t h r e e

"I think your phone is ringing," I said into Niall's chest. I pulled away from him and watched as he clicked the red deny button on his phone screen.

"Don't you need to take that? It might be important," I said to him as he slipped his phone back into his pocket.

"No it was just Greg. I can call him back later."

"Oh," I said quietly. An awkward silence filled the air between us and I started picking at my nails like I always do when I'm in an awkward situation.

"Why-"

"The-"

We both started speaking at the same time and I felt myself blush.

"You go," Niall said to me.

I nodded, "The reason I came here in the first place is cause I... well I wanted to hear what you had to say. Your explanation I mean."

"Really?" he asked, surprised. I nodded and he smiled, "We can go inside if you want, it's kinda cold out here." He was right, it was absolutely freezing.

"Ok," I said quietly and walked over to where he was holding the front door open for me. When I entered the house, I immediately felt warmer. I slipped off my trainers and placed them by the front door side by side. He laughed and shook his head at how stupid it was of me to perfectly line up my shoes but I took no notice of him.

Niall began walking towards the open door of his living room, the room I'd seen him kissing another girl in. The door was wide open and I could see the large grey sofa that Niall and the woman had been sat on that night. There was a coffee table infront of it with guitar rested carefully on top of a pile of paper. 5 plates were all piled on the coffee table, all with crumbs on.

I reached the door way of the room and stared at the sofa. Images of Niall's lips on another girls flashed through my head and refused to leave.

"Lily? What's wrong?" Niall asked. He was stood infront of me and blocking out the sofa but the images didn't stop. Niall's hand brushed against my arm and I moved my head to look at my arm in one quick movement.

"Sorry," I said and shook my head. The images had gone and I was purely focusing on Niall's touch on me once again but he took his hand away as soon as I started making my way over to the sofa.

I sat down next to Niall and swallowed heavily. The sofa was cold and I wanted to cuddle up to Niall but, of course, I didn't.

"Before you start, if I start crying then I'm sorry. For some reason at the moment I've become very emotional so I'm saying sorry now," I burst out. He chuckled nervously.

"That woman who kissed me is called Ella. We've been friends for as long as I can remember. You know the evening you waited on me and her at the restaurant?" he waited for me to answer and when I nodded he went on, "That was the first time I'd seen her since the day before I went on X-Factor. I've been so busy with the band and everything I hadn't had a chance to see her. And then she got my number from somewhere and we decided to meet up and have dinner. It wasn't a date or anything, just a friendly dinner.

The night you walked in on her kissing me, I had no idea she was coming round. Before you got here, that night, I was basically yelling in her face that she needed to leave because I didn't want you to think that something had happened between us. She kissed me and I got caught off guard. The first time I pushed her away and sat down on the sofa. She told me she was leaving but actually she sat down next to me and kissed me again. That's when you came in. I pushed her away as quickly as I could but she is surprisingly strong and she held on as long as she could."

I was crying when he stopped talking. Half of me believed him and the other half was telling me that he was making it all up.

"How do I know your telling the truth?" I said quietly. He wiped a tear away from my face with his thumb and said, "Because there's no point in lying now. I just want you to know the truth about what happened."

I looked into his eyes as he said the words and I knew he was telling the truth. But I still felt broken inside.

"I believe you, honestly I do... but you still kissed her, even if you didn't make the move," I said and more tears fell from my eyes.

"I know, I am so sorry that I have put you through all this. I'll never able to make it up to you but at least let me try. Please," the hurt in his voice was as clear as freshly washed windows and it made my heart ache.

"I guess there no harm in letting you try right?" I smiled and he breathed out feeling relieved that I'd said yes.

And then he kissed me.

"Shit, sorry. I have to idea why I did that," Niall tore his lips off mine fast and looked down at his hands. I smiled at his embarrassment even though it was a mean thing to do, I couldn't help it. He was to cute when he was embarrassed.

"I don't know if I'm ready for that yet, sorry," I admitted and I felt myself flush red, joining Niall in being embarrassed.

"Yeah that was pretty stupid of me," he rubbed the back of his neck and I wiped my eyes that still had tears in them for some reason.

"It's OK," I tried to get rid of some of the awkwardness between us but it wouldn't go anywhere. So instead we sat in silence for however long on Niall's sofa with just the sound of our breathing filling the silence.