My Mentor *Completed*

Thirty-Three. The Finals

I immediately grab hold of my shirt and pull it together.  I just stand there.  I can’t move and I have apparently become mute as well.  I see Harry standing there looking at me with so much sorrow filled in his eyes.  I know how badly he must be feeling right now.  I finally muster up the courage to speak.

“Susan” And that is it.  That is the only word I can get out of my mouth because she is standing right next to Harry and has her icy stare directed right at me.  She leaves Harry’s side and with her finger, points at me and motions for me to move over next to him.  I certainly don’t argue and do as I am told. 

She stands in front of us about ten feet away.  I can tell that she is mulling over her words to get them right.  I can’t really take my eyes off of her but I will myself to so that I can look up at Harry.  He looks back at me.  I mouth that I am sorry and he shakes his head softly.  He slightly smiles with his eyes and scoots just a little bit closer so that our arms are grazing.  I know this is his way of comforting me and I half smile in return.  We hear Susan clear her throat and we immediately turn our attention back to her.

“I find it quite amusing that you don’t think I suspected anything; that you don’t think any of us producers suspected anything.  Harry you made it quite obvious that you had feelings for him in the beginning but we thought we had taken care of the problem.  But then I started to notice the way you two would look at each other and I began to pay closer attention to what was going on.  You both were very good at hiding for a while but last night I was keeping an eye on both of you and you disappeared for like a half hour.  So I watched tonight.  I saw you leave and I followed.” She said pointing to Harry, “And what do you know.  Niall, you come into this old abandoned room and start to strip.  Now you can either tell me the whole story or you both will have consequences to deal with and they won’t be good.”  She finally stopped talking. 

Harry and I stayed silent for a couple minutes but could see her getting angrier each moment that passed that we were not talking.  Harry slowly wrapped his arm around my back and rested his hand on my hip.

“Niall and I have been dating since he got to London for the live shows.” He lied.  We told Liam, Zayn and Rich that we became friends after judges’ houses and started dating the day after the ordeal with Jamie, which was a half lie because we started communicating basically right after my audition.  Now we are telling Susan that we didn’t start dating until I came to London in October.  She was looking at us, waiting for more information.  Harry continued.

“We have been sneaking around, obviously, to spend time together and yes, last night we did sneak off to be together and that was our intent tonight as well.”  He finished because what else could he really say without going into specific detail.  We waited for her to gather her thoughts.

“This relationship is unacceptable but I am gathering that this won’t stop.  I can’t very well kick you off the show right now because you made it to the finals and I can’t very well terminate your contract, Harry because again, it is the finals and that would be quite suspicious.  So, as much as it upsets me to say, nothing can be done about this right now.  I’ll make sure this situation is fixed, however.  You have put the integrity of this show at risk.”

“How?” Harry snapped.  I rubbed his back subtly to calm him.

“You do realize that if this gets out everyone will say that the only reason Niall even made it to live shows is because of your attraction to him.  They will say the only reason he made it to finals is because you were dating him.  Who knows if that isn’t the truth.”

“It’s not!” Harry stated firmly.  “Niall’s unbelievable talent got him to live shows and his consistent near perfect performances kept him in this competition.  You know that.  You have seen all of his auditions and the performance at judges’ houses.  You know he deserved a spot.  You even told me that I made the right decisions on whom to bring with me to live shows.  You know he deserves to be here.  Plus, I didn’t keep him around this whole time, the viewers have.  His thousands and thousands of fans have.”