Remember Me [harry styles] ✓

42 - Harry and Juni

"I'm so glad we made it, look how far we've come my baby."

Harry's letter burns a hole in the pocket of my apron. It's been five days since it came through my letterbox and it's stayed with me at all times — under my pillow at night, in the main compartment of my handbag and even on the recipe book stand in my kitchen. I've read it at least three times a day, drafted six different responses and yet am no closer to actually making contact.

Putting the way I feel into words has never been one of my strengths.

I take a sip from my can of Solo and glance at the clock in the staff room. Ten minutes until the end of my lunch break and a little over four hours until I can go home and spend my evening writing draft after draft and torturing myself further. Eve has sent me three responses of her own — each bordering on either too desperate or too passive aggressive, but regardless of their unsuitability, I know that this is something I need to figure out for myself.

Do I want to forgive Harry?

Do I want to be with Harry?

Can I trust him not to hurt me again?

The questions are both endless and relentless; mostly at night when sleep refuses to pull me under and I'm staring at the ceiling until three am. And somehow I don't seem to have a definite answer to any of them.

I get up to dispose of my soda can when the two-way door swings open and thumps the general waste bin that's been wedged behind it. "Penny—" I begin to lecture, but her flustered expression and the speed at which she closes the door behind her stops me in my tracks. "What's the matter?"

There's a prominent red hue in both of her cheeks and her full fringe has parted down the middle — something I know she despises. "It's him." She snaps in a shout-whisper that sounds awfully similar to Cornelius Fudge having just discovered that Voldemort really has returned.

"What?" A cold sensation spreads across the back of my neck. "It's who?"

With one hand firmly against the door as if someone might force it open, she edges further into the room. "Him." She repeats; eyes wide and full of both distress and excitement. "Harry."

My now shaking left hand covers my mouth immediately. "Fuck."

"Uh huh." Penny mumbles, blinking at me from where she's stood. "And he's asking for you."

A moment of silence passes between us as I wrack my brains for some sort of emergency plan of action. This isn't fair, I'm not even remotely ready and I still haven't figured out what I want to say. But more to the point, what the flaming hell is he doing in Melbourne?

"Shall I tell him you're not working today?" Penny, my newly instated friend and sworn defender asks, and for a moment I do consider it. She could attempt to send him away with her appalling acting skills, but would that then make me a coward?

"I don't think that would work." I say out loud, more for my own benefit than hers. "He might question why you came running back here."

Her lips form an "o" shape in understanding and she begins to bite the lilac fingernails on her free hand. "What do we do? I can't just leave him out there."

"Is he alone?" I ask, now pacing across the room as though it might magically fix everything. Penny nods.

"Yep. He's wearing a funny hat."

I stop short and look up. "Pardon?"

"It's one of those newsboy caps." She shrugs. "I just don't think it's his best look."