Love and Fame (Harry Styles)

Chapter 35

Harry and I found ourselves back in my West Village apartment right before Christmas. We would only stay there for one night before going to Brooklyn to stay with Mom.

Mom was thrilled that we had decided to celebrate Christmas with her and Mike and Jonah, and I felt a pang of guilt when I realized just how much she had missed me.

I had missed her too, but I had had Harry by my side to keep me company. And it was hard missing the company of other people when he was around.

"I'm glad we decided to celebrate in America this year," I told Harry when he crawled under the covers next to me.

"Me too," he said and reached out to turn out the lights. "We're gonna have a good time."

"Is Gemma heartbroken?" I asked when I remembered how much she had loved spending Christmas with us last year.

"Pretty much. But she'll be okay. We'll be back home to celebrate New Year's Eve with her."

"Yeah..." I mumbled and hated that I could't be two places at once. "I'll bring her some of Mom's awesome homemade cookies. Maybe she'll be more likely to forgive me for taking you away from her if I bribe her with sweets."

"Maybe," Harry chuckled and wrapped me in his strong arms as I curled up next to him. "But I wouldn't worry about her too much. She'll be okay."

"I know she will be,," I said and rested my head on his chest. "But I still feel bad."

I fell asleep within seconds in Harry's arms, but woke only a few hours later with my heart racing in my chest.

Harry had rolled around in his sleep, leaving me by myself on my half of the bed. And for a horrible full minute after I woke up, I thought I was alone.

The last time I had slept in my bed had been when Harry and I had been briefly broken up. And being back in my bed, without Harry's arms wrapped tightly around me to assure me that he was actually there, made me feel like I was back to that horrible time.

When I realized that Harry was in fact next to me, I managed to calm my heart rate and go back to sleep again. But only after edging closer to him so that I could feel the warmth of his skin.

"What's up, T?" Mike said and gave me a brief hug, acting as if we had seen each other regularly over the past few months. Which, of course, we hadn't.

Mike wasn't the one to show off a lot of feelings, and that he even gave me a hug in the first place was very uncharacteristic of him. Jonah was the same way.

My brothers had always been kind to me and they were to some extent protective of me, but they wouldn't exactly spoil me with love.

Mom on the other hand, was another story. When she saw me, she hugged me so tightly that I could barely breathe and then she kissed me all over. She couldn't tell me enough how much she had missed me, and she barely noticed that Harry was loitering awkwardly behind me.

After having hugged and kissed me, she studied me to make sure that I hadn't changed too much and that I was still her little girl.

And then she finally turned to Harry. By then, Mike and Jonah had given him casual handshakes and moved further into the apartment.

"It's so good to see you again, Harry," Mom announced and embraced Harry in a motherly hug. I liked the fact that she was acting as if he was a son to her. "How's the family?"

"They're great," Harry said politely and with a wide smile. "Thank you. How are you?"

"Great, thank you!" Mom beamed. "Did they get the presents I shipped overseas?"

"Yeah, they did," Harry said as we emigrated further into the house to join Mike and Jonah in the kitchen. "And they sent presents with me to give to you as well."

Mom offered Harry tea and everyone sat down around the massive kitchen table to catch up.

Mom had gotten a new haircut and Jonah had changed subjects in college, again. Mike was still in his old job, but he had recently been promoted.

And despite the fact that we all had cell phones, constant Internet access and other communicative devices, I didn't know any of these things. I realized that it had been way too long since I had seen or talked to my family.

I guess that's what happens when you move from home and change continent and timezone when doing so, but I still felt bad. I could have at least talked to them on Skype more often. Or just sent them a text every now and then asking for an update.

I made a mental note to myself to do better in the future. They were my family after all, and I loved them and wanted to know that they were okay.

"How's the music thing going?" Mom asked as she put out all sorts of cookies for us to nibble on before dinner.

"The music thing's going great," Harry said and I giggled at the way Mom had put it. It was so like her to call it a thing. "We're on a break at the moment, but we'll resume the tour after Christmas. It'll be time to travel around in Europe."

"You'll get to see so many exciting places," Mom sighed and Harry and I nodded. "You know, when I was younger, Talia's dad and I drove a bus from New York to Argentina with four friends."

Mom and Dad's North and South America bus expedition had been something I thought of as common knowledge, but I had never mentioned it to Harry before. So of course it was exciting for him to listen to Mom rant on about her crazy experiences from the trip.

I guess it was always exciting to listen to the details of how their bus had broken down in the middle of the favela in Rio de Janeiro or how they had been stopped and searched on the border of Colombia and Venezuela because they were thought to be drug smugglers. How they survived the trip was beyond me.

When I was a kid I had always wanted to follow in their footsteps and do the same thing, despite all the things that had gone wrong on their journey.

Living in a bus with friends while traveling the world had always seemed appealing to me, and it was just when Mom told Harry about the thing that I realized that it was exactly what I was doing with the boys at the moment.