Forbidden

The next morning I woke up, my body aching all over, to find that I'd left the curtains open and light was beaming through the windows.
Almost immediately, I began to sob, resting my head in my hands as I wondered what I'd done to deserve it.

Had I given out the wrong signals? Had it seemed like I'd wanted it?
I stumbled towards the bathroom, hitting into the table on my way.
I glanced in the mirror, and it was like looking at a different person.

There was the faint trace of a black eye around my right eye, and I dreaded to think what it would look like when I took my make up off. My hair was knotted and greasy. My face was coated in the make up that had begun to run last night. My dress was hanging off, having ripped all down the side, revealing my bra. I stepped out of the dress, gasping slightly as I looked at the bruises covering me.

There were dark purple marks where he'd dug his fingernails into my sides, and just about everywhere else was covered in a fainter shade of purple, from where he'd refused to let me go.
I blinked back the tears, instead stepping into the piping hot shower and focusing on cleaning myself. Suddenly, I was overcome by the need to be clean. I wanted all traces of him gone. Eventually, I was done, having realized that I was as clean as I was ever going to get - at least on the outside.

It almost didn't feel real. It was like I'd imagined everything. I tried to convince myself that nothing had happened, I hadn't even gone out to the club. But, try as I might, I couldn't ignore the aching between my legs. I hadn't had the heart to look there, but I knew from how tender I felt that I must be covered in bruises. It seemed that he was anything but a gentle lover.

There was a knock at the door. I ignored it. One second later, there was another. The longer I left it, the harder and louder the knocks became, until I had no choice but to answer the door. Slowly, I pulled a dressing gown around me, walking over to the floor heavily.
I hesitated for a second before opening the door.

"Who is it?" I asked, looking at the door suspiciously.
"It's Harry." came a voice from the other side of the door.

I opened the door and Harry didn't even stop for a second. Immediately, he made his way through to the room, looking at me in disbelief.
"I cannot believe you." he told me, disbelief etched onto his face.

"What?" I asked, too numb to even care what he was talking about.
"There are pictures of you and that guy outside the club last night. They are everywhere!" he exclaimed, and I looked up from where I'd been staring at the carpet, almost too shocked to comprehend what he was talking about.

"Don't pretend you didn't realize. Honestly, snogging him like that right in front of the fans and paparazzi. Did you really think that it would go unnoticed?" he asked me loudly.
"Liam's completely lost it, Louis is devastated." he told me.

Then he stopped for a second, looking at my eye.
"What happened?" he asked.
"I fell" I told him, almost too quickly.He narrowed his eyes.
"Are you sure?" he asked me, slightly suspicious.

I nodded quickly, but to my horror tears began to pour out of my eyes. Harry looked at me, his eyes softening as he took in my appearance.
"Hey, it's fine. I'm here." he told me, wrapping his arms round me. I tried not to flinch as his arms brushed against my bruises, but failed. "What's wrong? he asked. "You can tell me."

I shook my head, ignoring the pain shooting up my neck as I did so.
"I'm fine. My eye just hurts and I'm tired." I lied, not wanting anyone to know what had happened.

If I told Harry, he would tell Liam, who would tell the police. Let's face it, if a member of One Direction's sister was raped, people would find out about it. I cringed as I thought about just how many people would read articles, or gather outside court to catch a glimpse of the boys and I.
Deciding the best thing to do was to keep quiet, I continued with my lie.

"I just really need my bed." I told him truthfully, and Harry left moments later having made me promise to call him if I needed anything.
I lay back on the bed, wrapping myself up in the duvet as I tried to block everything out.

It didn't work, and a moment later there was a knock at my door. I ignored it a few times, before the person started shouting.
"Millie, if you don't speak to me then I'm just going to have to talk to you from out here!" he warned.
Realizing it would probably do more harm than good to ignore him, I walked over to the door, letting him in.

Louis looked shocked that I'd given in so easily. I suppose I would have shocked myself, but I was too tired to even feel anything. For a moment he stood there, unsure of what to say, despite having been so desperate to speak to me.
"What is it, Louis?" I asked him, closing my eyes as I prepared for him to shout at me.

"I literally cannot believe you." he whispered. He seemed too angry to even shout, and it scared me.

"I don't know what I was doing." I told him quickly, reaching out to touch his arm and calm him down. It didn't work, he pushed my arm away roughly, reminding me of last night.
Immediately, tears began to pour down my face, but he didn't have any sympathy for me.

"I cannot fucking believe this. For God's sake Millie. You can't just cry every time we argue. It doesn't do anything. I don't even care anymore."
"I'm not trying to cry." I told him, wiping my tears away as he glared at me.

"I don't care! You have no right to be upset! You're the one that went off with a random guy, then left with him without telling us where you were going. I'm done with this. I'm done with sneaking around behind your brother's back, because you're too ashamed about me to tell anyone. I'm done with trying not to care when you sleep with other guys. I'm just sick of it." he exclaimed.

All I wanted in that moment was for him to hug me. Instead, he left.

I'm not sure how long I spent in bed, crying after that. It could have been minutes, hours or a day. Every time the tears began to slow down something would remind me, of the night before, or of losing Louis. I'm not sure which was worse.

Eventually, Harry walked in, having got a room key from the hotel manager.
"How're you holding up?" he asked. I ignored the question.

"Why are you so worried about me?" I asked. Harry sighed quietly, putting the glass of water he was holding down on the table.
"I don't know what's going through your head, but it doesn't seem good. Firstly, you and your boyfriend broke up. Then you decided to turn Louis down, for some unknown reason. Then you had another massive argument with him earlier, because of that guy last night. If I were you, I'd have phoned my therapist hours ago." he told me, and I almost smiled.

"Look, you don't have to tell me what happened. But is everything okay, I mean, at least bearable? Nothing serious has happened has it?" he asked, a sincere look on his face.
Once again, I considered telling him, but I decided it was best for no one to find out what had happened.

"Harry, I'm fine. What will it take for you to believe that?" I lied, trying to make him believe me.
"Come to dinner with us. We're all going out to this place down the road. We won't go anywhere afterwards if you don't want to." he offered.

"Fine." I said slowly. I hadn't actually expected to have to go out.
"Right then, I'll go tell everyone you're coming." he chirped happily.

I sat there for a moment, wondering if there was any way that I could get out of going. But I knew that if I didn't go, they'd suspect that something bad had happened. I resigned myself to the fact that I had to go, and settled for pulling on the biggest jumper I had with me and a pair of leggings, in an effort to cover myself up.

Minutes later, Harry was back, with Niall and Zayn in tow.
"Are you ready to party?" Niall asked me, jumping on the bed. I rolled my eyes

"No. We're going to dinner, not a rave." I told him in a monotone as Zayn smirked.
However, Harry was staring at my bed, or in particular, my pillow, where there were mascara stains.

I looked away, trying to stop myself from going red. I wasn't even wearing make up, so any blushing would be clearly visible.
"Are we going then?" I asked.
"Yeah, Liam, Danielle and Louis are meeting us in the lobby." Zayn told me, leading the way to the lift.
We stood in the lift in silence. I could sense the tension, and I knew that I was causing it, but I couldn't stop it.

Eventually, without having said another word to each other, we reached the lobby where Liam, Danielle and Louis were waiting.

I could see Liam was all set to glare at me and call me an idiot for the pictures from the night before, but then he noticed my black eye and lack of make up.
"What happened to your eye?" he asked as Danielle looked at me with concern.

"Fell over." I muttered.
"You know, this is the first time I've seen you leave the house without make up since you were fourteen." he told me, smirking slightly at the look of shock on everybody else's faces.
"Wait, since you were fourteen? That's almost four years!" Niall exclaimed.

"Well sorry Liam, but I didn't realize it was a crime to not wear make up." I snapped.
"That's not what I me-" he began before I interrupted.

"Maybe you shouldn't moan at me like that then" I told him.. trying to ignore the fact that there were tears welling up in my eyes. Everybody was looking round awkwardly, unsure of what to say as Liam held his arms up in defeat.
"Right, well I'm sorry then." he told me, looking slightly scared. I huffed slightly, painfully aware that all eyes were on me.

"Okay, let's go." Niall said, ever keen to eat, and we all trooped out of the doors after him to walk to the restaurant.
The walk to the restaurant, which should have taken five minutes, instead took fifteen minutes, mostly because screaming girls had gathered where there were already crowds of paparazzi.

I wasn't sure which group was louder: the hysterical girls, desperate to catch the attention of the boys, or the paparazzi who were yelling questions, each attempting to be louder than the other.

A few of the men shouted at me, asking what I'd thought of the mornings papers. I pretended not to notice them, trying to ignore the feeling of bile rising in my throat.

Finally, we walked into the restaurant, gaining looks from just about everybody as the paparazzi continued shouting outside the door.
We sat as far away from them as possible, tucked away in a private booth.

We sat there in silence, only interrupted by the sound of Niall slurping his drink. Louis looked over, concern, jealousy and anger in his eyes all at once, before hastily turning away as I caught him staring.

"So....." Zayn said awkwardly. It wasn't quiet for long though. Within seconds Louis had opened his mouth and I was willing him to stop speaking.
"Decided against bringing the guy from last night then, did you?" he asked me, a callous look blemishing his otherwise perfect face. I shrugged lightly, taking a sip of my drink in an effort to stop any emotion from appearing on my face.

"What guy?" I asked. Louis laughed, clapping slowly as if I'd just said the funniest thing I'd ever said. The boys were looking at him strangely, all except Harry, who had an exasperated look on his face.

"Only the guy you were whoring around with last night, of course." he said casually, as Liam stood up, anger clear on his face.
"Don't speak to my sister like that." he warned. Louis took another sip of his drink before slamming it down on the table and standing up just as quickly as Liam.

"Or?" he asked. Liam ignored the question, instead glaring at him.
"Take it back." Liam demanded. I thought about trying to calm him down, but knew it wouldn't work.
"No. It's not my fault that your sister sleeps around. Amelia," he began. It was the first time he'd ever called me Amelia. It felt cold between us.

"Did you, or did you not fuck that guy last night?" he asked, a hard look on his face as he looked directly into my eyes.

It was too much. Tears immediately began to well up in my eyes, spilling down my cheeks as I did my best to stay quiet. I didn't even pick up my bag, instead walking out of the restaurant as quickly as I possibly could.
The boys didn't follow me, so it didn't take too long to reach the hotel. Once in my room I took off my jumper and leggings, leaving me standing there in a pair of knickers and a bra. I was just staring down at the huge bruises covering my body.

Outfit:
Leggings: http://www.net-a-porter.com/product/323324
Jumper: http://www.net-a-porter.com/product/321234