Title: When One Door Closes

Author: Alan Hitchen

Email: darkmere2000@yahoo.co.uk

Disclaimer: Popular is the property of Touchstone Television

Pairing: None as such

Rating: PG-13

Information: Follows on from The First Step

Summmary: It's a bad day for Brooke

Quotation: "When one door closes, another opens; but we often look so long and so regretfully upon the closed door that we do not see the one which has opened for us." Alexander Graham Bell

Brooke found her ex-boyfriend studying alone in the library. "Hi, Josh," she said with an alluring smile.

"Oh, hi, Brooke," he smiled back.

"Can I sit down?" she asked.

"Sure," he replied, and pulled out a chair for her. She sat down, making sure to show off lots of leg as she did so.

"Carmen won't mind?"

"No, why should she?"

"She would if she knew what I wanted."

"And what do you want?"

"You. I made a big mistake. I want you back."

Carmen was returning to the table when she heard these words. She froze, then pulled herself back behind the stacks to listen to the conversation unobserved. Her heart pounded in her chest like a jackhammer as she waited for her nightmare to come true.

Josh shook his head in incredulity. "You're unbelievable, McQueen. You click your manicured fingers and expect me to come running back to heel just like that."

Brooke frowned at the negative response. "No, but we had something wonderful together, and we can have it again."

"Newsflash, Brooke, I've got something wonderful and her name is Carmen."

"But I thought..."

"Thought what, Brooke? I loved you. I wanted to be with you so much, but I never really felt I was, you were always keeping me at arm's length."

"This is about sex, isn't it?" Brooke said angrily. "That's all boys ever think of, that's why you went with Nicole."

"I went with Nicole because I was feeling hurt and rejected. And, FYI, it wasn't a good experience because I was being used, though come to think, she didn't seem to like it much either, but that's in the past. We're in the past. I'm with Carmen now, and that's the way it's going to stay."

Carmen silently cheered. At last the plain girl had come through from behind to take the prize. She'd been so worried that Josh would dump her at the first opportunity, but April had kept hold of the Stone Cold Fox, now she had kept hold of Josh, wonders never ceased. She decided now was the time to rub it in, and emerged from behind the stacks with an air of triumph, just in time to see a humiliated Brooke beating a hasty retreat from the scene.

Elsewhere in Kennedy High, Harrison was having his say, or trying to. "Well, I'd rather have her on our side than not."

"But she isn't on 'our' side," Lily contradicted, "she's on Sam's side. In fact I'm beginning to think she's surgically attached to her side. And what's with all that handholding anyway?"

"Sam says Nicole's feeling vulnerable."

"Vulnerable?! That girl's got a hide made of Kevlar, a skeleton of steel, and a heart of stone. She's up to something."

"Sam's no fool, she can look out for herself."

Lily looked at him wryly. "I hope so, Harrison, I hope so, 'cause someone's being played here and it isn't Nicole."

In the Novak, Brooke was looking at herself in the mirror, wondering where it had all gone wrong. "He turned me down. He said she was wonderful. He used to say I was."

"Don't fret, Brookie, I've got it covered," said Mary Cherry, pressing speed dial on her cellphone. "Hello, Momma, ma good friend Brooke is feelin' a lil' lonely. Can you fix her up for tonight? Hmmm. You'all in luck, Brookie, which one do you fancy? Zeke, Hickory, or Hunk? Huh?" Brooke didn't answer, in fact she wasn't even listening. "Send all three, we'll choose later. Thanks, Momma, I lurve you."

Back in the library, Sam was hard at work on her latest article. "Here's that book you wanted," said Nicole, taking the seat next to her new friend.

"Thanks, Nic," Sam replied, without even pausing from her feverish note-taking.

"Sam."

"Yes, Nic?"

"Thanks."

Sam stopped writing and looked up from her book. "What for?"

"For giving me a chance."

Sam reached out to pat Nicole's hand, she'd noticed that Nicole responded well to physical affection, and that she needed constant reassurance. "That's okay, Nic. Everyone deserves a chance."

"I, uh, wanted to ask you. Would you like to sleep over at my place sometime?"

Sam beamed. "That's a great idea. I'm sure the others will love it."

Nicole's face fell, she didn't actually want the others to come, but she couldn't let Sam know that in case it frightened her off. "But Carmen and Lily won't come, will they?" she pointed out.

Sam gave out a slight sigh, her friends had proved to be very stubborn on this subject, a gesture like this from Nicole might be the turning point, but on the other hand, as Nicole said, it might not. "Maybe they won't at the moment, but they'll come around in the end, you'll see," she said brightly.

"Well, you know them best," Nicole said stoically, "but you'll come won't you?" she added with a hopeful note.

Sam thought it over, it wouldn't hurt to check out Nicole's mansion. To her knowledge no one else had ever been invited, not even Brooke. "I'd love to," she said with a smile. Nicole was delighted.