The Night That Changed It All

George's First Day

"Have a great day, little bear. I'll see you when you get home, OK?" I sighed just before Lily Ann left with Liam, who was going to drop her to school. It was her first day back after the summer holidays, which had mostly been one big lazy day for us.

On the days we did do things, it was mostly going to art galleries for Lily Ann's artistic moods, first time experiences for Cathal, who was now five months old, or little group days out with all of One Direction and the families. We also went home to Ireland for a week, during which Theo tried to teach Lily Ann a bit of Irish.

She picked up the basics pretty quickly but after that she got confused and Theo got frustrated having to explain what was obvious to him over and over again, so they let it drop. She could now have a very basic conversation with me in Irish, though, so that was cool.

"OK, Dad. See you later." Lily Ann replied, squeezing my arm lightly so as not to jostle Cathal, who was giggling in my arms, before she bent slightly and kissed his forehead. "Bye Cathal." When she reached  the door, Lily Ann grinned and waved before closing it quietly and following Liam to the car.

"Alright, buddy. How about we have another lazy day?" I asked Cathal, who just blinked up at me. Taking this as a yes, I carried him to the sitting room, where we sat and watched Peppa Pig. There were so many different, bright colours that Cathal remained entertained right up until Liam came back and captured his attention.

"Hey, isn't it George's first day of school today?" Liam asked suddenly, looking up from playing peak-a-boo with Cathal, who was gazing up at Liam and pointing, as if to say; 'I found you!'

"Oh yeah; I completely forgot about that. Wonder how Eleanor and Louis and cooping." I acknowledged, nodding at Cathal when he looked back at me. He seemed to be asking why Liam wasn't focusing on him anymore, so I gave him his teddy bear to play with.

"Louis' probably freaking out. You know how he gets. Especially when it comes to George." Liam laughed, getting up off the floor to sit on the settee next to me. "Do you remember when Lily Ann first went to school?"

"Yeah; we were so worried about her and then she came home saying she loved it." I remembered, grinning at the memory. I'd cleaned the whole house because I was too full of restless, worried energy to sit still and Liam had reorganized every bookcase, CD rack and DVD display in the house for the same reason. Most of the books and some of my CD's were still in alphabetical order. I could only imagine what Louis, who was so protective and family orientated, would be like.

Just as I was about to say this, the door bell rang and Liam and I shared a look. "I wonder who that could be." Liam mumbled sarcastically as he got to his feet to go answer the door, rolling his eyes to me when he got to the door between the sitting room and hallway.

"I've just dropped George off at his first day of school and I'm already freaking out." Louis sighed as he brushed past Liam at the door. He only stopped to shrug off his coat before he flounced into the sitting room and plopped down into the armchair with a sigh that suggested he was carrying the weight of the world on his shoulder.

"Yeah; hey, Lou. Why don't you come in?" Liam asked sarcastically, raising his eyebrow at Louis when he shot him a dark look.

"I am far too worried for the safety of my child to be concerned with politeness." Louis shot back, making Liam put up his hands in surrender, before he dropped them back to his sides and sat down again; draping his arm around the back of the settee where I was sitting and rubbing my neck absentmindedly.

"Where's Eleanor?" I asked to defuse tension a bit. It had the desired effect, as Louis sagged slightly and Liam appeared less standoffish.

"She's gone visiting her parents. Her Dad's sick and her mother was kind of worried, so she's gone to reassure her everything's fine. I would have gone, too, but someone had to stay to get George to school. He couldn't miss his very first day." Louis explained, sounding a but rueful at the mention of the thing he was so worried about.

"Well, how about we call Zayn and Harry. We can make a bonding day out of it; all while keeping your mind off the worry." I suggested, knowing that Louis would not agree to cleaning or alphabetizing books as a way to distract himself.

"Zayn's got family stuff and......I don't actually know about Harry. I'll go call him." Louis sighed, before he sprang up and went off to call Harry, who agreed to come be supportive. Chloe was now only three months pregnant, so they were yet to even have a baby, never mind a child going to their first day of school.

By the time Harry arrived, more then forty five later, Louis was really on edge and looked about ready to drive back to London to check on George. Even his usual methods of distraction didn't seem to be working, but, thankfully, we were able to deter him from doing anything too stupid or outrageous.

"Hazza! What took you so long?" Louis all but whined from where he was sitting, up-side-down, on the armchair. He looked like he would have gotten up to hug Harry, but he was hanging up-side-down, so moving wasn't going to happen for a while.

"Hey, Boo bear." Harry greeted, squeezing Louis' knee as he walked by to sit where I'd been before I went to go answer the door. He then proceeded to twist his head so that he could look at Louis properly before asking; "Still worried about George?"

"Yes. What if some kid bullies him? He's so small for his age: he'd never be able to put up a decent fight. Besides, he wouldn't want to; last week he tried to nurse a fly back to health. A fly! He is the definition of the phrase 'wouldn't hurt a fly'." Louis exclaimed, scrunching his eyebrows together before suddenly pulling his legs forward so he fell off the armchair and onto the ground.

"Lou. He's four; no one bullies anyone at four. Kids that age don't care who you are or where you come from as long as your willing to run around in circles with them." Harry laughed, petting Louis' head reassuringly and grinning at him when he looked up with a forlorn expression almost etched into his features.

"Yeah, but-" Louis started to protest, only to be interrupted by Harry covering his mouth with his hand. Louis seemed a bit confused at this development for a second, but then he pulled Harry's hand away and kept a hold of it while he glared at Harry halfheartedly. 

"He'll. Be. Fine. Just stop worrying. George is a smart kid; he knows how to keep himself out of trouble." Harry assured, squeezing Louis' hand lightly before bending down to kiss the top of his head.

"Yeah, alright........" Louis sighed, leaning back on Harry's legs and keeping his hand so he could play with Harry's fingers. After a few minutes, Harry realized he wasn't getting his hand back any time soon, so he joined Louis on the floor; sitting with his legs bracketing Louis' while Louis leaned on his chest and rested his head on his shoulder.

We were all silent after that, until Cathal, who was sitting at Liam's feet, threw his teddy bear at Harry and Louis. That was all it took to break Louis from his trance, and he immediately took up the teddy bear and started to talk to Cathal in a much deeper voice while waving it around.

"Hey Lou; if you're going for George, you should probably head. It takes forty five minutes to get from here to London with little traffic and look at the time." I reminded later, in the afternoon, when Louis had gotten up from where he was cuddling with Harry.

"Yeah, I guess. Thanks, you guys. I probably would have torn out half my hair if I'd been sitting at home on my own." Louis grinned, before going off to the kitchen to put his mug in the sink, which is what he'd gotten up to do in the first place.

"Hey, I'll come, too. I got here in a taxi, 'cause Chloe was using the car today." Harry exclaimed, jumping up to get his and Louis' coats before following Louis out the door after they'd both said goodbye.

"Are we going to keep up our tradition and bring Cathal with us to pick up Lily Ann or what?" I asked when it came time to get Lily Ann from school. We'd always both gone to get her after her first day of school but now we had Cathal, who needed to be watched.

"Well, we can hardly break a tradition after five years, can we?" Liam laughed, before he went to get Cathal ready. When Lily Ann came out of class, she was in deep conversation with Harper, but when she saw us, she hugged Harper and ran over.

"Hey, little bear. How'd your day go?" I asked, rapping my arm around Lily Ann's shoulders and laughing when she grinned brightly before starting a detailed description of how her day went. She was delighted to report that she was in class with all the people she'd been with last year and so had two of her friends with her.