Monday, June 25 2012
Houston, TX / Atlanta, GA

Brittany shuffled out of bed and pulled her hair into a messy ponytail before trudging downstairs to the kitchen. She’d opted to stay with Charlotte and her mom instead of her own family, always having felt closer to them.

“Morning, sunshine,” Charlotte said brightly as Brittany sat down beside her.

“Morning,” Brittany muttered, putting her head in her hands.

“There’s coffee,” Charlotte said, motioning towards the table. “I can also make you waffles… but they’re going to be the freezer kind,” she laughed.

“Whatever,” Brittany shrugged, pouring herself a cup of coffee and staring down into it sadly.

Charlotte rolled her eyes at her friend’s depressed state. “Well, at least put some milk in it,” she said, passing the container over to Brittany.

Brittany did as she was told, but she still stayed silent as she stirred her drink.

“Come on Britt,” Charlotte urged. “We’ve got the whole day here. We can do whatever you want.”

“I don’t want to do anything,” Brittany said glumly. “I just want to go back upstairs and sleep and stay there for the rest of my life.”

Charlotte looked at Brittany with sympathy. “You can’t do that, you have to go back on tour tomorrow.”

“Yeah, I know,” Brittany sighed. With the fact that her career was beginning to take off, she really should have been more excited. Instead, all this tour had caused her was drama and heartbreak.

Self inflicted heartbreak, but still.

“Why’d you do it then? If you’re this miserable, you should just go to Atlanta and be with him,” Charlotte said plainly.

Brittany just shook her head. Charlotte’s logic made sense on the surface. Brittany was miserable, and she was sure Niall was miserable as well. But she’d also seen firsthand how much tension there had been between Niall and the other boys because of her. She loved him, and couldn’t bear to see him in any more pain because of that. All she wanted was to see him happy, and she knew that in time, he would be. Everything would go back to normal for him.

“I told you yesterday,” Brittany said quietly. “It’s what’s best for him.”

“Is it?” Charlotte asked. “Is it really? Because I bet you he’s not feeling the best right now. That boy is so in love with you, Britt Britt. I could see it on his face and the way he looked at you. He must be –”

“I know!” Brittany cut her friend off. “I know he loves me, and I’m fully aware of how much. He wasn’t ever going to break it off, that’s why I had to do it. Because he’s being completely ridiculous. I’m not going to Yoko him. God.”

Charlotte gave Brittany a look. “I’m sure he just didn’t do it because he knew that Harry would get over it eventually.”

“You’re not helping,” Brittany muttered, taking a sip of her coffee. “What’s done is done. It’s over,” she blinked back tears furiously at her last statement.

“It doesn’t have to be,” Charlottle told her seriously. “You can just call him up and tell him you love him and that you changed your mind. God he’s probably so sad… I can’t even imagine what it must have been like to break up with him. It was probably like kicking a puppy.”

Brittany looked at Charlotte with annoyance. “I told you what it was like yesterday. We said we loved each other and then he went back to his bus. That was it.”

“And then you called me, sobbing. And he was probably doing the same.”

Brittany really didn’t want to think about that, even though she knew Charlotte was probably right. “If it makes things right between him and Harry, then it was worth it,” she said stubbornly. “It was stupid anyway. He lives so far away. It never would have worked,” she said, wiping tears away from her face as she cried.

“Oh Britt Britt,” Charlotte said, sliding in closer to her friend and hugging her. “It’ll be okay, don’t worry. Let’s just get dressed and go shopping. We can pretend today is before you went on the tour and just spend the day being normal, okay?”

Brittany nodded, still feeling sad, heartbroken and lonely. She was grateful to have the day at home to take her mind off things. “Yeah, okay.”

***

“We’re here, Niall,” Liam said, pulling the curtain back on Niall’s bunk.

Niall just opened his eyes and looked at Liam, not really caring whether they were in Atlanta or not. They didn’t have a show that night, and all he wanted to do was sleep the day away.

“Come on, get up,” Liam urged, giving Niall a sympathetic look. “I know you’re upset, but we’re going to go out to lunch, just the five of us.”

“I don’t want to,” Niall replied rolling over onto his side. “I’m going to stay here.”

Liam rolled his eyes at Niall’s childishness. “You can’t stay in your bunk all day.”

“Yes I can,” Niall mumbled. “I don’t have anything better to do.”

Liam sighed. “It’s probably for the best you know,” he said softly. “She lives here, you live in the UK. You’ll never get to see each other once the tour’s over.”

Niall turned back around and glared at Liam. He would have done anything to make it work with Brittany. He didn’t care where she lived, he gladly would have paid to come visit her as often as he could have. “You should probably break up with Danielle then,” Niall advised angrily. “You’re on tour all the time, you never get to see her.”

“You know that’s different,” Liam said. “You know that this was because having Brittany as your girlfriend was only causing problems between you and Haz.”

“He would’ve got over it,” Niall said glumly. “She didn’t have to leave.”

“Well did you tell her that?”

Niall shrugged. He really was too passive. Now, he was kicking himself for not explaining the whole thing to Brittany, and getting her to reconsider. Instead, he’d just accepted what she was saying. Sometimes, he really hated that about himself. After all, it was his passiveness that had gotten him into this mess in the first place, wasn’t it?

“So she told you it was over, and you just shrugged and said it was fine. Good day then, see ya, I’m not going to sulk in my bunk,” Liam said sarcastically, raising his eyebrows.

“If that was what she wanted I wasn’t about to beg her to change her mind.”

“I’m sure it wasn’t what she wanted, it was probably just what she thought would be best for you. She’s seen how you and Harry are lately. I’m sure she thinks she’s the one who caused all of that.”

“She’s not,” Niall said quickly.

“She is,” Liam corrected him. “Not all of it, but she is responsible, you are too, and honestly, at this point even Harry is. The three of you need to get it sorted, and honestly Nialler, if you love this girl this much, you’re going to actually have to fight for her instead of mope around sadly.”

Niall heard everything Liam was saying, but it didn’t really sink in. He knew his friend was right, but at the moment he couldn’t see past the fact that just twenty four hours ago he’d been happily in love. Now, his whole world was shattered.

“Look, just come with us for lunch, alright? You’ll feel better after you eat something.”

For the first time in his life, Niall really didn’t think that was true.

***

Brittany chewed on the straw of her Frappuccino as she sat on a bench at the mall with her friend. “I don’t know,” she said quickly. “New York, I guess.”

Charlotte gave Brittany a weird look. “Really? Of all places that was your favourite on the tour? You hate New York.”

Brittany just shrugged. She tried to focus more on the early parts of the tour, when everything was fun and less dramatic. Usually, she hated New York, that was true. But the day she’d spent there with Harry had made her forget for a little while all her bad memories in that city. He’d made it fun again.

Perhaps that was what had attracted her to him in the first place. Not that it mattered anymore. That day had almost seemed like an eternity ago, when in reality it had only been a few weeks.

“I just had a nice day there with Harry, and it was before all the drama started happening with Niall, I guess. I don’t know.” Brittany took another sip of her drink and looked down. Retail therapy hadn’t helped her much, she was still feeling fairly depressed despite the shopping bags at her feet. “Why are we talking about this anyway? We said we were going to act normal. Talking about the tour with One Direction is the least normal thing ever.”

Charlotte just looked at Brittany and shrugged. “I’m just trying to help you see that the whole tour wasn’t as bad as you think it was, even though you’re grumpy about it now. Besides, I’d say talking about a One Direction tour is a pretty normal thing for girls our age to do,” she said cheekily.

“Most girls don’t ask their best friend which one of them was better in bed,” Brittany said, giving her friend an annoyed look.

“Yeah,” Charlotte laughed. “You still haven’t answered that question, by the way.”

Brittany rolled her eyes. She wished she could just act like a gossipy teenage girl, but her heart wasn’t really in it. Normally she would have shrugged off the drama and gushed with Charlotte about the fling she’d had over the summer. “I’ve already told you everything about all that.”

“You didn’t even tell me you’d slept with Niall until two days later!”

“I left my phone in Harry’s room! I wasn’t about to say to Niall ‘Oh hey, can I borrow your phone to text my best friend and let her know how good of a bang you were? Thanks.’”

Charlotte just laughed at Brittany’s remark. “I’m sure he wouldn’t have minded. So just to be clear… he was better, right?”

“He was… gentler…” Brittany trailed off, getting lost in her thoughts about Niall again. It was a strange mixture of happy and sad that she felt as she remembered. “I already told you this!”

“I know,” Charlotte said seriously. “I just wanted to see the look on your face when you said it.”

“Why?”

“Because it’s so obvious that you’re madly in love with him,” Charlotte said quietly. “And it’s the sweetest thing ever.”

Brittany stood up from her spot on the bench and threw her finished drink in the garbage. “Well it doesn’t matter now, does it? Honestly. Let’s just keep shopping,” she said, picking up her shopping bags in a huff.

Charlotte sighed to herself as she followed her friend. Often, she was far too stubborn for her own good and now it was costing her one of the best things that had happened in her life.

***

Niall pushed his food around on his plate. He couldn’t be bothered to eat anything. He was depressed, and to be honest, the restaurant they’d chosen wasn’t all that great. He’d never been a fan of Chili’s.

“Tour’s almost over, lads,” Liam said with a smile, looking around at the others. “Looking forward to getting home?”

A chorus of nods and agreements were shared throughout the table. Niall just shrugged a little. He wasn’t sure if he really wanted to go home or not. He supposed that once he did, things would be over with Brittany for good. Even though they sort of already were, he just hadn’t quite accepted that yet.

“It’ll be nice to have some time off after all this,” Liam said. “What about you Nialler, going back to Ireland for a bit?”

“I suppose,” Niall said. He hadn’t really thought about it. He tended to spend most of his off time in London and have his friends come visit him. Though, after the last couple of months he’d had, he was feeling more and more like he wanted to spend a lot of time in Mullingar with his family acting as though he wasn’t a popstar.

He sort of envied Brittany, getting to spend the day in Houston. He really wanted to text her and see how she was doing, but he’d figured it was best not to.

“We’ll be spending the last few days in Florida, we should ask management if we can go down to Disney or Universal or something,” Louis suggested with a grin.

“I don’t think we’ll have time,” Zayn said, looking around at the others. “We don’t have a day off when we’re over there.”

“Too bad, I would have loved to see Harry on the roller coasters at Disney,” Louis laughed.

Harry gave him a look. “You’re not getting me on one of those, so forget it.”

All of the boys just laughed, and Louis put his arm around Harry. “Come on mate, it’s not that bad. Or maybe you’d rather go to the Harry Potter park instead?”

Harry shrugged. “Emma Watson wouldn’t be there, so why bother?”

That earned another round of laughter from the rest of the boys. Niall rolled his eyes, unamused by Harry’s comment. He was still quite annoyed with him, and as such he didn’t find anything he did or said remotely funny.

“Not keen on Harry Potter, Niall?” Louis asked, noticing his unamused expression.

“Not really.” He wasn’t in the mood the chat with them. Really, he just wanted to go back to his bunk and sulk and look at twitter. The fans adoration always made him feel better, and their speculation about Brittany had died down for the time being at least.

“Well, where do you want to go in Florida?” Louis pressed. “Not that we can actually go anywhere… but still.”

Niall didn’t know anything about Florida, and he certainly didn’t care much to partake in their fantasy vacation. He tried his best though, since he knew that he was supposed to be trying to get along with the others again. “I don’t really know,” he said. “South Beach… that’s in Florida, right?”

The others laughed a little. Niall was always so unsure of himself when it came to geography. “Yes, Niall,” Liam grinned. “It’s in Miami. You couldn’t party too hard in South Beach though, the legal age there is still twenty-one.”

Niall smiled a little, feeling slightly better. “But you know, we could just chill on the beach with some palm trees.”

“Yes,” Harry said in agreement. “That would be better than the roller coaster.”

“Right,” Niall replied, not really wanting to continue having a conversation with Harry. He looked back down at his still full plate of food and somewhat wished they could have gone to Nando’s instead.

Perhaps he was looking forward to going home after all.