When Nathan gets out of the locker room, it seems that Dan has waited around the whole time Nathan was showering and packing up his things just to make some nasty comment and then leave. Lucas gets in his car to find Peyton's slutty, party girl best friend, Brooke, sitting in her underwear in his backseat. Mental note made that this takes at least a point off of this episode's overall believability factor, but we get a good idea of Brooke's character as she continues to strip. And we get a great moment of Whitey as he stops by to tell Lucas to get to the weight room after school, and then helpfully points out that he has a half-naked girl in his car. Good Guy Lucas keeps averting his eyes from Brooke, and she asks him how it feels that everything has now changed for him, and he's now going to be popular.
*Gavin DeGraw theme song plays, we sing along*
Nathan's laying on Peyton's bed, bitching about how everyone thinks Lucas is a big star and how his dad is going to get on his case. He notices that something's different with her room, but when she tells him it's because she took her sketches down, he responds, "What sketches?" You almost have to laugh because it's astonishing that someone could actually give that few shits about his girlfriend.
Quirky Best Friend Haley, who had to work for Lucas's mom, waits in the cafe until Lucas comes to tell her his good news. He asks if she wants to go see the Burning Boat, whatever the hell that means, and for some reason she answers in a British accent. Karen is eating dinner with Good Friend Keith by the river court, angry about how Sherry made several underhanded digs while inviting her to join boosters. Good Friend Keith, always wise, tells her to let it go.
Peyton is in her room, listening to music and drawing, because that's what Peyton does. She gets a message on her answering machine from Thud magazine, saying that they are interested in the sketches that Lucas dropped off.
We find out that the Burning Boat is a big boat that you can put items in all week, and that is set on fire at the end of the week, to symbolize fresh beginnings and the burning of "bad karma, bad luck, or bad choices." Seems like something a lot of people in this show could use. A boy comes up to Quirky Best Friend Haley and thanks her for her help tutoring him because he got a B+. He calls her a miracle worker. After he walks away, Lucas tells Haley he's burning the "Scott" that he ripped off the back of his jersey.
In school, people keep congratulating Lucas on how great he was in the last game. While Nathan is glaring at Lucas, he takes notice of how Quirky Best Friend Haley is always hanging around. Peyton comes up and, in Full Bitchy Peyton Mode, yells at him for submitting her sketches to Thud Magazine without asking. This seems pretty valid, but I think that the audience is supposed to think Good Guy Lucas did it for her own good. Brooke comes up and asks Lucas for her bra, so when they walk away, Peyton asks Brooke about her being partially naked in Lucas's car. Brooke explains to Peyton that Lucas is a Good Guy, and didn't do anything but drive her home.
Later, after practice, Lucas is showering and someone steals his towel and all of his clothes. He is forced to walk into the hallway with basketballs covering all that he prefers to keep concealed, and Whitey sees him, completely unperturbed. Lucas talks to Good Guy Uncle Keith about how things are changing for him, and how the team is hazing him. Good Guy Uncle Keith tells him they do it to everyone, and to show them he can take it, unless it gets "completely out of hand". This is all well and good, except we're sure it's going to get completely out of hand.
Whitey tells Nathan he's changing his position. Dan gets super pissed that Whitey gave Nathan's spot to Lucas, and we can tell how cut up he is about it because he's drinking a glass of Scotch alone in his living room. Dan tells him that he wants better for him than just working for him at the car dealership he owns. The next morning, he tells Nathan that Whitey is just doing this to Nathan to get back at Dan, convincing us that Dan is truly the most narcissistic man to ever be on TV. He tells him to treat Lucas like competition for his spot, and to attack him. He literally uses the word "attack" referring to his own son.
Nathan convinces a few of the other players that Lucas should be made to suffer, so that he can earn his spot on the team. They've filled Lucas's locker with water, ruining all of his belongings. Perfect Jake steps in to try to make Lucas feel better, and lend him extra practice clothes. Nathan enters the Tutor Center and asks Haley for help, but she says no, because she's Quirky Best Friend Haley to Lucas, who hates Nathan.
Peyton is at Thud, discussing her work. The editor tells her that she portrays high school as "tragic" and that it should be more cheerleader-happy-popular, essentially all the stuff Peyton secretly hates. Brooke flirts outrageously with Lucas during class, and in the same class, Nathan receives his failing grade. Peyton accompanies Brooke to get her legs waxed, and asks her why she's so persistent with her pursuit of Lucas, and Brooke admits she might want a real relationship.
Karen and Good Friend Keith have another boring conversation. Karen decides to go to the booster club meeting, and finds out that Sherry told her the wrong time. So high school. It's super awkward because all the other mothers are trying to understand the Dan-Lucas-Nathan-Karen-Nathan's mother situation. Karen is super classy about it until they start being assholes, so she decides to bring up that Lucas is being harassed by their sons. And then she goes ahead and calls Sherry a bitch, so she's apparently not trying to make friends, since she has Good Friend Keith.
When Lucas arrives at the river court that day, it's been trashed. So it just got personal. While he's scrubbing the backboard that they spray-painted, Peyton shows up. She tells him she's not doing the comic strip for Thud, and he accuses her of just being scared, but she explains that it's because the editor wanted her to change it, and she thanks Lucas anyway. He asks why she stays with Nathan, and she says it's because sometimes it's good, and sometimes there's no one else. Eyebrow raise from us.
Nathan calls Haley at the cafe to ask for help again and she blows him off. Not knowing that it was Nathan on the phone, Karen tells her to look for the best in a person, give people the benefit of the doubt, and all that. Perfect Jake comes into Good Guy Uncle Keith's auto shop while Lucas is working with him on a car. He says he wasn't there when the team trashed the river court, but apologizes anyway. He asks Lucas to take the high road, and tells him he has Lucas's back. Ugh, so perfect. Lucas complains to Haley about how nothing is going to make Nathan back off from him, and Haley gets that face that tells you she's considering something important.
Montage of Peyton thinking about the comic strip, Haley wondering if she should help Nathan, the other women glaring at Karen, Lucas cleaning up the river court, and Nathan looking at Lucas during practice for some reason. Haley is waiting for Lucas outside a movie theater, but about a block away, he's kidnapped by a bunch of boys on the team. After tying him up, they toss him in the shallow, muddy part of the lake. He gets untied easily, so they weren't actually trying to kill him or anything. That's a relief. Nathan gets out of the car like a mob boss after the other boys did the dirty work, and tells him if he doesn't quit the team, it'll "get ugly." Because being thrown in mud isn't considered ugly in Tree Hill, just like stealing a school bus and driving it drunk gets you no more than a warning.
When he gets home, still muddy as hell, he talks to his mom, even before he changes out of the soaked jeans that just can't be comfortable. She tells him she hasn't really been taking the high road with the other mothers, and he says he's going to start fighting back against the team. He fights with the team during practice, to Whitey's displeasure. Lucas talks to Quirky Best Friend Haley about it, but what I mainly got from this scene is that Quirky Best Friend Haley is wearing quirky pigtails. She goes to Nathan's house and says she will tutor him if he agrees not to tell Lucas ever, and if he agrees to leave Lucas alone.
The next morning, Nathan shows up to tutoring at the dock with coffee and Cracker Jacks. He finds a plastic bracelet in the Cracker Jacks box and gives it to Quirky Tutor Haley. She shuts him down and tells him not to bother trying to charm her because she doesn't trust him.
Peyton gives the editor her sketches, and says to take it or leave it, how it is. Later, the Burning Boat festival is finally happening. Whitey is doing the announcing of it, probably because everyone loves him. Karen apologizes to Sherry and the other mothers, and basically asks for a fresh start. Whitey talks about how great it is to have a chance to start over, after the boat is set on fire. Brooke starts hitting on Lucas once again, and Good Guy Lucas tells her she doesn't have to act "like this," I guess meaning she doesn't have to be so damn shameless. She wishes him luck "trying to resist." Lucas also approached Nathan and tells him he's not going anywhere.
At the end, Lucas quotes e. e. Cummings, because he is so well-read. He goes to talk to Quirky Best Friend Haley and compliments the Cracker Jack bracelet. The editor of Thud leaves a message for Peyton that they are running her comic strip. Haley lies to him about where she was that morning, and who she was tutoring.
Times I Cried: 0
Feelings Level: 5.
Plotline Believability: 7. Brooke is insane, and I'm not sure how common it is in real life for kids to gladly throw other kids, tied up, into water, but this is North Carolina, so who knows.
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