The Story // Harry Styles AU

Part 3

I glance down at my phone, reading Harry’s text for the thousandth time, and then I look up at the apartment building in front of me.  With a deep breath, I walk up the few steps and look at the buzzers.  He’s number 8.  I push the bell then turn to the speaker. 

“Hey, Poppy,” I hear Harry’s crackly voice come out of the box.  I push the button and lean close.

“How’d you know it was me?”

“I saw you from my window,” he chuckles.

“Creep,” I say.

“Come on in.  Level 8,” Harry reminds me.  I open the door and walk across the lobby, smiling lightly at the attendant, and I step into the lift.  I press the button next to the number 8 and the lift shoots upwards.  I stare at my fuzzy reflection in the wall of the lift and contemplate my outfit again although it’s too late to change.  It’s completely casual tonight; Harry said he’d even make dinner for us.  I decided on a large cream-colored sweater and blue skinny jeans and Vans. 

The lift jolts to a stop and dings, the doors opening.  I slowly step out and walk straight down the hall and up to the door with a gold number ‘8’ on it.  I knock gently and after a moment, the door opens to reveal Harry.

He smiles and bites his lip, looking at me, and I wait. “Are you moving in?” he finally asks, eyeing the bag hanging off my shoulder.

“Oh hush,” I say, pushing by him.  It’s only when I’m standing in the center of his flat that I realize how shaky my knees are and how sweaty my palms have gotten.  The interior is exactly what I expected.  It’s the apartment of an artist: a mess.  Tools and pieces of work everywhere; finished or not, and there’s music playing at a decent volume. “Wow,” I whisper.

“It’s a bit of a mess,” Harry laughs nervously.

“It looks just like mine,” I assure him. “Is this the piece?” I set my bag on the couch before walking over to a large canvas leaning on the wall.

“Yeah, do you like it?” he asks, coming to stand behind me.

“I love it,” I find myself saying.  The piece is bigger than I thought.  The canvas is pretty large, coming up to my waist.  On it is a young woman, showing resemblance to the one in the drawing Harry showed me on Friday.  She’s nude and is sitting sideways on a dining chair.  One foot is barely touching the floor and the other is resting on the seat, her knee pulled up close.  And she’s painting her toenails. “It looks really good.  You like drawing the figure?”

“Still life makes me want to strangle myself with a clay cutter,” Harry jokes and I laugh lightly.

“So this is for a gallery show?” I turn around and Harry nods, shoving his hands in the pockets of his jeans. “How’d you get someone to model for you?”

“I didn’t,” he tells me.

“You did this from your mind?” I look back at the drawing in awe before facing Harry again.

“I don’t have the kind of money to pay someone to model for me,” Harry shrugs. “So, I went through a lot of my drawings for references and came up with this,”

“You are…so good,” I tell him, shaking my head.

“There has to be some improvements I can make,” he says.

“There always are,” I assure him.  I kick off my sneakers and walk back over to where I put my bag on the couch.  I pull out both of my cameras and take them over to the drawing, setting them on the floor next to the drop cloth.

“So you’re a photography major,” Harry infers behind me.

“How’d you guess?” I ask sarcastically and he smiles.

“You hungry?” he wonders.

“Depends on what you’re making,” I shuffle my bare feet.

“How does pizza sound?” Harry asks, backing up into the kitchen.

“Homemade pizza?”

“Isn’t that the best kind?” he smiles, opening the refrigerator. 

“That actually sounds like something I want to help with,” I add, joining Harry.

“Oh really?” he pulls a bunch of things from the fridge. “You’ll have to deal with me putting anchovies on the pizza,”

“Um…okay,” I bite my lip and Harry starts laughing.

“I’m joking!” he nudges me before shutting the fridge.

We make two small pizzas, topping them with sausages and cheese and ham and pineapple.  Once they’re cooking in the oven, I wander back over to Harry’s drawing.  I drop myself onto the floor, staring at the work.

“Let me guess…go darker,” Harry says, sitting down beside me.

“That’s one thing,” I smile. “What if you added color?  Like, just to the nail polish?  A bright red or blue,” I look at Harry and he’s nodding.

“I can see that,” he agrees, opening up the box beside the canvas.  Inside it is tons of pencils and erasers.  I watch Harry scoot closer to his drawing, plucking a few pencils from the box. “What can you see getting darker?” he asks me.  I grab my Nikon camera and flick it on, bringing the viewfinder up to my eye. 

“The hair, for sure,” I tell him. “And the chair,” Harry agrees and gets right to work.  I stand up, letting him work, and I watch him.  I sing along to the songs I know and I listen to the ones that I don’t and I do what I do best; I take pictures.  I take them of Harry mostly.  I’m not even sure if he notices me moving his lights around to make more dramatic lighting while still trying to keep his drawing lit well so he can see what he’s doing. 

“Are you rearranging my flat?” I hear him mumble while I’m dragging a stand-up light away from the wall, as far as the cord will let it.

“No,” I mumble.  Harry continues shading his piece while I snap pictures of him.  All of a sudden, the timer for the pizzas goes off and Harry stops what he’s doing.  He scrambles up off the floor and goes into the kitchen.  I take the opportunity to take a few pictures of the work in progress then I go into the kitchen, the smell luring me in.  I set my camera on the counter and watch Harry cut the pizzas up.