Nightlight (on hold)

Chapter 39

Chapter 39

"You look so beautiful!" I jumped up and down and clapped my hands obnoxiously as Eleanor appeared from her bedroom. Madeleine and Claire leapt up a second later than me, both announcing how stunning the bride looked.

I mean really, white was her color.

Us three bridesmaids donned light blue, floor length dresses that were very flattering and pretty but hardly stole the show away from the divine vision that Eleanor had become. She smiled brightly at all of us, and started to blink quickly.

"Hey, hey!" I snapped my fingers at her. "Don't you dare cry, El. Claire spent all morning helping you with your hair and makeup, don't you dare ruin it." I stared at her sternly, but we all knew my threats were empty.

"I know! I know! I'm sorry, I'm just so happy!" She sniffled. Madeleine quickly raced to the bathroom and came out with plenty of tissues, just in case Eleanor broke down.

She was already doing a lot better than I had done on my wedding. I had literally locked myself in my bridal suite and broke the rule that bride and groom couldn't see each other before the wedding. So thumbs up, El. She was practically a natural.

"Ok, c'mon you cry baby," I teased her lovingly, "let's get our bouquets and get this show on the road. We're already ten minutes behind schedule and we wouldn't want your beloved Louis sweating in his fancy tux." I, as maid of honor, decided to take control and start being bossy. We made our way out of El's and Louis's flat to where Zayn had been waiting for us.

Since Eleanor had no family, and Zayn had known Eleanor practically the longest besides Lou, she asked him to walk her down the aisle. So he was the only non-groomsmen in our group, but I knew he didn't mind.

"You look wonderful, El. Harry and I bet money that he'd cry at the altar, so do your best, love." I rolled my eyes at his comment. "You look amazing to, Darlin'." He smiled at me.

"That wasn't why I was rolling my eyes, you idiot."

"Well you do look good. Practically edible." He teased, his smile growing more devilish and his eyes glinting mischievously. I smacked his chest lightly.

"Keep it in your pants, hotshot."

If I was being completely honest, I would tell you that I was actually the one struggling to keep it in my pants. My husband looked so hot in his tuxedo, even up to the bowtie. It was light blue, and I thought it would look to preppy for his bad boy style. I was even prepared to make fun of him a little.

But of course he pulled it off perfectly, and with so little effort. While I had spent all yesterday pimping and prodding myself to look perfect, he had just thrown his clothes on and voila.

He laughed at me, but kissed me softly before ushering all of us out of the building.

We all piled in the limo excitedly and chatted about the reception, which was going to be a big event. It was going to be the last night of One Direction. So all the guys, all the other members- in addition to a wedding, it was a farewell. Eleanor had used her expert planning skills to make sure her wedding was a huge party.

And she didn't mind at all sharing her day.

The ceremony was beautiful, but I knew it would be. I, as the maid of honor, walked down with Harry, the best man. He teased me all the way up the aisle, but don't worry- I gave it right back to him. That fucker knew exactly who he was dealing with.

Claire and Liam walked together, looking a little awkward since the two weren't as well acquainted as the rest of us, but neither looked uncomfortable. We were all one big family and we all loved each other. Even Harry, who was a butthead, was worthy of my love.

Niall and Madeleine looked smitten as the two walked together. They had made it official just two weeks before, so they were still in their honeymoon period. Everything was perfect on the cloud that was their new relationship. It was really cute to be honest.

A little too cute, but that's just me being picky.

I tripped on my way up the aisle, but Liam helped to steady me. The audience chuckled a little, and I'm sure I blushed brightly, but luckily I wasn't the star of the show that day, so it was probably forgotten quickly. Since Zayn was back with El, he didn't see it, but that didn't mean Louis and Harry didn't reenact it for him later on at the reception.

Eleanor walking down the aisle was a sight to see. Zayn looked amazing, but I couldn't even remember his presence because Eleanor stole the show. All eyes were on her, and rightfully so. Her dress wasn't poofy or big, it was just a simple white frock that clung to her thin frame. There were pretty lace flowers, but other than that it was quite simple.

Which meant that all of her beauty was coming from her, and not the dress.

When they reached us at the altar, Zayn kissed her cheek and then took his seat in the front row. El handed her bouquet of pink roses to me and shot me a nervous smile. I grinned back at her broadly. I wish I could give her a hug of encouragement but that would not have been the appropriate time.

I leaned forward slightly, so I could see the groom, only to find Harry handing Louis a hankerchief.

Well it looks like Harry and Zayn had been right: Louis was crying.

I mean he wasn't really crying, but his eyes were red and teary and I guess Harry was being a jerk, as usual, and wanted to draw attention to that. I rolled my eyes, but stood up straight. Through the entire ceremony, Zayn and I kept catching each other's eyes. He was shooting me silly expressions, and trying to distract me, but I somehow managed to remain stoic up there.

"You may now kiss your bride!" When the pastor said these words, I quickly turned to watch Louis grab his bride quickly, and then dip her, much to the audience's delight, before placing a long lasting kiss on her lips. When Eleanor was set back on her feet, her cheeks were a hot red, but she was smiling more than I had ever seen her smile before.

"It is my honor to announce for the first time as a married couple: Mr. and Mrs. Louis Tomlinson!" The entire church erupted in applause and people were on their feet. The married couple held hands as they led the wedding party back down the aisle and out of the beautiful, old building.

Mr. and Mrs. Tomlinson hopped in an old-fashioned Rolls Royce and sped off to the next venue. The rest of the guests filed out of the ceremony slowly, all chatting with each other, before disappearing towards their cars. I waited with the rest of the wedding party, until everyone was gone.

"Where's Zayn?" I asked Harry when I couldn't find my husband anywhere.

"Here I am, Darlin'. Sorry, I was so far in the front, took me bloody forever to get out of there." He grunted as I was brought into warm arms and a gentle kiss was placed on my temple. The seven of us climbed into the limo and headed to the next part of the exciting day.




"Ready?" Liam asked the group of us. The six of us were huddled around our table, with a bottle of Smirnoff Harry had "borrowed" from the open bar, each with a shot in our hands. Zayn had told me I was allowed to drink, because the venue was secured. Everyone was relaxed and having fun, and almost everyone was drunk or at least buzzed.

I wasn't that experience with alcohol, so I was advised to take it slow.

"Just get on with it. Not everything has to be a fucking production." Harry urged.

"Ok. Never have I ever... done anal." Liam smirked maliciously. Harry narrowed his eyes at the brown-haired man and downed his shot quickly. I giggled at the obvious annoyance on the green-eyed man's face, but then turned to see my own husband putting his newly empty glass down.

"Seriously?" I furrowed my brows at him. He had done anal with someone?

"Long time ago. We're not talking about it." Was his response.

Liam grinned even wider at the fact that now I was nagging Zayn and Claire was nagging Harry about their past sexual endeavors. He filled up the empty shot glasses quickly, and then we moved on to the next person.

"Never have I ever..." It was Zayn's turn. I could tell he was struggling to think of something he hadn't done, but that he knew his friends had done. That was what the whole game turned out to be. Claire and I barely drank, since all the statements were made with specific incidents in mind.

And Sophia was there too.

She and Liam had been out on a few small dates and apparently it was going well. So, he invited her to be his date to the wedding, and she obliged. I was glad because it meant Claire and I got to spend some time with her, and we were all having a blast. She was about as sober as the two of us, though, but I could tell she was enjoying the way the guys were messing with each other.

I had told her that the endearing brotherhood charm got old real fast.

"Never have I ever snorted coke." Zayn's eyes glinted devilishly as he stared expectantly at Liam. The shot was quickly thrown back and Zayn's gaze was met with a glare.

"It was bloody once!" Liam snapped when his eyes met my questioning ones. I held my hands up in surrender and turned back to the rest of the table. Before we continued, however, Claire's delicate hand brought her drink to her lips and threw it back quickly. She gently set the glass down on the table and waited for Liam to refill hers, too. Her eyes met no one's, they were trained solely on the little glass she had marked with her dark red lipstick.

"Oi! When was this?" Her boyfriend demanded an explanation.

"I don't want to talk about it." Her eyes never looked up, until a large hand pushed her chin up roughly, forcing her to meet his green ones.

"Like bloody hell we're not talking about it."

"Harry, lay off." I snapped at him. I wasn't a fan of how angry he got at her over nothing really. It wasn't like she was an addict and she hadn't done it while they were together, I assumed. He only looked at me to shoot me a 'shut the fuck up' glare, and then turned his rage filled eyes back to his girlfriend.

"Stay out of this." Zayn ordered me lowly.

Claire pulled herself away from Harry and quickly bolted out away from us. He went after her seconds later. I wanted to go, to make sure nothing escalated, but Zayn kept a firm grip on me until we saw the two leave the reception hall.

"Leave it to Harry to ruin our fun." Liam muttered. He turned to Sophia, who had grown deathly quiet and her face ghostly pale. "Can I have this dance, love?" His tone softened when he spoke to her. She nodded, but never changed her fearful expression. The two disappeared in the herd of people on the dance floor. On the edge of the group of people were Niall and Maddie, who were holding each other and dancing slowly, despite the fast paced tempo of the song.

The bride and the groom were at the center, of course.

"Let's go check on them." I motioned towards the exit Harry and Claire had used.

"Leave 'em be." Zayn responded. "Harry won't hurt her, they just need to talk." He reassured me. I let out a sigh, the talk was what I was afraid of.

Claire had told me about the incident in question. It was shortly after she quit school to go live with her mother. She was a mess and she was depressed and she was desperate, so she tried some stuff. None of it worked to take away the pain like she thought it would, so nothing stuck, but that didn't mean she hadn't tried.

I was just very thankful nothing came of her experimentations.

But it would crush Harry to find out that he drove the love of his life into such a bad place that she tried to use drugs as a way out.

"C'mon, I'm gonna smoke on the balcony. Why don't you join me?" My hand was grabbed gently and I was pulled behind the most gorgeous man in the room and out onto the cold, crisp air of the balcony, which looked over London, so it was truly beautiful.

Zayn let go of my hand and fished out his cigarettes and lighter in his coat pocket. Once he was lit, he leaned against the railing at looked at me with an unreadable expression.

"Eleanor was right, you know." He murmured. I moved to stand next to him, but on the side away from the cigarette smoke. No matter how hard I had tried to get him to quit, it seemed pointless. Maybe with the fall of One Direction, he'd have more time to focus on NOT smoking.

"What?" I pressed.

"That it probably isn't a good idea to stay in London." He took a big drag of his cigarette and let out the smoke to his other side.

"Ok." I nodded, waiting to hear his plan. Zayn always had a plan of action, and I knew he'd have on for us. I trusted him completely.

"So I was thinking of places we could go. Louis was talking about moving to a house in a little village or something and having children and trying to be... I don't know, normal." He explained to me. I had heard that from Eleanor, so I guessed that's where Louis had gotten his idea from.

"That sounds nice. Would we go to the same place as them?" I asked hopefully. A breeze hit us, but before I could even shiver, his coat was on my shoulders. I started to slide it off and give it back to him, I didn't want him getting sick, but I was met with a warning look, so I kept it on and snug around me.

"Well, I was thinking that, but then I thought of something else." He finished off his cigarette and put down the butt with the tip of his shoe. He then focused all of his attention on me. "What if we move to America? You know, like to where your parents are, and David and the little ones. You could get your degree and I could figure out what the fuck to do with my life." He suggested quietly. I stared at him for a good minute or so, not quite sure how to respond.

I had definitely not been expecting that.

"Or not! You don't have to go back to school. I've got all this money now, we could do nothing for the rest of our lives and still have leftover cash." He added in quickly.

"No, no." I smiled. "that sounds perfect."

"Alright then." He nodded, looking very serious. He was deep in thought, I guessed that he was mapping out the next year or so, figuring out what had to get done. His eyes were cast off over the city lights, so I surprised him by grabbing his dress shirt and pulling him to me.

Our eyes met and we just looked at each other for a moment. His arms snaked around me and pulled me closer. Our lips met passionately and for a few minutes, all we did was hold each other and kiss. But when we finally stopped, our hold never loosened. So there we stood, on the balcony over-looking London, slowly swaying along to the music coming from inside.