The next day was a busy day in the bachelor pad, for it was the day that they all went back to their own individual places. Each boy was in his own room, packing up all the belongings they had brought with them. For all of them, the week seemed to fly by so fast. The party, the fights… seemed to pass in the blink of an eye.

Harry had been packing his room, but he stopped when he opened up the desk drawer and remembered what he had put in there. Reaching slowly, he picked up the frame and flipped it over. He looked genuinely happy in the picture, but why wouldn’t he be? He was with her. Harry couldn’t remember how long it had been since he had felt that sheer happiness that he felt when he was with her.

Then again, he’s gotten close to that level. He had felt this with Darren. The was his heart would race and the way his smile could extend to the moon was enough to show it was nearly true, and that was only when he got a new message from her. Harry was just too in denial to realize that, and Lord knows what his reaction would be if he met Darren in person.

Harry shook off the tears that threatened to spill as he continues to admire her. This picture he held, had to be the best picture of her in Harry’s possession. The sun shined right onto her face and through her short, blondish-brown hair. The camera caught her at just the right angle, and with her smile more radiant than the sun.

Then, there was Harry, staring at her with the fattest smile he had ever smiled before. His eyes were lit up, and he looked awake, just like the first time he met her…

Harry had, reluctantly, agreed to go to the mall with Lou and Lux. He felt overworked from all of the early morning and late night recording sessions, and his eyes had bags forming under them. He would have been sleeping in, but he couldn’t resist a day with Lux.

Lou dragged Harry in and out of stores, and he was forced to look at racks upon racks of clothing, though nothing was purchased. Harry was beginning to regret coming, as he started to complain a lot. Eventually tired of his complaints, Lou told Harry it was alright to leave.

Harry apologized to Lou, but said goodbye nonetheless. However, just before he made it halfway through the mall, he saw her, and as in the picture his eyes lit up when they made eye contact. His and her eyes were locked together.

Confidently, Harry walked over to her, never breaking contact. He held out his hand. “Hi, I’m Harry.”

“Leanna,” she said and shook his hand.

Harry pushed away the memories and set the frame in his duffle bag, beginning to focus on packing again. In went most of his clothes, though he left some spare here should he ever return. All of his chargers and devices followed before he declared that he was done.

Glancing around the room one last time, he made sure that everything was packed and threw the bag over his shoulder. He met the rest of the band downstairs, dropping his bag down at the bottom next to the others’ bags.

There the five of them stood, staring at each other in silence. None of them knew what to say – which was puzzling because they were just returning to their separate homes.

Niall was the first to break the silence. “Well,” he sounded as if he could cry, “I guess this is goodbye.”

“Geez, Niall. You make it sound like the band is breaking up. We’re just going home!” Louis lightened up the situation. “I say that we cherish this last day in this house by doing all the stupid stuff we did many a year ago.”

Not too long after Louis had declared the proposition, the boys were on the couches playing fifa and drinking the last case of beer down. It seemed just like the old days; even Harry participated. Eventually, he even beat Zayn, 6-4.

By the end of the day, none of them wanted to leave. However, they knew they’d be seeing each other during recording sessions and basically anything and everything that had to do with their career. They loaded up into their cars and waved solemn goodbyes.

When Harry reached his flat, he was thoroughly tired, but he couldn’t help but feel like he was missing something today. There was something he must have forgotten, but he couldn’t put his finger on it. It was at the tip of his tongue, but the words were lost. He must’ve forgotten something, someone…

Darren.

She’d always started the conversations, but oddly enough, she hadn’t today. Realizing that she can’t always start the conversations, he sent one. It was a simple hello, nothing more, nothing less. He scrolled up a little to see the last message she had sent, the one Louis read out loud.

*ThatInvisibleGirl: I would, but that’s all the way downstairs. And the odds of them stopping their editing to come kill this spider is 1 in a million

Editing. That was the word that stood out the most to him. There was no direct way of telling who her brothers were, but he could now say that he knew they were twins and they edited stuff. Well, that really puts him in a higher position…

Harry started to put his stuff from his bag away while he waited for Darren to reply. However, minutes turned in to half an hour, and soon an hour had gone by. By now it was dark outside, and Harry figured that waiting for a response would be pointless. ‘Sleep is more important than a text. Right? …’

~

Darren had been fuming nearly the entire morning since yesterday at about noon. She couldn’t remember any second when she had stopped being pissed off at the world. Not even going to the bathroom stopped her from being upset. Her only problem was that she couldn’t blame anyone but herself. However, being the stubborn girl she is, she blamed her brothers for the death of her phone.

“Dare, it wasn’t our fault. You’re the one who chucked it across the room,” Jack argued. Anything he or Finn could say or do wouldn’t change Darren’s mind; she was pissed.

“You could have caught it! Or, I don’t know deflected it onto the soft carpet! Either way, you owe me a new phone.” Jack and Finn groaned, knowing they were fighting a battle that Darren had already won. “It’s my birth month anyway, so there’s nothing stopping you from getting me a new phone.”

Darren smiled, satisfied with how she ended the conversation, but she still wasn’t happy enough. Something was missing, but she never intended on figuring it out. Instead, she logged onto her tumblr and posted her thoughts.

Never throw you phone at the wall… unless you have brothers who love you ^-^

After her update, she scrolled through her wall, liking things here and there. She mainly used tumblr to be expressive though, writing about her life anonymously under her pen name, ThatInvisibleGirl. Darren loved how she could interact with strangers who felt the same way she felt – well, used to.

Her username came from how she felt when she lost everything: invisible. Darren could remember how she was ignored, passed by, unspoken to everyday up until she was sent off. She remembered how much she had changed after being sent to an all-girls boarding school, unappreciated by her father.

Darren couldn’t stand being invisible, so she took on the “rebel” look. After all, she already had the hair for it, and the stank attitude came naturally after that. She learned to take out her frustration on other people. In other words, Darren became what she never thought she would, but it wasn’t her fault. It was her father’s...

The doorbell rang, stopping Darren in the middle of her scroll. “Darren, Blithe is here!” Jack called soon after. Darren squealed and shut her laptop before racing down the stairs to greet Blithe.

The two best friends tackled each other in a hug, having not seen each other in some time – about a week or so actually. Blithe was the same age as Darren, about 5’5” with extremely blonde hair, but she was not the stereotypical dumb blonde with no self-respect.

“Let’s promise each other to never spend more that a few days apart,” Blithe said, still in the embrace.

“I agree,” Darren said, breaking up the hug. She isn’t exactly a hugger, but there were those few exceptions to huggable people, Blithe being one of them. “So… mall?”

“Let’s go!” Blithe said eagerly and dragged Darren out the door.

~

Harry held a frown all morning. Darren had yet to reply to him, and he was getting worried that she never would. In other words, he was overreacting, because ‘surely she has a good reason’.

Today, the band was back at work, discussing more about the tour though they still had over month to plan. The tour wasn’t going to be big, but every detail was of importance. It would only last but five, six weeks tops.

“Well boys, we have a surprise for you,” Simon announced. The boys perked up at the sound of surprise and sat up straight in their boring meeting room chairs. “To start getting the word out, we’ve decided to have One Direction make a surprise visit to the local mall. You’ll be announcing your tour their and singing the song of your choice to get fans excited about the tour.”

Harry couldn’t care less about performing at the mall. ‘Surprise? More like a command that we have no say in…’ he thought. He looked at the other boys’ expressions to see that they were skeptical about this. They all had mixed feelings about performing for the first time in public in a long time.

“When is that going to be?” Liam, curious to know more details, asked.

“Today, of course. The sooner the surprise, the more of a surprise it will be! You just have to decide on a song and get it approved by me. We’ll practice it once through if you’d like, then we’ll get into the vans and go. Sounds like a plan?” Simon didn’t wait for an answer before he said, “Great!” and left the boys alone in the meeting room.

The boys just sat there, thinking, thinking again… Harry, thinking he’d just let the boys choose the song, sat there and stared at his phone. It had been about nine hours of unresponsive waiting. No sign of the message being read, and no notification of a new message being delivered.

“We could sing Clueless,” Zayn suggested, “because we’re clearly clueless on what song to choose.” He was the first to speak up.

“No, that song is too sad and mellow to be getting fans excited for tour,” Louis tells him. The others agreed and started to process their songs that were more upbeat and exciting.

Niall decided to speak up, “How about Drifters? It’s a more upbeat tempo.” Liam argued that if they sang that song, it would be sad by true meaning even with the more upbeat sound.

Harry continued to stare vigorously at his phone screen, but he listened in on the conversation. Louis had suggested Falling Blind, but Zayn didn’t like the fact that Niall didn’t have a good part in it. Niall agreed with Zayn and suggested It’s Only. However, Louis said they still needed a lot of work on the chorus. No one could argue with that.

Harry sighed and put his phone away. If they had to argue any longer over song choice, his head would explode. “Let’s just sing Fly Me Home. It’s about missing home, or love, and going back to where it all started. Isn’t that what this tour is for anyway?”

The other boys blinked, not saying another word. They didn’t need to say another word, for they all knew that the song was perfect. Liam got up to tell Simon who came in and gave Harry a pat on the back for the brilliant suggestion. The band ran through the song once before determining that they didn’t need much practice. Then, they were off to the mall.

~

“What about this one?” Blithe asked, holding up another dress to show Darren. They had been at the mall for a little over an hour, just shopping around and enjoying each other’s company.

“Green doesn’t go with your complexion, Bee. Especially not that shade of green…” Darren criticized. She always knew what to say, and she is never afraid to tell someone what she truly thinks about something.

Blithe turned back to the rack and pulled out a black, lace top skater dress that caught her eye. She squealed and showed Darren. “This would look smashing on you!” Darren turned to see what Blithe was showing her and smiled.

“I love it! But don’t you think the two bozos I live with might kill me?” she questioned.

“You’re 21, Dare. They can’t tell you what you can and cannot wear. Besides, you’d look incredible in it, so you can’t not get it,” Blithe argued. Darren laughed and agreed, adding the dress to the items she was getting. She never tried anything on; she always had great judgment on what fit her and didn’t.

Darren decided she was done looking at clothes to which Blithe agreed, so the two checked out their purchases and walked out of the store. As soon as they got close to the front, they saw a huge crowd, filled with screaming girls. Darren got wide-eyed and looked to Blithe who shrugged her shoulders.

“Back it up, ladies!” they heard a burly man voice call out. Darren tried to look over heads to see what the commotion was about, but couldn’t see anything even with her height.

Darren wanted to walk closer to find out, but she was quickly grabbed ahold of by her bestie who dragged her to the back exit of the mall. Before they were out of earshot, they heard one loud, “I love you, One Direction!”

Darren instantly groaned. ‘Ew,’ she thought. She couldn’t stand those guys. Their music was okay, but they were constantly the topic of all of her closest friends, or YouTubers, and she didn’t think they were that special. She was sure they were great guys, but she wasn’t really a fan.

When they had finally exited the mall, the two best friends laughed, imitating some of the calls of the so-called Directioners.

“I love you, Harry!” Blithe mocked. She and Darren laughed. “Hey!” she perked up. “What are the odds that the guy your in contact with is him?”

Darren laughed. “There are millions of people by the name of Harry.”

“What would you do if it was him?” Blithe asked. It was more of a joke, but there was a hint of seriousness in her voice.

Darren hummed. “I suppose I wouldn’t treat him any differently. After all, he’s just like any other guy on this planet.”

“Yeah, yeah, but this guy happens to be loved by millions… He has millions!” Darren laughed and playfully shoved Blithe.

“Let’s just change the subject…” Darren groaned. It was true though; she’d just treat him like the guy she had come to know over kik, not a beloved boy band member who makes millions. He’s…. just your normal guy.

Notes

Hello!
So, if you don't read my review page, "Fanfiction 101", I just wanted to let you guys know that I have created an ask.fm for questions you have for me and an Instagram for updates on when I'll be updating my stories and why I won't be updating them if I haven't updated in a while. Links are in my bio. :)
Thoughts on this chapter? ~A