Stole My Heart

I looked out at the crowd anxiously. "There are a lot of people out there," I said. "Nervous?" Harry asked. I nodded and said, "What if I mess up?" "You won't. You'll do fine," Niall assured me, setting a comforting hand on my shoulder. I smiled up at him and the lights went dark, our signal to get onto the stage. I took my place next to the drummer, behind where the guys stood. The high-pitched screams were almost deafening when the lights came one and revealed One Direction to the crowd. Niall gave me an encouraging nod. I took this as my cue and began playing.

At first I was terrified, but then the boys started singing and the crowd started cheering louder. It was such a rush of excitement. I laughed but managed to keep playing as the boys poked fun at each other. They happily pranced around the stage. They jumped around and poked fun at me too. It was nice to feel like a part of something again.

Halfway through the performance, the boys took a break. On a screen above the stage showed tweets and comments from fans. Some tweets said things like, 'So excited for the show tonight! I love One Direction!' Some of the comments were pretty much, 'Harry I love you!', but then the comments changed to, 'Who's that girl? Where did she come from? How long is she going to be in the picture? Is she dating one of the boys?'

"Hey guys, this is Melody!" Niall introduced, "She's a friend of ours!" "Actually, the guitarist that we had scheduled for tonight broke his hand. So if she hadn't stepped in for us, we wouldn't have had a show for you all," Harry said. Then I got a respectable round of applause. I blushed and waved at the crowd shyly. I didn’t get any boo’s, which was good enough for me. We did some more songs for them before the show came to an end. They all said their goodbyes and I gave another shy wave goodbye.

After the show I congratulated the boys on their performance. " Hey, you guys did amazing!" I said happily, giving each of them a hug. "You were great too," Niall assured me. "Yeah, you were brilliant!" Louis added, making me blush. “You’re such a pretty color,” Harry laughed, making me blush more.

After we went to the back room I got a phone call from my boss. "Hey boss, what's up?" I asked as the guys gathered around me. "What the hell have you been doing the past few days?" he demanded angrily. I was slightly taken aback. What was he so mad about? "Megan gave me the afternoon off yesterday and I have had today scheduled as a day off for over a month now-" he cut me off saying, "That's load of bullcrap! Megan said that you just took off on her and left her with a large crowd of people!” He shouted. “I didn’t! Emily told me that I could have the night off! I even checked with Megan-” “Don’t you lie to me Melody! I am not stupid! She was right about you! Melody, you're done working here. You are fired. Don't bother showing up here ever again!"

Just like that, my former boss hung up on me. I put my phone in my lap and my head in my hands. The boys gathered around me. "Mel, are you okay?" Niall asked, sitting next to me. "No, I'm not. The other day I figured out that Alexa hadn't been paying the rent and we got kicked out of our apartment, and I just got a call from my boss. Apparently Megan told Jim that she never gave me the afternoon off yesterday or the day today. He told me not to show up for work ever again. So now I'm homeless and jobless," I said sadly.

"Hey lads, could I have a quick word with ya in the back room?" Niall asked. "Don't worry, love," Louis said, patting my hand, "We'll figure something out." "Thanks," I said as he got up to join the other guys in the next room. I began to wonder what they could possibly be talking about as I saw Louis dart from the other room and sprint down the hallway. The other guys came into the room. "So me an' the lads were thinking," Niall began, but Harry interrupted, "Well, it was Niall's idea, but we all agreed." "Anyhoo, we decided that we would like ya to come on tour with us as our guitarist," Niall finished. "Really? That's awesome! Thank you so much! I would love to!" I said, jumping up and giving each of them a hug.

"Where did Louis go?" I asked, finishing my circle of hugs with Zayn. "To go confirm it with our manager," he replied. "Yeah, we probably should have waited to tell you until-" Liam began, but he was cut off by Louis running into the room shouting, "He said yes! Can I tell her?! I want to tell her!" "We already told her, Lu," Harry said. "Aww... really?" Louis complained. "Thank you so much! I am so excited!" I said happily, giving Louis a hug. "Anything for you, love," he laughed, squeezing me back. Naturally I knew he didn't mean 'love' like he loved me like a girlfriend. It was just a thing that he did.

We then were driven back to the hotel. I took most of the things from my car and brought them into the tour bus. Amaryss, a friend that I trusted, came and picked up my car, promising to take good care of it. I was assigned a bunk on top of Zayn's and across from Niall and Harry's. I arranged my blankets on my bunk and threw my duffel bag on top then joined the boys in the little living room area.

We decided to have a pizza and movie night. We all squished together on the little couch and watched Finding Nemo. I made a place between Niall and Louis. Zayn and Liam were on the other side of Niall. Harry laid down on all of all of our laps, resting his head between Louis and I. "Don't let Niall hold the popcorn bowl!" Zayn warned, "He'll eat it all." I reached around Niall and got some popcorn. "I want some," Harry said, reaching for the bowl, but he came up a little short. "Come on lad, reach," Niall laughed.

"I can't reach it," he whined. "Someone shut him up! I'm trying to watch the movie," Liam complained. With an exaggerated sigh, I reached across Niall, got some popcorn, and placed it in Harry's mouth, saying, "There, now be quiet." I slouched back and set my head on Niall's shoulder. Then it occurred to me that these weren't my usual friends and probably weren't expecting me to be so touchy. "Um, let me know if this bothers you and I'll move," I told Niall, hoping he didn’t think I was too weird. "It's fine," he assured me, then we went back to watching the movie. I don’t know exactly how or what happened, but we all fell asleep.