Black And White //N.H

25.

When we get to church we walk in, and Niall tries as hard as possible not to get spotted. It's only me and him, since my family dropped out. He looks around at all the people, and places his head into my neck while standing in line waiting to get in. "Maybe we should leave, this stresses me out a little. I don't want you to freak out if we're spotted," he says. When we're just us I alway forget about the fact that he's famous. Sure, he writes songs, but I never think about the fact that he actually releases them. "Niall, it's fine. How many teenagers can you spot here? If someone spots you it's only going to be a few fans," I tell him, rubbing his back. Finally we get inside and can sit down. We find a place next to the wall, far back. "Thanks for coming with me. I know it can be a little boring, but it's nice doing something that reminds me of home," he tells me. "No worries. I want you to enjoy the holidays." I kiss his shoulder, and the priest starts singing. The service is actually pretty decent, and when I see Niall enjoying it, it makes me happy.

"That was nice," Niall says when we're waiting to leave. We are still sitting in our seats, waiting for the church to clear up so that we can get away unseen. "Yeah, it was. I haven't gone to church in years," I tell him, taking him by surprise. "Really?" I nod at him. "Shit," he suddenly mumbles under his breath and I look at him. "What?" He looks down at his hands, and he points toward the aisle. I look over and spot a girl, probably Amy's age, standing there, frozen. She's staring at Niall, making it clear that she recognizes him. "It's fine, it's one girl," I tell him and he quickly looks up at me. "One girl that wants a picture, and then it's gonna come another one, and another one. They turn up fast as hell, Em," he states. He lets go of my hand and gets up, putting on his jacket and straightening it out. I do the same, and we start walking, trying to get out. "Excuse me," I hear a girl voice say behind us, and turn around. It's the same girl, and she's poking Niall on his shoulder. He turns around, looking at her, before pulling on a smile on his face. I see that it's fake, but I don't say anything. The girl asks for a photo, and Niall's saying yes and being very polite. This is the first time I've seen Niall like this, when he's acting exactly like I'm guessing he's been taught in media training. The girl keeps talking to him, before another one turns up, and he repeats the process. This girl is the same age, and I'm taken by surprise about how flirty she's being. She's touching his arm, laughing at what seems to be every word coming out of his mouth, and so on. Niall is still the proper, mediatrained guy. He tries to say bye and turns back to me so we can move on, but both of the girls tag along, talking about how he's amazing, how good he looks, how they never thought they would meet him here, and so on. When we finally get outside I take a deep breath, before looking over at Niall. By now I can sense that he's annoyed, but he doesn't show it to the two teenagers. He tells them goodbye, grabs my hand and walks toward the car, making me go into the passenger seat before he gets into the driving seat speeding off. "I'm sorry about that," he says, glancing over at me. "Don't worry about it, Love, it's a part of you," I tell him, placing my hand on top of his. "I love my fans, I do, but they can freak me out. That second girl was more touchy than you, and she was like what? Fourteen?" I can sense that he's frustrated, so I squeeze his hands. "You know you can tell them to stop. You have the right to not be touched by your fans," I tell him. "Yeah, I know." he lets out a sigh, and parks the car.

We're back at the house, so we get inside. "Hello, kids, how was church?" my mother says as soon as we get inside. "It was lovely. Thank you for letting me borrow your daughter this morning," Niall says, smiling at my mother. "It was my pleasure." She disappears back into the kitchen, and I walk to the sitting room, that's empty. "Where is everyone?" I ask my mother when I walk into the kitchen. "Grandmother and grandfather needed to get some things done, so Evan took them to town," she says, cleaning up some dishes. "Do you need any help, Vivian?" Niall speaks up, but she shakes her head. "No, you two should go take a nap. You look tired." We do as she says, and head up to my room. We lay in bed for a couple of hours, going in and out of sleep, and just focused on being with each other.

"Present time, lets go," mother says when we're done eating dinner, and after we've changed out of our dresses and suits and into more comfier clothes. We always do this when we're with my mother, but at my father's place we have to wear nice clothes all night. We sit there opening gifts, and I'm taken by surprise when Niall has presents to everyone. He had a couple of tickets for a Manchester-Liverpool game for Evan, a wine bottle for mother and Connor, that by the look on Connors face seems expensive, and then some cozy mugs for my grandparents. I told him a couple of months back that they love collecting mugs, and these mugs have a picture of somewhere in Ireland on them. All of them thank him, and Evan seems really stoked. They have something for him as well. It's some sort of maroon blue book, and a pair of cufflinks. He laughs when he sees them, but seems pretty happy. "Thank you so much, these are amazing," he says. I lean over to look at them, and they have golf balls on them. This makes me laugh as well, but I smile at the fact that they've listened to me when I've talked about him. "These will work out super well when I'm signing players in modest golf, I love them," he says making my mother smile. "That's good, if not we can switch them, same with the book. We didn't know if it was something you needed but it looked nice," mother says, and I look at the book. On the front it says notes and N.H in gold letters. "It is so I can write down the scores," Niall explains and I nod. When most of the gifts are gone I hand Niall his present. I saw him looking at it when we were in the jewelry store buying presents for my siblings. He takes the small box and opens it, looking at the silver ring. It got a rectangular, black stone in the front. "How did you even notice that I wanted that ring? You were busy talking with the cashier when I looked at it," he asks me. I shrug at him, and he pulls me into a hug. "Thank you, I love it," he whispers and kisses my forehead.

We spend the rest of the evening like we always do on christmas, talking, telling stories, drinking and laughing.

"Yeh. I don't think I would ever have become the artist I am today if it weren't for the band," Niall tells Connor, as he's being grilled about everything that has to do with x-factor. I'm in an argument with Evan, about spanish and english football. He thinks the english league is better, while I'm all about La Liga. "Where does Lionel Messi play? Barcelona, not Manchester," I tell him and he rolls his eyes at me. "Yes, because he could never keep up with it. He would be outplayed if he meets up at Old Trafford," he says. "No way. Manchester would never be able to keep up with him. He could do a one against the whole team and he'll still win. And give Coutinho a maximum of two years and he's gone from english soccer, I promise you," I tell him a little annoyed. "No way, he will never leave. Just like you he's not gonna go to Spain," I freeze a little, before Niall looks at me. "He will, I'm telling you," I say, trying to brush it off. "When are you going to Spain?" Niall asks and I look at him. "I'm not," I tell him. "Wait, he doesn't know about it?" Evan says and I shoot him a deathglare. "Know what?" I let out a sigh, and rolled my eyes at Evan. "Em got an offer from FC Barcelona when she was what? Nineteen? They wanted her to play for the women's team but she said no and went on to become a radio host," Evan says and I glare at him. "Wait, what? Why on earth did you decline an offer from Barca? Wait, does this mean you didn't go all out when we played our match?" he says. "I didn't want to go. You should be happy about it, I could be in Spain right now and we would never get to know each other. And I might have slowed it down a bit when we played," I tell him. "Then we need to do it again. I think I would find a way to meet you anyways," he says, pulling me into his chest.