Stranded [harry styles] ✓

2

He looks awfully familiar.

Jules used to email me photos of guys she wished she were young enough to date in the hope that I would and she could live through me. Maybe he looks similar to one of them. 

I just stare.

"I know that this is probably all very overwhelming right now," he tells me with his hands raised as if he's about to be arrested. "But the plane we were on—it crashed. There was a storm and the engines cut out and we crashed into the sea."

My lips part but I continue to stare. 

"I think everyone is dead—apart from us, obviously. We must have washed up here. I think it's completely deserted. Imagine that—a deserted island? Cliché right? We just need Tom Hanks to pop up." He's manically rambling—I think it's shock. That's what they usually say, right? 

"I've pulled so many bodies out of the water in the last few hours. I'm so relieved to see somebody alive."

Bodies. 

Dead.

Deserted.

His words suddenly hit me like a ton of bricks and I burst into hysterical tears.

I can hear the repetitive chanting of the passenger who had been seated beside me. I can smell the stale vomit. I remember the plane shuddering and the feeling of falling—falling through the sky.

I never made it to Kuala Lumpur.

I won't be spending the Summer in Malaysia.

I think of Jules waiting for me in arrivals. She'll think I'm dead. My parents will think I'm dead. They'll think I perished along with everyone else.

The guy just stares out to sea—twiddling a fabric bracelet on his wrist. I can see the sun glistening off of silent tears that are now racing down his face. There will be people grieving for him too. My eyes lower and I notice there are more tattoos on his arms—like commemorative patches. They're not exactly intricate designs or carefully sketched masterpieces—they're doodles, as if someone was let loose with a Sharpie. I catch sight of the multiple metal bands wrapped around his long, slender fingers—somehow not lost in all the commotion. 

I realise then that I know exactly who he is.

"You're Harry Styles." I croak—another layer of my throat torn away.  

"Yep." He says quietly. He runs a hand through his hair but his fingers meet salty matted locks and become stuck. 

I walk away from him and begin to pace up and down the shore. I can't remember the last time I went to the beach and now can't help but think that if I ever get away from here—it won't quite hold the same connotations. The sun is unforgivingly hot and I wouldn't be surprised if I was beetroot red by now. I never did fair well against the sun—I have my mother's pale complexion to thank for that. If I thought I was out of my depth during the crash then I'm absolutely screwed now. I start to cry again.

This was not the plan. This wasn't meant to happen—I'm not supposed to be here. I bury my face in my hands and am surprised when an arm winds around my shoulders—pulling me into a tight grip. We stand like this for a while, Harry never loosening his grip and I think perhaps it's more for his benefit than it is mine. He's trying to hold it together just as much as I am. 

"What's your name?" He asks. I drop my hands from my face and look out to sea—it doesn't seem right that it's so beautiful. A prison shouldn't be so easy on the eye. 

I consider Harry's question—what does it really matter what my name is? I'll just be considered as one of the many passengers who unfortunately lost their lives that day. Soon I'll be a number in a news report and a history lesson. 

"Sarah." I finally tell him. We must look a right pair—blood stained and blotchy staring out to sea. Not that anyone will be observing. Harry takes a breath from beside me—it catches in his throat. 

"Sarah, we have got to do whatever it takes to get out of this mess."

I turn to look at him, forgetting the stiffness in my neck and wince for what feels like the hundredth time since I opened my eyes. "Harry, I might have seen Cast Away but I don't have the first clue as to how to survive on a deserted island."

It's embarrassing just saying it—Deserted Island. It sounds like it should belong on the blurb of a book or the script for a movie, not an event now permanently etched on the timeline of my life.

This shouldn't be real.

"I don't care." He says firmly. "I'm not dying here and neither are you."