Whatever Chains (Sequel to Where Your Heart is - A Harry Styles fanfiction)

Part Sixteen: Tell your father.

All sorts of delicious smells dance around the air as I walk through the front door, and I draw the deepest of breaths to take them all in.

I don't have to step into the kitchen to notice the roasted turkey or the bacon rolls. I know they're there because I can sense them with my nose.

"Mom! Dad!" I shout, shaking the small snowflakes that sprinkled on my shoulders in the short walk between the car and the house. "I'm here!"

I walk further across the narrow hall and into the living room, where I see my dad sitting on his favorite chair, reading by the fire.

"Oh, hi darling!" He chimes whilst putting down his book and standing up to hug me. "I never heard you come in. How was your trip? Is it snowing?"

His big hands land on my hair as he brushes it down until he reaches my shoulders. There's a big smile plastered on his face and his eyes glimmer with joy.

I respond to his smile with a bigger one, nodding.

"You look... beautiful." He adds, never giving me any room to answer his previous questions.

"Thanks?" I respond as a question, for he looks rather surprised about what he sees. "I guess."

He laughs apologetically, lifting my chin up with his thumb and his eyes scan my face.

"I didn't mean it quite like that, kid." He explains. "I meant it as you look differently beautiful... happy. I can't say  that I've seen you like this lately."

I know what he means, though. The last time he saw me I was a proper wreck, and I kept walking around the house, and my life, like a zombie who was barely functioning in survival mode.

"I am, Dad." I assure him, wrapping my hands around his wrist. "And about that, there's something I need to tell you. But first, where the hell is mom?"

Just as in cue, I hear her footsteps heavily stumping down the stairs. Less than a second later she is bursting into the living room and practically snatching me from my dad's arm to pull me into hers.

"My baby is here! How lovely." She speaks a little to loudly into my ear and I squirm.

"Let her breathe, woman." My father laughs and she lets me go just enough to reprimand him with a gentle slap on his chest. "Apparently our little ginger aftermath has news to share with us."

Suddenly I feel quite nervous, as they drag me to the couch, looking all excited about what I have to say, and I can see it in my mother's eyes that she has a little clue as to what is going on.

"He's back, isn't he?" She blurts impatiently, and visibly excited as she literally hangs at the edge of her seat.

I somehow like the way she phrases the question. As if he was something that I've lost, instead of something I let go willingly. And as if it was just a matter of time before we find our way back to each other. Or that fate would do it for us.

I mutter a simple yes, shrugging sheepishly and rubbing both hands against my thighs.

My mom squeals cheerfully and lunges forward to give me another hug, telling me how happy she is for me and she always knew things would eventually return to their right path.

"I'm sorry..." My father interrupts the moment, clearing his throat dramatically, and we both look at him. "I seem to have missed something here. What's going on? Who is this he and where did he come back from?"

Right, of course. He doesn't know anything about me breaking up with Harry, or about him at all for that matter.

I take my time to explain it to him. To let him in, not into every single detail, but into the necessary ones for everything to make sense.

He listens carefully, nodding from time to time so I know he's following me, but I can tell he is quite surprised.

"The guy from that band you used to have a crush on?" He asks when I finish talking. "The one with the long hair?"

I can't help but to crack up at the fact that that is the only thing that stuck on him after everything I told him. And my mum seems to find it quite as funny, too.

"Yes, the guy with the long hair." I confirm, and I smile at the thought of it and how it's always in the way in the most inconvenient of times. "And he's more than a crush, now. If fact, he always has been."

He looks at me and I can tell he has a lot of questions. To say that I was vague when explaining the events that lead to our distancing would be an understatement.

"They guy that I saw on TV, leaving a club visibly pissed and surrounded by models?"

Okay. Maybe the hair is not the only thing that stuck with him.

"Not that guy." I respond, sharply. "The man who put up with a lot of crap from me and forgave it all."

His hands go up in the air, as though he is defending himself from my words, and then he leans back on his chair.

"I want to meet him."

Something in his voice raise a few red flags in my brain. It sounds strained and unapologetic, and his face holds an expression to match them.

"Actually..." I pay extreme attention to the way I speak, making sure that he doesn't sense my sudden fear. "I invited him tomorrow. But you need to promise me you'll behave."

My mother, who is seated tightly close to me, lays a hand in my knee and squeezes it reassuringly as she promises that he will, but my dad snorts.

"I'm not making that promise. I don't think I like him for you." He states, and I start to consider the possibility of calling Harry to tell him not to come.

But I don't want to do that. The chance that he would take it as me having seconds thoughts about us scares me more than anything my dad would throw his way.

"Dad, what was it that you said to me when I walked through that door?" I enquire, and his grim stance seems to waver. "That I looked happy. Like I haven't looked in ages?"

He stirs in his seat, "I didn't say in ages, though."

I laugh gloomily, sighing in compliance.

"Maybe not. But you might as well have. Because it felt like ages, believe me. And out of all the things that made me miserable, missing him was the worst." I can feel my heart opening and shrinking all at once. "I am slowly feeling like my old self, dad... and if that's something that makes you happy, then you'll know who to thank."

That is the perfect definition of emotional blackmail. But that doesn't make what I have just said any less true.