During The X Factor (One Direction)

Chapter 2 - A Promise

I don’t know any of these four boys personally, but I laugh along with Harry all the same because I just love seeing that smile lighting up his face. He’s my best friend and I love when he’s happy, so I let him talk and talk about his new friends and his plans for the band for nearly half an hour.

“Cake, anyone?” Harry’s mum glides into the room carrying two huge slices of my mum’s cake and hands the one covered with ice cream to Harry and the other to me.

“Why don’t you stay over tonight, Chaz?” she asks me. Harry’s parents don’t mind when Harry’s friends stay over, especially when it’s me. Almost always it’s just because we lost track of time and it’s suddenly half past nine at night, so I immediately curl up on one of the couches downstairs under a spare duvet as if it’s totally natural to do so. 

That’s exactly what’s just happened.

“There you go,” I say to Harry, who is already comfortably tucked under his duvet with a pillow and the television remote. I carefully place his mug of hot chocolate on the coffee table and then start to warm myself up with my own.

The stupid sleepover games Harry had taken to bringing up each time I stayed over were not going to be forgotten tonight.

“Would you rather…lose your sense of hearing or taste?” this game is Harry’s favourite. For the majority of the questions he asks I will never, ever answer, just so he can’t hold my answers against me in the future.

I need to think for only a few seconds before deciding on my reply, “Lose my sense of taste, I reckon.”

Harry looks utterly shocked, “But you wouldn’t be able to taste Rose’s fudge cake again! Ever!”

I laugh at him when I see that he is genuinely shocked and concerned that I would rather not be able to taste food.

“I’d rather be able to hear you sing,” I admit, blushing in the dark.

Through my fringe I glance over at him. At first, when I see his face, I think he’s going to smile and tell me I’m the best friend ever. But, no. That’s not Harry’s style. Like a ninja, he whips a couch cushion from behind his back and throws it at me. It hits me right in the face.

“You’re so soppy.” He laughs.

“And you’re so dead!” I yell, kicking the duvet off my legs and sprinting over to him. I jump onto his legs and start beating him repeatedly with the cushion, laughing loudly with him. I only stop when he screams through his fingers, “I surrender!”

“Too right.” I say as I hop off of the couch and prance over to my duvet. Another cushion flies through the air and hit’s the back of my head. I turn to glare at Harry, but he’s sat whistling.

“Wasn’t me.” He says, holding his hands above his head as if it were proof. Casually, he points towards the lamp behind him.

“Ha ha,” I pretend to laugh, “That lamp had a good aim,” I rub the back of my head where the cushion hit me.

When I flop back onto my duvet, Harry’s mobile begins to ring.

“Hey, Gemma,” he says down the phone to his sister as if it’s perfectly normal for her to call him at nearly midnight, when she’s upstairs.

I can hear Gemma grumbling at him, clearly peeved, and we both laugh silently.

“She wants us to shut up, and go to sleep,” he says when she’s finished shouting at him.

Neither of us wants to mess with a sleepy, grumpy Gemma, so we say goodnight and slowly attempt to drift off to sleep.

I can’t close my eyes, though. One little thought is preventing me from sleeping, so I won’t get any sleep until I ask.

“Harry?” I whisper through the darkness. I can hear his soft breaths breaking through the silence and don’t want to stop them, but I need an answer. “Harry!” I hiss.

He grumbles and turns over, “Huh, what?”

“You know after this whole X Factor thing…you’re not going to forget about me, are you?” it’s a stupid question to ask, and it makes me feel like some needy child, but it’s something I really don’t want.

Harry doesn’t answer immediately. He props himself up on one elbow and peers at me, as if not completely sure I just asked.

“Chazza Hill,” he sighs, “I’m pretty sure that even if I’m mobbed by screaming girls every day and have to travel all across the world, I will never ever forget you.” I smile happily to myself and fall back onto my pillow.

“Good.”

“Good. Now shut up and let me sleep.”