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Sophie hates running. No, hate isn’t even a strong enough word for how much she absolutely loathes running. She’s doing it anyway, though, because she knows she needs to stay in shape somehow and all she’s done since she’s been on break from filming is lay around her house eating crisps and watching Downton Abbey reruns.
She changes into a tank top and shorts, it takes her a while to find her trainers, but she finally does. Just as she is about to leave, though, she realizes she needs to put a good running playlist onto her iPod to get herself pumped up. She spends awhile picking the perfect songs. “Baby” by Justin Bieber is obviously a must, and she winds up with far too many Spice Girls songs. Then it’s finally time to go.
Almost immediately after Sophie starts running she realizes it was a huge mistake.
“I’ve made a huge mistake!” She screams to no one, as she throws her hands into the air.
Sophie isn’t a quitter though, and she won’t admit defeat this easily, so she trudges on.
After about a mile she starts to feel faint and decides to lie down on the side of the road. It seemed like a good idea at the time, and she doesn’t know what happened, but suddenly someone is shaking her awake.
“Are you alright?”
Sophie opens her eyes and looks up into the boy’s big, brown (and very concerned) eyes. She sits up, brushing some of the dirt off her arms.
“Oh yeah, I’m fine! Just y’know, taking a nap on the side of the road.”
“Is that something you do for fun then?” The boy smiles, and visibly relaxes.
Now Sophie actually takes a good look at the boy kneeling next to her.
“Bloody hell, you’re Liam Payne!” Sophie knows she’s famous as well, and probably shouldn’t react this way to meeting a celebrity. But it’s Liam Payne. And she was lying on the side of the road. And she’s sweaty and covered in dirt. She curses the universe for this cruel joke, but maybe he’s into sweaty 17 year olds who can’t run and fall asleep on the side of the road. Sophie can only hope.
Liam simply smiles and nods. Sophie guesses he’s used to these kinds of reactions at this point. She still finds it strange when she gets recognized, she can’t imagine being in constant fear of loads of screaming girls. He helps her up while she continues to admire that he looks even better in person than he does in the pictures she’s seen of him. Or the One Direction posters she has on the walls of her room, whatever.
“Hey, aren’t you on Game of Thrones?” Liam asks, as Sophie tries to brush the dirt off her in the sexiest way possible (which is basically impossible, but she likes to think it’s the thought that counts).
Sophie smiles brightly, happy that he recognizes her as well, “Yeah! I play Sansa!”
“I love that show! You’re great in it!”
Sophie blushes now, “Thanks! Um you’re great too, like in your songs, and videos and such…”
Liam laughs and asks if she’d like to get coffee with him. Sophie completely forgets she’s still dirty and sweaty and agrees right away.
The date (Sophie doesn’t care if it’s not officially a date, they got coffee, it was a date) went perfectly. Unfortunately, but as Sophie had expected, Liam has very busy schedule, so they weren’t able to see each other again until he got another break in touring. However, that didn’t stop them from skyping almost every night. Even after they had a show and she could tell he was tired, he insisted he wanted to see and talk to her. It was sweet really. Sometimes he’d bring the other boys on for her to talk to. They grew fond of her, and she was relieved she wouldn’t have to try and make a good impression the first time she met them. She knew Liam’s bandmates were his entire world, and that if they hadn’t approved, the relationship would’ve been over like that.
When they finally see each other again, Sophie immediately jumps on him and begins kissing him. When she finally pulls back, Liam laughs.
“I missed you, too.” He says, smiling and kissing her on the cheek.
Sophie leads him into her house, and up to her room. Luckily no one else was home so she could avoid that whole situation a little while longer. Upon entering her room, Liam bursts into laughter. Sophie turns bright red, she has a couple One Direction posters, but the majority of the room is plastered in Justin Bieber posters.
“So you like Justin Bieber, yeah?” Liam finally says, while Sophie keeps her face hidden behind her hands. Liam looks over at her and realizing she’s embarrassed continues, “Hey now, don’t be ashamed, Niall’s room looks just like this.”
This puts Sophie at ease, and she laughs, wrapping her arms around Liam’s neck and kissing him once again.
Next time it’s Sophie’s turn to leave. She has to go back to Northern Ireland for filming the show. Liam’s on a break, though, and he flies out to visit her on set a couple weeks into filming.
“Wow this is incredible!” Sophie is showing Liam around the grand set and he’s admiring it, even though Sophie suspects he’s seen many more amazing places as he’s travelled around the world on tour.
They come to the Iron Throne and immediately Sophie is pushing Liam onto it.
“Come on, Liam! Get on it, I want to take a picture!”
He does as she says, and she immediately tweets the picture with the caption “Looks like there’s a new king of Westeros!”
Though their relationship is hard, with one of them almost always being away from home, Sophie has never been happier, she and Liam fit each other perfectly. Even though he sometimes tries to get her to go running with him, and she has to remind him of the state she was in the first time they met.