The Assistant

Two days passed since Nora’s morning with melancholy Harry, since his conundrum of confusing words that same day.She was still entirely on the fence about him. He wasn’t going out of his was to be a dick, which was nice. But still, he had mood swings worse than any girl she ever met.

Nora figured two could play that game. She would just give him a taste of his own medicine. But he wasn’t buying what she was putting down. She’d ignore him and he’d just ignore her even more. They even stayed away from each other when they were around the whole group because of their silent war. Louis kept telling everyone they had a fight. But what Louis didn’t know was they always fought. They never didn’t fight. It was what they did. It was just life with Harry. Because he was a confusing, egocentric, stubborn bastard.

Nora was stuck in a room with Harry as he laughed and had a good time with his mates, while her head was spinning with anger and regret. She was angry because he was such a complete douche bag to her and turned her into an absolute mess because of it. And the regret was such an obvious feeling to feel after everything they’d been through. She really was having a hard time coping with the slippery slope her life was sliding down. But of course, Harry was at the top, throwing grease down it to make sure she just kept sliding, sliding, sliding.

When Harry let out a loud, belly-laugh, Nora grit her teeth together. Oh, god. She couldn’t stand to be in the same room as him anymore and quickly stalked out, finding her way outside the venue.

“Hello, love,” she heard Louis and quickly looked up to find him and Zayn smoking with each other.

“Oh, Jesus! Hi,” she said, startled by them.

“Are you okay?” Zayn asked immediately, registering the anguish on her face.

“Uh… I’m fine,” she stammered, not really wanting to get into it.

“I can tell you’re not,” Zayn pointed out and she sent him a dead stare.

“Because of Harry, innit?” Louis asked and Nora let out a scoff.

“Bingo,” Zayn chimed in.

“Why is he such an… ugh!?” Nora grumbled, unable to come up with a good word to describe him. Both boys let out a laugh.

“I’m sorry,” Nora said immediately. They were two of Harry’s best mates after all.

“No need to apologize, Nora,” Louis said, letting out an amused chuckle.

“Wanna get high?” Zayn offered, holding out the joint he had between his fingers. It startled Nora because she didn’t even realize they were smoking that. She just assumed they were just on another cigarette break.

“Uh…” Nora stammered, looking behind her at the propped open door to the venue.

“It’ll be fine, Nora. I can’t even count how many times Paul and Preston got high with us,” Louis told her.

“What? Are you serious?” Nora asked, her mouth dropping open.

“You wouldn’t believe it,” Zayn added.

“Wow. I would have never thought…” Nora said, looking over at Zayn with her mouth hung open.

“It’s true,” Louis snickered as Zayn thrust out the joint for her again.

“I can’t even remember the last time I got high…” Nora told them as she pinched the end of the spliff between her fingers and pulled it up to her lips, taking a quick hit, letting it linger in her lungs before she exhaled.

“Look at you. Professional,” Louis laughed as she handed the joint off to him.

“Not really,” she said, looking away from them timidly.

The three of them finished off the joint and Zayn offered to light another, but Nora waved it off. She could already feel the effects of the marijuana. Her eyes felt heavy, like they were storing a lifetimes worth of tears behind them, and she could feel the tingling in her fingers and toes, and even listening to Zayn and Louis talk was almost a feat. Their voices sounded so far away. Louis’ laugh echoed in her mind as Zayn told a particularly funny story about a cat… or a dog. Nora couldn’t remember.

“Nora… yo, Nora,” Zayn said, snapping to get her attention as she stood there trying to contemplate why she couldn’t stop staring at the pavement.

“Hmm?” She hummed when Zayn’s voice finally registered in her mind.

“Your phones ringing, love,” Louis told her and she looked over at him, her mind barely catching up with his words.

“My phone?” She asked, slipping her hand in her back pocket, barely feeling the vibration against her skin.

“Oh, man. I think we broke her, mate,” Zayn laughed as Nora pulled out the phone, looking down at the screen.

“Are you going to answer it, love?” Louis asked her, stepping forward to swipe to answer the phone for her.

“Hmm,” she said, pulling the phone up to her ear.

“Hello?” She mumbled, her mouth feeling dry and sticky at the same time.

“Nora?” She heard a male’s voice and couldn’t assimilate who it was.

In the back of her mind she knew it wasn’t Harry. He wouldn’t call her. He’d just find her and mark his territory by pissing on her or something.

“Nora, are you there?” The man asked again.

“Mm-hmm,” she hummed, her mind still reeling with confusion.

“Wow,” Louis laughed next to her as he watched her pretty much fumble at life. Nora’s eyes looked up at him and he was smiling from ear-to-ear, his eyes mere slits as he found amusement in her short-comings.

“Shut up, Louis,” Nora told him, almost forgetting she was on the phone with someone. Louis and Zayn laughed out loud at her.

“Nora, can we talk?” The guy on the line asked her, sounding a bit more impatient with her and the tone in his voice felt familiar to her somehow.

She quickly pulled the phone from her ear as the menu came back into light – Grant’s name was splashed across the caller ID and her stomach wrenched.

“Grant?” Nora asked, putting the phone back up to her ear.

“Yes, Nora,” he told her.

“Eeek, we’ll come check on you in a bit,” Louis said, pulling a funny face as he and Zayn walked away from her, disappearing through the venue door.

“Can we talk?” Grant asked her again.

“I-I… uh, sure,” she said, unable to come up with anything else to say.

Grant let out a heavy sigh, but didn’t say anything right away and it confused her. Did he really actually call to talk or was this something else?

“I don’t… I don’t like how we left things with each other…” Grant finally spoke and it made Nora cringe, thinking back to the last time she spoke to him.

Harry was in the middle of fucking her on the tour bus, if she recalled correctly. She had to practically hang up on Grant before she said or did something to give their predicament away. That was the last time they spoke. It was weeks ago. Several weeks. So much had happened with Harry during that time.

“Grant…” Nora breathed, her heart beating fast in her chest.

“I’ve given you time to think about everything that’s happened between us,” Grant continued.

In all actuality, she didn’t spend much time thinking about the man she spent the previous four years with. He was like an afterthought once Harry came into her world. Harry was like a parasite that demanded her attention – he wouldn’t allow anything less.

“I was thinking… maybe before you, maybe before you head back to London for the second leg of tour, maybe you could fly out to New York for a few days and we could really sit down and talk things through,” Grant offered, sounding almost desperate.

“Mm,” Nora hummed, not in agreeance, just in acknowledgement. She had no idea what to think or how to feel in that moment. She was way too fucking high for that.

In the back of her mind, she heard the venue door open behind her, realizing it was probably Louis or Zayn coming back to check on her.

“Grant, listen. I just… I don’t really have a lot of… of time right now… to, um… to think about everything…” Nora told him, stammering like a fucking idiot. She had no idea what direction her brain wanted to go in.

“Why do you sound so weird?” Grant asked her curiously.

“Um…” Nora stammered before she let out a laugh.

“What’s going on, Nora?” Grant asked her.

“Nothing, nothing,” Nora said, trying to stifle the smile on her face. She didn’t want to admit to him that Zayn and Louis just got her high off some really fucking potent kush.

“Please, Nora. Please, can we get together? Will you come talk to me? I’ll buy you a plane ticket,” Grant told her desperately.

“I don’t think that’s such a good idea, Grant,” she managed to say.

“Why? Is this because of him? Because of Harry?” He seethed, saying Harry’s name with so much malice.

“Um…” Nora stammered, not sure what to say. Her brain was lagging and it was incredibly annoying.

“It is? Are you seeing him? Is that what’s going on?” Grant asked angrily.

“That’s what the tabloids are saying,” Nora said through a laugh, but immediately cringed. She needed to learn how to read the conversation. Jesus Christ.

“Are you fucking kidding me? Are you still fucking him?” Grant snapped and Nora’s silence was palpable.

“You’re still fucking him?” Grant yelled incredulously.

“Grant…” Nora breathed, still unable to be an honest part of the conversation they seemed to be having.

“What the fuck?” She heard Grant yell, and it sounded kind of far away as if he pulled the phone away. But then again, everything felt far away to her high ass.

“I’m sorry,” Nora breathed into the phone even though she had nothing to apologize for. It wasn’t like she was cheating on him or anything.

“You’ve got to be fucking kidding me?” Grant snapped into the receiver.

“He’s not all bad,” Nora squeaked. She shouldn’t have said that. Oh god, she shouldn’t have said that.

“You are fucked up, Nora. I listened to you complain about how he was constantly sexual harassing you when you were at their house. You were working and he was harassing you. You played so well into his hand by fucking him. Didn’t you? What kind of feminist are you? You let him manipulate you! Are you blind?” Grant yelled at her.

She was silent, listening to his rant. She did have to agree with him, because it was all true. She did let Harry manipulate her – almost every day since they started tour. And she was fucked up because she enjoyed. She enjoyed it way too much. It was vile. She was absolutely repugnant and she knew it.

“I-I… Grant, I have to go,” Nora said evenly, pulling the phone away from her ear before he had the chance to say another word.

Nora let out a breath, unable to really comprehend what just happened.

Harry stood outside of the venue listening to Nora talk to that piece of shit ex-boyfriend of hers on the phone. She was even laughing with him, which did awful things to him. He could feel the anger rise inside of him at the thought of her taking him back. Jealousy skated through him. He didn’t want to share her, even if she was just talking to him on the phone.

Harry leaned against the building listening to the entire conversation. He perked up a bit when he heard something about a tabloid and thought she might be talking about him. And a few moments later, she said something along the lines of ‘he’s not so bad’, which he knew had to be about him. She was talking to her ex about him? How the hell did he even come up in conversation? Was she telling him about their relationship? Was she having a laugh with her ex about him? Was she completely disregarding him?

It wasn’t long before Nora told Grant she needed to go and ended the conversation. Harry pulled himself away from the wall, ready to talk to her, but was startled when he heard her let out a loud breath.

“Nora?” Harry questioned, making his presence known.

“Holy fuck! Harry!” Nora yelled at the top of her lungs as she nearly jumped out of her skin, finding him standing there.

“You’re talking to your ex now?” Harry asked her, letting the jealousy seep through his words.

“He… he called,” she told him, still griping her cell phone in her hand.

“And?” Harry snapped at her.

“He wants to get together to talk,” Nora told him, cringing again. Read the fucking room. She did not need to admit that.

“And?” Harry growled through gritted teeth. Nora let out a laugh as she watched him, slipping her phone into the back pocket of her jean shorts. Oh, she was infuriating.

“What?” She snapped back at him, finding amusement in his obvious jealousy.

Harry was taken aback. This wasn’t normal-Nora. And he slowly started to recognize the signs – the glassy, hooded eyes; the giggling; the licking of her lips.

“Are you high?” Harry asked her quickly. Nora let out another laugh.

“Mm-hmm,” she said with a content smile, her eyelids nearly pressing against her cheeks, unable to open her eyes any further.

“What the—” He said, looking at her, feeling dumbfounded.

“Zayn and Louis—” She giggled.

“Of fucking course,” Harry grumbled, cutting her off.

“Why are you mad? Why do you even care?” Nora shot at him.

“I don’t fucking care, to be honest,” Harry scoffed at her. Lies. He knew it and she knew it.

“Why don’t you just go back to ignoring me and laughing with your little buddies? It would annoy me less than this fucking conversation is,” Nora shot at him, speaking the god’s honest truth. Harry scoffed, rolling his eyes at her.

“Or, you know…” She said, stepping up to him, trailing her finger down his chest.

“We could find a room and you could do what you do best. I’ve never had sex while I’ve been high,” she told him, trying to sound as seductive as possible.

Harry’s hands came up, gripping her wrists tightly in his hands and she could see his jaw clenching. They stared each other down and Nora wondered what in the hell he was thinking. He wasn’t giving anything away.

“Oi!” They heard Louis say from the venue door, breaking them out of their intense moment.

“You got her, mate?” Louis asked Harry. A second later, Harry dropped her wrists and stepped away from her.

“No,” he said evenly as he walked away from her, pushing past Louis as he went back into the venue.

Nora was left standing there with her mouth hung open. She never thought she’d see the day when Harry turned down the prospect of sex. And it tore apart all the little pieces of her that somehow managed to feel a glimmer of hope for the two of them.

Notes