Dreaming about London

He kissed me.

At first we both laughed through the kiss, but then I pulled him in closer and deepened the kiss not capable of resisting my desire for his warm body pressed against mine. He held me tightly with his hands around my waist and suddenly lifted me up quickly to sit on the kitchen counter behind me. He was touching my thighs, but only very lightly remembering the now small burn blisters on them from my clumsy coffee accident a few days earlier. His hands instead travelled up underneath my t-shirt and cupped my breasts, massaging them lightly.

We both moaned in to each other’s mouths. I took advantage of him being shirtless and let my hands investigate every inch of his chest, shoulders and upper arms, all feeling tense and strong. His kisses felt so soft and loving, and yet firm and persistent.


Suddenly we heard footsteps coming up the stairs from the basement. Niall and I quickly let go of each other and I managed to jump down from the kitchen counter just the second Niels came walking in to the kitchen in his boxers while rubbing his tired eyes.

“Wow!” he yelled when he saw us smiling a little too wide at him. “You scared me! What are you doing up at this hour?”

“Oh we were just finishing Laura’s birthday cake,” I said in the most casual way I could manage. “What are you doing?”

“School.” He looked at me like I was stupid.

“Right, that’s right. You go to school. Uhm… where are the rest?”

“They left at 7 o’clock. Like always.” He continued to look at me with a confused face expression. “Nice cake,” he then said. “Is it good, Niall? I can see you’ve tasted it.” Niels pointed at some cake at Niall’s mouth while poring some milk in a glass.

“Oh. Yeah it’s really good.” Niall tried as hard as I to appear casual. He wiped himself with a napkin.

“Maybe you should wipe here as well, Niall,” Niels said and pointed at my lower lip. “Looks like you’ve made a mess around here.” And then he went down stairs again with his glass of milk.

Niall and I looked at each other with big eyes and we both cracked up.

“All right, let’s get this cleaned up,” he said and started sweeping the crumbs in to the trash. I nodded and put the cake in to the fridge and wrote a note to my sister:


Hi Laura. The cake is in the fridge. I’m sleeping, don’t wake me up. Xx


I added that last bit when I suddenly felt the need for sleep taking over almost immediately. Without saying anything I took Niall’s hand and pulled him downstairs to my room.




I felt warm. I felt happy. I felt rested. I opened my eyes to look straight in to a toned chest and I smiled feeling Niall’s arms wrapped around me. I snuggled in closer to smell him. It was lovely – the smell of him was a mix of shower and some light and fresh cologne. He moved a bit, I was suddenly afraid that I’d waken him up.

“You awake?” he asked and I smiled up at his beautiful eyes that I could melt in to any second. He pecked my lips.

“I didn’t wake you up, did I?” I asked, but he shook his head and just said: “You snore a little bit.”

“I do, don’t I?” I felt incredibly embarrassed. I hated that I did that!

He must have noticed my awkward face expression, cause he quickly said: “No, it’s not a bad and heavy snore. I think it’s really cute.”

I couldn’t manage to do anything else than to laugh and hide my face in my hands. Niall chuckled and kissed my hair.

“Wow,” he said when he looked at his phone. “The boys have called me 5 times. I better call back.”



It rang two times before Louis’ voice came out of the speakers on Niall’s iPhone:

“Niall, why haven’t you picked up your phone, we’ve been calling you! We were worried about you.” He sounded just a tiny bit upset.

“Yeah, I know I’m sorry,” Niall answered. “But don’t worry I’m at Maja’s place.”

“I see…” Louis said with a suddenly different tone. “So did you have sex?”

My eyes stood wide open and so did Niall’s, when he exclaimed: “Louis!”

“Did she break your knees?”

Now also my mouth stood wide open. “Louis, Maja is listening,” Niall said with red cheeks.

“Hi Louis,” I said probably looking more red than Niall.

“Oh… well, hi Maja,” he said stumbling with the words. I’d never experienced him acting awkward or without knowing what to say, so that felt a bit weird.

Niall said: “Look, I’ll be home soon, I promise.”

“Jesus, you make it sound like I’m your father. But okay I’ll see you later then.” He hung up right after, probably feeling a bit embarrassed as well.

“Oh that poor boy!” I said. “He sounded so confused and devoid.”

“I think that a person like Louis is good for some awkward situations once in a while – he’s so full of shit," Niall said and we both chuckled.




We lay in bed and talked for some time before I found his now clean white t-shirt for him to put on, before I would jump his torso unable to master my desire for him.


I got another mind blowing kiss in the doorway before he started walking down the driveway and through the trees. I just kept staring at him from behind having dirty thoughts about what I would one day do to that cute but.




I spent the next five days thinking about him, texting with him, talking on the phone with him, practicing for the concert, both alone and with Aida and Em, working at the gas station, “Hell”, binging and there for running like a maniac, until Wednesday where I had my weekly appointment with the psychologist.



I sat down in the extremely comforting chair, or it at least used to feel like that on any other day, but not today. Still remembering the feeling of having failed completely at taking care of myself in any way, I was really not in the mood for talking about anything that had something to do with my eating disorder.


“Ok, so Maja, I’ve thought a lot about your lack of progress for a long time…” the psychologist began.

Oh great, I thought to myself and she continued:

“And I want to ask you something. If you think about it, and I mean really dig deep down inside you… Do you want to get rid of this eating disorder? Do you honestly want to improve and get better?”


I was speechless. How could she ask me something like that?! “Of course!” I blurred out feeling hurt.


“Let me explain why I ask you such a question,” she said trying to calm me down a bit. “An eating disorder is a mental illness that can be very dangerous. You’ve been diagnosed with bulimia for more than 2 years now and it has unfortunately not improved for you since then. You tell me that you only binge and throw up when you’re alone and not in front of anyone, which tells me that it’s only when you’re alone that you feel the need to do so.”

I nodded. This was all stuff I’d told her in the beginning. “What’s your point?” I asked.

“My point is that maybe you’ll need some kind of medical preparation to help you improve.”

“What? Are you insane?! I don’t need medication, I’m fine and functioning and I’m definitely not depressed!” I almost shouted the last bit suddenly feeling very angry and disappointed.

“Calm down, I’m not saying that you’re not fine or functioning among people. But what about when you’re alone? Do you find that you’re fine and functioning when you’re alone?”

“I…” I wanted to defend myself, but knowing that she had found the most bad and rotten place in me made me feel incredibly vulnerable and devoid and instead of saying anything the tears just started to drift down my cheeks.

“You don’t have to say anything. Many people are living with a light depression their entire lives without knowing anything about it, and it might sound rather odd but you’ve been lucky to get an eating disorder like bulimia.”

I looked at her through my tears with a frown on my forehead.

“Bulimia is a reaction to something like depression. By getting that – and acknowledging it – you will be able to get some help. The eating disorder made you realize that you had some mental problems that you couldn’t handle on your own – many, and I underline many, people don’t ever get to the stage that you did at the age of 19. Don’t see eating disorders as cop-outs, but instead as an expression of wanting to move on.
You tell me you’re very unhappy with the way you look, which is the main reason that you feel the need to punish yourself the way you do. Some light anti-depressant can help you not feeling this need as much. It might help you not hate your looks as much.”


All I could was to nod. I knew she was right. And at this stage I was ready to try pretty much anything to get rid of this disgusting habit.


I left with a prescription and swollen eyes.




The next morning I was thrilled to feel that the thought of the medication didn’t scare me as much. What scared me the most now was the thought of having to perform in front of a church full of people, and especially having to perform in front of the boys and Perrie, who I was a huge fan of.

Aida and Em arrived early that Thursday to prepare with me. We did some yoga to clear our minds – and yes that really helps – drank coffee and tried to think about something else than the concert.



In the afternoon I received a text message from Niall: “Can’t wait to hear your concert tonight!” I smiled widely as I looked down at my phone.

“Uuuuuh!” Aida said teasingly after having noticed my face. “Is that a message from Ireland?”

I rolled my eyes at her and then answered: “Yeah, he just wrote that he was looking forward to the concert…”

“Wait what?!” Em exclaimed. “The boys… at the concert?”

I nodded. “I figured you needed to know before so that you wouldn’t freak out too much in the middle of singing Copenhagen.”

“Hearing… me… sing…” Em’s breathing began enhancing quickly to a stage that couldn’t be healthy for any human being.

“Em, take it easy, it will be just fine,” I said rubbing her back. Aida tried to calm her down as well even though I could tell that she was going out of her mind.

“Em and Aida, listen to me for a second,” I began, but they were both looking straight through me with chocked faces. “Listen to me!” I raised my voice and I think it helped, they looked more present now, so I continued:

“I would never have asked you guys to help me with this concert if it wasn’t because I was so god damn proud of what we have made together. I’m so proud of the songs and I’m more than ready to show them off to the people in the church tonight. Aren’t you guys also proud of us?”

“What if we fuck it up?” Aida said worried.

“What if the boys think we suck?” Em said resignedly.

“Please stop! It’s not helping any of us to think that way. I’m as nervous as you are,” I blurred out and we all sat still for a while without anyone saying a word. Suddenly Aida stood up.

“Come on, let’s get dressed ladies,” she said persistently and I breathed a huge sigh of relief – she was suck a strong and powerful person that was able to keep calm in the most stressful situations. Em and I sometimes called her Wonder Woman.



We arrived at the church half an hour before the concert would begin, me in my favorite bordeaux dress with long sleeves, black nylon stockings and a pair of white plateau sneakers. I had curled my hair to make the look more formal and painted my nails black.

Em wore a crème colored dress with shorter sleeves than mine along with a gorgeous pair of black plateau sandals. Having straightened her long thick hair and wearing almost no makeup she looked incredibly beautiful in a very natural way.

Aida had put on a black dress, a bit tighter than the ones Em and I wore, that almost reached her knees but the sleeves were short enough to reveal her tattoo of a mermaid on her left forearm. She’d put on a pair of worn out white All Stars and had painted her nails black and along with a deep red lipstick on her big sensual lips, she looked very sexy.



We tried some of the two songs they would be helping me with, and then I warmed up on my violin, before the people would be arriving. The lights were turned off, and the big church was only lid up by candles. Aida and Em sat down in the front rows next to my big family so that they would be ready whenever it was their turn to shine. Em had a piece of paper in her hand that she roughly tore apart staring in the air and Aida just held on to her guitar for dear life staring in the air the same way as Em. I gave them one last reassuring glance, before I went behind the pulpit to wait for the priest’s introduction.



It felt like an everlasting row of agonizing minutes of warming up my fingers before the priest nodded at me and stood up. I walked past the pulpit to see a completely stuffed church filled with all sorts of people, mostly elder ones – they always loved that I played folk music. My blue eyes searched for a pair with the same color.
I caught them on the second row where I saw a smiling Niall sitting and looking more gorgeous than ever wearing a denim vest without sleeves on top of his white t-shirt. The rest of the boys sat there as well and also Perrie and Eleanor, who immediately took a picture as soon as I looked out at the crowd.


“Uhm… Good evening everyone,” I said with trembling voice. Why hadn’t I slapped myself before I went out here, I thought.

“Well. You should all have received a program at the entrance written in Danish, but since I know that there are a few people present today who don’t understand Danish, I’m going to do the presentations of the different tunes and songs in English as best as I can.” It calmed me down a bit to see Niall’s smile grow as I reached for my violin lying on the piano next to a big candlestick.



I began by playing a couple of traditional Danish tunes on the violin and then a jazz arrangement of a Danish traditional song on the piano. People eagerly gave applauses after each performance, but when I reached to the first song where I had to sing I suddenly became extremely nervous again, knowing that Perrie Edwards and One Direction were sitting a couple of feet away from me listening.

“The next song is the first one of the ones that I’ve written myself. This one I wrote a couple of years ago on a rainy Sunday morning and it’s mostly about love. How it can feel amazing and damaging to you at the same time. It’s called Your Heart Is As Black As Night.”


I sat down and played the intro that consisted of a few deep chords. As soon as I felt the music fill the room that was lid up by the gloomy light from the candles, my nerves disappeared and I started singing the first verse.

Your eyes maybe whole
But the story I'm told
Is your heart is as black as night
You lips maybe sweet
Such that I can't compete
But your heart is as black as night
I don't know why it came along
At such a perfect time
But if I let you hang around
I'm bound to lose my mind


When I finished the song I looked up at the audience to find Perrie nodding at me in approval, she probably knew that I was nervous about her hearing me sing. I smiled proudly and moved on to the next number, which was the Irish tune.

I played the fast melody while doing the stepping on the ground and people quickly began clapping along and cheering. That was what I loved most about folk music – it was the atmosphere it created, it brought along all kinds of people, everybody feeling happy. As I ended the tune with one last hard stamp with my right foot people applauded more than after any of the other numbers. This time I smiled at Niall to see that he was just about to stand up, but that he decided to stay down and yell instead. Next to him Eleanor was waving at me constantly holding up her camera and I smiled at her as well.



I performed a couple of other songs, including a Danish traditional song which I’d sung with my mum since I was a little girl. She sang a lower voice and I sang the melody tuned quite high, which I knew suited my voice best. I also played and sang my cover of another Danish traditional song. Both of the songs were received with great joy.


“On the next song I’m going to need some help from my dear friend, Em,” I said and Em gave me one last nervous glance before she stood up and lightly bowed to the audience.

I continued presenting the song: “This song is a new one that I honestly didn’t think much of until Em here came to me with some great ideas for an arrangement a couple of weeks ago, and this way it turned out to be a song worth sharing with you guys, and so I asked her to perform it with me tonight. This is To Open Up My Heart.”


I began the intro and Em started the first verse with a voice that sounded, if possible, more beautiful than ever in this big church.
I looked up at her. She had closed her eyes for a moment and her left hand did this constant slowly shaking movement that she always did when she sung. I then looked at the audience, who were completely mesmerized with her natural beauty and natural voice.


The song ended way too soon, but people seemed pretty satisfied. She bowed once again and I couldn’t help but notice Liam staring with admiration at every move she made and I smiled to myself.


“This is the last song for tonight. And here I’m going to have to ask for some more help in the form of my other dear friend, Aida. Give her a hand.” I clapped as well when she nodded towards the audience. I was impressed of how calm she seemed even though I knew she’d just made eye contact with Harry, who sat right behind her.

I let her do the presentation, when she’d sat down on a chair and getting her guitar ready.

“Uhm, the story behind this song was a spontaneous trip to our lovely capital, Copenhagen, last summer. I’d visited a friend and when I was walking among the tall beautiful buildings on my way back to the train station, these thoughts popped in to my head and I decided to write them down, before I would forget it all. When I came home I found a few chords that I thought fitted the atmosphere in Copenhagen. But then I really didn’t do any more to the song, before Maja asked if she could make a melody for my lyrics, and so she did. And so we’re going to perform the last song of tonight, called Copenhagen.”


She counted her and I in, I played a few light notes and she did the chords, before Em began the first verse.


Copenhagen
I've never seen you look this bright
Just awaken
From the beauty snooze you took last night

Oh, this tingling feeling
To be the blood inside your veins
I've been leaving, believing
I could find a better place

And all this time
You were right here

Right here, right here
Right here, you're right here
Right here, right here
Right here, you're right here



A song like this fitted Em’s voice better than any other and I closed my eyes, playing, listening and feeling the magic of the music filling the room. At this moment I didn’t care about any audience, but only the three of us enjoying playing with each other.



We ended the song with each of us singing a different part over and over again like a canon, without any instruments, Aida singing some deep notes, Em in the middle and me on the higher ones. This was my favorite part of any song we played together and I closed my eyes to enjoy it as much as possible.




When the song finished there was this moment of complete silence, right after the last note has escaped through the room, and you see and feel everything much more clearly than normally. That was the absolute best thing about intimate concerts for small crowds – it was having these moments where it felt like the world had just stopped turning for a second.


I sat at the piano with still with my eyes closed and somewhere outside my mind I heard the applauses spread and enhance, until they were loud enough to pull me back to reality, where I discovered several tears leaving the canthus of many people, among those Perrie and Eleanor, who had finally put down her camera to stand up a clap her hands.

Aida, Em and I also stood up to bow several times, before the audience went silently out of the church. I took a deep breath and hugged my two girls tightly. “I love you guys so much,” Em said with yet another tear escaping her eye.

I thanked them for their help before moving on to hugging each member of my family. They went home as I started to pack my violin and Em blowing out the candles.



“You were amazing,” I heard a voice from behind me that I instantly recognized. I turned around to give Niall a hug.

“Thank you so much for coming,” I said. The rest of the boys came over to congratulate and hug me.

“You are really good, Maja,” Perrie said and I couldn’t help but laugh a bit foolish and blush from her comment.

“Thank you,” was all I managed to say.


“Okay people, I want you all to meet my friends, Aida and Em,” I said loudly for everybody to hear. Liam was the first one to shake Em’s hand and soon they looked like they were getting along pretty well. They acted like me – they were incredibly good at not showing the thoughts that must have been going through their minds at that moment.


“Hey, we need to celebrate this!” Louis exclaimed. “Would you guys like to come home to our place?”

All the three of us nodded eagerly, and so we left the church to go towards the sea.

Notes

So this is the first concert of the many that will hopefully come later in the story. I hope you like it! If you do make sure to give it a vote! :-D

Here are some links to the songs from the concert:

Your Heart Is As Black As Night: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kmc1XN3iVVc
Copenhagen: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5CgB6cc6dyQ