Day 5        Charlotte POV            (December 21st 2013)

It was evening time on the fifth day. We were all huddled up at the center of the room- trying to keep warm from the awful chill that hung in the air. I was putting some heat back into Zayn’s fingers by rubbing my palms back and forth over them. While Niall sat beside me, his hand on my back, Louis started up another conversation.

“So what was the first thing you thought, Charlotte, when you met us?”

I slowed my speedy hands and thought about it. “Umm… I was scared. Very scared, actually. Now that I think about it… that had to be the most nerve racking thing I’ve ever done.”

“Aww come on! We aren’t that bad looking.”

I shot Liam a smile. “That’s not what I meant. I loved you guys. So I didn’t want to look like a babbling fool.”

“Did you ever have posters of us? Hanging above your bed and all?” Zayn asked, seriously intrigued.

Before I could utter a response Niall was swooping in.

“Oh yes she did!”

I turned around to face him. “And how do you know this?”

“Your mum told me,” he answered smartly.

“When did this conversation happen?”

“Before we were dating.”

I rolled my eyes. “Okay, I might have had a few -”

“From what she said it sounded like much more than a few,” Niall interrupted with a grin. “Hundreds, even.”

“Okay Mr. Exaggeration. I did not own hundreds of face blow ups. I could barely even afford the small ones on my allowance budget.”

“AHA!” Louis exclaimed. He pointed a slender finger at me, his grin appearing wide behind his peach fuzz facial hair. “So you do admit to owning our faces!”

“Yes, Louis.”

“Next question then,” Zayn cleared his throat and said. “Charlotte Hemming: which boy was your favorite? You know, before you met us and all.”

I blinked, utterly shocked. “Are we playing Interrogate Charlie… or what is this?”

“Yes I think that’s what the game should be called. A very appropriate name,” Louis said sassily with a nod.

“Answer the question,” Zayn said, holding an invisible microphone to my mouth.

He couldn’t be serious.

I looked around at their faces and let out a sigh. I couldn’t ignore the way they all eagerly leaned to the center of our circle. Liam raised a furry brow when our eyes met. Lou bit his lip, probably ready to hear his name roll off my tongue. Zayn kept the invisible mic to my face and a sparkle in his dark, round eyes.

They were going to beat it out of me, one way or another. They always got me to squeal.

“You want the truth?” I asked them.

They all nodded.

Leaning into Zayn’s microphone I slowly revealed, “Harry Styles.”

“YES!” Harry hollered like he had just won the freaking Olympics or something.

“That hurts,” Liam cried.

“I’m sorry… you wanted the truth,” I said with a shrug.

“Was it the hair?” Hazza asked. “I bet it was my hair.” He smirked cockily and leaned back a bit.

“Next question!” I said above the chatter.

“Oh no no no,” Harry tisked. “You aren’t getting off that easy. I want to hear more about your little crush on me.”

“It wasn’t a crush!”

“Suuuure,” Louis laughed.

I shoved my face into my hands. “Can we stop this game?”

“NOPE! I wanna hear more!”

“Harry…” I sighed. I should have never told them anything.

Louis nudged Harry. “It’s only fair that if she tells you about her little crush that you spill the beans about…”

“Shut the hell up,” Hazza responded quietly through gritted teeth.

I raised an eyebrow.

What was going on there?

I decided that if I wanted even the slightest chance of hearing that juicy secret I had to spill a couple of my own.

It would be hard: but I could do it.

I took a deep breath.

“Okay, fine.”

Everyone stared at me, eyes wide with anticipation.

Jesus, those boys could be so strange at times.

“Okay I admit it. Before I met any of you I might have had a thing for Hazza.”

“And it’s a good thing I’m not the insanely jealous type, or this would be real awkward,” Niall said. It was true, I definitely lucked out there. Niall was really good about those things.

I smiled. “That being said though, I would have killed to know any of you.”

“Killed? God, that’s viciously violent,” Louis said with a faked look of disgust.

I swallowed the lump in my throat before saying, “And… I owned a Harry Styles shirt.”

Silence followed.

“HAHAHAHAHA!” Lou died laughing.

Zayn caught his breath in between giggles to ask, “Was it one of those Mrs. Styles ones?”

I gave a shy nod. My cheeks were like little red apples.

As everyone kept the hysterics up I just sat there and rolled my eyes. “Okay I get it… its lame. But I’m not going to be the only one telling secrets here. So it’s someone else’s turn.”

“Anti-clockwise. It’s Zayn’s turn,” Niall pointed in the opposite direction than he was in.

Zayn stopped laughing at me.

Everyone was staring at him.

“A secret?” He clarified.

I nodded, a smile playing on my lips.

“Okay…” He took a deep breath. “I may or may not have stolen Liam’s toothbrush… and sold it on Ebay.”

“THAT’S WHERE IT WENT?!”

“Good job, Zayn. Way to get it off of the ole chest. Does it feel good?” Louis said.

“No… I didn’t ever feel guilty about it,” Zayn replied. He carelessly shrugged. I giggled.

“Well okay then,” He looked to Harry. “It’s your turn my friend.”

Harry looked a bit pale.

I leaned forward in my seat, ready to hear something good.

“…I couldn’t tie my shoes until I was nine.”

My shoulders dropped.

“That was a shitty secret,” Niall said from beside me.

“Well I’m sorry. Now it’s Liam’s turn.”

Liam smiled. “I don’t have any secrets, I’m afraid.”

“You can spill someone else’s,” Louis suggested.

Was it just me, or did Harry suddenly look very sick?

“Good idea, Lou!” Liam said. After a thoughtful moment he said, “In that case, I would like to share a Horan secret that needs to be shared. It’s been eating me away for a while now… someone from Charlotte’s school called the Chiall house a while back.”

I looked to my boyfriend.

“Sorry mate, but I think you needed some help admitting that one.” Liam shrugged.

I asked, “Who was it?”

Niall sighed, “It wasn’t-”

“Who. Called. Me?”

I had a sneaking suspicion but I wanted to hear the name straight from his secret keeping lips.

“Jasper.”

I blinked. “Why didn’t you tell me?” I practically begged.

“I didn’t want you to get upset,” Niall explained. “Liam said I should- but I didn’t want the call to ruin our trip.”

“It was recently?”

“Yeah. Right before we left,” He said. “I was going to tell you when we got back home.”

“You should have told me when it happened.”

“I know. But I couldn’t figure out how to, you know? How was I supposed to tell you that Jasper called and wanted to rekindle some sort of relationship?”

I stared at his face blankly.

“He did?”

“Yeah. And he sounded pretty fucking sincere.”

“Woah,” Zayn said.

“Yeah that’s what I was thinking,” I said softly to Zayn. “Woah.”

Jasper? THE Jasper? The one I had spent my entire school life loving was… actually interested in me? My stomach got this sickening knot at the thought of him. I didn’t like Jasper anymore. The guy I discovered to be a douche, the guy who pushed me down in the courtyard, the guy One Direction beat up for me? How was I supposed to like him?

“I’m sorry I didn’t tell you,” Niall said almost skittishly.

“No that’s okay,” I replied. “I understand.”

Niall blinked his two blue eyes. “You- you do?”

“Of course I do. I’m just glad that someone finally said something about it,” I said with a shrug. It stung a little that he had kept a secret from me, but I was willing to forgive and forget.

“I just didn’t want him to say anything that would hurt you again,” he said with a sad smile.

I nodded, giving the grin right back. It wasn’t because he was being jealous; it was because he cared about me so much. And I couldn’t be mad while butterflies were flying around my tummy.

“AWW!” Louis said. “Look at that; Doctor Phil is working his magic again.”

“Doctor Phil?” Liam repeated.

Louis nodded. “I call you that sometimes… in my head.”

“Okay then, fella. It’s your turn,” Doctor Phil told Lou.

Harry stood up from the ground. “I don’t really wanna play this game anymore. I think we should eat.”

“We ate earlier,” Zayn argued. “Get your arse back down here.”

Harry groaned and did so.

Louis grinned at him sneakily.

I had no idea what was going to come out of Lou’s mouth when he took his turn.

I sure as hell didn’t think he was going to say what he did.

My jaw dropped.

 **************************************************************************************

Harry POV

“Harry is in love with Emily!”

I cringed as Charlotte turned to stare at me. Her open mouth switched into a playful smirk.

“I knew IT!”

I felt myself blushing like a little school girl. I ran a hand through my hair and groaned. “It’s not a big deal,” I lied.

“What’s going on between you two then?” Liam asked. He was confused, as he should be. I myself had no fucking clue what was up between Em and I.

“Hazza wants her back,” Lou rambled.

I mentally strangled the bugger.

“Then why the hell did you break up in the first place?” Charlotte practically screamed.

I avoided the question.

“Because Emily won’t talk about it at all,” Charlotte said. She narrowed her eyes at me. “Hazza say something. You can’t just pretend like it didn’t happen. Tell me please! I’m dying!”

I made a big show of rolling my eyes.

Everyone was staring at me expectantly. Even Lou and he knew the story.

“I hate you,” I told Louis.

“I can live with that, as long as Harily survives.”

I sighed.

“Fine. But no one tells Emily,” I said while glaring at Charlotte. “Keep your trap shut, okay?”

Hesitantly she nodded.

I thought about where to start. “Okay… If you really want to know why we broke up, it’s because Emily freaked out on me.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Charlotte asked.

“It means she got scared and ran away. And I told her that if she wasn’t ready for something more serious than we were done.”

Charlotte shook her head left and right. “I knew it,” She said softly.

“Whelp. Charlotte knew what she was talking about when she wrote She’s Not Afraid,” Zayn said with a shrug.

“I just don’t understand,” Charlotte sighed. “She’s still crazy about you.”

I laughed bitterly, “Okay. Sure, let’s go with that.”

“Charles, you pretty much told the future with that song.”

“Not really,” I said. “She’s supposed to come back and the end of it all…”

“And she hasn’t,” Charlotte mumbled. She rubbed her face tiredly. She looked almost as exhausted by this topic as I was.

“But you know what, it’s okay. I got over it. I’m over it,” I said quickly. No one needed to be worrying about my love life; especially Charlotte.

Charlotte eyed me suspiciously. “Don’t lie to me, Styles.” She sat up on her knees, her dark wash jeans making noises against the ground. “The story doesn’t seem complete.” She searched my face, looking for any telltale signs. “Tell me the rest,” Charlotte ordered.

“There’s nothing else to tell!”

“LIAR,” Louis coughed into his arm.

Charlotte smirked knowingly. Her cherry painted lips revealed little dimples in her cheeks.

“Dammit,” I huffed. Those two were driving me insane.

“Come on Hazza. You can tell us anything,” Niall said.

I ran a hand through my hair and finally broke down. “I made a mistake, okay? I made a huge fucking mistake and just threw everything out the window.”

Charlotte glanced at Niall. He shrugged.

“I didn’t give it enough time dammit. I just walked out; I just walked out and left her all alone. If I had just helped her… Given her more time. And when she called I didn’t answer,” I said. Quieter I added, “I just let her go.”

Liam looked at me pitifully.

I shoved my face into my hands and mumbled, “God, I’m so stupid.”

I was so stupid. I just let her go. I should have seen it before, but she was the one. We had broken up that past February, right before Valentine’s Day. And ever since then I couldn’t get her out of my head.

I tried again to find somebody. But Emily wouldn’t get outta my head. Her sweet voice was all I heard, her freckled face on everyone in the crowds. And I missed those red curls. No one compared.

“I bet she hates me,” I said.

“Emily doesn’t hate you, Hazza,” Charlotte reassured sweetly.

I looked into her deep brown eyes, wishing they were the bright green ones I missed so damn much. “I bet she’s dating again,” I said.

Charlotte’s silence was all I needed to hear.

“Figures,” I mumbled.

“You’re dating, too!” Zayn added.

“Nothing serious,” I defended.

“Taylor seemed pretty serious about it,” Niall said.

I sighed, “Yeah and that’s where we disagreed.”

“Emily’s been trying to find someone new, but nothing’s worked out so far,” Charlotte said with a shrug.

“What about that one lawyer guy- Randy? Was that his name?” Niall asked her. “I thought she really liked him?”

Charlotte shook her head. “No the lawyer was Todd. Randy was the professor. But they haven’t found the time for a third date.”

“Lawyers and professors?” I gawked. “How the hell am I supposed to top that?”

Liam shrugged. “You had your chance buddy.”

“Don’t remind me,” I groaned.

“She want’s you back. Somewhere, deep down inside, Emily needs you.”

I blinked at Charlotte. Was she for real?

“But you can’t give up on her, Harry,” Charlotte added. “Because she’s scared to be in love.”

I nodded.

“So you’ll try?”

I looked over to Lou. With a nod and a sly smile on my face I said, “If you think it will work...”

Charlotte grinned.

“TEAM HARILY!” Louis screamed. Then he gave Charlotte a loud high five.