Something About You

Thirty One. December, 2020.

On Boxing Day, Niall wakes up to the sound of laughter downstairs, to the smell of cinnamon buns wafting into his room, to sunlight streaming in through a small gap in the curtains. The bed is empty but when he stretches his arm out he can still feel the warmth where Isla had slept, and when he opens his eyes he can see that the sheets are still rumpled on her side.

As he stretches and slowly wakes up, Niall lets out a soft, contended sigh. He remembers how Boxing Day felt when he was a kid, when he'd wake up early to rush downstairs and play with the toys he'd gotten the day before, then spend hours feeling happy and sleepy, watching football and eating leftovers on the couch. That's not quite his plan for today, but, as he swings his legs over the side of the bed and starts to find some clothes, this morning feels just as magical.

He finds exactly the scene he'd imagined in the kitchen: his mam, Isla, and Chris, together at the table, cradling mugs of tea and giggling over some joke Niall's missed out on. There's a plate of cinnamon buns between them, a Boxing Day classic, and Niall wants to be invisible for a moment, to just take this scene in uninterrupted, to memorize it forever.

He only gets a few seconds before his mother notices him.

'Good morning, pet,' she says, smiling. 'Sleep well?'

'Grand, yeah,' he tells her, padding the rest of the way into the kitchen. He drops a kiss on her cheek, then one on the top of Isla's head. 'Missed you,' he says, soft, just for her. He catches a tiny flush of red to her cheeks, a private twitch of her lips.

'Cinnamon bun, mate?' Chris passes the plate across the table, so Niall drops himself into the seat next to Isla and takes one. They're good enough to make him moan out loud, eliciting a surprised sound from Isla, who knocks her leg against his under the table. He tosses her a smirk.

'So the charity match is at 11?' Maura asks, oblivious. 'Will we all take the same car?'

'Reckon I'll drive Isles and myself,' Niall says, around a bite of cinnamon bun. 'Was thinking we might take a bit of a walk after, near the canal maybe.'

From across the table, Maura catches Niall's eye. She knows what Niall's been planning, of course, but not the details—he hadn't worked them out himself until this morning, until the day settled over him comfortably and he knew, without a shadow of a doubt, that it was time. But she gets him, his mam, has a brain just like his, a mother's intuition, unmatched. She gives him a small nod, which Niall mirrors, and then brings her mug up to her lips to hide her smile.

--

Niall's team loses the annual boxing day charity match, which is fine, really, because they raised €40,000 for Mullingar General Hospital, and Niall couldn't really think about anything other than Isla, anyway. He feels like he spent half the match watching her, bundled up on the sidelines with Emilia, Siobhan Foley, and Una Moran, cradling a cup of hot chocolate, standing up to cheer every time Niall gained possession of the ball.

He finds her out on the pitch after the match is called, once he's showered, changed into street clothes, bundled himself up appropriately for an Irish December. They're here until January fifth this time, the longest Niall's spent in Mullingar in a long, long time, and he feels so comfortably relaxed about it, so warm all over, tingly down to his fingers. That feeling only multiplies when he finds Isla on the empty pitch, kicking a ball back and forth with Mia.

'Hey,' Mia calls, when she spots him. 'There's our loser!'

'Your husband lost too, you know,' Niall calls back, sidling up to Isla. He wraps his arm around her waist, feels butterflies flutter in his stomach as she leans against him. 'Where is he, anyway?'

'Waiting in the car, said he's too cold,' Mia shakes her head. 'LA's softened him.'

'Embarrassing,' Niall laughs, leaning forward to give Mia a kiss on the cheek. 'We'll see you two tonight, yeah? At Deo's?'

'Assuming Sean doesn't freeze to death, you will,' Mia steps back, smiling now. 'See you lot later. Enjoy your walk!' And then she's gone, rushing across the pitch toward the warmth of Mully's mam's car, idling on the side of the road. His arms still wrapped around Isla, Niall watches her go, thinks about that: the word husband.

'Really fucking miss her,' says Isla, turning in Niall's arms so he can wrap her up in a hug, press a kiss to the top of her head. 'I hate LA.'

'Me too,' Niall laughs, rubbing Isla's back gently. 'I wish it would fall into the ocean.'

'It might, one day, all them earthquakes and shit,' Isla glances up at Niall. 'Maybe you shouldn't say that.'

Niall laughs, presses a soft kiss to Isla's nose. 'You're right, I take it back.'

For a moment, they stand there, holding each other in the middle of the football pitch as the early afternoon settles around them. This feels like the center of the universe, like Isla is the gravitational pull that holds it all together. He tilts her chin up to kiss her, remembering their very first kiss, exactly like this, in another pitch only a few miles away.

'You know,' says Isla, when they pull away. Her lips are cold and her cheeks are red and Niall can see her breath, curling in the air between them, as she speaks. 'I realized something this morning.'

'What's that?'

'We broke up ten years ago today. Like, to the day.'

'Fucking hell,' Niall thinks about it for a second, shaking his head to ward off the memory. 'You're right. Boxing Day 2010. Fucking stupid of me.'

'It needed to happen,' Isla's fingers gently run over the back of Niall's neck, cold, giving him goosebumps. 'It sucked, but I don't think we'd be here now if we hadn't.'

Niall hums, agreeing. He hasn't spent too much time thinking about the different roads he and Isla could've taken, because he knows this is the right one, too. The stupid mistakes, the seemingly endless pain, the drunk dials and the sleepless nights, they were part of a road: twisted, messy, perfect, theirs. He wouldn't want to change it. He wouldn't be holding her here, now, if he did.

'I'm glad,' Isla says eventually, softly. 'I'm glad we broke up and did all that stupid shite when we did it. I think I always knew we'd find our way back to each other, you know? And even though we lost time, I... we have the rest of forever to make up for it.'

'We do,' he tells her, his throat suddenly dry, his heart leaping in his chest. 'I love you.'

'Love you too,' she smiles, presses her lips to his gently, and Niall knows.

'Isla,' he says, pulling back from the kiss, reaching his hand into his pocket. He closes his fingers around the small, soft box, taking a deep breath when he thinks about the ring inside. 'I have something I want to ask you.'

And he knows, as he drops onto one knee in the muddy grass in the middle of the pitch, in the middle of Ireland, in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean, in the middle of the Universe, that Isla is going to say yes.

AN DEIREADH // THE END

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there it is, the end of niall and isla for now! this has been such a journey and I didn't want to sign off without saying thank you so, so much to anyone who has read even a sentence of this fic. it started off as such a small idea, and I genuinely thought most of the chapters would be between 500-1,000 words. instead, most are 1k plus, and I would be lying if I said I wasn't proud of myself for managing to pull this off. niall, isla, emilia, and mully are so close to my heart now, and they so feel like they're going to be a part of me forever. it means the fucking world that I got to share them with other people. thank you for reading, for letting me have a space to do what I want to do, and for trusting me with them. i love you and I owe you. finally, a big ol thank you to ​my friend rand, without whom this concept wouldn't even exist. I wouldn't have started posting my niall x ofc writing without rand's remarkable support and kindness, and I owe this work, which is a piece of my heart, to her. 

thank you thank you thank you thank you everyone. niall and isla belong to you now. i'll be back soon with more.