I woke up to the morning I had always dreamed of. Tangled in the arms of the man I loved, his slow breath being the only sound around and the movement of his chest lulling me to an utter state of calm.
Last night. The simple thought of it made my whole body tingle. I could still feel the ghost of his lips against my skin, the outline of his fingers when he held my hands and the small bruises on my thighs. It burned and hurt in the sweetest way, small reminders of what had happened only hours ago.
I didn't dare to move, I didn't dare to break this perfect moment that I had always hoped for, and yet as sleep slowly left my body, reality carefully crept into my mind. Yes I was lying on the chest of my beautiful broken boy, the one I loved, but I knew that the feeling wasn't mutual. It would never be, because Harry didn't love.
Knowing that, I didn't really know what I would be facing once we would both be awake. Were we supposed to act as if nothing happened? Were we supposed to talk about it? To be completely honest, both options weren't ones I was really fond of.
So I stayed still, enjoying these few moments of peace, as my eyes trailed along that body I knew so well. It took me everything I had not to reach and kiss his skin. I could still taste him from the night before, and the heat radiating from his body made him almost irresistible.
Thankfully - or sadly, depending on the perspective - Harry stirred in his sleep, indicating that he was waking up. His breaths became deeper and his muscles tensed. Lazily, his hand caressed my back and I nuzzled his chest, loving the way he touched me. I heard him sigh before I felt his warm lips on the top of my head and his arm pulling me closer.
"Good morning," he whispered, the small rasp of the morning present in his voice.
"Morning," I replied without looking up.
"You okay?" he asked, concern clear in his tone.
I sighed and nodded. "Yeah."
His hand squeezed my arm slightly and a heavy atmosphere lurked around us. It became even worse when he kissed the top of my head again and let his lips linger there.
For a second, I hoped. I hoped that Harry had magically changed in the span of one night. I hoped that he was suddenly starting to understand that he could feel things too. But that hope didn't last long. I knew Harry, I knew my beautiful broken boy. He didn't love and couldn't handle being loved, so I raised my upper body and put my weight on my elbow.
"What are you doing?" I asked, my eyes staring into his, making sure that he wouldn't lie to me.
"Touching you," he said nonchalantly. "You weren't complaining last night."
I hit his chest as hard as I could. "You're a dick!"
He grabbed my hands, keeping me from hitting him again. "Em, I'm joking, all right?" He apologized, his eyes sad but a small smile on his lips. "Is it so wrong to try and make you laugh? I haven't heard from you in a week, I missed you."
I bit my lower lip as he brought my hand to his lips and pressed a soft kiss on my knuckles. My eyes stayed on his lips and the way they curved when they kissed my skin and on the slow movement of his thumb against my fingers. I didn't know how he was able to do it, but he made me fall in love with him even harder. How could he be so hard, so mean at times, and so sweet and loving at others? His actions were always so contradictory it was hard to keep up and to stay strong.
I closed my eyes and laid my head back on him. I hummed at the contact of his warm skin and quickly kissed his chest, near his heart, with the small wish that maybe one day it would reach it.
"It was good," he mumbled after a few minutes of silence.
"Mmh?" I asked, not understanding what he was talking about.
He chuckled. "Last night."
I smiled and ran my finger along his upper body. "Was it?"
"Very," he admitted.
My smile got bigger and I looked down, hiding it as much as I could. This was different, talking about it. Usually, we avoided the subject, we walked around it. But I was glad that out of all the times we could have talked about it, we picked this one, one that had been somewhat different.
"What was your favourite part?" I asked to lighten the mood, my cheeks red in embarrassment.
He laughed softly. "You taking control," he replied. "That was different."
I laughed along with him. "Yeah, it was."
"How about you? Your favourite part?"
"When I came," I replied jokingly.
He hummed. "If I remember correctly, that happened more than once."
I lifted my head to look at him. Our eyes met, and I could see the amusement and pride in his. I pulled my tongue at him and he laughed again, this time squeezing me in his arms.
"I missed you, Em." And just like that, I knew our conversation was going to take a whole new direction.
I sighed and rested my body back on his. "I missed you too," I admitted.
His hand took a hold of mine that was resting on his stomach, and he intertwined our fingers together. "Did you?" He asked, his tone completely different from a minute ago. He was no longer playful. "Because you were the one ignoring me."
"You know I did," I mumbled against his chest.
My heart pulsed fast, so fast I feared it would jump out of my chest; Words I wanted to tell him for so long lingered on the tip of my tongue. Should I say them? Should I keep them in? I decided not to, and instead admitted something else.
"It was just hard to be around you after everything. But I missed you, truly."
I didn't need to look up to see that he was frowning. "Hard to be around me?"
"Mhm." I replied, being as vague as possible.
An exhausted sigh escaped his lips and he released my hand to run his through his hair. "So this is hard for you?"
I hugged him tight. "Don't be like that."
He laughed sarcastically. "Right, you just told me that it's hard for you to be with me."
"It's just- I just don't know how to be your friend," I whispered. "After you ended things, I wasn't sure - I'm still not sure - how to act."
"We're friends, Em. You act like we always act, just without the sex," he said, words rushing out of his mouth, before taking in a deep breath. "Well that part didn't work out really well, but you know what I mean."
We both started to laugh together, although I think we both forced it out, too scared and stubborn to actually face our problem, preferring to subtly change the subject without having to really talk about it.
"We're terrible at this." I said between laughs.
"What are we terrible at?" Harry asked.
I took in a deep breath, stopping my laughter. "Being just friends."
"With a body like yours, it's hard to resist," he laughed again, the movement making my head bounce on his chest slightly.
I rolled my eyes, but appreciated the compliment. "You're not helping, Harry," I mumbled.
I nuzzled his chest and held him tighter. The air around us was cold, but Harry radiated a comfortable warmth. And maybe, just maybe he smelled good too, a mix of his usual perfume, the remaining of yesterday's cigarettes, sweat and a hint of me.
He ran his finger softly along my spine, raising goose bumps all over my body. I loved it when he touched me like that, just for the sake of it. There was no rush in his movement, he seemed to have fallen deep in thoughts and was touching me calmly, mindlessly.
"What do we do now," I finally gathered the courage to ask.
To me it seemed that no matter how perfect this moment felt, there were only two ways that it would end. My perfect ending wasn't an option; Harry telling me that he felt the same way about me was never going to happen. We would either continue as fuck friends or we would try and be friends again. The first option seemed best for me, although the second option might be better for my sanity. Either way, I knew I would never be fully satisfied.
Harry sighed, his chest expanding before my eyes. "I don't know, Em."
I kept running my finger tracing up and down his chest as silence fell between the two of us.
"You know what," Harry exclaimed suddenly. "How about we do something fun today?
I looked up, intrigued by his excitement. This wasn't what I meant when I asked what we should do. I knew it, and I was sure that Harry did too, and once I met his eyes, I understood. He wanted to avoid the subject, he was as confused as I was about this and preferred to act as if nothing had changed last night.
I hated that option because last night meant a lot to me, but I knew that dealing with it in a different way would end up ruining it. So instead, I chose to be grateful to be able to keep the memory of last night intact and relieved that at least Harry wasn't pushing me away like I expected.
So I played his game. "Doing something fun would be nice," I agreed.
Harry smiled widely before starting to stretch his body. "Good. Now let's go get ready and we'll go right after."
I hummed and stretched out too before getting out of bed. I went to gather some clothes and headed to the bathroom, Harry following me. I turned around, frowning as I saw that he was coming into the bathroom with me.
"What are you doing?" I asked, a hint of humour in my voice.
He smiled. "Getting ready?"
"But I'm getting into the shower," I replied, trying to understand what was happening.
He shrugged and walked past me. "So?" He asked as he opened a drawer where my shaving cream and my razors were. He took them out and showed them. "Can I use these?"
I laughed, my worries tossed in a corner of my mind, "Sure. The smell of lilac may not be very masculine though."
Harry chuckled before awkwardly lifting his middle finger while holding the objects in his hands.
I was glad that it all felt natural between the two of us. Even if we had had a tough few weeks, acting as if nothing was wrong was a welcomed relief. Acting as if everything was fine between us, made it seem like things were okay. All I had to do was try to not overthink by wondering if we were back at being fuck-friends or if we were just being friends. I couldn't ask myself if last night had put a stop to us just being friends or if it was an exception. Harry was in a good mood and I wasn't going to ruin that.
While Harry started to shave his face, I stepped into the shower to wash the dirt of my night out. The water felt so good against my skin and eased some of the tension in my back. I took more time than necessary to wash my hair and body and Harry grew impatient.
"Hurry up in there," he said jokingly as he pulled the curtains and put his head through.
I turned around and threw him some water, making the both of us laugh. "I'm almost done," I said.
Harry smiled mischievously before letting his eyes trail down my body. I splashed him with water again.
"Let me shower in peace, you pervert!"
He chuckled loudly. "Can't I just come in now?"
"No," I said, trying to sound menacing. "Give me two minutes and the shower will be yours."
"Fine!" He replied, whining softly, before pulling his head out from the shower and giving me the privacy I asked for.
Like I promised, two minutes later I closed the water off and twisted my hair to release the water. I pulled my head through the shower curtain and was immediately greeted by Harry sitting on the counter, right next to the shower. He handed me my towels with a big smile on his face, knowing that I was going to ask for them.
"Thanks," I said as I grabbed the towels and hid behind the curtains.
I pulled my hair into a towel, before wrapping my body and stepping out of the shower.
"All yours," I told him.
He sighed and rolled his eyes. "About time."
I softly shoved him and he laughed before getting in the shower. For a minute I stood still, a silly smile on my face. I loved this; I loved being so playful with him. It had been too long since we acted that way and even if I was overwhelmed by how much had happened in the last 12 hours, I was glad that we had somehow made it to this.
Once I was done appreciating the moment, I put on my clothes and brushed my hair before drying them. Harry shower was quicker than mine and he too peaked his head out of the shower so that I would hand him his towel. I put down the hair dryer and took out towels for him. He thanked me before disappearing the curtain and coming out a few seconds later.
I stiffened my laugh as I saw that he had wrapped up his hair too.
"What?" He asked, his eyes intrigued but a small smile threatened to come out.
I shook my head, "Nothing."
He lifted a brow, this time making no efforts to hide his smile. "Are you laughing because of this?" He asked, pointing to the towel on his head. I bit my lower lip, giving him the answer he sought. "What did you expect, I have long hair," he defended himself.
"It just looks funny, that's all."
As soon as the words were out my mouth, Harry swiftly took the towel off and threw it my way. I laughed and dodged it at the last second. He was about to take off the towel that covered his lower region but I turned around before it was completely off, resulting in me receiving a towel behind my head.
"Put this back!" I ordered as I grabbed the towel and threw it in his direction.
He chuckled. "Why did you turn around, you've seen it all before."
I shrugged. "Don't know, just felt inappropriate."
"It wasn't," he replied with a small laugh
I took a quick peak behind, to see if he had put the towel back on. Once I saw that it was, I turned around with my arms crossed over my chest. "You're too comfortable with nakedness, I'm sure it's some sort of problem," I teased him.
"Or maybe I'm just comfortable with you."
I laughed nervously, feeling uncomfortable because of the sudden turn of the conversation. Harry smiled softly before picking his hair towel that was still on the floor and quickly drying his hair, acting as if he hadn't just gave me a shred of hope again.
"Do you need the hairdryer or I can put it away?" I asked him.
He straightened his posture, his hair wild on his head. "No that's fine," he replied politely. "Do you have any clothe of mine here, though? At least a t-shirt so I don't smell like booze and cigarettes. I have my gym bag in my car but all the clothes in it are dirty. "
"I still have that shirt of yours, the one that had blood on it."
Harry bit his lip nervously an expression of disgust on his face. Apparently the reminder of that night wasn't welcomed. "Is it clean?"
I chuckled. "Yeah. I'll go get it for you."
I came back a few minutes later, a clean shirt for him in hand. I tried not to let my eyes wander too much on his naked upper body or on his muscles as he put on the shirt. There was no secret in the fact that Harry was a sight to see and that I found him incredibly handsome, but it wasn't a reason to start drooling in front of him.
"Do you know what you want to do?" He asked once his shirt was on.
I quickly focused my eyes on his and shrugged. "Not really."
"Did you have anything to do today?"
I twisted my mouth in nervousness. "Well I kind of wanted to go to a shop outside of town since today is my day off, but I can find time to do that later this week."
"No, it's fine, we can do that," Harry insisted. "Let's go eat someplace and then we'll go to that shop."
I smiled, although this was unusual for Harry and I, I was glad we were doing something normal, something best friends did together. Maybe it wasn't the best way to deal with everything, after all, there were a lot of grey zone in our relationship right now, but I welcomed the pause from the rollercoaster with open arms.
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Cute, uh? If you guys only knew all I have planned for this story. Good and bad. I think you'll really like it, yet, y'all are gonna hate me. haha. Enjoy this happiness while it lasts, just saying.
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Lots of love,
Karry xx.