rivers_bend

I have been in the Harry Styles fanfic fandom for over a year now, but it took me a lot longer to get into One Direction fandom (and yes, for me, they are definitely not the same despite how it probably looks from the outside). First, their second album came out and I actually liked pretty much all the songs on it. Then they went on tour. A tour I never imagined wanting to see. Except then my friends started going to shows, and gifs and pictures and reports came out, and along about when they played DC, I became obsessed with the idea of going myself.

Tickets on StubHub were insane expensive, but all over the states, people were getting day-of tickets for much more reasonable prices, so I decided I'd do that. Instead, I kept obsessively refreshing StubHub on Friday, and all afternoon there was one single ticket in what looked like a great seat that had dropped quite a lot in price. It was still there about 4:00pm, and I decided I couldn't wait any longer; I had to have it (even though it was still a lot more than I'd planned on spending). You only live once, though, and I desperately wanted to go see this band of adorable idiots.

I then spent the next two days freaking out off and on, but finally it was time to go. On the way there, there was a bad traffic jam due to a stalled car, and I freaked out some more (as my twitter followers can attest), but it turned out perfectly. My first turn down a street near the theater was exquisitely timed, as just as I approached, a guy pulled out of a (free!) street parking spot just one block from the venue. No parking lots, no paying the $25 event rate, no walking long distances. Golden.

I made my way past the bazillion tour trucks, past the girls waiting at the gates that peeked through to where the buses were parked, and joined the crowds waiting to get into the venue. It made for good people watching. I know young teenage girls can be mean, boy do I remember that from when I was one, but seeing all these groups of friends waiting to have this experience together warmed my heart. There was one girl, about 16, wearing a batman shirt, and her mom caught up to her and her friends at one point, and asked her why she wasn't wearing her 1D shirt like so many other girls were. She kind of did an eye rolling sigh thing, and her friend said brightly, "It's the Bruce Wayne of one direction shirts." I loved that.

As we were going in, the woman checking bags at the station I went through was a few years older than me, and laughed when I grinned and held my empty hands out to my sides as I passed. "This," she said, "is obviously not your first concert." "Nope," I answered. "I've done this before." "And figured out you don't need your makeup." I was wearing a shirt a little bit too tight to be wholly flattering with my bra in use as a purse, but whatever. I still felt hot. And one girl about 14 or so said "I love your shirt!" It was my Pink Floyd shirt, and I was her age when I got into them, and it made me happy.

I made my way to my seat, and it had a really great view of the stage. There were some adorable girls next to me, sisters from the look of it. The younger one (about 10?) was the 1D fan, and her sister was probably 17 or so, and she obviously loved her sister like air, but was less into one direction. She was wholly attentive to all the facts and trivia her sister was sharing with her while we waited for 5SOS to come on, though.

5SOS were completely adorable on stage. They have a lot of presence, and are clearly great friends. Not that I didn't know this last bit from twitter, but still. It was good to see on stage. I probably would have enjoyed them even more if I had ever heard any of their songs. I did love their cover of Teenage Dream best. There was a dad a few rows back who was CRAZY into them. He was headbanging like he was at a White Snake concert and it was 1988. His daughter pretty much looked like she wanted the floor to open up and swallow her :D

After they went off stage, a man and his daughters came down our row, which scared me, because our row was fully occupied. then they stopped in front of me. I was like, FUCK I HOPE I DIDN'T GET A FAKE TICKET. but they were after the seats of the adorable sisters. It turns out the sisters were supposed to be in the next section over. The dad sat down next to me, and was kind of grumpy, but he ended up swapping with the daughter at the other end of their four seats so I got another little girl which was much more fun.

The girls on the other side of me were probably junior high age, and were INSANE for Niall. And Harry. But mostly Niall. I thought one of them was going to pass out at one point she was jumping and screaming so hard. Her little sister got a balloon with a glowstick in, and was super excited about it, but there was another one on a chair the row in front and two seats down from me the opposite side of where she was. She wanted that second balloon like it was filled with money. I could tell. But she couldn't reach it. After a few minutes, I leaned over the girl on the other side of me and got it for her, and she was SO. GRATEFUL. Her little face was glowing and she thanked me like six times. I was so glad to have helped make her night.

But what about One Direction? I hear you ask. They were fantastic.

There were definitely not the shenanigans that there have been at other shows. No rolling around on the floor or climbing on each other, or even any kisspering, but unlike when I saw Adam's Glamnation show and there was no kiss in Fever, that didn't matter to me. Getting to see these boys run around on the stage singing their hearts out was just glorious for me. I do wish I'd listened to their first album at all ever, because there were quite a few tracks from it, and I didn't know them (except for the singles), but it wasn't that big a deal. I sang along to all the songs I did know, and reached my hands for the rafters, and shone my phone light and danced and swayed.

The twitter questions were all actually questions tonight, rather than requests for them to do things. The first one was "which one of you do you think will get married first?" Liam answered quite cleverly that they didn't know, because after all, any one of them could go to a chapel in Vegas and get hitched without warning. That made the crowd scream, and the boys joked about Vegas for a bit, so they got out of that one. The asker was called @abbiesbuttcraic, and they teased about that too. Niall said what he reckoned happened was it was a case of putting a question in and not ever thinking you'd be up on screen, or you might have changed your twitter name first. it was very good natured ribbing. The second question escapes me, but the third was which of them would die first in the Hunger Games and why. Harry reckoned Liam because he would be all manly and RAWRR instead of having a strategy. Louis reckoned it would be him, as he nearly got crushed by the moving platform while they were trying to answer the question. Then Liam almost got crushed, too.

I was having fits about the platform because I am a total scaredy cat about heights. First of all, Harry didn't put on his belt clip thing until it had started moving, and then on the way back, Liam was dancing and the whole thing was shaking and wobbling alarmingly. I do not have enough faith in structural engineering, apparently. Of course everything was fine, though.

Harry is definitely the one most aware of the audience on stage as well as on social media. He was really playing up to the crowd, and threw at least four, maybe five, towels to the front rows. He knotted them in the middle so they'd fly far enough and not just flutter. The others all waved, and had good banter, and are good performers, but Harry's courting the fans in a way the others don't.

Niall is a really good guitar player, and is an absolute delight. I would love to see him just sitting and playing in the movie, and I hope we get that. Zayn is UNREAL beautiful. Like. I knew this about him? But in person his beauty is even more breathtaking. All the boys have obviously just had haircuts, and they all looked great, but shit, son. Zayn. a;dslkfjds Between his legs and Harry's legs, there was a lot of the show where I found it hard to concentrate on anything else. My taste in women runs the gamut of all kinds of shapes and sizes, but I like my boys skinny and breakable looking. Zayn fits that 100%. And holy fuck, there was one point where Harry was sitting in extreme profile, almost with his back turned to my section, and he had his far arm out behind him, so I could see all those tatts on the inside of his left arm, and oh my GOD I wanted to bite them so badly. I think it's best if I never try to have any kind of meet and greet with them :/

I think the funniest moment was when they were pointing out signs in the crowd (I think they were stalling while they fixed a sound issue) and Liam said, "Ooh my favourite one is Harry in a mankini there *points*. Or, wait. Is that Louis? Harry, is that you or Louis?" *Harry looks* "That's you, Liam." *Liam leans out and looks closer* "Is it? Is it me?" "Yes. It's you." "Okay, then! My favourite one is me in a mankini" *awkward grimace face*

Though at one point after he ran out of towels, Harry threw a drumstick into the crowd, and his face while it flew and he worried it was going to hit someone in the head was amazing. I really hope that someone caught that on film.

Oh god, I have just realized it's quarter to one, and I have a late start tomorrow, but not that late, so I need to go to sleep. I wanted to get this down, though, because I never want to forget. I'm so glad I decided to follow my heart and not my head on this one, and get the amazing seat, and go see this band I seem to have fallen in love with. Roll on the movie release date!

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