Authors Note : Hey! Thanks again for reading and reviewing. You know I love them. I'm glad you guys liked the Naley interaction. Cole will come back eventually, but he won't play a major roll in the story. I have bigger plans! So anyway - here's Chapter 3 and as usual, let me know what you think!

( P.S. - Sorry about the NBA - MBA , mix up. What's an MBA? Haha. I was super tired and I promise I'm not like basketball retarded. But I fixed it.)

- Love EC

Chapter 3: Everything's Changing

( Previously)

Haley didn't know what was happening until she felt Nathan's lips on hers. Her initial reaction was to pull away. Although, she couldn't help but notice the bolt of electricity she felt surge through her body. She didn't want him to stop and she could tell he didn't either. But, all to soon it was over and they were pulling away. Haley turned to Cole and said " I told you, I moved on. You should to." Cole grumbled something like " This isn't over." and then walked away. Leaving Nathan and Haley there alone .

Haley turned back to Nathan. " I'm sorry. I have to go." she spoke quickly and quietly, before she took off running all the way back to her dorm. Leaving a very confused Nathan wondering what the hell just happened.

As soon as Haley reached her dorm room, she was completely out of breath. She had just sprinted all the way back to her building. She stood outside for a minute, trying to process everything that just happened. After she caught her breath a little, everything started to click into place. She tilted her head back against the door and slid down until she was sitting outside her dorm with her back against the door. She put her head in her hands and started to cry. Why couldn't it just all go away? She was tired of this whole mess. She just wanted to be able to sleep at night, without the day he broke up with her replaying in her head over and over. She didn't want him back. That wasn't the problem. She was scared that she would never be able to let someone else all the way into her life again. She opened up her entire heart for him, only to have him treat it like it was nothing. Would she ever be ready to love again? Haley was so sick of all the uncertainties in her life. She felt like the same questions repeatedly ran through her head all the time. And she couldn't turn it off, no matter how hard she tried.

She continued to sit their and cry uncontrollably.

" Haley?" She looked up and noticed Lucas standing there. ( Ha, you were all wishing it was Nathan. Don't lie !) Lucas noticed her eyes were red and puffy and it didn't take a genius to realize she had been crying. " Oh my god, what's wrong?" he asked, kneeling down next to her.

" I - need you - to get Brooke- for me." she managed to say through her tears. "Please go find her for me." she said. " Okay." Lucas said and took off running down the hall.

Five minutes later Brooke and Lucas came back down the hall and Haley was still sitting there. She had stopped crying but she still had tear stains running down her face.

" Hales, what happened?" What's wrong? Are you okay?" Brooke kneeled down next to Haley and gently lifted her up. " Lucas, can you give us a minute?" Brooke asked Luke. " Yeah, um, just call me later?" he asked and Brooke nodded.

" I saw him earlier. He - he said- we weren't - no - he was wrong. I can't -" Haley started talking quickly and Brooke new that she had seen Cole. Brooke had known Haley for a long time and could read her like a book. She knew that when she talked quickly and made no sense, that she was angry or scared. In this case, Brooke could tell it was both. "Okay Hales, calm down. Let's go inside and you can tell me what happened." Brooke opened the door and led her inside. Haley took a seat on the bed and preceded to tell Brooke everything about her encounter with Cole and what happened after.

" He just came right over and kissed you? Just like that?" Brooke asked when Haley was just about finished with the story. " Yep." Haley nodded. " Well then! Brownie Points for Nathan! He so just earned my respect!" Brooke said, proudly. Haley laughed a little. That was one of the reasons Haley loved Brooke so much. She could turn around a bad situation in two seconds flat and always find a way to make her laugh.

Haley could be in the crappiest mood one morning, but by the end of the day, Brooke would have her laughing her butt off and feeling better then ever. Sometimes, when she was around Brooke, she just forgot all her problems just from seeing Brooke's big smile and bubbly personality.

" Well I think Cole is just an ass face, who needs to realize his place at the bottom of the pile. And the next time he tries to talk to you, completely ignore him and walk away because honestly, he's not worth any of your time." Brooke said. Haley just nodded in agreement.

" You know what always makes me feel better?" Brooke asked . " Getting drunk?" Haley guessed. " Well that and…. Wait for it…. wait for it……… SHOPPING!! Haley giggled and shook her head. " Why am I not surprised you just suggested that?" Haley asked. " Because if you know me as well as I think you do, you would know that it's the best therapy." Brooke pointed out. " Okay, fine. But only because I have nothing else to do today and I don't want to sit around moping and feeling sorry for myself." Haley said. "That's the spirit!" Brooke cheered. "Now go shower and change so we can go!" Haley looked down and noticed she was still in her workout close and a little sweaty. "Yeah, that'd probably be a good idea." Haley said before walking into the bathroom.

Haley and Brooke were all ready to go and they were walking out their building and into the parking lot. "Hey, did you ever get your car back from Bevin?" Haley asked. When she saw Brooke's expression she realized it wasn't a good idea. Brooke came to an immediate stop in the middle of the parking lot. " Bevin has my car?" She asked angrily. " Um, yeah, you kinda gave it to her last night while you were drunk." Haley said. " Are you kidding me? I gave her my freaking car?!" Brooke was yelling…. very loudly. " Why the hell would I do that?" Brooke asked. "Uh, did I not mention YOU WERE DRUNK!" Haley yelled back. " Haley, there are only three things I care about in this world! You, my clothes, and that car!" Brooke said very upset. " Please tell me I'm at the top of that list." Haley joked. "Who knows what she could have done with it, it's Bevin. Does she even know how to drive?" ( sorry for the Bevin bash. I really do love her.) "Brooke, don't get all worked up about this, I can just call her." Haley said taking out her cell phone. "How can I not get worked up about this. I own a freaking Mustang, or not by now. Who even knows?" Haley just rolled her eyes. When she got a hold of Bevin on the phone, she kindly asked her to return Brooke's car and told her to just ignore Brooke screaming her head off in the background . "See? That wasn't so hard. She's gonna bring it back later and she said nothing happened to it. We can just take my car to the mall, okay?" Haley asked. "Okay." Brooke said, finally calming down. " Sorry about all the yelling." Brooke apologized. "It's okay, I'm used to it." Haley said.

Brooke and Haley had been walking around the mall for about an hour and Haley had already found two new outfits with Brooke's help. Brooke was right. Haley thought. This does make me feel a little better.

They were on their way to the food court to get something for lunch when Brooke noticed a tall, handsome, blue eyed boy. " Nathan!" Brooke yelled. " Brooke, what are you doing?" Haley whispered. " I'm helping you move on." Brooke said, simply.

Nathan looked around from where he was standing with a group of his basketball friends. Then he noticed her. He told the guys he'd be right back and started towards where the girls were standing.

" Brooke, I'm so gonna kill you." Haley whispered quickly again. "Hey Nate!" Brooke said cheerily, when he had finally reached them. " Hey girls." he greeted them. Haley simply waved. " Haley tells me you drove us home the other night. I can't remember, for obvious reasons, but I bet she thinks that was so sweet of you." Brooke said. Haley's cheeks turned five shades of red and then she did the only thing that came to her mind. When Brooke and Haley were younger and were stuck in awkward situations, they would start dramatically coughing. So she did. Very dramatically. " Ughh, I think I should go get a drink." Haley lied. Nathan tried very hard not to giggle at Haley's antics and couldn't help but notice how cute it was.

Haley started speed walking towards the food court. Very fast speed walking that was on the verge of running. Once she got to one of the food stands, she looked back and noticed that Brooke and Nathan were still talking a few feet away. While she was waiting in line, tapping her foot impatiently, she felt someone come up behind her, who she thought was Brooke, until she heard them whisper in her ear, " Hey beautiful." Haley whipped around only to be faced with the object of all her nightmares. " What do you want Cole?" Haley asked forgetting about Brooke's "ignore him" rule. " You! I thought we already established this ?" "I'm not doing this with you." She said, turning back around in the very long line, that felt like it was taking forever. He grabbed her arm and spun her around again. " Why can't you just admit that you still love me so we can go back to the ways things were?" He said. " The way things were?!?!" she said loudly. " You mean, when you were cheating on me and lying to my face every freaking day?!" she yelled. "And, I don't love you anymore. I've moved on. You should too." Haley said. " You've moved on to that basketball player, who is as dumb as a doorknob?" Cole asked. Haley didn't even know what she was saying until the words came out. " Don't do that! Don't pretend you know him! You know nothing about him and he's a better person then you'll ever be!" Haley didn't know why but she almost liked defending Nathan as her pretend boyfriend. Cole moved closer to her and put his hand on her arm. " Can we please stop fighting like this? I just want you back." He started getting dangerously close to her face. " Get away from me!" she yelled.

Nathan and Brooke weren't too far away, when they heard Haley yell. They turned towards her and saw Cole grab her arm. They didn't even see him go up to her in the first place.

" What the hell is this?" Nathan felt his blood boil at the sight of Cole touching her. Why did this bother him so much? He had no idea. Before he knew it, he was walking over to them and it felt like he was having a flashback to that morning. Brooke was right behind him.

" Seriously, get away from me !" she yelled again. Cole just stepped closer to her and wouldn't let her arm go. " I believe she told you not to touch her ." Nathan said angrily, when he reached them. " What do we have here? Nathan Scott. The new boyfriend." Cole laughed and put on a disgusted face. Nathan remembered back to that morning when he kissed Haley to get her away from him. Brooke pulled Haley to the side. " You know what? You can have your little whore Nathan. I don't need her anyway." Cole spit out. Nathan did what he does best and acted on instinct. He punched Cole square in the nose. " Nathan!" Haley yelled. She ran over and pulled him away before he did it again. " What are you doing?" Haley asked. Nathan, honestly, didn't even know how to answer that. As soon as he heard the word "whore" come out of his mouth in a sentence about Haley, he snapped. He couldn't even apologize, because he really wasn't sorry at all. It felt quite good punching that guy. He didn't know why he felt so protective of Haley, he had only just started really talking to her.

Cole got up from the ground and just walked away, muttering a few profanities.

" Nathan you can't just go around punching people! Haley scolded him. "Actually, I, personally, enjoyed that !" Brooke pointed out. Nathan just stood there with his arms folded. " I don't even care about Cole, but you could have seriously hurt your hand! You play basketball and in case you forgot, your hands are kind of a key aspect in that game!" Haley said. " My hand is fine, but his nose probably isn't." Nathan smirked and Brooke high fived him. " Well, that was definitely the highlight of my day and I really wanna see my car, so can we go Hales?" Brooke asked. " Yeah, I've had a long day let's go." Haley said and they all made their way to the exit.

When they finally got to the main doors of the mall, Brooke started walking to the car and Haley turned to Nathan. " Even though I don't necessarily agree with what you did, I just wanted to thank you, and for this morning too. Haley leaned up and gave Nathan a hug. " You're always saving me." she whispered. "Someone's got to." he said back. ( Please don't hate me. I know that was a Leyton line, but I love it!) When she finally let go , she smiled at him once more and walked over to the car.

When Haley finally got home, she was exhausted. It had been such a long day and she just wanted to curl up in her bed and sleep forever. But she could not stop thinking about her hug with Nathan. It had felt so…. right.

When Brooke got back up to their dorm, after carefully inspecting her car, she saw Haley sitting on her bed, doing nothing.

" You're thinking about him, aren't you?" Brooke asked her. " Thinking about who?" Haley asked. " Don't play dumb ass girly. You're thinking about him and it bothers you because there might actually be someone new who wants to be in your life. You think it's to early but it's not. You've put your life on hold long enough Hales. It's time to start living again." Brooke said and then walked over to the bathroom.

Haley wondered why Brooke wasn't a professional psychic. That had been exactly what Haley was thinking, and she knew what Brooke said was right. But there were still all those unanswered questions in her head….

Authors Note: There's Chapter 3 ! Hope you liked it. Leave a review and let me know. I am expecting to update twice over the weekend. Love You Guys!

-EC