Isla’s POV
I wake up, still in Niall’s arms as he continues to sleep. I look up at his face, the bruises were still present but his eye was less swollen.
I gave him a light peck on his forehead before carefully slipping out of his arms and off of the hospital bed. I went into the bathroom to wash my face and attempted to tame my bedhead. When I got out of the bathroom, I saw someone enter the room.
“Harry?” I asked.
He looked over at me and gave me a smile. After returning the smile, I walked up to him and gave him a hug.
“Hey, I just wanted to check up on Niall.” We pulled away and he looked over at Niall’s sleeping body before turning his gaze back to me.
“He’s okay, I had to force him to sleep last night. He wanted to stay up.”
He raised one eyebrow at me and smirked. “Stay up and do what?”
I gasped, realizing what he meant before I slapped him on his arm.
“He just…he…we were just…” I stuttered. I sighed. “Not that, okay?”
“Okay, whatever you say,” he said, a smirk still present on his face.
A few moments of silence passed over us before I looked back up at him.
“Did you want to get some coffee?” I asked. “I don’t think Niall will be up for a while.”
He nodded. “Sure.”
“I’ll just leave a note for him.” I went to the side table where there was a notepad and a pen. I wrote down that I would be in the cafeteria and that I would be back soon. I placed it upright against the vase on the table.
Taking one last glance at Niall, we quietly left the room and headed to the cafeteria. We ordered our coffee and we sat down at a table in a corner far away from other visitors.
A few minutes passed with us blowing on the hot coffee and taking small sips.
I had wanted to say something to Harry since I woke up yesterday. And now was the perfect time.
“Harry?”
He looked up from over his coffee cup that we just took a sip of and focused his gaze on me.
“I wanted to thank you for what you did. For calling the police and coming to help us. I don’t know what would’ve happened if…”
I trailed off and looked down at the table, unable to even think about what would’ve happened if help hadn’t come.
“You’re welcome.”
I looked back up at him and he was giving me a small smile.
“But you know, I wish I had come sooner. I wish I was there in the beginning so neither you or Niall would’ve gotten hurt. I wish I was there to stop him.”
His words pained me knowing how he must’ve felt after finding out what happened. But I didn’t want him to feel guilty about anything.
“I know you do,” I said softly. “But…if you were there then…you might’ve gotten hurt, too. I know that he only wanted Niall to come so I know that if you came as well, he would’ve done something to you.”
“I don’t care. I just wish I had done something. I could’ve. I--”
I placed my hand on top of his. “Harry, it’s okay.”
He was starting to beat himself up for it. I didn’t want that.
“You did everything you could. Me and Niall may have some cuts and bruises but we’re still here. Because of you.”
His eyes began to soften, the guilt slowly washing away.
“But--”
“But nothing, Harry. Don’t worry about it anymore, okay? It’s in the past now.”
He still had a hint of guilt present on his features.
“And I wanted to thank you for staying with me afterwards. With the paramedics and on the way to the hospital.”
I really did want to thank Harry for that but I was also hoping that it would take his mind off of the guilt he was feeling. It seemed to work because a small smile appeared on his face.
“Of course.”
“I don’t think I would’ve handled being by myself at that time. So I really appreciate it.”
“I told you, I’d do anything for you.”
We just looked at each other, smiles present on both of our faces.
“Okay, enough of this serious stuff. Let’s talk about something else,” he said.
I was glad that Harry was okay now, that he wasn’t blaming himself about anything anymore. I just wanted to put everything behind and not worry about it anymore.
“What do you want to talk about?” I asked, taking another sip of my coffee.
He thought for a while before his face lit up.
“Oh, what are we going to do for Niall’s birthday?” he asked.
Niall’s birthday was in three weeks and with everything that’s happened, no one’s had time to plan anything.
“We should throw him a surprise party! Maybe have it the weekend before his birthday and tell him that we’re going to have a party the weekend after so he doesn’t suspect anything.”
“Sounds like a good plan. I’ll send out the invites and you plan everything else.”
I laughed. “That’s totally fair. Sending out the invites is such a difficult job.”
“Exactly,” he said, laughing.
“It’s okay, I’ll have the girls help me plan everything out.”
He nodded and took a drink from his coffee.
“Ooh! Maybe I can find a girl for you at the party!” I exclaimed.
He smiled and rolled his eyes. “Please, don’t.”
“Why not?” I whined.
“I can find a girl by myself, thank you very much.”
“Oh really? Is that why you had to have Liam ask Danielle to get me to talk to you when we first met?” I couldn’t help but giggle.
His face fell and turned red.
“Who told you that?” he asked, embarrassment filling his features.
I stayed silent, taking a sip of my coffee, using the cup to hide the smile plastered on my face.
“It was Liam, wasn’t it?”
He took my silence as confirmation.
“I’m going to kill him!” I burst out laughing. He had embarrassment and anger written all over his face.
“Hey, if he hadn’t done that, we wouldn’t have met,” I said, raising my eyebrows at him.
His face slightly softened.
“Yeah, but…he didn’t have to tell you that part,” he muttered. He was so adorable when he was embarrassed. “And I would’ve talked to you at the party eventually.”
“Uh huh, sure you would’ve. With Liam’s help, of course.” I laughed as he narrowed his eyes at my teasing. “But it’s okay, really. I think it was sweet. It was flattering.”
He looked up at me and I could tell he was trying to fight the smile that was creeping on his face. But then the smile disappeared and was again replaced with embarrassment.
“When did he tell you that?”
“The day after we met. After our kiss.” I couldn’t help but smile at the memory.
“Are you serious?!” He buried his face in his hands. “He’s making me seem like a priss now.”
I laughed but then I tried to suppress it so he wouldn’t feel as embarrassed. Once I was able to stop laughing, I reached over and pulled his hands away from his face.
“Hey, don’t feel embarrassed. Because of that, I met you. I wouldn’t have had it any other way.”
Hi face softened once again at my words.
“I guess you’re right.” He paused as he looked down. “But I’m still going to kill him.”
I laughed once again. “I can’t stop you there.”
He gave me a sweet smile, looking like he was okay now. But then, he looked over my shoulder and his face hardened.
“Speak of the devil.”
I looked over my shoulder and saw Liam, Louis and Zayn walking over to us. I turned towards Harry again and tried to stifle the giggle that was threatening to burst out of my mouth at his expression.
“How about we get him back?” I quickly said.
He looked at me with confusion but then he understood what I meant. That was when a smirk appeared on his face.
“Actually, why don’t we get all of the back? They told me some embarrassing stories about you when we first started dating.”
His eyes widened. “What did they tell you?”
“Shh, I’ll tell you later. Just follow my lead. And look sad.”
He looked confused once again but then he tried to put on his best sad face. He looked surprised for a second when I forced tears into my eyes, pretending to cry.
“Hey guys,” Zayn said as they finally reached us.
“We saw your note and we--Isla, why are you crying?!” Liam asked frantically.
I sniffled, trying to put on the best act I could. Slowly, I got up and faced the three boys.
“It’s Niall,” I said.
Worry and fear filled their features as they looked between me and Harry. I looked over at Harry and saw him with tears in his eyes as well.
Great acting, Harry.
“What…what about Niall?” Liam asked.
“He…he died last night,” I broke out in fake sobs and Harry got up and put his arms around me.
I peaked through my hair, which had fallen over my face and looked at the three boys. Shock was present on their faces before their eyes started to water.
“Are…are you serious?” Liam said, his voice breaking. “Wha…how?” His eyes were now filling up with tears?”
“A blood vessel ruptured in his brain. He…he didn’t make it.”
Louis took a seat on one of the chairs and buried his face in his hands. Zayn covered his mouth with his hand and started pacing around.
“No, no, no, no, no!” Liam shouted.
Harry still had his arms around me with his back facing the other boys. I could hear him laugh quietly. I tried pinching him to get him to stop but that seemed to only make him laugh harder before he couldn’t hold it back any longer. Harry was still laughing as he turned around and put his arm around my shoulder. I couldn’t help laughing along with him as I wiped the fake tears away.
Liam, Louis and Zayn looked at us confusedly.
My stomach was now hurting from laughing as I buried my face in Harry’s shoulder.
“What…what’s going on?” Liam asked.
“I can’t…believe…you actually…fell for that,” Harry said in between laughs.
“You think that if Niall really died, we’d be here in the cafeteria having coffee. And we would’ve told you right away,” I said, my laughter finally starting to die down.
“Why the hell would you do that?” Louis asked, anger present on his face.
“Let’s just say this is payback for all of the embarrassing things you told Isla when we first started dating.”
All three of their faces fell at Harry’s words.
“Oh.” Louis said. “Still. What you just did was way worse than what we did.”
“Exactly.”
Zayn shook his head. “Can we just go and see Niall?”
I rushed over and stood in front of them, holding my hands up to stop them.
“Uh uh, I think you owe someone an apology,” I raised my eyebrows at them. They exchanged looks before they turned around to face Harry.
“I’m sorry, Harry,” Liam said.
“Me, too,” Zayn muttered.
“I’m sorry, too, curly,” Louis interjected.
Harry grinned before walking up and putting his arms around their shoulders.
“Apology accepted. But if you do that again, just remember that I have embarrassing stories about all of you that your girlfriends would love to hear about.”
“You wouldn’t,” Louis said, his eyes widening in fear.
“I would.”
I rolled my eyes at them before I turned around and headed out of the cafeteria. The boys followed behind as they continued their banter.
Once we reached Niall’s room, they quieted down before I opened the door and entered the room. Niall was sitting up in bed with a tray of food in front of him.
“Ew, Nando’s for breakfast,” I exclaimed. “You guys got him that for his breakfast?”
“He’s getting out of the hospital today so he needs as much energy he can get,” Louis said.
I just rolled my eyes before walking up to the bed and sitting beside Niall. Once I sat down, Niall gave me a kiss on my cheek. I couldn’t help the smile that crept on my face. I turned my face towards him and gave him a peck on the lips.
Someone cleared their throat. “Hello to you, too, Niall,” Liam said.
Niall gave me one more kiss before turning to the boys.
“Hey, guys. Thanks for the food,” he said before taking a handful of fries and shoving it in his mouth.
“No problem. When are you able to leave?” Liam asked.
“I was actually able to leave when I woke up but I wanted to eat first.” He shrugged like it was no big deal.
“Well, hurry up, fatty! Let’s go home,” Louis said.
“Don't rush me!”
I rolled my eyes for what felt like the millionth time today before I got up.
“I’ll just gather all of your things so we can leave when you finish eating.”
“Thank you, babe. You’re amazing,” he grinned, his mouth full of food.
I scrunched my nose in pretend disgust. “Yeah, you too.”
They all laughed before I went around the room to get all of his stuff together. Once I finished, Niall had finished eating and then went to the bathroom to change. When he got out, we all left the room and he signed the discharge papers and we were finally able to leave.
He put his arm around my shoulder since he was still sore from his broken rib. I wrapped my arms around his waist to provide more support as we walked towards the exit.
Once we walked through the entrance doors, the four other boys decided to have a race to the car leaving me and Niall carefully walking after them.
“What’s the plan for today?” Niall asked.
“Well, you are going to go home and rest some more. We don’t want to risk you getting hurt again.”
“I’m not going to get hurt,” he whined. And perfect timing, he tripped over his own feet and stumbled. Luckily, I was able to prevent him from falling before he was able to regain his balance.
“Uh huh, I’m sure you won’t,” I said, laughing as his face grew red. “Let’s just stay home, just in case.”
His head whipped over to look at me. “‘We’ as in ‘you and me’? Just you and me?”
I raised an eyebrow at him. “Unless you want one of the boys to look after you.”
“No, no. I’m perfectly fine with you taking care of me.” He gave me a playful grin as we reached the car.
“So you’re okay with staying home now?” I smirked at him. I was about to open the door to the car when he grabbed my wrist, spinning me around and lightly pushing me against the side of the car.
I gasped in surprise and froze in my spot as I stared into his eyes.
“I am definitely okay with staying home now. With you.” He started to lean towards me until our lips were almost touching.
Just as I was about to close the small distance between our lips, we heard a window being opened.
“Get a room!”
“Ew!”
“My eyes!”
“Save that for later!”
Niall pulled back and sighed. I just giggled.
“We can continue this later,” I whispered, running my hands over his chest.
I guess I wasn’t quiet enough.
“Make sure you guys use protection!” Louis shouted from inside the car.
I rolled my eyes before pushing myself off of the car and opening the door. I looked inside the car and saw Louis sitting in the passenger seat. Paul was driving and Liam and Zayn were in the back seats. Harry drove here so he was waiting in his car right beside us.
“Why don’t we go in Harry’s car? Keep him company. And get away from these annoying children,” Niall said.
“No! We’re sorry! Please ride with us,” Liam said with puppy dog eyes.
I looked over at Niall and saw him giving me an expression I couldn’t figure out.
“Why don’t you ride here with them and I’ll go with Harry? I wanted to talk to him about something,” he said.
I was about to ask him what he wanted to talk to Harry about but he stopped me with a quick kiss before he hurried around the car and into Harry’s.
I guess I could ask him about it later.
I hopped in the car and sat in the middle seats. Liam jumped out of his seat and sat down beside me.
“Hey! I thought you were going to sit beside me,” Zayn said, pouting.
“I’ll sit beside you!” Louis exclaimed from the front seat. He quickly hopped over the seats.
“Boys! Behave!” Paul ordered. I laughed as I watched Louis struggle to get to his seat. Finally, he was able to sit beside Zayn. Paul started to drive once everyone was settled and I couldn’t help but look over inside Harry’s car. I had no idea what they were talking about but I was relieved to see that they were laughing before we passed them and left the hospital parking lot.
I couldn’t wait to go home. I don’t really like hospitals, especially having to stay overnight.
We were finally able to leave and I just wanted to home.
But where was home for me now?
I couldn't stay at Louis and El’s place forever. I needed to find my own place soon. But then I started to realize something.
I belong in one place. There was one place that I can call home.
It was wherever Niall was.
Niall is my home.
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