[H.S] Shots

time apart (angst)

(Y/N) didn’t know who to blame for how the night turned out: herself or her parents?

Usually when he drove, Harry liked to put his hand on (Y/N)’s thigh or bundled between her two, but if she needed any more of a reminder of how awful dinner had gone, he was definitely getting the point across with the way he kept his hands fixed tightly around the steering wheel. The car was silent aside from the quiet flow of Harry’s radio playing from a generic station. He hadn’t said a word to her since the argument had broke out between him and her parents, an expected conversation but more than inappropriate in a public restaurant. (Y/N) didn’t want to breach the chilly air between them either, instead alternating between picking at her nails and gazing out the window like she’d found the most interesting show.

The night had started in much higher spirits in her apartment. While she hadn’t been particularly excited for the plans they’d made with her parents, she was happy at least to have Harry at her side for the night. He’d been the best hype person while she was getting ready, telling her how pretty she looked and making jokes about skipping out on their plans and letting him have her for dinner instead. It did wonders to calm (Y/N)’s jitters and keep a smile on her face despite what she knew the meal would turn into.

Since the first (and last) time her parents met Harry, they’d kept their icy distance. (Y/N) was fine with that, as long as she didn’t think too hard about it, but one day they had reached out like their last reunion never happened. They didn’t mention Harry at all, nor really anything about her life, but they were pleasant enough to invite her to dinner to celebrate a work award her father had been given. She was more than reluctant to go, afraid this was only a ploy to get her to talk to them again in order to fill her head with toxicity. But, (Y/N) couldn’t help but hear out the little girl that lived in the back of her mind, the one that told her that maybe they really missed her and wanted to see her again after so long, maybe they even wanted to patch up what happened the last time.

And she’d always been bad at telling them no.

When she told Harry about the dinner plans, she knew he was disappointed. She remembered the way he took a deep breath and crossed his arms over his chest before rolling his lips between his teeth, his lip ring catching the light. He gave her this look, like he was surprised she agreed to the invitation. It felt like she had waited hours before he said anything, until he told her he wanted to go with her. He didn’t want her going alone when he knew she wasn’t going to be able to defend herself against the both of them. At the time, the thought of Harry accompanying her relieved a weight from her shoulders she didn’t know she had. She remembered the way she jumped in his arms and thanked him with kisses and words of affection for taking on the duty of going along with her.

She certainly didn’t remember thinking that the night would end like this.

The second her parents saw Harry walk in with her, their entire demeanor soured. The frown on her father’s face and the terribly hidden disappointment distorting her mother’s features brought her back to grade school reprimands that would plague her for weeks after. It only got worse when they saw her hand joined with Harry’s own tattooed one as they approached the table. He had started as nothing less than a gentleman, Harry pulling her chair out for her and greeting her parents with more respect than they could muster for even their own daughter.

Though the meal was tense, nothing erupted until her father egged Harry on halfway through their entrees. He knew what he was doing when he made a comment about how he thought (Y/N) should consider moving back home, that there were too many bad influences tainting her. At first Harry just quietly rolled his eyes and continued cutting into his food with a little too much force, but then her father pushed one more time, directly asking Harry when he planned on tossing (Y/N) to the side because they had someone much better suited for her in her hometown. (Y/N) couldn’t hear Harry’s biting response, the words too drowned out by the sound of blood rushing in her ears, but she could definitely hear the argument that started after.