“God damn it, Louis!” Niall shouts when he sees me throwing the cup to the floor, the contents soilling at my feet. I look at the Irish bloke and shrug. As if I care.

“What?” I ask back, folding my arms over my chest in a defiant posture. Alex is next to him and I feel her green eyes on me. We used to get along so well, it was always fun to goof around with her and she, somehow, always joked along and we laughed pretty hard. She always cooked for me and when I couldn’t stand carrots anymore, she made sure to never have them around again. She made chocolate muffins for me since then.

But Alex is a girl, no matter how tomboyish she is and even if she hates dresses. A girl like Eleanor —I mean, poisonous traitor— and I can’t trust her anymore. What if she does the same thing to Niall? Girls are like that; they can never have enough. You can give them the moon but it won’t be enough, because they will want a star. And I can’t give them a star, no matter how much I want. I can’t. I always thought doing my best was enough, but it isn’t. There’s always someone better.

I look away, not in the mood to hold Alex’s gaze anymore and I only snap out of my thoughts when Niall smack my head rather forcefully. Damn leprechaun, he looks nice and adorable, but he is strong.

“You clean that before Paul yells at us all,” he threatens but I stick my tongue out at him.

“It’s not my fault,” I state matter-of-factly, still with my arms folded. Niall really snorts, like a horse, and that makes Alex giggle. When he quickly looks at her, his expression changes, it softens and I want to puke when I see this. Now it’s my turn to snort and that brings Niall’s attention back to me.

“No shit Sherlock. We saw you, so clean this mess up.”

I frown at him, crinkling my nose in the process and I feel like showing my teeth. Almost like wolves do. Maybe I am a wolf now, a lonely wolf. I need no one. Yes, that’s gonna be my motto now.

“Harry, clean this!” I shout and my curly-haired friend looks up at me with a confused expression. “Yes, it’s your fault. Grimshaw is your friend and he brought that bitch with him and all this is her fault so it’s your responsibility to clean this up.” I step back, ready to leave the room. I know not only Harry but everyone else in the room is looking at me with the same expression.

“But…” Harry protests, but I walk past him.

“Your friend brought her. Your fault.” I repeat and I finally leave the room, grumpier than I was before because remembering my relationship with Alex made me forget for a second about Kay, but now she creeps her way into my thoughts again.

I really loathe her and I don’t understand why she can’t just step aside. I’ve been crystal clear with her, that I don’t want her around yet she always manages to find me and annoy me. And what with all this ‘I’ll make you fall in love with me’. In love with her, my arse. I rather eat carrots for the rest of my life.

What would posses her to say that? It’s completely impossible and why me? Why couldn’t she, oh I don’t know, annoy Liam? He is single, too! Oh come on, there are plenty of single men in the world, why me? What did I ever do to her to deserve this? I just want peace and quiet.

I think I hate her more than I hate the poisonous traitor. She is so annoying, so rude, stupid —because she doesn’t understand I don’t want to see her— and annoying. Wait… I already said that. It doesn’t matter, it needs to be said twice. I don’t understand why the others like her so much, specially the girls. She really gets along with Alex, which is even more annoying.

I need a synonym for annoying.

I take off my mobile to look for synonyms as I walk dawn the halls of the studio. I really want to start the tour already. Kay has a reason to be here just because we haven’t left yet, but once we start with the shows, I won’t have to see her again.

Oh, life seems so beautiful now.

A smile starts to spread across my face as I keep thinking how I won’t have to see her during the whole summer. Three months Kay-free. What could be more perfect than that? And I won’t have to see Mila and Hannah either as they will be staying here. Alex is going with us as she is part of the sound system crew, but I guess I can manage that. I can’t expect it to be only men around. I tried to convince Management to fire all women and leave only men, but they dismissed me mercilessly.

It’s hard to stay away from women when your group of closest friends has so many. There’s Alex, Belle and Phebs. We met them two years ago. Then Mila and Moni came into the picture. After that Hannah, and she brought Savannah with her! And now Kay is trying to make her way into the group! Eight women! Eight fucking women that are always around when the lads want to do something. They just can’t bear the thought of being away from them.

Pussies.

I really hope Liam doesn’t get a girlfriend, because that would mean another girl would get in the gang —as Moni calls it— and maybe she would have a friend and noooooo. Just picturing that makes me want to leave. Maybe I’ll take Moni’s old plan and I’ll become a monk in the Tibet.

Sounds legit.

“Infuriating is accurate,” I mumble to myself stopping for a second when I find the synonyms. Man, there are many words that describe Kay perfectly. I don’t have to use annoying all the time anymore.

“What’s infuriating?” a feminine voice asks and when I look up at her, I see Alex standing right in front of me.

“How did you get here? You were with Niall inside,” I accuse her as if she just did the worst thing ever. In a way, it is a horrendous crime: she is near me and I don’t want her here.

“Oh, c’mon, husband. You know you still love me,” She says playfully taking a step closer but I step back.

“I’m not your husband. Not anymore, at least,” I reply, pushing aside all the memories of those times when calling her ‘wife’ was our game, when I enjoyed making scenes with her so much.

“Since when? I never got the memo.” She is smiling but I’m not, I don’t find this amusing anymore. “C’mon, you haven’t called me wife in months and I miss it. I never thought I was gonna say that,” she laughs but my expression doesn’t change.

“Go with Niall and leave me alone, Alexia,” I call her that deliberately. I know she doesn’t really like people calling her for her full name, and when I do, her eyes widen in surprise. I fight back the pleased grin that threatens to show off.

“Louis,” she breathes in, barely a whisper and I see her trying to reach me with her hand, but I step even farther away. “Until when are you gonna act like this? We miss the old you.” Her eyes show real concern and that touches a part of me inside my heart, but I ignore it.

 That old Louis, the playful one, the clown of the group, the one who never wanted to grow up and only wanted to have fun died. He died the night a woman told him he wasn’t good enough and she didn’t love him anymore, no matter how hard he tried to make things work. And that old Louis can never come back.

“I’m sorry but I’m not acting like this. This is me now and if you don’t like it, you can step aside because I don’t need your pity nor your concern. I’m fine, I’m better than fine. So now, excuse me.”

I walk past Alex and I know she is still looking at me, I feel her eyes on my back as I keep walking, but I stop a few metres away, making a decision.

“I’ll send you the papers soon,” I add without turning back.

“What?” She asks and I hear her confusion clearly in her voice.

I look her over my shoulder, a slow smirk showing on my lips. “The divorce. Soon you won’t have any excuse to call me husband again.”

I expect her to look shocked and resigned, but she smiles at me with hope in her features. “I won’t sign it,” she shouts, her smile growing wider. “Unless I get to keep the Porsche.”

“Never!” I shout back. My Porsche, my baby.

“Then we’ll be husband and wife forever, Louis.” Alex smiles victorious at me before turning on her heels and walking away in the direction I came from. I still don’t understand how she got here.

I still don’t know why I said that. It’s not like we are actually married but still. Maybe there’s a part of me who can’t completely let go of that Louis I was before. A part of me still wants to have an easy friendship with Alex, a part of me doesn’t want to hate every woman, but it’s easier if I do, no exceptions.

If you expect the worst from everyone, no one can disappoint you. No one can hurt you. If I had expected Eleanor to betray me like that, she would have never had the power to hurt me the way she did. If I hate every woman equally —and yes, my mum and sisters are the only exception because they are family—, no one will hurt me that way again. No one will betray me like that. No other woman will make me feel the way Eleanor did and I want that. I want to be safe.

I don’t need a woman!

I’m fine, I’m more than fine. I have a job that everyone would kill to have. I get to do what I love every day and get paid for that! I travel the world, play for thousands of people every night, I’m with my best mates in the biggest boy band ever. Why would I want to be in a relationship? It’s better like this.

Why do I hate the boys’ girlfriends if they can’t really hurt me that way? Well that’s pretty simple: They can hurt my friends like that. I don’t trust them.

What if Alex finds someone better, someone that looks her style, someone that is not always surrounded by screaming teenagers asking him to marry them?

What if Mila finds a guy that doesn’t go around with rumours of cheating on her following closely behind?

What if Hannah finds a guy who does not always hate to leave her side to travel the world?

What if...? We are not the best guys around, we have many flaws even though our fans fail at seeing them. We’re far from perfect and even if we try our best to keep our relationships going, that may not be enough. And I know the lads love their girlfriends maybe too much. More than I ever loved Eleanor. What is going to happen when they break their hearts?

I saw Niall devastated once. I saw Zayn and I barely recognised him then. I saw Harry and that was the worst, seeing him without the life in his eyes anymore, with a fake smile that everyone bought. If Alex, Mila or Hannah do what Eleanor did to me… it’s going to be even worse for them. That is why I can’t trust them. Why all women are dangerous.

I don’t trust them, I don’t need them. Maybe one day the lads will see it from my point of view and they will realise I’m right and this is the best way to live. I just hope they won’t realise it too late.