Stranded [harry styles] ✓

17

There's a sharp prod against the right hand side of my face; pressing my cheek up flat up against my teeth. Dazed and confused, I roll away; desperately clinging onto the slumber that's quickly slipping away from me.

I'm caught in the limbo between being awake and asleep. One half of my brain is silent, peaceful and curled into a ball, whereas the other half can hear the ocean crashing against the rocks and dragging against the sand. It can hear the palms above creaking with a gentle breeze; the kind that scatters a mist of sea spray as far as it can carry it. It's idyllic really but I can't quite bring myself to wake up and deal with the fact that there are grains of sands stuck to my face with an adhesive of sweat from the morning sun. 

The prod comes again and this time I swat it away like a lingering bee. There's a deep, throaty laugh.

"Wake up!" It's Harry, of course.

My cheeks blush before my eyes open. Things have changed between us in the last couple of days. There's no more cold shoulder or uncomfortable tension. Instead there's the odd touch, a smile or even the gentlest press of lips against skin.

Eventually, I allow my eyes to flick open. Harry's kneeling next to me, a grin stretched across his face and his forehead partially covered by the fashionable bucket hat. My lips twitch with amusement.

"I hope you weren't watching me sleep." I frown and pull myself up into a sitting position. My limbs are stiff and sore where the hard spine of the palm leaf has dug into them; longing for the comfort of my mattress at home. "That would be kinda creepy." 

"Pfft! Absolutely not!" Harry snorts and pushes himself up into a standing position. "I've been to work - I've already caught a fish this morning."

As I watch his face, glowing with pride and jest, I notice the scab over his eyebrow has almost completely gone - now mostly a pink, puckered scar. Have we really been here that long? My right hand goes to the top of my left shoulder, surprised to find that my own wound is now sealed and stippled. 

I have been keeping track of the days - or at least trying to. But it would appear that no matter how many sun rises and sun sets I thought I had counted on my fingers, time has run ahead of us and merged everything into one. In fact, my whole concept of time has been lost - deserted like myself.  And now there's a knot, deep in my stomach, twisting ferociously at the thought that maybe we've been gone too long now to rely on anyone to come and find us. 

"What are you staring at?" He adds, eyebrows mashing into a frown. "Is there something on my face?" And like a squeamish child whose been told they have a spider in their hair, he starts swiping at his cheeks frantically, leaving long red marks as if he's been slapped.

"Not at all." I manage to grin and decide not to tell them that he truly does look ridiculous in that hat and also that we may have been here for a couple of weeks already. I dust the sand off of my body and stand up, surprised when Harry brushes a loose strand of hair out of my face. "Thank you."

He's smirking and I know full well it's because he's made me blush...again. 

"Stop being such a creep." I nudge him before turning and heading in the direction of the fire he's already assembled. There are two sticks crossed over the centre of it with half a fish on each; head and tailless. "And stop being so bloody good at everything!"

He catches up to me, sending a spray of balmy sand over my feet and out the corner of my eye, I can see he's grinning - somewhat ironically - like the Cheshire cat. "Hey, some of us are just born perfect." He shrugs. "It's not my fault that you're not one of them." 

My jaw drops and I whirl to face him. He's still grinning but rather than standing right beside me, he's slowly backing off, arms raised as if I'm about attack. I lunge for him, a laugh escaping from my lips as I do so and he hurtles down the beach in the direction of my 'SOS' sign. I fire after him, my feet anchoring in the sand each time they land, leaving me miles behind Harry who looks almost like he's running on top of it. Sports have never been my strong suit and right now, this seems to be more obvious than ever. 

"Get back here you sod!" I yell and I can hear his laugh from way up ahead. He's hard to miss in those damn shorts and that daft hat.  

I just about dodge the last 'S' as I approach him; bright red, sweaty and close to cardiac arrest. He stands with his hands on his hips like Peter Pan, looking down and admiring my writing. There's hardly any evidence to suggest he's just done any exercise at all. 

Damn him.

"If I didn't feel like I'm going to keel over," I pant, pointing an accusing finger at his smug, beaming face. "Then I would make you pay so bad right now." 

This only makes him smile wider, as if that was even possible. "Nice handy work, by the way." He casts his eyes over the sand again but I can only put my thumbs up in response, before craning my head upwards to look at the sky. 

It's been so empty. 

I had been so sure that something would fly over; that something would see us or our fire or my writing. I had been so sure. 

But how long is too long to keep looking? When is that terrible decision made? When are you officially on your own? 

I'd like to think that my parents, Jules and even Addie would never truly give up on me. Just as I would never give up on them if the situation were reversed. If I was told to accept that someone was gone, without seeing it for myself - I could never believe it."Pics or it didn't happen!" As Addie would say. 

"You have got to be kidding me." Harry's voice is almost breathless with surprise and I quickly bring my focus back down to where he stands. His eyes are focused on the shore slightly further up, further than either of us have been. For a moment I'm paralysed with fear, fear that whatever Harry has spotted is another body; bloated, grey and disfigured, like the many we've already encountered. But instead of paling or making some indication that we've got a nasty task to undertake - Harry starts walking. Walking towards whatever has caught his eye. I'm in two minds about whether to follow. I absolutely, one hundred percent do not want to see another fatality. But on the other hand, I'm not so sure it's a fatality at all. 

Curiosity gets the better of me and I jog to catch up with Harry's eager pace. There's signs of a smile playing with his lips but his eyes are wide and blinking madly as if he's staring into some sort of blinding abyss. I push my hair out of my face and open my mouth to ask Harry the question that's burning my lips - what is it?! 

But as we draw closer, I'm able to figure it out for myself. It's a duffel bag; a dark brown, battered leather wrapped in in some sort of rainbow striped luggage strap. Given Harry's reaction and eagerness, I had hoped for something a little more exciting. But a bag has a contents and a good contents could benefit us massively. I step forward to pull it out of the sea foam, but Harry's beaten me to it. He's grinning at it like he's been reunited with an old friend. 

"It's my bag." He says in a voice laced with disbelief. "Sarah, it's mine!"