Bread: Baby I'm-a Want You
Harry
Being at home for the better part of a year allows for a lot of thinking. Sometimes it was damaging and depressive, because my brain just ran the same clip of me singing to thousands of people on a loop. Other times it was insightful and offered a fair amount of introspection. I am now at a point in my life where I'm happy. Genuinely happy, with who I am and all I've been through. It wasn't an easy journey, and I'm quite sure it's still not over... because you learn for as long as you live, right?
What I aimed at most, whilst having coffee or a moment on my own, was what I had learned through experience. Being with Essie was like walking a familiar road but it looking completely new. So, as any person with a brain that never stops coming up with new thoughts, I thought about the course of my previous relationships. Some of them were short and sweet, fizzling out at just the right moment and others were longer and more impactful. All of them had one thing in common – they all ended at one point or another. Why was that? Was it their natural trajectory or was I the common denominator? Picking up on what Essie spent her entire life doing – making lists – I decided to create one of my own. What am I, and what am I not...?
I fall in love easily. I fall in love everywhere – on the tube, in interviews, stopped at a red light, during concerts, while I'm working and while I'm relaxing. It's a sensation that comes over me very easily. I almost never fall in love with looks, although I used to do that quite a lot when I was younger. I reckon it was the teenage rockstar stereotype that led me to such behaviours... I was it – young, popular, cool, attractive and everybody wanted to meet me and be around me. I'd escaped that self-prejudicial mindset, though, and I started falling in love with beings. When I first met Essie, I hadn't even seen her face and I'd already managed to fall a little in love with her. She stood in the middle of that huge set, fixing umbrella lights and dancing along to Bowie. I noticed her entire body moving subtly, along with the rhythm of 'Rebel Rebel', even her blonde curls boobed along as he sang. As the shoot moved along, I feel for her mannerisms, her way of being which was so bohemian but so stiff and firm at the same time. She released such small bits of information out into the universe that it was often hard to catch them.
Love intoxicates me. It always has. I think love is one of the most precious feelings life offers us. There is nothing like it, and it's completely different every time it happens, yet it always has the same undertones. It's bright, smiley, wonderful, intoxicating, infuriating, frustrating, fulfilling and has the power to make you or break you. Essie held that power in her hands from the second time we talked. The 12 hours we spent apart from me dropping her off to running into her the next morning, they were almost painful. Whatever I did, she somehow snuck her way into my thoughts, completely consuming them. What is she currently doing, does she drink coffee or tea, is she in love or has she ever been in love, does she have siblings and a big family, are her mornings always the same or does she break the routine? And, if I'm being honest, I felt like I was going crazy for a solid 12 hours. How was it possible that this human, one I'd only just met, moved into one of the drawers of my brain and just stayed?
I don't like to have sex with someone unless I know I'll be able to continue doing it. That's why I never have the infamous 'one-night-stands' my mates rave about. I don't get it, how can you share a piece of yourself with someone, knowing you won't do it again? Why would you allow a person to get that close to you if it were only for a night? This is exactly why I second guessed my decision to sleep with Essie that night, I knew I couldn't possibly taste her skin and then pack up and leave. I couldn't breathe and move in sync with her, knowing I'd be gone the next morning. Every time she touched my arm, left a soft kiss on my neck, or traced a finger over one of my tattoos – I was on the brink of inviting her to sleep in my bed every night.
I am patient, and I never force anything. I am known to rush into things, but I never force them to happen if they aren't developing on their own. I think I read in a psychology school book that pasta cooks for eleven minutes, the flight from London to Paris is roughly three quarters of an hour and if you tried rushing either of those things you'd end up with an uncooked dinner or swimming around the English Channel. As simplified as that was, we all have different timelines in life – some of my friends were in stable relationships, others already had children and then there were those that were still single and living with their parents. Things happen at a different pace, so it's normal that someone takes a while to fall in love, while I take approximately .3 seconds.
I love being happy, but my insecurities eat me alive. Who doesn't like being happy? It feels like waking up to the sun tickling your cheeks with its rays, the air smells of your favourite things and the song you like most in this world is playing on a loop in the background. Happiness is like reading a really good book in the most comfortable chair, with your feet dangling off the arm rest and playing with the warm grass. The only problem is – clouds cover my sun regularly. They hide it behind their grey mass and make me question its existence. And these clouds always have notes written on them: what if that song doesn't represent for the audience what it signifies for you, what if half the people around you are only there because of your name, what if the last date you went on was just a photo-op? Essie made me tremendously happy, every smile she gifted me had the power to chase away the grey... but what if she wakes up and realises this isn't what her heart desires?
I am a jealous guy. I'm jealous of the silky pillowcase that touches her skin in the mornings. I'm jealous of the hug her dog receives when he does something cute. I'm jealous of all the looks she attracts while walking down the street. I'm jealous of all the memories she has before me and the people she has lived them with. Essie is honest, sometimes to a fault. She doesn't do things out of spite and she never acts a certain way just to hurt someone. She showers me with love as much as her nature allows her to. I just always need more. My body craves her with its every pore, more than a drug, more than physical closeness. I can't help getting jealous of the air that caresses her cheeks.
So, all of that added up, subtracted, multiplied, and divided amounts to – I love, with my entire being, and my being has chosen you to love. I know you won't, but I must ask you anyway not to expect me to be perfect because I will mess up more than once. It's simple for me to love you, since my mind already has the formula imprinted deep inside it, and I don't see it stopping any time soon. You'll get frustrated with me, and when you do, dig this piece of paper up from one of your folders and read it again... it may not help with the frustration, but it will remind you of who I am, even when I act like a dick. Love, H.
"Darling, I've written something,", I found her seated at the dining table, zoned out from the outside world and deeply concentrated on editing photos, "It's for you to keep for as long as you want to.".
"Is it a song?", Essie finally turned away from the screen and looked at me.
"It isn't. I'd say it's better. It's me. I know it's often hard for you to understand some of my reactions, or even thoughts when I do share them with you. Trust me, I know. I often get thoughts so complex that my brain struggles to process it and then I wonder what it would be like to have the ability to allow my brain to use its full capacity, to let it just roam free and take those thoughts for a walk. This is me taking some of my thoughts for a walk.", I don't think she understood what I was talking about, but she would once she read the letter.
Essie
Harry left to do the food shop and I thought about working, but I couldn't get his letter out of my mind. Did he struggle expressing himself or was it my fault for not understanding him? Was this even about any of our recent discussions, or a completely unrelated issue?
"So, all of that added up, subtracted, multiplied, and divided amounts to – I love, with my entire being, and my being has chosen you to love. I know you won't, but I must ask you anyway not to expect me to be perfect because I will mess up more than once. It's simple for me to love you, since my mind already has the formula imprinted deep inside it, and I don't see it stopping any time soon. You'll get frustrated with me, and when you do, dig this piece of paper up from one of your folders and read it again... it may not help with the frustration, but it will remind you of who I am, even when I act like a dick. Love, H.", I put the piece of paper down and noticed that a few tears had escaped. I don't cry, unless I'm watching a sad film about a dog or the scene from Love Actually when Sam finally gets the girl and turns around to hug his stepfather.
There was something so distinctive about writing a letter like this, I felt privy to his most hidden thoughts. There weren't many things hidden about Harry... he was quite open about himself and his emotions. It wasn't always easy to read him, and there were certainly times where I wished for a 'Harry Styles guidebook', but generally speaking – what you saw was what you got. Still, reading what he wrote and how there was a part of him that saw each of those points as faults, whereas I saw them as complete virtues, made me sad. Was he not aware of his incredible self?
He walked through the door with five bags, struggling to get to the kitchen because Bono hung from one of his legs and I swung my arms around his neck.
"I love you, my entire being loves you, it chooses you to love. Don't forget that. You don't need to be perfect for me to love you or cherish you, because then you wouldn't be this Harry. You'd be some bloke without a weird sense of humour, without the flare for the dramatic and the affinity for knock-knock jokes. It would be a Harry without the gentle touch, without the teasing, without the accumulated knowledge of how and when our bodies work best together. I don't want a perfect guy, I want you."
I knew I'd keep this piece of paper forever; in the top drawer of every desk I own in every house I live in. But, more importantly, it shows there is a human behind your partner. We often forget that, busy with our jobs and daily struggles, behind the jokes and the long faces stands a living being that has a reason for all his feelings. It's good that he reminded me.
-----------------
A/N: You don't know how much I persisted in getting this update out haha. The power went out as I was writing it, my flatmates and I talked to the neighbours, figured out there wasn't anything we could do until tomorrow, then I finished the chapter and now I'm connected to my phone data in order to upload it :) But I had to - IT'S GOLDEN DAY! I absolutely loved it, even though my internet was shitty and I couldn't watch the premiere in HD (and we all know I would never wrong H like that and watch his mv in less than 1440p).
Hope you enjoyed the update, remember to smile and be kind, always.
T