Look for the Girl With the Broken Smile

“Stop it,” SJ giggled. She pushed Dougie off her. “How am I supposed to sketch you if you keep moving?”

“Sorry.” Dougie tried not to smile as he resumed his original position on her bed. To kill time until McFly’s show that night at the Wembley Arena, SJ was practicing drawing by making another portrait of Dougie. She still hadn’t heard any news from the London Institute of Art yet, but she pushed that thought out of her mind. She had to be patient, she knew that. They had probably just gotten her portfolio. There was no reason to panic.

“You’re gonna get in, SJ,” Dougie told her, immediately reading her mind.

SJ sighed. “I hope so.” She looked down to her paper and pushed her hair away from her face. It had been two days since SJ decided to choose Dougie—since then, she hadn’t cared to call James. She knew she had too, eventually, but she kept putting it off. Last night McFly had arrived in London, and they’d all gone out for dinner on one of their rare outings. Dougie and SJ had “accidentally” sat next to each other, and he kept touching her inappropriately under the table, making her blush. When they’d gotten back to the tourbus—McFly were too cheap to spend the night in a hotel, apparently—Danny, bless him, had distracted Tom and Harry downstairs, giving SJ and Dougie the chance to take their slow sweet time upstairs.

Dougie gently touched her neck, where a love bite had appeared from last night. “Sorry about that,” he apologized.

SJ pretended to glare at him. “Yeah, thanks a lot, Poynter. You animal.” She rolled her eyes.

Dougie gave her a completely irresistible grin, and she had to laugh. “I think I have some concealer that’ll cover it up,” she said. “I don’t want Harry to get the impression I’m getting it on with his idiot animal bandmate or anything like that.”

“Hey,” Dougie chided, punching her lightly. “I am not an idiot nor am I an animal—well, maybe a little.”

SJ laughed again. “Speaking of which,” Dougie continued.

“What? Animals?” SJ said absent-mindedly as she returned to her sketch. Dougie’s eyes were absolutely beautiful; they were her favorite part of the whole portrait so far.

“No.” Now he rolled his eyes. “Harry.”

“What about him?”

“Do you think he should maybe—know? About us, I mean?” Dougie ventured.

SJ put her pencil down and looked at him. “What do you mean?” she asked him cautiously.

“It’s just…Harry’s one of my best mates,” Dougie said in a rush. “I hate going behind his back, especially about something like this. I know he’s really protective of you and such but maybe he could…get used to the idea? Danny’s taken it really well.”

“Yeah, well, that’s because apparently Danny’s life-long mission from the very beginning has been to get us to get together,” SJ told him. “He told me yesterday.”

“I always had a feeling he was smart,” Dougie mused. “Well, anyway…what do you think?”

SJ examined her nails as she thought. Seriously, touring with four boys had done no good for the state of her nails. SJ knew that what was between her and Dougie was something more than just two horny kids hooking up—she really cared for him, and she knew he did too. And by telling people, it would make it official. The question was, did she want that? She considered it. Yes, she did. She wanted Dougie to be able to put his arm around her in front of the other boys. She wanted him to be able to kiss her in public. She wanted the comfort in knowing he was hers, officially. “I know what you mean,” she finally said. “But I think it would be too much for him now. Maybe we should wait until the tour’s over? You only have a couple of shows left, so it wouldn’t be that long of a wait,” she pointed out.

“Yeah, alright,” Dougie agreed, sounding relieved. “I just don’t want to hide anything from him.”

These words made SJ feel distinctly guilty. James immediately came up in her mind. Okay, so maybe she had lied to Dougie about not speaking to James. But it was only a small white lie. It didn’t matter, right? It was over with James. She didn’t need to worry about him.

But still…there was one last thing she needed to do. She put her pencil down again and closed her drawing pad. “Is Harry still not here?” she asked Dougie. Harry had mysteriously left earlier to “run some errands”.

Dougie shrugged. “I don’t think so, no.”

“Okay, well.” She nudged him off the bed. He stumbled before standing back up. “I need you to get out, I have to fix myself up before he gets back.”

“Why do I have to leave?” Dougie whined. “I want to watch you change!”

SJ stood up too. “Tom’s already suspicious enough as it is, pervert,” she said exasperatedly. “The last thing I want is him walking in.”

“Alright, alright,” Dougie sulked.

SJ smiled before giving him a lingering kiss. “Now go,” she ordered, pushing him to the door.

“Violent, woman!” she heard him mutter before he disappeared down the stairs.

Now alone, SJ picked up her mobile and sat down on her bunk, scrolling through her contacts. Her finger paused on James’ number. She really didn’t want to call him. But she had to. She sighed before pressing call.

She waited as it rang several times, before going straight to his voicemail. “Dammit,” she mumbled, before pressing end. What she had to tell him wasn’t really something she could explain in a voicemail. She’d have to wait until later to call him.

SJ laid down on the bunk as she tried to think of what she was going to do until the concert that night. She had about four hours to kill. Maybe she should go on a run, she considered. SJ hadn’t gone running in a while. She had picked up running soon after her father had died—there was something strangely comforting in the feeling of running and running in no particular direction. Somehow, it made her feel like she could run away from her problems.

Coming to a decision, SJ rolled off her bed and went to her duffel bag in the corner, pulling out green American Apparel running shorts and a white t-shirt. She changed quickly, and then put on high socks before wearing her trainers. Then she walked over to the mirror and examined the love bite on her neck. It was pretty visible. Nice one, Poynter, she thought to herself, inwardly rolling her eyes at him. She dug through her makeup bag to search for her concealer. Where was it??

“SJ!” she heard her cousin call from downstairs.

She paused. “Yeah, Harry?” He must have just gotten back from whatever “errands” he had been doing.

“Get down here! I’ve got a surprise for you!”

A surprise? “I’ll be down in a second,” she called back. Huh. A surprise. She had no idea what he could possibly mean by that, but she was intrigued. She gave up on trying finding the concealer and flipped her hair over to one side, aptly hiding the mark for the time being, before heading down the stairs, curious.

They all seemed to be gathered in the TV room. SJ wondered what the hell was going on as she walked in. “What is it, Harry?” she said. Something looked weird. She mentally counted all the heads in the room…five.

Five?! The extra person turned around to look at her. “Hey, SJ,” he said casually.

It was James.

SJ’s jaw dropped. She couldn’t speak. What the hell was James doing here? Harry mistook her horrified shock for thrilled surprise and said excitedly, “I knew you were probably missing him, so I arranged for him to come down and visit you.”

SJ glanced at the rest of McFly—Danny looked completely stunned, Dougie’s eyes were narrowing at James, and Tom’s expression was puzzled.

“Well? Aren’t you going to say anything?” Harry prompted.

SJ felt dizzy. “What? Oh…yeah…Thanks, Harry.” This was not supposed to be happening! She walked a little more into the room. Harry moved aside on the couch so there was a space next to James. Only because there was no other seat, she walked over and sat down next to him.

“Hey, baby, I missed you,” James murmured, leaning in to kiss her. SJ moved her head very slightly in a clichéd move that actually worked, so he ended up kissing her cheek.

“Hey,” she told him quietly. So this was why he hadn’t answered his phone—because he was already on his way to come see her! James slipped an arm around her, and as much as she wanted to push it off she couldn’t, not in front of Harry and Tom. She caught sight of Dougie’s expression across the room—he looked vaguely upset.

“When you didn’t call me back again two days ago I got a little worried. So I called Harry up and he said I was welcome to visit,” James told her.

SJ couldn’t believe the words that were coming out of his mouth. Just fucking great! Now that little “white lie” that she had told Dougie, about how she hadn’t had any contact at all with James, was completely exposed. She couldn’t even meet his eyes. “That’s…fab,” SJ said distractedly. “Er, James? I really need to talk to you.”

He looked at her, bewildered. “About?”

“About, er, stuff.” SJ flipped her hair nervously. This could not be any more awkward. Even Harry was starting to look like this hadn’t been such a great idea after all.

James frowned and didn’t respond, instead concentrating on something else. Shit! SJ just realized she had flipped back the hair that had been covering her rather obvious love bite. And James was staring at it.

“What’s this?” he asked, touching it with his finger.

“Er.” MAKE UP A LIE, SJ!!. “Er…” SJ stalled again. QUICK QUICK QUICK! As in RIGHT NOW! “I, er, burned myself with my blow dryer,” she came up with lamely. She covered it again quickly with her hair, but it was already too late.

“SJ,” he said very quietly, so only she could hear him. “Have you been messing around with some bloke behind my back? Even after you told me you weren’t?”

SJ looked at him. He looked like he could already anticipate her answer. SJ bit her lip. She didn’t love him in that way anymore, but she still didn’t want to hurt him. And it was awful, to find out like this.

Her silence was all the answer he needed. “Shit,” he swore. “Fucking hell.”

“Er…I’ll be in the kitchen,” Harry said hastily as he stood up. Tom followed him, but Danny and Dougie remained.

“Who is it?” James demanded, running his hand through his curly black hair.

“Yeah, I’m gonna go too,” Danny quickly excused himself and practically ran out to the kitchen.

SJ looked at Dougie, unable to answer James. She couldn’t believe what was happening. Dougie looked back at her, his expression unreadable. James followed her glance and saw Dougie. “Is it him?” he asked SJ. When SJ stayed silent again, he jumped up and shouted, “Fucking answer me, SJ! Is he the motherfucker?”

“I’m so sorry, James,” SJ choked out. There was a moment of silence. Then, all hell broke loose.

“Motherfucker!” James lunged at Dougie and grabbed him, pulling him off the couch. “Tell me, you fucker, have you been shagging my girlfriend?”

“James!” SJ shouted, jumping to her feet at once. “James, stop it!”

“Shut up,” James snarled at her. He shook Dougie, who looked terrified.

“James, please, stop it,” SJ tried to say calmly.

“Shut UP!” he roared. With a stream of curses, he dragged Dougie out the door. SJ heard them both stumble down the stairs to outside.

“Oh no,” she moaned, before running out and following them out to the parking lot, where Harry, Danny, and Tom had already beat her. James had Dougie pushed against the tour bus, holding him by his shirt.

“James, please,” SJ begged him.

James took a deep breath and looked at her, releasing his hold on Dougie momentarily. “SJ, just…answer this,” he asked her seriously. “Have you been shagging him behind my back?”

“James, I—I’m—Yes,” she whispered. She kept her gaze down, unable to meet his eyes.

“What?!” Harry almost screeched, but everyone ignored him.

SJ found her voice. "What, so you can cheat on me and I can't do the same to you? What a fucking double standard!" she shouted at him, not even caring that Harry was slowly piecing everything together.

"That's not it, SJ!" James yelled back at her. "I apologized for it and you forgave me! So obviously I thought everything was good between us. I should have known," he spat. "I should have known what a slag you are."

SJ had nothing to say. He was right. He had apologized, and SJ had given him the impression that he was forgiven by not breaking up with him right away. James' expression hardened as he tightened his hold on Dougie, who winced. “James, please,” SJ said desperately again.

“Fuck,” Harry swore. He looked around the empty parking lot, as if to searching for one of their bodyguards.

James’ eyes focused on SJ. “SJ, tell me it’s over,” he said quietly. “Tell me it’s over, tell me you’re just going to throw away three years like none of it even mattered to you, tell me you don’t even care about me, and I swear I will beat this motherfucker to the ground until he stops breathing.”

His threat hung in the air. Everyone was frozen, waiting for SJ’s response. SJ felt like she couldn’t think. SJ met Dougie’s eyes, and in that silent, horrible moment, she could read his expression completely—it was a mix of anger, desperation, and, most of all, incredible hurt.

SJ’s breath caught in her throat, and she looked down before the tears could spill down her cheeks. In a split second, she made her decision. “I’m sorry,” she whispered, to no one in particular. Then, she turned and ran.

And as she ran, she heard a dull thud that resounded through the parking lot and a yelp of pain. But she didn’t turn back. She just kept running.