Fairytale Gone Bad √

Chapter 12

HARRY'S POV

Greg had left a good ten minutes ago, saying he had to make some calls. Whatever that meant. At this point I was just glad he was gone.

Niall, Liam and I were the only ones in the room now. Zayn still hadn't shown up after taking that call from Perrie. I knew he hated to be seen crying, so probably he had gone somewhere to just put himself together before meeting us again.

"Hey, there." I heard Louis' voice, his head peeking through the slight open door. He was hesitating.

"Louis, we don't bite." Niall rolled his eyes. Louis' lips twitched in a small smile before he joined us, closing the door behind him.

"So..." He started, shifting his weight from one foot to another uncomfortably, staring at the floor. "Humm, I-I just really wanted to apologize. Not that it matters much since it's already too late for being sorry, but... I really am." He took a deep breath, finally looking at us in the eye. "I'm sorry."

"It's not too late." Liam said, shrugging. "Actually, it's kind of a relief to see that you know you made a mistake."

"But it's exactly that, Lou." Niall added. "It was just a mistake."

"Neither of us are perfect." I joined in. "Not that smoking and doing that kind of stuff is okay, because it's definetely not, but... We all make mistakes."

"And besides, who hasn't made something stupid at our age?" Liam agreed, slightly nodding.

Louis posture immediately changed, a small but true smile making its way to his face.

"I actually thought you'd be mad-" He started, but then Zayn opened the door, cutting him off. He looked at us with a strange look on his face. His eyes were still red and puffy from crying, as were Louis', now that I noticed.

"What's going on?" Zayn asked, his voice hesitant.

"We were just talking." Niall replied.

"Louis came here to apologize to us, just like you did a while ago." I said, taking a deep breath and trying to clear things up once and for all, since we were all there now. "Look, what you both did wasn't good. It's not okay to smoke and doing that kind of stuff. It's not. And no matter how much we try to sugar-coat it and say that it's okay, it's not. But we all make mistakes. What is done is done. All we can do now - and we will do it together - is apologize and avoid making the same mistake again."

"No matter what, we stick together." Niall said, his voice firm. "We always stand by each other through everything, and now is not an exception."

"And it's kind of our fault too, you know?" Liam intervened. "If you guys felt like you needed to do that to clear your head, or have fun, or whatever, it's our fault that we let you reach that point."

We all paused, just staring at each other with small smiles on our lips.

Niall sighed, breaking the comfortable silence.

"You know, you guys don't really understand how grateful I am to have you in my life." Zayn said, surprising us all. Zayn wasn't the kind of guy to share his feelings, so when he actually did, we listened.

"I was just expecting you guys to be angry. I was actually afraid you might want to end everything." Louis added, visibly relieved.

"What, end this?!" I said, my voice coming a octave higher than normal. "No fucking way!"

"After all that we've been through? Hell no." Liam rolled his eyes.

"You are the only ones that actually know what it's like to have the life we have. I know that I can count on you after all that we've been through, 'cause I know that you'll truly understand." Niall said, making us all turn our heads in his direction.