Seeing Blind

Chapter Twenty Five

I rubbed my eyes with the heels of my hands so vigorously that I started to see stars the moment I pulled my palms away. The action wasn't because I was tired, or that my eyes ached despite spending the last two hours reading. It wasn't because they were itchy, scratchy, or any other ailment. It was merely a foolish effort on my part, that failed just as I knew it would.

I had hoped that by rubbing my eyes, Harrys face would disappear from my mind. That I could erase the looks on his face over the last ten days from my vision and memory, absolving me of the guilt and pain I felt for causing it in the first place. It didn't work, of course, but still I tried.

It wasn't like I wasn't used to him looking at me that way. That whenever I passed him in the living room, he would glare at me with this strained blending of longing and hatred, or look away completely pretending I wasn't even there. This was how we had lived together the first weeks of my time in England, so you would think I would have been used to it. Maybe even that it would have been easy to go back to this state, since it had been one that I had learned to navigate already.

But it wasn't. Because every time he looked at me that way, every time he pretended I didn't exist in his life, another piece of my heart broke away. Like the petals of a wilting flower, I could feel it decaying in my chest, a shell of what it had been when he cared for me.

He had looked at me this way so many times, but never like this. I had learned to ignore it, to ignore him, but now I simply couldn't. Because each of those looks burned into my mind and soul like a brand, scarring me deeper than any broken bone or burn Reign had ever dealt me.

Because this time, I had earned those looks from him. Before, I had been an innocent bystander of his internal struggle. Now I was the catalyst for his heart feeling shattered.

My room was dark apart from the lamp on my night table, the comforter doing little to block out the cold that came from within me, having nothing to do with the winter storm raging outside. This was how I had spent almost every day and night over the last week and a half, all but hidden away in this small square space, escaping the looks and blame I saw on the faces of my roommates every time I ventured outside.

Harry had tried to talk to me over those first few days. He would knock on my door for hours, even though I had locked it from the inside, keeping him out of my room and my heart. At one point, he had gotten himself so worked up, so angry, he had started trying to take the hinges off the wall with a butter knife, shouting at me that if I was going to act like a child, he was going to have to treat me like his mum did him when he did the same thing at seven years old. Finally, Louis pulled the knife from his struggling fingers, talking him down from his frantic state, and leading him away.

After that, it was attempts as we passed in the house, waiting outside my classes, or sending me texts at all hours. You would think it would be impossible to avoid someone you lived with, but I will admit I got pretty good at it. Hiding away in my room like a veritable prison was my main go to choice, and after days of pulling away from his grip, refusing to look at him and see the hurt in his eyes, and telling him there was nothing left to talk about, he finally gave up on trying to force me.

Again, just like that night, he didn't follow. But I wasn't angry, because I needed him to stop trying. I needed him to make this decision easier on me, because every shout, every declaration and every promise that he wouldn't let me ruin this only put another crack in the icy exterior I was trying to maintain between us.

I didn't want to end things with Harry. It hurt me deeper than any pain I had ever experienced to think of him across the hall, in his bed, alone. To remember the feeling of his hands on my skin, and the way he made me feel safe. He had slowly started to rebuild me, piece by piece, over these few short months, and for that I would always be grateful.