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

Part Thirty-Five: Fade into view.

If history would have taught me anything, I shouldn't find it so shocking finding myself, once again, face to face with him.

And rather than a reminder from the universe that this is our written and sealed destiny, this encounters are starting to feel like a sick, twisted punishment.

He stands a few inches away from me, one hand perched on his hips and the other pinching his bottom lip between his index finger and his thumb.

It is really hard to read his expression, let alone decipher what he's feeling. But if he is feeling the way that I am, it has to be something in the middle of absolute puzzlement, a little fear and a hell of a lot anxiety.

There's a smile on his face, but it's demure and weak. His eyes never falter in their staring, but I can tell they are trying really hard to achieve such determination.

My heart is skipping countless beats so far, and just when I'm starting to think I might actually go into heart failure, his lips part open and it starts to race.

"Need help with that?"

He is asking the question at the same time his hands take a hold of the flowers in mine, so I don't get to answer. Which is a good thing since I'm pretty sure I would sound like an idiot if I ever manage to speak up.

I watch him walk towards the house, and when he gets to the door he simply turns around, as nonchalant as ever, and he nods his head for me to follow him.

"I didn't learn anything about decorating tables since then, you know." He says when he notices that I'm not moving. And there's a more inviting pose about him that somewhat soothes me.

So I move. One step in front of the other. And the weirdest thing is that all I can seem to think about is that I'm about to walk into the house he grew up in.

I walk a few steps behind him, following him towards the kitchen, and I try not to get distracted by all of the family framed pictures featuring him at different ages.

When I step into the kitchen, I see my mother chatting quite lively with Harry's mum about the flowers. And the moment she looks at me, I get it all.

This is the reason why my mother was so adamant in getting me to help her with the delivery of a last minute order from an 'old client' all the way to Holmes Chapel.

So much for the universe plotting, or fate stating its will ever so loudly. This was a much more sneaky, earthly bound force.

"This is my daughter, Lea..." My mother points in my direction with a smile. "She came home from New York for the holidays, and I put her to work, bless her heart."

I look at her with a serious glare and she shrugs.

"Hello." I say, waving my hand as if I was at school and the teacher just called my name, checking assistance.

Anne looks at me for half a second, and then at his son who is now painfully close to me at my side. I can't see his face, but she most definitely can. And it must be quite revealing because I can almost see her wheels turning and adding things up in her head.

"Oh! Lea?" Yes. The connection has been made. Not awkward at all. "I heard so much about you."

There's something in her eyes that looks a lot like sadness, and my stomach turns into a knot as I wonder how much Harry shared about us with her.

"Mum... please." Harry sounds abashed, finally letting that calm and collected facade crack a bit, which makes me feel a little less stressed out myself.

Anne apologizes and tells him to leave the arrangements at the table. She gives me another look and a warm, reassuring smile which I respond as candidly as I can, and then turns around to discuss money with my mother.

I don't move a muscle, painfully aware of his presence looming over me, trying really hard not to be so visibly affected by it. But the moment I feel his hand on my lower back, it's like a whip strikes my entire body.

"Come with me." He whispers in my ear, doing absolutely no favors to my electrified nerves. "Now."

His voice is determined but unreadable. And although there's no urge or pressure in the tone he just used, he didn't make it sound like I have a choice either.

We turn around and leave the room, noticing how this silence falls over it when they see us leave.

He guides me upstairs with his hand still on me, all the way through the hallway to the very end of it.

I hear soft music coming from one of the doors at my right, and even though is barely audible, I think I recognize his voice and how he's talking about something that used to be his.

He opens the door and I look at him, opening my mouth probably to complain. But he pushes me gently and before I know it, we are alone in his room.

I can't help but to study the place, and it is impossible not to smile at the thought that it looks pretty much like I've imagined it so many times in the past. It looks more like the room of a teenage boy, which lets me know that nothing really changed since the last time he actually lived here.

The bed is rather small and dressed with blue covers and pillows. The walls are covered with countless posters of rock and country bands from the seventies and the eighties, and there's a  rather sophisticated TV set poorly propped in a very inadequate table.

"What?" He says, when the small smile on my face grows unwillingly bigger and a soft chuckle breaks through.

"Nothing... it's just..." I stutter, blushing like a twelve year old who got caught daydreaming about her crush, by her crush. "Boys will be boys, right?"

He shrugs, looking at the same spot I was studying earlier, and nods.

"I guess."

His eyes find their way back to me and everything inside of me seems to turn into liquid, as if the matter which I am made of was about to desintegrate.

I was having a great day. Mince pies to last me for days and a Netflix queue ready to be explored.

"I didn't know it was your house." I explain myself rashly. "I wouldn't have come if I knew, I didn't mean to..."

"Did you do it?" He cuts me off, and he looks like he was caught by surprise with that question himself.

I narrow my eyes at him, trying to figure out what he's talking about, but it doesn't take me long to do it.

And once I do, it feels like a punch right where my stomach should be if it would have returned to its place after it fell at my feet the moment I saw him standing behind me.