Mirrors |NH|

Chapter Fourteen

A few minutes later after Niall had been taken away, Edie was placed into her brother's car, and he drove her home.  The entire ride was spent with her wanting to know what was going to happen to Niall.

"Why do you care?  He tried to rape you!"

"No, he didn't, Benny!  He was shot!  He freaked out at the noise."

"What are you talking about?"

"Niall!  The reason he's in this group is because he was shot!  A car must've backfired or something and he freaked out!  He was just trying to protect me.  I know he was!"

"Are you sure? Those eyewitnesses seemed fairly certain he was on top of you in that alley with you screaming."

"Well, no shit, Benny.  He doesn't know why I'm there so he doesn't know that by doing what he did was going to trigger memories I can't seem to ever escape. For fuck's sake, I'm sure!  Benny, he's being fucking processed right now for something he wasn't doing! I don't know what I ended up doing.  If I was screaming, then I was but it was all due to flashbacks, I swear.  My mind went back to that night."

"Edie, I just can't believe that he wasn't trying to do something to you.  I mean, for Christ's sake, it's obvious you're high as fuck.  And I'm willing to bet so was he.  Who brought it?  Did he get you high and try to rape you?"

"Benny!" she shouted at him.

"Calm down, Edie.  Look, let's get you home and calmed down and we can discuss this in the morning."

"There's nothing to discuss."

When they got to her flat, Benny decided he wasn't going to leave her so he put her to bed, and he parked himself on the couch.  He didn't know she couldn't sleep at night anymore, so she laid in bed, replaying the night over in her head.  But she couldn't bear the thought of Niall spending the night in a damn jail cell because of her; because of his demons.

She got up, got dressed, and slowly opened her door to make sure Benny was asleep.  She heard light snoring and knew he was out.  She grabbed her keys and walked out.  Destination: police station.

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Niall sat in a fucking jail cell for three hours before someone came and let him out.  He was taken to the front to find Harry, Liam, and Louis all standing there waiting for him.  Silently, they all got into the car.  No one said a word for several minutes before Harry finally broke the silence,

"What the fuck were you doing, Niall?"

"I didn't mean to hurt her."

"We know you didn't, lad," Louis started, "But something clearly freaked you both out.  What was it?"

Niall closed his eyes, "I don't really want to talk about it."

Liam slammed on the brakes. Pulling the car over, he turned around to face Niall, "You don't have a fucking choice.  For god sake's Niall, people out there think you tried to rape someone tonight!  If that's not what happened, then what is?"

"Do you really think I would rape someone?" Niall said, sarcastically, yet hurt that his friends would think that of him.

"No, we don't.  But Niall you've been a different person since you got shot which is understandable but you fucking skip your meeting, that I drove you to, get high with some girl and get yourself into one of the worst situations of your life!" Liam screeched.

Niall looked at the three guys around him.  He took a deep breath, "Yes, we got high tonight.  I brought them tonight but she brought brownies last week, so I didn't fucking trick her into eating something she didn't willingly want.  We went and got something to eat at the pub around the corner.  We got back and we were just sitting there, talking, when I heard gun shots.  And I didn't stop to think, all I thought about was getting us both out of the way.  I put my body on her to protect her.  I didn't mean to hurt her!"

"Niall, mate," Louis started softly, "You really need to start participating in these meetings.  You're reaction, though I suppose noble in wanting to keep her safe, was you reacting to something that wasn't there.  No gun shots, mate.  But your gut reaction shouldn't have been to topple yourself onto a stranger especially when you don't know what happened to her."

"She's not a stranger.  And I know but I don't understand her reaction.  She was there, she heard the noises, too.  I didn't imagine them."

"Dude," Harry started, "Did you stop to think that maybe her reaction has something to do with why she's at these meetings?"

"That's all I've been thinking about," Niall sighed as Liam sat back down in his seat and put the car into drive, pulling from the curb.

"And what conclusions have you drawn?" Harry asked.

Niall shrugged, he didn't want to say out loud what he knew had to be true. "I don't know," he whispered.

Louis, who was sitting in the back with him, hushed Harry before he could say what each of them was thinking.  He gave Niall a reassuring  shoulder rub.  The rest of the drive was in silence.