Simplicity [Narry]

w o u n d e d

Niall's eyes stung as he made his way into his house that day; they were pinched with hot tears and his cheeks were  flushed with the cold and, furthermore, embarrassment. He was an idiot, he knew. He was so silly. What kind of person trips over another person's foot, and bangs their head on the desk on the way down? No-one except for him, of course. And whilst the pain radiating from his eye was magnified by the need to cry, the purpling bruise splaying out across the upper-part of his cheekbone and eye-socket ached madly, and his head was pounding with every movement he made.

The collision made Niall think his head was going to explode. The impact his cheekbone made with the table was shattering, the vibrations zipping throughout his body like an electric shock. He was fine, though, bar the black-eye and the headache. It was practically a miracle he didn't have a concussion, the nurse said, though he didn't really understand what all that was.

The nurse had said a lot of things to him. Some things were harder to understand than others; she had asked, multiple times, if he had tripped. Niall was confused by this because he obviously had; he'd been the one to trip over Vick Harrelston's foot. Then the nurse started suggesting that maybe he was tripped up, and maybe Vick did it intentionally, and was he sure he fell over? Niall didn't like Vick, sure. Vick felt dangerous and bad, and his insides curdled at the very sight of his tormentor. He fell, though, he knew he did. He tripped over Vick's foot.

Niall couldn't really understand what the nurse was insinuating. It was an accident - just like the other day when Vick had accidentally bumped into Niall, causing him to slam into the classroom door. That had hurt, too.

With a soft exhale, Niall wiped gently at his cheeks to swipe away the tears then made his way into the kitchen. He grabbed an ice-pack as the nurse instructed before heading upstairs to get changed. He got into his PJs, slipping Harry's jacket on over the top, then snuggled into the sofa downstairs with 'Friends' droning on in the background. It was on simply for the noise; as much as Niall liked silence, something about the stillness of the air made a feeling rupture his heart, and in turn, made it easier to cry. Crying made his head hurt however, so he wanted to cry as little as possible.

Head ducked into the hoodie, which smelled faintly of Harry once more, Niall listened to Chandler's jokes even though he didn't really understand them, and let his tears fall freely even though he couldn't understand those, either.

If only he understood loneliness; then maybe he'd understand why the silence made it easier to cry.

Niall awoke slowly that night, his vision blurred around the edges, his body heavy-set and clumsy. Blindly, he reached out for the ringing phone which had awoken him, a yawn parting his lips, his hair in disarray from his deep sleep. He couldn't remember his dreams but found comfort in the idea that he was dreaming. He found it incredible, really. Dreams.

On the fifth ring, Niall answered the phone with a mumbled, "Hello?"

It was Greg. "Hey, Niall. Look, I'm sorry mate but I don't think I'm going to get home in time for dinner. You're going to have to order something."

Niall felt a pang in his chest; the TV was on standby due to the inactvitiy during the time Niall had been asleep, and the resulting silence was making Greg's absence hit him harder than expected. "It's okay, mate," he said, though he wasn't sure it was. He missed Greg; recently, his brother had been doing a variety of things in order to 'tie up loose ends' at his old job and begin preparations for his new one. That's why Niall hadn't seen Harry for a week or so, too; he'd been busy helping Greg prepare. He missed both of them, their absences a heavy weight on his chest, and this news only increased that feeling tenfold. "I understand."