Authors Note: I finally wrote again! I'm sorry that it took me so long. My writer's block is always horrible. I think I only wrote one time over the summer. But, since I finally hit 50K reads, I knew that I HAD to write! :) Warning: It's a really short chapter so I'm really sorry, but I have lots of ideas for the next couple chapters so I promise that they'll be coming soon.
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Harry and I were closer than ever. And yet, he was gone nearly every night and would get back well into the morning. One particular morning, I had spent the night at his house and I was still laying in his bed when he got there- so it must have been pretty early in the morning. At least, in respects to when he had recently been getting home.. He climbed into bed and planted a particularly sloppy kiss on my cheek. I propped my head up with my hand and stared at the beautiful boy who couldn't stop grinning like a child at me. "Can I ask you something?" I asked, lazily running my fingers through his hair.
"You can ask me absolutely anything, angel." he said, closing his eyes. One might perceive him to be drunk out of his mind, but he always gets this way when he's hysterically tired.
"Have you ever thought about just getting out of this? Leaving gang life? We could run."
"I can't do that." he said, almost stiffly, a vast contrast from before.
"But why ca-"
"You don't understand-" he started, but I cut him off.
"Then tell me! I'll never understand if you don't tell me. I want to understand. Let me."
"You can't just quit like it's some sort of game. It's just the way is for me- for us. If you try to just stop, you get killed. And I don't mean by any of the guys. I got lucky in that we're actually friends. Most gangs aren't. But if I just quit, I'll die. You'll die. They'll die. You don't get to make the choice to just stop. Marcus will kill us. Matt will kill us. There's no happy ending in this. You just have to make the most of what we already have, angel. Because, it's not going to get any better any time soon." he explained. It made tears come to my eyes but I looked away so he wouldn't see. Somehow, he knew anyway. He put his hand on my cheek, forcing me to look at him again. "I don't want to do this to you..." he spoke softly. "But there's no other way. That's why I'd never blame you for not loving me." That only made me cry more.
"I'll always love you. I don't care about that. It's ok. I was just asking. It's perfect anyway. It's perfect just to be here, doing all this with you. It's fine." I said, resting my head on his chest.
"It's not... It's not fine. I wish there was something I could do. You do deserve better. I just can't give it to you right now. I wish I could. One day, I swear to you that I will."
"All I need is everything that you are." I mumbled, trying to stop crying. The weight on my chest got lighter, but somehow, it only made me cry more. "I wish we could just run. Move really far away or something." I said so quietly, into his chest that it was mostly to myself.
"Maybe, angel. Maybe." he whispered, pulling me closer and rubbing my back.
Harry's POV
I woke up at nearly three in the damn morning to my phone vibrating. I looked at the number and didn't recognize it. I looked over at Charlotte, who was still fast asleep, facing away from me. I answered the phone and walked into the bathroom so that I wouldn't bother Charlotte. "Hello?"
"Is this Harry Styles?"
"That depends. Who's this?"
"This is the West ValleySprings police department, Chief Harris speaking." My heart nearly dropped right out of my chest. How did they get my number and what did they find out about? The worst part about living the kind of life that I do is never knowing which crime is the one you're getting in trouble. It's even harder to find out without revealing other crimes that the police weren't even already aware of.
