I'm not entirely sure how I made it up here. Especially considering that it's pitch black outside and apparently no one believes in outdoor lights when it's two in the morning. I guess the three summers of rock climbing lessons my parents signed me up for when I was younger brought me some valuable life skills. Because sneaking onto roofs would be a million times more difficult without them. I'm also surprised no one has woken up from the commotion I'm causing because about every seven seconds the word 'fuck' or 'shit' slips out of my mouth.
Sure, knocking on the door would be the most logical thing to do. Except like I said it's only two in the morning and I almost feel like that would be more alarming than my roof climbing. Plus, you can only knock so loud and considering the size of this house my knocks would surely go unanswered.
I try to quickly but quietly step my way across the roof that is thankfully not very steep. Not that I've spent much time here but even with the darkness I'm pretty sure I can navigate to the correct window. I hope I can at least, because it would be pretty startling to wake up and see me standing on the roof, looking in.
It may have something to do with the fact I just climbed up a house but I'm already sweating and it's not even a time in the day where it would be acceptable. The things I do for a bit of adventure.
After almost tripping and surely falling to my death, I make it to the right window. I peak inside shielding my eyes with cupped hands, hoping this will somehow help, and smile noticing that I'm looking in to the correct one. I hope no one is walking around at this time in the morning because I would look like a complete creep sitting on someone's roof, staring inside.
It's dark in the room but I can see Harry sleeping. He managed to push off any blankets that may have once been on the bed and he's sprawled out. taking up almost every inch of it. I'm not sure how he managed to be so contained when I was in there with him considering his state right now.
At first I quietly knock on the window, not wanting to scare him completely shitless. The soft knocks don't seem to work though so I gradually increase the force I'm applying to the glass with my knuckles. Of course. the Buehler's have newer windows with fancy locks otherwise I would just crawl through and shake Harry awake.
I continue to increase the loudness of my knock and I notice his body slightly stirring around, hopefully about to wake. I give one especially hard pound to the window and he shoots up. His eyes are barely open when he looks toward my spot on the outside of the house but once he sees me I'm pretty sure he screams. It's muffled through the window but I'm fairly damn certain a girly shriek just escaped his mouth.
Once he realizes it's me he seems to calm down some. Even with the realization that I'm not some axe-murderer he decides it's necessary to flip me off as he walks to the window, unlocking and opening it slowly.
"Hi," I breathe out once the glass is no longer blocking me from the inside of the house. His face is close to mine, still looking slightly asleep. I don't know how though, if someone woke me up by rapping on my window at this time in the morning I'd surely be awake and extremely pissed.
"What the actual fuck, Ellison," he glares at me, trying to sound mad but the tiredness in his voice doesn't make it nearly as convincing.
I roll my eyes at him. Harry Styles, I just climbed a fucking house to get to you, you could be a little more appreciative. "Well c'mon, put some clothes on," I nod to his mostly naked body, "We need to get going if we're going to make it on time."
"I'm not doing anything until you tell me where we are going," he glares at me harder, assuming that I'm up to no good. Not that this surprises me considering what normally happens.
"I swear nothing illegal!" I quickly defend my plans. "I may have stolen my mother's car, but I'm pretty sure that doesn't count. Other than that there is nothing that could get you in trouble."
"Are you getting soft?" he laughs with his eyes still barely open. I'm pretty sure if I didn't keep the conversation going he'd be back asleep within seconds.
"No," I shake my head. "Trust me, this will be fun. Now go put clothes on and meet me in the driveway."
"Are you going to climb down the roof?" he asks, confused. "How the hell did you even manage to get up here?"
"I'm a woman of many talents, Harold," I laugh, moving to crawl through the window. "Now move so I can go out the front door and not break my leg trying to descend down."
I'm sure I could easily make it back down. I'm somewhat of an expert at sneaking out, but I'm not extremely familiar with the setup of this house and I'd rather not ruin my plans for the day by having to stop by the hospital.
I sort of jump through the window and when I feel my feet solidly on ground, relief rushes over me. I look over at Harry who's rubbing his eyes, sleepy. I don't think he's really processed what is going on yet.
"Okay," I turn, cranking my head up to look at him. "Driveway, five minutes."
With that, I turn around and walk out his bedroom door, trusting that he will follow me. I walk through the house. tip toeing because I don't want to wake Matt's parents. Plus, then I'd have to explain why I snuck into their house at two in the morning. And while technically what I have planned isn't anything bad, I still don't feel like explaining it to two tired fifty year olds.
When I get through the front door, I close it as quietly as I can. I walk down the front steps and slide into my mother's car, waiting for Harry. Sitting in the driveway I try to find something to do distract me, but seconds later Harry walks out the front door, just as I was expecting. He's just as careful opening and closing the door as I was, looking about halfway awake as he makes his way down the steps, now wearing shorts and a sweatshirt with the hood up which covers his already beanie concealed hair.
He walks to the car and moves himself in, buckling up his seat belt before looking at me. I can't help but laugh a little at his sleepy eyes. I can't tell you why I'm so awake right now but I'm sure it has something to do with adrenalin of climbing up a house.
Neither of us says anything to each other and after a moment of silence in the car I decide the quietness is Harry agreeing to whatever plan I have. I back out of the driveway and move quickly through the quiet streets of town, feeling comfort in our silence.
Harry doesn't speak for at least another two hours. I think he might have actually fallen back asleep for part of the time, and I'm conviced there were soft snores coming from his side of the van. I didn't mind though because I was perfectly content driving in the dark with Neil Young playing in the background.
"Ellison," he yawns out. I look over at him briefly, then turn my eyes back to the road. The sun is starting to make an appearance in the South Dakota sky and the colors remind me of the happiest moment of my life that I shared with Harry weeks ago on the hill.
"Yes?"
"Why did you steal your mum's car?" he turns around, trying to take it in. I think he's finally starting to function like a normal human being because his voice sounds much more awake than it did a few hours ago.
"Because we're going on a road trip," I answer, very sure of my response.
"To where?" I see him stretching out in the passenger's seat. His arms are above his head, but they don't get very far before hitting the ceiling.
"The badlands," I probably should be a little more responsive to his questions since I dragged him out of bed and didn't tell him where we were going, but I also don't really care.
"The what?"
"Harry," I turn at him again, not understanding how he doesn't know where I'm talking about. He must still be tired, "The badlands, they sort of look like a mini grand canyon."
He nods his head humming as he thinks about it, "Oh yeah. Why couldn't we just take your car?"
Annoyed by his insistent questions, I sigh out before answering. "Two reasons. One, my mom had a full tank. So I wouldn't need to pay for nearly as much gas. Second, we're going on a family road trip and obviously we needed a minivan to make it official."
My mom insisted on buying a minivan after she signed Ethan up for soccer. I think she wanted to look like one of those stereotypical soccer mom's but in reality it was useless considering that's she been to about one of Ethan's games since he joined. Of course it was your state of the art minivan, DVD player and moveable chairs included. I can't even think of a time where my whole family was in this thing.
"Family road trip?" he continues to be confused and it's slightly adorable with his still sleepy mood.
"Yes," I nod quickly, my hands still on the steering wheel. "We're the Robinsons. My name is Shirley and I'm a full time, somewhat overweight mother that sells Tupperware from door to door. You're Wilfred and you're balding on the top of your head. You own an old time hardware store that is most likely going to go out of business in a few months, although we're both in denial about that. And then there's our three kids Brian, Meredith and Tommy."
I look at him for a second before continuing to talk, very seriously, about our 'family.' He stares at me with his mouth wide open. I can tell he wants to say something or laugh but he doesn't as I start talking again.
"Brian is the star of the football team, and he's secretly gay. We both know though and we're totally cool with it since we're surprisingly progressive considering our small town mentality. Meredith is the middle child and there is barely a moment she looks up from her phone. She pretends she's talking to her girlfriends but really she's texting about twenty different boys about when they'll fuck next, she's a bit promiscuous." I quickly add whispering, then I hear a small chuckle from Harry.
"We're not nearly as okay with that because even if we're progressive we can't help but think our 'little girl' is going to be a virgin her whole life, because that's obviously how the circle of life works. And Tommy, he's the youngest. He's a brat but we play favorites with him because he's still young enough to be cute and get away with things. We're on our annual family vacation escaping our miserably boring lives from some small town in Minnesota."
When I stop talking Harry stays silent for a few seconds. I think his tired brain is trying to process the elaborate story I just made up.
"Ellison," he breathes out. "You are seriously the craziest person I've ever met."
"Who's Ellison?" I yell before turning to him. Harry jumps at my sudden 'anger'. "Wilfred, have you been cheating on me with some young and dangerously good looking girl? I can't believe you... twenty years of marriage down the drain."
It takes him a moment to reply but when he does I can't help but smile. "No, no, no of course not, my sweet pumpkin head. How could I ever cheat on you? The only thing I love more than my hardware store is your voluptuous body, you know that."
"That's right," I smile smugly, happy that he's playing along. I attempt to speak my best stereotypical Minnesotan accent as I talk. "My slightly overweight voluptuous body rocks your world."
He laughs. "Oh shut up kids, obviously your mother and I have done the naughty, otherwise you wouldn't exist. And no Meredith, you cannot have another otter pop, it's four in the morning." He pretends that our kids just groaned at the topic of our conversation, but the way he talks almost convinces me that there really are three other people sitting in the back of this van.
This is what we do for the rest of the way there. Apparently Wilfred and Shirley can only go about fifteen minutes without arguing, because half of the car ride is spent 'pretending' to nag each other about something stupid. We sound like a bunch of fools but I'm not sure I've smiled so much in my life.
...
When we get to the badlands I easily find the parking lot I always tend to go to when visiting here. I have only been about three others times, but it's enough to make some sort of habit. It's still extremely early in the morning. Not compared to the two in the morning roof climbing I just survived but for a normal person they would just be waking up. So the area of the park we're at is completely empty.
Colors of pink and purple still paint the sky, resembling a cotton candy color, but the sun is ever increasing its presence into our world. It's beautiful and magical and magnificent and any other possible mesmerizing adjective you could think of. I wish I had a camera. But we all know cameras rarely serve justice to the beauty of the world so instead I'll just settle for the camera within my eyes, hoping it will develop a picture in my memory.
Harry and I walk silently toward the edge of the canyons. He's so close to me that our arms brush against each other every two steps we take, but neither of us makes an effort to move apart. For now the Robinson family act is gone and we're just Harry and Ellison.
Harry and Ellison.
Once we're about a foot away from the drop in the rocks we slow our steps. I'm not afraid of heights or anything but I'm still cautious because I'm not about to let a 127 Hours situation happen, there is no way I'm sawing off my arm. When I'm inches from the edge I carefully sit down feeling more secure with my butt on the ground than my feet, which are bound to trip over each other. Harry stays standing for a moment before sitting down next to me.
We both don't say anything as we take in the scenery. With all my other trips here it hasn't been like this. It's normally later in the day and much more crowded. I don't know if people even realize how magnificent this place is this early in the morning. At the moment I'm glad they don't because it's nice being alone surrounded by the rocks and colored sky.
"Wow," Harry breathes out, breaking the silence. "I don't think I can even think I begin to explain how beautiful this is."
I smile at his words. He talks slowly and I feel myself nodding as I agree with him. "It's not something you can describe, all you can do is feel it," I whisper, pulling the sleeves of my gray sweatshirt to cover my hands.
Neither of us dares to dangle our feet over the edge, leaving a respectable amount of space between our bodies and the drop in the terrain. Even with the distance I almost feel like I'm floating over the rocks, which only adds to the amount of content I feel for the world right now. South Dakota may suck in most aspects but right now I don't think it could be any more beautiful.
"How do you think of this stuff?" he questions still whispering. It's like we're both afraid if we speak any louder this will somehow all disappear.
"What do you mean?" I turn to look at him, unsure of what he's asking.
His face stays forward, appreciating the amazing view but he leans back on his elbows, getting more comfortable. The way the light hits his face is fantastic and I find it hard to look away.
"All of this," he gestures his hands toward the view in front of us. This doesn't make his thoughts any clearer to me though. "All of your elaborate plans, I don't even understand how you can imagine half the stuff that goes through your head."
"I don't know," I shrug because I really don't. This idea only came to me last night at about eleven. I had today off and I decided I didn't want to stay in town. Plus I had a feeling the badlands at in the earliest hours of the morning would be amazing.
"Seriously, Elle," he keeps talking but his whisper isn't there nearly as much at this point. It's still soft though, not daring to go over a hushed tone. "Why couldn't we have been friends sooner?"
"Because we grew up in different countries," I point out the obvious.
I can't help but wonder if Harry and I would have been friends if we had grown up together. Considering half the reason I spoke to him in the first place was because he was different from the people I'd always been around makes me feel like it wouldn't have been the same if we were always in each other's lives.
I'd like to think we would have been friends though. I think I would be a completely different person if he had been in my life sooner. The loathing of the world that is ever present in my head wouldn't be nearly as distinct.
"Obviously," he breathes out a sarcastic laugh. "It's just I feel like if we would have been friends sooner I wouldn't have spent nearly as much time doing stupid things."
"I do pretty stupid things," I again point out the obvious. I purposely anger my parents, get drunk almost every weekend and smoke weed way more than I should. I'd say that's a lot of stupid.
"Even your stupid things have meaning though," he continues to compliment me and since I don't know how to respond to compliments I just stay silent. "Well, maybe not the getting high part," he laughs, "but everything else. You're meaningful, Elle."
He turns to me, smiling and I can't help but smile back. It's not like I haven't done things like this the majority of my life but until Harry came along I wouldn't say any of it felt meaningful. He told me that he'd be the one to change things in my world but until now I hadn't really realized how true that would be.
He sits up again from his elbows and I'm surprised when I feel his arm wrap around my shoulder. It doesn't feel like it's intended to be a romantic gesture despite the closeness of our bodies and the soft lighting of the sky around us.
I'm surprised again when I feel my head lean into his embrace. Again, the intention isn't romantic, even though I'm sure to any onlooker it would appear so. It's just friendly. And I'm glad that this is all it is and he's just my friend because I honestly don't think my heart could handle any more.