The Long Road Home || h.s. au

Chapter Twelve

Harry cleared his throat. They had taken up a slow but steady place along the shore, right at the edge of where the water washed up, letting the waves wash over their toes. There were a couple of bonfires off in the distance, creating dots of bright orange along the coast. The sound of the lapping water was loud in the quietness of the night. The surf was calm, the waves no bigger than half a meter. Everything was just as Sia had imagined it would be. It made her wonder why she didn't take advantage of the beautiful beaches back in LA more often. Maybe now she wouldn't take them for granted.

"I uh...I was the one that sent him out lookin' for you that first time," Harry admitted, sounding a little bashful in his delivery.

Sia looked over at him, having to tilt her head up slightly to accommodate for their height difference. The moonlight was so bright that she could see the slight pink tinge of his cheeks and the high points of his ears.

She waited a beat before responding, "I know. Mitch told me."

Harry hummed, dipping his chin to his chest. "Wanted to go myself, but thought better of it. Mitch said he'd go for me. Just didn't want yeh gettin' lost out here by yourself in the dark."

Sia bit at the inside of her cheeks, contemplating how exactly she was going to respond. Her and Harry were still in this delicate place between tipping to hating each other again or tipping to becoming friends like they once were. She didn't want to go back to yelling at each other and avoiding each other at all costs. Everything she'd conditioned in herself over the last year told her to tell him he needed to mind his own business, because she was none of his concern anymore, but she kept reminding herself that they were working toward being friends again.

"I know I've bit your head off about it a couple times before," Sia began hesitantly, dipping her head down to look at her feet as they shuffled through the packed sand, "but I do actually appreciate your concern. Kinda miss havin' someone look after me. Not that I'm not capable of lookin' after myself. But..." Sia shrugged, "yeh know."

Harry stopped walking, and Sia only walked past him for a pace or two before realising he was behind her. She turned on her heel and looked at him. He had his head tilted down to his feet, both hands shoved in his pockets. His toes were wiggling in the damp sand.

"What?" Sia asked, very aware that he was toying with something he wanted to tell her in his mind.

Harry sighed before looking back up at her, giving her the courtesy of looking her in the eyes. "I know we agreed to not dive into all our shit, but, I feel like it's doing ourselves a disservice if we don't at least talk about something. It just eats at me sometimes."

Sia felt her jaw clenching in an automatic reaction to Harry's confrontation. And it wasn't even really a confrontation, it was more of a pleading suggestion, and it was one that was a long time coming. She had really got to get over her split-second reactions to all the things that Harry did, otherwise she'd be sprouting grey hairs before the end of this all.

"Can we..." Sia began, trying to unclench her teeth. She looked around and spotted a fairly big boulder that looked like it would do for a bit of seating while they were hashing things out. "Can we at least go sit for this?" she asked, gesturing to where she'd seen the rock, just a little ways down the shore.

Harry nodded and silently followed her, helping her take a seat before he arranged a comfortable position for himself. For thinking he was ready to have this conversation with her, he was feeling a lot of nerves about opening up the communication about what it was that had went wrong between them. He didn't want it to be the beginning of the end yet again.

When Harry had been silent for longer than Sia was comfortable with, she sighed and looked over at him. He had a nearly violent grip on his lower lip with his index finger and thumb, turning the skin a pale colour.