Short one...but I'm hoping to catch up and finish this thing soon, because I think I've scared off any potential readers with the 24 chapter mark. Anyway, we'll see how much further this thing goes!

"So a day when you've lost yourself completely, could be a night when your life ends."

"Are you tired already tutor girl?" Brooke asked, keeping up a frantic pace as Haley started to lag behind. Brooke was determined to hit every store before she left the city.

"You try and carry around an extra twenty pounds, and by that I mean all your shopping bags…" she trailed off trying to catch up. "Take some of these already!"

"Alright already, we can take a break I guess," she took the bags from Haley, and shut her cell phone. She had been secretly texting half of Tree Hill for the past hour about a certain piece of juicy gossip just 5 hours north.

It took two tables space to set down all of Brooke's shopping bags at the Café down the street.

"Listen Tutor Girl…" Brooke handed Haley her iced tea and sat down next to her amidst the shopping bags. "I need to talk to you about something."

Like that was news to Haley.

"You're going to have to come back to Tree Hill eventually, you know that right?"

The color flushed from Haley's face, along with her expression. Since when was Brooke playing dictator of the universe. "Actually, I don't," Haley replied, leaving Brooke expressionless this time. "I have nothing left there, and no one there, so why would I even thing of going back?"

"What about Nathan?"

Haley knew Brooke was fully aware of the charade that was going on in Tree Hill. The "don't let Haley know game," and she wasn't falling for it.

"You can't pretend nothing happened, Haley."

That seemed to be the mantra she had been hearing for quite a while. "Everyone else is," Haley replied, giving Brooke the eye. "Don't pretend Brooke, I know the truth."

"He still loves you," Brooke replied with all the sincerity she could muster.

"Too bad, I hear unrequited love is the worst," she replied, her words broken and choked as she held back tears. She still loved him too, but for some reason she knew deep down in her heart he didn't love her back anymore. Haley started to get up from the table, "Listen Brooke, I have a recording session at 8 tomorrow. You understand, right?"

She didn't even wait for Brooke's reply. She gave her a half-hearted good-bye and turned for the door just as the tears started to fall. She never thought Brooke would be her last good-bye to Tree Hill, but she just wanted all the pain to go away. She wanted to stop pretending, she wanted to stop being lied to.

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She left the apartment in a rush the next morning. She'd overslept, her mind a mess. She remembered the conversation with Brooke as she rushed down the stairs. Her head started to spin as she crossed the street near the studio. She rushed to cross the street at the tail end of a red light just as it was about to turn green. She made it halfway across the street when she glanced to her right. Her heart skipped a beat when she realized there was nothing she could do.

At least now all the spinning would stop.