Golden.

It dawned on me that there were only a few more days left in our plan to stay here on this island. This getaway was getting cut shorter and shorter every time I’d wake up in the morning. The days had gone by so quickly, and with everything that has been happening to us on this getaway, it’s so hard to focus on one thing at a time. Like management for example. I called my mum up yesterday to see how everyone was doing at home. They were mobbed actually; the entire house was surrounded by hundreds of fans and paparazzi, demanding answers to their questions, their concerns. I was just relieved that everyone was safe.

Everything was pretty good so far. The other lads called their fams up yesterday too, and everything’s still pretty tame at this point. However, the mystery still remains—what’s going to happen next?

It’s almost lunchtime, and I promised the boys I’d meet them in the dining area to discuss our game plan, according to Liam. But I also promised Lia I’d drop off something special for her. Since she didn’t come by this morning, I figured I’d surprise her. Her suite wasn’t too far from ours, just a few floors down. The gift bag dangled from my fingers as I walked slowly over to her suite. The hallways were unusually quiet; there wasn’t any cleaning going on today, I guess.

I knocked on the wooden door slowly. There was no response for a few minutes. Then a muffled sound of footsteps reached the door. Lia’s head stuck out. She looked pale again. It seemed as if she would get paler and paler every time I’d see her. When her eyes averted to mine, she seemed a little stunned that I was there.

“What are you doing here,” she muttered under her breath. It wasn’t much of a question; she sounded like she demanded an answer right away, but the weakness in her voice couldn’t bring over the emotion she probably wanted to. She had heavy bags under her eyes, obviously noting that she was getting weaker and she barely got any sleep.

“You didn’t stop by this morning.” I fidgeted with the bag in my hands. “So, I thought I’d drop by instead.”

Lia was sort of hesitant. She stood there for a while, as if she were contemplating on whether or not she wanted to let me in. She sighed heavily, and opened the door and stepped aside for me to come in. This was the first time I was ever entering her suite, the place she actually lived in. The air stunk of rotten food and heavy medication. It was like a hospital inside.

There were all kinds of machines in one side of the living room, and there were pills and tablets placed in jars and lined on a shelf along one wall. There was a whole variation of pills because their names were written on tape across each jar. I scanned the room, everything was lack-luster. Nothing held color or fun or happiness. The lights were dim and the curtains were shut all the way together, not allowing any sunlight to brighten up the room in the least.

It didn’t even look like the hotel suite anymore. It was as if it was customized because nothing made it seem like it was one of the hotel suites. It was an entirely different room.
No family pictures, no wall décor (aside from the medicine jars that seemed to act like décor), no little girl’s toys, no nothing!

The air was still, but the smell was more present than ever. It really did seem like a hospital. And I couldn’t understand why. What I did understand, though, was the reason why Lia probably didn’t want to let me in. I stood there in the middle of the room, sort of numb. And it was one of those moments where you’re just standing there, with all these things happening around you, and you don’t know what to do.

Lia was still standing by the doorway, her gaze down at the ground. She rubbed her arm slowly, hesitant, as if she knew exactly what I was thinking.

I stopped thinking. “Uh, here,” I said, walking over to her. “It’s our album, ‘Up All Night.’ I thought you might like it.” I gave her a warm smile before handing over the gift bag.

She took it emotionlessly, but forced a small smile to be polite. “Thanks.” She walked across the room and sat down at the table.

“I even put a One Direction shirt in there,” I said, shoveling my hands in my pockets, slowly walking over to her. “Our fans like to customize shirts for us, and I actually received similar designs of this one, so…”

She had her head in her hands. She didn’t look at me when she spoke, “I don’t think you should be giving this to me if it came from one of your fans.”

I didn’t say anything. I just looked at her, feeling sympathetic and pathetic at the same time.

“I’m sorry,” she said after a few minutes. “It’s just, this new medication, the side-effects are really getting to me. They make me feel sleepy. And feel like crap, pretty much.” She chuckled lightly when she said that, but she still had her head in her hands.

I sat down beside her, looking at her with puppy-dog eyes. I just wished I could rid her of such a slow, destructive sickness. If I were given three wishes, that would be my first right now. I’m not even kidding. Just sitting down there, watching her crumble inside, and not being able to do anything about it crushed me.

Not knowing what to do, I gently put a hand on her shoulder. She moved her head, and looked at me. I gave her a small smile, the warmest I could give her, no matter how terrible I was feeling for her. I’m sure she was feeling worse, and I needed to do my best to be strong enough for her.

I could see a small glint in her eyes when she tried to smile at me.

--

“What took you so long?” Louis asked, getting up from his seat to greet me. They all probably noticed the grim look on my face because they all stopped what they were doing as I took a seat beside them at the table.

“What’s wrong, mate?” Niall asked, looking at me sympathetically. He put down his sandwich. Niall doesn’t put down his food for just anybody. But my face probably looked worse than I made it seem like because he was ready to listen intently.

I sighed and glanced at the menu in front of me. “I dropped off the album at Lia’s today…”
They were silent, listening to my every word. “She’s not doing well, guys. And, and…” I could feel myself stammering, and it was hard to talk under the bombshell that wanted to explode in my throat. There was a big lump that I wanted to get rid of, but no matter how much I spoke, it just kept getting bigger and bigger. I managed to continue, “I can’t help but think of the worst. That it’s almost over.”

“Hey,” Zayn spoke up quickly. Clearly he didn’t want to hear any of the tragic remarks about the situation. And he only wanted me to cheer up. “Don’t say that.” He rested a consoling hand on my shoulder. “Things’ll be fine, yeah?”And with that, he sent me the warmest smile he could vive.

The rest of the morning was hard to get through. I had to fake all of my sadness just to hang out with the lands. But they knew there was nothing they could do. There we go again with hat situation. Where you can only sit back and watch someone crumble because there’s just nothing you can do.

Liam postponed our “game plan meeting” till later in the afternoon when I’d feel better. Then everyone went their separate ways after lunch. Louis suggested I take a walk before meeting up with again in the afternoon.

It was pretty warm out, but that was perfectly fine. The wind blew through my heavy curls, almost making it wavy from the strength of the breeze. All I could hear was the crashing of the waves against the shore and the seagulls that gawked and squawked above me. I didn’t bring any sunglasses so I squinted even as I kicked the sand below me.

My thoughts consumed me. Not only were there endless worries about Lia, and the mystery of what would happen to us regarding management, I had another thought that was eating me alive.

Cassandra.

I have to admit that my feelings for her did escalate since I first met her. We spent almost every day together, except when we were both feeling down about Lia. I loved pretty much everything about her—her modesty, her beauty, her humor, her laugh, her sincerity, her ingenuity…

“Hey, Cheeky.”

I turned around quickly, expecting to see Lia, knowing that she was one of the only people who called me that. But instead, there was a tall figure in front of me, with long strawberry blonde highlights in her hair. Her eyes were shielded by dark aviator sunglasses, which reflected me perfectly. She gave me a small smile and walked forward.

“Hey, Cass.” My voice was hoarse. She stood tall beside me, admiring the beachy view in front of her. We spent a few minutes in comfortable silence before she opened her mouth to speak. “Louis told me you’d be here.”

I didn’t say anything. There was nothing I needed to say. Nothing I could say.

“Come on.” She tugged on my hand, slipping hers into mine slowly. “I want to show you something.” I followed her reluctantly.

We stepped onto a long wooden flooring. It seemed to be small boutique shops that stood near us. Above us were big colorful tarpaulins as rooftops. I eyed some of the things on display. There were fancy tuxedos and suits, blazers and coats that hung effortlessly on the mannequins.

“What are we doing here?” I asked. Cassandra’s hand was still in mine as we stood in front of the big glass door of the boutique.

She looked at me. “We need to find you something to wear for the event tonight!” She tugged on my hand again as she pushed the heavy door to enter. “Come on!” Clearly, she was excited. I don’t know if it was genuine excitement or a disguise as well, but it was very convincing.

What Cassandra didn’t know was that I actually did have a suit packed in. I mean, I did expect something, at least one thing to happen that would require some dressing up. I’m Harry Styles, I’m always prepared.

There was a great selection of styles to choose from. Dark blue suits, grey, a tame silver even. I couldn’t help but heck the prices on the suits. They were way too expensive for normal blazers. Not even mine were that expensive. The numbers seemed to jump at me in the boldness of the lettering. Cassandra probably noticed the boggled look on my face because she started walking up to me. I could see her blurred figure from the corner of my eye.

She smiled and started grabbing hangers and hangers of different blazers for me to try on. She pretty much ran through the entire boutique, finally ending up with about fifteen or so suits for me to try on.

“Come on!” she called after me. She was waiting in the dressing room, hanging each suit by the door. There was a variety of different shades and colors that screamed at me when I entered the dressing room.

My eyes widened. “Wow, you really seem to have this all planned out.”

She pushed me into the little dressing room cubicle and shoved one of the suits into me before pulling the curtain closed.

We spent about an hour in there, including all the time that Cassandra took to critique each outfit and how it looked on me, as well as my reaction to each one. After much deliberation between two different suits, we finally came to an agreement to one (which I picked, by the way). It was a sleek dark blue, almost black. There was something about the simplicity that I loved about it.

What I didn’t love was when Cassandra pulled out her wallet in front of me.

“No, no, no,” I said. “What are you doing? No.”

She was sort of taken aback by my sudden reaction. Her face was stunned, but full of assurance. “Don’t worry about it.”

I put my hands on hers and pushed her wallet down on the counter. “No, I’m not going to let you pay for this. Not even I pay this much for a suit. No.” I could feel the sternness in my voice, and the way my eyes shadowed down on her.

Then I felt her thumb graze on the top of my hand, and a she sent a sweet smile my way. It pretty much melted me inside, and my eyes softened. “I’ve got it.”

I sighed. I wasn’t going to win this battle. “I’ll make it up to you, I swear,” I said, almost in a pleading tone.

She smiled at me again. But truthfully, I didn’t know how I was going to make it up to her. I didn’t know how I was ever going to owe to her, with the biggest secret I have already being kept from her. I am never going to be able to pay her back, in any way. Unless I tell her.

We left the boutique, the wind immediately taking over us. It shook my hair as I turned to look at Cassandra. “Thank you, so much.” I pulled her into a warm hug, stroking her long hair.

“No problem, Cheeky.” Her eyes squinted in the brightness, but still glistening through the slits that appeared. “I just, wanted to make you feel better, somehow. I know this whole Lia thing has really been messing with you. And it has been with me too. So you know, I just wanted to do something to help. A little.”

“You’ve helped, a lot.” I smiled at her.

“Well,” she said as she started to walk away. “I’ll see you tonight, then?” She looked back at me before her hair flipped and she walked away.

I watched her as she did, remembering all the things we’ve been through together the past few weeks. I watched her walk away, and I swear, I could see this happening. I could see this happening when she finally finds out about us, about me. About One Direction. I can’t let that happen. I can’t let everyone walk away.