Reckless {HS}

forty-four

Harry's Pov

I sat on the edge of the couch, leaning back slightly, eyes half-closed as the faint hum of conversation drifted around me. The energy in the room was weirdly calm for once. After everything that had happened over the past few days, it was like we all needed this — a moment of just... nothing. The sun had started to set outside, casting a dim orange glow through the windows. It bathed the living room in a warm, soft light that made everything feel kind of hazy.

Delilah was sitting on the other end of the couch, legs tucked under her, flipping through something on her phone. She looked peaceful, like the chaos of the night was far from her mind, which was a nice change. I kept catching myself stealing glances at her when I thought no one noticed.

Louis and Niall were lounging on the floor, backs against the wall, their usual bickering oddly toned down today. Niall was messing with a deck of cards he'd found, lazily shuffling them, while Louis absentmindedly flipped through a magazine he didn't even seem to be reading. Liam had taken the only armchair, his feet kicked up on the coffee table, eyes half-focused on the TV.

There was nothing on, really. Just some random documentary playing in the background, but no one was watching it. It was just noise — something to fill the silence.

"Man, this is the most boring thing I've ever seen," Niall finally broke the quiet, flicking one of the cards in Louis' direction.

"Then turn it off," Louis replied without looking up, but he didn't sound like he cared either way.

"I could," Niall said with a grin, "but I won't."

Typical. I smiled to myself, watching them fall back into their usual banter. It was like they couldn't go five minutes without trying to get a rise out of each other, but it kept the atmosphere light.

Delilah shifted next to me, stretching her legs out and letting them rest on the coffee table. She looked over at me, her eyes catching mine for a second before she smiled — a small, soft smile that made something stir in my chest. It took me off guard, how natural it felt to have her here now. Like she'd always been a part of this, even though it had only been a short time.

"Everything alright?" she asked quietly, her voice pulling me out of my thoughts.

"Yeah," I nodded, leaning back a little more. "Just thinking."

She nodded, like she understood without needing me to explain further. That was something I'd noticed about her — she never pushed for more than I was willing to give. And for some reason, that made me want to let her in a little more.

The rest of the evening passed like that, in easy silence and lazy conversation. Liam eventually flipped through the channels and landed on some action movie, the kind that's half explosions and half bad dialogue, but it was enough to hold our attention for a while.

Niall made a sarcastic comment every five minutes about how ridiculous the plot was, while Louis chimed in with his own theories about how he could pull off the stunts better.

"Yeah, sure, mate," Niall teased, rolling his eyes. "I'd pay to see that."

"Give me a budget, and I'll show you how it's done," Louis shot back, tossing a pillow in Niall's direction.

I shook my head, smiling at the two of them. Despite all the tension and high-stakes moves we'd made recently, this was the version of us that felt the most real. Just sitting around, talking crap, and pretending we weren't in the middle of something bigger than all of us.

At some point, Delilah stretched and got up, wandering off to the kitchen for a drink. My eyes followed her, half-watching as she moved, completely unaware of how much of my focus she'd taken. I heard the sound of the refrigerator opening then closing, but nothing more.

When she came back, she handed me a bottle of water without a word, her fingers brushing mine for just a second before she went back to her spot on the couch. It was such a small gesture, but it felt like it meant something. More than it should've.

I unscrewed the cap and took a sip, my mind wandering again. It was hard to shake the thoughts that had been circling my head since last night. The feeling that, somehow, we were all sitting on the edge of something that could blow up at any moment.

But for now, we had this. This weird, quiet calm that almost felt... normal.

And I had to admit, part of me wished it could stay this way a little longer.