“Come on Niall, it’s too cold to mess about,” Liam says to Niall as they approach the house. It’s raining. Niall jumps, startled.
“Where are we?” Niall asks and looks around. Last thing he remembers was arguing with Ava. “What the hell, why are you here?” Niall asks as Liam unlocks the front door.
“Niall, stop being stupid, Harry’s made you dinner,” Liam says, and Niall blinks, shocked. First Liam, now Harry? Niall asks himself. Niall follows Liam to the kitchen, passing a mirror on the way.
“WHAT THE FUCK?!” Niall stares at himself. He’s young. His small worry lines are gone, his face is bright and full of colour, there’s no bags under his eyes, and he still has braces.
Liam, Harry, Louis, and Zayn all enter the hallway, to see Niall staring at himself in the mirror. “Are you okay?” Harry asks Niall, as their blond friend reaches up and touches his hair. It’s blond! When he married Ava, she told him that he suited it better brunette, and now it’s back to blond!
“I’m...so confused,” Niall confessed as he turned around to his bandmates. “I was last with Ava.” He says.
“Ava?” Liam asks, “You were with me. We went to the cinemas?” Liam offers. Niall widens his eyes and stares at Liam.
“We did? What did we see?” Louis exchanges an uncomfortable glance with Zayn, and the two exit the room.
Liam rubbed his head, “We saw X-Men.”
“Oh cool. Was it good?” Niall asks. Liam just looks to Harry.
“Maybe we should call a doctor?” Harry asks, and Liam slowly nods. Niall stares at the two boys, confused as Harry walks off while tapping away on his phone. Liam stays with Niall, filling him in on what he’d missed off the movie.
The doctor arrives. And examines Niall. “There’s nothing wrong with him. Maybe there’s something that happened in his personal life. Ask him and you may get some answers.” Says the doctor. And then he was gone.
“Niall...” Liam trails off and sits beside his blond friend. “What’s going on?”
Without an answer, Niall fires a different question at Liam. “How old am I, Liam?” Well, that wasn’t expected.
“You’re twenty,” Liam said. Niall’s face turned to realisation as he remembered his final words that he’d said to Ava.
“Because sometimes, I wish I was just twenty again.”
“Shit,” Niall says. “I remember,” he nods. The boys all perk up, eager to know his story. “Okay. So, the last thing I remember was that I was with Ava.” Niall says.
“Who’s Ava?” Harry asks, scrunching up his nose.
“My wife from the future,” Niall says. “And we were arguing. We fought and I said ‘I wish I was twenty again’ then there’s a black patch and I wake up ten years younger and back with you guys.”
The boys fall silent. “So... you know everything that’s going to happen in the future?” Zayn asks. Niall nods.
“We win a VMA for You & I, we play at the Olympics again, Liam meets a girl called Becky, Zayn marries Perrie in Africa, Louis gets married underwater to Eleanor, Harry falls in love with a fan called Jadyen and the band splits up in 2018.” Niall blurts.
“Holy fuck,” Zayn cusses, eyes wide. “You’re not kidding, are you?”
Niall laughs, “If I were kidding, could I have made that up? You know I’m a shit liar.”
Liam then proceeds to ask Niall a question. “Do you have any kids?” Liam asks Niall. Niall falls silent.
“Um no.” He says.
“Why?” Liam pouts playfully.
“Well, Ava’s infertile and that’s why we argued. I told her that I still wanted to be with her, but she didn’t believe me and then we argued, and I wished my life away.”
