Introspective Strangers [h.s.]

Chapter 59

*** Hi! Before we get into Chapter 59, I just wanted to let everyone know about a beautiful playlist that @shesogolden_ made for the Introspective Strangers that reminds her of Harry and May! I know that you can't copy links directly from books, so it will be linked in my bio if anyone wants to check it out! :) It made me cry. The fact that someone liked this fic enough to dedicate an entire playlist to it is crazy!!!!! Anyway, I hope you all like it as much as I do!!! Xo ***

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Chapter 59

Words seemed to have escaped the two of us.

We spent the entire rest of the day and all night together just being, existing and finding out what it meant to truly live in the presence of someone else whom you hold to the very same degree as your own soul.

It was weird, to say the least.

Weird at first to come to terms with the extent of what we'd both admitted to each other and weird also to find that it rolled off my tongue quite nicely, as if 'I love you' had been there and ready forever – just waiting for me to find the right person to say it to.

What wasn't weird was how I felt when I said it. The way my entire body warmed and my heart seemed to beat extra fast, watching as Harry's face lit up and his eyes sparkled. The way I couldn't hide my own grin as he held me close, mumbling it back against my skin and letting the words tumble toward the very depths of this newfound reality of mine.

The reality where my heart beat solely to love Harry Styles.

Cliché? Maybe. Cheesy? Definitely.

But I didn't quite care.

I remembered the conversation that I'd had with Eve on the roof the weekend of her wedding. I remembered it as I laid beside Harry, too buzzed and full of adrenaline to sleep, watching the way his eyes fluttered and chest rose with every soft breath that he took as he dozed, his arm tightening every so often from where it was wrapped lazily around my shoulder.

I remembered how I thought she was crazy when she told me that she realized she loved Erik only a month in. How she told me that it was less about how long you'd known someone and more about how they made you feel.

I understood that now what she meant by that.

Because Harry was that person for me. Time didn't exist when I was with him, all that existed was the way that I felt. It wouldn't have mattered if I'd known him two months or two years, this feeling was something that I would have been sure of. No matter what.

And I hated that it took me so long to admit it to myself, let alone him. Let alone any other people in my life.

I remembered what it felt like the first few times I'd been asked if I loved him. That choked up, terrified feeling that had forced itself up into the driver's seat, only to let me sit passenger side and watch while it squashed every possible hope or thought that I had of deluding myself into thinking that it could be possible.

Possible for him to love me or for me to love him.

I didn't realize at first that it had been fear, not repulsion. No – I had never once been repulsed by the notion of Harry's love, but rather what it would be like to live a life of it unrequited. To know that, if ever I allowed myself the truth of how I felt, he wouldn't feel the same.

And now – in this strange, stupid, wonderful fucking reality – he did. I didn't quite understand why or how, but he did.

My sister was right when she said that the fictional lives of those Jane Austen and Emily Bronté heroines that I was so privy to wouldn't seem so far off with the right person. It was beginning to feel like my very own life had turned into one of those romance novels that I could only ever have dreamt about.