Liams POV (set before last Jades POV and the kiss etc, then you'll be able to tell when its present time)
Right. I need to sort this out ASAP. I have this theory, and whether I have it because I want to or not is completely irrelevant. I just need to be sure of it before I do anything, and Jade goes home soon. And by soon I mean in like 3 days. My guess is that Jade likes me. And I know for a fact that I like her, except if I either tell her I like her or kiss her or something and she doesn't like me, I'll most likely have an early funeral, but if she does like me then we could be happy, but I don't want to risk my possible untimely death. You see my dilemma?
I need to get her to admit it to me, but how?
"DING DONG!" I gave a little chuckle, she's just too sweet. I don't even know how she even had the courage to speak to Jade, let alone get so close to her.
"Coming Cat!" Time for our little party-planning sesh. I sound like a teenage girl. What's wrong with me today?
I opened the door to a bubbly excited Cat. "Planning time!" She squealed. Cat's already a great friend, but how Jade can cope with her almost 24 hours a day I do not know.
******
I shut the door behind Cat and just stood there. "You hear that Liam? Silence." I smiled to myself and went to triple check the plans Cat and I had made. I could hear muffled voices coming from next door, but I didn't take any notice of them. Right, Cat said that if Jade was going to have a party at all she didn't want it to be all cheesy. So the theme: Mainly black and white. We were going hire the party room thing, and have karaoke, and a dance floor, and a chocolate fountain, etc.
She could have coffee flavoured chocolate! I know Cat said not to plan anything without her but this was just too good. Jade loves coffee! It couldn't fail. We'd have to have a none-coffee chocolate fountain for the people who don't like coffee of course.
As I went to write it down my door swung open and made me draw a huge line across the whole page of plans.
"What the...! Niall?" I took in Niall's bright red face, bruised left cheekbone, slightly swollen lips and pissed off expression. "What happened to you?" I touched his left cheek and he winced away from my fingers.
"Jade happened." Jade? What's he talking about?
"Could you try giving me a little more detail? That's kind of vague..." I raised my eyebrows and he glared at me. Now this is a Niall you don't see very often. It's also kind of hard to believe that this is the same guy we said looks like a furby.
"Well you know the way Jade was mean to all of us and scared all of us, then got used to all of us, and then was as nice as she could be to us and then she starts to flirt with me, so I think 'Woah she likes me'. Then I go to her room because I was on my way to see you but Cat was in here so I went into her room. I didn't say anything to her I just walked in and she was facing away from me. Jade thought I was Cat and started talking but I turned her round and kissed her."
SAY WHAT NOW. Ok did he just say what I think he said?
"Then Jade kisses me back and it's all good, but then Cat comes back in and Jade finally opens her eyes, and looks shocked it's me. She tells Cat she's not Tori whoever that is, then slaps me and asks me to leave then starts apologising to Cat!" Ok, me and this boy need to talk.
I'm annoyed, but I don't want to act all jealous over someone I'm not even dating. I need a cover, but luckily, Niall's given me one. Cat obviously likes him but he's too busy smushing his lips on other people. I can just say I'm angry at him not noticing Cat (which I am but that's not my key issue here).
"Right, first off: you don't just walk in and kiss someone, and of course she was shocked, you just basically sexually harassed her!"
"But she kissed me back and-"
"I'm not finished yet. Second: did it ever occur to you that Jade broke up with Beck literally like a week and a half ago? She didn't get a chance to see who you were. Jade probably wanted it to be Beck. The reason Jade reacted the way she did is because- Well, there are so many different reasons, but her best friend likes you and she just watched you kiss Jade. You're not the only one who's affected by this Niall. This could have possibly ruined their friendship."
Wow. I could be an Agony Aunt. If you have a problem, write in to Aunt Liam for helpful advice!
Niall though for a minute and then his eyes widened. "Oh my God, I need to go and apologize to them both, especially- both of them!" I grabbed onto his arm. I didn't say anything, but my look said it all. He couldn't go now, they needed to sort things out between themselves. And he can't really go up to Cat and be like 'Hey I know you like me so I'm sorry I kissed your best friend.' can he?
Niall let out a big sigh and sat on my bed. About 10 seconds later the rest of the guys and Anna fell through the door laughing like maniacs. Anna was trying to talk but just kept on laughing. She managed to draw breath just about long enough to force out a few words. "Did you... Did you see his face?" Then she collapsed in a heap on the floor, still laughing. Guessing I'm not the only one who gets weak knees when I laugh too hard. The guys all nodded and helped her up.
Then Louis finally realized Niall and I weren't laughing and stopped. "Hey what's wrong with you guys?" He ruffled my hair and put his hands on Niall's cheeks making Niall wince again.
"Woah, what happened to your face man?" Zayn looked shocked. To be fair, Niall's cheekbone was now a deep purpley-blue colour just under his eye and it was quite swollen.
"Nothing ok!" He suddenly got up and pushed through everyone and stormed out of the door. Everyone looked at me with questioning eyes. I just shook my head at them, but they wouldn't take no for an answer. They kept poking me and trying to trick me into telling them, but I wouldn't crack. Or I thought I wouldn't, until Louis started tickling me.
He said he'd only stop if I told them what was going on, so I gave them a brief of what they missed. When I'd finished, they all just sat back and were completely silent. This was never a good sign. Then (as always) Louis was the first to break. He spluttered and then started chuckling, and then everyone joined in. I couldn't help it. Only Niall could do something like this.
When we'd all calmed down Anna and Harry said they'd go look for him. We let them go and settled down to play on our DS's.
*Anna's POV*
"We've been looking for Niall for ages! Can we go and do something else?" Harry whined at me. He looked so adorable with his bright puppy dog eyes and curly head. "It's only been 10 minutes!" But he just made his eyes wider. I shook my head and ruffled his hair. I gave in.
"Fine, we can go back down to the pool," His little face lit up and he grinned, creating the huge dimples in his cheeks. "But, you have to give me a piggy-back ride there." His smile turned into a frown. I put my hands on my hips. Harry rolled his eyes and crouched down, so I jumped onto his back and he raced off.
******
We'd been at the pool for a little while when Jade came over looking stressed. I sat up. "Hey, you ok?" I gave her a small smile.
"Yeah. Why wouldn't I be ok? I'm fine. Just great. Absolutely-" Harry put his hand on her shoulder.
"Jade, Liam told us what happened. That was quite a shiner you gave Niall." She rolled her eyes, but I could still see a hint of pride in her face among the guilt, even though she was clearly still stressed.
Jade turned back to me. "Hey, Anna can I talk to you for a minute?" I nodded and stood up and followed her a little way away from Harry.
For a while, she didn't say anything. She just stood there biting her black nails with a small frown line between her eyebrows. "Jade, tell me what's wrong. Why did you want to talk to me? I mean, you've only known me... Less than a day." She looked at me, and she was blatantly trying to decide whether to tell me or not, but then she relaxed a little bit.
"To be perfectly honest, I don't really know. I guess it's just you're a girl and not as close with Niall as the others and I feel like I can trust you. Can I trust you?"
I nodded my head and she told me about her problem with Cat wanting her to tell Niall but all the problems that could come with it.
"I think that you need to talk to Niall, but not about Cat liking him. Well, not specifically." Jade looked at me with a confused expression. "I mean, Niall already knows Cat likes him. Liam showed him just how obvious it was to everyone else. So what you need to do it tell Niall to pretend that you told him, not Liam and you don't have to be all awkward, but Cat still trusts you."
Jade considered it for a moment but then looked stressed again. "Can't you see? I don't want to talk to Niall about Cat at all!"
"Ok ok, I'll talk to him for you, but you still need to talk about what happened." She nodded and looked away. She still looked nervous. I opened my arms and pulled her into a hug. I don't think Jade is a huggy sort of person because it took her a moment to respond, but I felt her arms hesitantly slide round my shoulders. I felt the tension leave Jade's neck and upper back so I let go. I was about to turn around to leave but she called me back. Jade shuffled a bit and then took a deep breath. "Thanks." I smiled at her.
"It's fine." But she looked a little frustrated.
"No, I mean it. I seriously don't say thank you to people, but... Thanks. It means a lot." I nodded and gave her another hug and she was quicker to respond this time. I let go and went to back to Harry.
"So, what was that all about?" I tapped my finger on the end of my nose and he huffed.
"It's top secret stuff Harold. Now, I need to go find Niall."
******
*Jades POV*
Anna just text me to say she spoke to Niall about an hour ago, but she doesn't know where he is now. Strangely I have an idea of the exact place he might be.
I was right. I walked in and looked around to see Niall in the furthest corner from the door with a plate piled high with food. I walked over to him. he had his back to me so he couldn't see me.
"I thought it was only girls who comfort eat." His fork froze halfway to his mouth.
"What do you want Jade?" I walked to the other side of the table and motioned to the chair, but he just grunted. I took that as a yes and sat down opposite him.
"I want you to forgive me. Please?" Ok, too much of this apologizing stuff. Now I know why I never did it. It's awful, because I actually have a conscience. Niall looked thoughtful as he chewed.
"I'll forgive you and tell Cat it was you who told me her feelings," I let out a breath I didn't even know I was holding. I guess I'd become closer to these guys than I realized. Come to think of it, it's nice having friends that aren't scared of you. "If-" There's an if. I knew there would be an if. Things can never just be simple can they? There's always an if. "You sing a song about yourself being a bitch at your party that's supposed to be a surprise but I know you already know about it. No one has to know it's about you but you have to do it. You have to acknowledge that treating people like that isn't good. I know it's a bit stupid, but humour me."
I gave in because after what I'd done to the guy, it was the least I could do. We laughed and chatted for a while, but then Niall went serious again. "I'm sorry for kissing you, I shouldn't have done that. It's just, why did you flirt with me when you knew Cat liked me?"
Ah. There it is. The question I'd been dreading and hoped I'd gotten away with not answering. I couldn't back out of it now. I had to tell him. This might not go too well. Explanations were never something I wanted to do, so I always subconsciously made them as brief as possible, which also meant they were quite blunt.
"I saw Cat talking with Liam the other day by the pool, then he said something and she gave him a hug, which I didn't really care about because Cat hugs everyone, I mean, you saw the way she was after karaoke. Anyway, I didn't care, but then she-" I paused. I don't know if I could say it. It's no big deal to anyone else, and I don't want him to yell at me for causing all of this fuss for nothing. He raised his eyebrows at me, waiting for me to continue. "She kissed him on the cheek!" I blurted it out. There I've said it.
He looked a little bewildered. I don't blame him, I would to. "So, they talked, hugged, and she kissed him on the cheek?" I winced "That's what all this is about?" His accent sounded so cute and his voice so concerned that I looked up into his eyes and gave a small, slow nod.
"But Jade, I don't get what the problem is here." Here it comes. He looked confused, and then I saw the light in his eyes as the realization crossed his face. Here it is. I feel like Cady from Mean Girls right now. Word vomit.
"I think I like Liam."