Chapter 36

She was silent. She was like a foreign spy infiltrating the white house. Sneaky, stealth and soundless. Ollie actually did think, at that moment, that she could make a pretty good CIA agent or something one day. It was Saturday morning and she was coming down the hall as quietly as she could. Her dad was eating breakfast at the kitchen counter and she didn't want him to have time to speak first. Their relationship had just come right again, and she didn't want him to direct the conversation toward her absence at the beach last night, so she needed the element of surprise. Hence the tiptoeing toward the kitchen.

"Good morning kid," Nathan greeted the second she entered the room, not even looking up from his paper. He had heard her coming from the moment she left her room.

Ollie cursed inwardly. Maybe she should forget the spy idea. As she had feared, Nathan continued speaking before she had a chance to say anything.

"You weren't at the beach when I got there last night," He accused, peering over the top of the paper to see her reaction as she undoubtedly came up with a story.

"Oh, umm… Yeah. I got sick of waiting so I walked to Jess's." Technically true. She had gone to Jess's. Just she hadn't waited at all.

Nathan nodded, carefully keeping his amused smile covered from her view by the news paper. "I thought I came quite quickly." He stirred.

"I dunno. You probably did. Jess called just after I rang you and said some of the girls were coming round, so I went there. I called here but no-one picked up." The last part was a complete lie. She knew that he probably knew what she had done at the beach last night. But no way would she admit it to him.

"Oh OK," he shrugged as if he completely believed her story. Pretending to read, he saw a shocked expression rise to her face due to him seemingly giving up so easily.

It was nice to playfully stir her again, something he hadn't done in the past few months. He knew it was probably one of the things she had been referring to when she told him he had changed.

"So what did you do last night?" she asked a little too casually.

There it was. Just as he had expected. He had known she wouldn't be able to resist, even if it would most likely blow the little cover story she had just spun.

"Nothing much," he replied shortly, not looking up.

"So you didn't see anyone?" she pestered, a little irritated in his disinterestedness.

He shrugged and lowered the paper, looking square at her with a smirk, knowing she was backed into a corner, "Should I have?"

"No," Ollie lied, trying not to smile and show it. She was glad her dad was being so light hearted about it though. "I just thought you might have, I don't know bumped into someone."

"Nope."

Her eyes widened in alarm. What if neither had seen the table at the beach? What if only Haley had seen it, and had waited for somebody to come and tell her what was going on? What if they both had seen it, but had wanted nothing to do with it?

Nathan shook his head at her sudden look of worry. "Relax, bud. Everything went how I think you wanted it to."

Ollie scowled. So maybe she wasn't the best at cover stories either. She sighed realizing it wasn't all bad. At least none of her 'What ifs' had happened. "Was it really that obvious?" she asked.

He chuckled, "Yeah it was. I'm not too sure who helped you though."

That was good. Luke hadn't been too keen for them to know he had been partly behind the rather un-subtle interference into Haley and Nathans relationship. Ollie didn't really mind if they knew she was behind it though. As long as it had gone well, which it seemed it had, Nathan seemed calm and happy, so it can't have gone bad.

"Sooo?" she asked pryingly, hoping for a little detail.

"Sooo what?" he replied, mocking the way she had said 'so'.

She rolled her eyes. "So what happened?"

"We had dinner." He said bluntly as if it were the most obvious thing in the world.

Ollie groaned, "You're so difficult."

"Well it isn't really any of your business is it?" he joked.

Her jaw dropped. "Of course it's my business. Without me there wouldn't even be any business." Immediately she scrunched up her nose realizing that sounded a bit strange. "I just, mean that it sort of is my business. Beside, you make me tell you what I'm doing when I go out with Kaleb."

Kaleb was still a bit of a sensitive issue, but Nathan was getting more and more relaxed about it. He'd had a bit of talk, in other words completely assessed the young mans intentions, while he was waiting for Duncan to finish up basketball practice. Nathan did have to admit, Kaleb really wasn't very much like Nathan had once been.

"True." He knew he couldn't use the 'your only 15' excuse with her anymore, clearly she didn't respond to it well "And I guess it does affect you."

She nodded him along getting a bit impatient. He wondered if this was the general dynamic teenage girls. Relationship gossiping and trying to know all the details was what teenage girls always seemed to be going on about anyway.

"Haley and I," he wondered for a second how to put it, "we are, uh, dating."

He hated that word, it was so high school and college-ish. He knew quite a few 33 year olds did date quite a lot, as a regular thing, but for him, not having been properly dating for years, the word felt a bit alien.

Ollie suddenly looked very smug.

He raised his eyebrows at her, "You look happy?"She grinned and shrugged but he could tell that she was pleased. "You know things will probably be a bit different now. Haley's still quite famous."

Ollie nodded. As down to earth as Haley was, Ollie had noticed the glints of camera lenses outside Haley's house occasionally while she had been there. And before the school board had intervened, paparazzi had milled around the school gates trying to catch a glimpse of Haley's new life. As far as she knew, Ollie had so far managed to avoid the cameras, but it was only a matter of time before someone snapped either her or Nathan. Especially now that her parents were an item. Really, Ollie still hadn't even let her friends, other than Kaleb, know she had any connection whatsoever to Haley. It scared her a little, to think that the world might want to know her business just because of who her mother was. Nathan was right, it would be different.

"I know," Ollie nodded. "I'm quite surprised your marriage and everything wasn't dug up by the media ages ago though."

He frowned; he'd wondered too at times why no press had ever brought it up. Surely, people from their high school or people who had lived in Tree Hill at the time could have leaked the story of Haley James's abandoned child easily enough. Perhaps Daunte had dealt personally with that kind of thing. Nathan shuddered at the thought; he knew what that horrible man was capable of.

"Don't worry about it. They probably never made it public because I was just a boring undergraduate who was at college with a little kid in tow and then a high school coach."

Ollie nodded, "Hope they still think we're boring."

Nathan laughed, "I think that for a while at least you might be getting a few looks in the school corridors. I'll probably get a few too."

Ollie scoffed, "You're fully pleased about that though." She teased, seeing the slightly excited look on her dads face.

He faked hurt, "I didn't even have anything to do with this. As you made clear before, it's your fault we're together anyway."

"My fault! You're the one that's practically giddy with happiness," she defended herself.

Nathan laughed. She was actually sort of right, but he couldn't tell her that. "Dude, giddy?"

Ollie looked at him wide eyed with amusement. "Er, before you mock my wording you might want to make your way back from the 70's, father. No ones said 'dude in forever." She laughed well naturedly and rounded the bench to go into the kitchen.

"I wasn't even born in the 70's," he called after her, smiling at the light hearted banter that he had recently been worried might have disappeared forever.

He heard her reply and his smile just grew, "Yeah sure, whatever dad."