MY ANOREXIC FRIEND// N.S.

Epilogue

This is the story of two young boys, who were best friends, and both so desperately wanted to be something more.

But they never got the chance to try.

Harold Edward Styles and Niall James Horan met at the age of five, both at the same preschool. They both absolutely hated the place, and unconsciously, they created a bond.

At the age of six, they gave each other a friendship bracelet and they swore to be best friends forever and ever, no matter what would happen in the future.

At the age of seven, Harry defended Niall when he was being bullied by some idiotic kid on the playground. Niall was so thankful, he wrapped Harry in the tightest hug mankind has ever seen.

At the age of eight, Niall broke his wrist, and cried for hours. The pain was almost unbearable for his eight year old mind, but somehow, with Harry by his side, he managed.

At the age of nine, Harry and Niall hung out at each other's houses so much, their mother's weren't sure who was who's child.

At the age of ten, Harry and Niall became the biggest prankers the world has ever seen. They pranked teachers, students, their own parents. Even though they were scolded almost every day, they found it funny as hell.

At the age of eleven, Niall was called names by his fellow class mates, and he cried for hours because they had said he was fat. Harry didn't leave his side that night, whispering soft comforting sentences in Niall's ear.

At the age of twelve, Harry and Niall were walking in the park together, laughing and tickling each other. A man screamed at them, telling them they were going to be 'fucking fags' when they grew up. They didn't even understand the word, but they didn't know that they would soon enough.

At the age of thirteen, Harry's parents started fighting a lot. Harry ended up staying at Niall's place more than at his own house. Sometimes he called his best friend in the middle of the night, tears streaming down his face, unable to sleep because his parents were shouting profanities and slamming doors. Niall stayed up all night just to talk to him.

At the age of fourteen, Harry found out he was gay and came out to Niall. Niall had always told him he didn't mind and he'd support him no matter what, but Harry noticed how Niall wouldn't come as close to him anymore, and he wouldn't cuddle him anymore, and it broke his heart.

At the age of fifteen, Harry fell in love. He met this cute boy, called Josh, and they started dating. Two weeks later they were a couple, and they did everything together. Harry didn't really have as much time for Niall anymore, because he was too busy with his boyfriend. He missed Niall a lot, but he didn't dare admit it to himself, so how should he have explained it to Niall?

At the age of sixteen, Niall got crazily jealous of Josh. He noticed that he hated Harry's boyfriend's pretty eyes, his sharp jawline and his perfect smile. He noticed that he always ended up staring at them longingly, and it made him scared.

At the age of seventeen, Harry and Niall got into a crazy fight. Niall shouted at him, telling him it wasn't fair that he didn't get any attention. Harry shouted right back, screaming that Niall was just jealous. Niall told him that he wasn't jealous because he wasn't in love with Harry. Harry had snapped 'You sure?', to which Niall had replied: 'Yes, I'm not some fag'. Even though that one sentence had broken his heart, Harry had said: 'At least I'm not some stupid blonde, like you.' Niall had slapped him in the face, turned around and slammed the door after him. Touching his stinging cheek, Harry had told himself that Niall hadn't meant it. Three months later, as he was staring at the bruises on his body, the tears rolling down his face, he told himself that his boyfriend hadn't meant it, either.

At the age of eighteen, Harry, now once again single, told Niall he loved him. And as he sat there, staring at Niall through the tears in his eyes, hoping that Niall would say he loved Harry, too. Or even just that he liked him. Or just had said anything at all. But he didn't. Niall had just gotten up, in silence, and he had walked right out the door. That had been the last time Harry had ever seen him.

At the age of nineteen, Harry asked hunger and toothbrushes down his throat for the love Niall had denied him. He developed an eating disorder, and he found comfort in the hunger he had once found in a certain blond boy.

At the age of twenty, his parents cried every night, because they did no longer know how to keep the bones and the broken heart of their son together. Harry started seeing a therapist, and he started writing Niall. Because he desperately needed to know that he was alright and happy, even if that were the only things Harry hadn't been in a long time.

At the age of twenty-one, Harry found out that Niall had died. As he read the words, the walls he had built up around himself crushed, and his love poured out of his cold veins in the form of tears.

At the age of twenty-two, Harry lost the ability to find sleep. He sat up awake in his bed every night, staring into the dark. He didn't really talk anymore, he didn't really eat. He didn't do anything. He just sat there, locked inside his own dark mind, thinking about things nobody could ever understand. But then again, who would ever want to understand?

At the age of twenty-three, Harry swallowed anti-depressants as if they were candy, desperately trying to numb the pain inside, trying to fill the gap Niall had left. And he felt sorry, because he knew he never got to taste Niall's lips, and he wished he had.

Harry never made it to twenty-four.

One night, his mother walked into his room, and ran out crying and screaming. Because she had found Harry, her only son, surrounded by blood, lying on the floor. And he was no longer breathing.

His mother spent days crying, mourning over him, asking herself why the hell she couldn't be for him what the blond short boy had been.

His father left his mother, not really sure about the point of life anymore. He thought about his son every second of every day, and every time he saw cherries, he just wanted to think about his laughing son eating them, but he couldn't erase the image of his lifeless son, bathing in his own blood.

His sister never really got over it. She broke up with her boyfriend, claiming love wasn't any good. She started drinking, and bending over toilets in the morning, knowing there was a stranger lying in her bed, somewhere in between all the whisky bottles. Even though she tried so hard, she never managed to forget about her lonely brother.

He was buried, and a lot of people came to his funeral. As his coffin was lowered into the ground, ready to become just another one of all the unimportant dead faces resting at the cemetery, they all cried, claiming that Harry had been way too young to die.

Because he hadn't even made it to twenty-four.

Not that it really mattered. Niall hadn't even made it to nineteen.

Their families cried. But somewhere, wherever the hell they might have gone to, Niall and Harry, now together, cried with them.

And eventually, their families died. Without ever really having mentioned their names, because they spent their lives trying to forget about the tragedy that ruined the future they had built.

Nobody really remembered Harry and Niall anymore.

They hadn't done anything important for the world. They didn't really matter at all.

And their names were forgotten one day, just like the names of all the other unimportant people, all the other 'nothings' in this world.

And then, they were nothing more than two ordinary men, who lived extraordinary lives, and died extraordinary deaths no one knew about.

Isn't that a little sad?

AN: Wohoo! There's still an alternative ending left, so yaaaaay!  Also I'm going through a crisis right now! this book will be finished soon, so keep up! hope y'all enjoyed it! xx