Gone

Chapter 40: I Do Still Love You

Harry’s Pov

It been a week since the festival. I’ve talked to Charlie over the phone a couple of times. We’ve even been texting. She asked if we could forget about trying so hard to fall back in love, it was supposed to happen it would. I didn’t need to fall back in love with her. I never fell out.

Now I waited with sunglasses on. I leaned against a small post waiting for her to walk down the street. I wore a hat and tried to stay as hidden as possible. I saw her walking down the street with her hair pulled back in a ponytail. She had on a lace skirt that stopped around mid-thigh and a long sleeve sweater on top of it.

“Hey,” she said when stopping in front of me.

“Hi,” I smiled. She followed me to my car and I drove off.

“Are we going to another music festival Harry because I think I’m still a little hung over from the other one?” she said and laughed. I laughed to. Laughing was something only she could provoke in me. I drove to a place I know she’d love. It was a small creek in the woods close to a public pond.

Nobody knew about the creek. It was my secret since I moved out to London. I parked and looked over to her smiling. “Don’t you think this is a little public for a pop star?” she asked holding back a laugh.

“Yea this is but the place I’m taking you isn’t. Now get out the car,” I said and she laughed. We both got out and she followed me into the woods.

“Harry are you trying to rape me, because if you are be alarmed I have a knife in my purse and a hell of a scream.” She follows me deeper into the woods. I laugh.

“That’s nothing something you should be telling your rapist. And can you try and keep your mouth shut your ruining the surprise.” We were almost there. I walked a little bit further and we were there. It was a beautiful creek. The water gushing loudly across the rock. Wild flowers grew all around it and a stump of a tree that was cut down years ago.

“Oh my gosh,” Charlie spoke breathlessly. “It’s beautiful Harry.” Like you, I thought in my head. She walked over to the water and touched it. I walked behind her and looked at her reflection. She was so beautiful. I began to long for the days when I had her heart.

I saw her eyes shift to my reflection. Next thing I know there was water on my face. She had splashed me. I could hear her laughing as I wiped it out of my eyes. “You have less than a second to run.” I said and she screamed. She began to run and I chased her. I chased her through the woods, catching her and letting her go again. We played around. I found an apple tree and gave her an apple. She ate it. We planted the seeds.

We stayed running around and laughing until we tired and when we did tire we sat and talked. We talked about nothing but she said so much in every word. I took in every laugh. I remembered every word. And when we were done resting we run into the creek barefoot and began to splash each other. And at night when the sun was setting we laid on our backs waiting for the stars to appear and our clothes to dry. We laid side to side our shoulders almost touching. I looked at her face as she looked up at the sky.

When the stars finally did appear she began to talk about Shakespeare. About how Shakespeare took star crossed lover to his advantage with Romeo and Juliet. Then she start talking about how much of an abomination Romeo and Juliet is. When she was done talking she looked up at the stars. I managed to tear my eyes off of her and look at them too.

I had been working up the nerve all night but realized I was never going to fully come I decided to do it anyway. I put rested my arm on the ground and grabbed her hand that was laying lazily there. I held onto it hoping that she wouldn’t let go.