Frames That Used to Greet Me

We flew out of Dublin Sunday morning. After the incredibly long day of press Saturday, combined with another hangover from last night thanks to Niall, I wasn’t feeling my best.

Lou nudged me from our seats on the plane. “How you feeling?”

I shrugged. I hadn’t gotten as drunk last night as I had in the hotel, but that didn’t mean I hadn’t had my fair share of pints. “We need to stop going out with Nialler,” I muttered, turning my head to look out the window. Ireland passed below me. Or maybe we were technically in England now. Who knew?

Niall’s blonde head popped up over the seat in front of me. “What about Nialler?”

“Haz here can’t keep up with you anymore, Niall,” Lou told him, smacking me on the back.

Niall grinned. “I know. He was pissed well before any of us last night. Kept going on about--”

“Can we talk about something else?” I cut Niall off. I was drunk last night, but I could still remember what happened.

Niall shrugged. “‘s all right, mate. You just kept saying Mickey over and over.”

I groaned, falling further down in my seat.

From beside me, Louis sighed. “Haven’t talked to her, have you?”

I shook my head, avoiding everyone’s gaze.

“Talked to who? What happened?” Liam enquired, returning to his seat beside the blonde irishman.

“Nothing bloody happened,” I mumbled, still avoiding their looks. I pulled my phone out and checked it, even though we were in the air. Stupid.

“Our Hazza here is having a bit of trouble,” Lou said, hitting my back again. I complained about it, but he ignored me. “Lady problems, if you will.”

“Aren’t you dating that lass? What’s her name, Cora is it?” Niall asked.

“He was. She dumped him. What happened, anyways?” Lou said, turning to face me. “I mean... bit unexpected, yeah?”

I grunted. I really didn’t want to talk about it. They weren’t letting me off the hook. All of them fired questions at me, except for Zayn who was sound asleep in a seat across the aisle. I’d had enough. “Quiet, yeah?” I burst, shutting them all up. “Jesus, you’re worse than a bunch of girls.” I crossed my arms in front of my chest tightly and turned my head again, staring out the window.

Niall and Liam disappeared into their seats, leaving me be. That left just Lou, who wasn’t giving up so easily. “Don’t be a twat,” he said, quieter this time. “I’m just trying to help, mate. But you won’t let me.”

“I called Cora Mickey in bed,” I hissed, turning to glare at him. “Happy now? That’s why she broke up with me.”

Louis’s mouth formed an ‘O’ slowly as he took in what I was saying. “Mate, that’s... not good.”

I gave him a look that basically said no fucking kidding. “Thanks for that,” I mumbled.

“So... wait, is that why you called Michaela? Wait, do you actually like Mickey?”

I didn’t answer. No, I didn’t have those type of feelings for Mickey. That wasn’t... that wasn’t how we worked. We were just friends. It was just a mistake that Cora took and ran with, completely blew out of proportion.

So why did I call Mickey? Why did I have the urge to talk to her the other night? “I don’t know,” I said honestly, because I had no idea.

Louis sighed. “Maybe you should figure it out, mate. You haven’t talked to her?”

I shook my head. “Not since Friday night, and that obviously wasn’t exactly planned.”

“Start there then, Haz. Go see her when we get back and apologize for the drunk dial, then just go from there, yeah?”

I nodded. Maybe he was right. Maybe I just needed to talk to Mickey so we could figure some things out. “I’ll go see her when we get back,” I told him, and I meant it.

***

As soon as we got to Heathrow and got ushered to our respective cars, Louis and I in mine and the rest of the lads in their own separate ones, I had one goal in mind: to see Michaela.

“I’ll drop you off and then I’m going over to Mick’s,” I told him as I pulled out of the airport.

I drove faster than I ever had to get Lou back to the flat. He climbed out, the car still running and nodded. “Fix it, mate. Can’t stand you moping around any longer.” Before I could argue, he slammed the door and made his way into our building. I couldn’t help rolling my eyes but smirking just a little as I pulled away from the curb.

I made it to Mickey’s in record timing. Before I knew it, I was parking and climbing out. I nodded to the doorman and went right to the lift, hitting the button to take me to Mickey’s floor.

My leg bounced the entire ride up and didn’t stop until the doors slid open. Then suddenly I was in front of Mickey’s door. The same door I’d been to a million times before. “Come on, then,” I muttered to myself before taking a deep breath and raising my fist to knock.

I knocked. Then I waited. And I waited. I felt like I’d been out in the hall for twenty minutes. I looked around, but thankfully the hall was empty. Finally, when I thought I was going to have to give up and go home, the door opened and Mickey appeared.

And she looked... less than pleased. “Get in here,” she hissed, reaching out and grabbing my wrist to pull me inside. I stumbled inside and she slammed the door shut behind me.

Then there was silence.

She stood there, her frame blocking the door with her arms crossed tightly in front of her chest and a scowl on her lips. “I’ve been standing here for ten minutes trying to decide if I should open the door or not,” she said finally. “Now that you’re in here, I’m not entirely sure I made the right decision.”

I sighed, pulling my hands out of my pockets and shoving my curls off my face. “I didn’t come here to fight with you. I came here to apologize.”

“For what?”

I gave her a funny look. “For drunk dialing you the other night?”

She nodded. “It’s funny to me that you could pick just one, because it seems that you have a lot to be apologizing for.”

I sighed. “Maybe you’re right.”

“You’re goddamn right that I am! So where should you start?” She held her chin in mock-thought before snapping her fingers, as if she had a brilliant idea. I wasn’t so sure, but I listened. “Oh! I know! How about the bloody wedding from hell? Yeah, let’s start there,” she hissed, brushing by me and heading towards her kitchen.

I followed. “Fine,” I called after her. “I’m sorry for the wedding. I’m sorry for not telling you about Cora.”

She was leaning over her sink now, not facing me. I could almost feel her closing off, shutting down, just by the mention of Cora’s name. “Snowballed right into that one, didn’t we?” she muttered before turning to face me. Her cheeks were flushed and her eyes were wild. “Let’s talk about Cora, yeah?”

“All right. I’m sorry for not--”

“How long did it take you to start shagging her when I was ignoring you? Not long, I’m sure. How’d that go for you?”

This wasn’t fair. I came to apologize, and she was attacking me. I could hardly get a word in, but maybe that was the point. “She broke up with me,” I said simply.

“Good. You deserve that.”

I shrugged. Maybe I did. “Look, I came here to apologize. Can you just... can you let me do that, please? This is ridiculous, Mickey.”

The fire continued to burn. She took a threatening step forward and instinctively, I took one back. “No. What’s ridiculous is you,” she said, pointing her finger at my chest. “I don’t have to listen to your apology, and you know why? Because you don’t deserve forgiveness. Certainly not mine, at least. Do you have any idea how badly you’ve fucked up in the past month alone?”

“Of course I do. You have no idea. I tried to fix it, though. I’ve been trying, Mickey, but it’s like you want nothing to do with me.”

“Bullshit! That’s such bullshit, Harry. If by trying you mean you started hooking up with Cora? Then yeah, you tried. But you never once apologized to me, which is what you should have been doing.”

"I tried, Mickey! Dammit! I tried to get in touch with you. I wanted to talk to you, but you shut me out!" I yelled at her, my anger bubbling up. Anger and frustration and so much feeling from the past month, and suddenly it was all coming to the surface.

"I know!" She screamed back. "I fucking know! God dammit, Harry!"

I just barely had enough time to react as she threw her phone at me. Thankfully, I caught it. "Go ahead. Look."

I knit my eyebrows together, but looked at the phone. There they were, all of my messages. All of my voicemails. Every missed call. "That's not all," she said, like she was reading my mind. "The drafts. Look at them." I kept going before I found text after text, meant to be sent to me but never making it that far. "I didn't know what to do. I wanted to hate you, to just push you out of my life, but I couldn't and that was killing me. Do you have any idea how much this killed me?"

"Why didn't you just call then, Mick? All you had to do was call me, or answer the phone. I was trying, but you weren't having any of it. Still aren't, I don't think."

"Because you don't fucking deserve it!" She yelled, her cheeks flushed red with anger. "You don't get it, do you? You don't deserve any of this, Harry! I fell for you. Happy? I wasn't even looking and suddenly I was slipping over the edge. You snuck up on me. I went from not missing you to crying because I wanted to answer the phone so badly when you called. But I couldn't do it."

"She broke up with me because of you," I said suddenly. I felt like Mickey was confessing things to me, and now it was my turn. "It's you, Mick, always will be. Cora broke up with me because of you, and the next lass will do the same, and the lass after that. It'll keep happening, because none of them are you."

She stayed quiet, obviously not knowing what to say. I took a few long strides across the kitchen until I was right in front of her. Carefully, cautiously, my right hand brushed her cheek while my left went to her hip. "It's always going to be you. That's the problem," I whispered against her skin, my lips lightly brushing against hers.

That was all it took.

Her hands were in my hair, on my chest, exploring every inch of me like she never had before. It was urgent, rushed, maybe even angry. She held me as close as she possibly could, our lips crashing against each other. "I hate you," she mumbled, the words getting lost in my mouth. "I hate you, I hate you, I hate you." The anger was showing. Bites and clashing and an overall roughness that had never been there before. It was okay, though. Every emotion we had stored up was falling out of us in waves; if this was what it took, then so be it.

"I know," I told her, groaning as her teeth sank just a little too hard into my neck. "I'm sorry. I'm so sorry, Mickey."

"I hate you." Her voice was wavering. Her lips were everywhere. I thought I felt the shoulder of my shirt getting damp, but I wasn't sure. I just held her close, not wanting to let go.

"I know. I'm sorry. I love you." It was a constant mantra, one I couldn't stop repeating. 

Most importantly? It was true.