Night Changes

22

The next several days passed in a monotonous repetition of wake up alone, teach some classes, tidy the house, eat dinner alone, tidy up after Harry, and to go bed long after him.  Despite our argument and my hopes that it would bring his head out of his ass, apparently it had not had the effect I had hoped.

He had come home that evening, late as usual. Retrieving his dinner from the microwave, he came and joined me on the couch. Neither of us said anything as he ate, until he sat his dishes on the table and turned to me.

“Babe,” he said softly, angling himself towards me.

I turned to him, my eyes cautious. I said nothing.

“Im sorry,” he said, pulling his leg up onto the couch. “Im sorry we fought last night. And Im sorry I spoke to you that way. I had no right.”

I felt my icy exterior thaw slightly, but I didn’t let myself get too excited just yet.  “Im sorry too,” I said. “I know you’re under a lot of stress, and I shouldn’t have shouted at you either.”

Harry reached out, running the backs of his fingers along my cheek. I leaned into him, relishing in the first touch of affection he had shown me in weeks. All too soon, he pulled his hand away.

“Its late,” he said, glancing at the clock. “Im going to bed.”

With that, I felt the small touch of hope I had grasped onto that maybe, just maybe, he was coming back to me, break into a thousand tiny shards.  He leaned forward, pressing his lips to mine gently, before pushing off the couch and heading towards the bedroom.

I knew I would be right. I didn’t need to tell him about Ryan. He hadnt even asked how my day was.

By the end of the week, we had exchanged little more than the cursory conversation in passing that had become our normal. I felt as if I was living with a stranger. A ghost of the man I used to know and love more than my own life. He looked the same, and sounded the same. But nothing in his behavior equated the man I knew, to the one standing before me every day.

Another upsetting change was Harrys newfound tendency to have a drink when coming home. Along with the meal he would reheat, he would now also pull out a beer from the fridge. Sometimes two, depending on his mood and how his day had gone.

It wasn’t like Harry never drank. He did, on occasion, when we went out with friends. But it wasn’t something he didn’t with any form of regularity. We rarely had alcohol in the house, usually only buying it when we knew we would be having company…mainly Niall.

This new change in him was worrisome for me, but as I had come to do as of late, I stayed silent. He wasn’t getting drunk every night, becoming belligerent or abusive. He didn’t yell at me or cause a scene. So really, if he felt he needed a drink to calm himself after coming home from a stressful day, who was I to deny him this? If anything, I knew it would just start another fight, yet another thing to pull us apart. Another brick added to the wall that had been building between us.

It was now Friday, and I was headed to the studio to teach my two oclock class. The summer weather, now that we were in the grasp of June, was warm and soothing on my skin. I had plans tomorrow to go to Central Park with Louis, to show him around the city as I had originally planned to do with Harry. I had originally intended to ask Harry, beg him really, to spend this time with me. But just as I was about to bring it up, he told me that yet again he would be busy working with Zayn finishing up the details of the security monitoring in the building. They had moved in the week before, and there were still glitches he wanted to smooth out.