EIGHTEEN AND A HALF YEARS EARLIER

Brooke, I'm just as scared as you are. His words echoed in her head as she stood in front of the abortion clinic. They were too young to be parents, too young to have this kind of responsibility, too young to be making these kinds of choices. Slowly, timidly, she took a step forward, and inside.

The table was cold. She shifted, uncomfortable. Where was that nurse? It had been ten minutes, maybe twenty. Brooke, I'm just as scared as you are. "Stop," she muttered to the voice in her head. "Stop saying that!" The room was too hot. She could smell the cleaning products they'd used to sterilize the room. It tickled her nose and made her want to sneeze. Where was that nurse? She just wanted to get this over with. No, needed. She needed to get this over with. Outside the door she heard someone pass the door and continue down the hallway. Their steady footsteps sounded like a heartbeat. Where did that come from, she wondered. Brooke, I'm just as scared as you are. "Stop!" she screamed.

"I'm sorry, dear," responded the doctor, standing in the doorway. "Is something wrong?"

"I – I can't do this." mumbled Brooke. She clambered off the table and raced past the nurse, angrily brushing the tears from her eyes.

***********************

She lay face down on her bed, the words they had both said tumbling through her head like a waterfall just after a thunderstorm.

"You can't cut me out of this. Brooke, I'm just as scared as you are!" Lucas had pleaded, but it was too late for that.

"Oh, really? Or are you just worried that having a kid might deflate your market value?" She had to protect herself; she would never let him hurt their child as he had hurt her.

"How do I even know it's mine?" His words were vicious and he nearly snarled them at her.

"Trust me, it's yours." She'd retorted angrily. She walked away, leaving him stunned. It served him right.

"Don't shut me out of this, okay? We can deal with it together." She didn't know why he kept pleading with her. She was giving him a way out. He didn't want her or her baby anyway.

"But we're not together, remember?" Her comment was harsh, she knew that. But it was better to let him see the angry, bitter side than the hurt, lonely side that missed him. The side that wanted him back and cried over him every night.

She fell asleep, sprawled across the bed, her dry tears streaked across her cheeks. Her dreams were full of white-gowned doctors and babies crying and a blonde boy that wouldn't stop pleading with her.

He woke her later, walking right into her room just like he always had.

"What part of stay away from me do you not understand?" she'd asked cruelly. He shook his head and frowned, his eyes begging her, yet again, to listen.

"Just give me sixty seconds okay?" His voice was soft, and it took all she had not to give in.

"I'm sorry, but argument cut-off was nine-o-clock." She couldn't do this right now, not any of it.

"I don't want to argue. You don't even have to say anything. Just listen." He settled himself on her bed, careful not to sit too close. "My dad didn't want me, okay? Not just that he didn't want to claim me, he didn't want me to be born. And I always thought that when I started a family I'd be older, and settled, and I'd be…"

"In love?" she cut in as he trailed off.

"Yeah," he sighed. "But so did my mom."

"Lucas –"

"No, look…this whole thing scares the hell out of me, okay? But whatever you decide to do, I'll be there. And if you're not ready, then you're not ready, but if you want to have this baby, then so do I. And whatever it takes for me to be a good father, I'll be there. Always, I promise you. I won't let you down." She almost gave in to him right then, almost let him take her in his arms and hold her like he used to. He would be a good father one day, but today wasn't the right time. Even if he wanted to try, he couldn't raise a baby. He had too many dreams and so did she.

Slowly, she looked him in the eyes. Timidly, she whispered, "I lied."

"What?" He just looked confused and her heart broke.

"I'm not pregnant." It took all of her courage to say those three words. He couldn't know how close she came to giving in to him.

He argued with her because he was bewildered – after all, he had seen the test. It was a mistake, she'd explained. That can happen. He yelled then, and she knew she had done the right thing. It would never have worked between them. In a few days he would go back to his precious Peyton and she would just be a bad memory. And the baby…he would never know about it. It was better that way. She knew she couldn't abort it now. After leaving the clinic earlier, she knew she wouldn't be able to go back. Besides, she couldn't so that to Lucas, couldn't do to his baby what Dan had wanted to do to him. If she couldn't get rid of it she would go away for a while. There was nothing left for her in Tree Hill anyway.

She found out years later that he told his mother that evening that it had just been a scare. A scare, she thought, and his words echoed through her mind yet again. Brooke, I'm just as scared as you are. "Shut up, SHUT UP!" she screamed into her pillow. There was nobody else to yell at now. She was truly all alone.

***********************

He walked into his bedroom, months later, as she was packing for California. Even now she was barely showing, a bulky sweatshirt helping her to keep her secret.

"Look, are we ever going to talk about Peyton, and the stuff you found?" he questioned.

She looked up at him, her emotions carefully controlled, betraying nothing. "Actually, I was kind of relieved," she stated.

"Relieved?"

"I thought you might be into me. And it would have ruined everything because we've become friends and that's exactly what I needed…and it's exactly what I want." She explained slowly. She was so close to leaving and prayed that he would drop the issue before she lost this months-long façade.

"But you seemed upset that I held on to all that stuff," he argued. Drop it, she prayed silently as he added, "You still do."

She shook her head slowly. "Finding that stuff was like a kind of like evidence. It reminded me of what happened, and how it happened, and I guess my heart just wasn't ready for that." Several months ago, he would have seen straight through her lie. He would have figured out her defensive act and understood her tears. He would have put together the days out sick and the baggy clothes and her willingness to leave the only home she'd ever known to join parents that had never cared about her. But he hadn't payed that close attention, hadn't read her thoughts or interpreted her every emotion in a long time. She could leave now with him as a friend, and nothing more.

In the end, she almost told him. He kissed her and it felt so comfortable, so good, so right. "Tell me that was a goodbye kiss," she murmured. He shook his head, started to talk, but she blocked out his words. It could only be a goodbye kiss. Leaving was what she had to do. She walked out the door, looked back once, turned away again. "I'm sorry," she whispered. Her eyes betrayed her secret but he didn't notice. She left without telling him.