xcqmsr

[xcqmsr]

you sunshine, you temptress

pairings harry styles x fem!reader

warnings arguing, crying, tiny angst, established relationship, harry calls reader his sunshine, kissing, having kids, english isn’t my first language!

wc 5.4k

Unbelievably quiet day in London. A silence that rarely graced the ever-humming city had fallen like a woolen blanket over the streets. Clouds hung low, heavy and gray, but the air was oddly still—just the occasional lazy breeze that wandered between buildings, shuffling leaves and nudging scarves. That same breeze played mischievously with Harry’s curls, tugging at them like a child seeking attention. He gave an irritated huff, trying to smooth the mess with one hand.

Failing, he pulled his dark blue beanie down over his ears, tucking away the disobedient locks. The beanie was old, the hem stretched and soft from use, but comforting—like armor against the day. His nose, red from the cold, sniffled once as he turned the corner and stepped into Rosie’s Blooms, the familiar bell above the door tinkling softly.

The warmth inside wrapped around him instantly. The sharp but pleasant scent of freshly cut stems, damp earth, and perfume greeted him like a memory. A small heater buzzed faintly from under the counter. Behind it stood Rosie, her face blooming like one of her roses the moment she saw him. Her silvery-white hair was swept into a loose bun, and she wore her usual floral apron covered in smudges of green and pink.

“Oh my sweet child!” she cried, stepping forward slightly, her voice a melodic blend of scolding and affection. “You’ll catch cold wandering out like that with half a scarf and that ridiculous hat. Come now—tea?”

“No, no tea today,” Harry mumbled, offering her a crooked smile. His green eyes, wide and warm even in his embarrassment, met hers for only a moment. “Just… the usual. Please.”

Rosie gave him a knowing look. Her hands were already moving, selecting stems with the grace of a violinist tuning her instrument.

“A fight. Again.”

The words came out barely above a whisper, as if saying them louder would give them more power than he could handle. He looked down at his hands, the cuticles chewed, the fingers still trembling slightly with leftover frustration.

“Mmm,” Rosie murmured, gently snipping a stem. “Same one as last time?”

“Yeah.”

Silence fell again, broken only by the snip of scissors, the soft rustle of petals.

“She thinks I don’t listen. That I disappear into my own head when she needs me present. And maybe she’s right.”

He let out a dry laugh, rubbing the back of his neck. “I just… I get overwhelmed, you know? She says something small and it echoes in my head, gets louder, warps into something else. Then I panic, shut down, say something stupid. Something I don’t mean.”

Rosie looked up from the bouquet and gave him a soft glance, eyes filled with more understanding than words could hold.

“Love’s not easy, Harry. It’s messy. It digs up the worst parts of us, the scared little bits we try to hide. But if it’s real, if it’s worth it—” she tucked a sprig of eucalyptus between the dahlias “—then we fight for it. Not just with flowers, mind you.

He nodded, taking her words like medicine. He remembered the fight in flashes..

Her voice cracking as she said she felt alone, even when he was right there. His silence, colder than any insult. Her walking out of the room, not slamming the door, just quietly closing it. Somehow that hurt more. He hadn’t followed. Not then. Just sat on the edge of the bed, head in his hands, cursing himself.

And now here he was. Again.

“She likes white tulips,” Harry said suddenly, watching Rosie adjust the arrangement.

“I remember,” Rosie replied with a gentle smile. “Means forgiveness. Good choice.”

He watched as she added three tall tulips, crisp and elegant, among the blooms. There were soft blush roses too—her absolute favorite—and the purple lisianthus she once said reminded her of childhood summers. Rosie’s fingers moved like a weaver, binding not just flowers, but hope.

“You always remember what she likes,” Harry said softly.

“Because you always come back for her.”

He looked at her then. Really looked. She wasn’t just a florist. Not to him. She had become something like a confessor, a constant, someone who understood that flowers weren’t just decoration—they were language, apology, offering.

She wrapped the bouquet in cream paper, tied with a thin lavender ribbon.

“You’ll tell her what’s in your heart this time?”

Harry hesitated, then nodded. “Yeah. I think I’m ready to stop being afraid of being known.”

Rosie passed the bouquet over the counter. “Good. Because I think she’s ready to hear it.”

He left the shop, the cold air brushing his cheeks like a warning, or a push. The weight of the bouquet in his arms felt like carrying something fragile but essential. He decided to take a train. The drive to her flat wasn’t long, but he took his time. With every station, he rehearsed what he’d say—not a perfect speech, just the truth. That he was sorry. That he was trying. That he loved her. When he reached the door, he stood there for a moment. Breathing. The sound of distant traffic hummed behind him, but in his chest, it was quiet. He lifted his hand and knocked. The knock was soft. Too soft. Harry stood there for a second longer, then cleared his throat and raised his hand again, this time letting his knuckles land a little more firmly against the wood. The cold bit at his ears, even under the beanie, but his palms were sweating.

He could hear faint movement inside. A shifting floorboard. A pause. Then the sound of a lock turning. The door opened slowly, no more than a few inches at first. And then there she was.

She didn’t speak. Just stood there in her oversized cardigan—his cardigan, actually, the navy one he always left draped over the arm of the couch. Her hair was pulled back in a loose, tired knot. No makeup, no pretense. Just her.

His Sunshine.

Her gaze dropped to the bouquet in his hands, and something in her expression softened, though her mouth stayed in a line. She stepped back without a word, holding the door wider, a quiet invitation. Harry entered slowly. The hallway smelled like her. Like honey and vanilla and the old wooden floors she refused to replace because she said they had “personality.” He moved past the framed photos, all memories he was a part of: a blurry polaroid of them eating ice cream in winter, a beach trip where the wind had caught her hair just right. A snapshot of her hugging him from behind, his eyes squinting, mid-laugh.

She closed the door behind them. Didn’t speak.

“I brought your favorites,” he said quietly, holding out the bouquet like an offering. His voice cracked.

She took the flowers wordlessly, fingers brushing his for a fleeting second. That single touch nearly buckled his knees.

He followed her into the kitchen, where the kettle was already whistling on the stove. She poured them both a cup without asking—black for him, chamomile for her—and slid one mug across the counter.

Only then did she finally look at him properly.

“So.” Her voice was quiet, but not cold.

Harry blinked. His throat closed for a moment. “So,” he echoed, lamely.

She leaned against the counter, holding the mug close to her chest. “You walked out in the middle of me telling you how I felt.”

“I know,” he said quickly. “I know. I’m so sorry.”

“That’s not the first time, Harry.”

“I know.”

He put his mug down, untouched. “I panicked. I always panic. It’s not an excuse, I’m just—trying to explain. It’s like I get so scared of saying the wrong thing that I just say nothing. And then that becomes the wrong thing. And I know how it hurts you. I see it. I see your face, and I hate myself for it.”

Her eyes didn’t leave his. “You looked right through me. Like I wasn’t even there.”

His chest ached. “You are always there. You’re the only thing that’s always there. You’re the only thing I look for when everything else is noise.”

Silence.

He reached into his coat pocket and pulled out a crumpled piece of paper. Carefully, he unfolded it, revealing a messy scrawl of handwriting.

“I wrote this on the train back. I don’t… I’m not good at saying what I mean. But I thought, maybe, if I write it—”

She took the paper gently. Her fingers trembled slightly as she read. It wasn’t long. It didn’t need to be.

“Sunshine,

You deserve someone who doesn’t shut down every time it gets hard. You deserve someone who listens the first time, not after the third fight. I’m not always that person. But I want to be.

I love you. More than I know how to say. I’ll keep trying to be better. I promise I’ll keep trying.

Don’t give up on me yet.

Yours, H.”

When she finished reading, her wide eyes met his again. “I love you too, you idiot,” she said, her voice cracking for the first time. “That’s the problem. That’s why it hurts so much.”

Harry stepped forward. “Can I—?”

She nodded before he could finish the question. He wrapped his arms around her and held her like something precious. She melted into him, arms looping around his waist, face pressed into his chest. He buried his nose in her hair and breathed her in, like oxygen. “I’m scared,” he whispered. “So am I.”

“I’m going to mess up again.”

“I know,” she whispered. “But maybe you’ll mess up a little better next time.” They both laughed, just a little. She pulled back and looked up at him.

“Sit with me?”

“Always.”

They moved to the living room. She curled up on the couch, legs tucked under her, and he sat close enough that their knees touched. The bouquet sat in a vase nearby, already looking like it belonged. She toyed with the edge of her sleeve. “You used to call me your Sunshine all the time.” “I still do.” “You haven’t lately.”

He reached out and gently took her hand. “I stopped saying it out loud, but I didn’t stop thinking it. Not for a second.”

She didn’t respond right away. But her hand didn’t pull away either. She squeezed his fingers.

“Tell me why,” she said finally. “Tell me why you love me.”

He blinked, surprised. “You want me to—”

“Yes. Just… say it. Not in your head. Not on paper.”

So he did.

“I love the way you take your tea like it’s a ritual. The way you can’t pass a dog without greeting it like an old friend. I love that you cry during commercials. I love how you remember birthdays—not just mine, but Rosie’s, and my cousin’s, and that grumpy neighbor from three flats down.”

She was smiling now, eyes wide and wet.

“I love the way your hands shake when you’re angry. I love that you always pick the ugliest wrapping paper because you say ‘no one wants a gift to look intimidating.’ I love how your laugh sounds when you’re not trying to hide it.”

He leaned in. “I love that even when you’re mad at me—even when I deserve it—you still make me tea. You still wait for me to come home.”

Tears slipped down her cheeks, and he wiped one away with his thumb.

“You’re my Sunshine,” he whispered. “Even when I’m the storm.”

She didn’t say anything, not for a long time. She just looked at him like she was trying to memorize the moment.

Then she kissed him.

Soft. Long. Forgiving.

When they pulled apart, she rested her forehead against his.

“You’re not easy to love,” she said gently. “But neither am I. So maybe we make it work by not giving up on each other.”

Harry nodded. “Deal.”

She got up and fetched a blanket from the armchair, then returned to the couch and nestled into his side, pulling the blanket over them both. He wrapped his arms around her, and she rested her head against his shoulder. They sat there in the hush of their little flat, the city muffled outside, the bouquet fresh and full on the table. The tea cooled. The silence no longer felt like a punishment, but a peace.

Eventually, she spoke again. “You’re staying tonight.” It wasn’t a question. He kissed the top of her head. “I never wanted to leave.” She smiled, eyes closed. “Then don’t.”

It had been eleven months and thirteen days since Harry had knocked on her door with a bouquet in hand and fear in his chest. Since then, he had knocked in many other ways—small gestures, gentle questions, staying when it was easier to leave. And she had opened the door every time.

They had learned each other’s silences.

They had also learned that love didn’t mean never raising your voice. It meant raising it and still sitting down to dinner after. It meant apologizing—not just once, but every time it mattered.

Now, the quiet between them was safe. It didn’t carry weight. It allowed space.

On an early Sunday morning, with sunlight leaking across the bedroom floor like spilled honey, Harry woke before her. He always did, now. She liked to sleep in, curled around one of the throw pillows, her breathing deep and even. He had once told her she looked like a painting then—untouchable, timeless—and she had laughed, then kissed his forehead and said, “Stop being poetic and bring me coffee.”

Today, he didn’t bring coffee.

He just watched her. Her hair spread out on the pillow. That little line between her brows that always softened when she dreamed. Her wide eyes were closed, but he could still see every memory they held.

They had moved in together in April, after weeks of casually forgetting to leave each other’s flats. A plant here. A sweater there. Eventually, Harry had brought over his books and said, “So, should I just… stop pretending I live somewhere else?”

She’d only nodded and handed him a drawer.

———

Now, their flat was filled with mismatched mugs, framed movie posters, and soft blankets she insisted he didn’t need but secretly loved. The coffee table still had that dent from the time they tried to assemble a bookshelf while drinking wine. Neither of them had the heart to replace it.

He shifted slightly, brushing a loose strand of hair from her face. She stirred.

“Mm. What time is it?”

“Too early for real humans.”

“Mmmph,” she muttered, burrowing into the pillow. “You’re a menace.”

He smiled. “I know. Want coffee?”

“Only if you deliver it with a kiss.”

“I was planning to do that anyway.”

Later, after breakfast—eggs slightly overcooked, toast a bit burnt but enthusiastically buttered—they sat on the fire escape with their mugs. The city moved gently around them, like a cat stretching in sun. Pigeons waddled across the roof nearby. A child laughed somewhere down the block.

Harry nudged her foot with his.

“Hey.”

“Yeah?”

“I’ve been thinking.”

“Dangerous,” she teased, sipping her coffee.

He grinned. “Yeah. Still. I’ve been thinking… we’re good, right?”

She looked at him, really looked. Not just at his face, but into it. His eyes still held the same green warmth, the same flicker of self-doubt. But there was something steadier now, too.

“We’re better than good,” she said softly.

“I still think about that night.”

She nodded. “Me too.”

“I think about how close I came to screwing it all up.”

“You did screw it up,” she said with a smile. “But you fixed it.”

“I’m going to mess up again. Eventually.”

“I know,” she said. “So will I.”

There was a pause, not awkward but sacred.

“I’m not scared like I used to be,” he added. “Of being known.”

She leaned her head on his shoulder. “That’s what love does. It drags you into the light.”

They stayed there a while, the city humming gently around them.

———

But of course, life isn’t just lazy Sundays and kisses over toast. Three months later, they fought again. It was stupid. It always was. A forgotten dinner plan. A careless joke. A tired comment. This time, it hit differently. He had been working late. She had been waiting. And when he came home, phone dead, her face was pale and furious.

“You said you’d be home by eight.”

“I know. I’m sorry. I lost track of time—”

“You always lose track of time, Harry. You lose track of me.”

That did it. Something flared inside him, old and defensive.

“That’s not fair.”

“What’s not fair is sitting at a table for an hour, checking my phone every five minutes like an idiot.”

Her voice broke at the end, and it felt like being stabbed with a spoon: dull but deep. He wanted to defend himself. To tell her she was overreacting. That he had work. That he was trying. But instead, he took a breath. A slow, painful breath.

“I should’ve called,” he said. “Even just a text. I’m sorry.”

She blinked. Surprised.

“I didn’t mean to make you feel like that,” he added. “You waited for me, and I didn’t show up. I get it. That sucks.” The anger in her face melted into hurt, then into something softer.

“Thank you,” she said quietly. “For not making me feel crazy.”

“You’re not crazy,” he said. “You’re just in love with someone who sometimes disappears in his own head.” She walked over and wrapped her arms around him, forehead pressed to his chest.

“Don’t disappear,” she whispered.

“I won’t. Not again.” They held each other. No one said anything for a long time. Eventually, he pulled back and looked at her.

“I’ve got something,” he said, fumbling in his pocket. She raised an eyebrow. “If this is a snack, I forgive you forever.”

He laughed nervously.

It wasn’t a snack.

It was a small box.

Not velvet. Not perfect. But very, very Harry.

Her wide eyes locked onto his, and suddenly the air went still.

“I’m not asking now,” he said quickly. “I just… I wanted to show you. That I’m thinking about it. That I’m not going anywhere.” She stared at the box, then at him. Her mouth parted slightly, and her eyes shimmered.

“You’re serious?”

“I’ve never been more.”

She took the box, didn’t open it. Just held it close.

“Okay,” she said, voice shaking.

“Okay?”

She smiled. “Ask me when it’s raining. You know I love the rain.”

“Deal,” he whispered.

And just like that, they were them again.

———

It was raining on a Tuesday. Not the kind of soft drizzle that painted windows, but the full-hearted kind that danced on rooftops and overflowed gutters. Sunshine had always said it was her favorite weather—“the world washing itself clean,” she once called it. Harry stood under the awning of their corner café, holding a paper bag with two still-warm pastries and a takeaway coffee that was already beginning to cool in his hand. He watched the raindrops splatter against the sidewalk, his thumb running over the edge of the small box in his coat pocket. She was late. Not unusually so—she got distracted by bookstores, pigeons, buskers. Life itself. That’s what he loved about her. He didn’t plan to do it today. He had imagined candles or a violinist. Maybe even a beach trip. But now, watching the storm rage on and feeling that ache in his chest, he couldn’t wait anymore. She came into view through the blur of falling water. Hair drenched, cardigan clinging to her frame, cheeks flushed. She ran the last few feet and ducked under the awning with a breathless laugh.

“You’re soaked,” Harry said.

“So are you.”

“Not as beautifully.”

She rolled her eyes. “Stop flirting with me, I’m a taken woman.”

“Are you?”

She looked up. Confused, then curious.

Harry pulled the box from his pocket and got down on one knee—still under the awning, but the wetness of the rain found his knees anyway.

She gasped. Hands to her face. Tears already mixing with raindrops on her cheeks.

“I love you in every storm,” he said. “Every fight, every silence, every morning-after. I love you in the quiet. I love you in the thunder. And I want to love you for every tomorrow I’m lucky enough to get.”

He opened the box.

“So,” he whispered. “Will you be my forever Sunshine?”

She couldn’t speak at first. Just nodded. And then, “Yes. Yes. Yes.”

He slid the ring on her finger, and she tackled him in a hug so forceful they both ended up in the rain, soaked to the skin and laughing. He kissed her like they hadn’t already lived a hundred lifetimes together. And in that kiss, they wrote the first word of their forever.

___

Mornings in the house were loud before they were bright.

It usually started with Theo—now seven—thudding down the hall like a boy with very important missions. Today, it was “rescuing” his stuffed astronaut from under the couch, where it had fallen during a daring space mission the night before. Rowan, five and full of opinions, followed closely behind with a superhero cape and a suspiciously sticky face. He believed in dragons, didn’t trust cucumbers, and routinely tried to convince June to call him “Captain Danger. June, now two, was the chaos personified. A tiny hurricane in mismatched socks, she could destroy a bookshelf in 30 seconds and had the most angelic laugh doing it. Her vocabulary included “no,” “mine,” and “more toast,” with equal intensity. Harry stood in the kitchen, hair messy, making pancakes with one hand and pouring orange juice with the other. Sunshine leaned against the counter, sipping coffee, smiling at the controlled madness. The radio played quietly in the background, some old jazz tune that Harry swore they danced to once in Paris.

“Dad, Rowan said I can’t be on the moon crew!” Theo shouted from the living room.

“You ate the moon, Theo!” Rowan shouted back.

“I was hungry!”

His sunshine sighed into her mug. “You get Theo, I’ll get Rowan.”

“Deal.”

They moved through their morning choreography with a grace that only came from years of repetition and love. Breakfast, lost socks, forgotten library books. Kisses on foreheads. Hairbrushes wrestling with curls. Juice spills. Laughter. Screams. Apologies. Do-overs. Sometimes, Harry stood in the hallway and just watched it all—like a man seeing color for the first time. Later that day, while June napped and the boys built a fort out of blankets and ambition, Sunshine found Harry on the back steps, sketching in a notebook.

He looked up. “I drew the house again.”

“You always draw the house.”

“I like drawing what I never thought I’d have.”

She sat beside him, legs tucked under herself. “It’s messy.”

“It’s beautiful,” he said.

They didn’t speak for a while. The sun dipped low, and the shadows of the trees danced across the yard. Inside, the boys’ fort collapsed, followed by laughter. June stirred on the baby monitor, murmuring nonsense in her sleep.

Sunshine smiled. “We did okay, didn’t we?”

Harry looked at her. At the lines by her eyes that hadn’t been there ten years ago. At the strength in her. The grace.

“We did better than okay,” he said. “We made a universe.”

———

Years passed.

The boys grew taller. Their shoes got bigger. Theo became quiet and thoughtful, always with a book or sketchpad in hand. Rowan stayed bold and loud, but grew gentler in the way he held his little sister’s hand when she was scared. June grew up fast. Too fast. She wore her mother’s old cardigans, her father’s smile. She sang to herself in the garden and kept a diary full of little poems.

And then one day, the house was quiet again.

Theo left first—for university, then a gap year in Japan. Rowan went a year later, chasing music and something wild in his bones. June lingered, the last flicker of childhood in the halls, before she, too, packed a suitcase and kissed them both goodbye at the train station. Harry and Sunshine stood on the platform holding hands, watching their youngest daughter wave from the window. When the train disappeared around the bend, Sunshine whispered, “It’s quiet again.” Harry kissed her temple. “But not empty.”

———

They bought the cottage a year later.

Tucked in the countryside, it had ivy on the walls and windows that caught the golden light just right. The garden was overgrown when they moved in, but Sunshine loved the wildness of it. “It feels honest,” she said. Inside, it smelled of lavender and old wood. The fireplace crackled in the evenings, and the bookshelves groaned with their history. Every corner was filled with something from their life together—a framed drawing Theo made at ten, Rowan’s first guitar, one of June’s early poems scrawled in blue ink and pinned to the fridge. There was a bench out front, just under the tree that bloomed too early each spring. Harry sat there most mornings with his coffee, wrapped in a sweater Sunshine had knitted years ago. She would join him soon after, bringing a second mug and a knowing smile. One morning, he looked over at her as she read her book, feet tucked under her, glasses sliding down her nose.

“Do you remember the rainy day?”

She looked up. “Which one?”

“The one with the pastries. The one where I finally asked.”

She laughed softly. “You were so nervous.”

“I still am.”

She reached out and took his hand.

“You don’t need to ask anymore,” she whispered. “You already have everything you need.”

They sat in silence for a while. Birds chirped. A breeze rustled the leaves.

Eventually, she rested her head on his shoulder.

“You know,” she said sleepily, “one day the kids will bring their kids here. This house is going to hold so many more stories.”

Harry smiled, eyes wet.

“I hope they find the love in the walls.”

“They will,” she whispered. “It’s in everything.”

———

When the world slowed even more, when days passed with the rhythm of the wind and evenings melted into starlight, Harry and Sunshine stayed side by side—just as they always had. He never stopped calling her Sunshine. And even in the quietest moments, when no one else was around, he would still reach for her hand and whisper,

“You’re still my favorite forever.”

And she would answer, always,

“I was yours before you even asked.”