Sweater [Harry Styles AU]

Chapter Five

"Your point is invalid. There isn't a single reason that you should bring him here. Didn't you hear her last night? She doesn't want him here and you're trying to make me call him and have him come see her." I lean against the wall of my room, Harry and Bridgette continue to argue in her room and a strange sense of anger streams through me.

Something in me makes me cringe at the thought of them in her room.

What if they have a thing and fight all the time to cover it up and hide it from me?

My nose scrunches and my lips yank down into a frown. The thought of either of them having sex makes my stomach flip, especially if it was the both of them doing that with each other. 

Their yells and shouts seize, the only thing I can hear is the windows rattling from the fast wind blowing past. I start to over think the silence, disturbing thoughts and bad ideas travel through my head and make me want to barge into her room.

"Harry?" My voice wavers and my already clouded judgment starts to become even worse. 

"You bloody bitch! I know you didn't just fucking slap me!" 

In the whole entire two weeks of him being here, I haven't heard him raise his voice. He always managed to keep his short-fused temper at bay, with me at least.

"Styles?" I end up sounding wimpy and like a cornered child, my hands covering my ears and my eyes clenched shut. The thought of yelling for Bridgette crosses my mind but I stutter under my breath when I even attempt to.

"Elizabeth, did you call me?" Their conversation stops, more like yelling match, and the sounds of slipper covered feet pad across the flooring of the apartment. 

"No." Venom fills my words and halts my breathing for the shortest amount of time. I can't explain, nor do I want to, why I'm giving him attitude now of all times but all I want to do is curl up into a ball and completely ignore everyone. 

"Now both of you are giving me attitude? This is appalling, you of all people, Elizabeth! I never thought I'd see the bloody day that you were giving me cheek!" I don't react, the only thing he gets out of me in response is a low whimper. 

 After ten minutes, silence filled the apartment besides the clicking of my fan and the calm breathing of my kitten, Twinkie. My hand gently stroked her back, his tongue sticking out of his mouth the slightest bit.

The sound of fuzzy sock clad feet quietly stepped towards my door, the person on the other side raising their hand and knocking against the wood of my door gently.

I hesitated to do anything, I have no idea if I should act like I'm asleep or if I should face him and sort out our issues. The problem is, I don't know if I want to face our issues right now.

"Come in." I try to sound stern, my voice sounds like it belongs to someone else. 

Maybe if you weren't so scared of your past being regurgitated by the future, you'd be fine. 

My subconscious managed to make bile rise in my throat while Harry stepped through my doorframe. His whole demeanor has seemed to change, before you could feel his anger through the wafer thin walls of our apartment. Now he seemed to be empty, his facial features show he's been conflicting with himself internally. 

"We need to talk." 

Harry sounds like he just ran a marathon, what did we do to him?

"No shit, Sherlock." Twinkie decides at this moment and lick my face, soft purrs leaving him while Harry shifts his weight from one leg to the other uncomfortably.

"I have been thinking of a preposition to put forth to you. It will sound crazy at first, but the more you think about it the more you will like it." 

"What is this..." I pause a minute holding back a small smile that wanted nothing more than to break through. "preposition, you speak of." My fingers make air quotes around the word preposition.

"Well it has been hell for me to see you so upset over Niall. Bridgette and I have discussed this quite a bit the last day or so......this has not been easy for us to come up with trust me. It took a lot of time for us to put our heads together and think of ways to say this to you." 

"Bridgette and I both hate seeing you so....sullen over him falling too hard over you too quickly then taking it all out on you in the end. So we thought hey why not put you with someone you can actually tolerate...somewhat. This won't be a sexual relationship, or a dating relationship. It's just you and....me, living together and being there for each other. If something wants to happen over the span of time we agree to have this plan worked over, then so be it. It was meant to happen then. We could move out of here, get our own apartment and pick ourselves up from the pieces we've become. We can be each others backbone and reason to smile when we want to go into a fit of tears. The only thing is, if you agree and for how long you agree is the question to this whole fucked up situation that I've been spending hours thinking about and talking to Bridgette about over the last few days or so." 

"Harry....." 

"No, it is now or never Elizabeth. I will do a deal with you, we will flip a coin. Heads or tails, and how many years?" 

"Tails, one year." His eyes scrunched together then raised at my quick answer and he nodded while pulling his bottom lip between his teeth. 

"I call three years, and obviously heads." I roll my eyes at him, the anger and upset thoughts I had conjured up before he walked in here have now dissolved and faded in the back of my confused mind.

Harry retrieves a penny from his pocket, it balances on the top curve of his thumb and he continues to gnaw on that poor bottom lip of his.

He flips it. The coin goes flying and lands with a clank on the floor, I inhale deeply and go to kneel beside the coin to read the future it has in store for me.

"Three years it is, Styles."