AN/ Hey it's baaack! Enjoy!!

Part 7

Peyton looked at her friends face, the bruising on the left side was starting to turn a yellow colour. It was also still swollen but the doctor had said earlier that they would be able to take her for a scan sometime tomorrow, to see if her cheek bone was damaged enough to need surgery.

Peyton hoped it would be okay, Brooke would already have enough to deal with once she woke. The prospect of needing further surgery won't appeal to her, Brooke hated hospitals almost as much as Peyton did.

"So I left a message for my dad, to let him know what's happened. Not what actually happened, just that he needs to call me as soon as he can. I tried your parents again but no one's picking up at the new number you had for them." Peyton says as she slowly rubs her thumb against the back of the hand she was holding.

"I guess they might be out of town, but I'll keep trying okay." She continues.

"The doc's said he's going to reduce the medication they're giving you in the morning. So maybe you'll be awake when I come by for visiting. That'll be fun right?" She asks receiving no response from the brunette.

"I know you're not in a coma but does that mean I'm going to have to tell you this all over again. Man that's gonna suck, I can't remember half of what I've said the last two days, maybe I should have got Mouth to loan me his recorder and I could have taped these stimulating little speeches of mine." Peyton says with a smile.

Peyton had been spending her visits filling Brooke in on what was going on with their friends, how much they all wanted her to get better. That they were all waiting until they'd be allowed to visit to come bother her in person.

"I need you to wake up soon Brooke, you know. It doesn't matter how many times the staff here tell me you'll be okay I need to hear that from you B. Davis." Peyton whispered as tears gathered in her eyes. Slowly she reached over and gently tucked a few stray hairs behind Brooke's ear.

Peyton sighed and glanced at the clock on the wall, visiting had ended over twenty minutes ago and she knew a nurse would be in to chase her out soon. Peyton didn't care though, she arrived before visiting and stayed until she was kicked out. The only thing that mattered to her was knowing Brooke was okay, and she could only know that if she was there beside her.

It was the hours in between that hurt the most, time spent just waiting. Waiting until she could be with her again, waiting to see her, to physically touch her. It still all felt like a bad dream, that at any minute she'll wake up and none of this had ever happened.

But it had.

Peyton could only hope that Brooke would get the time to be able to heal from all of this, and that she would get the time to make everything right between them again.

She wanted that more than anything.

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"You think she'll be back soon?" Nathan asks Lucas as he sits down beside Haley on their couch.

Lucas sighs Peyton hadn't exactly filled him in on her plans, but as she was living here now so it was the best place to find her.

"I don't know Nate, visiting finished at eight tonight and it's already after nine." He replies.

"Why don't I call her?" Haley responds reaching for her cell phone sitting on the table.

"Tried that already Hales, I guess she has it switched off." Lucas says frowning.

Nathan shares a glance with Haley. They had already tried to reassure Lucas that Peyton wasn't going out of her way to avoid him, she just had to put all her focus into Brooke at the moment.

Where it should be.

"I'm sure she'll b-" Haley begins but is interrupted by Peyton walking into the house.

"Hey guys, Lucas." She greets with a nod as she continues into the kitchen before returning with a bottle of water and sitting down beside Luke.

"Hey baby, where have you been? I was getting kind of worried." Lucas says placing his arm around her shoulder and pulling her to him.

"Around." Peyton answers with a lift and fall of a shoulder before taking a drink from the bottle in her hand.

"How is she?" Nathan asks as they all look at her.

"She's about the same, should wake up tomorrow though, so that's good news." Peyton informs them.

"That's great news Peyton!" Haley says reaching over to hug the blonde.

"Will we get to see her soon then?" Asks Nathan with a smile.

"No, I don't think so. I guess it depends how quickly they move her out of ICU, until then she's stuck with me." Peyton replies as Haley pulls back.

"About that." Lucas begins. "Exactly how come you get to visit her?"

"Yeah what was with that whole Attorney thing the doc said you had." Nathan asks knowing the three of them had wondered the same thing but were unsure how to bring it up.

"Oh, that. Actually it was my dad's idea. You know when her parents took off, no one here was a relative or legal guardian my dad kind of worried about that." Peyton explained.

"Because it meant that if anything happened to her only her parents could do some stuff but they'd be on the other side of the country which meant she'd have to wait until they could get in touch or get back here." She continued.

"Like what?" Haley asked.

"Well only parents or legal guardians can give consent for medical stuff, or get her out of jail if she's ever arrested." Peyton tries to explain, even though she really wasn't sure about everything it meant.

"But she's eighteen now, shouldn't she be able to do that stuff for herself?"

Peyton shrugs at that.

"My dad said that if we got that for each other and he was legal responsible for her it wouldn't matter much if her parents weren't around anymore." Peyton says.

"But, wait a minute, your only seventeen. How can you be her guardian or whatever this thing is if you're not old enough?" Haley asks as she begins to wonder if they should have started talking about this in the first place. She had thought she was pretty smart but she still didn't really understand this.

Peyton grins and pulls out her wallet and takes out a driving license to show Haley.

"Well courtesy of one Brooke Davis I get to be older than her by four months. And as she's already eighteen she wouldn't have to use a fake I.D. if it was me in the hospital." Peyton says losing her smile as her thoughts turn to Brooke.

Nathan hands the license back to Peyton after glancing at it. It had looked real enough to him.

"So does that mean you could like, turn her machines off if you wanted?" Nathan asks only to be elbowed by his wife.

"Argh, Haley that hurt!"

"Well try not to ask dumb ass questions in future!" Haley replies as she looks at Peyton with concern. The blonde had gotten visibly paler at the question.

"Yeah I could." Peyton says quietly. "If she was hurt badly enough, yeah."

The three friends fall silent at that considering how grateful they were not only that Brooke wasn't that seriously injured, but also that Peyton wouldn't have to make that kind of decision.

"How about we watch some television?" Lucas asks while rubbing his hand down his girlfriends arm.

"Sure." Haley says turning on the set, thinking it was a good idea to distract Peyton from such depressing thoughts.

The students of Tree Hill High have suffered another devastating blow this weekend coming over a year since the fatal shooting at the school that claimed two lives.

It has emerged that Student Council President Brooke Davis has been the victim of a serious assault. It has yet to be confirmed, but sources at the local hospital have said the eighteen year old cheerleader was brought in on Friday night suffering from stab wounds and sexual assault.

Was this Prom night gone wrong or a case of a young woman in the wrong place at the wrong time?

We'll bring you more on this and all the other local headlines tonight at eleven.

"Son of a bitch!" Peyton shouts as Haley turns off the television. Standing and pacing the room as she runs a hand through her hair.

"Hey, this is good news. Maybe it'll help catch the guy, right?" Lucas asks looking at Peyton.

Peyton stops her pacing and stands glaring at her boyfriend.

"That wasn't news Luke!" She barks pointing a finger at the now darkened screen. "That was gossip that bitch has gotten trolling around the hospital waving money around. They aren't trying to catch anyone, they just want fodder for their fucking show."

"But it could help, right?" Lucas persists.

"What's going to help is the news conference the cops are going to hold tomorrow, what's going to help is Brooke waking up and being able to point the fucking bastard out! What isn't going to help is having the whole town gossiping about her and what happened that night. She doesn't need every person in this town knowing the details of what's happened to her!" She continues furiously moving closer to Lucas.

"But the cops were going to-"

"They were going to say she was attacked Luke, that was all. That and that a weapon was used, they were never going to mention the rape, at least until Brooke's spoken to them." Peyton her anger giving way to sadness.

"People would have found out eventually Peyton, it's a small town." Lucas says trying to calm her down.

Peyton frowned at that, it was a small town and she knew this was big news. But it involved her best friend and the last thing she wanted was people gossiping about Brooke everywhere she went.

What happened to Brooke would have been difficult for the brunette to deal with if she'd been the only one that knew, having the whole town look at you in pity might be too much for Brooke to handle.

Peyton had wanted to help Brooke heal, to help her work through what happened but any control she'd thought she had with just how many people knew the truth had now been taken from her.

She could only hope that some good would come of it.

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AN/ Thanks for reading and have a great time at the bells tonight!!