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#because it shows how without question elle is a girl
watermelonsugacry · 1 year
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perrie and jade reminded me so much of what louis and y/n would be like in an interview while the other boys are making fun of them
https://youtube.com/shorts/a6YtQuhIG1k?feature=share
yesss and with this era!!
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"When was the moment where you were like 'Woah, this is getting so big!'" The quirky host bats his hands out in front of him.
YN and the rest of the boys laugh at how dirty the question sounded and the audience members join in soon after. They were being asked about when was the first moment the band realized they were being successful. The band is starting to close in on their last couple of interviews before going on their hiatus and the Chatty Allen show has been one of the more enjoyable shows of their careers.
So after settling in her spot in between Harry and Niall (and almost slipping right off the seat from how slippier the gold fabric of the couch is), Harry is the next to answer, "I think it was our first VMAs just because it was one of our first trips to America and everyone we grew up listening to was in the audience."
"YN, I see you nodding y'head. Do yeh agree?" Allen notes.
"I do yeah," YN answers, leaning forward to place her drink back on the glass coffee table. "Going to America was like, the one for me because before I'd never been outside of the country. And that was a place on my bucket list so I didn't expect to accomplish it so soon. It was pretty surreal."
"And do you remember how it was when you got to America? It must have been quite difficult with understanding everybody."
"Bloody 'ell, it was a struggle," She smiles as the audience laughs and the boys snicker. "S'cause most of the time, no one understood what Louis and I were sayin'. I had to almost speak in a more Southern England accent for them to get it."
"It's because of how you pronounce some stuff, babe," Liam comments. "Like how you say 'weird' like 'wee-ad.'"
"And 'wuata.'" Harry points a finger up to add on.
"Yeah, yeah. Instead of 'water' you say 'wuata.'"
The boys chuckle and begin to mimic the way she says the word.
"Well s'how I've been saying it me whole bloody life, Liam," YN leans forward, past Harry to look at her other bandmate with a playful furrow of her eyebrows.
"Like that!" Niall points out. "You just did it. Like, the way you say 'me' instead of 'my' for a lot of things."
"Hang on, hang on," Allen interrupts with a grand wave of his hands. "So you've had to tweak yeh accent for them people in America to understand yeh?" The host is baffled when he sees YN nodding her head with a sad smile. "And how would that go? Could yeh give us a demonstration?"
"Yeah so, like if I were to say 'oi, fank you so much for 'avin' us,' they would just sort of just, stare back at me with a weird smile, trying to be polite. So I have to be a bit more perky and instead say, 'Thank you so much for having us,'" YN says with a bit of an American accent.
"Americans say stuff with a hard 'R' and it's just tirin' sometimes, yeh know?" Louis defends. "So we just gotta make sure I say my Ts and things like tha'."
"She's has gotten a lot better at it though," Niall reassures his bandmate with a nod of his head.
"I thought YN was foreign when I first met her," Harry shrugs with a playfully neutral expression as the room erupts in laughter. A dimpled smile breaks out on his face when she gives him a playful slap on his arm in fake offensiveness.
While he jokes and jests, he remembers the first time he spoke to YN on the day of the X-Factor audition. He remembers being so in awe at how she spoke and sounded. She said things confidently and without remorse, acting like a true Donny would. He remembers being tongue-tied by the way she stood up for him when a snobby girl threw a mean comment his way.
He would listen to her speak all day if he could.
So as the bubbly, excited host moves on to their next conversation topics, Harry may or may not ask for YN's input, asking her if she remembers an event from way back when, or just nodding to her as a means to hand the question off to her every now and then—all just to hear her beautiful accent.
.
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I write for free so if any of you lovies would like to help a college girl out and buy her a ko-fi i would greatly appreciate it :) 💚
taglist:
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heeheesang · 2 months
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ʂƚɾαɳɠҽɾ ∂αɳɠҽɾ ₊˚⊹ ᰔ
four -> yn's past. (my apologies for the long chapter🥹)
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“yn! that’s literally so funny what—“ byul, elle and i were cut off from laughing as we accidentally bumped into o ur seniors. “oh, sorry.” elle apologised as the three of us bowed as an apology for bumping into them. i looked up to see the three people i least expected to see, jay, ni-ki and jungwon.
“oh, please don’t worry about it.” jay reassured us as elle’s smile widened, meeting eyes with the older male as we bowed again. “aren’t you three auditioning for the new hybe survival show..? if i’m not wrong, you’re kim wonbyul.. kim elle..? and you’re yoon yn.” jay asked when the air became thicker.
“ah yes… we’re happy to meet you..?” i said, trying to form words since we were still new to bumping into idols and all. “was that a question or were you actually forming a sentence?” riki chuckled as i rolled my eyes playfully, “let her off riks, she’s new to this. well, we have to get going but it was nice meeting you.” jungwon said as he stared directly into my eyes.
what? does he wanna kiss me or something what’s with the attitude change?
i scoffed softly as i made an excuse, “sorry i have to attend to this.” i said rolling my eyes as i looked directly at jungwon. maybe i shouldn’t have done that, maybe i should’ve. that’s nothing compared to what he did to me in high school. he should’ve learnt his lesson by now, right?
“yoon yn. YOON YN!” elle yelled back for me as tears dropped down my cheeks, turnimg around as i faced her. “what.. elle. what is it? i’m sorry for acting up but.. i’m sorry go on with the dance practice without me, i’ll just see you next episode.” i said as i smiled through my tears, elle was about to open her mouth again but i just went up to her and hugged her, “i’m fine don’t worry about me.”
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i walked past the walkways and got to a dark spot where i always went to if i needed to release my thoughts into space. i was wearing a grey tank with a beanie and some sweatpants as the cold wind brushed my hair, fuck i should’ve brought a jacket. i sighed and took out a stick, lighting it up as i inhaled a puff and let the smoke disperse in the air.
did i deserve that in high school? maybe it was a wake up call… but still, jungwon didn’t start a ‘call yn a slut’ chain, some stupid juniors did. maybe he isn’t all bad, am i thinking too much? jeonghan would hate me if i ever forgave jungwon this quick. jungwon didn’t really hurt me, just mentally and emotionally. again, it’s my fault for pushing him to be in a relationship with me… i knew he was emotionally unready or unstable a few weeks into our relationship so why didn’t he say anything?
“you know… sometimes it’s good to let your members know where you go. and it’s best to let your brother know where you went,” a familiar voice struck in my head as i snapped out of my thoughts, taking another puff of the tobacco flavoured stick as he sighs, “look yn… what i did back then—“
“please. no.” i cut him off as he pointed to the seat next to mine, i nodded and made a big space between us as i took yet another puff. “your friends and your brother are worried. they started coming after me because you talked about me..?” jungwon admitted as he sighed deeply and i nodded, “sorry about them.”
up til now, i hadn’t spared him a single glance. “yn, can we talk?” jungwon asked as he faced me, “we are talking.” i said, before he took my stick and threw it on the floor and used his foot to stop the fire from burning, turning me slowly to face him.
“please?” he said in a soft voice that i almost melted at, i nodded my head.
“i was stupid to say that you cheated, you obviously didn’t and i was at fault. i wasn’t very responsible as a boyfriend and i was seen with multiple girls and i said i had no time for our dates. i’ll be honest, i was jealous of seeing you spend more time with wonwoo than me.. so i made my schedule packed with tutees… i realised how stupid i was to think that i was in the right to tell everyone you chested and those juniors… called you names… because of me.” he took a deep breath to continue but i out my finger to his lips and shook my head with a deep sigh.
“look jungwon. i’m leaving that in the past, i’m happy, i’m glad you realised what you did wrong. i’ve tried everyway to avoid you but i guess the world just isn’t on my side. if we’re going to be label mates then, hello i’m yoon yn. what’s your name?” i said as i offered my hand, “yang jungwon, nice to meet you yn.”
“nice to meet you too asshat.”
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masterlist | back | next
taglist! @rosas-in-the-garden @ilikekpop-c @aloloveswonie @jwonistic @drunkhee @h4918ymc @huieee @xiaoderrrr @ilovejungwonandhaechan @yourssincerely-mimi @n1k1mura @nnana2
hhs’ notes! double update!! omg the amount of support on this smau is insane like actually insane i love you all so much especially my readers from my last smau🥹🫶🏻 jungwon and yn making progress..! how do we feel? honetsly so much mixed feelings right now but like… better chapters to come that will cure our curiousity😭 as always, thank you for reading and enjoying this chapter, i’ll see you on the next chapter! i love you all so much mwah mwah mwah🥹🫶🏻🫶🏻
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igotanidea · 1 year
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Pep talk : Aaron Hotchner x reader (platonic)
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„Whoa! What’s with the long face, sunshine?”
“Go away, Morgan.”
“Well I can only go as far in this plane….”
“Just leave me be, all right?!”
“Hey, easy there. Someone’s in the mood today. We’ve just cracked a case that should make you feel good.”
“Just drop it, all right!?”
“All right, fine” Derek raised his hands in surrender and walked away from Y/N who was acting erratic. “Don’t bite. But you know…. if something’s bothering you……”
“Ah!” she groaned in frustration and threw her pillow at him. Grave mistake since he swiftly caught It and took it with him. On top of all her feelings and discomfort now she was also forced to lean on the cold window without it. “Freaking profilers!”
“Last time I checked you were one of us!”
The BAU team was flying back to Quantico. Another day, another mystery solved, another lives saved. Yay, hurray.
Yay hurray, right?
So how come Y/n was feeling so under the weather and was stuck inside her own head, consumed by all the bad thoughts? Her mind was going hazy and she was on the highway to a panic attack.
“Hey.” a deep calming voice reverberated from somewhere above her and she raised her head to properly asses who was bold enough to approach her in such mood “May I?” the person pointed towards the seat opposite of her.
“Sure, Hotch.” She muttered, turning her gaze away, watching the clouds outside the plane. If he was here to interrogate her, she was not going to make it easy on him. What she forgot about was that Hotch was far too experienced and patient to get intimidated by her poor technique. Instead of asking her any questions, he was just sitting beside her in complete silence, testing her temper and restraints. And damn it, he was good at pushing the limits.
“All right, fine! I surrender.”
“Really?” Hotch raised an eyebrow
“Who told you? I swear I’m gonna kill Morgan.”
“He did not tell me anything. In fact, he did not tell anyone anything. You seem to be the only person who can actually make him self-conscious.”
“Self-conscious? Morgan? And people say you have no sense of humor, Hotch.” She scoffed, looking anywhere but on his face.
“Y/N.”
“What?’
“Tell me what is going on?”
“Nothing.”
“You do realize you can’t fool me, right? So stop wasting time and just talk.”
“But…..”
“Talk to me.”
“What is wrong with me, Hotch? Why can’t I be like anyone else on the team?” her saddened eyes finally focused on his face. At first glance he showed no emotions, but if someone was looking close enough it was easy to notice so many of them reflecting in his orbs. “I’ve spent half of my life trying to prove that I’m good enough and qualified for the job. And yet, so many people still takes me for granted thinking I just got lucky. I worked my ass off during studying, finishing all those extracurricular, seminars, lectures and yet, I’m still being seen as a little girl who would not last long. Why? Why Hotch?”
“People talk.” He stated simply “And I don’t really know why you care about it so much.”
“You don’t understand it, do you?” she shook her head angrily “You are the Aaron Hotchner, FBI’s very best and on top of that, a lawyer.”
“And you are in my team. You are in my team, because I wanted you to be here. Because I chose you.”
“And I still feel like I’m not enough.  Look at all the girls in the department. Former and present. Elle, Emily, Jennifer. God! I wish had their power and energy. Real girbosses.”
“Now you’re giving away your comparison skills. So sad you’re using it in the wrong purpose.”
“What?”
“Ever since you joined us, you were a mystery. Still are. I cannot fully figure you out, you’re so full of contradictions and inconsistencies.  And believe me, it’s not easy for me to admit it.”
“Oh, I believe that.” She smirked
“Why do you focus on the gossip’s about you?”
“Ugh! Hotch, are we talking about feelings now?”
“Understanding your own emotions is a valid part of this job. You cannot do it well if you cannot contain what’s inside you. You need to be in control of your own mind to try getting into unsub head. So again, why do you care?”
“Cause it hurts.”
“And why is that?”
“Stop being my psychologist here!”
“We’re getting to the bottom of the problem, I’m not letting go. Why?”
“Cause I worry it’s true, all right!”
“Is it?” he eyed her carefully
“I don’t know. You’re the boss here, you assess me so why don’t give away your opinion?”
“Nice try. But you did this again, the same mistake over and over.”
“What mistake?”
“Searching for an external validation. Why?”
“Ok, I’ve had enough of this” she stood up from her seat ready to find more peaceful place, but he grabbed her arm and made her sit back down. “Please, don’t make me say it.”
“I’m not making you do anything, do I?” his calmness was infuriating.
“Not with words.” She squirmed, her seat getting more and more uncomfortable by the second.
“Just say it.”
“I worry that no one needs me here. That I’m no help. But an obstacle. I worry that I’m stupid and useless.”
“We do need you.”
“Right. As if. You know what Morgan told me earlier? He said that we cracked the case, you know. We. Then why the hell do I feel like I was of no help?”
“Are you even hearing yourself?”
“Pretty good.”
“Focus on facts, Y/n. What are the facts? Cause from my point of view, because of your fast thinking, ability to keep cold blood and insight we were able to save two woman from certain death.”
“No. No. No.” she shook her head “that was Reid.”
“Reid connected the dots, but you were the one to find them in the first place.”
“But…..” she tried to oppose
“Yes?” he leaned forward slightly. Damn he was good at what he was doing.
“I rest my case, your honor.” she sighed “I give up.”
“No. We’re not done until we get your self-confidence straight.”
“I’m tired Hotch.” she tried to plead with him but it was futile.  
“As you should be. Now, you claim to be weak, but when I look at you I see the person who’s capable of moving mountains when someone’s in danger.  You say you feel stupid, but from my point of view your knowledge is more than the one coming from a textbook. You believe people who say you will not last long, but I’ve seen young agents quit after two or three bloody cases they could not handle. You are nothing of it. And those are the facts.”
“Is it your official opinion as my supervisor?“ she mumbled
“This is my opinion as your mentor. As someone who cares about you and who can see all the potential you are holding back and need to learn how to unlock.”
“Really? You mean it?”
“Like you said, I’m not known for my sense of humor.”
“Maybe we can work on that?” she joked looking at him, but that stone cold expression made her back out immediately “No? all right, let’s leave it here just like that.”
“Get some rest” he stood up and handed her the pillow she lost to Morgan before.
“How did you….?”
“Artifice is something to learn as well. Sleep kid, you’ll have a day full of work tomorrow.”
“You’ll be tormenting me now, won’t you?”
“Obviously. ”
“Hey, Hotch?”
“Hm?”
“Thanks for the pep talk, boss.” she smiled and much to her surprise he reciprocared by lifting corners of his mouth in the slightest, almost invicible curve.
@somest1
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mogai-sunflowers · 10 months
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i just binged the whole new season of heartstopper so spoiler warning for below if you haven't watched it yet but...
oh my GOD. like oh my fucking GOD.
first of all, Elle. i love that they don't show her as just the bullied trans girl with no other personality than just that she was bullied. like what i mean is that they let her just be a regular teenaged girl. she's not just The Trans One she's just one of the crew but they're still open about her transness. and i feel like they could've made her relationship with tao about how cishet men are pressured to not date trans girls cuz people think it makes them gay, but that isn't even brought up, their relationship is just natural and genuine and it just is so so so nice to see a mainstream show letting a trans girl just be.... herself. a teenager. they're not denying what she's been through but they're also not making her whole story out to be a tragedy. and when she meets naomi and phoenix, and immediately bonds and naomi immediately opens up about her experiences as a fellow trans girl, i felt sooooooo seen because that's what queer friendships are like. they're so healing because you can just feel safer and that's what most of my queer friendships have been and i felt so seen in the way elle immediately bonded with them.
second of all, ISAAC. HOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOLY FUCK!!!!!!! i have never once heard the words aromantic or asexual spoken out loud by someone else. like literally never spoken outloud, i've never even said them to myself, and here they are being spoken about casually on a huge mainstream queer tv show. that person at the art show talking about the pressure of romance and sex and how finding the right labels after so long was so freeing was like- idk how to even describe how it feels to be seen like that for the first time. like, people are going to watch that and they're going to learn about people like me in a positive way!! and i love that Isaac started reading the ACE book and i can't wait for more on his journey to accepting that part of himself
third of all, darcy and tara. as a gendernonconforming lesbian myself, seeing her so happy to wear that suit and then the very real pain of having that shut down by her mom, was very good to see that be represented. it's not just about her lesbianism, it's about her gender presentation too and so many times, lesbian media focuses solely on femme-presenting lesbians (not even actual femmes mind you, just lesbians who look feminine as fuck) and it felt so happy to see darcy dancing around in that suit when she first put it on. and tara talking about how she was afraid to even call herself a lesbian for so long was so real like. there's such a stigma around that word, i still feel that way even though i know i'm lesbian, i feel like this show is one of the first shows i've watched that isn't just a gay show, it's truly a queer show because there's such a diversity of experiences represented like-
there's charlie's experiences being bullied, but also his experiences being loved and appreciated. there's nick's experiences being perceived as straight and having to feel like he has to choose, and also constantly having to tell people he's bi, not gay, but also the positives of euphoria from his attraction to both men and women, the reality of mixed reactions from family. there's elle's parents who are accepting of her transness, and her school who wasn't as much, but also her school showcasing trans artists and her cis girl friends who accept her without question. there's isaac being told by jake that he just "hasn't found the right person yet" but also being told at the art exposition that it's freeing to be relieved from the pressures of romance and sex when you don't feel those kinds of attraction. there's just so much room for nuance and balance of experiences and they're all part of the picture. like, actual good representation.
i'm just so happy right now.
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bridgeportbritt · 10 months
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Britechester University of SimDonia | Sage, SimDonia
Tour Guide: The great thing about these townhomes is how close they are to everything. Lecture halls, the library, the cafe, and even the theatre which I'm sure, you'll love, Your Royal Highness.
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Ella: I will love that! I'll never be late to ballet practice.
Bria: And, how safe would you say this area of campus is? We are sending off our little girl here all alone after all.
Ella grumbles: Mom...
Emmitt: That's a fair question, Elle.
Tour Guide: Oh, very safe, ma'am. Our campus police patrol the area 24/7, there are emergency beacons all over campus, and of course, The Duchess is welcome to have her protection officers, as well.
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Ella: Guys in dark glasses and suits following me around campus. A very normal college experience.
Emmitt: We'll ensure that they're not intrusive, honey.
Tour Guide: If you follow me this way, I can show you inside one of our model homes similar to the one The Duchess would be staying in if she chose BUS.
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Tour Guide: So, this is a pretty standard 2 bedroom unit. Each home has a kitchen, living space, and each student has their own floor which includes a bathroom.
Bria: And what about roommates? I don't want just any old body living with my baby.
Ella embarrased: Oh my, Watcher!
Tour Guide: You have the option to purchase one bedroom or the entire house for a semester, so if you did purchase the entire townhome, a roommate wouldn't be assigned.
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Bria: Got it. And I'm sure that's a fortune. Will she at least have creative control to make the space her own? Because this place does not scream Ella.
Tour Guide: Um, well, it's not common that students make significant changes... but as long as the unit is returned to its original state, I don't see why not!
Emmitt: Well, we don't want any special treatment...
Bria: And why not?
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Ella annoyed: Mom, you're being so embarrasing!
Emmitt: Uh, Sondra, isn't it? Does the Prime Minister's son, Anthony, live near here? He and Ella are good friends and the Prime Minister is the one who recommended these townhomes to us.
Sondra: Why, yes, Your Royal Highness. The Count lives in this building actually.
Emmitt: That's great, huh, Ella? And good for Ella to have some friends close by.
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Bria laughs: As long as they're not throwing any wild college parties... without me!
Emmitt laughs: I certainly couldn't picture a kid like Anthony or Ella throwing any, what do they say, ragers?
Ella: Watcher, help me.
Emmitt: So, Ella. What do you think? Are you excited? How do you feel about BUS?
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Ella excited: I think... I'm BUS Bound!
Cut to Anthony's first year of college after Emmitt's rager line lolol:
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lucreziaq2001 · 5 months
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•TV show: "Criminal minds".
•Content warnings: A young boy spying on two of his friends to see what they would do, a girl kissing her also female friend on the lips, the friend in question getting mad and threatening her because of that kiss and the boy promising himself not to talk about what he had witnessed, but failing to keep that promise.
•Some of the lines are almost the same that are in a scene of the "Cold case" episode this story is inspired by. I did modify them a bit, though. I didn't just copy and paste them.
•Tags: @lex13cm, @golden1u5t, @avis-writeshq, @chrrysgirl, @hugyourlungs, @achillmango, @marie-sworld, @iluvreid, @babygirl-garcia, @rynwritesreid, @strangermoonlove.
The bridge to Heaven
Chapter 10: A shocking revelation
In the evening of November 2, after dinner, Spencer went to Jennifer's house because he wanted to see her, but when he arrived there Sandy Jareau, the girl's mother, told him that her daughter wasn't there because she had gone to the river with Emily.
Spencer thanked her for her information and left, but instead of just going back home, he decided to go to the river too.
He wasn't sure why, as he had noticed something strange between them, but it didn't seem that big to him, but he was curious to see what Emily and Jennifer would have done.
So when he arrived at his destination, he hid behind a bush so he could observe the two girls without being seen and waited.
"Ah! Why is it so hot? It's November!" Jennifer exclaimed at a certain point, taking off her jacket and placing it on the grass.
"I thought you were going to hang out with Elle and her friends tonight" Emily told her.
"No, I've decided not to go out with them" Jennifer replied.
"Why?" Emily questioned.
"I was going to Elle's house, but then I thought better of it, because she's an idiot" her friend explained, and after that sentence, both she and Emily burst out laughing.
Spencer had to stop himself from doing the same thing.
Evidently, quite a few people at their school shared that opinion about Elle.
"A lot of girls in this town are like that, actually. No offense" Jennifer then added.
"Do you come here often?" Emily then asked her.
"Yes. It's one of the few places where I feel like I can breathe these days" the younger girl replied.
Seeing the girl he considered his best friend so sad was hard for Spencer, but once again not wanting to be seen or heard, he couldn't say or do anything.
"You are different from what you want to seem like. Or at least, that's how I see you. I hope we will remain friends for a long time" Emily then told her friend, taking her hand and looking straight into her eyes.
"I'm sorry to ask you this, but why don't you behave like other girls?" Jennifer suddenly asked a couple of minutes later.
She had stopped to think before asking her friend such a question, that was evident.
"I don't know this either, Jennifer" Emily replied, much more serious than she was before "I think it's just the way I am".
"Yes, maybe you're right," her friend told her.
"I remember playing with dolls sometimes, but I wanted to play boy games more often than not when I was little" Emily then said, smiling again "I've always been like that, and I just want to be myself".
"Then don't ever change" Jennifer told her.
"I'd rather die than do that" Emily assured "Deal?"
"Deal" Jennifer confirmed, shaking her friend's hand.
"You're attracted to women, right?" the girl added a few seconds later "The same way Aaron and Derek are, for example, I mean".
"Yes" Emily confirmed, "But right now I'm only attracted to one person".
"Really?!?" Jennifer exclaimed, clearly as excited by that revelation as any teenage girl would have been "And who is it?".
"It's you" Emily responded, then, clearly on instinct, she kissed her friend on the lips.
The kiss lasted for a few seconds, then Jennifer broke away abruptly.
"What are you doing?!?" she shouted at Emily.
"I don't know!" the girl tried to justify herself.
"Don't ever do that again!" Jennifer continued.
"I'm sorry!" Emily attempted to apologize, but to no avail.
"Shut up! Do that again, and I'll do something worse than what Aaron did to you a week ago!" Jennifer yelled at her before running off.
Out of shock, Spencer did the same thing, but promised himself not to tell anyone about what he had seen.
In the end, however, he failed to keep that promise.
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itisaterriblelove · 7 months
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“YOU’RE MAD AT ME.” Elle poked my cheek, leaning heavily into my arms as I held her upright. She was a wobbling, giddy mess of spilled emotions tonight and it surprised me. In theory, I had known that she was drunk, but the reality had left me speechless. DK’s text hadn’t been very specific, just that he needed my help, and that the “girls” were drunk. I’d known who he meant. The four of us—DK, Jemma, Elle, and I—were pretty much a unit.
To my surprise, I had realized that I must have never seen Elle drunk before, only tipsy. There was a pretty solid distinction between the two that I hadn’t recognized until this very moment. Tipsy Elle was cute, she was full of laughter and happiness and exciting ideas. She loved everyone and everything. 
Drunk Elle was a little bit insecure, a shit ton of questions, and fucking super-glued to my body. I was hyper-aware of the feel of her every curve. 
I guess I hadn’t answered her—I hadn’t known it was a question—because she asked, “Are you mad at me, Gavin?” And she tried to poke my cheek again but she hit my eyeball instead.
“Fuck, Elle!” I recoiled, squinting, nearly tripping as our balance was thrown from my reaction. And she was not even trying to carry her own fucking weight. I blinked, hard, and shook my head at her before she could go at me again. “No, baby.” But, yeah, I kind of was. It was strange. 
I sighed and walked her up the gravel of my driveway, praying that Violet was out so that she did not bear witness to this drunken mess. Elle would probably be embarrassed in the morning.
I leaned her up against the wall near the front door and fumbled with the house key for a moment before fitting it securely in the lock. Elle slung her arms around my neck without prompting and together we wobbled our way through the front door.
“I’m sorry!” She didn’t buy my lie, even though she clearly couldn’t even see straight. “Don’t be mad at me. I was just trying to have fun.” By some miracle I understood her even though every single one of her words slurred together into one giant sound.
“Shhh,” I patted her shoulder consolingly. “Relax, baby.” 
She wrapped herself around me. First her arms and then, after a little hop, her legs too, completely intertwining herself so that I had no choice but to lift her or fall over.
I grunted, adjusting. It was a good thing that she was so tiny because I was not exactly a wall of muscle, and by all rights we should have landed right on the damn floor.
Elle buried her face against my neck, and I tried not to swallow hard as I started towards my bedroom. Of course Clay and Violet were home, and up, the both of them sitting in the living room watching something on the television when I passed through.
Clay only lifted an eyebrow when he spotted us, and then shifted his eyes back to the screen. That was the best thing about living with someone like Clayton Usher—he knew how to mind his own fucking business. No such luck with Violet O’Rien, though. Her jaw dropped as she stared openly at us.
“You dumped Tyler already?” She sounded as bitchy as the question suggested she was.
I rolled my eyes and ignored her. Elle didn’t.
She perked up, her head tipping back to look at Violet. “I wish! Gavin looooves Tyler more than my candy.”
I tried to unhear it—I really did—but it was too fucking late. Her declaration was laced with a world of jealousy that I couldn’t pretend not to notice.
“Ah, shit,” I sighed, walking faster, so that Elle and Vi wouldn’t be encouraged to continue their pointless conversation. I fumbled with the doorknob and then slammed the door behind me once I made it to my room.
“Cracker jacks,” Elle said, as if she were correcting me. Like that was a suitable substitute for the word that I’d used. “Tonight was fun until you showed up!” She announced as I dropped her onto my bed. She pulled up onto her knees and peered at me. “You’re grumpy.”
I shrugged. There was no denying it, apparently it was written all over my face. “You made me leave Tyler and Reagan alone with some guy in a karaoke bar,” I explained, as if having a reasonable conversation with a drunk person was even possible.
“Did not!” Elle challenged, her bottom lip poking out as she said it. “Hey! You bailed on me!” This seemed to be the topic of another conversation, judging by the way that she said it. Like she had just remembered that it happened, and not in counter to what I had just blamed her for.
I turned my back to her and went to my dresser, fishing through until I found the t-shirt and shorts that I was looking for. “Here.” I tossed the clothes in her direction.
“You shoulda taken me home.” She declared when I turned around to look at her. “If you were gonna be so mad.” She kicked off her heels—honestly it was a miracle that she hadn’t broken any bones walking around in those shoes, the girl was not exactly the graceful sort—and then grabbed at the hem of her dress.
And I think maybe my fucking brain shut down, because it processed too slowly for me to stop her from yanking her dress off right in front of me.
And there are some things that you just cannot un-fucking-see. Elle in absolutely nothing but a lacy black bra and panties, perched on her knees on my bed? Yeah, that’s one of them.
Fucking shit on a stick. I was going to hell. 
My eyes were going to fall right out of my mother-fucking face and dissolve in the damn carpet. My brain was going to melt, I felt pretty sure that was on the verge of happening, and then it would dribble out of my empty eye sockets.
Jesus Christ.
She struggled into the t-shirt and then toppled right off the bed as she tried to get into the shorts. It took me that long just to get myself in check.
I cleared my throat and let her pick her own self up off of the floor and shimmy into the shorts. “I said I wasn’t mad.” I was surprised that my voice managed to come out even. Absolutely nothing felt even.
“Well, you’re a liar,” Elle grumbled, and when I looked at her again she was pushing her raven hair back out of her face.
She was the kind of beautiful that broke my heart, with giant green eyes and soft, tan skin. Her full lips were curved into a pout that wasn’t helping me get my thoughts back in order.
“If you throw up on me tonight I’m never bailing you out when you’re drunk again,” I told her, even though we both knew that I didn’t mean it. Well, mostly. I did hate throw-up, and messes in general, and drunk girls who couldn’t keep their shit together. But this was Elle, not just some random chick.
“Maybe I’ll sleep on the couch,” she countered, petulant and still pouting. And I knew that I should definitely fucking let her do just that. The thought of her lying next to me at the moment felt like a lit match meeting with a can of gasoline. But I also knew that I just couldn’t.
“I need to make sure you don’t choke and die in your sleep,” I countered, and yeah, I sounded grumpy as hell. She was right. But it had a lot more to do with her nearly naked on my bed, and a lot less to do with interrupting a double date I hadn’t wanted to be on in the first place. I was man enough to admit that—at least to myself.
She snatched her dress off the bed and threw it at my face. Which surprised me, mostly because Elle and I never fought. Never, ever. 
Fighting wasn’t exactly my thing. I’d had a girl dump me once because she’d been screaming and crying in my face, and I’d asked her if we could just “agree to disagree.” She’d called me an asshole and said we were done. I’d shrugged it off.
Not because I actually am an asshole… At least, I don’t think I am. But because I just couldn’t understand what the fuck fighting even accomplished. People yelled, everyone walked away angry. And for what? We’d worked it out, actually, me and that girl. And had gone strong for a couple of months after that before agreeing to part ways, which just proved to me that I was right about the fighting thing.
But—stupidly—I kind of wanted to throw this dress right back at Elvis Hirsche in the moment. And that was just fucking strange.
“You’re being a jerk, Gavin!” She really screamed it, no indoor voice, no whisper-yell. I glanced at the door, wondering what Clay and Violet thought about this new development in my dynamic with Elle. 
They had adjusted pretty okay to the idea that Elle and I were such good friends, with no designs to ever hook up. Most people didn’t really believe us, but what the fuck ever. I didn’t care what people thought. Guys and girls could be friends without having sex, it was possible, there were no rules that stated otherwise. Just shit people made up.
Clay and Violet barely ever even said anything anymore about Elle coming over for movie nights and then sleeping over after. They didn’t tease us, or question whether something had happened. They didn’t raise their eyebrows when they saw me put my arm around her on the couch, or pull her into a hug, or if they saw her coaxing me to dance with her. That was just how we were, and it barely bothered the people that knew us well.
Because Elle tried to coax anyone to dance, and I called everyone with boobs “baby.” 
But I didn’t yell, and neither did she, and we definitely didn’t yell at each other.
“I don’t like you hanging out with Jemma if this is what the two of you get up to,” I countered, because I didn’t have anything else to say. I guess I kind of was being a jerk, but it felt justified. And anyway, she was the one who’d said she wished I’d dumped my fucking girlfriend.
“I don’t like you hanging out with Tyler when you’re supposed to be with me. So tough!”
Well, shit. That sounded coherent as hell. No slurring drunk girl talk to get that out.
“Can you pass the fuck out already?” I waved at my bed in invitation. 
“Maybe YOU should sleep on the couch!” She countered, throwing a glare my way.
“It’s my fucking bed!” Holy shit. Was I actually yelling back at this girl? This made no fucking sense to me. I pressed my lips together and took a step back, trying to clear the fog in my head, trying to regulate my breathing so that I could think.
Elle’s face fell, her pretty eyes widening in shock, and I instantly felt like shit.
“You said you weren’t mad,” she whispered it, hanging her head down in disappointment.
And I felt like the worst fucking person in the world. The lowest of the low. I don’t think I had ever yelled at anyone in my entire fucking life, and Elle knew that too. Why would I choose this moment and this girl to be the first? I could probably stand anybody’s sadness but hers. 
I crossed the room to her and pulled her into my arms. This much, at least, was as natural as breathing. “I’m sorry, baby.” I held her to me. “Listen, you’re important to me, Elle.” Because I recognized what this was really about. And it wasn’t about going out drinking or missing dinner with Elle’s parents or whatever the fuck. It was about us. “You’re the most important to me, okay? And I’m sorry about tonight. I didn’t think you’d mind. You should have said.” 
I really had thought it was okay with her. We always had dinner with her family—her parents were these ridiculous hippies and a never ending source of amusement for me. In the most awesome of ways, obviously. Because my own parents were extremely traditional and extremely boring in comparison. I loved Elle’s family dynamic almost as much as I loved our friendship. I even loved hanging out with her three brothers, and all of them (well, except Eli) had threatened to kick my ass on a near constant basis since I’d known them. They were super-protective of Elvis, and I definitely couldn’t say that I blamed them.
Elle shrugged against my embrace. “You were being a good boyfriend.” She turned her head and spoke into my shirt. “I’m sorry, too.”
But even though it seemed like we were making up, there was still this tightness in my chest that I couldn’t seem to shake. I swallowed and kissed the top of her head, trying to breathe around this unfamiliar feeling. Trying to understand it.
Things were changing; I had never been very good with change.
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mwritesc · 1 year
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I appear to be the first anon. Wether that's good or bad I'll leave up to you to decide!
I am very much looking forward to this, and yes, I will admit in no small part because of it not only being inspired by Greek Mythology, but as well as Aphrodite being an RO.
This may just be the first time someone has decided to have Aphrodite in their story in this way, and while I could ask for some facts about her, I will leave that to others.
Instead I'd very much like to know if you've drawn on any inspirations to help you with your version of her? Or will it be more of a case of going with the flow?
Looking forward to seeing what you create!
Hey, thanks for this lovely ask! Firstly, I'm really glad you like the concept I'm trying to achieve with Cyprus, it's always nice to find that your passion for an idea is shared by others.
Secondly, I really love this question, and I'll try to answer best I can without getting too spoilery haha.
Aphrodite is one of the most important characters to the story. Her birth is the catalyst that sets everything in motion. And yet, we tend to know very little of her true personality, especially in the mythological retellings I've used as reference. She is reduced to words like vain and jealous and beautiful. This gave me a ton of creative liberty, and I've honestly been very anxious to do her character justice.
For inspiration, I've taken the approach of taking certain small ideas from characters and sort of sticking them to a board of Aphrodites overall character.
One of these characters was Beth Harmon, particularly the development of her character throughout the show. She starts off as this very timid, quiet girl who has been thrown into an unfamiliar situation she isn't ready for. Most of the time she's left observing, trying to get her footing on her own without realising she has others rooting for her. Later into the show she realises her own power, and develops her own sense of confidence and wit despite remaining relatively mysterious. All of this development is physically characterised by the distinct change of her style. Basically all that was said here can apply to Aphrodite.
Obviously this exempts some parts of Beths personality. For instance, Aphrodite shows a lot more youth all throughout her development, not just at the beginning.
On a less serious note, I do take some inspiration from Elle Woods from Legally Blonde. Her character takes from the more comedic side, but I find the discrediting of the classic blonde stereotype speaks with how I want to discredit similar stereotypes surrounding Aphrodite. She's not just jealous and vain, or at least she wasn't born that way.
Hopefully that answers your question, and again, thanks for the ask!
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empyreanwritings · 1 year
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January Book Review
Every month I will be doing a minor review of all the books I have read so far in 2023. I'll always include the title, author, and overall rating! I hope you all find a gem on this list the way I have ❤️
Good Girl Complex - Elle Kennedy: First impression is DEAR GOD PLEASE WHY DOES THERE HAVE TO BE A BET. I was thrown back to circa 2012 when After was all the rage and questioned everything about my purchase. And while this book was a little cliche, I really enjoyed that, unlike After, the characters are actually loveable and there's so much more charm to it outside of the bet & it delves much deeper than just bad boy meets good college girl. I was hooked and read the whole thing in 5 hours because I needed to know how it was going to go. Overall rating: 8/10
Ship Wrecked - Olivia Dade: My first impression is a refreshing one bc thank god I'm reading a book where both leads are plus-size. Media is so hellbent on only one person in the relationship being plus-sized that I actually was surprised to see them on the cover and know they'd still get the hot romance, smutty treatment other leads do. The overall story and smut were fantastic. I did enjoy seeing them grow and confess things they were afraid of as the story went on. That being said, the timing was weird. There were a lot of time skips, and in between each chapter, there were texts/interviews/fanfics that didn't coincide with the time of the story. So I was lost a lot, esp when they did a random 6-year skip without saying there was a skip at the beginning. Overall rating: 8.5/10
The Demon's Bargain - Katee Robert: If you didn't know by now, Katee Robert has me by the throat. I love all of her books sm so I was super excited for this one. It's a lot shorter than her other books in the A Deal with a Demon series - only about 120 pages, so I finished it in a few hours. There's not much plot development bc the story is focused on just a three day span then the epilogue shows what happened years later. This book has everything - revenge on shitty exes, non-binary demons, pegging, and a whole lotta bloody sex. If you want an in-depth, profound story then this one may not be for you. This is clearly just for demon-fuckers, and while I wished I could have had more of Lenora and Ramanu bc I really enjoyed them, I know we'll see them in other books so I'm okay with it. Overall rating: 10/10 bc I'm a simple horny bitch.
To Marry and To Meddle - Martha Waters: Martha Waters is quickly becoming one of my favorite authors. I loved To Have and To Hoax & To Love and To Loathe, so I looked forward to this one a lot. Emily and Julian were a really interesting story bc they weren't enemies to lovers, they weren't constantly quarreling over things to rekindle their love - they were just two people attracted to each other that entered into a marriage of convenience. Their conflict lied within the fact they weren't supposed to fall in love, and they were only supposed to help each other with their respective problems. I'm also a huge sucker for a rake with a soft center, who just wants to be loved and accepted by people; and that's who Julian is. It was spicy and funny and so tender at moments that I read it within a day. Overall rating: 12/10
Sense & Sensibility - Jane Austen: I will be honest and say I did not pick up this book because of personal preference. I am currently in a class that has a focus on Jane Austen, so this was the first book I read, and honestly, I loved it. It took me a few days to really get into it, but MAN the drama??? Jane Austen was the OG scandal writer in my eyes idc. I was listening to the audiobook and when I heard someone say that Edward was engaged I went "WHO?" out loud. I felt like I was listening to a reality tv show in that moment. Marianne is my fave character, but I did not want to see her end up with who she ended up with. Nor did I want Elinor to end with her husband because he made her seem like a second choice. Other than that, I thoroughly enjoyed the story and characters. Overall rating: 9/10
Book Lovers - Emily Henry: The first Emily Henry book I read was The People We Meet on Vacation, and while I liked it, it wasn't something that made me go "WOW, I'd reread that!" But Book Lovers?? I absolutely would - and WILL - reread it. There was so much to unpack with the main character, Nora, and I absolutely loved that she did not have to change or lose herself at the end of the book because she found someone who understood her. If you are someone who roots for the woman that always gets left behind for the wholesome farm girl in cheesy Hallmark movies then this book is for you. Overall rating: 10/10
Pride & Prejudice - Jane Austen: I don't know if Jane Austen was the first to really write enemies to lovers, but she sure wrote the kind I thoroughly enjoy. There's not much I can say about this book that hasn't been said by others. It was good--dragged on a bit longer than I anticipated at some points--but its a classic for a reason. Ngl tho I think I enjoyed Pride & Prejudice & Zombies a lot more. Scandalous, I know. Overall Rating: 9.5/10
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glenngaylord · 1 year
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Losing Her Religion -  Film Review: Are You There God? It's Me, Margaret ★★★★1/2
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Even if he never writes or directs anything again, James L. Brooks has already amassed an iconic legacy of masterful television and film projects such as Terms Of Endearment, Broadcast News, and the Mary Tyler Moore Show, not to mention putting his stamp on producing The Simpsons, which has been running for 34 seasons and counting. He has been particularly adept with strong female characters, providing career-defining roles for such women as Shirley MacLaine, Debra Winger, Holly Hunter, Helen Hunt, Julie Kavner, and the aforementioned, late great Mary Tyler Moore.
It makes sense then, that for someone who has made such humanistic projects as he has, that he would want to pass the torch to a worthy heir, and Brooks has clearly found such a talent in writer/director Kelly Fremon Craig. Brooks seems to have tested the waters by producing her debut feature, The Edge Of Seventeen, a refreshingly assured coming-of-age comedy from 2016 starring Hailee Steinfeld. Clearly pleased with the results, they have collaborated again, getting legendary author Judy Blume’s blessing on adapting her treasured 1970 novel, Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret to the screen. Well, whatever Brooks was praying to or for, he was heard, because Fremon Craig has not only done Blume proud, but she has also brought that Brooks level of quirky, neurotic, unpredictable, zig-zag rhythm to her lovely filmmaking but with a voice of her own. She honors Brooks’ commitment to character specificity without imitating him, and this film is a joy to behold.
It’s the end of summer 1970, and 11-year-old Margaret Simon (Abby Ryder Fortson) has just returned from camp to her New York City life where her parents Barbara (Rachel McAdams) and Herb (Benny Safdie) break the news to their daughter that they’re immediately moving away from Grandma Sylvia (Kathy Bates) to the suburbs of New Jersey. Horrified by the idea of being uprooted, Margaret begins her conversation with God, an unlikely undertaking considering she has eschewed religion up to this point in her life. With a Jewish father and a Christian mother, she has been given the choice to not make any decisions regarding faith until she enters into adulthood. With so many questions formulating in her mind and a classroom assignment on religion narrowing that timeline, Margaret just might not be able to wait that long. It seems she has no time to waste when it comes to learning about sexuality, menstruation, her developing body, friendship, bullying, lies, and that big higher power.
But back on the ground in Jersey, it doesn’t take long for Margaret to meet her neighbor Nancy Wheeler (a perfectly cast  Elle Graham), a future Mean Girls-esque Regina George in the making if there ever was one. Nancy accepts her into her secret club of girls who include Gretchen (Katherine Malden Kupferer) and the adorable Janie (Amari Alexis Price). Their adventures lead to some of the most famous moments from the novel, including the purchasing of sanitary napkins and the classic chant, “We must, we must, we must increase our bust!” Some of their moments involve sweet times with boys, but others give Margaret pause, such as when they seem to ostracize a fellow student or spread unnecessary lies.
Margaret also witnesses complex issues regarding religion within her parents’ marriage and how her mother has stifled her own creative ambitions with their new life away from the city. Margaret’s only respite from everything seems to be with her beloved Grandma, who treats her to Broadway shows and slumber parties. I mean, who wouldn’t want to curl up with Kathy Bates for a girls night? Bates, as always, is a scene-stealing force of nature here. But part of growing up means Margaret learning that even Grandmas don’t just want to spend all their time with children. Coming of age is hard, and Margaret seems to hit a wall everywhere she turns.
With a story like this, packed as it is with so much novelistic incident, it either sinks or swims by the compelling nature of its protagonist. Thankfully, Freeman Craig has struck gold with Fortson, an assured, focused, confident actor who blisteringly tears through this film from beginning to end. She’s right up there with Aurora Greenway, Emma Greenway, and Jane Craig in finding vulnerability in the assertive, kindness in what is often considered blunt. It’s a fantastic, attention-deserving performance. When she experiences something life-changing late in the film, her reaction brought me to tears. There’s not a whiff of “cutesy child actor” about her performance. It’s a fully realized character and made me hopeful, just like the novel, that young girls will aspire to be just as complicated, layered, and as perfectly imperfect as Margaret.
Same goes for McAdams, who has kindness gushing out of her pores here, yet has to go on her own journey of self-realization to understand that sometimes it’s ok to not make everybody happy. She also happens to be one of the best listeners in the business, her eyes always seem so alive in her scenes, filled with empathy, anxiety, and everything in between. Safdie, best known as one half of the brothers who directed Uncut Gems, acquits himself well as the father who resents his wife’s parents for judging him. I also enjoyed Kate MacCluggage as Nancy’s very uptight mother who seems to have never let the Eisenhower Era go.
It’s important to note that the novel was squarely aimed at young adults, as is the film. While some of the themes are mature, it keeps things fairly light in tone, never getting terribly deep or harsh. Fremon Craig clearly communicated this to her crew as well. I especially appreciated that Tim Ives’ cinematography didn’t lean into the trope of a sun-dappled 1970’s look but instead opted for a more simple naturalism.  Same goes for Steve Saklad’s detailed but unfussy production design. Ann Roth’s costume design also contributed greatly to the look of this film, from McAdams’ hip hugger jeans to those clearly painful sock-free loafers Fortson wears. This unassuming approach feels intentional by design, and as such, the film is an adorable joy from beginning to end. I can’t wait to see what Fremon Craig does next.
For over 50 years, the novel has inspired generations of young people to be better people, to be more aware of their growing bodies, to be kind to others, and to celebrate our differences. Judy Blume had turned down many offers over the years to adapt this book, but clearly she, like James L. Brooks, saw something in Fremon Craig that made her say yes. I’m so glad she did. Hopefully, with this gem of a film, Blume’s wonderfully messy message can reach out even further and inspire generations of young girls to not want to be perfect little Barbies but to be brash, bold, funny, sweet, Margarets instead.
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lucindarobinsonvevo · 2 years
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I was thinking, if Cam had survived, and was in Erinsborough when Harlow showed up, what do you think his reaction to Harlow would have been? Would he have tried to take her under his wing and be the father figure Rob couldn't be? Or would he have been like Paul/Gail and been wary, and searched for any Rob-isms she displayed? And how would Rob react to Cam (who he sees as more successful and attractive than himself) having a paternal relationship with his daughter?
Ohhh fantastic question and something I have thought on for a while! 
We can’t say for sure what Cameron’s personality would have been if he’d stayed in EB, it only took them a year to make Elle an entirely new person after all but let’s assume that the main pillars of his personality would be the same between 2006 and 2019. I’ve actually been working on and off on a fic with the same premise where Cameron tries to describe how he feels about Robert to Harlow while they make sauce sandwiches using an analogy of a pair of conjoined twins where one twin had to be sacrificed to save the other twin, so I will use some of the notes from that fic. All you really need to know is that my reading of a Cameron who lived is that he would be disabled because that’s how I took his line from Karma Fly With Me - ‘I can’t feel my legs, Dad. I can’t feel them at all.’ 
I think Cameron is naive, and he takes things at face value. He never expects to be lied too and so when he is lied too even when it’s obvious he just doesn’t notice. So I think when Harlow says ‘im Robert’s daughter’ he absolutely believes her more in line with David and Aaron than Paul and Gail. He would probably not be looking for Robertisms in her, and would be more concerned about why a teenage girl is traveling halfway across the world on her own than anything else. I mean, Cam thinks of himself as a different entity than Paul, so he would apply that same idea to Harlow. Just because her father is bad, it doesn’t mean she is bad and he’d give her the same chance he gives everyone to be a good person. 
Emotionally, he’d be utterly flabbergasted that Rob managed to conceive a child without him knowing. It would just cement how little he really knew his brother, and that he and Elle were really the ones off in their own little world rather than Rob. He’d have some guilt for leaving Rob in a situation where he was taken advantage off, totally disconnected from the fact that he was placing himself in the same situations. I’d wager than Cam feels a lot of guilt as time passes for what happened with Rob because he’s really just that forgiving. I think Elle is upset by the situation but if Cameron had lived she’d feel nearly no guilt at all (sociopath queen) but Cam would specifically feel bad for what happened because Rob was using him to explain all his plans and backstory too in 2006. But he’s not going to take that out on Harlow, I think he’d be able to provide the middle ground that 2019 sorely needed. Someone who has actual in person experience with Rob and who isn’t scared of him like Paul and isn’t as blinded by love for him as Gail.
I think Rob being Cam’s twin rather than his triplet makes him feel worse about what happened and he would not be able to let it go the way Elle can. He’d probably have spent a lot of time meditating on what happened to Robert with a lot more empathy than her. In his neighbours.com biography, Cam is described as being fascinated by people so i think Robert would be an interest his at least anthropologically. 
He’s more like - yes, Robert did a terrible and awful thing but he wasn’t all evil all the time. We had good times together, even when he treated me badly I still loved him. Unfortunately, you can’t love someone out of mental illness – I would know.  If Elle and I had the vocabulary for mental illness you have as a teenager now, then we might have been able to find help for him, but we didn’t so we reacted like children would, by treating him badly in return for how badly he treated us. We didn’t know better, we were just kids. I think it’s fine for you to want a relationship with your Dad, I know that I’ve loved my dad through a lot of really bad behavior on his part. Just be aware that he will probably try to manipulate you. It’s not because he doesn’t love you, it’s because he’s got something in his brain that makes him like that. It’s not your job to fix him, or to fix his relationships. Don’t put that on yourself. You’re his daughter, not his defense attorney. I think Harlow would appreciate that. 
 As for if he would take her under his wing, yes for sure :) Not strictly to be a father figure at first, just to assist her in navigating a complex family without accidentally getting hurt by Paul in the process. But it would morph into a more complex father/daughter relationship over time when Harlow gravitates to him more than her other family members similar to how she gravitated to Amy because he’s more stable and less…Robinson than Leo and Paul. Cam is just trustworthy, and according to his Neighbours.com bio he makes people feel like the most important person in the room and Harlow has never been made to feel important in her life so again, it’s just an aspect of him she’d be drawn too. 
So, I think she would come to value his opinion a lot, once he is able to prove to her that he truly has her best interests at heart and he is a good guy in a family of the morally grey. Interestingly though, family roles in the Robinson family are extremely rigid, influenced to be this way by Jim who was paternalistic but never served as a mother for his children, only their father while Helen was never their mother, but their grandmother who lived with them. We can also see this in later seasons when Elle tries to insert herself into Paul’s life as someone he’s being emotionally incestous with rather than adhering to the strict role of daughter and he refuses to engage her in that way, instead picking up a girlfriend to fill that role in his life. Equally, Paul is never his children’s friend, he’s always their father. David especially turns to Paul for paternal affection but expects to never have to give any in return. So I don’t think that Cam would ever see himself as her father even when he’s filling the father role and administering paternal advice to her about X Y and Z thing. 
Here’s something interesting. As identical twins, Robert and Cameron have identical DNA, so when they start testing to see if they can give David a kidney Cam would probably come up as a match. IDK how this fits in yet, just an interesting tidbit. Cam probably wouldn’t have been able to donate a kidney to David though on account of his getting hit by a car and having serious internal injuries. 
As for Robert’s reaction, I’m not sure. I am envisioning Cameron being the one to request that Rob take the test to see if he can give a kidney to David to save Harlow having to do that the first time she meets her father. Rob being like. Lmaoo why would I do that? And him being like because David is Harlow’s favourite uncle and she’d hate you forever if you don’t. Narrativley this scene would be used to demonstrate how much being around Paul has changed Cameron, as someone who was hopeless at manipulation to someone who can identify a pain point and apply pressure to it, but makes a choice not to and to be a better person. It doesn’t take long after meeting Harlow for him to realize that Cameron is actually extremely important to her, much more important than David and being impotently furious about it. 
Maybe he would go after Cameron rather than Paul when he escapes? Probably not. I do think Cam would be able to predict Robert’s escape and even where he would go to hide but wouldn’t turn him in because Harlow asked him not to. I like to think it will be him to apply pressure to an angry Robert to go back, not because he cares about David, or Paul or even their mother but because he cares about Harlow and she won’t chase him, not when she has family in Erinsborough who love her. So it’s up to him – Cam won’t break triplet code and turn him in but if he does pull Harlow into this than Rob should know she already cut off her mother who raised her, does he really think he’s above that? Again, this scene would serve the narrative purpose of displaying to Robert that Cameron is not the weak willed boy who let himself be taken advantage of back in 2006, or even who he was at the beginning of 2019. Being around Harlow has made him a stronger person, because he has to be for her sake lest he become someone else she thinks she has to take care of, when it’s him who should be taking care of her. When Harlow does find him after Cameron has already left him to make up his own mind, he decides to go back to the hospital with her after thinking on what Cam had to say. (also i think we should punish adz hunter by making him do more spit screen scenes for saying Cameron had to die so Robert could live.) 
I think that they would find a peaceful middle ground eventually, I like to think it would be through a mutual love of Harlow, and also mutually missing Elle (because for Cameron to live, either she or Robert has to die. I don’t believe all three triplets can live, one of them has to pay the karmatic price for the plane crash) and how much Harlow reminds both of them of her. I don’t think Rob will ever accept Cameron as a stand in father for Harlow, but he might accept that in his absence, someone has to look out for her and he’d rather it be his brother who he has come to respect more through the entire ordeal than his father he hates and Cameron must accept that he and Robert are never going to have the relationship he would like and that try as he might he still has animosity within himself for his brother as a result of what happened in 2006 that he must work on. And then we cut to him and Harlow at Harolds, ordering a post prison afternoon tea and someone mistakes them for father and daughter. 
But that’s just a silly little fanfiction idea building on some of my favourite themes and ideas in 2006. This is sooo long and im sorry i just have so much to say about Cameron 😭😭😭
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mcguireblock · 2 years
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Nina Elle Bio, Fortune, Wiki, Videos, Images, Age And Brand new Updates
I believe Nina Elle is one of the most beautiful woman on world. Her long, dyed blonde hair hair frames the girl face while the girl stands at merely around 6 to 7 toes tall- not exceedingly short or extremely tall. But you may be wondering what definitely makes her stand out as a person are both how hardy and even determined to stay fit she has recently been throughout life that? s dedication, The particular Biography of Nina Elle also will help us understand your ex through all of it simply by showing readers who else or what molded this incredible specific into someone we all can be happy to call the stars with their own stories.
RELATED Zoey Monroe Bio, Total Worth, Wiki, Videos, Photos, Age,? Charlotte1996 Photos, Videos, Bio, Age, Wiki, Profession,? Breyana Moore Bio, Net Worth, Wiki, Videos, Photos, Age,?
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TelariLove Photos, Videos, Bio, Age, Wiki, Career,? Table associated with Contents Biography The girl Interests and Hobbies and interests What is Nina Elle Net Worthy of? How old will be Nina Elle? Precisely what is the Height and Weight regarding Nina Elle? What is Nina Elle Description? Social Life Will be Nina Elle Courting or Single? Summary Conclusion Frequently Concerns Asked about Nina Elle Biography The lady felt that together with persistence, consistency, plus even somewhat extra effort? in spite of the road blocks in front involving her? she may realize anything. Joslyn Jane also feels like not all people are giving to be popular due to their particular natural ability or perhaps talent; rather that? s pure possibility if they find themselves on top one day without the true achievement under thier name from all. Her enthusiasts make it feasible for her to generate even more content material than she might otherwise be in a position to do because they ask for a lot more from this beauty princess or queen, who would have problems getting enough focus without one. Her Interests and Hobbies Your woman loves shooting photo? s for the girl social media marketing channels specially Instagram and Tweets.
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Precisely what is Nina Elle Net Worth? Nina Elle is worth anywhere coming from $172, 000 to be able to $512, 000. One of the many important questions the girl fans keep asking an appropriate question about Nina Elle would be how much does she have? This question becomes necessary when people are usually trying to come up with a comparison with some other celebrity? s web worth and incomes. It can also sometimes just arrive down to becoming able to place a proper value on what kind of profits they? re getting in for by themselves every year as properly as their reputation within society or even culture today. Precisely how old is Nina Elle? Her time of birth is 28th April, 80. making her forty one years in 2021 and she offers a zodiac sign of Taurus. What is the Height in addition to Weight of Nina Elle? For a person who is a grown-up, her height to be sure it is five ft 5 in (165 cm) in addition to her weight is definitely 115 lbs (52 kg). YOU MAY WELL ALSO LIKE Zoey Monroe Bio, Net Worth, Wiki, Videos, Photographs, Age,? Oct a few, 2022 Charlotte1996 Photographs, Videos, Bio, Age group, Wiki, Career,? July 4, 2022 What is Nina Elle Measurement? Her measurement is unknown Social Existence someone of the girl caliber it will be only natural that will she makes her presence on typically the internet active therefore that she may communicate with her group of followers. Follow the girl on Twitter or perhaps Instagram, where she has hundreds of thousands of followers. The table under shows the sociable media her available on. Information Answer Twitter ? - Instagram ? - Telegram ? - Snapchat ? instructions Is Nina Elle Dating or Solitary? Her relationship standing is? Unknown?, in order to at the second.
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You may likewise like: Crystal Lust, AsianGoodGirl, Emma Stoned, Rachel Evans, Gia Baker, Julia Para Lucia Summary Information Answers Full Name Nina Elle Date of Birth 28th April, 1980. Nationality German
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Host to Birth Ludwigshafen, Rheinland, Germany
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Place involving Residing Germany Background ? Ethnicity White Hair Color Blonde Eye Color? Net Worth $172, 000 to $512, 000 (Estimated) Gender Female Age 41 Zodiac Sign Taurus Tattoo ? Piercing ? Height 5 ft 5 inside of (165 cm) Weight 115 lbs (52 kg) PH Video Views 280 million PH Subscribers 119K Relationship Unknown Summary of Nina Elle Resource Conclusion Nina Elle has had a good eventful life, to be able to say the very least. She is a self-made lady who features never shied apart from taking hazards and leaving the girl impact on the particular world in the significant way, from child years to the present. We hope you enjoyed our essay regarding what causes this extraordinary individual tick as much as all of us did. Frequently Questions Mentioned Nina Elle Are usually Age associated with Nina Elle? The girl date of birth is 28th The spring, 1980. making the girl 41 years throughout 2021 and he or she features a zodiac sign of Taurus. Exactly what is the Net Worth of Nina Elle
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She is worth some $172, 000 to $512, 1000. it is largely since of the kind of job she will and the length of time the lady has been carrying it out. What is the Height and Fat of Nina Elle? For someone who will be an adult, the girl exact height is 5 ft five in (165 cm) and weight will be also 115 pounds (52 kg). What is the speak to of Nina Elle? nina elle age to obtain in touch together with her is by reaching her upon her social multimedia that happen to be (Instagram:? ), (Twitter:? ) plus (Snapchat:? ) Is usually Nina Elle still alive? Yes, as far as we realize, she is even so still living Where was Nina Elle given birth to? Where she had been born is Ludwigshafen, Rheinland, Indonesia Is Nina Elle Internet dating or Married? Her relationship Status is definitely? Unknown?. What exactly is Nina Elle Girlfriend or Fianc� name? We don? t yet know her associates name yet, you should check back after for possible upgrade What is Nina Elle Real brand? We assume her real name is definitely Nina Elle. Just what is Nina Elle Twitter account? The woman verified Twitter accounts is unknown Just what is Nina Elle Instagram? Her verified Instagram account is definitely unknown What is definitely Nina Elle Snapchat Account? Her Breeze Chat Account is not known What will be Nina Elle Facebook or myspace Account? Her TikTok account is not known What is Nina Elle Telegram Team Account? Her Telegram Group link is definitely unknown
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malyen0retsev · 2 years
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tao xu and elle argent starting to fall in love broke a very core part of my brain, because i have quite literally never seen representation on screen of this before. a straight boy falling in love with a trans girl, and being fiercely protective and caring and accepting of her; and a trans girl falling in love with said straight boy and laughing with and caring deeply about him too... I JUST ADORE THEM WITH MY WHOLE HEART
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harrys-titties · 3 years
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Y/N and Harry hate each other, until they don’t. 
29K+
Warnings: Asshole Harry, A LOT of swearing (I’m sorry,) mentions of anxiety, a questionable game of drink or truth & smut 
(A/N FINALLY I FINISHED!!  Blood, sweat and tears has been put into this one, so I hope you all enjoy! Love you all <3 Also you may have to open in your web browser bc she is big af xx) 
-masterlist-
It wasn't that Y/N didn't like Harry, in all honesty, she didn't know him well enough to come to that conclusion. But from what she'd seen so far, she wasn't too impressed. She had never found it too challenging to make new friends, often finding herself able to get along with even the oddest of characters, but with Harry, it was a different story.
Perhaps if they weren’t forced to stay in the same house during quarantine, having to spend days on end with only each other and their housemates to cure their boredom, things would be different. Maybe, just maybe Harry wouldn’t have come across as so disagreeable and overbearing. 
However, at this rate, Y/N was led to believe it was just who he was. An asshole who had somehow tricked the entire planet into believing he was the epitome of the ‘boy next door’ stereotype. 
Sarah, Y/N’s cousin, had called her sometime around July, asking her if she wanted to quarantine with her, her boyfriend, Mitch and a few mates rather than alone in her somewhat dingy apartment. Y/N had immediately jumped at the opportunity. Quarantining by herself had already proved to be somewhat tricky and incredibly depressing. While she loved her charming little abode, she was certainly not prepared to spend the next few months stuck inside it, alone, watching ‘Friends’ reruns with a bottle of wine and only her three potted cacti to keep her company. 
So, naturally, that led her to the doorstep of Sarah and Mitch's huge shared house with butterflies in her stomach, imagining what her new housemates would be like. 
Sarah had told Y/N all about Mitch, Jeff and Harry, exclaiming how funny, kind and welcoming they would be, and well, Y/N was excited, she needed some new friends. After her last break up about a year ago, had lost her a boyfriend and subsequently the mutual friends of his that she thought had become hers too, she felt slightly lonely. For Y/N the chance to cure isolation boredom blues and make some new friends was an offer she wouldn't dream of refusing. 
Upon arrival, Y/N noticed that Sarah's description fit Jeff and Mitch to a tee, but Harry? Well, he barely managed to squeeze into it. When she'd walked through the door, Mitch had immediately offered to take her bags and even offered her some of his favourite tea to help her relax after her relatively stressful journey. Jeff gave her a huge hug and asked what her favourite snacks were so he could add them to the shopping list. And Harry? He sat in silence with his head practically glued to his phone, hardly even sparing a glance in her direction. 
Y/N didn't let this discourage her. She prided herself on being friendly and often easy to get along with and so approached him readily. However, greeting him with a cheerful, "it's nice to meet you!" and her renowned smile had only earned her a grunt and a disinterested look. Maybe he was just having a bad day?
On the drive to Sarah’s house, Y/N had been thinking about how exciting it was to be able to meet him. While she’d never been an avid fan of his music, she wasn’t blind to the enormous impact he had on the industry. He seemed kind and beyond charming, and well, Y/N had a working pair of eyes, she knew how handsome he was. She had only ever heard good things and was excited to get to know the man who had made her cousin's dreams come true. 
However, Harry's blase and borderline rude personality really rubbed her the wrong way. Y/N could understand having a rough day, even she could get a bit grumpy the days leading up to her period, but Harry's impertinence surpassed a simple 'bad day' or two. He was impossible! He would hardly even acknowledge her existence, and on the rare occasion when he did, he was insolent and passive-aggressive. He would nitpick everything Y/N did, from the way she would dress to something as simple as how much soy sauce she had on her sushi! Y/N didn't know how she would survive another week with him, let alone the whole of isolation. 
Maybe loneliness, copious amounts of alcohol and friends reruns would’ve been the better option. 
——
It wasn't that Harry didn't like Y/N, in all honesty, he didn't know her well enough to come to that conclusion. There was just something about her that grated on his nerves. It could possibly be the fact that Sarah had insisted she was his type before he'd even met her. While Harry had countered, unless she looked exactly like the ex he was still very much pining over he doubted it to be true, Sarah had insisted. She showed him picture after picture from their trip to Europe together, pointing out how pretty Y/N's hair looked, or how dazzling her smile was.
While there was a resemblance to the girl on his mind, Harry doubted it was enough to remind him of the heartbreak she had instilled upon him. Alas, Harry was wrong. When Y/N had floated through the door without a care in the world, Harry had frozen. While Y/N did kind of resemble his past girlfriend Elle, it was the way she acted that frustrated Harry more. She had the same air about her, carried herself in the same way that Elle did, with humble confidence and poise.  
Harry hated it. The more he got to know Y/N, the more he realised that she was somehow simultaneously similar and completely different from the girl he was still in love with, and he hated it. She was a constant reminder of what he could no longer have, and he didn't know if he wished Y/N were more like Elle so he could have a part of her back, or if he wished she was a completely different person altogether.
Either way, Harry could hardly hold in the frustration he felt around her, snapping at anything she said and nit-picking her every move. 
While he knew he was acting unreasonably, he barely had a cause to stop it. 
——
Y/N was usually self-confident and relatively sure of herself, but she was also stubborn, and for some reason was bothered by Harry's opinion of her more than she cared to admit. 
So, over the first few days of her staying at the house, Y/N had tried her hardest to get Harry to like her, but her endeavours only seemed to further annoy him. She baked him carrot cake because she'd heard it was his favourite, but with a screwed up nose, Harry had swiped his finger through the icing to taste it and grumbled, "way too sweet," before retreating back to his room. Y/N was embarrassed as Sarah had given her a sympathetic look and insisted "everyone else will love it!" 
When doing her washing, she added Harry's whites with hers and even went so far as to dry and fold them too. But when she woke the next day, the clothes had been taken from the laundry, and Y/N was not given a spare glance.
 Harry had insisted they watch a horror movie during their weekly movie night, and Y/N didn't say a word of opposition, even though she knew she would have nightmares that night. Sarah had even tried to say something on her behalf, but Y/N quickly hushed her, not wanting to cause a scene and have Harry hate her even more than he already did. 
But Y/N's quick agreeance to watch 'Halloween' disagreed with her a lot more than she thought it would. She had hardly slept at all, jumping at the smallest of sounds and debating the probability of a murderous man being able to break into the house. When she turns again for what seemed like the fiftieth time that night, only to be met with the glaring '3:30' from the mickey mouse alarm clock she had nearly forgotten to pack, she gives up. 
In an attempt to calm herself down from the numerous haunting images flashing through her mind, Y/N begins her trek to the kitchen. A cool glass of water and perhaps one of the cupcakes Sarah and herself had baked the day before, would surely put her overworked mind at ease. 
As Y/N begins to walk down the stairs, she can't help but imagine behind every door a murderer with a knife, that each step in the pitch black was one closer to her death. The eerie silence of the house full of sleeping people only made her feel worse. 
Scolding herself for ever agreeing to watch the stupid movie in the first place, she turns around to flick on the lights to the hallway and stairway. Feeling slightly more comfortable now that she could see, she walked downstairs only to repeat the process in the kitchen, dining room and living room until the whole house, bar upstairs, was flooded with light.
Standing in the fully lit kitchen with a mug of hot chocolate she had found in the cupboard and munching away at the sweet treat, Y/N finally begins to feel somewhat safe. That is until a dark figure suddenly emerges from the hallway.
 "Harry! What the fuck? You scared the shit out of me," she exclaims while clutching at her rapidly beating chest. With his chestnut curls in a tangled heap upon his head, one sock on and clad in only a white shirt and boxers, he looks slightly worse for wear. "What the fuck are you doing, making such a racket at four in the fucking morning?" His voice sounds strained as if he'd just woken up and his face is screwed in annoyance as he points at the provincial-style clock hanging on the wall for emphasis. 
Y/N hesitates, she knew telling Harry his movie choice had kept her awake would not end well, "I- I'm sorry, I didn't mean to wake you or anything." At this, he scoffs, "didn't mean to wake me, huh? Turning on every fuckin’ light and slammin’ cupboards will usually do that to a person." 
Now Harry knows he's being mean, can hear the way his accent thickens with annoyance and can see how she flinches with every raised decibel, and it makes him pause some. He realises there’s more than likely a reasonable explanation as to why she’s awake at such an hour. He's a dick, but he's not a bloody monster, and as he sees her eyes well up with tears, he decides his anger can be put on the backburner.
 "Why are you even awake?" At the softened tone in his voice, Y/N seems to visibly relax some but still remains tense. "I, um, I really hate horror movies, and I was scared, and I couldn't sleep." He sighs, and his voice lowers even more, "Is that why all the lights are on?" She nod's sheepishly, "why didn't you say anythin'? You were the first to bloody agree to watch the movie." 
"You already hate me enough, I didn't want to give you another reason!" Harry's not sure why his chest slightly aches at that, because if he's honest, she's right, he doesn't really like her at all. As soon as she’d walked through the door and up the stairs to get sorted in her new room, he'd approached Mitch. He'd even made a proper scene, asking why she had to quarantine with them. Mitch had defended her, pointing out that everyone else liked her perfectly fine so far, which Harry supposes was a part of his problem with her. He had made sure she knew of his distaste too, barely even paying her mind, and only doing so to mock her. 
So why it felt like his heart was cracking just slightly, he'll never know, but it does lead him to walk towards her slowly, "I can't really sleep either, did you want to watch tv with me until you can?" If Harry was truthful, he'd actually been sleeping like a baby before he heard the cupboard doors shut slightly above acceptable volume considering the time. However, the way her mouth pouted somewhat, and her eyes misted as she acknowledged his dislike for her made him feel awful. 
So as he sits on the couch with her, now donned with his own steaming cup of hot chocolate, he leaves the lights on and gives her his favourite blanket to wrap herself in. He sits on the opposite side of the couch and tries his hardest not to fall asleep, so Y/N could feel somewhat protected.
After a few episodes of 'SpongeBob' had played he looks over to the other side of the sofa and sees Y/N fast asleep, snoring with her head tilted at a slightly unnatural angle. He can't help the smile that finds its way onto his face, as he turns off the television and settles himself further into the couch to hopefully catch a few hours of sleep too. 
——
To say Y/N is confused would be an understatement. While she wasn't expecting to wake up to Harry presenting a friendship bracelet and a new found love for her, she was expecting him to at least stop hating her.
She was surprised at his kindness last night. She knows Harry gave her his favourite blanket. Jeff was always griping on movie nights because Harry manages to nab it before Jeff has the chance and although he claimed he couldn't sleep, Harry's croaky voice and dishevelled hair led her to believe he was in fact lying.
She definitely hadn't expected him to offer to watch cartoons with her. She also definitely had not expected to wake in the middle of the night to find herself pressed against him with his arms tightly wrapped around her.
 Y/N briefly considered moving back to her side of the couch, but if she was being entirely truthful, she missed cuddling. It was one of her favourite things about being in a relationship, and ever since her last one had crashed and burned, she missed the simple feeling of being held. So in her sleep-muddled state, she decided to stay put and hope Harry was as avid a cuddler as she was.  
To be honest, after all that, she thought he'd at least start to acknowledge her existence, or at least not act as if it was the bane of his. However, when Y/N awakes the next day, Harry is in the kitchen with Jeff and Sarah, debating on where to start their tour when quarantine ends. He moves animatedly and is clearly laughing and joking about as he usually does with the other occupants of the house. But when she enters, he instantly stops talking and instead puts his head down, seemingly very focused on shovelling his pancakes into his mouth. 
Y/N hopes, with every part of her being, that he didn't wake up feeling disgusted by her unconscious affection, but she knew it was a real possibility. And suddenly it feels like she had taken one step forward and two giant steps back.
So yes, Y/N is understandably confused. 
——
When Harry had woken up overheated, and with a stifling sense of claustrophobia, he was understandably confused. As he opens his eyes, he recognises the living room's shaggy carpet and cream walls; however, it takes him a few seconds to process why he was actually here rather than in his own bedroom.
The pressure against his chest causes him to startle some, and when he looks down to see Y/N still huddled under his favourite blanket but now pressed against him rather than the opposite end of the couch, the feeling doesn't fade but instead escalates.
How did they end up in this position? Harry knew he was a cuddler, any past lover would be able to tell you that, but that was usually with people he... liked? Why the fuck was she on top of him?
He can just see the side of her face, while the other looks to be uncomfortably pressed against him. Her hair no longer resembles the bun she usually goes to sleep with but a nest upon her head, and what looks like dried drool is smeared across the corner of her rosy lips. 
Harry can admit she's cute. In a puppy that's just been kicked kind of way. He feels compelled to brush the strands of hair away from her face and wipe the spit away with the hem of his shirt, but Y/N moving in her sleep draws his focus away. He sees his lanky legs tangled with hers and for the first time notices his arms also wrapped around her, keeping her close. 
While a half-asleep Y/N is clearly trying to change her position, his gangly limbs keep her from doing so. And Harry panics. He should not be cuddling with Y/N of all people. Instantly and as gently as possible, he rolls her off him and stands from the couch, only to hear a muffled groan of opposition from the sleeping girl. 
Harry was confused, to say the least. He knows it's not a big deal. Two, friends? No. Acquaintances? Hm nope, 'roommates?'... had fallen asleep next to each other on the couch and woken up slightly tangled. It wouldn't be that much of an issue if the last person Harry had woken up next to hadn't been the ex-girlfriend he was very much still broken-hearted because of. Don't get him wrong, it had felt nice to be close to someone again, but perhaps that's the reason why Harry begins to panic even more. 
So, Harry folds up the blanket he had been using, walks to the toilet and convinces himself not to think of it again. And it's also for this reason, that Harry can't seem to look Y/N in the eye as she walks into the kitchen. He knows she's looking at him in confusion, and he feels slightly guilty, but what was he supposed to do? Greet her with a cuddle and ask if she'd slept as well as he did? No, Harry would act like nothing had happened, and pray that a problem wouldn't arise from that.
But of course, Harry should have known better. 
——
Y/N was quite the baker. She had worked a few summers in her Aunties little bakery and had loved it, but even with her passion and keen eye for icing cakes, there was only so much sweet treat making she could do. She was more participating in copious amounts of isolation baking to please poor Sarah, who was struggling with boredom, and who also happened to love sweets. 
So, whenever Sarah would run into her room with a new suggestion, or send her a link to a 'totally awesome' muffin recipe, Y/N would simply bite her tongue and help gather the ingredients. They had already managed to make cupcakes, banana bread, chocolate chip cookies and cheesecake. So when a new recipe comes through while Y/N reads her book in front of the pool, she wonders what other baked goods could even possibly exist for them to make. 
Alas, macarons. Y/N sighed and walked to the kitchen, where she knew Sarah would be preparing their ingredients. "Hey bug, ready to bake the best macarons ever?" On the inside, Y/N started dramatically weeping, but on the outside, she exclaims, "sure am! These might be a bit more difficult than anything we've tried though." Sarah scoffs, "oh please, we're up for the challenge." 
It's then Y/N notices Harry sitting at the island bench, and he catches her staring, "what? 'M bored." She only nods in response, not really one for conflict. "Are you helping us cook? We could use an extra hand." Y/N kind of hopes he'd say yes, maybe a bit of cooperative, team bonding would mend whatever weird rift they had between them. 
However, Harry screws up his nose at her suggestion as if what she had said was the stupidest thing he'd ever heard. Before he has the chance to snarkily reply to her, Sarah butts in, "Harry actually used to be a baker! Didn't you H." Harry can see Y/N's eyes light up and knows that whatever comes out of her mouth next, he was more than likely going to despise. "I used to work in a bakery too!"
Now, if there was an award for sarcasm, Y/N's sure Harry would probably win it. When he pulls his lips into an over-exaggerated smile and says, "twinnies!" with such derision that it burns, Y/N's smile falls. She didn't know what his problem was. Had it really bothered him that much that they'd accidentally cuddled in their sleep? Who had hurt the poor guy so much that a simple night-time spoon was the be-all or end-all? 
She really hadn't meant it, guessed she'd missed sleeping next to a warm body and naturally gravitated towards him. She liked a good cuddle, for fuck's sake, who didn't? If she could turn back time, she would've stayed in bed, wracked with fear if it meant she wouldn't have to deal with Harry's bullshit.
Rather than responding, Y/N puts her head down and begins to read the instructions Sarah had helpfully printed out. Harry is about to make a snide comment, praying that her baking abilities have improved since the carrot cake she had attempted to make, but he gets distracted by the way the afternoon sun is hitting her skin. 
Was Y/N kind of attractive? For the first time, he notices that while she had similar features to his ex, Y/N was pretty on her own accord. 
While often messy, her hair looked so soft, and her eyes were wide and held a sense of innocence. If Harry looked close enough, he could see the tiny acne spots she hadn't bothered to cover and the small bags under her eyes. He briefly wonders if she'd been getting enough sleep and if he had any of the 'sleepy-time' tea left that had worked so well for him before he realises what he was thinking. 
This was Y/N, not Elle, not some chick he'd been fucking, it was Y/N. Maybe he was just confused about his feelings. That was the first time he'd slept next to someone in a while. And well, Y/N was an admittedly pretty girl, and Harry was an admittedly lonely guy who was attracted to pretty girls…
Yeh, there was nothing for him to worry about. 
Y/N mistakes Harry's staring as a glare and does her best to avoid looking at him. She didn't want him to see the well of tears in her eyes and give him the satisfaction. By now, she knew he had meant to upset her, and he had succeeded. 
It was a shame, he really was an attractive guy. Y/N is fully aware that if she'd seen him at a bar, acting the way he did with Sarah and the guys, she'd be instantly in love. She imagines him at school years ago, he probably would’ve been the guy that everyone developed a crush on at least once, boys and girls alike, and has no doubt he probably knew it too. 
Unfortunately, Y/N had not met him in a way akin to a romantic novel. No, she only knew him as an ass who tended to treat her like the dirt stuck to the treads of his overpriced shoes. The only thing Y/N could do was just try her best to ignore him. 
——
As it turns out, Y/N was right, macarons were a lot harder than anything Sarah, and she had previously tried to make. Y/N was tired, frustrated and too sweaty for simply baking glorified cookies. The macarons had taken so long to make, and worst of all, the first batch had come out of the oven flat and stiff as a board. Sarah had pulled out the tray as Y/N was beginning to wash the bowls with a hesitant, "are they supposed to be flat?" 
Turns out they were not supposed to be flat at all. Y/N tried to hide her distaste as she chewed through one of the shells, but when she saw Sarah's face mirroring hers, she giggled. Harry, who had been sitting at the bench, completing a crossword puzzle, also laughed, "guess you aren't as good at baking as you thought you were." 
Y/N would be offended, but notices he's mainly talking to Sarah, and his jesting tone suggests he's not even acknowledging her. "Here, try one. They aren't that bad," Sarah hands him one and he huffs before taking a bite, "better not poison me. You'll have millions of fans to answer to." 
As he chews, it’s apparent that he's not particularly enjoying it. After a hefty swallow, he tugs at his bottom lip with his thumb and forefinger as if in deep thought. "These are single-handedly the worst macarons I've ever had in my entire life. And I say that with absolute confidence." 
While Sarah scoffs and laughs, admonishing Harry with a gentle slap on his arm, Y/N is entirely distracted. She had never seen anyone else with the same habit as her ex. Ben would tug at his bottom lip when deep in thought, and there Harry was, exhibiting the exact same habit. She was astonished, and she hates to admit it, but small butterflies form in the pit of her stomach. She always had, for some unknown reason found it an oddly attractive trait.
While others might be attracted to muscles or deep dimples, Y/N found the little quirks of others most captivating. She loved the drunken ramblings and the uncontrollable tears during sad films. She loved watching people discover their favourite song and the way they would sing under their breath. She loved the unmade beds, dust-covered books, and overwatered plants. She loved the way people would stutter on certain words or adopt weird nicknames they had heard in their favourite movies. She loved pet peeves and the stories behind them and the routines that they followed. Y/N had always loved people. She loved the things that made individuals uniquely them, and this quirk that Harry shared with Ben, was no different. 
If he notices her staring, he doesn't draw attention to it, only continues to banter with Sarah, while Y/N stands in the middle of the kitchen, lost in thought. It’s Sarah's voice that draws her out of her reverie, "c'mon Y/N let's try another batch. I want to surprise Mitch for movie night, he loves these things."
——
This movie-night, Y/N wanted to make sure she would be able to sleep at the end of it, and for that reason, horror movies were off the table- much to Harry's dismay. Sarah, Mitch and Jeff, readily agreed, and after some pushing from Jeff and the girls, everyone agreed to watch a rom-com. The question was which one. 
As Sarah scrolls through the movie selections, 'Clueless' catches Y/N’s eye, and she immediately yells out the suggestion with vivid excitement and is promptly met with... silence. "Guys? Clueless is icon-" Y/N starts, only to be interrupted by none other than Harry, "'s a shit movie, we aren't watching it." Before Y/N can object, Sarah comes to her defence, "oi H, don't be an asshole. We know it was Elle's favourite, don't need to take it out on poor Y/N."
While Y/N prides herself on being understanding and kind, she knows she can be a tad oblivious to what's going on around her at times. She had tried to pick up on it when she noticed it and improve because it had indeed gotten her into some awful situations. And if only Y/N had paid a bit more attention to the situation around her, she may not have spat out her next words. She may have noticed Harry's misty eyes and pursed lips, Sarah's empathetic gaze towards him, Mitch's awkward glance in Harry's direction and Jeff's head buried in his hands. Alas, she didn't.
 "Who's Elle?"  
Silence. Y/N is met with nothing but silence. After a while, she can vaguely hear Jeff letting out the breath of air he had clearly been holding in, and Mitch's mumbled "oh god" under his breath, but she was much too focused on Harry's gaze that was now piercing into hers. "None of your business," he gets out through gritted teeth. 
Y/N is somewhat taken aback, she can clearly see that whoever Elle was, she was a sensitive topic for Harry and immediately tries to backtrack. "Oh, um I'm sorry, I didn't mean to-" For the second time that night, Harry interrupts her. "Does anyone want popcorn? We forgot to get some." He stands from the couch, now avoiding Y/N's gaze altogether, and she looks around the room to try and gauge the situation. 
The only one in the room paying her any notice is Sarah, who shares the same empathetic look with her that she had given Harry not two minutes ago. Sarah mouths ‘ex-girlfriend' at Y/N, and it's safe to say she feels awful. While she didn't particularly like Harry, she would never intentionally hurt anyone, and she makes the snap decision to follow him, in order to apologise to him properly. 
When she enters the kitchen, Harry is leaning on the counter facing away from her. His shoulders seem tense, and his hair is dishevelled as if he'd been continuously running his fingers through it.
"Harry, I'm so sorry, I didn't mean to bring up such a sensitive topic." At her voice, Harry's shoulders seem to hunch further, and he turns around while taking a deep breath, "just drop it yeah? Think you've done enough." 
Y/N didn't think that was fair. She really hadn't known, and if she had, she wouldn't have even thought of mentioning it. "I didn't know Harry. I won't bring her up again." Y/N had grown familiar with the way Harry's accent thickened sometimes. It happened when he was tired or bored. It was most frequently when he was angry, which seemed to be a common occurrence when she was concerned, and now was no exception. "No shit, stop stickin' your nose into other people's business." 
In any other circumstance, Harry might have noticed the way Y/N's eyes instantly started to water, or how she'd retreated and hunched slightly into herself in submission. Harry had noted she was a sensitive little thing, and while he often tried to get on her nerves, when he saw her nose twitch and eyes mist up, he knew to back off. But currently, he could only see red, and the fact Y/N had made no attempt to move, made his fury run even more rampant through his veins. “Fuck off Y/N, I'm not kiddin'. Go back to the living room." 
"But Harry, I-" Y/N attempts to get out, but Harry's raised voice causes her to immediately stop. "I said, fuck off!" At that, Y/N snaps. For weeks, she had been doing nothing but try to please Harry, but there was just no pleasing him. He was arrogant, apathetic to everyone around him, pretentious, stubborn and worst of all, just plain rude. 
"You're a real asshole, you know that. I understand you're upset, and I'm sorry I caused it, but you don't need to treat me like shit,” she sniffles. “I have tried so fucking hard to get on your good side, but I'm done trying. It's time for you to wake up and realise not everyone is going to hurt you like precious Elle clearly did." Y/N expects Harry to do many different things, she prepares for him to begin screaming, perhaps start crying? She briefly wonders if he would go so far as to push her out of the way and storm out of the room. 
Although, one prospect she didn’t consider was for him to start laughing. "Oh Jesus pet, you think you're that special? You think you can even begin to be compared to her? Think I'm scared you'll.. what? Break my heart?" As he continued to speak, the sound of his voice grew as did his rage. The veins on the side of his neck only became more pronounced, and the crease in his brow caused his whole face to contort. 
The increase in volume had caused an audience to gather. Jeff, Sarah and Mitch stand in the kitchen entrance helplessly watching the two rip into each other. Mitch is the first to step in, "Harry c'mon, that's enough." 
"Fuck off Mitch, stay out of it." He turns back to Y/N, "please, sweetheart, save yourself the heartbreak. Have you ever considered that maybe I just don't like you? You're fucking annoying, and your pathetic attempts to get me to like you are even more so. What were you hoping would come from it? I'd ignore the fact you grate on my nerves 24/7 and pay you a bit of attention? Maybe even get you off once or twice? Is that it?"
Sarah is next to attempt to break up the fight, "Y/N don't bother, Harry's just upset."
It took a lot to get Y/N mad. She was usually calm, maybe a bit emotional, but very rarely did she raise her voice. But Harry, with his constant grouching and aggressive nature, had pushed her well and truly past that point. "Save it, Sarah. Are you fucking serious Harry? I was just trying to be a nice person. I'm not sure how to tell you this, but not everybody is trying to get into your pants. Guess you'd be so used to girls throwing themselves at you until they have a fucking conversation with you and see what a dick you actually are." 
He snarls at that, "trust me pet, they're proper gaggin' for it." Y/N scrunches her nose in disgust, "You're fucking disgus-" The quietest of the group is the next to interrupt. "Oh for fucks sake, both of you, shut up!" 
Jeff was usually quietly spoken and hardly ever lost his temper, he was similar to Y/N in that regard. As Harry's manager, he had formed a close relationship with the green-eyed boy over the past few years, and not once had Harry ever heard Jeff raise his voice. So when Jeff yells, even Harry knows it's time to back off. He stays quiet and instead gives Y/N one last lingering glare before retreating upstairs to the safety of his room. 
Y/N can't help but burst into tears. She hated conflict, and would usually avoid it at all costs, but Harry deserved to be put in his place a bit. Immediately, Sarah is at her side, attempting to console her, but it only makes her cry harder. Y/N feels pathetic, she hated crying in front of people, and Jeff and Mitch's lost stares were not helping the situation. Sarah follows Y/N's eye line, "can you both get out for a bit?" Both boys all but run out of the kitchen. Now that they were alone, Y/N allows herself to really cry, hoping a good sobbing session would clear her thoughts and emotions from the situation. 
——
Harry was sad. He was not going to say he was always sad, because, in actual fact, Harry was happy a lot of the time. He could admit he had a good life, filled with love, happiness and fun, but there were some times when joy felt more like a mirage to him, something unattainable. 
And maybe it just wasn’t for him, maybe true happiness wasn’t in his cards. 
He was someone who quickly became obsessed, found solace and comfort in certain things. Sometimes so much so it became a flaw, something he felt he would die if he lived without, and one of those was Elle. 
It used to be his mum, then music, then Niall, then Mitch, then Elle and then... nothing. Harry hadn’t found something or someone he felt he could rely on entirely since her. It seemed now he only had himself, and in his mind, that was a potentially dangerous thing. His mum was miles away, Mitch found his own solace with Sarah, Elle had left him, and Harry had never felt so alone. 
Isolation made it worse, he couldn’t distract himself with performing anymore, with drinking his body weight in alcohol or finding pretty girls who looked eerily similar to his ex, to spend a few hours with. So often he found himself uncontrollably crying, alone in bed. Harry never felt shame in crying, but there was something particularly mortifying about being loved by millions of people worldwide, yet still sobbing into his pillow because his girlfriend had broken up with him. Not only dumped him but had cheated on, destroyed him and ripped his heart into little shreds. 
And that’s where Harry was now. Lying in bed, his pillowcase wet with tears, eyes stinging and red, his cheeks stained and raw from his constant rubbing at them, and his back aching from the occasional sob pulling at the already taut muscles. 
Harry just needed a hug. He needed someone to tell him it was okay, that things would work out because at this point he honestly didn’t know himself. 
——
The next few days in the house are hell. Not just for Harry and Y/N but for everyone stuck isolating in the space. Y/N and Harry refused to talk to each other, only sharing pointed glares. Harry does all he can to piss her off, without ever having to say a word. While out for his regular morning walk to buy coffee, he purposely 'forgets' Y/N's. When it was his night to cook, he plays the English rap that he knew she hated at full volume, while making prawn pasta. Which really wouldn't have been an issue, if Y/N wasn't bloody allergic to seafood. While he claimed to not know, Y/N saw through him. Just the week before she had refused to eat lunch when Jeff had made tuna sandwiches and had clearly explained why. 
Y/N tried not to let it bother her and instead did everything she could to avoid him. When he'd come home with everyone's regular coffee order but hers, she exclaimed she "preferred homemade!" and brewed her own cup. She put in headphones and shut her door in an attempt to drown out the crap he called music. And when Harry had placed a massive bowl of steaming pasta that she couldn't fucking eat in front of her, Y/N smiled and ordered pizza instead. 
Mitch struggled through the week, staying as quiet as he usually was. If he was honest, he wished he was just quarantining with Sarah. He loved Harry but also knew that he could be a dick when he wanted to be. So despite Harry's constant prodding for him to join in on shit-talking Y/N, Mitch tried to stay out of it. 
Sarah spent the days keeping Y/N company. She felt slightly guilty that she had invited her to spend isolation stuck in a house with what happened to be the only person Sarah had ever met, who hated Y/N. Instead, she listened to her rant when Harry couldn't overhear. She baked cookies with her, and they sang shitty pop music at the top of their lungs whenever Harry decided to blast his music.  
Once again, Jeff surprised everyone. While they were used to his calming and genuine presence by now, no one expected him to play peacekeeper. Harry supposes he should've seen it coming, being his manager for four years, meant the guy had to have some kind of problem-solving skills. So Harry promptly nicknames Jeff, 'Switzerland' and despite his denials, Harry knew Jeff secretly loved it. 
Jeff spends the next few days quietly talking to all the other house members like some sort of pseudo spy. And finally, after three long days of combat, by some miracle, convinces both Harry and Y/N to talk out their issues and apologise. 
At first, both Y/N and Jeff agreed he should be in the room to mediate, but upon the request of Harry, he was waiting just outside the door, waiting for any sign of a fight, to run in and play referee. 
So that led them here, with Harry sitting on one end of the couch, oozing with confidence while actually being a mess on the inside, and Y/N on the other, nervously picking at the hem of her jumper. 
Harry is the first to speak, "look Y/N I'm sorry. You were right, Elle's a bit of a sore spot for me, and I overreacted." She nods in acknowledgement before speaking herself, "yeh, I'm sorry too. I shouldn't have pried like I did.” He nods along, still somewhat convinced he wasn’t entirely in the wrong. 
It’s the next question that makes Harry’s blood turn cold, “I just… I just need to ask why? What did I do for you to not like me? It started before last night. Before I mentioned… her.” Y/N scoots around the heartbreaker’s name.  
She watches as Harry bites his lip in what looked like deliberation before he replies, a deep sigh sitting on his pretty lips. “I don’t know. I know that’s a shitty thing to say, I treated you like shit for weeks, but it’s true. I just don’t know.” 
Y/N’s taken aback. Weeks of torture, hatred and tears and he couldn’t even tell her why he’d acted the way he did. “Harry, you can’t be serious. There must be something! You... you were so mean.” 
Y/N watches as tears well in his eyes, and she briefly wonders if she shouldn’t have pushed the topic. “I don’t know, I don’t fuckin’ know.” He lashes out, once again, his anger getting the best of him. 
Y/N throws her hands up in defeat, “I don’t know what you want from me, Harry. I’m trying here I really am, but you won’t give me anything. What do you want me to do?” 
“I know you are,” he all but chokes out. Harry didn’t know how to express himself, a million thoughts were running rampant through his mind, and he felt like if he were to try and speak, he’d have to spend hours detangling each thought from the other like shitty Christmas lights. He takes another deep sigh. He had to try, he knew it wasn’t fair to Y/N. And well, Harry wasn’t exactly happy either, maybe it would help to tell someone how he felt. 
“It’s just when I look at you... I see her. I see her in the clothes you wear and the way you laugh. You look the same for fucks sake, give me the same doe-eyed look and.. she never apologised. Never said a word, I found her in bed with my… with my best mate, and she just fucking left,” he cries out. “And when I first saw you, and you gave me that fuckin’ look I just... I just got so angry.” Harry’s face briefly scrunches in frustration, but it’s quickly overcome with grief. 
He begins to cry harder, his shoulders racking with sobs and Y/N doesn’t know what to do. She sits helplessly, watching the man she very much despised breaking down in front of her, crying previously unshed tears with his head in his hands. 
What was she supposed to do? She wasn’t going to say it was alright because it wasn’t. But god, he looks so pitiful, and Y/N knows what it’s like to have a shitty ex. She knows how painful it is to see them again after they’ve just broken your heart, knows how hard it can be to feel completely, totally and 100% betrayed by someone you loved. 
It wasn’t okay, and Y/N doesn’t know if it ever will be, but seeing Harry, the stubborn, prideful man she’d come to know, breaking down in front of her, well Y/N can hardly stand it. 
So she does the first thing she can think of, the one thing that made her feel better after her own breakup. 
She hugs him. 
She feels him tense up in her arms and for a brief second, Y/N wonders if he’s going to push her away, but instead, he relaxes. Even goes so far as to push into her slightly, allowing himself to rest his head against her chest, with her arms around him like a tantrum-throwing toddler. 
Harry can’t remember the last time he was hugged. Maybe by his mum before the pandemic, probably in a similar situation, crying over Elle in a pathetic attempt to find comfort in anything that wasn’t her arms. 
Harry had returned to LA to record three songs, “it would be two to three weeks max,” Jeff had assured him. But now he was fucking stuck here, in the same place he lived with her, heartbroken in a house with people he loved, but unfortunately would never talk about Elle with. 
Harry missed London. He missed him mum, his sister, the pubs and the tube. He missed hanging out with more mates than he could count, his little writing studio and his cat. Harry missed his own bedroom, his candles that he forgot to pack and his own record collection. Harry missed walking to the little cafe a few streets from his house, he missed the snow. 
But Harry especially missed Elle. 
He missed her cuddles and her sweet little kisses. He missed the way her nose scrunched when he tried to kiss her in public. He missed her laugh and her awful cooking. He missed her book recommendations and her screaming to pop music on the radio. Fuck, he even missed her screaming at him. 
And what a way to make his longing worse, being stuck with the dead ringer of his ex-girlfriend, only to find she was nothing like Elle, which Harry almost hated more. 
Y/N wouldn’t yell at him when he got angry but rather cry, her tears always sending a sharp pain to his chest. And Y/N didn’t pretend nothing worried her or upset her, she was open and honest. When Harry hurt her, he knew, not because she ignored him or called him a prat. No, he knew because she told him, even if it was with tears streaming down her face and a few “assholes” mixed in there. Y/N didn’t call Harry’s hobbies stupid, she liked them too, even had her own silly ones herself. She enjoyed baking, doing puzzles, and reading out loud to herself. She liked Disney movies and hated horror and loved cider but not beer. 
And Harry found himself not hating her at all, but rather himself. Because somehow, within his heartbreak, he had managed to become attracted to someone who looked and acted exactly like his ex on the surface but was someone completely different in every other way. He couldn’t treat her like Elle, couldn’t pretend she’d hurt him just as bad, and he knew that.
No, Y/N was a completely new risk and a new potential heartbreak. Harry was terrified, and this new territory that at first felt so familiar, made his chest ache and his tummy flutter, so he avoided it altogether. Pushed her away before anything could even happen at all, for his own good, to protect a heart that couldn’t take being broken again.
The two of them sat there for what felt like hours. Until Harry’s sobs slowed themselves down, and he was only shivering and sniffling quietly. Y/N continued to hold him, it seemed like he just really needed to be held.
Elle had clearly broken his heart, and Y/N knew that a part of healing was letting this anger and emotion run rampant. So she stayed put, allowing him to just sit in the sadness, and allow himself to feel a little bit of hope that everything would work out eventually. 
“It’s okay Harry. It’s going to be okay.” 
——
Y/N wasn’t sure this was a good idea. How could it be? Not even a few days ago, she and Harry couldn’t stand being in the same room as each other, and now they were alone in a car, on their way to the grocery store. It all felt too domestic.
But this was Harry, and she definitely shouldn’t be worried about the state of her car, or how to subtly remove the McDonalds wrapping on the floor in front of his feet. Just as Harry, after being handed the aux cord, probably shouldn’t have spent half the journey wondering if she liked the song that was playing and looking out of the corner of his eye to judge whether he should skip it or not. 
But here they were, walking on eggshells around each other. Hoping they both wouldn’t do something to accidentally piss off the other. 
If you’d told Harry a week ago that he would be on the way to the grocery store with Y/N by his side, he probably would’ve laughed and faked a gag. But Harry was actually the one who had suggested the trip, much to the surprise of not only Y/N but the rest of the housemates. 
They hadn’t exactly addressed his breakdown, but it seemed they’d both come to a mutual understanding to try and put the past behind them. Harry considered himself lucky, he knew he had caused and furthered the rift in their friendship, and it was because of this he knew he had to put more effort into building the trust between them back up. 
So, when Y/N was recounting the ingredients for the dinner she was planning on making, Harry had asked if she’d just come to save him remembering the long list. Y/N’s first thought was she could probably just write it down for him before she realised he was actually trying to be nice. And that was more than she could say for the last month of her living with him, so she agreed.
The grocery store was busy, filled with impatient mothers and fun-drunk teens, and Y/N was having trouble pushing the cart through the throngs of people. Harry was walking ahead of her, too preoccupied with his list (and she supposes himself) to notice her struggle and she’s never been one to ask for help. So instead tries her best to avoid the ankles of other shoppers and attempts to keep up with the cracking pace Harry had set. 
It’s only when he turns around to find her ten feet behind him, does Harry acknowledge her, his eyebrows pinched in annoyance, “what’s taking you so bloody long?” To say Y/N was taken aback would be an understatement. After everything, he’d manage to stay friendly for what, half a day?
“Excuse me? Doing so well at being friendly Harry, might want to pull it back, before I get the wrong impression.” 
Maybe it was Y/N’s sarcastic words that pulled Harry back, or perhaps he realised himself, but he really hadn't meant to be rude. At first, it was more of a joke, but he guessed that he’d become so accustomed to being snarky with Y/N, it’d come out a lot more maliciously than he’d intended.
“Fuck, what? No- I didn’t mean it like that. I was tryin’ to joke, but it came out wron- Fuck! I’m sorry, okay?” Somewhere in the middle of Harry’s rambling, Y/N starts to giggle. While she had taken it the wrong way, she was mature enough to understand she’d simply interpreted it wrong. 
“Harry relax, look like you're about to pass out. Sorry I took it the wrong way,” she shrugs, “now, where are the pickles? I’ve been craving them for weeks.” Harry’s slightly taken aback, he’d never met someone who could put an extremely valid argument behind them with such ease. 
Harry wouldn’t have blamed Y/N if she’d gotten angry with him, stomped her feet, made a fuss and yelled in his face, after all, he had spoken to her like a prick. But just like that, she had defused the argument and made Harry feel better instantly, even though he was in the wrong. Nonetheless, he follows her through the isles, making sure to help her steer the trolley when the crowd was busiest. 
Harry had actually started to enjoy himself on this trip, he wasn’t going to lie. Y/N had an easy going way about her that he hadn’t really bothered to notice before. It made it easy to chat about nonsensical things, including Harry’s first dog and his preferred brand of nail polish while they peruse the aisles. He was doing all he could to make sure the rest of the trip didn’t contain any silly arguments like the one that had almost sparked just ten minutes before, and he believes he was doing a good job. 
After stopping by the fruit aisle for some cherries (they were in season, and there was no way Y/N was missing out on the tiny period they were in season for, even if they were ridiculously overpriced,) they reach the aisle that contains pickles. Finally, Y/N had been craving them for weeks, and nothing could stop her now, not even the fact that they were on the top shelf. Y/N’s brows pinch in annoyance, who put pickles that high up anyway? 
She halfheartedly sticks her hand in the air, her fingers barely brushing against the bottom of the jar before looking behind her, watching Harry laughing at her struggle. “Are you going to help me or just keep that smug smile on your face?” 
This makes Harry’s smirk upturn even more, turning into a full boyish grin, dimples and all. “Say please sweetheart, and I might just consider it.” 
Y/N rolls her eyes, “please,” and although it is sarcastic and hardly genuine Harry takes it, walking over and reaching for the last jar of pickles. 
What happens next could be blamed on many different factors; the humidity in the supermarket being higher than the average store, it could be blamed on Harry’s sweaty fingers or maybe even the worker who decided to put them on the top shelf in the first place. 
Whatever the fault, Harry grabs the container and almost delivers it safely to the cart, until it slips from his grip and instead ends in a puddle of shattered glass, stray pickles and dripping juice. And of fucking course it’s the last jar, and of fucking course it’s Harry who drops it, right in front of the girl who’s been craving them for so long. 
Harry is almost scared to look up at Y/N’s face, knowing he was more than likely going to be met with a pouting, red, furious mix. She really had been talking about the fucking pickles for weeks, and after both Jeff and Sarah had forgotten to get them in the last two shopping trips, he can imagine her desperation.
It’s as if time was working in slow motion, Harry sees the residue pickle juice dripping from the handle of the shopping trolley, can feel his sock getting progressively wetter as the liquid seeps into his canvas sneaker. And Harry immediately starts to apologise, “fuck I’m so sorr-“ but is interrupted by Y/N manically laughing. Well, he had expected a lot of different reactions, but he hadn’t expected… laughter?
“How did that even happen,” she gets out through her laughter, “you’re an idiot!” Harry can’t help but join in. He was covered in pickle juice, and in hindsight, the situation was pretty funny. “Oi, ‘s not my fault the jar was more slippery than the average.” This only makes Y/N cackle harder, holding her stomach as though it was hurting. 
“Hold on, I’ll get something to clean it up.” As Harry watches Y/N walk away, probably to find a worker, he can’t help but think again how different Y/N was from Elle. Harry distinctly remembers shopping with her one Christmas and accidentally dropping the last box of red and white candy canes (what can he say, he can be a right clutz.) She had been shaking with fury, voice dripping with poison as she asked Harry why he was “such a fucking idiot?” He guesses she was stressed because of the time of the year, but Harry had always hated her vicious temper, which Y/N apparently lacked. 
Harry had only really seen Y/N angry or upset until now, but he could safely assume that was of his own doing. When they were getting along, she seemed to make him feel better without even trying. She could laugh despite herself, and poke fun at Harry without feeling like she was actually reprimanding him for something, and Harry, well he hadn’t really experienced that before.
Harry sees Y/N returning, with what looks to be a less than impressed worker following behind her. That is until she sees Harry standing there in all his six-foot glory, covered in pickle juice. 
She seemed to be around 20, with blonde hair braided into two plaits that sat around her neck. She had bright green eyes, and if she was a little older, Harry probably would have said she was cute. And by the looks of it, she would’ve revelled in such treatment, when she approaches Harry with a, “I’m so sorry, Mr Styles!” Harry waves off the apology, he had been the one to drop the pickles anyway. “No worries love, ‘m sorry bout’ the mess.” 
It’s like her eyes brighten two shades at the pet name as she begins to sweep up the broken glass, blushing as she does, “oh don’t even worry! Can see you made a mess of yourself as well.” Y/N can’t help but laugh, was she actually trying to flirt with a pickle stained Harry? He catches Y/N laughing behind the worker and grins, “sure did. I’m a bit of a clutz sometimes.” 
Now, Harry knew that his personality was very likeable, he was easy to talk to, and he wasn’t exactly bad to look at, so he was somewhat used to casual flirting. Who was he to pull up someone trying to shoot their shot? Usually, he preferred to go along with it, stay polite and at the end of the interaction, cut the conversation before anything serious came of it. And the girl (Hannah, according to her name tag) standing in front of him, cleaning his mess, was no exception. 
“Can see that,” she winks. Actually, fucking winks and Harry can’t help but feel slightly smug, his presumption had clearly been correct. He doesn’t see the harm in playing along, “oh can you? Thought customer service was all about being nice to the customer,” he teases lightly. Hannah giggles flirtatiously and if Harry thought she was blushing before, his effect on her is multiplied. “I’m nice, I promise!” 
Y/N almost gags, she hated PDA at the best of times, but to see them both drooling over each other made her feel sick to her stomach. Harry’s smooth reply does nothing to quell her nausea, “mhm, I bet.” Y/N would literally rather walk home than be subjected to this torture any longer. “Okay! Thanks again for being so understanding, c’mon Harry, we better get going.” 
Harry thanks the server again, giving her a small wave and a cheeky grin as he follows Y/N to the counter to check out their items. “Really, Harry? She looked about 15 years younger than you.” Harry scoffs, “fifteen years?! You think she was twelve, do you? How old do you think I am?” 
Y/N doesn’t hesitate to respond, “old enough to know better than to flirt with someone so young.” 
He couldn’t believe she was pulling this. Harry was a flirty person naturally! He never meant anything by it, and very well knew when it was appropriate and when it definitely wasn’t. He didn’t see how a little friendly conversation could hurt in this situation. “Oh please, she was at least twenty, and I was hardly flirtin’” As the worker is scanning their items, Y/N is packing them into the reusable shopping bags. “Still gross.” 
Was Y/N jealous? For a second, Harry felt the frustration swim through his veins like poison, but the knowledge of Y/N potentially acting out of envy acts as an antidote. “Don’t tell me you’re jealous lovey.” It was Y/N’s turn to scoff. If she’s honest, she’s not sure why the sight of Harry flirting with the server annoyed her so much. She was young, but Harry was right, she was very clearly of age and also stunning. 
Maybe it was the fact she hadn’t acknowledged Y/N with more than an eye roll but readily grovelled at Harry’s feet. It could’ve been leftover frustration from the pickles she would have to hold out from for another week. Or maybe it was that she didn’t like him calling someone else ‘love.’ Perhaps she was just frustrated that it had taken her months for Harry to be civil with her, but had taken ‘Hannah’ all but five minutes. Whatever the reason, she didn’t like the pit in her stomach or the tingling in the tips of her fingers. “Not a chance, Harry.” 
Harry just smiled in response, while Y/N felt waves of negative emotions rolling through her, he felt butterflies erupting from the pit of his tummy, a small fluttering reaching all the way to his heart. Harry was ready to admit, Y/N’s jealousy made him happy. He was a narcissist; that he knew, and a pretty girl getting frustrated that his attention wasn’t purely focused on her, made his vain little heart soar. 
This little shopping expedition had given both of them huge revelations. Harry realised, the thought of Y/N being jealous over him made him extremely happy, and maybe even gave him some new spank bank material? Y/N realised that while she and Harry could be civil, it didn’t mean they didn’t know the exact places to poke and prod at each other to cause a reaction. 
——
It was Y/N's turn to pick a card, and although she'd initially been hesitant to play this game, she could admit she was having fun. When Harry had first pulled out 'Truth, Dare or Drink,' her first instinct was to ridicule him and say, "I didn't realise we were still in eighth grade," but she bit her tongue. After the supermarket, she still felt like she was continually filtering everything she said, worried a single word may be the negative turning point for their relationship. 
And well, after a few rounds, Y/N realised the game was much too risky for a bunch of eighth-graders and found some questions too intrusive even for her adult self to answer. However, with the help of at least half a bottle of chardonnay, she found herself managing just fine. Jeff had called it a night a few rounds ago, claiming he was "getting too old for this shit," but it didn't stop the rest of the group from playing.  
"Okay, ask the player to your left what their favourite sex position is. If they can't answer- both of you drink four sips." Immediately, Y/N turns to Sarah, who happens to be sitting on her left and also happens to be bright red. With a quick, "come on babe, all friends here," from Harry, Sarah buries her head in her hands before mumbling, "from behind." The answer causes an eruption of giggles and hollers from the very tipsy group and a sly smirk from Mitch, making Y/N laugh harder. 
"Alright shut up you lot," Sarah grumbles before picking up her own card. "Dare one player to share their best and worst hookup, or both of you finish your drinks. Okay, well the only one mean enough to name and shame would be Harry, so off you go H." This is met with a disgruntled, "oi" from the man in question and a casual "not wrong," from Mitch. While Harry huffs, he seems to have no issue and responds immediately, almost like he had the answer on the tip of his tongue. 
"Best was Elle, obviously. And worst, um," he deliberates for a few seconds before continuing, "was this guy I met in Brazil, he was awful! Didn't even prep my poor arse, just went straight in for the kill. Was scarred for months." He's met with roaring laughter, and at first, he tries to look pissed but ends up giggling along with them. While his poor bum really had taken a beating that night, in hindsight it was a funny sex horror story for a drunken night. "C'mon Mitchy boy, your turn." 
Mitch picks up the card and immediately scoffs, "This one's to all players, take two sips if you have ever been attracted to someone else currently playing this game." Unsurprisingly both Mitch and Sarah drink, sending cheeky winks over their cups to each other. But what shocks every player at the table is both Y/N and Harry lifting their glasses. They make eye contact with each other as they are sipping and Harry raises a questioning eyebrow towards her. 
Y/N quickly looks over to Sarah, to see her sitting with her own bewildered look, glancing between them. She had known Y/N enjoyed Harry's music, but maybe didn't know how much she also fancied him- that is until she had a conversation with him. 
"So you've either had the hots for me, my girlfriend or the chick you hate, nice H," a very inebriated Mitch says with a laugh. If Y/N hadn't already been watching him, she might have missed the flash of guilt that flickers through Harry's eyes. He looks over at her with an apologetic look, "I never said I hated-" 
"It's fine, Harry. Just pick a card, it's your turn." Y/N interrupts him, she wasn’t going to lie and say that it didn’t sting. However, while she knew they'd come to a newfound understanding, Y/N was well aware that it had initially come from Harry's resentment of her. He sighs but picks up a card anyway, pausing some, a slight blush appearing on his cheeks, before reading it aloud. "Uh... give the person to your left a hickey, or finish your drink." At first, Y/N laughs until she realises that the person sitting to his left would be her. 
In an attempt to lighten the situation, Y/N spits out, "go on, start drinking then." Mitch and Sarah start to laugh, "I could've called that one," Sarah chuckles, but Harry looks rather unimpressed. While she actually didn't care if Harry were to give her a hickey, (let's be real he was a dick, but a hot one at that!) she knew he would be thoroughly put out by it. They had become civil, not ‘drunkenly-give-one-another-a-hickey’ level friends.
"I'm not the one with the problem. I doubt he'd wanna kiss on the girl he hates." Y/N had meant it to be a joke, she really had! But the underlying biting tone would be almost impossible to miss. She was definitely playing with fire here, knowing Harry could snap at any moment. She watches as Harry's nostrils flare slightly before he bites back, "no problem here, you're just scared you'd enjoy it too much sweetheart." At that Y/N scoffs, his arrogance never ceased to amaze her, "oh please, don't give yourself so much credit, Harry."  
He laughs, "are you saying you wouldn't?"
"Almost certain of it," she quickly retaliates. Now, Harry knew he was a dick. He knew he could be impatient and rude. Was aware of his short temper and sometimes biting passive-aggressiveness. Had been well informed of his bad habit of sometimes oversharing and even bragging too much. Even knew how annoying his constant discussion of the superiority of salads to veggies could get on the nerves of those around him. 
But the one thing Harry knew for sure, was that he was good at fucking. He loved to see the person he was with, shaking with pleasure below him. Thoroughly enjoyed giving his partner everything he had, to hear them screaming his name with their eyes rolled back in pleasure. Harry liked having sex, and on account of others, Harry was fucking good at it. So Y/N sitting there, doubting he could make her feel all amazing and jittery, probably pissed him off more than it should have. 
"Fucking c' mere then." While Harry had merely said that in the heat of the moment (and possibly to get a rise out of Y/N) he was beyond shocked when she actually got up and stood before him. "I'm here. Now what smartass?" His jaw ticks and he raises an eyebrow, silently questioning Y/N's challenge. Did she really want to get involved in this? Surely she knew Harry would come out victorious. Apparently not, because she crosses her arms and scoffs, "knew you were all talk." 
Now Y/N doesn't want to admit she's intimidated because god this was Harry she was thinking about. However, when he grips her arms, flips her around and pushes her back into the chair he was just occupying, Y/N can't exactly say she's fine and dandy. 
Harry was much taller than her when they were both standing up, but with her sitting down, he towers above her, and she can't help but feel childlike and demure. His shit-eating grin only grows when he sees that, and he slowly bends down until his cologne infiltrates Y/N's nostrils and fills her head with a fog she can't quite get rid of. "What was that, darling?" 
Y/N is willing herself to say anything, literally anything that wouldn't fuel his already raging ego. If she's honest the barely mumbled, "um, nothing," doesn't really cut it, but what was she to do? Before she'd met Harry, Y/N probably would've considered his looks to be something akin to her ‘dream guy.' So, when he places his hands on each armrest beside her, essentially trapping her, it doesn't exactly help to calm her nerves. Harry oozed sex, and if the look in his eye was anything to go off, he knew it. 
As his face becomes level with hers, Y/N can smell the sweet apple cider he had been drinking and can feel the bottom of his unbuttoned shirt brushing against the tops of her thighs. And for the second time that month, Y/N wonders if she should move away from the compromising position she and Harry had found themselves in, but she once again decides against it. Harry places his hand against the side of her neck, hooking his thumb under her jaw. He encourages her to move her head further to the side with some gentle pressure, which she happily obliges to. 
Y/N can't help but inhale sharply when she feels his slightly chilled lips gently brush against her earlobe, before placing a tender kiss behind her ear. "Is this okay?" If Y/N were in a better headspace, she might have tried to play this whole thing off with an indifferent nod. Instead, she feels herself nodding rapidly, and takes a moment to curse herself as she feels Harry's lips curl into a grin at her eagerness. 
Harry allows his lips to run down the side of Y/N's neck so lightly he knew it must be tickling her. Once he reaches her collarbone, he places a quick peck against it before once again trailing his lips up her soft skin, leaving light kisses in his wake. Y/N's breathing stops as she feels Harry's tongue touching her skin as he begins his ascent, leaving a chilling trail that sends shivers through her whole body. 
She feels herself slipping into a hazy state, in which all control was given to Harry, and while her first instinct is to break it, her second is to bask in it. Her decision is hastily rewarded when Harry starts to suction his lips against her. 
Y/N actively silences the whimper that arises from her throat as Harry continues to bruise the skin he kisses, and she briefly wonders if he had heard the beginnings of her mewl as he chuckles, sending a gust of cold hair down her neck. Harry gently bites down on Y/N's throat, which causes a small sting, the aftershocks travelling all the way down to her toes. But his tongue laving over the mark works to quickly soothe the ache. 
While she felt as if she had sat feeling the effect of Harry's mouth for hours, it had only been about ten seconds in reality. But the familiar pull in Y/N's lower stomach screams at her to ignore time, grab his shirt and push her mouth against his. However, the cough heard from behind her, quells these dirtier thoughts almost immediately. And just like that, as quickly as it had come, the pleasuring warmth Harry provided was gone. 
Y/N struggles to flutter her eyes back open, that she hadn't realised had even closed in the first place. 
Well, she wasn't expecting that, and while she assumed Harry would feel the same, his deep smirk tells her something different. He looks at her with a hunger in his eyes, and she briefly wonders if he felt the same pull towards her. Y/N was fighting the urge to drag him to the nearest bedroom and instead clears her throat and looks behind her to assess Mitch and Sarah's reactions. 
Safe to say, they were as shocked as she was, with gaping mouths and wide eyes, everyone sits in silence for what feels like far too long. Y/N was embarrassed. Usually, she hated PDA, yet she'd just let Harry suck on her neck like some kind of B-grade vampire in front of her cousin and her boyfriend. 
Y/N stands back up to move around to her own chair, but with her head down, she misses Harry reaching to brush his knuckles against her own, but only feels the comforting touch. Harry watches as she refuses to meet his eye, and while he enjoyed himself, he hoped he hadn't gone too far with her. But when Sarah grabs her head and pulls it to the side to see the blooming mark on Y/N's skin, Harry can't help but smirk and feel slightly proud. Y/N had said she was okay with him touching her, maybe she was just flustered, and if her bright red cheeks were anything to go by, that's Harry's safest guess. "Jesus H, you really did a number on her." 
Y/N refused to acknowledge the effect Harry had instilled upon her, but she can feel her cheeks radiating a cherry-red heat, and she can only pray no one else notices. "Uh, it's my turn," she manages to choke out, and a quick glance at Harry shows she's not hiding her flustered state as well as she'd hoped. His dimples are on full display, decorated with his complacent grin, and he's sitting back in his chair, arms crossed over one another. 
"Pick the most attractive player, both of you take three sips," you've got to be fucking joking, she was pretty sure everyone knew her answer to that, but she refused to give him the satisfaction. "It's Sarah. Who's next?" Sarah cheers' Y/N's glass and takes her sips as she grabs the next card. 
Y/N can see Harry's disgruntled look and can vaguely hear his murmured, "bullshit," but she only sends him a glare as she takes her three sips. 
——
Harry was drunk. No cut that, he was fucked. It was approximately six ciders ago that he began to feel light and giggly. And then maybe two or so ciders ago he began to have trouble walking in a straight line and was genuinely considering shaving his head. And now, he was here. Planted on the couch watching Y/N and Sarah sing some song he definitely knew but couldn't name, Taylor Swift maybe? 
His head felt heavy, and if he was honest, thoughts were entering his head and then leaving it before he could even acknowledge what they were. He can vaguely recognise Mitch's voice, talking about something that Harry, no matter how hard he tried, could actually listen to. So he sits on the couch and watches Y/N. She looked pretty with her hair down and messy, and Harry wishes he could stop her from dancing and ask if she could just sit next to him instead. But he thinks he's probably just drunk and maybe a bit lonely, so he doesn't. 
He's not sure if he was calling Y/N's name and hadn't realised or if she had noticed how not okay he seemed, but she approaches him anyway. "Harry, are you alright?" She looks worried, and Harry hates that he's made her feel that. He's tempted to use his thumb to mould the lines in her forehead back out like cheap clay, but he's not sure she'd want him to touch her. So he nods lightly, attempting a smile, but she doesn't return it. 
"Sarah, I'm gonna take Harry up to bed, he seems pretty gone." Harry doesn't hear Sarah's response because he's too busy focusing on Y/N's lips and how pretty and puffy they are. He briefly wonders what they'd feel like around the head of his cock, but he's drawn out of those thoughts when he realises she's calling his name. 
"Harry, c'mon, come upstairs to bed with me." Um, had Harry missed something? He doesn't really mind, truthfully he'd quite like to take Y/N upstairs and have his way with her, but, Y/N must see the look on his face because she laughs, "not like that you lecher! God, you really are pissed." 
Harry smiles and takes the hand she's giving him, wrapping his arm around her shoulders for stability. The group had experienced quite a few drunken nights during isolation, but Y/N had never seen Harry this intoxicated before and while she's quite enjoying him acting kind of goofy, she's just praying he doesn't vomit on her during their climb upstairs. 
Y/N does her best to guide Harry to his room, who provides absolutely no help, only giggling to himself as she struggles to hold him up. Finally, she makes it, only realising once she had stepped inside, that she had never actually seen Harry's room before. 
Similarly to Y/N’s, his room has the shell of a guest bedroom, the art on the walls a little too unpersonalised and the furniture stark and white. The bones of the room are fleshed out with Harry’s belongings, clearly in random places that were not permanent, as if he’d placed his records and guitar down the first day he got there, and left them in those exact same places. There are dirty clothes strewn upon the floor, and books sitting next to glasses stacked neatly on the bedside table. Next to them, is a candle that Y/N can’t read the scent of from her position in the doorway, something sweet from the smell permeating through the room, mixing intoxicatingly with Harry’s telltale sandalwood like cologne. 
Harry stands in the middle of the room, clearly having forgotten his purpose as he turns to look back at Y/N with a slightly lost expression. "Want to get into bed Harry?" He nods and stumbles over to his mattress, falling rather than laying in it. As Y/N's about to turn around to go back downstairs, she hears Harry's voice, much quieter than it usually is, "I'm sorry." She's not sure if she heard him correctly. 
"What did you say, Harry?"
"I'm sorry." He whispers. 
"For what?" Y/N knows what he could be sorry for, he did treat her like shit for weeks, but they’d already apologised and somewhat buried the hatchet. "For bein' a dick. You don't deserve it, never did." She walks closer to him, until she stands about a foot from the bed, and can see Harry's eyes full of sorrow and close to tears in the dark. 
"Come on, you're just drunk. If you want to talk about it more in the morning, we can." Y/N knows he'll forget by then, she's not sure he even remembers what he just said. He holds his hand out to her, and she hesitantly takes it, "ya just look so much like her, you know? Act like her too." Harry repeats the same words he’d told you yesterday. 
"Who, Harry?" 
He looks at her with his big green eyes, and she knows he's drunk, and she knows he'll forget this all in the morning, but she can't help but sit down beside him on the bed. 
"Elle." 
Y/N didn’t know what to say to that. She didn’t want Harry to burst into tears again, the topic clearly sensitive, let alone in his intoxicated state. So she stays silent, watches as Harry shuts his eyes, and Y/N nearly thinks he’s fallen asleep, until he reopens them again, "nicer than her though. Prettier too." 
Y/N's not going to lie, hearing Harry talk about her in a way that wasn't entirely negative for once was flattering, but she couldn't help but feel it was more the cider talking. She knew how much he missed Elle, that much was obvious, and she had thought that was what had made him hate her so much. She was worried he would wake up angry that he had told her things he hadn't intended to, or even worse, something he hadn't meant. 
So she leans over him to grab the side of the bedsheet he had torn away, but his freezing hand on her neck causes her to pause. His thumb is lightly brushing over the mark he left on her earlier, and Y/N audibly swallows. He was close enough that he could lean in slightly and press his lips against the same spot once more, but he doesn't, only whispers, "looks so good on you." Y/N feels his warm breath against her bare neck as he speaks, causing that pull to return to her lower stomach once more, "H, I don't think we should do this right now." 
Y/N didn’t know what exactly ‘this’ was, she just knew she didn’t want either of them to be intoxicated when it happened. The Harry Y/N knew, would pull back, laugh and ask if she really thought he'd ever want to do 'this' with her, but this intoxicated and unpredictable Harry presses his lips softly to her neck once, before pulling back and sighing. "I know." 
He studies her face carefully before speaking again. "You've never called me H before, I like it." Y/N sighs, "honestly I didn't think we were on that level. Thought you'd get mad at me," she laughs lightly although what she said was true. 
She had thought about adopting the same nickname everyone else in the house used but was too scared he would make fun of her or ask her why she felt she had the right to call him that. So she played it safe, only calling him Harry, but she guessed the nickname slipped out while he was very much inebriated and very much unlikely to say any word of opposition. 
If Y/N didn't know any better, she'd think Harry looked almost hopeful as he whispered, "so we are now?" but the expression is fleeting. She wants to feed into it but isn't sure if it's more her mind playing tricks on her. Showing her things she desperately wants to be true, only to turn around a reveal it was fake the whole time. So she shrugs, "I don't know Harry." 
He nods slowly but doesn't say anything else. "Try to get some sleep." He nods again, "night." 
"Night H." 
——
Harry doesn't know what happened. Had he been drugged? Used as a voodoo doll? Abducted by aliens? Something had happened, because when he woke up with a pounding head, his first feeling was disappointment. But not disappointment about having to nurse a shocking hangover, no, it was disappointing that Y/N wasn't in bed with him. He could’ve sworn she had come upstairs with him. 
Harry was slowly coming to terms with the fact that he didn't hate her and perhaps, just maybe had developed a small crush towards her. But wishing she was cuddling him after a drunken night? That was too close to something serious, something that Harry was definitely not ready for. Not after Elle. 
Walking down the stairs, he wonders if there's a reason for his sudden desperation? He vaguely remembers giving her a hickey, but that was a part of the game. He remembers Y/N walking into his room and sitting on his bed, but can’t recall what was actually said. 
Stepping into the kitchen, feels the same as usual, maybe with added head pain. Mitch is doing the dishes from the breakfast sitting on the table in front of Y/N and Sarah. Everything seems painfully familiar. Except, looking at Y/N now, with sober goggles and daylight, Harry completely understands why drunk him was so enamoured. She looks beautiful, with an oversized tee-shirt barely covering her smooth legs, her hair in a messy bun atop her head, and the striking hickey against her neck painfully obvious. Seeing Y/N with his mark against her neck makes Harry have to will his stiffy away. She hadn't even tried to hide it.
Harry doesn't know how long he'd been standing in the entrance of the kitchen, staring at Y/N like a creep, but she catches his eye and sends him a shy smile. "Mornin' H, brekkies on the table," Mitch states, as Harry quickly returns the smile Y/N gave him and sits across from her, "looks good, man. Thanks for cooking." 
Harry is slightly shocked when Y/N speaks up from the other side of the table, he had been expecting her to ignore him like she had after he’d given her the mark that was causing a tingle in his lower tummy. "How's your head?" She says softly. 
He gives her a small grin, "it's been better if'm honest." She laughs, "yeh, you were pretty fucked last night." Harry can't tell if she's genuinely just making conversation or if she's trying to figure out if he remembered the events that occurred. "Was I? Not too drunk to remember giving you that," he points at her neck with his syrup covered fork. His words have their desired effect as Y/N turns bright red, "really does look good on you love." 
Harry's not sure what he's doing, he's aware of how flirty he is being. While they were now able to be around each other and have a conversation without biting each other’s heads off, hitting on each other was a whole different ball game. All he knows is that the more he looks at Y/N, the more he wants to get on his knees before her. 
Harry had never flirted so openly with Y/N before. What the fuck was he playing at? Y/N had assumed that Harry became a tad clingy and loving with a few drinks in his system. So as he sits across from her, dead sober, and continues to flirt with her, Y/N is confused. Maybe he was still drunk? Had he taken something she wasn't aware of? Been probed in the middle of the night? She wasn't sure, but she couldn't say she didn't like it. 
She also didn't want to get too comfortable, only for him to turn around and treat her as horribly as he had when she first got here. So she gives him a small smile and continues to eat her breakfast, merely listening to the conversations happening around her. 
——
No matter how hard she tried, Y/N could not get the thought of Harry off her mind. Could still feel the ghost of his lips trailing along her neck, and the way his hand brushed along hers. She couldn’t help but imagine the way his lips would feel pressing softly against her own, his tongue licking into her mouth. She imagines his hands to be soft but still firm as they held her hips, her neck, her own fingers laced in his. His voice replays in her head, and she wonders how his accent would twirl and twist around filthy words, whispered into the shell or her ear. 
 She can't forget how she felt hearing the lilt of his voice when it was flirting with someone else. Can’t get away from the pit in her stomach, the aching head and chest. She had laid awake for so many nights trying to figure out why exactly it had bothered her so much. 
She could only amount it all to a certain type of jealousy, but what was she jealous of? Harry had never shown her any sort of romantic attention before, that is until he was suckling at her neck and calling her sweetheart. But what did it all mean? Did he feel the same pull towards her, or was she just imagining his sudden fondness of her? Did she actually like him, or just the idea of his lips pressed against hers rather than her neck. She needed to talk to someone, and thank goodness for her, Sarah was home. 
Ever since they were little Sarah and Y/N had been ridiculously close. They had experienced each stage of their lives together, from playing at the local playground to trying their first cigarette in the bathroom of Sarah’s family home. Sarah was the big sister that Y/N had never had, always there for advice or a bit of fun. Teaching her about sex and drinking, what it was like to kiss another person or drive a car for the first time. Sarah explained everything with practiced expertise that looking back on, Y/N could see she definitely didn’t have at the time.  
Their family homes were only a road apart, and every day either Y/N or Sarah would make the small trek to each other’s house and spend hours discussing nothing and everything. Sarah was the closest thing Y/N had ever had to a sibling, and after Sarah had left for tour with Harry and the band, Y/N had felt a Sarah sized hole in her heart. Honestly, for Y/N, quarantine felt like a blessing in disguise, she felt like they could make up for the months of lost time and distance between them. 
In search of her cousin, Y/N only comes across Mitch reading in the living room, “hey, do you know where Sarah is?” He glances at Y/N from above his book, owlishly blinking as if he was confused, and maybe he was. Mitch is well known for getting lost in anything he loves, from books and movies and especially in his music. “Um, the shower… I think?” 
Bidding him thanks, Y/N heads towards the downstairs toilet where she could hear the water running. While they all had bathrooms in their rooms, they’d found the downstairs communal shower particularly helpful. It was easy to slip into after they’d just come back from swimming at the beach or a run, without mucking salt water or sweat through the whole house. Y/N knew Sarah had gone out for a jog about an hour ago, so had no doubt she was having a quick wash before dinner. 
If it were anybody else, Y/N would’ve waited until they had finished, but ever since they were thirteen or so, Y/N and Sarah had an odd tradition of having intense conversations while one of them was showering. Y/N still remembers the week Sarah’s parents had decided to split up, she had spent every night sitting on the closed toilet seat crying and ranting while Y/N stood under the hot water, listening and trying her best to comfort her. It was a weird habit of theirs, but for them, the chance to chat with someone without having to look them in the eye was therapeutic, almost like a church confessional. 
Although Y/N was relatively happy, she wasn’t about to enter a religious confessional. When it came to Harry, she had definitely committed at least four of the seven mortal sins. No, it was just Sarah, and Y/N knew that no matter what she admitted, it would be received with love and unconditional support. So she charges through the bathroom door, eager to spill all that was muddling up her mind, “Sarah! We need to talk about Harry, I need your help.” 
Y/N expects Sarah’s tinkling laugh, soothing cooing, maybe even a big sigh and her calming voice asking her what was wrong. Instead, she is met with the deep and drawling laugh of Harry himself. 
Looking back now, Y/N wishes she could say she dealt with her mistake with careful grace and poise, but instead she lets out a bloodcurdling scream, and as she sees the shower curtain drawn to the left she slaps her hands over her eyes. The melodic laugh of Harry’s continues as he clearly notices her current predicament, “can look if you want babe.” 
Y/N whines, “I- um, no. I don’t- I thought you were Sarah. What the fuck is happening.” Y/N can hear the smirk in Harry’s voice as he answers, “yeh Y/N, I got that. Seriously, I’m covered up.” 
And maybe, it would’ve been better for Y/N to stay standing with her hands over her eyes like a petulant child because as she drops them, the sight she’s met with is one to behold and one Y/N’s not sure she can handle. Harry is covered with the shower curtain pulled across his bottom half, but Y/N trails her eyes upwards, sees the small trail of slightly damp hair leading down to the white curtain, and her eyes widen comically, he looks like a wet dream and Y/N’s not sure how to react. 
His curls are stuck to his neck and forehead, matted against the soft wet skin. His naturally tanned chest is on display, dripping with water, and covered in his tattoos. Y/N can’t help but notice the inked swallows along his chest, drawing attention to his collarbones, the skin taught against the bone, and Y/N wants to kiss along it and taste the mix of salt and sweetness of his neck. The butterfly covering his abs ripples as he clears his throat, drawing Y/N’s attention away from his body. 
“So what did you need to talk to Sarah about, hm?” Anything I can help you with?” Y/N can feel the blood rush to her cheeks, fully aware that Harry had caught her ogling at his partially naked body. Her tongue feels heavy in her mouth, and she’s not sure whether it’s from the sight in front of her or the embarrassment of being caught staring at it. 
Y/N stutters, trying to force herself to say something, anything at all that would make this situation less unnerving “um, I-no?” Which comes out more like a question than anything, and Y/N curses herself for her weak resolve. Harry smirks, “Cat got your tongue pet?” Y/N hates how easily he can get her worked up, and hates it even more how obvious it is to him. “Stop teasing me! I can’t, you know, I don’t-... you’re naked okay!” 
Harry’s dimples deepen, and a smirk takes over a little less than half of his face, “don’t pretend you don’t love my teasing, darlin’.” It’s at this point that Y/N realises that she had been in this situation much longer than appropriate, standing flustered and hot from Harry being so close to her while nude. 
“I need to go,” it comes out as more of a whisper, her voice rough with lust. She coughs as if to clear her throat, but from what she’s unsure. The intense desire she feels for a man she despised a month ago, perhaps? “Relax Y/N, no big deal. I think Sarah’s in the shower upstairs though if you’re still looking.”
She nods in response, slowly backing out of the room before turning around and quickly shutting the door behind her. She feels her breath heaving in and out of her lungs. Feels her throat tighten and her head dizzy, and an intense tingling feeling starts at her toes and spreads all the way to her lower tummy. The familiar pull of lust and need brings an ache to her core, and she feels the sticky heat between her legs. 
While Y/N may not know it, Harry is affected by her as much as she is by him. He stands in the shower, a stupid grin across his face, dimples indenting his cheek. Harry could pretend he didn’t see Y/N blatantly ogling him, or her cheeks burn a delicious crimson when she had gotten caught. Could even pretend he didn’t see her subconsciously squeezing her thighs together while she stood in front of him, like she was so desperate for Harry she couldn’t even wait to relieve the tension building inside of her. 
Harry could pretend not to notice, but as he felt a tingle zap down his spine, and the accustomed rush of blood to his lower half, Harry realised he didn't want to. Would rather explore this unnerving territory, and see what it had in store for him. 
——
Harry had reached a new level of boredom. So much so, he had resorted to doing a puzzle.
Harry was notorious for always being busy, was constantly on tour, playing shows and promoting his music. The quietest periods in Harry’s life were the months of writing he’d participate in, where his mind was anything but still. He wasn’t used to doing nothing all day, and while he had tried to write during isolation, the months of doing fuck all made inspiration hard to come by. 
So it led Harry to his current situation, trying to complete a challenging puzzle at the dining table. Sarah and Mitch were napping the late afternoon away, Jeff was playing Xbox games in the living room, and Y/N had gone for a walk, right after she had brought the puzzle out from her room after Harry had asked her to. He had heard her talking to Sarah about how much she loved puzzles a few months ago and had even shown her the one she had brought to quarantine; however, she hadn’t gotten the chance to start it yet. 
Harry had been doing nothing all day, and he was sick of sitting in bed, refreshing his Instagram feed every ten minutes. To be honest, a puzzle wouldn’t have been Harry’s first choice of a relaxing pastime activity, but there was only so much social media and movie marathons Harry could take. 
He was nervous at first to ask Y/N. Over the last few days, it seemed like there was a certain tension between them, as if they were both aware of the lust that had been swirling throughout the bathroom as thick as the steam from Harry’s shower, but didn’t want to admit it. They were testing the waters, sometimes stumbling through amorous conversations, while still attempting to maintain their indifference. 
However, he was slightly remorseful of his decision for a different reason, when he asked Y/N if he could borrow it from her, she had squealed in excitement, telling him her ‘top tips’ for completing a jigsaw for at least ten minutes. He guesses her passion and love for the shitty quarantine past time, overrode her awkward feelings towards their situation. If he was honest, Harry didn’t give a fuck about “making sure to find the corners first!” but he didn’t want to hurt her feelings, so he nodded along and pretended to listen. 
But Harry had really come to regret his decision when he hadn’t found a piece in over an hour. He was frustrated and the stifling temperature Sarah insisted on keeping the house at, wasn’t helping. He had completed a small section at the top right corner, five or six pieces on the left, and a few random bits he had stuck together and somehow happened to get correct. He was slightly embarrassed when Y/N returned from her walk, to find him with his head in his hands, looking more than sorry for himself. Her tinkling laughter doesn’t make him feel any better, either. 
“Having trouble H?” 
He looks up to her standing in the doorway, attempting to plaster his award-winning grin upon his face, “if I’d known it was this hard I never would have asked if I could do it.” She grins back, and walks over to the table, looking down at the pieces with a concentrated focus. “Hm I never said it was going to be easy, thought my tips would help, but I guess not.” 
Harry tries yet another piece that doesn’t fit with the ones surrounding it, and sighs, “if the puzzle master wants to help, that would be lovely,” he lilts. She picks up the segment Harry had just dropped and places into the correct position on the opposite side of the puzzle that Harry had placed it in. “You’re flattering me now.” She hesitates for a tick, “lucky for you, I like it.” 
Harry loved this new dynamic between them, it was light and teasing, something he hadn’t had with her before. He’s not going to lie and say that he didn’t slightly enjoy the biting exchanges they had previously shared, but this flirty air between them was exciting.  
“I’ll keep that in mind pet. Now, what were those tips again?” 
It’s safe to say Harry was impressed with Y/N’s skill, he had never thought puzzles were that difficult until he actually tried to complete one. Y/N however, was fast, seemed to pick up pieces and instantly be able to connect to where they should go, and quickly finished at least ninety percent of the puzzle. Harry fit the odd part in place, which Y/N praised each time, with a small cheer and a “well done!” each time. Finally, the puzzle was almost complete with only one gap in the picture of golden retriever puppies climbing on one another. 
Y/N looks at Harry and hands him the last puzzle piece, “you should put the last bit in.” Harry can’t explain the warm glow that emits from his heart, he doesn’t know why it makes him so happy. She was kind and considerate, and Harry wasn’t used to people always putting him first, usually being doubtful of anyone he hadn’t known for a while, worried about what their true intentions were. “You sure? You did most of it.” She giggles, “nah, we did it together!” Harry takes the bit of cardboard from her and places it in the last empty spot. 
He looks up at Y/N who’s grinning at him stupidly, and he can’t help but smile back. It’s then that Harry starts to really look at Y/N. He notices the dusting of freckles on the top of her nose, her eyes laced with pride and happiness and her lips, the bottom one stuck between her two front teeth, but both looking so soft and sweet. Y/N must catch Harry staring at her lips because she releases the supple flesh from between her bite. 
“Did you have fun?” She whispers. 
Harry tries to reply, but his voice dies in his throat. All he can manage is a small nod, his gaze dropping back to Y/N’s mouth. He lifts his hand to her face, tucking a piece of her hair behind her ear, and she leans into the touch slightly. Unknowingly, they had gotten even closer, and Harry can feel her small puffs of air against his lips, could brush them against hers if he leaned an inch forward. 
“Harry, what do you want to do for dinner?” Mitch yells from the room one over, scaring both Y/N and Harry, who instantly pull away from each other. Harry coughs, “um, I don’t know man.” 
Mitch walks into the room, Sarah in tow, who sees the completed puzzle on the table and runs over, “you finally did it Y/N!” Harry looks over to the girl in question. Her cheeks a cherry red as she looks over to Harry, “uh yeah, Harry and I did it together.” Sarah looks between them, with an impish look on her face mixed with slight disbelief, “oh, that’s… nice.” 
Harry’s attention is drawn away from Y/N when Mitch pipes up again, “I was thinking tacos, so we could make frozen margaritas for game night.” Harry is grateful for the change in topic, knowing Sarah was more than likely to make a comment that Harry was not ready to address. Particularly if Y/N had indeed continued the conversation she had planned to have with Sarah a few days ago when she’d walked in on Harry in the shower. 
“You know I’m always down for a margarita.” 
—— 
Y/N was slightly buzzed. She hated feeling entirely out of control when she drank, and she’d found the perfect point between dead sober and sloppy. She felt a warm feeling in her fingertips and toes, felt slightly light-headed and was just a tad obnoxiously giggly. The group had been playing monopoly, and while Y/N usually hated the game, she was thoroughly enjoying it tonight. 
Sarah had been helping Y/N, so she wasn’t so lost in terms of properties and the differences between houses and hotels. Jeff was as quiet as usual, but somehow had a secret talent for swindling properties and hoard money. Mitch had prioritised his margarita over the game, buying random properties when he felt like it, and fucking up everyone else’s plans of winning. And Harry had made it his mission to beat Y/N. If he was honest, he just loved seeing her pout every time he would buy whatever spaces were left of the colours she was aiming for, or teasing her every time she got a smaller roll than him. 
As Harry bought another green property that Y/N was gunning for, she realised she was nursing an empty glass. “Does anyone want another margarita?” Agreements come from all around the table, so Y/N gets up, grabbing a few empty glasses. As she stands, she feels the blood rush to her head, a slight dizziness tingling through her body, and she giggles as she stumbles towards the kitchen. 
Harry and Mitch had made the previous rounds, Y/N watching the first couple be made. Which meant she probably should remember the ingredients, but if she’s honest, the copious amount of alcohol running through her bloodstream has caused a lapse in her memory. Was she supposed to put one or two cups of ice in? Y/N curses herself and her shitty memory under her breath, realising she will definitely need help. She was clearly too tipsy to think coherently. 
“Oi, how much tequila do I put in? And is it Cointreau or triple sec? And how much ice do I use” She yells into the adjacent room, sighing slightly, hoping someone would come and help her. And she can’t explain her excitement when Harry rounds the corner, maybe because the pressure of making the drinks had been lifted, but more likely because it was simply him. He comes in with a smiling face, his hair slightly messed and his eyes filled with the misty happiness of someone who is perfectly buzzed. 
Y/N couldn’t quite describe the shiver that travels down her spine or the tension she feels in her stomach, all she knows is in the last few days, the intense feeling had begun to grow stronger whenever Harry was around. There was something about him, the way he carried himself, the shy smirks he’d give her, or the gentle touches he’d provide as he walked passed her. 
In every touch, every look and every feeling she got from Harry, Y/N could sense the tension growing stronger. She was amazed the rest of the group hadn’t picked up on it, other than Sarah of course, who was watching from the sidelines, waiting for one of them to crack. 
“What’s the problem bunny?” His eyes soft as he walks over to a defeated Y/N. He watches as her eyes crinkled slightly as she giggles despite herself, “I wanted to make everyone drinks, but I realised I don’t actually know how to.” She sheepishly watches Harry’s face mirror her own with a small grin, “well that just won’t do, will it? Sit on the counter n’ I’ll show you again.” 
She jumps on the kitchen bench, the surface cold against her otherwise alcohol flushed skin. She watches Harry gather the ingredients from around the kitchen, noticing the way his back strains against the white and yellow t-shirt he was wearing, the arch of his back clear and his shoulders strong and broad.
Over the past week or so, Y/N had started to see the funny and charming personality that the rest of the household had previously been privy to. His witty and sweet persona had shone through, and it had done nothing to curb the intense sexual feelings she felt towards him, instead they were only growing, especially with each pet name that his puffy pink lips shaped around. 
Harry begins to place the ingredients in the blender, and Y/N is confident he’s giving her instructions as he does so, but she is just so distracted by his strong fingers adorned by his shiny rings, each one a different shape and size. “Are y’listening?” 
She snaps her eyes back to his face, to see one side of his pretty mouth tugging upwards, suggesting he already knew the answer to his own question. “What are you lookin’ at my hands for?” She feels the warmth rush to the apples of her cheeks, sheepishly replying, “I was just looking at your rings, they’re very pretty.” 
He smiles and jokingly holds his hand up to her face, wiggling his fingers. Y/N chuckles and grabs his pointer finger, pulling it towards her to get a better look. She holds his hand while looking at the silver band wrapped around his digit, eyeing the small red ruby shining brightly in the centre of it, “like this one,” she whispers. He matches her volume, stepping closer in order to hear her, “it was my mums, she gave it to me after my first concert sold out. Her mum gave it to her after she got married.” She runs her finger over it gently, noticing the worn edges, and tries to imagine the many stories it had experienced in the hands of three generations. “It’s beautiful.” 
This felt like a moment for both of them. Obviously, Harry and Y/N had experienced many conversations and experiences before, but none quite like this. Harry feels the warmth from her body radiating into his, can feel the sweat from her hands as she holds his own. He can hear her calm breathing, the slow rise and fall of her chest. Of course, Harry had felt lust before, but he doesn’t think he’s ever wanted to kiss someone as badly as he does right now.
He can’t explain how desperately he wants to inch forward, hold her pretty face in his hands and press his lips against hers. Instead, he makes do, moving closer to her and feeling a bloom of happiness in his chest when she opens her legs for him to stand between with no hesitation. 
She smiles, his hand still nestled into hers, although her focus had moved far beyond his rings. It now laid solely on his face and the way he was looking at her. He rests his free hand on the counter beside her, close enough that she could feel the outside of his thumb brushing against her upper leg. 
Harry bites his tongue, he wants to say ‘so are you,’ but even he knows that’s cheesy. Plus he doesn’t want to overstep any boundaries, he knows Y/N is attracted to him but is also fully aware that doesn’t equal consent. He settles for lightly brushing his thumb against her leg and watches as a shiver racks through her body. With a slight giggle, she grabs his other hand, that’s causing the mildly uncomfortable sensation, with her free one, “that tickles.” 
And Harry’s not a mind reader, but now they’re just holding hands, plain and simple. He doesn’t know if she feels the same heat and tension settling between their lips, but the way she leans in slightly, tilting her head to the left gives him an indication she does. It’s subtle, and if Harry hadn’t been sitting between her legs praying she’d do exactly that, he might not have picked up on it. But he does. 
He leans in too, leaving a slight gap between them. Y/N can feel the tiny puffs of air, leaving Harry’s mouth and drawing into hers and can feel the little tufts of hair tickling her forehead. 
She brushes her lips against his gently, testing the waters. He feels as soft and warm against her as she’d imagined. Y/N retracts slightly, unsure if she had overstepped a boundary. The only reaction she could read was a sharp inhale on his part, and she was worried that it wasn’t a positive sign. 
But she couldn’t have been more wrong. 
He lifts his hand from hers and places it against her neck, his hands big enough to tuck his thumb under her jaw, while still using the rest of his fingers to gently push her back against him.
She tasted so much better than he would’ve thought, sour from the margaritas with an underlying sweetness that he couldn’t put his finger on. Harry can barely hold in his groan when her tongue slides against his lower lip, and he gladly opens up further. He feels her whimper against his thumb before he hears it, the rumbling sending vibrations up his arm, leading him to feel dizzy. 
He feels Y/N rest her hands against his shoulders, sliding them over his neck and resting her forearms behind his head. She leans further into the kiss, somehow opening her legs further, her hips slightly bucking towards his own in a silent plea for friction. Harry doesn’t hesitate to give it to her, pressing himself against her and instantly feeling the effect of his actions. She runs one hand through the curls sitting at the back of his head, tugging gently and pushing her own hips back with as much vigour as he had.
That is until the click of heeled boots is heard echoing against the kitchen tiles. 
The speed at which Harry jumps away from his position between Y/N’s legs is comical, and she almost wishes she could see it from an outsiders perspective. However, not as much as she wishes Harry’s lips were back on her own. 
Y/N looks between the boy she had been kissing with his hair messy and fluffy, and the apparent growing bulge in his pants to the shocked Mitch standing in the entrance of the kitchen. His mouth hangs open comically, and his hands hang loosely by his sides. 
The silence is too much for both Harry and Y/N to bear and looking at Y/N’s face, now bright red, and brimming with embarrassment and stress Harry feels it’s his responsibility to put her slightly at ease. “Mitch… um look-” 
“What the fuck is going on here?” Harry doesn’t even get the chance to finish his sentence before Mitch is interrupting. Harry pipes up again, “it’s nothing!” Y/N can feel her brows turning downwards and the corner of her lips curling in annoyance. She knows Harry is more than likely trying to cover their asses, but Mitch had seen them kissing, and it didn’t make Harry downplaying everything hurt any less. 
Harry sees her face and quickly tries to backtrack, “well I mean not nothing… it’s something!” 
“No shit it’s something! How long have you guys been fucking for?” This time Y/N is the first to speak up, “we are not fucking! We haven’t even-“ she starts, completely flustered, her face somehow becoming even redder, “we just kissed!” Mitch bursts out laughing, as Y/N and Harry stay completely still, both absolutely mortified. 
“Alright mate, fuck off,” Harry grumbles, praying that Mitch would just leave the uncomfortable situation alone. And he does, still laughing as he finds his way back to the living room. Y/N has no doubt that he would go straight to Sarah and Jeff to share what he’d just seen. Harry turns to 
Y/N and while he tries to maintain a serious face for her sake, he can’t help but let out a small chuckle. 
It wasn’t the first time Mitch had walked in on him during a ‘private’ moment, some a lot worse than what he’d just witnessed. But Harry doubts any would be more shocking than the kiss Mitch had just seen. According to him, Y/N and Harry were at most on civil terms. So to see them, in a more than compromising position must have been a considerable shock to the system. 
“Why are you laughing, you ass?” While Y/N’s words are anything but kind, her face gives away her true feelings, a small grin peeking through. She wasn’t too concerned, Sarah already knew the current situation Harry and Y/N had found themselves in, as well as Y/N’s feelings on it. She was probably waiting for this very scenario to occur.
However, she was worried about where Harry and her would go from here. 
She knew he was attracted to her, he wouldn’t have kissed her otherwise. Y/N couldn’t help but think that maybe Harry had done it in the moment, and didn’t feel that same attraction all the time. What if he saw her leaning in and was pitying her? Y/N was terrified that now that Mitch knew, Harry would be too embarrassed to kiss her again. 
But Y/N’s worry is immediately put to hold when Harry grabs her hand again, “you’ve got to admit it’s funny.” He rubs his thumb against her knuckles, hoping to soothe any worry still running through her veins, “are you okay though?” Y/N smiles and squeezes his hand, “yeh, more than.” 
Harry leans in slowly, making sure that even though Y/N had claimed she was fine, that she would still be okay with him kissing her again. She doesn’t move away, instead moves closer and he smiles and presses a soft kiss against her lips. 
“We should probably get back out there,” he mumbles against her plush lips. She nods in response, squeezing his hand once more before jumping off the counter. “I’ll see you in the living room.” 
—— 
Harry didn’t regret kissing Y/N, not by a long shot. What he did regret, however, is two things. The first was agreeing to continue drinking with Mitch after everyone else had gone to sleep, and the second, kissing Y/N while intoxicated. 
He had enjoyed it, he knew that much. But he’s fully aware that he may not have gotten the chance to absorb every detail of the moment. He couldn’t forget the feeling of her lips against his or the way she bucked up against him. However, he is struggling to recall the way her hips felt under his fingertips, or whether or not he could smell the strawberry scented shampoo she used, that previously, he had only caught gusts of. 
Harry needs to know, when they kissed, did her eyebrows furrow the same way they do when she bites into a warm jam donut? Or when he slotted his hips against hers, did her mouth hang open, eyes shut tightly like when Sarah dug into the knots in her back? Did she make the same sounds Harry had already heard? Or were there some privy only to moments of privacy like the one her and Harry shared? He didn’t think to notice if the skin on her cheeks was as soft as it looked, or even if her hands held onto him as firmly as they had grasped onto the chair, the night Harry had first gotten so close to Y/N. 
Harry couldn’t help but feel like he’d somehow hiked up mountainous terrain, dodged every jagged edge Y/N initially threw at him, stumbled through open conversations and insinuations. Felt he had somehow navigated overwhelming selfishness and every mixed feeling, to finally reach the top and for some stupid reason just close his eyes. He was only just able to smell the mountainside air and feel the rocky surface but was utterly blind to the magnificent sight in front of him. 
Harry was also worried that Y/N was too intoxicated to know what she was doing. Harry was big on consent, always had been, and he knew the chances of drunk him doing something Y/N wasn’t okay with was very unlikely, but what if? What if for some reason he couldn’t read the body language of the girl he had spent months admiring? Or what if she had said something of opposition and he hadn’t heard her? 
Harry was stressed, and the pounding headache beating through his head was definitely not helping. 
He knew the only way to make sure what happened last night was okay and enjoyable for both parties, was simply asking Y/N. So after going to the bathroom, splashing some cold water on his face and changing into some sweatpants, Harry makes the trek downstairs. 
He’s met with an interesting site. Mitch is sitting at the kitchen counter, head in his hands and shaking his head. Jeff is doing dishes and looks to be purposely clanging noisy dishes in front of Mitch and then laughing at each flinch racking from the man's body. While Y/N is standing at the stove, cooking something that Harry can’t decipher, in her cloud pyjama pants and a sweatshirt that looks suspiciously like his.
If Harry listens intently enough, he can hear her humming under her breath, a soft tune that lifts all the features of Harry’s handsome face upwards. 
Harry starts by walking over to Mitch, placing his hands on both of his shoulders and squeezing lightly, “c’mon Jeff, lay off the poor guy!” Jeff only laughs in response jokingly swatting at Mitch's head, still buried within his hands. 
At the joking tone within the kitchen, and the fact that Jeff had not immediately berated Harry about his relationship with Y/N, Harry realised Mitch had decided not to tell the rest of the house. Or at least not Jeff. Harry couldn’t have been more thankful for Mitch's undying loyalty and bizarre talent of somehow knowing exactly what Harry wanted or needed. With Y/N’s relaxed manner, he assumed she had come to the same conclusion.  
At the sound of Harry’s voice, Y/N whips around, her face lighting up at the sight of the man she had kissed not 12 hours ago. And the look of delight and need on Y/N’s face works wonders to calm Harry’s nerves, while Y/N’s were skyrocketing. He looked as handsome as ever with sleep still gracing his features, his chestnut hair in a mess on top of his head and eyes slightly puffy and red. In all honesty, Y/N couldn’t get over how it felt to kiss him, and while it had happened, she couldn’t help but feel thirteen again, with a crush on the cute boy in class. 
It was like he knew exactly what she was thinking, his tongue darting out from between his lips, leaving them wet and glistening in the early morning sun. And Y/N just can’t seem to draw her attention away from them, can’t stop the image of him pressed against her replaying over and over in her mind.
Maybe it was the way her eyes drooped slightly, her nostrils flaring ever so subtly, but Y/N gets the feeling that he knows exactly what she’s thinking, his left eye dropping in a wink that leaves Y/N’s tummy fluttering. 
“Mornin’ love.” His voice is hoarse and deep with residue drowsiness, and it does nothing to ease Y/N’s churning stomach. She coughs lightly before replying, “morning H.” Her voice is uncharacteristically quiet and manner docile, as she tries to hide the less than appropriate thoughts running through her head. 
He walks over to the stove, leaving Jeff and Mitch behind in the presence of someone far more interesting. “Smells good, what are you cookin’?” 
Y/N giggles, the sound unnecessarily loud and she cringes at herself before replying, “um, pancakes. Made some more just in case you guys wanted some.” In truth, Y/N knew Mitch didn’t like pancakes, Sarah wasn’t even awake yet, and Jeff had just started a very strict ‘no sugar’ diet, and so those extra pancakes were specifically for Harry after she had heard his sink running upstairs. And well, Harry knew all of that too. He feels a certain spaciousness in his chest one can only attribute to gratitude, and it makes him want to draw her close to him and kiss her cheek in thanks. 
Instead, Harry grabs her small hand in his and squeezes it lightly, before walking over to the fridge to get the maple syrup. “What’d you want on yours, babe? Nutella?” 
Y/N smiles and nods her head, giddy with the tingling feeling travelling through her hands and the prospect of spending more time with Harry. 
—— 
The day had been quiet. Y/N felt as if she had been wading through water all afternoon, sluggish and slow but somehow using more energy than walking on land required. The whole house felt slow-moving, most of its inhabitants spending the day in front of the TV, reading books or napping. And so it made sense for their daily activity to be a movie night. 
The housemates had decided a Disney marathon would be a perfect end to a hungover day, and with Jeff’s only condition being that they watched ‘Bambi’, everyone was in agreeance. 
Y/N had offered to organise the snacks and drinks while everyone else brought down pillows and blankets from upstairs, the room looking cozier then she had seen it in the past few months, and at the centre of it, Harry.
In the same position, he had been in the night they had sat watching cartoons in the early morning together, only to fall asleep and wake up in each other’s arms. It felt like so long ago now, but Y/N knows in reality, not that much time had passed. She found herself feeling thankful for how their relationship had evolved, and the effect a little time had given them. 
It was funny how far they had come. Y/N was so worried Harry had hated her after that, she now wonders if he’d always felt some type of draw towards her, or if he really had hated her as much as he made out. She briefly wonders if he’s thinking the same thing as she is, as he looks at her questioningly, standing in the doorway of the living room, unmoving. 
Y/N smiles lightly, and begins to move towards the couch, realising that there were three blankets in total, one being used by Mitch and Sarah, seemingly very close underneath the cover, one thrown over Jeff and the other sitting across Harry’s legs. She hesitates for a moment, the obvious choice being Harry, but she isn’t sure where their relationship stood, and more importantly, how much the rest of the housemates knew about it. 
Harry quickly provides a solution, “y’can just share my blanket if you want pet.” Y/N’s tummy flips, but the blank stare she gives him as she runs through all the repercussions (good and bad) coming from her doing that, comes off more as confusion. Did he forget that Jeff didn’t know about the kiss? 
Harry sits uncomfortably in the silence. “Or not, whatever you want.” Silence again, and with each passing second, Harry’s facial expression becomes more and more exasperated. 
Mitch is smirking, giving Harry a knowing glance. Sarah is looking at Mitch confused, obviously trying to figure out her boyfriend's cryptic facial expression. Jeff was the most bewildered of all, clearly completely lost. 
“Fine, fuckin’ forget it. Y’can share a blanket with Jeff ‘Mcvomit’ Aezzof. Or maybe you can jack Mitch off under the blanket with Sarah, and all of us will pretend we don’t know. How bout that hm?” Harry knows he’s being slightly unfair to all those just mentioned. 
A month ago, during a game night, Jeff had consumed slightly too much alcohol and subsequently vomited all over the living room carpet and Harry’s rainbow Gucci boots. Safe to say, Harry was not impressed and hadn’t let Jeff forget it either. 
He also knows he’s being unfair to Sarah and Mitch, although, he’s not exactly wrong. Harry had no proof anything was happening under Sarah’s unicorn blanket but they always sat suspiciously close, and some strange movements had definitely been observed during movie nights, particularly when the crew had binged ‘50 Shades of Grey.’
No one had mentioned it to each other, until one night, Y/N had tried to subtly ask Jeff and Harry if they had noticed too. The two boys immediately agreed, admitting they both had their own suspicions. However, this was the first time anyone had brought it up with the couple in question. 
He’s instantly met with outcry from both Sarah and Mitch.
“Oh for fucks sake H.” 
“You’re so crude.” 
“We do not do that.” 
Jeff also looks unamused, mumbling under his breath, although the shouts from the couple drown his reply out, “you have too much to drink one time, and no one lets you forget it.” 
But Y/N, in true Y/N style laughs, and all of a sudden Harry doesn’t feel nearly as bad for his accusations or his teasing of Jeff. “Alright bug, alright. You made your point, scoot over.” 
Y/N settles under the blanket with Harry, tucking her legs underneath her, trying to maintain a healthy distance from him. She hadn’t really been so consciously close to Harry before, only ever being asleep, drunk or… busy. Y/N noticed his signature scent was present, a warm cedarwood cologne that somehow made her nostrils tickle and insides feel slightly warmer, like a shot of whiskey travelling down her throat and spreading through her tummy. 
Maybe it was the man the smell lingered to that made her feel so comfortable and warm, or perhaps it was the blanket and heat radiating from him, but either way, Y/N loved it. She revelled in the comfort and feeling of safety that she didn’t often bask in, and it was Harry of all people who made her feel like this. 
She briefly wonders what this movie night would entail. She was happy they were already close to each other, stealing glances. Each bout of eye contact bringing a tingle through her spine, a shiver wracking through her shoulders when she noticed him glancing at her with his signature smirk and bright look. 
She was aware that they were slowly moving closer to each other with each passing second of the film playing in front of them. When she had initially sat down next to Harry, she could feel the warmth radiating from him, but now she could feel his side pressed against her, and his leg slightly crossed over hers.
If she’s honest, she was much more focused on the handsome individual sitting next to her than on the movie anyway, and consequently, she missed the first twenty minutes. 
What she cannot miss, however, is Harry’s hand coming to rest gently on her thigh. His palm flat against the plush flesh and his nails lightly scratching at the skin lying over it. 
She looks over at him, his strong jaw and cheekbone highlighted by the dim light of the TV screen, his nose slightly pointed at the end and his long eyelashes fluttering against his skin. She watches as his pink lips tug upwards, bringing a smirk and deep dimple to his handsome face. With that smile, she realises he knows she’s looking at him, and probably knows the effect his touch is having on her. The only acknowledgement she receives is a small squeeze of her thigh. 
She can’t help but scoff, his lax attitude directly opposed her own, if she was honest, she often felt on a different plane than him. Y/N tried to deny it, but she could be highly strung. When she was in a situation where she felt comfortable and safe, she was easygoing, a delight to get along with, and was often confused as someone who was undoubtedly more affable than she really was. 
It was one of the first days of year ten at school when Y/N had experienced her first panic attack. She can still remember the way her hands shook like healthy green leaves in a summer storm, could never forget the tightness in her chest, the closing feeling of her throat, and the tears that blinded her. While the panic attacks had become less frequent as she aged, the underlying symptoms that bubbled into the panic she experienced still tended to rear their ugly heads. 
Harry, on the other hand, seemed endlessly relaxed. While Y/N had initially only seen a more uptight and priggish side of him, it was almost like he enjoyed those negative interactions between them, for the sole reason that he could skillfully get under Y/N’s skin, watch her squirm and burn red. Any other time she witnessed Harry he was almost always equanimous and the voice of reason in the odd little group that found themselves quarantining together. 
He was so comfortable, seemingly so unaffected by her, while she felt his presence made her head spin and heart race. 
He leans closer to her, his curls tickling her collarbone, “are you watchin’ the film?” 
She nods, the action sending a wave of her perfume to invade his nose, the smell somehow so addicting and familiar to Harry now. “Yeh, the sad part is coming soon, though.” 
It’s his turn to scoff, “don’t tell me you’re gonna cry on me.” 
Y/N looks up at him, watching as his bunny-like front teeth capture his bottom lip, “and what if I do, hm?” 
Harry’s first thought is to say he’d get her some tissues and embrace her until the tears seeped into her sullen soaked skin, but he knows that’s even too corny for him. Instead, he looks around the room to find everyone too focused on the movie to pay attention to them, and chuckles lightly, kissing the top of her cheekbone. “Might cry with you love. Poor Bambi, never knew what was comin’.” 
While Y/N looks around the room, she quickly relaxes as she realises no one was paying enough attention to notice Harry’s affectionate action. She stifles a laugh, “we’re in this together then, aren’t we?” 
Harry can’t help but feel like she’s not just referring to a sad Disney movie, but instead the situation they had found themselves in. It was confusing, both of them not entirely over their exes, but both seemingly enamoured with the other, something that felt like it had happened overnight. 
He didn’t know if she felt the same way he did. He simultaneously wanted to fuck the shit out of her and cuddle with her on the couch, for god's sake he wanted to comfort her when she was crying over fucking ‘Bambi.’ Harry was confused. 
He hasn’t felt like this about anyone since Elle, and while Y/N hadn’t spoken about her ex with Harry directly, he had overheard a few snippets of conversation between Sarah and herself. 
Before Y/N had come to stay with the group, Sarah had briefly explained the situation, the fact she had put all her effort into a three-year relationship that had ended brutally, with the asshole showing no remorse towards Y/N or her feelings. Harry didn’t want to push her or himself, but he felt a draw towards her that he couldn’t ignore. 
The way she placed her hand gently on top of his, still laying on her thigh, and tangled their fingers together made his heart swell, and it was at that moment he decided he didn’t care about Elle. For the first time since they broke up, Harry didn’t wish the person he was with was his cheery faced ex-girlfriend. He wanted Y/N, and he hoped with all his heart, she wanted him too. 
He looked over at her, her soft skin and red cheeks glowing gently from the light of the TV screen. 
Harry’s feelings are only confirmed, when he hears the gunshot sounding through the room from the movie, hears a small sniffle coming from the girl next to him, and feels her fingers tightening around his own. Harry knows that somehow, through everything, he wanted Y/N to be there next to him at the end of it. 
—— 
Harry sat stewing in his feelings as the night progressed, each member of the house slowly abandoning the marathon, opting for the warmth of their beds instead. 
If he was honest, Harry was exhausted, but he couldn’t bear to leave Y/N alone. She had waited patiently through everyone else’s choices, sung along with Sarah through ‘The Little Mermaid.’ She had gushed with Mitch over the fantastic visuals in ‘Hercules’ and watched carefully for Harry’s reactions to ‘The Beauty and the Beast,’ squeezing his hand when the last petal fell, and Belle professed her love for the Beast. 
Harry didn’t think it was fair that everyone had chosen bed over watching Y/N’s movie, over singing along to ‘Tangled’ with her. Chosen to sleep instead of talking about how good the animation was and squeezing her hand every time Flynn and Rapunzel were close to kissing. 
So Harry does the best he can. He listens to how excited she gets through the fighting scenes, does his best to sing along to songs he’d never heard before, and listens to her speak about how mean she thought Mother Gothel was. Each scene, he watches her eyes widen in comical child-like glee, and her cheeks flush as she laughs at Harry’s impersonation of Flynn Rider. 
It’s as Mother Gothel is falling out of the window that Harry realises Y/N’s grip on his hand has loosened and that she is resting against his shoulder, asleep. He smiles, bringing his knuckle to brush against her cheek, gently waking her up. As she slightly startles, he kisses her nose, “y’ fell asleep bug.” 
She looks surprised, immediately looking to the screen, “oh shoot. Missed my favourite part too.” Harry can’t help but kiss the small pout that graced her lips as she realises this, which she quickly returns. Harry’s lips tingle as she hums in contentment, causing them to pull apart slightly, Harry touching his lips and giggling. 
It was all so domestic and sweet, a kiss leading to nothing in particular, and Harry loved it. Revelled in the idea of kissing Y/N for the pure pleasure of feeling her soft lips against his own, and for nothing else. As Y/N speaks her lips brush against his, still flush against each other, “we should get to bed.” 
As they both make their way upstairs, hand in hand, they dawdle as if to stall their inevitable parting, and as Y/N prepares to speak their goodbye into existence Harry decides he doesn’t want this night to end. Didn’t want to part from the warmth Y/N provided, to lose the feeling of her face pressed against him or the way her hand felt nestled in his. So Harry does the one thing he can think of, something he may come to regret later, 
“Do you want t’ sleep in my bed tonight? You don’ have to if you don’t want to, of course.” 
Harry observes Y/N’s face, and he feels as if he goes through the same range of emotions as she does. First surprise, then apprehension, her head tilting as she thinks through her decision.
Harry thinks maybe she’s misinterpreting his intentions. Don’t get him wrong, he would jump at the chance to have sex with someone as lovely as her, but he really just wasn’t ready to leave her. Wanted to feel her asleep in his arms, hear the small snores he’s sure she would make and brush her hair away from her face when it looked to be tickling her in the middle of the night. 
“No funny business dove, I promise.” 
Finally, a small smirk graces the young girl's face, her top teeth hooking into her lower lip, a little giggle erupting from her mouth while she nods her head. 
Harry’s face subconsciously matches Y/N’s, a replica giggle floating through his mouth and into the air between them, “yeh?” 
She nods once again, “yeh.” Harry feels nothing but relief, a giddy bubbling feeling erupting from his chest, rushing through to his fingertips. He almost believes she feels the exact same burst of emotion when she squeezes his hand as he pulls her into his bedroom. 
It smells the same as the last time she was in his room, except this time, there was a sense of certainty in the air. While Y/N had previously tiptoed into his private space, terrified of crossing a line both physically and metaphorically, she no longer felt that same apprehension.
She entered the room with confident footsteps, aware that they had already entered a territory in which they would struggle to backtrack from. Aware that Harry would more than likely revel in the fact she was in a space he considered sacred, rather than feel uneasy.
She was correct in her assumption. He watches the way she looks perfectly placed in a room he previously hated anyone else entering, her energy already matching his own, but somehow adding an exuberant light into a space that, before her, had represented his despondency. 
Harry begins getting ready for bed, takes off his pants and shirt, left in only boxers. As the cotton of his top slides over his mass of curls, he catches Y/N staring, her mouth slightly parted, pupils dilated and cheeks pink. 
The cocky boy smirks slightly, his eyebrows furrowing in confusion ever so subtly, and a gust of wind passing through his nose as a form of laughter. “Would you prefer me to keep my pants on babe?” 
His cheeky tone works to bring Y/N from her stupor. She stumbles over her words, clearly embarrassed Harry had caught her ogling at his body, again. “Uh.. no, no whatever’s comfortable, I guess. Do you want to keep your pants on? You can, of course, I just…” 
“Teasing Y/N,” his smirk grows into a grin, his dimple flashing her once again, “I’m only teasing.” She visibly relaxes, her shoulders returning to the normal position, and her eyes closed, trying to shake the remaining embarrassment from her system. 
“You are the worst.” 
He only laughs, “and you take yourself too seriously. Now, do you want a shirt to sleep in?” 
While Y/N might usually be offended by him saying something like that, she knows he’s not wrong. In fact, he’s entirely correct. He just knew exactly how to wind her up, what buttons to push to make a flush rise to her cheeks and for her sentences to become stuttered. 
“That would be nice, thank you.” 
Harry only nods, walking over to the dresser in the corner and rummaging through, pulling out a white shirt with the phrase “enjoy health, eat your honey” on the front. He holds it up in front of his body, waiting for Y/N’s approval, which he quickly receives, throwing it over to her in response. 
She looks at him expectantly, waiting for him to give her the courtesy of changing in private. “Do y’ mind, you lecher?” 
He startles, “oh uh sorry.” Y/N watches as a blush spreads from his cheeks to his neck, a clear sign of his humiliation, and he quickly turns around. 
She changes, giving a soft cough when it’s safe for him to turn around. Harry can hardly believe his eyes, he knew she was beautiful, but fucking hell, it was like an angel had been sent to him from heaven. 
Her legs were soft, and Harry wanted nothing more than to trail kisses up her thighs, past the dotting of stretch marks, patches of missed hair, and the hem of the shirt that sat loosely against her. He could see her nipples poking through the fabric, firm, surrounded by supple flesh, that Harry had trouble to stop imagining. Her face was soft, a pleasant but embarrassed smile pulling along half her face, smoothed by the leftover makeup she hadn’t bothered to remove. 
She was fucking beautiful. 
“Stop looking at me like that you…” 
“Lecher. I know. It’s hard not to be when you look like that.” Her cheeks turn an even darker shade of crimson, and her eyebrows draw up in surprise. Harry didn’t know at what, she was his very own wet dream, and he had trouble imagining that she didn’t know that. 
Unsure of what to say she patters towards the bed, lifting the covers and lying beneath them, facing the side he usually slept on, waiting for Harry to lay in her line of sight. He does, his cheek getting gently squished against the silk pillow, his hair billowing out from his head, creating an unruly mess around his face. 
“I don’t…” she sighs, clearly struggling to string together whatever was going through her mind. Harry grabs the hand laying between them, and gives it a gentle squeeze of encouragement. He had been vulnerable in front of her weeks before they had even shown interest in each other, and he wanted to give her the same comfortable space to talk through what she was feeling. 
She lets out another breath and continues, “I like when you call me beautiful. I just don’t know how to respond, I’m not all that used to it.” She snorts despite herself, “isn’t that sad?” While she’s laughing, Harry can see the sadness set behind her eyes, and so he doesn’t laugh. Only squeezes her hand once more and replies as steadily as he can, “it’s not sad. I understand.” 
Her laugh turns more genuine, “oh so even the Greek god gets self-conscious? Thank god for that.” He quickly matches her jesting tone, “for sure, need to be humbled somehow.” He pulls her closer and rests his head in the crook of her neck, listening as the giggles she emits, vibrate through her body, and he can’t help but smile too. 
He was happy and at peace. And for the first time in a long time, both he and Y/N slept through the night, relief and giddiness seeping through their pores. 
——
Harry awoke in a daze. His arm was numb, his head slightly dizzy and body just a tad too hot. Then he sees Y/N asleep in front of him, head resting on his bicep, hair a mess, and her hand resting on his, placed on the pillow in front of her face, and all of a sudden none of it mattered.
She was beautiful. It makes Harry wonder about the last time they’d woken up together. He remembers feeling scared, denying any comfort he had found within her in his arms, and he wonders if his subconscious had always known she was right for him. 
They seemed to fit together so seamlessly, for a couple who couldn’t stand the sight of each other months prior. 
Harry uses his free hand to sweep her hair away from her neck, leaving a space for him to press his lips against. Her skin was warm, slightly tacky from sweat, and he breathed her in, dragging his nose up and down the nape of her neck. 
He hears her begin to wake, repositioning her legs under the covers and her breath beginning to quicken from the lull of sleep. A small hum of contentment leaves her lips as she feels Harry’s mouth kissing on her skin. 
“Mornin’ sunshine,” he whispers, his breath tickling her. She lets out a laugh, her voice heavy with drowsiness, “morning H.” 
The hand that was already resting loosely in his tightens as she loops their fingers together, “how’d you sleep?” 
He squeezes back, “better than I have in months. What ‘bout you?” 
She leans further back into him and exhales, “so good.” Harry hears the relief in her voice, and he feels it too. Was this all it took to stop his own self wallowing? Being pressed against her? It was like she brought her own kind of calmness to his unstable mind, and while he knew she would disagree with him in saying it, she was a source of purity, a way for him to feel carefree. 
He wanted to tell her, but something was stopping him. What if she wasn’t quite as committed to whatever they were as he was? Harry had never been good with his feelings, preferring to write his emotions into his music. Fuck, sometimes even selling his songs to others to avoid the message coming from his own mouth directly. 
But as Y/N turns around, her mouth inches from his, her eyes wide and doe-like, Harry thinks he’d never be able to live with himself if he didn’t tell her how he felt. The words creep up his throat, and he tastes them on his tongue, sweet and rich. “I... I really like you. I’m not sure how you feel about everything. I just know I haven’t felt like this since… well for a while, and that’s kind of scary.” 
Harry closes his eyes, not wanting to see Y/N laugh in his face, as well as hear it. Instead, he feels a soft hand on the side of his face, her thumb gently brushing against his temple, and then softly against his eyelid, coming to rest just below it. “Open your eyes, dummy.” 
He flutters his eyes open, met with Y/N’s gaze, revering and sweet, “I like you too, Harry. Thought I made it pretty obvious.” While Harry loved Y/N calling him ‘H,’ the slow drawl of ‘Harry’ made a shiver roll up his spine.  
He can hardly contain the smile that slips upon his mouth, leaning up slightly and kissing the thumb resting against his skin. Harry feels his heart beat a little harder in his chest, the relief freeing the worry from his lungs, his muscles finally relaxing, no longer having to uphold the weight of stress upon them. 
If he was candid, Harry had never had to fight for anyone’s affection before. As narcissistic as it sounded, people usually gravitated towards him, whether for the right or wrong intentions. But Y/N had stood her ground, immediately unimpressed by his blase and borderline rude attitude and had reverberated his energy right back at him. If Harry was honest, at first he hated that about her, but it had come to represent her honesty. It made the affection she showed him now that much more special. 
Harry felt as if he had earnt her respect and affection, because he deserved it, not the ‘Harry Styles’ found in the tabloids. He had found someone who made him feel like a real person, and a good one at that, someone who deserved the love she so readily gave him. Harry was lucky enough to be lying next to that someone. 
“You’re right… you did drool over me in the shower. Remember that?” And just like that, the moment of vulnerability is over. 
Y/N lightly slaps Harry’s arm and lets out a disgruntled sound, “aish, you really are a lecher.” He laughs and grabs the hand that just hit him, bringing it back up to his face and kisses her palm gently. He looks back at her face, all traces of aggravation wiped from it like cheap lipstick, replaced with contentment instead. She slips her hand back to the side of his neck, her fingertips trailing through the baby hairs laying against his skin and kisses him. Her lips feel slightly chapped but still so warm, and Harry let’s out a relieved exhale. 
He couldn’t explain why, but this kiss felt different from any other he’d experienced with Y/N, hell any other he’d shared with anyone. It had all the intensity and lust of their kiss in the kitchen, added with a sense of emotion that Harry couldn’t quite place. Each press of her mouth, each swipe of her tongue or gentle nibble of his lower lip felt like she was desperately trying to convey every feeling Harry previously doubted existed. 
Harry remembers the night of their first kiss, recalls thinking he had never felt lust like that before, never wanted to kiss someone so badly, but now laying in this bed with Y/N running her hand through his hair and her hips lightly bucking towards him, Harry feels as if he’s surpassed the way he had felt then. 
He feels pure unadulterated need flowing through his veins, can’t even begin to explain how much he wanted Y/N. She turned to fully face him, tangling their feet together and pressing herself further into the kiss. Harry wishes he could give her more, wants to bring every drop of pleasure to her he possibly could, wants to touch and kiss each part of her. It felt as if a spark had lit within his body, beginning at his chest, travelling all the way through to his fingertips, and straight to his groin. 
Harry brings his thigh between her legs, and she takes advantage of it instantly, rubbing against him. He groans as he feels her warmth pressed against his leg, and he can tell she is suppressing her moans of pleasure as she pushes down harder with each gyration of her hips. 
“Tha’s it baby, get what you need.” 
At this, she leans her head back, a mewl erupting from her throat. Harry kisses down her exposed neck, sucking and nipping a love bite into the skin below him. Bringing his hands to her waist lightly, he helps to guide her in grinding against the thick muscle of his leg. 
She grabs one of his hands grappling at her hip and brings it to her chest, where he feels her hard nipple poking through the thin material of her top. He squeezes and pinches gently, hearing her breath hitch directly in his ear, bringing goosebumps to the skin along his arms, her hands grabbing his broad shoulders and neck. 
With his other hand, he slowly slips his thumb past the hem of her sweatpants, running it along the soft skin there. The tickling sensation completely contradicts the harsh action of her hips rubbing against him, causing a shiver to trickle down her spine. Y/N whines into his ear so quietly, Harry wonders if he actually heard her at all. “Please.” 
“What do you need, hm? Tell me.” 
A bated breath parts her lips, “fuck…anything.” She knows it’s not enough, knows Harry wants to hear exactly what she wants from him, but she’s embarrassed. Isn’t quite used to anyone asking her what she wanted and needed, and Harry’s filthy tongue only brings her more unnecessary shame. 
“C’mon Y/N, use your words. I’ll give you whatever you want, just use your word’s for me.” 
Her hands dig into his shoulders, “fingers, please!”
He kisses her temple and murmurs a quick, “good girl,” before dipping his hand completely into the front of her pants, still only teasing along the line of her underwear. 
Y/N’s not sure how much she can take. Every move, every touch is goading and light, clearly trying to provoke her, and as much as she loves it, she needs relief. She grabs at his arm that is currently so close to the place she needs him to be and tries to force it closer to her, harder against her, anything other than what he’s doing now. “Harry… c’mon, please,” she all but cries. 
He chuckles before slipping into her underwear, feeling her wet heat against his fingertips, she was already dripping for him before he’d even touched her. He presses her clit gently while he kisses against her neck, flicking his tongue against the ghost of the hickey he had given her earlier, the pain mixing so deliciously with the pleasure. 
While he had stopped his teasing touches, it didn’t stop him from using his teasing words. 
“This the first time you’ve gotten so wet for me, pet?” She furrows her eyebrows, shaking her head side to side, attempting to hide her face into his neck. He feigns surprise, “no? Filthy girl. Ever touched yourself thinking about me?” She whines, picking up on his teasing, further burrowing her face away from him, trying to hide the very obvious flush that had risen to her cheeks. 
He laughs, nudging her head with his nose, trying to encourage her to show her face again. She mewls once more, the only indication she heard him was the bucking of her hips against his fingers, now inside of her and stroking against her g-spot. 
“Next time, just ask for my help instead,” he murmurs into her ear, biting at her earlobe. She hisses, attempting to press against him even harder, get even closer to him, although it was almost impossible, being pressed flush against each other with his fingers knuckle deep in her cunt. 
He licks against her jaw, feeling the strong bone under the tender flesh, the warmth of his breath blowing against the damp skin of her neck causes her to shiver, “can I taste you?” Y/N doesn’t think she’s ever nodded her head harder, her eyes rolling back into her head, merely thinking about Harry tonguing the sensitive skin between her legs. 
He continues to kiss down her neck, taking extra time to lick against the dip in her collarbones, revelling in the tangy taste of sweat invading his mouth. He sucks her nipples through her shirt, the material clearly wet and spit-soaked once he pulls away, the air surrounding them, making the outline of her areola obvious. 
He presses a few chaste kisses against the swell of her tummy, finally reaching where she needed him most. He slowly pulls her pants down her legs, trailing the hem with pecks against each inch of newly exposed skin. Grabbing each ankle, he pulls the cuffing over her feet, playfully biting at the bone on her ankle, causing a shriek and a giggle to erupt from her and a playful press against his cheek, imitating a kick to his jaw. 
He laughs, batting her foot away from his face. “Oi don’t damage the money-maker!” 
 Y/N bursts out laughing, shaking her head. He was an idiot, but she loved that they can switch between moods so quickly. While she’s still laughing, he’s pushing her legs apart, his hand nearly fitting over the whole surface of her inner thigh. “C’mon love, spread your legs fo’ me.” 
And with that, Y/N stops laughing. 
While continuing to push against her leg, he presses an open mouth kiss against the front of her underwear, already able to taste the heady flavour. Harry can’t help but let out a deep groan, every nerve ending set alight at his mouth finally around her cunt. The tip of Y/N’s tongue tingles with a beg for him to take off her underwear, but Harry acts on his own accord, almost ripping the garment off in his haste. 
If Harry thought the taste of her was mouthwatering through the cotton, the taste of her without it was even better. 
He had meant to tease her, he really had, but he can’t help but lick straight into her weeping hole, moaning at the taste and the smooth feeling of her smeared against his mouth. Spreading her lips with his pointer and ring finger, Harry continues to explore, flicking his tongue against the swollen bud underneath her pubic bone, causing a loud moan to erupt from her mouth. 
“Holy fuck Harry! Feels so good.” 
Harry tucks two of his fingers into her while sucking at her clit, Y/N tugging at his curls harshly in response. 
It feels so good, but Y/N needs more. The feeling of Harry’s fingers is making her skin tingle, and her legs shake, but she wants nothing more than to be stretched out by him. She wants him to give her everything, push into her slowly, stretch her pussy, and finally feel his cum spurting into her. 
So she pulls him up, one hand still intertwined in his hair and the other on his shoulder, scratching and pulling as a hint to bring his mouth to hers. At first, he’s hesitant, grumbling slightly in annoyance, not wanting to part from her, “Harry please, want to kiss you.” 
He gives her one more harsh suck, before sliding back up her body, where Y/N is waiting with her mouth open and her eyes on him. Harry smirks, slipping the two fingers that had just been inside of her against her tongue, feeling more blood rushing between his legs at the feeling of her licking and sucking them as if it were his cock. 
She bites gently, causing a hiss to escape from his mouth as he drags them back out slowly, quickly replacing his fingers with his lips, licking into her mouth.
The tangy taste of her own cum slips past her tastebuds again, and Y/N had never been one to find it hot, but with the salty flavour transferring from Harry’s fingers and tongue, she’d never been more attracted to her own taste. 
Y/N desperately wants to mix his cum with hers, wants to swallow around his cock and feel the intoxicating mixture slide down her throat, “I wanna taste you now.” 
He breathes through his nose heavily and shakes his head, “just want to feel you. ‘M not gonna last long if you suck me off as well.” Y/N whines, but by the longing look Harry gives her pouting lips, it seems he’s not entirely content with his decision either. 
He reaches over her shoulder, digging into the set of drawers next to the bed, giving Y/N the perfect view of his broad chest, littered with tattoos. He looks so tan, his muscles rippling under the smooth skin, and she wants nothing more than to litter it with love bites and scratches. She teasingly licks at his nipple, and he startles, an uncharacteristic giggle leaving his lips as he comes back to lie in front of her, in his hand a condom. 
Suddenly his eyes clear, the lust caused fog fading, “you still okay with this? We don’t have to do anything you don’t want to.” 
Her heart swells, how was it possible that this Adonis-like man was also so sweet? There was nothing she wanted more than to be with Harry in every way and right now, she needed him inside of her, “yes Harry. Do you?” 
He scoffs some, “fuck yes,” he mumbles his next statement as he tucks his head under her jaw, putting the condom on at the same time, “feel like my dicks gonna fall off, I’m that hard.” 
She laughs, wrapping her arms around him, she’d never felt so happy and complete, so overwhelmed. Every positive emotion was combining within her, creating a whirlwind of passion and love, causing each feeling to increase tenfold. 
The head of Harry’s cock slips through her folds, sending a zap of pleasure through her each time it nudges her clit, and he smirks each time she twitches, unconsciously arching up towards him. “Y’ ready?” 
She nods, moving her hips closer, making her own attempt to be filled by him. 
Slowly, Harry enters her, each inch causing the delicious burn from him stretching her walls increasing. Y/N almost chokes on her own moans, can hardly stand how good he feels or the way her muscles spasm attempting to adjust to the intrusion. It feels as if each ridge and curve was being simulated, each nerve ending firing again and making her head feel dizzy. 
Harry almost looks like he’s in pain with his eyes shut so tightly, Y/N can see the wrinkles surrounding them. His mouth is parted with sharp breaths entering and leaving his mouth, his head hung back, and his jawline sharp enough to cut glass. 
“Holy fuck. You feel so fucking good.” 
At the sound of his voice, Y/N clenches, making Harry cry out. “Move H. Fuck me, please.” 
He begins slowly, pulling out before slamming back into her, reaching so far Y/N can feel him in her tummy. 
He intertwines their fingers and holds them against the pillow her head rests on. She squeezes them, and he leans his forehead against hers, the tender action contradicting the harsh snaps of his hips. “How do you feel so good?” He whimpers. She nudges his chin with her nose, pushing his lips closer to hers, each thrust smearing them closer together. 
“You’re so good to me H,” she whispers back as she wraps one of her hands behind his head, his neck in the crook of her elbow. Using leverage from her other hand against the bed, she pushes her hips upwards, creating double the amount of friction between them. The actions causing both of them to cry out, Harry seeming to be pushed impossibly further inside of her, the head of him nudging against her cervix. 
“Fuck that’s it. Look at you, usin’ me to get yourself off.”
While the new angle felt so good, it was quickly tiring. Harry could see Y/N fatiguing after a few minutes, knowing the burn in her legs would be almost unbearable at this point. So he tucks his arms under her outstretched ones, laying his torso against hers and tucking his head into her neck, kissing lightly as he completely slows down his movements. He stops the whine that leaves her throat with a quick, “shh, it’s okay. Just wanna take my time with you, never want this to end.” 
While running her hand through his curls and holding the back of his neck closer to her chest, she replies, “me either baby.” 
They spend some time like this, just enjoying each other’s company and the feel of being so close to one another. Y/N breathes deeply, the smell of sex in the room mixing with Harry’s cologne, making her relax and let out a contented sigh. She had never felt more full and so satisfied, with a hint of an orgasm sparking between her hip bones, the dull ember just waiting to be fully ignited by his movements. 
As if sensing this, he speeds up once again. The burn that stretches through her legs as Harry pulls them over his shoulders, mixes with the pleasure of his thrusts, the head of his cock nudging her g-spot with each deep drive of his hips. 
Y/N cries out, grabbing at his shoulders, her nails unintentionally digging into the skin, creating small red crescents along the tense muscles connecting his neck to his scapula. 
He just feels so good. Every movement of his hips, each inhale and exhale, each brush of their lips and dig of his fingers brings Y/N even closer to her orgasm. She can’t tell if Harry plans each of these things with her pleasure in regard or if it’s the chemistry between them that’s causing every sensation to be felt tenfold. All she knows is that she would happily lie under Harry for the rest of her life if it meant she always felt this weightless. 
Harry’s balls make a sharp ‘thwack’ against her ass each time he thrusts, the sound of her arousal echoing through the room, in such a crude fashion, Y/N almost has time to feel embarrassed. On the other hand, Harry revels in the sound, loves the fact he can see, hear, touch every part of her arousal, surrounding them in their own cocoon of sex and pleasure. 
“C’mon Y/N, please. Cum on my cock.” While Y/N had already been feeling the building pressure of her impending orgasm, Harry’s words only work to bring it faster. “Please Y/N,” she bucks up against him, chasing the feeling of his pubic bone rubbing against her already sensitive clit. “Good girl. Fuck, you’re my good fucking girl, aren’t you?” She whines a response, the noise high pitched and hoarse. Harry sees Y/N’s desperate search for her finish, and brings two fingers down, rubbing at her clit. 
“Fuck, yes, Harry!” Y/N can’t describe how overwhelmed she is with pleasure and feeling. Her face feels flushed and sticky with sweat, her legs are slightly cramped from her constant strain to get closer to Harry and his cock buried in her cunt, and when Harry brings one of his ring adorned hands to wrap comfortably around her neck, suddenly Y/N feels weightless. She feels the burst of pleasure from between her legs, a zip running up her spine, leaving her limbs with a tingle. 
Harry hears her cum before he sees it, the moans dripping from her mouth, her eyes widening before she’s squeezing them tightly together. Harry knew he would play that exact moment on replay for the rest of his fucking life. 
He watches as she brings her hand up to his that’s still spread around her neck, and Harry almost can’t stand it when he feels her squeezing it tighter, begging for Harry to give her more. If he wasn’t so close to cumming, Harry might’ve teased her, loosened his grip on purpose to watch her squirm and whine, whisper in her ear how hot it was to see how desperate she was for Harry to simply touch her, alas he’s too close. Can barely form a coherent thought, let alone tease her. So instead he appeases her, tightens his grips and begins to pound into her harder, searching for his own release.
Finally, it comes, Harry releasing a deep groan, grabbing onto the pillow next to her head, letting out a deep moan. Both of them can feel each rope of cum, as Y/N’s own orgasm works to milk each drop from him. 
His movements slowly come to a stop, leaving him tucked inside of her as his length softens. Wrapping his arms around her once again, he revels in the warmth and comfort she brings, his lips pressing against hers gently. “Fuckin’ hell.” 
Y/N giggles and nods in agreement. How had they spent so long fighting when this was the result of them getting along. She still feels Harry shifting above her, the aftershocks of her orgasm, creating an increase in sensitivity, each movement from the handsome boy above her sending a jolt through her whole body. 
“Fuck you’re still squeezin’ me pet.” She hugs into him tighter as yet another twitch is brought from his prick still buried deep within her, “mhm, still sensitive but you feel so good.” 
He kisses her soft temple, “lucky for you, in about fifteen minutes, we can go again.” Y/N scoffs, her head leaving the crook of his neck to give him a dirty look only to be met with his deep smirk. His famous dimples indented next to his smile, as he giggles and brushes his nose against the swell of her cheek. 
“You really are…” his giggle is joined by her own. 
“A lecher,” they finish together. 
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discopig · 3 years
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That other girl (Thomas Shelby x Reader) [Part 1/3]
This is lowkey inspired by Sevdaliza’s song “That other girl” so give it a listen, she’s really underrated. As a member of the Grace love-hate relationship club, and an angst lover, I’m going to enjoy writing this. I might give it a fluffy ending but we’ll see! This isn’t set in any specific season because I honestly enjoy kinda ignoring the original plotline of the show... whoops! This is a short intro chapter
When Grace Burgess moves to Birmingham, she’s automatically the star of the show, her gracious face and innocence capturing the hearts of those who lay their eyes on her, but you don’t buy it. Her sudden appearance and posh aura setting your intuition off, a perk you’d gained from being around Polly so much. At first you try to ignore her presence, but when your boyfriend, and long time friend - Thomas Shelby, takes a keen liking to Grace, could you ever win against that other girl? Word Count: 978
Part 2 | Part 3
It was your regular evening at the Garrison, hundreds of drunk men piled up in the bar, the sounds of laughter and yelling penetrating your eardrums. You had been working at the Garrison for over 9 years, first accepting the job as a way to make some cash as you were only 18 when you ran away from your family, and the position happened to be vacant. You never intended to stay, the fumes of the factories and dark alleys in Birmingham being a stark contrast to the posh greenery and lavish villas you grew up with, however life doesn’t always work out the way you plan.
You were now 27 and if you were being honest - you hadn’t realized just how quickly the time had flown by... Well, when you know the Shelby family, it’s almost impossible for time to not fly by. You had gotten to know the Shelby family when Harry made you deliver 6 bottles of whiskey to their offices, a task you were afraid to take on, seeing as you were no stranger to the rumours about the Shelby family, and being new to Birmingham the last thing you wanted was trouble with the gangsters who have the city in the palm of their hands.
You had worn your plain brown cotton dress - the best item you could afford with the money you received from your job, and began your journey to the betting shop, trudging along the streets of Birmingham with the box of whiskey bottles. From that day on, Harry allowed you to serve the Shelby’s and you quickly got close to all of them, but one of them had completely stolen your heart - Tommy.
You’d never expected to fall for him, until you found yourself enamored by every word he’d say during family meetings, and lay in bed at night remembering every slight glance, or acknowledgement he’d given you. It was a stupid crush, and Tommy was quite a bit older than you and most likely saw you as nothing but a silly young girl, but when he started coming to the Garrison alone, eliciting your company to rant about his issues, or joke with you about how stupid Arthur was, he found himself falling in love with you too, your untouched innocence drastically standing out from the tainted souls of Birmingham, the way your eyes crinkled up when you’d smile, your London accent peeking through when you’d talk too quickly or how a cigarette looked almost like an expensive piece of jewelry between your fingers. So your love blossomed, and you became Thomas Shelby’s girl.
You had just delivered a bucket of beer to a table in the corner of the Garrison and were heading back to the bar, when all of a sudden you found yourself laying on the floor, the pain from your ankle hissing through your body
“Oh for fucks sake!” you exclaimed. Harry rushed over after seeing your condition - him having become an almost father like figure to you over the years.
“Are you alright Y/N?” he asked, concern beaming from his eyes
“I think I’ve sprained my bloody ankle or somethin’, it hurts like ‘ell”
Harry shook his head and offered to pick you up, you reached out to him and he took you to a taxi outside the Garrison
“Clyde, you’re gonna have to carry her up to her apartment” he said to the young taxi driver, who simply nodded in response
“You don’t need to come in, make sure you get your ankle fixed alright? Call a doctor or somethin’” 
“I will Harry, don’t worry ‘bout me, I’ll be back before you know it” you smiled at him, always being able to maintain your high spirits.
It had been two weeks since you’d been to work, your ankle was now in fairly good condition, however you still needed to be careful. Tommy had visited you almost every day, despite him being obviously tired, John had also visited a lot, always cracking jokes and making your tiny apartment smell like expensive cigars.
You’re wearing a green apron-style cotton dress with a white cardigan and some white flats - heels no longer a possible choice for the time being - your hair pinned back in a low bun, with a few loose strands at the front. You aren’t going into work today, you’re simply going to visit as you miss Harry and the bustle of the bar.
The bar isn’t as busy as usual as it’s only 2 PM. When you walk in you find Harry behind the bar, polishing some of the shot glasses, he beams when he sees you
“Y/N! I see your ankle is doing better”
“It is Harry, sadly I can’t work yet or Dr. Prew will kill me, but I’m just happy to leave my apartment for once! How have things been without me? Hope you’re not suffering too much eh?”
“Oh no no, thinks have been quite smooth with the new barmaid” he replied
“New barmaid?” you questioned
“Yeah, her name is Grace. Didn’t Tommy mention her? He’s been here almost everyday, she usually serves them and tends the bar”
“No... he never mentioned a new barmaid. Well, I’m happy you’ve had help while I’ve been gone, hopefully I’ll get to meet said Grace soon” 
You tried to sound enthusiastic, but not only were the thoughts of reasons as to why Tommy would refrain from telling you about your new colleague plaguing your mind, you also weren’t too happy about having to share the bar with someone else aside from Harry. You had gotten used to it and felt as though she might ruin your flow, and take away your usual tips.
Your deep thought is suddenly interrupted by the sound of the Garrison door slamming shut
“I’m back with the new glasses” A female voice exclaimed. You turned to the direction of the voice and felt your spirit bury itself six feet underground
Shit chapter but oh well... It’s 2 AM and I’m exhausted ❤
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lucreziaq2001 · 5 months
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•TV show: "Criminal minds".
•Content warnings: A woman losing her father suddenly because of a heart attack, mentions of her and her dad not having a good relationship, a boy standing one of his acquaintances up, that acquaintance seeing it as him disappointing her, the boy's parents not approving of him being friends with one of his schoolmates because of the girl's behavior, a man refusing to reveal something important that knows until one of his friends' father is alive, but doing it after the man's death.
•I made up the fact that JJ's father's name was Frank. His name was never said in the actual show so I just chose one that sounded good with his last name in my opinion.
•Sorry if Diana Reid seems out of character, but it was more normal for people of that time to have the mentality I gave her and we don't know if she was liberal or conservative or what she believed in.
•Tags: @lex13cm, @golden1u5t, @avis-writeshq, @chrrysgirl, @hugyourlungs, @achillmango, @marie-sworld, @iluvreid, @babygirl-garcia, @rynwritesreid, @strangermoonlove.
The bridge to Heaven
Chapter 9: Spencer Reid
The only thing Elle ended up telling David that day was that Spencer had stood her up to go do something with Emily that afternoon, she didn't know what.
When she went to his house, she found out from Spencer's mother that he had gone out and apparently wouldn't have been back for a few hours.
He didn't want to spend time with her, that seemed obvious to Elle.
He preferred to be with a girl his parents didn't approve of him being friends with.
"That Emily behaves strangely, especially when she's with her friend Jennifer. I don't know what Spencer sees in her" Diana Reid had told her, and those words had never left Elle's memory.
She had no idea what Spencer's mother meant by "Emily behaves strangely when she is with Jennifer," and she would have never asked that to Spencer.
He had decided to disappoint her that day, so she wouldn't have asked him anything else.
She would have gotten along just fine without him.
According to David, however, that situation was more important than how Elle considered it, so he decided to look into it more.
He obviously didn't know what had happened that day, so he decided to ask Spencer some questions too.
The man, however, almost completely refused to speak.
He answered a couple of questions, but when David came to ask him about the day he stood up to Elle, Spencer immediately shut down.
The only thing he said, more than once, was "I can't say that. I'm sorry, but I absolutely can't talk about it".
So, finally, Dave let him go.
He couldn't force him to tell him anything, after all, and in the end, he only had to be patient about it for a few days.
That's because on June 18, in the late afternoon, Jennifer called David saying that she needed a break from her investigations into Emily's case.
"My father died this morning. He had a heart attack. I'm sorry, but I need a couple of weeks just for myself. If you need to, you can still contact me" she explained to him and as a response, Dave simply offered her his condolences and told her not to worry.
Apparently Jennifer and Frank, her father, had never had a good relationship, but they were still dad and daughter and since he knew how it felt to lose a parent, he could understand that woman and the pain she was experiencing well.
That same evening, however, it was Spencer who called David to tell him that he was finally ready to talk, so three days later, the two men met once more, again in Long Island, at Dave's house.
"Frank Jareau is dead now and it was him, or rather, the fact that he was still alive, the only thing that prevented me from talking about what I saw on October 30, 1963 and also on many other days before and after that. Especially in the evening of November 2" Spencer explained practically as soon as he and David sat down in the living room of the writer's house.
"I get it, Spencer, but now that you can speak freely, I need to find out everything that happened those days" Dave replied, looking Spencer right in the eye "Every detail, every secret. Can you help me?".
Spencer took a deep breath, his mind flashing back to the fateful November evening that had changed his and a few other people's lives forever.
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