Chapter 37

"Okay, what the hell happened between you and Lilly?" Niall asked as he hugged me from behind. I rolled my eyes before realizing he couldn't see me. 

"What are you talking about? Lilly and I are brilliant," I said, sarcasm dripping from my voice.

Niall chuckled. "Oh right, I'm so silly. It's not like you two have been glaring at each other or competing for Josh and I's attention."

"Big head much? It's not always about you," I teased, moving my head so I could kiss his cheek. I then shrugged him off me. Walking the short distance to the hotel counter, I snatched my ray bans and slipped them onto my head. "I'm going to the pool. I'm about as white as paper."

"Don't ignore the Lilly issue," Niall groaned in exasperation, giving me an annoyed look. All amusement was gone.

I crossed my arms, "I've tried talking to her, but she's been flat out avoiding me. Every time I'm around you or Josh, she gives me the evil eye. I know why she's been acting the way she has, I want to apologize for assuming the worst about her. But she won't give me the chance and I'm tired of doing all the work. She leaves tomorrow, so everything will go back to normal. Josh and Lilly can spend as much time together as they want, as long as I don't have to be in the same room as her."

"I'll call Josh and tell him to meet us at the pool. You will then sit down and talk to her." Niall grabbed my hand and started pulling me out the door. I planted my feet firmly in the carpet and refused to go any farther.

"Some people aren't going to get along with other people. Just because we are all connected through One Direction, doesn't mean I have to like her. Now, please leave me alone."

"You're being a real pain in the arse right now," he said, quite obviously perturbed.

"Yeah, well you're acting like we're in preschool and if you give us both a popsicle everything will be okay. I know you want everyone to just get along and be happy, but that's not how it works. We're not going to become best friends because we sit down and talk about our feelings. This isn't one of those cliché fan fictions about you, okay?" I said with arms crossed and annoyance seeping in my veins.

"Do you not see how this affects everyone around you? It's not just you and Lilly! Open your eyes and see that it hurts everyone around you. Because if you don't like Lilly and Lilly doesn't like you, people are going to start picking sides and it's going to create way more drama than we need. So please, just go talk to her and at least settle things. The death glares, the snarky comments to each other. Just make them stop!" Niall said as calmly as he could, although his fists were clenched. He gave me a look before leaving the hotel room, walking back towards his own.

Well that went well.

~*~*~

"Lilly! Wait up!" I called out to the blonde's retreating back. She turned momentarily, eyes meeting mine. She immediately shook her head and started speed walking forward. I groaned before trotting after her. Soon enough, I fell into step with her. Lilly ignored me, focused on getting to the pool. At least, that's where I assumed she was heading since she had a towel slung over her shoulder, sunglasses adorning her face and a bikini on under her clothes. "Lilly, can we please talk?"

"You finally gave into the boys' pleads to smooth our differences over, huh?" Lilly laughed with no amusement, not sparing a glance at me. We stepped out into the warm sun, the poolside almost completely empty. The girl headed straight to the chairs and I reluctantly followed behind.

"They've been after you too?" I said in a 'I'm trying to be cheerful even though I don't want too' tone.

"If they weren't blinded by the fact you're Louis' sister and they didn't feel so bad about the accident, they wouldn't even bother being nice to you." Lilly huffed, not even bothering to look at me.

"Oh really now? At least I didn't show up when they became famous. I've been there, even during the hard times." I snapped back, choosing to forget that I had promised myself to be nice.

"Yeah? Well sorry I didn't want to drag Josh into the drama that came with my dad's arrest," Lilly ended softly, eyes staring into the distance. "It's not exactly something you want to bother your best friend with when his career is finally taking off. He'd been waiting his whole life for that opportunity, I wasn't going to tie him down with my idiotic father's decisions. So, I apologize I didn't want to weigh him down with that."

I let out a sigh. Of course. Of course there was a completely good reason for it. Way to make me feel like an arsehole. "Sorry. I didn't know that."

"Not many people do. Not exactly something I like to brag about," she chuckled bitterly. "You don't hear people walking around talking about how they didn't talk to their best friend for two years because their father is a jerk and doesn't know what limits are."

"But he said he hadn't heard from you at all during those two years. Surely you would have texted him or something at least once. Why wait? Why show up now?"

"I did. I've tried. I typed out a message to Josh once a week, I just never actually got the nerve to press send. He sounded like he was so happy from what I saw on the websites and stuff. He was doing just fine without me. My dad was an alcoholic and an abuser. That's something I had kept from Josh our entire friendship when we were younger. Josh was my escape. So right before he left, when my father got arrested.. I couldn't just ring Josh up and be like 'hey my dad got arrested' because I never told him how my father destroyed my family." Lilly paused, taking a breath. It seemed as if this was the first time she was delving into this talk. "My father going to jail? That's when my entire family literally fell apart. My mom didn't know what to do, hell, she had spent the past twenty-five years living with that man. What was she supposed to do now that he was gone? I've spent the last two years picking my mom and my brother up from the depths they had fallen to. There was no way I was going to drag Josh into it. I was protecting him."

"He would have helped you. Why didn't you let him?" I asked softly, eyes wandering to the blonde. She looked miserable. I couldn't see past the sunglasses, but I was sure that behind the dark plastic, the girl was about to burst into tears.

"Because it wasn't his fight. I didn't want to be his charity case. So he left, he moved on, and I picked my family up from the ashes."

"Does he know all this?" I persisted in knowing.

"The gist of it. And as much as I hate admitting it, you're the first person I've really talked to about it." Lilly chuckled, slightly bitter. "The one girl I can't stand to be around now knows my deepest, darkest secret. Isn't this a real work of fiction?"

"Niall is going to be pissed at me until I at least get us on speaking terms. I'd happily say we can pretend to get along for everyone else.. But I know that wouldn't work. Please at least explain why you hate me so much, because it started way before I was mean to you."

"Why do you think?" Lilly said sarcastically, arms crossed and eyes focused in front of her.

"Because you've been hopelessly in love with Josh for the past several years? And you come back into his life to find out he's crushing on a girl who's dating his best mate?" 

"Wow, you're good at this guessing thing." Lilly rolled her eyes.

"He obviously likes you, though. I mean you're dating him. I'm pretty positive he's over me," I pointed out the obvious.

"It's not that easy. He can't just snap his fingers and be over you. The worst is that you continue to flirt and be just so nice to him. You're leading him on," Lilly snapped, the soft Lilly that had been present earlier was gone and frustration seeped from her voice.

"Like you don't do the same with Niall," I scoffed. "Speaking of which, why do you seem so intent on breaking us apart?"

"I don't know what you're talking about," Lilly replied indignantly as she picked up a magazine and started flipping through it. All types of connection we had managed to scrounge up while she talked about her dad were gone.

"Every time I'm with Niall, every time I talk to Niall, every time Josh mentions Niall and I.. You get so pissy. I have to admit, I thought you were aiming to steal him away from me."

"Because you seem like you're faking your affection for him," Lilly responded. "You almost seem like you like Josh more than your own boyfriend."

"I love Niall. I really do. What happened with Josh.. He was there for me when I was confused about everything, he helped me through a lot of really tough memories. I love that I know I can depend on him, but I love Niall. I want Josh to be happy, more than anything else. And if you make him happy? That's fantastic. I'll be happy for you two. I just don't want you to use him as your plaything or use him to get to the other boys. And I don't want you trying to break up the one thing in my life that is perfect. Niall is perfect and I love him more than I love anything else in the world."

"I would never use Josh. I'm pretty positive he's the one and I don't want anything to jeopardize that. That's why you annoy the hell out of me. You don't want him getting hurt? Then stop acting like he's a puppet on a string, he's not always going to do your bidding," Lilly replied, although the threat that had been present in her voice so far, was gone. She sounded more like she was just exasperated with the entire conversation.

"And I don't expect him to," I responded. "I don't want him to see me as anything more than a friend that will always be there for him."

"So I guess we're cool. Warning, I'm not going to start giggling, gossiping and getting Starbucks with you. We're not going to become best friends just because I spilled my secret to you, and just because we worked this little spat out." Lilly said firmly, sliding her sunglasses down to give me a look with her piercing grey eyes. "Can't say I like you. I'll tolerate you for everyone else's sake."

"Thank God. And thank God this is over. Now I don't have to hear Josh, Niall, Liam and Rosie all telling me to give you a chance a million times a day." I stood up, quite thankful that Lilly and I were no longer going at each other's throats.

Maybe things would finally calm down in my life.

Maybe.

Not likely, though.

Well, some of you were correct! Lilly had a secret. Will things get better now? Who knows ;) What was your favorite part of this chapter? What do you want more of? More feuds? More Josh/Brook? More Niall/Brook? More funny moments with all the boys? More sadness? Let me know in the comments! And don't forget to vote! 

(I'm really busy this week with school, look for the next upload hopefully on Thanksgiving!)