My dorm room is filled with dark shadows apart from the hallway light illuminating the crack of space under the door along with the dim shine of the street lights outside the window. Every now and then, the glow flickers from the parties of celebrating students beginning their pre-drunken shuffle to frat houses and building basements. I can hear their whoops and hollers of glee on the street below, undoubtedly happy that finals were over and the winter break between fall and spring semesters officially began tomorrow. My parents wouldn’t be picking me up until tomorrow so, here I am: sat on the bottom bunk in an oversized sweater and my underwear, staring at the mattress of the top bed and listening to Taylor Swift with a cooling cup of green tea sitting on my desk. No pants, Taylor Swift, and green tea were my idea of celebrating finishing my first semester of college with a 4.0; not that I really cared, to be honest. I didn’t really do anything outside of going to class, reading textbooks, and studying for exams. When I first got to campus, I figured that I would forget about it and make friends, meet guys, be too immersed in my studies to think about anything else. As the late summer warmth waned to the briskness of autumn, I still hadn’t made many friends at my school. I couldn’t stop thinking about him.
I just wanna tell you that it takes everything in me not to call you. And I wish I could run to you and I hope you know that every time I don’t, I almost do.
I groaned hearing the lyrics, knowing how close they fell against the sinews of my heart, shattering into shards of glass to reopen old wounds. I walked over to my iPod speakers and immediately shut off the music, ceasing its attack on my still tender feelings. Picking up my mug of tea in one hand and my iPhone in the other, I unlocked my screen to see the usual: the generic picture of grass in the background, no calls or texts but there was a Facebook notification about the birthday of some friend I don’t remember friending. The song’s lyrics still echoed in my head and bounced from one corner to the other. Like a masochist, I couldn’t help but go into my photo album and look at the few pictures I had left of him and me before I deleted most of them on a night similar to this one. A tear rolled down my cheek when I landed upon my favorite picture of us from our senior year.
It was taken after our soccer team had won the Pennsylvania State Championship when he kicked in the winning goal seconds before the timer would have buzzed. Our high school didn’t win many state championships, which made this victory even sweeter, especially with a huge crowd of people that traveled to a random school to cheer them on. The bright, warm colors of autumn served as the most beautiful backdrop for the mid-afternoon match, which contrasted with the windy chill of the crisp, November breeze. I sat between each of our parents and was surrounded by my best friends all teetering with excitement for the start of the game. In the midst of all the chatter and anticipation, everything stopped for me when I saw him jog on to the center of the field in what seemed like slow motion. The way he looked stepping on to the grass that day practically made my pulse stop in pure awe; there was something different about him today than any other game. He just looked so confident and authoritative which only enhanced how good he looked in his navy, light blue, and white uniform that showed off his shapely legs, his arms hidden by matching Under Armour, and his dark, curly hair pushed back from his forehead by a thin headband. My mouth stood agape as my eyes closely followed his strides, watching his calf muscles flex around his navy socks. The only time I looked away from him was to hide the blush creeping across my cheeks when he pointed to me from the turf and mouthed, “For you,” before offering me a little smile.
“Did you see that, Y/N?! He pointed to you! Oh, gosh, that was possibly the cutest thing ever!” When I looked up at him again, his gaze was still fixed upon me sitting in the bleachers with a hint of a smirk playing on his lips. “Good luck. I love you,” I mouthed back at him and blew him a kiss. Still looking at me, he reached out for the kiss and caught it in his palm before shoving it in the pocket of his shorts. When he had kicked the winning goal with three seconds left, he fell to his knees, his triumphant cry muffled by the roar of the crowd and quickly disrupted by the rest of the team running on to the field and piling on top of him. Before I knew it, I found myself storming the field with the rest of the crowd until I spotted him—Harry just waiting for me to see him. Without putting much thought in it, I ran toward him, arms and legs pumping like his were during the game. He caught me in his arms as I threw my body around him, aimlessly wrapping my legs around his waist and my arms around his neck.
