Grade 8

After waking up next to Harry Lena had thought it would be best to just stay away from him for awhile. As all ways that meant avoiding all of her friends associated with him. It was easy enough to fake being busy she spent her mornings with Finn working on the album and nights were spent with Mia. There was never a dull moment between with them as friends and for a little while she forgot all about Harry. No one had tried contacting her in days and all was well.

"Mia!" Lena exclaimed bursting through their apartment's door. "You will never guess what happened to me today!"

Mia stood up from the couch guilt written all over her face. Lena's smile dropped as she finally saw who was sitting on her couch.

"What are you doing here?" She asked dropping her bag to the ground.

Harry glanced at Niall hoping he would say something first. "Uh, well you've been avoiding us."

It wasn't completely unexpected for them to show up out of the blue it's what they did. Always showing up when it's least convenient just to turn everything upside down.

After the very awkward breakfast the morning after Harry's party Lena had hoped to avoid them as long as possible. She couldn't deny that she was avoiding them it was obvious. Sleeping with Harry was a major step back; she just needed time to deal with it.

"I know." She looked between them. "I needed some time."

"I think we've given ya plenty of time."

Lena nodded wincing slightly. "I know, I'm sorry."

Although she had patched things up with Niall, apologizing until she was blue in the face, there was still a lot of work to be done until they could move past what happened. He was still hurt that she left without saying goodbye and she was still scared to let him back in. Their wounds were healing slowly, but they were still healing.

Harry on the other hand was big gaping hole in the middle of her chest that wouldn't heal. There was so a long list of problems that would have to be worked through before they could even think of fixing the mess they were in.

"We're going over to Zayn's." Harry said standing up. "You don't have a choice so don't bother arguing."

Lena glanced at Mia who shrugged. "Alright."

She turned back toward the door she could feel Harry following close behind her. "You'll be driving with me."

Lena looked at him over her shoulder. "I'd rather not."

"Again, you don't have a choice."

With no energy to argue with him she simply went with it. Watching longingly as Niall and Mia drove in her car. If she hadn't known any better she wouldn't have liked the two of them being on their own after spending the night together; but Lena knew the truth of what happened while her and Harry were locked up in his room.

It didn't take much to coax the truth of Mia after leaving Harry's the silence in the car had gotten the best of Lena who couldn't hold her questions in any longer.

"Did you sleep with him?" She finally blurted.

Mia glanced at her a smirk forming. "I slept next to him."

"You know what I mean." Lena waited for Mia to say something. She didn't of course staying silent just to irritate Lena. "He has a kid so I would prefer it if you left him alone. Besides i don't think he's actually broken up with Sam."

"I know all about Olly and Sam." Mia replied. "We started to hook up but he was drunk and it just wasn't working. Instead he rambled on about how he fucked up and now he was losing his family. It was a long night, let me tell ya."

"You didn't sleep with him?" Lena asked surprised; that wasn't what she had expected.

"No I didn't."

At least Mia and Niall could be friends with little awkward tension unlike Lena and Harry. There was so much tension Lena could barely breath. It was obvious there was something on Harry's mind with the way he chewed on his lip his forehead creased as he thought hard.

"Just say what ever it is on your mind."

Harry jumped at Lena's outburst. "What?"

"You want to say something so just say it."

Lena waited patiently for Harry to say something. She watched the cars and buildings pass for a minute or two until he finally spoke his words slow and voice deep.

"I'm sorry."

Lena hadn't been expecting that she was shocked enough to turn to look at him. "What?"

"I'm sorry for everything that happened on tour." Harry's voice was strained like he was having trouble saying anything. "I'm sorry for being a dick to you at first."

Lena opened her mouth ready to tell him he didn't need to do this when he suddenly turned. Taking a side street and parking in the nearest spot. "What are you doing?"

He turned to look at her not having the distraction of driving. He wanted to do this right. "I'm sorry for using you. I know it was wrong but I don't want you to ever think that I didn't care about you. Whatever my intentions were at the beginning that all changed as I got to know you. I'm sorry for making you feel like a second choice to Alexis. I never wanted that to happen."

"Harry you don't have to do this."

"I do have to do this. You hate me now because I was such a terrible person to you." Harry looked away from her to study his finger nails picking at the dirt under them. He had a whole speech planed out for this moment, the moment he was alone with her, but as soon as she walked through her door his mind went blank. She looked happy until she saw him and he hated that he wanted to be her happiness but instead he was causing her pain. All he wanted was to stop that from happening. "And I'm sorry for what ever it is I did in Australia that made you want to leave. I wish I could take everything back and just do things right."

"I wish we could do that too."

"Maybe we can." There was so much hope in his voice a rare moment of emotion for him. Lena had seen many sides of Harry but this wasn't one of them.

"Alright we can start over as friends." Lena couldn't fight back her smile.

It only grew bigger when Harry's own wide grin spread his whole demeanor changing. He looked so happy and Lena couldn't believe she was the cause of it just by agreeing to be friends with him.



"What took you so long?"

The second Alexis opened the door her words leaving her mouth the mood that had finally shifted around Lena and Harry was back. There was a tension and the close proximity to each other was too much. As great as Harry's apology was it didn't fix anything except for Lena's bitterness towards him. Being friends wasn't going to be easy and it was only made worse by the very reason their relationship ended in the first place showing up constantly.

"Sorry we, uh, got lost." Harry stammered. "Is everyone else here then?"

"Yeah, Zayn should be here soon." Alexis stood back allowing enough room for them to enter the flat. "Lena, always lovely to see you."

"Likewise."

Lena glanced around the sitting room where Liam was sitting with Mia a faint blush sweeping over her cheeks. Sam was sat on the edge of the couch her back straight as she shot daggers at Mia; from next to her Niall was whispering something to her but it didn't seem to be gong well.

"Where's Louis?" Lena asked as she sat next to Niall trying not to overhear what he was saying to Sam.

"In Manchester with Eleanor finalizing their house stuff." Harry answered taking to standing against the wall.

"Not that this isn't fun, but what are we doing here?" Lena asked noticing the normally excited group were somber.

"Zayn's had a bit of a slip up." Alexis was the one to answer her question. "He's been using again and while I've been in New York it's just getting worse instead of better. He's been telling me he's seeing his sponsor regularly but he's not. Yesterday I found where he's been hiding his drugs and from the looks of it he's been using for a lot longer then I had thought."

"How long?" Lena hadn't known Zayn before when he had been using drugs and had only gotten to know a sober Zayn. The last time she had seen him there wasn't anything out of the ordinary.

"A few months."

"We want to talk to him." Liam spoke up. "Let him know that we know."

"And hope he gets help again." Harry added.

"What if he doesn't want to?" Mia asked. "He might not be ready for that."

"He doesn't have a choice." Alexis shook her head. "I almost lost him once I won't let it happen again."

"Why do you care?" Zayn was one of Lena's best friends she had been there for him when Alexis and Harry were tearing everything apart. She had seen the effects Alexis had on people it wasn't exactly surprising that Zayn had started using again if he was talking to Alexis again. She hadn't been very helpful to his recovery in the first place. "You haven't exactly been making things easy for him."

"That's not an excuse to start doing drugs again. I love him and I won't let this get the best of him again." Harry moved away from the wall his body shielding Alexis from the rest of the room. "It's not my fault."

Lena couldn't see what was going on with Alexis she didn't see the tears that Harry was quick to catch. She didn't see the way their eyes met both of their features softening. She didn't need to see all of that to know there was still something there that both of them were denying. No matter what Harry had to say about it because he had told her they had both decided too move on, gotten closure on that part of their relationship. That clearly wasn't he case. It didn't matter that Lena wanted to leave then to get away from Alexis and Harry because that's when Zayn made his grand entrance.