Leaving Town

Chapter 12- You Live Here?

"No, don't come in," Haley wailed, as she unlocked the door to her small townhouse. She had to leave Tree Hill to attend to a few things at home. Nathan had came with her, after much argument not to.

"No, I don't think so, I ride over an hour with a five-year-old singing '1000 Bottles of Beer On The Wall'… twice, cause she miscounted, to stand outside in the cold… you have to be kidding me."

"I told you not to come, traveling with a five-year-old is hard, that's why I told you not to come, plus, the place is a mess, I haven't been here in a week, but Taylor has, so it has to be a mess. I don't want you to see my house like this."

"Come on, you waltz into my apartment, when it's a complete mess, and I don't say anything."

"This is different, that was your mess, this isn't even my mess, it's Taylor, miss 'I'm just gonna crash on your couch for one night,' that was when we left Tree Hill from coach's funeral… and she's still crashed all over my living room. She dances on my countertops, and makes new drink concoctions on them, so the kitchen's a mess from her work experimenting. There's probably laundry all over the floor, hers, she never does laundry. The dining room is my mess of papers that need to be graded and have been graded, or are in the middle of being graded. There's no place clean to go, I'm telling you, you don't want to go in there."

"I do, I don't care if you're a slob, really, I don't, I'm just as messy most of the time."

"Fine," Haley said and pushed open the door to step on a pile of mail. Obviously it was out of Taylor's way to pick up the mail. She was always going in and out of the house, to the mall or to get Meredith, or out with some "friends". She couldn't be bothered to at one point in time when she walked into the house to bend down and pick up the mail, there had to be the whole week's worth of mail sitting on the floor, in front of where the mail slot was. Haley bent down to pick up the rather large pile of letters. "Told you it was a mess," Haley said walking past Taylor's living room to the kitchen, where she pulled herself up on the counter to look through the mail.

Meredith had already darted past them to her room, to say hello to all her stuffed animals, and dolls, and everything in her room. She was a funny little girl, and that's what everyone loved about her.

Haley flipped through the mail and Nathan watched her, she threw things to the bottom of the stack. They were all same sized envelopes, rather large, and white. That made him curious, what were those letters. She put the magazines down to her left, and Taylor's mail on her right. She occasionally opened a letter, or looked at a postcard, which would be put on the fridge with the rest of the post cards. She had gotten a lot of mail from her family recently, and from the family of her late brother's late wife. With the new custody decisions coming up, they all wanted in on the know, and some were even trying to come up with cases against her to get Meredith, even if Haley was the child's godmother, and it stated in her brother's will that the child go to her. She frowned at each letter from them.

"What's wrong," Nathan finally asked, after like the third letter. They didn't bother with e-mail, they knew she would delete it, and calling, well she wouldn't answer, or hang up on them. Mail, they figured, would be their best choice, she would have to read some of it.

"Nothing, just wishful thinking on my family's part, or Meredith's family. I swear, all of a sudden, everyone wants Meredith, now that my brother's dead. Sure, when he was alive, there really wasn't much anyone could say about it, he was her dad after all, but now, even her mother's family wants her. They've made no effort to contact me since my brother gave her to me, I really find this funny. I'm gonna go start a load of laundry, help yourself to whatever's in the kitchen, or the T.V., or heck, the dog in the backyard. Taylor and Meredith's dog, the big golden one, that Taylor actually feeds daily, and give water to."

"You have a dog?"

"Taylor and Meredith have a dog, and I told her that when she brought the thing home."

"What's its name?"

"Go ask Meredith, I never could guess what she said."

"Hey, one more question, what are the big white envelopes that you keep putting at the bottom?"

"Schools that want me."

"You didn't go to college!"

"No, high schools, to teach at, I'm an English teacher, and where I'm at, I don't like the pay, because they have too many teachers, so I'm looking for someplace else."

"Tree Hill needs teachers, those classes are really overpopulated, how many kids in your class?"

"About 20 or less."

"How would you like a class twice that size."

"I'm always up for a challenge."

"I'll put in a good word for you a Tree Hill."

"I need to start a load of laundry, I'll be right back," Haley said quickly, wanting to avoid that conversation, and left the room. Truth was, Tree Hill wanted her, they've been sending her stuff for months once she asked, but sadly, Nathan did work there, and there were rules about dating your coworker. Haley didn't like breaking rules.

While Haley was tackling "laundry" Nathan whipped out his cell to call Lucas, "Hey man."

"Nathan, where are you dude?"

"Virginia."

"Why are you in Virginia?"

"That's where Haley lives."

"You cannot be serious, one state north of North Carolina. All this time we thought she was in Maine or California or something."

"I know, it was a shock to me too, besides, wait, is Brooke there?"

"Dude, she's my wife, she's always around."

"Right, let me talk to her, going through her would be like a megaphone to Tree Hill, or at least you guys."

"Fine," Luke said, and Nathan heard him hand the phone over to Brooke.

"I have huge news, but if Haley knows I'm telling you this, it would be non-existent."

"Fine, tell everyone, don't let Haley know you told."

"Exactly. I think Haley's moving back to Tree Hill."

"OMG! Are you serious, Haley's moving back?" Brooke asked really excited.

"She's looking for a new job, she's a high school English teacher, and Tree Hill needs teachers, I brought it up, and she avoided the topic, I think she's coming home."

"That's great Nathan, really, you deserve this, but you do realize, if you mess up again, she's moving, and probably further away."

"Okay, I got to go, I think she might be coming, I'll talk to you later," Nathan said, and closed his phone and slipped it into his pocket. Thankfully it was only Meredith walking into the kitchen.

"You want to meet Sheldon?" she asked, looking up at him.

"Sure, who's Sheldon?"

"My turtle, she lives in my room."

"She?"

"Duh, of course Shelly's a girl, you're silly," she said, grabbing his hand to drag him up the steps to her room. You could tell that which door lead to her room just by looking down the hallway, without having to read her name on the door. It was pink, the rest of the doors were white. It was a big hint, and of course if you didn't get it, there was her name on the door in white painted wooden letters. The room even had a pink doorknob for goodness sake, you could tell that she liked pink.

"Is this your room," Nathan asked politely.

"Yup, ain't it great, it's all pink. Tí a Marí a did it. She wanted red, but I told her she's silly. Pink is way better, don't you think so," she asked, walking into "Pinkland".

Nathan nodded and "uh-huh" -ed, his mind was suddenly sent someplace else, back to sophomore Spanish class, tí a was Spanish for aunt, but why would she use that.

"This is Sheldon, or as I call her, Shelly," she pointed to her turtle, the only thing it seemed in the room that wasn't pink.

"Wow, she's nice," he said, looking around the rest of the room. There were a lot of pictures on the walls. "Who's this?" Nathan asked, pointing to one of the pictures.

"Tí a Marí a," she said simply, looking at it, "She was my nanny, as Aunty Haley put it. She spent the days with me before Aunty Taylor came to live here, and I started school."

"Oh," that made a lot of sense, "and these people," he asked, gesturing at the next picture.

"I never met them, at least I don't remember, but Aunty Haley says those are my uncles, my mommy's brothers. That's Uncle Danny, Uncle Mikey and Uncle Larry."

"Do you know your mommy's name?"

"Aunty Haley says it was Laura."

"Does your mommy have any sisters?"

"No, just three older brothers."

'Ouch!' Nathan thought, they would probably have killed Haley's brother if he hadn't of gone to war, knocking up their sister, then her dying when she had the kid. "Wow," he said, then started looking at the rest of the pictures, the rest were mostly of familiar people, Haley's family. Then there were a lot of Meredith on the wall, he assumed Haley's old boyfriend, whatshisname, took them. They weren't half bad though, he had to give the guy props for that.

"Let's go play with Doggie," Meredith said, dragging him back out of her room. She dragged him back down the steps and to the backyard where the dog was. Nathan expected a little dog, it was a houseful of girls, girly girls. A big dog, at least five feet tall, if he were to stand up on his hind legs, come running over to short, little Meredith and licked her face. The dog was huge, but the little girl tried as best she could to put her arms all around the dogs neck, but then settled for how far they could reach. He smiled at her attempt.

"His name is seriously Doggie?" Nathan asked.

"Yup… I named him."

"Wow," Nathan said, trying to sound excited like she was.

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Later that night, after Meredith had already gone to bed, Nathan and Haley sat at the counter in the kitchen, with warm cups of cocoa.

"I have a confession to make," Haley said quietly.

"Okay, what?" Nathan asked, curious. Haley got up and picked up a stack of mail and handed it to him.

"I don't need you to put in a good word for me at Tree Hill, they already want me, I filled out an application months ago, when I found out my job was at stake. I haven't gotten back to them. I kept reading the rules over and over, and I kept having this fight with myself about it. See, I figured I could move back there, I thought it could work, I read everything, including the list of staff, which you were on, which made me think back to the rules. I knew if I went back to Tree Hill, we would be together, its just the way it would be, we would see each other everyday, and it would be natural to go back to each other."

"I feel a but coming on, and I hope its not 'but I don't want to be with you' cause that would so seriously suck," Nathan said, hoping that, that, wasn't it.

"No, I want to be with you, that wasn't my dilemma, its that you work at Tree Hill."

"So?"

"You never read the rules?"

"Of course, I believe about half of them are about things I did while teaching there or when I went there. Like number 32. No faculty member can make any student for any reason run more than 100 laps around the premises. We were having a horrid streak, and I gave them 200 laps, and one snitched, so now I'm only allowed a hundred… and their changing that hundred to during a month's time," Nathan said chuckling.

"No, this rule is different, 'No faculty member shall date, see, have an affair with, or any other type of personal relationship other than platonic with any other faculty member during or after school hours.' It means we couldn't date, and seeing you everyday would probably drive me to that."

"Let's get married."

"What! Are you crazy?"

"No, I'm perfectly sane, right now, let's get married, Hales, we're meant to be, you know that, I know that, the whole world knows that," Nathan said, as Haley heard Taylor sneak in through the back, just getting in from work, or getting in to go to work.

"Yeah, but-" Nathan cut her off.

"No 'yeah buts,' lets just do it, we get married tonight, you quit your job tomorrow, move to Tree Hill this weekend, start working at Tree Hill on Monday and spend the rest of our lives together."

Haley saw Taylor walk to the couch and collapse on it, then looked at her watch, then to the steps that led upstairs. She knew Nathan was waiting for an answer, and she wanted to give him one, really she did, with all her heart, she wanted to jump up and scream yes, but that was the old Haley, the one who wasn't tied down to anything. She had Meredith now, and any rash decision could mean that she could loose her, or, then she thought, it might help her keep her, Meredith having a mother and a father figure, it might help. Then she thought about Taylor. She knew Taylor had no place else to go, and had given up practically everything to help Haley with Meredith, just so she could sleep on her couch, eat her food, and more, for nothing. She wasn't sure if Nathan would allow Taylor to just crash on the couch like that, or how Meredith would take to living with him. There was so much rushing through her head, and the look on Nathan's face steadily grew less and less excited as it was, the longer she took thinking. Haley thought about how her school would take to her quitting. Then to her students, they had all told her she was their favorite teacher, and for her to leave in the middle of the year, would be hard, and they would surely hate her, which she wasn't sure if she could handle. She also didn't think that the school would like her just quitting like that, sure it would be less trouble for them than firing her, and they could easily divide up her students to be put in the other classes, but she still wasn't sure. She also knew Nathan lived in apartment, and Meredith would be absolutely heartbroken if they couldn't keep Doggie. But then she thought of plusses, she would be with Nathan, all she had ever really wanted. She would be in Tree Hill, her home, where she knew she belonged. She absolutely loved Tree Hill, and knew Meredith would love it too, and Taylor probably wouldn't mind moving back there, she already knew her way around, and could easily find a job at some random bar, heck, she could move up from bar to club, and try working for Karen at TRIC. Karen would let her work there, with Taylor's résumé, which was pretty filled with different bars around the country, she knew how to make every drink and more known to man, the only difference was, she probably wouldn't be dancing on the bar, which Haley was perfectly okay with. There was also Tree Hill Elementary so close to the high school, it would be easy to go and get Meredith after work, and drop her off right before. There were also a lot more people in Tree Hill that cared about them than here.

Haley contemplated this in her head, and Nathan grew more and more worried, worried that she would say no, worried she would have five billion reasons why not to, and none to. Worried that she would tell him she didn't love him as much as he loved her. What he desperately wanted to know, though, was what was she thinking about, and why wasn't she saying it out loud. Nathan took a sip of his hot cocoa Haley had made, she always was a good cook, and it showed in everything she made.

The clock struck eleven, as he watched the second hand start to go around again. Nathan found it better to watch the clock than to look at Haley, her face robbed of emotion, and any sign of what she would say. He finally grew up the courage to ask again, this time more sincere, and real, only without a ring, which should make it better, spontaneous, "Hales, I fell in love with you the first time I ever laid eyes on you, and I made the stupid mistake of letting you slip away before. I don't want to do that again. I love you, I always have, and always will. I want to spend the rest of my life with you, so Haley, will you marry me, tonight, right now?" he asked, hoping it would influence her decision to say yes.

"Nathan…" she started with tears in her eyes, looking down, away from his line of vision "I… I… uh…"

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Gosh, I bet you guys are loving me right about now, I put you through a really long chapter of happiness and Naleyness, and just to end it like this. I do believe this is the longest chapter so far of this story, and I'm feeling really good about it. I love the emotion buildup, and Doggie, I just had to throw that in there, though, I thought having the dog chase Nathan around the tard was a bit much, so, yeah, I didn't do that, but I can rant about it now… go me.

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