I didn't go to see Harry again the day after.
The realisation of what had happened struck me as soon as I opened my eyes the morning after, the sudden drop in the tension I'd felt for hours making tears well up out of my eyes.
I didn't cry. Or at least, I didn't do what I normally would've identified as crying. I didn't cry my heart out, hiding my face in the pillow so that nobody could hear me, I didn't cry because of intense sadness, or despair. I just lay there, silently looking at the ceiling, frowning as I felt water travel down the side of my face and wet my pillow, not realising why I was even crying in the first place.
I sat up, staring at the opposite wall.
I knew I should've gone to see him, that was what any friend would've done, but I just couldn't. I couldn't bring myself to see him, not so soon. I didn't know why.
It was as if what had happened the day before had stripped me of a part of innocence I didn't even know was there. Reckless parties, drugs, alcohol, they all weren't part of my world. Overdoses were only things that happened in movies to me, and yet I'd been there. I'd been there, as someone I knew, and somehow cared about, risked to die because of it. I didn't know what to make of something like that - how to even process what had happened.
Was I supposed to act as if nothing had happened? Was I supposed to go see Harry and cry on his lap as he passed his hand through my hair, assuring me I was fine? Was I supposed to just go see him and sit there, saying nothing because there would be nothing left to say, until it'd be socially acceptable for me to leave? Or to send him a text asking him how he was doing, if he would've even checked his phone at all?
To the conflict between all those different things to do, I reacted with doing nothing.
I just sat there on my bed, wondering why I was feeling in that way, why was I caring so much about it, about him. We barely knew each other, after all. Then why had my heart dropped when something had risked to happen to him? It didn't make any sense to me. How could I already care so much for someone I barely knew?
I stayed in my room for the whole day, and my parents never came to knock, as if they could sense my need to be alone in that moment.
For that reason, while trying desperately to decide what to do, I ended up doing nothing. And even if it didn't feel right, it certainly felt like it was the only option in that moment.
• • •
When I arrived at school on Monday I knew I had to talk to Harry. I didn't know what about, I just knew that we had to. And if not, I should've certainly told him that I was sorry for not going to see him the day before.
As soon as I walked inside the building I could tell the news of what had happened had spread around like wildfire, all the people I walked past as I made my way towards my first class giving me apprehensive stares, making me feel as if I was the witness of a murder.
I started walking faster, not wanting to linger in the hallway and give people a chance to keep staring at me, which made me feel in a really awkward way. I should've known that from hanging out with the most popular boy in the entire school would've somehow made people notice me as well, but I'd never noticed how true it actually was, taken as I was by Harry whenever we were together. If those people had moderately sent glances my way when we were next to each other, in the aftermath of the mess that had happened on Saturday it was clear that I probably was one of the few people who knew what had truly taken place.
I sat down at my desk fast, lowering my head when I realised that a couple of people already waiting around had glanced my way. I could hear someone whisper somewhere in the room, but I couldn't tell what they were saying or even what they were talking about, which made me even more nervous. I just wanted Harry to come save me from the awkwardness of the situation, but he still hadn't shown up.
I glanced up when someone sat next to me, a sigh leaving my lips when I realised it was just Ella.
She took out her book and her pencil case, putting them on the desk in a orderly way, before turning to look at me. "So?"
I furrowed my eyebrows. "So what?"
She rolled her eyes. "Well since you're friends with Harry now, I was wondering if you know how he is. You know, he got stabbed on Saturday."
I widened my eyes as soon as I took in her last words. "Hang on, what?" I asked, finally properly turning to look at her.
"What?" She said snappily, raising an eyebrow.
"Did you just say stabbed?" I said confusedly, frowning.
She snorted, clearly annoyed by the way I was acting. "Yeah, apparently he got stabbed during a heated fight at a party on Saturday."
"How did that even..." I started, but I stopped right away, knowing that it wasn't my place to let her know what truly had happened. "Yeah, he's fine."
"Oh thank god" she said with a little smile, widening her eyes as soon as the words left her lips. "I mean, not that I care about him. But it's nice to know he's still alive."
I gave her a faint nod, not feeling like starting to question her actions, and turned my head to the other side, just to see that Harry's usual seat was empty, and that Niall was sitting on the one next to him.
I suddenly realised why I still hadn't seen him around that day. He hadn't come to school. I frowned, starting to worry. Niall has texted me he was supposed to be released the day before, in the early evening. Then why wasn't he at school? Maybe he wasn't feeling well? Or even worse, what if something had happened, and he hadn't been released? I took a deep breath, trying not to overthink it all before knowing what was truly going on.
All of sudden Niall glanced in my direction, probably sensing my gaze on him, and his blue eyes met mine. He gave me a little shrug, before taking out his phone and typing away.
After a few seconds my phone buzzed in my pocket. I took it out, discovering that Niall had sent me a text.
From Niall: at home.
I looked up and gave him a slight nod to show him that I'd read, making a mental note of going to see him later that day as the teacher came into the room with a cup of coffee in his hands.
• • •
I got off the bus and I covered the small distance between the bus stop and Harry and Niall's house by foot, not taking long thanks to my fast step.
When I arrived I double-checked the number, making sure that it indeed was the house Harry had dropped Niall in front of the day he'd given me a ride home, not trusting my memory too much, and I made my way towards the front door and rang the doorbell.
My nervousness started to grow as the seconds went by and I bit my lower lip anxiously as I started rethinking my idea of checking up on Harry. He probably didn't want to see me, especially after how I'd left him the other night, without as much as a goodbye. Probably his parents wouldn't have wanted to see me either - if they even knew who I was, that is, because what kind of person wouldn't even visit their friend in the hospital? They probably thought I was an awful person. I wondered if I could even see them as Harry's parents at all. I knew they legally were, but did Harry see them as his parents, or as some people that were just taking care of him? I didn't know, and that made me even more nervous, since it increased my chances of possibly messing up.
I almost jolted when the door opened all of sudden, a middle aged woman studying me from the open doorframe.
"Are you here for Niall?" She asked curiously, seeming to want to go straight to the point.
I took a deep breath before replying, readying myself for what was about to come. "I'm here for Harry, actually" I replied quietly, observing her as she gave me a fast once over.
"Harry?" She said confusedly, furrowing her eyebrows. "Nobody's ever here for Harry. He's always really private."
I nodded slightly at her words. "Is he at home?"
The woman opened the door more, allowing me to walk in. "He's in his room. Upstairs, first room on the right" she said, shutting it as soon as we were inside.
"Thank you" I replied her with a little smile, not wasting my time in walking up the stairs. Once I reached the first floor I took another deep breath, trying to soothe the nervousness I felt at the idea of seeing him again.
I slowly approached the room, stopping in the doorway and looking inside, spotting Harry's figure lying down on his side on the double bed. His eyes were closed, the white of a earphone peeking through his dark curls, allowing me to give a fast glance around without being seen. There was something of so intimate in seeing him curled up on his bed with his eyes closed, his defences down because of his believed aloneness, that I questioned if my decision of coming there had been wise at all.
Hoping that he wouldn't have seen it as me invading his personal space, I hesitantly knocked on the wood next to me, watching as his eyes opened right away at the sound. His gaze fell on me, but he made no move of sitting up - to be honest, he made no move at all aside from slightly pulling the wire of his earphone to make it fall back on the mattress.
"Can I come inside?" I asked quietly, feeling a slight agitation in the pit of my stomach as his attention fell on me.
He gave me a slight nod, so I walked forward, surpassing him to go sit on the edge of the bed, next to his feet, but on the opposite side of the one he was on.
"I'm sorry I didn't come visit" I said softly as soon as I sat down, staring at the closed wardrobe in front of me, that seemed to almost impend above me. For the split of a second I wondered why was it in Harry's room. I'd never thought much about it, but Harry had always stricken me as the kind of person that would prefer a kind of furniture that would go better with the room around it, giving each inch of it a purpose, not one to dominate in such a way above everything else.
I turned my head, sitting more comfortably and taking his figure in. He hadn't turned around, and was still looking towards the wall.
He shrugged, for how much his position on the bed let him. "It's fine, I understand" he replied almost as quietly as me, sounding like he'd just woken up.
I nodded, even though I knew he couldn't see me. I slid my shoes off and put my feet on the bed, bringing my knees up to my chest, looking away into the empty doorway. I stayed in silence for a while, a small side of me appreciating the quietness of the moment, before speaking again. "You weren't at school today."
"I'm fine" he replied, not moving an inch, "but Maura insisted I stayed at home. Thought I should've given her at least this one."
I let go of my knees, crossing my legs on the mattress. "I guess it makes sense" I said quietly, looking back at the wardrobe. I felt as if it could've fallen on me at any second because of how tall it was, and how close to the bed it was, I wonder how Harry could just be lying down so mindlessly, not sparing a single thought for the piece of furniture. I gave a glance around, noticing only in that moment how empty the entire room seemed to be. The walls were white, and nothing was on them. No pictures, no posters, no shelves, absolutely nothing. Not even as much as a chair against a wall to put the clothes he'd just taken off on. It felt weird to think that that was his bedroom. The room he went back to every day, the one that should've been his safe haven. To me, it just felt empty. Like an hotel room. As if it'd been furnished way before he came around, and he hadn't bothered to decorate it a bit to make it feel like home. Niall's mother seemed to be really sweet, so I knew that the only reason why Harry's room was so empty was Harry himself. I wondered why he'd decided to keep it like that, if he felt safe there. It seemed so unfitting for a nineteen-year-old to live in.
"I'm sorry for your drawing. It was due today, wasn't it?" He said after a while, but I just shrugged, wanting him to know that there was no reason for him to worry about it.
"It's fine, I got an extension" I replied right after, realising that he couldn't see me from where he was lying, thinking back of the conversation I'd had earlier that day with my teacher. I'd been given another week to finish the project, I hoped I could've made it in that time.
He gave me a slight nod, lifting his phone to stop the music, that had been mutedly playing during our conversation, and putting it on his nightstand with his earphones.
I hesitantly lay down on the bed, my back to his. "How are you?" I asked him, slowly passing my hand over the soft fabric of the pillow, scrunching my nose at its smell. It wasn't strong, or pungent, or anything that I could recognise as his usual cologne, but it was still so Harry, enough to make my head spin as I took in the slight scent.
He hummed, and I could feel the bed move as he shifted in position next to me. "I'm still shitting charcoal, so..." he let his words drift off, letting my insight do the rest.
I stared at his desk, that was leaning against the wall. It was almost empty, nothing on it but a couple of pens lying messily around and what looked like a stack of paper sheet on one side. Despite the carelessness of the way the pens seemed to have been thrown on it, the chair, looking somewhat uncomfortable, the kind of piece of furniture you'd buy for a guest room to suit all tastes, was put in order, as if someone had wanted to feign a minimal quantity of normality. "That was a stupid move" I said quietly.
I heard him take a deep breath, slowly, faintly, as if he didn't want to be heard. "I know" he replied lowly, almost whispered, an emotion I couldn't quite identify in the way he spoke.
I turned around, observing him. He was still facing the door, and all I could see was the mess of unbrushed curls on his head, on the pillow next to me. I watched his shoulder slowly rise and fall as he breathed, refraining from the urge to put my hand between his wide shoulders to discover if he truly was as fit as he seemed. I lifted myself up on my elbow, taking advantage of my new position to look at his profile from the side. He kept looking at the opposite wall, and if he noticed my stare, he didn't do anything to let me know. I let my eyes travel from his face to the slightly rough surface of the dull coloured blanket over his bed, searching for something to say that wouldn't have felt overly condoning or judgemental, something that could've fit inside that moment. I inadvertently let my gaze fall on his nightstand and a frown took over my face as soon as I realised what was on it.
There, next to his alarm clock and a closed book which back I didn't recognise, was a relatively small paper sheet, a flowery drawing etched on it by a pencil trait, soft enough to realise it was a first sketch, but hard enough to understand it was already finished. I let my eyes scan over it, biting my lower lip as I recognised my drawing style.
He'd kept my rose.
I stared at it for some seconds, not saying anything, a part of my mind wondering what was it doing on his nightstand, before lying down again and shifting closer to him. I felt the muscles of his back tense up against me as soon as I hesitantly put my head in the crook of his neck, feeling the warmth of his skin against my cheek right away. Not giving myself enough time to rethink it, I wrapped my free arm around his chest, resting my hand right over his heart.
He tensed up but didn't move away, or look at me.
We kept our positions for a while, none of us daring to say anything. I wondered if he knew I'd seen the drawing, and if him leaving it there truly meant anything. He could've just found it inside his pocket and momentarily left it there before throwing it away. But then again, it'd been many weeks since that day at my house, and it would've been unlikely of him too keep him for that long if it meant nothing to him. I wondered if it did actually mean something to him, and what he was thinking now that he knew I knew he'd kept it. Or if he cared at all.
After some minutes, right as I was about to shift away, I felt a sudden warmth envelop my hand, my heart skipping a beat when I realised he'd put his over mine, intertwining our fingers.
I've already said it a couple of times in my board, but I'll say it here as well.
Since I've been really busy lately with uni and everything, I tend to write (and so publish) my updates really late at night, and I'm often way too tired to reread them right away. For this reason, I tend to review them a day or so later, or whenever I find enough time really.
I hope it's not an issue, but please let me know if it's too annoying! x
Miki