the song for this chapter is "La Vie En Rose," by Louis Armstrong :)
***********
Hold me close and hold me fast
The magic spell you cast
This is la vie en rose
When you kiss me heaven sighs
And though I close my eyes
I see la vie en rose
***********
Harry
You know those select few moments in life where it feels like your soul gets to leave your body, solely so that you can truly appreciate the things around you? It's like you get to look at your life from a completely unbiased perspective, and you get to separate the good from the bad, the tears from the laughter, and finally, just see the most in-depth view of your life?
Yeah, that's where I'm at right now.
It was nearly time for dinner. The sun had almost completely set, and Tate was finishing up getting ready.
She was sat by the big bay window in the bedroom we had chosen to stay in. There was a window seat, with a pale yellow cushion that had little blue and white flowers dotted all over it. She had one leg tucked into her so that the sole of her foot was touching her upper thigh, while the other leg lazily hung over the white painted wood of the window seat.
I had finished getting ready forever ago, but I was just mindlessly picking around at my hair in the standing mirror in the room, pretending to be busy, just so that I could admire her in her natural state.
She was wearing a simple champagne-colored dress that had a slit that went to her knee, and the bottom hem of the dress fell to just right above her ankles. Although, with the position that she was sat in right now, the dress had hiked up over her thigh, making the contrast of her tan skin against the satin material of the dress stand out beautifully.
She hadn't put on her shoes yet, but they were placed on the ground beneath her. She thought that I hadn't noticed, but I watched her as she scooted them around on the ground until they were perfectly aligned next to each other. They were dainty little heels, with tiny little crystals all over them, and every time I moved my head, I caught them glinting in the light of the room.
The dress had a tank top style upper half, with thin little straps that hung carelessly on Tate's shoulders, the straps themselves having rhinestones to match the ones embellished on her heels.
Her hair was parted in the middle, her natural waves cascading down her back perfectly, and being one of the only things covering her exposed skin due to the low dip of her dress.
There were little lights mounted on the inside walls of the window, vintage-looking ones, with Edison bulbs placed within them that cast the most beautiful glow on Tate's face as she applied her makeup.
She was holding a vintage mirror in her hand that she had found on the desk in our bedroom, meticulously applying the dark brown mascara to her long lashes.
She had created a natural makeup look like she normally did, using a new lipstick that she had bought on our shopping trip to add a new addition to her look. It was by Gucci, and I only remembered that because I remember her reading out the name of it to me, it was called Goldie, and it was one of the most perfect and subtle red colors that I had ever seen, and it complimented her skin tone like it was crafted for her and her alone.
Her skin was glowing partially due to the light cast upon her face by the Edison bulbs, but also because she was her. A glowing, golden little earth angel, ascended from heaven in order to restore the light in my world that I had sworn would be forever lost.
As I said earlier, this was one of those select few moments where your soul got to leave your body and give you a look at your life from the outside in.
At this moment, I wasn't Harry Styles, a notorious assassin and renowned criminal. I wasn't Harry Styles, the boy who lost his mother too young in a way that was too cruel to even begin to fathom.
I was Harry Styles. Boyfriend to Tate Lennon Bridges, the most beautiful girl I had ever had the opportunity to know, and I say beautiful first and foremost in regards to her heart. Her appearance was merely an added bonus.
I was watching my girlfriend get ready for a date that my best friends in the world had prepared for us. I was in France, one of the most romantic places in the world, something that I had only truly come to appreciate after having fallen in love.
The house we were staying in, while small, was one of my favorite ones yet. It exuded a feeling of home and belonging, even before your foot crossed over the threshold. Some of the paint was chipping, there were a few teacups with cracks in them. The bed made a squeaky noise if you sat down too hard on it, and for the life of me, I couldn't figure out how to turn off the ceiling fan in the bedroom...no matter how many times I flipped the switch on and off. It was worn, with vintage elements and yes, there was dust in the corners, but at its core, it was beautiful.
And even though the house was dreamy before Tate had inhabited it, now that she was residing within its walls, it was absolutely and completely ethereal.
So now, at this moment, soul departed from my physical body, I began to see that my life was kind of like this house.
There were a few cracks in my memories. There were years that had been so harshly hit by wind and rain, that the paint of my life had started to chip away, exposing the wood underneath. I had months where no matter how careful I was, life started to squeak, just like the brass-framed bed across from me. And there were moments where, no matter how hard I tried, I couldn't turn off the pain that seeped into my bones when I thought about my mother, and how much I missed her. Just like the ceiling fan that seemed to have a mind of its own, with no switch to rule its actions, sometimes, I just had to accept that the pain was there.
But despite all of those things, despite the cobwebs and the creaky floorboards and the window that wouldn't open no matter how hard you pulled up on it...despite the finicky water heater that couldn't seem to make up its mind when it came to the temperature, or despite the one chair with the wobbly leg that I always seemed to inadvertently select as my seat...despite all these things...
My life still held beauty.
It held beauty in the fact that I had a place to live, food to eat, and a job-as frowned upon as it may be- that provided for me.
It held beauty in the fact that I had a group of best friends that I loved and adored, even if I didn't vocalize it as much as I should.
It held beauty in that even though my mother had been taken away from me sooner than I ever would have liked, and in a way that I wouldn't even dream could happen, the times that I did have with her were times of joy and love.
And it held beauty in the wonderful, blissful, thoughtful, and stunning human being that was Tate.
"Harry?"
She spoke my name, and in an instant, my soul retreated back into the confines of my physical body, jolting me back to reality in the strangest of sensations.
But for the first time in many years, when I was brought back from that otherworldly place, I wasn't depressed at the reality in front of me...
I was overjoyed.
Because there she was, a mere three or four feet away from me, all done up and all mine. I didn't lose her when I came back to my senses as I did when my mind would drift back to thoughts of my mother. When I blinked my eyes back to the present moment, she was there, just as beautiful as she was within any of my daydreams, if not more so.
With Tate, nothing ever got old.
There was no definitive end to our honeymoon phase, as I don't think it would ever stop. Each interaction with her was like it was our first, even if whatever it was happened to be our thousandth time.
The butterflies never ceased, the blush never forgot to creep its way onto our faces. Each kiss held only more and more electricity upon our lips coming in contact with one another. Every accidental brush of our hands made a smile involuntarily make its way onto my lips. Each and every last "I love you," that fell off of those beautiful lips of hers, whether it be in a shout or a whisper, made me feel what it felt like to fall in love all over again.
"Oui ma lumière?" I asked without hesitation, the change in language catching her off guard, and I smiled as her lips quirked in a confused manner.
"What does that mean?" She laughed softly, setting the gold antique mirror down on the worn-in cushion underneath her.
I smiled gently. "It means, 'yes my light?'" I answered her, watching as her face contorted into complete and utter adoration.
I often found myself comparing Tate to a fire. With the way that she completely engulfed me in her flames, the singe that she placed upon my skin as she proceeded to burn down the walls I had created for myself over the years.
But the thing about fire is that no matter how perilous the flames may be, it will still cast the most beautiful glow. It will still blaze a path into the darkness that no amount of water could even begin to douse.
So, even though she burned me, even though she set everything that I thought I knew completely ablaze...at the end of the day, she brought light into my dark world.
She was the light in my dark world.
And I'd get burned a thousand times if it meant I could see the glow of her face within the embers.
She pursed her lips together in a way that told me she was thinking. Whenever she was trying to come up with something or decide how to properly word whatever was on her mind, she always pursed her lips together and scrunched her nose up ever so slightly.
Just as I was about to ask her what was on her mind, she opened her mouth to speak.
"Je t'aime ma rose," she spoke in a voice that was barely above a whisper, but I heard each and every word loud and clear.
She said, "I love you, my rose," and I had no idea why.
It was now my turn to scrunch up my nose in confusion, lightly cocking my head to the side as I tried to understand why she had chosen to refer to me as a rose, as she had never done so before.
But the way she said it was so effortless. There was no hesitation in her word choice, which led me to believe that the newfound nickname was one that held significance to her that I did not understand.
"Why did you call me your rose?" I inquired, walking over to sit on the end of the bed, smiling to myself a bit as it squeaked under my weight, and this time, I wasn't annoyed by it.
She opened her mouth, but instead of speaking, she sucked in a short breath of air and pressed her lips closed again.
"I'll tell you another time. Maybe you can explain why you decided to call me your light as well," she smiled.
I pursed my lips into a smirk, and chuckled softly after.
"Maybe I will."
She stood up from where she had been sitting, bending down to slide her feet into the heels, quickly buckling them around her ankles.
My eyes trailed all the way up from the small little crystals that covered her heels, to the slit in her dress and the small sliver of skin peeking out from underneath it, up to her collarbones, which I desperately wanted to press kisses all over, and finally...to her face.
Her heels lightly tapped against the wooden floorboards as she strolled over to me and took her place standing between my legs.
My hands instinctively moved up towards her and rested upon her hips, and I gave them a light squeeze as I smiled up at her.
"Hey, baby," I breathed out softly, as for some reason, something about this moment felt hallowed.
A quiet chuckle left her lips as she wrapped her arms around my neck, looking down at me in adoration.
"Hey, baby-baby," she cooed back to me.
I stood up, her arms craning upwards as I resumed my normal height over her, and it was now my turn to smile down at her.
My hand delicately found its way to the back of her neck, and I tilted my head ever so slightly to the side as I leaned in, a soft grin on my lips as her eyes fluttered closed out of instinct.
My own eyes blinked shut as I brushed my lips against hers, and I pulled back to press a quick kiss to the tip of her nose before going back to my mission of planting a kiss on those "Goldie" red lips of hers.
But just as my lips were about to find their familiar place against hers, I heard Niall's obnoxiously loud voice yelling up the stairs in a very bad French accent...
"Dinner is served!"
I laughed before pressing a quick kiss to Tate's lips, knowing that if I did anything more, Niall would probably march upstairs in a chef's hat and kick down the door.
"I love you," I whispered, and Tate instantly gave me a toothy grin.
"And I love you."
Even with the added height from the heels, she still had to press on her toes in order to plant a soft kiss against my cheek, and my hand flew up to touch the spot where her lips had been in a reflex, almost like I wanted to confirm that they had been there and to hold the kiss in place, even though I knew I would probably get a hundred more cheek kisses tonight. It didn't matter, like I said, nothing ever got old with Tate.
"Meet you downstairs?" She asked, glancing down at my shoeless feet.
"See you in a sec," I nodded, my eyes never leaving her until she had completely shut the door behind her, wanting to hold onto every last second of her presence, regardless if I was going to be around her in less than five minutes.
I sat down on the bed as I tugged on my dress shoes, a pair of Gucci boots similar to the ones I had bought with the rainbows on them, but this pair being just a plain glossy black.
My clothing choice, however, was a lot bolder than the shoes.
I had decided on something that was extremely out of my comfort zone...a pale blue suit with a more blue-green dress shirt underneath it. I quite liked the way it looked on, and I was glad that I had allowed Tate to talk me into buying it.
She was changing me from the inside out, and I didn't mind it one bit.
I stood in front of the mirror once more to actually check my appearance, as previously, I had just been admiring Tate the whole time that I was stood in front of it.
I walked over to the dresser, and out of complete muscle memory, I reached for the knife that I always kept tucked into my back pocket. But this time, instead of just going right away and placing it in its usual spot, my hand stayed frozen and clasped around it, my wrist resting lightly upon the wooden top of the dresser.
I don't know what made me freeze, but all of a sudden, I didn't want to have the knife on me. Not for tonight at least.
To an outsider, this may have seemed like a silly and trivial thing. Of course, I didn't need a knife to go on a date...but for me, it was different.
Other than the time I had temporarily lost my life, which ended up leading me to Tate, and when I left it with her at the house...I had never been without it.
Whether I was killing a top priority person or going to get some milk at the grocery store, the knife was with me without fail.
But tonight, I didn't want it.
I wanted to let go, even if just for a few hours, of the constant revenge plot that loomed in the corners of my mind. I wanted to let go of the grief that had haunted me like a dark cloud for the last six years. I wanted to be free of the things in my past that dictated my present and future.
Tonight...I just wanted to have one of those out of body experiences, while still being within my body.
Tonight, I didn't want revenge. I didn't want to tear through name after name of suspects. I didn't want to talk about a mission that had already taken the lives of so many people.
No, tonight...I just wanted to be Harry...
and I wanted to have dinner with my girlfriend.
AN: I AM CRYING EVEN THOUGH I WROTE THIS I LOVE THIS CHAPTER SO MUCH AND I LOVE HARRY'S CHARACTER DEVELOPMENT MORE THAN I CAN EVEN BEGIN TO EXPLAIN! I HOPE YOU LOVED THIS AS MUCH AS I DO, AND PLEASE DON'T FORGET TO VOTE AND COMMENT AND LET ME KNOW WHAT YOU THINK! THE NEXT CHAPTER WILL BE THE ACTUAL DATE AND FROM TATE'S POV MOST LIKELY! ILY ALL SO MUCH! xx g