my crush harry styles:)

~chapter 9~

Chapter 9!! Guys enjoy and comment, vote and share please!! Sorry I haven't updated for ages!!

~chapter 9~

Next morning, Buster wakes me up with a frenzy of barking and tail wagging. I pull back the curtain and peer through the window, and there is mum looking bright and smiley, picking her way across the grass with a tray laden with breakfast treats.

We have only been in Cheshire a couple of days, but already Mum looks younger, more relaxed than I have seen her in years. I open the door and sit down on the step with the quilt wrapped round me, and Buster streaks past me, jumping up at Mum, his tail waving madly.

Mum laughs and swats buster away. 'No sausages, silly dog ...'She tells him. 'Did you sleep OK, (y/n)? Were you warm enough?'

'I slept fine,' I say. 'I was really toasty, and buster curled up on the end of the bed like a big fluffy hot-water bottle.'

Mum sets the tray down on the dew-damp grass and spreads a picnic blanket, and after a few curious sniffs to make sure there are no sausages to be had, Buster abandons us and trots off up to the house in search of breakfast. His loss. The tray is loaded up with orange juice and yoghurt and hot chocolate, and Mum hands me a plate laden with fresh pancakes and maple syrup, possibly the best breakfast ever invented.

'Don't be getting ideas,' Mum tells me. 'This won't happen every day, but I thought, just this once ... to celebrate your first night in the house. Besides, I wanted to show jack my pancake skills. I think he is impressed!'

A smile tugs at my lips. 'Of course he is,' I tell her.'You are the pancake queen of Australia.

'My fry-up skills are pretty legendary too,' mum says.

She sighs and takes a slurp of hot chocolate, and I wonder if she was really fooled by Amy's Little Miss Innocent act yesterday.

'It's all a bit frantic, isn't it?' she goes on. 'I feel like I haven't had a chance to talk to you properly since we got here, and I wanted to make sure you were OK.'

'I'm OK,' I promise. 'It's a bit like being thrown in at the deep end, but ... Tee and Lia and kacey

are really nice ... and Jack is lovely, obviously, but ...'

'... but?' Mum echoes.

I sigh. 'Well, I'm not sure Amy is mad about having us here,' I say carefully. 'She seems a bit ... prickly?'

Mum nods. 'Just a bit. I had an idea that something wasn't right, yesterday, but I didn't want to make a big scene, for Jacks sake ... I think we will have to tread carefully with Amy.'

I sigh. Tread carefully is right ... I have a feeling that life with Any will be like picking your way through a minefield. There could be explosions at any minute.

'She's not a happy girl,' she says. 'Jack knows she's struggling, but hes turned a blind eye for a while, thinking it would help. I guess he's been hoping Any will snap out of it, put the past behind her ... Well, maybe she will ...'

Mum frowns, looking into the distance, as if at something just out of reach.

'I suppose I'm saying that I know Amy might try to make things difficult,' she says. 'Just be careful, and try to remember she's not quite as tough as she seems. OK?'

'OK.'

'It's going to be fine, (y/n),' mum grins. 'This is such a huge change, for both of us, and for Jack and the girls too. I'm not saying it will be easy, but I know we can make this work. I never imagined I'd get another chance to be happy ... well, you know, the way I was happy with your dad. I've always wanted to be able to give you a proper family, and now I think maybe I can ...

'I want you to be as happy here as I am,' she goes on. 'It's the start of something wonderful, I know it is. Jack and I ... we've been friends for a long time, so we know each other well. To find each other again, to fall in love ... it's more than I could have hoped for. We share so many dreams, so many interests. We can work together, on the Bakery and cafe.

'I've done a lot of research and I'm certain we can make it work. Jacks going to design a website, put together an image, and once I have all my facts and figures sorted I'll put together a proposal for the bank, see if we can get a business loan. It's exciting!'

mum looks so happy, so hopeful, that I fling my arms round her and hug her tight, so tight I can smell pancakes and maple syrup on her breath.

There is nobody in the world I love more than my Mum. I want her to be happy, because she deserves to be.

'It's time to live the dream,' mum says. 'It's not easy to join together two families, but it can be done, and I think it will be worth all the effort. Jack and I so want it to work ...'

'I know,' I say, and I can't keep the smile from my voice. I want to be a part of this family too. Jack... And his daughters ... all of them are a million times more amazing than anything I ever dreamed of, because they're real. I never imagined someone like Amy in the picture, of course, but in the bright light of morning I wonder if I am worrying too much about her... She saw me talking to Harry, and if he told her I'd been flirting with him - well, no wonder she got the wrong end of the stick.

Harry is probably the kind of fickle, flirty boy who chats up any female between the ages of five and fifty. That would be enough to make anyone mad, but I am not interested in Harry styles not one bit. I expect he is the kind of boy who likes to keep a whole bunch of girls dangling, his own personal fan club. I for one do not want to be a part of it.

Amy will see that, and slowly she will realize that I am not a bad person, and that Mum is cool and kind and good stepmum material. We can make the jigsaw pieces fit after all ... maybe.

'I want it to work too,' I whisper. 'More than anything ...'

'Well then,' Mum says. 'We'll have to make it, won't we?'

It feels like a pact, a promise.

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