A/N: Hello! Ok so just some information you need to know about the story. Haley and Nathan will be endgame, the main story is centered around them. There will be a small side story with Brooke and Lucas too. Now I love Julian and Brooke truly but for this fic, Brooke and Lucas work well and are needed for the progression of the story. Peyton is in it but in a minor role compared to the others. The whole idea behind the story is that Nathan comes into Haley's life and he just changes things for her and she changes things for him. Whether in a good or bad way,or both, you just have to read to find out. Nathan and Haley do not down right hate each other in this fic either, they aren't exactly friends or friendly with each other but they don't go out of their way to make each others lives miserable or anything. The fic will be angst filled and fluffy and i'm hoping a bit fun.

I don't normally write One Tree Hill fan fics, I normally do Gossip Girl and Veronica Mars ones, but I am genuinely excited for this story the ideas for it keep coming. I hope you guys will like it! Please review feedback is always appreciated.

Last thing! There is a time jump in the first chapter, the first scene is the present day but the next scene in chapter 1 goes back a few months. The chapters will lead up to this first scene. Therefore it is vague. Also there isn't a lot of Haley and Nathan interactions in this first chapter but from chapter 2 it increases substantially. Just keep in mind that I am setting things up.

Happy reading!

Never Let Me Go

Chapter 1: It All Begins

Present Day

Haley's hands were shaking she couldn't believe she was this angry. Her thoughts were racing and her heart was pounding. In a few seconds she would have reached her destination. Ignoring the pain in her ankle, she continued to push on. The double black doors loomed in front of her, they were intimidating, but that didn't stop her from pushing them open. As soon as she stepped inside the venue, her senses were overwhelmed. There were a lot of people there and Haley found the noise particularly distracting. She realized she was on the wrong side of the room, which furthered added to the confused state her mind had temporarily entered into. None of that mattered, however, when she saw the red haired cheerleader across the room from her. Haley took a deep breath and walked straight towards her and across the basketball court. She vaguely registered people yelling at her. Finally, she stopped in front of the girl who had put her in such a rage. She knew what she was about to do was more Brooke's style, but hey, sometimes the girl was the best role model.

'Rachel!' Haley called out. Rachel turned to her with a smug look on her face.

'What, Haley?' That's when Haley lifted her hand and promptly slapped her. Hard. Her hand was stinging but the shocked look on Rachel's face had been worth it.

'That's all.' Haley replied and finally took in her surroundings. The place had gone quiet, which was something considering it was a basketball game. She looked to her right and saw Brooke staring at her, wide eyed but smiling. She looked back at Rachel who was clutching her cheek and too stunned to do anything. She looked behind her and saw that the basket ball players had stopped playing. Five seconds passed when she heard someone calling her.

'Hales,' she turned around and saw Nathan intently staring at her and clutching the basketball. He took a step towards her. Lucas was standing next to Nathan and was watching her very carefully.

'Don't.' she firmly said to him, which caused Nathan to take another step towards her. She looked to Lucas who placed a hand on Nathan's arm preventing him from moving any closer to her. Haley turned back to Brooke and shrugged, she needed to get out of there her feelings were beginning to overwhelm her. She turned to leave and before she had made it very far she heard Brooke's voice.

'And that ladies and gentleman's was Haley James!' Brooke exclaimed and the next voice she heard she recognized too.

'Go Haley!' Peyton began cheering and a moment later Brooke couldn't help but join in. The support she had just received from Brooke and Peyton momentarily suspended the whirlpool of emotions going through Haley and made her give a small chuckle. She reached the door and turned back, just long enough to see the basketball fall from Nathan's grasp. She headed out into the crisp air and finally felt like she could breathe again…

A few months earlier

Haley opened her eyes and sighed happily. It was Saturday. She got out of bed and began making coffee. She noted that it was a beautiful day outside, which made her smile even more. She finished making her coffee and went to sit down on her couch. This was her second year at Duke and she had been placed in her own room. Last year she had been roommates with Brooke, her ever happy and boy crazy friend. While she loved Brooke and had a great time last year with her, she had to admit she quite loved having her own space. She was flipping through a magazine, sipping on her coffee, when she heard a knock at the door. She put the magazine down and went to open the door.

'Morning!' Brooke exclaimed happily. Haley smiled at her and stepped aside so that she could enter. Just as Haley was about to close the door, she heard someone yelling.

'Wait wait wait!' A moment later Lucas entered the room, he gave Haley a peck on the head as he passed her. They had been friends forever. Haley grew up with Lucas and he was the one constant in her life. Although in recent years Brooke had become a feature which Haley couldn't imagine life without. They had become friends in the later years of high school, when one of Brooke's cheerleaders had called in sick a day before a cheer tournament. She stumbled upon Haley doing some exercises and recognized "mold-able skill" in her as Brooke had called it. She made Haley a stand in for the cheerleader and ever since then their friendship had grown. She turned to both her guests and regarded them with a smile.

'Morning,' she said and paused a moment, 'would you guys like some coffee?' They were gathered in her "living room" area which was really just a blue couch and a small T.V.

'Yes please.' They both replied in unison. Haley watched for a moment well Brooke gave Lucas a dazzling smile. The two had been flirting a lot lately. She left the room and fixed two cups of coffee, exactly how Brooke and Lucas liked it. She returned to them and found them flirting as she expected they would be. She handed each of them a mug and decided to find out what had prompted them to visit. She sat down and cleared her throat so as to gather their attention towards her and away from each other- something that was getting harder to do these days.

'What's going on, guys?' Haley asked and smiled at her friends. Brooke was the first to respond.

'I think we should go shopping today,' Brooke casually said with a huge grin on her face. Brooke was a fashion fiend. Her love for fashion coincided and fed her love for shopping. She was studying design and business and was no doubt going to become one of the world's greatest designers and business owner one day.

'And by "think" you mean "we are",' Haley coolly replied.

'Exactly!' Brooke replied and Haley laughed while giving her a nod. She then turned her attention to Lucas.

'Well, after you lovely ladies,' Lucas began and turned his attention over to Brooke when he said 'lovely'- something Brooke hadn't missed, 'are done shopping you can get ready for the party tonight.'

'Ooooh!' Brooke's interest was piqued and she immediately began to question Lucas. 'What time? Where is it? Who is hosting it?' Lucas gave a small laugh.

'It's at a friend's house, I will text you the address, and it starts at eight.' Lucas moved his gaze onto Haley. 'You will be there?' Haley considered this for a moment, she wasn't that big on house parties but she also didn't want to spend her Saturday night alone, while all her friends were out having a good time.

'Definitely,' Haley nodded. Lucas grinned at her.

'I thought I was going to have to do a lot of convincing to get you to go, its why I came over so early.' Lucas said a moment later. Haley was about to respond when Brooke began talking.

'She just wants to show off the new outfit she got at this party,' Brooke said and looked at Haley then Lucas.

'What outfit?' Haley asked surprised.

'The one we are about to go shopping for!' Brooke happily replied, this in turn made Lucas laugh. He stood up.

'I will leave you girls then,' he paused gave Haley another kiss on the head and then turned to Brooke and smiled, 'See you later?' he said to Brooke as more of a question than a statement. The one side of her mouth twitched up into a smile.

'Hopefully.' Brooke responded. Haley watched this and had to hold off her comments until Lucas had left . When he finally had Haley turned to Brooke.

'Was that my imagination or did Lucas kind of just ask you out, in a see-me-at-the-party-kind-of-way?'

'I don't know,' Brooke replied and took a sip of her coffee.

'What is going on with you two these days?' Was Haley's next question.

'I don't know,' Was Brooke's reply once more, she was now avoiding Haley's eye gaze.

'Well, what would you like to happen between you two?' At that Brooke looked up at Haley and a grin spread across her face.

'Let's just say, I wouldn't mind seeing what's under his clothes.' Haley's mouth fell open and she stood up.

'I shouldn't have asked!' Haley said to Brooke and shook her head. 'I'm going to get ready and then we can go shopping.'

Brooke and Haley had been at the mall for quite awhile. They had contacted their other friend Peyton to see if she would have liked to join them but she was out with her boyfriend Jake. They were however going to join them at the party tonight. They had just sat down for some frozen yogurt when Brooke suddenly squealed. Haley looked at her in surprise and then watched her jump up and run over and hug someone. It took Haley a moment to see passed the crowd, to where Brooke had gone, and who she was hugging. Haley wasn't surprised when she finally saw who it was. The elusive Nathan Scott, Lucas's half brother, although their relationship was more complicated than trying to decode an ancient language that no one had any knowledge of. Haley watched the encounter with interest. Nathan and her hardly ever interacted, they had nothing in common and never really hit it off. Her being best friends with Lucas probably had something to do with it. While Nathan and Lucas got along nowadays, Haley and Nathan never quite bonded. They were casual acquaintances at best. Brooke on the other hand was practically best friends with Nathan. Nathan and Brooke were inseparable in high school, always throwing parties and always the life of the parties. The two of them together had ruled the school. Haley watched them catch up and ate her frozen yogurt, about five minutes later Brooke returned.

'Nathan will be at the party tonight as well!' Haley couldn't help but hear the happiness in Brooke's voice. Nathan wasn't around these days as much as he was last year and she knew Brooke missed him. Something else was on Haley's mind though.

'Brooke, serious question,' Haley started and Brooke gave her her full attention, 'Out of the two Scott boys I always thought you would have gone for Nathan and not Lucas?' Brooke gave a small chuckle.

'First off that would be gross, he is like my brother, secondly I prefer the artistic- broody- kind -of -boy to the athletic- broken- type- of boy.' Haley considered this for a moment.

'Lucas is athletic though, his on the basketball team with Nathan.' Nathan and Lucas were the stars of the Duke basketball team. However Nathan was the captain. Brooke was the head of the cheer leading team, which solely existed to support the basketball team. Something that again made her and Nathan click and get on so well. Haley was also on the cheer leading squad, Brooke would not let her escape from it. It felt very high school to her, but she figured keeping active in college wasn't a bad thing.

'True, but Lucas wants to be a writer. Nathan wants to be a pro basketball player. Lucas is, I don't know, different. His fun and cute and has a way about him that isn't arrogant.' Brooke replied hoping she was making her point clear.

'So Nathan is arrogant?' Haley replied and considered what she had just been told. Brooke laughed.

'Not arrogant but he certainly likes the spotlight. Lucas is a nice balance and nice balance to me.' Haley nodded and watched as Brooke lit up every time she spoke about Lucas. She hadn't realized Brooke liked him so much. She originally thought it was just a flirtatious fun thing but after this conversation she was starting to think Brooke wanted to seriously date Lucas. Something she hadn't done with a lot of boys. Sure she went out with boys all the time, but date them exclusively, that she hardly did. Haley looked at her watch.

'We better get going so we have enough time to look at the last few stores, get back to Campus and get ready for the party.' Brooked nodded.

'I like the way you think, girly!' Haley laughed and they both stood up to finish off their shopping excursion.

Haley, Brooke and Peyton stood in front of Brooke's mirror doing final touch ups on their make up. They were about to leave for the party. Brooke was dressed in a well fitting strapless maroon dress with her hair down. It was extremely risky and a very Brooke dress. Everything about the dress played to Brooke's features. She was going to have boys all over her. Peyton was in a pretty black top that was low cut, something she knew Jake would appreciate. She paired it with skinny blue jeans and black heels. Haley was in a dark blue dress the back of the dress was really low cut and revealed a significant amount of skin. Brooke has insisted she buy it and wear it when she had tried it on this afternoon. It fit her well and it was casual enough for a party and sexy enough with the back to attract some attention, at least that was what Brooke had told her and what Peyton had confirmed later that evening. She had her hair up in a loose messy bun, which apparently also had a sexy vibe to it, again according to Brooke and Peyton. Haley wasn't the most comfortable with the dress but Brooke and Peyton had insisted that it looked great on her, so she put any worries she had about the dress at the back of her mind. The girls finished up and made their way out, Jake was the designated driver this evening. He was recently recovering from a cold so he insisted that he didn't mind driving them because he wasn't likely to drink. Normally they just would take a taxi. When Jake saw the girls he whistled.

'Looking good, ladies,' he commented and opened the back door of the car for Brooke and Haley to get in.

'We know.' Brooke cheekily replied as she got in. Jake then moved to the passenger door and opened it for Peyton.

'You especially look good, babe.' He said to Peyton and winked at her. She moved closer to him and lowered her voice so only he could hear.

'Wait till you see what is underneath the clothes,' Peyton said to Jake and pulled back to see a naughty smile spread across his face.

Fifteen minutes later they had arrived at the party. Once inside Haley and Brooke went looking for Lucas. Peyton and Jake went to get drinks for everyone. They found Lucas standing with Nathan.

'Hey boys,' Brooke greeted them first. They smiled at her. Lucas immediately took in her appearance and felt his heart race pick up. He couldn't help but think that she looked exquisite.

'Hey,' Haley said to both of them and smiled. Lucas once again kissed her on the top of her head and Nathan nodded. She looked at the boys, she had to admit they both looked extremely good. She glanced around briefly and noticed that there were quite a few girls checking the boys out. She turned her attention back to the group and noticed how Lucas and Brooke had stepped a bit to the side. Brooke laughed and Lucas smiled. The two had wasted no time and were already flirting. Haley inwardly groaned, she wasn't sure what to say to Nathan, she looked up at him and he looked back at her. She was a bit startled when she found herself thinking about how his grey shirt brought out his grey blue eyes.

'So will you be drinking at this party?' Nathan asked.

'What do you mean?' Haley responded.

'You don't usually drink at parties.' Nathan replied. Haley didn't know if had intended to sound mean or if he was just looking for a conversational filler but whatever it was she didn't feel like staying around to find out. She gave him a small smile.

'I think,' she turned around and Nathan inwardly made a sound of approval. The low back on her dress was doing amazing things for her. She turned back to Nathan who kept his cool. After all this was Haley James and she wasn't really his type. 'I'm actually going to go find Peyton and a drink.' With that she left. She was making her way through the crowd when a boy stepped in front of her path.

'Hi,' he said and smiled at her. 'I'm Drew.'

'Haley,' she said. The boy in front of her was quite good looking. He had the greenest eyes Haley had ever seen and they went well with his brown hair.

'Why are you all alone?' he asked her a moment later.

'I'm actually looking for my friend.'

'Well, Haley, why don't you spend some time with me and let your friend find you instead?' Drew tilted his head while waiting for her to respond. Truthfully Haley thought this proposition sounded a lot better than wondering around looking for Peyton. After all, the boy was cute and talking to him was harmless, it couldn't lead to anything bad happening… or at least that was what Haley thought.

A/N: Please review! I hope you guys are slightly intrigued.