old friends • tom holland

ten

I shot to my feet, glancing at Lucy before walking to the door of the flat. She smiled encouragingly and closed up her laptop, preparing to follow me to the door and meet my childhood friends. I grabbed ahold of the doorknob and pulled it open, a smile forming on my face in anticipation of seeing the boys. However, when I looked into the hallway there was no one to be seen.

"Ahhhhhhh!" I heard two male voices scream as I caught a sudden movement in the corners of my eyes. Two figures jumped out at me and engulfed me in a hug, and I reflexively brought my elbows back into the midsections of my attackers. Both dropped to the ground, groaning and complaining. Then I was able to understand what had just occurred.

"Shoot, my bad! I'm so sorry guys!" I gasped in part horror, part laughter as I watched both boys rolling around on the floor. This was my first time seeing Harrison in four years, and puberty had also done him well. He had gained some muscle and his face had matured and was certainly less of childlike than when I had left him.

"Jeez, Noelle, you have to be kidding me." Tom was still rolling around on the floor outside of the flat as he proceeded to continue to complain.

"I was expecting a nice welcoming hug, kid. Or at least some really awkward handshake. I haven't seen you in four years and this is the greeting that I get! Honestly. I was just trying to bring back old times by giving you a good scare," Harrison wheezed, but a smile was starting to show below it.

"The scaring strategy was good, I enjoyed you bringing back an old classic. However, unfortunately for you upon moving to New York as a young woman I decided that self defense classes might be a good idea. The elbow thing became a tad instinctive after a while. I learned some even better tricks than that, but I won't demonstrate those on you."

Harrison chuckled as he stood up. There was an awkward second or two where everyone was just looking each other over, maybe not quite checking each other out, but clearly seeing how time had changed each other. Personally, I thought that time had been a gift to each of us. It was hard to wrap my head around; the fact that the friendly but not particularly hot twigs that I had left in London were somehow hidden in these grown men that were not going to get turned down by too many girls.

"Oh, sorry, I left my manners back in England! Harrison, Tom, this is my friend Lucy. She was my roomate back when I first came to the country and luck has somehow kept us on the same teams ever since. She's my roomate here." I gestured toward Lucy, who emerged from the doorframe to give a little wave. She was often timid around new people, but I knew that her true self would probably begin to show itself within the next few hours.

"Nice to meet you, I'm Tom." He stuck out his hand for a handshake, and she accepted it.

"And I'm Harrison, it's a pleasure to meet you." Harrison followed suite and extended his hand in greeting.

After the pleasantries were complete I invited them in. "So I made spaghetti for dinner, and we have garlic bread to go with it.

"You actually remembered!" Harrison broke into a fit of laughter and I grinned at him.

"Ok, just because we haven't talked for a few years doesn't mean that I blocked everything out of my memory. I wouldn't ever want to forget those times."

"Yeah, we meant to apologize to you tonight about the way things ended. We should have tried harder to keep this friendship going," Tom spoke up, a serious expression on his face.

"Um, sorry to interrupt this, I wanted to meet you guys but I'm actually meeting someone for dinner. I think that I should let you guys have your reunion together, and I'll see you later hopefully." Lucy spoke up quietly, and I nodded and smiled in thanks as she left the apartment.

"No, don't feel bad. It's neither of our faults that we grew apart, distance does that to almost everyone. I'm the one to blame for moving, and even though I'm sorry that we didn't stay connected in the long haul, I can't say that I wouldn't do it again. I've had an amazing experience here, and I guess I just really needed to pursue this dream."

"So how has football been going here? It seems like it has been going well from what we've seen in the papers. I heard that your stock has gone up and you're now one of the highest paid female athletes in the United States!" Harrison exclaimed. The surprise in his voice was evident, but I completely understood. Not everyone was lucky enough to make it as far as I had.

"Yeah, things have been going well. After I graduated from the soccer academy that I moved here for, I got drafted into the NWSL, the women's soccer league here. From there things just kind of skyrocketed. Nothing compared to having the starring role in an upcoming Marvel movie though." I looked over at Tom who smiled sheepishly, pulling at the back of his neck with one arm.

"Oh, you heard about that little thing?"

"Come on mate, take a bit of credit. Just don't forget that it was really your assistant who got you here." Harrison clapped Tom on the back of the head in a mocking manner.

"Well if I'm being honest, google was kind to me today." I laughed nervously, "I know this sounds crappy of me, but I haven't really been keeping in touch with much. I'm definitely a genuine marvel fan, but I just haven't made it around to the theaters lately. But I was stoked to hear about it!"

"Hey, no problem. But you should really see it, because I'm kind of the best spiderman of all time."

I scoffed and muttered just loudly smoggy , "I don't know, Garfield was pretty good."

Tom continued and pretended to ignore me, "And while we're telling the truth, Harrison had no idea how to spell female football players in America before the Internet spelled it out for him."

"Alright, alright, I know that making fun of Harrison is always a good fallback, but I think we've exhausted that one for tonight." Harrison spoke demonstrating a textbook eye roll.

We took our time finishing the rest of dinner. Catching up was a long process, and while we were nowhere close to where we had been, I felt like the evening had been a good start to a potential relationship rebuild. Eventually, the boys helped me clean up and dishes before getting ready to go. They explained that they had an early morning the next day on set and had to get going as soon as possible.

"Thanks Noelle, I'm really glad that we got to catch up!" Harrison smiled while pulling me in for a hug.

"Yeah, we should definitely do it again sometime soon. Shoot us your schedule or something and maybe we can work something out." Tom also gave me a quick embrace before he opened the apartment door.

"Thanks for coming you guys! I can't believe we actually had a reunion after all these years, but I'm happy that it worked out. Good luck tomorrow!"

They proceeded out the door and I closed it behind them, leaning against it as they walked out. "I missed them a lot." I thought to myself.

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Hey everyone! I'm back and hoping to keep working on this story :) I'm definitely still here and excited about where this will go! Although I will say, writing this now after Tom and Harrison have come so far since I started it pretty crazy. I remember following Tom before he even had a million followers, and now he's at 14M! Anyway, thanks for being here and I hope that you stick around.
-L