Perfect Teeth

Harry was a cuddler, but I couldn't really give him much shit for it because I suppose I was one too. I shifted sometime in the middle of the night, turning to face him and burrow into his chest. One arm was underneath the pillow by our heads, the other draped over his side and (embarrassingly) snaked up the back of his t-shirt. One of my knees was in between his thighs, the other sprawled out along the remainder of his mattress. My lips were perfectly level with his collarbone, close enough that if I puckered my mouth I would be kissing him. His head was curved into mine as well, neck extending so his cheek was against my forehead. Both of his arms were wrapped around my midsection, one large hand cupping the small of my back while the other lay against my side.

My phone was vibrating underneath one of Harry's plush white pillows, alarm spasming. It was set for half seven, which really barely gave me enough time to grab something to eat before my exam at nine, but sleep was more important for my test-taking well-being than a shower. I yawned as I shut off my alarm, before slowly taking my hand from underneath Harry's shirt (flushing the entire time because Jesus Christ, Ezra, was it necessary to feel him up when he was drunk and sleepy? I was two steps away from sexual assault.) and began to untangle our limbs. His hand was still clinging to my waist and his eyelids began fluttering when I fully removed my body from his.

I watched him for a moment, waiting for his eyes to open fully, but when they didn't, I extracted myself from his bed. Which was hard, because Harry had used some of his pop star money to buy amazing bedding. It was like sleeping on a cloud. A warm, fluffy cloud that smelled distinctly like boy.

"You're leaving me already?" A groggy voice spoke just as I was slipping on my shoes. His morning voice was deep, slow, intoxicating, something warm and welcoming that made me want to say fuck it to my exam and crawl back next to him.

I turned back to face him just as Harry stretched out and let out a soft moan.

It was the type of sound that made me want to throw myself into the ocean, just to cool down the tingles along my spine.

Media communications. School. Exams. University. Self control.

Focus, Ezra, focus.

"I have an exam at nine." I told him gently, running my fingers through my hair to straighten some wayward strands.

Harry reached over for his phone, back muscles stretching deliciously (it was too early to have the willpower to look away) as he checked the time. "S'not even eight yet." He observed. "Twenty more minutes of sleep."

"You can go back to sleep, but I need a cup of coffee and to get all the way across London, so I'm gonna do that."

Harry let out a noise of disapproval, eyes fluttering shut as he patted the spot next to him. "C'mere." He drawled. "'M cold."

I told myself that he was being needy (and affectionate and adorable and slightly more friendly than I was used to) because he was tired and probably still slightly drunk, but even with that rationalization it was hard to ignore the reaction of my nerves as he invited me back into his bed. We were friends now. It was a distinctly different thought process to put myself into, because previously (like four weeks ago) Harry Styles was kind of this unattainable projection of a person. I saw his posts on Twitter and blogged about him on the Internet and made references in videos and that was it. Now we had a friendship. A real, legitimate friendship, in which he was apparently comfortable enough to try and coax me to cuddle with him and I was supposed to be cool enough not freak out that he wanted me to cuddle with him.

And maybe I was freaking out because it was all so sudden, his change from being an idolized paragon in my mind to something much more important entirely, or maybe it was because every time he looked at me my body wanted to flush and I could feel my brain going into overdrive. These were symptoms of something I was not willing to let myself think about.

I had to stay strong.

"How far away is the nearest Tube station?" I deflected.

Harry let out a sigh, face shoved into the plush pillow that I had been resting
on previously, before bringing his phone back up to his face. "Hold on." He
grunted.

I turned back to his doorway and gathered my bag, grunting as I slung it over my shoulder, fingers reaching inside for a pair of sunglasses. I wasn’t going to look into a mirror, because that was just going to stress me out more than I needed to. I figured I could hide until after the exam was over and I had a shower.

I turned back around just as Harry dropped his phone back down onto his mattress. “A car will be here in five.” He rasped, turning his head slightly and opening one eye to look at me.

“You didn’t have to do that.” I said, because he didn’t. I appreciated the gesture - a private car through London was undoubtedly faster than the Tube and I might have possibly had time to get both coffee and a breakfast burrito - but it wasn’t necessary.

He didn’t say anything, just let his left shoulder shrug deftly. “Take it as payback for taking care of me. How bad was I?”

“Only like, mildly white girl wasted, so really not that bad.” I assured him. “You only tried to make out with Grimmy twice.”

“Again?” He grumbled, just as my eyes widened and I let out a snort of laughter.

“Again?” I repeated, just as he lifted his head up to glare at me. “I was kidding!”

“In my defense, I was pissed out of my mind.” He defended with a sigh. “And it only happened once. Let’s just never bring that up again, yeah?”

I couldn’t stop myself from continuing to chuckle, shaking my head at his blasé attitude towards the entire thing. I mean, I probably wouldn’t mind making out with Grimmy either, but I was just thinking that if only the Internet knew. Fandoms would probably explode.

“I should probably wait outside.” I said after a moment of silence, shifting awkwardly from my left foot to my right. Harry’s eyelids were fluttering closed again and he looked just moments away from sleep.

“Jim’ll text me when he’s here.” Harry said, the side of his face sinking back into the plush pillow.

“Okay.”

There was a moment of silence, in which I shifted around awkwardly and I was sure that Harry had fallen asleep.

Just as I was about to sneak out of Harry’s bedroom, he opened one of his eyes again.

“You smell really nice.” He observed, before taking a whiff of his pillow.

I gave him a slightly screwy look, raising one eyebrow as I let out a little laugh. Definitely still drunk.

“Thank you.”

“Thanks for putting up with me last night.” He said after a moment. “Nick always says I’m awful when I’m drunk.”

“I’ve dealt with worse.” I shrugged.

“Still,” he continued. “You didn’t have to deal with me, so thanks.”

“We’re friends.” I pointed out. “So I kind of did have to deal with you. Good friends don’t let other good friends make fools out of themselves at karaoke bars.”

Harry chuckled at that. “Someone should tell Grimmy that. He likes to let people make fools out of themselves and then use it to his advantage.”

“I’ll send the Friendship Guidebook over to his house the second I get home.” I promised.

“Good,” Harry joked. “Make sure to send the one with pictures. It’s the only way to keep him entertained.

We both laughed just as Harry’s phone buzzed.

“Jim’s here.” He said, sitting up slightly. “Have a good exam. Choose the right answers. Don’t stress and all that shit. Do you want me to walk you out?”

“No, I think I can manage. If you get up, you’ll never get back to sleep.” I smiled. “Thanks for the sage advice, oh wise one.”

“Always happy to lend some advice. Text me when you’re out, yeah? I’ll treat you to a celebratory lunch.” Harry offered. I sent him another smile and made my way down the stairs.



I didn’t actually plan on texting Harry when I got out. I don’t really know why, but part of me just felt…weird. Like something had shifted between us suddenly, but I wasn’t exactly sure what. I had just gotten used to the idea of us for a friendship and now my mind was suddenly taking it to a completely different level.

I wasn’t actively thinking about him, either, because my entire morning consisted of my exam, scarfing down a breakfast burrito and a cup of coffee, and being too exhausted on the Tube ride back to my apartment to focus on anything except the poster in front of me. When I did get home, I collapsed on my mattress and fell asleep for like, six hours.

I woke up to my phone vibrating underneath my pillow.

“You have so much explaining to do, young lady.” ZZ snapped in greeting. “I want a diagram of every decision you’ve made in the past six hours as well as a seven page paper on how good of a shag Harry Styles is.”

“I’m sorry, what?” I mumbled, clearing the sleep from my voice.

“Oh don’t play naive with me. I know you’ve been holding out of me these past few weeks, giving me shit about how you’re ‘just friends’, but you can’t deny it now, sister. You’re totally shagging. There’s photographic evidence. And I want to know everything. How big is his dick? Does he know how to use it well? Because on one hand, he seems like such a people pleaser that he’d be such a God in the sack, but can someone that attractive really be good at everything, I mean—?,”

“—We aren’t having sex.” I interrupted quickly, eyes widening as I finally processed what she was saying.

“—It would be great if he was but—wait, what?” She stopped.

“We aren’t having sex.” I repeated, my voice stronger this time. I sat up in bed and rubbed the sleep from my eyes, disoriented. It had been light outside when I got in, but it was dark already.

“What do you mean you aren’t having sex? You left with him! Of course you’re having sex.” She protested.

“ZZ,” I spoke evenly, through the lightness and slight dizziness in my head. “I was there. I think I would know.”

“Then why did you leave with him if you weren’t having sex?” She asked. She seemed so genuinely perplexed that I actually wanted to laugh.

“Because he was drunk?” I replied, slightly questioningly. “And he looked like a puppy and really wanted me to take care of him and I have no self restraint?”

“Didn’t you have an exam this morning?”

I sighed again. “Yes.”

“Then why did you go to the party in the first place? I didn’t even know you knew Pixie Geldorf. ” ZZ questioned.

“I didn’t plan to.” I defended, because, well, I didn’t. “It just kind of happened. I was going to leave, but that felt rude? He asked me to stay, so I stayed. And then he needed to be taken home, so I took him home. I was a good friend.”

“A good friend?”

“Yes, ZZ, a good friend.” I was trying not to be exasperated with her, but I was delirious and even though it was more a sleep than a nap, I still had that feeling you get when you nap and you feel more like shit than before.

“So did you just drop him off at his house? Make sure he didn’t choke on his own puke and leave?”

My silence must have been my answer, because I didn’t exactly know what to say to that.

“You stayed?” She practically shrieked.

“He asked me to.” I muttered out weakly, before grumbling and swinging my legs over the side of the bed.

“And where exactly did you sleep last night, young lady?”

I ignored her and made my way into the kitchen and towards the coffee maker.

“In a bed.” I answered dryly, as I reached for a coffee mug from the drying rack.

“And who’s bed was that?” She sounded so smug, so goddamn victorious, that I rolled my eyes so hard it made my head hurt.

“Dude, trust me, it wasn’t like that, okay? It was strictly platonic.”

“Did you touch? Did you cuddle? Did you share a blanket?”

“What did you do last night?” I tried to (very badly) divert the attention away from the very awkward conversation at hand, but it just wasn’t working.

“Oh my god!” She squeaked. “You cuddled! You touched! I cannot fucking believe this!”

“Why is it such a big deal?” I shot right back. “So we might have cuddled a little bit? Friends do that! And he was drunk!”

“But you weren’t! And you aren’t telling me that he doesn’t have guest rooms! You willingly chose to sleep next to him and cuddle with him! Why would you do that if you’re just friends?” She fired off.

I don’t know.

I don’t know.

I don’t know.

So we cuddled. So I might have woken up with my hand on the middle of his back and my face in his neck, but he didn’t have to know that and neither did ZZ. Harry was an affectionate dude. I was an affectionate person. And maybe that’s just how cool English friend groups work. They cuddle. Harry and Grimmy had apparently kissed and weren’t in a relationship (that I knew of) so maybe it was a casual thing.

“Listen, it’s not a big deal. I don’t know why you’re giving me the third degree about this.”

“I was just calling to see what happened, because when I went on Twitter this morning ‘Hezra’ was trending again and usually that only happens when you two are seen out together.” She explained, her voice back down to the normal decimal.

That had been a thing that kept happening, the trending.

I couldn’t exactly blame ZZ for being curious. She probably would’ve waited until I got into the studio to grill me on things, but I wasn’t filming for Tongue in Cheek for a few days.

“It was—,” I sighed. “—It was just a cuddle, okay? I was tired and delirious and his bed is really nice. And he was drunk and overly affectionate. We’re friends. That’s it. And we’ve been friends for the past few weeks and I haven’t been hiding anything. We just get along really well and it’s nice. You know I don’t have that many friends in London. It’s pretty much you, Liam, and Harry, and people from YouTube.”

“Because you’re overworked and too busy.” She interjected.

“Whatever. Are you happy now? That you know the truth?”

“Ezra, I would’ve been happy either way.” She said. “Obviously, you know that I would willingly captain the Hezra ship, but if you aren’t into Harry, I’m not gonna pressure you about it.”

“It’s not that I’m not into Harry.” I blurted it out before I could even think about it. “It’s just that - it doesn’t seem realistic? Like I can barely believe that we’re friends, let alone that he would want to date me?”

“You need to stop seeing him as a celebrity and start seeing him as a person.” ZZ sighed.

“I do see him as a person!” I protested.

“Yes, but as a famous person. You have the same chance with Harry as you do with some other guy you’re friends with. Him being famous doesn’t change anything.”

Actually, no, it changed everything, but I wasn’t going to tell her that. I sighed.

“So does that mean you’re into him, then?” She persisted.

“I don’t know.” I answered honestly, because I didn’t. I was tired and groggy, but even though I had been trying to not think about Harry, it was apparently all I could think about. “I don’t want to have a crush on him.” I finally said, because that was true.

Having a crush on Harry had potential to get messy and fast. Enough people were already speculating and hoping and reading into things and if I let myself give into that, I didn’t really know how things would go. And I didn’t know if I wanted things to go that way.

Basically, I didn’t know anything.

“I don’t know anything.” I repeated to ZZ. “I am a mess of confused feelings. And I’m tired. And I had a killer exam today and I have work to do. So now I’m going to go sit on my one chair, drink a cup of coffee even though it’s probably like eight at night, and fuck around on the Internet, okay. Or do you need anything else from me?”

“I mean, I’d like a definitive answer on whether you do or do not have a crush on Harry Styles, but I can deal, I guess.”

“I’m glad.”

“Goodbye, Ezra. And next time you’re with Harry, will you please just have sex with him? Do it for me, okay?”

“Goodbye, ZZ.”

And I hung up, pressing the button on my phone. I set it down on the counter, prepared the coffee machine for a cup of coffee, and then gingerly picked up my mobile device.

I hadn’t thought about last night, not really. I had thought of people taking pictures when people were actually taking my pictures, but besides that, I had been so preoccupied and slightly overwhelmed that it didn’t really seem to matter.

And now…well, now it mattered.

There were 2,342 messages in my Tumblr ask box and after scrolling through three pages, I realized that the majority of them had to deal with Harry and I leaving Pixie Geldorf’s birthday party last night. My Twitter mentions were worse, some of the inquiring comments even from people I knew personally. There were text messages, e-mails, YouTube comments, and Instagram mentions. Most of the comments were inquisitive, but the majority of them were upbeat and positive. There were a few nasty messages mixed in there, but people just wanted to know what was going on between Harry and I. Why was I leaving with him? Were we both drunk? (In the paparazzi pictures, Harry was pretty obviously drunk, his eyes shining and cheeks flushed pink, but he had covered my face with his body for the majority of the pictures, so you couldn’t distinguish the expression on my face.) What was going on between us?

I kind of wanted to know, too. Was he always that affectionate with everyone? Most of me wanted to believe so - to brush off every contact of our skin by his overly affectionate nature, but then another part of me wanted to do the exact opposite of brush it off. I wanted to focus on it, obsess over it. He was touching me. He was touching me and he obviously liked it. He wound his body around mine and wrapped his arm around my waist and he wanted me to take him home. That was a train of thought I had to squash quickly, because it was the type of thing that gave a girl a whole lot of hope.

And I didn’t really know if I wanted to have a lot of hope. After preparing myself a proper cup of coffee, I dug my laptop out of my schoolbag and opened it up.

I hadn’t even finished typing it in before Google was already auto-filling it in.

Ezra Callil and Harry Styles was the very first thing suggested in the box.

I hit enter warily, but this was kind of my job. I was a social media person. I was on the Internet. It was my job to be on the Internet and to see what people were writing.

Even if it wasn’t very good.

Harry Styles Dating YouTuber?

A New Girlfriend for Harry?

Harry’s New Internet Hook-Up?

Most of them were funny, because why did it matter? The articles were speculation and blurry paparazzi photos. Some chronicled Harry and I’s relationship from that first interview, some saying that I snagged him with my ‘internet-charm’ and other’s saying that it was ‘unlikely that we were dating.’ And I found them all pretty much hilarious.



Ezra Callil @ezracallil
my mom just called me bc apparently I am being talked about on Chelsea Lately? How do I watch???

Ezra Callil @ezracallil
Holy shitballs Chelsea Lately just made fun of me it’s like all of my wildest dreams are coming true

Ezra Callil @ezracallil
(Also chels I agree dude wtf is the big deal? Idgi either.)

Ezra Callil @ezracallil
Woah there tigers I know u like to attack but like Chelsea handler can make fun of me all she wants I do not mind

Ezra Callil @ezracallil
And also bc I know you are wondering…nope, we aren’t dating.

Ezra Callil @ezracallil
If I were dating someone as foxy as Harry I would tell you all alright trust me I would tell the whole effing world

Ezra Callil @ezracallil
We are friends that is a thing that we are.

Ezra Callil @ezracallil
@HarryStyles please pretend you did not see that I called you foxy your ego doesn’t need to get any bigger

Harry Styles @harrystyles
Foxy foxy foxy.

Ezra Callil @ezracallil
In other news the spring on my 1 chair just poked through the fabric it’s official I need furniture

Ezra Callil @ezracallil
Someone pls take me to IKEA???