𝐒𝐭𝐚𝐧𝐳𝐚 𝟐𝟓𝟖 [𝐄𝐧𝐠𝐥𝐢𝐬𝐡 𝐓𝐫𝐚𝐧𝐬𝐥𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧]

𝟒𝟕. 𝐖𝐡𝐚𝐭 𝐝𝐨 𝐲𝐨𝐮 𝐝𝐨 𝐰𝐢𝐭𝐡 𝐢𝐭 𝐚𝐟𝐭𝐞𝐫?

In the morning I woke up with Lou nestled in my arms. It was always nice to wake up like this, although I had to admit that it was better when Louis was hugging me. It made me feel safe, protected and even loved. Now that I'd gotten used to sleeping with someone, I wondered if I'd be able to go back to solitude at night. Probably not.

But that answer that I had given myself was still somewhat incomplete. I would probably never be able to sleep alone again, but much more likely I would never be able to sleep with anyone but Louis again.

I wondered if I should have made a different choice the night before. If instead of running after Louis it wouldn't have been better to stay there arguing with the others, but in my heart I didn't regret anything, I knew I had made the right decision. Louis seemed like the only one who still cared about me, as far as the others were concerned... I didn't even know how to define them anymore, I didn't know if the term 'friends' was still adequate. I no longer recognized the people I had been dealing with all that time.

Liam was the one I could understand the most, by the end he was upset by the events and he was very nervous, but I didn't like it at all when he accused me of playing the victim, when all I was doing was worrying about him.

Plus I couldn't believe he actually wanted to forgive Zayn, what he had done to him and Niall was horrible. All this time he not only knew what Nick was doing, but was also helping him. Now that I thought about it, maybe I should have figured it out sooner. I suddenly became aware of the events, various flashes hit my mind and many things finally made sense.

Only Zayn and Liam knew Niall's secret and only Zayn originally knew Liam's. I remembered when he told me that he screwed up with Nick and he was trying to fix it and also when Nick had accidentally sent him that text saying 'oh you can do it'. It explained everything: how come he had things against Niall and Liam, but nothing against Louis, Josh or Zayn himself.

Zayn always got nervous when it came to Nick, but I thought it was because he was worried about me and other people. Even the phrase the latter had said when we were at Holmes Chapel:

"He didn't tell me he'd be here." Of course, Zayn was the only one of

my friends who didn't know that Louis was there with me. The thing is, it never occurred to me to suspect one of my friends; Zayn also, who was always so protective. That was probably the problem, he had focused so much on getting Louis away from us, from me, that he lost sight of everything else.

But Zayn wasn't the only one who hurt me deeply. Even Niall had crossed the line.

I could pass on having told Zayn about me and Louis, after all I was the first to get into that trouble. I could forgive him for not telling me Louis' story even though he knew how badly I resented knowing nothing. But I didn't really know how to act about the fact that he immediately accused Louis, without a second thought. I thought he more than anyone understood that Louis was not what everyone thought. He knew how much he cared about me and they had also kinda become friends by now! Of course, not best friends, but they laughed and joked together. How could he blame him? I didn't know what to think anymore.

Luckily in all that chaos I still had Louis. I smiled seeing him so defenceless in his sleep and tenderly stroked his cheek. Sadly the movement seemed to wake him up, as he squinted his eyes, before narrowing them and blinking a couple of times. He looked confused for a moment, then turned to me and smiled softly.

"Hey, how are you?" I asked, returning the smile. I would have even apologised for waking him up, but the alarm would still go off in a few minutes.

"I'm good enough, you rather? Is everything ok?" My smile widened even more to see that he was worried about me. Especially this early in the morning, usually at that hour he just sent me to hell.