Bruised, Battered And Broken.

Chapter 17

Another poster. Another picture. Another album. Harry's life had become very repetitive since Jess left, and now he sat in another signing, putting on the fake smile he wore for the fans and the cameras, plastering his autograph all over merchandise. It had been nearly four months since Jess had called him, and he hadn't spoken to her since. He had, of course tried, they all had. Louis and Liam had even driven down to Tring, Jess's home town, to try and track down her family. Something they hadn't informed Harry that they were going to do, and it was only when Zayn had let slip before an interview and Harry had refused to talk to them for a good week, before finally forgiving them, realising they were only trying to help.

When Jess had initially called him, he had tried calling her back, but the phone just kept ringing and ringing. The boys all tried over the course of the weeks but she didn't answer, then one day, it just stopped ringing out, just went dead, Harry had spent days listening to her voicemail, but then he couldn't even do that. He had the best men in the business trying to find her, but every line went dead, Harry just found himself admitting maybe she didn't want to be found. So eventually he just found himself giving up.

"Harry" he felt Zayn elbow him in the ribs "concentrate" Harry snapped out of his thoughts and realised that he had actually stopped signing and was holding up a rabble of girls from screaming in his face. He smiled at the fan, next in line and took her picture from her.

"and what's your name?" he asked her.

"Emily" she stuttered. Harry signed her photos and watched as she moved on to Zayn. Harry never actually understood why girls were like this with them. He started to take the offerings of the girls almost rebotically now, going back into his own little world, where everything was dark and cloudy and silent.

"Harry" he heard Louis shout, he flicked his eyes round to the right of him and met Louis deep blue eyes, he saw wrinkles form around them, to frame them as he smiled. He jumped out of his seat and whispered something to Paul. Harry tilted his head slightly, taking another piece of merchandise and signing it as he watched Louis and Paul, Niall had also noticed that something was going on and had watched, he watched as Paul heaved himself on the the table, everyone froze and watched him as he threw himself over, he felt a hand on his shoulder and realised that Louis was heaving him out of his seat. He heard Niall shout "well be back in ten minutes guys!" as he was ushered into the back room.

"what the hell is going on?" Harry asked "did I miss something?"

"were not too sure..." Niall said "I mean I only sort of saw her, Louis are you sure it was her?"

"are you sure it was who?" Harry frowned but he was being ignored.

"one hundred percent" was Louis response to Niall "I hope Paul caught up with her"

"with who?" Harry asked again.

"guys what's going on?" Liam asked.

"I'm going to go out and try to persuade her to come back..."

"louis" Niall said, putting his hand on Louis shoulder and pulling him back "If you go out there, your just going to cause a scene, it's full of screaming fans, they won't let you get through..."

Louis turned around, realising that Niall was right, Harry just looked at his friends, confused. An unfamiliar feeling began to bubble in his chest, nausea rippled through him, a tightness appeared in his throat, he looked at Liam and Zayn, who looked equally as confused as he did. He didn't have to wait long to find out who they were actually talking about.

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The last three months hadn't been kind to Jess. So unkind infact she had avoided looking in all mirrors, but today unfortunately called for her to look in a mirror. She didn't want anyone realising how bad things had actually got. She stared at her reflection, she was debating whether the boys would actually even recognise her.