WEAK // (Harry Styles)

8

The TV screen flickers as an unsteady stream of electricity disrupts the lights, and I jump when someone knocks on the front door. I flinch, pushing one of the pillows against my chest. She told me not to answer the door under any circumstances.

A moment of silence passes. I begin to think that the visitor is gone, but it only grants me a second of relief before the knocking starts again, this time heavier.

"OPEN UP!" A frantic voice sears through the cracks of the door. Violent poundings continue, so I sneak into the bedroom and close the door.

"I'm serious, I need help!" the voice, now a little more somber, continues. Whoever it is must think she's here. I bet he heard the TV before knocking. I sink into the dark, warily watching as his punches to the door creates cracks.

"Just a few hundred bucks to get me through the week, please," he says, his voice deep and pleading. Nothing happens for a minute, and I'm about to exit the bedroom before the door bursts open. The man falls to the floor along with the door, and I watch him as he slowly gets up.

His face is facing the other way, so the only thing I see is his backside. His clothes and hair are a matching black, just like her. He walks cautiously around the living room, glancing at the TV. He pushes the pillows off, and searches under the couch. He groans when he doesn't find anything, but then he eyes the box in the kitchen.

He hurries over and pushes the lid off. He just stares for a moment before slowly grasping one of the cube containers, lifting it into the light to examine. I hope for him to turn towards me so I can see his face, but he doesn't. He puts the cube back into the box, puts it under his shoulder and hurries out of the apartment, his red cap low on his head.

Shit.

Shit, shit, shit. She's not going to be happy about this. She risked her life for that box, and now it has been stolen under my watch. She's going to blame me. I can't have her mad at me. I can't disappoint her.

I pace around the room, putting everything back where it was. As soon as the apartment looks like he never entered, I sit down on the sofa as carefully as possible and wait for her return.

"What the hell happened here?" I hear after a few minutes. I turn my head, and see her at the entrance, staring down at the two pieces of wood on the floor. The door. My eyes widen at them, blood rushing to my head. How did I miss the broken door on the floor?

"Harry! Why is the door on the floor!" She yells, my heartbeat increasing with the volume.

"I- I'm sorry! I was so scared, there was a man who came here and- and he was knocking, and he slammed the door open, and he took-"

I don't even have to finish before she runs to the kitchen, growling at the empty kitchen table.

"Fuck, he took it!" she hisses, making fists in her hair before flipping the table with a strong kick.

"You were scared?! You're bigger than him! You could've knocked him out with a single punch!" she scolds me, causing my shoulders to shrink. I am bigger than her too, but I don't think I've ever been this scared before.

"I'm sorry, please forgive me!"

"You know how much I gave up for that box? You have no fucking idea how big of a deal this is Harry! That substance is dangerous, and it was meant for people very high up," she frantically yells, and my heart squeezes tight in my chest. "And now my impulsive, crazy brother is running around the city with it! Fucking hell Harry!"

I've never seen her angry before. Even when those guys in the back alley were trying to steal from her, she was careless as she knocked them out one by one. This brother of hers scares her.

"You have a brother?" I ask, realizing she never told me. In fact, she hasn't told me nearly anything about herself.

"Fuck you Harry," she seethes through her teeth and I flinch.

"I can get it back," I breathe. "Do you know where he might be? I'll take it back, I'll do anything! Just please don't yell at me," I whimper. She stares at me for a second before she shakes her head.

"The only thing you can do for me is to leave. Get out of my apartment!"

Shivers run through my body, needles prickling me so hard that I almost feel blood seeping through my skin.

"No, please no! I won't." My voice cracks at every word as the thing I fear most laces itself tightly over my chest. I can't lose her.

"You're only a liability, I realize that now. Leave or I'll make you," she says with a calmer tone.

I crumble to the floor, tears falling to the broken door. I need her. I can't lose her.

"I love you," I whisper pathetically.

"Oh wake the fuck up! You don't love me, you'll realize that in a few weeks without... me," she hesitates.

She's wrong. She has to be.

"It'll never go away, so I can't go. I'll never leave you, just please let me be with you," I sob, reaching my hands out to her as my eyes point at the floor.

"Alright Harry, that's it..." she warns. I hear her take steps toward the kitchen, and when I look up again, she is right in front of me with a metal bat in her hands.

"You leave me no choice."