alright so this is the end of strange as it seems i'll miss these characters so much omg :')
BTW SPECIAL THANKS TO WANI AND MICHELLE FOR READING IT AND ALWAYS GIVING ME FEEDBACK I LOVE YOU GIRLS
i know there were some of you reading it and not giving me feedback, boo you
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Epilogue.
It had been one year, three months and twelve days since that day at the garage. Niall had counted them because he just couldn’t believe that what was happening was true and not a dream, and he wouldn’t wake up all of a sudden and be back in the Atwood High School, which was his Hell but also Heaven through four years.
In such a little time Niall and the boys were travelling around the world and, as Harry said once, girls were screaming their names out of their lungs, but Harry wasn’t fully right. Lee wasn’t ‘nothing’ for Niall, not even after that year. He learnt not to hate her and forgive her, but she was still there in his mind as a bittersweet memory. He sometimes thought about her and remembered all of their soft words and sweet moments, and he was able to smile. That used to make him smile even bigger; nostalgia is such a beautifully sad feeling.
That night they were in New York. They were touring around America, and that night the concert was in The Big City, and it was impossible for Niall not to think about Lee. He wondered if she still lived there, and he was sure she did even though he heard that she was having trouble there, but he knew Lee was a rough girl and would never leave something without finishing it.
And just because of that, when Lee got to know that the boys were in New York, she did everything that was in her hand to finish what she started a long time ago at that swimming pool.
“Wow, that was simply amazing. Best gig ever!”
They back at the hotel after the concert and Niall couldn’t stop smiling. He was sweaty, his throat was sore and he was exhausted, but the crowd had been so amazing he just couldn’t stop smiling. Just when he sat on a couch, a bodyguard called him,
“Niall, someone is waiting for you. She’s waiting up in the roof.”
It was a dark cold night up in that eighth floor of that incredibly big building; the lights of the city didn’t allow the stars to show. Niall went upstairs with his bodyguard and his heart racing with a strange feeling. He kept asking the bodyguard who was it and the man just kept shrugging, and stayed inside when Niall opened the door to the roof and the wind hit him in the face.
He saw a very familiar figure looking down from the fence, her hair blowing under her shoulders with the wind. It was shorter now, probably hanging in her shoulders, and she had dyed it lighter. When she turned around and Niall saw her face, he swallowed hard.
“It’s a shame that this city has so many lights, you can’t see a single star…” She said, slowly walking towards Niall. “But it’s beautiful anyway, don’t you think? It’s a 24h movie.”
Niall couldn’t help a short laugh and simply said, “Lee.”
They looked at each other for a moment and then hugged. They held each other tight like old friends do, with a big grin on their lips and closed eyes.
Niall pulled away and grabbed her by her shoulders, a bit away from him to take a good stare at the girl that was now a complete 20 years old woman -even though that hair made her face look younger and smoother.
She was as beautiful as always and couldn’t stop smiling.
“Lee.” Niall said again, not able to say any other word.
“It’s been such a long time, right?”
“One year, three months and twelve days.” He replied, and then looked at his watch. “Thirteen now, it’s past twelve.”
“You’ve been counting the days, huh? I see you are doing fine… You don’t know how hard it was to get here; I’m lucky that Zayn saw me and recognized me.”
She walked away from him, back at the fence, and Niall followed her steps. Both of them placed their forearms on it and looked down at the fleeting lights of the cars.
“I just can’t believe what’s happening, my lips hurt too much for smiling all the time and my ears still buzz from the last concert and…”
“And you made it.” Lee cut him off, looking at him with emotional eyes. “You said you weren’t good enough, but you are. I watched you everyday in the X Factor, and you were perfect, even your audition… But I have to say that the first time that you sang Truly, Madly, Deeply, it sounded better to me.”
Niall nodded with a half smile while glancing up to the dark sky, and then watched her light a cigarette. And as she did it, the light of the fire made something in her chest shine and catch Niall’s attention: it was the ring that he gave her for her birthday last year. That made him get tons of memories that crashed against his body like a wave of concrete making his lungs run out of air and his eyes get wet.
Lee never took off that light chain.
“Why are you here, Lee?”
Lee’s eyes flew up to meet his and saw the tears menacing. She frowned and bit her upper lip in that way that Niall loved.
“I guess I wanted to apologize for what I did to you.” She murmured. “It was selfish and childish, and I… I haven’t stopped thinking about it since then. I haven’t stopped thinking ‘What if I had told him that I lied, just to protect him, when I said that I never loved him? What if I had told him that I loved him as much as the first day? Would we be together now, would he love me back?”
She said all of this looking into Niall’s eyes, and he had no doubt that, this time, she wasn’t lying.
“You couldn’t stop bossing around, huh?” He smiled sweetly and his eyes turned little, making those tears travel to the corner of his eyes. And then he said with a broken voice, “I’m really glad to see you again, Lee.”
And she replied in a whisper, “Do you think that we could be friends again?”
There were no ulterior motives in her voice, it was completely innocent and desperate; she truly needed Niall to be her friend again. He nodded repeatedly and kissed in her forehead, rounding her body with his arms and finding again that warm feeling that used to wrap their hearts. And Lee had to bury her face in his chest to let out all the blame and pain she had been keeping inside, and the tears blurred her eyes and stained Niall’s shirt with black make-up.
