Harry Styles: Real Person [BOOK ONE]

Chapter Five: The Eyes

Harry’s every thought was consumed with Mary Stephanie.

The boys spent all day at the hospital, visiting the little kids getting chemotherapy and other treatments, talking, singing, taking pictures, it was very mind consuming work.

Harry was distracted.

The first thing that kept running through his mind was it must’ve been a sign. He had seen this girl four times in the past two days completely randomly. Well, the third time was his own doing but still, if she hadn’t left that stupid journal at the club he still would’ve ran into her this morning at the hospital. It must’ve been the universe telling them that they should be together, right?

The second thing that was running through his mind was that she must not have seen the signs since she hadn’t called him yet.

Sure, it had only been 24 hours since he gave her his number. Maybe she was doing that “wait two days thing”. Or maybe she just wasn’t going to call.

He confessed all this to Louis later that night. Louis told him to be patient.

He didn’t want to be patient.

He wanted to be with Mary.

Louis told him he was falling too hard too fast again.

“I’m not falling too hard too fast. She’s different than that!” he whined over the cup of tea Louis made him.

“I know I know you keep saying that” Louis told him. “I’m just saying that I think she will call. And if she doesn’t, at least you know where she lives…” Louis joked.

Harry seriously considered going to her house. Louis slapped him and made him take a cold shower.

~~~~~~~~

Mary made it through her 6 hour infusion without seeing Harry again. When she left the hospital they were in with a little girl, singing to her. She waited until she was sure they were too preoccupied with singing before she walked out, saying goodbye to her new nurse friend Johana on the way.

She didn’t want to go right home. Going right home after a day of infusions meant to her that she was giving her life to the cancer. She couldn’t do that. She couldn’t let it take over her life again.

She didn’t realize where she was going until she got there. She was at the bookstore where Harry had first noticed her. She was there two days before, looking for a new journal for when she ran out of room in the one she had now. She couldn’t find one that was good enough.

She walked around for a little while, mostly just killing time. When she got to the section of journals she turned around to see what was on the bookshelf immediately behind her, knowing that if Harry had seen the tattoo on her back without her seeing him, he must’ve been standing behind her.

The bookshelf behind the journals was music history. That made sense.

But then he said that he remembered her because of her lips. That meant she must’ve looked right at him at some point. Maybe he was disguised? Wearing some kind of wig or mask so no one would notice him? Maybe she walked right past him, saying “good morning” and everything, without even realizing it.

Mary shook her head. She didn’t know why she was obsessing over this. She didn’t like Harry Styles. She couldn’t.

Could she???

She groaned and decided she needed to focus on something else. There was a café on the main floor of the bookstore with a little sitting area. She went there and found a table before realizing she didn’t bring anything besides her journal with her. The old man next to her promised to save her seat while she went to buy some writing utensils. In the art section she got 2 mechanical pencils, a package of colored pencils, a big eraser and a no smudge pen. She bought the stuff and went back to her seat.

The journal was her safe haven. She kept her soul inside it. She had never shown the contents to anyone. There were too many secrets and too much pain inside to show anyone and have a chance of them still thinking she was completely sane.

She opened up to the first page and examined the contents thus far, as she always did when she first opened it. She liked to go back and see her past and compare it to now, making mental notes of the good and bad changes before her next entry.

The journal was special. On the left side of each page were lined pieces of paper for writing; on the right were completely blank pages for drawing. Her two escapes. Usually the drawings didn’t match the writing on the opposite side, but sometimes she would draw and then write a paragraph or a poem to go along with the drawing, or vice versa. She looked through each page-most of the written entries were her personal thoughts and accounts of her life turned into symbolic passages with multiple meanings. The drawings were of all varieties. A lot of things she drew from things she saw around her, but sometimes she drew from memory or just making things up.

When she got to the next blank page she looked at it for a minute, and then took out the no smudge pen (essential, being a lefty and all) and started to write, continuing from an earlier passage,

Those terrible things I have done

You can relieve

With only something I know I don’t believe

Something I don’t know I need.

It’s been said and done

The time has come

I won’t run

I’ll stop chasing the sun

You have won

You’re only one.

Without stopping to think about her words, she picked up the pencils and colored pencils and tore them from their package. She flipped the book around so that the drawing page was horizontal. She usually drew without thinking but this time she was barely paying attention as her hand flew across the paper. She used the mechanical pencil and created a nose, eyebrows and empty eye sockets, shading as she went along. When this was done she took the colored pencils and removed the green ones from their box. She created irises with the green pencils and shaded them as carefully as possible, as to make them perfect.

When it was done, she looked at her work. They were Harrys’ eyes.

“You, young lady, are very talented” the old man next to her looked at her and smiled.

She continued to stare at the journal.

“Oh fuck it” she said, taking her stuff and leaving a very confused old man in her wake.

She told the cab driver her address “and make it fast” she said handing him a 50.

When she got home she found the box with the phone number written on it, and dialed.