Season 1 Episode 3
Are You True?

It was yet another Ravens basketball game that night, Haley was busy working at Karen's cafe so Lizzie was sitting with Karen and Keith.

Jake was passed the ball which was then thrown to Nathan who missed the basket. Jake caught the ball after it rebounded from the basket, he threw it to Lucas who was standing in the middle of the court. The blonde Scott prepared his shot, with five seconds left on the clock.

He threw the ball hoping to score it and just before the timer buzzed, the basketball swished smoothly through the hoop, making the Ravens win the game.

Everybody jumped up from their seats and started cheering for the Lucas. Everyone on the Ravens ran up to him and congratulated him, everyone except Nathan.

~~~~~~~~~~

Lizzie stood at the side of the carpark waiting for Brooke, she'd been waiting for at least ten minutes.

She was walking around the carpark hoping to find Brooke, when she heard Whitey talking to Lucas, "By the way, there's a half naked girl in the backseat of your car. I just thought you'd like to know."

Lizzie mentally face palmed herself, "Oh Brooke."

She slowly trudged over to Lucas's car hoping to find her sister, preferably dressed.

Brooke undressing herself in the backseat of cars was a specialty of hers, it was her way of seducing guys and it always worked. She'd expressed her interest in Lucas more than once so it wasn't that much of a surprise that she had tried seducing him.

Lizzie made her way to Lucas's car and lightly tapped on the drivers seat window. Lucas slowly rolled the window down, unsure as to why she was knocking on his window.

"Please tell me that my half naked sister isn't in your backseat." Lizzie whispered,

Brooke peered her head in between the passenger and driver seat with an cheeky smile, "Hey sis!"

Lizzie grimaced from seeing her sisters breasts, "Brooke, can you please cover up and get dressed so we can go home."

Brooke gradually grabbed her cheering uniform and put it back on,

Once Brooke had gotten out of the car, her and Lizzie started retreating back to the car when she paused in her step.

Lizzie halted as well, "What?"

"I left my bra in his backseat!" Brooke groaned,

She started to turn around, planning on going back to get it when Lizzie grabbed onto her shoulders.

"Woah, you are not going back there! You've done enough for tonight." Lizzie lectured, gently pushing her sister forward.

"But it's my favorite bra! You know the leopard print one." Brooke complained,

"Oh, well in that case, of course we can go back and get it." Lizzie bluffed,

Brooke's face brightened with excitement, "Really?"

"No!"

~~~~~~~~~~

Once Lizzie drove Brooke to their house, she then drove over to Karen's cafe. She had made plans to hang out with Haley and Lucas after the game.

Lizzie walked into the cafe just before Haley turned the "closed" sign around.

Haley quickly turned around once Lucas walked in, waiting to hear the score from tonight's game since Lizzie refused to tell her.

"Twelve points, eight assists. And I made the game winning shot." Lucas announced,

Haley squealed, jumping into his arms. Lizzie sat on a stool with a smile, watching the two best friends.

Lucas saw her sitting there, "What are you doing over there? Get in here." The blonde told her, opening his left arm for her, leading the three into a group hug

"That is great, right?" Haley assumed, separating from the hug.

Lizzie lightly hit Haley's arm to get her attention, "Are you kidding me? It was amazing! You were on total fire tonight, Luke."

"Yeah, it was alright." Lucas shrugged,

"Oh, I can't believe that I had to work. Tell me all about it!" Haley said, excitement clear in her voice.

"Actually, the beginning wasn't so great, Lizzie and I ran into you-know-who." Lucas trailed off,

"Dan? Oh I'm sorry, do you want to talk about it?" Haley offered.

"Actually, I was thinking about checking out the burning boat. You guys game?"

"Oooh, well I suppose I could be seen with you people in public." Haley drawled in a posh English accent before continuing, "Let me just call home and tell them not to wait up."

Haley walked over to the landline and rang her parents, "Hey mom, it's Haley. Haley James, your daughter."

Lucas gave her a confused look, and she made a drinking signal before continuing her talk on the phone, "Listen, I'm gonna go out after work and I'll be home. Okay? Bye."

"Was your mom drinking?" Lucas questioned,

"No, I got the machine." Haley scoffed, before walking out the door.

Lucas looked over to Lizzie, "Do you need to use the phone to call your parents?"

Lizzie snorted, "Yeah right. I could be lost at sea and I doubt they'd notice."

Lucas looked at her with sympathy in his eyes which made Lizzie groan.

"Don't! Please just, don't give me that look. they've never really taken an interest in mine or Brookes life. It's always been that way, I've gotten over it."

"Aren't you mad at them?" Lucas asked, his tone sympathetic,

Lizzie sighed, "I was. For a long time actually, but I realized that being angry at them wasn't going to change anything. It wasn't going to make them care about us. Besides, I've got Brooke. She's all I really need."

Lucas smiled at Lizzie, he never really noticed the short brunette before, but once Haley introduced them, he realized how kind and strong she was. He had become incredibly grateful to have her as his friend.

Haley opened the door of the cafe and peered her head in, "You two coming?"

"Yep, let's go!" Lizzie exclaimed.

~~~~~~~~~~

Haley, Lizzie and Lucas walked around the dock, checking out the little shops that people had put up.

"Nice game Lucas." An unfamiliar voice called out to the trio.

"Hey, thanks." Lucas responded,

Haley beamed at him, "You are just blowing up."

"Well yeah man, I'm a big star now. You better hope I keep you two around." Lucas joked around with his two close friends.

"Oh no, are we little people not good enough to be seen with the great Lucas Scott? Whatever will we do?" Lizzie giggled.

Haley giggled before moving on to a new talking subject, "So last night, I'm watching "Scandinavian Week" on the history channel and I-"

"Because?" Lucas cut her off,

"Because, blonde Viking guys are hot. Anyway, this whole burning boat thing is a total rip-off of a Viking funeral. Did you know that?" Haley questioned her two friends.

Before Lucas or Lizzie could respond, a brunette sophomore walked up to the three juniors, "You know, you know that you're the bomb."

Lucas, assuming the compliment was directed to him, answered with a simple thanks.

Brandon turned his head over to Haley, "Check it out!"

Haley laughed at Lucas before looking at the piece of paper, "B+! Brandon, all right! You did it!"

Brandon smiled, "Yeah, I just threw all of my bad grades into the pot. I'm not going back to that."

"I know you're not." Haley stated, proudly.

"I'm so proud of you Brandon." Lizzie commented,

"I've had too many tutors to count, but these two are miracle workers. They've both helped me out so much."

"No, this is all you." Haley disagreed,

"Congratulations man." Lizzie complimented.

"Thanks, you guys. See you later." Brandon said, before walking away.

Lizzie quickly wrapped Haley into a hug, celebrating Brandon's win.

"Yes! I knew he could do it." Haley cheered,

"Nice work guys."

"Thank you." The two girls responded, simultaneously.

"So, what bad mojo are you two burning this year?" Haley asked,

Lucas pulled out a strap that said "Scott" on it, it was from his basketball jersey.

"Not wearing that on my Jersey." Lucas said, throwing it into the pile.

"What about you Liz?" Haley questioned, looking over at the brunette.

Lizzie dug through her jean pockets and pulled out a crumpled piece of paper.

"I've been doing this since 4th grade. I write down confessions, feelings, resolutions and secrets all onto a piece of paper and I burn it on the night of the burning boat to make it not known as shame but as a celebration. It's sort of become a tradition." Lizzie told the two.

Lizzie took one more look at all the things she'd written on the paper before placing it on top of the pile.

"We're going to watch this together right?" Lucas assumed,

"Maybe. I have to uh, check my schedule. Because the word around town, is that I'm "the bomb." Haley said, before flipping her hair and walking away in a joking manner.

"Hey, you're not the only one!" Lizzie called out with a grin on her face.

~~~~~~~~~~

"Who do you think you are?" Peyton demanded, leaning against a locker.

"Someone you're pissed at" Lucas assumed,

"You submitted my sketches to "THUD" magazine." Peyton snapped.

"And they liked them, didn't they?"

"If I wanted your help, I would ask for it." Peyton told Lucas, before Lizzie and Brooke walked up to the two.

"Hey girl." Brooke greeted Peyton before turning to Lucas, "Hey, you didn't happen to find my uh-"

Before Brooke could finish her sentence, Lucas pulled the leopard print bra out of his locker.

"Thank you gorgeous." Brooke said, taking the bra out of Lucas's hands and shoving it in her bag.

She then wrapped her arm around her little sisters and walked away.

Peyton quickly caught up with the two outside, "Watcha got there?"

"What?" Brooke asked, acting innocent.

"You know what, the Brooke Davis leopard bra. Dude, that thing's like a welcome mat." Peyton chuckled, "Anyway, I heard you were naked in his car."

"No! I was partially naked." Brooke corrected,

"Oh, but naked enough that her little sister got a clear view of her breasts." Lizzie giggled, bumping her hip against Brookes.

"Well, at one point I had mittens on because it was cold. Oh, did you see my-"

"Okay, focus." Peyton cut Brooke off, "You're a slut in mittens. Then what happened?"

"Well, something could've happened if Little Miss Nosy over here didn't come over and drag me out of his car." Brooke grumbled.

Peyton snickered as Lizzie looked over at Brooke with an offended expression,

"I am not nosy! I was just looking out for my big sister and frankly, I was saving you from yourself."

Brooke rolled her eyes at her sister. Since their mother rarely payed attention to them, Lizzie had taken the role of looking after Brooke since they were young and although it should've been the other way around, Brooke was secretly happy that Lizzie always lectured her about boys and school. It was like having a real mom.

~~~~~~~~~~

"Alright, I'm going to start to pair you up now." The teacher announced,

Lizzie was currently sitting in science, one of her favorite subjects. She had always loved learning about the world, especially space.

"Michael and Chloe. Justin and Anna." The teacher listed,

Lizzie wrote lyrics for a song that she had been working on as she waited for her name to be called out.

Lizzie secretly wrote songs in her notebook whenever she was bored, but she had never shared them with anyone, not even Brooke.

She had always hoped to become a singer one day but she was too nervous to actually do anything about it.

"Elizabeth and Kyle." The teacher called out her name, snapping Lizzie out of her thoughts.

An attractive brunette pulled up a chair and sat next to her, "Hi, I'm Kyle Anderson." The boy introduced himself, holding his hand out.

"I'm Lizzie Davis." Lizzie responded, shaking his hand. "Looks like we're working together with this project."

Kyle gave her a warm smile, "Seems that way. When would you like to start?"

"Well, class ends in five minutes so there's no point starting now. How about tomorrow afternoon after school?" Lizzie suggested.

"Sounds good." Kyle agreed,

"Do you know where Karen's cafe is?" Lizzie asked, hoping to study at the small cafe.

"Yeah, North Avenue right?" 

Lizzie nodded, "Great, well I'll meet you there around 3:30?"

"3:30 it is." Kyle confirmed.

~~~~~~~~~~

Haley and Lizzie were both spending their free period in the tutor centre. Lizzie was writing down some ideas for her assignment with Kyle and Haley was restocking the student folders when Nathan walked in.

"Hey."

Haley looked at him with slight disapproval, "Can I help you?"

"I hope so, you're my tutor." Nathan answered, looking directly at Haley.

Lizzie kept her head down knowing that she wasn't apart of the conversation.

Haley scoffed lightly, "Yeah, I don't think so"

Nathan looked down at the blue slip in his hands, "You're Haley James, right?"

Lizzie covered her mouth, trying not to giggle from Nathan's confused expression.

Haley sent a slight glare to Lizzie before turning back towards Nathan and snatching the paper out of his hands.

"I'm sorry, I'm best friends with Lucas." Haley stated simply.

"Well then I'm sorry too." Nathan joked,

"Forget it, I'll find you someone else." Haley offered, moving away to look at the list of tutors.

Nathan stepped in front of her making her pause in her step, "Whoa wait, there is nobody else alright? I'd be fine with it if there was."

"If there were." Lizzie muttered, she hadn't meant to interrupt but she had a habit of correcting peoples grammar. It had only gotten worse once she started tutoring.

Nathan looked at her with a slight smirk, "Right."

"Look, I can't help you and on top of that, I won't help you okay?" Haley sighed, before walking away ending the conversation.

Nathan looked back at the two girls for a second before he walked out.

Haley scoffed, plopping into the seat opposite Lizzie, "Can you believe him?"

"I don't know, he seemed pretty genuine about needing your help." Lizzie replied to Haley's rhetorical question.

"Maybe he is, but why is he so intent on having me as his tutor?" Haley questioned,

"Probably because you're the best." Lizzie said, like it was obvious.

"Well, I'm never going to help him. I couldn't do that to Lucas." Haley stated.

Lizzie kept quiet, not knowing what to say next. She felt sorry for Nathan, she knew that if he didn't get his grades up, he could get kicked off the basketball team. She wanted to help him, but he didn't ask her, which for some reason, slightly upset her.

~~~~~~~~~~

The two dark haired girls were packing up the desk that they had been working at when Nathan walked in for the second time that day.

"Hey, I just wanted to let you know that I'm gonna be fine." Nathan told Haley with a defeated look on his face.

"Good." Haley shrugged,

"I mean F is for fine, right?" Nathan stated, holding up his test which had a large red F on it before walking out.

"What am I gonna do? If I tutor him, then I'm betraying Lucas. But if I don't tutor him, can I really call myself a tutor?" Haley sighed with a defeated look on her face as she sat back down.

Lizzie sat on the chair next to her, trying to think of a way to help when suddenly, an idea popped into her head.

"What if I tutor him?" Lizzie suggested,

"What?"

"I can tutor him. Think about it, I don't have any other students I need to tutor at the moment, you won't be betraying Lucas and Nathan will stop failing his classes. Win-win." Lizzie explained,

Haley processed Lizzie's words before she spoke, "But what about your friendship with Lucas? I don't think he'd be too happy with you tutoring Nathan either."

Lizzie leaned over to her close friend and put her hand on top of Haley's, "I'd rather risk my friendship with Lucas than have you lose yours with him."

Haley was truly touched by Lizzie's words, she had never really had any true friends other than Lucas so she very much cherished her friendship with the brunette

"Thank you, but I can't ask you to do that." Haley said,

Lizzie smiled softly, her hand still on Haley's, "You're not asking, I'm offering. Please let me help you."

Haley sighed before giving in and pulling Lizzie into a tight hug,

Lizzie didn't know it yet, but that offer would change her entire life.

~~~~~~~~~~

"Did you hear what's been happening with Lucas these last few days?" Haley asked,

Lizzie gave her friend a confused look, "No. What's been happening?"

"Nathan and the basketball team have been harassing him because he was given the starting position. They drenched his clothes, destroyed the river court and just last night, they jumped him and tossed him into a mud puddle in the middle of nowhere and left him there!" Haley ranted, furious about how her best friend was being treated.

"Oh my god, are you serious? Is Lucas okay?" Lizzie frantically asked, freaked out about the new information.

"Yeah, he texted me last night. You see, this is why you shouldn't tutor Nathan and why I refused to." Haley fumed,

"Look, I've know Nathan since second grade and he wasn't always like this. His dad puts a lot of pressure on him about basketball and he never even got to know Lucas so it must be tough for him. I'm not defending him for his actions, I'm just saying that
there are two sides to each story. Remember that." Lizzie pointed out.

Haley sighed, knowing her friend had a point. "Well, is there someway you can tutor him and get him to leave Lucas alone?" Haley asked, sarcastically.

"You know what, there just might be a way."

~~~~~~~~~~

Later that same night, Lizzie drove over to Nathan's house. She slowly walked up to the front door and gently knocked on the wooden door.

A couple seconds later, the door opened revealing Nathan,

"Hey. Uh, are you returning the favor from a couple nights ago?" Nathan asked, recalling from when he turned up on her doorstep.

Lizzie smiled, "No. I'm your tutor."

Nathan gave Lizzie a slightly confused look, "I don't understand, I asked Haley to be my tutor. Not that I'm complaining."

Lizzie rolled her eyes, annoyed at his flirting. She was starting to realize why Haley didn't want to tutor him, "Look, I'm offering to be your tutor. Take it or leave it."

Nathan stared at Lizzie, not knowing what to say so he stayed silent.

Lizzie scoffed and turned around, prepared to walk away. She wasn't going to waste her time tutoring Nathan if he couldn't be bothered. But before she could walk away, she felt a hand lightly grip her wrist.

"Wait. please, don't go." Nathan pleaded, looking directly into Lizzie's green eyes.

Lizzie looked back at Nathan with just as much intensity.

"I'd love to be tutored by you." Nathan said, sincerity clear in his voice.

Lizzie smiled brightly until she realized that Nathan's hand was still wrapped around her wrist.

She loudly cleared her throat, breaking Nathan out of his trance making him let go of her wrist.

"There is one condition though. You need to leave Lucas alone." Lizzie insisted,

Nathan smirked slightly, "Done."

"Alright. Well I'll see you tomorrow then. My house, 9:00." Lizzie stated, "Goodnight Nathan."

Lizzie walked off, too scared to look back. She didn't know what she was feeling towards Nathan and she didn't want to know.

Nathan watched her retreating body before he whispered to himself, "Goodnight Lizzie."

Even though Nathan had whispered the small sentence, Lizzie had still heard it. She didn't know why but she felt butterflies flutter around in her stomach and millions of thoughts infiltrated her mind, although one stuck out to her more than the others,

She needed to talk to Peyton.

~~~~~~~~~~

"Knock knock." Lizzie sang, leaning against the doorway of Peyton's bedroom.

Peyton looked up from her sketchbook and smiled brightly when she saw one of her best friends, "Hey! What are you doing here?"

Lizzie slowly walked into Peyton's room, "Well, I actually came because I need to talk to you about something."

Peyton stood up from her desk with concern from hearing Lizzie's tone,

"Is everything okay?" Peyton asked, taking a seat next to Lizzie on the bed.

"I guess it depends on how you feel about what I'm going to tell you." Lizzie responded, fiddling with her hands.

Peyton chuckled uncomfortably, "Liz, you're kind of scaring me. What's wrong?"

"Umm, so Nathan and I have been talking quite a bit recently.." Lizzie started off, waiting to see how Peyton would react.

"Yeah..." Peyton egged Lizzie to continue,

"And I've offered to tutor him. But if you don't want me to, I won't. I just really hope that you're okay with this." Lizzie rushed out.

"Wait what? You're tutoring Nathan?" Peyton exclaimed,

"Yeah... please don't be mad." Lizzie pleaded with a shy smile.

Peyton laughed, "Mad? Why would I be mad? You're seriously tutoring Nathan though? Why?"

"Well he came to the tutoring centre and asked Haley to tutor him but she refused to because of Lucas but then she felt guilty because he had failed an English test so I offered to tutor him." Lizzie explained.

"Is that what you were worried to tell me?" Peyton inquired,

"Yeah, sort of." Lizzie replied, cautiously.

"Don't worry, I'm not mad. I actually think it's a really nice thing that you're doing." Peyton laughed before she hopped off the bed, walked over to her shelf of records, and pulled out a Michael Jackson record off the shelf.

"I went to the record store yesterday and found the "thriller" Michael Jackson record that you've been looking for. I still don't understand how you can like this type of music." Peyton stated, handing the record over to Lizzie.

"Hey, don't diss the king of pop." Lizzie shrugged, taking the record out of Peyton's hands and carefully put it into her backpack.

The two friends talked for a few more minutes until Peyton's phone dinged signaling a text message. Peyton looked at it to see a text message from Brooke informing her about an emergent fashion crisis.

"I gotta go. Duty calls." Peyton informed Lizzie, showing her the text message.

A teasing smile came across Lizzie's face once she finished reading the text, "Well, you best not keep your highness waiting."

"Why me?" Peyton groaned as she walked out of her bedroom.

~~~~~~~~~~

Lizzie walked over to the door once she heard the doorbell ring, it was 8:50 so she was expecting Nathan soon.

When she opened the door, Nathan was standing there with two coffees in his hand, "Breakfast of champions. Want one?"

"You're early." Lizzie grinned, accepting one of the coffees and taking a sip.

"Yeah, I wanted to get started as soon as possible." Nathan said, placing his backpack on a seat at the breakfast bar before taking the seat next to it.

While Lizzie gathered the textbooks and sheets together, Nathan pulled out a cracker jack from his pocket, "Oh, please let this be a cheat sheet."

He opened the prize which presented him with a pink bracelet and colorful charms. He looked at Lizzie who was now sorting out the stationery.

"It's for you." Nathan smiled, holding out the bracelet.

Lizzie's cheeks flushed pink with embarrassment, "No, stop."

"Come on." Nathan insisted as he gently slid the bracelet onto Lizzie's wrist.

"Don't say I never gave you anything." Nathan teased,

Lizzie admired the bracelet on her wrist, "Thanks. That's really sweet of you."

"Don't mention it." Nathan remarked, staring into Lizzie's dark green eyes.

Lizzie knew that she should just ignore his gaze and focus on tutoring him, but she couldn't look away from him. After what seemed like an eternity, she awkwardly cleared her throat and turned back to the studying material.

"Okay, so I've got three textbooks here. This one is Math, this one is English and this one is History." Lizzie listed, pointing to each individual textbook.

"Wow, so you just have random textbooks lying around in your bedroom, huh?" Nathan mocked, with a smirk.

Lizzie playfully rolled her eyes, "I borrowed them from the tutor centre. Do you wanna work on Math first?"

"Sure. But can we also work on English as well, because I really suck at that too" Nathan asked,

Lizzie chuckled, before opening up the math textbook, "Sure. Let's start on page 18."

Nathan didn't realize it yet, but he was slowly falling in love with Lizzie Davis.