Reign || Harry Styles

06: Apprehension

Harry watched his tawny-haired girlfriend as she began to pout and shrug.

"I don't know, Harry. I give up."

And there it was.

The anticipated statement of surrender. He saw it coming.

And Harry didn't know what to say, really. Because he only wanted her to cheer up just a little, to wipe off that pout from her pretty face. He wasn't sure of why Elsie didn't enjoy his guessing games much like he did. It was supposed to be all fun and laughter, if she didn't respond so surly.

And Harry didn't know what to say to her, really.

But he shoved his despair straight away. Telling himself that it didn't matter, and what mattered was that he loved her, he loved her from her skin to her bones. All of her. He loved all of her.

Because Elsie was selfless, caring, benevolent. And that was all that mattered to him.

That was all that should matter to him.

Elsie. Not her.

Not her.

Not her.

"Y'know what?" he said as he crossed the room, trying hard not to sound pissy towards the girl staring at him with a befuddled look written all over her face. He paused for a second before continuing. "Nevermind. I'm just gonna go shower."

And just like that, he left the room in which they had shared the night together. Just like that.

Harry strode right into the bathroom and shut the door behind him with a loud thud. He put his hands on the rim of the bathroom sink, leaning his entire body weight on it as he heaved a heavy sigh.

He was undeniably upset about Elsie's gruffness, and rather apprehensive about his upcoming editorial (that was about to take place in less than an hour, but Harry shook the thought away). And there he was, staring at the the other curly-haired lad in the mirror, wondering if the jitters would subside.

"Harry?" Elsie's dulcet voice called from the opposite side of the closed door, knocking on it a few times. "Are you okay?"

Harry ran a hand through the chaotic mess of bed hair as he forced a flat-toned reply. "M'fine, love."

He wasn't. He most definitely wasn't.

There was a series of mild conflicting emotions in his mind that he couldn't decipher into words. It wasn't because of Elsie, because he knew his sweet, doting confidante had nothing to do with it. It was him, it was most definitely him.

Stripped off from any piece of clothing, Harry stepped into the shower stall, turning on the tap after he did so. He stood still as the hot, crystalline liquid flowed from the shower head and landed on his unclothed skin. Every single droplet of water crawling down the surface of his body felt comfortingly soothing. The sensation relaxed his tension for a bit, but he still couldn't clear his somewhat conflicting mind from the thought of her.

It was the substantial fact that he just couldn't stop looking at his lover of a year and a half without seeing her and the pair of sapphire blue eyes that imprisoned him in her gaze. Come to think of it, the encounter wasn't something significant in Harry's life journey (it may be to Niall, but then again, that was a different story), but he knew if that one brief and insignificant encounter could lead up to him seeing her in the simplest of things, then he would have to brace himself for the next.

And most definitely, it wasn't going to be the only time he saw and spoke to her.

Because he was going to see her again.

And the idea of seeing her again––just the mere idea––was enough to ignite the apprehension in his chest.

Because Harry knew from the moment she laid eyes on him, she had silently invited him to her game.

A game he knew he would never win.

A game she knew she would always win.

And Jean Franco always come out victorious.