On the next day, when I walked into my maths class, Niall was already inside and sitting at his desk. I made my way towards the desk next to Ella, momentarily glancing at the back of the class to discover Janette was back in her usual place.
I sat down, glancing at Harry as he walked towards the desk next to his friend.
"Why are you even interested in him that much? Yeah he's hot, but he's an asshole" Ella commented, looking up from her phone.
I shrugged, not replying to her.
She put down the phone and opened her notebook as the teacher came in. "Just think of Aiden, he's lovely and kind, basically everything Harry isn't. You'd have to be stupid not to like him."
I sighed as the class started. Of course Ella would have to share her opinions with me on that day as well.
For that reason, when my free period came, I took it as my chance to spend some time alone, away from her insistent chatter.
I was sketching on the stairs when Harry came to sit next to me again. I kept drawing, pretending not to pay much attention to him, even though my senses were heightened by his simple closeness. For a while, the only sound was the scratching of pencil on paper.
"Come with me" he said all of sudden.
I turned so fast towards him that I almost felt my neck snap. "What?" I asked him, pretty sure that I had heard him wrong.
He stood up, walking down the couple of steps that separated him from the street, making me realise I'd understood correctly.
"Why?" I asked him again, but he just shrugged in response. I hesitantly stood up, closing my notebook and giving a fast glance to the building behind me. "I'm not skipping my last class" I deadpanned.
"You're eighteen" Harry said giving me a weird look, but he didn't sound pissed at me.
I bit my lower lip as I realised he'd basically said the same thing Aiden had told me a couple of weeks ago. "Technically, I'm seventeen" I replied, my mind working fast to come to a decision. I could've stayed there and completed my day like I'd always done, or I could've gone away with him, to do nobody knew what. I hated that the decision seemed so easy for me to take. I sighed, putting my notebook and pencil into the pocket of my coat and walking down the couple of steps. "I was born in December" I added when I saw the confused glance he'd given me.
We started walking down the road next to each other in silence. I gave him some subtle glances every once in a while, conscious of his presence next to me.
After a while, rethinking of the exchange we'd just had, I realised how little we actually knew about each other, despite having spent so much time together since the start of the year. "How old are you?" I dropped the question casually, hoping that he would've answered it.
"Nineteen."
I looked at him in surprise, stopping in the middle of the pavement. "Did you fail a class?"
"No" he simply replied while staring right ahead, as if he wasn't enjoying the conversation for some reason.
I put my hands in my pockets frowning. "Did... you fail a whole year?" I asked him as we resumed walking, even though it didn't seem likely. I didn't know much about Harry, but he didn't look like the kind of person that would've failed... everything.
"No." He gave me a side glance, before letting out a little sigh. "I didn't go to school for a year when I was younger" he shared, a hint of something that felt like hesitance in his voice.
"For a whole year? Your parents must've freaked" I said. "Did you at least do some kind of work?" I asked him, and he shook his head. "I bet your mum went crazy about that" I commented.
He looked down at the sidewalk without saying anything, his silence feeling a little bit heavier than usual.
I kept quiet as well, wondering if I'd said something wrong. I couldn't understand why he'd closed in on himself all of sudden, he'd seemed okay with having a conversation just seconds before.
We arrived at a park and sat down under a tree after having cleared a spot between the fallen leaves.
I crossed my legs and glanced at him from the corner of my eye. He was sitting with his back against the trunk, his knees to his chest, and was looking straight ahead again. I followed his gaze, but there seemed to be nothing worthy of attention. For the second time in just a few days I wondered what was he thinking about, that made him space out like that.
"Harry?" I called him, and he moved his green gaze on me at the mention of his name. "Can I draw you?"
He bit his lower lip subconsciously. "Another project?" He asked, a hint of something I couldn't quite define in his voice.
I shook my head. "I just want to draw you" I said. "Can I?"
He didn't reply, but he also didn't say no, so I resolved it was fine for me to. It wasn't like we were strangers to that anyway, at that point.
I took the notebook out, openly looking at him without worrying that he would've noticed, since I had just found a good excuse to.
He was looking into nothing again. I let my eyes travel down his face, from the dark of his eyelashes to the pink of his rosy lips. Even though I had drawn him so many times, his beauty still felt as unreal as it did when I used to stare at him from the opposite side of the class and sketch him on the corner of my notes. Looking at him I could see that he wasn't perfect, but it was as if all his imperfections came together to create something that truly had perfection in it.
He leaned his head against the bark, closing his eyes for a couple of seconds before opening them again. Mine didn't leave him, enticed by the way his long eyelashes fluttered. He was stunning. It was somewhat hard to believe that he was a person just like me. It was as if he'd tried so hard to create a detached image of himself supported by his almost surreal beauty, that it'd just become who he was.
I looked down at the notebook and started sketching him, finding it easy after having done it so many times in the past month.
All of sudden I heard a shaky intake of breath, and I looked up at him again. He'd closed his eyes, but they didn't stay closed long. He opened them, staring right ahead again. He seemed to be having a lot on his mind, and something in the way he was scratching his nail against the fabric of his jeans told me that what he was thinking about wasn't pleasant.
I frowned, realising that something was off. I hesitantly closed the notebook and left it on my legs, looking at him carefully. I debated whether I should've said something or not for a few seconds, before deciding to go for the former. "Are you okay?" I asked him, hoping that he wouldn't have seen it as overstepping and wouldn't have pushed me away like he always did whenever he felt like things were getting too personal for his liking.
"Yeah" he simply replied, but something told me it was the exact opposite.
I stayed still for a few seconds, not really knowing how to handle that unsettling situation. Something was wrong, I knew it was. We both knew that he was just ignoring what was obvious. I wondered if that was why he'd decided to ask me to skip the rest of the day. Even though I couldn't really understand why he'd asked me out of all people, if that was the case. We weren't close.
"Why are we here instead of being in class?" I asked him faintly, trying to find out the answer for the many questions that fluttered inside my head.
"To get away from things" he replied softly, giving me a fast glance.
"Why me?" It was a legitimate question. Why had he asked me, instead of Niall, or Janette, or whoever he was friends with? We weren't friends or anything like that. Why had he come to me, out of all people? What was it about me, that had made him decide to come to me when he felt upset? It didn't make any sense to me.
He gave me an enigmatic look. "Why not?" There was some edge to the question, as if he was somehow daring me to prove him wrong.
I sighed, looking down at the notebook in my lap. It didn't take me long to decide what to do. I knew by then that he would've never talked about what was wrong, and I also knew that trying to get him to talk about it would've potentially resulted in disaster, but that didn't mean I wouldn't have tried to still be there for him somehow. I took the notebook and put it back into my pocket, under his attentive stare.
"Am I not enough to spark your creativity?" He murmured, looking at me.
I shrugged. "I just want to talk to you, that's it."
He hummed at my words but made no attempt to start a conversation, resorting to staring into nothing again and playing with the ring on his index finger.
"I'm sorry if I said something wrong before" I said trying to break the newly established silence.
"It's fine" he simply said, shutting me up with the shortness of his tone.
I sighed, starting to wonder what I was doing there with him. He was the one who'd asked me to go somewhere with him, so I couldn't understand why he was kind of dismissing me like that. I looked around, noticing that the number of people around us had increased a little. I checked the time on my phone, realising that I should've left in that moment if I wanted to be home at my usual time. "I need to go home" I said standing up.
He said nothing, but stood up as well, brushing the dirt off his dark jeans.
"Will you... come to mine tomorrow?" I asked him, and he nodded. "Good" I said lowly to myself. I stared at him for a couple of seconds. Should I have just said goodbye and left? Or should I have waited for him so that we could've walked out together?
All of sudden his phone rang, saving me from having to choose. He took it out of his pocket and glanced at the caller ID, letting it ring for a couple of times.
I took it as my cue to leave. "I'll just go now" I told him, turning around as he picked up the call.
I walked fast towards the entrance of the park, the realisation of what had just happened sinking in more and more with every step I took. Had I really just skipped my last class - which I'd never done before - just because Harry had asked me to? I shook my head, mentally reproaching myself.
The more time I spent with him, the less I acted like myself.
And the worst part was that I somehow liked that.