"No, I'd say happy isn't really the word I would have used!"
"Come on Harry, I know you missed me."
Louis, who couldn't bear to be ignored, came up beside me and started yelling at me impatiently.
"Harry, you want to tell me who this guy is? What's going on?" To that point Nick said.
"Who am I? Who are you!"
"Until proven otherwise, you're the stranger in my room!" Nick's face brightened.
"Oh, so you must be my roommate!"
"Roommate? What?"
"Yes, I just moved, my name is Nick. Are you..."
"Louis, Louis Tomlinson." Nick turned to me and laughed.
"Louis? That Louis? Oh my God when I decided to come here I certainly didn't think I'd end up in the room with him! Perfect, I'd say that luck is on my side!"
"What are you doing here? I thought I made it pretty clear to you that I never want to see you again. Maybe another punch would help to understand better..."
"Uh how aggressive, Styles! And I was so eager to see you and meet your friends!"
Saying this he turned to Louis, who immediately took advantage of the attention given to him.
"Are you telling me I'm going to have to share the room again? Is it possible that I can't have even a little peace?"
Nick looked Louis over the head then laughed.
"Of course Harry has good taste! It's going to be fun..."
I panicked by those words, I grabbed Louis by the shoulders and forced him to look at me.
"Listen to me Louis, please! I know you hate me now, maybe you always have, but now you have to listen to me. You have to stay as far away as possible from Nick and above all don't believe anything he tells you."
His eyes widened at seeing me so worried, almost beside myself. He slowly took my hands off his shoulders and stared me straight in the eyes.
"Harry, will you explain to me why..." I shook my head violently.
"No, Lou, not here, not..." I glanced at Nick who was staring at us giggling with his arms crossed "...now"
"But Harry..."
"Listen, if you come to the cafeteria tonight at 10, I'll explain everything!"
I heard him stammer an 'ok', so I pulled back and started to leave "Lou, really, be careful please."
I turned and left, heading towards the park because I knew that by then Stan was surely back in my room.
I still couldn't get over the fact that Nick was actually there in college, that it wasn't just a figment of my imagination, which was pretty terrible as a thought. Why couldn't he just leave me alone? Was that really a lot to ask? I just wanted some peace, my college life between Louis and Zayn was already complicated enough, there was no need for Nick to put himself there as a further obstacle. The truth is that I was afraid of him, I was terrified of what he could do to me. What if he raped me? He had already tried it and if I hadn't had quick reflexes he would surely have succeeded.
He had evidently come here with a very specific plan and I was pretty sure that destroying my life was part of it. As if that wasn't enough, he had also ended up in the room with Louis, since he was the only one without a partner. Nick was right when he said that luck was on his side, but definitely not on mine. The idea of what he might say to Louis scared me even more than what he might do to me personally. What if he told him I had a crush on him? He wouldn't have done that, would he? Yet he'd alluded to it before... The best part was that I'd never actually told him I liked Louis, he'd deduced it himself!
'Wait, now that I think about it, what did he say earlier? That I do have a good taste? Oh no, not this! He can torment me all he wants, but he mustn't touch Louis! Why didn't I think of this before? Nick is gay and Louis is the most beautiful boy ever on the face of the Earth, surely he will flirt with him, but I can not allow it. He is mine, mine and nobody else's. He must not even dare to put his hands, eyes or any other part of his body on him.
"Hey Hazza, what are you doing walking around looking lost?" I looked up and saw Liam, Zayn and Niall walking towards me smiling.
"Oh nothing, it's just that..." I smiled bitterly, "Well complications."
Their faces, noting my air, suddenly became more serious. "What did Louis do to you? I knew I shouldn't have told you to talk to him, now I'm going to him and..."
"What? No Zayn, calm down. Louis didn't do anything at all, actually I haven't really talked to him."
"And why?"
"I ran into his amazing and wonderful new roommate earlier," I said on a sarcastic note.
"And who would that be?" Liam interjected.
"Nick Grimshaw."
"Wait, that wasn't the name of the guy who..."
"Yes Niall, it's him." Of course I had mentioned to Niall about Nick after he intercepted Josh's call.
"But why..."
"Wait Niall, it's time for dinner" Liam broke in again "why don't we talk there?"
"I'm not coming to eat, sorry. I'm not very hungry."
"But Harry, you can't skip meals!" Why did Liam always have to be so apprehensive?
"Listen, come to the cafeteria this evening at 10 and I'll tell you everything."
I didn't even wait for an answer from them and went to my room, glad to find it empty.
**
I was in the cafeteria sitting at one of the round tables waiting for the boys and Louis. I thought it would be better to just tell everyone the story once, but now it didn't seem like a great idea anymore. First I wasn't really sure I wanted to tell the story and then I was scared of what might happen to having my friends and Louis so close.
The first to arrive were Liam, Zayn and Niall. They greeted me and sat down at my table.
"So Harry, why don't you tell us about this guy? You really got us worried earlier and Niall's information was very restricted."
"Wait, why don't we order something first? And then to tell the truth we have to wait..."
Just then Louis walked through the door. Immediately Zayn snapped to attention. "What's he doing here? I thought we were supposed to talk, not that you were throwing a party."
I purposely ignored Zayn's comment and waited for Louis to approach us.
"Harry, what are they doing here? If I'd known it was a party I would have brought some drinks."
Despite the situation I couldn't help but laugh.
"What's so funny?" an annoyed Louis asked.
"Nothing, it's just... You and Zayn are more alike than you think."
The two in question exchanged a venom glare, but this time it was Zayn who spoke up.
"I have nothing to do with him."
"Guys, not now."
"Niall's right" Liam added "We're here because Harry has to talk to us about something or rather someone that's bothering him and arguing doesn't seem like the best way to allow him to. Louis, why don't you sit down?" With that Liam nodded to the chair between him and Zayn. Louis looked at it a little undecided.
"Sorry Payne, nothing personal." He grabbed the chair and moved it, putting it between me and Niall.
That decision made me rather happy, first of all because I was more comfortable with the idea that Louis and Zayn weren't sitting next to each other, then... well because Louis had sat next to me. I know he did it because he didn't know the others much, but I still missed that closeness. I waited for the five chocolates we had ordered to arrive and then I tried to speak.
"I... Well... Well... To tell the truth, I'm not sure where to begin, to be completely honest, I'm not even sure what to tell you."
"You wanted to tell us about Nick, didn't you? Why don't you start by explaining how you know him?" I thanked Liam with my eyes for giving me a starting point.
"Nick was my best friend when I lived in Holmes Chapel. During the day we did the usual things the boys did: we insulted the teachers, we played pranks on the other boys and in the evening we went clubbing, got drunk and competed to see who could to get more girls or whoever fucked the hottest girl at the end of the night" I smiled "I always won. That was the only thing that really bound us, that kept us together. Then I came here and we never heard from each other again. Not because we didn't want to, but simply because we had no reason to. I don't think either of us ever really missed each other. We were so close, but we really didn't care about each other. We just thought about ourselves, to have fun. When I came back for the Christmas holidays I was surprised to see him. When my mother told me that my best friend had come to visit me I didn't even understand what she was talking about. That evening we went out, for old times' sake..."
Everyone was listening to me breathlessly. They knew the important part was yet to come.
"We went to a club near my house, only that day I didn't feel so well and that's why I only had two girls. He and my friends" I mimicked quotation marks with my fingers at the word friends "they found it quite strange. For some reason they thought I was gay."
"And are you?" Louis asked. I immediately blushed and began to stammer.
"No, but that's not the point anyway!" Louis shrugged.
"I was just asking." I let out a sigh and resumed my story, while that corner of my head kept wondering why Louis would ask me such a question and if Niall would stop secretly laughing into his chocolate.
"We ended up arguing and I went home." Ok it didn't quite go like this, but I couldn't admit that I was actually gay, also because I wasn't sure about it either.
"After a while Nick came to my room, I thought it was to apologise, but it wasn't. He came up telling me that he always had a crush on me or something. Ok, let's say he used stronger words, but I don't feel like repeating the exact words. Then... he kissed me" it must have been my impression, but I thought I saw Louis stiffen slightly in his chair "against my will and ignoring my protests. It would have gone even further if a call from Josh hadn't interrupted the situation.
"I kicked him out of the house. I told him that I never wanted to see him again, but it didn't help to make him leave. On the contrary he started following me and spying on me every time I left the house. Scared, I asked my mother not to let him enter the house for any reason. Well, he came in through the window and went even harder than the last time, but as he was trying to undo my pants I punched him, breaking his nose. It was obvious he wasn't expecting this, that he thought I was just a weak little boy. I didn't see him for the rest of the holidays, I thought I fixed him, but... he's here now." At the end of my story I kept my gaze fixed on my chocolate, almost intact and now cold. I felt a hand rest on my thigh and when I raised my head, to my great surprise I realised that it was Louis', who was now looking at me with his piercing blue eyes, as if he wanted to dig inside me to find out more. Reluctantly I took my eyes away from his and saw that the others were staring at me too, some scared, some encouraging, some just plain confused.
"Don't worry Harry, we won't let him hurt you."
"No Niall, don't worry. That's not the point, I'm capable of defending myself from him. I just wish you would stay away from him and not believe his words and I wanted to give you a valid reason to do so." They just nodded and I felt... good. I was surrounded by the people I loved most along with my family, who were there to support me, putting aside all the grievances and disputes that existed between them.
"Thanks for everything."
**
"Hey baby! What are you doing, won't you say hi?" Never had the choice to skip the history lesson seemed so bad to me.
"Nick, what are you doing here?"
"Where? In the corridor of our school?"
"Go back to class." I was about to continue my walk, but I was stopped by him, who pulled me towards him.
"May I know what you want?" He laughed, a laugh I'd never heard in the years we'd been friends.
"You, wasn't it obvious?" I shoved him, forcing him away from me.
"One day I'll have you Styles and that day is very very close! You're mine, you know it. You always have been, you just have to realise it. It's up to you to choose how."
I simply ignored his words and briskly walked towards the end of the corridor. Once around the corner I breathed a sigh of relief, but I didn't have time to catch my breath that I felt someone grab me and in less than no time I found myself in a closet. I wondered how Nick could have been so fast, but in the dark of the closet I recognized that he wasn't my captor. The features were too thin and delicate to belong to him and certainly Nick did not have those sapphires instead of eyes. Louis' voice soon came to confirm my theory, still holding me tightly by the T-Shirt.
"You're not fucking his, you're only mine!" I didn't have time to realise his words that I found myself pressed against the wall of the closet with Louis' lips pressing hard on mine. After the first moment of surprise, I just decided not to think, so I let my arms slide over his body and kissed him back passionately. He put a hand behind my head to pull me closer to him as his body pressed harder and harder on mine. When we parted he seemed to suddenly come to his senses and looked at me almost scared.
"Sorry, I don't..." And he rushed to the door.