A Niall Horan Love Story: Solo Mission?

Chapter 6: Framed

  ~Kylie’s Pov~

“I wanna be drunk when I wake up: on the right side of the wrong bed.  And every excuse I made up—to tell you the truth I hate what didn’t kill me, never made me stronger at all.”

I—along with 30-or-so other exasperated Canadian citizens—was shunned in the back of this monstrosity of a plane, waiting anxiously for that forever-smiling maid lady to pick up that microphone thingy and officially announce our arrival in Holmes Chapel, London.

     Yippee.

It had been a 7 hour and 30 minute flight, and my ADD had made it extremely difficult.  I had been unable to sit still for periods longer than 40 minutes at a time, so I’d had to occupy myself with none other than myself.

            No different from what I had been doing for the past 17 years, I suppose.

*************

As I sat (uncomfortably, I might add) atop one of the many blue, swede chair within this airplane coach bus, the angelic voice of Ed Sheeran boomed in my earphones, and my small red luggage did not cease to bang against my shins with every jolt of the vehicle.  People were sitting and standing, squatting and jumping, all around me, as the bus was stocked beyond capacity.  The sounds of crying babies, desperate mothers, and exasperated fathers diffused throughout the bus like the smell of an old perfume bottle. 

Young girls were staring at me in awe—and I had to admit, my appearance did make quite the spectacle: I was dressed in a tight black top with an over-the-shoulder orange sweater, and I wore beige capri-trousers that bunched up with a string at the bottom.  My ginger hair was tied in a messy high ponytail, and I had applied dark, black makeup around my blue eyes—all this had been done in the airplane bathroom, by the way—causing them to pop out of my head and complement my purple nose ring.

            I looked like a mix between Kim Possible, and a gothic Japanese cartoon character.

I brushed off the stares, however.  I was using the makeup to hide the marks from the beating I had just endured, and these were my only clean clothes.  My red luggage contained the other two outfits that I owned.

As we neared London Airport, I tried not to think about the reaction my “mother” had had when I’d told her, yet the events continued to play out before my brain’s eyes with the sole purpose of terrorizing me.  I had to literally mutter random words under my breath in order to distract myself.

  It probably looked like I was whispering incantations under my breath.

Or setting off a bomb.

        With my words.

 Because I’m Kylie the Teenage Witch.

By the way—a word of advice: never, EVER, say the word “bomb” on an airplane, because you will scare the bejeezus out of every living person there, and you will most likely end up in hand cuffs.

I know this because while I was waiting at my terminal—I didn’t know even what a terminal was until I’d heard the lady on the microphone yell that a certain “Aarnold Skiddmark” was about to miss his flight in “Terminal 1, Terminal 1!”—a strange, mysterious-looking boy with a dark black t-shirt and a quiff was being carried away, evidently, against his will, from the plane and toward the exit, with his cuffed hands behind his back. 

I had barely gotten a good look at quiff boy except for those minor details; I had not actually met his eyes as he’d walked past me from the back of the plane to the front, since they were framed with thick, dark lashes, and they had been downcast; however, for some reason, had it not been for the seatbelt fastened around my waist, I would have listened to the voice in my mind which had compelled me to follow him.  

This boy—or man, rather—had some sort of magnetic quality, some.. thing… (for lack of better word) that had drawn me toward him.

Even 20 minutes after he’d left, and the plane was beginning its (extremely loud and obnoxious) takeoff, I hadn’t been able to stop my mind from wondering about him: what he was doing; where he was going; why his countenance resembled that of an abused puppy dog. 

    But I’d had to ignore my questions and focus on popping my ears as the plane had risen from Earth’s ashes, and soared throughout the air like a winged bird.

Now, the bus was as cold as the exterior through which it was passing.  The beautiful tall trees and lush bushes were being illuminated by the white flecks of snow that gracefully landed, and melted quickly, thereafter, upon acquaintance with their pined branches, the blossoming of the purple flowers within these bushes unfortunately stagnated by the cold.  There were no other signs of animal life, but the human robots were bustling about on the sidewalks, clickitty-clackiting in their heels—on both men and woman shoes alike—with black “stockings” for the girls, or black “slacks” for the “lads,” as I soon understood to term them, and white fur coats to complement the white snow falling about their fair faces.  Every person had a purpose, and a briefcase to match. 

 Soon enough, the bus came to a steady, complete stop in front of a tall grey building with no name, which of course conceded that all of the regulars quickly collect their many belongings and push their way out of the bus, fighting for dominance up to the point in which they reached the snow-filled pavement, where they then took to shaking themselves off, gatherning their luggages, and making their way resolutely toward the building that calmly awaited their arrival.

      Now, I was the only one left. 

The bus driver heaved himself off his deep-set chair, and turned slightly to glance toward my shadowed figure in the far back of the bus, hand upon hip, expectant expression upon face, demanding with a mere glance that I make an exodus out of the bus within the second.

Suddenly, I forgot about the paper in the front pocket, on which I had carefully re-scribbled the number Skidmark had written on my plane ticket; I forgot about the red iPod and the earbuds that had been, for the past five minutes, not playing any music; I focused all of my energy in pulling my suitcase atop my knees and hugging it to my quivering chest for all that was holy, because for the first time, my life was completely unpredictable, and in the hands of someone other my mother—someone other than Dan.

            It was in my own.