Fame ***

The sound of hustle and bustle roused me from my sleep in the morning. Careful not to disturb whatever was happening, I opened my eyes only a slit, locking my sight on the figure flitting around the kitchen through my eyelashes.

Niall was shirtless, leaning over the stove, poking something in a frying pan with a spatula. He looked so comfortable, so at ease. It was almost like he didn’t have a girl, who was practically a stranger to him, sleeping on his couch.

And then, I smelled what he was cooking. The aroma, which seemed to be composed of onions, peppers, bacon, and eggs, wafted in my direction, almost immediately making my mouth water. It had been years since I’d eaten an egg yolk, and bacon was something that I’d ruled out of my diet by age three.

But Niall had taken the time to make me breakfast. The thought just seemed totally out of nowhere, and I didn’t know how I was going to receive the caring gesture. My mind started to rev with possible ways I could play the scene, but before I could figure it out, I saw Niall coming toward where I was still lying on the couch, a small white plate in his hands.

I closed my eyes, cutting off any chance I had toward spying on his next moves. And about three seconds later, his warm hand was on my bare arm, shaking me gently. “Lilah,” he said in a soft, affectionate voice. “Lilah, wake up.”

I took in a sharp breath, pretending like he’d just interrupted a deep sleep, my head snapping up toward his. When I saw him standing there, I made a show of relaxing and smiling. “Hi,” I laughed.

“Good morning,” he replied. “I, um, made you an omelet. I have no idea whether you like omelets or not, but I figured it would be better than nothing.” He stopped for a second, looking wholly embarrassed, before putting the plate down on the table in front of me. “It has peppers, onions, cheese, and bacon. Wait, you’re not Jewish, right?”

“I’m atheist,” I replied, which didn’t seem to make him relax at all. “But this is perfect. Thank you, Niall.”

He gave me a small smile. “I didn’t know if you wanted me to wake you up last night or anything, so I just didn’t. I hope you didn’t have any meetings this morning.”

I sat up and refrained from rolling my eyes. If I had any meetings that day, I certainly wouldn’t have allowed myself to fall asleep on the couch in his hotel room. But either way, I called to him, “No, I don’t. I’m free all day.”

“Cool.” I glanced over at him to see if he was actually smiling as widely as his voice suggested, but he had his back to me, so I couldn’t tell. “I’ll be there in a few minutes. I just have to make my own omelet first.”

To make room for him, I scooted over until my side was pressed against the arm of the sofa and tucked my legs underneath me before leaning over and taking my breakfast. It looked really good, if incredibly fattening. Part of me wanted to fake sick to keep from consuming all the calories, but in the end, the immature side of my brain won. Plus, I could just go an extra half hour on the treadmill or something to even it out.

And thank God I decided the extra workout time was worth it. The omelet was absolutely incredible, with cheese that was just melted enough to meld with all the other flavors, and I’d forgotten how much more flavorful eggs were when the yolk wasn’t removed.

“Wow, Niall,” I breathed, forgetting for once that I was supposed to be a bitch, “this is incredible. I had no idea you could cook.”

“I can’t, really,” he admitted. “I just got sick of getting takeaway all the time, so I Googled how to make an omelet, and I worked on it until I was satisfied. But you like it?”

“Can I hire you as my personal chef?” I laughed. But as reality set in, I knew that if I hired Niall as my personal chef, I’d be five hundred pounds quite soon. So it was a good thing he had the boy band thing going for him and didn’t take my proposal seriously.

“Oh, yeah, I only charge a thousand pounds a meal,” he teased, turning the dial on the oven until it clicked to signal it was off. After putting his omelet on his own plate, he came to join me on the couch. “Wow, Lilah, you were hungry, huh?”

I looked down at my half-eaten plate and chuckled. “I didn’t even think I was. I guess I’m just not used to food this high in fat and calories.”

Oh, shit. That was not supposed to slip out of my mouth. I wanted Niall to think I was carefree and didn't care about what the media thought, yet I just admitted that I watched my diet like a hawk.

But Niall didn’t seem to care. He didn’t even blink. “You don’t have to do that, you know,” he informed me conversationally as he popped a bite of his food into his mouth. “That must get exhausting, making sure everything you put into your mouth has fewer than so many calories.”

I swallowed and answered without thinking, “It kind of is, but if it means that I get to keep the body I have, then it’s worth it. I can’t let myself gain too much weight, or people will be all over me. You know more than anyone how the media works.”

“That’s true,” Niall agreed, “but it shouldn’t matter. Just don’t let what the media says bother you.”

“You don’t get a lot of media attention, am I right?” Although I didn’t have any kind of accusatory tone in my statement, he still looked slightly offended, so I worked to clean it up. “I mean, it’s usually Harry or Zayn, right?”

“I guess. But I think I get a lot of fan criticism, so I know where you’re coming from.”

“Fan criticism?” Well, I certainly didn’t get any of that. If people were my fans, they practically worshipped the ground I walked on, and if they hated me, they picked apart everything I did. That was how things typically worked. “If they’re your fans, how do they criticize you?”

“Various things,” he responded vaguely. “It doesn’t matter. We don’t have to talk about it.” It was pretty obvious that, whatever those assholes said to him, it bothered him. But either way, he put a smile on his face and got to his feet. “Want me to take your plate for you?”

I handed it over and watched him walk away. His skin was so incredibly pale, and I wondered why he hadn’t bothered to put a shirt on, even though I was awake and perfectly capable of seeing him. Maybe he just wasn’t bothered by it.

For a second, I thought about going into the kitchen and kissing him. I wondered if my dress and hair looked messed up enough to make it look like we’d spent the night together instead of just in the same hotel suite, if maybe kissing him would make me look a little guiltier, but I didn’t want to ruin it. Niall and I had what would seem to him like a sweet, slow relationship, and I wasn’t ready initiate the next step. After all, it was very possible I could scare him away, and I really didn’t want to do that.

“Hey, Niall, you’ve been really sweet, but I should probably get back.” I stretched, clasping my hands together and reaching for the sky, knowing that the skirt of my dress, which was already folded up in places, was rising to dangerously high levels. “Plus, you probably have interviews and stuff, right?”

“At two,” he filled in before running the sink water for a second to rinse off the plates we’d used. “But it’s only half twelve right now.”

I had no idea what that meant, so I pulled out my phone and checked the time. Twelve thirty. “I’ll give you time to get ready and stuff,” I told him. “But I had a really fun night, and I’m sorry that I fell asleep while we were watching the movie.”

“It’s okay.” He turned to me and smiled, showing off those awful braces again. “I’m glad that we got to spend more time with each other.” There was a short pause before he continued. “The boys and I are going back to England in a couple days, but we can still keep in contact through our phones, if you want.”

“I’d love that.” After smoothing down the bottom of my dress, I went to slip on my shoes. “And whenever we’re in each other’s country, we’ll have to get together and catch up. Does that sound okay with you?”

“Of course.” He picked up my purse off the floor and brought it to me. I took it with a smile, placing it over my shoulder.

“Thanks, Niall,” I told him, leaning my face toward his, fully expecting that he’d kiss me. “And thanks for giving me a chance, even if Harry isn’t my biggest fan.”

“I’m glad I gave you one.” A look of confusion crossed over his face for a second before he leaned forward, brushed my hair out of the way, and pecked me on the cheek softly. “I’ll talk to you later, okay?”

“Okay.”

Knowing that I wasn’t going to get any more action than that pathetic excuse for a kiss, I made my way out of the hotel suite and shut the door behind me.

It was kind of weird, that he hadn’t kissed me for real, since I could tell that he was starting to trust me. But part of me, strangely enough, thought that it made the date that much sweeter.