A/N: Is it just me or is 2x10 one of, if not the best 90210 episode ever? (Not that it's saying a lot because this shows writing was LOL worthy in season one). Gosh, I'm such a sucker for angst. Anyway, this is just a wee piece on Liam and Naomi's thoughts after that episode. Hand hold-age! So adorable. Anyway, read, review and enjoy.

I Don't Believe That Anybody Feels the Way I do about You Now

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Forgiving is love's toughest work, and love's biggest risk. - Lewis B. Smedes

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When he asked her to help, he meant it in more ways than one. It's only later, upon reflection, when he understands just how much weight his words hold when he's talking to her.

It's completely appropriate that she's the one healing him, or something (he's Liam Court and he sure as hell doesn't need to be healed, he convinces himself) and their eyes connect and the air crackles between them like he knew it would. The way it always did. The way it does. The way it probably always will.

He proceeds to tell her how sorry he is, again, but he knows that will never be enough for her. Apologies simply don't cut it for girls like Naomi, and when it's the Naomi, (he wants to believe that maybe someday he can think to himself that she's his Naomi) he knows he's going to have to do something incredibly special if he's going to get this girl back into his life again.

And before he gets the time to do something monumentally stupid like kiss her or tell her he thinks he is falling in love with her Navid interrupts, and he's never been more grateful to see that boy in his life.

To think her life was once so impeccably structured.

She's ending this fling, relationship (whatever this is) with a great guy she knows wouldn't break her heart. A guy who would be faithful. A guy that looks at her and clearly values her highly, maybe the highest she's ever been valued by a guy. But here she is, cutting ties because there's only one boy in her head. And he isn't faithful, and she doesn't think he values her at all most of time.

I hope he's worth it.

And despite all the flaws, his broody walls higher than any she's ever attempted to scale before, she knows that somewhere in between all their issues, Liam Court is the one boy who is worth it.

Lies, lies, lies all around, every where she turns, there's someone else she knows and loves that apparently, she doesn't really know at all.

Naomi knew Ade was using again. It's the type of language between two best friends that's acquired over the years, as one friend falls and the other picks them up. Naomi has realised that through the years, that's not how it's been between her and Adrianna. It's being Adrianna falling, falling, falling, and it's been Naomi constantly reaching out, hoping to catch her. This time though, it's like Adrianna is flinging herself over a cliff and Naomi hasn't got there in time, and the brunette is already over the edge.

After the confrontation in Ade's bedroom, Naomi cries. Sobs manically and goes home alone, because Jen is too busy with her English teacher. It's ridiculous, because even when Jen is here, she's not really. Not when Naomi needs her. When she gets home, her head just lies on the steering wheel for a while, because this isn't really a home. Adrianna was her home, and now that's something she barely knows anymore.

So she calls Silver.

Timing was never Naomi's niche. It was something at her command, if anything, because she stormed into a room turning heads wherever she went and nobody questioned her. Now the only person that's questioning her is herself.

Silver's mother has died, and it makes Naomi put everything into perspective. Her she's been, weeping over a broken heart and a broken family, when Silver's mother has gone. She'll never speak to her again.

She does what she's always done; put her own issues at bay so she can help her best friend. And it makes her smile for the first time in a while; because that's what she and Silver are, once again, best friends.

Silver tells her to come to the hospital, "I need you, Nai." And from then on, there are no questions.

She teeters inside, careful with her words, because regularly she'd make fun of something to salvage a situation, but there's nothing she can do here.

She lets Silver crumble apart before anything can be pieced back together again.

So when Silver meets her, face on in a corridor, all mascara tears, all Naomi says when she embraces her friend is; "Have to hurt before you can heal."

Because the clichés of I know and I'm sorry for your loss and I understand aren't enough when it's Silver and Naomi.

He doesn't spend the night with Ivy.

It's not that it feels wrong, or whatever. It just feels like nothing. Like he's wasting his time, hurting yet another girl for nothing. It's a void he's simply trying to fill.

Ivy calls him at eight, wanting to hang out and he loses his temper slightly. It's nothing new, he knows, but with Jen winning by manipulating, he feels like his life lacks more focus more than ever.

Ring, ring, ring and it's not Naomi.

Maybe that's the fact that makes him lose his grip.

He collapses onto his bed, just staring into nothing. All he remembers about the whole day is looking into those green eyes and hopes that in her own way, she's come to terms with his betrayal. But he sense that forgiveness is far away.

Night fades into dawn, dawn is misted by tears, dawn leads to morning and then Navid somehow ends up in hospital, as if they needed this.

All she's been doing is calling Adrianna, and it's bitterly typical when there's no answer to any of her messages.

"You know...you and Liam...it's pretty..." she begins, not sure if she should say it.

"I know. It's ridiculous that I dump someone I've always dreamed of meeting. I mean, he ticked pretty much every box." Naomi replies, perfectly aware of just how neurotic she can be.

"Pretty much every box? Must have left one out. Like the 'he's-not-Liam' box." Silver smiles knowingly.

Naomi doesn't argue. Silver's the only person who renders her speechless like that.

"Just try and be careful is all. Kelly has one of those guys too. You know, even when Dylan appears out of her life, he never really leaves. Maybe Liam's that guy for you." Silver adds always the analytic.

"That boy is the torture of my life, Silver. For my sake I hope not." Naomi responds, but even as she's saying it, she knows he always be there too.

"Oh he's your Dylan all right." Silver chuckles, before she remembers her mother is dead.

They walk down to see how Navid is and as they do so, they come face to face with the boy they've just been discussing.

Her green meets his blue. It's a strange, charged moment and this when she knows she's in for the ride of her life with this boy. She shouldn't have got herself into this, but impulse usually got the better of Naomi. Maybe this time, the impulse is guided by reason.

The moment she forgives him, it's not a classic Naomi Clark dramatic blowout. It's resolute, and it feels a lot like the beginning of something permanent. It's silent, a moment of acknowledgement. Friends, fighting or more, forgiveness isn't as far away as Liam thought.