A Slide Into First ➵ narry

Chapter 3

It turns out that the Braxton Wrenches were a busy little team, and for the next ten days the team was gone. Ten consecutive nights of away games. Liam came over the first day (Louis was still mega-hungover from the night before) and Harry and he went out to the mall. The next night there was an X-box tournament over at Zayn’s place, alcohol included. The entire week was full of minor diversions like those: biking, taking drives around the surrounding area, smoking weed in a field. And nearly every night Harry talked with his friends back home through Skype. Carl was always on, but sometimes Cara or Nick or Ed joined him. His friends, in both Michigan and Florida, weren’t going to let Harry pass this summer by idly.

In reality, Harry needed this break from work. He felt himself forgetting about Niall and becoming more interested in his other friends. Not in thatway, of course. He just felt that this time apart from focusing on Niall helped him get closer to these other crazy people that had inserted themselves into his life. He learned that Zayn only took the internship in Braxton because he had been lazy and missed the deadlines on the other internships actually in NYC. Louis was going to school for supply chain management, but his real talents were in the theatre. He had been Danny in “Grease” that spring, and his performance drew critical acclaim from all the media outlets at MSU. Liam was an avid runner who had once been third in the entire country back in middle school, but had since fallen to just barely being in the top 100. They even hung out with the one of the other guys from the snack stand once or twice, Josh, and he showed them his aptitude for drumming.

Harry felt stupid for ignoring these people before. Sure, Niall was fun and cute and always seemed to put a smile on Harry’s face, but these other people he had surrounded himself with were just as special. Liam was always interested in what you had to say. Genuinely, enthusiastically interested. Louis knew how to annoy the hell out of you and make you want to kiss his ass at the same time. Zayn could be quite reserved at times, but at others he was able to run circles around you with his energy. Those ten days flew by so quickly that Harry didn’t realize when they were over.

**

Harry was awoken by three loud bangs on the front door. It was the last day of his break from work before the team returned to play at the stadium again, and he was cherishing his time to sleep in. They had stayed up late the night before playing poker at Zayn’s place, so he was a bit unhappy when he had to get up. He didn’t feel like putting on clothes just to appease the UPS guy so he grabbed a towel to throw around his waist. He regretted the decision immediately when he opened the door to see Niall’s face.

“Ooh, did I catch you at a bad time?” Niall asked in a joking manner.

“Shit, fuck, uh, come in. Let me…just go…fix this,” Harry said.

Niall made himself comfortable on the couch while Harry tried to run back to his room in the least-awkward manner possible. He threw on a pair of jeans and a shirt he was pretty sure he hadn’t washed yet, but he was in such a hurry that he barely noticed. With a few swipes at his hair he was ready to be presentable for Niall.

Niall was staring at picture frames on the end table when Harry came back into the room. Niall was wearing a tanktop and a snapback again. Harry was pretty sure that was his entire closet, but he couldn’t be one to judge considering his consisted only of skinny jeans and white tshirts.

“Ah, better,” Niall said, looking up at him from the couch.

“So, um, don’t mean to be rude. But why are you here?” Harry asked, following it with a small cough.

“Not rude at all! I would have called but I don’t have your number so… anyways I was wondering if you wanted to go with me to Wal-Mart?”

“Ooh, what a wonderful place for a date,” Harry said as he started to eat a banana, hoping Niall would catch that it was a joke. Praying, really. Luckily, Niall let out a particularly loud chortle.