red herring [h.s.]

52.

TW: mentions of death, blood, illness and death by suicide

Harry.

"All good?" Mike asked. I stood in the doorway of the bedroom where Stella and I had slept for the past month. The bed was neatly made, the sheets smelling fresh. The closets were empty, the desk void of her laptop, the pillows gone from the floor.

We spent the past few hours running around to get everything as it looked before we arrived.

I slowly nodded and picked up the final bag, "Yeah, I checked everything."

"Okay, our room's good too. The car is loaded." Mike answered. I sighed out and nodded, following him down the stairs as my eyes darted over the interior of the now empty house. It was strange to think we had spent a month here, the four of us.

"Did you count the guns? We didn't leave any?" I asked while closing the front door behind me. Mike had his hands stuffed in his pockets while shaking his head, "Nope, all there."

This house had seen more emotion than mine ever would. The couch where Stella had cried, slept, drank the vodka and where we had fucked this morning. The kitchen table where we had argued, laughed together, stolen touches underneath the surface. It's also where she tried to sit as far away from me as possible for a long time.

I rubbed my palm over my face, fatigue taking over. These past few days had been exhausting. Honestly, this entire month had been exhausting.

Dominic and Mike were a little vague on the details of the call they had with Matt. Basically, when Stella and I were out on our walk, he called the burner phone to let us know they had caught Stella. Just mere hours after the Brooklyn Post was printed and distributed, she took the bait and headed to the hotel that Stella described in her column. Across the bubblegum pink building in the Bronx.

She walked right up to the room, not even having that many men with her, and was surprised to find Matt in there. It was an easy seize. We were good to go.

It almost felt too easy, but I shrugged it off and joined Stella in the backseat of the car. She nervously fumbled with her fingers, sneaking one last glance at the house. I think she was both happy and sad to leave. The future was kind of scary for us right now.

All the secrets were out in the open though, which felt like a huge weight lifted off my shoulders. Stella didn't cry or curse at me when I explained my job to her, she simply observed and took it all in. I knew it was a lot yet she reacted better than I could've imagined. Right now, we just had to deal with this and hopefully once everything died down a little, we could just go back to being us. That was the best case scenario.

We had been good these past few days, we had felt like us again. Like Harry and Stella. I was her Harry and she was my Stella. We were us. But us was fragile right now, simply patched together with needle and thread but about ready to burst and drop into pieces. Not much had to go wrong for everything to fall apart again, we both knew it. We both were patient with one another for that exact same reason, but it did show that we both wanted this to work just as much as the other person.

It was barely past noon when we started the drive, the trunk filled to the brim with all our stuff. Stella was in her leggings and the hoodie, wearing the same sneakers as she had on during our walk. I had just changed into jeans but wore my same clothes as well.

Dominic was behind the wheel, driving us out of the Catskills and back into the city. It felt strange not having been there for a month. I hadn't gone that long without New York in almost ten years, ever since arriving. I had missed my friends tremendously, also never having gone that long without hearing from them or seeing them. I could only hope none of them got injured too badly while trying to bring in Kristina. Apparently Matt didn't elaborate on any of that and just asked us to get home as soon as possible.