Aquarelle [h.s]

thirty-seven

A week had gone by since our encounter with Nicholas and we were now standing in my studio, as we did every Tuesday.

Harry was in front of me, in the most complete silence, as I took some pictures, pausing every once in a while to decide what to do next, but just ending up taking more pictures I didn't need instead of daring to talk to him.

I wasn't used to him being so quiet all of a sudden. I'd really hoped we were over that, but it'd turned out that we weren't, at all, and I couldn't help but wonder if it was my fault.

Maybe, if I'd made it clearer to Harry that the words Nicholas had told him meant nothing, we wouldn't have been in that situation. Or maybe, if I'd managed to stop him before he could go away and talk it out with him, instead of letting time and distance settle that argument in his mind, things would've been different. And even though I knew that thinking that way wouldn't have helped me in the slightest, I didn't know how to stop.

I'd known Harry was sensitive and that it wouldn't have taken much to make him run away since the start. Why hadn't I done anything to prevent it from happening? Had I actually hoped things would've been different this time, or had I just given up since the start? I didn't want to think that was it.

All I knew, though, was that Harry had barely said a word to me all week, and I hadn't done anything to try to talk to him and get him to tell me what was going on. I didn't really know why. I figured that, even though I did want answers, there was a part of me that thought he was just waiting for me to say something to leave me once again.

I couldn't go on like that, though, and I knew that. I had to talk to him, no matter what doing so would've brought. If I'd waited for him to come to me, I would've been waiting my whole life.

I took a deep breath, turning around and putting the camera down on my desk, looking down at it for some seconds before finally turning to face Harry. "Are you okay?" I asked him gently, feeling a wave of nervousness wash over me in the second I asked the question.

I couldn't shake away the feeling that asking that question would've been the start of the end, but I knew I couldn't have possibly gone on like that for more days. It hurt me whenever Harry pushed me away like that.

He gave me a little indecipherable look. "I guess" he said, but he himself didn't even seem to believe his words.

I sighed, hating the way his silence made me feel. "Harry" I called him by his name, hoping that it would have some kind of effect on him, and maybe made him realise that I wasn't against him. "What's going on?"

He didn't reply, preferring to say nothing instead, as if there truly was nothing to say.

"I'm not going to stand here and pretend this is normal, because it isn't. And you know that" I told him, speaking honestly to him, "so, please, talk to me."

"He's right" he said suddenly, and I widened my eyes. I hadn't expected him to say something like that, at all. I'd expected Nicholas's words to make him panic, not make him believe that what he was saying was absolutely true.

"What?"

He shook his head, looking straight ahead at the wall behind my head. "I don't want to make the same mistakes I made years ago."

I frowned, his words immediately ringing a danger bell in my mind. "What are you saying?" I asked, slowly and carefully, hoping that I'd just understood him wrong and he didn't actually mean what I thought he meant.

Harry went quiet for some seconds, pressing his lips together and furrowing his eyebrows as he looked down, seeming to be trying to find the best way to explain what he meant. "I left because I knew I would've hurt you" he then said, speaking slowly and attentively, as if he wanted to make sure that each word was right as soon as he let it out. "I wasn't at my best, I knew it would've happened" he continued, "I still have things to work through."