Lightweight

Chapter Twenty

"Is this really necessary?" Annie whined from the comfort of her bathroom.

She could practically feel the nine pairs of eyes as they bore down on her locked bathroom door in anticipation for her to reveal to them her newly dolled up self. Eleanor had already talked her up and set everybody's expectations insurmountably high so Annie wasn't too excited to see their disappointed faces when she walked out, looking perfectly ordinary at best. God, why was she doing this? Was the premier really that big of a deal? Annie didn't even think they had big movie premiers in places like North Carolina and Liam had to explain to her that the director was really loyal to his home state and refused to have the event anywhere other than there.

"Man up and show us your dress!" Louis called from her bed with the others. Was this whole big reveal really necessary? Why was everybody so excited to see Annie in a dress?

"That doesn't even make sense," Annie grumbled under her breath but she patted her hair down and opened the bathroom door. She came out to nine stunned faces like the ones of Eleanor and Danielle had at the mall. The boys, Eleanor, Danielle, Natasha and Paul looked at her in silence.

"I told you I look dumb," she said to Eleanor in a huff.

The hours of work that Eleanor, Danielle and Natasha had put into Annie's appearance had gone to waste. The silence filled the room as the eyes of those around her couldn't leave the sight of her and Annie felt completely terrible. She must have looked even worse than she thought and the lack of words being exchanged only confirmed it. Management was sure to hate her even more now; they would probably think she dressed terribly on purpose. That was it, she wasn't going. Annie was about to turn right around and lock herself in her bathroom until the rest of the group was forced to go to the premier without her and spare everyone the embarrassment of being seen with her.

"You look absolutely brilliant," Liam finally said.

"Amazing," Zayn agreed.

"You guys did a good job, I know how hard it was," Louis joked and Eleanor threw a pillow at his head.

"What do you think Niall?" Annie asked, unsure. He hadn't said anything yet.

"I- um- well," Niall stammered, "I don't know what I've done to deserve you."

That response gave the rest of the boys the exclusive rights to tear the shit out of Niall and make fun of him and sent a harsh blush to Annie's cheeks. Niall ignored the endless taunts and made his way to Annie's side. He looked handsome to say the least. His blonde hair was sculpted into a quiff, like the majority of the other boys, and his shirt and cardigan made him look like a proper gentleman, something Annie knew he definitely wasn't. While she liked the change of pace, wardrobe wise, on Niall she insanely preferred the disheveled Niall she had come to know with his messy hair hidden under a snapback and stupid little tank tops. At least he was still wearing Supras.

The boys were all in some sort of fancy white shirt black pant combo with hints of their own style coming through. Eleanor looked beautiful as usual in a cream colored light gown and Danielle had a form fitting little black dress on. Harry asked Natasha to come as his date, which she clarified as just as friends very adamantly, she was wearing a floral print dress that made her legs look miles long. That was one group of good looking people.

While Annie would have never admitted it, or realized it for that matter, she was the most breath taking of the group. Perhaps the rest of the girls toned it down or it was an inevitable occurrence but there was no denying the fact. Annie's long hair had been transformed, thanks to Eleanor, into a flowing gorgeous mane of wavy curls that swept over her left shoulder gracefully and her makeup was done perfectly, bringing out the color of her eyes even more, as if it were possible while she was in that dress. The deep green material fell all the way to the floor with elegance and although the top was a low cut heart shape she didn't feel too exposed like she normally would have. Annie's favorite part about the dress was how it matched her eyes, she was pretty sure Danielle had picked out the dress for that reason.