Playing It Wrong
Chapter Three – I Told You So


Summary:Haley James is at the top of her class and has everything she wants, a great boyfriend, tons of friends, and she's the captain of the cheerleading squad. Nathan Scott is recently injured and hating life. The only good thing he has is his girlfriend. However, when Haley and Nathan's "other halves" go behind their backs and get together, Haley devises a plan for revenge: Date Nathan Scott. Will it work or will she become too distracted along the way?


A/N: Thanks for the reviews everyone! I really hope you enjoy this chapter! I skipped ahead a few days so if you get confused about it, three days have passed. Please keep the reviews coming. They inspire me as cheesy as that sounds. Also, if you have ANY ideas PLEASE send them to me because I have NOT planned out this story. I'm writing it by chapter.

"What the hell are you doing here?" She set down the paper and pen and removed her glasses.

"I just wanted to talk, if that's okay with you. If not, I can wait." Haley was silent for a few seconds before pointing to the chair next to her.

"You have two minutes because in about two minutes, Nathan will be coming out here and I will not keep him from kicking your ass. So speak fast."

"Okay. I just wanted to apologize for what I did and I know it may seem worthless to you, but I do mean it. I didn't know what to do. I didn't want to break up with you and take the risk of losing my best friend and I didn't want to hurt Brooke." Haley rolled her eyes, but said nothing. "Look, I understand that you hate me and probably wish I would die, but I just needed you to hear that I'm sorry." Lucas got up and made his way down the porch steps.

"Hey Lucas?" He stopped and turned to Haley. There were tears forming in her eyes and he could tell that she was trying to be strong and not let him see her breaking down.

"Yeah?"

"I would have been your friend, no matter what. I've known you since we were kids. I would have been a little mad if you had left me for Brooke, but it wouldn't hurt as bad as it hurts now. I trusted you and I gave you my heart. I would have stayed friends with you, but you betrayed me by not telling me and by leading me on. I don't think we can ever be friends again and as far as I'm concerned that would be fine."

Lucas looked hurt and he knew he had royally screwed himself.

Nathan sat in the quad waiting for Haley. She had told him that she needed to talk to him and they had decided that lunch would be the best time to talk. It had been a few days since Nathan and Haley had found out. Nathan had had several run-ins with Brooke since then and all of them had been sufficiently awkward. They also had to tolerate sitting next to each other in Calculus for a whole hour. Brooke had tried talking to Nathan, but he was adamant to ignore her as long as possible. He even went as far as getting up and moving across the room halfway through class, receiving several odd looks from his fellow classmates.

He had called his Uncle Cooper on his way to school to ask if he could stay with him until he found his own place. He had decided he would skip his last class so he could get his things out of the apartment without running into Brooke.

"Hey," Haley said as she sat down next to Nathan.

"Hey." The two sat there in awkward silence for a few moments. Obviously, Haley's actions the other morning had caused more tension then she had hoped for. "So, what did you want to talk about?"

"Oh, right. I wanted to apologize for the other morning. I didn't mean to come off as manipulative or anything. I just did the first thing that came to mind and obviously it worked, but I feel bad now. I don't want you to do this if you aren't comfortable or ready or just don't want to do this. I was just really angry when I asked you." She looked at him hoping he would understand where she was coming from.

Nathan nodded and let out a small laugh. "It's totally okay. It's not that I don't want to go along with this whole thing, I'm just not sure that I'm ready to get back into that kind of commitment, even though we wouldn't actually be dating."

"Then why did you say yes?" Haley knew it was because of what she did, but she wanted to hear him say it.

"You know why I said yes." Haley blushed at the comment. "I just didn't picture you as the seductive type."

"I'm sorry. I'm not normally like that. I really don't know what came over me."

"Hey, I'm not complaining." Haley's blush went from a light pink shade to a crimson red in a matter of seconds. She didn't know why this was happening. She had never been this way with Lucas and she was supposed to hate Nathan.

"Well, if we aren't going to pretend to date, the least we can do is be friends, right? It won't hurt either of us to be a little more civil with each other." Nathan nodded. They had been getting along a little better, even before the blow up.

"That'd be great."

"Oh! I finished going over your paper this morning. It's great, but there are a few errors. I wrote notes in the margins so you can fix them." She handed the paper to Nathan and watched as he flipped through it. He impressed her sometimes. When she had first started tutoring him, he was so arrogant and rude. He thought he was so much better then everyone. That is until she stopped tutoring him and his grades started slipping. She had started tutoring him again and she saw a huge improvement. His attitude seemed to disappear and he was actually enjoyable to be around. "How have you been today?"

"I was actually doing fairly well this morning and then I ran into Brooke. She was coming out of the gym as I was going in and I'm just so used to seeing her every morning that I hadn't even thought of seeing her. I kind of felt bad about all the mean things I said to her the other night until I ran into her before Calculus with Lucas. It amazes me how she says all these things about how sorry she is and that she didn't mean to hurt us, but it doesn't take her much time to make it clear to everyone that she and Lucas are now together." Haley shook her head, hurt that they could act so selfishly. "To make it worse, she decided to try and talk to me all through Calculus to the point that I had to get up and move away from her. I just don't understand her."

"And speaking of our favourite cheerleader..." Haley pointed behind Nathan when she saw Brooke approaching.

"Great. I wonder what lame excuses she has now." Haley laughed at the comment and stopped when Brooke stopped at the table.

"Nathan, can I talk to you... alone." She gave Haley a look that was far from apologetic. Haley rolled her eyes and made no effort to move.

"Actually, Haley and I are talking. It'll have to wait." Nathan looked down at the paper in front of him, hoping Brooke would get a clue.

"It's important. We need to talk about what happened. You've been ignoring me for three days now." Brooke crossed her arms.

"Why don't you just leave him alone? He obviously has nothing to say to you. Do you not get it?" Haley had had enough of Brooke and her whining. She was so sick of people giving Brooke the benefit of the doubt even when they knew she didn't deserve it. She had seen Brooke get her way so many times by being flirtatious or acting dumb and she was sick of it.

"Why don't you mind your own business? How about that? Why don't you run along and find Lucas? Oh, that's right. You guys broke up." Brooke smirked at Haley. A few students passing by stopped when they heard Brooke's comment. This caused even more to gather, all of them hoping there would be a fight.

"Brooke, you need to back off," Nathan warned, standing up between the two girls.

"Why? She needs to get over it and stop acting like a baby. So what if her boyfriend doesn't want her anymore."

"Oh that's it, you bitch." Haley pushed Nathan out of her way and lunged at Brooke, causing them to topple to the ground. Haley pinned Brooke to the ground and punched her square in the jaw. Half the crowd cheered Haley on while the other half was rooting for Brooke.

"You have no right!" Haley raised her hand and backhanded Brooke so hard she heard a popping noise. Brooke screamed in pain and tried to hit Haley and push her off of her. She was surprised at how strong Haley was. Haley pulled Brooke's hair in order to keep her from pushing on her. Brooke managed to reach out and scratch Haley across the face, leaving two identical cuts.

"Chick fight!!" Some guy yelled. "Yeah!"

"You think you're so perfect, Brooke? Huh?! Think you'll be perfect with a black eye? Or how about a broken nose?!"

"Punch her!" Some chick from the crowd yelled.

"Yeah, lay it on her!"

Haley raised her fist, but before she could punch Brooke, Nathan grabbed her around the waist and pulled her off of Brooke. Haley was kicking violently, trying to get out of Nathan's grasp, but it was no use. Brooke just lay there on the ground, groaning in pain.

"Let me go, Nathan!" Haley tried biting his arm, but couldn't turn her head far enough.

"Not until you calm down." Haley kicked Nathan in the shin, but it did nothing to loosen his grip. She would have gone for his knee, but knew how much his rehabilitation meant to him.

"Fine. Just let me go!" Nathan was hesitant. "I'm serious." Nathan put Haley down and made sure she didn't try anything. Haley grabbed her things and looked at Brooke. "Besides, she isn't worth it anymore," she spat before walking away.

Haley sat in the gym after school that day working on her Calculus homework. She had cancelled cheer practice that afternoon and decided to watch the basketball practice and wait for Nathan, despite Lucas being there. Every time she looked up Lucas was watching her. She knew she had been harsh when they had talked earlier that week, but it wasn't like he didn't deserve it. As for Nathan, he had been given permission to go to practice, but he couldn't do any strenuous exercises.

Haley and Brooke were both lucky that they weren't suspended. They had both been called into Principal Turner's office and had tried to convince him it was a stupid fight over nothing. He had been hesitant to let them go, but had decided to if they wrote him a paper on why fighting is bad. There had been a few moments in the office where Haley had been tempted to bash Brooke's face into Turner's desk.

Haley looked up and saw Peyton approaching the bleachers. She set down her things and turned to look at her friend, slightly wincing at the sight of Haley's scratched up cheek.

"Hey," Peyton said, sitting down next to Haley. "How's the face?" She pointed to the scratch marks across Haley's cheek.

"It hurts a lot, but I imagine Brooke's hurts about ten times worse."

"Yeah, I heard you wailed on her pretty bad."

Haley nodded. "Yeah, it was not one of my proudest moments." She shrugged and looked over at the basketball team. She smiled when Nathan looked over at her. This didn't go unnoticed by Peyton.

"How's Nathan?" Haley looked over at Peyton and shrugged.

"How would I know?"

"Well, you guys have been spending an awful lot of time together lately. What's going on, Haley?"

Haley sighed. "I don't know. I freaked out the other morning and tried to get Nathan to go along with this crazy plan and it's been really awkward since then, even though we've been hanging out. I guess we're just trying to find some sort of answer for why this had to happen to us."

"Shouldn't you be trying to figure that out on your own because I was pretty sure that, that is how it works?" Haley looked at Peyton and knew she was trying to get at something.

"Look Peyton, I know you think there is something going on just like the rest of the school, but there is nothing going on between Nathan and me." Peyton raised her eyebrow.

"You know you like him and you have for a while. You just didn't want to admit it because you were with Lucas and now that you aren't with him anymore, you're starting to admit it to yourself. You know I'm right, Haley."

"Well, even if you were right and I'm not saying you are, it wouldn't matter. Nathan and I won't be ready for relationships for a while so just drop it, okay?"

"Okay. I won't mention it again."

"Thank you." The two sat silent for a few seconds and watched the basketball team. Haley looked over at Nathan. She knew Peyton was right even if she didn't want to admit it, but she knew nothing would come of her feelings. Things were too complicated right now. "How are you and Jake?"

"Uhm... We're doing fine." Peyton shrugged and looked at Haley. "We're not doing too great. I don't think it's going to work. We've been trying to spend time together lately, but it's like we have nothing to do, other than have sex and even that gets old."

"Not for back stabbing bitches like Brooke," Haley mumbled.

"Haley James, be nice."

"Sorry... I mean about you and Jake, not Brooke." Peyton rolled her eyes.

"It'll be okay. How weird is it living in the same apartment as Brooke?"

"I actually haven't seen her in like two days. She leaves early and gets in late. I guess I'll have to deal with it eventually and I'll figure that out then. Right now, I don't wanna think about it."

Haley and Peyton looked over at the team when Whitey blew his whistle. A few minutes later he dismissed the team and Haley and Peyton made their way over to them. Haley stopped when she saw Brooke approach Lucas. The two acted as if they hadn't just broken up with someone three days prior. Lucas looked up and made eye contact with Haley and she couldn't handle it anymore.

"I gotta go. Tell Nathan I'll call him later," Haley said to Peyton before leaving the gym. Peyton walked over to Brooke and Lucas.

"Can I talk to you?" She said to Brooke.

"I'm busy..." Brooke turned away from Peyton and back to Lucas.

"No, you're not." Peyton grabbed Brooke by the arm and pulled her away from Lucas.

"Ow! Peyton, let go!" When they were on the other side of the gym Peyton let go and turned to Brooke.

"Look, you need to stop. If you're gonna date Lucas, don't flaunt it in front of Haley."

Brooke got a fake confused look on her face. "I don't know what you're talking about."

"Yes you do, Brooke. You're acting like you've been dating Lucas for months in front of the girl you just broke him up with! She was your best friend and did nothing to you and you repay her this way? What is wrong with you?"

"Did you forget that she tried to kill me in the quad today?" Brooke pointed to her jaw which had a dark bruise forming on it.

"You totally deserved it! You stole her boyfriend and acted like it wasn't your fault. Sorry, but you deserved to get your ass kicked." Peyton shook her head and walked way.

Haley sat on the couch in the apartment living room waiting for Nathan so they could do their tutoring session. They hadn't really talked since the fight in the courtyard. Haley had called him after she had left the gym and told him to meet her at the apartment for tutoring because she didn't feel like going to her parent's house and had a feeling there wouldn't be any distractions around the apartment tonight.

Haley started thinking about what Peyton had said to her earlier. It really bugged her that Peyton could read her so well. She wondered if anyone else could see that she had feelings for Nathan and how obvious it was.

"You're losing it, Haley. You don't like him. You can't. It's insane." The sound of the front door closing jarred her from her thoughts and she turned around to see Nathan.

"You know, they say talking to yourself is the first sign of insanity." He walked over to the couch and sat next to Haley. "What were you going on about when I walked in?"

"It was nothing. Why do you ask?" Haley got a worried look on her face.'What if he heard me and is just playing dumb? Oh god.'

"Just wondering what's bringing out the crazy in you, Hales."

"Nothing. You called me Hales. Why?"

"I don't know. It just came to mind. What's the big deal?" Nathan got a very confused look on her face. However, he started to understand when a blush crept across Haley's cheeks. "What were you going on about when I walked in? Because I could have sworn you said something about you not liking someone. Who's this mystery person that you like?" Nathan cocked his eyebrow and gave her a smirk. This received him a glare from Haley.

"It sure wasn't you," she declared crossing her arms.

"I think you're lying..."

"Well I'm not."

"Right. So if I moved closer to you," he said doing just that, "you wouldn't be bothered in the least bit."

Haley eyeballed him closely and then gave him a smirk. "No."

Nathan knew she was lying. He moved even closer and sensed her tense up. "Really?" He continued moving closer until he had Haley backed up and leaning against the arm of the couch. He was hovering over her and staring at her.

"Nope, I'm not bothered at all." Her breathing was becoming heavier and she knew that Nathan knew she was lying. She just didn't want to admit it. Nathan slid a hand up Haley's side causing her skin to form goose bumps. They stared intently into each other's eyes and Haley felt herself getting lost in the dark blue orbs.

"And you wouldn't be bothered if we had a very close face-to-face conversation?" Haley became very nervous when Nathan leaned in and their lips were mere centimetres from each other.

"Uh..." She tried to say no, but she couldn't. Words were becoming very difficult to form and breathing was becoming very difficult.

"That's what I thought," Nathan said before closing the distance and kissing Haley. Haley didn't respond at first because she was so thrown off by Nathan's actions, but after a second she relaxed and kissed him back. However, the moment didn't last very long when they heard the door close. Nathan quickly jumped off of Haley and they both looked over the couch to see Peyton standing there with a huge grin on her face.

"I told you so," she said, looking at Haley, before going to her room. Nathan looked at Haley obviously confused.

TBC.

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