Harry’s POV

“Just go, please.” I plead her.

“Harry…” She whines.

“Pleaaase? Last round, I promise. You’re good at this game.”

“Harry, this is childish.” She chuckles at her own statement.

“We can go take photos with the camera after?” I bargain, which got her quiet.

We have been playing hide and seek for a while now, and trust me, she is a good hider. Earlier, after our talk of the birthday party, we went for a quick swim in the lake. The water was warm, and Chasity had provided me with Amber’s favorite swimwear. She wore a bright blue one piece with a lovely design. It also had cut outs on the sides of her waist. It adorned her perfectly. Even though it took me quite a while to convince her, and even longer to at least get her to come out from hiding in the bushes.

After the swim, we went for a walk through the trees. I had my present in plain sight, hanging down around my neck from the strap. She would plead me to give it to her to take some pictures with it, whenever she saw something that would have been nice on her wall. Every fifteen minutes or so there would be a spider near her foot, causing her to scream. At one point, it got to where I was giving her a piggy back ride on the way back to the lake.

We got to the familiar pathway, after me finding her in a tree. With her on my back, everything felt right. Yet, there was something wrong, like I was missing something, but couldn't tell what it was. When we returned to our spot on the blanket, I set her down and walked behind her to check on our bathing suits, if they were dried out yet. I removed the camera from my neck, setting it down on the blanket gently before turning to her. The only thing that took my attention from her was the spider on her back, slowly creeping up. I giggled to myself, unsure whether to tell her or not.

"What's so funny now, Harry?" She asks me with her back turned, causing me to chuckle even louder. She turns to me with a confused face.

"Nothing, sweetheart." I tell her, covering my mouth with my hand. My eyes widened when I see the spider crawl to her shoulder, casually sitting there. I am going to feel so bad for that creature when it's gone... And dead. She follows my line of sight, to see the taunting spider on her shoulder, screaming a bloody murder scream. I laugh out loud as I cover my ears.

"HARRY, WHY DIDN'T YOU TELL ME THAT THERE WAS A SPIDER ON ME??!!" She yells at me. She screams again, trying to get it off of her without touching it. She found a branch, and tried to use it to get it off of her, but was too shaken to get it. Her tactic ended up causing her to smack herself with the branch, and I know its going to leave a bruise.

"Here, let me." I still laugh, but walk up to her anyways. She hands me the stick furiously, holding herself. I set the branch down and cup my hands near the spider, removing it from her and leaving it on a nearby tree.

"See? That wasn't so bad." I smile at her, tossing the branch to the floor. She huffs while crossing her arms, turning and walking away from me.

"That was horrible, Harry."

"Oh come on, don't be like that." I call out to her, quickly catching up to her. She notices me picking up my pace, so she does the same. After a couple seconds, she was full out sprinting, beginning to worry me that she could trip and fall over and really hurt herself.

"What are you doing? Do you want to play tag or something?" I call out. She quickly stops, making me crash into her from behind, knocking us to the ground. She yelps out, as I quickly move myself to take the fall for her. She lands on top of me, her arms around my neck. We both groan at the impact.

"You okay?" I ask her, rubbing her back. She stays silent. "Amber, are you hurt?" I asked, beginning to get concerned. I balance myself on my elbows, trying to get a look on her face. She doesn't move, but instead starts to giggle, allowing me to sigh a breath of relief.

"Jesus, Amber. At least respond when I ask you something."

"You want to play tag?" She asks through her laughter, causing me to chuckle along.

"I was just asking, since you were running away from me. Why did you do that?" I ask her, now sitting up straight. She gets up and off of me, sitting in front of me with her legs crossed.

"I got mad that you didn't tell me about the spider." She pouts, making me hold back a laugh.

"Well how could I have seen it with you on my back? I don't have eyes on the back of my head, even though I sometimes wish I did." I winked, causing her to blush slightly. She gets up and dusts herself off.

"Alright, fair point."

"Did you want to play hide and seek?" I question. She shook her head. "Why not?" I ask.

"It's a forest, there aren't many places where you can hide." She explains, shrugging.

"I disagree." I stand up and make my way to the lake, knowing that she is close behind.

"What are you doing?" She asks me. I move to a nearby tree, and resting my head against it.

"I'm going to count to 20, and you're going to go hide. Go!" I shout as I began to count.

Which led to the hide and seek game now. She refused to come out as she was embarrassed of herself, shockingly. She is beautiful, I just wished she realized that.

Photography, which I found out from an un-named source, was a small hobby of hers. She would go to the larger part of the city, sometimes in the parks, and take photographs. Occasionally she would take pictures of herself with the help of Chasity at times. Chasity showed me some of them, which turned out amazing.

“Promise?” She asks, sticking out her pinkie.

“And you say that hide and seek is childish.” I joked, earning a rolling set of eyes, but I connected our pinkies either way. “But you can’t go to the car, that’s cheating.” I warn her as she distances herself from me.

“Of course. I have something else in mind. Just start counting.” She says as she runs into the trees. I smile to myself as I know she’s walking in direction of the car. I place my head on the nearest tree, and wrapped my arms over my head as I counted to twenty.

“1… 2… 3…” I yell out. The sound of her feet crunching on the leaves gets quieter. “7… 8… 9…” It starts coming back, with the sound of more. “13… 14… 15... “ The bushes behind me start to rustle and crunch. “18… 19… 20! Ready or not, here I come!” I shout as I remove myself from the tree, and examine the empty area around me. I begin making my way down the path we came from earlier today, trying to see if she is making a run for the car.

“Amber… Come out come out wherever you are...” I spoke quietly, hoping to find any movements, or hear a giggle. I know she won’t actually respond to me, but it’s always worth a try. From the corner of my eye I see bushes shaking, a weird laughter coming out of it.

“Hmmm.” I hum to myself, and walk quietly to the bush, only to find someone I wasn’t looking for.


Amber’s POV


“Amber…Come out, come out, wherever you are…” I hear Harry mutter in the short distance away from me.

Sitting on a branch on a tall tree, I watch Harry walk right past me. He thought it would be a good idea to play hide and seek in the little forest we were in. Such a child. If anything, I could have run back to the car and wait for him there, but he set boundaries to prevent that. He must know me better than I thought…

The sun was beginning it descend on the horizon, but still giving us plenty of daylight. I look down at my watch to read 8:30 pm. It’s getting late, and I have stuff to do back at home… Great. Good thing he had come with spare clothes, that Chasity had packed so I wasn’t up in a tree in a one piece. I had a nice red t-shirt with high waist shorts and my black vans.

I heard ruffling sounds from beneath me, quickly bringing my attention back to the matter at hand. I couldn’t identify the reason behind the sound. I should have asked Harry if there were wild animals in here that could possibly hurt us before we started.

The noise came back and by now I lost him. Feeling a tad scared, I bring my knees up to my chest, giving me something to hold tight. The sound grows louder, surrounding the tree followed by the sound of growling. My eyes widened at the sound, panic now taking over my body.

“Amber?” I hear Harry faintly call out. This is not a time for jokes, Harry.

“Amber, game over, I think a couple friends found us and they want to chat.” He calls out, growing weaker as he walks further away from me. The movements in the bushes beneath me suddenly stopped, making my heart stop as well. Suddenly, something covers my mouth from behind me, making me scream at the top of my lungs.

“Amber!! Where are you?!” I hear Harry immediately yell from a small distance.

“Shhh.” The person said behind me. I am literally shaking, as I know that it isn’t Harry, and we were the only ones out here.

“Let me go!” I mumble through the hand, thankful that it was removed right after I pleaded. Arms wrapped around my waist, bringing me back down to the ground suddenly, not giving me enough time to prepare myself so I screamed again.

“Jesus, Amber… It’s just me. Let’s not give Harry a heart attack, shall we?” The voice says much clearer this time, giving me comfort. I was released, given the freedom to turn around and meet my scarer.

“Louis… Why did you do that?!” I angrily spoke.

“Just a joke, Amber. Calm down.” He said in defense, but I could easily tell that he was holding in his laughter. The remainder of the boys emerge from the bushes that surrounded the tree I was in with the same face as Louis’. I cross my arms at them, tapping my foot.

“I told you, I knew you shouldn’t have done that. I knew she was going to get scared.” Liam starts.

“Sorry Amber.” The rest of them monotonically say. I sighed, regaining my breath from all of this excitement. Well, horror excitement. I did not enjoy that one bit.

“It’s alright, but how did you guys know we were here?” I ask them, making my way back to the lake, them trailing behind.

“Well, like I said we needed Harry back by 5.” Louis sighs. I scrunch my face up in confusion.

“I thought you were joking?” They all gave me weird looks. “What?” I question.

“He didn’t tell you, didn’t he.” Zayn mumbles, making me even more confused.

“Guys, enough with being vague. What’s going on?” I ask, becoming a bit frustrated.

We make it back to the lake, sitting around the now empty plates. I now feel very thankful that I changed. The bathing suits were sitting on a branch on the closest tree to the water, flowing in the breeze. The blanket moved a couple feet away from where it originally was, probably from the breeze.

“Amber! Where are you?!” Harry frantically shouts, the sound of his footsteps coming closer.

“I’m at the lake!” I shout back at him before turning to his friends. “What do you mean he didn’t tell me?” I ask them, but they averted my eyes to behind me. I turned around just as Harry appears, running at me for dear life but stopping once he sees the rest of the guys.

“Aw, you guys found her first…” He whines as he takes me in a large hug, towering over me from behind. "Are you okay? I heard you scream. Are you hurt? Bleeding? Broken bones-"

"Harry, I'm okay. Promise." I giggle, letting his arms wrap around me tighter.

“Harry.” Liam starts. I feel like there is tension going on between them, making me a bit queasy inside. Harry’s head moves, facing them.

“Liam.” He responds as he lets me go and sits by my side.

“You do realize what time it is, right?” Niall says. Harry reaches for his phone that was turned off. Once turned on he was greeted with hundreds of voice-mails and text messages. The clock appeared, reading 8:40 pm.

“Oh.” Was all he said. “Is Paul out there?” He then asks. They all nod.

“He rescheduled another flight in three hours, but he wants us all at the airport now before the fans build up.” Zayn explains. Okay, now I’m confused. I also find it a tad rude how they are all talking as if I was not present.

“Flight?” I ask, feeling a bit rude interrupting as well. They all finally looked at me before each other. They all whispered among themselves. Louis was nudged, and all the guys looked to him. What is going on? Why can't Harry just tell me? Louis then cleared his throat before speaking.

“Amber, we’re leaving.” He stated awkwardly. Yeah, I know they are.

“On Sunday, though… Right?” They stay silent for a moment, making me feel regret for asking. As if it wasn’t obvious already, you can pretty much put the pieces together by now. I just need to hear it to make sure. Harry told me they had the weekend…

“Change of plans. We were leaving tonight, supposed to be in 20 minutes, but Harry must have lost track of time.” Louis explains to me. “He was supposed to tell you now, but I see you guys ended up playing hide and seek.” He crosses his arms and stares at Harry who looked guilty. So this wasn’t a date then? Just a farewell?

“Oh.” Was all I said, looking down at my feet, my hands intertwined on my lap.

“We’re really sorry, Amber.” Liam apologizes.

“What for? It’s your job.” I shrug. I stand up and dust myself off lightly. Louis stands and walks over to me, taking me in an embrace with the other boys following in suit. Before I knew it, we were in a large group hug, with me barely breathing in the middle. They are going to make me cry.

“Don’t act so sad, guys. You will be back soon.” I say as they remove themselves from me. They stay silent. “Right?” I ask, looking between them all.

“For sure.” Zayn says with his half smile, reassuring me.

“Alright then.” I sighed, upset for the moment is already happening. I had prepared myself for this on Sunday night, not now. “We should probably pick this up. Don’t want to leave anything else behind." I state. We all silently pick up the items that Harry had set up, probably only hours earlier. I slowly made my way back to the car with my back to them after feeling like I have everything that I could carry, including my swimsuit.

“Amber…” I hear Harry say, but I don’t turn around, just kept walking.

I don’t even know why I feel like I am being distant. Maybe it’s the thought of being away from them after everything that’s happened, or that I just do want to leave… Leave them, at least. Maybe just the feeling of it being too soon, I mean, they did have the weekend. Oh stop, you know they have work to do. They already did so much to stay with you for your birthday. Be thankful, there are many people in the world that wish to be you. Things happen. Get used to it. Of course they do. Great, now the tears are building up.

“Amber, wait.” Harry calls out again, this time falling into my pace and walking next to me.

“Hey.” I greet him, looking down. He wraps one arm around my shoulder, tugging me closer to him.

“I’m sorry that I didn’t tell you. It slipped my mind. Honest.” He says quietly.

“Like I said, don’t be. It’s your job. Last minute changes happen. We just have to get used to them, that’s all.” He sighs and rests his head on top of mine gently, staying silent as the sound of nature fills our ears.

"There's something on your mind, what is it?" He asks after a couple moments of silence.

Walking into the parking lot, I’m not really surprised by the sudden turn of events to see Chasity in the driver’s seat of the car Harry and I came in, and a van with Paul in the front seat next to it, speaking on the phone.

"Nothing." I wipe my eyes, removing my tears as I wait for the rest of the boys to come out of the forest, already with glum faces. We pack everything into the car’s trunk, and everything else into the backseat. I shut the door after everything is secured, turning to still see the sad faces on them all.

“Come on, guys.” I slightly smile, even though I'm starting to tear up again. On the inside I feel like I’m breaking like glass. It’s only been a few weeks, yet they were the best they have ever been. But, now comes the hard part. The farewell.

“We’ll see you soon. Be sure to keep in touch, okay?” Liam says as he hugs me tightly. I nod into his shoulder, holding in the tears.

“I will.” He releases me, Zayn coming next.

“See you soon, babe.” He softly smiles at me before the embrace.

“See you, Malik.” I joke, squeezing him tighter.

“Come on, my turn.” Niall says from behind Zayn, pouting. I chuckle at his behavior. Zayn lets me go, allowing me to open my arms out for Niall. He stretches his arms out just as wide, pulling me tightly onto him. So this is what the Horan Hug is like.

“I’ve always wanted a Horan Hug since the day I discovered you guys.” I whisper into Niall’s ear. He laughs out loud as hugs me tighter.

“You’re always welcome to them. Always. I’m your teddy bear if you need a cuddle, okay Amber?” He reminds me. I laugh as well.

“Of course.” He lets me go, Louis quickly coming into view with sad puppy eyes as he tackles me in his embrace.

“I’m gonna miss you Bambi.” He says quietly. I sigh, trying to move myself to not die in his arms.

“I’ll miss you too Tommy, but this isn't a forever goodbye.” I tell him as I remove my arms from him, but his still wrapped around me.

"I know, it's a going to be a lengthy 'see you soon." He hugs me tighter, swinging us side to side.

“Louis, let go. You have stuff to do.” I rub his back, giving it two pats. He finally lets me go, ruffles my hair, and hops into the awaiting van, leaving me and Harry to ourselves. It was silent for a moment, and I am not really sure what to do at this point. I had a small feeling that Harry doesn’t either.

"Amber..." Harry starts. I look up at him, unsure whether to go up to him. I mean, we are dating, sort of, shouldn't I do that whenever? "What's on your mind, you look troubled..." He mutters, cupping my face.

"Harry." I start. "It's nothing. Really. Just taking in the hit of reality, that's all."

“Amber I really am sorry, it really-” He starts but I cut him off.

“Harry, stop saying that. It’s okay.” I actually begin to chuckle at his repetitiveness.

“Honest?” He asks.

“Honest.” I smile up at him. He closes his mouth and looks down, shuffling his right foot. He then removes his arms from his back, displaying the vintage camera.

“Here.” He hands it out to me, looking up to my eyes with a soft smile. “It’s your present anyway.” He shrugs. I take the camera, get a feel for it in my actual hands.

“Harry, where did you get this?” He shakes his head.

“On my trip in the U.K. I’ve had it for a while, but I never had much use for it. When I found out how you like those, I wanted to give it you. So, it’s yours now.” The calmness in his voice feels uneasy, like there’s something else. “Happy birthday, Amber Rose.” He smiles once more, before placing a kiss on my forehead. The horn honks, taking our attention to Paul, gesturing for us to come over. Harry takes my hand in his and walks us to the driver’s door of the van.

“Hop in you two. We can say goodbye at the airport.” Paul smirks. Shuffling sounds goes off in the back of the van, as Harry’s hand squeezes mine tighter. We make our way to the door, Harry entering first with me getting the window seat.

“What about Chasity?” I ask as Harry reaches over me to close the door.

“Niall is going to ride with her, so she isn’t alone.” It was then that I noticed the absence of one of the band members. Liam sat in the passenger seat, Zayn was next to Harry as Louis had the back to himself. I look over to the parked car next to us and see Niall strapping into the passenger seat, planting a kiss on her cheek.

“Alright.” I sigh with a smile, gripping the camera in my lap. Harry’s arm snakes around my shoulders, letting my head rest against his chest, knowing that I have to repeat this process when we get there.

Notes

I'm sorry for the lack of updates, I don't really feel well, but trying my best with getting the chapters up, honest. Anyone else had it up to here in school work? *Raises hand* I do.

Also, I feel like I will be putting the story on hold at this point, take a little break from this story, and head back to my other story that I'm doing. So for now I will leave this where this is, hopefully I will get back to this soon. I've somewhat started the next chapter, but I am lost at this point on where I should go with this, but I'm trying to make sense out of it. :P

But please leave a comment, vote, or subscribe if still interested in doing so, would be very kind to do so :) xx