His Princess

Days began to turn into weeks. Life continued on, and it was getting painful. I don’t think it was necessarily that I wasn’t with him as much as it was that there was still so much undecided about us. He was getting frustrated, although he would never admit that. I could tell by the way he was always tired, aside from the fact that he wasn’t getting much sleep with the touring and all. Then he took even more time to talk to me, and from there . . . . he was just exhausted. I couldn’t help but feel guilty about it, as I should’ve. I was hurting him.

We even fought a couple of times about it. Once, we hung up on Skype in the middle of a fight only to quickly try and call each other back. He beat me to the punch, though—not that I minded him wanting to call me back so desperately.

Another night, he got drunk. I mean, he got wasted, and he started singing a song off of their new albumto me—one of the deluxe edition songs, I might add, called Illusion. To tell you that I was close to breaking in that moment is an understatement. If my uncle hadn’t come in yelling, I probably would have, but instead, I had to quickly go and hide my computer.

I got beaten again, but he wasn’t as violent as last time. Niall was freaking out, mostly because he heard the yelling and put it all together. Of course, the next time I talked to him, he was paying close attention to my face to see if he hurt me again. This time, however, he just slapped me and left an ugly red mark on my face that was gone within a couple days.

Each time Niall saw something new, he got more and more pissed about it. I honestly thought he was about to find a way to jump through the camera and beat the hell out of my uncle, but we all know that’s not possible. He had tried too many times.

Before one of their shows, I was surprised to get a group Skype from all of them. When I looked surprised, Liam quickly informed me that it’s a thing they do. Anyone who has a girlfriend, they Skype her on occasion, and all five goof off. Mostly they try to embarrass the one whose lady is being called, but they enjoy themselves.

That got me excited to hear, even though Niall said, “Guys, she’s not my girlfriend,” and looked quite irritated about it. I felt guilty, sure, but I was also happy to hear them say that. Me, Emmit Aldaine, Niall’s girlfriend?

That’s all I wanted right now was to be just that, and I began feeling my resolve dissolving away. It was, really, only a matter of time before I caved, so why bother extending it out? Why not just go for it?

Ugh. I can’t give in so easily. I can try to fight off the disaster.

While they were being goofy and raiding Niall’s underwear stash to show to me, it gave Niall and me some time to talk. He looked much different from the last time I saw him, but only because with each day, he grew more and more upset about everything. His hair was growing out, more brown than anything as it did, but the most obvious thing wasn’t his pain. It wasn’t his hair. It was the dark, puffy circles forming under his eyes that they hadn’t gone through makeup to cover up yet.

He began touching the screen, and I did the same. It made him smile a little, but his poor sensitive heart had been broken, and it was going to take someone fixing it to make him smile again like he was known to do. “I miss you.”

It made my heart flutter to hear this, but I dimmed my smile to say, “I miss you, too, and I’m sorry to have caused you all of this trouble.”

He shook his head slowly and forced a smile. “Don’t worry about it, Em. One day, it’ll be worth all of this.”

“You’re so certain that everything’s gonna be just perfect and peachy for us,” I said, and he actually laughed. “What?”

“I am certain. It’s a little hard to see sometimes when you get all stubborn, but then there are times where I know it’s only a matter of time,” he said. “You know it too.”

I didn’t answer but instead changed the subject. “Well, good luck tonight.”

That got a bright grin across his lips, and the boys came back into the picture. “Yeah. That right there tells me I’m right.”

Harry was waving Niall’s underwear in front of the camera, and I just laughed as Niall took it from his hands and began sitting on it. “Hey, Emmit! Did you know that in Indonesia, if they catch a man masturbating, they decapitate him?”

My eyes were slightly widened when I heard this news, but mostly I was confused. “Wait. Which head do they cut off?”

That got all five of them laughing. Louis actually fell over on top of Niall while Zayn and Liam propped each other up to laugh. Harry was just rolling on the floor. Actually, I think he really did fall onto the floor laughing and started rolling from there.

“I’m serious!” I insisted, but I couldn’t help but laugh myself. “I mean, honestly.”

“I think it's actually only punishable by a sentence of thirty-two months, maximum,” Niall answered for me, and even though he was still laughing a little, in the background, I heard some of them still cracking up hysterically. “I think this will be a good show, lads.”

“Thank you, Emmit!” Louis exclaimed, and he gave me his “sexy” smile while fluttering his eyebrows. “That made my day.”

Right about that time, though, I heard the front door slam, and my uncle was immediately yelling at me. I planned for this to not happen, but for whatever reason, he was home early.

Niall knew exactly what was happening, and even though he hated just leaving me like this, he quickly said, “We’ll talk later, Em. We gotta get going.”

And just like that, he ended the call. It was just in the nick of time, too, because I barely managed to shut my laptop and slide it up under my bed before my uncle came barging in with a strange object in his hand.

It was hard and slender, and he didn’t hesitate to throw it at me. “You dirty little whore! What’s this I hear about you hanging out with five guys?!”

Oh dear.
*** Niall’s hands shook more violently than he could handle, but he turned away from the confusion on his bandmates’ faces so they couldn’t see the agony on his own. As deeply as he felt it inside, he was certain it was plastered all over his face.

“Niall . . . what was that about?” Harry asked. “There was still time before we planned to call Perrie.”

“Call Perrie,” he said, but he could scarcely breathe enough to get the words out. He felt helpless and weak, beyond pathetic. He just cringed as horrible thoughts filled his mind of a large man beating the living shit out of tiny little Emmit.

What if he decided to just kill her?

That thought sent Niall into panic mode as tears fell down his burning face, and his body began hyperventilating. No matter how much he thought to take deep breaths, it just wasn’t working.

Her stepdad couldn’t do that! If he did, Niall would make sure he rotted in prison until the prison rotted on top of him, and then he’d move him to another prison and let that prison rot on top of him as well.

Really, if he killed her or even severely injured her, it was going to be really ugly really fast, but that didn’t change the fact that she would be gone from his life forever in a way he couldn’t fight.

“Niall, what is going on?” Louis demanded. “Look, if something’s wrong, we need to know about it too.”

“He can’t tell you,” Harry whispered, and Niall was grateful for that. “He promised Emmit he wouldn’t, and he won’t break that promise.”

Everyone was worried now. Niall hadn’t been the only one to hear the yelling in the background, but they were beginning to piece it together.

“I’m calling her back,” Liam said, but Niall knew it wouldn’t work. Liam quickly figured that out when he got back to the computer. “She’s offline.”

“Call her cell,” Louis suggested.

“Guys, no,” Niall whispered. “She can’t answer right now. She’s . . . busy.”

They understood. Without telling them, and without breaking his promise, they understood exactly what was going on. They understood why Niall looked as if he was willing to jump through that computer and throw it all away for her because that was honestly how he felt in that moment. Rage and agony boiled and churned inside of him, and he just ached to be with her again.

“That’s . . . why she’s making this so complicated,” Liam said, and now, Harry looked absolutely horrified. “She . . . doesn’t want you to get involved with her abusive family.”

“Just her stepdad and mom,” Niall disagreed. “That’s why she was so happy about us meeting Mika like we did. Mika needed hope, and we gave it to her. Guys, we changed a girl’s life the same day her older sister changed all of ours.”

It didn’t surprise Niall to see tears in everyone’s eyes as he looked at all of them, but within a couple seconds, the five of them had a tight grip on one another that was unbreakable. All of them crying together, whispering how their friend had to be alright . . . it was a heartbreaking moment. Niall had already accepted this, but seeing his brothers cry like this about a girl who they had only seen cause him a lot of stress and pain made Niall realize that Harry had to be right about them.

Liam was also right the other day when he said that one single person had changed five lives forever because she had, and this was just changing them some more.

Perrie called when they didn’t call when we were supposed to, and they all acted like they were just fine . . . except Niall, who didn’t bother trying to pretend that he was.

Perrie noticed the way Niall looked at his hands and didn’t goof off like the rest of them were trying to, and she sighed. “Niall, is that girl still playing you?”

The entire mood of the room shifted, and in a single instant, Niall felt the anger boiling in his chest all over again as his eyebrows rose. “What?”

“Niall, she’s doing this for the attention,” Perrie insisted. “Just think about it! She’s been unknown all of her life, and now she’s known as the girl who refuses to date Niall Horan and is best friends with One Direction. What other reason does she have?”

“She’s not like that!” Niall snapped. He hadn’t meant to snap like he had, but it was a lie that Niall was in no mood to hear. Perrie jumped at the sound of his rage, and it surprised everyone. Niall didn’t stay in the room to be lectured or asked to apologize. She didn’t even know what she was saying! It was just a bunch of lies, and Niall couldn’t handle it at that time.

He didn’t really know where he was going, but eventually, he just sat down on the elevator of their hotel and rode it up and down. When no one was on the elevator needing to go somewhere, he pushed random buttons himself.

Harry knew just where to find him after he had been on the elevator for a few trips up and down, and for a few more rounds, he just rode in silence beside him. Neither of the two had to say anything to know that this upset the two of them more than any of the others. Niall was falling for this girl. Harry was becoming best friends with her, and now he had to face the harsh reality that she was being abused at home, possibly as they sat there.

“I noticed makeup on her face that day we all toured New York,” Harry finally said. “It was strange looking, but I didn’t question it. Didn’t think I had a right to. She also walked funny sometimes and had her hand clutching her side. Do you know why?”

“He cracked a couple of her ribs,” Niall explained, voice very dry and somber. Raspy even. “Busted up her face really bad. She’s lucky he didn’t break her nose. Just bruised it.”

Harry leaned back against the elevator and sighed. “Why do some of the most beautiful things have to be ruined by the hideous world out there?”

Niall didn’t have an answer for him, but there wasn’t time to answer either. Louis, Liam, and Zayn found them then, and they were hurrying them down to the lobby of the hotel. Security and management shuffled them along into the SUVs, and they were off to the stadium.

Niall knew that for him, at least, this was gonna be one of the hardest shows he had ever had to do.

Makeup was miserable. Lou styling Niall’s hair was miserable. It was just a miserable time, but when Niall looked around, the misery was all around him. He hated seeing it, but even as Lou questioned it and demanded an answer, no one gave her one.

It wasn’t until 5 Seconds of Summer finished and the sound crew began putting on their microphones that Niall said anything, and when he did, it was directly to Zayn. “I shouldn’t have yelled at Perrie like that. I’m gonna apologize.”

He shook his head. “No need. She realized that she was wrong and plans to apologize to you. I understand. She was judging her completely wrong, and it was not the time to hear that.”

Niall looked down to his shoes, unable to stop the water that started filling his eyes. “What if she’s not okay?”

“Then we have a sick bastard to kill when we get done with this,” Zayn said, and that was how Niall was able to go out and fake a smile, even knowing that the girl he was somehow already falling for could be in serious danger.

Emmit, please be alright. Please?

Notes

The lyrics are from the wonderful song Learn From the Night by the wonderful band Sent By Ravens. :)

Hope you guys enjoy! I love getting new people interested in this story. Thank you so much to those that have been here from the beginning, and those who are finding it now, thank you. :) I hope you all continue to enjoy this story.

Let me know what you think. :)