the writer // harry styles au

chapter 7

Harry

The typewriter is cold. The clicking is infuriating. I always thought that using a utensil like this would improve my writing because it's what all the great writers used. F. Scott Fitzgerald wrote one of the best novels of all time on a typewriter. The Great Gatsby covers multiple topics, with angst and depth; love and hate; wealth and riches. I was so naïve to have ever thought I could write a novel as iconic and brilliant as Fitzgerald's.

These words lying on the pages are words of pure fiction. None of this has been taken from personal experience. Writers gain and produce work by experiencing what they're writing about, and I'm declining this offer with Alexis.

My last book, 'In The Night', was written in my old bedroom; where I grew up. The walls were painted a depressing dark blue, with the paint that touched the skirting boards peeling off. The light was a rustic, old single lamp about the size of a football. It hung about a metre from the roof, and, if I was on my tip toes (at the age of 14), I could touch it. The roof wasn't high, the door crept more than a haunted houses' floors and my bed was only a foot from my desk, but it was the comfort of the room that made me feel as if my real life was connected to the novel.

The novel starts off with a boy lying awake in his bed in a room that was just like my own. He's petrified. His covers are pulled up just until they reach the dip of his nose between his two eyes. Starting the novel in an almost familiar like setting helped me make it a great novel, if I may say so.

You would think that no matter the environment, the writing would be the same- never differ- but your wrong. Within a familiar environment a writer is able to write a character in their own familiar setting, relating their current emotions to the characters. If the writer was to be in an unusual setting, he would be able to write a character who felt out of place and, again, relating to the character.

The problem with my story is the unfamiliarity with Alexis. I want to write about a boy who immediately feels at home with this girl; that the second he bumps into this girl, just the colour of her eyes gives him a sense of belonging. I don't feel this with Alexis. Behind her eyes is nothing. Her pupils are a wall that no one wants to bring down because they're so beautiful. Her hair is plain, her figure is tall with below average curves. I haven't found a sense of familiarity with her, and that troubles me because I need to feel familiar with her to write that feeling.

My office is only lit by a cheap IKEA lamp and my desk wobbles each time I press down a key on the typewriter. I'm agitated and frustrated. I pick up the typewriter. I don't need this piece of rubbish anymore. I carry it out my study. The stupid machinery is heavier than my eyelids, which are dripping with sleep. Each step I take down my stairs hurts. I have no stamina at this unearthly hour. My front door is hauled open by my weak hand. I jog to the bin around the side of my house, the cold evening is biting at my skin and my blood is pumping faster though my body to keep me warm. I pull open the bin and let the typewriter drop and smash. One of the keys flies up, knocking one side of the bin before falling to the bottom again.

I run my hands up and down my bare arms. I take it in. The cold evening, the fog only a few houses down the street. I breathe out and watch the air in front if my face become visible. It floats up slowly and disappears. I feel a sudden pinch by the top of my spine and realise that being out in the cold may not benefit me in anyway except for the the metaphors currently running through my mind.

I run to the door and swing it open quickly. I run to my bedroom and slip underneath the warm confines of my bed. The flannelette sheets are cold and stiff, most likely because I've been sleeping with my head on my desk for the past two nights.

I had come home after dropping Alexis off to write about how it felt to be around her, but that wasn't how I wanted to write her. I had felt uncomfortable all night (except for the goddamn blowjob she gave me). I want to write a sense of belonging. When I dropped her off it was awkward, sufficiently awkward. She had gotten out of the car on her own, not waiting for me to open the door like I was going to. She waited by her car door while I walked around. Her brown fringe looked too long, nearly long enough to bother with her eye sight. She was tugging the coat tighter and tighter against her body, trying to keep her body heat close. Her arms were crossed over each other, another heat-keeping-in method.

I think she was refraining from doing something. Maybe she wanted to kiss me as much as I wanted to kiss her. We walked up to the building's entrance in silence, my hands we deep in my coat pockets, and as much as I wanted to touch her, I couldn't. She didn't want me to. We had stood at the entrance for a few seconds. I was taking in every but of her, probably to her annoyance. Her messed up fringe, the choppy layers on her hair, her dry lips. Each flaw I found made me more intoxicated than I was before. Her imperfections were my weakness and I didn't know why.

The door had opened suddenly, a man in his mid-forties jogged out the door in a grey t-shirt, jeans and socks. My mind pondered as to why this man would be running outside like that on a freezing night. While that was going on in my mind, Alexis had taken the opportunity to escape into her building. I turned around to nothing. No brown hair, no dry lips, no shivering body- nothing. I was angry. I wanted to grab her and kiss her with more passion than in the restaurant. She is annoying and doesn't stop worrying, but I can't get enough of her.

I walked back to my car. I turned to look up to her building, only to see a small brown haired girl poking her head out from behind a curtain. He fringe had been pushed back by the curtain and her hair was pulled back. I waved up to her, only to have her cower away into the depths of her apartment.

Of all the events of that night, you would think I would be the one avoiding the other, but no. I feel like this girl will be something special to me. How? I don't know.

I will text her in the morning. I will.

***

That morning I went out the breakfast at a small café around the block from my house. The café was filled with a mass amount of lovesick couples. Good for them, I thought. A majority of the human race spends their life finding their significant other and it seems that all these people had.

I pulled out my phone after I was seated, I didn't want to look like a lone soul in this café who had nothing important to do. I did have something important to do, though. I had to text Alexis.

My phone felt too thin in my hands. I hate this fucking phone. I hate texting. I hate how nervous I am just to text this phenomenal girl.

I need to text her, so I do:

Hi, Alexis. I know that our first date didn't go like normal ones do, but maybe we can try again? I just need to see you again. Please, text back. H. xx

(A/N: Hi guys! Just pointing out, I am Australian so you might see different spelling or words you don't know like 'fringe' (which are bangs btw). Anyway, please vote and comment!!)