"Katie, are you okay? You look like you've seen a ghost" he asked with concern in his voice.
"Yeah. I just er..." I pointed to the stairs. "I er, I've finished unpacking." He let out a sign if relief.
"Is that it? You looked petrified." He worries to much honestly.
"G I'm fine honestly." He was walking round the room straightening things out.
"You haven't called me G in for forever, the last thing you said to me was 'I'm gonna miss you G.'" Wow.
"How can you remember that?" I was watching him walk round the room and he abruptly turned round.
"Of course I remember the last thing you said to me, I'm not going to forget, it was one of the worst moments of my life-"
"G." I tried to make him stop.
"That night I found you, you were going on about me leaving you and-"
"Gary!"
"You were saying I forgot you, left you, abandoned you-" I couldn't have him making me feel like shit.
"GARY!" I shouted "YOU KNOW I TRIED TO GET RID OF YOU OUT OF MY MIND, I- I'M SORRY!" I couldn't help but cry again, all I've seemed to do recently is cry in front of him.
"Ka-" I walked up the stairs.
"No Gary, I need some time by myself." What was I doing, being here with him, I told myself I would never forgive him. I walked in to our bedroom, no his bedroom, I don't even know who's bedroom it counts as. I could hear him shouting me so I locked the door and just lay down on the bed, it was only 5 and I didn't even realise how tired I was until I lay there, I thought about things and managed to fall asleep without him, I felt safe just knowing he was around.
I was awoken to the sound of the piano being played, I looked at the clock and it was just gone 8 I couldn't believe I'd spelt for nearly 3 hours.
"You light, the skies up above me"
I could hear Gary singing outside so I stood up, walked over to the double doors and opened them and walked out on to the balcony.
"A star, so bright you blind me"
He had covered the garden in beautiful twinkling fairy lights, he was sat at his piano singing me Rule The World.
"Don't close your eyes, don't fade away, don't fade away ooooooo"
"Gary." I said, he kept playing the piano but had stopped singing. "G, I'm sorry, I'm sorry for everything and I mean everything, all this, it's beautiful, you're beautiful." I shouted down to him. "I love you" I whispered, my little secret. "Stay there, I'm coming down." I walked back in to the bedroom and closed the doors, did he listen to me and stay where he was? Of course not. I walked out the room and down the stairs.
"Gary do you ever liste-" I stopped, he'd basically done everything he did outside, in here, fair lights everywhere lighting up the room and on the table ready and waiting was a candle lit dinner. "What did you do?" I asked.
"I keep saying thy I'm going to protect you and look after you and not make to feel like crap again, and yet I still do it. I did this for you, I know it won't make anything up to you but it's a start." I was completely speechless, I just stood there and looked around the room.
"G, this must have took you forever to do."
"It's all worth it for you, everything I do for you is worth it. Now" he said pulling out a chair for me at the table. "Come sit down, I've prepared dinner for you." I walked over.
"Thank you sir." I said siting down.
"My name is Gary and I shall be your server tonight." Ge couldn't help but role play, he's always been like it. "On the menu we have pizza or pizza." I couldn't help but laugh at him.
"You ruined it, you ruined it." I said laughing still.
"Oh come on, I spent all evening doing this for you, I needed something that would take twenty minutes, play along please." He gave me the puppy dog eyes and pleaded with me.
"Fine, fine. I will have the pizza sir." I playing along with his little game.
"Two Hawaiian asda pizzas coming up." He said walking away.
"See, you ruined it again." I thought about what had happened throughout the day and I'm not going to lie I was still pretty tired, I just wanted to eat my food and go back to bed. Gary came back in with two plates both with Hawaiian pizzas on, he put one plate down in front of me and one in front of his own seat.
"Your favourite I believe."
"Thank you." I smiled at him. We ate in silence for the most part, it also didn't take us long to eat it. The time had some how managed to get to 9.
"I know it's a Saturday night and stuff but would it seem really boring if I went to bed soon I mean I am absolutely shattered." Oh dear, I sound like such a loser.
"No, no. That's fine, you've had a hard past week, I understand you need your rest, I'll probably be up at about 11 anyway." He started laughing to himself.
"We're such party animals aren't we?" He joked.
"We sure are." I replied. We both stood up and he gave me a hug.
"Thank you, it was a lovely meal Mr Barlow and the decorations were amazing. I shall see you in the morning." I walked away from him and lazily walked up the stairs with such little effort. I had to go toilet I was bursting, after I went to our room, put my phone on charge, pulled out Garys shirt I stole from him this morning, put it on and jumped in to bed. It was such a big, warm, soft and cosy bed. It didn't take me long to get sleep as I drifted off I pondered what tomorrow would bring.
*Garys P.O.V*
I caught up with some programmes I missed last week when I was in the hospital with Katie, by about 11 I had ran out of things to watch so decided to go up to bed. I quietly crept up the stairs to make sure I didn't wake her, she needed her rest she's had a really long and hard week. I went toilet and got changed in there so I didn't make to much noise in the bedroom and wake her up, I walked in to the bedroom, put my clothes in a pile in the draw.
I looked over at Katie, she looked so peaceful when she was asleep, like she hasn't been through shit, it was nice to see her so unhurt. I pulled back the covers, slipped in to bed and put one arm round her and pulled her close to me. I made sure she was sound asleep and whispered.
"You're the one I've always liked, I love you." I didn't know what we could do tomorrow, although I planned on making her feel comfortable and at home, let her relax and rest all day, she had a big day on Monday meeting the boys.
It didn't take me long to get sleep last right apparently but I was up at ten. I never sleep this long, I must have been tired. I got up and got dressed and left Katie to sleep longer, she always has been able to sleep for hours and hours and hours. I can't remember leaving my phone down stairs last night but I suppose I must have seeming as it was on the coffee table, I had a message from Mark:
Gaz! What is going on!? Have you seen the newspapers today!?
Shit, what's on the front of them, crap, crap, crap. I grabbed my keys, put my hood up and walked out the house, there was a little corner shop at the end of the road so I jogged down to it. I walked it, hopefully being fairly unnoticeable and walked over to where all the papers were kept, lucky it was near the back of the shop so no one really could or would see me. There was pictures of me and Katie all over them:
"Is This Barlows New Girl?" One of them read
"Could Gary Have Finally Found The One?" Another read
"Could Gary Barlow Have Found His Babe And Will He Have The Greatest Day" You can always count on The Sun to have a classy headline.
I picked up all three and walked over to the counter and placed them down, the worker scanned them as I got my money out.
"Do you think he could of finally have got the right woman?" He asked me, oh good he hadn't realised it was me. I gave him the money, picked up the papers and said.
"Who knows if they're actually together? The media is always twisting things believe me." I walked out before he could respond, I hoped Katie hadn't woken up because knowing her she would be worried, I jogged back not really know what to do.
I only really knew that I was angry, angry with the paps and the papers, but especially angry with myself. Why didn't I think of this? It was obviously going to happened, they'd spent all last week trying to find out what was happening with us. Nothing yet.
I ran down the path to my house and quickly walked in, I sat on the sofa just thinking about all the paper covers, after a while I decided to actually read them. It was all generally quite true stuff "Friends from high school." "Stayed with her when she was in hospital." "Has been looking for her for ages." Everything apart from the fact "we were together" was true. It took me longer than I'd expected to read them and when I finally looked at my phone I had messages from everyone from my Mum to even Lauren, I ignored them all at this time because it was already 11 and Katie still wasn't up so I decided to make us so what would be brunch by the time she gets up.
As a nice surprise I thought I'd make her, her favourite pancakes again. It took me three attempts to make the perfect batch if had passed about an hour when the door slowly opened and she walked in, she looked beautiful even her sleekly state and my shirt, she smiled at me, I know my face must have just lit up.
"Good morning." I said.
"It's basically afternoon now G. God, how long did I sleep?" She questioned me.
"Erm-" I counted all the hours in my head "About 15 hours I would say." Wow, she really can sleep.
"Oh god, I don't know why I'm so tired constantly, sorry I've been such terrible company the past couple of days."
"It's fine, you've had a hard week, you deserve some rest. Now I have some good news and bad news, well I suppose it's bad. Okay I'm going to give you the good news first so that hopefully you won't hate me as much for the bad news." She looked at my quite quizzical.
"What have you done now?" She asked.
"Nothing, well it wasn't actually my fault, I just didn't really consider it. Erm anyway the good news isssssss, I made you your favourite pancakes again!" I said putting her plate in front of her.
"Oh my god! Yay G!" She practically screamed at me as she started gobbling down her pancakes.
"Right the bad news, erm all the papers think we're an item." I said passing over the papers too her. She just looked at them and kept eating.
"Gary." She said after he last bite, Jesus she got through them quick. "I knew this was going to happen, I've seen the papers before, I do not believe for a second that Harry Styles is actually with Kendall Jenner. We'll just simply tell them we aren't" I was shocked at her calmness.
"Erm, are you sure it's okay? It's just I know what you're like, I expected you to be a bit more erm angry about it. I don't know why really." I explained to her.
"G, it's in the friendship description, I always thought that it would end up happening with all these rumours, I just thought it would take a bit longer and that they wouldn't know so much about me, that's just freaky."
"Thank you, not many people would be as calm about this as you are. You're such a special friend."
*KNOCK KNOCK* we were disturbed from our conversation by a knock at the door, I wasn't expecting anyone so it was a bit of a surprise. "I swear if it's the pap" I mumbled as I walked out the kitchen, Katie was following me. I walked over to the door and unlocked it and slowly opened it.
"Oh, you finally found her then!?"
Shit. It was Chloe. My life was just starting to go good again, she cannot ruin it.