Cracks in Anchors

I don’t really know how I ended up here; how I ended up being eyed by my three closest friends, how I ended up choking on words and how I ended up drinking a latte that didn’t seem all that appealing anymore. Liam was the one who broke the silence with his calm words; naturally because he was the level-headed one of the group.

“Louis told us everything that’s happened and how you feel,” Liam stopped to take a sip of his coffee and the other two nodded their heads, “and we just don’t want you falling into things too fast. We all know how that ends up.”

He was referring to me and Jolene, whatever we were. I had secretly been hoping we were nothing; everything was over and Jolene and thrown out her ring and forgotten my number and she’d be thinking she was leaving me to dry without a word when really I would be relishing in that. But I knew Jolene better than that, I had years to get to know her, and I knew a text would be lighting up my phone soon enough. We were playing the waiting game, but she didn’t know I had the stronger advantage and could play that game for the rest of my life, and I knew she couldn’t. She never could win games.

I felt Liam’s eyes on me and knew I had respond, so I took a quick sip of my frilly coffee and cleared my scratchy throat. “Do you lads think I’m fucked up?”

The question took everyone by surprise and it hung in the air like a bomb waiting to fall and crash into the ground and explode.

“No, you’re not fucked up Harry. People loose feelings and grow them all the time, nothing wrong with that,” Zayn said gruffly, grabbing at a napkin Niall had under his palm.

“Then what should I do about Jolene?”

Niall shot a look at Zayn but smiled nonetheless when Zayn just rolled his coffee brown eyes.

“Well we all know she’s not patient, so I’m assuming she’ll try to call you soon. I think you should tell her, stop playing this stupid game. You know you don’t want her.”

Zayn was right, I hadn’t wanted her in a long time and maybe it was douche-baggy of me to keep playing her. So I pledged to myself that when her number did light up my phone I would answer and hear her out - or maybe not and just avoid all that bullshit - and tell her we were over. Tell her I didn’t want to marry her and she could pawn the ring and keep the apartment and forget about me. Do what she had to do to move on, find a better fiancée than I was, because she deserved it. It wasn’t you, and I meant it, it was me. It was my fault for falling out of love with her, it was my fault for falling into something with another girl, and somewhere in the depths of my soul I always though I was the reason why Jolene lost the baby; like I was never meant to see the little girl that would remind me so much of her mother. Maybe God knew what would happen in the end, maybe he already carved out our story and knew it would kill me to have that reminder always around. Maybe when Jolene found out she was pregnant, right in that second when the words imprinted in her brain, that baby was already destined to die. But that thought just made me feel worse and guiltier and I thought I was going to vomit all over Niall, who sat across from me and squirmed in the vinyl booth.

“Yeah, I guess I have to, right?” But Niall’s flirting or something of the likes with Zayn and Louis’s busy texting someone on his phone and Liam’s really the only one still listening.

“Yeah, I think you have to.”

I sit and stare at my flexing fingers for a few seconds before I look up and see Zayn ruffling Niall’s hair and Niall just pouting and whining and tugging at the sleeve of Zayn’s sweatshirt.

“God, boys, get a fucking room.”



I’m trying to sleep, my head encased in a comforter, when my phone begins to vibrate on the bedside table. I groan and slide upward on the bed and reach blindly for the phone, which I manage to grab and tap the ‘answer’ button and hold to my ear without falling off the bed.

“Hello?” My voice comes groggily out of my throat and whoever’s on the other line could tell they had woken me up.

A sob ripped through the speaker before a bird-like voice filled my head. “Harry, it’s me, Jolene.”

I propped up on my elbows and thought back to the conversation I had with the lads.

“Yes, Jolene?”

I didn’t necessarily want to hear her begging for me back, but I felt like I needed to hype myself up so I didn’t chicken out like I did so many times before; times when I could have broken up with her.

“I’m sorry I kicked you out. It’s okay that you haven’t booked a venue, I can wait and I know you’re busy with your job and I still love you-”

“I want to break up Jolene.”

And there it was, the bomb had been dropped and it felt good to have the thought lifted off my shoulders and I felt at peace for a split-second.

“You what?” I heard the crack in her voice and the tears that welled at the back of her throat.

“I can’t do this anymore. I can’t pretend I feel the same way as I used to, because I don’t. I stopped,” I felt bad for saying it but I did anyway, “I stopped loving you like I did. I want you to be happy, so I want you to find someone who can do better by you, but I can’t anymore. I jumped too quickly into a domesticated life. I didn’t book the venue deliberately, I’m not going to lie to you. I just didn’t want to get married, I didn’t want the day to happen, and I’m sorry I lied and I’m sorry I couldn’t have been man enough to tell you. My feeling started to change the day we lost her and recently the feelings have been enforced. I’m sorry for hurting you and lying to you for so long. So it’s okay to loose my number and it’s okay for you to hate me, I’ll understand.”

All I heard was a dial tone and I took that as Jolene hanging up on me, and instead of shedding a tear or yelling, I just put my phone back on the table and slipped under the covers, falling asleep to the lull of Louis’s deep breathing besides me.



“You look down, Mr. Styles, what’s up?” Sullivan looked at me behind dark sunglasses, hanging around after the bell rang and everyone filed out for the next class.

I just shrugged and said, “Shouldn’t you be getting to your next class?”

“It’s lunch, I can skip and stay here.”

It made me happy to know that Sullivan wanted to stay; was willing to stay with me and see what was bothering me. It made me feel cared about, and in a weird way made me feel like maybe Sullivan liked me just the slightest.

“Okay then, if you want to know I will tell you.” I looked around the room, hoping I could find somewhere where no one could heard what was about to be said.

“Why don’t we go out to the parking lot, I go all the time.”

I just nodded and followed her, this time feeling odd as Sullivan directed me to her parked Sedan and leaned against the trunk. She pulled out a pack of cigarettes and instead of scolding her like I bet everyone else did, I just quirked an eyebrow but let her light it with a deep purple lighter she fetched from her messenger bag. She took a drag, held it for a second too long, then let it spiral into the clear sky.

“I’m glad you’re not yelling at me like everyone else does.” She didn’t look at me, just took another drag and pulled her hair behind her shoulders.

“I’m not like everyone else, as you can tell.”

A nod. A spiral of smoke. An open mouth with words tumbling from it.

“I broke up with my fiancé, I just didn’t feel the same anymore. After-” I hesitated; didn’t know if I wanted to tell her about my lost daughter; but Sullivan waved her hand, an incentive to go on.

“After she lost our daughter, all the love I had just faded away.”

She nodded her head.

“I’m horrible, yeah?”

I watched as something pooled in her eyes and she dropped her smoldering cigarette to the ground, snuffing it out with the bottom of her boot and turning to look at me. And then I saw sympathy wash over her face and the tears that got stuck at the bottom of her eyelids.

“No, not at all, Harry. But I’m so sorry, I can’t imagine that.”

Then she leaned in to me and for a second I thought she was going to walk away, but instead she slung her arms around my neck and molded her body into mine; her teenage one into my almost-adult one. “You’re not horrible at all.”