Chapter Two

“So what did you two, lads, get into?” Zayn asked, smiling in spite himself. He had had particularly good time with Perrie and he wondered if his mates had a good time as well.

“Yeah,” Liam said grinning like a gowl. He was remembering the blonde barmaid.

Zayn was about to comment on Liam’s grinning like he had met a charva, but Niall cut him off.

“Liam met an incompetent barmaid who spilled her whole lot of ale and he paid for it! He also gave her his number like a plonker for brains,” Niall said feeling a bit cross.

“What’s crawled into your bum? You act like Charlie was some kind of scanger or something!” Liam ranted feeling exasperated at his mate.

Niall shook his head. He knew that Liam was right. There was nothing wrong with the girl; it was Niall who had something wrong with him. He felt jealous. “I don’t know, Liam. I’ve just had an off day all day. I’m sorry.”

“It’s okay. I guess you didn’t hit it off with Katharine?” Liam asked, feeling sure he was right.

To be honest Niall hadn’t really paid much attention to Katharine. She was charming and pretty, but he was too focused on waiting for Liam to return that he didn’t hit it off with her.

“Not really.”

“Poor, Niall. He struck out while Louis is getting his end away,” Harry said wriggling his eyebrows.

For the first time both the boys noticed that Louis was nowhere to be found.

“Hardy har har,” Niall said, acting a little more cross about the statement than he really was.

“Louis is going to conk you good when he finds out you said that!” Zayn exclaimed.

Harry shrugged smiling mischievously. “Well, we all know it’s true. Why else would he lengthen his date with El?”

“Maybe because it’s his six month?” Zayn retorted.

Harry snorted. “You didn’t make it to your six month with Perrie did you?”

Zayn dropped his jaw. He could not believe that Harry said that. What he and Perrie did was none of Harry’s business. “We haven’t had our six month yet. We are just about to have our three month.”

“Not what I asked,” Harry chided, his dark eyes dancing.

“Oh, shut up you eejits,” Niall snapped and wandered off to his room.

The boys just shrugged and continued their little argy-bargy. Liam heaved himself off the sofa and followed Niall. He had a feeling that he was the cause of Niall’s mental behaviour. Although, he was not sure just what he had done to set him off.

He padded up the stairs and knocked on Niall’s bedroom door. A muffled groan came from the inside of the room. Liam took a deep breath and gave the handle a try. To his surprise it turned easily beneath his fingers and he let himself in. He stepped inside and shut the door behind him leaning on it for a quick second of support and then marched forward to sit on Niall’s bed.

“What do you want?” Niall asked not getting up from his position on his bed.

“Oh. Nially, what’s the matter?”

“I don’t know, mate. I’m just down about being single, I guess,” Niall said with a sigh. He felt like he was telling the truth, but only part of it.

Liam put a hand on Niall’s knee. “Look, Nially, I know it’s tough being single now, now, that we really need someone to lean on, but hey, you’ve got me. I mean we’ve got each other.”

For some reason Niall couldn’t explain he got a tingling feeling in the pit of his tummy when Liam said that last bit. He just shrugged it off as knowing that one of his best mates had his back, no matter how silly he was acting. He curled into a ball on his side and chanced a sconce at his fellow singer. He felt the tingly feeling even more intense.

“Is there anything else the matter, Nially?” Liam asked softly, noticed how strange the blonde haired boy was looking at him.

Niall snapped out of his trance and shook his head. “No, I’d like to be alone now, if you don’t mind.”

“Okay, Nially. I just wanted to see how you were doing. If there’s anything I can do just holler down for me,” Liam said, patting Niall’s legs as he got up.

“I will,” Niall said before rolling over.

He kept his thoughts at bay until he heard the soft click of the door. Then he rolled over on his stomach, with his face smashed into the pillow, and started mumbling his frustrations. He felt like he was being completely ridiculous. He had no idea what was wrong with him and it was just so frustrating. If he knew what was bothering him it would make things a lot easier. If he could just put a name to it, then maybe he wouldn’t feel like he was going completely bonkers.

He finally fell asleep after picking apart his brain for a few hours.

Meanwhile the other boys were conversing in the sitting room.

“Did you ever find out what was wrong with Niall?” Zayn asked curiously from his spot on the sofa.

“I don’t know if this was meant to be personal or not, but I think he’s a bit down because he sees how you all are with your girlfriends,” Liam informed them reluctantly.

He thought there was more to it than that, more that Niall wasn’t telling him. But he didn’t want to let the boys know. It was obviously very private. And it obviously had something to do with him.

Liam was still thinking it over, uninvolved in the other’s conversation, when Louis walked through the door. He crept in trying to be sneaky and closed the door behind him, leaning against it with a grin plastered on his face.

Harry cat-called Louis. “Woohoo! Someone got some tail tonight!”

Liam joined in. “You manky thing you! Defiling El the way you do!”

Louis’ cheeks burned bright red. He could have ripped up the floor boards and set up camp under there. He couldn’t help it if it was his six month with Eleanor and they both wanted it to be special. “Oh, bugger off!”

The boys laughed and Harry elbowed Liam grinning at how red Louis’ face was. Harry always loved embarrassing the other boys with all of his innuendos. He really did seem to be the pervert of the group and everyone knew it.

“Ah, come on, Louis. You know we are just poking fun at you! You know we love you,” Liam said as Louis pushed off to his room, still teeming with embarrassment.

“Yeah, yeah,” he said shrugging Liam off.

He just wanted some peace and quiet. Some time to think about how amazing his night had went. And how he had indeed ‘got some tail.’

“Way to go, Liam, you’ve set off two of us in one night,” Harry chided.

“What can I say? I have that effect on people,” Liam said shrugging innocently.

Notes

I love this chapter. I have no idea why. But I am so frustrated I had this story posted on the HarryStyles website and it had a lot of fews and reads and stuff and I accidentally deleted it!