Guarded

26

Annaleise’s POV

Fucking asshole. Asshole. Asshole. Asshole. UGH! I hated him right now. I was so fucking pissed. The alcohol had worked its way fully into my bloodstream by this point and I felt so angry and so invincible.

‘Promise me you’ll take a taxi’ he pleaded before I left. Ha. Fuck him. I can take care of myself and I can drive and I’m going to go home and shower and cry and then probably stalk him on Twitter all morning since by that time I’ll be sober and end up missing him.

I got in the car and backed out the parking spot, nearly forgetting to pay the fee before leaving the lot. The guard waved me on and I turned onto the main roads heading towards the freeway. It would take me another half hour to get home so I turned on the radio on full blast and sang along to whatever song was on. I was fine. I obeyed all the traffic laws until the next song came on. “I figured it out.. I figured it out from black and white..” I glared at the radio for playing a One Direction song.

Stupid DJs. I was fine until Harry’s part came on. And I swear, I only closed my eyes for one second. I heard the crunching sound of metal and glass breaking and that made me open my eyes. Fuck. What did I hit? I looked at the car in front of me. It was an LAPD police cruiser and the officer got out and was approaching my car. And that’s the last thing I remember.

-

“Are you OUT OF YOUR MIND, ANNALIESE?” My aunt shouted at me. I looked around me. We were in my house. How did I get here? What the hell had happened? She waved the piece of paper in front of me.

“Orla is doing the best she can, but this is going to end up being out of our control, Annaleise. I am so disappointed in you right now.”

I snapped back into reality. “What happened?”

“What happened? You just got arrested for a DUI after hitting a police car, Annaleise. That’s what happened. You argued with the officer, telling him he was only arresting you because he liked the One Direction song on the radio and you hated it and then you proceeded to tell the whole LAPD what a giant – and I quote – cock, Harry Styles is. You’re in big trouble, missy. This is out of our hands now. I’m sorry. But this is already going to be in the news for the next few days and you’re just going to have to deal with that.”

I stared at her incredulously. I had done what exactly? Fucking hell. I was screwed. As if I didn’t have enough on my plate at that moment, I had to go and add one more thing to it. I tuned my Aunt’s shouting out and walked upstairs to my room, turning on the shower and standing under the hot water until it got cold. When I got out, I put on clean pajamas and curled up in bed and fell asleep.

I checked the time when I woke up. I had five missed calls from Harry and several text messages, ranging from ‘I landed – miss you’ to ‘Guess you won’t be talking to me for a few days’ to ‘Lizzy told me what happened, please call me are you okay?’

I groaned and tossed the phone to the side, rolling over and staring at the blank wall. It was three in the morning. I felt restless but tired still. I drifted back to sleep somehow though and managed to get a few more hours in until the buzzing of my cell phone in my ear woke up me. Not bothering to check the caller ID, I slid the call to answer and mumbled a ‘hullo’ to whoever it was.