Bloom

February

When I woke up the next morning, I spent two minutes trying to figure out how I’d ended up in somebody else’s bed wearing pyjama bottoms and a t-shirt that definitely weren’t mine. My head was pounding and my mouth was dry, the makeup I’d so carefully put on last night was probably all over my face, judging by the streaks on the pillowcase, and there was a half-eaten brownie on the side table.

I sat up and stretched, desperately in need of a glass of water and some Advil, and padded out of the room. Silas’s door was shut, though I had no memory of him coming home, and I found Matt stretched out on the sofa with a blanket haphazardly thrown across his sleeping frame. I grabbed the bottle of ibuprofen from the bathroom cabinet and popped two pills, then filled two glasses of water and left the medicine and one glass on the coffee table for Matt when he woke up.

The brownies I’d made last night — while drunk, so they probably tasted awful — were sitting on the stovetop, still in the tin, with two pieces missing. I guessed that Matt had actually eaten his, while I’d fallen asleep halfway through. I returned to the bathroom, avoiding my reflection until I’d washed off all the makeup, and attempted to detangle my hair with my fingers. This, of course, was pointless, and I ended up twisting the unruly chestnut locks into a bun atop my head.

Matt was waking up when I came out of the bathroom. “Morning,” I said, though I wasn’t entirely sure what time it was, and sat next to him on the couch. “Sleep well?”

“My back hurts,” he whined, grabbing the bottle of ibuprofen and the water. “How are you up before me?”

I checked his phone and saw that it was a quarter to twelve. A few more hours — not necessarily sleeping, just lying in bed — would’ve been nice, considering it was Sunday. “You have two texts from Silas and a missed call from Harry,” I said, handing the phone over.

Matt nodded, leaving me to check his messages and probably splash some cold water on his face so he could wake up a little faster. I sat on the sofa with my legs criss-crossed, cradling the water in my lap and willing myself to stay awake. My own phone was somewhere in the apartment, probably in one of my coat pockets, and I wondered if there were any messages waiting for me. It wasn’t like Matt and I had told anyone we were leaving last night, after all.

By the time I’d actually gotten to my feet and was about to start looking, Matt strode into the room speaking into his mobile with an exasperated voice.

“Calm down, would you?” he exclaimed into the phone, rolling his eyes at me, then flopping down onto the couch. “Just—Harry, shut the fuck up for a second, yeah? Thank you. Now, if you’d let me get a word in earlier, I would’ve been able to tell you that Imogen’s here. Yes, she’s standing right in front of me. What? Are you joking? Oh, for—I’m handing her the—“

Matt leapt up and shoved his phone at me, before stalking off to his room. I blinked after him, then at the phone in my hand with Harry’s name on the screen. I was a bit afraid of getting yelled at, so I held the device at a safe distance before saying anything. “Hi?”

“Thank God,” Harry sighed, his voice strained and tired. “I’ve been calling you all night.”

“Sorry,” I mumbled, holding the phone properly now that I was assured he wasn’t going to start shouting.

“Are you all right?”

“Hungover, but fine.”

“Why did you leave?” he asked, and he sounded so genuinely confused that it made my chest ache.

I rubbed my forehead, grimacing. The throbbing hadn’t subsided yet. “I wasn’t really planning on staying over, you know that right? It would be weird.”

“No, it wouldn’t. Aimee, Jillian, Niall, and loads of other people — they all stayed. You could’ve stayed.”

“Well, if I’d known that staying was a thing, then—“

“And it’s not supposed to be weird between us. That was part of the agreement,” Harry continued, ignoring me. “You should be able to stop over whenever and it should be completely normal. That’s part of the whole ‘friends’ thing, yeah?”

“Okay,” I said. “Next time I’ll stay.”

“Good. Now, Silas wants us all to go for lunch at this pub south of the Heath. I think he’s texted Matt about it, probably you as well,” Harry paused, and I could practically hear him frowning and thinking. “It’s good that you two are getting on. Did you just go there and fall asleep, or…“

He cleared his throat loudly, and it was a really obvious way of changing the subject, but I let it slide and starting talking to fill the awkward silence. “Honestly, I have no idea what happened when we left. I woke up in Matt’s room and there was this brownie, and I was so confused, then—”

“I really don’t need to hear about the morning after,” Harry interrupted, annoyed.

“Shit! Not like, oh fuck. That sounded like something happened that definitely did not happen,” I groaned, squeezing my eyes shut. “I really need some coffee. Hey! Here’s Matt!”

My voice was falsely cheery, and it didn’t fool Harry for a second, but I wasn’t going to last much longer in that conversation. I practically threw the phone at Matt, racing into his room to change into last night’s clothes. When I came out, Matt was laughing.

“She got this mad idea on the way down ‘ere that she was gonna bake fucking brownies at two in the morning. And of course she did, while drinking the rest of the wine Silas’s mum got him for Christmas. The brownies were awful.”

“I don’t remember any of that,” I sighed, sitting down next to him. “Can we stop at Astor before we go for food? I don’t want to show up in the same outfit I was wearing last night.”

Matt, still on the phone with Harry, flicked the bun atop my head. “You could use a shower, too, you smell like gin and really expensive wine. And chocolate.”

“Thanks,” I replied dryly, bumping my shoulder against his.



We knew we were at the right pub by the horde of paps crowded on the sidewalk outside. Matt stepped closer to me, wrapping a protective arm around my shoulders, because a few heads had turned in our direction and there was always the chance I’d be recognized. A few cameras flashed, but we got in the front door without any difficulty.

The pub, which I guessed was an old house that had been converted, had a massive outside seating area that was closed because of the cold, was fairly small inside. It smelled amazing, and when I glanced at the spread on one of the tables I could feel my stomach grumbling in response to the delicious food. People were drinking beer, which seemed a bit weird to me at half past noon, but there were parts of British culture that I had yet to get the hang of.

It took one look around the dining area and a quick peek at the bar — and seeing none of our friends in the process — for Matt and I to wonder if maybe the paps had been mislead to thinking that this was where Harry Styles was having Sunday roast. Matt and I approached the bar, and the bartender strode over with a friendly smile on his face. “How can I help you two?” he asked.

“We’re looking for our friends,” I said. “Um, is there another place where—“

“Imogen! Matt!” Jillian exclaimed, appearing from out of nowhere. She grinned (a little flirtatiously) at the bartender. “They’re with us, James, not to worry.”

She led us around the corner to another room, which I assumed was the overflow seating area due to the cluster of tables occupying the space. Three tables had been pushed together in the corner, where Silas and Harry were seated. I guessed that sitting back here had come on Harry’s request, because the front windows of the pub were wide and gave a clear view of the interior, and in this room the windows looked out into the garden, which I assumed was blocked from the front, because there wasn’t anyone peering through.

“James?” I asked, raising my eyebrows at Jillian.

Her grin widened as she sat back down. Matt immediately sat next to Harry, occupying the last spot on that side of the table, and clapped his friend on the shoulder. It made Harry jump, and he looked around in a sort of daze, his eyes finally landing on me and staying there.

“You look like shit,” I said, draping my coat on the back of the chair before sitting down.

“Didn’t sleep much,” he said, his voice even raspier than it had been over the phone. I noticed that, unlike Silas and Jillian with their pints, Harry had a cup of tea in front of him.

“How does it feel to be twenty, mate?” Matt asked.

Harry shrugged. “S’alright.”

“Imogen was right, you look proper knackered,” Matt continued, his tone light. There was music playing in the main room, and Jillian was interrogating Silas about the shirt he was wearing (because it definitely wasn’t his, the loud pattern made that blatantly obvious), but Harry was in his own little thoughtful bubble, tracing the rim of his cup with a ringed finger and glancing up at me periodically. His eyes were too clouded for me to read and he wore his usual frown, so I couldn’t determine exactly what sort of mood he was in, other than that the cheery birthday boy I’d encountered so briefly yesterday probably wasn’t going to make another appearance any time soon. “What happened after we left?”

“You missed the cake!” Jillian cried, suddenly switching her attention to us. “I can’t believe you left before cake.”

“Imogen did make brownies at the flat,” Matt said, grinning at me.

I groaned. “Please don’t remind me of that disaster. I tried one before we left, it was awful. I can’t believe you ate a whole piece.”

He shook his head. “Nah, I tossed it after one bite.”

“I don’t blame you.”

“So you two left together?” Jillian asked, sipping her pint.

I hadn’t been looking at him on purpose, but my gaze happened to be on Harry when she asked, and I saw his frown deepen into a full-on scowl. Apparently he still wasn’t over the whole ‘Imogen didn’t stay over’ thing. I didn’t think it was that big of a deal; he was just being difficult.

“She kicked me out of my own bed too,” Matt complained. “My back’s still sore from sleeping on that bloody couch.”

“For the record,” I interjected. “Your bed is super uncomfortable too. My fucking dorm mattress is better than that piece of shit you have.”

Silas chuckled. “He did get it off some bloke for forty quid.”

“Well, if we’re comparing quality of sleep,” Jillian said, and by the sweeping motion she made with her glass, I guessed that she’d had a few before Matt and I arrived. “Harry’s guest bed is lovely.”

“If I recall correctly, you and Niall shared a bed,” said Harry, the first grin I’d seen him make in what felt like forever appearing on his face.

Jillian smirked. “Are you implying something, Harry?”

“Is he implying something?” I asked, my eyes flicking rapidly between them. Jillian was smiling, having too much fun keeping us guessing to answer.

“If you’d stayed, you wouldn’t have to ask that,” Harry mumbled, smile gone.

I bit back the very profane retort I had in mind, because an employee had just come in and stood at the head of the table to ask if we were ready to order. Harry kept his steely gaze on me throughout the entire ordering process, like he was looking for a fight, asking for it even, and I almost, almost gave it to him. After asking for something on the special Sunday menu that I’d hardly even read over properly, I also asked for a pint of my own, and pointedly ignored Harry.

This, of course, only made him want my attention more. I didn’t understand why he wanted us to argue, as if a big fight was somehow going to get us out of this rut (it had, I admit, been partly to blame for us falling into this whole ‘but we’re not’ business in the first place), even though it was very obvious to me that we could be perfectly fine friends if he would stop being so goddamn moody all the time and actually make an effort for once. That little glimpse of Happy Harry at his birthday had been so wonderful that maybe I was just comparing everything to it now, but I really did miss seeing a genuine smile on his face.

“Now, let’s get back to our previous discussion,” Jillian announced, grinning impishly at Silas while she did so. “On where everyone spent the night.”

“Jill—“

“Silas,” she said. “Would you like to share with us?”

We all looked at Silas, varying degrees of smugness on our faces, and he fiddled with the collar of the ridiculous shirt he had on. “Er…”

“Grim texted me in a panic about an hour ago,” Harry informed the table, twirling the white iPhone in his hand with a contemplative expression on his face. He raised his eyebrows at Silas. I was just surprised he’d said anything at all, I’d thought that his surliness would prevent him from doing anything but glower in my direction for the entire meal. “Said you weren’t answering and wanted to make sure you’d fed his dog. He’s quite annoyed that he couldn’t be here, I think, ‘cause of that meeting or wherever he is. ”

Silas glared at Harry, like it wasn’t already totally obvious where he’d spent the night, and spent the next ten minutes scowling into his pint and not talking to anyone.

Considering I’d made the very poor choice to sit across from Harry — although, to be fair, I didn’t expecting him to be quite this grumpy — not looking at him was almost impossible. I could stare at my plate and the other people at the table, but my eyes would always go back to him, no matter how hard I tried.

After eating less than half of my food (which was delicious, but I couldn’t appreciate it with Harry distracting me) I needed space to breathe. “‘Scuse me,” I muttered, tossing down my fork and pushing out from the table. I ducked my head and rushed out of the room, one hand already tearing out the elastic that was keeping my damp hair out of my face just so that I could run my fingers through it in exasperation.

The bathrooms were in the little hallway between the room we were in and the main pub. I went in and was relieved to see that all the stalls were empty, and stood before the mirror with my hands braced against the sink. My head dropped, hair falling in citrus-scented waves over my face. I breathed a long, heavy sigh, then stood up straight and shook my hair back, fixing my reflection with a determined stare.

Then somebody knocked.

I threw a confused look toward the door, wondering who on earth would knock, and wandered over to see who it was. When I saw Harry, hands tucked into the pockets of his hoodie (which I’d been trying to ignore up until this point, because hoodies had never been particularly attractive until Harry Styles decided to wear one), floppy fringe falling into his face and lips pursed, I was even more confused.

“Um,” I said, tilting my head to the side as I blinked at him. “Can I help you?”

“Is anyone else in there?”

“No, but—“ Harry pushed past me, raking his fingers through his hair impatiently, and stood in the middle of the women’s bathroom without a hint of embarrassment. “Again, why are you here?”

“I think something needs to be cleared up,” he said.

“Okay,” I replied slowly, stepping away from the door. I folded my hands over my chest and raised my eyebrows at him, waiting.

Harry played with his lower lip, hesitating. “There was no specific reason why you left yesterday?”

I groaned. “This again? Really, Harry? Can’t you just let it go?”

He looked at me incredulously. “No, I won’t let it go. You left without telling me, didn’t answer your phone all night…you’re the reason I didn’t get any bloody sleep! I thought we were going to talk, because there’s so many things that I haven’t gotten the chance to tell you, but then you were just…gone. I couldn’t help but assume that I’d done something, because when you don’t talk to me, it means you’re upset with me. So I need to know what it is. I need to fix it.”

“I didn’t stay because I didn’t want to,” I said, and he grunted in disbelief, looking away from me to stare at the wall. “Really! I was walking through the house and I saw—“

When my voice cracked, Harry’s eyes flew to me.

“I saw Matt,” I continued unsteadily. “And I was already going to leave, so I asked if he wanted to come with, and he said yes. We didn’t tell anyone because you were all having so much fun, and would probably try and tell us to stay longer even though we didn’t want to.”

“Is that it?”

“Of course it is!”

He didn’t appear convinced. “You left because you didn’t want to be there anymore,” he said, even slower than his usual pace. I nodded. “Why didn’t you want to be there?”

“Oh my God,” I complained. “Why do you need to know that? It’s my personal business, it doesn’t have anything to do with you.”

“If it has nothing to do with me, then I’ll leave.”

“Harry,“ I said, frustrated.

“So it does have something to do with me!” he exclaimed, though I hadn’t said anything to indicate as such.

The door opened and a girl walked in, her eyes going wide at the sight of us, and she quickly stepped back, letting the door fall shut. “I think this is a good place to end the conversation,” I said.

“We need to finish a conversation for once,” Harry disagreed. “Nothing ever gets solved, not really. There’s still all this—“ he gestured frantically between us. “—left and it’s driving me mad.”

My shoulders slumped. I gave up, and it wasn’t a particularly proud moment, but the bathroom was making me claustrophobic and Harry was staring at me in that intense way he did and half of me wanted to punch him, while the other half was struggling not to launch myself across the room and kiss him.

“I saw Darcy going up to your room,” I said with a shrug, my voice flat. “It shouldn’t have made me feel…well, anything, but it did — it does, and I’m sorry I didn’t tell you before I left. But don’t you get it now? It would’ve been weird if I’d stayed, because all I’d be able to think about was you and her, and making brownies seemed like a better option.”

A crease formed between his brows while Harry examined the floor. “So, you left because you saw Darcy, and you didn’t like the idea of being in the house while we shagged, is that it?”

“Essentially, yes,” I sighed.

“Well,” he said, his voice considerably lighter than before. His eyes, when they flicked up to mine, were back to the earnest, spring green I liked so much. “I didn’t sleep with her. So there’s that.”

I was too surprised to form words, much less a complete sentence, and Harry waited until I’d recovered with a small smile on his face. “But I saw her…”

“We had an agreement, you see,” he explained. “I like making things clear, which is why you are so…anyway, Darcy and I agreed that if either of us developed feelings, then we’d stop. It wasn’t something either of us wanted. We were doing what we were doing because we’re the same, her and I.”

“I need to go,” I mumbled, unable to look at him for another second. I hurried out of the bathroom, nearly knocking over the girl still waiting in the hallway, and put on my coat as quick as I could, digging a few notes out of my pocket and tossing them onto the table. All three of my friends asked why I was leaving (after Jillian inquired rather loudly if Harry and I had been ‘snogging in the toilets’) but I could only rush out a half-coherent response before I heard Harry behind me. I grabbed my purse and practically ran out of there, knowing Harry wouldn’t be stupid enough to follow me into the swarm of paparazzi outside.

I didn’t even notice if there were any photographs taken, my legs carrying me quickly out of range. My brain was working so fast that I couldn’t even consciously keep up, and I was sitting on the Tube shoving in my headphones and blasting the loudest music in my library just to drown out the world.

Developing feelings didn’t seem like something that could happen to people like Harry and Darcy. They slept together because of that, because feelings just weren’t part of the equation, not a risk they even had to consider. I couldn’t understand why the prospect of feelings was even part of whatever bizarre agreement they’d made when the shagging became a regular thing, much less how one of them — or, and this was even harder to imagine, both — could’ve started to feel something. But, apparently, I was wrong.