When I Get You Alone

1. One.

"Oi! Tits McGee! Wake up."

The sound every woman dreams of waking up to.

Groaning, I turned over onto my stomach and burrowed under the covers of the unfamiliar bed. The next time I need to sleep off an international flight/hangover (as those two things are rarely mutually exclusive), I'll shell out for a hotel room. So far Ed Sheeran was proving to be useless for anything other than a place to crash. Well, and Grammy nominated songs.

"Marigold likes to throw things. So just duck to the left a bit and she'll probably miss you." I heard him mutter to an unknown visitor, whose loud laugh jolted me to full awareness.

Not okay.

I felt the edge of the mattress sink down a bit next to me and I kicked violently in the direction of the intruder.

"Good morning starshine." Ed sang in his stupid lovely voice whilst poking me with a callused finger. "The earth says hello!!!"

"Go away Edward." I whined, my voice slightly muffled by a pillow.

"Please don't drool all over my roommate's bedding." He sighed before flipping me over unceremoniously.

"What's the harm with this low thread count? Where are these from, Ikea? Use some of that pop star money and treat him to a new set."

And here we go with Ed's signature shrug and smile.

Ignoring my incredibly intrusive host, I plowed on. "He knows that I'm staying here right?"

"Yeah." Ed stood up to start yanking open the curtains, apparently not satisfied that I had been properly disturbed. "He'll be in Ireland visiting family until the end of the week. Not that he'd mind coming home to you in his bed. I showed him a picture of you and Arrow and he think you're right fit."

I narrowed my eyes at Ed's hijacking of my pet name for my best friend, and his current girlfriend, Arabella. I was Morrow, she was Arrow, and Ed... well he could be something eventually, but I don't like to give people nicknames too soon. You know, in case they start to get attached.

"Tell him to buy some Egyptian cotton sheets and then we can talk." I retorted suggestively as I shook off the bed covers. "What's your roommate's name again? Something simultaneously ridiculous and Irish?"

"Niall Horan. You'll love him!"

Because I love most people oh so much.

Ed was already a touch too sunny for my taste and from the photos around the room I had taken over, this new kid, Niall, was worse. Ed's roommate's goofy grin seemed bright enough to scar my retinas. Remind me to make sure he has nothing to smile about around me- I wouldn't want to have to punch Blondie's teeth in for the sake of my sanity.

"How does Arrow deal with your ginger happy sunshine routine in the morning?" I scowled. "It's blinding."

Ed mocked my grouchy expression with an exaggerated frown. "Some women prefer to wake up to a happy face in the morning Marigold."

I chucked a pillow at him and he ducked left, dodging it with ease.

"I know that you prefer your bedfellows to be middle aged lawyers-"

"Fuck off Sheeran he was only twenty-nine." My cheeks still burned at the mention of my recent six month tryst with my father's junior partner, Asher, or Ass-her as Arabella liked to call him.

My charming best friend had clearly been running her mouth on our trans-Atlantic journey. As soon as our second flight lifted off the runway at Dulles (we had to connect in D.C. from Chicago, as direct O'Hare to Heathrow is an unspeakable drag), I downed my trusty mixture of Xanax and a tumbler or three of scotch and zoned out into my little world.