Better for You

Avoiding Harry for the past week had been very easy, considering that he hadn't showed up at class once. I should have felt relieved that I didn't have to put up with him any more, but part of me missed him, I don’t know what it was about him that I missed but somehow something felt missing nonetheless. One thing that had surprised me was that in the past week Mike hadn’t spoken to me once. He’d told me last week that he was too busy to talk and that he’d call me when he had the time but he hadn’t picked up the phone to call me once and the feeling of being pushed to the side in his life was unsettling.

After hanging out with Andy, Abby and their group of friends, I had agreed to go the party tonight at the frat house. Although I knew that it was probably going to be a bad idea because I would probably run into Harry, for some reason the thought of running into Harry was mainly why I wanted to go.

I had changed into a pink fringe crop top, white ripped skinny jeans, a black biker jacket and my favourite pink ankle booties. I wasn't originally going to bother putting on make-up, but on the off chance that I might run into Harry, I decided to put some on to try and look as attractive as possible. I wasn't planning on doing anything with Harry, but I just wanted to prove what he the other week about me wrong and show him what he was missing out on.

I left my hair naturally curly and added some eye make-up. I put some subtle eye-shadow on, then some black liquid eyeliner. I did quite a few swipes of mascara to show off my long eyelashes, then put on some nude lipstick on my lips. After giving my outfit a once over in the large mirror on the wall I decided that I was ready to go to the party. While I waited for Abby to get ready I decided to post a selfie on Instagram, as I was pretty proud of my eye-makeup. Usually when I put eyeliner on it smudges and goes awfully wrong, however this time I actually managed to make a good straight line.

I did a closed mouth smile, and after a few takes I gave up, feeling too awkward taking one on my own. "Abby..." I began in a sweet high pitched voice.

"What do you want?" she asked, throwing me a look over her shoulder with raised eyebrows. By now Abby had realized that when I use that pitch of voice it mean that I want something, or I need help.

"Well, can I take a selfie with you?" I asked bluntly, and Abby grinned at me and nodded her head. I rolled my eyes at her and brought up the camera on Instagram.

"I knew that you were a selfie girl!" Abby laughed and I raised my eyebrows at her. I then turned to the camera and did an over-the-top pout. Abby laughed, then copied me and I took the shot, then took another photo of us both laughing our previous pout. I smiled as I looked at the second photo, both of us looking genuinely happy and carefree. I decided to post the photo of us laughing with the caption ‘I’m the funny one fyi @Abby_Wilson '

Abby laughed when she saw the picture on her account and I smiled at her cheekily before we went outside and began to walk to the frat house.

The frat house was only a 20 minute walk away, When we got around 60 feet from it I could hear the loud booming of music from the speakers and I was reminded of the type of people who go this party; not my normal crowd. I took a deep breath and reminded myself that I'd be hanging around Abby and Andy and Niall and so I'd be fine. Niall had to be one of the cheeriest person I'd ever met! Louis was really funny, him and Niall together was probably the most entertaining thing in existence! Liam was slightly more reserved than Niall and Louis, but was still really sweet and funny. I was glad that I was friends with this group as they were really sweet and genuinely nice.

As soon as I walked into the party I was hit by the stench of weed and sweaty bodies. I rolled my eyes at the smell of the illegal substance and followed Abby to the rest of the group. They all smiled when they saw us coming, and we all began chatting about what had already happened. Louis was really drunk and so was giggling at every story that was told.

"Where is the toilet?" I whispered to Abby while Louis was slurring some story about how he cracked his head open skateboarding when he was eight although everyone knew that he was bullshitting.

"Upstairs on the first or second door on the left; I can't remember which." Abby told me and I thanked her and went up the stairs looking towards the left and noticing the first door quite a while down the long hallway. I open it and my mouth flew wide open as I saw Harry and some random girl, who wasn't Lucy, having a full on makeout session. A small squeal escaped my mouth before I could stop it and I turned to leave as I heard Harry groan.

"What's your problem?" He asked in a low, harsh voice. I turned to face him and the realization hit him that it's me and his face expression changes slightly, to a less angry one. "Oh, Izzy, what do you want?" He asked, in a still sharp tone, but it didn't sound as venomous as the last time.

"Uhm, nothing I was just looking for the toilets and I came in here and then saw you two and um, I'll be on my way now." I rambled, eventually trailing off at the end. Harry rolled his eyes at me and then went back to kissing the girl. I nodded my head, even though he couldn't see it, and left the room. I went into the bathroom and noticed sick covering the toilet, making me want to add to it and throw up as I left the room, deciding that I'd have to find another toilet.

I walked further down the hallway and opened more doors, that mainly opened to reveal more drunken teenagers snogging each other's faces off. I sighed, not finding another toilet as I made it to the final room, praying that it was a bathroom. As I opened the door, and I was surprised to find a bedroom that was surprisingly tidy. It had a long ebony bookshelf, filled with books that were practically begging for me to read them. "Do not go in there." A deep voice spoke from behind me, and I had heard it enough times to recognize it. Harry.

I turned around on my heel to find him standing directly behind me. "Why not?" I asked, in a confident tone.

"Because that's my room and I don't want you to go in there." Harry answered bitterly and I rolled my eyes at him. This was his room? He was studying law and yet enjoyed reading in his free time - no way could this be Harry.

"Fine, whatever." I muttered, brushing past him, purposely shoving his shoulder with mine as I did so, ignoring the rapid increase of my heart rate as a result of our close proximity.

"What happened to the sassy Izzy?" Harry called from behind me and I turned around to face him, to find him staring at me deep in thought.

"Nothing, she's just not wasting her time on jerks." I answered. Harry narrowed his eyes at me in concentration. I rolled my eyes at his oddly serious behaviour and turned to walk away when Harry huffed and began walking up to me.

"Look, can we just start over?" He asked, stopping as he stood, or more honestly towered, right in front of me and I narrowed my eyes at him. Why did he want to start over? Why was he even wasting his time with me - he didn’t seem to be the type who went out of their way to make friendships.

"Apologize." I instructed and he furrowed his eyebrows at me in confusion.

"For what?" He asked and I rolled my eyes at him.

"For being an arse a week ago." I replied and Harry huffed and this time he was the one to roll his eyes at me.

"Fine. I'm sorry for being a dick to you a week ago. There, now can we start over?" Harry asked and I smiled at him, pleased that he'd apologized and nodded my head, when I heard Gas Pedal begin blaring through the speakers. A smile crept onto my face.

"Gotta go!" I told him and hurried down the stairs to find Abby who was giving me the same smile. "Slow down, grab the wall" I began singing as I led Abby to where everyone was dancing.

Abby and I began doing stupid, weird dance moves that somehow fit with the lyrics as we rapped them. "Hella thick I wanna smash ‘em all!" I sang to Abby laughing. Anyone watching us must have thought that we were crazy, well we are to be honest, but still. "Gas pedal, gas pedal" I sang, doing stupid facial expressions as the song ended and Abby and I burst into laughter.

"Whoa, where did the inner gangster come from Izzy?" Niall laughed as I sat down. I gave him a smug smirk, and playfully straightened the collar to my jacket as the group started laughing again.

"Please, you can hear it in her chavvy British accent!" Andy joked, imitating my voice with a crappy British accent, which I playfully rolled my eyes at.

Then a drunk brunette with messy hair and dark brown eyes came stumbling over to our group. He stank of marijuana which I wrinkled my nose at. "So, you're Izzy huh?" He slurred and my eyes flickered around the room urgently, trying to find an excuse to leave and get away from the man.

"Uhm." I began, not knowing how I should answer him. How did he even know my name? I doubt that he's the type of guy that Abby would hang around with.

"I'll take that as a yes, my name's Luke." He introduced, holding his hand out to me, and I stared at it nervously. Who knows what types of germs are on his hand, I thought as I stared at his hand, refusing to shake it.

"Luke, what are you doing over there?" Harry groaned, coming over and placing Luke's arm around his neck and looked at me. "Sorry bout him, he can be a bit of a pain at times." He told me and I shrugged my shoulders at him.

"S'alright." I replied, watching him as he walked away. I took my phone out for the first time since the party had began and noticed that I had plenty of Instagram notifications, but still no call or text from Mike. I checked the time, and it was 1 o'clock and so I mentally decided that it was time to go home. "Um, Abby. I think that I might leave now." I told her and she nodded her head at me, while I prayed that she wanted to go back too. I did not want to walk back home at 1 o'clock in the morning alone.

"Ok, I should probably get going to; I'll see you guys around." She called to the group as they all waved goodbye. I smiled and waved at them too, then turned and began walking out. The air outside was cool, making me clutch my jacket close to my side to keep in some heat.

"Look at who it is! The Virgin Mary!" Lacy called, walking over to me. I internally cringed at her appearance. She was wearing a very low cut top, and then a skirt, if you can even call it that, with high heels. I looked up at her and her make-up was smeared half the way down her face making me smirk.

"What a new and original insult, I’d give it a C+" I quipped, wiping her smirk off of her face as she narrowed her eyes at me.

"Whatever, how are you and Harry doing? I heard that you had an argument with him a week ago. Yeah, he came over to me afterwards laughing about how you had said all of this deep shit as though he actually cared about you! I do have to say, he really nailed your whiny, snobby British accent!" Lucy teased, cocking her head to the side, while grinning at me evilly.

Harry humiliated me again? I sighed, shaking my head again and storming back into the frat house with a hard expression on my face as I searched for the green eyed jerk. How could he be such a ass to me and then be all nice to me? I'm tired of him messing with my emotions, and now I'm going rant at him until I've let everything out, then storm out, I told myself. I had thoroughly searched the entirety of the downstairs when I realized that he's probably in his room.

I went up the stairs, taking them two-by-two, then rushed down the hallway, towards Harry's room. When I got there I raised my hand to knock on the door, then thought of a better way to make an appearance and opened the door aggressively to reveal Harry lying on his bed, writing some notes on a page. He glared up at me, with murderous eyes that matched mine. "What the fuck are you doing in my room? I told you not to come in here!" He yelled pushing his notes onto his bedside table and standing up, but I ignored him and walked over to him.

I could feel my anger radiating off of me as I came closer and closer to him. "What the hell is your problem with me? Why the hell do you stab me in the back every single time that I think that we're getting somewhere?" I yelled, gesturing my hands wildly to show my anger and frustration.

"What are you talking about?" He asked in a raised voice. I glared at him and balled my hands into fists at my sides, trying to stop myself lashing out and doing something stupid.

"After our fight last week you run and bitch to Lucy about it, laughing about me? You mess with my head 24/7! Just stop! Stop pretending that you actually give a damn about us being friends; because you don't! You just don't." I told him, my voice calming down, and I could feel my anger rolling off of me and being replaced by hurt.

"Yeah, because you know fuck all about me?" Harry asked, laughing bitterly, while I just narrowed my eyes at him.

"I know that something bad has happened to you, something bad enough for you to push away any type of relationship with anyone." I blurted, not even thinking about it; but when I did think about it, it did make sense. "That's why you drink so much! You're not being yourself, simply running away from who you are!” I rambled, it all made sense and as I looked at Harry he looked slightly vulnerable. “What happened that made you turn into such an ass?" I asked him curiously, my anger had disappeared without a trace.

Harry's eyes noticeably darkened and he glared at me. "Get, the fuck out of my room!" He growled at me slowly, taking my by surprise. The evil glint in his eyes bought all of the anger towards him flooding back to me.

"You know, you can't keep skipping lessons forever. Eventually you're going to have to man up Styles!" I spat at him, and he walked closer to me, and I could almost see the anger steaming from his body,

"Oh and I bet you were crying your eyes out over that weren't you huh? Did you mention it to your boring boyfriend huh, did you tell him how devastated you are that for the first time things aren’t going how you want them?" He spoke evilly, laughing humorlessly.

“Shut up Harry, you know nothing about me and my life so don’t assume you do.” I yelled at him. How dare he mock me and assume that my life has been a simple, pleasant experience; he could not be further from the truth.

“Oh really, let me guess; you grew up with your married parents in a house with a white picket fence and a big garden and you never had to want for everything; how am I doing?” Harry asked with a malicious glint in his eyes.

“Fuck you Harry” I spat at him, his accusations cutting deeper than they should. Truth is that what he just described was what everything assumed about my family life but I grew up in a doll house and no-one saw it coming but one day it all got smashed to pieces and although people act like nothing happened, everything was still broken.

“You’re just angry because I’m right” Harry argued back with a triumphant smile on his cocky face and I wanted to punch his face so bad.

“No, I’m angry because I wish that you were” I replied, my voice low and quiet as it almost broke. Harry’s expression turned serious and I even detected what he probably wanted me to think was concern when in reality it was humour or something. He opened his mouth to say something which would probably rip me open but I interrupted. “Don’t, I can’t and you just.” I began, not knowing how to phrase what I needed to say, “just stay away from me.”

I replied before walking out of his room and slamming the door behind me in anger, frustration and hurt. I rushed down the stairs and saw Abby waiting for me patiently by the door. As I made my way over to her she sent me an apologetic smile which I returned with a sigh as she led me away from the stupid frat house. I regretted coming here. As we walked back to the dorm, Abby trying to cheer me up by telling me a story about how Louis and Zayn had a verbal confrontation which exposed Zayn for being a dick. I chuckled lightly, at her attempts to lighten the mood, which I was very grateful for. But no matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t stop thinking about what must have happened to make Harry the way he is.