Artwork [h.s]

seventy-one

I got out of the house when I heard a car stop in front of it, sending it a confused glance when I discovered that it wasn't Harry's. I didn't have to wonder long though, as the door on the driver's side and Liam exited the vehicle, leaning his forearms on the roof as he looked at me in silence.

"Hi" I said, but it came out as more of a question than anything else, slowly closing the door behind myself and walking towards the street. "Where's Harry?" I added, hoping that it wouldn't have sounded rude, simply unable to understand why Harry wasn't there, and why Liam was in his usual parking spot.

"Hey" he replied, shooting me a quick smile. "Harry woke up late, so he asked me to come get you instead. He figured you wouldn't have wanted to get to class late."

I gave him a careful nod. "It makes sense." I opened the door, but waited for Liam to sit back in the car before sitting down on the passenger seat as well. I closed the door and put my bag between my legs, giving him a side glance as he turned on the engine. "Thank you" I added for good measure, since it was quite kind of him to drive me as he had no obligation to. It felt a bit awkward for us to be in the car so carelessly, considering the events of the day before. I blushed slightly, I probably had indeed overreacted and had managed to scare both him and Zayn. I wondered what they thought of me now, but I also didn't want to know.

I'd never been as scared as I'd been the day before, when I thought that something had indeed happened to Harry, and that was why he'd disappeared. It'd really helped me to understand how much he meant to me - even though I'd been replying to his I love you's for days, I didn't think I'd truly realised what those words truly meant until what had happened. I didn't even think there were words to describe the feeling that had overcome me at the thought of him being hurt or worse. I'd felt as if my heart had stopped dead in my chest even though I could feel it beat harshly against my ribcage, to the point that it wouldn't have surprised me if it had managed to break through and fall on the ground at my feet. It had been terrifying, even though that word wasn't nearly enough to describe it.

"So how's it been going? Between you and Harry, lately?" Liam asked while he was driving all of sudden, shaking me out of my thoughts.

I glanced at him, not entirely sure of the answer. Even if he hadn't really done anything weird lately - aside from leaving of course - I could sense that there was something between us. I couldn't tell if it was bad or good, and it unsettled me. Harry had always been kind of unreadable, but never to that degree, and I didn't know what to think of it. The day before he'd been as open as I'd never seen him, and yet he'd managed to be the most ambiguous I'd ever seen him. But I couldn't have told him that, mostly because I knew Harry still wasn't exactly in good terms with him, it didn't matter how hard I wished that someone would've brought some sense to his delphic behaviour. "I think fine, why?" I ended up saying, hoping that the pause before my answer wouldn't have been suspicious to him.

He shrugged, his eyes focused on the road. "No particular reason, I was just curious."

I nodded, trying my best to act as if his question hadn't been a bit weird. After all, we weren't nearly close enough for him to expect me to randomly confide in him, so it was quite clear that there was a very specific reason why he'd asked me that. "Alright" I simply said, deciding to let it go, going back to looking out of the window.

There were a couple of minutes of silence before Liam spoke again. "He seemed a bit upset yesterday evening" he said, and I turned my head to glance at him. His eyebrows were furrowed, a confused look on his face as he spoke.

"Really?" I asked, knowing that it was kind of a stupid thing to ask, but not knowing what to do with the silence he'd given me to reply in.

"Yeah" he replied. "He called me sounding a bit panicked. I don't even know what he expected me to say."