Lightning in a Bottle

I didn’t go home that night. Instead, I stayed at Dani’s as she, Blue and Liam helped me figure out what to do. Even after Liam left that night I hadn’t decided on what I would say to Niall or if I was just going back to get my things.

Though, I kept that latter to myself, because my friends were set on me going back and fixing this with Niall. Even though I think part of Blue would back me if I just fucking left him.

Blue and Dani and I ended up making a blanket nest in the living room and having an old fashioned sleepover. Even though we’re all in our mid 20’s we’re still kids at heart. We probably always will be to be honest. It was awesome to just spend time with them and forget all the insanity that was going on in my life right now, especially since Blue was only here for a few days.

The next day though, they kicked me out at noon to go and talk to Niall. To say I was a nerves wreck would be an understatement. I had no idea how this was going to go even though they all promised Niall was a mess and regretted what he said. The last time I listened to someone, Liam said Niall would be alright and then he broke up with me.

Oh wait, sorry- ‘take a break.’ Like that’s such a massive difference.

I drove the long way to the neighborhood. I needed all the time I could get to mentally prepare for this. As soon as I had gotten in the car, I forgot everything those three had told me last night. I should have taken notes or something, because I didn’t know what I was supposed to say to him once I got home.

When I turned down the street to get to mine, I slowed down in front of Harry and Dakota’s house. Liam’s words about how angry Harry is flashed in my mind as I pulled over and parked my car. I knew I should try and fix at least someone I knew I could.

Dakota answered the door, “Hey!” She pulled me into a hug as she pulled me into the house. “Where you have been?”

“Yes, where the fuck have you been Ayden?” Harry asked coming into the foyer from the living room. He looked annoyed. Not quite angry but he sure wasn’t happy.

I looked between the two of them, “I went to Dani’s. I just needed to get away you know?”

“I knew it,” Kota said.

Harry scoffed, “Why didn’t you come here? Why haven’t you been returning my calls and texts? Why did I have to hear you were fine through Kota? Aren’t we friends too? Or am I completely mistaken?”

“Harry,” I sighed. “We are friends. I just didn’t want to make things complicated between you and Niall so I went to someone who wasn’t a part of this One Direction thing anymore.”

“So you couldn’t at least text me?” he exploded.

“Harry,” Dakota warned.

“No! I’m mad alright!”

I took a step closer to him, “I’m sorry Harry. I just… I’ve been messed up. I am messed up. I just needed to shut the world out for a little bit.”

He groaned, “God, I’ve been so worried about you.” He was still irritated but he pulled me into a massive hug. “I hate that you felt like you couldn’t come to me!”

“I’m sorry,” I said into his chest, as he was crushing me too him. I looked at Kota from over his arm and she was smiling softly at us, and rolled her eyes playfully when she caught my eye. “I’m sorry I shut you both out,” I said as I pulled from Harry’s grasp. “I just, I don’t know I needed to get away where I could breathe.”

“I’m so pissed off at him,” Harry said as he led us all to the living room where we sat on the couch.

“I heard. Liam told me you weren’t talking to Niall.”

“You talked to Liam?” Harry glared.

I helped up my hands, “He found me. Calm down.”

“How are you doing?” Kota asked, steering the conversation around.

I shrugged, “I feel numb honestly. But under all that I’m angry.”

“Are you going to talk to him?”

I shrugged, “I’m supposed too.”

“You should just leave him,” Harry commented.

“Harry!” Kota glared, “That’s not your choice, and that’s rude of you to say!”

“Well I’m pissed off okay? Why does he keep breaking up with her like this?”

She huffed at her boyfriend, “He’s only done this once before.”

“That’s once too many!” they were discussing this like I wasn’t even there.

“Stop being over protective,” Kota said as he placed a hand on my knee, “She’s an adult!”

“And that adult is right here!” I said looking between the two. “Look, I don’t know what I’m gonna do. I just… I love him so much. But I’m so angry that he didn’t give me a say in this break up or whatever, again.”

“Please tell me you’re going to let him have it,” Harry grumbled.

I shrugged, “I don’t know what I’m going to do, but we need to talk so that’s what I’m going over there too do.”

“I know you guys can work this out,” Kota said. “Just stick your foot in his ass and tell him you’re not over until you say you are.”

I cracked a smile, “That’s what everyone’s told me to do.” Then I turned to Harry, “And you! No matter how this turns out, you can’t just ignore him and be angry at him. You’re in a band with him, your friendship comes before ours. No matter how flattered I am that you’ve taken my side,” I smiled.

“I’m sorry, he’s being a fucking twat! How can he just so easily ruin something great?”

“Harry,” Kota said softly, “We aren’t exactly in the position to judge. We’re just as fucked up as they are.”

“We don’t break up with each other over something stupid.”

She gave him a flat look, “I could give a few examples, but I’ll just keep quiet.”

“And it’s not stupid,” I said weakly. “I know where he’s coming from.”

He scoffed, “Does he have no faith that you’ll change your mind?”

“I have changed my mind,” I sighed. “But he didn’t give me a chance to say that. But I’m going to tell him now. I’ve got to find my inner bitch before I go over there.”

“Want to borrow Harry’s?” Kota smirked, “He’s is out full force.”

“Oi!”

Kota and I laughed, “Thanks, but I think I have enough reasons to find my own.”

“Even though I think Niall’s stupid and you could do so much better than him,” Harry sighed, “I support whatever choice you make with this.”

“Thanks. Means a lot.”

“But if you shut me out next time he fucks up, I’ll be so pissed off at you.”

I smirked and Dakota laughed, “And now you know what it’s like to have Harry as an over protective brother.”

“I think my actually brother could take notes.”

He glared at us, “Rude.”

*****

I sat in my car outside of the house listening to All Time Low trying to pump myself up for about 20 minutes. I was shaking and nervous and just had no idea what I was doing.

When I was younger, before I got with Niall, or Josh for that matter, I remember being this badass girl who wouldn’t put up with any bullshit. As soon as a guy got weird or became a twat, I’d show him the door, and move on without even a second thought.

But then somewhere down the line, I wanted to find love. Real love, and I let myself fall and get my heart broken and now here I was. I was willing to put up with such bullshit because I was so suffocatingly in love with this Irish lad who sang in a boy band for a living and drank too much.

Part of me, the little bit of that jaded teenager that I used, to be wanted me to just drive away. Cut my loses and start new. But the other part of me, the part that knew that moving on from Niall would hurt and break me, and would probably change me forever- told me to put my big girl knickers on and get out of the car to go try and fix this relationshit that I had put so much time and effort in.

Because, what it all comes down to was love wasn’t it? That’s what we all spend our lives looking for, was love. There were countess books, movies and songs about it, and it was a social norm- to meet someone and share your life with them, and make new families and grow old making shared memories. And it’s not like Niall and I had a terrible relationship. We had an amazing time together! We bickered here and there, and his stubbornness drove me up the wall, but overall he made me happier than I could ever think to be.

The only big problem we had was that he seemed to always make decisions on our relationship without even consulting me. To the point where he thought breaking up with me- ruining the most important thing in my life- was okay without even letting me speak my piece.

As ‘Break Out, Break Out,’ came to an end I shut off my car and got out. It was now or never, and I’ve already procrastinated this for as long as possible, and now I had enough fury to push me forward. I needed to do this, this needed to come to an end, any end, today.

The door was unlocked, so I just let myself in. The house was quiet except for the sounds of an acoustic guitar that floated down the stairs. I figured following the chords was the best bet to find Niall. I set my bag down on the side table by the door and quietly made my way through the house up the stairs. I felt like if I made any noise I’d disturb something, the missed placed calm that was in the air thanks to the sound of the chord changes coming from Niall somewhere upstairs.

I followed the music up to our bedroom. Niall was facing away from the door, staring out the window as he played a song that was vaguely recognizable but I couldn’t place it. He must not have heard me come in because as I stood in the doorway, he didn’t even flinch- he just continued strumming along and staring out the window.

The chords he was playing changed and the melody to ‘Passenger Seat’ started to play before he started to mumble the lyrics softly to himself. It was like a stab in the heart hearing him play it. I couldn’t stand here and hear him play it, not right now when nothing was okay, “Niall.”

The chords scratched and he almost dropped the guitar as he whipped around to look at me. He stared at me with the scared shocked expression on his face as his tried catching his breath from the scare I just gave him. He looked exhausted, there were bags under his eyes and his eye lids were drooping like he hadn’t slept in days. “Ayden!” He sighed as he stood up, placing the guitar on the bed. “Where have you been? I’ve been going out of me mind with worry!” He came around the bed, but still kept his distance. “No one’s heard from you. Where did you go?” I could tell he was trying to stay calm, but a storm was brewing behind his eyes.

I shrugged, “I went to Dani’s.” Seeing him, standing in front of me looking so run down, I lost all the fight I had when I first came in here.

“You didn’t have to leave,” he said softly. “I told you that you didn’t have too.”

“I know,” it was hard to swallow. “I just… couldn’t be in the house with you after-” I couldn’t say it. I tried, but the words wouldn’t come out.

He winced, “I would have left if I knew you felt that way.”

“I don’t want you to have to do something like that. I- I don’t even want to be having this conversation right now.” The anger was coming back, and it was coming back fast, “God Niall why do you keep doing this to me?” I could feel my throat tighten as the urge to cry came with every word I spoke. “It’s not fair! It’s not fair that you just- you just decide that we’re done. A relationship is two people. Two! So why do you always get to rip my heart out without even letting me speak?”

“I-”

“No, fuck you! This is my turn to talk!” I seethed. I didn’t know I had this much pent up aggression until the words flew out of me without even having to put thought into it. “If you were so unhappy why didn’t you just tell me? We could have talked this out. You could have told me that you thought we wanted different things, because if you would have told me I would have told you that I was warming up to the idea of having kids this you.” The look of shock that crossed his face didn’t go unnoticed, but I was on a roll here. “I’ve talked to everyone, and they all made these amazing points about having kids, and that life didn’t end when I had one, but just changed.

“I don’t want them soon, but someday…” I shrugged, “Becoming a mom still scares me, but my aunt says that’s normal.” I was getting off track here and I needed to go back to the main point. “But I guess that doesn’t matter now. How could I ever consider having a real future with someone who would just decide to end it without even letting me fight for it? But that doesn’t matter now either because it’s already over.”

“No!” he said looking pained. He closed the distance between us with a few fast strides to me. He grabbed my hands and looked down at me desperately, “No, I don’t want it to be over. I’m a fucking idiot, and everything I said- it was a stupid, stupid thing I did. I didn’t mean any of it.”

“Yes you did,” I sighed trying to pull my hands from his, but he wouldn’t let me.

“No, stop!” his bottom lip trembled and his eyes were glassy. “I will get on my knees and beg if I have too. Don’t leave. I’m sorry for pushing you out. I’m sorry for making these decisions without letting you having a say. I’m stubborn and stupid and I’m a mess, and you deserve so much better than me. But I can’t- I won’t be able to live without you.” He let out a shaky breath, “When you left and I didn’t know where you were- no one had heard from you, I realized how bad I fucked up. If I couldn’t handle you being MIA for a few days, how do I expect myself to get through the rest of my life knowing I fucked up something great?”

I watched as a tear fell down his face and it was like the wind was knocked out of me. This wasn’t how I saw this conversation going at all. “Niall I-”

“I’m sorry, so sorry. I’ll be sorry for the rest of my life if I let you walk out the door again.” More tears fell and then he, no lie, legit fell to his knees in front of me, “I need you. Kids or no kids, I don’t fucking care, I just need you.” He took a deep breath trying to calm his breathing as he cried. He rested his face in the shirt on my stomach as he wrapped his arms around my thighs. “I love you, and I’ve ruined everything because I’m fucking stupid. I’ll understand if you never forgive me, but I really, really want you too. That’s selfish I know, but I can’t help it. I don’t know how much more I can grovel, but I will.”

I’ve never seen Niall this wrecked. He was sobbing, I was crying- we were some pair. I didn’t know what to say, again this wasn’t how I saw this going. I whipped at my face and took a deep breath trying to scramble my brain into something coherent. “Niall,” I said softly and reached around my legs to find his hands to pull them from my legs.

“No, no, no. Please don’t leave,” he cried into my shirt. “I’m sorry. I’m so, so, sorry. I will forever be sorry!”

“Niall,” I said more forcefully. “I’m not leaving,” he let me pry his hands apart so I could unwrap them from me so I could get on my knees to his level. “Hey,” I said softly. I cradled his face in my hands and whipped at the tears on his face, “I’m not going to leave okay? You just need to calm down yeah?”

He wrapped his arms around my waist and placed his forehead against mine, “I’m so sorry Ayden. I didn’t think it through.” I whipped at his tears as they fell. I tried keeping mine at bay but a few escaped. “I will never forgive myself for hurting you, for ever hurting you. I know I’ve done it more times than is ever acceptable and all I can do is try to make up for it. Every day for the rest of our lives, if you let me.”

“You really hurt me Ni,” I said softly. I bit my lip as I tried to think clearly, “I really hate it when you don’t let me say my side of things. I know I hurt you when I said I didn’t want kids, but we could have talked more about it.”

“I know,” he sighed, calming down. “I know, and I was stupid not to come to you.”

“I hate it when you shut me out. It hurts that you don’t trust me enough to come to me.”

He shook his head as one of his hands came up to wipe my tears, “It’s not that I don’t trust you- I trust you with my life Ayden. I just… you know how hard it is for me to express myself some times.”

“Well you need to work on it. Because I can’t- I won’t stick around next time you decide you can’t be in this relationship anymore. I love you so much, but it’s not fair to me.” I sighed, “You can’t keep ripping my heart out.”

“I won’t,” he promised. “I’ll never do this to you again. Because I don’t think I could do this to myself again.” I slowly wrapped my arms around him and hugged him too me. He buried his face in my neck, kissing it softly, “I’m sorry Ayden,” he said again. “Please forgive me,” he squeezed me to him.

“I can forgive you. But we need to work on some things. You can’t shut me out anymore. I’ve completely let my walls down for you, it’s only fair that you do the same to me.”

He nodded into my neck, “I know. And I will, we can talk about whatever you want. We don’t have to have kids-”

“No, don’t say that,” I said pulling back and sitting back on my legs. “I don’t want you to have to give up something for me.”

“Well I don’t want to push you into something either.”

I sighed, “We can talk about it, about everything. I could see myself having kids, just… a few years off. I’m not ready yet.”

“Well I’m not ready yet either. I think I just let myself get into my head and I freaked. I talked myself into thinking you didn’t want anything with me. Like you didn’t really want to be with me.”

I shook my head, “That’s so far from the truth Niall. I love you, I can’t see my future without you.”

He smiled softly at my words, “I can’t either. That’s why I asked you to marry me.” His face dropped, “Do- are we… You still want to marry me right?”

My heart raced at his question, “Yes,” I whispered. “But things have to change Niall.”

“They will,” he said instantly. “They are! I will never do this again. The past week without you was god awful. I couldn’t sleep, I couldn’t eat. I was this zombie.” He let me go and pulled at the chain around his neck, and out popped my ring from under his shirt. He pulled it over his head and pulled it off the chain, “Will you take this back? Will you stay, and marry me and grow old with me and kick my ass if I do anything stupid again?”

“You’re not going to do anything like this again because I’ll fucking leave and never come back,” I warned.

He winced, “I’ll never do this again. Promise!” He grabbed my left hand and held my engagement ring next to it, “Will you take me back? Will you marry me?”

I bit my lip as I stared up at him. He looked so worried and scared and unsure of what I’d say. He’d stopped crying but his eyes were red and puffy and he’d stopped breathing. “Yes,” I whispered. “Yes, I’ll marry you.”

He let out a big breath and his shoulders relaxed as he slid the ring back on my finger. “Thank you. And I’m so, so sorry.”

“You can stop apologizing, yeah? Let’s just move on from this okay?”

He nodded, “Okay.” His hand came up to cradle between my neck and my jaw, “I love you.”

“I love you too. I wouldn’t be here if I didn’t.”

He nodded and licked his lips, “Can I kiss you?”

I smiled softly, “Well you better.”

When his lips touched mine a calming feeling flowed through my boys. I felt safe again. I mean, we still had a lot to work on, that was abundantly clear, but at least he acknowledged he needed to change some things.

His kisses turned urgent as I allowed his tongue to deepen it. “Hey,” I said against his lips, “Slow down, we’ve got all the time in the world. I’m not going anywhere.”

He nodded, pressing his lips to mine, “I know. I just missed you.”

“I missed you too.” I pushed my finger into his hair as his hands crept up my shirt.

All our movements were slower now as he turned and laid me out on the floor beneath him. “I love you,” he said again as he started kissing down my jaw and neck. “I love you, I love you, I love you.”

I hooked my leg around his waist, “I love you too.”