The Other Harry #Wattys2015

Chapter 22

-Chapter 22-

Pulling myself onto my knees, I grit my teeth and try to push out the pain in my bones with a heavy breath. It doesn’t work but I draw my head up, trying to catch sight of my assailant as the top of the stairs becomes illuminated with the warm yellow glow pouring out of individual rooms.

“Tish,” voices call from upstairs. There are footsteps as Olivia, Niall and Harry rush down. “Are you okay?”

“Fine,” I murmur sluggishly, my head still aching, still drawn to the top of the stairs. Liam descends last, and he isn’t like the others, he doesn’t rush. On his face is that same blank sort of expression that I saw him wearing before. Harry cups his hand under my chin and I grab his wrist tight as I flinch away from Liam which he takes as a sign that I want to be held close. All I can do though is remain stiff as I watch Liam through narrowed eyes.

“What happened?” Liam asks. “Did you trip?” Like he’s so concerned over my welfare or something. I press my mouth down for a moment, but when the others tip their heads towards me I can’t resist,

“No. I was pushed.”

I know what I felt. It wasn’t like catching my foot on a piece of the floorboard that had come loose, it wasn’t like walking too quickly and finding that the rug had slipped and shifted beneath my weight. There had been hands on my back, they had shoved and for a moment I had sailed through the air before bashing into what felt like every step on the way back down to earth. I curl my hand into a fist,

“By him,” I say, nodding my head towards Liam.

True, I hadn’t seen anyone do anything. But who else could it have possibly been? I trust Olivia and Niall and Harry not to hurt me like that for no reason, why wouldn’t I after everything we’ve been through? But I don’t know Liam, hell, for all we know it might not even be the real Liam. Those thirty clones from the woods all looked identical after all.

Liam takes a step back, “What? No I didn’t!”

“No…that didn’t happen,” Harry adds, his brow furrowed as he looks between me and Liam.

“Yes it did,” I insist and sound more certain than I actually am. Maybe I’m just one of those naturally contrary people, but the more Liam protests, the more Harry frowns and Olivia shakes her head, the more I feel like it’s true, or at least that I have to argue my point to the death.

“Did you actually see him push you?” Olivia begins sensibly and I have to say silent at that one, not wanting to admit that no, I hadn’t, seen him do it per se. But I know I wasn’t imagining being pushed.

“He did it,” is all I repeat, wrapping my arms around my waist to try and do my best to dull the pain as I pull myself up off the ground so I can at least look Liam in the eye as I accuse him. He’s looking nervous now at least, mouth dropping open as he turns to the others beseechingly.

“I swear I didn’t…Haz, you gotta-”

“I know,” says Harry, getting up and putting a hand on Liam’s shoulder. “It’s dark and it’s late, Tish. Just cool off, okay?” I think back to when I’d been with Harry earlier, and he’d kissed me and told me never to do anything he said. Well, that’s how it felt now. The moment he tells me to cool off is the exact moment I feel a fire starting in my chest and my lip curls.

Why does he immediately assume that I’m mistaken? Like this is some bros before hos bullshit about a small incident in the pub, when as far as I can tell Liam Payne tried to seriously hurt me, maybe even tried to kill me.  “How do we even know he’s the real Liam?” I say hotly, turning my head to look around the others. But they all lower their heads as if they don’t want to look at me, the way that you might avert your eyes from a crazy person ranting and raving on the subway or on a bus or something.