Chapter Sixteen

A/N - August 2023 - Fo any rereaders who were once disappointed in the livestream having 1.8 million views I've made a change...

They start the livestream 43 minutes after the announcement. The five of them have piled together on one couch, the four girls huddled together behind the camera as they turn on the livestream from the official Instagram account, linking in each of the boys own personal accounts so that they get the maximum amount of viewers. Lottie, who's in charge of filming them, holds the screen down at first, and waits, all of them, in silence for two minutes as they watch the numbers on the livestream steadily pass 500k. They've not yet said a word, waiting and watching as the numbers climb and climb. Harry is sat against the far left of the couch, Niall beside him, Zayn in the middle, then Louis and finally Liam.

Lottie makes a countdown with her fingers and then lifts the phone to show the five of them.

"Hello!" Niall calls out. They'd purposefully left this entire thing unscripted, they had certain things they had to cover, such as the date for when tour tickets would come on sale and the countries they were heading to on tour, but other than that it had been decided that it was entirely up to them how they handled this. Harry didn't know which option he'd have preferred.

"I guess we wanted to come on, prove that our accounts haven't been hacked and we aren't pulling a prank." Niall continues before Louis reaches across Zayn and smacks him on his arm.

"Hey! What did ya do that for?" Niall cries and the rest of them burst out laughing.

"I don't think someone is capable of hacking all of our individual accounts, and the band account and pull something like this off mate." Zayn muses and Harry has to hide his smile.

"I think you're underestimating some of our fans technological skills."

"Anyway," Liam cuts in, "We know a lot of people have been expecting some big news to come from us, especially in the last couple weeks, however we are all very, very excited to announce that the five of us will be embarking on a one off, special ten year anniversary of One Direction tour this year! Now tickets will go on sale from February 1st and the tour is set to begin on the 28th of March!"

"Now the tour, as I'm sure some of you will have seen from the announcement earlier, is set to kickstart in Europe, followed by North America, South America, Asia and finally ending in Oceania in October!" Niall explains and Harry shuffles down deeper into the sofa as Niall speaks.

He sees Lottie trying to mouth something at them and tilts his head to the side when he catches her eye.

"Solo music..." He catches and nods once at her.

"So," He begins, noticing the phone shift slightly to catch him more in the frame, "I'm sure many of you are wondering what is going to happen considering Niall, Louis and I all have either recently released, or are about to release, our own solo albums. We will be playing through, each of us, our own solo songs as well as the bands' from over the years in each concert."

"Basically, like getting six differences performances in one night!" Niall pipes in.

"Pretty much." Says Liam.

"Do you wanna read out some questions?" Zayn asks Lottie who nods behind the camera and busies herself scrolling through the comment section.

"Alright, here's one." She says from off camera. "If fans collectively vote for one song that you must perform, will you follow through with it?"

"Oh," Louis says tracing his hands down the length of his thighs, "That's a good question, what do we reckon lads?"

"Well, obviously the tour is mainly to be performing songs from Made In The A.M now we have thrown in some older songs as well, but maybe. The set list has been finalized but you never know? If there's enough of a push, I reckon we could pull something like that together for a special occasion?" Liam answers for them and Harry definitely thinks he would go along with that for the odd show. As long as the song wasn't bloody Na Na Na. That he wouldn't do.

"Ok, next question; Zayn, what made you decide to rejoin the band for the tour?" Lottie says with a knowing smile and Zayn almost looks guilty. All the boys know why he left, most of the fans now too and the last thing they feel towards him now is resentment.

"I felt this was simply far too special, us celebrating ten years, to not tag along for. These boys gave me some of the best years of my life and maybe I didn't enjoy every part of being in the band but they're all still my brothers. One Direction, that's all you guys too," He says looking directly towards the phone, "Are a part of my life story, this just wasn't something I could turn down."

"What an answer." Niall says throwing an arm casually around Zayn's shoulder.

"Oh!" Daisy says glancing up from her phone, "Here's a goody! People wanna know who the band is going to be."

"Ah, we're very excited about who is joining us for tour! We're working on an opening act so we'll get back to you with that one however, for ourselves, we'll be joined by the wonderful Ny Oh, Mitch Rowlands and Sarah Jones, from my own band, Sandy Beales, who I'm sure many of you know and also Michael Blackwell who's been working with Louis!" Harry answers.

"Can you reveal any of the songs you've chosen to be on the setlist?" Phoebe now asks them.

"That's top secret information." Louis says with a wink, "However I can admit that it's a fairly epic setlist we've compiled!"

"Absolutely." Niall nods in agreement.

"Alright Harry, this one is just for you." Lottie says looking to him with a cheeky smile, "Watermelon or strawberries?"

The rest of the boys all burst out laughing, even Gemma and the twins join in whilst he just sits and shakes his head.

"This is just so not far. We're less than an hour back into this and I'm already being targeted!" He says jokingly, feigning standing up and walking away but Niall pulls him back down into the sofa and locks him there.

"Oh no! You're here to stay."

"Alright, alright! Well, if I really have to choose I'm gonna go with Watermelon."

"What! Watermelon, over strawberries?" Liam says from the other end of the sofa, leaning forward.

"Hey now," Louis says interjecting, "You choose raspberries over blueberries, you can't talk."

"The second we're done with this I'm creating a poll for everyone to answer and then we'll see which is the superior fruit." Liam argues back and Harry knows instantly that he's back where he belongs.

"I never, ever, should have tweeted that. Zayn says with a shake of his head.

"Definitely not." Louis says flashing Zayn a knowing smirk.

"Anyways, moving on before we start world war three in here." Lottie says. "Alright, digging up the real dirt here, who's idea was it to organize the reunion for now?"

"Alright I'm definitely takin' the credit for this one!" Niall says almost instantly and he doesn't think anyone could argue against that. "I mean we'd always said we'd come back, just a matter of when. And we certainly had 2020 in mind as it is our ten-year anniversary, but I pitched it to all our managers early last year."

"That's true." Liam says with a nod of his head.

"It's taken some time but we're here now and so fuckin' excited to be going on tour this year... hey!"

"Don't swear." Zayn says hitting Niall softly on his arm.

"Anyway, as I was saying before I was so rudely interrupted, we're all pretty bloody excited," Niall begins again with a pointed look at Zayn, "To be coming back together again. We've all matured a lot so this is gonna be a fusion of some pretty different styles here but we're rolling with it!"

"Alright, a couple more questions. Got any good one's girls?" Lottie asks, turning her head to the three behind her.

"In case anyone's confused your camera personal for today is Miss Lottie Tomlinson, Daisy, Phoebe and Gemma are all acting as support staff." Louis says gesturing towards the three girls and Lottie quickly turns the phone to capture them all in the frame.

"Support staff!" Daisy cries and the lads all laugh.

"Poor service, haven't in made me another cup o' tea yet!" Louis retorts and Harry doesn't bother hiding his smile at their antics.

"As you can all tell," He says looking into the phone camera, "We're all very mature adults and are taking this very seriously."

"You are sitting on Louis' sofa on a Tuesday night in a Gucci sweater there H." Liam pipes up.

"It's comfortable!" He protests and the others all laugh at him.

"This is honestly like trying to herd toddlers, we're trying to sort through some questions here!" Lottie says once more from behind the camera.

"Here's one, Louis how are you feeling about your album release, only three more days!" Gemma asks and Harry gulps down the lump that forms in his throat, averting his eyes from the camera.

"So excited for you all to hear it, been a long time in the works but it's gonna be a good one I'd say. Almost as exciting as a One Direction reunion I'd say."

"Ok none of you are on your phones but the number four Twitter trend worldwide right now is people arguing over if Zayn or Harry is going to be the one to sing the high notes in Drag Me Down so boys, which one of you is getting that honour?" Phoebe asks, looking up from her phone and catches his eye.

"Harry surely." Zayn says instantly, "That's yours mate."

"I reckon we could share it around, there's gonna be some changes to the sections in the songs from Made In The A.M now we have this one joining us." Harry replies and reaches his arm around Niall to rest a hand on Zayn's shoulder.

"There you have it Twitter." Niall says and it's Gemma who asks the next question.

"Now the title of the tour is Where We Belong who's idea was it to name the tour this?"

"That was the creation of one Amanda Rell and Liam Payne. We tossed around a few name idea's but it seemed pretty fitting for us to return with that title." Niall explains.

"Ok, but which songs are each of you most looking forward to performing live on tour?"

"Didn't we just say that there would be no set list reveal?" Liam says but Louis only shrugs.

"I think everyone can already guess some of the songs that we've put on the set list so imma just go ahead and say Infinity."

"I'm gonna agree with Louis on that one." He says, shifting his hand till it's lying back in his lap, the other resting comfortably on the arm of the sofa.

"What A Feeling has always been one I've been keen to perform on stage." Liam mentions.

"I'm definitely looking forward to the new songs, so just all of them I suppose." Zayn says next and they all turn to Niall.

"What Makes You Beautiful, obviously." They all groan, the girls trying to hide their snorts of laughter.

"Hilarious." Louis says with a fond shake of his head.

"Think you should stick to being a musician Ni, a comedy might not be in your calling." Zayn says planting a hand on Niall's knee.

"Fake it till you make it right?"

"Ok boys, one last question. Is the world going to be treated to an a sixth One Direction album?"

"That's confidential for the time being." Liam says and Harry has to fight not to run his gaze over the other boys, they hadn't exactly spoken about releasing a new album and he was glad that Liam had been so quick thinking as to answer for them.

"We'll go one step at a time, tour first then we'll see what comes next." Zayn followed up with.

"Anything else any of you want to add?" Lottie asks when they fall silent for a moment.

"Ah yes." He speaks up, "I would like to say a heartfelt thank you to each and every one of you who has supported us, from any time period in the last ten years. It's been a real journey so far, as a band and each of us as solo artists so I'd like to say thank you for sticking with us, supporting our careers and we're so, so excited to be seeing you all on tour this year!"

"H pretty much summed it up, thank you, each of ya! And we can't wait to get back out there with you guys!" Niall says after him. Zayn, Liam and Louis each nodding in agreement and muttering thank yous to the camera.

"Alright! See you all soon, don't forget tickets go on sale for the Where We Belong tour on February 1st! And also, celebrate the debut solo album from Mr. Tomlinson here, Walls will be out on January 31st!" Liam finishes.

"And... scene!" Lottie calls as she lowers the phone, ending the livestream.

"How many people just watched us makes fools out of ourselves?" Is the first thing Zayn asks and Harry watches as each of the four girls faces brim with amusement.

"Oh you know, only 12.8 million."

"You're not fucking serious!"

"Almost got a new record there, a lot more people joined in the later half of the stream, and there's the whole thing about time zones but you just drew that audience with no announcement that you were going live so I'd say that was pretty impressive."

"This tour is gonna be huge innit it?" Louis says standing from the sofa and reaching for a now surely cold cup of tea.

"When have any of your tours not been huge?" Phoebe comments.

"I just don't want a load of unrealistically high standards to be put on us to pull this off. I mean, we were playing sold out arena and stadium shows on our last couple tours, what if this time round isn't like that?" Zayn comments, shifting slightly over towards Liam to give him and Niall more room.

"Honestly mate, I don't care if we're playing in front of 2,000 or 80,000, I just want to be up on stage with you lot doing what we love." Niall says.

"Not to toot our own horns here, but we're one of the biggest boybands ever, let alone the fact that each of us has been immensely successful as solo artists, I don't think we have much to worry about with drawing a crowd." Liam offers in response to Zayn's comment.

"He's got a point, you guys have had less than two hours since announcing your return and the entire world has gone nuts, half of it isn't even awake yet!"

"Daisy does have a point." Lottie replies nodding towards her younger sister.

From the corner of his eye, Harry watches as Louis makes his way towards the kitchen to make himself a fresh cup of tea. He'd been unusually quiet during the live, he'd always had so much presence, especially in the early years when they'd done things like this and it had struck him as out of character the entire livestream. Perhaps he was just nervous with the release of his album, but he'd still said very little.

It wasn't his problem, not anymore. He cared, as a friend of course, that Louis seemed slightly off, but his days of being able to tuck Louis into him and talk about personal things were long gone.

Pushing himself off the couch he went towards the small cabinet beneath the tv, crouched down and scanned over the vinyl's on display. Sure enough, on the very end was his own album, the black and white exclusive edition at that and he pulled it out from the shelf. It felt odd being in Louis' home with his own album sat in his hands. Sure he remembered the short texts that Louis had sent of him buying the album, but it was still a moment when he held Louis own personal copy in his hands.

Before Louis could come back into the living room he tucked the album back on the shelf and turned back towards the crowd behind him. Everyone was caught in their own private conversations, but he still caught the pointed stare Zayn gave him as he walked back towards the couch and settled down for an afternoon with his bandmates.