Disclaimer: I do not own One Tree Hill or its characters...I own nothing but this story's plot!!!

Chapter 4:

Come on, Come out

Three weeks later, Brooke and Nate were still going strong in the dating department. There was only one problem; he wanted to get more serious while she still wanted to take it slow. Rachel had actually applied to cosmetology school, through the encouraging of Brooke who wanted her to get an actual job. And Olivia, well she was still a crazy messy.

It was Saturday and Brooke, Rachel, and Olivia had gone out for brunch and a day of shopping. It was girls only, no boys allowed not even if he was Patrick Dempsey. It was a rule Rachel had amended years ago when she had Brooke had begun the once-a-month-shop-and-get-food-tradition.

They went to a little outdoor café since it was such a pretty day and the weather was really warm. Brooke order a fruit salad and a blueberry muffin, she got Olivia her favorite, pancakes. And Rachel ordered her usual, a mushroom and goat cheese omelet.

Right as they were beginning to dig into their breakfasts, Brooke's cell phone began to ring.

"Mommy phone's ringing," Olivia told her as Brooke frantically dug through her oversized bag to find the device.

"Do not answer that," Rachel commanded her once she had pulled the phone from her purse. "This is Rachel, Brooke, and Olivia day. Not whoever is on the other end of that phone line day," she told her friend, being the stubborn girl she was.

Brooke looked at her friend like she was insane and then looked at the phone's screen. The name flashing across it was 'Haley.' "Rach, I have to take this. It's Hales," Brooke told her apologetically, as she stood from the table to take the call.

"Fine," Rachel grumbled and fed herself another bite of her omelet. "That whore isn't even here and I'm still competing with her for Brooke's friendship," she mumbled under her breath.

"Auntie Rachie," Olivia said slowly, looking up from her food with a mouth covered with syrup and pancake pieces. "Who is Haley?"

Rachel leaned across the table and looked the little girl in the face. "Haley is someone who used to be Mommy's and my friend, but now she is just trying to…well I'm not sure, but I know she has got to have an ulterior motive," she told the little girl as if she understood every word. "And I'm going to figure it out, don't you worry."

Olivia crunched up her face and tilted her head to the side. Rachel had lost her at they used to be friends. "Okay," she said, content with the answer even though it didn't make any sense to her and she went back to her food.

A few minutes later Brooke returned to the table, setting her phone down next to her. She immediately turned to Olivia. "Liv, what is all over your face?" she asked her, observing the sticky mess her daughter was covered in. "I swear, I don't even know why you eat pancakes." She wondered aloud, wiping her daughter's mouth. "Probably because you fa—I mean your Auntie Rachie loves them. They are just so…so…ewww!"

"Nice save," Rachel sarcastically told her, catching the brunette's near misstep. "So what was little Miss Haley wanting?" She asked now in a condescending tone of voice.

"Nothing too exciting. Okay, well actually it is kind of exciting," she said, practically bouncing in her chair. "She invited us to Jamie's fourth birthday party. It's like a week and a half before the wedding, so I am thinking it's doable. We'll just stay in Tree Hill for a little while. It will be like a vacation!"

"Me likey vacations," Olivia chimed in, trying her best to lick the syrup around her mouth with her tongue. "Yay!"

"Brooke, are you sure?" Rachel asked her. "That's a long time to be in Tree Hill. You know, having to deal with the wedding an all?" She continued questioning her friend, giving her sideways glance as if her words had a double meaning.

"Rachel, I'll be fine," Brooke assured her. "I'm a big girl. Besides, if I keep hiding, and not facing my fears, I'm going to be hiding forever."

"Well, well, look who has turned the corner at pathetic and moved onto progress," Rachel teased her, though inside she was sincerely happy with her friend's decision. It sounded like it was for the right reason.

"Shut up and eat your omelet. We've got shopping to do," Brooke said, as she threw a miniscule piece of her muffin at the red head, causing them both to laugh and laugh.

After a long day of shopping Brooke and Olivia were back at home, trying to unwind. This was not a particularly easy task for Olivia who was a complete bundle of energy most of the time.

"Mommy, watch what I do," she called to her mom who was sitting on the chaise lounge as the stood on their living room sofa.

"Olivia, sit down. What did I tell you about standing on the furniture?" She asked her frantically setting down her laptop so she could retrieve her child.

"Wait Mommy, just watch!" She shrieked, and before Brooke had reached her she had done a summersault across the couch cushions.

"Liv! You have got to be more careful. You could have fallen off and hurt yourself. Mommy doesn't want you to get hurt. You are too important to her to be hurt," she said, picking up her little girl and holding her tight to her chest.

As she was squeezing the little girl her doorbell rang. She wasn't really expecting anyone, and Rachel had a key. So she sat down Olivia and tentatively approached the door.

"I'm coming," she called as she walked towards it, Olivia following closely at her heels. She opened the door to reveal a smiling Nate.

"What are you doing here?" She happily asked him as he leaned down to kiss her lightly. She moved aside so he could enter her home.

"I just wanted to see my two favorite girls," he told her, bending down to take Olivia in his arms. "So what have you two been up to?" He asked as they walked into the living room.

"We went shopping with Auntie Rachie," Olivia told him excitedly. "And it was so fun!" She added, grabbing his cheeks to emphasize her point to him.

Brooke laughed at her daughter's interactions with Nate; she could be such a drama queen. "Well we did that," she laughed. "And now we are just hanging out. And I'm looking for flights for a wedding I have to attend," she told him, flopping back down on the chaise while Nate held Olivia on the couch.

"Oh, fun. You don't seem too excited about it," He observed, noting the tone of Brooke's voice as more obligatory than joyous.

"Yeah well, it's a long story," she told him. "One that frankly paints all the people involved in a bad light. And I don't want you to judge these people on their past without even knowing them," she explained to him.

"What's that supposed to mean?" He asked her curiously, now noticing a small gleam in her eyes.

"Well, I was going to ask you in a little bit better of a way," she told him. "But I wanted to know if you wanted to go to the wedding with me. It's the wedding of two of my old friend's, one former best friend and one former boyfriend. And I just think it could be a lot more bearable if you were there," she told him, smiling weakly.

"Well there's no place else I'd rather be," he told her. "I hope I can get off work though. I mean with you gone and everything," he said, watching her smile fade.

"Yeah, I didn't think about that," she said, realizing it might not be possible for him to come. "We are going to be gone for about two weeks."

"But I'll still try. And maybe I can just come down for the actual wedding," he said, hoping to cheer her back up some.

"I'd like that," she nodded, and she looked over for Olivia's response. She was surprised to find her little girl had fallen asleep in Nate's arms. "I guess she was more tired than I thought," she said, walking over and taking Olivia from him. "I'm going to go put her down. I'll be back in a minute."

"Alright, I'll be here," he said, leaning back on her couch and flicking on the television. "When you get back, we can talk some more about the wedding. And maybe you can tell me some good things about your old friend's and the place you grew up."

Brooke smiled and nodded her head at him. She knew the time was going to come sometime, the time when Nate found out her entire story. Now was a good a time as any she supposed. At this stage, if he ran, maybe it wouldn't hurt too badly. And if he stayed, well maybe he wouldn't judge her for the way she handled things.

"So let me get the straight," Nate said, leaning back on the couch so he could get a better look at Brooke who was sitting beside him. "The guy who is getting married is Olivia's father?" He asked her, still shocked as he was starting to see why Brooke was so reluctant about going to the whole thing.

"Only in the loosest since of the word," she told him, hanging her head. It was a hard thing to talk about, Lucas's unkind rejection of his own flesh and blood. "He has never even acknowledged her as his daughter or in a way that wasn't negative."

"And you've never tried to contact him? To get any kind of support or help?" He asked her, not fully graspin Brooke's way of handling her predicament.

"No. It was my decision. I tried to involve him, but I guess he would rather forget about me than care to be involved. So I decided to give him what he wanted. I wanted Olivia, and I don't regret for a second having her in my life. She is my everything," she told him, looking up into his eyes while the tears threatened to fall from hers.

"Brooke, I'm sorry if talking about this upset you," he told her. "But it means a lot that you trust me enough to open up to me. I care about you Brooke Davis, so much. And I want to be able to help you and be there for you," he said, wiping a single tear from her soft cheek.

"Thanks," she whispered. "It means a lot to have you here. I haven't had anyone I could count on, well besides Rachel, in a long time. All my other friends from back home seemingly wrote me out of their lives when I moved. And I guess I kind of kept them out of mine as well. I just felt so rejected and isolated, from all of them."

"I know that must have been hard. But I am here now, and I won't let you go through it alone," he said, taking her hand in his own.

"I appreciate that. I really do. I also appreciate you not running from the hills when you heard my crazy story. Even as I go over it in my head, I know it sounds kind of insane," she tried to laugh a little to lighten the dark mood that had settled over the room.

"Not completely, just the part that you never tried to contact Lucas by any other method than a letter," he admitted to her. "I mean, I think I would have called or something. But then again, I've never been in your situation so I can't really say what I would do."

"I know, I can see from the outside how it would seem that way. But if you knew Lucas, and you knew our relationship, you would know how important letters were to the two of us. They were kind of our thing," she told him, hoping he wasn't taking her explanation of what she shared with Luke the wrong way. "And besides, at Hansonville that was the only way we were allowed to communicate with the outside world besides the monitored parental phone calls It was like prison."

"Yeah, are you sure Hansonville was actually a school?" He joked with the brunette, trying to add some humor to the dreary mood that had settled over the room. "And I can respect your decisions. It sounds to me like you did the best you could with what you had," he said, smiling at her. "As selfish as this sounds, I can't help but be a little bit glad that he let you go, though I can't see how he ever did. Because if he hadn't, I would have never have gotten the joy of having you and Olivia in my life," he told her, leaning over to kiss her on the cheek.

"Well I always say, what's meant to be will always find a way, so you never know what can happen," she smiled and kissed him on the mouth. "People who are meant to be together always find their way in the end. And the two getting married are living proof of that."

Nate nodded his head and pulled Brooke closer to him in a tight embrace. "Thank you for telling me all this tonight," he whispered into her hair. "I feel like I just solved a huge chunk of my Brooke Davis puzzle."

Brooke giggled a little as she nuzzled in closer to his strong chest. "Now I guess it's time for me to start working on my Nate Archibald puzzle, huh?" she asked him.

"I wouldn't hurt," he joked with her as they leaned back onto the sofa and got comfortable. It was going to be long night, Nate realized as he tried to get as personal with Brooke as she had been with him.

"Mommy!" Olivia yelled when her mother arrived home from work Monday afternoon. She jumped down from the table and ran straight into Brooke's waiting arms.

"Hey Sweetness," Brooke said, stroking the little girl's hair."Did you have a good day?" She asked her. She hated missing out on her daughter's life by having to work, but she was very thankful that she had a friend like Rachel who she could trust her with.

"Was she good Rach?" She asked her friend who was gathering up her things.

"You know better than to ask me that. Of course she wasn't anything less than angelic," she winked at her friend.

Brooke laughed at her friend, Rachel knew her well enough to know that she wouldn't believe anything less than what she had just told her. "Where are you running off to, Missy?" She asked her friend, who looked like she was about to race out the door.

"What? You think you're the only one who has a life around here?" She asked the brunette in a joking tone of voice. "I, my friend, have a date," she smiled at her friend, bounding over beside her.

"Well look at you," Brooke told her, slapping her on the shoulder. "Who's the lucky guy? Anyone I would know?" She eagerly asked, wanting to get as many details from her friend as she could.

"No, I don't think you know him," she said shaking her head. "His name is Marco and he's Brazilian and oh-so-gorgeous. I cannot wait because it has been forever since I have gotten laid," she told her friend.

"What? Rachel! Olivia is right here," Brooke said, shocked, as she pointed to the little girl not standing two feet from the friends.

"Like she knows what I'm talking about," the red head waved her off. "Besides, she's your daughter…it's not like she going to remain innocent forever. I mean, didn't Nate like stay over the other night?"

Brooke pretended to be hurt and poked out her lip to act like she was pouting. "Fine, whatever that is supposed to mean, because nothing happened with Nate. All we did was talk," she told her friend, as if that were obvious.

"Well if it's true then that's a shame because he is too sexy not to get a piece," she said, and she threw in a wink to annoy her friend even farther.

"Would you just go get ready for your date?" Brooke joked, as she pushed her friend towards the door. "At least now maybe you will have something more interesting to worry about than my love life."

Rachel threw her head back in laughter as she continued to move towards the door. "I mean, thank goodness because worrying about your love life left me as disappointed as someone waiting for rain in the Sahara Desert!" She cackled as she walked out the door.

"Bye Auntie Rachie," Olivia said, looking up from her coloring book to wave when she heard the door open.

"Goodbye Liv. You take care of Mommy, okay? Don't let her do anything I wouldn't do," she instructed the little girl as she flashed her a big smile.

"Okay," Olivia nodded and returned the smile. "I make Mommy be good," She added as she blew Rachel a kiss.

Rachel did the same to the little girl, in a most dramatic manner of course, like she was a beauty queen or something. "Great. See you two tomorrow," Rachel told them as she closed the door behind her.

"Liv, Aunt Rachel is crazy isn't she?" Brooke asked her daughter as she took a seat at the table across from the blue-eyed babe.

"She is so silly!" Olivia laughed as she looked up at her mother. "She going on vacation too, right?" The little girl asked, looking at Brooke expectantly for an answer.

"Yes, she's going too. Why? Would it not be fun with just Mommy?" She asked, half afraid to hear the girl's answer.

"Yes, it fun with you, Mommy. But Auntie Rachie said she would protect me from the mean girl with swirly hair, like Ursula," Olivia nodded, her eyes wide. It was so funny how she hung on Rachel's every word, taking whatever she told her as fact.

"Is that what Aunt Rachel told you?" Brooke asked her suspiciously.

"Yes, she telled me that," Olivia confessed. "It make me scared. But Auntie Rachie said it will be fun and I only sees nice people."

"Well that much is true, Honey. Everyone were going to meet is nice. And they used to be Mommy and Aunt Rachel's friends," she told the small girl, hoping to ease whatever anxieties Rachel might have created about the trip.

"Why they not your friend now, Mommy?" Olivia asked her, looking back down at the picture she was drawing.

Damn, was this twenty questions or something? But Brooke was used to the third degree or the fifth what Rachel usually gave her that was two degrees worse; Olivia was just getting to the age where she had to know everything about everything. "Well Baby, sometimes when big people grow up, they are different than who they were when they were small. And things change," she tried to explain.

Olivia nodded her head, not understanding what her mom was saying. "Like they got mean?" She asked her for some sort of clarification.

Brooke propped her head on her hand. "I guess you could say that," she mumbled, blowing a stray piece of hair from her face. There were only so many things you could explain to a three-year old, not matter how smart. And this definitely wasn't one of those things.

"Seriously, Brooke, we're flying coach?" Rachel asked her friend in disbelief. It was Wednesday and they were scheduled to leave for Tree Hill in two days. "You couldn't spring for first class?"

Brooke just threw her a WTF expressing and went back to folding Olivia's tiny clothes and placing them in her Dora the Explorer suitcase. "Well considering the fact that you got a free ticket, I wouldn't be complaining too much Missy," she said, knowing Rachel was only joking with her.

"Listen sluttle, I didn't ask to come on this little shindig. One of the only people I even remotely liked in Tree Hill doesn't live there anymore. And frankly, there is only one person worth going back to see, and he is not even one of the one's that you are worried about," she told her, throwing her hands into the air.

"Whoa, calm down, Rach," Brooke instructed. "What are you so worked up about?" She asked, taking a break from folding the clothes to look at her friend.

"Nothing, just nothing," she said, shaking her head in disbelief. "Just you and your stupid hard-headed ass. You know going to Tree Hill is only going to get ugly," she added, sitting on Olivia's tiny bed.

Brooke sighed; she knew Rachel was only trying to look out for her. But seriously, she had had a mom once before and look how well that turned out. "Rachel, it is going to be fine," she tried to convince her friend. "Everything will be okay. Nothing is going to change."

Now it was Rachel's turn to give Brooke a WTF look. "How can you honestly say that, Brooke? Do you not think when Lucas lays his eyes on that little girl that he will fall head over heels for her? Can you honestly tell me you are not worried?" She asked her all in rapid-fire.

It took Rachel a long time to open up, and a long time to be comfortable with people. But once you were her friend, you were her friend for life. She didn't like things that threatened her normalcy. And she would do anything in her power to stop them from occurring. She was a protector.

Brooke hung her head. Honestly, she didn't know what would happen when Lucas saw Olivia. But she didn't think Lucas would flat out act like she didn't exist for the first three years of her life either. People can surprise you that way. Whatever happened, Olivia was her daughter and she wanted her to meet all the people that had been important to her in her own life. She was tired of hiding.

"I don't know, Rach," Brooke finally answered her; looking up to meet her friend's gaze. "But I feel like I need to go home. Not just for Jamie's birthday or for the wedding, but for me. Honestly, I never felt like I got closure there. And maybe that is partly my own fault, but I was young and hurt back then. I've grown a lot in these past three years and I feel like this is something I need to do."

Rachel nodded, still not fully agreeing with her friend's rationale behind the whole thing. All she could see was Brooke's heart breaking all over again, and that is not something she wanted for her friend, especially not if she thought she could prevent it.

Brooke sensing Rachel's hesitance added, "I know it sounds stupid and lame, but I can't explain it. It is just something I need to do. And I need you there with me."

"Then I'll be there," Rachel told her, rising from Olivia's bed to stand beside her friend. "I've got to go pack. I'll see you in the morning to watch Liv," she said to her friend, giving her a quick hug before walking out of the room.

Brooke let her body slum down in front of Olivia's bed. Maybe Rachel was right. Maybe going back to Tree Hill was a bad idea. There was only one way to find out. Rachel had always told her to live her life, no regrets. Well for her to do that, she knew what she had to do. She definitely had to return to Tree Hill.

Okay, so I am sure everyone will be excited for next chapter when we get to see more of our Tree Hill gang! I know it has been a kind of drug out time for them to get there but next chapter...voila! Thank you to everyone who read last chapter...and especially the reviewers! You are all awesome! Can't wait to see what you thought of this chapter!!

Audra