“Ok,” I said trying to sound calm and unaffected by the weird situation.

“You know, Sheila…” he then said, “I…”

Another agonizing moment of silent.


“What about Sheila?” I asked.

“I slept with her,” he said not wanting to look in to my eyes. “Last week.”



I didn’t know what to do. I just stood and stared at him wishing that what he’d just said wasn’t true.


“It was that night, where you know… I got completely wasted and out of control and really shouldn’t have happened, I don’t remember much of it and the bit that I do remember wasn’t very good…”

“Don’t lie to me,” I interrupted him. That was the only thing I could say, the only thing that immediately popped in to my head. He looked up at me a bit surprised by my sudden action of speak. I looked in to his eyes, wanting him to know that he had hurt me. Then I turned and left the toilet.



I went back to the table to get my jacket, the others were laughing hard about something Perrie did with her mouth. But I didn’t feel any need to laugh at all, it felt like I literally was unable to do such a weird thing as smiling.


“What’s up Maja, did you have some fun on the toilet?” Aida asked loudly with a teasing tone, probably thinking that me and Niall had been out there doing the completely opposite than what had actually happened.


Harry calmed her down, knowing that I wasn’t feeling good. I didn’t say anything, I just grabbed my jacket and went towards the door. I saw out of my canthus that both Aida and Em were about to stand up and follow me, but Harry asked them to sit down and he was completely right.

The only thing I wanted to do was to be alone.



Outside I turned left to get to the tube, but a hand on my shoulder stopped me. I quickly turned around to look in to Harry’s emerald green eyes.

“Let me give you a lift home,” he said and pulled me towards his car that he’d picked me and Aida up in. I didn’t try to fight against him, knowing that I wanted to get home as fast as possible and without having to wonder around the streets of London five hundred times to find out where I was.


I sat down in the passenger seat and we started driving without any us saying a word.


How could I have been so stupid?! Of course Niall was a guy like any other – a complete asshole that chose to lie instead of taking responsibility for his actions no matter how bad they would be. What did do to deserve a treatment like this? Did I do something wrong? God, I hated that I always tried to figure out how much of a guy’s shitty behavior that was caused by me – cause all the times there were no excuse for being like that! Niall was one of the many examples that made it extremely difficult for each girl to think that they deserved better than being treated like that. Why didn’t I deserve better?



All these angry thoughts ran through my head over and over again all the way back to my apartment.

About half an hour later he pulled off to the side and stopped the car.

“Thank you, Harry. Tell the others I’m sorry,” was all I could say before I got out of the car. Harry quickly put his hand on mine.

“Maja,” he said and I turned towards him. “It’s going to be okay.”


At that moment I realized how good a friend I already had in Harry. He seemed to be an incredible mind reader who almost always knew what I needed and what I was thinking. A really good guy that any girl will be lucky to be with and even just as his friend I even also felt extremely lucky.

I didn’t say anything and showed probably absolutely no emotion when I shut the door. I went up the stairs and locked myself inside the building. When I got in to the apartment I walked towards the window in the living room seeing that Harry hadn’t left yet, he waited a few more minutes before he drove away. The second his car disappeared around the corner I burst in to tears.




I woke up very late the next morning but I didn’t get up. I felt completely empty and without any ability to do anything at all. So I stayed on my matrass, I don’t know for how long, I didn’t bother what time it was. I didn’t bother about anything.


Suddenly my door opened and two figures came in.

“Hey,” Em’s voice said and as she sat down on the matrass. I didn’t answer, didn’t even look at her.

“Maja, I’m really sorry about last night,” Aida said as she also sat down on the other side. “Also that I just blurred out something completely stupid when you were clearly feeling down…”

“Aida, I think we all know that you obviously are not the person I’m having a problem with right now,” I suddenly interrupted her not wanting her to sit and feel bad about something completely insignificant.


At first she looked at bit stunned, but her face quickly transformed in to understanding, knowing that it didn’t bother me.


“Do you think it’s because…” I began with two pairs of curious eyes staring at me, “Do you think it’s because I didn’t want to sleep with him?”

“Oh my God, no!” Em exclaimed. “Why the hell would that be the reason?”


At that moment I didn’t feel empty and numb anymore, but sad and I felt the tears building up in my eyes heavily.


“Oh sweety,” they both said at the same time and came closer to me to hold me, which only made me cry even harder.

“Then what was his fucking reason to sleep with Sheila?” I asked also feeling angry. So many thoughts rushed through my head that I didn’t get to think about half of them before another pushed the other one away. I didn’t wait for an answer until I continued myself: “No it’s actually not the fact that he slept with her, I mean we weren’t together, I don’t owe him. And we’d spent so much time apart, he was really drunk and probably didn’t care about much that night. But… he lied to me.”


Again both of my friends looked at me nodding.


After a long silence Em started: “If Liam had done to me what Niall has to you, I would feel really hurt as well, even though none of us had discussed anything about being a couple. You just know that you might like each other too much to wanting to be with anyone else at that moment.”

“Yeah that must be the reason. I liked him, he didn’t like me,” I said feeling depressed and hurt.

“I wouldn’t say it like that, Maja…” Aida began but once again I cut her off by saying:

“The thing is… I really thought I had figured him out, I thought that he was the most amazing guy. And I really liked him so I didn’t sleep with him, because I was afraid of getting hurt, because I knew that the moment I slept with him I would really, really like him. And the thought of getting hurt by a person that you like that much was more than I could bear. So I didn’t. And look where that has got me now…”


I could go on and on for hours talking about my own stupidity, but then it was Aida’s turn to come through for me. “Jesus Christ, Maja, it’s not because you didn’t sleep with him!” she exclaimed and I looked at her frightened as she continued: “Niall did that because he was a mess that night and completely wasted. It was stupid of him and his mistake. His mistake, and not yours!”


I didn’t say anything, I only managed to nod. Her little speech had gotten to me I guess.

After another long silence Em said. “I have some news that might cheer you up.”

I sat up straight and looked at her with my swollen eyes trying to blink off a few tears.


“Yesterday, when you were at the toilet a man came over to Aida and I and asked if we did any gigs. He’d probably seen us on stage singing Mama Lied. So… he gave me his card and I called him today, and woila! We’re playing our first concert in London in exactly two weeks!”

Aida was smiling proudly and I just looked at them completely stunned, both at the change of subject and the news that Em had just told me.

“Are you serious?” I asked and she nodded.

“At some place called Dirty Dicks,” she said and my eyes flew open.

“What kind of performance did that man want us to do, did you say?” I couldn’t help but ask.
Aida laughed. “Don’t worry, Dirty Dicks is a well-known venue that holds a lot of small concerts. The man from yesterday owns the place.”

“Oh okay,” I said relieved. “Guess I need to get me a piano right away so that we can practice.”

They both looked at me with surprise as I quickly stood up from my matrass. I grabbed my phone and saw that Niall had been calling me five times that day. I didn’t bother. Instead I typed in another number.


“Who are you calling?” Em asked and she got her answer right away as I said: “Hi Harry, it’s Maja.”

“Hi Maja!” I heard him say through the phone. “How are you feeling?”

“Listen I need your help. Do you know any good music stores? I need a piano,” I told him.

“Yeah of course! Uhm… should I pick you up, then we can go look at one together? You’ll need the car to get it home anyway so…” he said with a bit of hesitation.

“Well… if you’re not busy or anything, then it would be really nice of you.” I tried my very best to sound happy, despite all the hurt feelings that were still recycling in my body.



Forty five minutes later I heard a car honking from down the street and I went down the stairs after having put on some light makeup and my hair in a bun, since I was literally looking like hell when I first looked in the mirror. My eyes were still red and swollen from both crying and getting almost no sleep so I had kind of given up on trying hiding that.


I jumped in the passenger seat next to Harry.

“Hi”, he said and gave me a hug.

“It’s way too much for you to do this for me, I can’t thank you enough,” I just said in to his shoulder.

“No problem, that’s what friends do.” He smiled a tiny bit, but yet he still sensed that I was still feeling like shit.


“So where are we going?” I asked after a few minutes of silent drive through West End.

“To Kensington Pianos. They have a great and very wide range of different pianos,” he answered.


I nodded, thinking that it sounded like the right place. Kensington wasn’t very far away from where we lived, it only took about fifteen minutes to get to the warehouse.



“Man, that’s big!” I gushed when I looked up at two floor tall building that was apparently filled with nothing but different pianos. Harry smiled and pulled me inside where I almost got dizzy looking at all that good stuff all at the same place.

“So what kind of piano were you thinking about buying?” he asked.

“Uhm, an electric one that I can bring with me, but it still has to have a good sound and touch,” I said not looking at him but instead at all the pianos around me. I ran my hands over the keys and the wooden surfaces on some of the really big and beautiful pianos that unfortunately were way too expensive.


“One day, I’m going to buy one of these,” I said as I saw Harry watching me.



I followed him upstairs where the electric ones were placed. I tried some different ones that turned out not to be exactly my taste, I knew I had to find one that I could write songs on. Harry walked around on his own looking at different pianos as well, giving me some privacy trying them out one by one.

After a while I sat down at a Kawai ES6 that was standing on a tripod that made it look like an upright standing piano. The fact that it almost looked like a real piano helped a lot. I felt the keys and played a couple of notes.



Suddenly it dawned on me why I had been so busy getting a piano. With all these feelings in my mind I was in desperate need of a way to let out some of them. So I started playing quietly.

Note by note a melody started forming with a couple of simple chords. With closed eyes I hummed different things not knowing how it would sound. Once I thought I’d found something good I quickly recorded it on my phone. And as always I didn’t have any lyrics yet, but I couldn’t imagine that it would be that difficult to make them this time, I was in the mood for making songs now.


“That’s beautiful,” I heard Harry say and I turned around looking scared at him.

“Uhm… thanks,” I said blushing. “I think I want this one.” I stood in order not to have to play anymore with him standing there listening.

“Oh you don’t want to try some more? There are several others over here.” He pointed to the left side of the huge room but I just shook my head.

“This is the right one.” And that was what I truly felt, I could really imagine myself making a lot of music on this.



I went to the counter to buy it and after that we were showed down stairs to a door outside at the parking lot where the items were delivered. I’d bought the tripod as well for when it would stand in my room.

“Maja, I’ve been thinking about something for a while,” Harry began as we stood waiting for my purchase.

“Yeah?” I said looking at him.

“I was thinking if we could run together. I mean, I’ve always wanted to do something serious about my training and it could be nice to have a partner,” he said.

“That sounds like a great idea!” I said smiling, though it was a smile that I had to force on my face despite the fact that normally I would be very happy about something like that.

“Good. Can we do a run today when we’ve gotten this piano home to your place?” he asked.

“But. Do you have clothes and shoes with you and all that?” I asked a bit confused.

“Yeah, I kind of planned it right after you called,” he smiled.

“I see.” Now I couldn’t help but smile and wrap my arm around his shoulders. “We can do that.”



My phone buzzed and I looked down to see Niall calling once again and I put the phone back in my pocket.


“He’s really sorry, Maja,” Harry suddenly said.

I looked down at my feet without answering.


He continued: “I visited him this morning, he’s feeling awful. You should see him, he’s not talking about anything else than how much he regrets what happened that wasted night last week…”

“He lied to me, Harry!” I exclaimed thinking that I would explode if I had to hear him speak of that guy anymore. We looked in to each other’s eyes. “I don’t do liars,” I just said and turned away.

Notes

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