Time of Our Lives

*Kariann’s POV*

The next couple of days went by quite slowly. Dakota has been doing what she can to keep her mind positive and off of the issues with the media. Funny enough, she’s actually been talking to Bonnie more often, through texting and calling. If I wanted to be honest, I felt kind of left out. She’s been confiding a lot in her friend instead of me, but then again I could understand. I was sure she just wanted to talk to someone that wasn’t involved in all of this. She just wanted her space.

I noticed that the magazine was gone. If I had to guess right, she may have thrown the thing away. I was sitting on the couch, looking through my phone, bored. I was so done with worrying about everything. I wish I could just do something besides look at the threats that are posted all over Twitter.

“Kariann?”

I looked up, seeing Harry standing in front of me. He was casually dressed, ready to go somewhere. “Yeah?”

He looked around, only able to see Dakota behind him, quietly talking on the phone. He took a seat next to me, whispering so only I could hear. “Listen, me and the guys are getting ready to head out. Niall got us all tickets to an amusement park. So…”

I started to grin. “You want us to tag along?”

“It’ll get your mind off of everything.” He answered, smiling.

“Hell yeah, then.” I said, holding up a hand for a high five.

He gave me one and I stood up, walking over to Dakota. I squatted down so our faces were level. She turned her head that was laying on the couch. “What?”

“Niall got us tickets to an amusement park. Get your ass up and get ready, cause we’re going.”

Her eyes lit up at the sound of an amusement park. “No way! Holy Moles, Bonnie, I gotta go!”

She nodded into her phone, Bonnie giving her last minute details on something. “Yeah. Okay, I’ll call you sometime when I get the chance!”

She hung up, sitting up on the couch. We both waited until the rest of the guys came downstairs dressed and ready to go. We took our time getting ready and once we were done, we headed down to meet up with the guys. “The van’s here.” Zayn pointed out, looking out the window.

“Let’s go!” Niall said excitedly.

“You can ride in the van with us. There’s plenty of room.” Liam said, being one of the last to get out of the bus.

We followed after the boys, being the last to climb in the van. I was stuck in between Zayn and Harry, whilst Niall was between Dakota and Liam. Louis was in the very back, taking over the whole row. I stared out the window past Harry. I noticed he was staring down at his phone. “Made any progress with that girl yet?” I asked.

Harry looked up, slightly confused by the question, but shook his head as if remembering. “Oh, well, with everything that has been going on these past few days, I haven’t had the chance to talk to her properly.”

“That’s too bad.” I sighed.

“Maybe I’ll talk to her when we get to the park.”

“Cool.” I said, smiling at him.

The rest of the ride was quite silent. Everyone’s excitement began to rise when the rollercoasters came into view. “I can’t wait to ride on them!” Dakota said excitedly.

I noticed Harry made a scared face. “We’re riding coasters?”

“Why else would we be coming?” Niall asked.

“Harry hates them.” Liam said, as if remembering.

“Seriously?” Dakota asked, then laughed. “What a pansy!”

Harry pouted. I nudged him with my elbow. “Hey, I’ll stay with you during the rides if you want.”

“Seriously?” He asked, eyes widening, smile broadening.

I nodded. I didn’t have anything against rollercoasters, but I knew the feeling of being left alone in an amusement park. “Aw, that means some of us will be riding alone.” Dakota pouted. “Oh well.”

The driver stopped in front of the entrance, saving us a walk. We climbed out one by one. I found it surprising just how empty the park was considering it was near the end of summer. “This is great!” Louis said, “No people around to mess with us! Hell yeah, let’s go!”

He started walking ahead and Niall ran to jump on his back. Today was seriously going to be fun. Not surprising how everyone wanted to get on a rollercoaster first. They all got in line and Harry and I decided to wait on them. “I got a feeling all their going to ride are the coasters.” Harry pouted, checking out the map. “There’s… seven of them! Jeez.”

I thought for a moment before grinning at them, “Wanna ditch them? We can check out the other rides while they have their own fun.”

“You sure? I thought you wanted to hang out with the others?”

I shook my head, “It’s okay. It’s better than being stuck on a bench while they have fun.”

I brought out my phone, dialing Dakota’s phone. I could see her in line so I know she wasn’t about to board yet. “Yeah?”

“Harry and I are going to walk around and ride other rides, so we can meet up later.”

I saw her move in line to see where we were. “Oh, okay. Let’s meet up for lunch then. We’ll see you later!”

From here, I could see the biggest grin on her face. She waved, along with the other four. I stood up, hitting Harry’s shoulder to get his attention. “Come on, let’s go.”

He got up and we started walking. His nose was still stuck in the map as we walked. “What should we ride?”

“How about the first thing we pass?” I asked, looking at him.

He shrugged. “Alright. Screw the map, I can’t understand it anyways.”

I laughed and we walked for about five minutes before we came across our first ride. “Seriously…?” Harry asked.

It was a mini-coaster for little kids. I laughed and grabbed his arm, “Come on. We agreed on the first ride. It probably doesn’t last three seconds.”

He made a face but otherwise came along. I kept my arm wrapped around his. I never realized how long we were like that until we got up to the person who was to lead us in. “On a date?” He asked, grinning at the two of us.

I blinked, not saying anything at first. “Sure am.” Harry grinned.

“Your girlfriend scared of the big ones?” He asked, pointing up at a rollercoaster.

“Ah…”

I snorted. “Hell no. He’s the one who pussied out.”

Harry gaped at me, not believing what I said. The guy and I laughed as he let us in. We got tucked in, Harry pouting at me. “You totally just killed my man pride, you know.”

“Love you, Harry.” I smiled, laughing.

Was I imagining things? I could’ve sworn he just took in a breath, like he just lost it. I looked around, seeing kids get in the ride. “Okay.” I said, looking around. “How about the next ride we get on not being a kiddie ride?”

Harry nodded quickly, agreeing. The ride took off, but that didn’t keep us from having fun. We screamed like little kids, having the time of our lives. We were laughing as we got off, even receiving some glares from parents. We walked around, lost but not caring. We saw the next ride being the Tornado. I loved these things. Harry looked like he wanted to puke watching it spin as fast it did.

“Hazza, do you have an issue with fast rides?” I asked, watching his expression as he stared at the ride.

He swallowed before shaking his head. “Nope. I’m perfectly fine.”

That didn’t really answer my question, but seeing how he somehow mustered the courage to step on the ride, we got on anyways. The ride started, speeding up quickly as we spun around. There were multiple couples on and people moving around as the thing spun. I found myself laughing, looking over at Harry. To be honest, I was shocked nobody even noticed he was here.

The ride stopped and we got off. It was when we were walking and how quiet Harry was being did I realize something was wrong. I looked up at him. His face was white as a sheet. “Harry?” I asked, stopping him from walking.

He swallowed, bringing a hand up to rub his eyes. “Whoa… I feel dizzy.”

I grabbed his arm and led him over to a bench. He sat down, rubbing his face in his hands. I rubbed a hand on his back. “Do you want something to drink?”

He shook his head. “No, I’ll be fine, just give me a moment.”

I continued to rub his back as he took in some breaths. “How often do you even come to amusement parks?”

“Well…” He started. “I try to avoid them. I hate rollercoasters and I get dizzy easily. Normally I come for the water parks. Water slides and stuff I’m completely fine with.”

“Too bad there’s no water park.” I said, sighing.

Harry took a deep breath before sitting up straighter, looking at me. “It’s fine.”

“You sure?”

His eyes softened as he looked into my own. He smiled. “Yeah. I’m having a lot of fun hanging out with you.”

“Oh, my God!” I heard from a distance. Harry and I looked over, seeing two younger teenagers coming over. They looked over Harry. He had part of his hair put back and was wearing glasses. “A-are you Harry Styles?” The blonde girl asked, holding a book to her chest.

“Ah, ya.” Harry said, giving me a quick glance.

“And you!” The brunette pointed at me. “You’re the girl who’s picture in all over Twitter right now! Oh, my God! Can… can we have your autographs!?”

The blonde held out her book to Harry, who reached up to sign it. What shocked me was the brunette had a book in front of my face. She stared at me like she was expecting me to do something with it. Harry nudged me. “Are you going to sign it or not?”

“What?” I asked. “You want me to sign it?”

The brunette nodded. “Please.”

I took the pen, staring at the blank page. “Come on, Kariann!” Harry rolled his eyes. “How hard is it to do a signature?”

“Shut up!” I stuck my tongue out at him. “I never signed an autograph before.”

I scratched my name down, sticking the pen in the crease. Harry was next to sign hers as the blonde came over to me. “Since you’re Kariann, the dark hair girl is Dakota, right?” I nodded at the blonde and she smiled. “You girls are like our idols. Because of you, you gave us a small speck of hope that even normal teens can be friends with celebrities. You made it possible for us to dream.”

I smiled at her. “Thank you. I wish my friend was here with me to hear this. She really needs it right now.”

“Oh! Dakota.” The brunette exclaimed. “Yes, we heard of the rumors of she and Louis going around. I just wanted to say that I never believed it in the first place. Louis’s too good to his girlfriend for that to happen. Now after meeting you, I believe you and Dakota are awesome girls. I wish we could be friends.”

I wasn’t sure what to think, but these thirteen year olds made my day. They asked for a picture and we took it with them. They thanked us before running off. “I don’t believe it. Harry Styles is sitting right here and they were only interested in talking to you.”

I stuck my tongue out at him. “You’ll live. Are you feeling better?”

“After hearing that. Yeah, a hundred times better.”

We got up before we started walking again. The next sign we saw was of a rollercoaster. “The Fright, huh?” I looked up, hear screams as people on the coaster did flips.

I looked at Harry. His face was pulled up in fear. “Holy shit, what if they fell out?”

“Their strapped in.” I rolled my eyes.

“But still…” He muttered.

“Come on.” I urged. “I wanna ride something-“

“Wait. Let’s ride this.” Harry said, grabbing my arm to stop me.

“Huh?”

He pulled me into the line for the coaster. “You’re seriously going to ride this?” I asked, raising an eye at Harry.

He nodded. “Yeah.” His face froze for a second before looking down at me. “For this time only, so feel honored.”

I shook my head, smiling. “Whatever, Styles.”

We neared the front of the line. I urged him to sit in the very front, but he would only settle for the second row. We took our seats and after everyone was set, the coaster set off. “Oh, my God. Oh, my God. Oh, my God.” Harry breathed, speaking fast. We were rising. Along with everyone else, I put my hands in the air. “What are you doing!?” He practically screeched.

“What do you mean?” I asked. “Everyone does this.”

He let out a breath. “I’m going to die. I can already see it.”

I brought a hand down, forcing his hand nearest to me free from the bar. I intertwined our fingers as I held his arm up some. “What-“ He started, but didn’t otherwise pull away.

“You’ll be fine!” I yelled as we neared the top. “I’ll be right beside you the whole time anyways.”

We dipped over the top, going from slow to very quick in a split-second. Harry’s hand tightened in my own as the coaster did its dips and turns. I screamed in excitement, laughing. Harry was doing the same, only he was freaking out. The ride barely lasted three minutes and came to a stop to let us off. I stepped off first and kept a hold on Harry’s hand just in case he got dizzy again.

I had to lead him to a bench again and we sat down. “Harry, seriously, I don’t like that we have to take a ten minute break every time we get off a ride.”

“Hence why I always avoid theme parks.” Harry said, looking up. He brought a hand to his face again, only then did I realize my hand was still intertwined in his, resting on his leg. “Harry…”

He looked up, curious. I felt his green orbs pierce into my eyes. I blinked, forgetting what I was going to say. “I think that rollercoaster is getting to me.” I said, taking a deep breath.

“Looks like I’m not the only one with coaster issues.”

I rolled my eyes. “Whatever.”

I felt my pocket beginning to buzz with someone calling. Thankfully Harry let my hand go so I could reach down my pocket and get my phone. I didn’t even look to see who was calling. “Hello?”

“Honey?”

Alex? Whoa, for the first time in a while he called. I couldn’t help it though, a smile was brought onto my face as I spoke through the phone. “Hey, babe…”

*Harry’s POV*

Dread filled my body as I watch the smile lit up on Kariann’s face as she spoke through the phone. A smile I’ve seen on her face so many times that it was directed toward one person and one person only: her boyfriend. I sighed, resting back against the bench to let her talk on the phone. We were having so much fun together. She even held my hand, something I wasn’t expecting at the time but didn’t complain about either. Why did it have to be him?

Why not me? “Hey…” I said, touching her shoulder.

She looked at me, wondering what I wanted. “I’m going to go find a restroom. Stay here, I’ll be right back.”

She nodded, continuing to speak into the phone.

Me and the guys had to leave onto a plane tomorrow morning to go to Vancouver. Since the girls didn’t have passports, they couldn’t go. They were to stay in the tour bus and ride from here in Utah to Washington. That only made my heart ache, because after our concert in Seattle, the girls were to take a plane home.

Who knew when we would see them again? I talked to the guys and we said we would visit them one last time before we were to take a plane home back in England, but even that seemed impossible since they were to start school again. So basically, after today, we had one day left together.

That really sucked. I didn’t go to the bathroom, since I didn’t even need to go. I just walked around, killing a few minutes of time before heading back. I didn’t want to hear her conversation with her boyfriend. It made me too jealous. It made me want to rip the phone out of her hand and just throw it. I really needed to chill out.

“Harry!” Kariann called out, waving as I was walking back.

She was off the phone, thankfully to me. I had my hands in my pocket, giving her a side smile. “Ready?” I asked.

She nodded. “Oh, Dakota texted me. They said they were going to have lunch soon. We should meet up.”

I nodded. She stuck her phone back in her pocket as she rose. Somehow it felt as if that phone call caused us to distance ourselves. Before we would walk right next to each other, arms brushing. Now she was about a half foot away from me. Maybe it wasn’t that big of a distance, but I didn’t like it. I wanted to be where we were before she answered that phone. Me holding her hand as she checked to make sure I was okay.

Damn it, seriously, I needed to get my head out of my ass sooner or later. We met up with the others and decided on some pizza for lunch. During the time Liam got a call on his phone. “Ay, photo shoot is canceled. We can stay longer!”

We cheered. I was happy to spend more time with Kariann. We separated from them, making our way around the park. “Hey, look, it’s a Ferris Wheel.” Kariann pointed out. “Wanna ride? Or are you afraid of heights too?”

I rolled my eyes, the phone call made hours ago long forgotten in my mind. “Whatever. Let’s go.”

We got on the ride. Slowly we were reaching to the top. “We’ve been here for a long time.” Kariann said, noticing the sun starting to set.

I nodded, agreeing. “Yeah…”

We were silent for a while, watching the park get slightly broader and smaller as we rose in the air. I looked over, seeing Kariann. Her chin was resting on her hand as she stared out the window. I casually rested my head against the window, continuing to stare at her.

“How long are you going to sit there and stare at me?” Kariann asked after a moment, looking at me.

I shrugged. “I guess until we get off this ride.”

She snorted. “You’re missing quite a view out there.”

“You’re all I need to see.” I whispered, too low for her to hear. A small smile spread across my face, at least she didn’t scold me for staring.

“So, tell me,” Kariann started, resting back against the seat to look at me. “What caused you to want to ride that rollercoaster?”

“Uh…” I started, rubbing the back of my neck. “Facing my fears, I guess?”

Kariann shook her head, finding it hard to believe me. I leaned forward, resting my elbows on my knees. “Okay, do you really want to know?”

She cocked her head. She nodded after a second. “It’s because you were there.” I leaned back again. “I knew that if I became scared or pussied out, you would be there to help me through it and not judge me for it.”

“So what are you trying to say?” She asked, raising an eyebrow. “Are you saying I’m just some sort of babysitter?”

I smiled, laughing some. “No. I’m saying with you here by my side, I feel like I can face anything. Whether it’s a rollercoaster or whatever. You give me the courage to do anything.”

Kariann looked out the window again. “I don’t see how. I’m just a simple girl.”

“That’s all you’ll ever need to be with me.” I said, studying her expression.

Her mouth twitched. She looked over at me again. Our eyes met, staring into each other. She frowned, trying to read my own expression. Was she finally catching on? Does she realize my feelings for her yet? Just how obvious did I need to make it? Did I literally need to crash my lips onto hers to make her realize it? I took a deep breath before standing up to walk over to her.

*Kariann’s POV*

Harry was standing in front of me. The carriage shook some and it was beginning to scare me some. “Harry-“

He bent over in front of me, placing a hand on my shoulder. I looked up, founding myself to be staring into his green eyes. I could feel his breath tickling my face. I saw his head move over some and his eyes close some. I felt my eyes widened. Was he… His eyes looked up at me as his hand moved from my shoulder to the front of my face. “There was a loose hair.”

He stood up, dropping the hair to the side. I swallowed. What the… I could feel a huge blush coming onto my cheeks as he took a seat on the opposite end. I felt the carriage stop, this time it was our turn to get off. “Thank you for riding!” The worker said, leading me out first.

Just what was I expecting? Did I seriously think there for a second that he was going to kiss me? I touched my still heated face. God, Kariann, just… No. Don’t think about Harry like that. I already had a boyfriend and he had a girl he was already interested in. There was no way in hell we could happen. Just friends. Yeah, just friends. Shit, I really needed to stop this.

A hand grabbed my arm, making me stop. The sensation was so overwhelming that I couldn’t help but stare down at Harry’s hand that was touching me. What the hell, I didn’t feel this way when we held hands before. Oh, God, now I was thinking about that. “Um, we’re supposed to meet the others over there.” He pointed with his free hand.

I nodded. “Yeah. Sorry, I’m a bit tired.”

“Should I put a leash on you so you don’t go wondering off?” Harry asked, grinning some.

I rolled my eyes. “Whatever.”

We started walking again. Somehow it felt that we’ve gotten closer. Our arms were brushing and somehow I kept counting each brush that happened. Fuck. I really needed to stop this. I was leaving home in two days and I really didn’t need to be developing feelings for a boy that I know I’ll never end up with. Just ignore it. I was good at that.

Besides, Harry already had a girl he cared about.