Chapter 14: Everything Changes

After sitting dazed in my tiny bunk with Lacey staring over me for a few seconds, a sudden burst of energy began to flood through me. I needed to see Harry, talk to him, figure out what was going on.

I stumbled out of bed as Lacey asked, “What are you doing?”

I began throwing on random pieces of clothing as I stated, “I need to find Harry.”

Lacey still had a serious face. It was strange because normally she was giggly and smiling whenever I was going to have a meeting with Harry. That is when I fully realized how much this incident was going to affect everything. She couldn’t fix this one for me.

Lacey stepped aside and watched as I trudged towards the front of the rather long bus. I practically stormed out the door and fell straight into someone, luckily, the someone I needed to find.

We both laid spread across the ground my arm crossing over his chest. “Mads! We really need to have a chat.” He said rather sternly.

I got off of him and stood up quickly saying, “Believe me. I already know.”

He followed my swift action of getting off the ground and grabbed my arm. “C’mon. We need to find someplace private.”

Harry hurriedly dragged me to an unknown location. The way he was pulling me along felt different than usual though. It wasn’t in a cutesy or loving sort of way as before. It was rather serious and harsh. He was already feeling cold to me, and I was beginning to feel even worse about the whole situation.

Finally we found a place that seemed private enough for Harry to stop pulling me. It was some sort of abandoned back building in the arena. It was old and falling apart. There were spider webs everywhere and the windows were all broken in. It seemed more like a shack really. Its run down condition made it easy for us to break in and shut out the angry One Direction world outside, leaving only the two of us.

We were both quiet not really sure how to begin. Harry started out first quiet and slow, “Mads… I don’t know what to say. I feel so foolish.”

I shook my head, “No Harry… It’s my fault. I am the one who took your glasses off. That’s when the paparazzi were able to snap those photos of us.”

Harry’s gaze met mine and it never seemed more serious, “No. I am the one who blew the cover. Me. Not you. Those paps weren’t randomly outside that alleyway.”

I was confused, “…but you were disguised the whole day, they had to be randomly there. It definitely was my fault. Right?”

Harry stepped closer to me and there was a slight elevation in his voice, “Don’t you get it Mads?! I blew the cover way before we even stepped into that alleyway!”

Remembering the day’s events, I quickly stated, “Well yeah. At the theater, but I don’t think anyone noticed the switch you made there…”

Harry was already growing impatient with me. He stepped right in front of me and grabbed my shoulders in his hands. He practically growled, “NO MADS! You don’t understand! It was all ME! …. One thing about the paps is that they ALWAYS know what is going on. I shouldn’t have even risked meeting those fans at the theater at all! It only alerted the photographers of my location. They FOLLOWED us… EVERYWHERE after that.”

I tried to speak, “Harry…how did..?”

He cut me off, “They are really good at blending Mads! They were at the theater from the time I stepped out as myself, they had to have saw me exit the building, they followed us to that restaurant, they watched us leave… and they were just….. waiting there… THE ENTIRE TIME…. for their perfect moment…. And when they saw us walk out of the alley they had it!”

His loud and rough voice was fuming and was beginning to scare me. I turned my face to the side a bit as I tried to calm him. “H-Harry.” I stuttered. “Please… please just try to settle down. We can try to fix this.”

He didn’t relax at all. His green eyes blazed darker and he instead began to shake my shoulders slightly as he spoke with his gruff voice even louder, “Jesus Maddie!!… You don’t know how all this works!! This CANNOT be fixed! SOON…. Soon, they are going to know who YOU are. I failed you Mads… I failed. All I wanted to do was protect you, and I can’t even do that. I’m just NO GOOD… They’re never going to leave you alone Maddie, because of ME. If the paps even catch a GLIMPSE of us together, a fan feeding frenzy will just erupt all over again! IT WILL NEVER END! They will never let us be together the way we want to be!”

I was in complete horror. I never expected this. A few tears began to slip from my eyes and race down my cheek. Harry then realized what he was doing and let go of my shoulders. They felt sore from how hard he was holding on. The darkness in his eyes subsided and he backed as far away from me as possible. I wanted to both run away and to try to comfort him all at the same time.

I decided to be brave and took a few steps in his direction in attempt to console him. “Harry… Maybe.... it’s for the best? Maybe the fans will get used to us? Maybe… I can try to deal with all the… erm… criticism? I don’t want to lose you in all this… please?” I begged.

He shook his head. “I can’t let you do that Mads. I care too much. I couldn’t live with myself.” He practically whispered as something caught in his throat. “I …we… just can’t do this. I refuse to put you through all that. You’re too good for it, too good for me.”

That was such a lie. More tears began to stream down my face. I didn’t want everything to change like this. My heart felt like it was glass and someone had just shattered it into a million pieces, because I realized the truth of it was, “…but Harry… I love you.” The words just poured out of my mouth while in mid thought.

I quickly looked away, too afraid to see his reaction. I could feel his person slowly creeping towards me. When he was directly in front of me he quietly requested, “What did you just say?”

I forced my gaze up to his. The raging dark eyes of a few minutes before were now big and concentrated. “I said… I love you.”

The room was dead silent. Harry wrapped my arms around me and placed his forehead against mine. We stayed that way for a few seconds before he pulled away. His arms were still placed loosely around me when he spoke “Mads… I can’t… why… I don’t know what to say.”

I was heartbroken, truly. It was the worst feeling to tell someone how you felt about them, and not hear the same in return. I looked deep into his eyes where tears were starting to form. “Harry… please.”

His silent stare was so intently upon me, but his arms fell from me altogether. He brushed the tears from his face and swiped them through his hair before speaking, “Mads. I know that you know how much I care about you. I’ve told you… but it doesn’t matter anymore. I can’t let myself say those words back to you, knowing this has to be it between us.”

His face fell to the ground. At his last statement a lump caught in my throat causing me to hiccup a bit from the tears that were flowing a lot more fluently at that point. “Harry … it doesn’t have to be this way.” I pleaded.

His face shot back to mine and he inched forward a bit. “I care too much to let this happen. It has to be Mads.” He bent down and gently kissed my forehead for the last time, and turned to walk away, out of my life.

I sat down in the old decrepit building and folded my legs into my arms. I couldn’t bring myself to leave. The image of Harry’s sad face and him just walking away was burned into my mind. I know he wanted to protect me, but part of me didn’t care. I just needed to be with him.

My mind soon began to wander to crazy accusations. I began to think about what if Harry did it just to make it all easier on himself? I thought he might have broken things off with me just so he could blow the situation off when it came to interviews or whatever. I fell into a terrible place. I just wanted to blame someone, and it so easily could be placed on Harry.

I am not sure how long I sat there, but when I finally decided to rejoin the world, everything felt different. I felt empty. The day was so bright, and was mocking the darkness I felt inside my chest.

I found my way back to the bus, just wanting to collapse and shut out the entire world, a world that was screaming for One Direction, screaming for Harry.

Unfortunately, when I climbed my way onto the bus, this did not happen. It was lunch time and I was greeted by several strange faces from other crew members. I didn’t want to know what their problem was. I had enough to think about. I pushed my way to the back of the bus, but I noticed their stares all followed me. Then I saw Lacey.

She pulled my arm to the back and shut the curtain behind us. She had a serious face. I knew it before she even spoke, “Your name has been leaked.”

Notes

This was an emotional chapter to write....I probably would have had it done yesterday, but I kept changing it!

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Love you guys!
-Jen