Hy guys so here comes my new chapter. Again I am sorry I didn't update. Time flies by so quickly lately before you know it months have passed.

So this chapter plays during episode 5.06. I hope you like it.

LukePeyTLA & OTHGirl24 : Thank you for your review. Please give me a feedback.

Jamyj30: I am glad that you like my story and I already have some changes planned. I sometimes don't like Lucas behavior either but we have fanfiction, right?

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Thank you to kit147 and coffelover328 for following my story.

Also to all those who have to story on alert and previously reviewed and have to wait for update. I would be very happy to hear from you.

Disclaimer: I don't own OTH and its characters. It belongs to Mark Schwan and the CW.

Broken Strings

by James Morrison & Nelly Furtado

Lucas

Lucas was in his car, his hands clasping the back of his neck and his eyes shut. What was he supposed to do? He didn't know right now. He knew what he should do, rationally.

Peyton had hurt Lindsay, his girlfriend. Apparently she didn't like her. OK, given their history or more precisely his past with Peyton he should be mad at her. She offended Lindsay. But somehow he couldn't. When he had stormed into Peyton' s office to talk to her or rather tried to she had looked exhausted and from her manner she seemed to have quite some problems with her label, missing artist and Brooke' s mom (which never helped to ease a mind) and apparently with her decision to move back to Tree Hill and him. This last snippet was what disturbed him the most. He kept asking himself what had caused her to doubt her decision and what made her say 'I can't do with this right now. No you cannot help me right now. This is the last thing that I want.'

Even if the label wasn't going as good as she had expected she never was a person who gave up easily and she had many supporters, but the way she had snapped at him made him worried.

But to avoid a conversation with him this vehemently and phrasing it like that? Sure there had been some situations in the past few weeks that had made him think about her, more often than he led on actually. But he couldn't wrap his head around why she was possessing his thoughts like that.

Especially since the CoB opening. He was still confused about his own actions. This guy hadn't treated her the way he should have and he had felt obliged to tell her that. She had been all that mattered at that moment. But her outburst afterwords had evoked a guilt in him. He didn't want to make her cry. But at the same time he didn't regretted in the least the short time she had leaned into him, it had felt just right.

Lindsay had perceived him more vary ever since the ladder incident and she wasn't the worst. Haley seemed on alert as to anything on the subject. She tried to hide it but he knew Haley too well. Her eyes seem to react to every word and action he took, and he was certain she had seen him talk to Peyton and them running out of the store together. She was watching them for sure.

When he and Lindsay were at Nathan ans Haley's an hour ago some things happened. First Haley defended Peyton because she knew about the problems they had with Victoria. She did it kind of playfully as to try not to sound as if she wanted to increase the tension but Lindsay' s reply didn't leave any doubt that she mistrusted Peyton. The way she had said :'There is more to it than that. Peyton feels like she has some sort of jurisdiction over Lucas because of their past.' He had felt an urge to defend Peyton as well, knowing very well that it wouldn't help convincing Lindsay to the opposite. But he couldn't help himself. He had always been and still felt like her protector.

Also he couldn't shake the feeling that he wanted Peyton to be jealous or claim his attention. It assured him of their connection, a connection which status he was trying to decipher. All those mentioning her didn't make it easier.

He gazed up at the window to Peyton' s office where he had been parking for the last our or so. He needed to see Peyton. He just had to talk to hear to find out what was going on his head right now. What she was thinking about? He had to figure our why she disliked Lindsay. Was it because of him? And if it was – and his stomach warmed at the thought – what did it meant for them?

-0-

Peyton was sitting at her desk. She seemed to be drawing something. As he perceived her he could sense that she was thinking something through. Apparently she had a lot on her mind. Her shoulders were slumped.

He quietly made his way over while rubbing his hands together nervously.

"I saw light on", he said and she looked up, not happy to see him. "Which isn't surprising how hard you work."She was about to say something the tension still in her posture.

He sad down on the chair in front of her.

He sensed the following words would hurt her, they weren't the gentle tone he usually used but given their last conversation and her current mood he doubted it would work so he got straight to the point.

"You know you haven't been yourself lately, Peyton. I mean not the Peyton I remember."

She replied calmly but didn't look up to meet his eyes, hiding her feelings. "Well I haven't been that Peyton in three years." That comment hit its mark and it hurt. He knew deep down that something must have happened to make her reflect like that so he asked: "What happened?"

She hesitated at first but finally looked up and closed up her pencil.

"OK...I went by my old house yesterday. There is a teenage girl living there now.. And she showed me my closet door. And you know what that said?", the way she was looking at him now almost dared him to answer, an answer he could see in his mind as if he stood directly in front of mentioned closet door. How could he not know?

"Lucas and Peyton: True Love Always. That's what we were supposed to have. Until you showed up in LA three years ago and ambushed me."

"If by ambushed you you mean proposed to you?", he replied, barely holding his voice. Was that how she saw his proposal? He had yearned for her, wanted to be with her forever and she felt ambushed?

And her reply made it hard for him to keep calm: "Oh, yeah out of the blue. A proposal that had been driven by an insecurity I have never been able to understand."

He couldn't believe it. His feelings were in a turmoil and it took all his regained prospective on that particular night not to stand up and shake her. He wanted to shake her and make her see his point. Did she really saw his proposal as insecurity? He had wanted to see her everyday because he had been sure that they belonged together. How come two people who had been supposedly in love saw a significant situation so differently?

"Insecurity, right. Let me tell you how you get always,Peyton, when a man asks you to marry him, you say yes. You don't say no and call him insecure.", he was surprised his voice was still calm.

"I never said no! I said that I loved you and that I did want to marry you someday.", she said pointing her hands at him and shaking her head from left to right. "Oh god Luke, I did want you so bad but you gave up on us."

He couldn't hold it anymore and stood up, gazing down at her disbelievingly.

Leading his palm his chest he exclaimed: "I gave up on us?"

"Yes." Peyton shouted.

"By proposing I gave up on us?", he asked again. This couldn't be real. Her eyes widened, sadness and regret reflected in her emerald pools.

"No. By not waiting you gave up on us. That's the truth and you know it.'", Peyton said with an evident tremor in her voice that always marked her emotional than stood up, going to the shelf and turning her back to him.

Not waiting? Not waiting? Please what? They had got together after all this time, only to be separated by her moving to LA. Yes, he had wanted her to do this internship to go after her dream and he had accepted Whitey's offer as co-coach but he had truly thought it would work. But his yearning and his wish to see her and share his happy moments with her was anything but giving up!

All the feelings he had felt after her rejection burst through. All the feelings, the rage he had kept bottled up for three years.

"That's great Peyton you wanna talk truth? Let's tell the truth. You gave up on me. That's why you said no. You didn't think I could do it. You didn't think I could get my novel published. Maybe you just didn't care. Because it wasn't about you or what you wanted."

That made her turn around to meet his gaze. Anger and rustration shimmered in her eyes and he could see tears trying to leak out.

"Well if that's the truth. If I never cared then how come every time I see this stupid book I buy it, every stupid damn time.", she screamed, grabbing each exemplar with a fury that made him doubt his theory. Whenever Peyton was this angry she truly cared. She bought every copy of his novel. What was he supposed to do? He didn't know any more but his head was aching. This was so confusing. All that he had talked himself into believing about her reasons shattered.

And her next words increased those feelings. He dug his hands into his waist and bit his lip trying to hold his ground.

"You said I was great. You said I could be great. You said we were meant to be together. You said it to me. You said it to the world and I wish you never had because you didn't mean any of it."she was barely holding herself together, her hand covering her mouth and she on the wedge of tears.

Lucas all the while speechless and he tried hard to focus on his balance. He was so captivated by her outburst, her sparkling eyes that he forgot to avoid the last book she was throwing.

It hit him on his forehead and his already unstable body stumbled backwards a few steps, his thigh meeting the chair he had previously sat in and he fell over it.

The last thoughts that ran through his head before he got unconscious were: 'She heard me. She heard what I said about her and it mattered. The one person I wanted to give self-confidence and trust within herself, heard me.'

OK so this was a little shorter than usual. But the next chapter picks up right here and continues in 5.07 so please review.

Your reviews and/or story alert make me anxious to check my mails.