During The X Factor (One Direction)

Chapter 4 - Life Without Him

I stare at the empty seat beside me and sigh. There’s only one person on the planet that should be sat next to me right now, but he’s not here. I fold my arms across my chest like a moody child and sit and think of the wonderful time he’s probably having.

“Charity, do you know the answer?” asks Bill, my sociology teacher.

“It’s Chaz,” I tell him, without looking up from my desk, “And no, I don’t.”

He wanders over to my table and stands right in front of me, forcing me to look up and see his grey, wrinkled face glaring at me, “Well, Charity, perhaps if you would stop daydreaming, you might. You don’t want to get in trouble so early in the year, do you?”

I smile, thinking about Year 7 Maths with Mr Taylor, when he said pretty much the same thing to Harry and me.

This time, Harry isn’t with me, and I couldn’t be more depressed about it.

It’s as if everything I previously shared with my best friend has been stolen by his new friends, his band mates. Playing those stupid sleepover games until four in the morning, for example. That was something he’d only do with me, seeing as I couldn’t sit through a movie for more than an hour without getting bored stiff. Hundreds of jokes shared between just the two of us will soon be forgotten, as he creates his own with Liam, Louis, Niall and Zayn.

Even Harry himself has been stolen and taken to London to live in a huge fancy house with two dozen strangers.

Of course, I understand that this is all for his future career as a musician, and words can’t describe how happy I am for him. I just don’t want to lose him.

“No, Bill,” I reply. Satisfied, he saunters back towards the board and continues with his lesson, ignoring me for the next half an hour.

I try and concentrate on sociology, but it’s impossible. My mind is full of Harry…and Liam.

I can’t deny it. Ever since the group sang in Marbella, Liam is all I can think about. Every now and then I would ask Harry a question about him, but he would reply with a suspicious expression, which would always make me drop the subject. After that, Harry didn’t seem to speak about his band mates much.

That was until they started messaging him about a week before they were due to move in to the X Factor house. 

He would sit and randomly blurt out “Louis is sooooo funny! Look at what he just text me!” or “Ha, A’s in English and Zayn still uses text talk!” or “Niall is such an idiot, look at what he just said!”

I noticed he didn’t seem to mention Liam too much, though.

It’s lunchtime after sociology, so I meander across campus and into the cafeteria where I find a bunch of my friends already crammed into a corner.

“Hey, Chaz!” says Lizzy, a friend of mine from high school, “How was class? You heard anything from Hazza recently?” she asks me as she nibbles on her sandwich. I fall into the chair next to her and pull out my own lunch.

Without Lizzy seeing, I quickly whip my phone from my pocket and glance at the screen. When I see no little message icon flashing madly at me, I sigh. Before sliding my phone back into my pocket my eyes sweep over the screensaver. It’s a picture of Harry and me taken at his birthday party three years ago. I smile at how young we look, and how much Harry dislikes the picture.

“Er, no.” I tell Lizzy, smiling, trying to make it seem like it isn’t a big deal that my best friend hasn’t bothered to contact me in nearly five days.

“Well, at least you can see him this weekend!” she’s trying to make me feel better, and I appreciate that, but it isn’t working.

On Monday, I was buzzing. I couldn’t wait for the weekend to arrive. The day seemed to drag on longer and I could barley keep still.

But by Tuesday afternoon, when I had heard NOTHING from Harry what so ever, I had become very difficult to be around. I wasn’t listening to anything anyone said to me, I wasn’t talking to anyone. I wasn’t even eating.

Luckily, on Friday night (I had started eating again, by the way, thanks to some of mum’s chocolate cake) when I was watching telly with my mother, a message from Harry came through.

Hey C! Sorry I haven’t been in touch recently, but we’ve been super busy. Can’t wait to see you tomorrow xx

I honestly nearly died. I screamed, making my mum jump about a foot into the air, and then I ran upstairs to pack for tomorrow. I hadn’t previously had the energy to be bothered with packing, but now I was panicking, trying to find the right outfits to take with me.

My blue suitcase, now complete with belt around the middle because there is just too much in it, is now finally propped up against the wall, threatening to slam onto the floor. I risk it smashing through the floor and instantly doze off.

-

It’s now Saturday morning and we’re on the two-hour train journey to London, and it seems like all of my energy from the past week has suddenly dived into me.

We won’t get to see Harry properly until Sunday, but we’re going to the first live show tonight to watch him and the rest of the boys performing. Harry’s family, the loudest, rowdiest bunch of loons I have ever seen, are seated in from of my mum and me on the train. They won’t stop laughing and they keep chanting and throwing their banners into the air.

I’m joining in of course! My boring mother is pressed up against the window reading a book, but I’m clapping to the chants and waving my giant banner over my head.

Thank goodness our carriage is otherwise empty.

Several hours later, after we’ve flung our belongings into our hotel rooms and wolfed down our tea, we’re queuing up outside the studios, waiting to get inside. Both in the queue and once inside, we’re all going crazy. Like animals in a zoo, but with huge banners and identical t-shirts declaring our support for Harry.

If you were to then feed all of these zoo animals a LOT of sugar and energy drinks, then you can get a fairly good image of what our little group looks like when we hear that One Direction are up next.

We’re forced to watch the introductory video in silence, but when the music begins to play and five boys appear on stage, I scream until all of my voice is lost. And that’s before they’ve started singing.

Instantly I recognise the first voice as Liam’s, and my knees nearly give way as he steps out onto the stage. Uncontrollably, I ‘whoop’ and scream louder than anybody else around me. I blush and look down, and Zayn starts to sing his lines.

Harry already told us that he hasn’t got a solo, so ‘don’t get excited or anything,’ but when all five boys sing together, we go crazy again. Especially Harry’s mum, who is dancing madly and screaming until she is hoarse. I laugh and copy her.

After their performance, pretty much all of my energy is gone. The remainder of the performances quickly become simple blurs in my mind. One or two stand out above the rest, like Aiden Grimshaw’s amazing version of Mad World, but the clearest is still One Direction’s Viva La Vida.

I’m deaf by the end of the show, but that it was beyond amazing.

We make our way back to the hotel and then, when I’m trying to get to sleep (failing to, because mum’s so hooked on her book she won’t turn the light off) I replay their performance in my head.

Well, not the whole performance. The first bit, where Liam sings, appears in front of my eyes, but then Zayn and Niall are skipped, but then I watch the rest as they all sing together. Still, my gaze is locked on Liam, and only Liam. Harry is pretty much forgotten until I grab my phone to check the time and I see a flashing message icon. It’s from Harry.

Hey! Hope you enjoyed the show! Can’t wait to see you properly tomorrow. The boys can’t wait to meet you ;) x

My first reaction to that: I get to meet Liam.