Water Under the Bridge ›› n.h. mature

Thirty-Two

Kate Marshall

What a fucking night. I'm tired but mostly elated. The sex gets better each time.

I started trying to pack up my stuff to leave for Oslo. But I was distracted as I thought through every detail from the night before. Never have I felt so confident with someone. It was never like that with Connor. I wonder how Connor is doing actually. But he never made me feel like that.

I was positively giddy as I rolled my suitcase out of my room. That is until I saw everyone else's faces. No one looks like they slept very well. Worry lines were evident on each face.

Aren't I just the biggest bitch on the planet. Everyone has been worried sick about the explosion near the stadium last night and I practically forgot with what my night turned in to. We loaded up and got ready to head to Oslo.

"We wanted to bring you up to speed," Paul said to us once we were seated on the bus. "Last night's outage was caused by a transformer exploding, cutting off power to the region. At this point the city believes it was a freak accident and not done deliberately. Although you can see how dangerous of a situation someone could have created if it was intentional."

"I thought it was a bomb," Liam admitted.

"It sounded like a gun shot to me," I said.

"For all we knew at the time, it could have been either," Paul said. "That's why it was so important to get out of there as quickly as possible. Thank you all for your quick reactions last night."

"Why do you sound skeptical that it was a freak accident?" Niall asked. Paul did say that like he wasn't convinced.

"I think they were awfully quick to make the determination. There are politics at play too if they still want acts to come to their city to perform. Plus the liability of it all."

Everyone thoughtfully considered what he said, looks of concern all around. It's unsettling to think about being lied to.

"But I'm not paid to speculate!" Paul kidded. "Just wanted you to know what we're hearing and know that we think you are completely safe. Please come talk to me if you have concerns."

Paul left our bus for the crew's bus and the engine started up a few moments later.

"Last fucking thing I want to worry about is the potential that it was deliberate," Louis muttered.

"I was shaken," Harry admitted.

"Me too," I agreed. Niall nodded and his eyes met mine. We were sitting next to each other, a little closer than usual. But really everyone was sitting closer than usual after last night. People like to be tethered to someone.

Louis wondered out loud what fans thought of it and if word had spread beyond just those who were at the concert last night. He pulled out his phone to look. After a bit of scrolling, clearly something else had caught his attention.

"So this is the next big plan, huh?" Louis asked. He spun his phone around to show a picture of us headed out to the bars the night before last.

"What do you mean?" Harry asked.

"Look," Louis said. He scrolled to another picture that was more clear.

I leaned across to see what he was talking about. There on Twitter was a string of pictures of Liam and me climbing out of the van then walking into the bar together. It looked oddly intimate. Considering I lived that moment and it wasn't intimate or flirty at all, that was unsettling.

"What does it say?" Liam asked.

"That you guys are dating."

"What?" I was trying to piece together how such a big leap could be made from a couple pictures.