Clandestine {Harry Styles Fanfiction}

Part 15

In about twenty-four hours, I would be in Sydney, Australia. Today, right now, was the start of an adventure. Or at least, that was what my Grandfather had told me when I’d phoned him with my worries and apprehension about going on tour with the world’s most lusted after boy band the night before.

 An adventure. I liked the sound of that.

My eyes darted around my room in exuberance. I only had about thirty minutes until I needed to leave for the airport. That gave me just enough time to dress and sort the marshmallows from the cereal pieces in a bowl of Lucky Charms. I always ate the marshmallows first.

I pulled on a T-shirt and a pair of worn skinny jeans and then stuffed my feet into my favorite pair of Chucks. Definitely not an Isabelle-approved outfit, but considering she was fast asleep beneath her 938462827 thread-count sheets, I didn’t think it really mattered. We’d said our goodbyes last night; the end of Isabelle’s campaign to be the most accommodating cousin ever. The charade had been going on ever since the dinner with Harry and his family. For the past two weeks, she’d been sugar-sweet to me, buying me trendy clothes for the Australia leg of the tour (none of which I planned on wearing) and even offering to lend me her favorite silk pillow for the long flights, which I’d politely declined.

I tiptoed around the flat, packing last minute items into my suitcase and practically inhaling my Lucky Charms. I’d wanted to bring some along on my trip, because long flights made me hungry. But airports had rules and one of them was that you couldn’t take food through airport security. Because I might hide an atomic bomb in a box of cereal. The horror.

I was halfway out the door before I realized that the winter coat I’d been wearing these past couple of months in London was far too heavy for Australia, where February marked the conclusion of summer. I shrugged it off and hung it up in my closet, rummaging around for a lighter jacket. As I pulled my favorite leather one down from the top shelf, something tumbled down with it, landing lightly on my closet floor. Curious, I bent down to find it was a mitten. A red mitten.

I plucked it off of the floor and touched it to my cheek. It was so very soft and smelled vaguely of cologne. His cologne. The scent brought back a torrent of memories, most especially his lips on mine.

 I bit the inside of my cheek and shoved the mitten and its pair into the bottom of my suitcase, well aware that they would have no use in Australia.

My eyes passed over the flat one more time as I hovered in the doorway. My hand tightened on the handle of my suitcase. I would miss London and I would miss Isabelle. But stepping out that door meant freedom, something that I’d craved for a long time. I felt a smile curve across my lips the door shut behind me with an assured click.

This was it. There was no going back now.

*****

It was a bleak, damp, cold London morning. But for some reason, Heathrow had the air conditioner running, which meant it was absolutely freezing in the long security line. I wrapped my sweater tightly around myself and clutched the handle of my carry-on bag.

I really hoped that the weather in Australia was favorable because I was in need of some serious sunshine.

I chewed absent-mindedly on my thumbnail. I hated standing in lines by myself. I found myself wishing that I might find Sima or Quinn or Angelina or Kate, the other back-up dancers, to keep me company. Or anyone from the crew of people going on tour with One Direction. There were so many of them; that had been my first reaction when I’d met everyone at the meet and greet party the week before.

In addition to the boys of One Direction, the tour crew consisted of the back-up dancers, the entire security team and their vests, a traveling chef, a personal trainer, a stylist, a make-up artist, the choreographer and assistant choreographer, the band, a bunch of men in suits, a lot of people with iPads who looked very important, the staging and lighting people, the vocal coaches, the PR representatives, and some guy called Tom. I’d found myself wondering how all of these people were going to fit on one private jet.