Instead of answering the boys just stood next to each other smiling proudly and kindly at us.

“I’m not kidding, if this is a joke, I will not find it funny!” Aida said sounding really serious, but I couldn’t agree more.

“We wanted to do this for you,” Harry answered her with the most gorgeous smile that would melt every girl’s heart in the matter of a second, but I had a feeling that Aida’s mind was way too busy freaking out over something else, since she also just kept staring at them.


A few seconds of complete silence later we still hadn’t moved or managed to get any words across our lips. By now the boys had started looking like they were about to crack up at our silly and dumb faces, but they all managed to hold it back by biting down on their lips and waiting for our reaction.

“Oh my God,” Em then suddenly said as if something had just hit her, while we were now staring vigorously around at each other. I began to get the point as well as I heard myself gush:

“Helena Hørlyck… is… is going to be our… our vocal coach?” The last part was a question that I already knew the answer to, but nonetheless I turned towards the boys in the need of hearing say it again, confirming to me that I wasn’t just imagining this. My glance quickly swift between each of their sets of perfect white teeth, desperately waiting for the first mouth to move in order to say the word, “yes”. Niall turned out to be the first one who did that.

“So…” I began again, this time frowning slightly, “Helena Hørlyck is going… to be our vocal coach?”

“YES!” they then all shouted at the same time, including Perrie and Eleanor. Apparently we had trouble wrapping our head around that thought. I nodded slowly, very slowly, and suddenly felt my wide eyes getting all dry from staring around me and I blinked a few times while turning my head back towards the girls sitting next to me.

“Helena Hørlyck is going to be our vocal coach,” I told them and they looked like they were also about to get the whole picture.

“Helena Hørlyck is going to be our vocal coach,” Em smiled with glossy eyes.

“Helena Hørlyck is going to be our vocal coach,” Aida then repeated with a louder and trembling voice as if she was about to explode.

“Oh my God!” Em yelled with big eyes pointing like daggers at us. she and I too felt like we were on the verge of exploding from the excitement, joy and eagerness boiling inside of us.

And so we did. Exploded.

We all stood up at the same time shouting all sorts of things, just whatever popped in to our minds.

“Jesus Christ!”

“This is awesome!”

“Gurl, we’re gonna be perf.”

“Ok, but wha!?”

“Nigga please!”

“So siiiiick!”

“What if we meet One Direction?”

“Fuck me hard in the arse, please.”


And then mainly just an endless stream of general cursing that was quickly replaced by our signature move that consisted of one word – “whut” – repeated over and over again while we threw our hands at each other standing in a small circle doing some crazy and rather awkward looking hand gestures.


“They always do that,” I heard Niall tell the others as they probably looked confused and a bit scared at the way we chose to celebrate the great news. But then they quickly started cracking up along with him as they realized how utterly stupid we were looking and sounding.

“Wow, I can’t wait to see your reaction when you win an award,” Zayn said teasingly.

“Gurl, don’t you even get me started!” I exclaimed after restraining myself a tad, before pulling him in for a tight hug. “Thank you guys so much! You have no idea what this means to us!” I gave all of them some long and probably a bit violent hugs as well. “This is way too much!”

“You deserve it,” Niall smiled at me when I reached him and I took a deep breath in to his neck. I felt more grateful than ever. We really were the luckiest girls in the world right now.


My gratitude most certainly didn’t grow smaller as the hours continued to pass in the blink of an eye. We stayed in Zayn and Perrie’s living room for most of the early afternoon drinking hot cocoa, eating sweets and cookies and laughing almost the entire day away. I couldn’t get over the fact that I was surrounded by the sweetest people ever. Zayn and Perrie were so cute, they’d made such a huge effort in this day, making tons of food for all of us and decorated their entire apartment in the most cozy way with Christmas ornaments and candles scattered all over the place.

A few Christmas presents – beside the huge one that the girls and I had received – were exchanged. All of the boys gave each other a small thing each, like silly things like racers, shampoo or condoms since they weren’t really in lack of anything besides those kind of stuff. That last thing was a gift from Niall to Harry with a small card attached to it with the words: Stay safe.


“You said you wanted socks,” I explained innocently when Niall opened the small random gift that I’d given him; A pair of woolen socks that I’d knitted myself. “If the price for them was calculated in the number of hours spent on the production, then your gift to me actually seems pretty wack.”

He laughed loudly at my remark and leaned in to kiss me.

“You’re so incredibly cute,” he smiled down at the plain dark grey socks that I’d spent every available moment on making through the last couple of weeks, using multiple recipes from magazines to get to find out a way to make then, it had really taken up a lot of my free time to get them done on time. It was easy to tell that they were poorly made and way too big, since I didn’t have either the skills, time or patience to make multi colored ones in the right size.

“The nicest present I’ve ever received,” he said quietly to me and the thrill over how happy he genuinely looked grew fast in my stomach.

“You too, mother fucker,” I responded in my best impression of Aida’s ghetto accent, which made him laugh even more and poke my side teasingly.



It was kind of sad when the boys had to leave in the late afternoon to get to the sound check before their small performance tonight. Us girls would get ready at home and meet them there. The nerves about going to a red carpet and the excitement about watching the boys perform properly for the first time had started to get to Em, Aida and I by now and we were already freaking out when Eleanor informed us that we would only have two hours before the car would pick us up.

I hurried to Niall’s apartment where all my stuff was and jumped in the shower. Luckily I had discussed my look for tonight with Aida over and over again and dragged her to the store to help me buy a dress, so I didn’t have to worry about that too much. All though I couldn’t help but feel that I was about to shit myself knowing how many pictures that would be taken of us. I had to look perfect. Or at least convince everybody that I thought so myself.
I shaved my legs, conditioned my hair, blow dried it upside down and straightened it in order to get rid of frizz that it always had after a shower, since I was going to wear in a tight bun.


An hour and a half I found myself walking up the stairs back towards Zayn and Perrie’s place, where we’d agreed on quickly meeting to get a few advices from Perrie and Eleanor, who were more used to the spotlight and these kinds of events.

When I entered the kitchen where Aida was pouring us some cocktails I felt my feet literally stop walking at the sight of her. She looked so god damn amazing, I wanted to punch her beautiful face.
She was wearing a dark blue skater dress with short sleeves revealing her bare legs and a pair of beige Christian Louboutin’s. Her nails were painted black and she’d combed her short hair slick back with gel and applied a classic makeup, consisting of some black eyeliner and dark red lipstick.

“Aida…” I gushed, apparently snapping her out of her thoughts as she quickly looked up from the drinks that looked very much like Cosmopolitans.

“Maja!” she squealed in a shrilly tone that made me jump slightly, I had expected that reaction from her. “You look incredible!” she told me with the proudest smile. “That dress really suits you.”

“Girl, you too!” I said back to her. “You look so hot.”

“A bit like Marcel in Best Song Ever, don’t you think?” she smirked which made me chuckle.

“Definitely, very stylish,” I agreed. “Or should I say Styles…”

Her only reply to my horrible joke was a whack on my shoulder.


The girls joined us in the kitchen one by one, Em was the last one to arrive from Liam’s apartment where she had her things, I assume it was her unruly hair that had taken so long. As I glanced around the room I foolishly admired everybody’s looks;

Em had bought a tight black dress that was closed all the way around the neck, but had the most beautiful open back, bare legs and some red pointy stilettos. Her hair was controlled by probably a decent amount of hairspray holding it in place in the low bun in her neck. She’d added some thick black eyeliner on her eyes making her look foxy as hell.

Perrie sat nipping off her drink, very unlike me, who preferred to empty several drinks quickly. I had no intention of taking over that red carpet as terribly sober as I was by now. She was wearing a white silk tank top with thin straps and a low cut all the way down to her chest, along with a pair of high waisted black trousers with wide width and a pair of black stilettos, and she looked absolutely fabulous but yet still quite laid back, in some weird way that only she could master. Her hair was curled to perfection and hanging loosely around her face, on which she’d made some smokey eyes to complete her look.

Eleanor had put on a white jumpsuit that had a beautiful floral pattern spread out over her shoulders and a bit down the chest. If I ever became slim enough I would do anything to borrow that from her. With a thin white belt in her waist and some white high heeled sandals. Her hair was pulled back in a tight tall ponytail that hung straight down her back

I wore a loose white dress with long sleeves that reached down to just above the knees and that had a slice in both sides, along with my black Christian Louboutin pumps and some black fishnet stockings. Last mentioned was Aida’s idea, since I didn’t feel that good about walking on a red carpet in bare legs just yet, weight loss or not. I had put my hair up in a tight tall bun and added some of my many big gold accessories. I had borrowed Aida’s dark red lipstick and put on some black eyeliner as well. I had painted my nails in the same deep red color as I had on my lips.


Perrie and Eleanor both seemed calm, happiness and excitement were the only feelings written on their pretty faces, while a pale white color was painted on Aida, Em and I, no matter how much bronzer we would add on our cheeks, we still looked uncomfortable, nervous and slightly ill.
That was actually the only thing I could put a finger on, when it came to the way we looked, we simply just didn’t appear as confident and alive as normal.

“Okay girls!” I exclaimed a bit too loudly, before quickly downing another drink. “You need to help us getting through this dreadful thing looking reasonably good, we need some advice.”

The two beautiful girls stared at our eagerly nodding heads, both looking like they weren’t exactly sure of what to say.

“Uhm…” Perrie began. “Well, what do you want to know?”

“Like how you manage to look so fucking perfect out there,” Em said instantly in a slightly shrill tone.

“How do we pose? How do we smile? Is there anything about the lightning that we should know?” Aida joined in as well. We were all equally nervous about this shit.

“What are my best angles?” I asked, awfully sure that there weren’t any good to pick from.

“Okay, okay!” Em chuckled. “I’ll show you a couple of tricks. Stand up.”

The three of us did as we were told and walked towards her as she gestured for us to come closer. She began with eying up me with a small frown on her forehead.

“Maja, put your hand on your hip,” she commanded and so I did. “Stand with your legs close together, weight on both of them. Shoulders back. Okay, yes. And then…” She took my face in her hands and scanned it for a few seconds before telling me: “At first you don’t smile, just keep your mouth closed, but do it in the end. Then they get a few pictures to pick from.”

I nodded, grateful that I was now a bit aware of what I had to do.

“Em, you need to stand straight at first with one hand on your hip as well, but you also need to show the back of that dress, it’s just so beautiful, so then you just turn your body a bit more towards Liam. Don’t worry, the photographers will usually shout all that to you.”

At last it was Aida’s turn:

“You look so foxy when you lightly squeeze your eyes together. Yes, like that! Don’t smile and if you do, just do it lightly. No hand on the hip, let your arm hang loosely and put the weight on the leg away from Harry and then just pop that hip.”

At that second Perrie’s phone buzzed with the message that the car would there to pick us up in two minutes, and my newly found confidence immediately vanished and I was back to feeling anxious, sweaty and horribly nervous.

“Eleanor, are you going to finish that cocktail?!” I instantly asked her and she shook her head with a small smirk before I roughly grabbed the Martini glass from the kitchen counter and emptied it.


“Fuck, I’ve eaten too much today,” I sighed a few minutes later, when the alcohol just didn’t seem to kick me as it would normally do after three rather strong Cosmopolitans. We were sitting next to each other in a big car, Eleanor and Perrie strategically placed at the door, they knew what to do when we would get out.
The only positive thing I could think of was my loose dress that didn’t reveal any of that huge belly I had created through a cozy day of eating. I was glad that I weren’t wearing a tight dress like Em, even though her body didn’t show any signs of unwanted bumps anywhere. I’ve always wondered where she kept her intestines…


Soon – way too soon – the car pulled up at some tall building. The sound of hundreds of people speaking and shouting filled my ears and flashes from an endless row of cameras penetrated through the dark car windows.
Perrie had informed us that we would meet the boys inside where the real red carpet would be, even though there was also one laid out that led the way up to the entrance of the building.

“They will probably ask some questions about your clothes and your opinion about the cause,” she’d told us. Luckily we had prepared a few notes about the cause; The whole even was made to support families and people with tough lives through Christmas and the cold winter months.

“Ready?” Eleanor Asked us all snapping me out of my thoughts and I didn’t get to nod before she smiled reassuringly at us before the door was opened and she stepped out of the car, followed by Perrie, Em, me and then Aida.


The noise was deafening. People shouting questions, girls screaming and flashes blinding the eyes, but that was actually quite all right, cause then I would have to concentrate on walking straight in my heels, instead of actually acknowledging the hundreds of people staring at us. I followed the girls as we slowly headed closer to the flashes and the journalists. On our way there were so many girls waving at us with phones, pens and paper. At first both me, Aida and Em thought that they only wanted pictures and autographs from Eleanor and Perrie, but soon it became clear that their intense and excited eyes also pointed straight at us.

Wow. That felt quite cool.

We also quickly became aware that there weren’t any time left for acting insecure if you wanted to get just a small part of them satisfied, suddenly my hand was writing nonstop on different surfaces, I did notice that it was mostly pictures of the boys though. Even though I knew that they’d obviously just shown up because of them, I still felt incredibly honored that they wanted me to sign it as well. Most of them wanted pictures as well, and I really did my best to master a happy smile, but it honestly felt a bit weird that they wanted to have a picture with… me. Like, it was really weird.


After a few minutes of signing and smiling I saw the girls heading over towards the cameras and I followed them behind.
We were asked to get close together and take some pictures all the five of us, and then they also wanted a few of Aida, Em and I. It didn’t feel completely fancy though, since it was freezing and we had to keep on our coats to stay just reasonably warm.


“Where’s your coat from?” a woman journalist asked me at some point and I stopped to answer her.

“Uhm… I think it was from Topshop. Yeah,” I smiled kindly at her. “Just the one I use every day, but it’s really warm.

She chuckled at my answer before then asking: “Then I don’t suppose those are real Christiand Louboutin’s?” She pointed down at the red sole underneath my feet.

“Oh no, they’re good enough,” I told her. “They did cut in to my budget quite a bit though.”

“I see,” she laughed before we would head towards the main entrance of the building.

Notes