”Aida,” Em said moving closer to her and wrapping an arm around her shoulders. “Calm down, just take it easy. What did your mother tell you?”

I just sat on the other side of the table staring at her as she tried to compose her breathing but without much result.

“She told me…” she began still heaving making it hard for her to speak. “She’s sick. She… has… cancer.”



It felt like I had been punched in the stomach and I now understood how Aida felt, when she didn’t have any air left to speak. I felt my mouth open but not a single sound came across it.

Em’s rubbing on Aida’s back had suddenly stopped and it was like everything around us became blurry for a few seconds and that it was only the three of us in that restaurant, in this entire world.


“What…” I began but my voice was too raspy and airy, I could barely hear it myself, so I coughed and started my sentence over. “What kind of cancer?”

“Breast,” she sobbed as Em pulled her in closer.

“Don’t worry, sweetie,” she whispered in to her hair. “It’s going to be okay.” Em tried the best she could to be supportive and strong but I could tell that she was really close to crying as well and so I decided to put aside my own needs and for once be the strong one of us.

“Did she say anything about how you know… bad it was?” I asked struggling to stop my voice from shaking from the tears finding their way to my eyes also.

“They… think it’s… st-stage one…” Aida sobbed and saying that out loud looked like it helped her a little.

“That’s a great sign!” I smiled reassuringly back at her, but nothing in her friends’ behavior could make up for the fact that she wanted to be with her mum more than ever right now in a tough time like this and it made her sad, angry and frustrated with herself that she couldn’t.

“I’m sure she knows that you are here for her, she understands that you can’t go home,” I said assuming that that was her biggest concern. “She’s not alone, Aida. She has the rest of your family to take care of her and besides, she’s a mum. No one can conquer anything like those creatures.”


That was the drop that made it all too much for Em as she now suddenly had several tears streaming down her face.

“Yeah, she’s strong,” she managed to agree though. “I know it’s really difficult for you and that you must be so concerned, not being able to think about anything else than what might happen to her, but I can almost sure you that nothing like that will happen. She will be fine.”

“How can you know that?” Aida kept crying.

“Because she has to be fine,” I blurred out not thinking too much about what she would feel about me putting in that way. But it actually looked like my honesty got to her as her breathing started to slow down just a tad. “Thank you for telling us,” I added and she nodded dapping her face with a napkin.

“I just don’t know how I’m going to function with all this on my mind…” she mumbled.

“It’s only normal and very understandable if you can’t act like always after what has happened,” Em said. “It might be hard for you to realize, but you can’t always be only awesome inside and out all the way as you are used to. And no one will judge you if you can’t.”


Em’s reassuring words comforted not only Aida, but also me realizing that we would forever have each other’s backs whenever we would need it.

“You can count on us,” I said out loud revealing my thoughts to them. “As we can count on you.”

“Thank you,” she sighed and I was relieved to sense that we’d in some way lifted a bit of the burden off her shoulders.

“And not to destroy our bit sensitive mood, but it’s almost half past one and we have to leave now if we wanted to go to that other exhibition,” I smiled.

“If you just want to go home, then we’ll just do that…” Em began but Aida immediately shook her head.

“No, I think it’s the only thing that can keep my mind preoccupied right now,” she said and so I turned around to get the check.



Luckily the next exhibition did seem to keep our minds thinking only about that since it consisted of photos by the documentary photographer, Martin Parr. His work had kind of the same style as Mark Cohen, showing the “uglier” side of life, using honesty as the main topic in it.


This was the kind of beauty that Aida loved so much and I spent most of the time in Margaret Street Gallery that was just around the corner from Oxford Street, admiring her and not the photos hanging on the walls around me.


“Girls…” I began when we were all standing at the same spot for once. “I need to ask you something.”

“Of course,” Em said.

“It’s uhm… about Eric,” I mumbled, especially that last bit since the guilt came rushing over me every second I said his name out loud.

“You guys have kissed, haven’t you?” Aida asked without spending no more time on waiting for me to say it myself. I was really stunned but the hurt and reproachfully look on Em’s face made me hurry to elaborate what had happened.

“Well. Not really,” I said. “Thursday night when I stayed at Adam’s place he kissed me, but I pushed him away immediately and he did feel very sorry for his behavior, he was just really drunk and he didn’t know about Niall and me. The question is, do you think I should tell him?”

“Tell Niall?” Aida asked. “Oh God no.”

“Why not?” I asked.

“Because it didn’t mean anything and literally nothing happened. I think you would do more damage than good by telling him,” she said convincing.

“I think you should definitely tell him,” Em said and we both looked at her with surprise. “I mean, it’s all about being honest, and you always say that that is all you would want from him, then I really think you should take the responsibility for what happened and tell Niall. He’s such a great guy and I just think he deserves to know.”


We were all silent for a few seconds, I didn’t exactly know what to say or what to think.

“But what if, as Aida said, it will only do harm and no good?” I asked her.

“If it does any harm it brings you closer,” Em answered point plank like she was some sort of oracle sending me answers to what question I might have in mind.

“Jesus, you sound like the Dalai Lama,” Aida teased with her first smile of the day all over her lips.



We spent the rest of the day in galleries and going out for some cocktails in the evening and really felt nice to just be with the girls, just like the old days, except for all the girls that wanted pictures with us now. There were only one or two rude comments among all their questions and being with my friends made it all seem less scary, so all in all it was actually okay to be mobbed by so many people, even though I’d never thought I’d say that.



Sunday we went shopping for more stuff for especially my room, since I hadn’t had a chance to do that because of all that time I’d spent in the hospital, while both Em and Aida had pretty much finished the decoration of theirs. But as I was a completely ignorant in departments like this we borrowed Liam’s car so that they could help me out with it all.

We got me a bed, a proper wardrobe, a desk and a ton of things to make it look cozy and warm. It was a very important room to me, since my piano was standing in there and then because I would do most of my song writing in there, making me feel comfortable and peaceful was a vital part of it.


This way the weekend flew by in the blink of an eye and the next thing I remember happening was me setting the alarm clock to 6.30 Sunday night. Tomorrow would be first day back at working at Aunt Betty’s and I was actually looking forward to see Nathalie and the rest of the staff again and just get an everyday up and going again, especially now when my body almost felt back to normal. I had started to feel the energy building up in my body now when it didn’t hurt anymore and the first thing I could ever think about wasn’t running with Harry or dancing at a club. It was having sex with Niall.

I was feeling so incredibly horny all the time, even in my dreams during the night the tingling feeling in my lower section was following me as well just like it did all day.




Working at Aunt Betty was just as I remembered it; busy and hectic, getting sore feet from standing up all the time, girls still coming in asking for photos and stuff and of course talking to a truly great and helpful colleague like Nathalie. She’d been handling the shop all by herself in these almost three weeks, but if I had been away for longer they might’ve hired another one to help her, it was too tough on her with such stressful job along with having a child at home to take care of. She was relieved to feel the time to have a lunch break now when I was helping her.


To my sorrow I had to text Niall and tell him that I had to go home and rehearse for the concert with the girls and therefor couldn’t spend the night at his place. My sexual frustration and longing for his great person was driving me crazy as he sent back one of his sweet and understanding messages saying that he was just looking forward to the concert then.


After me and the girls’ rehearsal that evening that consisted of trying out the new songs that we hadn’t played together yet, which by the way went really well, I decided to call him just to hear his soft and comforting voice. Luckily he picked up after only a few rings.


“Hello?” his voice came through my phone.

“Niall hi!” I exclaimed a bit louder than I was expecting.

“Maja!” he exclaimed as well which made me feel a bit more comfortable after my shrill outbreak before.

“Just wanted to hear your voice,” I said cheekily. “How are you?”

“Great,” he said. “Missing you though, when do I get to see you again?”

“Yeah, I know, I really miss you too, it’s just all that rehearsing with the girls has to be done first, or else I will get way too nervous about that concert on Saturday you know,” I said trying to express the sadness that I was feeling through the phone.

“I know, I’m also quite busy recording at the moment, since we’re putting some of the last finishing touches on a few of the songs and so on. We have to be done in two weeks, so it’s every day, all day.” At that point I just realized how tired he sounded. “But the concert was on Saturday? What about our date then?” he asked.

“I know, but I was thinking that maybe we could do that Friday night? If you can find the time through all that recording and so on,” I said.

“Yeah, that sounds great! Looking forward to see you then.”

“What kind of date are you taking me on by the way?” I quickly asked suddenly feeling so scared of what the fuck to wear.

“A fancy one,” he said. “We haven’t done that. And I know this great place in Notting Hill that I want to take you to.”


God, a fancy one, I thought with so much concern. I would definitely need to buy a new dress for that occasion then! But the concern about a dress suddenly became incredibly small when I got to think about another concern that had made me call him in the first place.


“Niall?” I said. “I have to tell you something.”

“What is it?” The understanding and calmness in his voice was killing me, making me feel even more terrible than I already did.

“Do you remember Eric?” I asked.

“Yes, I do.”

“Okay, it’s because…” I felt my heart beating faster and faster as I struggled to fulfill the sentence. “After the rehearsal with that folk music band that he’s in as well last Thursday, we kind of had a party and got a bit drunk and so on. And so he… kind of… tried to kiss me. And I swear I pushed him away immediately, but he didn’t know about you and me and he did apologize afterwards feeling bad about what he’d done.”


Several agonizing seconds of silence went by and I was starting to feel really nervous that Aida had been completely right about doing more bad than good by telling him this.


“Did you kiss?” Niall then finally asked and I drew a huge sigh of relief.

“No, I mean, not really,” I said. “It was dark and suddenly it just happened and before I knew it I had pushed him away. I promise you, I had no intentions or even thoughts of something like that, never. I just… thought I wanted to tell you, you know… to be honest with you.”

My words were once again followed by silence, which made my brain feel like it was moving around with all the different thoughts that came through it.

“Did you guys kiss?” he asked once again which confused me a little, I thought I’d just answered that question. But when he remained quiet I knew that I had to elaborate my answer from before.

“No, it was an accident, nothing happened, though I feel so bad about it all, Niall, I’m really sorry. I honestly don’t know why he did it and I don’t think he does either, he’s just a bit of a womanizer who jumps on any available creature that walks, it had nothing to with me in particular…”

“No, I mean, did your lips and his meet or didn’t they?” he said a bit louder to block mine.

“Well. Yes,” I said surprised by his interruption. “Yes they did, I guess.”

When he didn’t say anything I decided to keep on with my apologizes. “I’m just really sorry, Niall. I would never do anything like that to you, I care for you so much, I hope you know that!”

“I don’t know what to say,” he said. And neither did I. I felt like I had tried everything to convince him about the innocence of that mistake and that he had nothing to worry about.

Again he didn’t say anything after that. After a few moments I realized that it wasn’t because he was waiting for me to say anything. Or at least he wouldn’t hear it now, when I heard the tone that indicated that the other person had hung up the phone.

Notes

So what do you guys think? What will happen between Maja and Niall??? Leave comment! :-D