"Peyton, I am sorry, I am sorry that this happened to you. I am sorry that I wasn't there for you."
"No one could have prevented this, other then me. And you know what; you are here for me now. But you cannot be the hero all of the time, you are allowed to be saved as well," Brooke looked at her like she was talking crazy.
"I know that you are not going to be very happy about this, but Karen told me what happened to you."
"I don't know what you are talking about. Nothing happened to me," she went to get back up and she misstep and came back down next to Peyton.
"It is okay, Brooke. We can get through this together; we have got the same emotions, the same thoughts, the same pains."
She shook her head, "No, no, it is not the same. You were hurt more."
"Nobody can measure that, Brooke. No one can measure the difference in the pain that we have experienced."
"I caused my pain; it was my entire fault."
"As was mine."
"You were under the influence of cocaine, Gavin took advantage of you."
"It wasn't Gavin."
"What? Where did this happen?"
"I woke up this morning…" Peyton told her the whole story.
"Peyton, you really don't deserve this, I really wish that I could have kept you in Tric last night. If I did, then we wouldn't be sitting here right now."
"Do you regret it?"
"No, I don't regret it. I just wish that the circumstances were better, Peyton. We cannot write our own paths, we have already figured that out, but I wish that we had more control. I mean the writer of Brooke must have thought that I was a lot stronger then I really am because I cannot handle all of this. I am 18 years old now; I am considered an adult now, but honestly I think I have been an adult since I was seven. And the adult world is kind of scary. Sometimes I lay in my bed at night and wonder what a childhood who be like, 'cause, I really doubt you can call what I had a childhood."
"You never let anyone in, Brooke. No one out there thinks that your life is this severe, no one would ever know. And that is because you never let anyone in your life. You put on this front that nothing matters and that you cannot get hurt. But that is all that you know."
"They can have their world, and their perceptions and misconceptions of me, but they don't live my world everyday, they do not know the person that I struggle to be. If they wanted to know the real person…"
"Then what? Brooke, you were not going to let them in, because you do not even know who that person is. How can you give anyone a tour into your life, when you could not even be the tour guide?"
"I don't know, Peyton. I don't know. I have lived this life so long as a fake that I do not even know what it is to be alive, to be real."
"How about you start today? Start again, when Haley opens up her eyes she is going to have to do the same thing. Do it with her, start again. No one has said that this is how your life always has to be, you can change it. This does not have to be you anymore."
"I really think that the person that I was disappeared when I walked out of Karen's café." She slipped; she let the truth slip a little further.
"Today? When you left today? Or another day? What day are you talking about, Brooke?"
"The night that I was attacked," it was Brooke's turn to tell her sad tale. And she told Peyton every detail, every thought that was rushing through her head, there was no reason to hold anything back.
"Is that the reason that you are so close with Haley now?"
"I was a horrible person when I walked into that café that night, and she did not even care what I have done to her. I was bruised, I was hurt and she did everything in her power to protect me. If she could do that, then I had to realize that the world was not as bad as I was letting it be, Haley was just one small example. She helped me through this dark time, so I want to be able to do something for her in return. I want her to open her eyes so she can enter this perfect world where she cannot feel anymore pain."
"But those kinds of worlds don't exist."
"For Haley, I wish that they did."
"I put her through hell, and I don't even know why. I guess since Nathan was my friend first, that I wanted to protect him…somehow. I think that I was so under the influence though, that it did not matter that I was causing her pain. It was just some fun to do, and it brought Gavin and me even closer. Where the hell did I find that one?"
"You deserve better."
"I don't deserve anything, Brooke. I could have taken better control of my life and the bad things in it, they would have never have happened. I let someone else take the lead and in the end I was not happy. But it was my choice to let go, it was my fault that things have turned out the way that they have."
"If that is what you live with, then I cannot change that. Do you think that when we were born that our lives were already written for us? Did someone write down in my book that I was never going to experience love no matter what I tried to do? And you would lose two mothers and take a down spiral in a life of cocaine?"
"I don't know, Brooke. I think when the author starts the book that they do not have a bad ending in mind. I mean isn't it everyone's dream to have a happy ending?"
"But not everyone is going to get a happy ending."
"Some people will though, and if it is limited, I guess we just have to fight for those spots, the spots of happiness."
"And fight like hell we must."
"What really happened to us, Brooke? How did we get here?"
"You mean right now, what tore us apart? Or what brought us back together? Life, Peyton that is all that I can tell you, which is all that I know."
"I want to be a better person, I want to change, and I want to take control of my life. I just don't know if I can do it."
"I am thinking that is a good place to start. Maybe you, me, and Haley, we are all going to take a course in life, maybe Life: for dummies. Because we must have done something wrong along the way, we are not doing a very good job."
"No, we aren't."
After a brief silence, Brooke was still concerned about Peyton, "Hey, did you get checked out, do you know if you…you know…have anything?"
"Karen actually took me to the clinic before we came here; they are going to call me whenever they know something. I am praying to the God that I have never done anything for, but I wishing and hoping that I am not pregnant, I do not think I could handle that, especially knowing that the child was created during rape."
"I am just talking from experience of a child born into a world without love, if you are pregnant, Peyton, which I pray to God you are not, please if you decide to bring this baby into the world, please, no matter if it is just you, bring him into the world with love. Just look how I turned out, I wouldn't want anyone else to turn out this way."
"Honestly, Brooke, I have known you for over a decade, and I do not ever think that you give yourself enough credit. Never. And you deserve a lot more. Just look at your life, and everything that you have, but have gotten without love and support. And look how well that you have turned out. You did this all alone; you are this strong all by yourself."
"I am only as strong as my heart is, not as strong as I appear to be. And you know what? That heart of mine is barely even there nowadays."
"At least yours is still there, can we say the same about Haley's?"
"I cannot even tell you that, not until she wakes up. But as I can see it, it is broken into a million tiny pieces, and I am just hoping that somehow they can put it back together, whether it be the doctors, Lucas, or even Nathan, someone. I do not know how much longer I can live knowing her heart is shattered, and I am getting by."
"But you really aren't getting by, Brooke. For all that the world and even you knows, your heart can be as broken as Haley's right now."
"Like you said, we don't know. And it is not of main concern right now. Can we drop the topic of me; we always lead back to it? I think that I have pretty much been focused on me for the first 18 years, I am thinking for the next 18 I am going to focus on some other people, some more worthy people."
"No one can get through to you, can they?"
Well one person could, "Brooke, Brooke, she is calling your name," Lucas said coming down the hall where the duo were sitting.
Brooke looked up, not believing what he just told her, it was exactly what she wanted to hear, but she could not move, she could not physically move. What was wrong with her? Why couldn't she move? Haley needed her and her ass was cemented to the ground. Was this a sign? A sign that she was not going to be able to take what was in front of her? Was she not going to able to handle Haley's pain? Her mind was filled with so many questions that she did not even hear, Peyton talking to her.
"Brooke, Brooke. Aren't you going to go to her? Brooke, are you okay?"
"I can't. I can't move."
"This is the moment that you have been waiting for Brooke, you want to be Haley's hero, you cannot do that sitting on your ass," Lucas told her.
"Lucas," Peyton couldn't believe that he said that to her. "Brooke, you can do it, are you afraid of something? Are you afraid of failing? Because if that is true, then that is not possible, anything that you do right now for Haley will be saving her."
"I can't move, I cannot move," Brooke was scared, her body was honestly stopping her. "Lucas, can you please help me?"
"And I thought you could do everything yourself," he reached his hand down to grab hers and pulled her up.
Brooke was weak on her feet, she tried to walk but her legs failed her once more. Lucas held on to her, "Brooke, honestly, are you okay?"
"I am just a little weak on my feet, that is all."
Lucas helped her down the hall back to Haley's room, when she walked in she expected Haley to be sitting up with a smile on her face talking to Karen. But that is not what she found. Haley was not awake, or at least her eyes were not open. The machines were still attached to her, and Karen was holding her hand begging her to open her eyes again. Karen turned around when she heard footsteps, and her new face of concern was for Brooke, Lucas's arm was more then just causally placed on her waist. He was supporting her. "Brooke, are you okay?"
"She cannot even walk down the hall on her own two feet."
"What happened?"
"Nothing happened, I am just a little weak and overwhelmed that is all. Can I sit with her now?"
"Yeah, of course you can, sweetheart. She just squeezed my hand and said your name, and that is all that she has said. Maybe if you are here she will open her eyes."
"I am not going to leave her side again, I wasn't here before and her eyes are still closed. The only way that I am going to leave this room now is if she is with me."
"That might be some time Brooke, I talked with the doctors."
"Well then I am going to be here a long time. I have nothing else left to do. I really do not want to live this life for myself anymore anyways. It is about time that I stopped thinking about myself and be here for Haley. She was there when I thought no one else would. So I am here for her now, and I am not going to leave her side."
Karen looked from her son to Peyton, who made it to the room; they both had done damage to Brooke's heart. And Karen was not looking at them to point it out; she just looked at them to show her concern. When those girls woke up that morning, none of them knew that it was going to be their day of breaking point; it is not something that they could judge. But Karen looked at all of them, and Peyton surpassed her breaking point and she ended up in the hospital, and now she was starting a new path. Haley physically and mentally broke down, and she is currently in the hospital. Her future is not as clear as Peyton's right now. But at least that she is in the hospital, it was a step, she was no longer living with the physical pain that she had been. But Brooke. She might have passed her breaking point, but she was not getting some sort of treatment like the rest of them. When was this going to happen? Was she going to be okay?
"Haley, Haley, I am back, and this time I am not going to leave your side. So open your eyes. I want to talk to you. Please, open your eyes. I know that this is selfish, but I cannot handle this anymore. I cannot do it anymore. I am lost without you; I do not know what to do when your eyes are closed. What am I supposed to do?" Brooke held on to her hand, she was not going to let go. She was not going to have Haley thinking that she would leave her in her time of need.
The others left the room, letting Brooke be with Haley. Every one of them cared about Haley and her wellbeing. But all of them also cared about Brooke. And they knew that this is what she needed. "Is she going to be okay, Karen?"
"Which one?"
