Loved You First

"Painted on skinny jeans, obnoxious, expensive shoes, and is that Harry's pullover? Are you sure you're NOT Harry Styles?"

“Piss off, Tommo, I’m not in the mood,” I rolled my eyes as I climbed up into Louis’ Range Rover.

“He still hasn’t called, has he?” Louis frowned at me, cerulean eyes wide and expression soft.

“He called once, but it was a very, uh, brief conversation,” I admitted, pulling my backpack off my shoulders and setting it next to my feet. “Thanks, by the way. You really didn’t have to drive me.”

He shook his head. “I don’t want you on the tube after what happened the other day. Nobody fucks with my little bird, yeah?”

He leaned over and ruffled my hair and I scrunched my nose at him, swatting his hand away and leaning over to pull the beanie off his head.

“Oi!” He huffed, hair sticking up in little tufts around his head. Louis brought the hand that was in my hair up to his to try and fix his fringe, whining when I pulled my phone out to snap a picture.

arielagarcia: look who rolled out of bed before noon to drive me to school awwww @louist91 #bedhead #bigbrother

@Arielalala: bedheaded big brother @Louis_Tomlinson instagram.com/afm03j4if

“Ariela Garcia mentioned you in a tweet. Say, ‘read,’ or ‘dismiss,’” the car’s robotic voice told us, Louis’ phone lighting up where it was sitting on the console between us.

“Dismiss,” Louis told it, shooting me a glare. “Thanks for that, Ari. My mentions are probably blowing up right now.”

“Your mentions are always blowing up,” I pointed out as he pulled up to the entrance of the school.

“Get the fuck out of my car, you absolute nuisance,” he laughed, leaning over me and opening the door. I kissed his cheek while he still leaning over me and he scrunched up his nose and clacked his teeth at me like he was going to bite.

I picked my backpack up and shoved his face away as I climbed out of the car.

“Have a good day, yeah? Love you,” he called as I walked away.

“Love you, too!” I called over my shoulder, walking over to where Fenna, Alex and Oli were sitting around a picnic table by the front entrance.

Alex and Oli gave me happy greetings and Fenna yelled a ‘Nice hair, popstar!’ at Louis as he drove away. He laughed and flipped her off through the window.

“Are you sleeping with Louis now, too?” A nasally voice called and all of my friends and I straightened automatically, Fenna going as far as standing up in front of me.

“Shut the fuck up, Jess,” Fenna hissed, voice low and dangerous.

“Oh, and what are you gonna do about it, Sykes? We both know you can’t fight during footie season,” Jess sneered, marching toward Fenna until they were eye to eye. She walked her fingers down the arm of Fenna’s varsity letterman as if to demonstrate.

“I can’t fight on school grounds, that doesn’t mean I won’t break your fucking nose the minute you walk past that gate,” Fenna pointed to the fence around the perimeter of the school.

“An 18 year old attacking a helpless 16 year old? I wonder how the police would feel about that,” Jess tapped her chin in mock thought.

“How about a 17 year old doing it for her?” Another girl materialized at Fenna’s side, staring evenly down at Jess. She crossed her arms, biceps bulging against the fabric of her own letterman that matched Fenna’s exactly, save for the surname embroidered on the back.

“Amelie!” Jess smiled mockingly at her. “I was wondering how long it would take you to swoop in and save your little girlfriend here.”

“Oh, just piss off before someone finds a teacher,” Fenna warned, nodding at where yet another girl in a letterman was leaning in the doorway to the school, watching the exchange between the girls apprehensively.

Jess rolled her eyes. “Yeah, whatever.” She strutted away, heels clicking annoyingly against the concrete.

“God, I hate her,” Alex muttered, shaking his head.

“Hey,” I put a hand on Fenna’s shoulder and one on Amelie’s. “Thanks, for that. You really didn’t have to.”

“It’s no problem, Ari, really,” Fenna rolled her eyes before turning to Amelie. “Thanks for backing me up.”

“Of course,” Amelie beamed. “We’re a team, yeah?”

@Arielalala: cool thing about being best friends with the captain is that the whole team protects you

@Arielalala: and by that I mean thank you @Fenna96 @AmelieAustin and the rest of the footie team for always having my back

The bell rang then, just as a silver Range Rover pulled into the drive. Amelie went back to her table to gather her things while Alex, Oli and Fenna pulled their backpacks onto their shoulders. The glare from the sun on the windshield hid the driver from view, but no one else was moving toward it, so I figured it was Louis.

“I must have left something in the car,” I nodded toward it. “I’ll see you guys in class.”

“We can wait,” Oli offered.

“Don’t be stupid, Dr. Clark will have your head. Seriously, I’ll be right there, go,” I shoved at the three of them and they huffed but walked obediently into the school. I skipped over to the car, skidding to a stop when I got close enough to see in the passenger side window.

The car was definitely for me, but it wasn’t Louis.

He looked dreadful, normally bright green eyes dull and rimmed in red, curls falling greasy and flat around his face, stubble decorating his chin, pink lips chapped and bitten raw.

It was Harry.

He rolled down the window and leaned over.

“I need to talk to you. Can you get in the car, please?” He asked, voice rough like he’d been crying.

I gaped at him. “You’re not-You can’t be serious.”

“Of course I’m serious,” he rasped, brow furrowing. “Why wouldn’t I be serious?”

“H, I,” I stammered. “Fuck, Harry. Could you have picked a worse time? I have class in like, two minutes.”

“Will you please just get in the car?” He begged. My heart crawled into my throat at how desperate he sounded, but I stood my ground.

“No!” I snapped. “I’m not getting in the damn car. You bailed on me for a week and now all of a sudden you decide to drop out of the fucking sky and you have the fucking nerve to demand that I go talk to you when I should be in class?
No. You know what? Fuck you, Harry. I don’t have time for this.”

“Ela, I’m sorry, I-” He tried, but I cut him off.

“Don’t you dare call me that. Don’t you use that name against me like a weapon,” I snarled. Tears were pooling in his eyes and I knew I’d be crying, too, if I stayed any longer.

“Look,” I whispered. “I love you, Haz, but I just can’t do this right now, alright?”

Harry visibly relaxed at my words, blowing out a long breath.

“Yeah, alright. Can I come and pick you up after school, then?” He asked, voice soft and careful.

Wordlessly, I nodded at him, hitching my backpack higher up on my shoulder, but I made no move to walk away. I raised an eyebrow at him, knowing he would know what I wanted from him.

“Shit, I love you, too. Sorry, I didn’t realize I hadn’t said it back,” Harry apologized, sending me a sheepish grin. I gave him one small smile before I turned and sprinted to my classroom, just barely making it inside as the late bell rang.

****

New Message to: Fenna
So…it was H’s car this morning, not L’s. He wanted me to get in to talk to him
I told him to fuck off
He’s coming after school to pick me up

New Messages from: Fenna
Good. I would’ve told him to fuck off if you hadn’t

Also good that you’re gonna talk to him afterschool

I believe in you!!!!

Xxxxx

New Message to: Sister
Harry is back from LA and picking me up after school so we can talk jsyk

New Message from: Sister
Okay muñeca call me if you need me to come get you and I want you home by 11!!! Love you xxx

****

@Arielalala: It started out with a kiss, how did it end up like this?

After my last class ended, Fenna dragged me into the loo. I found myself in the same position I’d been in months before, when Abe had just broken up with me, staring myself down in the mirror, knuckles white where they were wrapped around the sink, as Harry’s Range Rover pulled up. Fenna saw him through the little window in the girls’ room and all but shoved me out.

The ride to his house was tense, silent, and downright awkward. It was made even worse by the fact that I couldn’t even remember the last time I’d been awkward or tense with Harry. Harry had always been my constant, my safe place. He was the one person I never had to be awkward around and it really sucked that that was no longer the case.

I sat with my back rigid on the couch, hating every second of it while Harry moved into the kitchen.

“Can I make you a cuppa?” He called back to me.

“No!” I yelled back. “Jesus, H, no, I don’t want a cuppa. Fuck, you’ve never offered me tea when I walked in. I’m not a houseguest, I practically live here.”

“Fuck, I know,” he muttered, walking back into the living room empty handed, head hanging between his shoulders and curls falling into his eyes. “I just, fuck, I really don’t know what I’m supposed to do.”

He sat across from me on the couch, knees pulled up to his chest and long arms wrapped around them. Harry looked preposterous with his lanky frame curled in on himself like that, and the sight made my heart clench as he ducked his head and hid behind his hair.

“Hey,” I murmured, pushing a few curls out of his eyes and behind his ear. “Talk to me.”

“I don’t know where to start,” he admitted. I crossed my legs and moved so that our knees were touching.

“’S okay,” I promised. “I don’t really know, either. Just…start from the beginning, I guess. Like…What happened at the party? Like, what was running through your head?”

“I just,” he began, voice just above a whisper. “I was really shocked, I guess? When you kissed me. But, like, it’s not that I didn’t like it, because I did, obviously. But, I mean, you were drunk and I didn’t know if you would have wanted to kiss me if you were sober and I didn’t want to take advantage of you like that so I stopped. And then you got really mad and you wouldn’t talk to me, so I made sure you and Fen and everyone else got home safe and then I went to try and talk to you again but you were still mad, so I just…went home.”

Harry took a deep breath and blinked back the tears that were forming in his normally bright eyes. I pulled his hands off his knees and tangled my fingers with his. “I was…I was really upset, I, fuck, I cried. I cried because I’ve been in love with you since before I even knew what love is and I have no fucking idea how you feel about me and I didn’t know if you were just kissing me because you were drunk and I was there and I just-”

“Harry,” I interrupted, voice soft and fond. “H, I-”

“Don’t,” he begged, voice rough. “Please, just let me finish. I don’t know if I can get it all out if I stop. Please.” I nodded at him, eyes wide, and squeezed his hands once.

“It’s just…That day, that Cynthia and Gem dragged you to my mom’s house? When you walked in, it was like, you were the prettiest thing I had ever seen. And I know we were both so young but the more I got to know you, the more I believed that I could travel the world I would never find anyone quite as wonderful as you. And then, the band happened and now I have travelled the world and I’ve dated models and superstars and I’ve met girls all over but I’ve never found anyone that could measure up to you. I’ve been in love with you since I was fourteen years old and it’s only gotten stronger as the years went on. You’ve always been my best friend, you never let the band get in the way of us, you’ve always been my constant, no matter where in the world I was or how long I was away, you’re always here when I come home.”

He laughed softly, shaking his head. “You’re bloody brilliant and I really don’t want to lose you over a kiss. If you don’t feel the same about me, I get it, and it’s fine, but I don’t want to lose you as a friend.”

Harry nudged my knee with his, looking up at me sheepishly from under long lashes. “’S your turn to talk,” he whispered.

“Okay,” I whispered back. “Okay. I guess…I mean, I always thought everyone that said we were in love or thought we were together was crazy but then, I started to think that maybe they weren’t crazy. I mean, Abe was so sure I was in love with you that he broke up with me. And like, when I went to LA with you, it was like, such a big deal in my head that I was gonna share a bed with you, and I wouldn’t have even spared it a second thought if it had been Alex, or even Louis. And it was like, all of a sudden I realized that you weren’t a kid anymore, it was like I’d blinked and you’d gotten fit as fuck. And then, like, on Christmas Eve, we kissed and I really really really liked it and so on New Years Eve, I really wanted to kiss you at midnight, and like, I was drunk so I was more confident that I would’ve been if I’d been sober, but I wasn’t just kissing you because I was drunk. I’d wanted to do it for a while, I just needed an opportunity…”

I paused, staring at where Harry’s long fingers were intertwined with my smaller ones. I rubbed over his cross tattoo with my thumb. “I guess, what I’m trying to say is, I think I’m in love with you, too. And I think I have been for a long time. I dated Abe for four months and I was sad for, like, a day; but when you disappeared on me I was a miserable shit literally right up until you pulled up to the school. Like, everybody was taking care of me and distracting me, so I was pretty much fine, but it was always there in the back of my mind, you know? I could never really be fine because I didn’t know if you and I were fine. And I don’t ever want to experience that again. I never want to lose you, either.”

The last word was barely out of my mouth before Harry was cutting me off with his lips, hands releasing mine to rest on my hips. My hands tangled in his curls while he rubbed circles with his thumbs under my jumper. Harry was kissing me like he needed me to breathe and holy shit, it was so much better when we were both sober.

Harry pulled away after my lungs started burning from lack of oxygen, and rested his forehead against mine. Both of us were panting into each other mouths, soft smiles playing on our now swollen lips and dimples displayed proudly on both our faces.

“So, does this mean I can call you my girlfriend?”

Instead of answering, I just rolled my eyes and pulled him down to kiss me again. I felt him smile against my lips and I knew then, that everything was going be just fine.

****

@Arielalala: If you were a snowflake, impossibly I’d be the same shape as you.

@Harry_Styles: If you’re a snowflake, I’m a snowflake.

@Fenna96: @Harry_Styles you have no fucking chill I s2g

@Arielalala: @Fenna96 @Harry_Styles you both need to find your chill