Silent Cries ☾N.H.S

14.5| unbeating heart

❝ i know who i was this morning,
but now i'm somebody else. ❞

A/N: another short chapter, but after this they will be longer!! sorry about the walter feels lately omgnaHja. all of you reading this are beautiful, leave a comment or vote and i'll try to check out your profile and read stories, hip hip huRray ✿

☾ 14.5 ☽

He knitted his eyebrows in confusion. "Fifth question? Third? I can't quite remember"

"Fourth question, Styles."

"Oh, my last name? I don't see why this is important, but I come from a British family, that's where my slight accent comes from, I mean it's almost gone after all these years living in America. Anyways, I had a mother and father, and one older brother."

"One older brother," I repeated.

"One older brother," he confirmed.

The puzzle pieces were finally piecing themselves together. "Did this brother have any kids?"

"Yes, Harry the second- why do you need to know this?"

I smiled to myself. "I know Harry the third, he's the librarian's son."

Walter sat upright. "Do we look like twins?"

I laughed. "You both look exactly the same."

Then Walter looked over at me with astonishment. "You go to the library? What, you can read?"

I glared at him, as he chuckled at me. "Yes, I can. I go there so much that I personally know the librarian, dumbass."

Walter looked over at me questioningly, and that's when I realized I had my head resting on his shoulder. I quickly straightened myself.

"Why were you trying to scare me in the beginning?" I asked, changing subjects.

"I didn't know why I was there in your life, so I tried to scare you away. I didn't want you caught up in my mess."

I raised my eyebrow. "You tried to scare me away from my own home?"

"Well, I guess I was trying to scare myself away, if that makes sense?" His hands were pulling at the weeds surrounding our feet.

"That makes no sense."

He threw some of the weeds at me. Silence hung over us like a heavy coat. I stared at his strong jawline. When he turned his gaze on me I had looked away, and was instead touching a flower growing from the dirt beneath my doc martens.

I broke the silence. "You said before that you'd help me find Niall. He's still alive?"

"I visited his afterlife. He's still alive, he's just having a hard time getting out of his afterlife."

"He's alive?" I smiled so big, it hurt my mouth.

A picture of Niall with hair like lavender ocean waves, skin like an artist's journal, eyes like nebulas, and with his smile like a meadow of wild sunflowers drew itself in my mind.

Walter grinned at me silently, his green eyes turning a soft gray. I reached out and grabbed his arm happily.

Walter's eyes continued to stay fixed on me dully. "The last question, right?" He asked, changing the subject.

I let go of him. "How can I touch you?"

"It's a long story," he whispered, his eyes becoming so pale gray that they looked like the kind of fog where you couldn't see anything one foot away.

"I'll take it to my grave." A weird feeling coursed through my body as I said that.

He took a deep breath and stared at me for a long time, as though maybe I could answer the question for myself.

He whispered, "Come over here."

He tugged me closer to him, his arms folding around me as he pressed our bodies to the stone angel. Confused, I looked up at him; his chin was propped onto the corner of my neck, and his eyes swam with tears. I remained quiet. I felt warmth creep through my skin and when I looked at my fingers gripping the stone, they were translucent. His grip on me shook and trembled.

"What's going on?" I asked. My fingers were almost invisible now, the warmth from his core radiating onto my back.

My cheek was pressed against the broken statue, my heart was making a racket and beating rapidly, so rapidly it seemed to stop all at once. I gasped for air, but it seemed as though I didn't need any. Silence.

I felt Walter's lips press against the back of my neck. "I'm sorry I couldn't save you, love."

He pulled me back, his arms still enclosed around my invisible figure. One hand came out and rubbed at some dirt in the statue. His movement was slow, and it looked like time had caught up to him in that moment. Centuries old, his skin looked so transparent I could see his frail bones. Slowly, words started to materialize.

When I saw the name engraved into the stone, my eyes rolled back into my head, and I got sucked back into the abyss of the ocean once again.