Illicit [Harry Styles]

Chapter 52

Once Mckenzie had left later on, I decided I needed to sort a few things out. Niall being one of them. I left my bed and knocked on his door, hearing a murmur of acknowledgement telling me to come in, so I meekly peered round the wood before stepping into his bedroom.

It was late afternoon, verging on evening, yet Niall still had his curtain's closed and his room was sweaty and dark as always. He was sat on his bed with his eyes fixated on his TV, playing some kind of game on whatever console he had.

"How was your talk? I hope you told him to do one," he said bluntly, not taking his eyes off the screen as I sat down beside him.

"Yes and no..."

He gave the biggest, most irritated sigh I'd ever heard and pressed pause, ultimately turning to face me now. "What happened?"

"I'm not going to tell you because you're being moody about something that's really none of your business. Like, this is my thing to deal with and you keep getting involved as if it's yours," I told him, and he didn't look best pleased.

"I'm only getting involved to protect you."

"I don't need protecting!" I snapped, "I know I'm your little sister, but that doesn't mean I need you to beat up anyone that upsets me. I can handle this on my own, you know."

"Harry was my friend, Jess!" His voice was raised to match mine, but only to get his point across. I could tell he wasn't being horrible. "I can't just let someone I thought was a mate drag my sister away from her boyfriend, see her behind my back and then pull the shít that he did and get away with it."

"He isn't entirely bad, you're making it sound worse than it is. He didn't 'drag me away' from Liam. You can't help who you-"

I had to clamp my mouth shut before I said something stupid. I was on a rush of confidence in the heat of our quarrel and was almost about to repeat what Liam had said to me back in the kitchen the day he found out about Harry and I; 'you can't help who you fall in love with'. I hated how that word kept finding it's way back into all of this, I didn't love Harry. I couldn't.

Niall was clearly oblivious to what I'd almost let slip, just looking frustrated at the petty sibling squabble we were having. I felt like the whole situation was becoming less and less of a big deal for some reason. "Just tell me what you said to him."

I rolled my eyes to let him know I wasn't happy about spilling my private life to him. "He said he was sorry and wanted to work it out, that he'd change. I told him that I couldn't do it, but we kind of agreed that he would try and prove it to me before I made any promises."

"That's it? He hit you with the 'I'm sorry, I'll change' card and you just gave in?" he scoffed incredulously.

"Obviously that wasn't it, I'm just not about to tell you exactly what happened. That's the simple version."

"I don't want the simple version, I want to know what he said to you," he demanded, irking me even more.

"Well you're not getting it, Niall! That's private! Now can we please talk about what it was I intended on discussing before you decided to stick your ore in?"

He shot me a cross look, but eventually muttered, "Fine."

"We need to think of something to tell mum as to why we're both battered and bruised. Or anyone that asks, for that matter," I brought up, and I didn't like the facial expression my brother displayed at the mention of the topic.

"What do you mean 'think of something'? I'm telling the truth," he stated firmly.

"No, Niall! You can't tell everyone that Harry did this!" I fretted. "At least not mum."