Wow, thanks so much everyone for all the amazing reviews - over 200! You all are the best. I had never expected that many for my first story.

I'm sad to say that this is last chapter so please review.

And keep an eye for my new story which I should be posting soon.

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Haley walked across the hall. She really needed some advice from her best friend right about now. The night before had been horrendous. And she needed to talk to her best friend about what had happened. She had wanted to talk to her about what happened last night right after it had happened, but she couldn't make herself do so. She needed some more time. Besides she didn't want to ruin Brooke's night as well, so she had just told Brooke that she was going to head home early. And like a good best friend, Brooke had given Haley the keys to her itty-bitty, blue convertible—courtesy of Mommy Davis and Daddy Davis Dearest—and assured Haley that Lucas would give her a ride home.

After getting no response to knocking on the door to Brooke's room, Haley turned the handle on the door and pushed it open. A laugh escaped her mouth once she entered the room and she saw Brooke half hanging off the bed with her mouth wide open. Oh how Haley wished she had a camera right now. Too bad the batteries for her camera were dead.

Haley made her way over to the bed and sat on the other side where Brooke wasn't occupying any space. "Wake up, Brookie." Haley sing-songed loudly. It was around eleven thirty and she shouldn't have been surprised that Brooke was still sleeping. She always was late sleeper; especially compared to Haley, who was always a rise-with-the-sun kind of girl.

Brooke shot up from her spot instantly causing her to fall off the bed onto her plush, carpeted floor. "Ouch!" She whined as she landed hard on her butt. "Haley!" She cried.

"What?" Haley managed to ask in between her bubbling laughter. She couldn't help herself. It was funny.

"Help me up." She demanded. "It's your fault I'm on the floor anyway." Brooke said as she reached out her arms for Haley to come help her get up.

"What?! How is my fault that you fell off the bed? It's not like I pushed you off." Haley laughed as she crawled to the other side of the bed to help her stubborn friend, knowing that Brooke would sit there complaining until Haley helped her up.

"Well it was your wake up call that forced me to fall therefore it is your fault." Brooke explained as Haley pulled her up off the floor.

"Whatever you say, Brookie." Haley gave up as she watched Brooke get back on her bed.

"You got that right." Brooke winked playfully. "So what brings you to room at..." She trailed off, turning to look at the clock. "at 11:35?" She finished and watched Haley tense up a little bit at the question. "What happened?" She asked becoming serious knowing there was something weird going on if Haley tensed at a simple question like that.

Haley laid back against the pillows and closed her eyes as the memory flooded her mind again for what felt like the millionth time since it happened. "Last night Nathan kind of said something to me." She revealed quietly.

Brooke felt anger flow through her at the way Haley spoke. "What did he do to you now?" She asked furiously.

"No, Brooke nothing bad—well, I don't think...I'm not sure."

"So what did he say to you?" She repeated herself.

Haley swallowed hard. She wasn't sure she wanted to have this conversation anymore. But she knew there was no way that Brooke was going to let her off that easy and just forget about this. She took a deep breath before saying, "Nathan told me he was in love me." She confessed quietly.

Brooke's eyes widened. That was unexpected. Maybe not so much as the night before came back into play.

Brooke watched her best friend go before turning around and narrowing her eyes. She made her way over to Nathan and Rachel. "I just need to borrow him for one second." She said sweetly as she grabbed Nathan's arm and pulled him away from Rachel and everyone else. As soon as they were alone Brooke dropped her smile and narrowed her eyes again. "What the hell is the matter with you?" She hissed.

"What? What are you talking about?" He asked confusedly. 'What the hell is going on?' He thought.

"I'm talking about you and Rach-ho." She clarified. "Why are you hanging around her? Especially when you still love Haley and she still loves you?"

His eyes widened at her words. "What did you just say?" He asked stunned.

"What, can't you hear?"

"You just said I still love Haley and she still loves me." He repeated her exact words.

"Yeah so what?" Brooke asked confused. Her eyes then widened as she clasped a hand over her mouth. "Oh my God!" She gasped. "I can't believe I just said that." She said more to herself. She hadn't even been thinking about it. She had been so furious with Nathan being with Rachel that she hadn't thought about what she was saying. "Do you?" She finally asked, bringing Nathan out of his own thoughts.

"What? No. No." He denied profusely, shaking his head. "Did she say something to you?" He asked curiously.

"No, I just, well I can just see it. Kind of." She stuttered. Brooke wasn't one to get nervous, but she had just blurted out how her friend feels about this boy to said boy and Haley hadn't even admitted it yet. This was not good. Not good at all.

"Brooke–"

"No." She said cutting him off. "We never had this conversation. Got it? Great." She said answering her own question before leaving.

Uh oh, Brooke thought. She mentally cured herself and her big mouth. "So what did you say?" She asked carefully. She wasn't sure if Haley was here to yell at her or thank her. Or if Haley even knew that she was one that had put that thought into Nathan's head even though he had it in his heart all along. Haley did, they just both needed a push in the right direction.

Haley frustratingly huffed. "I said 'thank you'. Can you believe that?! Thank you. He tells me that he is in love with me and I thank him. Oh wait, no actually first I said 'oh' and then I said 'thank you'. God, I am such an idiot!" Haley rambled on.

So she must not know, Brooke thought to herself. "Uh Hales—"

"What am I supposed to do now?" She looked over at Brooke—not only a fashion expert, but a boy expert as well—for some guidance. "Help me." She cried.

"Are you in love with him?" Brooke asked simply.

"You just get straight to the point, don't you?" Haley muttered under her breath all the while making sure it was loud enough for Brooke to hear.

"Haley?" Brooke prodded.

"I...—"

"Cause that's what it all comes down to you. You know? Either you are in love with him or you aren't. But no ones knows the truth except for you. You just need to admit it to yourself if you are. True love doesn't mean that you won't get in fights or be scared or even break up, it means that you'll always get back together. If you are in love with him, then you need to tell him." Brooke enlightened. "But if you aren't then you have to tell him that too. Because you can't leave it like this, Haley."

"I don't know. I mean I think I might know deep down. But I think I'm afraid to know. Scared to be in love. To be in love with Nathan." Haley admitted softly.

Brooke pulled Haley into a hug. "It's okay, Hales. It's okay to be afraid and scared. But it's also okay to be in love." She told her friend, seeing as she was speaking from experience.

She had been scared to death when she had first realized that she was in love with Lucas. She was afraid to love him, anyone really. She had been afraid to need him and to be vulnerable, but as much as she was afraid she was twice as much in love with him. And her love for him had triumphed her being scared. And in the end he loved her too and it was amazing.

Haley chewed on her lip nervously as she contemplated on knocking on the big, wooden door standing in front of her. She had been standing out here on the door step for the about the past ten minutes now, trying to force herself to knock on the door, but she hadn't had enough will power to do so yet. She wasn't even sure if he would answer if he knew it was her. Or if he would even talk to her once he saw that it was her.

She closed her eyes as she thought back to the night before. Again.

"Um, I don't really know...well I...I love you. I'm in love with you." He stuttered to get out.

"Oh." She said barely audible. She immediately got off of his lap and stood in front of him.

"Hales?" He asked confused.

"Uh, thank you?" She said before her bottom lip made it's way in between her teeth and her eyebrows furrowed as if she was in deep concentration.

He raised his eyebrows. "Thank you? That's all you have to say?" He asked incredulously.

"Nathan–"

"No, it's okay." He cut her off. "Look, I uh, I gotta go." He muttered before walking away and leaving her standing there alone.

She felt horrible. But it had come as such a shock to her. She didn't even know what to think, let alone what to say. So many things were running through her mind at the moment that those three words had come out of his mouth.

She wasn't even sure how she was feeling. Especially after their break up because of her finding out he was basically using her and then having to see Rachel hang all over him and him not do anything to stop it. Her emotions were going crazy and they were all over the place. She couldn't even think properly about how she felt about the whole situation anymore. Everything was so messed up and crazy. She wasn't sure about anything anymore. And the last thing she had expected him to say to her was that he loved her; that he was in love with her.

Her mind had went into over-drive as she heard him say those words to her. She had never expected it and she didn't know what to say. She wasn't sure that she would even be able to say anything at all. But thank you? Seriously? She mentally kicked herself over and over again every time she thought about it. Out of all the things that possibly could've came out of her mouth it just had to be 'thank you'. God, she was such an idiot. And that memory would never let her forget it either.

Nathan probably hated her know. She wouldn't be surprised if he did. If he never wanted to see her face or hear her name again she wouldn't be surprised at that either. She was such an idiot and that had probably hurt him as much as her finding out about the bet had hurt her. And she would never wish that kind of pain on anybody. Not even her worst enemy, let alone Nathan.

But her conversation with Brooke this morning had given her some insight. After they had talked, Haley had retreated back to her bedroom after thanking Brooke. She had sat on her bed just thinking for almost a half an hour straight. She had even realized how long she had been sitting there. She had quickly gotten a shower, blow dried her hair into her natural, frizzy, curls and gotten dressed before rushing out of the house.

Haley took a long, deep breath before she raised her hand to the door. Closing her eyes, she stretched her hand out and knocked on the door three times. Her eyes shot open immediately. She hadn't expected to knock. She didn't think that she would actually knock yet. She wasn't ready for this. Maybe it wasn't too late to run away before some one answered.

She took a couple of steps backwards, away from the door. She could leave and no one would even know it was her. Hopefully. She started to turn around. She was going to make a run for it while she still could.

At least that was what she was planning to do until she heard the door suddenly open and a male voice call out, "Haley?"

Haley clenched her eyes shut tight and slowly turned back around to face the door. Opening her eyes she sighed with a little relief when she saw that it was Lucas who was standing there. "Hi." She said nervously and gave him a small wave of.

"Hey." He responded as he raised a questioning eyebrow at her.

He must know, She thought to herself in her head.

"What are you doing here?" He asked her. "Sorry." He apologized immediately as he realized how mean that must have sounded. This was his best friend after all. "That probably made me sound like a jerk."

"No, it's okay." She assured him.

"You okay?" He asked as he brought her closer for a hug.

"Not really sure right now." She answered just being content with hugging her best friend.

"Yo, Luke, who was at the door?" A voice called out, causing Lucas and Haley to pull away from each other.

"Uh, it's—" Lucas began.

"Haley." Nathan finished as he came into view from behind Lucas.

"Yeah." Lucas said. "Listen, I really should get going." He said knowing that the two of them had some things that they really needed to discuss privately. "See you later?" He asked, reaching his fist out.

Nathan nodded and bumped fists with his brother.

Lucas turned back to Haley and gave her a quick hug. "Good luck." He whispered to her before he let her go and left.

Haley shifted uncomfortably under Nathan's gaze. She felt so awkward standing there on his door step. "Um, maybe, maybe this wasn't such a good idea." She stuttered to get out softly.

Nathan nodded his head as he reached out to shut the door.

"No, wait." Haley said, putting her hand on the door. "We have to talk. I mean I have to talk to you." She explained.

He looked at her expectantly when she didn't say anything else.

"Do you think that I could maybe come in?" She meekly asked him. She never wanted it to be like this. She wished it wasn't like this.

Nathan stood there for a few minutes like he was contemplating on whether or not he was going to let her come inside. He begrudgingly stepped aside, creating space for her to come in. He wasn't really sure if he was going to regret this or not. Not to mention that he really wasn't in the mood to talk to her, but he remembered when he had really wanted to talk to her after the break-up, so going against how badly he felt like slamming the door in her face and telling her to never come back to protect his pride, he allowed her to come inside.

Haley walked in and watched Nathan shut the door. "So I guess sorry is a good start." She said nervously once he turned around to face her.

He folded his arms across his Tree Hill Ravens Basketball T-shirt covered chest.

"Okay, I can see that you're not going to make this easy for me." She said to more to herself than to him even though she spoke out loud. "I, uh, I don't really know where to begin." She laughed nervously.

"What are you doing here, Haley?" Nathan cut in, him finally speaking to her.

"I just have so much to say to you." She told him.

He nodded and motioned for her to follow him when he began walking away from the doorway and towards the living room where he sat on the couch and Haley sat on the the chair facing him.

"I guess I should start from the beginning." She said. "You hurt me Nathan. You hurt me so bad." She said bluntly.

"If you came here to put me down and make feel worse about the stupid bet then you can leave." He said coldly.

"No, that's not why I came here. I just needed you to hear that from me." She explained.

"Well I did, so you don't have to tell me again."

"Moving on." She stated. "I was mad. And sad. And all these other things that I can't even begin to explain. So I'm sorry that I wouldn't talk to you right away, but I couldn't make myself want to listen to you at the time. That's mostly why I avoided you." She told him. "I didn't want to avoid you, I just...I just couldn't be around you."

"I was a super-bitch to you and I'm sorry. You didn't deserve that. Well, you kind of did, but maybe not everything I said. I was pretty harsh." She admitted honestly.

Nathan nodded his head in agreement.

"Oh and I'm also sorry about the whole not telling you about Gigi being your new tutor thing. I shouldn't have done that. You were the one who needed the tutoring and it should have been up to you. It was completely uncalled for an unprofessional. I understand why you were upset about that. "

"And then you had Rach-h—Rachel." She gritted out through her teeth. "And honestly—I was jealous okay. So if that was your intention, well it worked."

"It wasn't." He said.

"What?"

"I wasn't trying to make you jealous." He told her.

"Oh." She said softly. "So you like her?" She asked. "Well, that's, that's good." She said trying to be strong.

"No. I don't like her." He clarified, surprised that that was what Haley thought. Didn't she remember what he had said to her the night before? "She's actually really annoying." He admitted. Only Lucas knew that Nathan couldn't stand Rachel, but for some reason even after everything, he couldn't stand to have Haley thinking that he liked Rachel.

Haley nodded her head. "Okay, so no Rachel." She said. "Well, basically seeing you around her made me feel even worse. I mean it's so obvious that she wants you." She stated with more edge in her voice than she would have liked.

"At least someone wants me." He grumbled. "Sorry." He said almost immediately after.

She nodded. "It's not that I don't want you Nathan. That's not the problem." She admitted. "Last night, when you found me in the backyard, I was mad at you. Mostly because you were hanging out with Rach-ho and I—"

"Rach-what?" He asked amusedly with a smirk forming on his face.

She smiled meekly. "Rach-ho." She repeated. "Brooke and I kind of started calling her that once we saw she liked you and Lucas." She revealed.

"Nice." He said.

She let out a small laugh. "Um, last night when you said that you, well you know...when you said that you loved me; that you were in love with me...um, did you really mean that?" She stuttered to ask.

He nodded his head. "I didn't really know it at first, but when Brooke had mentioned love it kind of all made sense and came to me."

"I felt like such an idiot." She confessed. "I had never felt more stupid in my life then when I said thank you. It's not really how I pictured that happening, you know?"

"Yeah I know."

"Nathan, I am so sorry." She said getting up from her spot on the chair and moving over to the couch to sit next to him, but still leaving a little bit of distance between the two. "I was just so confused about my feelings. I didn't even know how I felt about anything at the time. I know that probably isn't really a good excuse for me being an idiot and saying thank you and oh, but I was just so confused and all of my thoughts were all jumbled together."

"But I though about it all night and all morning. So then I finally went to talk to Brooke and she made me realize that I do love you. I am just so scared. So afraid. Terrified, actually. I don't want to be vulnerable, but that's part of what being in love is about. I am so afraid of getting hurt again and I don't know where to go from here, but I couldn't leave you wondering if I loved you or not, especially after some of the things I had said when you came to talk to me.

"It's not like we were in love. It was a stupid high school fling, Nathan. It meant nothing." The harsh words she had spat at him flashed through her mind.

"So here it is. Here I am, being afraid and vulnerable. I love you. And I understand if it's too late or not enough anymore and you want nothing to do with me and—"

"Haley." He cut her off.

"Huh?"

"Thank you." He smirked at her. He closed the distance between them and captured her mouth with his in a fiery, passionate kiss before pulling away and resting his forehead against hers. "Say it again." He demanded against her lips as he brought his mouth back down to hers.

She smiled at him. "I love you." She said breathlessly.

"I love you too, Hales." He said before capturing her lips in a kiss again.

They fell in love—all because of a bet.