This Year's Love // Michael Clifford

Chapter Twenty-Eight

Chapter Twenty-Eight

Brittany Dawson

"I'm really digging this look, Brittany," Luke comments.

"Dude," Michael grunts.

"What? I can't compliment your girlfriend?" Luke asks.

Michael only glares at him in response. I giggle, shaking my head at the two. The three of us were at lunch at an outdoor restaurant in Long Beach. While the other two bickered and discussed things irrelevant to me, I was on my phone. I'd recently upgraded to the iPhone 6 after much persuasion on Michael's part. I wasn't happy about the three hundred dollars I had to spend on it, but it was better than the six hundred I would have had to pay had my contract not been up.

A text message comes through on my phone. I'm surprised to not have a recollection on the owner of the unknown number.

From: Unknown Number

Hello. I see your success is going really swell. Congratulations. Maybe we could meet up for dinner sometime while you're in Cali? -H xx

"Hey, who's H?" I ask Michael.

His head instantly shoots to meet my gaze. "Why?"

"I just got a text from someone who signed off as H," I answer. "Who is it?"

"H?" Luke repeats. "That's Harry, I'm pretty sure."

"Harry?" I ask. "Prince Harry?"

"No, you nimwit," Michael says. "Harry Styles."

"Harry Sty-" My eyes immediately widen in delight. "Like One Direction?"

"Like One Direction," Luke confirms, taking a sip of his lemon water (gross, in my opinion; I hate lemon).

"What did he say?" Michael asks, trying to peer at my phone.

I roll my eyes. "He asked for nudes, Michael."

"Seriously? Forward them to me," Luke jokes.

"Don't reply," Michael says.

I narrow my eyes at him. "Why?"

"Because he just wants to hook up with you probably," he replies.

I let out a low laugh. "He just congratulated me on my success, Michael. I hardly doubt that counts for a booty text."

"Brittany, I'm being for real."

"And so am I," I retort. "I'm a big girl, Michael. I can handle myself."

"Just-"

"If you're worried about me cheating on you, then you can throw that idea out the window. It's not gonna happen," I claim.

"I'm not worried about you cheating on me. I'm worried he's going to put the moves on you," he explains.

"He won't."

Michael keeps his mouth shut after that. I shake off the annoyance I had towards him, then formed a reply to Harry after saving his number and name into my phone.

To: Harry Styles

Thank you! And I'll be here for the next week. What day are you available?