a-sweeter-sin

[a-sweeter-sin]

Liar, Liar

-George Clarke x Reader

Brother’s best friend type of thing….

They used to call her “little liar.”

She could still hear it in George’s voice, sharp, smug, always louder when her brother was around. They were two years older, and she was too girlish, sensitive. Every holiday gathering, every family camping trip or neighbour’s garden do, she’d be lingering nearby, desperate to be included. George would look to her, eyes gleaming with mischief, and say something like:

“Oi, isn’t it past your bedtime?”

Or worse: “You’re not coming, this is proper stuff, not games for little girls.”

She was six when they convinced her to hide inside the wardrobe during a game of hide and seek, they then left her there for nearly an hour. She came out all tear-streaked and shaking, only to find the boys had ditched her to watch telly, totally unfazed, unaware.

She was seven the first time they locked her out of the treehouse. Her brother’s voice had laughed through the planks “go away, no babies allowed!” But it was George who stuck his head out of the hatch and poured the last of his juice all over her hair. She ran inside crying to the parents, this was how she earned the name ‘little liar’ as both boys claimed she was lying.

She was nine when they nicked her diary and read it aloud along the seating on the patio, her brother howling with laughter, George mocking every innocent line like it was the funniest thing he’d ever read.

And yet, somehow, she always waited for George to arrive.

He was loud, sarcastic, messy, and mean, but he was magnetic. There was something about him that made her stomach fizz, gave her butterflies, even when she hated him. Especially when she hated him. She listened out for the knock at the door, or clack of the football boots on the wood of the hallway floor.

~

By the time she was sixteen, the teasing had shifted.

Subtler now. Crueller in its own way.

He’d ruffle her hair when she walked past, even when it was curled or styled. He’d comment on her clothes, “You off to a wedding or something?” When she was trying out a new dress, or “That shade of lipstick’s a bit…. mad, right?” when she was already feeling self-conscious.

She told herself that she didn’t care, that he wasn’t special. She told herself George was just her brother’s mate.

She told herself that again the day he walked past her outside the common room, plucked a book from under her arm and started reading the most embarrassing paragraph aloud.

It was from a romance novel of her friends, she’d only just started it, his eyebrows were raised and his voice dripped with mockery:

“Her lips trembled as his hands smoothed over her waist, drifting lower, touching her in ways she’d never been touched before.” - “Bloody hell, didn’t know they stocked this at the library,” he’d laughed.

Most of her friends had giggled, half in shock, half in fear of saying the wrong thing.

She stood frozen, face burning, cheeks aflame, barely managing to whisper: “Give it back.”

“Relax,” he’d said, tossing it back at her like it was no big deal. “Didn’t peg you as the steamy sort.”

That night, she cried in the bath

But worse, worse than the humiliation, was the blunt ache that followed. Because even then, even when he made her feel pathetic, her stomach still flipped every time he said her name.

~

She saw him once at a house party in the summer holidays. She wasn’t supposed to be there, her brother had warned her not to come, but she turned up anyway, heart hammering in her chest, face all done up with her mate’s glittery eye shadow, skirt much too short.

George saw her straight away. Walked over to her with that lazy grin.

“Didn’t know they let little girls in.” he’d said, taking a swig of some cheap beer.

“Didn’t know you were the doorman,” she snapped

But this only made him laugh.

He smirked, his eyes flicking down to her legs. “You always dress like that for attention?”

She wanted to slap him. She wanted to kiss him.

Why did he have to make her feel so small.

Instead, she rolled her eyes and walked off. But her hands were shaking the rest of the night.

~

School had started back up again when things shifted again.

There were whispers going around the boys in her year, crude, disgusting things said in locker rooms and in stairwells. She heard her name thrown around like it meant nothing. Some guy in the year above, she barely knew told his mate she was “easy,” loud enough for her to hear.

She didn’t tell anyone. Just went quiet. Took longer routes between classes. Avoided eye contact during form.

Then, out of nowhere, she saw George waiting in the courtyard after school.

She was just coming out of history, when she spotted him leaning against the gate, arms crossed, face set, stern.

“What are you doing?” She asked, her stomach lurching.

He didn’t answer right away, jaw ticking. Just brushed passed her and muttered under his breath, “Sorted it.”

Later that night, she’d hear whispers from a friend, one of the boys had shown up with a bloodied nose and refused to say who’d given it to him.

She never asked George for details.

He never offered.

That was the first time she thought: Maybe he doesn’t hate me after all.

But nothing changed. Not really.

He still turned up at her house and called her “kiddo.” Still sat on the sofa, feet on the coffee table, joking with her brother like nothing in the world could rattle him. Still teased her, still acted like her feelings were nothing but background noise.

~

University didn’t help.

She saw less of him, but the few times they crossed paths, Christmas, birthdays, summer barbecues, it was always the same. A comment here. A smirk there. Lingering glances she wasn’t sure whether she imagined.

She remembered one birthday, her own, her nineteenth. George had turned up late, already a bit tipsy, wearing a stupid party hat someone had forced on him. He’d handed her a birthday card that just said “Don’t get emotional.” He only gave a lazed smile as she looked at him in confusion.

Then he’d whispered as he passed, “Nineteen. Bloody hell. Proper grown-up now, aren’t you?”

And the worst part? Her heart had leapt. Just from that.

~

The night it all came to a head was a sticky July evening. A friend of her brother’s, someone they both vaguely knew, was throwing a party in their back garden. One of those informal summer things, with fairy lights, sickly mixers, cheap beer. She wore a little lilac dress, and a glittery lipgloss that made her feel, confident, braver, even.

She’d laughed too loudly. Drank too quickly. Kept catching George’s eyes across the fire pit.

She should’ve ignored him. Should’ve stayed away.

But when her brother passed out, and she needed a lift home, George offered.

And she let him.

They didn’t speak much during the drive. The music was low and soft. The window was down.

And somewhere halfway home, she said it.

“I used to like you, you know.”

He glanced at her. Said nothing.

“I used to really like you.”

A pause. A beat. Then: “You’re still a kid.”

She didn’t say anything after that.

Just gave him a nod, turned her face to the window, tried to stop the tears from welling up in her eyes.

When he pulled up outside her place, she climbed out without a word.

And this time around, he was the one watching her walk away.

~

Four months passed

She met someone. Luke. He was sweet. He showed up at the right time, just when she’d stopped looking for fireworks and started craving some form of warmth. He texted her first. Made it on time. Held her hand in public like he was proud of her.

He didn’t make her heart race, or her stomach fill with butterflies. But he made her feel steady.

She blocked George’s number. Unfollowed him on every platform. Erased him from her life the best she could.

And still… her brother would say, “He’s been asking about you.”

She didn’t respond.

She didn’t care.

Or at least, she pretended she didn’t.

~

Then came a family function. Her cousin’s engagement party. Flower arrangements, lanterns strung up around the patio. Tables decked with finger food, and champagne loosing its bubbles.

And of course.

George.

He was wearing a short sleeved button up with jeans, a pint held in his hand, grinning like he hadn’t wrecked her with a few careless words.

“You look different,” he said when he spotted her.

“Grown-up.”

She gave him a tight lipped smile. “It’s only been a few months…”

He laughed under his breath, nodding. “I ‘spose so.”

Luke appeared at her side, as if on cue, wrapping an arm around her waist. The tension snapped into focus,

“This him then?” George asked, jaw clenched.

“Yeah, this is Luke,” she said coldly. “My boyfriend.”

Luke shook his hand politely, clueless to the undercurrent.

George’s jaw ticked, eyebrows slightly furrowed.

“Nice to meet you,” Luke said, smiling.

“Yeah, you too,” George responded, voice flat.

She turned away without another word. Luke followed.

~

Later that same evening, after the speeches and half-drunk toasts, she went to go find her coat.

She found George instead.

Standing in the hallway by the stairs, arms folded across his chest, watching her.

“You’re still mad,” He said.

“You’re still cocky,” She snapped.

He took a step closer. “You cut me off.”

“You deserved it.”

“I was trying to do the right thing,” he said, voice lower now. “Didn’t think you actually wanted someone like me.”

She rolled her eyes, laughing bitter. “That’s rich, coming from the guy who used to leave me stuck in closets for hours.”

“I was a knob. I know that.”

“You still are,” she huffed.

His eyes met hers, intense, everything felt quiet. “I miss you.”

She hated the way her chest ached at that.

“Don’t,” she whispered. “Don’t do this.”

“Tell me you don’t think about me.”

“I don’t,” her voice cracked.

He stepped in, his voice a low rasp. “Liar.”

And then he kissed her.

All harsh and bruising.

And the worst part?

She kissed him back.

Until she didn’t.

Until she pushed at his chest, breaking away, heart racing, breath caught in her throat.

“I have a boyfriend.” Her voice wavered.

“I know.”

“Then what the hell are you doing?”

He didn’t answer.

She left.

~

Guilt consumed her, so much so, she broke up with Luke within the same week.

They were sitting in his car outside her house. It was raining, light and soft, tapping against the windscreen like the sky was trying to fill the silence between them.

Luke was saying something about his weekend, something normal, something safe, but she just couldn’t listen. Couldn’t even meet his eyes.

She stared at the condensation forming on the window and said, quietly, “I’m sorry.”

He stopped mid-sentence. “What?”

“I’m sorry, Luke. It’s just... I don’t think this is going to work.”

He blinked at her, confused. “Where’s this coming from?”

“I don’t know,” she lied. “I’ve just been feeling it for a while.”

His jaw tensed, he breathed out hard. “Yeah…. Right.”

He didn’t ask her for reasons, he had an idea, but didn’t even want to ask. He nodded, the way kind people do when they feel they need to protect their dignity.

“Okay,” he said slowly. “I hope he’s worth it.”

She didn’t answer. She felt ashamed, the guilt piling up so high it lodged itself in her throat.

George hadn’t called, hadn’t even messaged. Nothing.

And that should’ve told her everything she needed to know.

~

The next week felt quiet. The evenings felt drawn-out, longer. The ache in her chest grew strange and dauntingly familiar, like an old bruise blooming beneath the surface.

She knew it was wrong, but she missed the steady feeling Luke provided. The simplicity of being loved without question, no strings, complications.

But even more than that, she hated herself for the way she thought about George. The kiss replayed in her mind at any given moment, when brushing her teeth, walking home from work, folding her laundry. It wasn’t even the kiss itself, it was his voice. The look in his eyes. The way he’d said, “I miss you,” like he meant it.

And yet, he hadn’t done anything since.

She refused to be the one to chase him.

She’d spent years doing that in silence. That was well over now.

So, she got on with it, life in general.

Went to work. Messaged her friends. Drank wine in the bath and watched comfort shows she was paying half her attention to.

~

Two weeks later, her friends dragged her out.

“Wear something hot,” they’d said. “No moping about tonight.”

She wore a black lace dress and lipgloss that caught the light. Laughed too loudly at pre-drinks, let someone style her hair in some half-up do, and let herself feel good for the first time in ages.

They ended up at a rooftop bar, somewhere with edge, with fairy lights and loud music, packed full of people pretending they weren’t looking for someone to watch them, want them.

She was halfway through her second dirty martini when she saw him.

George.

Not just George. George with someone else.

She froze in her place.

He was leaning against the bar, pint in hand, head tilted slightly as he spoke to her. Her. A tall, leggy brunette with shiny dark hair and a posh laugh that floated above the music. She was the kind of girl who looked like she modelled for Zara and drank tequila straight. She was everything she wasn’t.

And George was smiling. Ear to ear at that.

Not in that cocky, teasing way he used to with her.

No. This was different.

Soft. Relaxed. Flirtatious.

And then, he looked up.

Their eyes met across the room. The crowd vanished. The noise dulled.

He just stared.

Didn’t smile. Didn’t wave. Didn’t say a word.

Just stared.

And for a moment, she forgot how to breathe.

Her friend tugged at her sleeve. “You alright?”

Her throat felt all tight, but she nodded. “Yeah, fine.”

But she wasn’t. Not even close.

Because she realised something right then,

She’d spent years wondering if George would ever want her the way she wanted him.

Then spent weeks wondering if she’d made the right decision.

And now, finally, she knew:

She was nothing more than a ghost in his rear-view mirror.

She turned away before he could look any longer.

Finished her drink in one go.

She saw it as she was leaving.

The flicker in his eyes.

Her stomach dropped as she rushed down the hall.

~

She turned away before she could cry. Before she could throw a drink or do something stupid like ask why. Why he kissed her. Why he said he missed her. Why he looked at her like she was everything one moment,

and like she was nothing in the next.

She took the lift down alone, pressing the button with shaky hands, her chest tight, heart throbbing somewhere in her throat. She hit the pavement outside and breathed in the cool night air like it might steady her.

It didn’t.

She was halfway down the street, heels clacking against wet concrete, when she heard him.

“Oi,”

Her spine tensed.

She didn’t stop.

“Hey, wait. Just stop.”

She didn’t.

Then a hand caught at her forearm, not rough, just enough to make her turn back.

George.

His curls were windswept, his cheeks flushed from drinking or running or both. He looked at her as if she’d just bolted from a burning building.

His eyebrows furrowed, he crowded into her, towering. “What’s wrong?” he asked, like it was a genuine question.

She laughed, a hollow, breathless sound that didn’t quite reach her eyes.

“You’re joking.”

“What?”

She yanked her arm free from his grip. “Don’t do that. Don’t play dumb with me.”

“I’m not-”

“You always do this,” her voice was biting, louder than she meant for it to be. “Every time something actually matters, you suddenly forget how to speak like a real human.”

George blinked, clearly thrown. “I don’t know what you mean…”

“She looked perfect, by the way,” she cut him off. “That girl. She looked perfect. Tall. Posh. Shiny hair for days. Probably doesn’t have a single embarrassing story to her name.”

He didn’t say anything.

“And you just stood there. Like nothing ever happened between us. Like you didn’t kiss me. Like you didn’t look me in the eye and tell me you missed me.”

His mouth parted slightly. “That was…different.”

“No, no George. It was cruel.”

There was a beat of silence.

She stepped back from him. “I broke up with someone who actually wanted me. Someone who treated me like I mattered. And for what? For some version of you that only exists when we’re alone and you’re bored or drunk or nostalgic?”

“I didn’t mean to hurt you,” he muttered.

“Yet somehow you always do!” She snapped. "You’ve been hurting me since I was seven years old. Since you poured juice all over my head and told me I was too childish to play with you. Since you read my diary, making a joke out of how I felt. Since you ruffled my hair like it was nothing when I put so much effort in just to be noticed.”

His face fell slightly, a flicker of guilt slipping through.

“You kissed me,” she whispered, voice wavering. “And then you disappeared. Again. Like I was something embarrassing you wanted to forget.”

George looked at her like he didn’t know how to respond. He sucked in a breath, flicked his eyes to his shoes. Like every word she said had peeled something raw open inside him. Exposed him.

“I don’t know what to say,” he murmured. “You scare the hell out of me, sometimes.”

“Good,” she said. “You should be scared. Because for the first time in my life, I’m not waiting for you to get your act together, waiting for you to suddenly want me.”

He stared at her. “I wasn’t with her. Not like that. I only just met her.”

She shook her head, sighing. “It doesn’t matter.”

“It does.”

“No,” she said, voice cold, icy. “What matters is that you let me walk away thinking I’d imagined all of it. That I was stupid, or desperate, or childish. Again. And I’ve grown too much to keep letting you make me feel so small.”

He opened his mouth. Closed it again.

“I cared about you,” she said softly. “For years. And you didn’t even have the guts to tell me you didn’t want me, you could never just shut me down.”

“Did you enjoy it?” She got more heated now. “How I fawned over you, pined after your affection.”

He huffed, ran a hand down his face. “Come on, you can’t genuinely think that.” He was shaking his head now, as if he were in disbelief.

“You don’t take me seriously,” she pointed out. “Even now, I mean look at you.”

He rolled his eyes.

“Look, I’m just going to go,”

She turned away. He didn’t stop her.

As she walked off into the night, heart cracked open, but spine straight.

She let him stare.

Let him finally feel it

He was lying, to himself, to her.

After all, it was his turn after all this time.

Liar.

[a-sweeter-sin]

Dull Ache

-Harry Lewis x reader

-Her

Some mornings still start with him

The kettle boils. The toast seemingly takes forever to pop. And in the quiet, I hear his laugh, that gravelly sound, the one that was always too loud for the room. I sit at the kitchen table, legs tucked beneath me, it’s old mahogany, we bought it at an antique store together. Steam curls up from my mug, like smoke from a slow-burning fire.

It’s been ten months and twenty seven days.

Not that I’ve been keeping count.

I take the long route to work, my original path passes the bookshop. Our bookshop. The one with the twisting stairs, slanted bookshelves, the crooked cat and the owner who always smelled like dust and bergamot. We used to go there on Saturdays, sometimes after a night out when we didn’t want to talk too much. He’d pick out a poetry book at random, flip it open and read the strangest lines he could find in a posh accent until I was doubled over in laughter.

He told me he could fall in love with me in a library. I think he did.

I think I did, too.

-Harry

It’s the small things that cut deep.

This morning, someone in the coffee shop was wearing her perfume. Not just something like it. Hers. That haunting, deep vanilla, caramel, and cigarette sweetness she always carried. A comforting sickly sweetness that clung to her skin. My hand clenched around the mug before I knew what I was doing.

I’d be lying if I said I didn’t miss her, yet these are the kind of lies I swallow down. Push away.

I walk past her old tube stop on the way to work. The tiles still cracked. The adverts still peeling. She used to leave me voice notes while waiting, rambling nonsense, or even quoting poetry, something she’d recently read. I’d smile like a fool listening, no matter where I was, pretending I hated how dramatic she was. I never hated it. I loved it more than she knew. More than I could handle.

And that’s the truth of it: I couldn’t handle her love. Not all of it. Not then. Not when it asked for all of me in return.

-Her

It rained hard yesterday.

The kind of rain that pounds down, makes the world feel lonely, all glassy streets and grey breath. My umbrella flipped inside out as I turned a corner, metal limbs snapping like broken wings.

Just like that, I was back there. Another storm. Another street. Him by my side, the both of us drenched, his umbrella useless, our clothes soaked through.

He found a newspaper, held it over my head, laughing like an idiot. It only worked for a moment.

I laughed then.

Now, I just stood, wet, still, the rain beating down on me as I tried to push him from my mind.

-Harry

I keep my coat zipped up, even as the weather turns warm.

She used to say I never dressed properly for the weather. Always too hot, or too cold. I never listened. Not really. But she’d tug at my sleeves anyway, pulling them down over my wrists, as the wind was biting, tuck her hands into mine as if she were trying to fix something broken.

Sometimes I still wear the jumper she knitted me one Christmas. She made it while it was a hobbie of hers. It falls a little short on the arms, and sits all wonky at my waist. But it holds a lingering scent of caramel, and of her.

I went down near Soho last Sunday. Thought I’d pick up some flowers for the flat, in the hope of making it feel less drab and graveyard-ish. There was this stall with tulips. She used to call them ‘shamelessly sappy’, said they looked like they didn’t care how romantical they were.

In the aftermath of a fight, she once brought a whole bouquet to my place. Said, “if we’re going to fight, let’s be sure to make the aftermath pretty.” I’d laughed at her, I didn’t realise she meant it.

-Her

Every now and then he’d carry around a camera.

A ridiculous, clunky old thing with chipped leather and several dents. He said these newer digital ones were too sterile, “memories should be grainy,” he told me, “like old dreams.”

I found one of his prints the other day while clearing out a drawer. A photo of me from the side, taken while I was getting ready in the morning, standing barefoot on the tile, the light streaming in through the window. My spine curved like a cat stretching, nightdress starting to slip off one shoulder. I stared at it for a long time.

I looked so…calm. So unaware.

There was a time I trusted him with everything. My body. My secrets. My insecurities.

-Harry

I don’t take many pictures anymore.

There’s no one to capture in the lens. No one who understands that I don’t want smiles, I want moments. She used to get that. She hated posed pictures. She’d say, “don’t capture me perfect. Capture me real.”

I still have the ones she took of me. One where I’m mid-yawn, sprawled out along her sofa, a coffee half balanced on my stomach. Another where I’m cooking shirtless, some pasta dish. She told me I looked all scruffy, like a tragic husband in a French indie film.

I haven’t deleted them. Can’t bring myself to.

I told myself I’ve moved on, I’m past it. But truthfully, I’m still stuck somewhere in those photographs. Between frames. Between moments. Between Her.

-Her

I see him during the winter.

It’s always the winter. When the streets turn all silver, crystallised, and the evenings swallow you earlier than expected. We used to walk for miles just to talk. Layers of woollen jumpers, and rain-proof coats, hands shoved in pockets, steam rising from our mouths like confession.

Back then he hated the silence. He’d fill it with silly facts, crude jokes, or awkward questions. Once asked me if I believed in parallel universes. I said no, but I now secretly hope there’s one out there where we got it right.

He made me laugh, even when I didn’t want to. Kissed at the corners of my eyes when I cried. He was the first man I ever let see me fall apart.

I wish he hadn’t watched so closely. I wish he hadn’t known where the cracks were.

-Harry

She used to call me whenever she couldn’t fall asleep.

At 2AM. 3:47AM. Once at 5:14, freaked out after she had a dream where she had drowned and she was convinced it meant something. I’d always answer, even if I’d been dead asleep, I think even now I’d come when she called. It was like she lived in the in-between hours, fragile and echoing.

I liked those moments best. No pretence. No performance. Just the sound of her voice, quiet and slow, sweet, like a breeze slipping through a half-open window.

She told me before that being with me felt like standing on the edge of a cliff. Equal parts awe and fear.

I joked, “at least the view’s good.”

Back then I didn’t understand that what she meant was: she never felt entirely secure in our relationship. Safe.

-Her

I think I knew, deep down at least.

Not at first. But something shifted. He started talking differently. Laughing at things he wouldn’t have before. Pulling away from kisses too early, too quickly.

Love doesn’t just vanish, it rots. Slowly. Seeping. Quietly. One tulip petal at a time.

I remember the night I found out.

Barcelona. He was supposed to be there for work. But I got a message. A girl I wasn’t acquainted with tagged him in a photo ‘by mistake’. It was blurry, but there he was, his arms around her waist, head tilted, lips too close. I felt my stomach drop before I even clicked on it.

I think betrayal is quieter than people expect.

I didn’t scream, I didn’t key his car, or burn his things, or send her messages laced with fury. I didn’t call him, didn’t text him, didn’t wait for him to arrive home to yell at him. I just went back to my apartment.

The next day I took the Rilke book from the shelf, the one he picked out on our first trip to the bookshop, sat in the kitchen cross legged, and waited for the sun to rise.

I didn’t cry until the morning.

The sun peeked over the hillside, he still hadn’t contacted me.

I felt sick.

-Harry

It happened once. Barcelona.

The city bled wine, breathed lust. And I let myself believe that loneliness was a reputable excuse.

I didn’t plan it. It wasn’t a slow slide. It was a crash. A landslide. A mistake with a face I don’t remember and a laugh I’ll never care to hear again.

When I came home my apartment was empty. I drove to her place, and it was like she knew I was coming. I saw her waiting at the door, Rilke book in hand. Her eyes were glassy, but she pushed her shoulders back, breathing steady. She didn’t scream. Just looked at me like I was something she’d once believed in, now exposed for what I really was.

She said nothing. Threw the key to my apartment I had given her to the floor at my feet. Closed the door in my face, gently, without slamming it.

Her silence, the finalisation of it all.

That was worse than any punishment.

-Her

Sometimes I wonder what I’d say if he showed up now. Apologised. Said he’d changed. That it was a stupid mistake.

I think I’d still want to touch his face. Just once. Feel it it still fit between my hands the way it used to. But then I’d remember what he did. That night. The photograph. His silence.

I loved him more than I should have. And maybe part of me still does, like he etched his way into my heart, sunk himself deep. But I can’t just wipe the slate. Love isn’t an excuse, and I can’t excuse this betrayal. It doesn’t resurrect trust, ease the hurt.

And I’m not the girl who cries on the kitchen floor. Not anymore.

He broke something I can’t give back.

-Harry

I walk past our places on purpose now.

Like penance. Like maybe if I hurt enough, I’ll balance the scale.

She deserved better. Deserved someone who didn’t flinch at the weight of her love. Someone who knew what to do with it.

I didn’t.

I wish I knew then what I know now.

I wish I could’ve been what she deserved.

[a-sweeter-sin]

Let the Light In

Harry Lewis x reader

-let the light in. At your back door yelling 'cause I wanna come in. Turn your light on. Look at us, you and I, back at it again…. -Lana del rey

-slightly toxic relationship over the space of a couple years….

~

She entered Harry’s life like a whirlwind during the winter. Easing, quickly into on and off stages, close to dating, yet there was never any classification.

Harry, a fair bit older. Wasn’t sure he was ready to settle down. She was younger, yet to explore all the world had to offer, this way of thinking may have doomed them from the start, fate, or an inability to push one’s insecurities, doubts to the side for a chance at something good, something pure, feelings that root their way inside, deep, and leave longing, pain in the heart at their absence.

They found themselves in this routine, both of them living different, busy lives. Whenever they were in London, or the same city, they would show up, sometimes out of the blue wherever the other was staying. Sometimes it was late, the city long asleep, a knock could be heard, feet shuffling to the door, whispered greetings, messy kisses, messier loving.

London is where most of this went down, Harry would show up at her apartment, no work for the following week, so he’d stay. It was like they could pretend for a while, pretend they were living a different life, one where their worlds revolved around each other.

But soon the act was up, the curtain would draw to a close, the crowd would leave. It was back to the real world, for the both of them. Harry had shoots to get to, places to travel, while she had her life to figure out, studies to complete, passions to find.

Yet they always found themselves back in the same place one way or another.

~

Summer came, and they spent most of it together. Trips to the beach, warm evening dinners. Their facade of a relationship felt prolonged this time around, both having time off from their usual routine, alternating between one another’s apartments, spending no more than a couple days apart.

She slipped away with the breeze on a Thursday night, the summer had begun to slip away, yet free spirited as she was, she chased the heat, chased it all the way across Europe with some close friends from school, before settling in the Italian countryside, working for a family who owned a large old farm house.

She left nothing but a note to Harry ‘see you soon - xoxo’ yet he found out what she was off doing from the pictures she’d post every once in a while.

Harry shrugged it off, she’s just some girl, besides she’s too young to settle down with, would I even want that? He became more indulged in his work, though without fail, every night, he’d leave the light on, just incase. Their own little code to say ‘I’m here, you’re welcome to come in.’

~

Months passed and they both lived their lives, Harry worked, yet the last he’d heard, she was modelling in Sweden, though she hadn’t updated her social media in a good month or so.

Knocking on his window like a storm that had remembered the way home. Snow clung to her eyelashes. She wore a red coat and smelled like warm vanilla.

“Let me in,” she whispered.

“I thought you were gone for good.”

“I was. But the light was on.”

He let her in.

They didn’t talk much that night, just curled around each other on the mattress, the hum of the radiator filling in the words they weren’t ready to say. In the dark, she reached for his hand.

“I dreamt you were driving, and I was in the back seat,” she murmured.

“What happened?”

“We crashed, I think. But I wasn’t scared. You were with me.”

Harry hummed in response, pulling her closer by her waist.

They fell back into it, yet only for a week.

Harry left, early in the morning before she awoke. His excuse, like usual, work. He left her a note on her kitchen counter reading: ‘Off for work, see you soon.’

She returned to university, busying herself with coursework, she’d taken up fashion design as a hobby during her travels, one of the Italian women she worked with taught her a thing or two about making clothes. She wanted her own brand, her clothing line, all unique, all her.

‘Soon’ the last word he left her with, felt longer than need be, she checked his socials though he wasn’t one for being active, she missed him, though she’d never tell him that.

~

Harry rapped against the door to her apartment, he was tipsy and couldn’t ignore the fact that his journey home had taken him by her apartment.

They sat, cosy in her living room, drinking wine, something red made in France. The conversation was easy, like they hadn’t spent any time apart, like this was their normal.

She turned to him saying, “You’re the kind of guy that calls women ‘complicated’ because they won’t kiss you.”

Harry said, “You’re the kind of girl who confuses cruelty with confidence.”

She laughed. He didn’t.

But he followed her into her bedroom anyway, like a moth does a flame.

They didn’t even kiss that night. Just talked for hours, between the rooms of her cluttered apartment until the sun came up. She told him about styling a shoot for a band that never paid her. He told her about the latest video he and the boys had made, and the time he spent with his family before returning to London. He left again in the morning.

~

Harry saw her again at a brand launch near a scenic Lake. He was there with the rest of the group, though he was much less social then the rest of them. She was there because she’d styled half the models, her clothing line becoming more and more successful. He wanted to tell her he’s proud, that everything she’s done is amazing, they weren’t like that though, they’re not together. Nevertheless, Her name was misspelled on the press board, but it didn’t matter, she was just happy to be there.

He caught her in his phone lens and didn’t post the photo.

“Delete that,” she said, brushing past him in leather boots, already sipping champagne she didn’t pay for.

“I didn’t take it,” he lied, but he couldn’t help the smile that graced his features.

“Yes, you did.” Though her serious exterior cracked and she smiled at him, her eyes crinkling.

He never realised how much he loved her smile.

~

And just like that, they fell back into place.

They were beautiful together in the way that got noticed. Like a perfume ad no one could afford: Harry thrown in whatever clothes he could find, while she dressed herself in patent leather, little skirts, and vintage pieces, now hard to find.

His fans caught them once, the picture going viral, the two of them, laughing at a rooftop bar, the sky burning gold behind them.

Someone tweeted: ‘Love looks like this.’

But they weren’t in love, not yet at least. They were intrigued. Lit up by each other like camera flashes in a dim room.

She liked how Harry always seemed like he was thinking of something better than the moment, she mistook that for mystery. He liked the way she quoted fashion editors like poets, that she was smart, always having a book on the go.

~

Eventually, they were dropping in and out of each other's lives so much that their friends got curious who they were spending so much time with. She bumped into him on a night out with her friends, he was seemingly doing the same, introductions were made, brief and awkward, nothing more really came of it by this point.

They were never good for each other. Everyone knew it. Maybe even they knew it too, but knowing something doesn’t always mean you do anything about it.

Sometimes, when the loneliness settled too deep in his chest, Harry would message her nothing more than a couple words like 'You up?' She’d leave him on read for days, sometimes weeks. And then, without warning, she’d reply.

A picture. Her legs in a hotel bed. Sunlight on her thighs. The caption: “Guess who just shot a campaign in Paris?”

He wouldn’t reply. But a few nights later, she’d show up in London again, asking if she could stay over.

He said yes. He always did.

~

They argued more now. Not over big things, over nothing, really. Spilled wine. Missed calls. Who looked at who for too long in the back of a cab, the kind of look that speaks louder than certain words. He’d call her childish, immature. She’d call him cold, cruel, emotionally constipated.

Still, they kissed and shared lingering touches, some nights he'd push her down into the mattress, 'loving' her like no one else could, like the world was ending and they were trying to drown it out with the sound of skin on skin.

~

“I think you only like me when you’re bored,” she said once, curled up in his bed wearing his old hoodie.

Harry looked at her and said nothing. His face remained blank, yet he looked to his hands.

“Say something,” she whispered.

“I think you only like me when no one else is looking.”

The silence was sharp enough to cut her. But she didn’t bleed. Not in front of him.

~

One weekend in November, he brought someone else to a party some of her recent designs were being displayed at.

He hadn’t known she was working it. But when he saw her across the room, clipboard in hand, lips painted a mauve-ish pink, it was too late.

She saw him too. She didn’t flinch. She just walked by, trailed her fingers across Harry's back, before coming to a stop beside him. She Smiled, slow and poisonous.

“You two are cute. But does she know you snore when you’re stressed?”

the girls mouth dropped open, Harry's jaw tightened, but just as he was going to say something, she was already gone, disappearing into the crowd like a mist of perfume.

~

They didn’t speak for six weeks after that. Until he came to her apartment drunk again, this time without knocking.

He used the spare key she forgot he had.

She found him asleep on her couch at 4 a.m., face buried in one of her coats.

“What the hell are you doing here?” she snapped.

“Missed you,” he mumbled, eyes barely open.

“You humiliated me.”

“I humiliated myself,” he said. “You just make it look prettier.”

She hated how good he was at saying the wrong thing beautifully. Hated how her heart still jumped whenever she heard his voice.

That night, she didn’t let him into her bed. But she gave him a blanket. In the morning, he was gone.

~

By spring, she’d started seeing someone else. A photographer. He was older, older than Harry. Calmer. Didn’t raise his voice, didn’t disappear.

Harry found out the usual way, through someone else’s tagged photos. She looked happy, radiant, posing with the man beside a river in Amsterdam.

He stared at the post for five full minutes before throwing his phone somewhere across the room. He wasn't angry, at least that's what he told himself.

Later that night, he texted her.

"Are you happy now?"

No response.

Two days later, she messaged back.

"Are you?"

He didn't know how to respond so he left it, pushed all thoughts of her away like he did his other problems.

~

They saw each other again in June. A gallery event in Soho. She wore all black, from her dress to her shoes, her hair was curled, full of volume in the way that made her most confident.

He didn’t expect her to walk over.

They spent most of the night by the open bar, making idle chat before she blurted out the kind of words they never really spoke aloud.

“You still leaving the light on for me?” she asked.

He didn’t answer.

“I don’t even check anymore.”

“Liar.”

She smiled bitterly. “Yeah. Maybe.”

That night they left together. Again.

But this time was different.

They fought in the Uber. A real fight. Brutal, sharp-edged.

"I can’t do this anymore," she said, voice cracked. "I want something solid, Harry. Someone that doesn’t disappear when the sun comes up, or when your job calls."

"You knew what this was," he shot back. "Don’t pretend you wanted a proper relationship with someone like me."

"That’s the thing," she said. "I did."

She got out before the car stopped at his place.

Harry didn’t follow after her. He went home. Left the light off.

~

They stayed away longer this time. Maybe out of pride. Maybe self-preservation. But time’s cruel. It doesn’t heal everything. Sometimes it just softens the edges enough to start again.

He ran into her in December, back in London, both of them dressed too well for people trying too hard not to care.

He said, "You look different."

She said, "Long time, no see."

He asked if she still made clothes. She asked if he was still filming with his group.

This time around seemed different, they settled in, stayed, yet still avoided the pressure of labels, the confirmation of feelings they shared.

~

He left the first time after six months, right before her birthday.

The boys were filming a video that would take him to New York. She asked him not to go.

“This is what I do, it's my job.”

“And what am I?”

He didn’t answer. Just zipped his bag and kissed her temple like a friend.

She posted a story: pink lips, colder eyes, captioned “Girls don’t cry in Margiela.”

He watched it alone, lying in a stranger’s hotel bed. Guilt seeping into his stomach and lingering.

~

They came back together like clothes after rain, damp, clinging, full of old scent. Like lost lovers, he apologized for his leaving, for his mistakes, and she, as per usual, forgave him, pulling him closer by the belt loops of his jeans.

That night he held her close, whispering in her ear as she clung to him, her nails digging into his arms, the muscles on his biceps. He loved making her this way, all shaky, teary-eyed. A mess.

He was gone again in the morning, no note, no message, like he never returned at all.

~

Each time he left, she made herself smaller. Each time he returned, she made herself colder.

When he knocked at her door the next time, she let him in.

“Why do you keep coming back?” she asked.

“Because it’s you.”

“That’s not an answer.”

“It’s the only one I’ve got.”

“Well it's not good enough, not this time at least.”

Yet she wasn't able to push him away, to rid her life of every experience and emotion he brought.

This time around was the longest they had ever been together, it felt more stable, more real. Harry still left for work, but never for long and he came back as soon as he was finished. Though she was uncertain. there were frays and splits in the curtain, and she often wondered what it would take for it to draw close like it had so many times before.

Obviously it wouldn’t take much.

~

The next time he left was quiet.

No fight. Just a text:

“They want me in Monaco for two weeks. Might extend.”

She replied "See you then. xxx"

Two weeks became six. He stopped watching her stories after the one where she was in bed with someone else.

He liked it less when she wasn’t waiting.

~

They met again at a dinner party, accidentally, intentionally.

“How’s Monaco?”

“Fast. Beautiful. Warm.”

“You always liked the heat.”

“Always more when you were around.”

“I miss you.”

“I don’t believe you.”

“You leave before the light comes in, Harry. Every time.”

She left before dessert.

They never broke up cleanly.

But they were never together. But never not, not really.

~

He called from Berlin, a couple months later.

“I saw your shoot.”

“You always think I’m hurting.”

“You always are.”

She hung up.

~

He didn’t call for two months.

They both saw other people. But never really moved on.

Spring came late.

They made eye contact at a party in the countryside, they didn’t speak all night.

At 2:41 a.m., he messaged her:

“Want me to come over?”

She didn’t reply.

He came anyway. Knocking at the door to her B&B.

They kissed like war. Raging. Brutal. Harsh

He held her down on the bed, pulling at her hair so he could whisper in her ear. "You know you need me." All she could do was mumble in agreement, he smirked at this, not needing her conformation to know.

In the morning: coffee, silence.

“We’re disgusting.” She murmured.

He shook his head, smiling at her through her embarrassment.

“We’re inevitable.”

She didn’t know which was worse.

~

They tried again.

Dates that ended in slammed doors. Sex like an apology. Fights that circled back to nothing.

She once screamed, “Do you actually want me?” “Like could you ever see yourself in a relationship with me or have we been pretending this whole time?”

He deflected, questioning her, “Would you even want me if I stayed?”

They both lied.

He disappeared that summer. No goodbye.

She stopped eating for two days. Booked a job. Slept with a model who didn’t know her name.

Texted Harry: “Don’t come back.”

He replied three weeks later: “I never really leave.”

And he didn’t.

Not really.

They haunted each other.

In playlists. In tagged photos. In the necklace she left in his coat pocket. In the boots by his door.

~

One night, he showed up with her favorite flowers.

“You think this means anything?”

“No. But I couldn’t breathe till I saw you.”

She let him in.

Of course she did.

They undressed like punishment. Clung like a cure.

Then they didn’t speak for a month.

~

Their last reunion wasn’t soft. It was destruction.

He showed up drunk.

“Why do you keep doing this?” she cried. “Why do you come back when there’s nothing left to break?”

“I love you.”

“You love the idea of a relationship with me.”

He nodded.

She didn’t kiss him. He slept on the floor.

In the morning, he was gone.

She didn’t chase.

He didn’t call.

But they still haunted each other.

In photos. In strangers. In silence.

~

She saw him one last time across the street, hand-in-hand with someone new.

She looked away. Tears biting at the edge of her waterline.

He turned back, just as she vanished into the crowd, her long hair whipping behind her.

Then he knew.

Knew where his heart belonged, that his light would always stay on in the hopes of her return.

Though she had known long before, leaving for the last time was easier than she thought.

Her light stayed off, the fuse long blown, the switch all worn out, it's warm glow faded for good.

[a-sweeter-sin]

Hate The Game

He was in upper sixth, tall and captain of the rugby team. I was surprised when he approached me.

I’d seen him before, obviously. Everyone had. You couldn’t miss him, walking through the hallways, head held high, like he owned the place.

It was a Tuesday, wet and grey, the kind of day that makes the corridors smell like damp coats and cheap deodorant. I was at my locker, fiddling with a broken zip on my bag, when I felt him stop next to me. Noticed, not heard. He always moved with that casual confidence, shoulders back, school tie loose like he couldn't be bothered but still wanted to look good.

“You always this quiet?” he asked, eyes on mine like he was genuinely curious.

I hesitated. Looked down at the cracked linoleum between us. “Only when I’ve got nothing to say.”

He laughed at that. Not mean. Surprised. “Fair.”

I didn’t expect him to remember the conversation. I thought maybe it had been a joke. A dare. Something to kill time before form. But then he was there again the next day. And the one after. Sometimes a casual “Alright?” when he passed me in the corridor. Sometimes something more, like holding the door too long or falling into step beside me on the way out.

It felt…odd.

Boys had looked before. Some were bolder than others. They’d shout things as they passed, some would give glances like they were seeing through my uniform. I knew what they said when they thought I wasn’t listening, how they thought I was “fit but weird,” how I “kept to my little bubble,” how I was the kind of girl no one had ever managed to “crack.” But that was the point. I didn’t want to be cracked. I had my friends, my routine, my quiet. I liked my world unbothered.

He didn’t barge into it. Not all at once. He crept in slowly, like a fog.

By November, he’d memorised my free periods. By December, he had began listening to the music I liked. He’d sometimes steal my phone, grinning as he did. “You can’t seriously listen to this every day,” he’d say. “You need to try my taste.” I'll admit this made me cringe.

He’d come and find me outside the block I sat at during lunch. The spot no one else bothered with because it was too far from the canteen and too exposed to the wind. I liked it because it was quiet. He started showing up like it was his idea.

“You don’t say much,” he told me once. “I like that.”

“I’m not here to entertain you,” I said back.

He grinned. “That’s what I like even more.”

The attention confused me. I didn’t trust it, not entirely. I’d watch the way he was with other girls, how easily he could slip on a smile, how loud his laugh was when he was surrounded by the rest of the team. With me, he was quieter. Still cocky, but in a different way. Measured. Focused. Like I was a puzzle he was determined to solve.

I wanted to believe it was real. But part of me always felt like I was walking a tightrope. I doubted him from the start, his trustworthiness, but part of me was curious, that's my fault.

By January, everyone knew. Whispers in the corridor, people watching us too long, my friends raising their eyebrows every time I mentioned his name. He didn’t hide it. If anything, he made it more obvious. Waiting by my locker, sliding his arm around my shoulders when he passed me in the quad, calling me "babe" or some cringe-worthy pet name with a confidence I hadn’t earned yet.

“You don’t have to do that,” I told him once when he kissed my cheek in front of everyone.

He leaned down, murmured in my ear, “Why not? Scared people’ll know you’re mine?”

His voice was teasing, but it prickled under my skin. He said things like that often, little reminders that he was older, louder, bigger. That he had the control. The power.

Still, I let him in.

He wasn’t always cruel. Sometimes he was thoughtful. He remembered the date of my mock exams and brought me a KitKat “for brain fuel.” He walked me home on icy afternoons. He asked about my family, my friends, what I wanted to do after sixth form. He told me about his own plans, uni, probably Newcastle, maybe Bristol if the rugby scouts bit.

“I’ll miss this place, though,” he said one night as we sat on the pitch after hours, watching the sky change. “Miss you, if you’re still around.”

I didn’t say anything. I wanted to believe he meant it.

By February, we were calling it what it seemed: a relationship. I didn’t tell my parents. He never asked to meet them. I wasn’t surprised. It was all very school-ish, texting at midnight, sneaking off behind buildings, holding hands under the table in the library. But still, there was a weight to it. Or maybe that was just me.

Sometimes I caught the way his mates looked at me when I passed. Not just in a she's fit kind of way, but something else. Knowing. Sneering. I didn’t like it. I asked him once, “What do they say about me?”

He smiled, too fast. “Don’t worry about them. They’re just pricks.”

“But they talk, right?”

“They’re just jealous. You’re the one girl no one else ever got close to.”

I wanted to believe that was a compliment. I think I did, back then.

The longer we were together, the more I let myself be vulnerable. I let him in, slowly, carefully. Told him things I hadn’t told anyone else. He kissed my forehead when I cried. Held my hand when I got my first bad mark in English. Made me feel seen, if only in fragments.

But there were cracks.

When he was with his team, he changed. Louder. Meaner. More arrogant. Once, I heard him talk about a younger boy on the team who’d dropped the ball during a match. “He’s soft,” he sneered. “Like a girl, what a pussy.” Most of his other teammates laughed.

I pulled him aside later. “Don’t say stuff like that.”

“What? It’s just banter.”

“It’s not.”

He looked at me for a moment like he didn’t recognise me. Then he kissed me and called me sensitive.

By March, we were fraying, or my composure was crumbling.

He stopped replying as quickly. Cancelled plans last minute. Got defensive when I asked why. “You’re clingy lately,” he muttered once when I asked if he wanted to come over after school. “Let me breathe, yeah?”

I almost ended it then. Should’ve.

But then he’d soften. Say things like “Sorry, just stressed” or “Didn’t mean to snap”. And I’d fall back in, hopeful, or denying those thought that sat at the back go my mind, the pit in my stomach.

It was a Thursday when the pressure of my emotional dam broke...

I’d finished revision early and went to meet him outside the changing rooms. I knew he had practice and thought I’d surprise him. Bring him one of those drinks I knew he liked and maybe walk home together. The door was slightly ajar. I heard them before I saw them.

“Mate, chill,” he was saying. I knew that voice. I knew its different tones. This one was careless. Cruel. “It’s not like I actually like her.”

Laughter. Low and muttering. Another voice said, “But you’ve been with her for, what, like six months?”

“Yeah, and? It was just a bit of fun. You said I couldn’t pull it off.”

More laughter. Louder now.

“Didn’t think she’d fall that quick though. Thought she was smarter.”

I couldn’t move. Couldn’t breathe. I think I stood there for a full minute before I backed away. My hands were shaking. I dropped the drink somewhere between the changing room and the front gate.

He messaged that night.

You alright? Didn’t see you today.

I didn’t reply.

He messaged again the next morning. Waited outside my form room. I walked past him like he wasn’t there.

Eventually, he cornered me in the hall. “What’s going on with you?”

I looked at him. Really looked. At the boy who needed to be adored. The boy who played people like positions on a pitch. The boy who wanted to win so badly, he didn’t care who got hurt.

“You used me,” I said.

He blinked, shook his head. “What are you talking about?”

“You said it wasn’t real. That it was a game.”

His mouth opened. Closed. “It wasn’t like that.”

“Don’t lie.”

For once, he didn’t have a clever comeback. Just silence.

My lip trembled, and for a split second I saw him smirk, my brow furrowed. he felt different, like the persona he hid behind was melting away.

And then something changed.

Not in the air, but in him. I saw it, clearly, terrifyingly, in his eyes. Like shutters slamming down behind them. The softness, the charm, the boy I’d let in slowly over months, gone. What replaced him was something colder. Sharper. Cruel.

It wasn’t that he raised his voice. He didn’t need to. It was the way he straightened his posture, squared his shoulders like he was back on the pitch. Like I was just another opponent to run through. The way he tilted his head and narrowed his eyes like I’d said something stupid, laughable even.

“You done?” he asked.

I blinked.

He took a slow step forward, and my back hit the cold wall of the now empty hallway. Not forcefully, but enough that I noticed. Enough that I realised he’d always stood a little too close, spoke a little too low, held my waist a little too tightly. I’d mistaken it for protectiveness. Affection. Now I saw it for what it really was.

Control.

“You think I’m the first guy to try it with you?” he asked, voice low. “You’re not that special.”

I didn’t respond. Couldn’t.

He smiled then. Not the smile he used when he teased me about my music taste or when he kissed me behind the gym block. This one was different. This one was twisted at the edges. Almost pitying.

“You’re just another girl who wanted something more,” he said. “And yeah, maybe I let you believe it. Maybe I even believed it for a bit. But come on. Be honest. You were flattered I even looked at you.”

The words sank like stones.

“I was never yours,” I said, though my voice came out small. Too small.

He leaned in closer. His breath was warm, but his words... on the other hand, were not.

“You wanted to believe you were different,” he murmured. “But you thirst for the slightest bit of attention, its sad really.”

He stepped back then, like none of it had mattered. Like he hadn’t just peeled my trust off like old wallpaper, exposing everything underneath.

And then he shrugged.

“Don’t hate the game,” he said, voice flat. “Hate yourself for thinking you weren’t part of it.”

-I don't know what to say about this... this is so not mysterious gurl of me... I am being dramatic this is so not personal and very fictional (😉😏 me when I'm lowkey lying).......

[a-sweeter-sin]

Thunder ~ Part 2

- George Clarke

You roll like thunder, pouring all your drinks. The party’s lit and you, my friend, half-cut when it begins. You roll like thunder, you’re tryna catch that wind…. -Lana Del Rey

College/high school George Clarke x reader

-I’m still so new to this, I don’t know how to link parts one and two, but part one should be just under this on my page…

Summary: School starts again after the holidays, but this time things don’t feel quite right. There’s this unspoken tension between the two, and it feels as if it could break at any second, George can only handle it for so long…

Her writing program was coming to a close, and so were the holidays, meaning back to reality, or the quiet, mundane, bubble that was her home town.

This writing program had been like a retreat, she was surrounded by people much like her, that challenged her and made her think on things in different ways, much more so than she had ever experienced back in school.

She came back, with a week left before school started back up, before her last year. It didn’t really feel like she was coming back to anything, the trees were still bare from the winters harsh touch, the town itself still quiet. She dragged her hefty suitcase down the familiar footpath, past the same park, the same bus stop where people just stared, glued to their phones like they were scared of being present. She felt different, not in the physical sense, or any cliché way, just more at home within her own skin.

When school started back up, the other students were louder, brasher. One girl cried during History on the first day back and no one knew what to do. She didn’t cry once, not during school, but she wrote like her chest was splintering. It felt good. Like she could channel everything she was feeling, like being scraped clean.

Back home, she stayed in her room longer than she needed to. Her mum asked if she wanted to see her friends, she had to remind her she didn’t really have any close ones here, she had a small group to sit with at lunch, she had acquaintances, people she’d sit next to in class, people who sometimes liked to talk to her in passing, but never invited her to parties.

She hadn’t expected to think about George. But she did, more than she’d like to admit.

He’d stopped speaking to her after exams. No goodbye, no text. He just slowly vanished, like they’d imagined the whole thing. She tried not to romanticise it. She told herself he was just a boy who didn’t know how to hold a mirror to himself, and she was just a girl who made him nervous by doing exactly that.

Still. She found herself walking by the rugby pitches one evening just to see if he was there. He was, standing with a group, laughing too hard at something. His voice reached her before his eyes did. And he saw her.

For a moment there was nothing.

Then he looked away.

She stood there for a few seconds longer than she should have, before then walking on. Her face scrunched up, eyes watering like they did after these times.

Later that week, they bumped into each other in the same park, the one where they’d sat and talked about everything and nothing. He was on a run, she was walking with her headphones blasting. He said “Hey,” like it was just another day. She nodded. He shifted his weight, like he wanted to say more but he didn’t know if he was allowed.

“How was your writing program?” He asked, searching for her eyes.

“Interesting, good,” She responded. “I wrote a lot.”

“That’s great,” he said, and it sounded like he meant it.

She wanted to ask him why he had disappeared. She wanted to ask if it had mattered to him at all, the walks, the silence, the things they almost let happen, the things they felt, or at least she felt. But she didn’t. She didn’t want to give him the power to confirm what she already feared.

Instead, she just said, “You look the same.”

He blinked, his eyebrows furrowed. “Is that a good thing?”

She shrugged. “It’s just a thing.”

They stood there, a while, just two people pretending they were still the versions of themselves who once had a quiet understanding. But she could see it in his eyes, the guilt, or maybe the confusion. And all she felt was tired. Not angry. Just tired of being the only one who knew how keep hold of fragile things without dropping them.

She walked away first this time. She didn’t look back.

That night, she wrote a poem about absence. About a silent longing. She didn’t name him. She didn’t have to.

-

The year had droned on, term three rolled around and George welcomed the nearing end to his college years.

They hadn’t spoken since their last encounter in the park, yet George found himself looking for her, in the halls, during lunch breaks, and in any classes they shared. He never thought he could miss someone yet be in their presence almost every day.

George didn’t plan on going to her house. He didn’t even know for sure if she still lived in the same one. But his feet carried him there anyway, on instinct, not desire. Or maybe that was the same thing now.

It was raining in that indecisive, misty way that didn’t drench you all at once, just crept in slowly, soaking your clothes. He stood tentatively across the street from her place for a good minute before doing anything. His jumper was almost soaked through, his fists scrunched and jammed inside his pockets. He felt childish, putting off something after he’d come all this way.

Then he crossed the street.

Her mum answered. He remembered her vaguely, from the times they’d spent going between each other’s houses. She had soft eyes, and a warm smile, but she seemed like the kind of woman who always knew more than she let on. She didn’t look surprised to see him.

She called upstairs to you, no judgment, nor hesitation in her voice, before slinking away leaving him shivering in the doorway.

Then came a pause. Footsteps.

Then there she was.

She looked exactly how he pictured her, which annoyed him in a way he couldn’t explain. She was wearing cozy clothes, fitting for the weather, her sleeves reached past her wrists, she tugged on them in a nervous manner, her face formed in a frown when she saw me, not a smile in sight. She folded her arms up as if to protect herself, like a barrier, like she was already bracing herself for disappointment.

“What are you doing here?”

“I don’t know,” he answered her, and it was honest.

She stepped aside against the door, allowing him inside anyway.

He followed her into the kitchen. The light was low and warm, everything too quiet, the atmosphere awkward and cracking, bursting at the seems just waiting for something to be said. She made tea without asking if he wanted any. He watched her move about like he wasn’t even there.

When the tea was done, she headed upstairs, he followed after her, the two of them entering her room. She placed the tea down at her desk, not before finding an uncluttered space, then went to close the door behind him.

“You can’t just show up out of the blue,” she said finally, breaking the silence.

“I know.”

“You didn’t even say goodbye.”

“I know”

“You ignored me. Pretended you didn’t know me around your friends.��

“I know.” He paused. “I’m sorry.”

Her eyes were squinting slightly, her voice had begun to tremble but she held her head high. She looked at him hard then.

“You’re not sorry, George. You just feel bad now because I didn’t wait around for you, didn’t chase after you like I’m sure many other girls have.”

That stung, he could feel his chest tighten. Maybe because it was true. Maybe because he wasn’t sure what he had expected her to do, write about him? Stay quiet? Disappear politely?

He didn’t answer her yet, just shifted to reach for his tea, hoping the mug might help him think of what to say, might offer him a script.

“I don’t know how to do this,” he said.

“What, be decent?” She shot back. “Not just disappear from my life for months, then expect me to welcome you back in after you show up at my door.”

He flinched, just slightly.

She sighed, and for the first time that day he saw her properly, she looked tired, not just of him, but of the whole thing, of being the one who had to say the hard part, of being the one who won’t just give in when given some form of apology.

“I liked you,” she murmured quietly. “I really did. But you made me feel like I should be embarrassed for it, or that you would be embarrassed of it.”

“I liked you too,” “I like you too,” he said, but it came out too fast, and overall, too late.

She laughed, but not in the way he loved, she laughed, bitter. “You have a funny way of showing it.”

“I was scared.”

“Of what? Your reputation, harm coming to your image?”

“Of you,” he said.

That stopped her. She blinked once, then twice, taken aback. Then she laughed again, but it wasn’t bitter this time. Just surprised.

“Of me?”

He nodded. “You saw things, I mean really saw. I’m not used to that.”

She looked down at the floor, then back up at him. For the first time in months, she wasn’t wearing armour, her wall had fallen before him.

“I could say the same, you’ve seen more of me than anyone, you know more of me.”

And maybe that was the last bit of permission he needed, or maybe it was something else entirely, something he couldn’t name but had been building inside him since that first walk home, since their first proper conversation.

He kissed her. Soft, and a little hesitant, like testing something out that you’ve only ever imagined. She kissed him back. Her hands gripped the damp fabric of his jumper like she didn’t trust him not to vanish again, and maybe she was right to.

When they eventually pulled apart, they just stood there, foreheads close, noses touching, breathing unevenly, like they’d finally surfaced something that came from deep down.

He didn’t say anything straight away.

And neither did she.

But this time, the silence felt different, like something beginning, not something breaking.

- Again this is partially based on Normal People, and I don’t usually post stuff like this… I’m not a George Clarke super fan, this is me, yet again projecting. Sorry if this bothers anyone that I used him for this little story thing. 💃🫰

[a-sweeter-sin]

Thunder

- George Clarke

You act like fucking mr bright side when you’re with all your friends, but I know what you’re like when the party ends…. -Lana Del Rey

College/high school George Clarke x reader

Summary: George finds himself always wanting to be around the quiet, more reserved girl. But he just can’t let go of the way other people see him, not yet at least…

George Clarke was well liked, he was friendly, confident and known for having this sarcastic humour. People liked him because he was tall and easygoing, because he was a part of the rugby team and never tried too hard to be liked, to seem popular. He didn’t talk much during his classes, but when he did, his voice carried like someone used to being listened to, other people’s murmurs would quiet down to hear what he had to say.

It was the second term of sixth form, lower sixth to be more specific, when George Clarke had started sitting by you in English. You weren’t really all that popular, yet not invisible either, quick witted and bambi-eyed, known for writing poems that made even their teacher uncomfortable. She had never really spoken to George. Never properly looked at him, not really.

Yet one day George turned to her during English, he asked her what she thought of the book they were reading, and instead of shrugging, dismissing him, she said, “I think it’s about someone pretending not to care as a form of self-preservation.”

George smiled, he smiled in that endearing way that made people think he was about to say something witty, but he didn’t. He just nodded. She went back to her own world, he liked that she didn’t wait for his approval.

Somehow they began to walk home together after school, they lived in opposite directions from one another. He said he liked the long way, she didn’t question it, no one at school mentioned it, not to him at least, though someone tagged him in a meme about artsy girls and rugby lads and he blocked the account almost instantly.

Around his teammates though, George acted as if she didn’t exist. If she passed them in the hallway, he’d glance at her quickly, before looking away, as if he were looking at something he wasn’t supposed to, like if he were caught it would matter. Once, she said “hi” to him in front of a few of the lads, and he didn’t say anything back, he just nodded slightly, like she was one of the many girls that would giggle and wave, saying flirtatious hello’s to him in the halls. He saw the furrow in her brow, the way her lip slightly quivered as she turned away. Later, he texted her a singular line: “Sorry, Didn’t mean to be weird.” She didn’t reply.

At school, he played into his friends’ ways, leaned into his easy charm, the jokes, the shoulder-punches when someone would say something crude, when someone would make a fool of themselves. He let people think he was uncomplicated, that he was, for the most part, like the rest of them. When the team was around, he laughed louder, talked faster, and said things he wouldn’t dare let her hear. She noticed, of course she did. But she never brought it up.

She didn’t ask him about his life much, straying away from questions that danced along the border of being ‘too personal’. He never told her about the pressure he was under from his dad to follow the same career path as him. He never told her how his mum has cried almost nightly since his sister left for London. She didn’t know that sometimes, on game days, he threw up in the locker room toilets before matches because being the kind of person people expected him to be made him sick.

But she saw him. That was the unsettling part.

One bleak afternoon, sitting on an old bench in the park, she looked at him and said, “You’re good at hiding.”

He laughed, thinking she was joking. But when he looked at her, her eyes were squinting from the sun, her face had softened with seriousness.

“I mean it,” she muttered. “You think people don’t notice your persona, how you can disappear into yourself, but I do.”

He looked down at his hands, they shook ever so slightly. “I don’t know how not to, people have this view of me.” His words clipped not knowing what else to say.

She didn’t answer. She just swung her legs, biting the inside of her cheek and scrunching her face up the way she always did when she wanted to cry but wouldn’t.

They spent the most of lower sixth form like this, having fleeting moments, feelings bubbling beneath the surface that neither of them mustered up the courage to mention. Something had passed between them within the remainder of the year, something genuine, something gentle and, maybe, doomed.

After end of year exams, the holidays came and he slowly stopped seeing her. She went off for a writing program over the break, and he stayed home, training for the next season with the boisterous rugby team, going into town with his ‘friend group’ the same friend group he felt he couldn’t really be himself around.

He never told anyone about her, how she made him feel, but sometimes, on long train rides, or after training when the adrenaline fades and his chest feels empty, he’d think about her, he’d think about the way she looked at him, how sometimes she’d look, and it would feel like she was reading a version of him no one else could see.

And his chest would tighten, it hurt, but not in a bad way. In the way that made him want to be the person he was when he was with her, the person he hid away from everyone else.

There was a pressure building within George, and he wondered how long it would take until it snapped, he wondered how long it would be until he could see her again.

-This is low-key based off of Normal People, also I’ve never written one of these before so this is not my usual thing….

P.s. I’m not a George super fan, this is just me projecting. I just didn’t know who to write this with, so sorry if this bothers anyone, he’s been all over my feed and luckily he played rugby. 🤞🕺

- part 2 out now on my page (sorry didn’t know how to link it 😛)

[a-sweeter-sin]

~ Romanticising life in the countryside ~

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Boarding School- Lana Del Rey

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- I wish my uniform was cute

Why do they have to make us soo frumpy and shapeless 😭

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-Norman Fucking Rockwell

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How am I not a sketchbook doodle…

- I wish I could draw or like something….

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