Through The Dark (Niall Horan Fanfic)

Chapter 7

Aubree's POV

I closed the door quietly as I got back into the house after my date with Niall. I smiled at the thought of that.

Exhausted like always, I went upstairs, slipped into the confines of my bedsheets and fell asleep.

I woke up barely an hour later from a bad dream. I couldn't even remember what it was about. I rubbed my forehead, sitting up against my pillows.

I took a sip from the waterbottle on my side table, and laid back down again.

I tossed and turned and got my feet tangled in the sheets.

It was an hour later and I accepted defeat: I couldn't get back to sleep.

Tumblr, I decided.

I flipped open my laptop, letting the screen light up the room. I scrolled through pictures and textposts until I came across the only One Direction fanpage I followed. The textpost was about a paragraph long, and my tired eyes didn't feel like reading it, but they fell on the last line:

'cmon, guys: you need to chill about the whole niall & mystery girl thing, he obviously doesnt like her'

He obviously doesn't like her.

He obviously doesn't like me.

What was I thinking? Why would he like me? How could someone ever like me?

I could tell by the way he looked at me sometimes that he knew I was a little bit messed up, but he didn't know everything. He didn't know the scars and the sleepless nights and the tears and the loneliness. He didn't know who I was. And if he ever did find out, he wouldn't want me.

So why even try?

Why even build up my confidence and happiness just to be torn down? No one would love someone like this.

Niall's POV

I opened the door to Harry and let him in. "Where were you last night? I thought we were going to get drinks?"

I grinned. "Change of plans. Sorry, mate."

He sat down on the edge of the hotel bed, rolling his plaid shirt sleeves up, and then threading fingers through the brown mop of hair sitting on his head. "What kind of change of plans?"

I simply grinned in response and it clicked in his head, "Whoa, mystery girl?"

I sighed. "Her name's Aubree. But, yes. Her."

"How'd it go?" Harry leaned back, his hands behind his head as he fell on the sheets, waiting for a story.

"Decent. Still can't tell if she's all that into me, though."

He sat up again, and then attacked me by ruffling my hair, "Oh come on, everybody loves Niall."

Aubree's POV

Two days later with two calls from Niall ignored, and I was sitting at a table, book shelves towering on either side of me, and an old woman front and center.

There was a middle-aged man across the room at the table next to a 16 year old girl, who was sitting across from an older man at the table adjacent to a 25 year old woman.

I scribbled on the corner of the page of my leather notebook, making sure the pen worked. More people of various ages scattered into the area and chose a seat, opening their own notebooks.

"I'm Mrs. Wood." The lady with chin length, thin grey hair in the front of the room announced her presence.

"Since there's some new faces, I think an introduction is needed." She made eye contact with me.

"As some of you may know, I am the owner of this place." She paused and all twelve people sitting at the tables gave her snaps, clapping being to loud for a book store.

She went on about her history of the place and the classes she held from for an hour on Saturdays.

She started off the little class by just explaining the basics: every detail matters, use all five senses when possible, you have to picture it in your head before you can bring it to life on paper, blah, blah, blah.

And then she told us to make a list of our favorite things about ourselves, but of course we had to be detailed. It would be a poem. Just a poem about ourselves. The good things about us.

I looked around the small area in the book store to see people scribbling in their notebooks. All of them but me. What would I write? What did I like about myself? Whatever I would end up writing would be a compelte lie.

The old lady was making her way around the space, manouevering through the tables and leaving light comments to float in the air when she read something she liked. It reminded me of those intimidating teachers in high school that would look at my papers and always make me feel like I was doing something wrong, even though I wasn't.

The grey-haired lady stopped at my table. She did a double-take at my empty notebook, and then flipped through my pages, expecting to see her assignment in there somewhere.

I opened my mouth, "I, um, I didn't start yet."

"Well, why not? Don't act so humble. Everyone likes something about themselves. You're thinking too hard. Don't think at all, in fact. Close your eyes. Write the first thing that comes to your mind."

And then she moved to the next person.

Eyelashes, I thought.

Yeah, my eyelashes. They weren't too bad, I guessed.

I pressed my pencil to the paper:

Long midnight black lashes.

Immediately I crossed out the word long. Too boring. I reached for the Thesaurus that had somehow landed it's way at my table, and change 'long' to 'extensive'.

Soon, the fake class was over. All I had was my first thought. But it was a start.

I smiled and walked home.

But once I was home my smile disappeared. My sister was there, and the rest of the day I got nothing but rude comments.

"Mum, do you think Jasper could join us for dinner tonight?"

She replied with a satisfied yes right away.

I took my only shot back at my sister all day, "Why are you constantly with him? Get some friends."

"At least I have someone who loves me." Alyssa swiftly commented back with no thought.

My dad overheard her, sitting only a few feet away on a different couch with my mother, and said, "Hey, that's not nice, Alyssa. And it's not true, Aubree is loved by many people."

Even I rolled my eyes. I felt like we were in middle school all over again. Alyssa was so immature.

"Yes it is!" Alyssa laughed. "No ones ever going to like her if she doesn't just grow up! She needs to get over herself."

"That's enough." My dad said, but I was already exiting my room.

She was right, and that's why I was mad. But I couldn't change. My depression wouldn't let me, and I didn't know how.

She was right.

No one was going to love me.

I should just give up.

Niall's POV

I got a call from Aubree that night, and I jumped at the sound of her ringtone. I had a special ringtone for her, just so I wouldn't get excited when anyone else would call.

"Aubree!"

There was a bit of silence, but I could hear her sniffling on the other end. "Are you okay?"

"Niall," she breathed in deeply, "we can't do this. We shouldn't."

My stomach dropped. I sat on my bed. "What? Aubree, I thought we just decided that we were going to-"

"Niall, just stop. Please. I can't do this. I don't want to make you feel like you have to act to like me, okay? Just... just... I gotta go."

She hung up the phone.