Alternate Paths (Harry Styles Fan Fiction)

Chapter 4 - Harry

Author's Note

Alright, here’s another chapter! A familiar someone shows up in this too, so hopefully you can spot them. Thanks so, so much also for any support because it makes this 100x more fun to write! I’m also putting songs which somewhat (some more than others) relate to the chapter and it’s funny to think that I actually chose these songs a year (or almost two) ago when I first thought of the story.

As always, feedback, comments and votes are greatly appreciated :)

HopeSilver xxx

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When half the world thinks that a certain group of people are perfect, conflict happens. I sighed to myself as I watched the argument about to arise - something both Liam and I had known would occur three days ago. It wasn't like what they were arguing about was important, but an accumulation of annoyance over the past week had caused both Zayn and Louis to snap at each other like territorial dogs.

Louis had been walking out of the room, and Zayn - being a bit OCD - asked him to close the door. If Lou had listened maybe the argument wouldn't have instigated, but then again, Li and I knew that it would have to start one way or another.

"I asked you to just close it. Is that too much to ask?"

"If you want the door closed, close it your bloody self!" Louis retorted, crossing his arms as he stood halfway in the doorway and halfway through the room.

Niall watched on abashedly, flicking his untouched sandwich that he should have eaten half an hour ago. His eyes scanned back and forth between the two as he furrowed his eyebrows. Liam and I were still seated by the kitchen bench, neither of us making a move towards our arguing band mates although we knew at some point we would have to break it up.

"You're always so stubborn-" Louis stormed across the room, grabbing Zayn by the fine cotton of his shirt.

"I don't give a-"

"No!" Liam yelled as he charged over, placing one hand on Zayn's chest and the other on Louis'. "You're not going to get into a punch up over a stupid argument like this. Louis, just close the door next time, alright? And Zayn, if Louis doesn't do what you ask of him, don't go bloody psycho," Liam groaned exasperatedly. "Lou, we'll discuss this later, but right now I just want you and Zayn to apologise, alright?"

"I'm not saying sorry," they both whined in unison.

"Bugger it. Just-" Shaking his hair into a tussled mess, Liam sighed and left the room.

Both Louis and Zayn's faces which were contorted with anger, softened with concern as our mate trudged out of the room, his head hug low and shoulders slumped.

"Look, Louis, I'm sorry that I got angry when you didn't shut the door. We're all just really annoyed because of you-know-who so em... yeah."

Louis shook his head with a sort of smile tugging the corner of his pink lips. "I should have just closed it, I'm sorry Zayn, you don't have to be. But next time, you don't have to order me around like a mother," Lou joked, embracing Zayn in a chaste hug.

I smiled. Not a full on beam, just a half upturned smile where part of me was happy and the other half just damn depressed. Slowly moving towards the door as to not be noticed, I planned to find Liam. It was his flat and so it would be easy to find him since the most likely place he would have gone was his bedroom. Unlike what many people thought, One Direction didn't share some sort of mega penthouse. We all had our own flats in the better side of London, just near Kensington Square. Although I missed the time when Lou and I flat shared and even before that when we actually did have a flat for all five of us, I did enjoy the freedom. Just because I was in a band with some of my best mates, that didn't mean I spent every hour of the day with them. We did meet up every second day or so, but I had other people I wanted to see - my family, people I had known in Holmes Chapel. The only problem now was that, if I did see anyone from my pre-X Factor days, all they wanted to talk about was what I had been doing since it was 'so much more exciting than their news'. I appreciated how supportive they were but it - quite frankly - got annoying when they could no longer see me as Harry-the-childhood-friend and only recognise Harry-the-ridiculously-famous-Styles. Those people were the only humans I felt I could be myself around, bar mum, Gemma, Louis, Niall, Liam, and Zayn. The fact that they couldn't see beyond the fame just pained me.