Hard to Handle (A 1D Story)

Ch. 14 - Lunch At The Beach

Morning arrived in the form of thin rays of sunlight, peeking through the slats of my bedroom window. I instinctively covered my face with a free hand and groaned. After a while, I rolled onto my other side to dodge the light. After a while, I cracked my eyes open.

I’m not alone.

It took a second for my sleep-addled brain to register that there was another body crumpled underneath the mass of blankets beside me, and another to register what had happened. I lay there for a while, unblinkingly. Guess we’d talked right up until we both fell asleep.

I rubbed my eyes and quietly extracted myself from the bed, trying not to wake Niall. I tiptoed out the door, pulled it shut behind me, and stepped daintily down the hall into the kitchen.

… And found myself staring right into the face of one Harry Styles.

“Ahh!” I gasped, hand flying to my mouth. “Jesus Christ.”

“You can just call me Harry,” he smirked, folding his arms.

I rolled my eyes and sidestepped him to get to the coffee pot. “Hilarious. Can you tell me why you’re standing at the end of the hallway at the crack of dawn like a creep?”

“I wasn’t just standing.” He held up the mug in his hand as if proving a point. “Having coffee, you know. It’s a free country. Remember? Freedom? You won it from us in the war.”

“Very funny.”

“And how was your night?”

Something about Harry’s supposedly innocuous question made me pause. I set down the coffee pot and took a deep breath before turning to face him, forcing a thin smile.

“It was fine... and yours?”

“Superb.” He narrowed his eyes and gave me a sarcastic smirk over the rim of his mug.

I narrowed my eyes back, suspiciously. I knew he wanted to say more (and I thought I had an idea now what he wanted to say), but I wasn’t about to give him the satisfaction. Instead, I turned back to the counter.

And indeed, it wasn’t long before – “So what… does this make three?”

“What are you talking about, Harry?”

“You’ve hooked up with three out of five of us. Haven’t you? Wow. 60 percent.” He sucked in his breath sharply and quirked his head with an teasing smirk. “How do you feel about that statistic?”

My blood boiled. Even though I had seen this coming, it didn’t make me any less annoyed.

“For your information,” I snapped, “some guys are capable of spending the night with a girl without thinking of ulterior motives.”

“So nothing happened?”

“Talking happened.” I turned to him. “And it was a nice conversation. Anything else, Mom?”

Harry narrowed his eyes at me, and I narrowed mine back. I folded my arms. There was a long, stony silence.

Finally, he relented. “Nope.”

I inhaled slowly. “Fine.”

“Whatever.”

“Cool.”

“Ooh, awkward. Should I leave?”

Harry and I turned at once at the sound of Louis’ voice entering the conversation. He was standing, frozen in his tracks in the entranceway of the kitchen.

“I was never here,” Louis grinned sheepishly, backing up.

I chuckled in relief and unfolded my arms. “That’s okay, Louis. Harry and I were just talking about what we should do today.”