Liam Payne, Maya Henry.
Jamie McCarthy/Getty Images for the Elton John AIDS Foundation
Liam Payne and ex-fiancee Maya Henri had an on-and-off relationship.
The One Direction alum was first linked to Henry in August 2018, shortly after he and his ex-girlfriend Cheryl Cole broken. A year later, Payne and Henry made their relationship Instagram official.
“If someone wants to take a picture, someone is going to do something. The difference is with her, she’s so relaxed that it helps me relax into a situation, rather than being somewhere, and talking about who’s watching and what’s going on,” Payne said on KISS FM United Kingdom in September 2019. “People will watch anything. What am I supposed to do? I can’t do anything about it now. It’s too late for that. It was just kind of nice to get out.
He added: “I’ve managed to explore London a lot more than I ever have in my life, which has been quite fun. My life has been completely normal lately, which has been a break.
Dave Bennett/Getty Images; Karwai Tang/WireImage Liam Payne’s ex-fiancée Maya Henry has stepped away from her real life to write her debut novel, Looking Forward. “Obviously, the book is fiction, [but it’s] definitely inspired by real events. Henry, 23, told People in an interview published on Wednesday (May 15).[The main character] Mallory looks a lot like […]
Payne proposed in August 2020, but they split the following year. Payne and Henry later reconciled, but called it quits for good in May 2022 after he was accused of cheating. (Payne denied the allegations at the time.)
When Henry published a novel inspired by this tumultuous relationship in 2024, Look forward tosome fans were convinced she was inspired by Payne.
“Some of the things that fictionalized the book were, obviously, the name changes, some cities are different,” Henry said on the “Internet Is Dead” podcast in October 2024. “Some of the timelines are a little skewed. People were like, “This can’t be about Liam,” because when I was talking about the abortion, he said, “Oh, I’m not ready to have a kid,” and in real life, this is obviously not the case. For privacy reasons, I just wanted to leave that sort of thing out of my book.
Payne, who died a few weeks later at the age of 31, shared his son Bear with his ex Cole.
Keep scrolling to review the timeline of Payne and Henry’s relationship:
2018
Payne and Henry started dating when they were 26 and 18, respectively. He has never publicly addressed the age gap.
August 2020
Two years later, Us every week confirmed that Payne had proposed.
June 2021
During an appearance on the “Diary of a CEO” podcast, Payne revealed that he is single.
“I feel like more than anything at this point, I’m more disappointed in myself than in continuing to hurt people,” he said at the time. “It annoys me. I’m just not very good at relationships. I’m just not very good at it, so I just need to work on myself before I rely on anyone else.
Payne added: “I feel like that’s where I got to in my last relationship. I simply no longer presented a very good version of myself, that I didn’t appreciate and that I didn’t like to be.
One Direction may have put their music on hiatus together, but bandmates Harry Styles, Niall Horan, Liam Payne, Louis Tomlinson and Zayn Malik have kept the ball rolling when it comes to romance. Malik’s relationship with fellow English singer Perrie Edwards was a fan favorite since the couple began dating in 2011 and got engaged. […]
October 2021
The breakup was short-lived as Payne and Henry reconciled several months later, before making their red carpet debut at the BFI London Film Festival in October.
May 2022
In May 2022, they split again after rumors surfaced that Payne had cheated on Henry. Payne’s rep, however, said We that he and Henry separated “over a month ago.”
The same year, Payne began dating Kate Cassidy.
May 2024
Henry published his first novel on May 14 about Mallory Hunt, a fan of the boy band 5Forward, who ends up becoming a model. Once Mallory becomes an It Girl, she meets and begins dating former 5Forward member Oliver Smith. In the book, Oliver forced Mallory to have an abortion after she became pregnant.
“Obviously, the book is fiction, [but it’s] definitely inspired by real events,” Henry said People in an interview published Wednesday May 15. »[The main character] Mallory is a lot like me, and that’s why it was very easy for me to write her character and put the emotion into it. I’m just grateful to have this opportunity and this platform to really help be a voice for women.
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Payne has never publicly addressed Henry’s book.
October 2024
Henry continued to detail his relationship with Payne in a series of scathing social media videos. In a clip from early October, Henry claimed that Payne told him that former 1D Zayn Malik once I threw him against a wall. (Neither singer has responded to the rumor. We I requested comment at the time.)
On October 14, the Daily Mail reported that Henry sent Payne a cease and desist letter after allegedly trying to contact her multiple times. We confirmed two days later that Payne died at age 31 when he fell from a hotel balcony in Argentina.
