Quarter-Life

"And she still agreed to go?" Zayn's voice rings through the living room as Niall eats breakfast on the couch. His laptop is on the coffee table in front of him and Zayn's face is magnified on the screen. 

"Can you believe it?" Niall says as he spoons cereal into his mouth.

"Typical," Zayn adjusts his glasses with a chuckle. "Maybe she's one of those birds who like to fight as foreplay."

"That's what I was thinking, but D says it's definitely the brogue and the hair."

"There's no way she’s going to let that slide because he's got a cute accent and a greaseball on his head."

Harry is standing against the door to the balcony with Rhiannon on his shoulder, feeding her blueberries from the bowl in his hand and listening to Niall recount Friday night’s disaster. They’re supposed to be getting ready for a free movie night at the park with Daisy and Anna, but because Zayn rarely has the time for a face-to-face chat anymore (he’s a third-year medical student), Niall’s put his shower off for a little while.

“I'm thinking if he gets a couple of shots in him, he'll be fine,” Niall reasons before drinking the milk out of his bowl. “He's just a little sad now, but he's wicked cool when he's shitfaced."

"He's the coolest guy in the room when he's shitfaced!" Zayn’s tone makes Harry rolls his eyes. He sounds too keen on Niall’s idea.

"So, we agree; he should get shitfaced."

"I'm right here, and I will not get shitfaced," Harry deadpans. He’s eager to show Anna that he’s not a moody asshole, and Romeo + Juliet doesn’t seem like a good movie to watch while drunk.

He thought Niall would stay cross with him after his stunt at Birdy’s on Friday, and it appeared to be that way because he didn’t make a single snarky, elitist comment about Harry’s decision to watch Lifetime movies all day yesterday as he worked on his lesson plan.

As it turns out, however, he was just having trouble coming up with a pity-based plan to force Harry into Anna’s good graces. A movie at the park seemed like the perfect thing; it isn't four blocks from the flat like Birdy’s, so Harry can't leave easily, and he knows watching movies at the park is one of Harry’s favorite things to do. If it were earlier in the day and he could bring Rhiannon with him, it would be the perfect Sunday activity.

"What about tipsy?" Zayn asks.

"He should do something because so far, he’s an arse when he's sober."

"Can you believe these pricks, Rhi? They talk about me like I’m not even here." Harry turns to kiss the cat on his shoulder and lets her nuzzle the top of his damp head as he finishes the last of the blueberries.

“Wait, has he even agreed to go?”

“I have,” Harry answers before making his way into the flat’s impossibly small kitchen behind Niall, taking the laptop and handing his empty bowl to Niall so he can wash it.

“Maybe he’s not so off, then,” Zayn says. “Shit.”

He watches Zayn scramble on his end for a moment and he smiles to himself, slightly content that something’s gone wrong. His lunch break is only twenty-five minutes long this evening, yet he’s spent the whole time gossiping with Niall and neglecting his meal, so he quickly says his goodbyes and wishes Harry luck before Niall heads off to shower.

Harry decides to go out on the balcony for a cigarette, and he takes his time with it as he's already dressed in his black 'dates only' jeans and a Rolling Stones t-shirt, playing with Rhiannon's ears and scrolling through his email inbox while he sits on the floor. 

"He's the coolest guy in the room when he's shitfaced!" Harry says to himself aloud in a mocking tone and takes a drag of his cigarette. "Douche." 

When Rhiannon climbs on to his lap, and effectively covers it with her hair, Harry tosses the filter out to scoop her up and go inside. She paws at his face from his cradled arms, and he releases her onto the carpet to prevent any further hair from sticking to his clothes.

He's guessing that she doesn't want to be inside, which makes sense because she was a stray before Harry found her on his way home from the bar two years ago. Rhiannon was too chunky and angelic to be a street cat, so he brought her home immediately and she's been by his side (or strewn atop him) ever since. 

Harry realizes he's still barefoot when he steps on some milk Niall had apparently spilled. After he re-enters the kitchen to wash his hands and wipe his foot off, he catches a glimpse of an oblong brown thing behind their coffeemaker. It's a bottle of whiskey with a wrinkled note stuck to it over a very hard piece of gum that reads "IN CASE OF EMERGENCY".

He wonders if this is Niall's idea of home invasion protection or if he's just worried about last-minute guests. Either is plausible, he thinks as he pads into his bedroom, which is most likely two square feet bigger than the kitchen and lit up only by a wooden lamp Mr. Frank let him take when he moved out.

Yesterday was a good day, and he was starting to feel okay after taking time to re-charge with an uninterrupted string of bad movies about eating disorders and stolen newborns— until Niall told him about today’s set up. He still feels terrible about going off on Anna. 

He's on his bed and staring at the boots on his feet, feeling a pang of discomfort at the thought of his behavior on Friday and hoping things go well with her tonight. He thinks she's very good-looking and nice to talk to when she isn't upset at him, and he’ll feel terrible if she spends the rest of her life hating him (with reason) for a little bout of anxiety. 

Rhiannon meows lazily and snaps him out of his trance.

"What are you doing there?" The crease in his forehead deepens as he watches Rhiannon stretch across a shirt he's apparently forgotten to throw in the wash. His eyes widen when he notices the dark spot on it, and he immediately knows that she's just peed all over the same shirt that had survived Friday's coffee spill. 

"Rhiannon," Harry groans. So much for his favorite shirt.

"Hello, little one," Niall says in a small voice as the brown cat curls around his feet. He's already showered and dressed. "What's she doing?"

"She pissed all over my shirt," Harry whines from the floor. He's plugging his nose with one hand and holding the button-up with the other, and he stands to give Niall a better look. "I don't have time to wash it."

"D'you think that detergent thing will work on it?"

"Good idea," Harry says, sprinting into the living room to fish it out of his briefcase.

He lays the shirt on the coffee table (not without protest from Niall) and basically pummels the pen into the fabric. It's refusing to clear up after a few minutes under the detergent and a few more in the kitchen sink, during which Harry tries to convince Niall that Rhiannon is upset because he bailed on her on Friday.

"Just throw it away, man."

"This is my favorite shirt, Niall."

"It's gonna smell like cat piss forever. Remember when she did it all over my jumper after I forgot to wish her a happy Thanksgiving?" Niall asks through a laugh and walks over to grab the shirt and throw it into the kitchen bin.

"You're right," Harry sighs as he stalks off to the couch where Rhiannon is laying. He buries his face in the fur on her back and mumbles an apology. "I'm a bad daddy."

"You're going to be a single daddy if you don't get up. Daisy says they'll be there in thirty," Niall says. They’re late, per usual.

He grabs his house keys and their designated park blanket, and Harry follows him out the door just as he grabs his wallet from the table by the door and blows Rhiannon a kiss. 



After Harry re-introduces himself to Anna when the four meet up by the popcorn vendor, she tells him that all will be officially forgiven if he shares a bottle of wine with her. He tries to tell her that he doesn't want to drink, but the promise of forgiveness and her pretty blue eyes convince him. 

He prefers wine over beer, anyway. Maybe his anxiety likes wine, too, and that's why it's behaving as they chat.

"I don't know why we couldn't get popcorn," Anna leans over and whispers in Harry's ear. The two are at the front edge of the blanket, currently resting on their elbows in front of Daisy and Niall. He politely reminds her that her own best friend is a vegan, meaning they couldn't get popcorn from the cart because of the butter, and she clicks her tongue.

"They've been sucking face for, like, ten minutes. I doubt she'll even notice if there're any animal by-products nearby," she whines, and Harry nearly chokes on the wine he's just sipped when he turns around to see Niall and Daisy lovingly making out behind them.

"This isn't even a romantic movie," Harry laughs softly when he turns to face the projection.

"What do you mean? It totally is," Anna's whisper is louder this time and her eyebrows wrinkle together. "It's one of the greatest love stories in existence."

"Romeo and Juliet?"

"Yes," she says matter-of-factly. "It's a classic."

"A classic satire, maybe. It's certainly not a romance," Harry whispers back, keeping his eyes glued to the movie. His chest grows cold from within.

"Are you telling me that my entire undergrad focus on Shakespeare was for nothing?" Anna asks, and when Harry turns to raise an eyebrow, she winks. "I'm only kidding."

"I almost left again," he chuckles and runs his free hand through his loose hair. He's relieved because he doesn't know if he can withstand hanging out with someone, even if they're gorgeous, who has a painfully basic worldview.

"To buy me popcorn?" Anna says with a full mouth, batting her impossibly straight eyelashes. 

"I reckon it would be rude if we-" Harry's interrupted by Anna, who points to his left. He turns to see two teenage girls holding their cell phones, waiting for him to notice them, and their faces lighting up when he finally makes eye contact.

"Hi, Mr. Styles," a tall girl with blonde braids giggles lightly. He recognizes her and the shorter, brunette girl beside her from his first period class.

"Vanessa, Madison," he smiles at them and raises his wine glass, which is probably the worst thing to do when running into students outside of school. "How are you?"

"Um," Vanessa, the blonde girl, plays with the end of a braid, "good, I'm good. What are you doing here?"

The brunette girl swats at her friend's shoulder and turns to Harry with a smile. "We just wanted to know if you were still collecting the homework tomorrow."

He gives Anna an apologetic look because although they're not on a date, despite their friends' painfully obvious motives, he feels bad about the girls' intrusion on their attempt to get to know each other. You know, for their friends’ (and his sex life’s) sake.

"Tomorrow's Monday, so… Yes," he laughs. He props himself up to sit when he sees that their eyes won't stop flickering between Anna and himself. "Why? Do you need extra time?"

"No, no, we just wanted to make sur-"

"Is that Mr. Horan?" Vanessa hisses and interrupts Madison's obvious lie; Harry typically has students ask him about homework when they run into him in public, "just wanting to make sure", but really wanting to flirt. 

Harry whips his head back to see Niall whispering something in Daisy's ear amid soft kisses. He notices that Anna does too before covering her mouth to muffle her laughter, and he looks back to the bug-eyed girls.

"I won't tell him about this if you don't," he says and throws in a wink. The girls won't stop gawking at both the scene behind Harry and Anna beside him, though they sigh and laugh at Harry's gesture, and head back to their own blanket somewhere in the crowd. 

"That was cute," Anna chuckles. 

"It would've been cuter if Niall hadn't been snogging the life out of D," he takes another sip of his wine and curls his arms around his knees. Maybe drinking isn't the worst thing to do in front of students, he thinks, but that's because openly making out with someone in front of them dethrones it.

"They totally have crushes on you,” she laughs quietly, though she frowns when she begins to chew on another piece of celery covered in Daisy's homemade hummus. His chest grows colder as he listens to her softly munching and he suddenly wants to smoke.

"Are you feeling threatened by tenth grade girls?" Anna throws a piece of celery at him, soft laughter bubbling up through her lips despite her look of disgust.

"I'm way cuter," she argues with a playful smile on her giant lips. 

"You are, in an adult librarian way."

"I'm not a librarian!" They laugh again, loud enough for the skinny kid in front of them to ask them to shut up. "I told you, I work at a bookstore," her voice returns to a whisper. 

"There's a difference?" He asks, and he bites into the celery stalk she chucked at his knees; his palms have started to sweat though his mind is free of any nerves. 

Anna threatens to throw another piece, but it flies out of her hand and hits Daisy's hip before she can launch it at Harry. The two hold their breath and exchange a long look while they wait for Daisy to say something, but that never comes. 

"Told you she wouldn't notice anything," Anna sings and gestures to her best friend. "We should definitely get popcorn."

Harry can't help but jokingly roll his eyes, and he offers to buy her a bag because he wants to make her happy (and would love a cigarette to occupy his clammy hands).

He's smoking one as he leans against the tree next to the popcorn cart, pinching the filter with the same hand he's using to feed himself popcorn from the bag in his other hand. He should've returned to the blanket about five minutes ago, but the aquarium scene where Leonardo DiCaprio and Claire Danes first meet is one of his favorites, so he's stopped to make sure he sees every second of it. 

He doesn't find the story to be a romantic one, but goddamn it, he's a proud sucker for 'love at first sight' moments.

He lets his hand drop after another long drag, and he's taking his time with this cigarette because he's hoping it suppresses the growing hole in his sternum. Instead of cement, however, he feels his knuckles dampen. 

He looks down to check if his palm sweat has spread to the back of his hand when he sees a gray dog furiously sniffing at his hand. When it jumps up on him, it paws at both the popcorn bag and the dwindling cigarette, and both spill to the grass. Harry’s stomach drops when he sees the dog’s nose touch the end of the burning paper.

“Marcel!"

"No, no, no, no," He hurriedly stammers when he feels the settling burn of the cherry just as the dog does; it whines and it paws at its own face.

"Marcel!" A woman in a brown jumper with long, black hair runs toward Harry, who has gotten on his knees to try and check out the dog's nose. Pissing Anna off by showing up empty-handed is better than starting his week off by disfiguring an innocent dog. "I'm so sor-"

"No, it's my fault. I shouldn't have been holding my cigarette like that," he says as he inspects Marcel's nose. It's fine, and he nearly falls backward when the dog begins to lick his face.

"Wait— did you burn him?" The sour tone of her voice is enough for Harry to scoff as she drops to her knees and tugs on Marcel's black collar.

"No! What kind of vile person do I look like?" He picks up the popcorn bag and dusts the dirt off his knees before seeing that the woman is digging her white trousers into dirt and unnecessarily buttered popcorn bits in order to click the chain back on to the dog’s collar.

"Let me help you," Harry sighs and extends a hand to her because it would be rude (and awkward) to leave her there. When she looks up and her almost-black eyes meet his, her expression softens.

"You're the British guy I bumped into at Greene East," she states when she places her warm hand in Harry’s damp one. Her other hand is still wrapped around Marcel's leash and she takes a moment to clear the mess on her knees while Harry studies her face. Previously unnoticed dimples pierce into her cheeks as her lips curl into a smirk, and a sigh blows through them.

It clicks in his mind: she's the one who dirtied the shirt Rhiannon peed on earlier. He then realizes that he's carrying the same detergent pen she gave him in his pocket, having shoved it in there in his desperation to clean the dress shirt.

Instead of confirming what she's said, he digs his hands into his pocket and pulls out the orange pen.

"I told you to keep it," she laughs.

"Well, your trousers are dirty because of me. It’s only fair that I return the favor, yeah?"

Harry reckons his pores are dripping with mortification this time around, even if there aren't any teenagers ogling like before. The hole burying itself in his chest feels like it's pushing down into his stomach and before his mouth can even water, he's pulling another cigarette out of the box in his pocket and twirling it between his fingers.

"I guess white pants need a little character sometimes, too,” she repeats what he’d said about the dress shirt Friday morning in the hallway. Laughter comes out through his nose, and he palms at his face lightly with his free hand, peeking at her through his sticky fingers before nodding.

“Sometimes.”

“It’s really Marcel’s fault. He ran after a squirrel before I could put his leash on,” she smiles, looking down to rub the calmer dog’s head.

“Oh,” speaking of Marcel, he thinks, “that doesn’t work on pee, by the way.”

The woman giggles again with a curious look on her face. “How do you know?”

“My cat peed on my shirt— the same shirt you blessed with your presence, actually— and I had to throw it out.”

“Lucky for me, Marcel doesn’t really, like, pee on anything. I’ll keep it in mind, though,” she pockets her pen and tugs on the dog’s leash as he lights up a second cigarette. “I’ll see you around.”

Harry waves back and watches her walk off with the gray dog before turning to buy another stupidly expensive bag of popcorn for Anna.

She’s cranky when he returns, but not as cranky as Daisy when she finally notices that Anna has eaten all the celery sticks she brought. She spends the rest of the movie grumbling about it while Harry spends it with his arm around a grateful Anna. He lets her finish the whole bag alone because he omits the detail about eating much of the first bag and dropping the rest, and says he doesn't want any.

When he goes to bed at night, he resolves to drink more wine.