Amaryllis

12

The Friday of the full moon, walking up the hill towards the house feels liberating. Harry has missed it here, so much, and it feels like the entire forest is welcoming him back, muddy shoes and fallen leaves behind his collar.

Niall greets him before Harry has a chance to walk up the steps to the porch, as he runs out the door to tackle Harry to the ground within seconds, shouting his name at an ear-splitting volume.

"Hey, Ni," Harry laughs, patting his friend on the back as he inconspicuously moves his limbs to check for broken bones. "I've missed you."

"We missed you too!"

Harry chuckles and shoves Niall off of him, trying to brush dirt and leaves off his clothes as he stands up. "How have you been?" he asks, offering Niall a hand as he splutters something about rude werewolves.

"Not much happening," he shrugs, starting back towards the house. "I failed a class, Louis burned a pot. Nothing about the Swifts."

Inside, the house welcomes Harry with the familiar smell of boy and stale pizza. Said boys are all lying on various surfaces in the living room, eyes dead as they watch infomercials.

"Hiii," he says, waving. Liam perks up a little as his gaze warms, and sends Harry a wave. Zayn doesn't move the arm he's slung over his face, but he does call out a "hi, Harry". Louis, closest to the door with his eyes closed, ignores him completely, but the smirk on his face is all Harry needs.

"Are you having a wake?"

"Nah," Niall answers him, still loud as he walks in with a bowl of popcorn, "they just woke up. Losers."

"It's nine in the morning, Ni, please go fuck yourself," Louis quips, voice lacking its usual bite.

Niall shakes his head. "Harry said he was coming at nine! You should've been waiting for him at the door."

"That's really not necessary," Harry laughs, feeling warm even in the breeze coming through the cracked window. "Do you want breakfast?"

Niall hugs his giant bowl protectively, but the rest of them visibly perk up – Liam even goes as far as sitting up and saying "yes, please".

Breakfast it is – Harry gives his all to make a full English worth getting out of the living room for, and he gets what he's been hoping for; an adorably sleepy, stumbling pile of werewolves and one hungry-looking human shuffle into the kitchen and take a seat at the table.

Louis immediately steals the entire plate of bacon, piles seven slices up into a crooked little tower, then steals eggs and tomatoes right from under Zayn's nose. He's only stopped when Liam, who’s pouring himself a mug of tea, narrowly misses stabbing him in the hand with a fork.

Harry eats leaning back against his chair, surveying the picture in front of him. He loves being domestic, has since he was a kid, and he can't help imagining more mornings like this, cooking breakfast for his mates to enjoy.

(And maybe he's thought of an alternate version, too, where nobody's awake yet and he puts breakfast on a tray and carries it to his bedroom, except it's not his anymore because it's theirs—and he may have thought of a person he'd like to fit into that blank, human-shaped space. Except that might not work now, because who he has in mind is not quite human, but. He'd make do.)

When everybody's sufficiently awake, after tea and coffee and dessert consisting of old winegums per Louis’s request, Niall takes his leave. He goes around the table bumping fists and kissing heads and hugging, and Harry gets all three. They all go stand on the front porch to yell byes after him and wave until he gets lost between the trees. It's lovely.