One Time Only

Chapter 25

Harry rolls over and grabs his phone, he looks to see what time it is. Stretching his arms over his head, he then throws the covers back and gets dressed. Now all he has to do is decide on weather he looks for Jeri and more than likely his mom, or go into the shop and get back to work.
After brushing his teeth he decides Jeri is more important, he's making plenty of money without picking up another tattoo gun. Walking out of his room Harry grabs his keys, he figures the best place to go is the shop. Maybe begging Andi will help in finding the girl he loves. Besides that, he knows he needs to explain the Mary situation. It wasn't what it sounded like.
Pulling up in front of the shop, Harry notices it's still locked up. Meaning Louis lied to him, leaning against his car he sighs.

"Excuse me? Aren't you one of the owners here?" A blonde young man asks.

"Yeah, I am. I'm about to open up. You wanting a tattoo?" Harry asks him.

"Oh no, not really. I was just wondering when Jeri would be coming back to work so she could finish the one she started on me. My name is Matt, my sister works at the hospital, in the maternity ward. She called and said Jeri had her baby. I just thought since you work here you'd know when she's coming back." Matt says.

Harry looks down at the guy in front of him. "Jeri gave you a tattoo?" He asks, at Matt's nod Harry asks. "Can I see it?"

"Sure." Matt says, taking off his shirt, turning around. What Harry sees almost has his jaw dropping. The tattoo on Matt's back is amazing. "Jeri started this about a week ago, she warned me she probably wouldn't be able to get it done before going into labor. But I really don't mind, it'll be worth the wait. I know you've been out of town but the pictures of her other tattoos, well she's just really good." Matt says with a grin.

"I can see that, with what she's gotten done on yours so far." Harry says. "But on when she'll be back to work? I'm not sure. I guess that all depends on how she's feeling, she just gave birth to our child." Harry says.

"Oh, so you're the dad." Matt says with a frown. "No offense but you sure did picked an odd time to leave, her being pregnant and all. From what Louis said just the other day you've been gone for almost five and half months. That would mean you left her alone during most of this. That sucks." Matt says shaking his head. "I gotta go, I'll have my sister find out what I need to know. Don't sound like you'll know shit." Matt says as he turns and walks away.

After hearing what Matt said about the pictures of the tattoos Jeri has done, Harry walks to the door and unlocks it, after flipping on the lights he looks around. Right away Harry sees the changes that have been made, but what drew him further into the room was the pictures on, what once was an empty wall, that could be nothing but Jeri's work. Every single tattoo was beautifully done.

"It only took her two weeks after you left to be able to do that." Louis says, causing Harry to spin around and look at his friend. "She had bought herself a gun and all the equipment to go with it, to practice with, she wanted to surprise you the next time you let her give you one. Guess you never noticed all the tossed out oranges she used."

"You lied to me earlier." Harry snaps. "Is that what our friendship has come to?" He asks.

Louis shrugs. "So. How many times have you lied to all of in the past several months? Oh wait, that's right. We never heard from you after you walked out and left your pregnant ex here to fend for herself. Get over yourself Harry, the world doesn't revolve around you. There are others on this planet that matters. And let me tell you this, what you did to Jeri? Well that was one of the biggest dick moves I've ever seen you do, and I've seen some pretty out there shit you've pulled to get away from gold diggers. And she's not even one of those. Hell she has more money than you, ever think about that?" Louis yells. "God I don't even know where this ego came from all of a sudden. What the hell crawled up your ass and convinced you you could shit gold, because I'm here to tell you you can't."

"Enough!" Harry roars. "I get it, I'm a fuck up. That's all I've done since we've been here. Hell the only good thing I've done is meet Jeri and fall in love with her. I even managed to fuck that up, and don't bring that Mary chic into this. I never had a thing going with her. She's a tattoo artist I was thinking about flying here to help out, hoping to expand our shop some. I was going to talk to you about it first, that is until I found out about those deleted texts, that's when I realized she wanted more than just a job." Harry says as he sits down on the sofa. "So, what do I have? Son or daughter?" He finally asks.

Louis sighs. "I'll probably get yelled at for doing this, but what the hell." He says as he pulls out his phone and hands it to Harry. "You have a son, Jeri named him Timothy Edward Styles."

Harry looks down at Louis' phone to see a picture of Jeri holding a tiny version of him. Harry puts his head in his hands and sobs. "Jesus, he looks just like me. Louis I love her so much, I don't know why I keep hurting her the way I am."

"Maybe it's time to see a professional." Louis says. "There's no shame in that."

Harry nods. "Maybe you're right."