red herring [h.s.]

44.

TW: mentions of a death by suicide

Stella.

I wasn't sure how long Harry and I sat down in the grass for. The sun was high up in the sky by the time I gathered my breath and felt my dry cheeks, the tears no longer running.

He was in front of me, still holding my hands. His grasp turned softer over the time as he was now just gently playing with my fingers and my eyes were locked on the movement of his digits against mine. He was soft as he brushed the pad of his thumb over the length of my ring finger, mindlessly tapping over the spot where I used to wear my engagement ring years ago.

It had been silent for a long time now.

After Harry confessed that he slept with other people when we were already dating, it brought a fresh layer of pain to me. I didn't know why I had such a strong reaction to those words, it wasn't worse than whatever I had already found out about him in the past few weeks. It hurt to know that I was throwing myself a hundred percent head first into this relationship with him while he went behind my back and was unfaithful.

While I was all giddy and talking him up to my friends, a smile on my face when I walked home after receiving a text from him. There had been butterflies on my part from the moment we met, and it was insane how attached I got to him since that first time we kissed. That kiss stayed with me for so long that I contemplated writing a column about it. It completely fried my nerve endings.

And Harry was in someone else's bed that same night. Someone who we had been hanging out with, someone I had sent him in a taxi with knowing they both lived in the same neighbourhood.

So naïve.

It just kind of felt like the cherry on top of things that had been going wrong. For a moment today I thought maybe I could possibly forgive him. I saw in him what I always saw in him, and it was stupid to deny that I felt anything but love. It was stupid to even try and deny my feelings. So when we were sitting on this bench and he held my hand, and he repeated that he loved me over and over again with so much sincerity in his eyes, I felt myself falling in love all over again.

So this just felt like another kick while already being down, just crawled back up to my knees. I didn't know how much longer I could do this for. I was sure Harry had many more skeletons in his closet that I was unaware of and that would pain me. I wondered how many more secrets I had to uncover.

It was as if he suddenly noticed that I stopped crying. I didn't have to lift my head to know that he was looking at me. I could feel it, physically. His gaze was so heavy and powerful. It always was. Most times it made me feel sexy and desired, now it made me feel small. Like it had done when I first met him and he intimidated me so much. Knowing he wasn't attracted to me at all that first night, hurt a different way. My ego was pained from that, my self-confidence shrunk a little. The guy who tried so hard and pulled out all the stops, wasn't even that into me.

Great.

"Stella." Harry murmured. I sniffed once and flicked my dry eyes up to him. He was close to me, our foreheads just a few inches apart. Somehow it didn't bother me that much at this moment, his knees bumping into mine as we sat cross-legged on the grass and my hands in his warm ones. For once, the idea of Harry touching me even as innocently as this, didn't make me want to shudder and vomit. I wondered how long it would last.

Harry licked his lips, "I need you to understand that there's no one else I want. I... I did those things with other girls before I got to know who you really were. I was still trying to keep my distance back then, was trying to convince myself that I wasn't falling for you. I swear that ever since the moment we became intimate, I haven't touched another woman. I never want to ever again. You're the only one I want, the only one that drives me crazy, the only one I dream about." He spilled in a mumble, softly squeezing my hands, "You're the only one I can fantasize about. It's more than sex with us, and you know it too. There... There will never be anyone like you, I never want anyone else. I'll always be yours, you have all of me."