Stupid With Love

Coming Clean

Niall P.O.V.

I feel like shit.

I could vaguely remember the events that took place yesterday. Broken hand, vodka, falling off the stage, water in the middle of the night, deep throaty laugh. The finer details are still fuzzy. I walk into the small kitchen; I need painkillers and a glass of water desperately. My head is pounding. I turn off the faucet and turn towards the TV, hearing mysterious soft snores coming from the couch in front of me. I move slowly over toward the noise, my feet shuffling in front of me. Peering over the back of the couch, I am met with a head of dark brown hair. I walk around to the front of the couch and lift their legs up, carefully placing them back on my legs as I sit down. They lift their head up slowly, hair tousled and sticking up to the right side.

Large, sleepy, emerald eyes stare at me.

“Harry, what are you doing here?” I ask him straight out, talking a painkiller and a sip of water.

“I stayed over to make sure you were okay,” he replied simply, lifting his legs off mine and moving himself into a sitting position. “I wanted to talk. I’m here to talk, if you want to. But I need to tell you something first.” I waited for him to continue. “Simon cancelled the rest of our tour. He’s sending us home.”

“What?” I shouted, instantly regretting it as a sharp pain shot through my head.

“You heard what he said, Niall. If we had one more incident like when you punched Liam, on or off the stage he would be cancelling the tour and sending us home. And you got drunk and literally fell off of the stage. Your alcohol reading was off the charts and we found your water bottle. So he cancelled our tour.” Harry finished.

“Oh,” It was all I could manage to say.

“Why did you do it, Niall? Why did you drink when you knew we had a show? You knew Simon would cancel the tour,” He was angry now.

“I needed to feel numb, Harry. I didn’t want to feel anything. I didn’t think he was actually serious though,” I said, looking him right in the eyes.

“Turns out he was. After we got you back to your room, we had another conference with him. He said we can choose when we come back as long as it is within a reasonable time frame, or we can leave for England tomorrow.”

“Tomorrow? Will he not give us a reasonable time to think about it?” I asked.

“No, he said choose tomorrow, or find our own way back home. It sounds harsh, but after the stunts that were pulled, I understand were he’s coming from.” Harry said. “So, do you want to talk about what’s going on with you?”

“I-,” I started, not sure what I wanted to say. Harry looked at me, waiting patiently. “I ah-,” I tried again.

“Why don’t you try starting from the beginning, you’ve been weird since we got to Australia. You and Liam both have,” he said, trying to help me.

“Harry, I don’t want you to see me differently. Or Liam. No matter what I tell you now, you have to promise me. Promise me that you won’t hold anything against him and we will all be okay.” I looked him right in the eyes as I spoke.

Harry looked worried, but there was an underlying curiosity there, and in that moment I couldn’t not tell him. He’s the only one that has asked me questions and hassled me to tell him what’s wrong. He’s the only one that’s cared.

“I promise, Niall.”

“I fell in love.” Harry’s eyes instantly sparked.

“You fell in love? That’s great Niall.” He didn’t let me finish. I put my hand up to silence him.

“I fell in love, Harry. I fell in love with Liam.” I finished.

“Wait what? You fell in love with Liam?” He was surprised, to say the least. But I couldn’t stop now, I had started and now I have to finish.

“Harry, stop interrupting me! You don’t know how hard this is to tell you. You wanted to know, so just shut up and listen.” He sat back, and motioned with his hand for me to continue.

“Liam and I have had a thing going since before we came to Australia. But when we got here things changed. I wrote him a song Harry. [b]A song.[/b] What the fuck is wrong with me? We were never exclusive, but I thought we actually meant something to each other. I thought I meant something to him. So I wrote him a song and told him I loved him. That was the day you guys went to the beach. That was the day Liam went out and fucked some girl in a filthy bar. And a few days after, Liam dumped me.” I hadn’t realised I was crying until the tears fell off of my cheeks and onto my hands. I reached up and quickly wiping them away, hoping Harry hadn’t noticed, but knowing that he had. He went to speak, but again I stopped him.

“I knew something was wrong, he didn’t say anything, but in some way he was different. He didn’t have that spark in his eyes, but I chose to ignore it because I wanted us to work. I wanted him. Maybe I’m selfish; maybe it is my fault that I got hurt. I got in to deep.” I waited for him to say something.

“Niall, it’s not your fault. No one gets to choose who they fall in love with; your case sucks because you fell in love with someone who apparently doesn’t love you back. But the worse part is that you have to see him everyday. I’m so sorry that you’re hurting, Niall.” His words were kind, but his eyes had turned dark.

“I just don’t know what to do anymore, Harry. I can’t talk to him. He won’t let me. I’ve tried. I can’t talk to Zayn or Louis, they don’t understand. I didn’t even want to tell you, but here we are,” I took a deep breath. “It’s like I’m breathing and I’m walking through my life, but I can’t see anything around me. It’s like I’m slowly falling and there is nothing that will slow my descent. I need something that will make me feel alive again. I need a reason to keep going.”

There was now a steady stream of tears silently flowing down my cheeks, they wouldn’t stop.

“It will be okay, Niall,” Harry reached over and wiped a thumb across my cheek, but it only made me cry harder. After a while I found myself curled up into a ball in his arms, as we lay awkwardly on the couch, neither of us comfy, but neither of us wanting to move. In that moment we found comfort in each other. The weight I have been carrying around on my shoulders for weeks has finally been lifted, my only regret is that I passed it on to Harry, and now it will weigh on him.

Some time after my tears stopped flowing, and I fell into a deep unconsciousness, it was dark when I woke up to find that Harry was gone. I got up and searched the hotel room and found no trace of him. He must be with the other boys. I decided to walk over to Louis flat to see when he has decided to leave.

I got to his door but was reluctant to knock, because I am the reason they all have to make this choice, I’m the reason they have to leave. I stopped thinking and knocked twice. Louis answered the door, and upon seeing it was me, had an angry scowl etched into his face.

“Come to apologise, Niall?” He asked me, the joking boy gone completely from his features.

“Yes,” I replied simply. “I wanted to see what you decided to do.” He hadn’t made a move to allow me inside, so we stood awkwardly in the hallway.

“Louis who is it?” I heard Zayn shout from inside the room.

“It’s Niall, he’s apparently come to apologise,” Louis shouted back, never taking his eyes off of me. “So, let’s hear it then.” He said, once Zayn came to join us.

“I just wanted to say how sorry I am that I got the tour cancelled. You would understand if you knew the whole story but I can’t tell you, and I’m sorry about that. You are just going to have to trust that I had a good reason for doing what I did, and –“

“A good reason? You had a good reason for getting drunk and falling off the stage at the concert, and not to mention the fact that you had already punched Liam on stage and almost broke his face,“ Louis said, cutting me off.

“You ruined our tour, Niall. I’m sorry but we can’t forgive you for that. You need to get your shit together, so that we can all do this again someday. But for now Louis, Liam and I are leaving for London tomorrow, and it’s up to you what you decide to do. But until you sort whatever is going on with you out, we don’t want to hear from you,” Zayn said.

“What about Harry? What’s he decided to do?” I asked, my eyes starting to water from what Zayn said.

“We don’t know, we haven’t seen him. But our plane leaves at 11am tomorrow, and if you decided to come back to London, we want you to catch a different flight, we don’t want you on ours,” Zayn said.

I couldn’t believe they were doing this. I told them I was sorry, but they don’t care. They’re only angry because I got the tour cancelled, but it was Liam. This is all because of Liam, it’s his fault.

“All I can say is that I’m sorry. And I won’t bother you again.” I tried again.

“Niall, we’re sorry, but we think it’s for the best.” Louis said.

I started to turn away, the tears slowly starting to run down my cheeks again. “You wouldn’t be saying that if you knew the truth, you should talk to Liam though, he knows what happened.” And with that I turned completely and walked away from them.

I found a door at the end of the corridor that read ‘ROOF’, I put my hand on the knob, and was surprised when it turned, I placed a rock that was just inside the door against the door frame to keep the door open and walked slowly up the stairs.

I need a different perspective, and what’s more peaceful and what’s more thrilling then standing at the edge of a roof.