why he left

2. Angel With A Shotgun

Harry Styles was scared of many things.

Like spiders and snakes and the future but never once had he thought that he'd be scared of an iPod. It wasn't a very rational fear either.

The way his mind was twisting possible tsunamis that the iPod could cause almost made the iPod sound humane.

How could a little metal object inflict so much damage? Well he was about to find out.

For the past week he'd been trying to summon the courage to just, get it over with.

But everytime he'd tried, he'd gotten as far as he had gone with the boys. He could totally picture Louis calling him "a fucking wuss" and laughing at him with Niall.

"Harry! I'm going out tell mum- what's wrong?" Gemma asked, concerned.

"Is not knowing why something happened going to haunt me?" Harry asked suddenly.

"What?"

"Not knowing. Would it kill me?"

"Yes it would. You'd regret it. Me? Not so much. But where is this coming from?"

"Zayn." Gemma nodded, remembering Harry's frantic phone call the night he found out about him.

"I think you should talk to him. Like have a sit down and talk. About everything." Gemma told him, nodding at his phone.

Harry merely smiled in response. He waited until he heard the front door shut downstairs to press play.

"Harry, before you start panicking, you're not to be blamed. Sorry if I freaked you out." Harry rolled his eyes at that.

Too late for that.

"When I first met you, I thought you were gonna be quite the ladies man. I wasn't wrong mate." Harry stared intensely at the iPod, wondering where this was headed.

"Harry do you remember Rebecca? Remember when I dated her? You guys made fun of me, because she was older."

"Plug in the usb, the first map shows where I took her on our first date."

Harry quickly scrambled around to pull out his laptop and rammed the usb into the plughole. He quickly scrolled through the contents in the folder and found the map.

There was a little star on a small café a few blocks away from his house. Harry squeezed his eyes shut and tried to remember the night they helped Zayn sneak out of his house to go on the date. Harry unpaused the audio.

"Go there. Or don't. But I promise the whole experience is better if you do. Just saying."

Harry sighed, throwing a clean shirt over his head. He pictured Zayn smirking, knowing he'd gotten his way.

The roads were empty for the most part which was odd as it usually was full at the time. Harry slowly parked his car and put on his sunglasses and silently prayed that he won't be recognized. Who was he kidding.

Thankfully the cafe was was empty there was only one man who had his head burried in a newspaper. Harry quietly slipped into a booth, with earphones on and pulled his cap tighter and clicked play.

"It was pretty awkward that date. I arrived early and ordered a milkshake. And then I realized how childish it made me look and had a coffee instead. It wasn't the best idea I was hyped all evening." Harry smiled, remembering that day.

Zayn came back and initiated a pillow fight straight off which got him to finally properly get along with Louis.

"And you know what she'd ordered when she came in? A milkshake! It was the funniest thing. She told me you could never outgrow a milkshake."

"I laughed and told her I ordered one before but I wanted to impress her. Then she told me to never bow down to someone else's wishes over yours and not even to her."

Harry stared, dumbfounded.

Zayn had thrown that advice around to all of them plenty of times. It worked everytime but he had no idea that was where ot came into play.

"Those words haunted me everyday. Even now. It's haunting me right now. I need it to stop. I can't-"

"-I can't make it stop any other way. When I broke up with her, I used her own advice against her."

"Are you alright?" Harry's head shot up at the voice, frantically looking around for the source.

An old lady was staring at Harry curiously.

"Are you alright?" She repeated. Harry immediately pulled his ear buds out.

"I'm fine thank you." He answered politely, hoping she'd leave him alone.

"Would you like something to eat?"

"A milkshake please and thank you." She nodded at him before walking back to the kitchen. Harry sank into his seat and took some deep breaths.

Nothing he can say can make it worse, he told himself mentally. After collecting himself he rewinded.

"She told me I did the right thing, that I should never compromise my happiness. And now here I am heeding it again."

"I need this to stop, I need to get out. This was the only way I could get out-"

"Here you go." Harry jumped out of his seat and nearly knocked into the waitress.

"I'm so sorry, you startled me." He told he earnestly. She didn't reply.

"I've finally remembered you." She answered. Harry cringed mentally hoping she didn't have a twitter.

You'd be surprised about who's on there nowadays.

"You're that boy from that band. My granddaughter loves you!"

There it is, thought Harry.

"Would you mind signing this sheet for her? Her name's Jamie." She exclaimed pushing the back of an old notepad towards him.

Harry could only nod and oblige even though he could feel the warmth of happiness at mentions of his fans he was impatient to get back to what Zayn had to say.

Gemma was right not knowing would kill him. Even when Harry was little this was a problem for him. He single handedly managed to ruin Santa Claus and the Tooth Fairy for himself by the habit.

Once the old lady had moved away Harry quickly left the café, milkshake in tow knowing he only had moments before the lady would call her granddaughter. He quickly parked by his mum's house.

There was no one home yet.

He quickly pressed unpause.

"There's not just one or two days to this decision it's a build up from everything I'm telling you and I will go on to tell you."

Harry didn't understand why Zayn would leave this for him.

"When you dated Caroline we made fun of you more. But you were happy and then you broke up because management told you to. They didn't force you. They only mentioned it and you blindly followed. Do things for yourself."

"This is my way of doing things for myself."

"Niall you make-"

That was it?

That was his message to him?

And then it hit him.

So hard he almost toppled over.

Zayn wanted to tell Harry one last time about this. To try to convince him to not compromise his happiness.

As he drank the milkshake Harry realized he'd compromised his happiness most of his life. He didn't want to keep at it.

And he was gonna start with his hair.

---

You'd think living in Carolina for my whole life would have me get used to the heat NOPE IM PRACTICALLY MELTING WTF

- tay x