✓ lights /styles au/

13 Guilty

[unedited]
it must've just happened, you and i.

Harry went with Josephine to make sure her cat was well. She dropped it off at her neighbor's house before they went to Harry's apartment. She packed a small bag and by the time everything was set and they were done hooking up green light bulbs in all of his rooms, it was nearly ten.

He was exhausted but when he was sat on his bed beside Jo, he slipped out a piece of paper from the side drawer along with his slate and stylus, locking the page between the metal clamps and sighing gently as he straightened his back.

"What are you doing?"

"Writing a time-keep for one of my students."

"So a schedule?" Jo asked quietly. He felt her fingers tap his forearm slowly, the tips of her nails delicately grazing him.

"Not really," he mumbled, stabbing the paper passively with his stylus. After his name was engraved into the thick white sheet, he turned toward her, feeling her strong gaze every time he moved his hands. "Hm?"

"Teach me," she said quietly, and he nodded, deciding he'd just make the time-keep in the morning instead.

He moved the slate down and began poking in the alphabet. Starting with A and ending with Z, leaving out W just to add it at the end of the last line. Then he turned toward her, holding it up so the braille was showing. "Here."

She took the paper from him and he felt her move closer, her arms slightly lifted as her shoulder dug into his. "What are these? Words?"

"Letters."

He reached for her hand, taking her fingers in his and dragging it over to the paper. Everything was quiet around them as he brushed her hand across the braille.

He felt for the letter a and then put her index on it. "If you just want to learn the letters, it's actually really easy."

She didn't say anything. Just hummed. A small sound ripping from the back of her throat.

He taught her the first ten letters of the alphabet, and then taught her how the next ten letters were the same except one other dot was added. The next ten letters had two extra dots at the bottom, but they still had the same ones as the first line of letters.

He taught her the letter w last since it was added to the Braille alphabet after all other letters were made, and when he was done teaching her the whole alphabet, he taught her how to capitalize them.

Nearly two hours later, they were both exhausted and decided to set off for sleep.

The lights were off and they were tucked securely under the sheets when her phone's marimba ringtone began to blare throughout the bedroom. He nudged her and groaned.

"Phone," he said groggily, not bothering to clear his throat. "Your phone is ringing."

"Let it ring."

It stopped and he sunk back into his pillow, strands of hair finding a place in his mouth only to be torn out by his hands.

The marimba ringtone started again. Joey let out a groan before sitting up. Harry frowned when she was done. He thought she was silencing the phone, but seconds after the ringtone ceased, she said, "hello," and left the room.