I quickly untangled myself from Nathan and took a huge step away from him.

"What are you guys doing?" She asked struggling to place a smile on her face. "It's almost curfew Haley," She spared us one last glance before turning on her heel and stalked away.

I looked quickly over at Nathan before shaking my head and rushed after Kaitlyn. Some things were more important.

"Hey, we need to talk," I said grabbing her arm, stopping her from entering the house. This certainly was not a conversation I wanted to have around her folks.

"It's almost 9 Haley. I don't want to get in trouble."

"Me neither. Talk to me," I said grabbing her again. I watched her take in a deep breath and look back in the direction we had just come from. "What are you thinking?"

"One month," She said narrowing her eyes at me. When all I did was stare back at her she threw her hands in the air in frustration before placing them on her hips. "You've been here a month. I've liked him for years. But I guess I'm just not as easy as you. That's his type you know, girls who are ready and willing to fall into bed with him. Girls, like you."

I couldn't stop the hurt. Her words felt like a punch to the stomach. It felt like the wind had been blown right out of me. Obviously it showed on my face because I saw her eyes widen before then narrowed at me again.

"I know you're hurt, Kate," I said easily as I ran a shaky hand threw my hair. "I didn't mean for you…"

"To what? You didn't mean for me to catch you practically having sex with the boy you knew I liked. I confided in you. I called you my sister," She said in a whisper as her eyes glazed over with tears she refused to let fall. "Now I know why no one has ever wanted you. You don't care who you hurt as long as you get what you want. You," She said stepping closer to me so she was in my face, "are nothing but a pathetic slut. And I hate you."

I watched her turn and go inside the house, slamming the door behind her. I stood there as she turned off the porch light and I was left in the darkness.

I fell to the stairs and wrapped my arms around myself and with every fiber of my being willed my self not to cry. I had been called all kinds of names before. I had been yelled at, thrown around, looked down at, and been treated like dirt. But never had it had this effect. Never had I felt this completely terrible. Never had I felt this alone.

I felt him near me. Before he was draping his jacket over me, before he was sitting next to me, I knew he was there. He probably had been there the entire time. And that, did not sit well with me.

"She's just upset. She'll get over it and apologize."

"I don't deserve it. I hurt her. We hurt her," I looked over at him and shook my head and then stood up. "Did you know? Did you know how she felt?"

I watched him place his hands on his knees before he too stood up.

"Come, let's go for a walk."

"Hello! Did you not see that? Did you not hear any of that? I can't go anywhere with you?"

"Well, I'm not going to stand here squinting trying to see you in the dark. So, you either come with me and we'll talk about this somewhere else or you can sit out here all night. I'm sure she locked the door and I'm betting you don't have keys so…" I watched him rock back on his heels before he turned around and started walking away.

"I'm not coming after you!" I squinted to see where he went then looked back at the door. Shit. "Nathan! Wait."

Have you ever had one of those moments where you just wanted to close your eyes and will it all away? Just close your eyes, only to open them and find out it had all been a dream. You find yourself back in your bed and everything is okay. No more nightmares. Just open your eyes and realize none of it had been real. If only, if only, that could happen to me.

I squeezed my eyes shut one more time before opening them and looked across the table to still find Kate glaring at me.

Nope, it wasn't a dream. Fuck my life.

I lowered my head and heard Mark clear his throat for the fifth time that morning. Looking up I caught the glance between Emma and Mark and the knowing look before they both turned towards me. Looks like I got ratted on last night.

I turned to my right and saw Alex grin at me before looking over at his sister who in turn glared at him.

Mark cleared his throat again before looking at his watch and sighed. He gave Emma a frustrated look before shifting his attention to his son.

"Didn't you say you had plans with Michael today?"

"I did. But this is more fun."

I had to bit my tongue to stop from laughing as Emma choked on her juice, Kate glared, and Mark looked unhappy.

I really needed to spend more time with this boy. He was ballsy, I'll give him that. How he found this awkward breakfast fun I don't know, but, I guess it's a sibling thing.

"I think you should go get ready to go out. I'll be ready to take you in 10 minutes so have your stuff together by then," Mark said unaffected. I saw Alex open his mouth to protest but shut it just as quickly and got up from the table mumbling something about always missing out on the fun stuff.

I cracked a smile at the small boys back and vowed to get to know him better. That is, of course, if I get to stick around long enough.

"Haley, Kaitlyn, is there something you need to discuss?"

I looked over at Emma before looking to Kate. She was playing with her napkin in her lap as if it would transport her to another place. Where was my napkin?

"Girls?"

"It's nothing. Girl stuff. Teen stuff. You guys wouldn't understand," Kate mumbled not looking up.

Mark shifted uncomfortably in his seat as Emma sighed.

"You do know I was once a teenage girl. I might be able to help."

"That was forever ago. Things have changed."

"I think what Kate is trying to say is…"

"I can speak for myself thank you."

"I was just trying to help."

"I think you've helped yourself enough. Don't you?" She narrowed her eyes at me and all I could do was sigh and shake my head.

"Whatever. I'll be upstairs…packing. It's been fun."

"Not really."

"That's enough!" Mark boomed standing up. I felt the whole table shake under my hands and I slowly took a step back in retreat. "Haley, sit."

Once I obliged he ran his hand threw his hair before mumbling to himself something about girls and teenagers and why did he ever have any. I cracked a small smile before taking in another deep breath to keep myself in check.

"Look, this is my entire fault. And I am truly sorry. You'll never know how sorry I am that I hurt you," I looked over at Kate who still had her eyes slightly narrowed. "What I did was selfish and I apologize. But I can't take it back and I suppose…I don't want to."

"Then why apologize? You say you're sorry then go and say, 'wait, never mind, I meant to do it.' That's bull…crap," She sucked her bottom lip in her mouth and sent an apologetic glance to her mother. Then she turned her attention back to me, waiting for my response.

"I'm sorry I hurt you. I'm sorry…"

"You got caught," She interrupted, standing up, looking down her nose at me.

"No! That's not it. I would have told you,"

She snorted in response causing me to lose my patience. I've had enough of this attitude. I stood up and leaned across the table and narrowed my eyes at her.

"I'm sorry you're hurting, really, I am. I'm sorry I broke our trust. And I'm sorry to be the one who finally broke the fairytale bubble you live in that said you two would someday be together. I fucked up. And now I'm apologizing. So, accept it or don't, I don't care any more."

"Wait, wait, wait. This is over a boy? Who? And do you realize how…."

"It wasn't a 'fairytale bubble.' It was my life," Kate said interrupting her mom, leaning across the table also so we were nose to nose. "And I told you all about him. I trusted you. You lead me to believe you were helping me when all along you were going behind my back to get him yourself. You're conniving and selfish. I hate you."

I stared at her and let her words sink in like they were a knife being stabbed in my chest. That's not how it happened. That's not how I meant for any of this to happen. She had to know that. She had to know I never meant to hurt her. Why didn't she know that?

I could vaguely here Mark lecturing us over all the noise in my head. I looked over from him back to Kate who had stopped glaring and was now close to tears. She stepped back and into her mothers embrace as Mark continued to pace and talk. It all seemed to be happening in slow motion. No, it looked like it was happening in another world. The polished father dropping everything to stroke his daughter's hair as she wept on her mothers shoulder.

I took a slow and silent step back and shook my head to clear this world. I wanted to get back to the small and cramped apartment with just me and Taylor. But it wasn't going away. They weren't going away. The pain wasn't going away.

"I'm sorry," I whispered before turning on my heel and I did what I do best. I fled.

Safe Haven: a place, a situation, or an activity which provides people with an opportunity to escape from things that they find unpleasant or worrying.

In my situation it's always good to find one place you can go. A place you can be alone with your thoughts. A place, that's not always crowded with people so you can just be alone. A safe haven. I think that's one of the first things I look for when I move to a new place. You see, for normal kids my age, your 'safe place' is probably your room. In some cases that can't always be true so it's best to scout out another place to go and just…escape. Escape the world. Escape reality. Escape people. Escape…yourself. Now, I haven't been in Tree Hill that long and half of the time I have been here was spent grounded in the place I'm running from. So I had to think pretty hard about my go to place. This, of course, got me thinking about a certain blue eyed boy.

No, I didn't go running to him. Although that would have been the easy thing to do. But, I've never been that kind of girl. I've never been the one who needed a man to lean on. And I didn't plan on changing that today.

But I did take him into consideration when I choose my place. And no, I didn't choose it because he could show up at any minute. But, if that were to happen…ugh. Forget it.

I laid down and closed my eyes to keep the sun out. On a sigh I opened them again and struggled to readjust to the light and just stared up at the sky.

Why was it when you're feeling really good it rains, but when you're miserable the suns out and the sky is clear and bright blue?

I felt a quick vibration in my pocket and groaned instinctively and prepared myself for the punishment that was on my way. When I saw all I had was a text curiosity took over so I quickly opened my phone and a fresh new batch of emotions swirled in.

Been Busy. Sorry. Call you when I have enough free time to catch up. Love and misses

TAY

"Seriously? Over a month of not speaking and this is all I get. You have got to be fucking kidding me." I quickly sat up and dialed her number and had to fight the urge not to throw my phone when my call got sent to voice mail. I threw back my head and finally let it all out. With everything in me I screamed at the top of my lungs.

"That is quiet a welcome. Thanks."

I whipped my head around to face the intruder before letting out a small groan.

"Welcome….Piper, right?" I said standing up. I lifted a hand to block the sun out and stretched my other hand out to her with a big smile on my face.

"Close, it's Peyton. You're…Holly? It is Holly isn't it," The blonde grabbed my hand and placed her own fake smile on her face and I couldn't stop the laugh from escaping.

"Yes, yes that's me. I'm sorry," I said bending over, grabbing my sides between breaths. "I've had a really bad day."

"Oh, I can tell. I always have a laughing fit on rough days."

"I know. Its twi…twisted. Oh lord, I can't stop."

"Well, umm, I was just looking for Lucas or Nate. I think I left something at their place and no one was home so I thought they'd…do you know where Nathan is?"

I straightened myself at the tone and took a deep calming breath.

"Why would I?"

"Just a question based on some rumors that are going around. You guys are close, right?"

"Me and Lucas are close too. You want to question me about him as well."

She took a step closer to me so she stood a few inches taller and looked down at me with heat in her eyes.

"Brooke is my best friend. If you even think…"

"Relax Curly. Just friends," I held my hands up in surrender and took a step back. "Been in town what, 5 weeks, and I already have enemies. That's gotta be a new record."

"I don't want to be your enemy. I just see you getting close, maybe to close, to my friends, which in turn could hurt my other friends and I just…" She trailed off and looked up toward the sky. "Why are you here?"

"I didn't exactly have a choice. Mark and Emma choose me and I have to go…"

"I didn't mean Tree Hill. I meant here," She lifted her arms and looked back over at me. "Of all the places there are to go in town why the River Court?"

"I haven't exactly had a full tour of the place just yet and…I don't know. One night me and Nathan went out and…stop that," I said placing my hands on my hips.

"What? I didn't even say anything?"

"You rolled your eyes and then you smiled!"

"Is that illegal wherever it is you're from?"

"No. But we do have this rule that says it's ok to beat the snot out of nosy bitches."

"I would like to see you try," She lifted her arms again and balled her hands into fists but this time she had a genuine smile on her face.

"That's not even how you do it. You would break your thumbs like that," I rolled my eyes at her as I walked past her and towards the bench.

"He likes you."

I stopped and inhaled before I turned back to face her.

"I know. You have a point?"

"I just don't want to see anyone get hurt is all."

"Well, it's too little too late for that one. But don't worry, Nathan is unaffected I'm sure."

She opened her mouth to say something else so I just held up a hand to stop her. This really was the last thing I wanted. I just wanted to be alone. I did not want to talk about this right now. I was not ready to talk about him. So, I improvised.

"So, Curly, have you ever heard of a hair straighter?"

"So you kissed her?"

"Mm-hmm."

"And Kate saw?"

"Yup."

"Dude, that sucks."

"Totally."

"Did you hear mom and dad are splitting and we are moving to Canada?"

"Yeah. Total bummer."

"Nate," Lucas moved to step in front of his brother. Nathan looked up from the ground with his trademark smirk in place causing his older brother to snarl.

"I heard you. And it is a bummer. Canada sucks," Nathan stepped around his brother before looking down the street and made a step to cross it.

"Wait," Lucas reached out and grabbed his arm to stop him and made him face him again. "I thought you liked her. I thought you wanted to kiss her and all that jazz."

"I did. But I didn't know it would cause trouble," Nathan ran a hand threw his hair and started growing uncomfortable under his brother's stare.

"Are you saying you never knew how Kate felt?"

"No, I knew. But come on dude, she's just a kid. I thought she would grow out of it. I thought it was just an innocent little crush. What was I supposed to do?"

"Well, I'm sure making out with the girl living her is a big no-no in girl world," Lucas said with a chuckle. He stopped abruptly when Nathan glared at him. "Hey, all I'm saying is you have to fix it. Make things right between them again. After that, then things can maybe happen for you and Haley. Maybe."

"And I do that how exactly?"

"Talk to Kate."

Nathan stared at his brother as if he had gone crazy. Which, in Nathans mind, he probably had. There was no way he could go talk to her. He heard her last night. He heard the things she had said, the names she had called Haley. That little girl was a spit fire and Nathan was not afraid to admit he was a little afraid. Lord knew what she would unleash when he came face to face with her.

Of course he knew she had a crush on him. It was pretty obvious. But what was he supposed to do about it? All his friends kept telling him to go easy on her, that she was just a kid. But that didn't mean he wasn't allowed to have his fun. And he did, he always had fun when it came to girls.

And that's what Haley was. She was fun. He had a good time with her. They got along and they had similar interests. It certainly helped that she was good to look at.

But, then there was her relationship with Kate. He didn't want to be the reason anything bad happened. In the past he could care less if girls fought over him. Hell, he enjoyed it. But this was different. One wrong move and that was it. Haley was gone. He certainly didn't want that on his shoulders. And he still wasn't sure how he felt about her. Sure he was attracted. It was hard not to be. But there was something more.

Nathan shook his head, trying to clear it and let out a frustrated groan. "I have no fucking clue what I'm supposed to do."

"I thought I just told you. Don't you listen?"

Nathan shot his Lucas a look before looking over Lucas' shoulder. "Got any other ideas? And think fast."

Lucas followed his brother's line of sight before a grin broke out on his face. He saw the two people approaching them and couldn't keep in the chuckle. "Man, I love small towns. I really wish I had some popcorn though," He added with a laugh and raised his hand in greeting. This was going to be interesting.