Those Maudlin Days

It's kind of funny. You can find yourself completely fed up with your day to day routine, the same faces, the same worries, the repetition that your life becomes. You can always predict your next move, pretend you're only one type of person, live within the standards that comes with that very routine and never branch out. You can wish for something, anything to change. And then when it does, you can catch yourself wanting to take it all back.

Maybe it was because I never particularly despised my own routine. Sure, sometimes school got to be too much. Occasionally I found myself imagining what it'd be like if Costa burned down. I'd be lying if I said I didn't once find myself sneering at a stuck up, self-righteous, ten year violinist in my orchestra who couldn't take proper direction from our more knowledgeable composer. But all in all, I enjoyed what I was doing. I went to a decent university and took classes that normally had me engaged. There were regulars at my place of work who tipped me way more than needed, simply because they liked me. And quite honestly, playing within that orchestra was probably my favorite pastime. I wasn't discontent. I didn't want change.

So when change came, it wasn't like I was wanting to take back all the moments I had wished for something to just happen -- there wasn't many to begin with. I was just flabbergasted. I wanted to turn back time. I wanted to ward away anything that didn't fit within my busy schedule. Of course, this realization didn't hit until much later, but when it came, I realized what change could do to someone who was so used to a patterned life. I had been so accustomed to my ways, my life, everything I had set up for myself that I didn't think one little shake of it all could cause me to crumble. I thought I was more stable than I actually was. I thought I was set in stone.

Turns out, Erin Arabella Coyne was just a name for a face and the rest was up for any twists and turns my life wanted to take. I had figured I was the mostly quiet girl who found herself entirely too at peace with her violin. I watched Abigail and said she was something close to a free-spirit. I put myself beside her and decided I was the reasonable and responsible one. But that wasn't the case. I wasn't a list of cause-and-effects, I wasn't the antonym of every adjective that was a synonym for spontaneous. I just hadn't found myself in situations where my normal behavior could be tested.

But with change came those very tests and with those tests came regretful hangovers.

The reason for my relentless drinking, my 'need to have fun,' was clear to me and only me that night. I wanted to forget the hours spent within the suffocating house I had once called a 'home.' My drunken warm and hazy mind was capable of blocking out the recent memory and that was good enough for me. What the reasonable and responsible Erin didn't take into count was the fact that beside her sat a mostly stranger who couldn't help but take this second impression at face value. Harry Styles watched as I drank myself in a flirty, babbling mess, but the memory was nothing but a blur to me. Anything after my third drink was beyond me. And he probably figured that the Erin before him, the one who ordered back to back drinks and openly complimented his eyes after the alcohol had dismissed her normally cold front, was just the regular Erin, once put within a bar setting. What he didn't realize was that the girl who had taken over that night wasn't me at all.

Or so I thought, as Abigail attempted to piece together the story before me (at the time, I didn't realize that the Erin that night was still me -- just a coping version of me. A very terrible coping version).

"I don't know all the details. I was just drinking the last of the disgusting, cheap wine you got, reading the book you made me borrow when I heard your faint giggles behind the door. Somehow, it unlocked -- I guess Mr. Pop Star found your key in your purse -- and then you two were stumbling within. Next time a celebrity decides to stop by our flat, give me a warning, yeah?"

My head was pounding, my cheeks were flushed with embarrassment and I was still wearing my clothes and most of the make up from the previous night but groggy and aching, I had found my way to the living room at some odd hour in the afternoon. The more my flat mate mocked me, the more I just wanted to hide under the covers of my cozy bed and pretend the previous night had never occurred. But my curiosity was burning and to be fair, I probably needed to know just how big of a fool I had made of myself.

"I'll be sure to do just that, Abby," I scoffed as my hand reached up to massage my temple. Whether it was the hangover's avenging headache or my frustrations with the girl wearing the smirk before me, I just wanted Advil and tea. I stayed put, though, impatient as ever as I sighed, "Okay? So we stumbled in, you took over and he left?"

A loud laugh erupted from Abigail as she pushed her messy hair from her round face, her eyes drifting to a recently bought tabloid in her lap. Bringing her mug of coffee -- which I had to admit, looked and tauntingly smelled like a little piece of heaven in that moment -- to her lips, she grinned, as if hiding a perfect, little secret, "He left then? You wish."

I groaned then, realizing I was hopeless at that point. The night had been nothing short of a disaster, clearly even by Abigail's standards, and she had only been around for the very last of it. Half of me wished to mend the entire situation right at that moment, without all the information. I wanted to grab my phone, apologize endlessly to both Harry and Liam and keep my fingers crossed that they'd find it in their oh-so famous hearts to forgive me. But the other half of me, the frightfully stronger side, wanted to just push the two boys from my life. In the end, Liam and I had lost touch before and Harry had never been such a big part of me. I could be written off in their books as the embarrassing girl from Wolverhampton and allow them to go on recording albums and being the dream of every fourteen year old girl. But not before I knew just exactly what had happened.

"He was shockingly polite for what he's presented as," Abigail noted, flipping a page in her magazine. I couldn't help but roll my eyes; her sources were always shady. 'This site said this, this tabloid said that,' might as well been Abigail's catch phrases. There was no doubt in my mind that whatever Harry was presented as in the tabloids was false. Then again, I didn't know him well enough to say I knew any better. I had met him twice and couldn't remember the second occasion in the slightest. So instead of apprehending her for her gullible behavior, I just motioned for my flat mate to go on as I laid down on our couch and pulled a pillow over my face.

"He said something about needing to get you into bed and you giggled, taking it as a pass. He blushed and muttered something I couldn't hear to you and you pouted like a child. But that's not surprising, I guess. You do tend to do that, you know. Get enough alcohol in your system and you suddenly turn back eight years in age. You become a very flirty ten year old, it's quite strange," Abigail ventured off topic. She was right, I knew she was. I was nothing close to a charming drinker. But I refused to listen to it, already red as a tomato from humiliation from my 'out of character' behavior.

Muffled by the pillow, I cried, "Just shut up and tell me what happened!"

"Well then," My flat mate sneered, though she obliged, "Not really quite sure what happened then. He took one glance at your pouting face and just whisked you away. Said he'd take care of you and you lead him to your bedroom."

By the last sentence, the pillow was thrown across the room and I had darted up right, eyes wide. He'd take care of me? None of it sounded promising and I was appalled by not only my actions, but Abigail's lack of better judgment to stop it. Angry but unsure, I couldn't help but accuse her and feel the need to point fingers, to put the blame on someone other than myself, "You didn't stop me? You didn't stop him? Abigail, I was intoxicated and you knew! How could you let that--"

My tirade was cut off at that point though, by an incredulous look on Abby's face and her immediate protests, "What? You think I'd actually let you have a one night stand with a womanizing pop star while you were drunk? I might want you to live a little, but not like that! Give me some kind of credit."

Relief washed over my body, knowing that at the very least, Harry hadn't pushed his welcome. I had woken up aware that I was still in the same outfit as the night before, albeit with a few added, unappreciated wrinkles. But nothing looked out of place other than the dark circles under my eyes. Sinking back against the cushions, I curled into myself, feeling low for even momentarily thinking that Abigail hadn't been on my side, "Sorry, I just..."

My voice trailed off, but she didn't push. Instead, after a lingering stare in my direction, with her no doubt debating if a fight over my momentary meltdown was even worthwhile, her eyes moved back to the magazine and she went on, "I followed you two and he made a point not to shut the door completely. I figured that was a sign that he wasn't trying anything, but I stayed in the hallway, just to be sure. Nothing happened, in the end -- you two just talked."

Gazing straight ahead, I attempted to push past all the haze of the night, the black blur that was everything post-third drink. I did remember bits and pieces. I could remember trying to force Harry to dance when a Strokes song came on and he argued that it wasn't 'dancing music.' I could remember in a slurred manner, telling Liam how odd it was, that he was so famous, so in the spotlight. He had tried to say that he was nothing special, just the same kid from Wolverhampton who couldn't ever really make any friends besides Andy Samuels, a name that only then sounded familiar. And I could remember the disgusted look on Danielle's face as she watched me wipe the excess drink from the corner of my mouth, when it dribbled down and I laughed. But beyond that, I couldn't remember anything else. What conversation I had had with Harry Styles in the comfort of my bedroom was lost on me.

Luckily, Abigail was finally quick to fill me in.

"He's a mumbler, that one, but I caught most bits. He just asked you to lay on your side in case you felt sick and you asked him if he had fun. You sounded like you were being a bit cheeky, but he didn't seem to go for it. There was a rather pregnant pause and he asked you why you drank so much instead. Then you got quiet. I think I heard a sob into your pillow before he asked again, reaching out to you. But you--"

"I screamed at him."

I almost shocked myself when I spoke up. But as Abigail began describing my last conscious moments, the memories began playing out in my head. I imagined them as she said them and with a snap, they appeared, playing out like a bad movie in my head. My blue eyes looked up from their dead gaze across the room to meet hers, but she didn't say anything. The silence was enough for me.

"I screamed at him to get out. I told him it was none of his business, that he didn't know me and he was in no right to push for an answer. I yelled at him to get out, he stayed for a moment longer as I cried into my pillow again, and then he..."

For whatever reason, the words were hard to say. My eyes drifted away from the sympathetic look that Abigail's stare now held, but as sick as it made me feel, I didn't care to call her out on it. I just let the words fall through the cracks.

Unfortunately, she was quick to pick them up, "He left."

The feeling then was worse than my previous fear of regretful actions. I had thought maybe I had gotten too physical, too promiscuous. I had thought maybe I had shared my life story in a terrible bout of word vomit. I had thought maybe I had made a fool of myself by tripping over myself, slurring my words and ultimately seeming like a mess. But I had been worse; I had been vulnerable. And more so, I had punished someone for being -- or attempting to be -- a good person. As Harry was generous enough to assume that my behavior within the night wasn't a constant and allowed his curiosity to build a moment of sorts, I had pushed it away. I had made him feel small. And almost hauntingly, the tension in my bedroom in that moment, when I had been bawling and he was just sitting there, mulling over my shoddy protests over his kindness wafted around me again. More so, I felt stupid. When had I become the girl who got caught up and cried, ruining everyone's night? It seemed so unlike me. It was a change of pace and one I didn't particularly like in the least bit.

Something changed as I mindlessly let my fingers pull through a piece of knotted hair. The night before, Harry Styles had been nothing more than the cheeky boy sending me too many winking faces via text messaging to count. But now, I realized he wasn't just the pop star who had built an aura of confidence around him. He was a nice guy. He was worth while. And though I did understand why I hadn't opened up to him and still felt no need to, I felt partially guilty for kicking him out the way I had, because I knew why I had. I didn't want Harry to be anything more than the cocky celebrity I had pinned him as.

I stood up and began to walk towards my room.

"Where are you going?" Abigail called after me.

But all I said before my door shut behind me was a vague, "To clean the mess I made."