Niall Horan
My dream was getting hazy. I vaguely started to notice sleep was slipping away.
An arm draped itself over my torso and I felt a body curl into mine.
I tensed, out of pure habit or maybe some deeply rooted survival instinct, and turned my body away.
But the arm didn't let go. Gently it traced up my chest and continued to hold me, her body pressed to my back.
My brain started to put the pieces together as I woke up. Kate was in my bed. Kate came in last night looking crazy hot in her tiny shorts with the tiny hearts all over them, and her sleep shirt slipping off her shoulder, and her fuck me eyes.
She climbed in my bed, she held me, she kissed me. Even worse, she confided in me. She trusted me. God knows why she trusts me.
It's so much pressure. There are too many unknowns. She looks at me like she's so happy we're trying this thing and I am constantly thinking about how inadequate I am.
I haven't dated since... I haven't dated in a long time. There's good reason I don't date. Or I guess didn't date. Not for years. Although this is hardly dating.
I rolled back towards her, giving an inch when she deserves a mile. But she sure is patient with me.
Kate's hand that had been on my chest trailed up to my face. She kissed my cheek softly, then by my ear. It wasn't a bad way to wake up.
After a few moments of her being nestled closer, her fingers gently caressing me, she broke the silence.
"Kiss me," she said. She sounded pleading but not desperate.
I turned my face to hers and kissed her lips, conscious of the fact that I need to brush my teeth. I never do the morning after thing. There rarely is a morning after. I go to a girl's place and I'm gone ten minutes after we finish. To sleep peacefully in my own bed. Alone.
Kate didn't seem to mind a thing. She broke the kiss briefly, but I quickly realized it was only to climb on top of me and then intensify it.
Too late I realized how hard I was. After all, it's the morning.
This is not going to be good for my plan to do things the opposite of how we did them before.
Kate noticed right away. How could she not? She's so confident, she just decided to grind her hips against me as she kept kissing me. I wish I could enjoy this all morning.
But then she broke the kiss, and she was moving down my body. It took me a second to realize she was planning on giving me head.
"Stop."
"You don't mean that, do you?" Kate asked, looking up at me from down by my shorts. Her big eyes were killing me.
"I do mean it. I want it, I really do," I started to explain.
"Then take it." Clearly she was frustrated. "You say you want me but it kind of hurts that it doesn't really seem like you mean it."
"We've talked about this," I said, pulling her back up to my face.
"And yet I still don't totally understand what you mean."
"Baby," I tried to soothe. My hand went to hold her face and I ran my thumb over her soft cheek and absentmindedly over her full pink lips. "I want this time to be different. I want you to feel good with me, not shitty like last time."
"Making me come would make me feel good." A blush crept up her chest and onto her face as soon as she said it. She looked like she surprised even herself.
"You say that, but I don't see how it would be very different from last time."
I could tell she was frustrated now. She shoved herself out of the bed and threw her hands up.
"Because you're here! You're here for me and you're probably half of why I'm able to go out on that stage every night and you're being my friend! I feel like me again and I swear it's partially because of you."
"God damn it, Kate. Stop giving me so much credit because I have no fucking clue what I'm doing so right now and what I did so wrong when we were fucking back in London!" I had raised my voice too. We had each gotten pretty worked up.
"You said it! Just there! We were fucking. We weren't friends back in London. We drank beer and watched football together sometimes, but we weren't really friends. We didn't talk like friends."
"Oh come off it. We did too," I said, the tone of my voice trying to sound like I was calling out her bullshit. "Maybe our words have gotten sweeter but we absolutely were friends." It's how I felt. She truly blindsided me when she told me about how the whole hooking up arrangement made her feel.
"Well maybe it was just me being screwed up then! I don't know. But something was wrong then and something is right now and I wish you could see that."
"I'm scared, Katie."
"Don't be."
"I am! The last thing in the world I want is for this to not work out."
I really am. I'm scared to screw up. I'm almost scared to have sex with her because it feels like there's so much pressure on it now. Now there are deeper feelings there.
There were always feelings when we were hooking up. I felt so much for her, she's admitted she felt the same, but I didn't know that we were on the same page at the time so it wasn't scary.
We hadn't said it out loud. It's like it wasn't real until we did. Now that we've both put it out there, it will mean something the next time we have sex. I don't know that I'm ready for it to mean something.
At least I'm not ready for Kate to be expecting it to mean something.
I haven't been in love in a long time. I don't know that I am in love with Kate. But the last time I was in love was a train wreck. I lie and say I've never been in love before but that's not true. I was and it tore me apart.
"We just have to hope for the best," Kate finally said with a softer voice than before.
I absolutely hate that. There's no such thing. Things don't just happen, you have to make them happen, and I don't know how to make this happen the right way.
But everything I've said all morning has been negative so this time I just kept my mouth shut.
"I better leave before the crew wants us to get our day started," Kate said.
I still didn't say anything. I just climbed out of bed and wrapped my arms around her. I gave her one more kiss before she went to the door. After looking through the peephole and seeing no one, and pressing her ear to the door and I assume hearing no one, she slipped out.
Fucking god damn it. I ran my hands into my hair, super frustrated with myself. I meant it when I said I don't know what she thinks I'm doing right because it doesn't feel like a damn thing.
I got myself up and dressed to go train. It's a show day so it's got to be about time for that. Maybe I can work off some of this frustration.
...
Will, the head tour manager, was trying to round everybody up. They're squeezing in a meeting with the management team before soundcheck. I hate when we pack these days too full. We usually get in late the night before and then there's already training and warming up before sound check, plus trying to fit in a healthy meal and spending time in hair and wardrobe. But hopefully fitting this in now means we can have a day completely free from work soon.
"Hotel's conference room in ten," Will reminded everyone. "It's on the second floor."
"I had Kate squeeze in a rehearsal," Gina told him. "We might be a couple minutes late but we'll be there."
"Kate is part of this too?" I asked.
"Yeah, what's this meeting about anyway?" Louis asked.
"Tour planning. She's part of this tour. Don't be late," Will added before heading out.
"Should be interesting," Harry noted quietly.
Ten minutes later we shuffled into the hotel conference room. It was awkwardly oversized for our purposes. This hotel probably hosts large conferences for different businesses, but we just had a couple tables shoved together on one side of the room.
We all took our seats and looked around the room. A young, shiny guy in a new suit was at the other side of the table. He's definitely an attorney for the label, but not our usual.
"Hey. Where's Al?" I asked. He's been on the team since the beginning. He's a lawyer but his role has always stretched beyond that.
"Al is still part of this, he's just not here today. Hi, I'm Henry Thompson. I'm outside counsel. The label has hired my firm." He reached across the table to shake our hands. "Gallagher, Pearson & Associates."
I was wondering what they needed to bring in a suit for. But then Will answered my question.
"The label is just trying to spread out some liability," Will said. "Just a change to our legal structure. Outside counsel to bolster our internal legal team."
"I didn't mean to alarm anyone," Henry said. "I am just here to nail down the details of the next leg of your tour."
"Yeah we don't know a thing about the next leg," Liam said.
"Exactly. It wasn't ironed out at the same time as the first leg, so I'm here to make sure contractual obligations are met, but the label has dates lined up."
He passed a schedule out to all of us. After this leg ends in Ireland, the plan is that we will have two weeks off before hitting the ground running again with more shows in Europe.
"We would like to announce this in a week and put tickets on sale a week later."
"I'm all for more tour dates," I said. "We knew this leg wasn't going to be the end. But I don't get what there is to decide."
"The opening act," Will explained.
Kate? What about Kate?
"We better wait for her to arrive before we discuss this," Henry said. He looks a little uncomfortable. Is he nervous? He does look super young. He can't be more than three years out of law school.
"Kate should stay," Harry said, surprising me a little.
"Yeah we like having her here," Liam said.
Finally the door burst open. "Sorry!" Gina called into the room. "It's my fault we're late. I pushed for a rehearsal there probably wasn't time for." I fought the urge to roll my eyes. Gina is so loud and brash and truly couldn't have sounded less sorry.
I turned to see Kate looking a little flustered as she came through the door stuffing her notebook in her bag.
"Hi," she said as she finally looked up when she reached the table. She stuck her hand out to the lawyer at first but then drew it back slightly when their eyes met. "Oh!" Kate squeaked.
"Hey, Kate."
"Henry!" She reluctantly put her hand back out to meet his. She looked so caught off guard and his face flushed ten shades of red.
What is going on? I looked around at the boys and they were as confused as me. Louis wore one of his classic smirks.
"You know each other?" Gina asked.
"It would appear so," Louis said when Kate didn't answer. He just couldn't hold it in.
"Yeah, kind of. Not well." She gave a shy smile. She still looked so flustered. "We should start the meeting," Kate finally said.