harrieatthemet - Tumblr blog

harrieatthemet · 14 days ago

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Chapter Six. The meeting.

All she did was invite him to sit. Neither of them had any idea what it would stir up on a shared stone step.

Word Count: 11.2k

HOLLYYYY FUCCKKKKKKKK

(Ch. 1, Ch. 2, Ch. 3, Ch. 4, Ch. 5)

It hit her like a freight train. A chill shot right down her spine, sharp and painfully electric, and Anna felt her stomach flip so impossibly fast that she flew her elbow atop her knee just to keep herself somewhat steady. There was a slight tremble to her cigarette she could feel, and all she could do was hope nobody else noticed. And as she let out a shaky exhale that was intended to be smooth, she hoped nobody noticed that either. Because she hadn’t heard that voice in years.

Sure, she’d heard it on the radio once or twice - but oftentimes she’d immediately switch stations. There were a few instances amidst a late night doom scroll on Twitter or Instagram she’d come across clips from an interview or a show, and she’d linger for a moment just to feed the beast of yearning and familiarity deep within her. She just hadn’t heard his voice like this - clear, close, silky - in the air around her, thick with Georgia heat and bourbon and smoke. The undertone of warmth that used to be exclusively just for her. He was real. He was here. And he still sounded like home.

“Sorry.” Harry stammered from an onset of mild panic. “I can- if y’need me to- I don’t mind stepping back inside. Don’t want t’intrude.”

He felt like someone had taken a wire brush directly to the lining of his lungs. There she was. The real version - not a grainy interview clip or a blurry paparazzi photo. This wasn’t a zoomed in group picture where, if he pinched the screen with his fingers and honed in a bit, he could get a glimpse of her amongst friends. He’d done that countless times. Shamelessly.

Right in front of him, with her back turned and head tilted in laughter was the woman he’d once built an entire life around in his head. The woman who haunted his music, his memories, even most of his goddamn daydreams. Here she sat - merely 10 or so feet away from him with a lit cigarette adorning her fingers and a glow of real joy that permeated the outdoor space - it shot an ache in his chest.

Harry watched as Anna’s spine straightened ever so slightly once he spoke, the laughter waning soon thereafter. All he could manage to do was awkwardly shift his weight and try to ignore how embarrassingly clammy his hand felt against his glass. Did he sound too casual? Too easy - like this wasn’t a big deal and he didn’t really care they were finally crossing paths?

His gaze flickered to her hair, disregarding the weight of Anna’s familial entourage boring a hole into his face or trying to sneak quick and uncertain glances between him and Anna. It was soft, lighter than he remembered, but he liked it - pulled half up with a few pieces falling free. Her dress was pale, some shade between dusk and rose - it was hard to tell for sure under dimmed lights against the dark of night. His eyes traveled down from her neck to just above the end of her spine - skin exposed as a courtesy of the backless dress. Jesus Christ. He didn’t even realize he was holding his breath until a shrill pain shot itself through his chest.

Vivienne blinked between Harry and Anna with such stealth, he’d almost missed it. Her lips, glossed and crooked as she broke out a rather telling grin, parted in awe as she let her stare linger on him a moment too long. Her glass hung loosely between two fingers as she wobbled a bit in place.

“Not at all,” she gasped, one hand fluttering to her chest in mock aghast, “matter of fact, you’re not goin’ anywhere mister.”

Anna pressed her lips together into a tight line as the words came falling from Vivienne’s lips laced with champagne and an overbearing urge to play matchmaker. It felt like she’d just thrown a grenade into Anna’s lap and everyone was waiting for it to go off. Reflexively, she tried to swallow hard against the heat inching its way up the back of her throat. She even tried to blink herself back to whatever composure she’d had before but her lashes fluttered too fast, and the opportunity passed. It felt as though the air around her had shifted from a summery sweet to something sharper, more pointed - a feeling that was laced with unearthed memories and an undertone of danger. Like the aroma of something that was once long buried, and kept that way, had suddenly bloomed in the dark.

Her face stayed angled at just the right place where she could catch the last of the glow from the string light in her periphery, and she caught the quickest glimpse of him in the reflection on the patio door - broad shoulders in a dark suit, a reserved tilt of his head, the faintest image of stubble and a rugged moustache. He was older looking than the image of him she kept tucked away for safekeeping - the man who she’d left behind in the LA house years ago. But he still held the same features of the memory she never stopped rewriting. Anna felt her chest ache and she hated - truly hated - how badly she still wanted to run towards him, instead of running away this time.

Harry blinked, a cross between startled and unsure as Vivienne stared back at him. “Sorry?”

Vivienne took a somewhat theatrical step forward, swaying a bit before retiring her glass down on the step beneath Anna. She made sure to avoid Anna’s desperate gaze, a silent plea that was essentially begging Vivienne to just shut the fuck up. But by God, she couldn’t help herself. Instead she maneuvered her way past her unraveling sister-in-law on the steps, traipsing up until she was placing herself squarely between him and Anna’s back. She was like the bouncer of fate itself.

“You came all this way,” Vivienne continued with all the commanding authority of a woman who had been overserved and lost the point of her rant, “You don’t just.. Slip away from a moment like this! This-this is divine timing.”

Lacey stifled an uncomfortable laugh behind her hand, cocking a brow towards Max. “Oh here she goes.”

Vivienne threw a hand towards Anna’s direction - who was sitting stoically still in both fear and sheer humiliation for what she anticipated to come out of Vivienne’s mouth next. She couldn’t even bear to shoot a look towards Lacey and Max. She was still too preoccupied with trying to pretend her pulse wasn’t vigorously galloping in her eardrums.

“There was so much love there once,” Vivienne declared like a pastor at a Southern revival, her drawl thick from liquor. “Storybook love, y’know? Special - the kind that makes other people feel like shit.”

“Oh my god,” Anna groaned in embarrassment as she threw her palm to her face, “Viv, please.”

“Good lord, it was.. cinematic. And I just-” Vivienne’s voice cracked, and Harry wasn’t sure if she was about to cry or sneeze. “Don’t y’all remember how she used to just glow around him?”

Anna lets out another gargled groan as she physically felt the heat rising to her cheeks. She’s one more reminiscent comment from Vivienne away from shoveling the remnants of her cigarette into her mouth and chewing it whole. Anything would be less painful than this. Lacey and Max say nothing, despite Vivienne turning to them with flailing arms in search of affirmation from them to make her case in point.

“Vivienne,” Anna’s words come out as a muffled plea, her hands still covering her face, “can you please-”

“No, no - let me just -” Vivienne waved a hand over her shoulder, ignoring Anna entirely. “It was a glow, Harry. Sexy - ethereal, like a fairy kind of. No - an angel. Like a firefly in a mason jar. And hell, don’t get me started on how you looked at her. Like she was the second coming and-”

Anna groaned again, louder this time. “Oh Jesus fucking Christ.”

“So no,” Vivienne concluded dramatically, pointing her finger sternly in Harry’s direction. “You stay. You both stay and do - do the - I don’t know, whatever it is emotionally stunted people do when they’re still in love and don’t-”

Max stepped up, placing a hand on Vivienne’s shoulder. “Alright Casanova, come on now-”

“Max w-hold on!”

“No, Viv, we’re goin’ inside to funnel you some water and maybe even a soft pretzel.”

“I can’t yet,” Vivienne’s protests started to wane as Max gently ushered her closer to the door, “I was halfway through my monologue.”

Lacey sighed as she stood up, giving a quick squeeze to Anna’s knee before she ensued after the circus moving indoors, “Finish it to the ficus by the women’s bathroom.”

Vivienne’s pout of defiance rivaled that of an incessant toddler as she was being forcefully guided to the patio doors. She huffed, just once, beneath her breath as Max continued to gently tug her backward. Yet she stayed fixed and facing both Harry and Anna - like she couldn’t bear to look away just yet.

“Be good,” she called out one last time, pointing at them both. “Or bad! Kiss, yell - I don’t care! Just do it!”

It was her departing statement before she less than gracefully disappeared into the glow of the lights inside. Lacey pattered a few feet behind them, Vivienne’s clutch she’d left behind swinging in her hand as she approached Harry before the doors. She mouthed a shameful ‘I’m so sorry’ when they locked eyes in passing, and all he could manage was a weird sort of tight-lipped smile paired with a nod before she slithered through the door. It closed behind her and that was it - silence settling again like a warm fog.

And then, after a beat, Anna let out another long exhale. She could still hear every drunken declaration that came out of Vivienne’s mouth, ringing in her ears as each word etched themselves into her brain. Like a punishment or form of public torture. The quiet that followed - the same one she found herself sitting in now - felt too still. Too heavy - almost as heavy as Harry’s stare on the back of her neck, where something ancient and instinctive was beginning to prickle. She didn’t want to turn around - not yet. But she needed to. Despite her body resisting it like it knew it’d be walking into a fire, she still forced herself to move.

A small shift of her knee, a tightening of her spine, the release of a breath she hadn’t even realized she was holding - slowly, she twisted on the step. The silk of her dress crumpled between her thigh and the stone, cigarette still burning faintly between her fingers. And when her body had angled to a halt amidst her turn, there he was.

“Hi.” Harry’s throat tightened, his voice low and warm and full of everything he wasn’t sure how to say yet.

He was looking at her with the same set of green eyes that she couldn’t ever quite manage to let herself forget - the same pair that were identical to the ones that look up at her every night at bedtime. The same, identical pair that she gave birth to nearly four years ago. The same identical pair that he knows nothing about.

It felt like being physically struck, the breath stuttering in the middle of her throat. He stood just a few feet away, bourbon glass cradled casually in one hand, the soft gold light from the patio reflecting off the dark curve of his hair, kissing the slope of his cheekbone. He definitely looked older - sharper around the edges, more weathered in a worldly kind of way, leaner in the jaw - but no less familiar. His suit jacket hung open, his dress shirt loose and unbuttoned just enough she could faintly make out the tattoos that adorned his chest. The same ones she used to blindly trace with the tips of her fingers when she was bored or tired.

He was handsome in the way that still made her stomach turn over, made her fingers twitch and bones remember what it felt like to be wanted - to really, truly be seen. It made a rush of something sweep up in her chest - ache, panic, longing - she wasn’t sure and she couldn’t quite name it. And she didn’t want to, it was simply too big. Her body was still buzzing from the tequila and the nicotine and the sheer adrenaline of it all. But somewhere beneath all of that was a crashing, terrible joy that she adamantly tried to keep shoved down. She couldn’t - not now, not after everything, and not before all that’s surely to come.

Anna swallowed hard and tried to sit up straighter, their stares still interlocked without any intent on breaking as she tried to steel herself. Her spine locked into its usual armor. The ache in her chest got shoved down, smothered beneath dry humor and carefully trained apathy. You’re not that girl anymore, she told herself. So don’t act like it.

But her body felt like it was trying to betray her - fingers still maintaining their faint tremble, pulse racing, lungs wound tighter with a cross between breathlessness and grief. She clenched her jaw and tried to hold his gaze like it didn’t threaten to completely undo her. Like her entire life wasn’t about to split at the seams - for the second time. So when she finally spoke, her voice was only mildly uneven.

“Hi.” there it was, her forced ‘cool girl’ facade. “You wanna keep standing there and wait for Vivienne to rope you into a second monologue?”

Harry felt his heart lurch impossibly hard in his chest - so much so that he had to try to swallow against it. Her voice was lower than the one he’d play on a loop in his memory, a bit rougher at the edges. Maybe it was the combination of humidity infiltrating her mouth in congruence with the cigarette smoke. Or the quiet tone she offered with caution, like that of a painfully fragile olive branch or a match that was just itching to be struck.

He didn’t answer right away - couldn’t - because now she was facing him. Head on, really, truly facing him. They weren’t separated by a room full of people this time. She couldn’t bob and weave her way through a crowd to avoid him. God, she was so impossibly close he could reach his arm out and just about graze his fingertips against her bare shoulder. It took all of the strength he could possibly drudge up to keep the emotions swirling within him from showing plainly on his face. But he felt it - all of it - surging through him like a tidal wave. Relief, disbelief, guilt, longing, an almost euphoric sense of comfort intertwined with bliss familiarity. He wanted to press his forehead to hers and keep it there for a moment too long, that way he’d know for sure she was actually real.

Anna studies him for a moment longer with an uncertain smirk, hanging on how fixed his stare was on her face. “You’re gawking, you know. It’s a little weird.”

He’d imagined this exact moment a thousand different ways. It’d been, shamefully, practiced in mirrors. He’d drawled over it via dreams, in the faux seclusion that the backseat of black cars provided and hotel rooms kept aglow with nothing but a dim phone screen at 2 a.m., scrolling aimlessly through every possible trace of her the internet could offer him. Which was hardly ever anything at all. Nothing came close to reality.

She was luminous. Skin golden, kissed in favor by the sun and soft - her cheeks had gone flush from what he’d assume were the drinks in coercion with the blaring Georgia sun. He’d like to think maybe, just maybe, she was just as flustered and nervous as he was. And that’s why her cheeks looked so pink. If she was, he knows she’d never say it. Never show it. Her hair was lighter now - more blonde than the picture of her from years ago he always held onto - burned caramel, sun-drenched at the tips, catching the glow of string lights around her like it was spun silk. A few new freckles marched across the bridge of her nose, more spilling onto her cheeks than before. Her lips, full and glossed faintly with whatever she’d been drinking, played a painful reminder on what it used to feel like to kiss them. To kiss her - completely losing himself.

“I can go back inside.” he answered fast - too fast, and it made him go flush with embarrassment for some reason. “If - like, if y’wanted t’be on your own for a bit.”

Anna didn’t respond immediately. Instead she let the words hang in the air until they got stiff - partially because she wanted to make sure whatever she said next was the right thing to say, and also just because she found a bit of pleasure watching him twist in the proverbial wind. She just continued to look at him for a beat too long, her expression unreadable in the golden wash of warm lighting overhead. He combed over every word that just came out of his mouth, how they slipped out before he could leash them, the way his voice cracked a bit at the end. But then she cracked the faintest smile - dry, knowing, evidently amused.

“It was an invite for you to sit, Harry.” The way she says his name, through a lilted and polite chuckle, makes him almost want to collapse. “I don’t mind the company.”

“Even the company of an ex-lover?”

Anna cranes her head a bit in a strained laugh, reserved but he can still tell it was genuine. It was tightly controlled - more a puff of air than genuine amusement - but it was enough to suffice for him. It takes the edge off the interaction a bit - makes him feel less terrified and more at ease. There’s still caution - still the unavoidable awkwardness of it all. Each step he takes closer to the spot beside her makes his knees almost feel wobbly - makes the sound of his shoes hitting the stone feel louder as they echo in both of his ears.

“I mean,” Anna looks away, pretending to brush something imaginary off the lap of her dress. “I’ve honestly had worse.”

It made his lips twitch with something just shy of a full smile, his chest hammering loud enough that he was nearly certain she could hear every thud. He took a tentative step forward, briskly followed by another. Each swing of his leg and heel-to-toe movement of his foot felt unbearably magnified, the scrape of his soles against the stone beneath his feet shouting against the quieted hush of the patio. His limbs almost felt awkward, like they weren’t really his and his knees were just shy of completely knocking.

Once he finally reached the spot beside her, the additional sliver of space she’d provided as she slid over after inviting him to join her, he hesitated. Not because he didn’t want to sit - he did. But once he did, that was it. They’d talk - face to face, side by side, nothing to interrupt them but a muffled bass solo or the cooing of cicadas. And she’d be right beside him finally - warm, real, and close enough to touch. The first time in four years that the space that existed between them was only sticky air.

Then he lowered himself beside her. Close - impossibly close. Yet, somehow, not close enough. The silk of her dress rustled a bit as she scooched over a bit more, loose strands of hair wriggling slightly in unison with the movement of her body. Their arms nearly brushed and his breath caught momentarily. She was just within reach and he longed for the freedom to let his fingers graze hers, run them down the etch of the exposed spine on her open back dress. He was still reeling from the way she said his name like it still belonged to her. Maybe it did.

They say in silence for a moment. Not heavy, not light - just slightly weighted with history and the ghosts of everything left unsaid between them trying to quietly settle itself at their feet. He racked his brain for something to say - anything to get her to keep talking so he could listen to her voice like it was his favorite song.

“Did you cut y’hair?”

Anna belted out a breathy laugh, still balancing the whittling cigarette in her fingers. “Did I cut my hair? That’s your opening line?”

“Come on!” Harry blushed through a sheepish chuckle, “M’bloody flustered! What did y’want me t’say, then?”

Anna had her knees bent up loosely in front of her, arms lazily slung over both as her lit stick of nicotine dangled precariously from her hand. She felt him watching, studying, like he was taking stock in every inch of her body. Like if he didn’t, he couldn’t update the memory of her that lived rent free in his head. She didn’t need to look to know - she felt in the kind of way you could feel sunlight on bare skin. The prickling heat of it. The pull.

“Something witty and British.” She teased, gaze still trained on the point of her shoes. “Like.. I don’t know.. beg for a drag of my cigarette or something.”

“You were never very keen on sharing.”

“I’ve evolved.” Anna twists her body a bit so it’s more squared towards him before humbly extending her hand, like she’s bestowing a holy offer. “Consider this proof of evolution.”

He stared at it for a second - like it was a relic from a life he used to know, or a dare he’d never turned down. And he felt a flutter travel from his gut and up to his neck as she wiggled her eyebrows at him. If he didn’t know any better, he’d almost believe that she really was as relaxed as she was trying to portray herself to be. Almost.

Anna added, “Don’t make me be the only vice-ridden bridesmaid tonight.”

Harry raised an eyebrow. “Oh so you’ve started collecting vices?”

“More like bad habits.” Anna shrugged smugly with one bare shoulder. “Cigarettes, dessert before dinner, exes who used to be in boybands.”

“Mmm,” he groaned amidst dry laughter, letting smoke trickle from his lips. “I missed that, y’smart mouth.”

“Oh?” Anna chuckled teasingly with a cocked brow, “you missed my mouth?”

“Still very goddamn cheeky, I see.” He laughed with a shake of his head, though the moment that follows is unnervingly sober. “And what if I said yes?”

She smiled despite herself - forced, tense, mildly caught off guard and put on the spot all at once. It was that same, crooked little grin she’d spent all these years perfecting after learning it could get her out of trouble. Sometimes even into it. On the inside, though, her stomach clenched so painstakingly hard it practically winded her. There it was - that shift.

Subtle, but she still felt it - evident in the way Harry’s voice dipped in pitch and the expression on his face softened at the edges. The way his stare loitered for just a moment too long. The energy shifted from two old flames spitting witty banter back and forth to something deeper - something a bit more raw and more vulnerable than Anna might’ve been prepared for. It was too honest. Honesty, in this instance, was dangerous. Honesty meant cracks, and if he scooted over just half an inch to where he could get even closer to see them, he’d unravel everything Anna’s spent the better part of 4 years trying to keep hidden. Everything she kept locked away behind a devilish grin and a smug shrug of the shoulders.

This was easier - laughing like it meant nothing, lighthearted teasing and aimless conversation with no real sense of direction. It was a script she knew by heart. It was safer than the truth - that she missed him too. That he was still under her skin in ways that made her feel brutally feral if she allowed herself to think about it for too long.

“What if you didn’t hog my emergency cigarette, first?” She quipped lightly, extending her hand.

Too forward too quickly - he thought. Message received. He didn’t want to overcrowd her, physically or emotionally. Truthfully, he was content getting whatever version of her she was willing to give him so long as he got to spend more time with her outside. More time talking. More time watching her adjust pieces of her hair every so often, listening to her voice when she spoke, watch the way she gently kept the cigarette tucked between her fingers as she put it to her mouth. He didn’t even care that he stared while she let the curve of her lips adhere to the filtered end. It made him want to rip the thing out of her hand and put his own mouth there in its absence, get a taste of tequila and remnants of the Marlboro Red straight out of her own mouth. Too forward too quickly.

Harry leaned forward slightly, resting his elbows on his knees as he basked in the sight of her exhaling another cloud of smoke - letting it curl into the Georgia air before completely dissipating. Then, after a beat too long, he asked - softly, but deliberately, like he’d been holding it in for years:

“How’ve you been, though? Tell me what you’ve been up to.”

Anna glanced at him sidelong, her smile starting to twitch as if she found his question deeply amusing. Or maybe she found it mildly unnerving - like a threat or an overbearing performance evaluation. It was hard to say. All she did was tap a bit of ash from her cigarette before letting it fall to the stone beneath them, meeting the ground and vanishing into the gravel below.

“Oh, you know..” she said breezily, “just casual arson, some light forgery. I’ve been thinking about starting a Ponzi Scheme, actually.”

Harry huffed out a laugh through his nose, his eyes darting across her face like he forged her hand before she’d even had the chance to play it. She always found that mildly annoying - how good he was at finding this charming, effortless way of seeing right through her when she got like this. When she tried to stay armed.

“Anna..”

“What?” She said innocently, licking her lips before guiding the cigarette back towards them. “You asked, so I’m giving you an update.”

“I know what I asked,” he tutted playfully, “I meant a real one. Y’not savvy enough to pioneer a Ponzi scheme.”

“Ok that’s just not true and you know it.” She wanted to avoid being transparent, but his pause after her move of defiance confirmed for her that he wasn’t going to budge. “Work’s been… good. Busy, but good.”

“That I gathered.” He smiled - genuine, almost like he couldn’t neglect showing how proud he felt. “Y'bloody everywhere.”

She blinked, feigning surprise. “Do I just haunt your algorithm?”

He didn’t deny it - just chuckled instead. “Th’label is very - y’built something quite brilliant.”

Something in her face softened - just a flicker - and he could tell that meant more than she’d willingly admit to him. It was a small step at melting the ice fortress in front of him, and he was determined to keep chipping away until it disappeared altogether. Still, she deflected anyways.

“Brilliant feels too generous. Functional chaos sounds much sexier. More appropriate.”

“I saw th’Paris piece,” he said. “That one with th’netted cape over the silk bias cut.”

Anna tilted her head slowly, finally turning her gaze towards him, brows lifted in mock surprise and a smile tugging harder at the corners of her mouth.

“Look at you dropping vocabulary like ‘bias cut’. You’ve been Googling me, Styles?”

Harry’s ears went a little pink. “Y’practically impossible to find online anywhere else…”

“I’m flattered.” She interjected with a grin.

“Seriously, though,” he stated, quieter now, “how have you been?”

Anna’s eyes loitered a bit longer on his face - the soberness of his tone, the sincerity of his expression. She peeled her gaze away and dropped it to her hands, deciding instead to fixate on the ring clad to her pointer finger. She took a breath, then another. She almost couldn’t stand how hard he was making it to keep up the act.

“I’ve been.. Fine.” she said. And it was honest whilst omitting most of the truth. “Some days more than fine. Others not so much.”

Harry just nodded slowly. His jaw tensed, but he didn’t push. He wouldn’t. Vulnerability isn’t her strong suit - never has been. He knows that. It’s why he’s ok taking whatever crumbs of genuinity she’s willing to give right now. It’s better than nothing.

She looked back up at him again, mouth tugged into a half-smile. “Why? Expecting me to say I was just miserable without you?”

He blinked - caught off guard. Both by the question and the sincerity of playfulness in her tone. “No, ‘course not. I just- dunno. Wanted t’hear it from you. That you’ve been well ‘nd all.”

“Have you been miserable without me?” she teased, but her voice was gentler. Almost apologetic.

Harry looked at her for a long second. And this time, he didn’t smile. He didn’t match her energy with a witty joke or a lighthearted jab. He didn’t chuckle it off and nod towards the cigarette to ask for his turn to take a drag. He just stared. And he was daring her to stare back with that same kind of fire. His answer was soft. Honest.

“Maybe,” he said. “Sometimes, I guess. Yeah.”

Anna didn’t blink right away. For a moment, she almost didn’t breathe. There was a soft pang of guilt that hit her like an unforgiving titlewave. She felt mean, now. Unkind, like she had shared an inside joke that Harry wasn’t a part of. Like she took a genuine moment and tried to shapeshift it into something else.

Her chest lifted on a slow inhale, and something in her posture shifted in the most subtle way - her body bracing against a truth her heart wasn’t equipped to carry. She felt her breath hitch in her throat before she could stop it, looking away in a hurried rush. She was suddenly too aware of the tightness behind her eyes.

She could’ve said it back. She could’ve been honest about how she felt, for once in her fucking life, and said yes. Yes - she was miserable sometimes, too. Yes, there were nights she missed him so much she could nearly feel the aching sensation in the center of her chest. That his name was the one she had to bite back when Charlie first kicked in her stomach - he was the only person she wanted to tell. But she wasn’t ready to let him back in like that.

She offered the cigarette back to him again - a silent peace offering that he willfully obliged. And as the silence stretched, she could feel the shift in him. It was a subtle recoil, like he immediately regretted speaking the words aloud and showing his cards too soon. Like the truth had left him exposed and she didn’t care enough to match it. So Anna did what she always did when emotions tangled too tightly in her chest - she pivoted.

“Well,” she forced a slow smile, “I’m buying that - must be why you wrote that song about me.”

Harry finally turned to her again, caught off guard. But she noticed how his shoulders went less tense and his posture grew less stoic. A slow, stunned grin crept across the lower half of his face as he let out a breathy, befuddled laugh.

“Who told you that!” he asked, half serious and half joking.

Anna just smirked, eyes narrowing like a cat who’d gotten into something it shouldn’t have. “Can’t say. I’m not a snitch.”

“Oh, come on!” he enticed, nudging her knee with his own. “Which one did they tell you about?”

She widened her eyes in mock offense and genuine amusement. “I’m sorry, did you just ask which one?”

Anna released a genuine giggle - partially flattered, but mostly taken by the fact that he was so keen to give up that information. And she laughed even harder when he shifted in his seat beside her in a disgruntled way, like he couldn’t believe she’d just gotten him to fold like that again. Then he blushed - only a bit. His lips conformed into a crooked, self-depricating smile. Like he’d just gotten caught red-handed.

“So there’s more than one now?” Anna ensued gleefully, extending her hand to nudge his arm. “As in, what, a running list? How many?”

It really wasn’t intended as a big deal. He knows why she did it - light, airy, playful energy lingering between them. It was instinctual for her to just reach out and give him a lighthearted shove to the bicep and punctuate it with a laugh. It was the kind of contact that probably meant nothing to her. The type of thing people do all the time. The type of thing nobody would even think twice about - nobody would really make note of him. Except for him, it was the complete opposite. It was loaded.

The second that her fingers brushed against his arm, followed by her palm splaying flat against the thin material of his shirt, he felt every inch of his body light up like someone sparked a fuse in the hollow of his chest. It traveled outwardly in a demure explosion - electric and familiar. Borderline terrifying. He swore if his heart chose to thud any harder it’d perforate his lungs. It was like the skin beneath his shirt, right where she touched him, was still buzzing - even after her hand had retreated back to her lap.

He had no idea how she was managing to do this - how she was sitting beside him as if she hadn’t once carved herself out of his life with surgical precision, leaving him behind like she was never there in the first place. Like she wasn’t the entity that almost unraveled him and rebuilt him at the same time. Like this wasn’t the first time they’d been close enough to actually touch each other in over four years.

She’d laughed, that pretty little smirk tugging at her lips - same set of lips he wanted glued to his own, yet couldn’t have. Her hair brushed his shoulder for a moment before she pulled back. It was all so casual, so easy. She probably had no idea it nearly wrecked him. And for the sake of the moment, he wasn’t going to show her that it almost did.

“M’not telling you!” He teased back. “And I wouldn’t call it a running list. Just… inspiration struck. Maybe, I dunno, more than once.”

“More than once!” Anna repeated in exasperated flattery, throwing a hand to her chest. “I guess we split custody of the grammy, now.”

“Listen t’you giving me shit about my songs!” he laughed, “Pot calling the kettle black, much?”

“I’m not giving you shit,” Anna lightheartedly lamented. “Let me revel in the fact that I was the muse for a handful of hits.”

“You’re an artist!” He starts, still chasing the lightness of the moment. “Y’understand the urge, yeah? Drawing from real life - y’mean t’tell me you’ve never taken personal experience and turned it into a dress. Or, better yet, an entire collection?”

Anna cocked a brow, feigning offense. “Oh I take everything and stitch it into my clothing. Joy, heartbreak, a particularly rude cab driver I was saddled with in New York once-”

Harry laughed. It was an easy, real sound. The kind that crinkled the corners of his eyes and brought a pinkish hue of warmth to his cheeks. It was sweet and almost boyish. It was almost damn near enough to make Anna melt into her spot on the step, drudging up that familiar feeling of warm contentness in her belly. It paralleled a particular sense of comfort - like coming back home after a long day.

But then, without warning, something in him palpably shifted. He quieted. His grin softened at the edges, like it had run out of places to go. His head hung a bit while he let his gaze sit on the tip of Anna’s shoes before he looked back up at her again. And before she could keep them skimming the surface, he asked her something - quietly, cautiously, but not without weight.

“And what else?” His tone was startlingly gentle, vulnerable. “Is there any of me in something you’ve made?”

The question stole the air right out of her throat. He wasn’t asking to be clever. There was no teasing anymore. The conversation had progressed into something else now - something hushed, almost reverent. Like the words had slipped out of his mouth and past his lips before he could cage them. His gaze lingered on her face like he was in desperate search of something - seeking out the answer before she spoke it in a state of tamed panic.

Anna chose not to look at him right away. Instead, she turned her eyes out to look on at the dark stretch of golf course - where the night air shimmered faintly from waning heat against the blurred outline of rolling hills. The question packed a punch that was delivered to her gut so severely she had to try and fight the urge to physically keel over. If only he knew.

If only he knew how all the parts of him she carried - good and bad - lived undyingly throughout countless skirt hems, pant seams, or necklines of dresses. How many sketches were scrawled from the aching memory of his hands. He had no idea that she had designed an entire line based off the fabric of one of his old t-shirts, the same one she still kept on the bottom of her pajama drawer. He had no idea just how much of him lived in her work. And then some. If only he knew that her first, true runway piece - the one that permanently altered the trajectory of her career - was made in a frenzy of sleepless nights and swollen feet, stitched together by grief and longing and a baby growing quietly inside her.

Is there any of me in something you’ve made.

She wants to tell him yes, but beyond the clothes. Beyond the self acclaimed label, the hemlines, the patchwork. There was a lot of him that existed in what was profoundly her biggest project of all. He’d collaborated with her in ways he wasn’t even privy to, ways that he couldn’t even fathom if she were to tell him right now - under string lights and between shared cigarette drags. Yes he existed in something she’s made - her child. Their child. The same one who had grown up right under his nose. The same one who had his eyes - a hauntingly familiar shade of hazy green. She had the same crinkle in her nose when she was deep in thought, the same kink of natural-born waves in her hair. She had an identical knack of winning people over with a little bit of charm and a whole lot of natural empathy. She rivaled his inquisitive sense of wonder - like she would still be insatiable even if she knew everything. She inherited those dimples in her cheeks, the same dimples Anna fell in love with right around her 21st birthday. She had that mirrored habit of asking a ridiculous amount of questions.

It took her nine months to make Charlie, and she was saturated with plenty of him. She can feel the confession clawing at the back of her throat, and the urgency burns like white-hot fire when she glances at him - still boring a hole into the side of her face. Just the thought of her, of Charlie, But she tables it - swallows it dry before locking it back up again. Immediately after the metaphorical wall goes right back up. She can’t do it. Not right now. So instead she turned to him with a smirk, slow and enigmatic, and let the silence stretch for a moment long enough to keep the truth buried where it rightfully belonged.

“Maybe,” she finally said, her voice teasing but her eyes speaking something different entirely. “But where’s the fun in telling you what pieces? Better to keep you guessing.”

“S’a very Anna answer.” His laugh comes out as a huff through his nose. “S’exactly what I expected you t’say.”

Maybe it was liquid courage that the alcohol was giving him, or the intoxication of her thigh almost pressing directly against his own, but he wasn’t ready to ease up entirely. There’s still layers to her he feels compelled to pull back - there always was more beneath the surface with her. All he got was a ‘maybe’ with that sly little smile, the kind she always deferred to when she was working to keep something close to her chest. She was always like this - delicate and sharp all at once, a closed book with torn and glowing edges. He could never quite manage to get inside her unless she really allowed him to, and right now she was dangling the key to entry right in front of his face.

Harry took a slow, methodical sip from his glass - letting the liquid cool the skin of his lips whilst savoring the way it burned as it slithered down the back of his throat. It was just something he could give his hands to do in order to keep them from doing what they really wanted - touching her hair by her face, the exposed skin of her back, the top of her or the knuckles of her fingers. But even the alcohol couldn’t numb the pulsing in his jaw or the low flicker of something unsettingly ugly that was beginning to twist in his gut.

Christ, who else has known her after me?

Who came after him that had access to this version of her - more grown, more golden, still impossibly magnetic in that effortlessly infatuating way she carried herself? Who else has touched that lighter, sun kissed hair - got their fingers tangled in the knots at the end, got to pull on it the way that she likes? Who was privileged enough to get to pepper kisses to her freckled shoulders after a long day spent beneath the sun, or whisper something stupid in her ear just to coax the same laugh out of her that he’d heard a few minutes ago? Has she let anyone in?

Did anyone else know her laugh in the dark? The way she curled up on the left side of the bed - never the right. Is there someone else who knew to put just one packet of sugar in her coffee - no cream or milk because she hated the after taste. It didn’t matter what kind or brand. Would he know that she made the best grilled cheese, or that she couldn’t parallel park for shit?

He didn’t want to ask. He really, really didn’t want to know. But he couldn’t not. Because the not knowing felt like an agitating splinter lodged somewhere deep inside his brain. The type of splinter someone keeps tonguing at despite the unbearable amount of pain that comes with it.

His eyes flickered to her side profile - the cigarette glowing faintly between her fingers as she brought it back up to her lips again. He swooned over the way her dress shimmered under the patio lights, almost as if someone had just poured the material onto her body. Her lashes were long, cheekbones catching the soft warmth that came in tandem with the night air, and she looked… content. Guarded, but oddly at peace. And that might’ve been the part that stung the most. Because he wasn’t. Not since her - not really. And the idea that someone else had taken the space in her life that he used to fill, if someone else slipped into the cracks and found the version of her she never really let anyone else see - he might very well collapse and die right here in front of her. So he cleared his throat lightly, trying to keep it casual. Playful, even.

“So,” He hoped the smile on his lips masked the desperation in his heart. “Y’seeing anyone?”

The question came like another sucker punch, though this one was wrapped in velvet upon delivery. He asked it lightly - offhand, almost - but Anna knew better. She knew there was weight packed beneath it. She sensed it in the way the question settled between them, humming like a live wire. She knew it was coming - of course she did. You don’t cross paths with the man you haven’t seen in four years - the same man who changed your life in every possible way a person can be changed - and not anticipate a question of that magnitude to weasel its way to the surface. Knowing it was coming didn’t make it any easier, though. It wasn’t a simple answer. In broader terms, maybe it was, because she could just say no. She hadn’t been seeing anyone, not seriously - not really. In all honesty, she didn’t even have the interest. Because that would require her to make room, and she couldn’t.

Between dawn feedings and design deadlines, Charlie’s sticky fingers and her tiny disarray of shoes piled up by the door, and the way Anna’s body - mind and soul, too - had been proudly claimed by motherhood so wholly, it never crossed her mind to try. There was the occasional fling - a short-lived hook up just to scratch the itch. But the truth was, amidst it all, she hadn’t wanted to let anyone else in. Not since Harry.

And she could have said all that to him. She could have cut her heart wide open and laid it bleeding on the small sliver of open stone between them - handing it to him like a handwritten note, messily folded. But instead, she cracked a smirk and leaned into the shield she knew best.

“Me? Oh yeah, tons of people.” She drawled, letting the cigarette sizzle out as she dropped it into her glass of half melted ice. “Tom Cruise and Toby McGuire on the weekends. Bluey during the week.”

The last name slipped out faster than she even managed to realize - her brain instinctually defaulting to the first thing Charlie asks to watch upon waking up in the morning. And she didn’t even think twice about it until Harry pointedly called her out for it.

“Have y’gone mad?” He barked out a laugh, cutting her off mid-smirk. “Y’watch children’s shows in y’spare time now?”

Anna’s heart stopped - only for a second. Just long enough to keep her train of thought on track and divert her peace of mind from derailing. She coughed lightly, smiled harder, eyes flickering down to the step beneath her like it had somehow become the most interesting thing she’d ever seen. Her brain was screaming at her - too close, way too close. Pull back. But her body portrayed nothing but amusement.

“Lilly’s really into it.” She brazenly lies. “Besides, Bluey’s got a wicked sense of humor. 10/10 watch, I couldn’t recommend it more.”

Harry raised a brow but didn’t push it. All he did was just chuckle again, leaning back on his hands so he could stretch his legs out in front of him. But his smile faded just enough to make room for something softer, something more sincere. He still hasn’t gotten an answer out of her yet. A real answer - one that will dislodge that pesky splinter.

“I know it sounded like a joke,” he said, voice easy but eyes still steady on her. “But it wasn’t.”

Anna sighed with a playful head shake. “It never is with you.”

“I meant it.” He leaned forward slightly, forearms braced on his knees while his thumb absently rubbed a ring on his finger. “Anyone good? Someone… lucky enough?”

Anna stilled. She could feel the smile on her face begin to falter and, for a moment, the air between them became suspended. It felt thin, kind of like stretched glass. She didn’t answer - not right away. Even if she wanted to, she wasn’t even sure what she would say. She just looked down instead, lashes brushing against her cheeks as she stared onward at the stone step between. Like, somehow, she might find the answer there. Of course she didn’t. Only the sight of his shoes - those damn, worn in dress shoes with a scuffed toe and undone laces, because of course he could never manage to tie them properly. But something about them - about him - sitting here asking that question like it was the most casual thing, like it was something that didn’t make her chest tight made her jaw lock.

“Don’t do that.” Anna exhaled, intentionally avoiding his stare.

“Do what?” He pushed softly. “S’been a long time, just trying to catch up. ”

“That.” She insisted, finally pulling her gaze back up to meet his. “You’re doing that thing you always do.”

She watched the expression on his face flicker - confusion fluttered by the intrigued knitting of his eyebrows. Her fingers toyed with the ring clad to her pointer finger, like giving her spare hand something to fiddle with would help ease the anxiety coursing through her body. There was a line that had appeared between them - thin, treacherous, daring. The more she thought about it, the tighter everything on her body felt. The clothes, the jewelry, the makeup - all of it was starting to smother her.

“What thing?”

“That soft-spoken thing,,” She pushes, voice more firm - like she’s frustrated with just how well he’s able to do it. “Where you’re all earnest, like it’s easy. Like you don’t know what you’re doing.”

“M’not doing anything on purpose.” Harry’s tone is assuring, though just an octave short of begging almost.

“I know, and that’s the worst part.” Anna said through a dry, hollow chuckle - one that didn’t reach her eyes. “You’re so good at it… you just - you talk like someone who hasn’t made it impossibly hard to just fucking breath the last four years.”

Harry’s face fell, but she didn’t see it. She couldn’t bring herself to look up at him and say it. But he felt her words like a subtle blow right to the chest. Blunt but intimate, delivered by only someone who really knew him who could manage to land a hit like that. It echoed in his mind, her voice far softer than the words that came with it. It was almost as if she didn’t mean to actually say it out loud. It gutted him, because he had and so did she. And they both knew it.

She didn’t bother to look at him when she said it, and to him that might’ve been the one part that seemed to cut the deepest. Her eyes remained downward, fixated on the lawn whilst remaining glassy and distant under string lights, jaw still clenched like she was keeping the rest of her sentence hostage atop her tongue. Harry took a hard swallow as he watched her, so beautiful and poised and composed, yet visibly rattled underneath that layer of armor she made so hard to penetrate.

She continued to toy with that same ring, twirling it around her finger like it was the only plausible distraction. On and off she slipped it - gliding it into her hand before mindlessly slipping it back on. Off again it came, though this time she kept it wrapped in her palm.

Her profile glowed against the humidity-stricken night, hair lit gold by the flicker of patio light and skin still buzzing with the combination of tequila and tension simmering between them. And in that moment, as he stared and studied, he didn’t care about any of it - the past, the present, or even the unearthed pain between them nobody wanted to address.

He just wanted to touch her - reach out and brush the hair off her shoulder, or press his lips to her temple like he used to. To apologize without having to speak a single word. He wanted to hold her hand, invite her into his arms and keep her head so close to his chest that she’d be able to hear the rapid thudding of his heart. But he didn’t, and he knew she wouldn’t let him.

“You don’t have to tell me anything,” He affirmed quietly with a kindness so familiar it hurt. “You never have to.

“I know.” Anna nodded, exhaling slowly through her nose. “You just have this annoying habit of making me want to.”

It lulled a smile out of him - warm, like a flicker of light in the dark. “Well then tell me. Whatever y’want. Whatever y’don’t. M’here.”

Anna’s stomach flipped. Not in a fluttery, girlish kind of way - but like something was loosening or unraveling within her gut. It was the gentleness stitched in his voice that sunk her. It always sank her. How he’d look at her the way he’s doing right now, like she’s something precious and even the silences they shared were etched with meaning. And fuck, he still knew exactly how to do it all - how to speak so softly that her walls started to crumble. She hated that. She missed that.

She could feel her mouth start to go dry and fingers urge to reach for something - her now empty drink, her ring that was now clammy in her palm, his hand that was only mere inches out of her grasp. But all she did was sit there, blinking at him. It was just something about the way he said it, like it wasn’t a question. Like it didn’t need to be pried out of her.

Because he knew. He always knew when something was pressing at the edge of her, if she was holding back something so heavy that it manifested itself through a slight curl in her shoulders. Whether she wanted him to or not, he always had a knack for reading her body like a blueprint.

And maybe it was the tequila or the thickness of the humidity in the air. Or maybe she had just finally reached a point where she was tired of holding it all on her own. But she suddenly couldn’t suppress this nagging urge to tell him everything.

Admit that behind the jokes and the sarcasm, the wittiness and lighthearted small talk, she really was miserable without him. She wanted to tell him about all of the sleepless nights she endured, the ones where images of him haunted her and forced her eyes to stay open. She wanted to tell him she’d never dated anybody after him because she couldn’t. She could never bring herself to - how could she? She could feel the desire to tell him that - yes, she also caught herself scouring the internet for him, too. She wanted to tell him that leaving him behind LA and erasing any trace of her may have been the biggest regret of her life.

And there was Charlie too. She wanted to share that with him - that they created this beautiful, ethereal person who was just a sheer force. She wanted to tell him all about this tiny little person, his near-spitting image, and all the amazing qualities she possessed.She felt the pressure in her throat - the need to tell him that as she grew their love in physical form, she wanted to call and tell him every single day. There wasn’t a single day in the past 4 and a half years - 1,643 days - that she didn’t have to fight that urge to tell him. There was so much she wanted to tell him.

It crept up her throat like a tide - completely uncontainable. And then she turned to him. Took a deep breath. She put the ring down behind her so she could wipe her palms against the flimsy fabric of her silk dress, now a bit stuck to the tops of her thighs. She saw the glint of hope in his eyes - subtle, but real. Earth shatteringly real. And her heart was beating so loud now that she was sure he could hear it too.

He was waiting. God, he was right there - right in front of her. She’d played this out over and over in her head for years. And in the moment, right now, she thought of all the ways this could go. He could feel the weight of whatever wasn’t being said - heavy, looming. What it was, exactly, he couldn’t say. His fingers flexed around the glass in his hand, nerves and instinct twisting in his gut. He was bursting at the seams for her to say it - whatever it was. He was about to ask her to tell him the thing he knew was right there. But when he opened his mouth, someone else spoke for him.

“Anna?”

The sound of the patio doors soon followed, creaking open and cutting through the air like a dropped plate in a quiet room. Harry’s shoulders instinctually tensed, his question immediately dissolving between his chest and his throat. He released a long exhale through his nose, jaw ticking as he watched the silhouette step outside, utterly oblivious to the moment they’d just ripped out from beneath him. Timing, he thought bitterly. Always the fucking timing.

“Ans, you alive out here somewhere?”

The voice rang through clear as a bell, even before the full figure stepped into semi-view. Gargled music from the ongoing reception inside trickled out through the cracked door, along with the dwindled sound of Anna’s aunt Joanie singing the incorrect lyrics to Midnight Train To Georgia. And it was loud, which told Anna she had reached a level of inebriation so high that she had now taken ownership of the band’s mic stand.

Sadie emerged further onto the patio, backlit by the soft amber glow of the venue lights. Her silhouette framed perfectly in the doorway like a divine apparition with a neatly executed bun and a cocktail ring. In one hand she had Anna’s phone glued to her palm, her eyes squinting a bit against the night like she was trying to make out who was sitting across the patio.

“Earth to Anna.” She called again, this time with a little more urgency, before finally spotting her - really spotting her.

Anna’s head twisted reflexively at the sound of her name, as did Harry’s beside her. She could feel his body shift. But her eyes were always locked on Sadie. And in that moment - God, in that moment - any shred of ease she felt immediately washed away. And in turn, the onset of panic took its place.

She was an idiot to think that she could have brought something of that magnitude so brazenly. And she felt fear strike her upon reaching a sober moment, realizing the severity of the situation she almost just found herself in. Sadie was her person. Her constant. Her harbor in the storm. And here she was again, stepping in at the perfect time to save Anna from herself. The timing was divine, like the universe had caught her flailing, dangling just a few seconds too long on the edge of something too honest, too open, and decided to intervene.

Anna hadn’t realized how tightly she’d been wound until she found Sadie’s face - equal parts concerned and exasperated, clutching onto Anna’s phone like a torch or a warning bell. It made her want to laugh and cry and sprint towards her best friend like a child leaving their first day of school. It made her want to collapse into her arms and tell her she had no idea she was almost too late.

“Hi,” Anna breathed, riddled with relief. “Over here, Sadie.”

It came out brighter than she felt, practiced like everything else tonight. She could feel Harry’s gaze flicker to her, probably trying to better understand the sudden shift in her energy, how her body seemed to recalibrate at the sight of another person - this person. But still, she didn’t look at him. Not yet.

Sadie inserted herself a little further into the night, heels clicking gently across the stone as she traipsed across the patio to bring herself closer to Anna’s spot. Anna didn’t fully straighten her spine, she wasn’t fully ready to relinquish the moment yet. But the posture shift was enough to signal that something had changed.

And that’s when Sadie’s eyes adjusted. When her gaze flickered past Anna and landed on him. Harry stood slowly, not entirely confident in the gesture, but his manners made him too polite to stay seated. He knows Sadie - knows she never really liked him when he and Anna were together. Which only makes him wonder just how much her dislike has grown in all their time apart. He rubbed a palm down the side of his trousers and offered the faintest of smiles. Tight, awkward, just this side of sincere.

“Sadie,” he said with an earnest nod and grin. “Been a while, really good t’see you.”

Anna could feel it instantly - the subtle bristle of Sadie’s spine, the unignorable flash of surprise that darted across her face before she tamped it down with the composure of someone who’d rehearsed this more times than she’d care to admit. Sadie didn’t like Harry. Never had. Not since the end, especially. And definitely not after those seven months Anna had spent here in Georgia, confined to her home and growing a secret while swallowing grief in equal measure. She didn’t care that it was Anna’s choice. Sadie didn’t like Harry.

But she’d be cordial with him for the same reason she didn’t like him - for Anna. She was good. Graceful, even. She let a beat pass just long enough to make Harry feel it before offering a soft, clipped response.

“Harry,” she was curt, but polite. “Same to you.”

If anything, he anticipated a long stare, cold around the edges without a single word spoken back to him. Sadie’s gesture had exceeded what he originally anticipated. And maybe that’s what he deserved. Knowing how close they were, he could only assume Sadie was privy to all the things he’d done he wished he could undo. Surely Anna had told her about it all, not a single detail missed. He swallowed once, subtly. Anna caught it.

Sadie lingered, her attention now fixed solely on Anna. Her voice dropped an octave - calmer, more careful.

“So” she started slowly, dragging it out inquisitively. “How goes it out here?”

Anna’s expression barely shifted, save for the corner of her mouth lifting like a shrug. “We’re just catching up.” She replied, voice airy, almost flippant.

“Trying to make up for lost time.” Harry, still beside Anna, nodded along with a faint smile.

It was the kind of sentiment that, to anyone else, came across as innocent and light. But to Sadie it rang loud. Far too much time had been lost, and while they were both to blame, Sadie chose to hold Harry predominantly accountable. Her brows trembled with a faint twitch, a small glimmer of hesitation. She wasn’t sure how much Harry knew or how long they’ve been outside for. Alone. She didn’t know what Anna did or didn’t choose to share. But she did know to tread incredibly lightly.

“Your phone,” she proclaimed as she extended it out towards Anna, “is blowing up.”

“Oh.” Anna blinked, reaching for it without glancing on the screen. “You can just turn it off, toss it back on the table.”

Sadie hesitated, glancing between Anna and Harry before continuing. “Uh, I can if you want me to. It’s - just that Tuck… he’s on the phone.”

Anna froze. She felt the name of her brother fall onto her chest like a dropped stone from overhead. For a moment, she didn’t move. The air shifted and she felt it - thick, like it was syrup lining her lungs.

The name alone wasn’t dangerous. It was safe, protective. It was more what would ensue after Tuck that made the blood in Anna’s veins turn to ice. That made her nervously fidget with a loose piece of string on her dress as she silently prayed that God and the universe wouldn’t betray her. Not right now.

She could feel the pulse in Harry’s energy beside her as he tuned in further, curious and unnervingly attentive. She wouldn’t dare bring herself to look at him, even if it was just a quick glance out of the corner of her eye. Instead she trained her eyes on Sadie with a look sharply enthralled by silent pleading, Anna’s way of trying to send a message without word. Don’t say more. Please don’t say more. She widened her eyes just a fraction - a blaring alarm bell behind them. But it was too dim on the patio. She couldn’t figure out if Sadie was able to receive it.

“Is everything okay?” Anna tried to force an even tone of leisure, though the wobble at the end gave it away.

Sadie nodded, almost too breezy now, the way she did when she was trying to pretend she wasn’t walking along a figurative tightrope. “Yeah everything’s fine. He’s just asking if Honey Bunny is in your bag because-”

“Oh-yeah. Yep, let me - just -” Anna tripped over her own words in a frenzy. “Hand me the phone and I’ll talk to him inside.”

Too fast, too forced, and too panic induced. She could hear it in her own voice. But it was already out there, hanging in the air and unraveling amongst them all.

She was standing now, reaching manically for the phone before Sadie could even utter another syllable. Her hand out was outstretched like a lifeline and her heart was beating so fast, she could practically feel it in her gums. Kind of the same way she could feel Harry’s eyes beginning to narrow behind her. He didn’t speak, didn’t say anything. She just felt it - that pesky question mark conforming between his eyebrows, the sudden shift in his posture. It was quiet curiosity that was starting to shapeshift into suspicion.

“Let me, uh-” Anna struggled to find the words as she avoided Harry’s gaze upon walking past him. “I’m gonna run inside to take this.”

“Something wrong? Harry asked. “Y’seem frazzled.”

“All good.” Anna said over shoulder, voice high and casual like it was dipped in frosting whilst crumbling underneath. “I just need to - we can finish another time. I promise.”

She could feel the weight of the moment bearing down behind her, the heaviness in his stare and everything he still hadn’t got to ask her yet. He wasn’t done, and he had this feeling gnawing at him that she wasn’t done either - even if she had already turned her back to him, heading for the door to leave him standing on his own, but it wasn’t new to him. That feeling of her arm brushing past his own as she departed, the fragrant scent of her perfume lingering briefly in her wake. He’s already lived it once. He was familiar with what it felt like to watch her walk away and close the door behind her - never come back.

The door clicked shut behind her, soft yet final. The warmth of her body she had left behind on the stone step beside him was already starting to cool as it made contact with the air. He made his way back to being seated, in the same spot before, elbows on his knees and hands clasped like he could rewind time if he prayed for it hard enough. So he could bring himself back to a few minutes ago - when she was still here, when her shoulder brushed up against his. So he could still listen to her voice - sweet, silky, and melodic.

His heart was still tilting, still trying to catch up with the rest of his body. He felt like the air had been knocked out of him, but not all at once. It was a slow and steady deflation - achingly quiet and merely unstoppable. Everything about being next to her again had felt like deja vu and revelation wrapped neatly into one. It was like he was being pulled under by something familiar yet dangerous, and he did nothing to try and fight it. Honestly, he didn’t want to.

And then something glimmered beside him - faintly, like it shyly stole a flicker of light hanging above it. Like it was a beacon of hope. Just a few inches from where her hand had been moving just a few moments ago was her ring. Slim, gold, and delicate with that small little emerald jewel sitting proudly at the top. He’d noticed her fidgeting with it. Now it just sat here, abandoned and forgotten just like he was.

For a second he wondered if maybe she left it on purpose. Was it a message? A breadcrumb he was supposed to pick up on? She’s calculated enough to pull it off. Sneaky enough, too. But it’s her grandmother’s right, he thought. Too valuable - she’d never risk it. But that didn’t keep him from reaching for it slowly with a gentle approach, like it could vanish into thin air the moment he laid a finger on it. He felt kind of corny, even chuckled to himself when he realized how embarrassingly cliche this felt.

Back then she had walked away, disappearing like smoke. And he let her. He watched her fade and spent the past four years trying to chase a shadow while convincing himself it was exactly what she wanted. Now he had a reason to find her again this time. A real, tangible excuse in the form of cold metal sitting in the palm of his hand. This was his reason to circle back and knock on the door she tried closing years ago.

He wasn’t going to let this night slip through his fingers like he did when she left LA. There was history still there, of course. But now it feels like there was something more. Something palpable that he just barely scratched the surface on.

He won’t make the same mistake twice.

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harrieatthemet · 15 days ago

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The way H is still smitten for her… looks like this time way from each other has helped him see what he has lost and have some picking up to do.. Anna don’t make it easy for him lol

EXACTLY! It’s still the same Anna he dated for years except now everything she used to talk about became her reality… a luxury clothing line, her move to New York, it’s like she evolved into the person she dreamed of becoming and he’s OBSESSED

#asks

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harrieatthemet · 15 days ago

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OMG NOOOO HATE ON ANNA, she’s beautifully complicated. I love a 10 dimensional, perplexing, and COMPLICATED character. That’s why this story is so addictive!!!

Anna is intricate for a reason!!!!! Justice for my diva!!!! She’s just a girl who thrives on imperfection and is emotionally stunted!! Such a complex baddie ugh love her bad

#asks

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harrieatthemet · 15 days ago

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forgot to finish before i hit submit but need her to start... being fr... also how is she not all over that man she's a better woman than me

sheer willpower!!!!!!!

#asks #Where Honey Sleeps

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harrieatthemet · 15 days ago

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dude wtf is Anna's problem.....

Y'ALL. NOT TOO MUCH ON MY GIRL! a little patience for my broody southern girl!!! who bottles up emotions!!! and values independence!!!!

#asks #Where Honey Sleeps #wait y'all pls dont hate her she just FEELS A LOT!

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harrieatthemet · 15 days ago

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Masterlist Update

GUYS IM FIXING IT AGAIN IM SO SORRY PUT THE TORCHES DOWN IM WORKING ON IT :((((((

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