my mother." She tried to read her father's eyes for some type of answer, but nothing was there.

"I mean I know she's lying—she just has to be. She's probably just some deranged lunatic or something." She tried to shrug it off, she even tried laughing a little about the whole situation, but her father's silence was scaring her.

"Peyton… we need to talk." His tone and the fact that he didn't use her nickname were making her nervous. She didn't want to hear whatever he had to say now.

"Daddy it's okay—you don't have to say anything. I know she's not my mother and that's all that matters."

Larry hated seeing his daughter like this, he didn't want this time to have to ever come, but it caught up with him.

"Peyton when your mom and I were in high school she was best friends with a woman named Elizabeth. They were always together, going to parties, they were cheerleaders, I guess you could say that were inseparable. During our junior year I started dating Elizabeth even though I had eyes for your mother. We dated all of the way until the middle of senior year until she lied and told me she was pregnant. I found out that same day that she was just lying as a way to get back at me once she found out that I had feelings for Anna so we broke up."

Peyton shook her head as her father continued to speak… why did this all sound somewhat familiar?

"We didn't really speak to each other since we broke up and then the summer before we all went to college I started dating your mom. We got married right out of college and we had been married for about a year when the problems starting happening. For some reason we were always fighting and arguing over the pettiest of things. It was terrible, so we agreed to go to marriage counseling for about a couple of months. The counseling seemed to work because after the first month we made the decision to have a baby. We tried and tried for months, but nothing seemed to work. It was then when we made the decision to go get checked out, it was at the doctor's when we got the heartbreaking news that Anna couldn't have children. We were devastated and the fights just started happening again. We decided to go to counseling again and we thought that would be the answer to all of our problems but it wasn't. We separated a month later."

"So what are you trying to tell me? That I was adopted? That whatever happened between you and Elizabeth is justified because you and mom were separated at the time?" Peyton asked she was practically disgusted. She wasn't sure if she wanted to hear anymore about this.

"Peyton listen," Larry sensed his daughter's hostility and tried to explain the story as best as he could, "Your mother and I were always fighting… it just wasn't working out. So we were separated for about three months and during that time I had a chance meeting with Elizabeth one day. We were talking and laughing just like we used to in high school, she was making me forget about all of the problems at home. We kept in contact for about a few weeks and we would meet up sometimes. One night we just took it too far and things just got so—messy. After that night I realized that what I did was wrong and that your mother was the only one for me, so I called up Anna and told her that I couldn't live without her. I came home and we continued to go through counseling and things were going well for us again. I still tried to keep in touch with Elizabeth, but she had left town."

"You cheated on mom?" She couldn't believe what she was hearing. Her father had cheated on her mother, all of these lies they were just coming out and she didn't know how to stop them.

"You have to understand Peyton that I didn't mean to," She watched as her father's expression soon saddened. She knew he was sorry for what he had did, but that didn't mean she could forgive him.

"Well did you ever tell mom about it?"

"I told Anna about what happened immediately. She didn't forgive me at first—it took time, but we got over it together. About a year later Elizabeth came back to town and she asked me to meet her. I agreed and when I went to go meet her she was carrying a baby with her. When I saw her with you in her arms Peyton, I just knew that you were mine. She told me that she couldn't take care of the baby—she said she wasn't ready for a big responsibility like that. So I convinced her not to give the baby up for adoption, instead I told her that she could give the baby to me and Anna, we would legally adopted you, and be your parents. She agreed and ever since that day you became our child. That's the reason why your middle name is Elizabeth—she's your biological mother, Peyton. I know this isn't easy for you, but Anna was your mom and I'm your dad. We're your parents and that's all that should really matter."

Peyton didn't know what to say, well she did, but she wasn't sure if what she had to say would be appropriate. She was shocked. Everything that he had said were like her worst fears all coming true. She couldn't comprehend any of this she wouldn't let herself. How could her parents do that to her? How could they lie like that? All of these questions were just running through her head, everything was happening so fast.

"I can't believe this." She muttered as she stood up from the table, ready to go up in her room or outside somewhere, she didn't want to be in this house right now.

"Peyton you have to understand we didn't tell you about this for a good reason." He went over to where she was standing and tried to touch her arm, but she pulled away.

"And what reason was that? To protect me?" She shouted at him and Larry could only shake his head. He didn't mean for this to happen like this.

"Peyton—"

"How could you do this to me? How could you both lie like that? For seventeen years I believed that she was mother and now you tell me that it's all a lie!" She turned her head away from him so he wouldn't see her crying. She didn't like crying in front of her dad… she had spent so many tears over a woman that wasn't even her real mother and a father who had betrayed her mother's trust. Everything she had ever known, everything she had come to believe was all a lie.

"I know you're hurt right now and I know this probably wasn't what you wanted to hear right now, but I couldn't lie to you anymore—"

"You did it for seventeen years of my life, what's wrong with doing it now?" She snapped bitterly at him.

"I deserve that." He sighed defeated.

"No," She turned around to face him, "You deserve a hell of a lot more. If I didn't bring this up would you have ever told me? If Elizabeth didn't come back to Tree Hill claiming to be my mother would you have ever told me about this all?"

"Eventually… yes I would've. The only reason I didn't tell you sooner is because I knew this was how you would react. Your mom and I wanted to wait until you were older to tell you and then the accident happened, so I just put it off… until now." Larry tried his best to explain this whole thing, but he knew that there was nothing he could say to get her calm down and listen to him. He had to give her time and let this all sink in. Hopefully by tomorrow, before he would leave, she would come to her senses.

"How can I believe you? I can't… I can't even trust you anymore." She whispered hoarsely, her voice breaking on her last words. She couldn't stay there anymore. So without another word or glance at her father she went straight out the door. Not even worrying to get her jacket or car keys, she just walked. She didn't know where she was going; she just knew that she had to get away.

As she walked she took out her cell phone and began dialing various numbers. She desperately needed someone to talk to; she didn't want to be alone right now.

"Haley, it's me. Call me back when you get this—I really need to talk to you right now." She hung up after she left a message on Haley's voice mail. She must've been working at the café.

She dialed Brooke's number and waited for her to pick up, but she never did. She really needed her best friend right now and she wasn't answering, she even tried Nathan, but he was out of town. That left one person, one person she didn't really want to need right now, but she was sure she could count on him. She turned around and started walking in the direction of his house. She reached it within minutes

She stood in front of Lucas' door, not sure if she should knock or not. What if Karen answered it? She didn't feel like explaining why she was currently in tears to her. She didn't know what to do… she needed Lucas right now, once again when everyone was basically gone he was the only one she could count on. Taking her chances, she softly knocked on the door and waited for someone to answer. She stood there for about a minute and still no one came. She thought about knocking again, but instead she got ready to turn around.

"Peyton?" She turned around as she heard the door creak open and came face to face with Lucas. He looked like he had been sleeping… this must've been a bad time.

"I'm sorry—I'll come back another time." She tried to turn away so he wouldn't see that she was crying, but it was already too late.

"Peyton? What's wrong?" Now he was getting worried. It wasn't everyday that Peyton would end up on his doorstep crying. He knew her father was leaving tomorrow and then it all hit him—this had to be about her mother.

"Peyton, I'm so sorry." She nodded sadly as she continued to cry. Without another word from either of them, she just fell into his open arms and cried, forgetting everything.

Lucas closed his eyes as he held her in arms. Everything that happened between them didn't seem to matter; this was what they both needed. He would be there for her no matter what; everything else just didn't seem so important anymore.

Yeah so they're friends again… atleast they'll try to be. So that's it for the whole Peyton/Elizabeth/Larry thing. I have no idea where they're going to go with it on the show, but I thought it made sense for Larry to cheat or whatever. It was the only way things would've worked out so I just went with it. Thanks for the reviews guys; I hope you liked this chapter. There are onlythree more chapters left… so things are coming to a close soon. Next is Fix You.