The late Liam Payne had an on-and-off relationship with Maya Henry from 2019 to 2022.
The former One Direction member and Texan model were first spotted together in August 2018 but didn’t go Instagram official until September 2019. Payne and Henry got engaged the following year, though he announced their first split in June 2021. By October, they were back together before eventually breaking up for good in 2022.
After their relationship ended, Henry, 23, opened up about her time with the singer, noting that their eight-year age gap affected their dynamic.
“I definitely chose to forgive a lot of things. When you love someone so much, you have those rose-colored glasses. You’re in denial, so you think those things will stop, and they don’t, and that just becomes an issue among other issues,” she told PEOPLE in May 2024.
Just one week before Payne’s death, Henry issued a cease-and-desist order to the former One Direction singer after she alleged he repeatedly contacted her, according to the Daily Mail.
She also shared some details of her alleged experience with an ex — whom she doesn’t name, but associates with “One Direction fans” — on TikTok. “Ever since we broke up, he messages me, blows up my phone … always from different phone numbers,” Henry said. “He’ll create new iCloud accounts to message me.”
A source with knowledge of the situation says Payne “was extremely overwhelmed by all of the legal issues” involving Henry.
Here’s everything to know about Liam Payne’s ex-fiancée Maya Henry and her former relationship with the late pop star.
She’s a model, influencer and author
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Henry grew up in Texas with her parents, lawyer Thomas J. Henry and Azteca Henry. She is an influencer and model who often shares her outfits and travels on Instagram.
In May 2024, she published her first book, Looking Forward, and she now studies writing at New York University.
Payne and Henry got engaged in 2020
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Payne and Henry were first linked in August 2018, following his split from ex-girlfriend Cheryl in July. However, the pair didn’t confirm their new romance until September 2019.
In August 2020, Payne and Henry stepped out in London with the influencer sporting a large diamond ring on her ring finger.
Soon after, Payne’s rep confirmed to PEOPLE that the couple were engaged.
“We’re just really happy,” Payne said during an appearance on Good Morning America after the engagement. “The last week I’ve had a birthday, my son has gone to school for the first time today, so it feels like a lot of firsts for me actually, which is great!”
They broke up twice, in June 2021 and the spring of 2022
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In June 2021, Payne appeared on The Diary Of a CEO podcast and announced his split from Henry.
“I feel like more than anything at this point, I’m more disappointed in myself that I keep on hurting people. That annoys me. I’ve just not been very good at relationships,” he said. “And I know what my pattern of things is with relationships, I feel at this point. I’m just not very good at them so I just need to work on myself before I put myself on to somebody else. And I feel like that’s where I got to in my last relationship.”
Despite this brief split, the couple stepped out together again in March 2022 and confirmed that they were back together. “She’s still my fiancée,” Payne said. “We’re still here together, and we’re very, very happy at the moment. Probably the happiest we’ve been. I think we went through a lot in COVID. I feel like we’ve come out the other side of it a bit stronger.”
Just a few months later, in May 2022, Payne and Henry split for good. Neither member of the former couple spoke out about the breakup but Henry commented on a photo of her ex with another woman, writing, “Please stop sending me these pictures of my fiancé wrapped around another woman. This is not me and it’s hard enough knowing this has happened without seeing it. Enough now.”
She wrote a fiction book about a popstar “inspired by true events”
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After her relationship with Payne ended, Henry authored a novel called Looking Forward, which the model said was inspired by personal journals written during the COVID-19 pandemic while she was still engaged to the singer.
In the book, an aspiring model named Mallory falls in love with a former boy band member, Oliver. The work chronicles their whirlwind romance and the protagonist’s eventual heartbreak when Oliver grows frustrated with his stalling career. It also touches on themes including abortion, abuse, violence, self-harm, substance abuse and eating disorders.
Though the novel is fiction, Henry told PEOPLE it was “definitely inspired by true events … [The main character] Mallory is very similar to me, and that’s why it was very easy for me to write her character and put the emotion in there. I’m just grateful that I have this opportunity and platform to really help be a voice for women.”
She said her relationship with Payne was “no fairytale”
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While Henry didn’t reveal the extent to which her fictionalized novel mirrored her relationship with Payne, she did get candid about their relationship while promoting the book.
“Every time I would tell people the story [of how we met], they would always say, ‘Oh my God, it’s like a fairytale, it’s like a movie,’ ” she said of their early romance. “I feel like I had to put that in the book and take that inspiration, because it just doesn’t seem real.”
In Looking Forward, Mallory deals with multiple instances of domestic abuse, including verbal insults and violence when Oliver chases her down the hallway. The character also becomes pregnant, though Oliver tells her that he will walk away from the relationship if she chooses to keep the baby.
Mallory has an abortion but suffers severe complications and ultimately enters the hospital to treat hemorrhaging, an experience Henry went through in her own life.
“What I went through in real life is very similar to what Mallory went through in the book. I definitely did have some complications, and I did have to go to the hospital alone,” she told PEOPLE of her own medical abortion.
She added: “If it were up to me, I wouldn’t have done it. But then also, if I were to have made a different decision, then I would’ve lost the person that I loved. There were definitely difficult conversations about it. But looking back now, things happen for a reason.”
Expanding on her experience dating Payne, Henry said, “I just became so desensitized to everything going on that I was like, ‘OK, this is my relationship, and this is how it’s going to be.’ And I feel like once you get out of [it], you’re really like, ‘Oh my gosh, what was I doing, and why was I there?’ ”
If you are experiencing domestic violence, call the National Domestic Violence Hotline at 1-800-799-7233, or go to thehotline.org. All calls are toll-free and confidential. The hotline is available 24/7 in more than 170 languages.
