Loved You First

She wasn’t going to let Sean leaving bother her, especially because since then they had a few small conversations here and there throughout the week. They were still broken up, but were also still friends and that was what Mae wanted. They talked about how he was doing and what was going on with him since he had been home, and surprisingly Sean had asked about Mae and Niall, and it wasn’t to be an asshole; he was genuinely curious. And that’s how Mae knew that Sean was a great guy and would someday find a girl who appreciated that as much as she had.

Even though it had been a week, Mae and Niall hadn’t had a lot of alone time together. Mae didn’t want to rush things and look like a bitch by getting over Sean in a matter of 24 hours, and Niall didn’t want to push her to go out again so quickly. He did respect her distance, and wasn’t going to be so pushy considering Sean was already gone and wasn’t an intimate factor in Mae’s life.

It was a bright, sunny, warm day in Daytona and Mae was sitting on the beach. She enjoyed watching kids and teenagers jump into the waves that were coming towards shore and the other children who were putting all of their time and effort into poorly constructed sandcastles. Mae tried to get outside and sit out on the beach every day, whether it was by herself or with one of the guys or Doniya, because she knew once she was gone she wouldn’t be able to do it again for another year, or even more.

Mae’s thoughts and concentration (if you call intense people-watching a form of concentration) were broken as two people plopped down next to her in the sand. She glanced over to see Louis and Niall on top of their towels with smiles on their faces. Both of them were shirtless with their swim trunks on and with aviators perched on their noses to try and block out the sun’s rays.

“Hey, Miss Mae,” Louis said cheerfully. “How long you been here?”

“Maybe a half hour or so,” Mae said with a sigh as she looked around. “Doniya said she was busy with her sisters and mom today so I don’t really have any plans at the moment.”

“Well, we saw you while we were walking by the pier and wanted to see what you were up to,” Louis said with a shrug before smirking. “And by ‘we’ I mean Nialler.”

“Thanks, mate,” Niall chuckled as he tossed a handful of sand onto Louis’ swim trunks.

Mae smiled as she glanced over at Niall. He looked back at her with a crooked-tooth grin, and she was relieved to be able to not feel guilty about thinking it was still the cutest thing she had ever seen. It was silent between the three of them for a few minutes as Louis looked between Niall and Mae, who were obviously stealing glances at each other every now and then. He continued to sit there and watch them for another minute, before glancing down at his phone.

“Oh, whaddya know, Liam wants me to go back to the house…to do some stuff,” Louis said as he jumped up from the ground. “I’ll catch you later, and you two have fun taking each other’s clothes off with your eyes.”

“Well, alright…” Niall trailed off as he watched Louis walk away from them and back towards the house. “Like that wasn’t the biggest lie and creepiest phrase I’ve ever heard.”

“Well, it’s Louis. What do you expect?” Mae sighed as she adjusted the top of her bikini. She laid back on her towel and Niall followed suit instantly.

“So, how was your and Louis’ walk?” she asked him as she turned her head so she could actually look at him.

“It was okay,” Niall said with a slight shrug. He placed his hands behind his head. “We went onto the pier for a while and he wanted to stop every five seconds to watch everyone in a two foot radius fish. But after that it was decent; we went pretty far distance. Like a mile I think.”

Mae smiled to herself as she shook her head, but didn’t bother to say anything. It was silent again between the two of them before Niall spoke up.

“So, uh,” he hesitated. “Have you talked to Sean? Are you guys okay?”

Surprised that he asked, Mae nodded her head. “Yeah, I have. And we’re fine.”

“Like fine as in you’re getting back together, or fine as in you guys are friends?” he asked with obvious hope in his voice.

“Fine as in we’re friends,” Mae said, trying not to sound too excited that Niall was worried that they could potentially get back together. She liked how he showed that he cared even when he tried not to make it obvious. “We won’t ever get back together I’m sure.”

“That’s good,” Niall said as a small smile crept onto his lips.

“So, what are you doing tonight?” Mae asked curiously as she propped herself up on one elbow and turned to Niall. He hadn’t asked her to do anything with him all week, and she was sure it was because he didn’t want to seem like he was rushing Mae into trying to date again. But the more she looked at and talked to him and the more she thought about last summer, the more she wanted to go on a date with him and spend more alone time with him. And she wanted that night to be tonight, even if she had to take the first step in getting there.

“The guys and I were going to just play some videogames and hang out because we went bowling last night,” Niall responded as he watched Mae’s expressions carefully to try and see what she was getting at.

“Would you want to do something with me? Like maybe have a date?” she asked slowly, hoping she didn’t sound snotty trying to cancel his plans with the guys (although, let’s be honest, we all know he wouldn’t mind).

“I would be more than happy to,” he said with a big grin on his face. “But what do you mean ‘have’ a date?”

“Because we don’t have to go anywhere; we can just stay here,” she shrugged. “My parents are going out tonight with some friends that they have down here so we could just watch some movies at my house if you wanted to.”

“I thought you weren’t allowed to have boys there when your parents weren’t there?” Niall asked, his tone confused.

“They just can’t find out,” she said, feeling slightly dangerous. “I just don’t really want to go somewhere tonight.”

“Oh, Miss Rebel, look at you,” Niall chuckled. “Going behind your parents’ backs to have a boy come over.”

“Shut up,” Mae laughed as she shoved Niall gently, happy that she could openly flirt with Niall without wandering if Sean would be jealous. “Are you in or not?”

“Oh, absolutely,” he nodded. “I’ll be there, and I’ll buy dinner if we get pizza or something.”

“Then it’s a date,” grinned Mae as she laid down on her back again so she could feel the sun on her chest and stomach, and she tried not to giggle or make an excited outburst when she felt Niall take her hand in his and lace their fingers together. All she did was sigh to herself, knowing that the rest of this summer was going to be even better than last year.