Help Me
Chapter five - Arrival
Niall's POV
The plane shakes slightly as the wheels touch down onto the tarmac. The classic Aussie heat waves glimmered off the runway as we coast into the hangar. I notice Liam's white knuckles loosening their grip around the arm rests, and I lean over to tease him. "Come on Li, still afraid of flying then, are we?", I smirk as he leans over and punches me lightly in the arm. "Come on you two, let's go!", Harry bossing us around as usual. As I climb down the plane ladder, a football goes flying past my head, narrowly missing Paul. "Come on Louis, stop being a pain in the ass and get out here!", Paul yells as the cheeky boy pokes his head around the Jet's door. Zayn shakes his head and shoves Louis down the steps, while carrying his art book in the other hand. Management has finally granted us a two week break from our "On the Road Again" tour, and we're going to Brisbane, Gold Coast! It's April, so it's just beginning autumn in Australia, but it's still quite warm and perfect for the beach! As we start to walk through the large hangar towards the door, I can already hear the distant screams of the fans. I'm not sure how relaxing these two weeks are actually going to be.
At the hotel, we're bored. Security's already told us that we can't go outside anywhere today, there's too many fans. Harry and Liam are versing each other on FIFA, while Louis hangs over the back of the couch, trying to cover Harry's eyes with his hands so Liam wins. Zayn is sketching something in his book, and I'm looking through a very empty facebook feed. So far, I'm bored out of my mind, and I'm pretty sure everyone else is too. Liam throws down his controller. "Right lads, we have to get out of here or else my head is officially going to explode." Louis has a weird smile on his face that normally means he's got some crazy plan building in that odd brain of his.
Half an hour later, we are hidden in the back of a Laundry truck that is hot and cramped. "Lou, where is this guy letting us out?", I wonder. I am not a big fan of small spaces. Louis is quick to reply. "Oh, just at the rental car place down the road. It's time to go explore this city!". The truck slows and the doors are flung open to reveal a smiling Asian man holding out his hand to help us out. I can finally breathe again! We all nod our thanks to the man, and Louis presses something into his hand. We run into the rental car shop before any nosy fans spot us, and Harry is quick to find a big black Range Rover that'll fit us perfectly. Five minutes later, we're in the car and ready go. "Where to first lads?", Harry asks. "The beach!" Zayn and I yell at the same time. We look at each other and grin. "Twinsies!", we both yell in american accents. We are so weird.
Coasting down the road, all of the windows are open and even Zayn's perfectly styled hair is blowing in the wind. Sometime's I miss the freedom that we never seem to have anymore. I don't regret going on X-factor, or meeting the lads, but I do miss just being Niall. Not Niall from One Direction, or rich and famous Niall, just Niall. I stare out the window at the beach rushing past, feeling a little sad that I've never found a girl who's liked me for just being Niall. However, I quickly perk up when Liam's call of "Fish & Chips!" rolls through the car. I am in a deep long-term relationship with food, and will eat anything. And right now, I'm starving. "You're always starving, Niall!", Harry smirks. Oops, thinking out loud again. You could say food has that effect on me.
Ten minutes later, Liam is back with two big paper bundles that smell like heaven. We park the car at the empty end of the beach, and sit on the sand eating chips and feeding the seagulls. The sun's almost set by the time we are finished, and I stretch back on the sand, rubbing my now very full stomach. "Let's go exploring!", Louis exclaims, sitting up. "But Louuuuu, it's so warm and comfortable here...", Zayn moans, still lying spread-eagled across the sand. Louis smirks and stands up, deliberately shaking himself so that the sand blows onto Zayn's face. "Louis Tomlinson, I am about to beat your ass!" They both jump up and soon Louis is on the ground, with Zayn tickling him. Suddenly, we hear a distant shout. "Did someone just say Louis Tomlinson?" "Oh. My. God. I will DIE if they are here right now!" "There they are!" A small hoard of teenage girls are running towards us, and we quickly jump up. "Right", Harry says, "time to go lads!" A minute later we're all sitting in the car, out of breathe but grinning uncontrollably. "Alright, where to next boys?", Harry asks. Liam instantly perks up. "Isn't there a huge university somewhere near here?" And of course, Liam is the one wanting to go visit a fucking school. On our break. Seriously Liam? "Come on Niall, don't be such a buzzkill", he whines. Fine. "But we have to get ice cream afterwards!" Liam groans. "Whatever, now let's go!"
It's dark by the time we pull up to the university carpark. "Liam, this was a fucking waste of time!", I moan. What, I get grumpy when I'm hungry! "Come on, just a five minute look..." he whines. "Fine, but just to let you know I'm expecting at least three scoops!", I warn. The boys chuckle as we all jump out of the car. "So this is the university?" Harry asks. As Liam opens his mouth to reply with some smartass comment, I notice a glowing patch in the grass. "Hey, look lads, someone's dropped their phone!". I pick it up and turn it over, and the messenger app is open with an unsent message. "Carpark help now? what does that mean?". I turn the phone back over, looking for answers to who the owner is. "I think there's someone here!", Zayn says, looking around. I flick my phone's flashlight on, and the other boys quickly follow suit. I'm just crunching through a big pile of leaves when Liam suddenly calls out, "Hello?". I noisily turn around, surrounded by leaves up to my shins, and Liam snaps, "Shut up Niall, I heard something!". A small, pitifully painful voice wafts through the night air. I think it's a girl's voice, and she sounds like she is terrified.
"Please... up he-here". Harry spins around. "Lads, I think she's in a tree!" We all begin to run towards the sound of the voice, and stop under a big gum tree with low hanging branches. "Oh shit" Liam's looking up into the branches. "Boys, I've found her. She doesn't look good." Liam shines his torch light up into the branches, and there, high in the tree, blood covering her face and body, is a young girl. She looks terrified, and as we all stare up at her, she squints at us and shuts her eyes. "Liam, you're blinding her, put the light down!"
Louis suddenly looks down, the same time as I notice the leaves surrounding us are a funny reddish-brown colour. "Holy shit, is this blood on the ground?", Louis exclaims. We all look down at the large amount of red liquid covering the carpet of leaves. We look back up, and I start to feel a little bit of fear. Who is cruel enough to do this to someone as beautiful and innocent as her? There's a shaking in the tree as she tries to lift herself up, and the thin branch she's resting on makes an odd noise. "Babe, please don't move", Liam calls out. Her face changes into one of shock as she looks down on us, and I think she's finally realized who we are. The branch keeps shaking, and Louis starts to talk calmly to her. "Love, you're about seven metres off the ground. Please don't shake the branch." She just nods, clutching tightly onto the thin support that keeps her from tumbling to catastrophe. Suddenly, there is a crack, and the branch shudders. She whips her head around to look at us with pure fear and desperation that makes my heart break a little. She is terrified, and to be honest, so am I.
Suddenly, her face goes slack, and almost in slow motion, she begins to fall. I feel myself run forward and unconsciously yell out. "No!". Yet all I can do is watch in horror as her hands slip from the branch. Suddenly, she is jerked to a stop. Her ankle. It's caught in the branch, and as we watch, horrified, she screams as her ankle is bent to almost 90 degrees. Suddenly, her knee makes a horrific snapping noise and her foot slips free. She's falling, and I can't do anything to stop the inevitable...
Her fragile body slams into the ground, and something makes an awful cracking noise. I crouch over her as her eyes close. Her breathing is jerky and unstable, and I try not to panic. "Wake up... WAKE UP!!" She can't die. Oh God, please don't let her die. Liam presses his hand to her side, and it comes away soaked. "Shit, she's bleeding everywhere!" Suddenly her eyes snap open, and her face contorts in agony. She looks as if she's about to pass out, and her mouth opens, but no words come out. As gently as I can, I scoop her up in my arms and we start running towards the car. Harry slides into the driver's seat, and slams the key into the ignition. Louis jumps into the front passenger seat and scrambles for his phone. Liam is in the middle seat, holding the wound in her side closed, and Zayn is trying to protect her mangled leg from the bumps in the road. Liam's hands are covered in blood, and I quickly whip my t-shirt off and press it against her stomach. Liam smiles at me, half grateful and half fearfully. Someone's hurt her, and we can't do anything about it. If we had been at the university half an hour earlier, we could have stopped this. "Why has someone done this to you?". I'm more talking to myself, but her eyes flicker up towards me.
She start to silently cry, and she's obviously in a lot of pain. "Harry, drive fucking faster!" I don't even know this girl, but there's something about her that reminds me of myself. Louis is on the phone, speaking to someone at the hospital. The most we know about Australia's hospitals is the emergency number. He's yelling into the phone, trying to figure out directions to the nearest one. Her eyes are flickering around the car, terror and pain reflecting in the hazel orbs. I pull her close to my chest, whispering over and over. "I'm so, so, sorry. I'm so sorry." Tears slip out of my eyes, and I make no effort to wipe them away. It just hurts me to see such innocence, lying beaten and bloody, crumpled on the ground. She suddenly screams, and I look up in alarm to see Zayn looking horrified, his hand holding her ankle. "Zayn, no!", I yell. He looks like he's going to be sick as he whispers, "There's bone poking out mate, this is worse than we thought!" I feel her small body trembling in my arms as I look over at Liam. He's staring at her knee, which is wrenched around at a horribly inhumane angle. "Her kneecap's all twisted, this is bad." She starts to quiver, and too late I realize this talk is scaring her even more. Her eyes are closed as I look down at her, and her shaking is getting worse. "Hello, please open your eyes", I say softly, and the hazel meets my blue. She lays still for a few seconds, and I think she's finally calming down when she starts to moan in terror. I look at her in horror as her eyes flutter closed and she slumps onto my lap.
The plane shakes slightly as the wheels touch down onto the tarmac. The classic Aussie heat waves glimmered off the runway as we coast into the hangar. I notice Liam's white knuckles loosening their grip around the arm rests, and I lean over to tease him. "Come on Li, still afraid of flying then, are we?", I smirk as he leans over and punches me lightly in the arm. "Come on you two, let's go!", Harry bossing us around as usual. As I climb down the plane ladder, a football goes flying past my head, narrowly missing Paul. "Come on Louis, stop being a pain in the ass and get out here!", Paul yells as the cheeky boy pokes his head around the Jet's door. Zayn shakes his head and shoves Louis down the steps, while carrying his art book in the other hand. Management has finally granted us a two week break from our "On the Road Again" tour, and we're going to Brisbane, Gold Coast! It's April, so it's just beginning autumn in Australia, but it's still quite warm and perfect for the beach! As we start to walk through the large hangar towards the door, I can already hear the distant screams of the fans. I'm not sure how relaxing these two weeks are actually going to be.
At the hotel, we're bored. Security's already told us that we can't go outside anywhere today, there's too many fans. Harry and Liam are versing each other on FIFA, while Louis hangs over the back of the couch, trying to cover Harry's eyes with his hands so Liam wins. Zayn is sketching something in his book, and I'm looking through a very empty facebook feed. So far, I'm bored out of my mind, and I'm pretty sure everyone else is too. Liam throws down his controller. "Right lads, we have to get out of here or else my head is officially going to explode." Louis has a weird smile on his face that normally means he's got some crazy plan building in that odd brain of his.
Half an hour later, we are hidden in the back of a Laundry truck that is hot and cramped. "Lou, where is this guy letting us out?", I wonder. I am not a big fan of small spaces. Louis is quick to reply. "Oh, just at the rental car place down the road. It's time to go explore this city!". The truck slows and the doors are flung open to reveal a smiling Asian man holding out his hand to help us out. I can finally breathe again! We all nod our thanks to the man, and Louis presses something into his hand. We run into the rental car shop before any nosy fans spot us, and Harry is quick to find a big black Range Rover that'll fit us perfectly. Five minutes later, we're in the car and ready go. "Where to first lads?", Harry asks. "The beach!" Zayn and I yell at the same time. We look at each other and grin. "Twinsies!", we both yell in american accents. We are so weird.
Coasting down the road, all of the windows are open and even Zayn's perfectly styled hair is blowing in the wind. Sometime's I miss the freedom that we never seem to have anymore. I don't regret going on X-factor, or meeting the lads, but I do miss just being Niall. Not Niall from One Direction, or rich and famous Niall, just Niall. I stare out the window at the beach rushing past, feeling a little sad that I've never found a girl who's liked me for just being Niall. However, I quickly perk up when Liam's call of "Fish & Chips!" rolls through the car. I am in a deep long-term relationship with food, and will eat anything. And right now, I'm starving. "You're always starving, Niall!", Harry smirks. Oops, thinking out loud again. You could say food has that effect on me.
Ten minutes later, Liam is back with two big paper bundles that smell like heaven. We park the car at the empty end of the beach, and sit on the sand eating chips and feeding the seagulls. The sun's almost set by the time we are finished, and I stretch back on the sand, rubbing my now very full stomach. "Let's go exploring!", Louis exclaims, sitting up. "But Louuuuu, it's so warm and comfortable here...", Zayn moans, still lying spread-eagled across the sand. Louis smirks and stands up, deliberately shaking himself so that the sand blows onto Zayn's face. "Louis Tomlinson, I am about to beat your ass!" They both jump up and soon Louis is on the ground, with Zayn tickling him. Suddenly, we hear a distant shout. "Did someone just say Louis Tomlinson?" "Oh. My. God. I will DIE if they are here right now!" "There they are!" A small hoard of teenage girls are running towards us, and we quickly jump up. "Right", Harry says, "time to go lads!" A minute later we're all sitting in the car, out of breathe but grinning uncontrollably. "Alright, where to next boys?", Harry asks. Liam instantly perks up. "Isn't there a huge university somewhere near here?" And of course, Liam is the one wanting to go visit a fucking school. On our break. Seriously Liam? "Come on Niall, don't be such a buzzkill", he whines. Fine. "But we have to get ice cream afterwards!" Liam groans. "Whatever, now let's go!"
It's dark by the time we pull up to the university carpark. "Liam, this was a fucking waste of time!", I moan. What, I get grumpy when I'm hungry! "Come on, just a five minute look..." he whines. "Fine, but just to let you know I'm expecting at least three scoops!", I warn. The boys chuckle as we all jump out of the car. "So this is the university?" Harry asks. As Liam opens his mouth to reply with some smartass comment, I notice a glowing patch in the grass. "Hey, look lads, someone's dropped their phone!". I pick it up and turn it over, and the messenger app is open with an unsent message. "Carpark help now? what does that mean?". I turn the phone back over, looking for answers to who the owner is. "I think there's someone here!", Zayn says, looking around. I flick my phone's flashlight on, and the other boys quickly follow suit. I'm just crunching through a big pile of leaves when Liam suddenly calls out, "Hello?". I noisily turn around, surrounded by leaves up to my shins, and Liam snaps, "Shut up Niall, I heard something!". A small, pitifully painful voice wafts through the night air. I think it's a girl's voice, and she sounds like she is terrified.
"Please... up he-here". Harry spins around. "Lads, I think she's in a tree!" We all begin to run towards the sound of the voice, and stop under a big gum tree with low hanging branches. "Oh shit" Liam's looking up into the branches. "Boys, I've found her. She doesn't look good." Liam shines his torch light up into the branches, and there, high in the tree, blood covering her face and body, is a young girl. She looks terrified, and as we all stare up at her, she squints at us and shuts her eyes. "Liam, you're blinding her, put the light down!"
Louis suddenly looks down, the same time as I notice the leaves surrounding us are a funny reddish-brown colour. "Holy shit, is this blood on the ground?", Louis exclaims. We all look down at the large amount of red liquid covering the carpet of leaves. We look back up, and I start to feel a little bit of fear. Who is cruel enough to do this to someone as beautiful and innocent as her? There's a shaking in the tree as she tries to lift herself up, and the thin branch she's resting on makes an odd noise. "Babe, please don't move", Liam calls out. Her face changes into one of shock as she looks down on us, and I think she's finally realized who we are. The branch keeps shaking, and Louis starts to talk calmly to her. "Love, you're about seven metres off the ground. Please don't shake the branch." She just nods, clutching tightly onto the thin support that keeps her from tumbling to catastrophe. Suddenly, there is a crack, and the branch shudders. She whips her head around to look at us with pure fear and desperation that makes my heart break a little. She is terrified, and to be honest, so am I.
Suddenly, her face goes slack, and almost in slow motion, she begins to fall. I feel myself run forward and unconsciously yell out. "No!". Yet all I can do is watch in horror as her hands slip from the branch. Suddenly, she is jerked to a stop. Her ankle. It's caught in the branch, and as we watch, horrified, she screams as her ankle is bent to almost 90 degrees. Suddenly, her knee makes a horrific snapping noise and her foot slips free. She's falling, and I can't do anything to stop the inevitable...
Her fragile body slams into the ground, and something makes an awful cracking noise. I crouch over her as her eyes close. Her breathing is jerky and unstable, and I try not to panic. "Wake up... WAKE UP!!" She can't die. Oh God, please don't let her die. Liam presses his hand to her side, and it comes away soaked. "Shit, she's bleeding everywhere!" Suddenly her eyes snap open, and her face contorts in agony. She looks as if she's about to pass out, and her mouth opens, but no words come out. As gently as I can, I scoop her up in my arms and we start running towards the car. Harry slides into the driver's seat, and slams the key into the ignition. Louis jumps into the front passenger seat and scrambles for his phone. Liam is in the middle seat, holding the wound in her side closed, and Zayn is trying to protect her mangled leg from the bumps in the road. Liam's hands are covered in blood, and I quickly whip my t-shirt off and press it against her stomach. Liam smiles at me, half grateful and half fearfully. Someone's hurt her, and we can't do anything about it. If we had been at the university half an hour earlier, we could have stopped this. "Why has someone done this to you?". I'm more talking to myself, but her eyes flicker up towards me.
She start to silently cry, and she's obviously in a lot of pain. "Harry, drive fucking faster!" I don't even know this girl, but there's something about her that reminds me of myself. Louis is on the phone, speaking to someone at the hospital. The most we know about Australia's hospitals is the emergency number. He's yelling into the phone, trying to figure out directions to the nearest one. Her eyes are flickering around the car, terror and pain reflecting in the hazel orbs. I pull her close to my chest, whispering over and over. "I'm so, so, sorry. I'm so sorry." Tears slip out of my eyes, and I make no effort to wipe them away. It just hurts me to see such innocence, lying beaten and bloody, crumpled on the ground. She suddenly screams, and I look up in alarm to see Zayn looking horrified, his hand holding her ankle. "Zayn, no!", I yell. He looks like he's going to be sick as he whispers, "There's bone poking out mate, this is worse than we thought!" I feel her small body trembling in my arms as I look over at Liam. He's staring at her knee, which is wrenched around at a horribly inhumane angle. "Her kneecap's all twisted, this is bad." She starts to quiver, and too late I realize this talk is scaring her even more. Her eyes are closed as I look down at her, and her shaking is getting worse. "Hello, please open your eyes", I say softly, and the hazel meets my blue. She lays still for a few seconds, and I think she's finally calming down when she starts to moan in terror. I look at her in horror as her eyes flutter closed and she slumps onto my lap.
Notes
Hey Lovelies!
Sorry for the long wait, this week is basically the most important week of my year, NCEA exams! They basically determine the rest of my life, and I'm studying flat out, so I'm not going to update for four more days. Once my exams are done I'll have endless writing time, and we'll continue on with the story!
Please leave a comment and rate my story if you're enjoying it! It's nice to know people are reading but leaving comments and ratings actually motivate me to write, and if no one cares what I'm writing, I'll just stop :(
Please leave me a comment about what you like and what you don't, I love writing this story but if no one else is enjoying it I'll stop! I takes me a lot of time and effort to write these chapters, and I would really appreciate some feedback!
Thanks, lots of love,
Half_a_heart x
Will you continue this story???
6/17/17