This Thing Upon Me [Order The eBook] [Harry Styles]

Chapter 16***

WARNING: This chapter contains mature scenes and a few graphic sexual descriptions. 

Love, he said, gas
kiss me off,
kiss my lips,
kiss my hair,
my fingers,
my c*ck, my b*lls,
my eyes, my brain,
make me forget...

Charles Bukowski | Love Lyrics

*** THIS CHAPTER HAS BEEN EDITED AND IS NO LONGER CENSORED***

During a swim we had a game of volleyball where I skinny-dipped, and the boys made fun of me. Z stuck to the shallow ends of the pool and helped me as best as he could from there. He wasn't much help though, because his phobia of the water made him slow and he was overly careful of his every step. We lost dreadfully.

"C'mon, bro! Sh-t, Zayn!" I cried after he let them score again. "Zaynnnnn!" After we dried off and got dressed, I was determined to do something about it.

"Mate, that can't happen again." I told him from across the bed upstairs. "They'll never let uz live it down." He lay back across the center of the bed with a laugh.

"I did my best, Haz, what're youh on about? I can't be as quick as youh guys, youh now that. I'm not drowning over some stupid game."

"I know, I know..." I said, pacing back and forth and knocking the heel of my hand against my head in frustration. "What if I taught you to swim? Like now? Like today!"

"There's nothing youh can tell me that me instructors haven't already tried. It's useless, maan. Just forget it."

"Useless, maan." I mimicked his accent since I was annoyed, which in turn annoyed him. "Well, we have to do something, alright?" I huffed, ruffling my hair. "We can't just give up, y'know? That's what they want us to do. What if your life depended on it?!"

"On us winning?"

"On you swimming, ya knob!" He sat up and looked at me like I had a point. His eyes always got soft and lazy this time of evening.

"Um, well then I supposed I'd be f--ked then right?"

"Only if you want to give up and accept it!"

"Then what do youh want me to do, Harreh?" he asked with a smirk that let me know he was simply humoring me, as though I were a petulant child who wouldn't accept that he knew best.

"I say we go downstairs, find my old floaties, then tomorrow before we start filming, you and I...we just go out and start from scratch." He let out a tehehe sort of snicker, burying his face into the mattress. It was ridiculously cute. I slapped his bum and started out the door.

"Cmon, come with me!"

"Why don't youh go alone, broh, since youh know soh much?" He grinned, propping onto his elbows.

"I have to go in the cellar..."

"Youh scared or sumthin'?"

"No..."

"Stylerrr...?"

"Alright, look...there's bugs down there, alright? And it's really dark now since the sun's setting. I just need you to come with, ok?" He got up right away.

The cellar was as long as the house and filled with old furniture and hanging suits that looked like men in the shadows. The entire place had the off-putting smell of a thrift store, peppered with decades-old mildew. My stepdad had made narrow aisles to pass straight through to the opposite end of the house, where things were a bit more spacious and orderly.