Two Way Street

We walked down the street silently for a few meters before Mara burst out, “We need to find Niall.”

“What?” I asked, raising an eyebrow at her.

“He doesn’t know anything that’s happened,” she reminded me. “Not that we got drunk, slept together, your argument with Zayn-”

“You know about that?” I questioned, running my free hand through my hair and blushing.

“Uh, yeah. I talked with him briefly earlier. He feels like complete shit, you know.”

“Yeah, well, think about how I feel about the fact that he went behind my back and told Louis something that I told him in confidence.”

Mara stepped out in front of me, stopping me in my tracks. “Liam, he made a mistake. Everyone makes mistakes. And even if he doesn’t think it was a mistake, imagine how you’d feel in his position, stuck between two friends like that. It’s not an easy place to be.”

Ugh. I hated when other people made more sense than my thoughts did. “I guess you have a point,” I admitted grudgingly.

“Great. So you’ll have a chat with him later?”

“Maybe.”

She laughed, taking my hand and starting to walk again. “Better than a no.”

I smiled at her as I pulled out my phone. “Hold on, I’m going to give Niall a ring to see where he is.”

After pulling up his name and pressing CALL, I held the phone to my ear with my shoulder.

It took about a million rings, but Niall finally picked up the phone. “Hi, Liam,” he greeted in his happy-go-lucky voice.

“Hey,” I replied. “Um, where are you?”

“At my flat,” he laughed. “I do spend time here sometimes, you know.”

“Who knew?” I joked back. “Mind if Mara and I pop by?”

“You and…who? What? What’s going on?”

I turned to Mara and whispered, away from the phone, “I think I’ve just short-circuited his brain.”

She let out a good-natured laugh as I pulled away from her, resting the phone against my ear again. “That’s the whole point, mate.”

“Oh my God.” I could hear the grin distorting his brogue. “Okay, yeah. Come on over. I’ve just got to run the vacuum.”

“I’m sure you’ll have time,” I reassured him. “We’re going to be there in about ten minutes.”
“See you then.”

The line went dead, so I slipped the phone back into my pocket. “This is going to be interesting,” I told her calmly.

* * *

“Wait,” Niall interjected, putting up a finger, “you did what?”

“I went to the pub and got drunk. With Mara.”

“Well, not with me,” Mara protested. “You already started by the time I got there, and the place was so packed that I couldn’t find any other seats. I had to sit by you.”

“Okay, I got drunker with Mara,” I allowed. “And then we went back to my place.”

“Holy shit,” Niall gasped. “No you didn’t!”

I nodded before finishing the rest of the story, giving him the bare details, since I didn’t want to go play-by-play of my argument with Zayn or how pissed Louis was at me. At least, I figured he was still pissed at me. It seemed like he was on his way to forgiving Mara, though.

“Wow,” Niall sighed. “I hang out by myself for a day, and all this shit happens?”

“Yup,” I laughed. “Welcome to One Direction, where there’s never a dull moment.”

“So you guys have had sex,” Niall stated plainly, looking back and forth between Mara and me. “What does that mean?”

I narrowed my eyes at him, trying not to burst out into hysterics in his face. “Are you trying to tell me that you don’t know what sex is?”

He let the words sink in before he snorted with laughter. “Oh my God, no. I know how that works, thanks. I mean…what does that mean for the two of you?”

I looked over at Mara, but she just stared back at me without offering an answer.

The truth was that I had never been the kind of guy who just fooled around with girls or went out with them a couple of times before ditching them. I liked having girlfriends, someone special in my life who I could care about completely.

But I didn’t know how Mara rolled. I didn’t know how ready she was for commitment (small-time commitment…not marriage or anything), or if she just wanted to play out relationship by ear for a little while.

So I just cleared my throat and said, “Um…we’re not sure. We haven’t really discussed it much.”

“You might want to get on that,” Niall told us. “I feel like Lou will have an easier time accepting you if you’re together. You know what I mean? ‘Cause right now, you guys were just kind of a one-night stand. Ish.”

I suppressed a shudder. One-night stands were not my thing. “Um, no, it wasn’t.”

“That might be how Louis sees it.”

I sighed. “I didn’t think of that. But I guess you have a point.”

I glanced over at Mara again, but she wasn’t looking at me.

“You guys look like you could use some food,” Niall expressed, getting to his feet. “Typically, I don’t share my food, but I’m going to make an exception.”

“You are just too kind, Nialler,” I chuckled.

Mara got to her feet and followed him into the kitchen, probably to pick out what food she wanted the most. Not that I figured she’d have tons of options, since Niall would only offer some of his food to share.

I sat back on the couch, and my mind wandered to what Mara was talking about earlier, when we were discussing my argument with Zayn. She did have a point: just because he made a mistake didn’t mean he didn’t deserve a second chance.

But my anger was still so raw toward him that it was hard not to be biased, to look at the situation objectively. It still felt like we were Brutus and Caesar. Even though I wasn’t dead. Nor did I plan on getting dead.

“Hellooooo?” Mara’s confused voice broke through my thoughts. “Anyone home?”

I blinked a couple of times to find her standing very close to me, waving a hand in front of my face. “Sorry,” I laughed. “Just thinking.”

“We could tell,” Niall told me as he sat down, bowl of crisps in his hand. “There was smoke coming out of your ears.”

I shot him a glare and reached over to grab some crisps.

“So do you know what you’re going to do about Zayn?” Niall asked. “’Cause I don’t want this whole band at each other’s throats.”

I let out a sigh. “I don’t know, Nialler. I just…don’t know.”