"You're very pretty."
Harry couldn't help the little smile that slid onto his face as Piper leaned heavily against him, her stumbling feet nearly slipping out from under her. He hauled her upward, propping his shoulder under her arm to help support her. She was forced to hang awkwardly off of him but she didn't seem to mind, turning her body against him as she giggled to herself.
"D'you think so?" he confirmed, just for his own amusement.
Piper nodded her head solemnly, looking up at him with a serious pout. "Yes. Very much so. Very very pretty."
"Well, thank you very much. I'm glad you think so." Harry adjusted his own steps as Piper wobbled sideways, keeping her on her two feet so she didn't tumble right down to the ground. The car was only a block away but at this rate, he wasn't sure she'd make it.
"All the girls in the loo thought you were very pretty and they were trying to find a way to... to get you to dance with them and probably to fuck them but I said - I said, that's my boyfriend! He's mine and I'm the only one that gets to fuck him."
"Oh Jesus," Harry muttered as Piper waved her hand erratically. He wished she was joking but he was pretty confident that she wasn't. Piper was very good at holding her liquor but there was that hard set line of hers, that limit of tolerance, and when she crossed over it she just let go and became a little wild child. Most of the time, he found it endearing. Sometimes, it was exhausting.
"You are a very pretty man and you're all mine." She hiccoughed, throwing her free arm around Harry so she was plastered to his side. "All mine. My man. My strong man."
"Alright, petal. I get it. I'm all yours."
"All mine," she mumbled as her eyes fluttered shut, a giggle slipping from between her lips. "I like you lots and lots."
"Well, that's good. I would hope so. I am your boyfriend, after all."
"You're my boyfriend!" She gasped dramatically, pulling herself away from him and nearly stumbling backward. He grabbed her by the wrist and dragged her upright, catching her shoulder when she leaned forward to compensate. "You're my boyfriend and we should celebrate! We need another drink, bartender."
She demanded this of the lamppost and Harry knew that she was beyond drunk and that he needed to get her into bed as soon as he could. "Come on," he said gently, taking her forearm gently in his hand and using it to lead her forward. She took slow steps behind him, grasping onto the sleeve of his coat. "Let's get you home, petal."
They got halfway down the block and Harry could see the Range Rover at the end of the road when Piper suddenly stopped and flopped down to the ground, folding her legs beneath her. "None of that," Harry said as he tried to yank her up but she was resolved to sit on the ground. With a sigh, Harry crouched down in front of her. "Why are we on the floor?"
"I was too tall," she told him resolutely and with absolute conviction. "I needed to be small. I'm little now, see? And I feel much less foggy now that I'm little."
Harry took a deep breath in through his nose and out through his mouth, trying his best to keep his patience. "Can you be small in the car?"
"Nope. Gotta be small on the sidewalk."
"Of course." With a resigned sigh, Harry sat himself down on the sidewalk, facing her. It was well past two in the morning so the streets were empty. No one would bother them on the sidewalk so Harry couldn't see the harm in letting Piper sit and sober up a bit. Just to make sure she wouldn't get cold in the spring breeze, he shrugged out of his coat and tucked it over her shoulders, tucking her arms into the sleeves.
"Smells like you," she informed him with a wide, lazy grin. "'S good. I like your smell. Smells like home."
So, maybe drunk Piper wasn't entirely bad. Not when she said things like that and made him sort of breathless and entirely overwhelmed by that feeling, that one that started with the L word that they didn't say out loud.
"I want... I want -" She stumbled over the words and Harry took pity on her, reaching over to squeeze her knee gently until she looked up with her brow scrunched, her lips pouted.
"What do you want, petal?"
"I want to marry you."
That one set him back a little. His eyes widened as his lips opened just a bit, just enough that he could lick them, wet the skin that was suddenly dry. "You - you do?"
"Yup. I want to marry you. A lot." She was smiling dreamily up at the sky, at those few stars that managed to shine through the din of light that the city reflected back on the sky. "Wanna be your wife. Wanna be Mrs. Styles."
"Do you?" he asked, part amused, part awed, part scared out of his mind.
"You betcha. Do you want to marry me?"
The only reason he answered so honestly was because he was confident that she wouldn't remember this in the morning. "More than anything," he told her, his voice barely a whisper.
It was enough. Her face lit up like sunshine, lighting up the dark night. He felt that pressure on his chest that he got sometimes when he was just taken aback by her, by everything she was.
"Good. It's settled then. Next Tuesday, we're going to go get married." She scrambled in the pocket of her dress, looking for her phone. When she finally found it, she fumbled to unlock it. "Gonna tell everyone that we're getting married and they're all invited. Open bar. Then everyone will come."
Harry snatched the phone from her before she could do any lasting damage. He wasn't in the mood to explain to her entire contact list why they'd gotten a text invitation to their wedding at two in the morning. "Let's save that for later, petal," he suggested gently as he tucked the phone away. "And maybe we'll wait a bit longer than next Tuesday."
"You're right. Too soon." She shook her head solemnly, her eyes already drifting shut. Harry recognized this - she'd be out cold in minutes. Then he'd be able to carry her home and tuck her in and tomorrow morning she'd be her normally sarcastic, hungover self. For now, he just had to let her talk herself to sleep. "We need more time," she was saying insistently. "Not next Tuesday, okay? The one after that. Next next Tuesday. Tuesday's little sister."
"Sure, petal," Harry murmured as Piper slid forward, tucking herself against his chest with her face pressed into his neck.
"Gonna be Mrs. Styles next next Tuesday."
He hefted up her dead weight, tossing her over his shoulder so he could get her to the car with minimal casualties (a shoe was sacrificed for the cause).
Maybe not next next Tuesday, he mused as he buckled her into the car. But someday.