how you get the boy

twenty two

There were days when I wondered why was I friend with Niall who, despite my constant effort to ignore him for the past twenty-five minutes, couldn't leave me alone when I wanted him to.

Today was one of those days.

"Tenley," Niall whispered, his knees bouncing up and down. His restlessness was making me feel restless. "Tee, what're you doing?"

"Studying," I told him, keeping my eyes fixated on the book in front of me. I wasn't going to let him distract me even though his mere presence did. I'd been reading the same line over and over again since he found me in the library and decided to pull the chair out and sit in front of me.

"Hey Tee," Niall nudged me with his foot for the fourth time and I diverted my gaze from the book to him – finally. I kinked an eyebrow at him, urging him to continue speaking. "You okay?"

"Yeah," I nodded, brows furrowing in confusion. It was perplexing enough that he knew where to find me without having to contact me first – not that this was the first time, but still – and now he was beginning to weird me out by sounding and looking so worried as though I wasn't supposed to be okay. So I asked him, "Why wouldn't I be?"

Lips pressed into a thin line and eyes squinted, he scanned my face whilst I fought the urge to look away. I couldn't risk doing that because that would lead to him suspecting that I was hiding something from him – which I actually was, but he didn't need to know that. He also didn't need to know that in the past few nights, I had a hard time falling asleep because I couldn't find a way to stop myself from tossing and turning in my bed. By the time it was time for me to get up, I made peace with the fact that today wasn't going to be a good day.

The cycle had been repeating itself for three days and counting.

"Tee, I don't think you're okay," Niall pointed out and I was worried that he might have just read my mind. "I mean, clearly you aren't. You look like you didn't sleep at all."

I shook my head, "I'm okay, Ni, stop it. I did sleep."

"For how long?" He asked and then dumbly, he added, "And stop what?"

"Stop staring at my face," I scolded him, kicking his foot under the table. He winced; I smiled. "It's bothering me, alright, so just stop."

I should've known better than to think that Niall would listen to me because the moment those words left my mouth, he leaned closer, his front meeting the table, and his blue eyes scrutinised my face as he tried to figure me out. I didn't want him to but I knew he would – in a matter of seconds.

"I think you're not okay because," he paused, pulling his lower lip between his teeth and chewing on it. As I looked at him, I realised that he was mulling over something because the hesitation plastered across his face told me that he wasn't sure if he should say it. So I kicked his foot – again – a cue for him to just spill it because he had successfully distracted me from studying and I wasn't going to let him leave me hanging.

"Well?" I asked, "Why did you think I'm not okay, Niall? Enlighten me."

"Fine," he said with a roll of his eyes like he was annoyed with me. I was the one who should be annoyed. Then, he closed his eyes briefly, taking a deep breath before he said the next few words that managed to steal the air from my lungs. Words that came out as a question rather than a statement and words that were spoken so fast that it took me a few seconds longer to process them. "Because Harry's been seeing someone?"

A part of me suspected that he was going out with someone because he wasn't around often – I didn't stalk him, I swear – whereas another part of me had made me believe that he was just out with his friends.