Roommates // h.s.

Chapter Thirty

“We need to establish some rules,” I declared, holding up a blank sheet of lined paper, not revealing the front to make it seem as if I’d actually written these supposed ‘rules’ down. He looked up from the stack of yellow paper he’d been scribbling on.

“Rules?” he inquired, flatly. He still seemed to be on the grumpy side since last night, or really, only a few hours ago, looking at it arithmetically.

“Yes,” I cleared my throat, pretending to scan the blank page. “Firstly, you’re not allowed to play with my emotions.”

“Play with your emotions,” he repeated, getting the taste of the words on his plump lips. I had to rip my longing gaze from them.

“Exactly. You can’t just kiss me and confuse the shit out of me and then bring some twig bitch home to bang,” I said. Quickly including, “Or maybe she’s a nice person. Who knows? I apologize.”

“Don’t apologize,” he said, his cynical expression slowly morphing to an amused one. “She is a bitch.”

I furrowed my brow, “Then why did you…” I shook my head. Why get involved when I didn’t have to. “Anyways. Second rule. You can’t be a complete A-word to me without a logical explanation. And if you are an A-word, please tell me what the matter is in hopes that we can solve the dispute.”

He rolled his eyes. “You want me to talk about my feelings,” he rephrased. “Good luck with that, Ana.”

“If you get to have rules,” I said, although none of his rules were terribly hard to follow, “so do I.”

“I own this flat,” he remarked.

“Yes, but I pay you rent. So I sort of own half. Hence the rules.” I waved the blank paper.

He looked at me as if this sparked idea was insane, but he said, “Okay. Fine. And what are the next of these supposed ‘rules?’”

“Okay. Next one. Be honest with me.”

He scoffed. “What?”

“Be honest with me,” I repeated, ignoring his obvious degradation of my rule. “It shouldn’t be that hard, Harry.”

“Why should I be honest with you?”

“Why shouldn’t you be honest with me, is the bigger question here, Mr. Styles,” I retorted. “If we are to be living under the same roof, we should trust each other, shouldn’t we?”

He sighed, again rolling his emerald eyes, breathing, “Fine. Any more rules for me, Ms. Mills?”

“Matter of fact, yes. Stop leaving the freaking toilet seat up in the bathroom.”

He smirked. “Did you fall in?” he wondered, amused. I rolled my eyes, not denying it, because in fact, I nearly had fallen in earlier in the week. That could’ve been horrifyingly disastrous and painstakingly embarrassing, even if only I was the one to know of such an event. 

“Is that it?” he wondered.

I shrugged. “Yeah. For now.”

“Let me see the list,” he said, arm outstretched, waiting for the lined paper to connect with his hand. I gripped the sheet tighter, folding it neatly into a square and shoving it in my sweater pocket.

“No,” I quickly dismissed.

“Why?” His eyes danced.

“Because you should already have them memorized by now.”

His smirk grew. “You made those up off the top of your head, didn’t you?”

“Technically, I’ve been thinking that last one for the past four weeks,” I said, defiantly. “I expect you to follow my rules if I have to follow yours.”