Labels || H.S. [#Wattys2020]

TWENTY-FOUR

"Look, like everything, this is an art," Harry said smoothly as he slipped on his wide-brim black hat and matching sunglasses. Reagan simply shook her head, she could feel her face automatically go into a frown the moment she saw Harry trying to act 'natural'.

"An art?" She asked, looking at her reflection in the shiny metal surface of the elevator door.

"Yeah, Rae."

"Alright." She said in disbelief.

He ignored her lack of faith in him and continued, "You walk with your head up high as if nothing is wrong. As if no one is following you."

"I thought you said no one would be following us."

The elevator dinged and Harry smirked, "It's me, Rae. Why wouldn't anyone follow us."

She rolled her eyes, "Conceited."

He laughed, "I was just joking. Most of the time people photograph me looking terribly, or doing boring stuff."

"Well, if you consider that terrible..." She said, remembering a bunch of pictures she had seen of him on one of Kennedy's blogs. He was always holding an iced coffee or tea, always with that stupid hat or his hair in a bun, always looking like he didn't even know he was being watched. Yeah, it was boring stuff, but she had to admit it was pretty endearing too.

"Look, just act natural. If you do that, they don't really have much to print, do they?"

"Yeah, I guess."

"After you then." He said opening the back door to the label building. He had already known that Reagan was weary about the paps, so he didn't want to make her walk in front of all her co-workers as well. Besides, going the back way may throw off the paparazzi for a while.

She walked out into the perfect, sunny, LA day and they made their way onto the street. That's when her heart started beating abnormally. He turned to smile at her, to reassure her that she was doing just fine, thinking that it would soothe her. He was wrong.

He had lowered his sunglasses just a tad so that his eyes met hers and when he smiled he had caught her off guard because she was preoccupied with acting natural that he completely flustered her. Her heart started doing funny palpitations and she was sure that she might have passed out at that very moment.

"Hey, Rae, you okay? You look a bit flushed." Harry said, genuinely concerned.

"Just hot is all." She said, walking a bit faster.

The shop was around the corner, they would make it in five minutes flat. At least, that's what Harry reassured Reagan before they had left. By the time five minutes had passed though, they were only about halfway there.

"Harry?"

"Yes?"

"Where is this shop?"

"We're almost there."

"Are we now?"

He pushed his sunglasses further up on his nose, "You need to loosen up, Rae."

She looked around nervously, her stomach in knots, "I'm fine."

"Really, because that's the twentieth time you turn around. You going to sprint soon?" He asked, suddenly recalling the moment they met. He smirked at the thought of a scarred Reagan running down the hallway completely barefoot and afraid.

She looked at him sharply, "You said it was five minutes away."

"Well, it's right there." He said pointing in front of him.