So, it has been brought to my attention by a review that this story isn't very "realistic." And I hate that I let a review offend me like that, but it has, so I just thought I would bring some attention to that...you can interpret this story however you want. Like it, don't like it, whatever, but just remember that this story is just that - a story. It's not real life. I don't mean for this to be completely realistic or whatever. I'm just enjoying writing it, and hopefully you guys are still liking it.

Now that my little rant is over, I hope you like this next installment. I'm not sure I'm completely satisfied with it, but hey, it's here, so I might as well roll with it...enjoy, and keep reviewing! You guys are awesome!

-Lindsay

"Nathan!" Haley called out, trying to wake him from what seemed to her a very, very deep sleep. "Nathan Scott!"

Finally after she yelled at him for what seemed like the fiftieth time, he rolled over and looked at her. "Jesus, Haley, what the hell do you want?" He glanced at the clock near her bed. "It's eight o'clock."

"I know," she replied, sitting on the bed to tie her shoes. She'd been up since six thirty. She had already showered, eaten, called Jared, Taylor, and her manager. She was doing well. She had plans with the girls at nine, and she knew that the guys were doing something around that same time so she figured he needed to get up eventually. "But I think you're supposed to meet Luke and Jake around nine so I thought you needed to get up."

"How considerate of you." He rolled his eyes. "I actually set my phone alarm for eight thirty, so I was going to get up. Just not this early."

"Good thing we didn't stay married then," she muttered. "I'd be waking you up early everyday and you'd probably want to kill me."

"Kind of like how I want to kill you now?" he mumbled, pushing himself out of bed. She had already woken him up. There was no point in just laying there anymore. She had ruined it for him. He was definitely not a morning person.

"Exactly." She smirked.

He groaned and made his way to the bathroom. Looking in the mirror, he studied himself closely. He didn't think this was where his life was going to end up. He knew he'd be in the NBA. That was a given, and it had been the plan his entire life. But he always figured he'd have Haley by his side through everything. When he married her, he was sure they'd stick together forever. He didn't think he'd go back to Tree Hill for a wedding while the girl he'd been dating for months now was working back in Los Angeles. And he also figured that if he did have a new girlfriend, he'd be in love with her by now, and at this point, he just...wasn't.

If he were to be honest with himself, Haley was the only girl he had ever been in love with, and a small part of him still was. But he couldn't act on that...not now. Not after everything that had been said and done between them. He had had several girlfriends in the past few years. But he never loved them any of them, and he found that a little strange because he had fallen in love with Haley quite quickly. That was the way it was though, and he didn't know how to change it. Haley was the only one to capture his heart that special way.

An hour later, Nathan was sitting at a table in Jake's house, trying to plan a quick bachelor party with Lucas while Jake ran Jenny to a friend's house. "Strippers?" Luke asked, looking at his little brother.

Nathan looked up, a smile on his face. "I'm never one to turn down strippers, Luke," he informed him.

"You just turn down a lot of other things," Lucas said quietly, looking back down at the paper he was writing on. He still had a lot of planning to do. They were getting married in like two days and he had nothing done for Jake's party.

"Excuse me?" Nathan blinked a few times. "What's that supposed to mean?"

Lucas sighed. He hadn't meant to say what he did. It just came out. And now that it did, he was going to have to explain to Nathan what he meant by that, and Nathan was going to get all pissy and it was just not a good way to begin the morning. Brooke had already gotten her period the night before, and he thought that was going to ruin his day...but no. It was probably going to be Nathan's bad attitude.

"Nathan, it's fairly obvious to the rest of the group that you and Hales aren't over each other," he said as if it were the simplest thing in the world.

"God," he scoffed. "I haven't seen her in six years, Lucas. That's ridiculous. Of course I'm over her and she's over me. She's marrying that one guy. Jerry - "

"Jared," Lucas corrected, a smile playing on his lips. "Not Jerry."

"Whatever. I didn't turn Haley down this week," he said, referring to Lucas's earlier comment. "So I don't understand why you're telling me I turn things down."

"You turned her down six years ago," Lucas reminded him. "And if you don't mind me saying so, it was probably the most jackass move you've ever pulled, Nate. Worse than how you were when you first came to town. You broke her heart back then."

"I do mind you saying so," he bit out. "That door was closed a long time ago. And it's not going to reopen just because Haley and I are in the same place. It's - "

"You were in California when she was," Lucas pointed out. "The same place and the door didn't get reopened...but now...you've kind of worked through some of your issues and you're talking and I just...I think that you're not as over her as you're telling me. And it's the same for her."

"She is engaged, Lucas. Engaged," he emphasized. "There's nothing there anymore."

"You can be with someone and not be over somebody else!"

"I'm not you, Brooke, and Peyton," Nathan snarled, getting more pissed off by the second. He loved his brother, but Lucas and his girlfriend were both a little too nosy for his liking sometimes. He wanted to live his life without his meddling brother or his equally meddling girlfriend telling him what he was feeling at all times.

"That was high school," Lucas said calmly, not at all offended by Nathan's bad attitude. He had expected this. He had been bracing himself for the jerk he knew his brother to be.

"Which is the same time Haley and I were married!" he exclaimed, finally getting his point across. That was high school and times had changed. They were grown up now with their own separate lives, and going back to the way things were in high school just didn't exist. Those lives didn't exist.

"Marriage is different than some high school crushes. If you married her you obviously planned on loving her forever. Forever doesn't last until you're like twenty-five, Nathan. It lasts...well, forever. And I think you'll have feelings for her forever. I'm not saying you're in love with her. I'm saying you still have some feelings deep down even if you won't admit them."

He knew in his heart that Lucas had a point, and he also knew he had feelings for Haley, but that didn't mean his older brother needed to know about them. He was going to just let Lucas think he was wrong. He didn't need an 'I told you so' or anything from anyone. Yeah, he had feelings for Haley, and he always would but he didn't want to act on those, and if she had some for him, he was pretty sure she wasn't going to act on them either.

He rolled his eyes. "Luke, just plan your damn stripper party."

Lucas laughed. "Whatever you say."

--

"Hales," Brooke whined. "Just tell us that you have feelings!"

Haley rolled her eyes at her friend and shook her head for what had to be the thirtieth time that morning. "Brooke, no! I do not have feelings for Nathan Scott. That was high school, and newsflash! I'm all grown up now!"

"Me too, and I fell for Lucas in high school, and I'm still with him."

"Yeah," Peyton jumped in, looking up from her sketch pad. She was currently working on something for Brooke's fashion line. "I fell for Jake back then and here I am, marrying him in just two days."

"You also fell for Luke," Haley pointed out, sipping her coffee.

"Temporary insanity." She waved it off. "Jake's my forever, Haley, and I think in your heart, Nathan's probably yours."

"Okay, you know what?" Haley set down her mug and looked at her friends. She was just going to tell them about her and Jared. It was time to just get it out. Maybe then they would get off her back about being in love with Nathan or whatever they were trying to tell her.

She had some feelings, but she always would. She figured that was to be expected when you marry a boy in high school and end that marriage. You always come back to your first love, someone had told her once, and she was sure to go back to hers. But she wasn't going to. That was the thing. Haley was with Jared now, and it was going to stay that way.

"I am marrying Jared," she blurted out, watching the eyes of her friends grow wider by the millisecond. "He asked me in Starbucks, I said yes, and here we are."

Brooke coughed. "You're...you're marrying him?"

"Sure am." She nodded.

"I don't know if I buy it," Brooke said to Peyton, raising an eyebrow. "Where's the ring?"

"I didn't wear it," she admitted. "It's in my purse. I didn't want to take away from your week, Peyton."

"Either that or you didn't want to make Nathan mad," Peyton said to her, putting down her pencil.

"Nathan has nothing to do with this," she bit out, annoyed. She wasn't concerned about Nathan's thoughts on her engagement...at least she thought she wasn't. "When I came back here, I knew that Nathan would be an ass...and you know, if I announced an engagement, his attitude wouldn't have changed. He'd still be an ass, so my decision wasn't about Nathan. At all."

"So this was all about Peyton?" Brooke inquired, raising a perfectly shaped eyebrow. She was having a tiny problem believing that. Haley still loved Nathan, she just knew it. While she knew that Haley, in her own way, loved Jared, she also knew that Nathan was Haley's soul mate...if the two of them would have just realized that by now. She wouldn't admit it to anyone that she felt like that, but she knew it back in high school, and she still knew it. They were meant to be...it didn't take a genius to figure that out.

"Yes!" she nearly shouted. "This was about Peyton! I'm not taking away from your week!" she addressed her friend, who was seriously concentrating on this sketch of hers. "I'm not going to take anything else away from your week, Peyton. I came back to Tree Hill, and that was pretty big news. But announcing an engagement? That's even bigger."

"If Nathan weren't here, would you?" Peyton asked, smirking a little.

Haley groaned. Of course they were going to do this. Ask her questions to get her to admit she still had feelings for Nathan. It was so Peyton and Brooke like. "You guys..."

"Answer the question, Haley," Peyton urged.

"Yeah," Brooke jumped in. "Answer the question, Haley."

She sighed and looked away. "I honestly have no idea. Do I

worry about how Nathan feels about it? Yeah, I do, but I don't know why. He's dating that one girl, and I'm sure he doesn't worry about how I'm feeling about that."

"You would have told us," Brooke surmised, nodding to Peyton. She was sure of it. She knew they both had hidden feelings, and she knew Haley would have told. She just knew it.

"Whatever. It doesn't even matter because that's a different situation that's not even happening."

"But if it was, you would have told us!" Brooke sing-songed, smiling. "You would have told us!"

"Shut up," Haley grumbled, rolling her eyes.

--

"How was it with the guys?" Haley asked Nathan later that day, when they had both somehow managed to get back to the hotel at the same time. Both of them were sick of their friends' questioning and taunting, and just wanted to get back to the hotel room. They both needed breaks. His answer was an eye roll and a shake of his head. "That bad, huh?"

"Hell," he muttered, throwing his sweatshirt on the cot. "It was pure hell."

"Why?" She plopped down on her bed, crossing her legs Indian styled, waiting for him to continue. "Did Lucas beat you in one on one or something?"

"Please," he scoffed. "I am an NBA player, Haley. Do you think Lucas is going to beat me in a damn one on one game?"

"Geez." She held up her hand in order to somehow fight off his harsh words. "I was just asking. And Lucas beat you before," she reminded him.

He frowned. "That was one time. In high school. He didn't even play in college because of his heart!"

"I know, Nathan. Why are you in such a bad mood? I didn't do anything to you today so quit taking your issues out on me!"

"Sorry," he apologized, looking contrite. "It's just...well, Luke just kept grilling me on how we weren't over each other. Then Jake came home and jumped in on it too. Finally, I just had it. I was gonna snap, Haley. I had to get out of there."

She was surprised to hear that. She knew girls were like that with their friends. It had been like that ever since elementary if she could remember correctly. Little girls were always wanting to know who their friends had crushes on. Of course that would carry on when they were getting out of college. Girls just didn't lose that trait...but guys? She had no idea guys were like that.

"They really did that?"

"Yeah," he confirmed, flopping his head down on his pillow after he got on his cot. "It was awful. I couldn't handle it."

"Understandable."

"Right." He nodded. "How was it with Brooke and Peyton?"

"Actually..." She laughed at the irony of the situation. "They were talking to me about the same thing, and I got fed up with it too."

He looked over at her, raising his eyebrows. "Seriously? Wow. They're all perfect for each other."

"Yeah. So," she said after a brief pause, "was Luke right?"

His face turned red and he looked back up at the ceiling. Of course Lucas was right. Coming back to Tree Hill just made him sure that he had feelings for her, but the question was, did he really want to be honest with Haley about them? She had a serious boyfriend - well, fiancé now - and he wasn't sure telling her the truth would be good for her relationship. But then again, she wasn't even sure she wanted to marry Jared anymore.

"I, um..." He sighed, not answering her.

She got up and walked over to him, sitting by his chest. He sat up on his elbows and looked her straight in her chocolate brown eyes. "Was Lucas right?" she repeated.

She was so close to him. He could smell the hint of minty gum on her breath, and the vanilla shampoo she had used that morning, which was still sitting in the shower. He noticed the tiny freckle below her lip, and the way her forehead crinkled a little when she was serious. He took in her new hair color, and the way it matched everything about her perfectly. The blonde matched her deep brown eyes, and it was also the perfect color for her personality. Haley was a bright, friendly, sunny girl, and her hair definitely enhanced that about her.

He had to tell her. There was no way he couldn't now that she was asking. It didn't mean anything, but if he had learned anything from being with Haley, it was that honesty was completely necessary. Without it, he had nothing.

"Haley," he whispered, not trusting his voice. "I think that there's always going to be something in my heart for you. You were the girl of my dreams, and I don't forget that easily."

Her eyes widened as she looked at him. She had no idea he was going to be that open and honest about this topic when she had asked him. She had expected him to brush it off, saying that he had a girlfriend and anything he felt didn't matter anymore. But he hadn't. And now here they were - sitting on this little, tiny bed with Nathan admitting there was still something in his heart for her.

Before she could say anything, he was brushing back a lock of hair from her eye. "I mean that, Haley. You were the girl of my dreams, and now that I'm seeing you again...I can't help but wonder what went wrong with us." She gave him a soft smile, waiting for him to continue. Leaning up on his elbows even further, just to get closer to her, he continued. "I told myself that I wasn't going to act on anything I felt for you anymore. But you're sitting here, asking me if Lucas and everyone is right? They are, Haley, they are. A part of me is still in love with you, and I thought it was dead, but it's not."

She nodded and blew out a slow breath. "Wow. Never in a million years would I have thought I'd be hearing that from you," she admitted, looking him straight in his deep blue eyes. "But it's really nice to hear it," she added, seeing the look on his face. "A part of me is still in love with you too, Nathan." He smiled widely at her, pleased to know she felt the same way. "I thought it was dead, just like you did, but it's not. And I think that's why we both still wonder sometimes about the what-ifs. What if we had stayed together, and what if you had taken me back the night I showed up on the porch? But we can't dwell on that...we're here now, and we just have to deal with things the way they are."

Without waiting for her to continue or to form a sentence himself, Nathan's lips were on hers in a crushing kiss. It was the most passion Haley had felt in six years, she was sure of that. Her hands came up to cup his face, and slowly but surely, he laid back on the cot, pulling her on top of him.

Her hands began combing through his thick hair, and his traveled the length of her back. The feel of her body on his made him think something of Tree Hill that he hadn't thought in a long, long time: it was home. With Haley there, it was home.