girl dream=having an instagram feed that feels like a summer evening, smelling of perfume and spf you’ve been reapplying all day, eating a perfectly peeled orange, whilst waiting on your pasta to finish cooking. sipping on red wine, swapping between having one hand on a book you weren’t sure you’d like but your friend recommended it and you trusted her so you gave it a go and now you can’t peel your eyes off of it for even a second and the other hand is petting the sweet cat purring in your lap you named little suvi, meaning summer. a record player is humming in tune with the birds and the giggles of your most favourite, bestest friends inside the house with all the windows open, curtains blowing with the gentle breeze, you’re all content, you’re all healthy, you’re all happy. that’s my girl dream to evoke emotion as powerful as i felt writing this.
“It’s okay! Don’t worry about it, I don’t mind. It kind of seemed like Niall’s speed anyway,” he shrugged.
“But what if we had found like – like, y’know. . .your stash of stuff? Like guns and – and ties and –”
Harry chuckled, scrunching his nose, “Ohh, stuff like that I keep underneath my seat,” he pointed behind them, “ I can lift it, and there’s a compartment beneath it for all that.”
“Oh,” Y/N swallowed thickly, punching in the code to their main lobby, “Sorry though, for like – doing that still.”
“I really don’t have anything to hide from you,” he said, “It’s nice, actually, since the big thing is kind of out in the open, it feels like I can be myself. Y’know?”
or
Y/N & Harry see each other all of the time, it's a little weird, right?
[WARNING: Harry lowkey has some stalker-ish tendencies, but he isn’t being creepy for creep-sake, it’s more so ‘I need to make sure you don’t ruin this very intense, long-standing operation’ kind (and things concerning the cat)! There are also mentions of violence! if that makes you uncomfortable, this is NOT the fic to read!!]
(15.3k+ words)
part 1
ii.
Y/N doesn’t know if she should be suspicious or not.
Because here is the thing: she sees Harry everywhere. Everywhere. It started first with the boba place beside the vet, sure, and then at the bowling alley, but soon he pops up in places that she often frequents. Places she’s never seen him before, until after she met him, though she isn’t sure she could use that against him. Maybe they’d been passing by each other this whole time and had no idea how prevalent they’d become in one another’s lives. Or maybe Harry is following her much closer than he’d initially led her to believe.
She isn’t sure. It wouldn’t make sense, she thinks, if this were him following her. He had told her from the very start that if he wanted to follow her, she wouldn’t know or notice, but maybe that had just been to throw her off? Like, he said it so that if he ever did get caught, then it wouldn’t be obvious he was following her?
Because every time Y/N sees him, he is heavily involved in doing something else. Like, if he were following her, he was not doing a good job at paying attention to her at all, or at least that’s what she thinks. If she were to stalk someone, then she’d make more of an effort to focus.
For example, she ran into him at the grocery store near her flat. It was a big one in the area, but it was a chain, so there were multiple around the city, meaning it wasn’t like he needed to be at that very one specifically. The weather was so nice that week, which – if you asked Niall – was always around the time Y/N started on her “Girl Who is Going To Be Okay” tour, so she’s meal prepping and making vows to eat better. That means she’s filling up her cart with lots of fruits and veggies, tofu, whole grains, and a couple of snacks for when she inevitably gives up because cooking every fucking day is too hard (and how dare you expect her to eat leftovers for more than lunch the following day?).
Anyway, she was pushing a heavy cart out of the snack cake aisle when she almost slammed her cart into someone rounding the corner. “Oh my god! I’m sorry,” she rushed, feeling as rattled as her cart, but then she looked up at the person, expecting a soccer mom with a cart full of juice boxes – and instead, she saw Harry. Her eyes widened, calling his name.
Once he registered it was her, Harry’s smile stretched wide and bright, “Oh, Y/N, hi,” his dimples are deep crevices in his cheeks, and her thumbs itch to dig into them, but she shoves the thought away, “Wow, your trolley is pretty heavy, isn’t it? Do you need some help pushing?” He’d inquired as if he wasn’t pushing his own full cart of groceries.
Y/N couldn’t help but peer at him, though, “You come to this store?”
He nodded, “Yeah, all the time.”
“Really? That’s so crazy, I’ve never – I’ve never seen you here before.”
Harry hummed, running his palm along the handle of his cart, “Yeah, isn’t that crazy? I’ve never seen you either, haha, are you stalking me?” He was teasing, at least she’s pretty sure he was, “If you’re concerned, though, I have some receipts from the last couple of months, before you and I ever met. I have an app that, if I scan the receipts, gives me points toward a gift card. Would that make you feel better? If I send you some?” Y/N opened her mouth to tell him no, because she wasn’t trying to seem crazy, but he cut her off, “Actually, I’ll just go ahead and send them.” Then he motioned toward her cart, “But seriously, Sweetheart, that’s full. You’ll have trouble carrying those home, won’t you? Let me help.”
She did end up letting him take her home with little fuss because he was right, it would have been horrible trying to cart all this home alone. Then he helped her pull it all upstairs, put it away, rearranged her fridge and pantry in a way that was more “palatable” and easy to go through if she was going to be meal prepping, gave Muffy a thousand kisses on her tiny head, then went on his way. Y/N is a little bit boggled by how quickly she went from suspicion and distrust to allowing him in her home again. She wondered if he was just good at manipulating the situation, if she was stupid, or if it was a little bit of both. Who knows?
And, listen, if that was one off, Y/N wouldn’t have thought anything about it.
But then she sees him at a craft store, lingering around the embroidery hoops with a basket full of supplies. Y/N had been planning on going for a couple of days before she finally did it. Aki’s birthday was coming up, and she was a clay keychain making god, so Y/N was going to get her some more of the supplies that she likes to use. They’re relatively inexpensive, but “annoying to buy,” as Aki had put it. Plus, there were some paints and a new type of resin she’d mentioned that she’d like to dabble with as well, so Y/N had filled her cart full of things. Enough that she had a feeling the “inexpensive” aspect of this was no longer going to be a factor.
That’s besides the point, though. This was the second time in the span of only a few days that she and Harry ran into each other outside of any sort of spot it’d make sense for them to meet (which, they didn’t have many – maybe an alleyway would make sense, or her flat, since he probably already knows how to get in and out through her window, no matter her being on the fifth floor). Then, she was really getting suspicious – her eyes narrowed from across the aisle. As if he had a sixth sense (and he probably does), he turned to face her. He must have felt her gaze burning into his side.
“Oh, wow, this is getting kind of creepy,” Harry noted.
“You’re telling me,” Y/N replied, only she was the one to approach him, keeping her cart in front of her so she didn’t have to slam it into him, “I didn’t know you embroidered.”
There were a lot of things Y/N didn’t know about him, so it was sort of stupid to say. Like, she didn’t know what exactly his job entailed. She didn’t know how someone so weird but also kind of normal, and nowhere near gloomy enough, got involved in a job like the one he has. On top of that, Y/N doesn’t know if he is actually a psychopath who is doing a really good job at seeming normal.
But she doesn’t know what his favorite food might be, or if he knows how to ride a bike well. She doesn’t know if he’s a shower-in-the-morning or in-the-evening kind of guy, and if he sticks to a strict skincare routine. Y/N doesn’t know if he folds his laundry neatly and puts it away, or if he just pulls from his hamper and lives out of it like a suitcase. What was his favorite color? Did he have a favorite show? Did he like going out to eat? And why did Y/N care about any of this?
The things she does know? Harry likes cats (he likes Muffy, especially), he actually puts his fruits and veggies in the labeled drawers in the fridge, and refuses to have cereal and granola bars on the same shelf (granola bars are a snack food, not just a breakfast food, they should be put with the snacks), his biceps are big, he likes boba tea (Gladys does love him Y/N found out when she went after one of Muffy’s vet appointments, because Y/N caved and asked) he’s the “best uncle ever”, and he thinks that she’s beautiful.
And, apparently, he likes to embroider.
“I’m not the best at it,” he admitted to her, slipped his phone out of his pocket, and started scrolling to his photo album labeled Crafting Attempts, and he scrolled through it to show her his different “attempts”. Y/N found that Harry’s “not the best at it” and her “not the best at it” are two completely separate things. When she’s attempting something, it is usually sort of ugly: the stitches are uneven, the paint is runny, the clay has fingerprints all over it – whatever the media she’s trying to work with, because she convinces herself that she could become really good at a different craft every couple of weeks to keep life magical.
Harry’s attempt, Y/N found, is a beautiful and intricate piece that someone would probably spend 100 quid on without batting an eyelash. He’s not just embroidering cheesy sayings with flowers around them – he’s embroidering scenes. Mountainsides and trails, coral reefs and sea sunsets – things that Y/N would have never thought to even try. Her mouth fell open as he scrolled through them, clearly his hand holding the hoop, or a couple of them, he took a selfie with them like he was proudly sending them to someone.
“Wait, what the fuck?” Y/N touched his phone, zoomed in closer on his work, “What do you mean you aren’t the best at it? This is amazing!”
He smiled sheepishly, and his cheeks even had the nerve to color a little, “Really? You think? My nan says I still have a long way to go.”
“I’m like. . .horrified and intrigued to see what her pieces must look like if this is what has a long way to go.”
His dimple was cute when it popped out on the left side, and Y/N really wanted to dig her thumb into it again, but she refrained (she’s so strong-willed). “Do you work with clay?”
So, somehow, they finish out the rest of that shopping trip together, too. Y/N explained that she was really here for Aki, and somehow or another, Harry wheedles out some information that Y/N wanted to learn how to learn how to tunisian crochet. Then he showed her the best hooks for it, the best yarn, and she was convinced she could crochet a summer tube top with the pattern he promised to send her, because he’d made one for his sister. This time, Harry doesn’t follow her home, but he does give her an air kiss and specifies that it was for her to keep, save, and give to Muffy.
Y/N sees him at the boba place again, and they sit down for a drink together. When she and Niall are picking up lunch, Harry is at the same sandwich spot (where he told the guy over the counter, “I’ll have the usual,” so it’s obviously somewhere he frequents). Getting coffee with Aki and Harry is plucking his lip at one of the tables and typing on a computer. For fuck sake, she went to get a newer, bigger telly because there was a sale at one of the department stores closer to her, and Harry is in the same store, trying to decide what LEDs to get for wrapping around his TV.
It’s suspicious – if it were anyone else, Y/N would have for sure been convinced that they were stalking her and that was that. And, if it were anyone else, she would have probably filed a police report a long time ago and started carrying around mace. She had every reason to believe that Harry would be stalking her, due to the nature of their relationship, but every time they bumped into each other, he had just as much of a reason to be there as she did. Plus, he is always so willing to prove to her that it wasn’t him tracking her location, because “I trust you’re not going to go to the police at this point. Also, I’ll get an alert if you’re within 1 kilometer of a station, so I’m not worried.”
There’s also the fact that wherever she ends up, Harry already seems to have been established there. His basket is always fuller, his food is typically a quarter to halfway gone, the seat he’s sitting in is warm, and the workers know him. Even in places Y/N has never been, she bumped into him. Honestly, it really is starting to look like Y/N was the one stalking him, and even Niall had questioned her on it, after the fourth coincidental run-in with Harry when she suggested they try out a new cafe across town.
“Like, I’m not going to judge you, I’ve done my fair share of cyber stalking, but babe, if you’re trying to make a good impression, we should probably be a little less obvious that you’re following him around.” He had a straw tucked into the corner of his mouth – Harry had come to sit with them for a while, then suggested they try the peach lemonade for something refreshing and his favorite fruit tart (“I hope it isn’t too tart-y of a treat for you, to pair the both together. I’m a big fan though.”). They did, and tried it in front of him, and after they told him how good it was, he left.
“I’m not stalking him,” Y/N stressed, and if she could explain to Niall how, actually, it had been the other way around for a while, she would have, but she has to bite her tongue, “It is like the universe is desperate to make us cross paths at any given moment.”
Niall hummed low, thumbing a crumb off the corner of his mouth, “I don’t know how to tell you this, but he must be your soulmate then. Like, your red string of fate is making damn sure you’ll bump into each other several times a week.” He scratched the side of his jaw, “I read this one story where Cupid was getting pissed because this couple kept ignoring blatant signs they were supposed to get together, so he came off his cloud and shoved their heads until they kissed.” He took another drink.
Y/N sighed, “Is this the same story where Cupid had 'huge, tit-like pecs and a giant bulge’? The yaoi?”
“Ugh, yes, it was so good,” Niall unlocked his phone, “Let me send you the link again.”
It was weird, all of it, but again – she fully believes that if Harry was stalking her still, he’d A: Tell her about it, or B: Be so stealthy and secretive that she’d have no clue. This did seem like a next-level sort of Cupid-like fate, trying to get them to run into each other in a normal, meet-cute kind of way. Like that had been the plan all along, but they screwed it up by Y/N going on the blind date and Harry mistaking her for some model, knees deep in some garbage.
The only time this now routine interaction starts going differently is when she accidentally goes to a sex club.
Now, it was more complicated than it sounded. Y/N, Aki, and Niall had all made plans to go to this new spot in the city that had special, coordinated theme nights. Y2K, cybercore, burlesque, kpop, 90s hits, 80s party – things like that. They had never been before, but they had all been seeing advertisements around, whether in person, on the back of a bench, the side of the bus stop, or online, when FYP and home pages started getting a little too clued in on the area they live. And there was J.J., the receptionist at work, who overheard them speaking about it and let them know she’d gone on ‘Hippie Hooray Thursday’ and it was a great experience. The drinks were still relatively cheap, and it wasn’t overcrowded yet, like most places like it tend to get. The vibes were also very “girlie pop,” which was comforting and at least gave them a little more of a chance at escaping borderline harassment from drunk dickheads at the bar.
On a normal day, the three of them would pull up together, not only to save money when they Lyft but also because none of them likes walking in alone. Whether that be at a restaurant, at a club, a bar, or a random swim meet, so Niall’s nephew has more people rooting for him, or Aki’s cousin’s graduation, that she didn’t want to be bored during – arriving together is a must. Namely, because it saved them from the horrible and awkward interaction of scanning the crowd in search of your friends, not being able to find them, trying to message them, and having terrible service in that moment for no other reason but to make life harder. Also, that’s too much time for an unwanted suitor to stumble up, smelling like he might have missed the toilet during his last piss, and smelling like he might have gone into a sauna without deodorant early in the morning (when everyone is at their stinkiest, or at least that’s what Y/N thinks).
But tonight, Y/N would be a little under an hour late. She had made a promise to her neighbor that she would help them hang something – his name is Mikey. Mikey is really nice, and he and his boyfriend have helped Y/N bring in some pretty heavy boxes from the mailroom, so she thought it was the least she could do. She had a studfinder and a drill, and was at least proficient-ish enough to use them to help hang his new telly. It wouldn’t take long, but Mikey didn’t get off work until 7 PM, so it would stunt her getting-ready time by a little.
Theoretically, Niall and Aki could wait for her, but she doesn’t want them to miss out on any time since she had made a promise to someone. And this particular club stops selling drinks at a certain time – earlier than the others, for whatever reason – so she didn’t want them to miss out on that either. They liked drinking more than her anyway, so it wasn’t like she felt pressured to catch up either. So she told them to just go ahead, and she would catch up with them. Niall sent her the address for her to put into Lyft.
Y/N should have known something was up the moment her Lyft driver, a nicer, older woman (thank god), who raised her eyebrows when she saw where they were headed, “Oh, wow,” her voice was soft, but shocked, “I didn’t realize they’d opened up yet.” She looked through the rearview, a glint in her gaze, “My husband's been wanting to go, but I don’t know if it’s necessarily our scene.”
“Oh no, you should definitely go! I think stuff like this can be anyone’s scene,” Y/N smiled, not thinking anything of it. She’d imagined a middle-aged couple dressed like the red carpet in the early 2000s, or in their best 1920s Hollywood glamor, having the time of their lives, and it made her heart warm. Just because you’re on the older end doesn’t mean you can’t have fun anymore – she hated that notion.
The intersection was innocent enough. Her car smelled how they do when they’re fresh from the dealer, and the interior is sleek and dark, so she pretends that she’s a celebrity with her driver taking her to the city for a big gala. The shorts she was wearing were riding up her ass, and the seam was shoved up against her puss, but she could bear it when she was maladaptively daydreaming. Y/N messaged them that she was en route and to at least keep an eye on the door so someone could grab her when she walked in.
When they pulled up, there was red lighting pouring out of the door, highlighting half of the bouncer's face. The theme tonight was some hybrid version of cybercore and the feeling you get when you’re in the title screen of a game on one of the first PlayStation consoles. Aki sent her a couple of Pinterest boards and brought her a bag of clothes to pick through so that she could construct an outfit. So Y/N has a glittery, silvery belt that isn’t functional mostly just for fashion, and everything is white and blue. She surprisingly had these sort of reflective boots from a rave that her cousin begged her to go to. And her hair was filled with silver hair clips, enough that she thinks if she walked through a metal detector, it would start screeching. There’s also a little Tamagotchi clipped to one of the belt loops – she hopes this is the actual vibe, or she’s going to feel like an idiot. She is a little confused by the lighting, though.
“Be safe!” The driver told her, waving, “Remember to use protection!”
Y/N gave a shocked giggle as she left the backseat – she had not been expecting that for sure. It was sort of presumptuous of her to think that Y/N was going to be fucking, but she is a young woman going to a club, so – fair enough. She thanked her, closed the door, and then walked up to the bouncer. It was 20 quid at the door, which Niall hadn’t mentioned, but she figured that with as many advertisements as they have and their current social media presence, they needed to recoup some, somehow.
When she walked in. . .well, she was a little confused. Y/N seemed to be the only person who took the theme seriously, which automatically makes her want to crawl under a rock. It’s a little smoky here, like they had a fog machine somewhere, almost, but she had a feeling that it was just a lot of vapes, cigarettes, and weed – her lungs would definitely be upset with her after this. The air felt heavy and warm except for a few spaces where the air conditioner was blowing hard, and she could tell there were more clusters of people hovering around. There are more sitting areas than she’d anticipated, and the music is not as electronic as she was expecting, either. Plus, everyone was moving very. . .horn-ily? Y/N doesn’t know what else to say. People were pressed close, with not a ton of space, and they’re grabbing and holding places that are not super respectful for a first meet, and unless all of these people know each other, she’s imagining that some of these people are strangers.
And Y/N doesn’t slutshame! She just had no idea that this was the vibe here – J.J. did not mention that this was so sex driven. She would have definitely prepared herself a little more mentally (and physically, too, hell) if she knew that was the main objective of this place. Y/N’s squinting, searching for her friends, and reaching into her purse to find her phone to let them know she was here.
When she was looking down at her phone, she accidentally knocked into someone. Hard enough that she nearly stumbled back, a gasp leaving her mouth when she felt someone grip around her waist to steady her, “Whoa, whoa!” The voice reached her, and Y/N looked up from her phone to the guy who caught her before she made more of a spectacle, “You alright?”
“Yeah, sorry,” she righted herself, standing up straighter, and his hands fell away from her. The man before her looks sort of familiar, but she wouldn’t be able to place him if she tried. Maybe he just had one of those faces, honestly. “I wasn’t looking where I was going.”
“I could tell,” he chuckled, reaching a hand to comb through his hair – in the lighting she couldn’t tell what color it was, but it was dark. He’s in a tank top, but in a fashion way, over a douche-y frat guy way, she thinks. Y/N is suspicious of the sunglasses that he has, pushing his hair from his face, but he has an earring that dangles from his left ear that catches in the glimmering neon sign. He’s cute, and if she were in a situation, she better understood she might think he was cuter, but she’s a little disoriented right now. His gaze comes up and down her body without even bothering to hide it. “Are you here alone?”
Y/N blinked, “Oh, um –”
“There you are, baby.” More hands slip around her belly, the sliver of skin from where her shirt rides up, only this voice she knows quite well at this point, “You’re late.”
When she tilted her head to look up at him, he was already looking at her, a soft but exasperated smile with a gentle huff, shaking his head, and there was something in his gaze that said play along, “You need to watch where you walk, Sweet girl.” Then his arms squeezed around her a little tighter. This is as close as she’d been to him since he’d held her at knife point in an alleyway. She thinks she should be somewhere in a sympathetic response, all things considered, but she melts into him instead. Harry feels so broad like this, and she can feel his chest through whatever he’s wearing,
The guy doesn’t walk away at first, looking at the two of them curiously, “Hm. Is she a puppy?”
Harry’s hand, feathery, snakes up to her throat. He drags the pad of his thumb across her thudding pulse, and Y/N’s brain completely blanks, “She’s more of my kitty,” he presses down a little, her eyelids flutter – what the fuck is happening, “But she’s too shy to be collared in public.”
“Hmm,” the man hums, “You should get her a necklace then, to ease into it.”
“Ahhh! You’re so smart,” he taps her, “Isn’t he smart?”
Y/N nods, at least being able to respond when prompted, “Yes,” she answers, blinking, probably looking like he’d cleaned out all the thoughts in her brain because he did – there was nothing left to knock around in there, “So smart.”
The guy chuckles, holding out his hand to shake, and Harry meets it first, gently, then Y/N. His grip is firm, and his rings are still cold, pressed to her sweaty palms. “I go by Ben,” he replied, “Are you and your kitty up for a third for a night? I wouldn’t mind helping you train her.”
What the fuck is going on?!!
Harry laughs, presses his cheek into the top of her head, “Hmm, that’s really a nice offer, but we’re still quite shy – this is our first time. Maybe next time?”
Ben is thankfully (or maybe she isn’t thankful – what the hell, she doesn’t know), Ben takes it well, “Of course,” he nods, “I come on most Fridays, if you ever change your mind. Have a good time, yeah? Be safe.”
He touches them both lightly, then heads in the direction opposite to them. Harry doesn’t take his arms from around her, waddling them deeper inside the club. “Just come with me, okay, kitty?” He murmurs close to her ear, and Y/N nods, resting her arms over his arms and letting him lead her. She should probably yank away. Honestly, she probably should have pulled away the moment that he started whatever role-playing scheme she had somehow gotten caught in.
But instead, for whatever reason, she just goes with him. There’s a large, open archway that leads to a hallway that’s a little darker, but still a muted red-ish pink. A ton of doors line either side – it almost looks like one of those backroom edits, but Harry seems to know that one three down and to the left is empty. At least he opens the door pretty confidently, twisting the knob and shoving it without a second thought. He ushers her inside before they finally separate, and she feels far colder than she had. The heat immediately left, and Y/N is left shivering, frowning a little.
The room is nice. It’s a little small, but she guesses that a sex club doesn’t necessarily need a luxury master bedroom to fuck in. Still, the walls are a velvet blue, and the red lighting is finally exchanged for something warm and yellow – string lantern lights and lamps that bring this nice, comforting glow. The bed is on the wall perpendicular to the one with the door, neatly made with light colored sheets, which might be both a blessing and a curse (she’d love to use a blacklight on that, and the walls, that must be horrible to try and clean). There’s a small loveseat adjacent to the bed, a small coffee table, and beneath the table top, there’s what seems to be different whips and cuffs. A few random art pieces are on the wall, all varying sensual pieces – how could a blob of colors be sensual, she doesn’t know, but she’s just catching a vibe from it.
“Sweetheart, I’m going to ask something, and I don’t want you to be offended,” Harry finally began, and Y/N turned to him, where he was standing in front of the table, looking concerned. Her brows dip, and the frown that had been on her mouth pulls just a little deeper on her cheeks, “Are you following me?”
Y/N blinked at him. Her brain, which had finally started working again, starts to short-circuit again, “What? Excuse me?”
“It’s just – I see you everywhere, and most of those things I can kind of explain away – especially since I had access to your internet. Well, technically I still do –” he runs his fingers through his hair, “But I know for a fact that this sort of scene is not for you at all. You’ve shown no interest in a BDSM club, and I don’t think you’d just randomly hook up with someone here either.” He shook his head, “If you’re following me, sweetheart, I don’t mind it, but I’d rather you just ask me if where I’m headed is work-related, because I don’t want you to get caught up in something dangerous again. Like with –”
“Okay, wait, wait, wait!” Y/N put her hands up, “Why would I be following you around? What would that do for me? Jesus Christ, Harry,” she huffed, “I haven’t been following you, I’ve been wondering if you were following me. I’ve been going to the places we run into each other for years now! And I promise you the last thing I want is to get mixed up in all of the – whatever it is, since the first time I did, I was almost killed.” Harry grimaces at that, like the memory is just as horrible as being held at knifepoint, “Plus, if I were some mastermind, wouldn’t you know that already? You’ve got access to all of my shit.”
Harry considers it, nodding a little, “Yeah, I guess you’re right about that. But still,” he searches her face, “Why are you here? This really doesn’t seem like your thing. And you aren’t necessarily dressed for it.”
She is still frowning, pointing outside, “I’m meeting up with my friends. But I have a feeling that Ni sent me the wrong address,” she pulls out her phone, pulling up their message thread and flipping it over, “See?”
Harry’s eyes darted across the screen, then he pouted his mouth, “Ah, I see –” he pointed in the vague direction of outside, “The themed club is a few spots down.”
“Yeah,” Y/N replied, flipping her phone back around and replying to a slightly panicking Niall and Aki, who are wondering where she is. She tells them that she just went into the wrong place and that she’d be on her way in a minute, before slipping her phone back into her purse, “So that’s my explanation. What are you doing here?”
He scratches the back of his neck, “Ah, well – that guy you and I bumped into? He’s got a link to ‘pet food man’,” he explains, and Y/N realizes then why he’d looked so familiar. When she’d done a hate stalk of the pet food guy post being stood up, this dude must have been in a lot of photos with him. At least enough that she could recognize him a little, seeing him in the low, red lighting of a club, “I rented this room in particular because he was using the room next door, but I stepped out for a drink once I realized he was really just in there to fuck. When I was at the bar, I saw you bump into him and – yeah. Sorry about all that, I was just. . .I was worried that he might try to sleep with you.”
Y/N knuckles at her eyes – the night hadn’t even officially started for her, and she was more than ready to go home. A hot bath, Muffy eyeing her warily from the edge of the tub, and the promise of her bed just a couple of meters away seemed really nice right now. “So that’s why we were LARP-ing a kinky couple?”
“Yes, exactly. Plus, if he realized who you were, he might start getting suspicious and. . .yeah, I just don’t want you mixed up in this at all,” he takes a step closer, looking guilty, “I’m sorry for accusing you of following me. I really had no place.” He reached out and readjusted the straps of the tank top she had on beneath her off-shoulder t-shirt, fixing them so they weren’t folded in on themselves. It feels nice, his fingers beneath the fabric along her shoulders. “But, for the record, if you were following me, I really wouldn’t mind! It’s mostly safety reasons that would have me concerned, you know?”
Laughing, Y/N nods, “I get it, I’d – I mean, I’ve been wondering the same for you. Our circumstances are just weird.” Then she points toward the door, “I really should go to the right club, though, before Niall and Aki have a panic attack.”
“Let me take you, I know exactly where it’s at.”
Y/N finally looks at what he’s wearing now that everything has been settled. She thinks that only he could make a plain white shirt and jeans look almost sultry enough for a sex club. The shirt itself wasn’t all that fitted, but his chest was so big that it almost made it pretty tight around the area. And for some reason, the watch on his wrist was doing something for her, but she blames that on whatever must be getting pumped through the vents here. Like an aphrodisiac or something, to get people wanting to fuck.
“Um, not to be annoying, but to avoid suspicion, I probably need to be on top of you again,” he suggests before they open the door, “If you don’t mind, that is. But – uh – if he, for whatever reason, knows who you are because of the pet food man, I just have this bad feeling that he might try and. . .lure you in, or something. I don’t know. Maybe I’m being paranoid.”
If the assassin is paranoid, Y/N is going to take it to heart. The pet food guy had messaged her a while ago, and she had simply never responded, all things considered. She’d even asked Harry if he wanted her to respond in the name of his investigation or whatever, but he told her absolutely not. Y/N isn’t sure what Mr. “I go by Ben” could do by wanting to fuck her, or get involved with her and Harry, but she’d like to avoid it, she thinks.
She grabbed his hands and placed them on her waist before twisting around and melting back into him. There are worse places to be, definitely, and the way he morphs around her body is so natural, it’s almost like he’s done it a thousand times before.
“Just follow my lead again, kitty,” he murmured softly, “You did so well last time.”
The praise shouldn’t go to her head (or her pussy), but it does, and she blames the little sliver of arousal burning low in her belly on, again, them pumping something through the vents. Instead of acknowledging this, or how her heart is racing, or the way she’s kind of dizzy when she realizes, once again, how good he smells – she says, “Meow.” It made him laugh, and then he opened the door.
Exiting isn’t difficult, though they do pass Ben again, who gives them a little nod as they leave. They don’t peel off each other until they’re further away, and even then, Harry stays close, a hand gripped around her bicep as he squeezes her arm. “You usually don’t show up at places on your own like this,” Harry noted, “There’s safety in numbers, you know?”
“I know,” the weather isn’t horrible tonight, relatively warm for what it has been, so she doesn’t feel like she’s shivering out of her bones for the first time in forever, “I was helping my neighbor, so I had to come a little late.”
Harry hums, “The one on the left? The girl with the bunny? Did Oliver get stuck under the dresser again?”
“No, it was the one on the right – Mikey,” he squeezes her arm again, as they’re walking up to the door to the bouncer, and he slips out his wallet and takes two bills out to pay. Y/N starts to go to grab her wallet so she can immediately pay him back, but he shakes his head and uses his free hand to remove her purse from her hands, and holds it instead. Y/N, at this point, knows better than to argue with him and just lets it go. “He needed help with his TV. He’s bad with drills.”
Before Harry could respond, as soon as they stepped into the club, she was almost instantly jumped, “God, where were you?” Niall’s hands grabbed her shoulders, “I was about to send Aki to go hunting!”
“You look good,” Aki pulls at the bottom of her shorts a little, her fingers sneaking up beneath the denim, “Gorgeous. Who is the straggler you picked up?”
“Oh! Um, this – this is Harry,” she introduced Aki, who had only known him in name alone, and Niall’s borderline perverted description of him (“He was wearing jeans when I met him, so I was catching print, and it was flat Aki, I think he’s a size D for sure.”) “The Lyft dropped me off at the wrong place, I think, or you sent me the wrong address. I haven’t dug deep enough to figure out who was at fault,” she nudged Harry with her hip, “But he saved me, so it’s okay.”
Aki, who clearly was at least one drink and maybe a shot in, drops her mouth open, “Oh my goddd,” she gasps, “You’re the level D.”
Harry tilted his head, smiling, “I don’t know what that means,” he raised his hand, “But I’m Harry! It’s nice to meet you – you’re Aki, right?”
Aki grins, meeting his hand and shaking once, “Yes, yes, yes, that’s me. Did Y/N tell you about that time we kissed a year ago?”
His eyes widened, mouth falling open as he looked to Y/N and then to Aki, “Uh – no, she hasn’t yet.”
“Well, she loves to kiss, fun fact, if you ask her, then she will. All you have to do is ask! She likes it when you bite –”
“Enough!” Y/N places her hand on either side of Aki’s shoulders and presses her backward, encouraging her to walk, “Let’s go sit or something.”
“I’ve kissed her, too, a couple of times if you were wondering. It really is just as easy as asking,” Niall told him gleefully, “Come on, Harry, we’ve got plenty of space for you.”
. . .
Harry drives them all home.
First, he drops off Aki. He walks her up to her flat while she and Niall stay in the car, and almost as soon as he disappears from their line of sight, Niall leans forward to stuff his head between the driver and passenger seat. Y/N was on the passenger side, minding her business on her phone, while Niall popped open the middle console. “Should we dig through his shit?” He inquired, but he had already decided what he was going to be doing. Y/N’s heart rate immediately skyrocketed because she immediately assumed that Niall would be finding a gun or something. The gun, thankfully, is not in the middle console where Niall is searching – instead, they find sunglasses, tissues, a couple of spare dollars, and hand sanitizer. One thing that’s a little sketchy is that he has two tampons and two pads tucked neatly in an underneath compartment, but it’s alongside ibuprofen, motion sickness glasses, lotion, and Zyrtec, like a small, driven pharmacy.
“Oh, wow, what the fuck,” Niall thumbed through it all, “You guys might be perfect for each other, these are your brand of tampon and pads and everything.” He closed it, “Look in the glove compartment.”
That’s almost painfully normal, too. His car manual, insurance cards, all the shit you get after your car gets inspected. There are a lot of coupons, too, a couple of receipts, and like four punch cards to different places (the boba place near Muffy’s vet, a frozen yogurt spot, a cafe, and what looks like a bakery card), and that’s about it. Y/N thinks he either brought his normal person car and he has a second one, or there’s a secret compartment or something with everything else.
Niall sighs, “Okay, all we learned is that he is thoughtful and a loyal customer. Does he volunteer at an animal shelter, too, or –” Just as he brings it up, Y/N reaches in and finds a lanyard with his name, a badge, the name of their city’s humane society, and his picture with the label VOLUNTEER. “You’re joking.”
They scramble to put everything back when they see him appear in the front doors. Their phone buzzes, and Aki has sent a picture of herself on her sofa, with a granola halfway in her mouth and a message:
Hey, big dick is really nice, Y/N, I love ur new boyfie
Harry gets back into his car, “Okay,” he buckles back up, and shifts his car into drive, “Let's get you home, Ni. Do you need to stop anywhere before we go?”
“Noooo,” Ni pokes Y/N’s shoulder, “Hey, can we have a sleepover with Aki soon? I wanna do cute shit.”
“Yeah,” Y/N agreed easily, only realizing then that she was still holding one of Harry’s punch cards in her hand. She slipped it under her thigh, hoping to leave it on the seat, and maybe Harry would think he’d just accidentally left it out, or something. He probably wouldn’t think that, but he’s also too nice to question her, so it would work out. “We can give each other light back tickles.”
“Yes. . .Harry, do you have any experience with light back tickling?” Niall inquired, because he’s Niall, and he’s nothing if not a master wing man with the devastatingly good ability to be inclusive in all things.
Harry, who is just so willing to go along with any conversation and anything in general (like when Aki said that whoever had the biggest hands had to go buy them a round of drinks, and he stood up without even a whisper of a whine or complaint), told them, “I have a lot of experience. My sister used to make me rub her arm for hours at a time, and in exchange, she’d let me hook the PlayStation up to the telly in her room so I could play scary games.” He wiggled the fingers on the wheel, “I’m a tickling master though.”
“That’s so perfect, because Y/N had an ex once who never petted her ever,” Niall laid a sympathetic hand on her shoulder, “Which is so sad, it’s like ignoring a kitten at your feet. He was the worst.”
“Ni, please never speak again.”
Harry makes a disgruntled sound in her throat, “That’s horrible. I think petting someone is like the best part of any relationship, right? To pet and be petted. We’re all animals at the end of the day, wanting affection.”
Niall squeezes her shoulder, “That’s what I think too. Well, anyway, make this left up here if you want to take a shortcut.”
Once they’re dropping Niall off, Harry offers to walk him up to his flat, and Y/N prays that Niall says no. There was zero reason for them to have any amount of time alone, lest Niall start divulging all of Y/N’s deepest, darkest kinks in an effort to get things going. Especially when she spots a borderline evil smile stretching across his mouth. She tries to quickly think of any excuse she could that would make Harry stay in the car and have Niall fend for himself, but she doesn’t have to, “Nah, I can fend for myself. And I can’t be trusted with any sort of brain-to-mouth filter when I’m tipsy. Who knows what I would have started sharing?” He leaned in and smushed a kiss against Y/N’s temple, “Byeeee!”
They stay in the parking lot until Niall sends a picture of himself in his flat.
Don’t do anything too crazy tonight, but if u do, take measurements
“Alright,” he hums softly, “Let’s get you home, Sweetheart.”
The drive is nice and smooth – Harry is a really good driver. She doesn’t give him enough credit for it; the couple of times she’s been in the car with him, she hasn’t gotten to really pay attention to it. This is the longest she’s been in the car with him, though, and the way he operates a motor vehicle is hot as hell, honestly, the more she thinks about it. She would be willing to sit in the car with him all day, whether it was going from place to place running errands, or on a road trip of some kind.
“Do you want to come upstairs and see Muffy?” Y/N asks, and Harry gasps.
“I thought that was a given,” he held a hand to his chest, “Do you think I’d ever say no to seeing my baby?”
Y/N is feeling sort of buzzy around the edges, warm. If she and Harry were closer, she’d be employing him to give her back tickles until she fell asleep tonight, but they aren’t. Maybe one day they could be – or maybe that would be weird, all things considered. Y/N isn’t sure what the appropriate relationship to have with Harry is, since it seems like they’ll be in each other’s lives no matter what. Maybe what Niall had been saying about that red string of fate had more validity than she’d originally given it. It did seem like they were running together, twisting, entangling, making it more and more difficult for them to unknot. Like when you’re sewing with a piece of thread that's too long that loops and tightens into the tiniest knot you’ve ever seen – one you can’t get your needle to pierce through, even.
And there was the fact that he so seamlessly became a good addition to her trio, despite not really planning on being involved. He laughs, and he tells his own jokes, and both Aki and Niall seem to be absolutely smitten with him, which is saying a lot because they absolutely hated her ex. If he wasn’t meant to be in their lives, then how was he able to make it feel like he’d been a part of their group from the very start? To the ease with which he joins banter, to how happy he seems to be involved, and how he’s so engaged with the conversation. He’s asking questions and remembering things that they had said earlier in passing, or things that Y/N has said (he asked Aki all about her clay making).
But then there’s the thought that. . .well, that’s sort of his job, isn’t it? Was he fitting in seamlessly because of who he is as a person, or was it because of who he wanted them to think he is? She’d seen how easily he could morph into someone meant to be taking up space where he was, only fifteen minutes before they met up with her friends. Nobody would have questioned for a second if Harry belonged in that sex club – and the ease with which he adapted, acting like they were lovers, shy enough to deny a third, but experimental enough to be there in the first place – it should make her suspicious. Y/N should be more suspicious of him now than she’s ever been.
She wasn’t, though. For whatever reason, Y/N trusted Harry more than she trusted a man with a hood walking down the street, and Harry was a known hitman – they met because he’d held a knife to her throat! Was she stupid? If she told Niall or Aki any of this, they’d probably shame her, then lock her in a cage, and never let her step foot outside alone again. Since she clearly couldn’t think for herself.
“We’re hereeee,” he says softly, and Y/N gathered her purse and popped the car door open. She waited for him to get out too before she started ahead of him, and Harry made a little sound in his throat, “Oh, hold on, you’ve got something stuck –” The sound of his footsteps sped up on the pavement, so he’s right behind her, before something is carefully plucked from her thigh. It’s with horror that Y/N realized it was one of his punch cards – the one she’d slipped under her leg so that she could inconspicuously leave it in the seat. “Silly, you forgot to put it back.”
Y/N turned to look at him, blinking several times at him, “I – um – why do you sound not surprised that I have it?”
Harry smiled, “You guys went through my stuff, right? When I came back in the car, I set my elbow down on the middle console, and it clicked shut, so I figured you went through the glove compartment too?”
Her face feels hot, twisting to face forward again, “Um, well – uh –”
“It’s okay! Don’t worry about it, I don’t mind. It kind of seemed like Niall’s speed anyway,” he shrugged.
“But what if we had found like – like, y’know. . .your stash of stuff? Like guns and – and ties and –”
Harry chuckled, scrunching his nose, “Ohh, stuff like that I keep underneath my seat,” he pointed behind them, “ I can lift it, and there’s a compartment beneath it for all that.”
“Oh,” Y/N swallowed thickly, punching in the code to their main lobby, “Sorry though, for like – doing that still.”
“I really don’t have anything to hide from you,” he said, “It’s nice, actually, since the big thing is kind of out in the open, it feels like I can be myself. Y’know?”
The list of things Y/N had never experienced in a man just gets longer and longer the more time she spends with Harry. He didn’t mind if she went through his things, he’d very comfortably typed in his phone password right in her line of sight, and if she inquired about his job then he answered her questions right away, with zero hesitation and almost brutal honesty. Not even three hours ago, he had been entirely too accepting of her stalking him so long as she wasn’t following him anywhere dangerous. Enough that he had said it twice! Y/N thinks she could probably show up at his flat without having ever been invited and having zero reason to know where he lived, and Harry would accept her inside with open arms. He’d probably even offer her tea and dinner or something.
Once they open the door, they’re greeted by Muffy, who must have heard her messing with the lock. She laced between Y/N’s ankles first before toddling up to Harry, who plucked her up and brought her to his chest immediately, “Hi, pretty girl,” he hummed sweetly, leaned in, and nuzzled into the side of her body, “You smell so good – like the bigger kitty.”
Y/N’s face gets hot when he mentions it again, leading them into the living room, “Shut up,” she murmured, “You’re annoying.”
“Awww, what?” He followed deeper inside, but he’d walked this pathway so many times, Y/N thinks he even knew where the floorboards creaked, “You played your part so well, I would’ve thought you’d done it before. Maybe you are a kitty.”
Y/N, who had let her purse slip off her shoulder and drop to the floor with a thud beside the coffee table. She twisted around, eyes narrowed, and pointed at him, “Hey! I barely even spoke; you were way too equipped to play the part of whatever the heck you were doing. You’ve definitely done that before!”
He smiled, a dimpled cheek, “Well, yeah,” he told her, “I have.”
She paused, still pointing, “Oh, you – you have?” He nodded, and maybe a sober Y/N wouldn’t be so nosy, but a Y/N with a couple of drinks in her gets possessed by a Niall-shaped demon, “Wait, what? How so?”
Harry tilted his head, “What do you mean, how so?”
“Like with who and what were you doing?”
He held a hand to his chest again, in that ‘old southern woman who is appalled’ way that he likes to, and she’s seen it happen several times that night, “That’s not very appropriate to talk about with a lady.”
Y/N stared at him, brows dipped, “A lady? You were practically choking me and saying I was a sex cat less than three hours ago!”
“I was playing a part!” He answered, placing his hand on his chest over Muffy’s ear, “And there’s a baby here, we shouldn’t pollute her ears with it.”
“So what, were you like pulling them around on a leash or something?”
“Y/N!”
“I just want to know!”
“Yeah, I’m picking that up,” he replied, “But why? Is it really that important?”
Y/N doesn’t know. She’s blaming this on the liquor and also Niall polluting her mind with the notion that if a man is in your house, you deserve to know every single aspect of his life and then some. She thinks that’s only if you’re dating, though, probably, and having sex – if they were, Y/N would expect to know every minute detail. But they weren’t – honestly, Y/N doesn’t even know if he considers them friends. Are they? Maybe not. Y/N isn’t sure what they are, but friends doesn’t seem right – neither does acquaintances.
She couldn’t explain why she wanted to know; she just knew that she did. Now that the image was in her head and with what had transpired that night, Y/N needed to know immediately why Harry was able to fall into that dynamic so easily. Even if it was brief, and even if they didn’t need to go that deeply into it. Y/N thinks that if they had to do a scene or something in front of Ben, then he would have enacted it flawlessly. And then the picture of her on her knees in front of him on her hands and knees starts to haunt her, and she just needs to know, okay? A few cocktails crossed her blood-brain barrier, and suddenly every question she’s ever had needed to be answered right now.
“I don’t know,” she admitted, shrugging in an effort to seem nonchalant but actually being very much the opposite, “Like – friends talk about this stuff, right?” Saying friends even seemed weird on her tongue, and her body feels warm, flushed from alcohol and the embarrassment of Harry even looking at her right now when she was floundering. She isn’t looking at him, instead pretending that there was a stain on her shirt that she was suddenly hyperfixating on.
Harry said, probably the worst thing he could have said.
“We’re friends?”
So, she is actually refusing to look at his face at this point. And she’s not drunk enough to not remember this so it will haunt her in the morning, but she is drunk enough for tears to threaten the back of her eyelids almost instantly as she mutters, “Um, nevermind, I’m just g’na go take a bath,” before turning on her heel, “Just – uh, see you later.”
But Harry doesn’t let her get away with it that easily. “Wait!” His voice was a little loud as he looped around her, intercepting her route, still clutching Muffy to his chest, “Wait, Y/N, I didn’t mean it in a shitty way! I was genuinely asking!”
“Okay, well, now I’m embarrassed,” she answered a little too honestly, and the tears were coming whether she wanted them to or not, so she held a hand over her face, “You’re not allowed to look at me right now, or it’ll be more embarrassing, so you have to go.”
Harry is usually pretty good at listening, but this time he isn’t. He carefully placed his fingers on her wrist and pressed down, moving her hand away from her face and revealing her watering eyes. She doesn’t even know why she was about to cry – it was stupid. First, she tried pressuring him into explaining the clear pet play dynamic he had with a relationship in the past, and then she suggested they were friends, and he questioned her, and vodka cranberries always made her a little quicker to get teary over anything, especially if she was embarrassed. And right now she was embarrassed. It wasn’t Niall who couldn’t be trusted alone with Harry, it was her.
“Sweetheart, I’m sorry, it came off differently than I intended,” he offered, “I was just wondering, that's all. I kind of thought of us as friends, but with our situation, I didn’t know if you thought of us as friends, y’know? But I honestly see and spend more time with you than I do with any of my other friends.” His fingers stayed on her wrist, looping around it gently, “I just wanted to confirm. It makes me happy that you see us like that, instead of me being the weird, creepy stalker that got you mixed up in rich people bullshit. Please don’t cry, or honestly, I might start – I’m sort of a sympathy crier.”
“Crying, who’s crying?” Y/N asked, clearly moments from tears, “You are a weird, creepy stalker,” she sniffled, and Harry giggled, squeezing around her wrist, “But yeah, I think – I don’t know, I think we’re friends. Niall definitely thinks he’s your friend at this point – Aki, too. It takes one good drinking experience and a drive home before you’re locked in as one of their pals.”
Harry stayed for a little while after that. At least until Y/N has drunk two glasses of water and preemptively taken a paracetamol, and pinky swore she won’t fall asleep in the bathtub, before he finally made his departure. Muffy watched him leave at the door, and it almost made Y/N cry again, and she realized, once more, that she was a little drunker than she originally thought and intended to be.
She feels tired, but she still makes herself get in the bathtub. Y/N filled it high with bubbles and oils, then sloshed around in there for a while, while Muffy – as per usual – hovered from a spot on the corner of the tub and watched her carefully. Every so often, she’d bat the foam of bubbles, and Y/N would scoop and place it in front of her. Besides that, Y/N scrubbed some of the bar sent off of her and slowly, but surely, sobered enough that she was re-embarrassed by almost crying in front of Harry and actively replaying how it felt to be pressed up against him, with him kissing her head and pretending they were a BDSM couple. It’s a haunting mix of humiliation and desire that’s ruthlessly making her horny, so she tried to ignore it.
Alas, she couldn’t. After toweling off and shoving herself into a big shirt, she pulls out her phone and gets an incognito tab. It isn’t like she’d never seen it before; there’d been posts and stuff online, smut she’s read with it, fanart she’s seen drawn of it – she doesn’t think she’d ever seen an actual video of it before. So she’s curious, what it would actually look like, and if she is doing this with the intent to imagine Harry in the place of the man and her in the place of the woman, then that’s her business.
Because at the end of the day, Harry is very attractive. He’s attractive and nice, and he just doesn’t put off nearly as many bad vibes as he should, given the context in which they’ve met. Plus, he looked sexy driving, and his watch was hot on his wrist, and it made her want to hump his hand – she doesn’t know, maybe thinking all of this is crazy, but she’s ovulating probably, so. . .sue her.
The couple she finds seems to have another page with non-free content, but she doesn’t fall into that wormhole, so she just clicks through their 3-minute previews. They were fully committed, actually, collar, leash, and all – but Y/N found that it isn’t necessarily the aspect that she was interested in. Pet play was all fine and good, but she thinks she just liked the condescending tone and the humiliation that probably came with it, walking on all fours, acting like an animal.
So then she finds other profiles. A lesbian couple where one of the women in the video had rules that she couldn’t touch herself, but she did, and subsequently got punished for it. A gay couple where one of the men was tied in pretty, purple silk rope in a way so lewd that Y/N’s mouth had fallen open (and she pulsed around nothing). There was a throuple that had one member sitting on the floor, helplessly rubbing his face against their legs, begging for attention that they were keen on withholding.
Y/N wasn’t even masturbating – it felt like she was researching for a project or something. She’s maybe on her 10th or 12th video when a message from Harry pops up at the top of her screen.
Are you still interested in what you asked before?
About how I acted it out so well?
It took her a second to register that Harry had not only messaged her but asked what he did, that she was staring blankly at her phone, and was almost checking out for a second. Her brain helplessly clicked its gears for her to respond before she finally paused the video and swiped out of the tab, going to their message thread and opening it up.
Well, yeah I am
I give him a lot of shit but I am just Niall, at the end of the day
The three dots pop up immediately.
okay, but you have to promise to answer a question of mine too, but you can’t ask a question about my question
Okayyyyy
Sketch but i wanna know
Harry takes a moment to respond, but the dots are there on the screen, so she knew it was only because he was typing. She could swipe back into the porn tab, but she quickly convinced herself that, if he wasn’t already tapped into her phone before, messaging her somehow would give him a direct gateway to what she was looking at. Or, she imagined Muffy stomping over her phone, then copying and pasting the link of the video and sending it to Harry, all with her teensy little paw pads. So instead, she just stared at the screen and waited patiently, her heart starting to kick a little faster against her chest.
sooo, it was a couple years ago but i used to be in this like pretty intense dom/sub arrangement where we sort of let it bleed into our real lives, and it wasn’t master/pet or anything but it really wasn’t all that spectacular or crazy, but we did have a list of rules and they did get punished if they didn’t follow them. . .stuff like that
idk if you were expecting something like spectacular and insane, but that’s all there is to it really
i guess i don’t come off as someone who is into that though since you seemed kind of surprised
Y/N’s fingers moved before she could really think.
Like what sort of punishments?
Asking in the spirit of friendship, of course.
Her heart is full-blown thundering now, when Harry replied.
y’know like usual stuff
spanking, edging, overstim, understim
things like that
Oh wow, okay
Thank you for telling me all of that. I was really curious
Y/N’s palms felt sweaty as she held her phone in a tight grip, afraid it would slip and hit her in the chest. She felt short of breath and antsy, like she needed to stick her hand down her pants, but also go to bed immediately because once she actually gets off thinking about Harry, she’s done for. “The first nut dedicated to them is the nut of impending hyperfixation,” is what Aki had said once, and Y/N agreed that it could not be good. Unless she was on the direct route to have sex with the person, she had to keep her hands to herself.
I'm glad to satisfy your curiosity
So now you don’t have to look up porn about it
Her face lights aflame, looking around her room hastily, as if Harry would suddenly be standing beside her or something. Then she remembered that he had access to her phone, and her thumbs tapped against the screen to exit out of the tab, then go back into their messages.
Heyyyyy, I thought you weren’t looking at my phone anymore!! Jerk!!!
sorrryyy, i didnt realize i still get notifs when u open an incognito tab
:(
Aww, c’mon, don’t cry about it
You’re a cute crier though so maybe cry about it a little and send me a picture. In the spirit of friendship, of course.
Y/N immediately opened the camera and frowned at it, making sure Muffy – who was slowly waning in and out of sleep – was in the shot.
Pretty girl
Girls ***
I’m going to ask my question now, okay?
Y/N hearted all three messages then waited for him to answer.
Mikey, your neighbor. . .does he invite you over to help him a lot?
Ummmm not a ton, no
Just when tools are involved
Do you ever go to not help? Like to hang out?
Not really??? We’re friendly, but not that close
He usually has his boyfriend over anyway.
Oh! Boyfriend!!
Well, that’s great! Was just wondering, glad you can help your neighbor :))
You should drink one more glass of water before going to bed
Ugh, but I’ve been peeing like every five minutes from the first two
The more pee the better, keep it up!
Sweet dreams!!
Y/N flopped her phone face down on the mattress. She isn’t sure what he cared about Mikey for, but knowing Harry, it was probably some long, convoluted background that he somehow shared with the uncle’s, sister’s, cousin of Mikey, knowing the pet food guy. She’s still sort of caught up in the fact that not only did Harry tell her what his old BDSM-y relationship entailed, but let her know that he knew she was looking at porn, and on top of that, called her a cute crier and then called her pretty when she sent a pic. That was a lot to handle – if she told Niall and Aki any of this (sans the incognito mode tidbit), then they would both spontaneously combust, she’s sure of it.
She buried her face into her pillow and squealed.
What the hell was going on right now?
. . .
Y/N was a little scared.
In any other time of her life, she wouldn’t have been, because there wouldn’t have been a reason to be. Seeing some guy she was supposed to go on a blind date with that stood her up would have made her angry rather than frightened. Her teeth would grit together, she’d dance with the idea of calling him something derogatory or being the bigger person, and end up stalking off, thinking about beating his ass. Then she’d recount the story to Niall on the phone in dramatic detail, who would recount it in even more theatrical detail to Aki later on when Y/N had finally let it go a little bit.
But this time she was scared, yeah. Mostly because she didn’t really recognize him when he walked up to her. She was at the mall. Y/N liked to go, sometimes, if she had a free day with no other plans and nobody to shop with. She used to think it was sad to go alone, but it was relatively cathartic being able to float around aimlessly, walking in and out of stores that she wanted, leaving when she didn’t want to be in there. The only thing that sucked was if she wanted to try something on and was unsure about it, there was nobody to bounce ideas off of, and she was nowhere near outgoing enough to ask one of the staff.
So, this Saturday, she’d planned a little mall day. She’d gotten a mani/pedi that morning, as soon as the place by her flat opened to beat that afternoon rush of all the walk-ins and scheduled appointments. She wore sandals today, for the first time of the year, since the weather was nice and her feet looked well-cared for rather than the reptilian-like appearance they take if she takes too long to get them done. There was nothing fancy about her outfit, just a t-shirt and shorts, but the sun felt good on her skin even in the brief moments she was outside, so she wasn’t overly concerned with what she looked like.
Y/N had been to three stores already and had gotten a good amount at each. Each hand had two bags each in it that she’d been swinging around at her side while she debated if she wanted to go into the candle store and obnoxiously sniff all of the scents, until she needed coffee beans to clear out her nose. She’d already spent like 80 quid, and while the financially responsible side of her thinks that she should stop there, the less clever side thinks that she might as well round it up to 100.
She had just decided that she was going in when she’d been stopped beside the massage chairs.
Y/N has only been stopped a handful of times in her life by strangers. Once, it was because she favored someone’s cousin, whom they had been waiting for at the park, and then had Y/N stay so they could meet (they did look quite similar). There was a second time somebody had asked her where the nearest bus station was, a heavy accent that she had never been able to place, but she walked them to the subway (and told them to use the translator app if speaking their language was more comfortable – and then she learned the Polish way to say thank you). And then the third time was because her shoe was untied, and a very nice (albeit very drunk) older woman placed her hand on Y/N’s shoulder to grab her attention, pierced her bicep with fake, pointy nails, and told her, “You’ll trip like that, Hon, you need to tie ‘em. “
It doesn’t happen often, though. Y/N isn’t sure why – maybe she doesn’t look very friendly, she always thought, but Niall told her that was not the case at all. In university, he did his thesis on the social interactions of modern young adults and realized that it was disordered and complicated. Going up to someone to strike up a chat rarely inspired confidence in making a new friend, and instead made most people’s hackles rise. Immediately guarded, worried, and wondering what their next move would be, and if it might involve hurting them. That used to be the only way to make friends, to amble up to them while you
So, understandably, when it happens at the mall, Y/N is instantly paranoid, especially with everything that was going on. She gasps when their hand reaches out to rest on her shoulder, and she jerks away, only to be met with a soft chuckle, “I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to scare you,” and that is not the voice she’s used to hearing those words from. Where she should be turning around to see Harry, all sweet and smiling at her with two dimpled cheeks, she instead sees the pet food man (who she knew was named Finley, at this point, but just simply didn’t deserve to be referred to by anything other than his job description).
Y/N blinked – she looked him up and down and noted that he was in a suit at the mall, and this was not wealthy enough of a mall for him to be wearing a suit here, of all things, “Oh, I’m so sorry to interrupt you,” he said, in a way that didn’t seem sorry at all, but she might just dislike him so everything he does is going to be horrible and annoying, “I just – you look very familiar.”
“I hear that every so often,” she replied, “But I don’t think I’m who you’re looking for.” She rolled her shoulder in an effort to get him off of her.
“Ah, you might be, though,” he held out his hand, “I think we were supposed to go on a blind date together?”
Y/N paused. She knew why, she knew what he looked like, but she didn’t know how he could have known what she looked like. It made her skin crawl a little – she isn’t even sure why, or what he’s doing that’s so sketchy, it’s just the fact that it is, and the fact that Harry so adamantly dislikes him is enough for her. Plus, the suit at the mall, and the way his smile doesn’t reach his eyes very well. She can tell that he’s someone who pretends to smile a lot.
Still, even with the fear that tickles the back of her brain, she nodded, “Yeah, I think we were. Before you stood me up, that is.”
His eyes widened like he hadn’t been expecting her to bring it up, and honestly, Y/N hadn’t been expecting herself to bring it up either. Niall and Aki would be proud of her, she knew that at least, but Harry would probably grumble at her. It was silly to engage, he would tell her, that he’s a dangerous man capable of doing dangerous things, even though he just runs a pet food company. The best thing would have been to politely decline that she was anyone he could possibly know, then head off in the opposite direction.
Instead, she stands before him, trying to look unwavering, “I need to go,” she told him, clearing her throat, “Have a good day.”
He should leave her alone, but he doesn’t – of course, he doesn’t. When she tried to walk away again, he stopped her once more, “Please, hear me out – something came up,” he told her, sounding a little desperate, “And time just got away from me, so by the time I realized what time it was, it had been far too late for me to show. Then I felt like a dick trying to contact you, but –”
“Really, I’m not interested, okay? It was very embarrassing and –” I almost got killed because of you, you random jackass! “--and I never want to think about it again, so let’s just call it.”
It was weird, though, wasn't it? That he had even stopped her in passing in the first place – why would he do that? (And why was he at the mall in general? She thought rich people did most of their shopping online and in those fancy boutiques that only they could afford.) It’d be one thing if they had met before this moment and he had recognized her as she passed, but this was odd. Y/N would never in her life stop a blind date that didn’t even happen, on their way to their next destination, to do what, exactly? She really hadn’t let him get far enough to explain what his purpose for stopping her was. There was just something fishy about the entire thing, and now, ever since Harry, she’s been a lot more wary about the people who surround her, and this guy – Finley – was a major red flag.
Something prickles at the back of her neck, and she is suddenly very, very grateful to be in the middle of a crowded mall rather than somewhere stuck and alone with him.
“I just want to make it up to you,” he told her, but Y/N was sliding out her phone from her purse and clicking on Harry’s message thread, typing an all-caps ‘CALL ME’ that she hoped he would see right away, “Seriously, just one coffee! It’d be on me, yeah? To make amends, and –”
Y/N’s phone began to buzz, vibrating against her palm as she clutched it tight, “I’m already seeing someone else,” she lied easily, “And it wouldn’t be respectful to him.” She slid to answer, placed the phone to her ear, and gave Finley a small nod, before pitching up her voice a bit, “Hey, baby,” she used the pet name, hoping that it would indicate to Harry that something was wrong. Harry may call her baby this, Sweetheart that, but Y/N never used any pet names when she was referring to him, “Are you on your way?”
“Y/N?” He immediately seemed suspicious – she could hear it in his tone, “Is something the matter?”
“Yeah,” she answered vaguely, already wandering away from Finley, who, thankfully, hadn’t followed her; however, she did see that he was immediately on his phone, which was also weird. Still, despite the distance she’s putting in between them, Y/N still feels anxious and worried enough not to explain the details too vividly: “Can you come?”
“Okay, I’m on my way. Stay on the phone with me until I get there.”
It wasn’t the most dangerous situation to be in – again, she was in a very public, crowded mall on a Saturday – but still, her heart thundered in her chest. She felt a little queasy about all of it, squidgy while her bubble tea from earlier sat heavy in her belly. Y/N’s looking around, suddenly feeling very helpless, very hopeless, and wondering if he’s bad enough to have a hitman after him to some degree, then he could be bad enough to have his own hitmen. Should she have acted more chill? What if she pissed him off and now he’s going to send a hit out on her or something? Fuck! How horrible is it that she even has to worry about shit like this? He was the one who stood her up! He was the reason she’d even had a knife to her throat in the first place, even though she somehow, in the most dysfunctional way, made a friendship out of it.
Harry makes her talk about what she did today. She could tell he was trying to distract her, but it wasn’t really working – Y/N was too hyperaware of all of her surroundings now. For some reason, she keeps imagining him popping up Michael Myers style and slowly but menacingly following her through the mall, and somehow keeping pace with her running while he does a slightly fast pace walk. Still, she tries to tell Harry about the earrings she bought with a matching ankle bracelet, the new skincare, and lip gloss. Even he seemed distracted, though, as he hummed at her, prompting her gently but nowhere near the active listening he’s usually doing when anyone is involved.
It takes him a little less than 12 minutes to get there. Y/N takes one brief look over her shoulder to see if she could spot him hovering behind a plant or a person. Then she trots a little when she’s going to the front entrance, where Harry idles illegally in the fire lane. The door is already being pressed open, like he didn’t want her to waste even a single bit of time, and only once she’d crawled into the passenger seat does he hang up the phone.
“What happened, baby? Tell me every little detail.”
And she does. Now that she tells it back to him, it really didn’t sound all that horrible, but her heart was still racing, and her palms were still sweating like he’d grabbed ahold of her and pushed her down, or said something threatening. She mentioned several times that maybe she was just too in her head about it, and it was actually more normal than it felt. Y/N even momentarily suggested that maybe she was the off-putting one to him, with how frantic she started to get trying to get away.
Harry nipped that in the bud quickly, “No, you aren’t being dramatic, this is very odd behavior for him. He never goes to the fucking mall – rich fuckers like him, never do.” Y/N nodded, “This whole thing is weird. You were right to call me.”
“Do you need to go back in?” She pointed toward the mall, “I feel better about going back in if I’m with you, since –
“No,” he denied her immediately, “Not, this is as close to anything as I ever want you to get. And even this was entirely too close,” he shook his head, “Honestly. . .would you be okay if I came over to your flat and stayed for a while? Would you mind?”
Y/N shook her head, “I would mind more if you left me alone,” she told him, “You can stay for as long as you like.”
. . .
Harry is irritated and feeling soft, and it’s the weirdest combination of feelings that he’s ever had to deal with in his life.
Irritated for the obvious reason – Y/N doesn’t deserve any of this. He meant it, from the moment he realized that she was not Antonyia, he was so deeply apologetic that he was breaking his own key rules, like giving out his name or letting someone see his face. Both of which he’d done in rapid succession of one another, when most of the time, what he perceives as a target never sees him coming in the first place. All she’d been doing was going on a date that had been set up by her friend, and she was not only stood up, but then held at knife point in an alleyway because she’d been trying to save a kitten, of all things. It was a horrible case of wrong place at the wrong time, and she had to suffer because of it – it’s not even like she could go to the police about it, namely because he had to threaten her not to.
So, yeah, Harry feels horrible about it. In a different universe, they would have had the meet-cute of the century. Like in the human society where Harry volunteers on weekends, or at the boba place she seems so fond of (Gladys is starting to like Y/N more, he thinks, and he has a feeling he’s going to have to start fighting for her top spot as favorite customers). He would probably be bewitched by her gentle demeanor, then thrown off by a quick tongue and a sort of bratty mouth, but he’s always been into that, so it would’ve worked fine. He would have asked her on a date, for coffee, or to share a little slice of cake at a bakery.
Instead, Harry met her in an alleyway, thinking she was someone else, and threatening her for information that she didn’t know. Then he left her with a tiny, stinky kitten after she’d been traumatized because he needed to go find the actual Antoniya, who very clearly must have been tipped off for neither her nor Finley to show up to the restaurant they both separately had reservations at that night. Though he warned her, he had to track her messages, her calls, internet searches and history, and her location. It wasn’t the most ideal way to get to know someone. He really tried to lay off too, after like the first couple of days, he realized that she seemed to be more of the suffer in silence and the ‘pretend like it didn’t happen’ approach, which benefited them.
It seemed as though fate had wanted their paths to cross, though. If Harry believed in soulmates, even in a platonic sense, then he would think they were something of the sort. How else would it make sense that they literally run into each other everywhere? Harry technically, only officially followed her without her knowing a couple of times. He’d traced her to and from work the first couple of days, and all of this had started. And once he realized quickly that she had no intention of exposing him and blowing up a plan that had been years in the making, he stopped. The fact that they’d run into each other so many times was even starting to get creepy to him, and he was technically the weird stalker of the two. But it seemed like everywhere he turned, she was there as well, almost like she was following him.
He should be more weirded out by it than he is, but he isn’t. Harry doesn’t mind it – and she’s cute, and gets this silly look on her face every time she sees him when she wasn’t expecting to. It’s this very same look that has convinced Harry, without a shadow of a doubt, that Y/N wasn’t actually following him with some ulterior motive in mind (the only time he got really, really suspicious was the whole sex club ordeal, but that was easily explained away).
They were just meant to be in each other’s lives, for whatever reason. Harry believes that even if they hadn’t met in the off-kilter way they did, then he and Y/N would have found their way to each other somehow, someway. Their paths were meant to cross, whether it be in an alleyway, at a boba place, in a bowling alley, in a craft store, at the grocery, at a sex club – it was certain, and predetermined, he thinks. It was enough to make him believe in something like soulmates.
He’d been growing quite fond of her, too, the more they interacted and spoke to one another. Y/N was funnier than he thinks she knows she is, and she’s sweet, and almost way too okay with their dynamic and how they met. Harry thinks he’d be hard-pressed to find someone who would willingly let a known, somewhat stalker accompany them on the rest of their grocery trip, or sit down with them for a boba. He doesn’t think he’d be able to find one who was willing to let him come into her flat at all, and have total faith and trust in what he says. Because Harry always means what he says, but she had no reason to believe that after they first met, but she just does.
When she admitted that she considered them friends (and then promptly cried because she was drunk and Harry had the worst sort of response in the world, probably), Harry’s heart felt squishy and malleable in a way it only does when he’s feeling particularly endeared. Like when he looked Muffy in the eyes for the first time and thought he’d probably do anything in the world to protect that kitten. The same goes for Y/N, he thinks. He’d felt this urge to protect her once before, when she had called him on her way home, nervous about a guy in a hoodie. But that had been relatively new to their dynamic, so it wasn’t anything crazy.
But now, it was something else entirely. Now, Harry just wanted to lock her up in her flat and keep her safe where he knew he could. He didn’t like that Finley, all of a sudden, was at the same mall that Y/N was at, and was close enough to grab her and make her uncomfortable, both physically and with words. It was suspicious, just like she had described it to him – the fact that he stopped her even more so. Harry suspected that whatever this was had something to do with Y/N’s likeness to Antonyia. Finley was sort of a dog, so it wouldn’t be out of the question for him to utilize someone to his personal benefit, even if it meant putting them in danger. Harry isn’t sure what the plan is, but he knows with time, he could sure as hell figure it out, and figure it out quickly enough that he would be ahead of them again.
He would do a sweep of her flat, just in case, and make sure that nobody other than Harry had been tracking anything regarding her. Then he’d double-check that all of her locks and windows are still latched firmly. He’d look for even a bowl or a bottle of lotion that was out of place. He’d probably teach YN how to spot differences like that, too, just for future situations where this might arise.
So that’s why he was feeling irritated. He was feeling soft because Y/N was currently asleep on the sofa with Muffy against her belly, and he thinks it might be the cutest thing he’s seen in his life. She’d been so wired right after they got home, she was just jittering with nervous energy. Now that the adrenaline had worn off, she fell asleep quickly on the couch beside him when he was looking at the weather. She was closer to him than he wondered if she actually meant to be, with her head curled up on the pillow that was directly besides thigh. Harry had to hold back from combing his fingers along her skin a couple of times after finding out that she liked to be petted. She was snoring even, these feathery little noises. The fact that she felt safe enough with him to fall asleep so deeply made something warm stir in his chest. Same with Muffy, snuggled all close to her, sweet and soft.
Harry thinks he’ll probably be spending a lot of time here in the following days.
“Oh, good, you took her to the vet,” Y/N whips her head around to see Harry, but he looks much different than he did during their first meeting. No dark clothes and black hoodie, no black mask, and no knife – at least none that she could see. He probably has it strapped to his ankle or something, “I was worried you’d just drop her off at a shelter or something. There are plenty of no-kill ones in the area, but you know, sweet kittens can get lost in the cracks there sometimes.”
When he reaches out to let the kitten sniff his hands, Y/N pulls the carrier closer to her, regarding him doubtfully, “What are you doing here?” She inquires, “You don’t have to follow me, I’m not going to tell.”
Harry’s brows raise, “Huh? I’m not following you. I was getting a tea,” he holds up the boba cup in his left hand, shaking it around, then reaches into his pocket and produces a punch card, with ten cups scribbled out, “I come here all the time, it’s my favorite. This was my 10th one, so the next time it’s free. You can ask Gladys, I’m her favorite customer.”
or
Y/N and Harry have the meet-ugly of the century
[WARNING: Harry lowkey has some stalker-ish tendencies, but he isn't being creepy for creep-sake, it's more so 'I need to make sure you don't ruin this very intense, long-standing operation' kind (and things concerning the cat). It's heavier in this part than it will be in the following parts. There are also references to kidnapping, though none actually happen in the fic, and mentions of violence. IF THIS IN ANYWAY MAKES YOU UNCOMFORTABLE, this may not be the fic to read!!]
(17.1k+ words)
i.
Y/N can see the breath in front of her mouth.
That’s all she can see right now, really. That’s all she can focus on, beyond the loud, almost obnoxious thudding that her heart echoes through her ears, bouncing off the membranes inside like a kettle drum. She hears that, her own staggered breathing, and then the resounding silence that can only manifest in times of pure panic. Like that time she honest to god thought a bear was in the backyard of their rented cabin (with a very unreliable door, that even a raccoon had managed to open with a little shove of its body – it turned out that it wasn’t a bear, but someone’s dog from a spot rented nearby, thankfully), or when she was driving in a thunderstorm so horrible that she could barely see the car in front of her beyond the sheets of rain (she was alone, of course, on her way to Niall’s and thinking that she could beat out the storm, but it turns out that when the weather app says rain in 20 minutes, it actually means 5).
Well, it just so happens that when an unknown assailant has her pinned against bricks with something sharp at her throat, her body has the same response. Her sympathetic nervous system is consistent, to say the least, and maybe a little confused about the difference between a thunderstorm and being kidnapped and potentially killed.
Her day had started like any other day. Y/N had woken up ten minutes before her first alarm, then rolled around beneath her covers until her second. She did her morning stretches, a New Year’s resolution imposed by Niall, who was convinced they could hold each other accountable (he stopped doing them a week in), then forced herself into a shower where the water was too on the side of too hot. The way it pelted at her skin felt like little pieces of lava raining from the sky – or what she assumed that felt like. She made half of breakfast because she was already running a bit late and wanted to stop by her favorite cafe on the way to work. The barista, whose name she did not know despite seeing him at least 2-3 times a week, already had her typed in, so she swiped her card and loitered around the pick-up counter until it was ready. She took the subway further into the city, which let her off just a block away from her office building.
Once she got to work, it was much the same as well. She clocked in, and her coworker Aki was usually around the time clock at the same point she was in the morning, so they’d walk in together. Y/N would get to her desk, and she’d set her coffee down on the table, and while she was organizing her stuff to set up shop for the day, Niall would pop his head over the top of her and Aki’s shared space. Only Y/N’s coffee is the only one that Niall plucks up from the desk and steals a drink from without asking (something that would typically send her over the edge, but she and Niall had been friends since UNI, had even lived together for a couple of semesters before he moved in with his boyfriend at the time, and what was hers, was his, and vice versa – he’d beaten that into her within the first month of knowing him).
She’s a part of the marketing team for a music company, and with an album release around the corner, their days were pretty busy. Enough so that when Niall grinned, asking her what she was wearing to her date tonight, she barely looked away from the screen to say, “What date?” And promptly get swatted in the shoulder for it, by Aki though, not Niall (he knew Y/N would hit him back 10x harder) “Hey –”
“You seriously did not forget your date!” Aki’s voice is relatively deep for how girly she looks with pink hair and an even pinker cardigan on, but it can get pretty shrill when she’s upset. “With the handsome guy Niall set you up with? The CEO of –”
“Oh, yeah, yeah, the pet food guy.” Y/N filled in.
“The CEO of the pet food brand,” Niall corrects, “You could be Miss. Yummy Bites Meow-edition, but tell me you brought something different to wear.”
Y/N pouted and looked down at her outfit – sure, maybe it wasn’t the best thing in the world, but it wasn’t horrible, “What’s wrong with what I’m wearing?”
“Are you planning on seducing a CEO in a sweater?” Aki inquired.
Her pout deepened, “It’s cashmere!” She told them, “Besides, I’m not looking to seduce anyone. This is more of a courtesy date since he’s Ni’s friend of a friend, or however this got set up. Bestie's rules say that I can’t make him look bad.”
“That is true,” Niall wrapped around the cubicle half wall, instead of leaning over it as he was, and pulling the stool Y/N used to set her feet up on from beneath her desk to sit, “Sweater or not, I want you to give him a chance, yeah? You were just complaining about not having anyone to cuddle during the winter.”
Y/N sighed and finally spun around from her computer, “I was drunk when I was whining about that, you know you’re supposed to take that with a grain of salt.”
“Drunk mind, sober truth,” Aki quoted, and Niall nodded his assent.
“So when Ni said he was open to tentacle porn after four tequila shots, he was telling the truth?”
“Hey, I was drunk, you can’t trust a thing I say.”
Y/N scoffed, then rumpled her lips, she sagged her shoulders, “Listen, I promise to give the pet store guy a chance, yeah? We’ll fall in love discussing kibble marketing tactics.”
“That’s the spirit!” Aki chirped, squeezing her knee, “There’s love in the air – I’m sensing your soulmate nearby!”
Even with the proposed date, the rest of Y/N’s day went by as it usually does. She went to meetings, she ate lunch with Niall and Aki, then got into an intense discussion regarding a Korean drama that Niall had never watched but liked to have invested opinions on. Y/N almost spilled the pasta she had on the cashmere sweater, but thankfully, it just hit her pants instead, and a stain remover pen works far better on wool-blended pants. The second half of the day is relatively quick, and Aki, who kept a mini flat iron in her purse at all times for her bangs, re-did Y/N’s hair in the bathroom.
By 6 PM, she was sitting in a restaurant with a glass of red wine in front of her. Every sip she took, her face pinched, because she hates wine, actually, but Niall said it would make her look more affluent and cultured or whatever. She thought it’d be better to try and get used to the taste now, while she waited for him to show, rather than trying to police her face in front of a stranger whom she was meant to be “wooing”.
They were supposed to meet at 6:15 PM, but Y/N showed up a bit earlier because she was closer. Y/N had tapped into the two-week-old message thread during lunch break to confirm dinner, because if she forgot, and she wasn’t a CEO, then she’s assuming he most likely forgot too. Surprisingly enough, he confirmed the time and the place, and said he was excited to meet her. She wondered if it was his secretary or personal assistant responding instead of him, because the exclamation points and general excitement seemed not that of a CEO. Maybe she was casting judgment before giving him a chance, though – maybe he would be a quirky guy. He runs a pet food company, and Y/N felt as though she shouldn’t expect a brooding, grumpy executive.
Y/N was open to being shocked by the guy.
If he ever showed up.
Because 6:15 turned into 6:30. And 6:30 turned into 7:00. And Y/N was two glasses of wine and about half a loaf of complimentary bread in before she accepts that she got stood up on a date that she didn’t even want to fucking go to. Y/N knew that her waiter knew, and her waiter definitely went to the back with the rest of the staff and spoke about the sad girl in booth 8 waiting for some prick that never showed. She took her check, sent Niall and Aki a very strongly worded message, and tried to walk out of the restaurant with her head held high, even though she definitely wanted to cry a little. She was embarrassed, above all things, and Y/N hated feeling like she was a part of a humiliation ritual. The only time she likes to be kind of humiliated is in bed, but that’s where she draws the line.
So, yeah, tears were beading at her eyes as she was shoving her arms through her puffy winter coat. She could feel her phone buzzing in her pocket, but she wasn’t in the mood to answer it. Y/N needed to get home, get in a hot bath, and roast in it seafood boil style, then eat her leftovers like she had intended to do from the start of the day. Now she was further from the subway than she’d like to be, and on top of that, it’s late now, in the middle of winter. There was a cold front coming in, too, one that was bad enough they’d been told to turn their faucets on and let them drip. The wind chill was bitter when it slapped her across the face – nearly as bitter as the wine she drank and the way she felt.
She was in the middle of pulling her gloves on when she heard a soft meow. Y/N picked her head up and looked around – there were a few people on the street, but not many. It wasn’t the weekend, and typically on Thursday nights, this part of town wasn’t that busy (even ritzy, wealthy people need to go home and get ready for bed at a suitable time during the weekday, it turns out). The meow is sad – it sounded like a cry, and Y/N frowned at the thought of a stray cat out in this weather. It was far too cold, and they weren’t nearly close enough to the animal shelter for it to scout out one of those heated huts they set up for the winter.
In retrospect, it was stupid of her to be lured into an alleyway because of a cat. Had she known that when she stepped into it with her phone’s flashlight lit up, she’d be yanked further in and placed in this particular predicament? Not at all. All she knew for sure, really, was that if she made it out of this alive, she was going to beat Niall’s ass (not Aki’s, though she held some blame in making her go – because she was well aware Aki could beat her ass).
“Don’t move,” the voice was low, right in her ear, and she felt the cold, sharp tip of a blade right against her throat, “If you do, you’ll get hurt, yeah? We don’t want that, do we?”
Y/N’s mouth runs dry, her heart is echoing in her ears, the visual of her breath ghosting in front of her is all she can see, “N-no,” she replied, her hands stiff at her sides, “I – you can have my wallet, it’s in my pocket, and –”
“I don’t want your money,” he cut her off, “Your little friend you were supposed to meet – you must have been tipped off, yeah? Told him not to show?” Y/N’s brows furrowed, “Who paid you?”
“Wh-what?” Y/N thinks that if this guy wasn’t holding her up, she’d probably fall out, “Nobody paid me, I was – I just got stood up –”
He scoffed, “Do you think I’m stupid?” He replied, “I’ve been following him for weeks, tracking his calls, his emails, his messages – the dumbass didn’t even use a burner. You have connections to Holland.”
“I don’t know who you’re talking about!” Y/N all but squeals, her voice raising, but when he shushes her, she feels the blade against her throat; she swallows hard – her neurons are misfiring, she’s certain of it. She is so overwhelmed, confused, and flushed with fear that she thinks she might pass out. Or that wine is going to make a reappearance on the concrete. Or she’s going to piss herself. Fuck, she doesn’t know. Is she seriously going to get murdered after being stood up? That’s like two messed-up things in one day, and totally not fair! Is this because she didn’t forward that chain mail when she was 11? This has something to do with that, she’s sure of it, because there’s no way that this just happened to her randomly.
Her phone buzzes in her pocket again, “I swear, I have no idea what you’re talking about,” she says, voice hushed but rushed, “I literally just work on a marketing team, and I got stood up for a date that my friend set up with some dickhead CEO! I don’t know a ‘Holland’, and I certainly did not tell him not to show up! I barely even know his name!”
A hand reaches into the pocket, her phone is buzzing, and when he holds the phone out in front of them, Niall’s stupid contact photo is on the screen (it’s him, cake smeared all over his face, grinning ear-to-ear after someone random at the bar smushed his head into it after he blew out his candles). “If this call is sketchy in any way,” he threatens, “I’ll kill you where you stand.”
The man behind her swipes the call to answer it, and never has Y/N been so happy with the fact that Niall immediately starts talking as soon as the call clicks over, “Baby, I’m so sorry! I’m seriously going to kick Oliver’s ass, he said this guy was super sweet. And to stand you up, of all people, you’re a catch! You should have been standing him up!” He sounds flustered, “I’m so sorry I made you go.”
She could scream, and holler, and tell Niall to call the cops, but she doesn’t really see what that would do for her right now. This guy could slice her up and be long gone before Niall even believed this wasn’t some elaborate joke to make him feel bad. The blade against her neck was a helpful reminder, too, that he had the upper hand in this situation.
“It’s fine, Ni, I’m just going to go home,” Y/N steels her voice, and tries not to sound like someone being held at knife point, “I’ll – call you when I get there.”
“You don’t want to stay on the phone? I know how much you hate the subway this late. I was kind of hoping he’d use his CEO money to get you an Uber, or like – I don’t know, buy you a car and profess his undying love or something.”
She swallows hard, “No, it’s fine, I just want to be alone with my thoughts for a little while.”
“I get it,” he agrees, “Mope away, baby, call me when you get home, okay? Don’t forget.”
They hang up the phone, and in that same instant, the knife is taken away from her. “Oh, wow, I’m so sorry.” The guy switches up so fast, Y/N nearly gets whiplash, and when she’s twisting to get a look at him, she sees a man with a mask over his mouth and a beanie. He does pull the mask down and pockets the knife – she guesses as a show of trust or something – she doesn’t know. She still feels frozen in her spot, “This is so embarrassing, let me make a quick phone call. Stay where you’re at, though, yeah?”
He pulls his phone from his pocket and dials someone. The guy keeps his gaze on her, and as her eyes finally adjust to the darkness, she can just barely make out his face with the scant amount of light oozing in from the street lamp. It casts shadows over his face – he looks normal. Not like someone who would pull a stranger into the alleyway and threaten them. And he looks incredibly apologetic, scratching at his chin, when the person on the other end answers.
The conversation is short, kind of coded, but Y/N listens when he says, “Yeah, well, I’m staring at the wrong woman right now. Mhm. Yeah – no, yeah, this is definitely bad. Of course I showed her my face, I feel horrible,” he frowned, nodding his head, “Well, yeah that’s a given. Uh-huh. Okay, I’ll tell her,” then he chuckles, “God, shut up, I know – I haven’t done something like this since I was a recruit. Nobody is going to let me hear the end of it.”
He clicks his phone, shuts it off with the pad of his gloved thumb, then slips his phone into his pocket, “Okay, so here’s the thing – I’m not going to hurt you, okay? But I also can’t just let you off into the night – if you go to the police, that kind of really puts a damper on everything, y’know? And this has been years in the making, and a lot of money riding on it, that will piss off some very important people if it gets screwed up.” He pointed to himself, “I don’t want that,” then he pointed to her, “And you definitely don’t want that. I guarantee it. So I’ll have to take you home, okay?”
She stared at him, trying to register everything he told her, and honestly, everything that had just happened in the last 10 minutes. He really didn’t phrase that like a question, so it seemed like what she answered wouldn’t matter either way. When her gaze warily drops down to where he pocketed the knife, he pulls it out of his pocket and delicately gives it an underhand toss across the alleyway. The sound of it clinks and twinkles as it hits the concrete, careening over to a stop against the bricks. “Here, I won’t bring it,” he tells her, then apologizes again, “I’m really sorry, this is so horrible, but – I mean, if you refuse, then I’m going to have to knock you out, and I really don’t want to do that either.”
“You had no problem holding a knife to my throat,” Y/N reminds him, and he holds his chest.
“Hey, that was different, I thought you were someone bad!” He defends himself, “Really, I’m a gentleman.”
She huffs a laugh, finally regaining some of the feeling in her legs, “Um, okay, I guess, I don’t really have a choice,” He nodded, and Y/N couldn’t tell if he mockingly felt bad for her, or if this was genuine, “Can I – can I ask two questions though, really quick?”
“Hm, depends on what they are. I can’t answer some of them.”
“What’s your name?”
He peers at her, squinting a little, “Y’know, I’d normally refuse that one, but it seems like you’ve had a rough night. And if you do go to the police, well – I’ll know, y’know?” No, she doesn’t know how he’d know, but she doesn’t really care to ask either, “And I’ll have time to get things in order, so I’ll be honest with you. My name is Harry. I won’t tell you the last name though,” he held out his hand, formally, to shake, “And your name isn’t Antonyia, I’m guessing? That’s who I thought you were.”
She tentatively takes his hand – she wouldn’t have, if not for the fact that she was wearing a glove too. Their gloved hands meet, and he shakes once, “I’m Y/N,” she replies, “How did you make such a realistic cat sound? Like – that’s the only reason I came in here.”
The man – Harry – blinks, then shakes his head, “Oh, that wasn’t me, that was just really lucky. Good thing you’re an animal lover,” God, is this guy for real? “I reckon there is a real cat in here –” he pointed deeper into the alleyway, “It was meowing the whole time, but I think you were scared, so you didn’t hear. Do you want me to go look? You can keep the flashlight on me to make sure I’m not doing anything weird.”
So Y/N does send him deeper into the alleyway, because she came in here to save a cat, and it almost cost her her life, and she would be saving the fucking cat at the very least. Y/N keeps the flashlight trained on him, watching as he clicks his tongue and calls for whatever cat might be hiding in the alleyway. It takes a while, but soon she hears a gasp, more little chirps, and meows, and then he’s crouching down. When he stands back up, he turns around and makes his way back – when he’s close enough, Y/N can see he’s got a tiny little thing in his arms, covered in mud, and shivering.
“Poor baby,” he sighs, “She’s freezing, isn’t she? And so stinky, ah – let’s get her home.”
“It’s a girl?” Y/N tilted her head, “How can you tell?”
“I can’t,” he answers truthfully, “It’s just a guess. Alright, so my car is kind of far, but –”
“Do you – I mean, do you mind if we take the subway instead?”
They do. Harry is kind enough (that’s funny to say) to allow her the small grace of them taking the subway, rather than Y/N really sealing a night of horrible choices by getting in a stranger’s car. Harry holds onto the cat the entire time and chats idly, as if they were old friends who had just bumped into each other. He talks about the weather, about the show that’s being promoted on the top of the subway, and about what he wants for breakfast tomorrow morning. At this point, Y/N is kind of dissociating, so she’s replying but not to her fullest, probably. He doesn’t seem to take any offense to it, though.
In the light, she can make out his features much better. His eyes are green, his brows are well-groomed, and even his face seems cleanly shaven. His skin looks smooth and soft, like someone who takes delicate care of it. His lips look smooth too, and glossy, and his cheekbones are high. He even has pretty cute dimples. Objectively, he’s handsome and quite pretty, but he was holding a knife to her throat no more than 30-ish minutes ago, so she is still wary. What must his job be, if that’s something he does? Did he work for the mafia? Or just some random gang? Honestly, with how he coos and talks sweetly to the kitten, she doesn’t see how he could be the type of person carrying around a knife at all, but she supposes she’s been wrong in her assessments before.
He walks her all the way up to her door, where he’s handing over the sodden, muddied kitten that had been a very good girl (boy?) during the entire venture home. Her eyes widened, “Oh, I can’t –”
“You’ll have to,” he replied decisively, carefully navigating her, “I have some stuff to take care of, since I messed up, haha.” Y/N takes the stinky, muddy kitten in her arms and tries not to think about getting these stains out of her coat and sweater. “Take good care of her, okay? I’ll keep in touch!”
Then he’s leaving, relatively leisurely for someone who said they had things to take care of. And Y/N is left, holding the dirty kitten, wondering what the hell just happened, because what the fuck.
What the fuck!
. . .
Y/N stayed up far too late for someone who needed to be at work this morning. Could you blame her, though? She’d first been humiliated, then went through something incredibly traumatic, and on top of that, had a scared, shivering, starving, and dirty little kitten in her arms. If she had gone to bed at an appropriate time after that, then she’d probably need to be checked in somewhere for a mental exam to make sure she was processing things adequately.
After Harry left her, she decided to focus all of her attention on the baby that he’d left her with. The kitten doesn’t move around much, which yanks at her heart – she was probably so cold and hungry, Y/N needed to figure something out quickly. So she uses her phone to order a variety of cat-related goods, and what started as just essentials turns into treats, toys, and a warming cat bed. It was scheduled to arrive in 30-ish minutes, since she lives pretty close to a pet store, and the delivery drivers are always making laps around the area (she lives close to several grocery stores, too). She makes a mental note to make a vet appointment for tomorrow after work, but before that, she needs to get the dirt and grime off of this stinky kitten.
The bath goes better than she’d expected, but again, it makes her heart hurt that the tiny baby is probably most likely so exhausted and hungry that she has little fight left to give. She puts one of her towels in the warmer that Niall sent her the link to three months ago (that had changed her showering life entirely), and fills her sink with warm, sudsy, shampoo-y water. She scrubbed her carefully, gently, stripping her of the dirt and grime. She drained and replaced the water three separate times before it stopped getting murky as she massaged her newly revealed, gray fur.
She was fluffy and puffy when Y/N dried her with a washcloth at first, getting the majority of the dripping water off of her before she carefully wrapped her in the warm towel. Y/N placed her carefully in the cradle of her lap, then sat in front of the space heater. There was a little rumble at first, which Y/N almost mistook for the heater, but then she felt the lump of towel with a cat head sticking out of it purring, and her heart did another little twitch. The poor thing was so cold and lonely out there, she wanted to cry thinking about it.
Harry had pretty confidently suggested that she should be close to 8 weeks, and Y/N had asked how he knew that before he launched into a whole thing about their eyes, their mobility, how much weight they should be gaining in a month, etc, etc. To be honest, she’d only been half listening, because she was borderline dissociating the whole trip back to her flat, wondering if she’d actually just drunk too much wine and passed out waiting for her date rather than nearly getting kidnapped.
As Y/N set up the litter box, the food and water bowls, and the warm bed, she had decided for sure that she wouldn’t be going to the police about this. Harry’s vague threat was enough to scare her, that’s for sure, and even though he seems like he feels bad, she’s certain he would be comfortable killing if it meant keeping him out of jail. Niall and Aki wouldn’t be hearing about it either, at least not until she knows more about this, or until all of this blows over and a few months (or years) pass, and she’s confident Harry doesn’t have her chipped somewhere. Plus, both of them are such big mouths (she says this endearingly), there was no way they could keep it a secret.
So what happened tonight was between Y/N, the kitten, and Harry. Those would be the only three who knew anything about anything that was going on. Which was alright; Y/N was kind of banking on stuffing this back in the recesses of her mind so she doesn’t get weird about having to pass alleyways or go out on dates that could lead to being stood up.
“It was just a weird, one-time thing,” Y/N was speaking to herself, but also the kitten, who had just eaten some wet food, drank water, and let Y/N place her in the warm cat bed that she placed on her bedside table (she moved her lamp out of the way for now – she just wanted to keep an eye on her, and it was big enough that she wouldn’t fall right off if she rolled around at all), “I was in the wrong place at the wrong time. Harry will probably low-key stalk me for a while, realize that I’m not going to say anything, and then leave us alone. Right, kitty?”
That’s what she expected, at least. The following day, Y/N left the kitten in her bathroom with all of the trinkets she bought for her, along with her food, water, and litter box. On the way into work, she scheduled the vet appointment and, thankfully, got in at a good time with her story. Niall meets her at the time clock today, with an extra coffee in hand, and a bag of a pastry dangling out of his mouth. When Y/N grabs it from him so he can talk, he immediately launches into 1000 apologies and threats towards the guy who stood her up.
“Seriously, I’ll put a hit out on him.” Niall unintentionally makes a mockery of her current situation, and the irony of it is almost funny enough that she wants to reveal everything that happened. “What a prick! I tore into Ricky about setting you up with such an asshole.”
Y/N sighed, “You didn’t have to do that, Ni,” she shook her head, “It’s whatever, you know, some people are just stupid. Maybe he just changed his mind and was too embarrassed to cancel.”
“What he should be embarrassed about is his fuck ass CEO position at a pet food company.”
“Weren’t you just hyping him up yesterday for that?”
Niall turned his nose up, “That’s before we found out he was a major dick,” he slid closer to her, so that as they walked, their arms touched. Niall was a touchy-feely guy in general, but it is exacerbated tenfold when he feels bad or guilty about something. She already wasn’t going to tell him about Harry, but if she had been planning to, all of that was thwarted by the way he slid her favorite order in her palm and used his freehand to scratch gently at the nape of her neck. He feels horrible already; if she let him know that she had almost been mistakenly kidnapped and killed, she thinks he’d lose his mind.
“Really, don’t worry about it, okay? I’m okay. I was sad last night, but I’m just –” I’m honestly, happy to be alive – “ – fine, yeah?”
“Okay,” he pouts his mouth, “But if you want to talk about it, you know I’m here, right? Aki too – I had to tell her so she didn’t say something stupid.”
Aki appears suddenly beside them, “I’ve never said a stupid thing a day in my life,” she rebuts, then reaches in to squeeze Y/N’s side, “You know every Baddie has to get stood up at least once or twice? It builds character and makes you extra hot – I read that somewhere, like a Seventeen article or something.”
“Do they even print that anymore?” Niall inquires, still rubbing at the back of Y/N’s neck – she likes it, so she doesn’t tell him to stop – plus, if she got too weird about her neck, he might inspect a little closer and notice the little cut on her skin. She’d already come up with the elaborate ploy to blame it on the kitten and her clunky, clumsy use of her nails.
The rest of her morning is relatively normal. She sets up at her desk, reveals to Aki and subsequently Niall (who at this point should just shack up in a desk near theirs, because he’s over there more than he’s at his own space already) that she had found a kitten after being stood up the night prior, and both gasp. Obviously, they want to come meet her, but Y/N tells them she needs to make sure she’s up to date on her shots and more comfortable before they do. She does show them pictures, though, and they coo and awe at her phone loud enough that their floor manager also comes to look.
They eventually have to work. Y/N answers emails and coordinates dates for different record stores to release an album's special vinyl edition. She worries her lip between her teeth when she starts thinking too much about what happened last night, then shoves it to the back of her head when she decides to focus on the new addition to her flat waiting for her at home. Actually, anytime the flutter of Harry tries to tiptoe back into her head, she swats him like a fly out of it. Imagining a miniature version of the man she met last night flying away from her head after being hit by the miniature guard version of her that patrols her brain – makes her giggle, at least.
It’s around lunchtime that the front desk receptionist shows up at Y/N’s cubicle before she has the chance to flee with Niall and Aki to the cafe down the road. In her hands is a huge bouquet of wildflowers, an assortment of pinks, purples, and periwinkle blues. “These came for you!” She grinned at Y/N, clearly giddied by flowers sent, “I didn’t know you were dating anyone!”
“Oh, I’m not,” Y/N’s brows raised, taking the bouquet by the glass vase, “Ah? Are you sure it’s mine?”
“Positive,” she replied as she started walking away, the front desk phone ringing. “They were sent for you by first and last name.”
Y/N spots a card in the midst of the flowers, nestled between what looks like lavender, and she plucks it from the center. On one side is her name, and on the other is a little note.
Sorry again about last night ( • ᴗ - ) ✧ - H
Her eyes widen as she reads over it, before she quickly stuffs it inside her work bag hanging open at her feet. Thankfully, Aki was in the bathroom, and Niall’s nosy ass was just far enough that she could get away with it before he made it to her desk. It would be too difficult to backpedal and try to explain the card when she’s pretty sure the guy she was supposed to meet did not have a name that began with H. Not only that, the wording suggests that they had spoken with each other and he’d already apologized, which he hadn’t (asshole), and Aki and Niall both already know that. Clearly, Harry doesn’t care if she seems like a liar whose story isn’t straight in front of her friends – that or he’s trying to test her.
“Holy fuck, look at the size of that!” Niall exclaims, dangling over the side of her cubicle again, and Aki lets out her own gasp when she comes back, letting her fingers touch and graze different parts of the plant, “I guess dickhead thought this was going to fix it all, hm? Did he leave a card?”
Y/N shook her head, keeping her gaze locked on the flowers as if she were marveling at them, only because she knew Niall could scan her face and read her lie in 3 seconds flat. “No, this is crazy,” she murmured, because, objectively, it was. To Niall and Aki, it would make sense how the CEO of the pet food guy would know where she worked, because he was Niall’s friend of a friend, and Niall’s friend would have an idea where Niall worked. But to Y/N, who knows that it was the guy who had just pressed a knife to her throat the night prior – she knew there was no way for him to know without him having done something creepy. Whether it was somehow look into her, on whatever weird, fucked up software hitmen have, or he followed her this morning. Both were equally horrible, she feels.
The logical part of her brain told her that he’d basically told her he was going to do this the night before. He literally said I’ll keep in touch – she just hadn’t thought it’d be in the form of apology flowers. Or, well, threatening flowers. She isn’t sure – she couldn’t get a read on that guy at all! Part of her could see where this was a thinly veiled threat disguised as a flowery, spring-y gift, like a ‘See, I know where you work, so you better keep your mouth shut,’ kind of thing. But the other part of her could imagine that, as weirdly apologetic and helpful as he was after the fact, these were a genuine peace offering. She couldn’t decide. How quickly he switched up his attitude once he realized she wasn’t the woman he was after made it hard to tell what kind of person he was. Did he have split personalities? Maybe you had to, to do the work that he does. If she could even tell what that work was – she’s really just guessing.
And what was up with the emoji after?
“Guys always think flowers are going to make up for their shitty disposition,” Aki clicks her tongue, taking the vase out of Y/N’s hand, and setting it on their shared space in between them, “But we needed some garnish for our desk, it’s been looking extra depressing lately. You know, we should really look into decorating it all cutesy.”
“Please do, I reckon we could really liven it up with your Hentai collection.”
Aki rolls her eyes, “I think you mean your Hentai collection, you fucking perv.”
Y/N is thankful for her friend’s varying levels of attention deficits that get the heat off her quicker. The back of her neck feels hot, and she feels a curl in her stomach – it feels wrong to lie to them, but it felt like she didn’t have much of a choice. It was either that or Harry would probably kill her, so she’s sure that they would understand if it came down to it. The note that he sent is burning a hole through her bag; she can practically feel it radiating heat. Her fingers itch to grab it, but what would it matter if she did? Rereading it wouldn’t help – it’s not like there would be some clue or something.
She needs to view it as a weird, hybrid apology/threat and go about her day.
So that’s what she does. The rest of her day is as normal as the first half had been before lunch, and her boss lets her leave a little early for the vet appointment. She beats the evening rush of people going home on the subway, then makes it to her flat in record time, all without being accosted by some random criminal. The kitten is happy to see her, chirping and meowing loudly when she opens the door to greet her. Last night, she had purchased a small, collapsible crate, and she coaxed the kitten inside it with treats, then stuffed Y/N’s winter scarf inside so that she could smell it.
The vet went well – better than she thought for a stray kitty. Y/N finds out that she is, in fact, a girl. They did a flea check, and there were none, thank god, because Y/N had not considered that a possibility when she let her sleep beside her bed. Preventative dewormers, a broad-spectrum antibiotic for what they told her was a respiratory infection, an ointment for her left eye that was looking red during the exam, a vaccine schedule for the coming months, and a day to be spayed. They also give her an idea of what sort of food would be best for her, concerning her age and other factors. Y/N appreciates that they aren’t trying to force her into purchasing the food they have at the counter. There’s also a new patient sign-on bonus and a discount for stray care (since they require more interventions than a run-of-the-mill adoption, but they want to encourage people to help strays on the street).
Leaving the vet, Y/N felt a lot better about the situation. She was going to stop at the pet store again, to get the food they suggested, though she was starting to panic about how she was going to carry all of this home. Y/N had the (now) sleeping cat in the crate, a bag full of meds, and the thought of adding a huge thing of food to that seems just horrific.
Whether by the grace of the universe or as another slap to her face, she hears an all too familiar voice.
“Oh, good, you took her to the vet,” Y/N whips her head around to see Harry, but he looks much different than he did during their first meeting. No dark clothes and black hoodie, no black mask, and no knife – at least none that she could see. He probably has it strapped to his ankle or something, “I was worried you’d just drop her off at a shelter or something. There are plenty of no-kill ones in the area, but you know, sweet kittens can get lost in the cracks there sometimes.”
When he reaches out to let the kitten sniff his hands, Y/N pulls the carrier closer to her, regarding him doubtfully, “What are you doing here?” She inquires, “You don’t have to follow me, I’m not going to tell.”
Harry’s brows raise, “Huh? I’m not following you. I was getting a tea,” he holds up the boba cup in his left hand, shaking it around, then reaches into his pocket and produces a punch card, with ten cups scribbled out, “I come here all the time, it’s my favorite. This was my 10th one, so the next time it’s free. You can ask Gladys, I’m her favorite customer.”
She relaxes a little – there’s something about Harry that is very convincing. . .she doesn’t know. Maybe it’s a part of his job to be convincing, whatever his specific job title is. He seems so unsuspecting and normal right now, Y/N is starting to wonder if she’d hallucinated the whole attempted kidnapping and knife to throat part. How could this guy, who is in a white shirt with a lamb on it, a zipped-up windbreaker, and athletic shorts, be the same person she’d met last night? He’s got sunglasses pressing his hair up and out of his face, and in this light, his eyes are very green. Really, the only suspicious-looking thing about him was the fact that he had a small bag strapped across his body, which really could be holding anything. It was decorated with pins and keychains, though. Would someone really keep something nefarious in a bag that had a patchwork cat with big button eyes dangling off the side of it?
“Oh,” she replied, “Well, after the flowers I just thought – I don’t know.”
“The flowers,” Harry repeated, tilting his head, “You didn’t like them? But you had wildflowers on your doormat?”
She blinked, “No, I liked them! They were pretty, but I just thought you sending them to my job was like a threat or something.”
His eyes went wide again, “A threat? Jeez, you are very distrusting. Which is wise, sure, but you should be just a little more trusting sometimes, your life would be much more lax.” It was a crazy thing to say, all things considered, but he continued as if he didn’t realize how stupid what he just said was, “Your hands are kind of full? Do you need help?”
Would it be stupid to agree to this? Of course it would – this man is probably dangerous! He is dangerous, and she doesn’t know the extent of what he could do or to whom he does it. But it’s like. . .he already knows where she lives. And the thought of lugging a 6kg bag of food around, plus her work bag, plus the cat, and all her meds. . .it just seems like a lot, really. She also thinks that if he was going to actually hurt her, he would’ve done it in the dark alleyway that he found her in, and not in broad daylight outside of a boba place and an animal clinic.
“Actually, would you help me carry this home? I need to stop at the pet store and get food for her. They think she should be on a semi-special diet – one for sensitive tummies.”
He easily took the crate from her hands, fixing his fingers around the straps at the top, “Ahh, I see – they probably put her on a lot of meds, right? Sometimes those antibiotics can be really harsh on the stomach.”
“Yeah,” she told him as they started walking – the pet store wasn’t very far, and she’d really prefer not to walk in silence, honestly, it’d give her way too much time to think. And right now she can’t really think, or she’ll overthink, so she just talks – maybe she’d even be able to get some information out of him. Not that she really needs anything. She doesn’t want to be involved, but she’d just like to know how involved he’s actually going to be with her, so that it could settle her mind. “Um, do you know a lot about cats?”
Harry turns and looks at her with a smile, nodding, “I foster them from time-to-time,” he explains, “Every couple of months. But then I get attached. They’re usually medically complex, so they need a lot of time and attention and love, and when work gets busy, I’m unable to provide all they need, so I don’t adopt them officially, even though I really want to.”
“Oh, that. . .was not what I was expecting,” Y/N thought he’d admit to growing up with a cat or something – maybe saving a stray once a long time ago, or knowing a friend of a friend who did. She guesses it makes sense, though, how comfortably he’d been cradling the kitten to his chest the night before. And she was surprised to find that there were fluctuations in his work, but this at least gave her an opening to ask, “So, I’m not trying to be nosy or anything, but what is it that you do, exactly?”
Harry hums low, tucks the straw into the corner of his mouth, and takes a drink. It doesn’t seem like he’s stalling, though. “Well, officially, and as far as the government and my family are concerned, I work remotely as a financial advisor for some of the wealthier people in the area. I got my degree in finance with an emphasis on business administration.”
Y/N slides her work back from her left shoulder to her right, rolling out the tension that had started to form from having it hooked and heavy over her arm for so long, “And unofficially?” She prompts, and the corner of Harry’s lips twitches in something of a soft smile.
“Ah, there really isn’t a name for that.” He tells her, “Just some part-time stuff.”
She blinks at him, “I guess I was just wondering how much this part-time stuff was going to involve like. . .like watching me, or whatever.” Y/N gently prods, “I understand why you have to, I guess, but just – like knowing what you’re doing and when you’re doing it would make me feel a little better about it all. At least I think it will.”
Harry is quiet for a moment, like he’s contemplating his response. Finally, it seems like he’s having an appropriate response to the situation, though his gentle and overall flippant, calm, and otherwise friendly attitude has kept her calmer than she thinks she would have been otherwise. There’s something about him that is just. . .it makes her let her guard down, a little – she can feel it. Y/N doesn’t even know if she’d have felt comfortable enough to let the CEO come with her to the petstore, yet here she is with this stranger. A stranger, who was probably far more threatening than he let on.
“Again, I’m telling you a lot here,” he finally began, “Only because I feel so bad for what happened last night. The fact that you got stood up and got mixed up in shitty, rich people bullshit. I just have to track you for a little while; it would make the people I work for feel a lot better, and I’d rather it be me than them sending someone else. Especially since I’m the one who got you involved in all of this.” He waves his hands around, motioning like he was referring to the bigger picture, but ends up bopping the kitten around a bit in her crate, “So, full disclosure: I’m tracking calls and texts, and I know when you leave your flat and where you’re going! Otherwise, I’m leaving you be.” He smiles like it’s something to be proud of, and something that she should appreciate. “Today, though, I really wasn’t following you. I’d already been getting my tea when you showed up, and I wanted to greet you to check-in. If I were really following you and didn’t want you to know, then you wouldn’t.”
That was an unsettling note to end it on, for sure, “I – uh. . .I appreciate the honesty,” she nods, swallowing.
Harry sighs, almost comically, dragging a thumb across his brow, “Ah, you’re so understanding! I’m glad we got that settled; it was kind of eating away at me, too,” he replied, “Anyway, I’d suggest staying away from that CEO; he’s under a lot of scrutiny right now, by a lot of angry rich men – definitely not the place to be. I’m one of the kinder options of my colleagues, so it would be a shame if someone else mistook you for Antonyia.” He tucked his cup between his bicep and chest before using his newly free hand to squeeze her shoulder, and Y/N tenses under the grip but doesn’t pull away. “Anyway, what are you going to name her?”
“Pardon?” Y/N’s head is reeling, her thoughts tied up in disjointed knots.
“The baby?” Harry holds up the crate, “Her name? Have you given it any thought?”
Y/N finally registered what he was asking her and shook her head, “Ah, no, I haven’t,” she answered honestly, “I’ve just been so focused on getting her settled that a name has completely slipped from my mind.”
A gentle hum leaves Harry, almost sounding like a purr himself, but then she realizes the kitten is purring in her crate, and when Y/N peers through the side window, she sees her kneading the scarf she has in there. Her heart felt soft as Harry spoke, “Let’s name her Muffy.”
“Muffy?” Y/N tilted her head, “Do you mean Miffy? Like the rabbit.”
“No, silly, I mean Muffy. Like a Muffy.”
The kitten stretches up to the little window and presses the soft, new skin of toe beans up against the wall. They had somehow stayed so soft, even after her rough life on the streets, and Y/N thinks that’s nice. Really, the only indication that she had been in an alleyway the night before was the small tear in the thin skin of her ear. Her big eyes either plead with her to not name her Muffy or to keep the name Muffy – she really doesn’t know.
“Okay,” Y/N agreed, “Muffy it is.”
“Yay! Muff for short,” he smiled, “And when she hops off the bed during midnight zoomies, we can call it Muff Diving.”
Y/N doesn’t know who this “we” is, but she lets it go as they walk into the pet store.
It was interesting. Harry suggested a cart because, allegedly, they couldn’t just come here to get pet food and nothing else. He was telling her all of the things that she needed with the bag of food. More toys that are “mentally stimulating”, a small cat treat, scratchers for her nails, a special brand of shampoo, and conditioner. He loads her cart, all while talking her ear off about how important every one of these items is to ensure success for Muffy’s life. Y/N has no choice but to believe him, all things considered – he did allegedly foster cats and seemed pretty knowledgeable about it all. And since he would be there to help carry, she was okay with it. The only slightly off-putting thing he said the whole trip was when they were near the beds and he murmured, “You’ve already got one of those, so we’re good here.” Which meant – yeah, for sure, he was somehow in her phone – but she tries not to think about that.
He carries all the heavy things while she carries the kitten and the lesser full bags. Harry doesn’t complain, and she thinks that if his jacket were off, his biceps would be bulging out of his sleeves. They felt big last night when they were wrapped around her at least, and she was, for the most part, immobile. He barely breaks a sweat on the entire walk to her car, or when they discover the elevator is down and have to trek up the stairwell.
Once they get to her flat, he politely turns his head when she punches the code into her keypad and then only steps inside the very front door to set the things on the floor.
“Ah, thanks for letting me tag along,” he smiles, as if he’d asked to go, “Anyway, I’ve got somewhere to be like –” he checks his watch, “30 minutes ago. Do you mind if I set a camera up outside your door?”
“Um, a little?”
Harry gives a nod, “You’re right. Okay, bye!”
Y/N unzips Muffy, who ambles out of her carrier and then stares at Y/N with eyes that could only suggest Hey, what the hell is up with that guy?
“I don’t know, Muffy,” she clicks her tongue, “Let's get you fed.”
. . .
The coming weeks were uneventful.
Work was busy as ever, but that’s to be expected. As the rollout for one album progressed, they started the beginnings of marketing for another, so the team was divided in half, heavying the workload on both ends. Their days were so jam-packed with meetings, calls, creating playlists that include new singles, and promotion of an upcoming tour – that Niall could only stop by Y/N and Aki’s desk 30 times, which is far less than his typical 93 a day. Everyone is a little miserable, but their trio especially, because they have been afforded no time to be even a little silly. Aki, every so often, will take one of her hair clips off her head and scrape it against Y/N’s scalp to clip it, which offers three giggles before they are reduced to silence again. Y/N has been halfway arguing with the production team of a talk show to briefly mention the album, because there are two separate covers, and for some reason they are stuck on the risque one being too much for TV (“Which is why you would use the single’s album artwork, as discussed in the prior email.”).
So, yeah, work sucks, but it shoves all of what happened last month to the back of her head like a distant memory. The only proof that it had occurred was Muffy toddling around her flat, now done with her antibiotics and becoming more and more comfortable with the space (Y/N has even taken to letting her roam around the flat in her absence rather than shutting her away in the bathroom when she’s at work). Otherwise, she hadn’t heard from Harry or seen him, which she doesn’t know if it’s a good thing or a bad thing. He had told her that she wouldn’t know if he was following her or not, which she thought would make her more nervous, but it turns out she really doesn’t care. It’s not even like she feels prickles on the back of her neck or anything. Either Harry is really sneaky, or he’s too busy to be following her at all.
Even the little scar on her neck had since faded, replaced by many scars on her hands and thighs from someone who isn’t in the best control of their claws yet (her name rhymed with Tuffy). The flowers he’d sent had withered and wilted, so Aki threw them out, and the card he’d sent with them, Y/N, had tucked somewhere on her desk at home, so it was surely lost. It really did seem like just a bad dream. Or a very vivid, wine-induced hallucination.
On a Friday, she, Niall, and Aki go for drinks. They needed it, for sure; their clock-out time is typically 5 PM, but the three of them ended up staying until closer to 7, merely because they’re good friends and excellent coworkers. Y/N and Aki were pretty much finished up with their end of the marketing for the newly released album, but the other project that Niall’s team got placed on was still in the working phases, and at its most difficult when promoting the single of a relatively new artist. It was always a little harder to get different ads and influencers on board advertising someone that they weren’t familiar with. However, Niall was in luck to have two friends deeply invested in social media, who knew that someone making a really good edit to a song was a sure-fire way to get people interested. So long as they had a clip of it that they could utilize.
Still, contacting the artist’s team to get a clip of the song takes time, explaining their thought process takes time, and then hoping that whatever college student is pouring their heart and soul into editing their favorite celebrities in high definition is willing to bite. They eat there, ordering takeout for themselves and the janitorial staff on their floor that stays late. Niall, who had been in desperate need of physical contact for the past couple of weeks, was practically glued to her and Aki at every move they made. At some point, he was practically in Y/N’s lap while she was on the phone because he knew that she couldn’t tell him to shove off.
The extra time together hadn’t been enough, she guesses, because all of them are game to go out afterward. Especially when Niall tells them that the bar closest to them has half-priced drinks until 10 PM.
Y/N is about two drinks in (and two drinks short of being ready to have this happen) when her phone buzzes on the table in front of them. She sees that it’s a text from the contact STUPID DUMB FUCKING PET FOOD GUY (it used to just be ‘pet food guy’, but after that night, she’d changed it in a fit of rage), and her heart drops to her stomach.
I’m so sorry about the other night. Something came up that I had to take care of, and time got away from me.
I should have messaged you, though, sooner, but I was embarrassed.
Would you let me make it up to you? Are you free sometime next week?
“Who’s messaging you?” Aki hooks her chin over Y/N’s shoulder, squinting (she desperately needs to renew her contact prescription but refuses) at her screen, which garners Niall’s attention, who also leans into Y/N’s space, “Oh, you have got to be kidding me.”
Niall’s brows furrowed, “Is he joking? That was literally last month! That’s so obnoxious. Give me the phone so I can call him a dumb fuck.”
“I’m. . .wow. That’s – wow. Men actually might be the stupidest things to walk this planet.” Y/N blinks at her phone, “I’m going to turn my read receipts on, so he sees I saw it.”
Aki and Niall are nodding, “Yes, yes,” they agreed, then Aki goes on to say, “C’mon, Ni, let's get her more drinks. We’re getting you more drinks and a basket of fries.”
“Why do I have to go?”
“Because we’re putting it on your tab, babe.”
Y/N is left at the table, angrily putting her read receipts on. It’s so stupid, honestly, because he was indirectly responsible for her almost getting killed and halfway getting stalked over it! He was also indirectly responsible for Muffy, which pisses her off, because she refuses to give him credit for anything good in her life. And her sweet little Muffy is the light of her life.
Her phone buzzes again, and she suspects that it’s the CEO (what was his real name again?), but it’s an unknown number. Y/N’s brows dip, and now she’s squinting at her screen in a similar way to Aki.
Wow, what a douchebag.
Do you want me to block him for you? I can sign him up for the church of Scientology while I’m at it.
Y/N has a feeling deep in her loins that this is Harry. He had told her that he was inside of her phone – honestly, he’s probably the most honest man in her life next to Niall, and she’s only met him twice in person. Honestly, Y/N should probably be more worked up about that, but at this point, she’s more worked up about this guy thinking he could message her a month after the fact, and she would answer him and go out. What the hell does he even want to do with her anyway? It’s not like she’s a model, a millionaire, and he’s got no indication whether or not she has a good personality – so what would possess him to message her?
She could ignore Harry’s message, but she doesn’t. Y/N lets her fingers slide across the keyboard while Aki and Niall are busy, because as much as she loves them, they are very nosy and in her business, so they’re always reading over her shoulder. Y/N’s lucky his message was sent when it did rather than when they were still over here, because she has no idea how she would have explained that.
Hahahahaha, I know right, he’s a fucking prick
I’ll block him later. I sort of want to see if he explains himself
The Scientology thing would be cool tho
Harry hearts the message. Y/N clicks out of the thread just as Aki and Niall are returning, and Aki already has a fry tucked between her teeth, “Baby, they gave us two baskets!” She cheers at her, sliding them onto the table, “Has he messaged anymore? We saw you on your phone.”
Y/N shook her head, “No, I was just on Twitter,” she lied, a little bit of guilt welling in her belly. She really didn’t like lying to them, but she has to move on. “Should we eat these and then go dance? My bones feel jittery, like they need to move.”
“Oh my god, yes,” Aki breathes a sigh through his nose, “That sounds beautiful. Do you think the DJ takes requests? I’ve always wanted to close my eyes and exist in the same sphere as Charlie XCX blasting since BRAT summer.”
“You’re in luck, it’s a jukebox, not a DJ – we need to download the app though.”
Y/N is still able to have fun – that isn’t a hard feat with the two she’s with, that’s for sure, but there’s still something niggling at the back of her head. She just can’t brush it off. How weird it is that he’d choose now to send her a message? Was he really just that stupid? Had he forgotten about her entirely, and then the guilt of it clawed at the back of his throat? She really didn’t think he even knew her enough to feel guilty about it, if she’s honest. It was just weird is all. Like an ex that messages you when they sense your emotional stability is a little too well-balanced.
Harry must think it’s odd, too, for him to message her. He’s weird, sure, and she hadn’t heard from him for about a month either, but had he suspected this was her involvement in something greater, Y/N doesn’t think he would have messaged her. He would have let her respond and seen how the conversation went, then probably do away with her for lying to him if it seemed in any way sketchy. Though at this point, Y/N thinks Harry could be fairly confident she had nothing to do with anything that he initially thought. She also thinks he could be pretty certain she wasn’t going to go to the police about this, either, at this point.
Y/N was content on pretending that all of it never happened, and gaslighting herself into believing that she’d found Muffy in a completely normal, sane, work-friendly story way.
They actually don’t stay out very late. By the time they’re leaving, Y/N and Aki had sobered up a fair amount, but Niall was about ten sheets to the wind. It sucks, because those two take a different subway than she does to her home stop, and she really didn’t want to go alone. But she didn’t want to leave Muffy home alone for the night just yet, and already felt like she was damaging the poor cat’s psyche by not coming home the time she usually does. And as fun as it was to wrestle a still ready to party Niall out of his outside clothes and into bed, she desperately wanted to be submerged in the bathtub and then snuggled in her bed. She’d just washed her sheets last night, so they were still fresh and smelling like fabric softener.
Everything was okay until she and the others actually had to split ways. Then, when Y/N was on a subway car by herself (save for a handful of other strangers surrounding her, all various states of disarray, from just about to start their night to clearly ending it), she starts to get paranoid. She really does not like taking the subway by herself, but it’s either a well-lit underground cart or she’s trekking more than 5km home alone in the dark. And Y/N would rather take her chances with a couple of drug-induced waves of hysteria surrounded by equally dumbfounded strangers.
Even after getting off the subway, she has a couple of blocks to walk before she’s at her flat building. Fridays were typically busier, but she still didn’t live in the most exciting part of town, so even being busy was a little too empty for her liking. The click of her shoes against the pavement echoes hauntingly, and the sound of her breath is too loud. She can hear the rapid thud of her heartbeat. It’s a little too similar to last month, when all of this started, only it was much warmer in the night than it had been then. She doesn’t see the smoky plumes of her breath in front of her mouth this time, but she still curls her arms around her upper half anyway.
Her phone is fixed in a tight grip. She would call Aki, but she knows they’re still in the subway and the service is shit on their route. Y/N swallows thickly and looks back behind her, wondering why her city didn’t seem to believe in an obscene amount of street lights and advertisements with huge, bright LED lettering. It would make her feel a lot better about traveling.
Y/N keeps looking behind her, though, and when she spots someone a few meters behind her, her heart starts racing faster. She doesn’t know if he has anything to do with anything, but her brain has convinced her that he totally does. And he isn’t the same frame or stature as what she remembered Harry was, even when most of his body was hidden in all his bulky clothes. This guy wears a similar black hoodie and hat, from what she can tell. She swallows hard again, dragging her gaze ahead of herself again. She passes a couple leaning against the brick of a closed bakery, sharing a cigarette whose scent burns its way through her nose. Y/N could have stopped with them, pretended to bum a smoke off them, and see if the mysterious, cloaked in a black hoodie figure, kept moving along, but she decided against it. What if it is one of Harry’s deranged coworkers, and she gets two innocent strangers involved in her mess? Then she’d be no better than the dick fuck that got her interwoven in it.
Clutching her phone, Y/N doesn’t spare too many thoughts about what she does next. The idea of it had popped into her head as soon as she was feeling paranoid, but it also seemed kind of crazy to do. It’s not like she could entirely trust him, either, but for whatever reason, her chances felt better with him rather than the guy behind her, all things considered. The glass on her screen has condensation from her sweaty palm as she clicks on her message thread and finds where Harry had sent her the text, right at the top. She has no clue if this is his actual number or not, but she clicks it anyway, lets it take her to the contact screen, and presses the phone icon to call.
It rings twice before it clicks over, Harry’s voice low and a little syrupy, “Hello?” He sounded groggy, almost – had he been asleep? Y/N twists around to look behind her again, and the stranger is not holding a phone to his ear and muffling his voice at all. Both hands are still in their pocket, suspiciously, “Y/N? What’s wrong?”
“One of your colleagues wouldn’t happen to be following me, right?” Y/N cut right to it, feeling like there was no time to beat around the bush, “Like, do you guys have a standard uniform of black hoodie, black beanie, or was that just a you thing?”
Harry makes a noise in his throat, “I only wore that because I wanted to completely disappear into the alleyway. Otherwise, wearing all black like that can be more suspicious than anything.” Y/N thinks she can hear the sound of a mattress on the other end, or maybe a sofa. Something settling beneath the shift of weight, definitely, “As far as I’m concerned, nobody should be following you at all. I’m assigned to you as of now, since it was my fault you got involved. The others thought it’d be better to pay you off or do away with you at first, but I convinced them otherwise.”
Her stomach turns, “Yeah, well, I don’t know if I’m being paranoid or if someone is actually following me, but I’m feeling –” scared, “--annoyed. Like, if someone is following me right now, that’s so annoying.”
“Where are you? I’ll come get you.”
“No, it’s fine, I just – will you just stay on the phone for a second? Until I know whether or not this is something to be panicking over?”
Harry hums, softly, “Yes, of course,” he replies, “I’ll stay on with you until you get home, yeah?”
She’s quiet for a second, turning to look behind her again, and her shoulders sag when she watches the guy pausing to light a cigarette, the ember glowing in the dark as he waits at the bottom of a stoop. The door opens – Y/N can hear the greeting of someone from far away, and Y/N sees a woman hook her purse over her arm as she shuts and locks the door behind her. She probably looks creepy, gawking from afar like this, but she watches them link hands and turn in the opposite direction from her.
Y/N sighs into the phone, “Fuck,” she gives a breathless laugh, and Harry hums a little.
“What? What is it?”
“It was just some random guy,” she admits, turning back around and walking with a little less tension-ridden muscles than she had been, “God, who just walks around in a black hoodie with it up? It’s like – early spring, it’s nice out right now!
“Ah, men are weird,” Harry tells her, “Reckon it’s programmed in most of them to unintentionally look like the sketchiest person when they’re just walking down the street. There needs to be a course in schools about how not to look menacing.”
Y/N huffed a laugh, “Yeah, I – thank you, for that. Sorry to call – did I wake you up?”
“Don’t worry about it! Really, it’s the least I can do,” he drops something on the other end of the line, and it thuds – he murmurs a cuss under his breath about a shoe, then grunts when she assumes he bends down to pick it up, “I fell asleep on the couch, yeah. I was up late last night.”
Her mind starts racing immediately. Y/N imagines Harry in several scenarios, all in rapid succession. Him sneaking along the perimeter of some billionaire’s estate, lurking until he finds a faulty spot in the security system, and crawls through an open window. Him in some abandoned warehouse, in the middle of a shootout, where he’s hidden behind barrels of who knows what. Him on a dock, beating information out of someone, pulling off fingernails until he admits that there was a under the books deal with Friskies cat treats or something.
“Oh, was it... work-related?”
Would he tell her? Was he allowed to? Did someone listen to his phone conversations? Y/N is still pretty confused about what the hell it was he was doing. When she’d asked before, Harry made it sound like he was just some part-timer helping out with odd jobs, not interwoven with some sketchy crime syndicate.
“Not at all,” he replied easily, “I got caught up watching Stranger Things and finishing out the last season. Hated how it ended, though, so then I stayed up watching video essays about it online.”
That was. . .not what she expected. Harry is quite full of surprises.
She laughs a little again, “Yeah, I saw a lot of people weren’t happy with it,” she scratches the side of her neck, just below her jawbone, “Alright, I won’t keep you on. I’m sorry for waking you again.”
“No, don’t apologize, seriously. And keep me on the phone,” he added, “At least until you get home safely. Tell me about my sweet Muffy. Is she adjusting well?”
Y/N stays on the phone with him, because honestly, she hadn’t wanted to hang up at all; she’d just been trying to be considerate. At least in this moment, in her slightly tipsy state, something is soothing about his voice on the phone. Even if this very same voice had threatened her not too long ago, his drawl is slow and thoughtful, like he’s choosing his words carefully. He listens well, asks the right questions, and does not give off ‘finance bro’ vibes at all, which is refreshing (their finance team at work is the worst, honestly, like leftover greek row alumni that wouldn’t let their fraternity days go – Niall had fucked his way through at least half of them at this point, and they all sucked. . .literally and figuratively).
This definitely wasn’t healthy or probably appropriate, but neither was any of this, so – she thought it was okay to use this weird dynamic for her advantage just this one time. Y/N felt safer on the phone, and Harry seemed okay with staying on it, all the way until she was in front of her door.
“I see you made it home,” he noted, “Do you feel safe now?”
Y/N’s brows furrowed, “How’d you know I made it home? Hey, I thought I told you not to put a camera out here.”
“I didn’t! I just have your location, remember?”
“Oh yeah, my bad,” she giggles again, typing in her keycode and slipping into her flat, really feeling all the tension leaving her joints and muscles the moment she locks her door, slips the bar lock closed at the top, and then uses her additional, portable door lock as a tertiary line of defense. “Yeah, I’m okay now. Thank you again for staying on the phone with me.”
“Again, don’t even mention it,” she can imagine him waving his hands, like he’s brushing her gratitude to the side – he gesticulates quite often when he speaks, or at least he did in their brief meetings, “I’m glad you made it home safely. Give Muffy lots of kisses from me.”
When they get off the phone, Y/N finds herself. . .kind of wishing they had stayed on. Which is crazy. She tries to convince herself that she only wishes they would’ve, so she could have poked his brain on why he thinks the CEO would have messaged her randomly tonight, but she knows that isn’t the case. Honestly, she’d forgotten all about that when they were just talking.
Y/N had always considered herself the more well-adjusted of her friends, but she’s starting to find that hard to believe now. There’s no way a well-adjusted person would be reacting to this situation like this, she thinks. Hell, tonight was the first time she’d felt genuine fear since it all started, and she’s certain she probably should have been feeling paranoia and worry to that extent this entire time.
But there is something about Harry and knowing that he was watching her, to some degree, that was. . .disarming, she thinks, is the word for it. Maybe it was the blatant honesty that gave her a sense of security in him, whether it was false or not. She isn’t sure, and she thinks that if she looks too deeply into it, it’ll drive her crazy.
So she chooses to ignore it instead. Muffy greets her in the living room, and when she plucks her up, she presses kisses to the top of her head.
. . .
Y/N is shit at bowling.
Like, seriously, she’s the worst at it. Somehow, she gets roped into a bowling extravaganza every month by Niall, who owns his own platinum blue bowling ball that was customized to the shape of his very hand. When he’d first mentioned liking bowling, Y/N told him she enjoyed it too, but they were talking about two very different types. Y/N enjoyed the kind where you’re with your friends, silly names on the board, negging each other for bumper balls, and finding creative ways to roll the ball down the lane. Niall enjoyed the competitive, you’re against strangers, critiquing techniques, and the toe of your shoe better not cross that line type of bowling.
Y/N found out his approach to the sport was far different than her own, and while she was imagining Niall putting a name like Monster Cock on the scoreboard and sneaking in a flask of tequila, he was wondering where Y/N’s custom ball was. She never did come clean about what she suspected, mostly because he just seemed to happy to have someone to practice with, before his competitions. Even when he found out Y/N was horrible at it, he was stoked to create a proper training regimen to help her get better. And to see the fruits of his labor when she got her first (completely accidental) strike? Y/N doesn’t think he’s ever been so proud of her.
It makes Y/N happy to make Niall smile. For as obnoxious as he was, he was her very first friend when she started at this company three years ago, feeling battered and beaten from her last job, and coming out of a ridiculously convoluted situationship. Her first day on, the woman who trained her (who has since left the job, thankfully) ripped her a new one about how she formatted emails and her less-than-proficient use of Excel (even though use of Excel had not been on the job description and she’d even been honest with them during her interview, that she knew bare minimum and they still hired her!), and Y/N’s only option was to find somewhere to cry during her lunch break.
There was a spot on the fourth floor that Y/N thought would be very popular among the workers there. It was set up like a cafe, almost, with a self-serve station and a basket of snacks that were routinely swapped out for new ones. They also had a microwave, a hot water spout, tea bags, and various syrups of all different flavors to mix in your coffee. There were windows, very big and slanted, that took up the entirety of one wall, which always had plenty of light pouring into it from the outside world. That’s what Y/N thought would have been the selling point to get people sitting in the booths and tables they had set up here.
But in this particular spot, not only was the service bad, but during the extremes of weather – either very hot, or very cold – the windows made sure you felt every bit of it. On nicer days, sometimes there’s a couple of people, but enough below-freezing days and sweltering hot mornings have steered people clear of it. So during her lunch break, she charges her ass up there, finds the booth in the furthest corner, and tucks herself away to cry. It just turns out that Niall, who had only started a year before her, also storms up there to have a good cry. And when they are confronted with the other one, all teary eyes and frowning faces, because it turns out that their floor is not kind to new orientees.
So he scooted into the seat across from her, a big pouted lip as he wiped away the tears in his eyes, “Lorraine is a huge bitch.” He tells her, sniffling, “She’s shitty with all her orientees, so don’t take it to heart.”
Y/N nodded, knuckling at her left eye, leaving the side of her finger all wet, “And Victor has a stick up his ass, I heard he’s always too hard on new people.” She’s referring to Niall’s trainer. They both giggled, shared a muffin, and then exchanged numbers and have been in each other’s business ever since. (And Aki was trained by Y/N, who had been a year in and not feeling like an imposter too much anymore, so she made sure to give her a far better experience. Aki still cried, but that was because Y/N was being too reassuring when she screwed something up, and she’s got some intense ‘former prodigy child’ stuff to work through.)
There are no secrets between them, not really, but keeping Niall out of the loop of Harry has been making her feel pretty guilty lately. So when Niall told her it was about time for his yearly bowling competition and he needed to start training, Y/N obviously offered to go with him. He always wipes the floor with her, but she tries her best, and they do have fun, even when Niall gets weirdly serious about her technique.
So that’s where they are now – at the newly renovated bowling alley that was equipped with an arcade that she and Niall would definitely stop at and try to get stuffies from the claw machines. The food is pretty good here too, and after a particularly gruelling match (Niall almost doubles her score), he’ll treat her to a milkshake. They won’t actually eat the burgers like they used to because then they have all of fifteen minutes to get home before they shit themselves.
It’s the usual crowd here on a Saturday morning. There’s a birthday party taking up the last two lanes on the left, which accounts for most of the bowlers here today. Other than about 10 kids and a couple of parents, there was a group of six people with greying hair in the classic bowling button-ups that Y/N is surprised Niall doesn’t own one of. The later into the night, the crazier and more hectic this place gets, with teenagers and tweens, because you only have to be above 12 to enter without an adult, so they run amok here. For that reason, she and Niall come bright and early when they’re all still sleeping in because no matter how much older they get, the age range of 12-17 is scary as hell, and Y/N will not be getting bullied on her day off work.
For the quieter atmosphere, it makes it easy for Y/N to people-watch while Niall is taking his turn. It always takes him at least 30 seconds to a minute (sometimes two, if it seems particularly difficult, like two pins on adjacent sides of the lane) to decide how he’s going to throw it, so she keeps herself busy. Since the classic button-up wearers were pretty chill, just taking their turns and chatting amongst themselves, Y/N was watching the party. The kids were well-behaved, everyone politely taking their turn, and only seeming a little zany while they were sitting and waiting. One of them had a birthday crown and a sash. Two of them were dancing around in a circle, but it was confined to their area, and they weren’t very loud. Y/N would think it was a church group, but usually they all have a matching shirt. And she’s pretty sure she saw one of the adults smoking outside when they came in.
One of the adults was clearly the birthday girl’s mom, because she wore a shirt with the birthday girl’s face on it, which was quite cute. Her hair was pulled out of her face, and she was smiling pleasantly. Two of the adults were talking animatedly off to the side, one of them waving their hands, their eyebrows lifting in shock at whatever the person in front of them had said. One of them was on their phone, with a dupe LV case that Y/N only knows is a dupe because she spent an hour one night watching a video of a girl pointing out all the things that help you spot a real from a fake (like she had money to be buying Louis Vuitton in the first place – she just liked to be in everyone’s business). And then one adult was Harry, who was staring at her.
…
Huh.
Yeah, there he is. He also has a shirt with the birthday girl’s face on it, and Y/N’s eyes widen – holy fuck, did he have a daughter? Were he and this lady together? Did she know that her husband and/or boyfriend and/or baby daddy was threatening people in alleyways? Did Y/N have a duty to tell her, or was she supposed to mind her business for once in her life?
She can’t stop staring, mouth falling agape. Niall’s presence is sudden beside her, and she almost screams when he starts talking, looking to her side to find his gaze already trained across from them, “Okay, what hot dad are you looking at?”
“I’m not,” she shook her head, turning her body so that she wasn’t facing them directly, “I think we just locked eyes or something.”
“Okay, well, you must’ve had ‘come over here’ in your gaze because he’s headed this way.”
“What?” Y/N exclaimed, turning again to see him, and lo and behold, he was stepping over one of the kids sitting criss-cross on the ground, on his way to them. What was he doing? Wasn’t this stupid? Y/N’s pretty sure he was supposed to act like he didn’t know her, and they would go on their merry way. Doesn’t he know how bad she is at lying?
The closer Harry gets, the nearer Y/N can see he’s already showing a dimple. “Hey!” He greets her familiarly, “Weird to run into you here.”
Y/N opens her mouth, but Niall starts speaking before she can fumble through her own acknowledgement, “And who might you be?” He inquired, head tilting, “I’ve studied every single one of Y/N’s followers and following on Instagram, and I don’t think I’ve ever seen your face.”
Harry doesn’t even seem startled by Niall, though he comes off quite strong, “Oh, I really don’t have social media,” he answers smoothly.
“Hm. In a weird, ‘I’m better than it way’, or an ‘old soul’ way?”
Harry seemed to chew over the thought before settling on, “In a ‘I don’t know what I’m doing with it and my pictures always come out kind of shitty’ way.”
“Very well,” Niall likes that answer, “Proceed. Who are you?”
“I’m Harry,” he smiles, “I – “ almost kidnapped her instead of this woman named Antoniya on that blind date you set her up with a month and a half ago, “-- know Y/N from UNI. We were in the same Psych lecture.”
“Yes!” Y/N finally spoke, agreeing, nodding her head, because whether Harry had actually dug into her past or not, he had said the perfect thing, “You remember, Ni – I’ve talked about him before?” There was a guy she mentioned every so often, from her psych lecture, who was cute and had a pretty smile. She only mentions him because she had a wet dream about him like two years ago, but it was so filthy it stuck with her.
Niall’s eyes went wide, “Ohhhhhh, that one? The hot guy?” Y/N forgets, though, that Niall doesn’t have a filter. And even though this is not the same man, her stomach still drops all the same when he says it, and Harry chuckles warmly.
“I didn’t know that you – um – that you had a kid?” Y/N tries to change course before Niall can get too crazy, motioning to Harry’s shirt.
He looked down like he’d forgotten he was wearing it, “Oh, I don’t – see?” He pointed to the star button fixed to the upper corner that says WORLD’S BEST UNCLE!! in big letters, “I’m the world’s best uncle, actually. My niece is turning 8 today.”
That makes Y/N relax a little, her shoulders slumping when she breathes out a soft, “Oh! Right, yeah, that’s – that’s great.” And she’s happy because she isn’t spiraling that Harry has a wife and daughter that has no idea what he gets up to, but she thinks Niall mistakes the sigh of relief and the relaxed shoulders. Because, ever the wingman, he pinches her hip in the way he does before he’s about to ‘work his magic’ as he calls it.
“So are you single or. . .?”
“Ni!” Y/N chides him, but Harry only answers easily. He always answers questions so easily, like he doesn’t have a thing to hide.
“Yeah, I am. Have been for longer than I care to admit.”
Niall snorts, “I hear that,” he murmured, then motioned to Y/N, waving his hand up and down her torso, “Y/N is pretty, isn’t she? I heard that she’s really good at breaking people out of a dating slump.”
She thinks that if anyone felt her cheeks, their fingers would be immediately set to flame and seared from how hot they burn. It’s one thing when Niall is pulling these moves out at a bar or club, and Y/N’s tipsy and actually dressed pretty. It’s another thing when she’s in a shirt three times her size and her pre-period bloat sweatpants (that were just nice enough a brown and straight-legged, so she could pass them off as actual pants), hair pulled out of her bare face, and not even a single bit of jewelry on. It probably looks like she just rolled out of bed. And if Harry wants to squash this right here right now, he’s honest enough that he could probably say something like, “Eh, she wasn’t my type then and isn’t really my type now, but there’s plenty of people out there that would like her!” Then she’d have to curl up and roll herself down the lane to crash into the pins and disappear into the bowling abyss.
“Oh, she’s beautiful,” Harry answers, and his tone is so sickeningly genuine, Y/N thinks she’s going to roll herself down the lane anyway, “I’ve thought that since the moment I got a good look at her. She’s far too good for me, though.”
Something twirls and spins inside of her that hasn’t twirled and spun in a long time. There’s the reasonable part of her that reminds her he only said that to be nice, but then there’s the evil, deluded part of her. The one who thinks “to be nice,” all he had to do was agree she was pretty and move on, but he really didn’t have to say she was beautiful or anything.
Even so, what did it matter if he thought she was beautiful? Clearly, she’s a little disturbed to feel a giddy rush through her veins when the circumstances of their meeting are the way they are, but. . .like it feels good. Harry’s cute, and his biceps are just as big as they felt wrapped around her that first night, and even though she can tell the shirt he’s wearing is supposed to be oversized, it still stretches around his chest pretty tight. Plus, he’s got this 70s porno mustache that’s doing things for her. And she has never been one who can differentiate feelings of gratitude from real feelings, so since he’s been nothing but nice to her (after the obvious), and had answered her call no questions asked when she really had no business calling him the other night. . .well, she isn’t proud to admit it, but she’d had a dream about him too.
It was brief! Really, she barely remembers any of it – just a bleary subconscious rendezvous where he was holding her, but he was shirtless, and Y/N was gnawing at his arm. That’s all she remembered – she didn’t even see his face, but she just knew it was him from his slightly distorted voice murmuring, “You’re worse than Muffy,” all breathy, “Naughty thing.” – and she woke up confused, a little breathless, and with a weird dream crush that would eventually fizzle out if she ignored it.
God, this is so fucked up – she’s probably so fucked up. It’s not even like she can tell anyone about it, and she thinks that would make her feel a lot better, but who the hell is she going to tell? Harry? She can’t even make a Reddit post in case he’s still looking at her search history!
“Oh god, she’s been stunned into shy silence,” Niall pinched her hip again, “Sweet baby she is. Are you willing to write your number down for her?”
Harry puffs a laugh through his nose, and she isn’t sure if it’s because of how forward Niall is being or because Y/N already sort of has his number, “Ah, sure,” he shrugs, “Why not? I think it’s more empowering for the guy to give out his number first, y’know? Then you don’t have to feel pressured to answer when they message you, and you can let them down easily in the event that you never text at all. It’s a win/win and much better for not getting harassed.”
“I’d think you were being performative right now, but you have a very genuine aura and tone,” Niall clicks his tongue, “Was he like this in school? Should we be suspicious?”
There are like a thousand things you should be suspicious of right now. “Yeah, he’s always been pretty genuine,” Y/N clears her throat, “I do think Niall is doing more of the pressuring right now, though.”
“No pressure, just gentle guidance.” Niall has never had anything gentle about his guidance, but Y/N bites her tongue before she says anything, “My sweet Y/N is the one that got away for loads of people in the back. It’s heartwrenching, the number of suitors at her door, but she’s got high standards and doesn’t like time wasters, so tread carefully. Those she deems worthy are those who get a chance.”
Now he’s just straight up lying, but leave it to Niall to make her seem like some desirable lady in a high court. This same tactic is actually what launched her into her last situationship, who did, in fact, waste her time.
“I’ll be on my best behavior then,” Harry plays along easily, and for this reason, Y/N already knows that he’s on Niall’s good side. Anyone who doesn’t scurry from Niall’s generally intense demeanor always has a win in his book. Instead of sliding the number and leaving it on the table, Harry places it delicately into Y/N’s hand, his fingers stroking along hers when he passes it over. “I should get back, I reckon it’s almost my turn. I’ll look forward to your call, Y/N, if you decide I’m worthy enough. It was nice to see you,” he turns to Niall, “And it was lovely to meet you.”
When he’s out of earshot, Y/N turns to look at Niall with wild eyes, “You are out of your mind.”
“What? He’s cute! And you’ve been talking about that dream with him for two years unprovoked, so it’s time to get a real taste, and maybe your subconscious can finally rest.” Niall presses himself up from his seat, “Okay, no time to dawdle, we need to get back to this game. You missed my spare this last round when you were staring; it was impressive.”
Later that night, when she’s at home with Muffy in her lap, Y/N looks at the number Harry had given her. It was different from the number he’d messaged her from before. Was this his real number?
I’m sorry about him
Ni gets excited sometimes
That was one way to put it, for sure. Harry answers almost immediately, though.
Oh, don’t worry about it, he was funny
I did a full background check on him, too, since he was the one who set you up on the date
Came back clear! He did get a ticket for jaywalking, though
Y/N blinks at her phone screen, then looks in her lap to Muffy, who is giving her that look again – one that reads, ‘Seriously, what is up with this guy,’ and Y/N can only shrug her shoulders because she has no idea. He’s so weird, and that message should scare her, but instead, it just reminds her how weird he is. And because she’s sick in the head, she actually feels a little endeared, even, by how weird he is.
Wow, was she really this easy? Apparently, all you’ve got to do is seem pretty apologetic for holding a knife to her throat, and she practically forgives and forgets! Be nice to her a couple of times and call her beautiful? Well, hell, go ahead and do a background check on her and her friends! She’ll do you one better, and she’ll give you their fingerprints too. Would that make it easier?
It’s messed up, but she guesses she’s a little messed up, too. Niall and Aki both have always said that she needed to be in a ‘Freak for Freak’ kind of relationship.
But she’s getting ahead of herself. This is stupid! Harry was just playing along and having fun with Niall, that was all. There was nothing more to it, and Y/N needs to stop turning it into something. Besides, he “mostly” kidnaps people for a living, whatever the hell that means! He’d told her that himself. Y/N had no business getting anywhere near involved with something like that, even though she is already kind of halfway involved. Not for much longer, though – surely Harry could prove to his coworkers that she, without a shadow of a doubt, had nothing to do with the pet food guy and was simply at the wrong place at the wrong time. So long as he doesn’t keep messaging her or something stupid, then she could just put all of this behind her. If she and Harry ran into each other in public like the universe seems keen on making them do now, they’d give each other a polite nod and be on their way.
Her phone buzzes in her hand, and drags her eyes to the top of the screen again.
I hope I didn’t make you uncomfortable though!
Earlier, y’know
Y/N’s fingers swiped quickly over the keyboard.
Hahaa, not at all, that’s okay! I know you were just playing around with Ni
You’re lucky tho, usually he can spot lies from a lightyear away
The three dots reappear almost instantly.
I wasn’t lying though
You are very beautiful
Who I thought you were is a model, and I didn’t question if you were actually her or not for a second y’know
I don’t lie about things like that!!
Anyway, you should go to bed soon, Muffy’s vet appointment is early tomorrow morning
okay... so here we are with a new vamprry. pleaseee let me know what you guys think, I am a slut for vampy so I figured we needed some more of him in our life :)
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WC- 3.1k
Warnings- mentions of blood, vampires, stalking (Edward Cullen has nothing on him), twilight slander, invasion of privacy, morally gray H, etc
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Harry hated that stupid movie.
It wasn’t at all what real vampires were. While he wished it was as lighthearted as the movie tried to portray, it was a bit more classy and a lot more hierarchical than the humans would truly ever know. They walked among them, yes, but in more plain sight than they could ever guess. Celebrities, politicians, even royalty were of vampiric life. It wasn’t as silly as this movie suggested, nor did they solely feed off of animal blood. It did taste a bit gamey, did in a pinch, but he wasn’t one who could stomach that sort of pseudo vegan lifestyle. Ever since that movie had erupted from whatever depths of hell it was created, it had caused him nothing but strife. Years later the vampire craze had seemed to slow, but lines were nearly burned into his ears after being subjected to the comfort movie of his unfortunate neighbor and object of his current affection.
He knew it was creepy and perhaps the one thing he shared with the Cullen fellow. Watching her as she slept.
It was dangerous, stupid even, for her to leave her windows unlocked and while part of him wanted to scold her for it, the other part was thankful. He didn’t have to form another guise to get into her house, he could enter directly where his little human laid her head at night and he could watch her breathe. Listen to her breaths and heartbeats underneath the television shows she left on to drown out any noises the old house may make. That’s what she said in her journal, anyway.
He sat in the chair across from her bed, listening to the comfort of her heartbeats as he flipped through the pages. It was an invasion of privacy, he knew it, and while sometimes he felt bad… it was his way of getting to know her. Morals had never quite been his thing anyway, let alone when it came to the girl snoozing in her bed like a pleased kitten in a sunbeam. Maybe he was deluding himself, but he swore that she calmed the fitful sleep when he entered his room. Like her body knew of his presence. Instead of being on edge, like any sensible human would be in direct contact with a predator, she possibly had a miswire of her brain.
For all of the things he knew about her, for his addiction to her scent and being near her, they didn’t talk much. Harry owned the house next to hers, which was originally a rental, but the moment he had caught her scent he knew he had to stay longer.
It was unnatural if you were a human, sure, but if you were a vampire you would understand. There were certain people, certain scents, that drove you insane. That weighed heavily on your brain and acted as an addiction. Y/N had captured his attention the moment he had pulled into the street, Harry immediately clocked that she had been the source of the scent that had caught his nose a few miles away. He’d been meaning to park at his place and go on foot in search of it, but as fate would have it; she was right next door.
To get an invitation into her house, it had been quite simple. Using his cat that didn’t exist as an excuse; he asked if he could come around and look for him in her yard. The little thing had gasped, nodding her head ecstatically and inviting him in without second thought, only with the promise of getting a pet in if he were to find the fictional cat. A good thing for him, but worrying for the future. Inviting people in, vampires in, was incredibly dangerous. He had wanted to scold her for it, to make her understand the danger she had put herself in, but it was much harder to do that when said woman had no idea that his kind could even be a threat to her.
From there it had been waving when he left and she sat on her porch with her book, feet tucked under her body as she rocked on her glider. A pitcher of cherry limeade next to her, sweetening her blood in ways that made his fangs prick his lips. The human did things she had next to no clue affected him so deeply. One particular day he had been desperate to hear her voice, going as far as stealing her mail so he could deliver it to her himself. Knocking at her door, he’d been anxious with anticipation hearing her walk up to the front of her house. Water had been on and there was the faint scent of lemon dish soap lingering in the air along with the slight clinking of dishes, cluing him into the fact she had definitely been doing her dishes. When his obsession did answer the door, his breath had caught in his throat as he looked down at her.
Something about that day had shifted his addiction to her into overdrive. Watching her eyes widen and the smile grow on her face, tendrils of hair falling out of her ponytail and her heartbeat picking up, he had found out that he wasn’t the only one with an interest. He’d handed over the mail, swallowing the lump in his throat as her smaller hand brushed his own. Warm, silky skin, lighting him up with the single touch. It had been a short interaction, mostly due to the burning in his throat as the wind picked up and washed him with her scent yet again. A muttered excuse had made even himself wince as he was mindful of his pace, walking back to his place and getting directly into his car. He’d needed a feed desperately if he was going to be around her.
Harry had done a plethora of ridiculous things in order to slowly wiggle himself into the little human’s life, but getting a pet cat was probably the most ridiculous. A fluffy black cat with golden eyes and a raspy meow had been his pick, letting it have the run of the house and the yard because what if Y/N asked about it? The plan was to get himself intertwined in her life, so he had to have some truths to it.
As oblivious as some humans could be, he knew his human was far more perceptive in terms of figuring out if people had things off with them. Her diary had said as much.
Tonight, he had been chomping at the bit for her to go to sleep. Waiting outside her house, watching her shut it down and go upstairs as he scaled the large tree next to her room for a view. He could tell she was tired, but she sat for twenty minutes scribbling away into her notebook with a smile on her face and the pace of her heart upticking a few times, making him wonder what she was writing about. Was it him? Her certainly hoped so.
It was pathetic. If anyone knew of his wistful sighs and his borderline obsessive routine of slipping into her room one she fell into dreamland, they’d surely remind him that getting involved with a human was surely a terrible idea. It wasn’t unheard of, no, but it ended in disaster some of the time. The vampire counterpart going too far during a feeding, accidentally hurting them during sex, the human getting sick and them perishing leaving the eternal to go insane after. Even still, the threat wasn’t enough to keep him away from her.
As he heard her breathing even out, he climbed slowly into her room and made sure to keep quiet as she hadn’t entered the deepest part of sleep yet. Usually he had some sort of control on his need to be around her but after their conversation in her backyard, he had been itching to get into her mind.
The journal was a deep brown, suede strings around it with a few charms on the worn material. It wrapped around to keep it closed, reminding him of his own journals back in his estate. She cherished each one of her journals, it seemed, and he found himself liking her even more because of it. Humans could be so wasteful, so unaware of the things they produced. His human, though, she was mindful of her footprint. A slight smile twitched at the corner of his lips as he looked down at her sleeping form. Looming over her wasn’t the brightest idea, but something in his restless soul had calmed with the vision of her safe and snug in the warm blankets.
His stomach was full from one of those dreaded blood packets. Nothing like the real thing, required heating, but he needed to ensure she was safe from him. With blood that made his mouth water, even with his strong restraint he wasn’t going to leave anything to chance. The idea of anything happening to her weighed heavily on him, twisting his stomach each and every time it came to light in his mine. “Gorgeous.” He murmured, brushing his knuckle against her cheek. The touch was a compulsion, unable to help it as he felt the warmth under his cool digit. Every time he limited himself to just a few fleeting touches, but he could feel it getting harder and harder staying away from her as the days went by.
Mentally prying himself from her form, he took the journal in his hand and padded over to the armchair in the corner. It gave a perfect view of her sleeping face, the soft lines making his chest squeeze before he opened up the leatherbound book to the newest entry.
‘I saw him again today. I haven’t spoken about him much in here but I think its time to.
He is ungodly handsome. I’m talking, how are you real, greek god, roman statue good looking.’
He had to stifle a laugh, running his finger over the inked words.
‘His name is Harry and we’ve met a few times, but today was the longest we spoke. I finally met his cat, Midnight, which is a less than original name for a black cat but I’ll let it slide. He was so gentle with him, picking him up and letting me hold him. He purred and was absolutely the cutest little thing ever, but I was distracted by his owner. Usually he doesn’t say much and originally I thought he didn’t like me or something, but I think he’s just shy.’
Another thing that made him have to seal his lips from reacting to. Harry wasn’t shy, he was cold. He kept to himself not because he was afraid, but because he wasn’t fond of communication. In her case, though, it was because he wasn’t sure he could keep from asking her to come over to his place and find a way to seduce her. To get her just as addicted to his presence as he was to hers. As morally gray as a creature could be, he didn’t want to force her affections.
‘ He has the nicest voice. It’s quiet but dark and deep and I felt bad for thinking about what else it could say later on, but it’s not like he’d ever know. There has never been another person to his house that I’ve seen that looks romantic, but maybe he just like fuckbuddies. Sucks that hes my neighbor and I get dreadfully emotionally attached, otherwise I’d suggest that sorta thing. Maybe. It’s unlike me to feel so curious about a man considering I’ve been doing my best to try and stay true to my no dating year, but it’s incredibly hard not to want to see more of him.’
Sitting up in his seat, he didn’t suppress the smirk on his face as he read what she wrote down. Maybe one day he’d feel guilt about reading her private thing, but right now? He was fucking thankful he did. There was confirmation of returned interest, interest in more nonetheless. Usually the idea of more than a night of sex would send the vampire running, but his little human had bewitched him. There would be no world in which he could have a single night with her and give her up. Being more in tune with the more primal parts of him, he had the knowledge that it was already finding himself tangled in her web. This mere human trapping his affections in steel threads.
‘I think I’m gonna try and feel him out a bit. Not in a creepy way or anything but, maybe take more initiative. The only problem with that is he is super intimidating and probably a bit out of my league, and I’ve got no damn clue if he’s single or even looking. At the risk of making a fool out of myself, I’m gonna try and see. Mama always did say you never got anything if you didn’t ask. I still can’t believe how many times i've quoted her in here. I wish she was around so I could ask her what to do.’
The smile on his face slipped as he was reminded of previous entries. His sweet little human was pretty alone in the world. She had some friends, was good with the other neighbors, but she had no family. She still had no clue it was him that left her the pie and stack of romance books outside her door on Christmas. He’d feel gutted at the idea of her spending it alone, especially after reading and knowing how badly she craved companionship. There was no true talk of what happened to her family other than there being an accident, but that was something he would let her tell him herself.
‘I hope I’m not just reading into things because I’m a little desperate for someone to want me, but I swore I could feel him checking me out. He gave me a cute little smile and the motherfucker had dimples. DIMPLES! How is it possible for a man as severely handsome as him to look adorable when he smiled? God does indeed have favorites.’
It was definitely a stroke to the ego to know how attractive she found him, but the next paragraph was what really moved him.
‘Above all of that, he seems pretty smart. Really intelligent, actually. He’s quite charming once he starts talking to you, and I felt like he was really giving me every bit of his attention. In a way it was a little overwhelming because I haven’t ever felt that way before from a man, but it was so nice to have someone give me their time without the distraction of phones or work or anything. We talked for probably about half an hour and I found myself getting closer to the fence, almost asking if he wanted to come in for a coffee or if he was down, cherry limeade. I didn’t want to seem desperate though, so I said bye first. Stupid on my part. He seems like the type of person who I could talk to for hours and not get bored. That's a rare type of person. Then again, maybe I am slightly delusional.’
If only she knew.
Harry closed the journal, diligently trying to replicate the way she had wrapped the suede around the leather before getting up and placing it back on her nightstand.
“If only you knew that you make me feel so insane that I’d risk stealing a star for you.” His words were delicate, hopefully entering her dreams. It was abundantly apparent to him that she wasn’t given the proper affection in her life and It would be his job to provide.A challenge he was up for. His fingers found her face again, delicately tracing the curve of her nose as he tried to commit each mark on her to memory. It was interrupted, though, when she let out a little whimper in her sleep, making him freeze and his eyes widen. He was fully prepared to have to wipe her memories, to have her eyes fluttering open and screams leaving her throat, but instead she did the opposite. Hands emerged from under the blankets, lightly grabbing onto his wrist and pulling his cool touch onto her hot cheek. Silky smooth skin, slightly damp from the light sweat in her sleep nuzzled into his palm. He watched as limbs stretched under her before she curled up again and held his hand to her face, urging the touch to stay put.
She was asleep and sought him out. The grip on his sleeve lessened as she fell back into the slumber he was jealous of, wishing he could be in her head and see the things she had running around up there. The sweetest hum left her throat in a final act of settling, Harry allowing the urges to win and ran his thumb over the curve of said cheek. It was astonishing to him, given that her body should be sensing the danger of having the monster who had dreamed of sinking his fangs into her throat, her wrist, her inner thigh, feasting on her blood- but maybe she could also sense that he wouldn’t want to hurt her. Just a taste. He could live with just a taste of her on his tongue. “Sweet little thing…” He swallowed, finding the urge more strong by the moment. All he craved was crawling into the bed with her, pulling her frame into his own and burying his face in the curve of her neck. He would take a little bite, just enough to get it on his tongue before he licked it closed. He wanted to feel her breathing against his hand and hear every shift she made at night, the rush of blood through her veins. It was surpassing the normal urges a vampire would have with his prey, but he had a feeling it had never been normal between them. He couldn’t change it overnight. His body softened as he leaned against the bed, a soft hum leaving his lips as he began to lightly sing the soft lullaby he had been coaxed into dreamland with as a child.
There was no moving him, not until the first hint of sunlight lit the sky azure. The best night of his life had been sitting on his knees by her bedside, allowed to have his cold skin warmed by her cheek as she had put it there herself. When he had to finally pull away, the warmth tingled in his palm as he pressed it to his own cheek and imagined how it would feel the day she let him warm himself from the source. However long that would take, he would wait along for her and let her cling to his unknowing hand to sing her the quietest lullabies to quell any fears she had.
Hey hi hello! We got vampy part 2 coming' at you now. I'm thinking this is a 5 parter, I've been chipping away at it :-) I hope you guys like him.
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Lullaby Masterlist
WC- 6.1k
Warnings- vampires, mention of blood, mentions of familial death etc, H is obsessive n a lil stalkery but he's a vampire so to be expected, slight manipulation on his part, invasion of her privacy, soft h, slight smutty thoughts, etc
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The Sun setting was one of her favorite views.
Sitting on the front porch with her book in hand, she had her feed tucked under her to the side as she looked at the blend of fiery orange, saccharine pinks, brilliant yellows and the tiniest bits of purple. The calming of the day, the chaos of lawnmowers, cars running, children giggling and squealing all blending out into a soft quiet harmonized with crickets. The new summer heat lingered but the cool breeze tickled her skin, a welcome relief from the oven of a car she had been in on the way home. Her AC had died earlier today, marking the beginning of a difficult day.
At the end of it, though, she could always count on the sky to calm her down. The swirls of color fading into the night, twinkly stars appearing as the dotted sky darkened and the moon peaked out to say hello.
Y/N was a dreamer. Someone with her head in the clouds a lot of the time, theorizing and poetical thinking, wondering what else was out there in the world. What had she not discovered yet? There was this tug in her soul, bone deep, that she was meant for something more. That the other shoe would drop at any moment and her life would be turned upside down. Her dreams were filled with promise, of a world that was a little darker but so much more vibrant. Smells more intense, colors more vivid, taste elevated. In her dreams a few nights prior, she could feel the hands of her lover perfectly, though she had a problem actually seeing them- just a general outline, dark hair, pale skin. Cool hands on her cheek that she nuzzled into, a deep voice drawling out words she couldn’t quite understand but somehow found comfort in. That feeling had soothed her soul, settled that ache in her bones even just for the duration of the dream.
Her heart hurt when she arose, seeing no lover beside her. No cool fingers brushing hair from her eyes, no soft lips buttoning with her own. It hurt her to crave someone she logically knew didn’t actually exist, but she accepted it. As dreamy as she could be, her logical mind won over in this aspect and reminded her that she’d find her person one day. That her dreams were just dreams, to not mourn the loss of a lover that simply did not exist.
But still, the yearning didn’t stop.
Her bowl of cherries beside her, she rocked on her glider as she watched people arrive home for the night. Odd? Perhaps. But Y/N enjoyed the art of people watching. Waving to her neighbors who gave her polite smiles before entering their own houses, seeing their own families.
As much as she was grateful to her grandmother for leaving her the large old home that she had many a memory in, it sometimes felt overwhelmingly lonely. There was only so much space a single young woman needed, and even if she thoroughly enjoyed using a single room for a closet, it only reminded her when she laid in the dead of night after waking up over some weird tugging feeling in her chest that bogged her down significantly. That loneliness that felt even more palpable in the way she had no one to try her test batch of cookies and no one to turn over to in bed to show a ridiculous post she saw on social media.
Sure, she had some friends who would come over and stay the night at times but after her grandmother passed, she had no one. At least of familial relation. Her friends were as close as they could get, but it was difficult to form bonds at times when she was tugged two separate ways. Everyone always left. The want to be so close she was clingy, and the overwhelming fear something would happen and they would leave by their own accord- or not- hindered her from allowing people to get as close as she desired.
Sometimes she wished her loved ones could have been immortal. Even though it didn’t exist- even if her grandmother told her the stories of the supernatural and paranormal bonds- she wished it did. Wished that someone would never leave her, would love her endlessly. A bond deeper than marriage, no worries of cheaters or boring of her. It may sound a bit crazy, but she wished for complete devotion. Overwhelming love that wouldn’t end. If only something like that existed in anything but a book. Her grandmother had sort of set her up for failure by planting all those ideas of those all encompassing love stories in her mind.
Sighing to herself, she popped a cherry into her mouth to end her own pity party and went to go back to her book- but a familiar car brought her out of her focus.
Harry was back.
He hadn’t been home for three days, she had noticed. Not that she was stalking him or anything but she had vowed to herself in her journal and her mind to make more of an effort with him, so his absence had been noted. In some ways she had been relieved to have an excuse so she wouldn’t have to fear rejection but on the other hand she was getting antsy to just get the disappointment over if it was going to happen
Harry was, for a lack of a better term, dreamy. His voice, the bold structure of his face; the petal pink of his lips. He had the most alluring eyes, shifting between green and gold at times that she had noticed the last time they’d spoken. He was tall and built, large shoulders and tattooed arms she had seen peeks of but not enough to get a full picture. Large hands with thicker fingers and a plethora of rings that would look gaudy on anyone else but with his persona, it simply fit. Slightly mysterious, guarded in a way; but still kind. Classy in a different sort of style that she hadn’t seen from many people around here. The stylish way he dressed even represented bits and pieces of a time that she read of in her books. He was elegant in ways that she had thought of as a movie character, like he was in a different time period and brought here. The elements of vintage tied into his outfits had her thinking he must have an appreciation for history at the very least.
Her eyes took him in as he lifted a worn leather duffle bag out of the trunk of his sports car. It wasn’t the Range Rover she had usually seen, or the Audi, but a bit flashier and sleek. A new purchase, maybe? Nevertheless, it was a way into conversation.
“Nice car!” She called over, wincing immediately as she realized how lame that must have sounded. His head snapped over to hers, sunglasses still on his eyes even with the fading light. A tiny smile planted the well of his dimple, placing the bag on top of the now closed trunk.
“Hi, Y/N.” Skin prickled with chills as he said her name. It sounded real damn nice coming from his mouth. “Would you like to come see it?” He asked politely. Not being able to see his eyes was a little intimidating, but she returned the smile and stood up with her cherries in hand. The least she could do was share her fruit with him if he was letting her see the car.
“Is it new?” She questioned, approaching with her sandals slapping against her feet. Mentally she set a reminder to get different ones that weren’t obnoxious. Getting closer to him she could feel the familiar tingle at the base of her spine, a slight giddiness as her heartbeat picked up the closer she got to him.
“It is, yeah. Had to fly out to drive it back.” He admitted, seemingly taller than the last time they’d talked. How much money did the man have? Surely a decent amount, as anyone in this neighborhood did, but three cars and flying out to get one seemed a bit luxurious to her.
“Oh wow, that’s some dedication. It looks worth it though. I don’t know a ton about cars but it’s gorgeous.” She nodded, looking it over. The rambling didn’t help her cause but it was pretty much standard when she was nervous. “Oh! Uh, did you want some of my cherries?” Holding the pink ceramic bowl out to him, her eyes looked up at him and saw her reflection in the sunglasses. She wished she could see how he was looking back at her. If she would see any interest. Thankfully she could tell by the smile that he at least seemed slightly endeared.
“Sure, thank you.” Two of his ringed fingers picked out a ripe one, pinching the small red fruit in his hands, looking down as a bit of the juice dribbled down his thumb. “Did you…”
“Yeah, I pitted them already. Sorry, I didn’t think to warn you. But you’re wearing all black so it shouldn’t stain, I don’t think.” The attempt of a joke had her groaning in her head. Could she act fucking normal? Her mind was a jumbled mess, as it usually was with him, but it seemed to be getting worse. The thought of her cherry stained fingers had come back to her, filtering through the thoughts of wanting to know more about him into a slight shame that she hadn’t thought to have warned the man of dripping cherry juice down the back of his hand.
“It’s not a problem.” He assured, popping it into his mouth.
Perhaps she needed to get laid, but somehow watching him chew the cherry was better than porn. The slight dark red sheen on his lip, gently dripping down his chin and the clench of his jaw as he worked the flesh of the fruit through his teeth, he let out a pleased hum.
Y/N saw the path the dribble of juice going further down and before she could think twice, she leaned up on her toes. There was little hesitation as she thumbed over his chin, wiping the juice away. It had been like second nature, invading his personal space like it was instinct.
Her hand froze as soon as reality set in, his chewing taking a pause as there was a moment of bated breath. Bright eyes widened, ripping her hand away like his touch had scorched her. “Oh my god, I’m so sorry. I have no idea why I just did that.” She squawked, holding her hand up in front of her chest. “That was so rude of me. I swear I don’t usually just touch people like that, it was just dripping down your chin and I didn’t want it to stain more of your skin and-“
“I didn’t say it was a problem.” The vampire murmured, swallowing the sweet fruit. “I didn’t mind at all.” His own thumb came up to brush over the path her digit had taken. It still thrummed with warmth from the human’s touch, his body perking up as he ached to take a step closer. Her scent made a lot of sense considering he had seen her more often than not with bowls of fruit on her porch. Fresh cut strawberries in sugar, watermelon, mango sliced into wedges, grapes, but most frequent were the cherries. It reflected in her sweet scent, sugary but not in a sickly way. Fresh, sweet, ripe like fruit.
He was glad he wore his glasses because the thought moved towards how sweet she would taste right now. If he were able to just take her gaze and use his slow, deep words and locked eyes to compel her to move the hair off of her neck and tilt it for him, lift her to sit on the hood of the car and let his teeth sink into the throbbing artery in her throat. How the sugary taste would tinge the metallic aftertaste. She’d writhe in his hold and spread her legs for him, give him the option of burying his tongue to lap up the only substance that would be able to compete with the obsession he would surely have with her blood. Maybe even take a bite at the junction of her thigh, leave marks all over her. Punctures to visibly show it and his scent to claim the little human as his own.
If the glasses weren’t on, it was sure that she’d see the flash of red in his iris.
“Still.” She said sheepishly. “We are friends but I don’t know how you are with touch and everything and I didn’t have permission, so I’m sorry.”
Harry smiled at that. The little peach, his little cherry, so considerate of other people. She had no idea how he had to dig his nails into his palm to keep from grabbing her and hauling her into him so he could suck off the slight stain on her lips. Bury his face in her throat and inhale her dangerous temptation.
“I promise, it’s quite alright. You can touch me anytime you’d like.” He took a risk in placing one of his hands on her shoulder, letting some more of her warmth infiltrate his system. The words had been loaded, sure, but he remembered vividly how her journal entry had written about wanting to see more of him. It was his fault, spending so much time with her even if she was asleep. Her body was going to crave him just as much as he craved her. “If you would like, I would be more than willing to take you on a drive sometime.”
This was something of an excuse to see her again, but the creature was overwhelmingly desperate to form a bond with her. As much as he looked forward to watching her sleep, he would rather her be in his bed, soaking his sheets and pillows with her tantalizing scent. The idea of getting close to her was something he had been weighing for a while, but reading her journal a few days ago had clued him into knowing the pull wasn’t just one sided.
The memory of her nuzzling her cheek into his frosty palm, sighing in contentment when he had observed her the night before had him feeling borderline insane- even more than one would be after living centuries, amassing knowledge and watching the world consistently evolve around you than one would imagine. His hand still tingled when he recalled feeling the heat of her skin, knowing she was so full of life underneath him. Finding comfort in the monster that gnawed at his cheek to keep from sinking his fangs into her delectable skin, taste her blood as it seeped over his tongue. If only he could skip to the part where she knew, where she’d crave the venom igniting her nerves. Y/N would be the prettiest little snack he ever had.
“Oh, really?” She perked up, blinking up at him. “I’d love that. When- when did you want to? It’s up to you, I’m free all weekend and stuff but I know you’re busy.” There was a pause. “Or it seems so. I’m not sure why I assumed that.”
Again, his little human made him chuckle. “I am.” He wasn’t, not right now. He had a handle on his duties, but the majority of the time he was writing. Painting. Looking at properties to invest in on his iPad while curated playlists crooned from the speakers around his house. If only he could imagine such a thing back in 1760 without being accused of witchcraft. Then again, witchcraft was too much for humans even now to comprehend. “But I’d be more than happy to take you out. I don’t… know many people in the neighborhood because of it. A little lonely at times.”
It was actually by his own want, because the less people knew of him around here the better- but he had this insane obsession with this particular human, so she was the exception to his ‘stick to vampires but even then limit your socialization’ rule.
He knew he was appealing to Y/N’s metaphorical bleeding heart. Manipulation was in his nature. In this case, though, he had no cruel intentions. He wanted to get to know the pretty girl, wanted to have her feel the same amount of lust and obsession he was subject to feel on a daily basis. Humans knew nothing of how intense and passionate a vampire’s affections could be, and for that reason he had been hiding his time. Laying in the shadows and approaching while she slept to soothe the inner beast that insisted he crawl out the window with her body attached to his so she could reside in his house, feast on whatever she chose and allowed him to touch and feed on her as much as he chose.
She’d like it, he was pretty sure. Once she warmed up to the idea, Harry had high hopes that she would allow him to be as handsy as he wanted. Sex between a pair with a compatible scent was otherworldly. If she were to be with him, he’d need to pace himself and understand his strength, but there was that part of him that still worried slightly. He cared for her. She wasn’t a metaphorical juice pouch for him to snack on like a lot of others his kind referred to humans as. Something he used to laugh at before he scented the girl with eager eyes in front of him. Now he understood why his uncle had fought so much, defending his human soulmate. Eventually he turned her, but during the few years she remained human he had been valiant in his efforts to defend her honor in every way possible.
It was partially why he didn’t tell many people of his suspicions of his bond with his own little human. Already slightly on edge from not being able to hold her the way his body needed, he would not be surprised if he lost it on anyone who snickered at her.
Buying the car was a strategic effort to get himself to cool off, but it did no good. If anything he was more desperate now. The good news, however, was that Y/N felt his absence just as much. Her hands had touched him like he was hers to touch. His body felt the flush of pleasure just being near her, clenching his fists by his sides to keep from reaching out to her. So close to him, so damn close, but he had to behave.
Y/N with her tender soul gave him a look of understanding. One that would later make him feel a sickly guilt because he was alone by choice, and the pretty woman was alone because life had dealt her a hard hand. She understood loneliness because it was all she felt.
“Well you know me.” Her voice was delicate as she looked up at him. “And we can get to know each other so maybe you feel less alone. I know the feeling and it’s hard, but you don’t need to feel that with me. I’m right next door.” Pointing towards her house with an understanding smile, he felt a little more guilt but tried to shove it down. Y/N wouldn’t feel any sort of loneliness if he could help it. “You’re welcome anytime. Just knock.”
The knowledge that he’d been inside her house more times than she could even count should be something that exacerbated the guilt, but it didn’t. In that respect, he thought of it as a favor to her. Getting his fix without suffocating her with his presence while she was awake was a gift, because if she had even the slightest inkling on how much self control it took for him not to simply steal her away and sink his teeth into her neck, claim her as his soul bonded, she would be terrified. “I will.” Letting himself smile a bit bigger at her, he lifted the bag up on his arm. “How about you come over tomorrow evening and I’ll take you on the drive.”
He could hear the pickup of her heart. The slightly elevated thumping went harder, the blood rushing to her cheeks as her eyes widened slightly and she swallowed audibly- for him anyways- making him feel the satisfaction in his chest that he had this sort of impact on her. If his heart still beat he was positive it would kick up at the mere mention of her, the slight catch of her scent, but this was progress. Restraining himself now was the hardest thing he had ever done.
“Yeah! Yeah, that would be awesome.” The human chirped, tucking a bit of hair behind her ear. His hand tightened on the bad strap from how the slight movement had wafted some more of her scent towards him. It would be a struggle to control his eyes when they were alone, but going at sundown should be an excuse to keep his glasses on… at least for a little while.
“Amazing. I’ll be yours at sunset.”
In more ways than she knew.
Harry let her stumble over her goodbyes, her slightly shaky hands grabbing the bowl of cherries and walking back to her front porch with curious eyes that met his own as she looked back. He knew he wasn’t the only one who felt the connection, he’d seen it written in her journal, but feeling it in real time was surreal. It took the most self discipline he’d needed all week to walk inside his house, dropping himself onto the velvet sofa with a grunt. The place she had touched on his chin to wipe away the ironically deep red juice still held some warmth, reminding him again that she’d touched him. There was no question about the pull, seeing how mortified she’d been at her body's reaction- but it had been natural. It made sense to him that she’d be drawn to touch him. Human resolve was weaker than one of a vampire but that didn’t mean he didn’t feel that overwhelming urge to run to her house and ask to come in right now just to see her.
Instead, he sat with the french doors open in the back to listen to her go about her house. She hummed to herself, cooked dinner, and took a shower. The humid air floated out of her bathroom window that she kept slightly cracked to make sure it didn’t steam up too much, letting him inhale her at her purest form. When they got together he’d try to find her less strong shampoo and wash so her natural scent could be highlighted, but luckily her intuition had her choosing similar to how she came off to him. Almost like subconsciously she knew what to do to attract him there.
It was when he heard the scratching of pen to paper that he went outside to wait. In hand he had a warmed bag of blood poured into a crystal glass- a bit pretentious- to calm his nerves. He loved wine, sure, but he needed to be positive his hunger was satiated before going up to see her. If he was being honest, he knew it wouldn’t be until he tasted Y/N, but he had to try. Had to keep her safe in the best ways he could until they passed the threshold of pretending to move around one another and into a courting.
The plan had never been to take a human as a mate- as it probably wasn’t for any vampire. Humans were glorified bloodbags to a lot of his kind, seen as a lesser being. While he didn’t always share that exact sentiment, he was guilty of caring less for humans in general. They were oblivious to danger, slightly obnoxious, covered themselves in putrid perfumes, loud, uncouth, and fragile. So fucking fragile that it still terrified Harry to touch Y/N. He needed to ensure her safety in any way possible and that meant training himself to touch gently. To hold gently. To avoid any sort of pain that would absolutely wreck him to be the source of.
Humans weren’t ideal mates for that reason. Vampires got carried away during sx, the stamina hot and hard, the passion making it difficult to hide the monstrous nature that laid internally. He knew he’d take Y/N over and over again until she was sleepy and sore if he had the chance. If Y/N allowed him that honor, he could easily spend days locked inside of a room with her with little need to pull his cock from the warm confines of her cunt. It was the dream he had over and over again, yet something he feared. If he lost control with her in the heat of the moment he couldn’t recover. Though he had faith in himself to keep her safe, sex was the one thing he craved and feared the most with her.
Lost in his thoughts, he watched the light turn down in her room. Never off, as she had a slight fear of the dark. Her bedside lamp turned on, he could hear her breathing start to even out as he jumped over the fence separating their properties and scaled the tree to her balcony. It wasn’t necessary, but the less trapezing he had to do around her home the better. Counting her heartbeats, he waited for 30 minutes for it all to even out and resemble the deeper parts of sleep before he opened the door.
One of these days he would scold her for leaving windows and doors unlocked. It was just like a human to be forgetful of those things, even if it did benefit him. His chest tightened as he walked in to see her body curled into a ball under the duvet. Hair peeking out, she was obviously a bit cold from how she had huddled under the cover of her blankets. A pang of sadness hit his stomach, perhaps a hint of inadequacy because he wouldn’t be able to keep her warm with his body. He could blame all sorts of health issues, but as long as she remained human he wouldn’t be a source of comfort in that way.
He let out a soft sigh before swiping the journal, settling himself in the chair across from her. A leg crossed over his thigh, lightly tapping his foot in the air as he began to read.
‘I talked to Harry today :-) He was so nice. Very intimidating in a weird way, but also not. It’s hard to explain. That feeling that makes me drawn to him felt a little stronger, even if I did make a fool of myself. I didn’t think twice before reaching up to wipe cherry juice from his chin, which like…. That was so weird of me. He didn’t seem to judge me for it but there had to be some part of him that was freaked out.’
A chuckle left his throat, whisper soft as his fingertip caressed the words as he read. In his head he could hear exactly how she’d say these things out loud. The journal was an extension of her, a physical example of her stream of consciousness.
‘Regardless, I’m seeing him tomorrow. I’m panicking, of course, but I think above else I’m really excited. There’s that weird buzzing in my stomach at the thought of him and my chest gets all warm. I haven’t ever spent time with him outside of our talks outside or when he came to get his cat but he offered. I was going to be brave and all of that but thank god he took the initiative. I would have done it… probably. It’s just hard because I don’t think my body has ever reacted to a man the way it reacted to him today.’
Harry smiled to himself at the last sentence. It must be confusing to a human with no idea of what was happening. No clue that it was the universe leading her towards him, making him appealing because he was the one that could give her what she wanted. She was his, the bond he had accidentally jumpstarted starting to fall further into place. The sleeping girl didn’t know how he’d almost moaned at the feeling of her hand on him, how he’d been tempted to suck the juice from her thumb and squish one of the fruits between his fingers to trickle down her neck. His throat tightened at the image in his head, dark red beads moving down her skin, taunting him. His tongue lapping it up, kissing over her pulsepoint before he sunk his teeth in and took a few strong pulls from her artery.
Swallowing thickly, he went to go back to the journal entry, to read more about her thoughts and excitement about him, but that was interrupted.
“Harry?” A hoarse voice rang through the air, making his entire body freeze. The flush of cold washed over him as he lifted his eyes to meet hers, droopy and furrow browed. “Am I dreaming?”
Fuck.
“Yeah, darling. It’s a dream.” His voice swiftly took on a croon, placing the journal to the desk and standing up from the chair. “You’re alright.” If his heart still beat it would be in his throat and at his feet at the same time, body tense as he tried to navigate this the best way possible. It was too early for her to know he came in here, came to spend time with her even when she slept. It was far too much for her to know he counted her breaths and monitored the beats in her chest. That he tried to give her privacy when she touched herself to get herself sleepy, but he couldn’t help overhearing even when trying to distract himself in his home office.
“Oh.” The sad sigh had him curious. Was she disappointed? What would she truly do if she knew this was anything but a dream, a sickly reality where a monster was completely and utterly obsessed with her, and wanted to bond her to his side for the rest of eternity. “Can you come lay with me then? If this is a dream I think I shouldn’t waste it with you over there.”
The vampire wanted to laugh at how completely absurd this was. How fucking insanely lucky he had gotten that her own glass of wine had her more drowsy than normal. This scenario had been his fear from the beginning, but he had to wonder if her body felt the pull more now that she’d touched him. Now, she knew how his skin felt. Contact had been made, and maybe her body felt his presence more than before. “Of course I can.” He smiled lightly, padding over to her empty side of the bed to toe off his shoes. It felt surreal, her heat radiating off of the mattress as he slowly lowered himself down on the sleeping pad that was probably a bit too hard and springy for her. She’d prefer his bed, he was positive. It’d cost a pretty penny but for the times he did want to sleep it was perfection.
“This is the most realistic dream. I need to lay off the Cabernet before bed.” She yawned, lifting the duvet up and showing no hesitation as she scooted closer to him and laid herself down next to him. “Well, dream Harry, you’re gonna have t’do until the real one wants me. Hold me please.”
It was times like this that Harry wondered what sort of good karma he’d gotten, especially with how many lives he’d taken, to get a taste of this. Her body warmth was so delicious, her scent making his mouth water and he thanked whoever was listening in his head that he’d had the intuition to have fed before this. Her body was delicate and soft, turning over for him to lay with her- spoon her. Harry hadn’t done this in a number of years, had never felt the real urge to, but he did it for her regardless. Took her soft flesh into his hands and felt her shiver as she she huddled closer to him. Hot fingers ran over the backs of his hands, slotting in between the spaces. In all his existence, he had never had a feeling to compare to his one.
“Is this alright, Darling?” He asked into her ear, trying his best to remain calm. This was the ultimate impulse control, her thudding pulse right at mouth level. He could hear the blood running under her skin, the pumps of her heart moving it through her system. Digging his canine into his lip, he took deep and slow breaths through his mouth to try and limit temptation. It didn’t take it all away, his head dizzy from the scent surrounding him, but if he took a large inhale of the spot next to her ear he would perhaps lose his mind.
“Mhm.” She sighed contently. “This is a good dream. Maybe you’ll fall in love with me tomorrow and I can make this real.” The words were said so quiet that he was sure that no human could hear them, but he could. He heard them and committed them to memory. The sweet little human had no idea that he’d been falling for a long time. Y/N took up the majority of his thoughts, owning him in a way that had him feeling like his life wasn’t his anymore. For someone with control issues it had made him furious at first, but the last bit of anger towards her for owning him melted away as she melted into his body, giving herself to him. There was no way he could hold even the slightest bit of resentment when it felt this divine to hold her.
The only times he had held humans in his life had been to drain them of their blood. To watch the life drain from them as he took it selfishly for his own needs. Never once has it been to cherish one, to commit the feel of her fingers between his to memory. It was overwhelming, as the girl dozed off in his arms, to know that this was merely a taste of what he could have. He needed to charm her, to get her to see that he could give her the love no one else could. Albeit obsessive, possessive, intense, unlike anything a human could give her, he had a feeling that if she had been a temptation for him that the fates had chosen to give him a human who could handle it.
“I’m going to take care of you.” He spoke softly, not wanting to rouse her from her sleep quite yet. “You are the most precious thing in my world. Somehow you’ve managed to bewitch me, little human. Completely take my heart from my chest, regardless of how dormant it has laid.” Inhaling shakily, he let his nose run along her cheek. “You won’t have to be alone ever again. Not if I can help it. I’ll show you the love you deserve.”
It wasn’t until the bright blue of the early turning dawn started to break that he found himself able to move from her bed. It took three tries and a lot of control when she sought him out, holding tighter to him and whimpering when he went to leave in his first attempts, but he had to go before she woke up. It ached, the thought of leaving her, but he had to. Even though hours later would feel like an eternity, he couldn’t take any more risks tonight. The selfishness he had for staying all night couldn’t be extended to waking her up with sweet words and his mouth. Even though it pained him, the soreness of his chest making it feel even more hollow, he had felt more whole in those hours than he’d ever imagined he could be.
The melancholy that followed him around, the bitterness, it didn’t go away completely- but it had dulled down to a whisper as he climbed out of her yard. Just hours with her and he felt lighter.
Like his heart started to beat again.
Once they get to the lounge, Harry can admit two things: he barely knows who they’re meeting, and both he and Y/N are far too overdressed for the situation. At least, club vibes are a little more relaxed, aren’t they? But Y/N and Harry are coming straight after their 9-to-5 (that had been more like an 8-to-7 as of late), Y/N was in a sleeveless silk blouse, a petal pink with bottoms in the same color. She’d been wearing a cardigan all day, too, but the first moment they stepped into the hot car park, Y/N gasped and ripped it off to tie around her waist, “You’re trying to kill me, you really are.”
“Huh?” Harry frowned, “I don’t make the weather; how is this my fault?”
“I saw your bank statements to Helios. Do you think I’m dumb?”
Harry’s face twisted, “Who is Helios? Wait, and can you see my bank statements?”
or
Harry can't be normal about his PA & Y/N is softer than she lets on
part 1
(18.5k+ words)
ii.
“You’ve been jumpy today.”
When Harry had seen what his schedule was going to look like for the next couple of weeks, he knew it was going to be daunting. There are two peak seasons, both in winter and in summer; this past winter had been his first peak, and it had gone semi-horribly, even with all the effort and elbow grease Y/N put into keeping things straight. Harry was crashing and burning badly, frantic and frazzled, feeling the impostor syndrome wiggling deep in his bones and reminding him this job had been handed to him, not earned.
He remembered Y/N, even as stressed as she was, and even with as much as he seemed to annoy her, was kinder to him about it than she probably should have been. Her kindness had been shown in ordering him to take an hour-long lunch and threatening a shock collar on him if he tried to do any work during it because, “You’re useless when you haven’t eaten.” It’d also been shown in her delegating less important meetings to other floor and department heads, she thought could handle it. Then Harry mysteriously got a 2-hour-long massage gift certificate as a “promotion” opportunity that their company would somehow post about. Y/N went into a whole discussion on social media outreach and analytics, only for nothing to ever come of it.
Harry didn’t want to be a burden on her this time. To be fair, he felt much more comfortable in his position as the company head now, even with only six additional months under his belt. His work/life balance was still shot to hell, but he knew when it was necessary to carry stress and when it wasn't. He could work out if someone was trying to hustle them or if negotiations were actually good. Harry had an easier time answering emails, interacting socially, and at least putting on a face that didn’t expose that he felt like he had no idea what he was doing. “Fake it ‘till you make it” is a saying Harry had lived by all of his life, starting from when he lied his way into the neighborhood footie team by saying he’d been playing since he was 4 (he’d never kicked a ball in his life at that point). That’s when Harry learned that as long as you say things with enough conviction, people will eventually just believe you.
So he does a lot of that, and the more he does it, the more comfortable he is doing it. Which means hopefully he doesn’t have to rely on Y/N as much this time.
. . .at least, not in a way that she’s necessarily aware of.
Watching her live was something close to a religious experience; the way it eased the tension from his muscles and turned his brain all ooey-gooey was something he’d not experienced in a very long time. The constant humming, buzzing energy of every atom that makes him up had slowed to something slow-moving, gentle – the plodding waves of an ocean drawing the grains of sand back and forth. Harry had missed feeling this way – honestly, Harry doesn’t even know if he’d felt that way before. He’d felt something like it, but he was truly boneless, brain melting through his ears onto the pillow, crawling beneath it to hide until the sun came back out. He was peaceful, cozy, even covered in cum with his robe half undone.
And that was just from one live stream. A block of 15, maybe 20 minutes of her getting off, and it was better than any lay Harry had experienced up to that point. It was hard to wrap his head around it. . .so obviously, he had to make sure the next night. . .and the night after that. . .and the night after that. Harry would have loved to watch a plethora of videos, but he only permits himself one a night because – well, he doesn’t have a reason. He just feels like he needs to pace himself, or he’ll goon himself right into a coma or something.
Each night, though, after he cums watching her, an orgasm that rattles his brain into nothing and morphs him into a useless puddle on the mattress. He thinks his imprint is probably deeply embedded there. If he touches his prick anymore, he’s going to fucking chafe, and his palm is rubbed raw. He’s worried about showing people his hand, thinking that the skin would be noticeably pinker than the rest. Even on Monday, when he first had to look her in the eyes after cumming to the thought of her, she asked him to hold his hand out for something and tilted her head when he held out his left hand.
“Weird,” she remarked, sliding the stack of papers into her left hand, “You’re right-handed.”
Harry blinked at her, “Uh. . .yeah.”
Y/N blinked at him in return. “Yeah,” her brows furrowed, “Okay, anyway –”
The first few days he had to see her were a little easier because he was so busy that he barely saw her. From meeting to meeting, lunches, and daytime drinks. The fashion industry has so many moving parts, so there are always so many people to speak to. But on Wednesday, he sees Y/N the first thing in the morning – actually, he sees Y/N at his doorway, bright and early, 5 AM.
He startled, only half-dressed in his briefs and the 4-inch inseam shorts that Harry had in 10 different colors in because his friend Adam told him it was necessary. He had one sock on, pulled up over his ankle, and the other sock in his hand. Harry was confused, digging through his head, trying to remember if his sister had planned a trip that he forgot about and was showing up to stay, or if he was about to get robbed. But then he looked through the peephole and saw Y/N with a very unimpressed glare.
“What’s going on?” Harry said instantly as he opened the door, “Is everything okay? Are you okay?”
“Am I okay? No.” She answered immediately, pushing passed him to get into his flat, “I had to wake up at 4 AM to get fucking work out clothes on, so I can do a 2 mile run with you and this fucking Versace ambassador,” she slammed her purse down on his counter, frowning, “I hate running, I don’t like being up this early, and I want to go back to bed immediately. Worst of all, you definitely forgot that this was a thing, even though I put it in your calendar. I should’ve set reminders, but I figured you would be up this early to run anyway, you exercise-loving freak.”
Harry checked his phone, and sure enough, in the calendar, Y/N had input it.
Running With Versace /ᐠ •̀ ˕ •́ マ
The angry cat seemed to speak about how she felt, without the small monologue when she walked through the door.
“Oh, I definitely – I definitely remembered that,” Harry scratched the back of his neck, “Um, yeah! Just remind me where we were going for the run? And why?”
It was kind of like getting whiplash, seeing Y/N on the screen and in person. Last night, he’d watched 40 minutes of Y/N rutting her swollen clit against a Fleshlight, whining and pouting, begging to cum while Harry tried and failed to edge himself twice. That morning, she seemed like she was struggling (and failing) not to glare at him every time he opened his mouth. Fair enough – Harry could admit that his brain still hadn’t turned on yet all the way, and seeing the person who had been responsible (unknowingly) for his peaceful, sleep-filled nights wasn’t helping him reboot any quicker.
“You stupidly agreed to it when he was flirting with you,” Y/N replied, shaking her head, “Which I totally get; he’s a smokeshow, but so is his husband, and I don’t know how well you’d do in a throuple.”
Harry does vaguely remember smiling and nodding, staring into the stranger’s pretty eyes, and agreeing to go on a morning jog since they’d both bonded over a love for running. Still, he’s confused, “So, wait – why are you going?”
Y/N’s glare couldn’t have gotten more severe. “Why am I going? Oh, I don’t know,” she shrugged, “Maybe because my super sweet, stellar boss told Aki that I loved running too, that we go every morning, because what a coincidence his assistant runs with him too! And that’s so nice, because we all get to turn our work brains on and discuss the distribution of a summer collection in our stores without having to meet in a stuffy old conference room.” The more she said, the more Harry remembered, the more he cringed at himself. He was a sucker for a pretty face; he could admit that. He’d probably have agreed to skydive and discuss the distribution if Aki had asked. And, more than likely, he probably would’ve had Y/N come too.
The thing was – Harry doesn’t even mean to include Y/N all of the time. It just comes out whenever he’s agreeing to something, to also rope her into it. If she notices that he does this, then she never says anything about it outright, but she definitely complains about it in the moment.
“Ah, yeah, that’s starting to sound a bit familiar,” he pointed toward his room, “I’m g’na finish getting dressed.”
So, Harry had started out relatively normal this morning, even with the sudden change in plans. He was feeling satiated and calm, clear-headed, like he could talk the ambassador into speaking to Donatella and selling him half of the company or something crazy. And then he walks into his room, and sees his laptop on his bed, plugged into the charger with the lid open, and suddenly remembers that he fell asleep with Y/N’s video on it. Y/N, who, if she suddenly needed to use his computer for something, would have no problem about grabbing it, typing in his password, opening it up, and –
Harry slammed the lid closed and shoved it up under the pillow, his heart hammering against his chest. He immediately starts to scan the room, like maybe he forgot that he wrote “I WATCH YOUR STREAMS LIKE A FILTHY PERVERT” on the walls or something. Really, the only thing that could have indicated anything was his laptop but he put that away. And really, what were the chances that Y/N would want to use his computer that early in the morning?
“Harry,” he could hear the floorboards shifting, her voice getting closer, “Where’s your computer? I forgot to forward our numbers to the finance department.”
If it was possible to break out into a cold sweat in two seconds, Harry did so.
“Wh-what?”
Y/N is standing at his doorway, and it’s – it’s weird to see her close to his room like this. In his panic, he finally registered what she was wearing. The leggings that hug her thighs so tightly, he can almost vividly imagine them bare, so he can only imagine what it looks like when she turns around. She has a purple jacket on, but he’d already twisted it tight around her waist to reveal the t-shirt she wore beneath it. It was nothing spectacular, but he knew what lay beneath it, and that was enough to twist something deep in his belly. Her hair was pressed from her face, her eyes were bright despite how tired she was, and her lips looked as glossy as they did when she was whimpering about how good it felt to grind on something last night.
“Your computer,” she repeated, then her eyes moved around the room, and Harry saw where they were trained – at the head of his bed, where he’d just placed it. He thought for a moment she was using her freaky, psychic demon powers on him, but when he turned, he saw that his charging cord was still clearly on the bed, stretched and leading to where his laptop hid. “I just need it for a second.”
“No!” He answered maybe too quickly, then swallowed hard, because god, that was a little obvious that he was hiding something, “Not–um, not that one, it doesn’t work, I – my office,” he nodded, pointed to the left, “Down the hall! You can – go in there. My desktop is already logged in.”
Y/N peered at him curiously, because as always – she knew something was up, but she must be too tired to fight him on it. Like a small act of mercy, she nodded her head and pivoted on her heel, going deeper into his flat. Harry let out a tiny breath before he pushed his knuckles into his eyes and told himself to get it the fuck together.
So, yeah, after that, he was kind of on edge. Jumpier than normal, which is why Y/N comments on it as they drive to the trail Harry had agreed to run at.
“You’ve been jumpy today.” She told him, after they’d reached for the air conditioner dial in his car at the same time and Harry snatched his hands away Edward Cullen style, “What’s going on with you?”
“Huh? Nothing,” Harry tried to play it cool, “I’m always jumpy.”
He could feel her boring holes into the side of his head with her gaze. He hoped, once more, that the sun just wasn’t high enough in the sky for her to bother with bothering him. Like, hopefully, maybe, he was praying that she just let it go, how she let the laptop thing go this morning. That would be the ideal scenario, at least.
“If you were watching porn on it, I don’t care,” she replied suddenly, “Just say that’s your porn computer and tell me to use the other one next time, instead of being all weird.”
Harry’s blood runs ice cold, “What?” He all but squawks, his face flaming with heat instantly, “That’s not–no! That’s not it at all!”
“Hey, there’s no reason to be so shy,” she raised her hands, “Everyone watches porn. As long as it’s ethically sourced, I don’t see why it would be an issue. Self care includes masturbation and –”
“Stop!” Harry squeaks, definitely not sounding as assertive as he would like to. The comfort that she has to speak about Harry’s sex life is mind-boggling to him, because he’s certain that most people don’t discuss that with their bosses, but Y/N seemed to have no issue. And honestly? She was a huge part of his supposed sex life right now, so she really did kind of have the right to bring it up, but Harry was not about to do that with her right now.
“Jeez, you’re shy.” She lowers her seat, leaning it back a bit more. “Niall has gone in-depth with me about every possible position he’s been in, with demonstrations, and all the nasty little kinks he’s into. Nothing I could see on your laptop would surprise me.” She sighed, shaking her head, and Harry can almost guarantee that what is on his screen would surprise her, “I thought you went out this past weekend, though? With your friends?”
Harry’s mouth is permanently hung open. “So you did set that up?”
“Of course I did,” she replied without a hint of shame, “I got my ass handed to me because you were all flighty, so I was looking out for me.” The navigation system tells him to turn left into the parking lot, and Harry had never been so excited to arrive somewhere to work out before. “We can table this conversation for now. You need to de-blush yourself before we see Aki, or I’m g’na have to tell him you were watching porn this morning.”
“I was not watching porn this morning!”
“Oh, sorry,” she corrects, “Last night.”
Harry feels like he’s going to explode. Y/N gives him approximately 1 minute and 15 seconds to “de-blush” before they get out of the car (she set a timer), so he really has no time to settle himself before they’re walking up to Aki, who is alone. And Aki, ever the flirt, almost immediately makes Harry blush all over again when he sees his gaze lace over Harry’s body like a snake, slithering from his legs upward.
“So this is what you’ve been hiding under those suits,” he smiles, and Harry’s heart was already hammering because of Y/N, so this does little to help it slow, “Have you thought about modeling?”
All giddy, Harry scrunches his nose, “Ah, that – is very flattering, but I’d much prefer to stay away from the lens if I could help it.”
“That’s a shame then,” Aki winks at him before turning to greet Y/N, “Always a pleasure, Miss. Y/N. How are your cats?”
Before Harry can be confused about how Aki knows Y/N has a cat (and he wonders if he even knew that Y/N had a cat), Y/N – who has all but cussed him out this morning through her vicious gaze – sounds like she couldn’t be happier to be awake this early. Like going for a run was the best thing Harry could have signed her up for, “The pleasure is mine! They’re doing well. Greedy little things, though. They try to wake me up an hour before my alarm every morning to feed them.”
“Mine does the same,” Aki groans, shaking his head, and reaching up to pull his hair back to place a small bun. It looked like he’d just stepped off a shampoo commercial, and he could almost hear Y/N grumbling about how the world is so easy for pretty men. “You’ll have to forgive my running buddy. She was not in the mood to come out this early – practically told me to fuck off when I called to wake her up,” he chuckles warmly, and Harry thinks he feels Y/N go rigid beside him. Admitting that was probably the worst thing Aki could have done to Harry, he’s pretty sure, save for him slapping Y/N in the face and saying Harry told him to do it.
“Ahh,” Y/N clears her throat, and maybe to the untrained ear, she still sounds chipper, but Harry can sense the edge to her voice – the way it sours into something that sounds like I’m going to beat my boss' ass as soon as you turn around, “I hope I’m not intruding then. I can leave you both two it if –”
“Nonsense, nonsense,” Aki waved his hand, “Don’t worry about that! I’m looking forward to spending my morning with both of you.”
It had been her one out, but even Harry could have told her Aki wouldn’t send her away. Y/N just had that way about people, even ones who had only met or spoken to her a couple of times. It still drives Harry crazy how effortlessly this all comes to her, despite her clear distaste for most of the social settings they’re put in. Even now, she stretches and grins at Aki like she were an avid runner, and chats idly with him about the “runner’s high at the halfway point” that he could guarantee she had never experienced. Maybe she was the one who could convince Aki to sell them half of the company somehow.
The weather isn’t miserable for a run, actually. There was a threatening heat wave this week, but this early in the morning, the sun hadn’t begun to bake the earth just yet. Morning dew still moistened the grass in little droplets clinging to the blades, the air smelling the way it only could during the summer, at this exact time. It was not yet humid, what was left over of the nighttime breeze still whistled carefully between the trees, lingering long enough to cool the back of his neck when sweat started to build at the nape.
All things considered, Y/N keeps a pretty even pace with both Harry and Aki, though she’s quieter than typical. Y/N has never been much of a “speak when spoken to” individual, but right now she only replies when they say her name directly. When Harry looks over to check in on her, he can tell she’s focusing on her breathing, probably more than the conversation, and there’s a pissed off glare reserved just for him to see. Especially when she senses that he’s looking over at her, so she jabs her finger ahead like she’s scolding him to look forward.
They actually don’t speak about work at all, which is good, depending on how you look at it. For Harry, on one hand, it is nice because then he just gets to focus on his run and being bracketed by two people he heavily fantasizes about without them knowing. On the other hand, he knows the point of Y/N being on this run has diminished to completely moot, which means he’s going to definitely get his ass handed to him.
“Will you be attending Craig’s gala? It’s only two weeks away.” Aki inquires, and Harry feels Y/N tense beside him. He’s unsure what her deal is, but Y/N’s reaction instantly puts him on edge, so he treads carefully.
“Yes, we’ll be there,” Harry sounded more winded than he would like, but they were about to finish off, and this is always the point in time where he feels like his lungs are starting to work against him. For some reason, with Aki’s tone, Harry feels like he has to make an excuse for why he’s going, especially when Aki turns away from the trail to look at him, “He’s a long-time friend of my father’s. I imagine he’ll be attending too.”
Aki hums, low, gentle, “I see,” he nods, “I’ll be there as well then. I just wanted to make sure I was among. . .friends, y’know?” He gave another small nod, mostly to himself, “It’d look bad if I didn’t show, but I didn’t want to be made a mockery of either.”
Honestly, Harry has absolutely no idea what the hell he’s talking about. He’s sure Y/N would update him later, but for now, he thinks something along the lines of “What would Y/N do?” and he’s definitely sure she wouldn’t have asked Aki what he was talking about. He also doesn’t think she would speak too favorably to Craig either, considering the weird tension that stirred at his name being mentioned. So he’s good, he keeps his answer as vague as he can without sounding robotic.
“Yeah, of course. We’ll spend time together there, yeah? Y/N will be there too! Hopefully, we can sit at the same table.”
He thinks that’s good enough, and the sudden, soft breath Y/N lets out either suggests he did bad or he did good. It didn’t sound irritated, though, and when he spared a glance at Y/N, she wasn’t glaring at him more than usual. Actually, he receives a curt nod, which is as close to praise as he thinks he’ll get from Y/N today, so he’ll take it.
Aki sighs happily, “That’s a relief,” and then he loops his arm around Harry, squeezes him as they run, and then extends his hand further to pinch at Y/N’s shoulder, “Don’t tell anyone else, but you two or my favorite to work with by far. This industry gets so muddled and fucked with such shitty people. You two are the best little duo.”
In Harry’s head, he’d always interpreted people seeing them as boss and unwilling, annoyed assistant – but he supposes that wouldn’t make sense. Y/N comes off in a much different light than she shows him, so it makes sense that people see them differently. A little duo – a pair; if you saw Harry, chances are Y/N was close by, more by his own design than hers. They weren’t “dumb boss who marathon masturbates to his begrudging assistant’s secret streaming account”, but “the CEO of a fashion company and an astute, clever personal assistant that keeps him on track”. The ladder definitely sounded more professional and had a much better ring to it.
The rest of the run goes by well. Aki wanted to go for breakfast, but one look at his watch and he realized that both of them needed to head home and get ready for the day. Once they crawled back into Harry’s car, the doors closed, and out of earshot, Y/N twisted in the seat to face him, “For once, you didn’t make a socially inept offense. I’d like to tell you I’m proud.”
Harry’s insides fizzle from the praise, despite it being kind of a backward compliment. Still, any amount of approval from Y/N is few and far between, so he has to take it while he can.
“Thank you,” he murmurs gratefully, “But what exactly was that about?”
“Craig’s wife, may or may not have cheated on someone who shares a striking resemblance to Aki, and Craig got pissy drunk, kind of blew up at him at a dinner, accused him of ruining his marriage, all that,” Y/N waved her hand like it was old news, but Harry’s mouth fell open, “Craig either forgot Aki was happily married or what, I don’t know all the details. What I do know is that they’ve since “made up,” but it was more for appearances in the rich people's social circle than actually putting it in the past. It’s best not to get in the middle, so just keep sitting there and being pretty, minding your business.”
His insides go from fizzling to full-on boiling bubbles, proliferating and popping through his veins.
“You think I’m pretty?”
Y/N looks at him, rolls her eyes, then clicks her tongue.
“Don’t fish for compliments, it’s unbecoming.”
. . .
Y/N was in a bad mood.
Harry thinks that it’s probably a well-deserved bad mood. Tuesday morning, they had woken up early for the run with Aki. Then, Tuesday night, she had stayed over late with Harry, attending a meeting that lasted far too long over drinks. On Wednesday, they were slammed with quarterly reports, which technically should have been Harry’s job, but with the negotiations for autumn collections being released in his stores, Y/N had to take the brunt of it. Her fingers must ache from all the typing she’s had to do, because he passes by her desk midday, and Niall is massaging her knuckles while she pouts. Thursday, there were quarterly evaluations, again, something that should be Harry’s job, mostly, but he’s been so busy he hasn’t been able to check in with most of his employees besides a passing ‘good morning’ and ‘have a good night’. So once again, Y/N had to take over. Then Friday is another late meeting, but Harry barely knows how much it can be classified as a meeting when it’s at a club lounge. This one Harry offered to go alone, so Y/N could at least have her Friday, but she rolled her eyes and said she’d be there.
She didn’t have to tell him she was in a bad mood for him to notice. With how busy both of them had been this week, despite seeing each other, Harry could sense it from miles away. Each update in his calendar, the cat emoticons get progressively angrier as the days go by, ranging from /ᐠ - ˕ -マ to /ᐠ •̀ ˕ •́ マ. Her insults toward him lack the typical bite they have, but Harry can only deduce that’s because she’s actually pissed. An Y/N that’s insulting him is a Y/N that’s having fun; Harry had long since come to terms with that. But the version of Y/N he’d been privy to all week was having the opposite of fun – she was miserable and sleepy, and forgetting to hydrate, much less reminding him.
And what better way to end a hard, dehydrated work week than piling on cocktails around important businessmen? Y/N could come up with several different ways; she’d actually made a list on a post-it and placed it on Harry’s desk.
Things I’d rather be doing:
Sleeping
Lying down in oncoming traffic
Changing a cat cafe’s litterboxes with my bare hands
Having a nice meal at home
Drinking wine and painting
Make friends with an eldritch monster hiding under my bed
Watch the shows I’ve had to ignore this past week
It’s like she couldn’t decide on real or fake answers, but the list was entertaining, to say the least. When Harry sees her a little bit after lunch (his consisted of a banana, and Y/N, at her desk, was eating a bag of Chex Mix and mini muffins, so both of them weren’t having the most fulfilling meals), he checks in with her, “Did you get any sleep last night?” Harry asks and is almost instantly answered when she turns to look at him, her face pulled into a frown.
“Don’t ask stupid questions.” She ordered, “I’m forwarding all of the evaluations. I need you to sign every single one because I’m not going to jail for unlawfully forging a signature.”
Once they get to the lounge, Harry can admit two things: he barely knows who they’re meeting, and both he and Y/N are far too overdressed for the situation. At least, club vibes are a little more relaxed, aren’t they? But Y/N and Harry are coming straight after their 9-to-5 (that had been more like an 8-to-7 as of late), Y/N was in a sleeveless silk blouse, a petal pink with bottoms in the same color. She’d been wearing a cardigan all day, too, but the first moment they stepped into the hot car park, Y/N gasped and ripped it off to tie around her waist, “You’re trying to kill me, you really are.”
“Huh?” Harry frowned, “I don’t make the weather; how is this my fault?”
“I saw your bank statements to Helios. Do you think I’m dumb?”
Harry’s face twisted, “Who is Helios? Wait, and can you see my bank statements?”
Harry was still in his suit for the most part, though he’d taken off the jacket and left it in the car. He’s pretty sure that if he lifted his arms up, there would be pit stains, because it was humid and hot outside, even from the walk from the valet to the inside. Plus, Harry was just left with the horrid thought that Y/N could see his bank statements, and that made him want to lock himself in a sauna and melt. If she could see his bank statements, then she definitely saw her camming site all over the fucking place. From breaking behind paywalls to the one livestream he’d attended and spent way too much money on.
They were sitting, waiting patiently, somehow fashionably early despite the meeting time being at 7 PM. Y/N goes through the email three separate times to make sure they weren’t reading the date or time wrong, and on the third check, she locks her phone with a grunt. “Fucking rich, dumb CEOs not giving a fuck about people’s time,” she leans back into the couch they were sitting on, the rented out area, “I’m gonna put you all on a deserted island without a boat.”
“Can’t I be left out?” He pouted, “I’m also suffering with you.”
“I’m suffering because of you.” She muttered spitefully.
Harry leans forward, grabbing one of the four cocktails that had been sitting on the table, but hands it to Y/N instead, “Here,” he suggested, “I’ll make sure we don’t stay here too long, yeah? An hour tops, then I’ll say I have to pick up my dog at the groomer.”
“Yeah, for a timely 8 PM pick up,” Y/N grumbled.
“Then I’ll get a migraine or something,” he promised, “Leave it to me. Just get tipsy or something so the time goes by quicker.”
Y/N eyes him for a moment, seeming distrusting, “What’s with you?” She asks, “You’re being suspiciously agreeable today.”
She isn’t wrong. In the past, when Y/N’s in a particularly harsher, grumpier mood than usual, Harry tries to steer clear of her in any way he can. And if he can’t, then he relegates himself to abject silence to avoid saying something to put her in a foul mood. Even if it were just the two of them in a room, he’d avoid eye contact with her, tense at her side, worried that his next breath might make her implode.
Guilt is what keeps him from doing that today. While Harry is the reason for Y/N’s stress, Y/N is the reason Harry is handling this busy week relatively well, in ways that she isn’t even aware of. Every night he goes home, he picks one of her videos to watch, he cums so hard that his vision whites out, then he has a nice hot shower, crawls into bed, and falls asleep in less than 5 minutes. He feels well rested when he wakes up, even though he’s been sleeping in late enough to miss some of his exercise time, it doesn’t even send him spiraling like it might in the past. He ambles about his kitchen, makes himself breakfast, and hums quietly until it’s time to leave. Hell, he’s even singing to the radio on the way in and the way home! He overheard Y/N tell Niall that if she isn’t listening to something that’s mostly guitars squealing and drums being hit, then she’s driving home in silence. Silence –and that’s never been something okay with her.
So, yeah, he’s trying to be accommodating to her shitty mood since he plays a huge part in it. If he were better at his job – more suited and proficient at the role – then Y/N wouldn’t have to pick up so much slack. She helps him here, she helps him at home; Y/N helps, but there is nobody to help her, with all of it, besides Niall and his finger massages. And Harry’s offer for her to get at least a buzz on company time and to speed this along.
“Can’t I just take care of my employee?” Harry decided to answer a question with a question, one of Y/N’s least favorite tactics, but before she can grill him further, their evening guests arrive. From Y/N’s irritated debrief in the car, it’s the two owners of boutiques Harry’s father helped build five years ago, hoping to merge facilities into a larger shop. Harry didn’t know much about the boutiques, but how Y/N described them, it was ritzy for people who didn’t want to spend a thousand quid on a white shirt, but wouldn’t be caught in anything less than 80. They’d been trying to meet up with Harry for months now, but all of their schedules finally aligned.
Y/N had a feeling that they wanted to discuss Harry helping them rebrand and rebuild, because somehow she knew they were in contact with a well-known contractor, whose prices are never pretty. Like many things, Y/N was absolutely right – after some light small talk, getting comfortable with each other, Vada and Juniper wanted to discuss if Harry wanted a part in the finances of the build, plus a spot to soft launch one of his company’s newer, working brands. Expensive jewelry, high-dollar watches – things that Harry didn’t think necessarily needed a store rented out to sell when they weren’t sure how well they would do anyway. For now, it’d just been an online storefront, but their bartering chip to place it in their boutique was pretty good. Even Y/N seemed impressed by their pitch, and she’s notoriously harder to sell things to, despite the final call not being her own (she aligns with what Harry thinks relatively often).
“Ah, I don’t see why not?” Harry shrugs, then looks at Y/N, who has finished the rest of her second cocktail, now playing with the toothpick and a slice of strawberry between her teeth. She nods along, but he doesn’t know much she’s actually listening once her part in the conversation is finished, “Let me work out the semantics of it, and I’ll get back to you by the middle of next week. Does that sound okay? It seems like a symbiotic relationship.”
For as confident as they came off in their suggestion, they both looked ten times more relieved by his reply. Harry thinks his father was infamous for being a hard sell. He’d never be trying to make you feel stupid for it, Harry knew that much, but there was a level of condescension that comes with being the head of a company for so many years. He’s sure that when they first asked for help five years ago, his father probably really had them chasing their tails to explain how it would profit them. It would explain their near thesis-statement-like proposal.
True to his word, Harry gets them out of there pretty quickly. He forgoes both excuses from before and instead says he’s relieving his dog sitter so she can get home to her children. Harry doesn’t have a dog, nor a dog sitter with children, but they didn’t seem suspicious at all. They bid their goodbyes, Harry and Y/N excuse themselves first, and they make their way out of the lounge at 8:02. But Harry doesn’t realize just how pleasant of a buzz Y/N put on until she lets a gust of air from her lungs, nudging his body with hers playfully.
“I’m glad you agreed,” she told him, and it’s then too that he realizes she’s got a slight stumble in her step, “Being a woman having to ask a man for help already feels degrading when it shouldn’t, and some people are such dickheads about being in a position of power over people who need them. Apparently, your dad was a huge dickhead to them last time, is what I heard – no offense.”
Harry snorted, “None taken,” he replied, reaching out to steady her when they got close to a curb, “Aish, maybe the second drink was pretty strong?”
“Oh, definitely too strong,” she agreed, reaching up to pop the top button of her top while they waited for the valet. It does very little to uncover much skin, but it’s still more than she’d been showing before, and Harry is just a man at the end of the day. Her throat looks pretty, he feels kind of like a vampire staring at it, and there’s a necklace around her throat that lies delicately between her collarbones. It twinkles in the light – he wonders if someone bought it for her.“You’re g’na have to drive me home, I’m not taking a subway like this.”
“Of course.”
“And you’re stopping me to pick up food too, since you tried to starve me today.” Harry laughed again, nodding, “And it’s your treat.”
“Is that so?” He’s amused, “You’re quite the bossy drunk, aren’t you?”
This is a version of Y/N he hasn’t gotten to see. Harry has witnessed Y/N in work mode, both at the company building and outside of it. Then he’s seen her in work mode with several layers of fabric missing, doing filthy things with an even filthier tongue. He’s seen her grumpy, he’s seen her mildly displeased, he’s seen her smile genuinely, he thinks like a handful of times. . .but he has never seen her this relaxed and unfiltered. And he would say that she’s pretty unfiltered as a person already.
The valet pulls Harry’s car around, then walks to the passenger side to open up the door for Y/N. It’s a young guy, in his early 20s, Harry would guess, and he’s giving her heart eyes while he waits for her to get in the car. Y/N switches the arm that her cardigan is stretched across. “Thank you,” she nods in his direction. “Very chivalrous, Harry, give him a good tip.”
Harry huffed a breath through his nose and thumbed a couple of notes from his wallet, rolling them up and sliding them into the boy’s hand. He holds back a laugh when Y/N reaches out to grab the handle and yanks the door shut, almost (unintentionally) dragging the valet’s hand with it and slamming it in the door. He pulls his fingers back just in time to avoid it, but the gasp he lets out almost echoes in the garage. “Sorry about her,” Harry patted his shoulder, “She’s a bit tipsy.”
“No problem, thank you, Sir,” he nods his head, “Have a good time with your wife.”
Wife? Oh my god. . .were they giving that impression? Neither of them is even wearing rings on their left hand!
When he gets in the car, he chews around the thought of telling Y/N, but he decides to hold his tongue. Knowing her, she’d probably make a disgusted noise and say something that would hurt his feelings, so he’d rather just pocket it as a silly comment that he’ll inevitably think about until 1 in the morning when finding sleep is difficult.
Y/N is already messing with the radio, connecting her Bluetooth without asking. Not that she would ask if she wasn’t drunk, she usually just lets him play whatever is on the radio or whatever playlist is on his phone. Not that she’d ever let him get away with a song that she thought was shitty; a grunt here or a long drawn sigh there that suggested he should switch to the next while she was still considering being kind about it. One time, she said something along the lines of, “You like a lot of music that seems like generic Love Island songs,” and Harry spent an entire 48-hour period reconsidering his music taste.
She puts on something whose album cover is neon green and a beat that startles Harry before she adjusts it to a lower murmur, “Wow, we should probably go clubbing like a real club one day. Ni and I go to this one down in the city, and like – yeah, the floors are pretty sticky but the vibes are immaculate.”
Harry’s brows furrow as he spins the wheel left, pulling them out of the parking garage, “Was that not considered a real club?” He chances a look at her, to see her staring at him with a horror-stricken face, “No?”
“Of course not. You can tell you grew up rich,” she jammed her thumb back toward the building that was slowly getting smaller in the rearview, the bracelets on her wrists making a twinkling sound when they knock together, “That’s like a smarmy, pompous, look at my red bottom heels kind of thing. You can’t even really relax and get fucked up ‘cos someone’s sticking their nose up at you, and there’s a CEO being creepy in the corner – no offense.” Y/N presses the button for the air conditioner, kicking it on harder, “I mean like, neon lights, so dark that everyone looks like a ‘New York 10’, the drinks are sugary sweet, and someone’s humping in the bathroom stall next to you while you pee. Oh! And like – any song from BRAT playing top volume.”
This is the most entertaining he thinks Y/N has ever been (save for what he’s been seeing on her videos), at least with Harry in her presence. Usually,1` she’s so annoyed with every breath he takes that there’s no time for any conversations outside of work. Except that one time she spoke to him about how he shouldn’t be embarrassed about watching porn, but that was less entertaining to him and more like seeing a hungry colossal squid slowly making its way toward him while he’s in a rinky-dink wooden boat.
“What is a brat?” Harry inquired, and Y/N groaned, “What?”
“You act like an old man, y’know,” Y/N clicks her tongue, “Where have you been this whole summer? It’s the second BRAT summer, mind you, and we’re already a month in; you should’ve been paying attention.”
“I really have no idea what you’re saying to me right now.”
She moves her seat so she’s leaning back, “I want Mexican food,” she tells him, “No, actually – I want ramen.”
“Oh, okay,” he murmurs, “Where do you want to go for it? Is there a place around here?”
“On Brickmount, yeah,” Y/N starts to type an address into her phone, and the navigator talks loudly over the speakers, “Let me read the menu to you so you don’t waste time looking.”
They’re an 8-minute drive from the restaurant, and Y/N combs through every aspect of the menu and all the different combinations that he could choose from. From how she’s describing it, he doesn’t think it’s a sit-down restaurant, so he’s unsure why he would have to make a decision right now, but he lets her read it off to him anyway. This is typical of their dynamic, Y/N instructing Harry on things, so he’s used to following her train of thought, even if it was a slightly drunk version of it.
Street parking is a hassle (“Not everywhere has valet, you princess.”), but Harry does find a spot just a couple of meters away from the store. It looks nice from the outside, a bowl with a face blushing is what indicates that this is the store, but Harry sees no actual name sign. The windows are frosted glass, so he can’t see much beyond the warm glow of lighting that warms the inside. This part of the city isn’t as bustling right now as he thinks it usually is, but there’s still a good number of people ambling about.
Y/N barely waits for him to put the car in park before she unbuckles and opens the car door, which musters a squawk from his throat that she pointedly ignores. The way Harry scrambles out of the car would be funny if he weren’t the one scrambling, but he fumbles while he grabs for his wallet and his keys, tripping over his feet when he rushes up the sidewalk to get to catch up with her. She’s already at the door, holding it open for him, but loudly greeting someone from behind the counter.
“Yeah, can I have my usual bowl?” She grins at the guy behind the counter, a tall, slim man who looks like he didn’t sleep much the night before. His hair is dark and buzzed short, and he has a silver ball at the tail of his eyebrow and a second piercing around his bottom lip in the right corner. He’s like. . lowkey ethereal, and the smile he’s giving Y/N is boyish and sweet, “And he’ll have. . .hey, what are you getting?”
Harry’s gaze darts over the menu, choosing the first thing he sees, “Uh, the spicy pork ramen seems good,” he decides.
“And he wants an extra egg.” The guy asks, and there are literally stars in his eyes when he looks at her. Have this many people been interested in Y/N, and he just hasn’t noticed it? The last time he made note of someone flirting openly with her was with Xia in HR during the end-of-year party last December. Twice in a night was kind of crazy, but he guesses she does look good tonight. He doesn’t know if she’s done something different with her makeup, or if her hair is just particularly shiny, or if it’s just nice to see her shoulders, bare arms, collarbone, and neck – she looks good. She deserves to be flirted with, probably, if anyone wanted to outright tell her she was beautiful. And Harry would just ignore the heavy weight sitting in the center of his chest.
“Does he want the extra egg, or are you just going to take it?” He looked down toward the screen, using the tip of his index finger to input Harry’s order, “The last guy you brought here told me you took his extra egg.”
Harry’s chest twists – what other guy?
“Niall is a liar, you can’t believe a word he says.” Y/N replied.
Oh. Okay, it was just Niall. Why did that matter? Certainly, Harry didn’t really care, is all. . .he was just curious. Y/N complains often that she barely has time to wipe her ass with how busy Harry keeps her, so he had always assumed she wasn’t dating or seeing anyone. But he guesses that could be wrong. It’s not like Y/N would tell him anyway – she could have been with someone for 4 years at this point and Harry wouldn’t know. Hell, she and Niall could be dating and he’d be none the wiser. Did her potential, maybe partner know about her streaming? She never mentioned one on there, but she guesses that would ruin the illusion.
“Theoretically, if that extra egg was for me, though, would you forfeit the upcharge?”
“Theoretically, that’d triple the upcharge.”
“Ah, then yes, it’s for me, not him, go ahead and run his card through.” With a laugh, he sets his eyes back on Harry and swallows a little nervously while he waits for Harry to dig out his wallet. He slides one of his platinum cards over the counter.
As he takes it, he clears his throat, then swallows again. His adam’s apple bobs with it, “So I take it you’re the boss she’s always talking about?”
“Oh! Oh, um, – yeah,” Harry is caught off guard by the sudden mention. Y/N talks about him? God, what the hell is she saying? Oh, my creepy boss watches my videos, and I see him breaking through the paywalls all of the time, but he thinks I don’t know, fucking loser. And how did he know what Harry looked like? Was she showing pictures? “She’s complaining about me, isn’t she?”
The guy smiles gently, “Ahh, when isn’t she complaining?”
“Fair enough.”
“Hey, stop talking about me like I’m not here,” she grumbles, fixing her purse around her shoulder and pivoting on her heel. The click of her Aquazzarra dupes (he knew that of her own admittance, that because he took a guess) echoes in the small restaurant. The ankle strap looks like a delicate bow tied around the back of it – Harry thinks he could wrap his whole hand around her ankle, probably. The thought twists something heavy and hot in his lower belly, but he chooses – for his self-preservation – to ignore it.
Y/N chooses a booth halfway down the left wall. She plops on the plum colored upholstery, scooting her bum across until she’s sat in the middle. They were the only ones in here right now, and the table was almost sparkling, like all they’ve had to do for the last couple of hours is clean. She must notice him looking around because she mentions, “It gets really busy around 10-11 PM, when people start heading home after drinking.”
Harry hums, resting his elbow on the table, and then his chin on his knuckles, “So you come here with Niall?”
“Niall begs to come with me, but usually I send him home. This is my come-down after drinking time.”
With curled brows, he readjusts his hips on the seat, “So you go home alone from here? That doesn’t seem safe.”
“I’ll make sure to start calling you to come get me.” Y/N slips her phone from her purse – a little lilac thing she got from the COACH outlet, and Harry only knows because he overheard her gushing about the prices versus their comparable pricing.
Harry wouldn’t mind if she did. Call him, that is, to come and get her. He’d rather have her wake him up in the middle of the night than trek home in the city in any sort of state of inebriation. Even though the crime rate isn’t high compared to other cities around the world, it’s still dangerous.
“You are welcome to call a car on the company card,” he suggests, while her fingers slide around the keyboard of her phone, typing something, “The service we use runs until 2 AM on weekend nights.”
Y/N looks up from her phone, narrowing her eyes at him for a second, then looks back down to her phone, “I’ll just call you instead.” She’s trying to brush him off.
“That’s fine too,” Harry replies coolly.
When she clicks her phone shut, a second later, he feels his phone vibrate in his pocket. Did she just text him? Or was he CC’d in an email? “I have to piss,” she announces, slipping her phone back into her purse and letting it slide off her shoulder, “Don’t steal my things.”
While she made her way to the bathroom, Harry took his phone from his pocket. His heart drops down to his stomach.
Like, maybe a week ago, Harry had missed two of Y/N’s livestreams. He was sifting his way through all of her old, posted videos, but there was a headrush he got when he watched her live that one time, that he hasn’t been able to replicate. So he’d downloaded the streaming app, and put on her notifications just to make sure he didn’t miss it the next time. He guesses it sends messages when she just sends a regular post.
I’ll be streaming soooon! ≽^•⩊•^≼ ₊˚⊹♡ Wait up for me!
Another hot pull of arousal tugs at his gut. She’s going to stream when she gets home? After spending all this evening with Harry, she’s going to go upstairs to her flat, turn on her camera, split her thighs – Harry has some questions. Like, does she have a set streaming schedule, and it just so happened that they had this planned on the night of one of her usual streams? Or was she horny right now and knew that she could get money for getting off? Was she going to keep wearing this outfit, split the buttons down the middle, and reveal whatever pretty bra she had on underneath? Or would she get out of her clothes, get washed up, come on cam with skin all supple, soft, and warm from the bath? Harry doesn’t know which would be better. Both stir an itch that he wants to dig his nails into, scratch until it’s satiated, scratch until it hurts a little, scratch until it starts to feel good again.
“Here you go,” Harry jumps, his phone nearly slipping from his hands and clattering on the table when the guy from behind the counter delivers their food. He places Harry’s steaming bowl in front of him first, then sets Y/N’s where she’ll sit across from him. In Harry’s ramen, he sees two eggs: “I gave you an extra egg just in case you really did want it. I already put a 3rd one in hers, the egg-loving weirdo.” Then, he goes back to the cooler behind the counter and pops open the drawer, grabbing two cans and returning to place them in front of him. “If you aren’t careful, she’ll try and snatch this too.”
“Thank you,” Harry smiles gratefully up at him, taking one of the cans, “You know a lot about her, huh? She comes here often?”
The guy smiles – he doesn’t have a name tag on, but Harry would feel kind of weird to ask for it. Like he was being a possessive creep or something, wondering what his name was. Does that make sense? He isn’t sure. “Yeah. She came in here drunk last summer, and it’s been hard to get rid of her since,” he jokes. “Is she like this at work? I’ve always wondered.”
Harry shrugs, “A little bit. Usually, she is scolding me for forgetting something a bit more.”
“Ahh, that’s our Y/N, isn’t it?”
Our? As in like. . .Harry and the employee? Or as in the employee and the rest of the people running the establishment? Or like, they’re friends. Is she friends with this guy? Outside of just eating here? Harry needs to know desperately.
Before he could do any further prying, Y/N comes back out. There’s a pleased sound that leaves her throat when she realizes the food is here. Even more overjoyed when she sees the drink he’d placed in front of her, “Oh! God, you love me so bad,” she scooted back into the booth.
Eating with Y/N like this is different than how they’ve eaten together before. One, Y/N was still a little tipsy and far more relaxed than she usually is when they were eating together. Typically, the meal is forced, whether it’s a mandatory group event of some kind that requires his attendance and he makes her join, if they’re trying to foster employee bonding, or if they were eating snacks at their desks that are within eyesight of each other. This is much more relaxed; Y/N isn’t shoveling food down her throat to finish it to get to the next task, nor is she trying to eat prim and proper while they discuss marketing. She eats, she rambles, she catches Harry up on celebrity drama and controversies (like JoJo Siwa, whoever that is – he needs to get Y/N in contact with Kai, they’d probably have a great time together).
This version of Y/N is scarily similar to the version that is on her streams. Someone unwound, speaking with her friends – he even makes her laugh once, because he doesn’t know who Sabrina Carpenter was (he finds out quickly, with photo proof that she exists, a snippet of her song, both from Y/N singing and a YouTube video). Her eyes are soft, big, and her voice is so much different when she isn’t stony with him. This is a version of Y/N he’d like to see more often. One that he could only hope he’d earn the privilege to.
But there isn’t really a way to do that, is there? Harry is her boss, Y/N treats him as such. They weren’t friends. Not how Y/N is with Niall, or how she is with the guy who works here. Not even how she is with the people who are watching her streams, whether that’s put on for money or not. All Harry is to Y/N is her incompetent boss, who she has to be a rotten brat to because he pisses her off (which is different than a brat girl summer, mind you – Harry’s learning).
“Hey,” he feels a foot tap against his shin from across the table, “Why do you look so depressed all of a sudden?”
“Hm?” Harry flickers his gaze up to her, “I’m not,” he assures her, “Just tired.”
Y/N stares at him, then clicks her foot against his calf again, “I told you, you need to be sleeping more.” She reaches for her phone again, “I’ll have some of this lavender, chamomile tea ordered to your flat. It tastes like plants, but it puts me right to bed.” She jabs a thumb in the direction of the counter, “Puts him to bed too, and he has insomnia pretty bad.”
Harry leans over, “Oh? How much is it?”
“Don’t worry about it.”
His brows furrow, “But –”
“Listen, I’m on your payroll, technically you’re already paying for this,” she waves him away, then swats his calf with the side of her foot again, “Express shipping will have it here by tomorrow night. You can give me a raise as thanks.”
They don’t stay for much longer after that. Harry drives Y/N to her flat, feeling a weird mix between warm and sad, and she’s blissfully unaware. Or at least she acts like she is, cranking the same neon green album (what he learns now is BRAT – he’d gotten a full lesson on what a ‘Brat’ summer entails and how he hasn’t been living one), and fiddling with the settings of his air conditioner. Her hair is in a low bun, but the front pieces are messy around her face. This is the most relaxed he thinks he’s ever seen her with him.
The drive to her building isn’t too horrible, and Harry almost finds himself wishing that it were a little longer. Now that he really thinks about it, it’s probably for the best that Y/N isn’t always like this around him. She’s done it for a total of maybe 2 and a half hours, and he’s already wanting to know who every person in her life is and what they know about her. Was this a side effect of the whole fucking himself to her or what? Maybe she has pheromones oozing from her pores.
Y/N gathered her things and twisted to look at him, “Thank you for driving me home and also for the meal,” she reached behind her to pop the door open, “I think you should’ve gotten out and opened my door for me too, but I guess chivalry isn’t a thing anymore.”
Harry’s eyes widened, “Oh, let me –” he started to unbuckle, but Y/N cackles and pushes the door open with her foot.
“You better rest up this weekend,” she ordered him, “We have a busy week ahead.”
“You too,” he waved when she turned back to look at him, now outside of the door, “Goodnight Y/N.”
“Goodnight, Harry.”
Harry watches her up until the point she walks into glass doors, and he sees her disappear into the lobby. With a soft sigh, he puts the car in drive and starts to make his way home. It would do him some good to go home and get some rest. He could have a nice, long, hot shower and finally put on those silk pajamas his sister sent him from her trip to Greece. He dabbles with the idea of shaving his legs so he could feel how smooth it’d be against it per his sister’s recommendation, but he also doesn’t know if he wants to waste any time doing that. At this point, he’ll already be struggling to convince his future self to wash his face before bed.
When Harry’s pulling up to a stoplight, his phone buzzes with another notification. It’s from Y/N.
Or better yet, it’s from Y/N on her site again.
Like he’d been Pavlov’d into the response, his cock threatens a small twitch in his briefs. From where he has his phone propped onto a vent holder, he leans forward and swipes the notification, and is greeted with a photo that she must have just taken. It’s her neck down, the buttons of the top she’d been wearing are undone to about midchest. He can see the periwinkle scallops of her bra, the white bow that sits between the two cups, the soft swell of her breast. The twinkle of her necklace draws his eyes to her throat, and it makes him feel like a vampire, how badly he wants to sink his teeth into her.
For the most part, Y/N had such a stark difference in her behavior toward him and from what he’s seen on the site, that it hadn’t been as hard to differentiate the two. To keep his brain in locked segments so that he could act right around her, without giving off any indication that he’d edged himself for two hours with her on an uploaded stream in his time off.
But for this – to see her in the outfit that he had just been with her in – oh, it’s a lot to process.
Isn’t my necklace pretty? I’ll be on in 10 𐔌՞. .՞𐦯
The honk from a car behind him is what lets him know the light had switched from red to green. Harry flinched hard, sheepishly waved in his rearview, and pressed on the gas. There was some urgency to get home now that he’d been reminded that there would be a little more to his night than just showering and heading to bed. He’d been so caught up with the idea of her streaming before, only for it to get smushed by him being bummed they weren’t friends. God, wasn’t he pathetic? Who even wants to be friends with their personal assistant that badly? Except maybe Aki, who has a very good relationship with his PA, but – but that’s besides the point.
Harry gets home in record time. He forgoes the elevator when he feels his phone buzz in his pocket, another notification, and he realizes that this one must be her already on live. He takes the stairs two at a time, acknowledging that this was a little pitiful, but his cock urged him not to care. To not think about anything or with anything, other than getting off, and how nice that’ll feel before he hops into the shower and goes to bed.
He barely closes the door before he pulls his phone from his pocket and clicks on the red ₊˚⊹♡ ᓚ₍ ^. .^₎ streaming now!
The screen takes a moment to buffer, but once it does, he can see Y/N. She’s not in her usual spot where she likes to stream and take videos. It looks like she’s in the same room, at least by the purple and pink coloring, but the background is different. She was in a pillow-filled area, though, like a little nook in the wall where she placed a ton of cushions to make it cozy. Maybe Harry has seen it in a video before? But he doesn’t know – he’s usually staring at her, not assessing the background.
Surrounded by the pillows, she’s in the center, her bum on the floor. The quality is a little fuzzier than usual, so she must be filming with her laptop – at least that’s what he guesses, “What do you think the difference between a kink and a fetish is?” She’s continuing whatever she was talking about before he got on, leaning comfortably against the pillows, still in her outfit from tonight. Only now she has glasses on, nipping at her thumbnail and squinting at the screen. If Harry didn’t know Y/N, then he would think she was just trying to use the topic as a spin-off into something sexy, but the look in her eyes suggests that she’s actually curious. The slight furrow in her brow is one she only does during meetings, when someone says something she doesn’t understand.
People are answering, and Harry can see the responses in the tiny corner. Maybe he should just mind his business on his couch where he’d plopped down and keep one hand in his pants, but. . .well, last time he was involved in a live, it was kind of fun, wasn’t it? And Y/N was so nice to him last time. He doesn’t expect the same response, because last time he was new and she was trying to retain a viewer. But maybe she’ll greet him.
tapiocaenthuiast93 tipped 3000 coins!
How I’ve always understood it is that a kink is more of an “add-on,” but a fetish is more of a requirement, right? But maybe I have that wrong.
Y/N’s eyes light up when she sees the username – or maybe they just light up because of the 3000 coins. Regardless, her eyes light up and she leans forward, “Oh! Hi Tappy,” she smiled, but then pouted, “Actually, wait no, I’m mad at you. You gave me a crazy orgasm and then disappeared! I thought maybe you didn’t like it enough to come back.”
She had noticed his absence. That makes his heart race more than he thinks he’d like to admit. He’s quick to type back into the chat.
tapiocaenthuiast93 tipped 2000 coins!
No, of course not! I loved every second of it. I’ve been busy. . .watched your other uploads in the meantime.
Her lip is still pouted as she reads, but she heaves a big, very Y/N sigh. One that he hears often, typically followed by, “Do you think you’d be able to function without me, or would you just end up a bug under a rock?”
“I guess that’s okay,” she is barefoot now, he notices, playing with the fabric of her pants around her ankle, “You came just in time though! I like your explanation, that makes sense. I was just wondering because while I was eating today, I was trying to decide if my thing for men in watches was a kink or something.” Harry blinks at his screen, then at his left wrist, where his Cartier watch was strapped tightly. Had she. . .had she been looking at his watch? Wait –
wolfienightt21 tipped 100 coins!
ooooh, who was wearing a watch that caught your eye?
“Oh, it was my boss,” she answers easily, and Harry thinks his heart is going to speed out of his chest, “He has this one – he doesn’t wear it all the time, but when he does, I can’t stop looking at it.” She admits, “But I’m really good at being inconspicuous, so he doesn’t know.”
Y/N is great at being inconspicuous, because Harry had no fucking idea. He thinks he saw her, maybe looking at his hand once, and it was while he was picking up the noodles with his chopsticks, so that’s what he thought had caught her eye. But it was his watch?
“Yeah, he has nice hands, they’re pretty. You can tell he’s never had to lift a shovel a day in his life,” he huffed a breath through his nose – of course, she’d slide a dig in there, but he can’t even be mad about it. Not when she’s saying his hands are nice – that they’re pretty, “And his fingers are long, and kind of thick. He’s always got these nice rings on. . .so the watch just kind of adds to it. Anytime my ex wanted me to suck on his fingers unprompted, he’d just wear a watch, and I’d be begging for them in my mouth.”
This is a lot to take in. Even more so when Y/N starts casually unbuttoning her top the rest of the way. Was this Y/N’s roundabout way of saying she was thinking about putting Harry’s fingers in her mouth all dinner, or was she just sharing an anecdote about her little kink? Either way, the image of her pretty lips stretched around his knuckles is enough to make him unbutton his pants. He uses one hand to wriggle them down his thighs, keeping his briefs on because when he cums, he’d prefer not to do it on something that would need to be dry cleaned. And he didn’t trust his sofa’s upholstery to hold up in his home washer.
“Oh, shut up,” she’s answering some more of the comments, “I don’t have a crush on my boss. He’s a thorn in my side,” before Harry’s feelings could get too hurt, she continues, “He is hot though. Like, really. Sometimes he can be cute too, but I’d rather walk on melting glass than ever let him know that.” Her eyes scan the screen as she reads more, “Why can’t he know I think he’s cute? Well, besides the obvi reason that he’s my boss,” she slips the shirt off her shoulders, revealing more of her skin, soft, smooth, his fingers twitch like they wish they could reach out and touch her but instead he slips his hand down and squeezes his hardening prick, “--I like when guys are a little scared of me. If he knows I think he’s cute, then he won’t be nearly as jumpy around me. That just won’t do.”
Harry shouldn’t be hearing this. He definitely shouldn’t be hearing this, or getting hard over it, or having to remind himself to swallow the spit collecting in his mouth while she wiggles out of her bottoms without any fanfare. Yet here he is, doing all those things, as she parts her legs and shows off a pretty wet spot on the fabric of her panties, “I wasn’t even planning on streaming tonight, but I’m a little tipsy and very horny, so here we are.”
tapiocaenthuiast93 tipped 2000 coins!
Was it the watch? lolll
He shouldn’t have, but he couldn’t help it. Harry just had to know.
“Hmm, yeah, I was kind of – yeah,” she nods, slipping her fingers under the waistband of her panties, and the fabric stretches around her knuckles, “Plus he was being very respectful to women, that’s always hot. Then I saw his watch, and I’m always a little more. . .more susceptible to horny thoughts when I’m drinking. You know how it is.” She sighed, slowly starting to rub, and Harry slid his hand under his underwear too, wrapping his fist around his cock. The pull is a little dry, but he thinks he deserves for it to hurt a little (and he likes it, more than he’d care to admit), “And he lets me boss him around sometimes. I like that too.”
bugboibottom3 tipped 200 coins!
omgomg switch y/n!! when r u going to do a dom stream? U look gorgeous btw!!! <3
“Thanks, Buggy,” Y/N’s voice was a little tight, her head relaxing back against the pillows, “Dom stream, huh? You’d like that?”
There are so many messages, Harry doesn’t have to add his input. He’d very much enjoy watching that, seeing what she’d come up with, hearing how she’d boss them all around. His head is spinning, and the coil of arousal in his gut is burning hot from everything he is learning right now. Y/N thought he was cute, liked the watch on his wrist, thought about his fingers in her mouth (maybe, but he’s choosing to believe that it happened), and liked bossing him around. And she’s always bossing him around. Like, all of the time. Was she thinking about domming him while she did it?
He could imagine it – he could imagine their dynamic going both ways. Just as Harry could picture clearly, Y/N bent over his desk, drooling over the reports that she’d just dropped by while he stretched and speared her open on his cock again, and again (deep, just how she likes) – he could picture her running the show. Could picture himself edged for hours, tied up, begging her to let him cum. Could imagine his arms twisted behind his back, bound by the wrist while she rode him, nice and slow, squeezing her walls around him every time she sank down, pussy drooling down to his balls.
“Maybe we will,” she hums, “Maybe I’ll convince my boss to come on stream, yeah? We’ll really live the fantasy, like. . .like ‘mean secretary fucks boss into submission’ or some cheesy porno storyboard name. I bet he’d let me,” her hips roll into her hands, “He lets me do everything else.”
Harry would, he realizes. He’d let her do anything. If she wanted him to boss her around and tell her what to do like he did the first stream, then he would. If she wanted to boss him around and make him beg to cum, then he’d do so not only willingly, but gladly. The best of both worlds – like being with Rafayel and Kai at the same time, but she’s one person. His personal assistant, who has no idea how much she’s been making him cun the passed couple of weeks.
Because he’s just been overloaded with intel that he’s going to spend a minimum of three years thinking about, including that Y/N is fantasizing about fucking him on a stream with her hand in her panties – he cums without even registering he was about to. It hits him hard, fast, dirty as he fills up his briefs, emptying his load into them. His mind is literally swirling – he’s bummed out because he usually likes to hold out with her, at least in her videos, and cum with her. But he couldn’t help it. Not when she’d said all of that. Not when he started to imagine it too.
Just because he’d cum, though, doesn’t mean that he can’t be helpful. Harry has always prided himself on being almost overly generous in bed. And from the looks of it, from what he knows about how Y/N likes to get off (or at least from what he’s picked up on from watching her videos), is that her fingers weren’t going to be enough for her.
tapiocaenthuiast93 tipped 4000 coins!
Why don’t you get that silicone pink vibrator you like so much? The double-sided one. Make yourself cum, Sweetheart ₍⑅ᐢ..ᐢ₎
He uses the emoticon because it was offered for how much he’d tipped.
Y/N’s eyes go wide, then her gaze softens, and she grins, pulling her hand from her panties.
“Okayyyyy,” she answers, “But you have to stay and watch the whole thing, okay?”
Harry wouldn’t miss it for anything.
. . .
The next week is a whirlwind.
On Monday, they really do hit the ground running. After a busy morning, they go to get fitted for their formal evening attire that they’ll be wearing for the Gala on Thursday. Y/N had a navy blue suit tailored to his body in a way that even Harry can admit he looks good in. The way the bottoms hug around his bum makes it look like all the squats he does in his workout routine have been paying off, and he likes how the jacket hugs around his shoulders. Everything is very crisp, down to the socks they suggest he wear with the polished leather shoes. His watch gleams on his wrist under the light.
He should keep his mouth shut, probably, but there’s an itch in his bones that makes him have to ask it. “Do you think I should wear the watch with the suit?” He looked at Y/N, who had been sitting on a velour chair to the right of the mirror, waiting patiently for him to finish up.
He asked when the tailor had disappeared out of the room in search of a needle. Harry doesn’t know what he expected from her. Maybe for her lashes to flutter, or for her face to change, or for there to be any indication that she might be affected by the watch, how she’d said she was on Friday. Just to see if it was real or if he’d hallucinated the entire stream.
Y/N looks at him blankly, picking at her fingernail.
“Why would I care? Do what you want.”
That shot that down pretty quickly, but Harry deserved it. What did he expect? For her to say yes, he should wear the watch because it turns her on, and she just told all the people watching her stream that? He was stupid to even bring it up. Y/N doesn’t look suspicious of him, though; she just goes back to plucking at her nail and grumbles something about being too bloated to try on a dress right now.
Once they get Harry out of his suit and have it carefully tucked away in an outfit bag, Y/N is next to go. She disappears in their dressing room for around 10 minutes before she comes out in a floor-length, navy blue dress. There were sparkles all along the fabric, so every time she moved and it caught the light, it looked like her body was made up of hundreds of twinkling stars. The draped sleeves were off the shoulder, and there was a slit that went up just above the mid-thigh.
She looked amazing in it. Whenever the accessories were added and her hair was done, he knew she’d look even better. It would be difficult to try and act normal around her, for sure. Especially after he’d just spent the entire weekend watching her livestreams (the one from Friday, her actual scheduled one on Saturday that he left dinner with Adam early to catch, and a little Sunday quickie that she did about midday when Harry was making himself lunch). After being called out for not being there, Harry made sure he was there for every single one, from the moment it started to the moment it ended. On the third day, when she said, “You’ve been making every single one, Tappy, I’m happy, good boy,” Harry could have combusted and cum right there, so it’s not like he really had a choice from then on, right? He needed to be at each one.
“Does this color match well enough with your suit?” Y/N inquired, pinching the fabric and rubbing it between her fingers. Harry nods quickly, so fast that it feels like his brain is bouncing around in his head.
“Yes, it does, it’s beautiful,” he swallows hard, “I think this is a nice cut on you.”
“Yeah?” She seemed surprised to hear it – there wasn’t even any snark in her response when she turned away from the mirror to look at him. She points to the neckline and traces over it, “The off-the-shoulder doesn’t look stupid? Sometimes I feel like it looks too bare on me.”
Harry is also surprised that she seems to care about his opinion at all. “Once you accessorize, you won’t feel that way. The necklace should be a bit big, though, yeah? Like a white diamond with a rain effect, I think it would look great. There was – I feel like I saw one here, hold on.”
They brought the necklace out at Harry’s request, and he watched with keen interest as they carefully wrapped it around her neck, clipping it. It does its job to make her neck and chest area less bare, and to draw attention to her neck once again, making Harry feel like he was a vampire obsessed with her throat once again. He imagined her hair in one of those messy, wedding-style updos, and he thought she’d blow away most of the people attending, Harry included.
“Yeah, this is perfect.”
Her fingers trace delicately over the diamonds, all various cuts – pear-shaped, round, marquise. “How would I word this in a Google search? I need to find one that isn’t more than a month’s rent – I’m already spending a pretty penny on this dress.”
“Don’t worry about that,” Harry waves his hand, “I’ll take care of the dress and the necklace. I’m sure there are some earrings too.”
Her brows furrow, “Hey –”
“I won’t hear it,” his phone starts to buzz in his pocket from a call, so he stands to reach for it, pulling it out, “I’ve got it covered. Think of it as a bonus check or summat, whatever makes you feel better about it.”
(The call was from Adam, so it hadn’t been that important to answer, but it was easier to cut the potential for her arguing with him on it quickly. “There’s a new gym that we need to go to,” Adam had gleefully shared, “It’s jungle-themed, for some reason, and there’s like an obstacle course, it’s fucking crazy!”)
Tuesday and Wednesday are a blur of the usual meetings, calls, reports, and whisperings of Paris Fashion Week. They were trying to decide if they should have a few company representatives fly out to it this year, and if one of those representatives should be Harry or not. His father had only attended one or two in his time running the company, but that was for the mere fact that he hated the phony socialization part of it. Harry also isn’t a fan, but is better at faking it than his father is. It’s more so moving schedules around than it is getting a spot at the show, though, considering they’d already received several invitations to attend.
That was the big topic of discussion, plus Wednesday, they got a call from Callum, ensuring that they were still going to attend the next day, and then another call from Aki, who was also ensuring they were going to attend the next day. Y/N placates Aki while Harry is on the phone with Callum, in the same room, because as if to test them, they both called at the same time.
(Harry sneezed once during his call with Aki, so an orange came flying at his chest around 3 PM, but Y/N had no time to sit and talk to him about his water intake, because she disappeared from the door quickly after.)
Thursday comes, and of course, the entire first half of the morning slows almost to a standstill. They have this big Gala to get ready for, and again, though it wasn’t Harry’s, he still feels a sense of nerves slither beneath his skin. It’s one of the first big events that he’ll be running the company for, so he has to put on a good face; be amicable and nice. Not only is it a fundraising event, but it also functions as a mixer, a popularity contest, and a networking affair all at once. There are always so many people that he’s met, so much drama to follow, so many things that he can’t mention to this person about that person, and vice versa. Y/N helps, sure, but she’s pulled every which way, too.
Around 4 PM, Y/N and Harry have to leave to get ready. When he was walking up to Y/N’s desk earlier, he overheard Niall, who still makes his presence very brief around Harry, ask a fair question. “I mean, I always kind of consider you two as peas in a pod, but do you really have to go to this, too? Like. . .I feel like most PAs aren’t this heavily involved.”
Y/N shrugged, “I think it makes him feel better if there’s someone with him,” she answered, “And I don’t mind pretending to be important for a couple of hours.”
Harry definitely expected a snarkier reply. Maybe something like, “Well, when he figures out how to run a company by himself, then he can, but he’s an idiot, so he needs me.” But she doesn’t. She was doing it to legitimately be helpful to him – to be kind. It reminds him that she thinks he’s cute too, and he’d never realized that. It makes him wonder what else Y/N thinks but doesn’t let him know.
They would part ways for the getting ready aspect, both in their own flats. Y/N hired someone to do her hair, Harry knows that much, but he thinks otherwise, she’s getting ready by herself. He almost suggested that they just share his bathroom – it’s big enough, they could just both take separate showers, because getting ready by yourself is kind of a bummer. . .but he holds off. It would be weird to invite her, he knows, because just because he is under the illusion that they are closer to each other because he’s been watching her streams, doesn’t mean they are. She doesn’t even know that he’s been watching them.
So he gets ready alone. Talks to Adam on FaceTime for the duration of him after the shower, while he washes his face, rebrushes his teeth, and just as he started panicking about what he’s going to do with his hair (because he didn’t think that far, and gelling it down hasn’t been an option lately with how long it’s gotten), there’s a knock on his door. Harry takes Adam to go answer it, only to find that Y/N has scheduled someone to come do his hair for him.
“Wow, she’s really always about 10 steps ahead, isn’t she?” Adam said over the speaker, “Like seriously, she might be clairvoyant. Or – wait, didn’t you say you think she might be a demon because it’s starting to add up.”
“Okay, I’m getting off the phone now, Adam, bye.”
The hairdresser is one he’s had before – Michael always does really well with his curls. This time, he even stayed over to help Harry get in his suit, so Harry tips him extra (even when he’s notified that Y/N has already paid and tipped). He fixes his watch on his wrist, his driver shows up at 6 PM to pick him up, and Harry’s pleased to find that Y/N’s already in the car. She’s buckled, a small clutch in her lap – she looks beautiful. The necklace and the earrings, her hair pulled from her face except for a few intricately displaced strands, and a hairpin placed in the braided bun. Her makeup is light, her lips so glossy they look like jelly. Beside her thigh are the two boxes with the pins in them.
“That was kind of sad,” Y/N said as soon as he got inside and buckled, “Like, I do not like getting ready by myself. I talked to Niall on the phone the whole time,” Harry chuckles, because they really are more alike than he thought. “Next time, let’s just figure out how to get ready together. Now take your pin.”
“Yeah,” Harry agreed, to leave no room for any questions about how he’d feel about it, “That’d be nice.”
The drive is actually 20 minutes out to the convention center, so it does take some time, but Y/N fills the space with mindless chatter about who is going to be there, and who might be cheating on whom, how he needs to interact with Aki and Callum. They’re there before Harry even realizes, and his nerves have been alleviated for the most part, with Y/N at his side. This is how he always feels, though, and he doesn’t even know if he’s surprised that she’d been able to notice this.
It’s immediately having to turn on, from the moment that they step outside of the car, he hears his name being called. So much happens at once, all from people whom he only sort of vaguely remembers, but he turns on as quickly as he can, smiling, shaking hands, sharing cheek kisses – all of it. It takes them about 20 minutes to even get inside the convention center, after taking pictures and having fun little small talk. At the very least, while it’s overwhelming, it’s a good introduction to what the rest of the night was going to be like.
Y/N does good as always, at getting them away from the conversation and continuing on to the next person or group of people. Once they get inside, there is much more to see, like the whale ice sculpture that Callum did end up choosing, and hundreds of more people. For the most part, they needed to get to their seats at the dinner table so that they could eat. Dinner would be served at 7 PM. They were cutting it close. By the grace of the universe, they are sitting at the same table with Aki and his personal assistant, with a couple of others. Callum is sitting with Harry’s father at a table toward the front – he makes a note to go greet him later on.
The dinner was good. There are at least 50 tables with 7-10 people sitting at each, so it was a good turnout. It’s what every one of these events looks like, with decor, flowers as decorations, velvety light grey curtains that are ceiling to floor length. Callum does a speech, thanks everyone for coming, discusses his company and how he pursued his dreams from a young age, all of that feel-good, cheesy storyboard stuff. Harry thinks it’s cute, especially when he starts to tear up a little bit. He gives a shout out to Harry’s father, who stands up and gets an arm around his shoulder and a squeeze, and then a shout out to Harry, who raises his hand and waves. Aki doesn’t seem too perturbed by this, and Harry notices Y/N reaching over and patting his bicep inconspicuously.
Now that Harry’s looking for it, he notices Y/N staring at his hands, especially the left one with the watch. Not only that, he catches her staring at a lot of hands with watches that accompany the wrist, like Aki’s, and one guy named Caleb across the table. Then there was a waiter who Y/N was eyeballing kind of hard, and he noticed that he had a thick banded watch on his wrist too. She really likes a wristwatch – more than he’d even thought, and then he wonders if maybe it is a fetish.
After dinner, there is more networking. Y/N goes with Harry to meet up with his father, but not before taking Harry’s phone and slipping it into her clutch so that he could have them free. It’d been a hassle to juggle it, and his suit had no pockets, so he’d just been tucking it into his waistband, but that takes away from the look of the suit, according to Y/N. Harry had no problem handing his phone over, though – he doesn’t even think anything of it.
They go to greet his father, who hugs him tightly and fixes his tie, also wearing a matching Dove pin, “Look at you, handsome,” he says, squeezing his shoulder, then turns to Y/N and squeezes hers as well. “And of course, Miss. Y/N, it’s always a pleasure to see you. You look beautiful.”
“It’s nice to see you too, Sir.” She reaches up to touch his hand, “Thank you! You’re so sweet.”
Harry is having a good enough time. He’d indulged in quite a few drinks at this point, so he was feeling pleasantly tipsy, as was Y/N, and he recognized the swimmy look in her gaze. He’ll be happy when this is over and he can take his shoes off, put on his pajamas, and go to bed. There’d already been like 3 “let’s go out for drinks after this” invites that he had declined because he really isn’t interested. Despite outer appearances and how he presents himself, Harry has a relatively low social battery. The only person who has ever realized just how low that social battery is is Y/N, who will take the reins of the conversation when he starts to falter.
That’s what he thinks she’s doing when she appears after going to the bathroom. Y/N taps his shoulder in the middle of his conversation with a designer named Penelope, who actually used to date Harry’s second-year UNI roommate. “Hey, Aki wants to see you,” she smiles, unassuming, and the look in her eyes says that she’s lying. Besides that, Harry knew that if Aki wanted him, then he’d just come up to him, himself; he wouldn’t send Y/N to do it. But Harry figures that Y/N is helping him out, giving him a break from the constant conversation – maybe they could just stand outside for a little while.
So Harry follows her until they’re out of view from Penelope, before they slip through the doors into a hallway. They make a lot of twists and turns in the halls, but Y/N seems to navigate them easily, like she’d already mapped this out before coming to get him. They are in a far more secluded part when she finally stops, twisting around to look at him, her eyes set in a serious gleam. Harry starts to realize that this is not about giving him a break. What had he done?
“Harry,” she begins, “I saw something interesting.”
He blinks at her.
“Um, okay?”
Y/N reaches into her purse, pulls out his phone, and flips it over so the screen is facing him. When she taps it to wake his phone, Harry is staring at his lock screen, a mountain wallpaper background from his trip to Norway, and. . .
. . .and a notification from Y/N.
Not from her phone number, but from her camming site.
Harry blinks at the phone. His heart sinks to his stomach at the same time that his blood rushes to his face, warming his ears, pinking his cheeks. The spit in his mouth all dries out, that’s left agape as he searches for the words to say. What was he even supposed to say? This was literally like – worst-case fucking scenario.
Hi, sorry, as your boss, I definitely shouldn’t be touching myself to your secret online camming account, but I also definitely am! You’re just really hot, and it’s the only thing that makes me cum so hard that I can smell colors, and I finally go to sleep.
“Oh.”
Y/N scoffs a laugh, “Yeah, oh,” she closes his phone and slides it back into her purse, “Why didn’t you tell me?”
Wait, what? “I – what?”
“Like, are you trying to work up an HR case against me or what?”
“Oh my god, no, I –”
“Because why do you have the notifications on, huh? Does anyone else know? Are you doing this so that you can get evidence or something against me? Because I’m so mean, you’ve been collecting all these screenshots and video clips to –”
“No!” Harry all but shouts to stop her, shaking his head, “No, of course not, I have them on because I want to watch, for fuck sake,” he admits, his face feels like it’s flaming red, but it’s better than her thinking he was watching her with a vindictive state of mind.
Y/N pauses her tirade, realization dawning on her face, the furrow in her brow soothing out just enough to uncrinkle her forehead, “Oh.”
“Yeah, oh,” Harry heaves a big breath, shaking his head, the alcohol in his system makes it a little easier for words to spill from his mouth, “I – a – it’s the only thing that gets me off like that, y’know? Like – like my brain stops working so hard, and I cum like so much, it’s embarrassing, and then I go to bed. S’why I’ve been so well rested lately, s’just – you’re good, at. . .at what you do. You’re good at that. And this job too – you kind of excel at everything.”
Y/N’s eyes are darting across his face, like she’s searching for any hint that he might be lying. It looks like a thousand things are running through her head at once.
“Are you attracted to me?” She finally settles for.
Harry nods, swallowing thickly, “Well, obviously.”
“How long have you been watching me?”
“For a couple of weeks now.”
“And what’s your username?”
Harry pauses, sucking his bottom lip into his mouth, “I don’t wanna say.”
“Say it.”
“I’m – uh – tapiocaenthusiest93.”
Y/N’s eyes go wide, “What the fuck, Harry –”
“I know, I’m sorry, I –”
“I thought you hated tapioca.” She shook her head, “Were you lying to me this whole time?”
Harry pauses again – this is so fucking crazy, his head is spinning. That’s what she had taken from that? “I mean –”
Her fingers loop around his wrist as she pulls him to follow after her. They wind through a couple more hallways until they find themselves in the bathroom – this one clearly not readily available for the event happening, meaning it would be empty. The motion lights had even been off when they stepped inside it, a family restroom, so she pushes him in and shuts the door before locking it with a click that echoes off the walls. Harry is confused until she looks at him, arms crossed, staring him down.
“You’re a pervert,” she tells him, and Harry frowns but doesn’t deny it, “You’ve been watching your employee fuck herself in front of a camera, and have been cumming lots from it, according to you, yeah?”
Harry clears his throat, “Ah, I-yeah.”
“You’ve probably been thinking about fucking me, haven’t you?” He flinches from the blunt lilt to her voice, before nodding again, “Filthy. I bet you – I bet you’d get on your knees right now and beg if it meant you could even smell me.”
At first, he thought he was being scolded. He thought that Y/N took him to the bathroom to scold him more thoroughly, and Harry would have to beg her for forgiveness. But this. . .how she’s looking at him, the last sentence she’d just said – Harry thinks that this is going in a different direction than he thought her finding out would go. This is going in what he would say is arguably the best direction it could have gone.
Harry can take a hint. He sinks to his knees right there in front of her, on what he considers a considerably clean bathroom floor. His hands hover, trembling, over her thighs, his heart moving from his stomach to his throat, beating wildly before he lies his palms against her legs. He feels the warmth of her skin on the left hand, where the slit opened up. Y/N is looking down at him, arms crossed, but she looks a little nervous. It makes him feel better, that he isn’t the only one whose heart might be racing.
“Go on,” she nods her head, “What do you say?”
“Please?” He swallows again, “Please, I – I’m filthy. I’m disgusting – I’ve been dreaming about burying my face between your legs for weeks now, and I – it’d. . .it’d make me – fuck,” he wonders if his pupils are blown, or if he looks as fucked as he feels. His cock is hard in his trousers – he thinks that all of the blood in his body rushed so fast to his dick, that's why he’s a little lightheaded. That, and the way that Y/N uncrosses her arms, carefully wiggling the fabric of her dress up her thighs while she leaned back against the door.
Harry leans in without thinking – this is all going so fast, he wonders if he’s going to pass out. She splits her thighs just enough for him to fit his face in between them, pressing his nose against her powder blue panties. Harry knows his nose is big – he knows it feels good when it’s pressed up the right way. He’d watched so many videos at this point that he knows exactly where her clit is hidden beneath the fabric, so he dances the bridge of his nose along the swell of it, and sucks in a deep breath.
It’s a lot – she smells so good, heady, somewhere that Harry thinks he needs to be forever. He breaths in again when she twitches, her thighs twitching when he runs his nose up and down her slit. It feels extra filthy, just sniffing her like this – distantly, Harry remembers leaving a comment with a 2000 coin tip that said he wanted to smell her (to be fair, Harry had been edging for a couple hours with her at that point, so he was liable to say every bit of his pervy thoughts and ideas). He doesn’t know if she remembers that, and this is why she’s doing it, or if she has just assessed that Harry may or may not be into sniffing panties.
Either way, Harry is happy where he’s at. Enough that when he looks up at her from where he’s pressed himself, and sees how jelly lips agape, and her lidded eyes, he doesn’t think twice before pushing his lips against hers. At first, just to kiss over her, but when her hips buck into his face, and her crossed arms loosen from around her chest, Harry does it again, only this time it’s open-mouthed.
“You wanna taste me, huh?” She asks, and Harry nods, not taking his face away from her, curling his arms around her thighs and urging her to lift one over his shoulder, and she does so easily, “One get your filthy tongue inside of me?”
“Fuck, please,” he whines, muffled against her, “Please, please.”
Y/N laughs, breathlessly, “Fine,” she murmurs, “But you only have 5 minutes to try and make me cum. If you can’t, then you’re never doing this again.”
Harry doesn’t know how much weight the threat actually carries, but he wasn’t going to risk it. In a perfect world, he’d take his time with her – spend hours pulling her apart and carefully putting her back together again with his tongue alone. Once, he’d eaten Kai out for so long that his jaw and tongue hurt the next morning, but he still called her up and wanted to go again before she’d even showered. Harry likes eating pussy – he’s good at it too, or at least he’d been told.
But right now, their situation wasn’t ideal. They couldn’t disappear for too long without there being questions of where they ran off to. So Harry is quick to run the flat of his tongue over her panties first, one long strip from back to front, only to curl his fingers in the crotch of them and pull them to the side. Harry doesn’t swallow any of his drool, instead letting his spit wet his tongue and make it messier. Y/N likes it messy, from the amount of lube she’s always using, he’d determined that. He slides his tongue between her folds with purpose, slurping around her clit and echoing the moan that she lets leave her throat.
She tastes good and feels soft against his tongue. Harry’s whole nose is shoved against her while he does these long strokes, trying to taste every bit of her that she has to offer. His arms tighten around her when he slips himself back to her clit, lulling his tongue in circles before smacking his lips against it. She likes a lot of stimulation on her clit – it’s actually pretty difficult for her to cum untouched, and Harry was not about to try and figure out how to do that right now. Not when he’d had a clear task delivered before him.
So Harry puckers his lips, he suckles at her clit, and moans so that it vibrates around her. He’s messy with it, feeling how his spit and her juices are coating his chin, his lips, and his cock is throbbing so hard in his trousers he has to make a concentrated effort not to cum in them. He wishes he had time to look at her pussy, to be gentle with it, and tender before getting messy and rough, but maybe he could have that a different time. Maybe, if he were good now, she’d let him spend as long as he wanted down here.
“Oh my god,” Y/N breathes out, head knocking back against the door, “No wonder Kai and Rafayel always want you around, huh?” She cards her fingers through his hair, gripping him at the root, “Your mouth is insane – f-fuck, I’m – I’m close.”
Harry gets excited and doubles his efforts. He sucks and licks, swirls his tongue, even pulls back and spits, then licks it all right back up again. It’s only when he focuses back on her clit, looking up at her while she stared down at him, before his eyes fluttered closed as her thigh on his shoulder started pressing closer to the side of his head – that she cums. She doesn’t warn him, but he can feel it, the way she starts to throb deliciously against his tongue, before she starts getting wetter, pulsing, covering her mouth, and moaning while she bites into her palm to quiet it.
Harry keeps licking until she pushes his head away, her leg sliding off of his shoulder, heels clicking back against the floor. “Jesus,” she laughs, trying to restyle the messy but clean appearance his hair had before she’d gotten her hands in it. It feels good – Harry thinks he could purr, with his face all wet, his eyes closed while she touched him, “That was – wow. You’re more slutty than I thought.”
He pouted, “Heyyyyy,” his whine makes her laugh again, “I – did I do good? Can I do it again?”
“We should probably talk before we do this again,” Y/N tells him, “About. . .um, this whole thing. Can you make it look like you didn’t just eat pussy in the bathroom for like 30 more minutes? Until we can leave and go somewhere?”
He blinked his eyes open at her. From this angle, with her taste on his tongue, and the glow of someone who just had an orgasm, Y/N looks like a goddess. He nods, using her hand to help him stand up from the floor, no matter how badly he wants to just push his face into her thigh until she recovers enough for him to eat her again.
Harry had been so worried before, about what her finding out would mean. Even when he was in his fantasies about fucking her, the post-nut clarity would always sour the mood, wondering how awkward it might be between them afterward. If she might avoid his eyes, or he wouldn’t be able to speak to her without stuttering. Would they forever change their dynamic? Would Y/N stop scolding him and teasing him in favor of just being silent? Then she’d have to leave and be someone else’s PA because things got too weird.
That worry had lasted all of 3 seconds because when Harry tries to walk out of the bathroom, she grabs his wrist, “Ah! What are you doing?”
“Going back?”
“Jesus, Harry, your face is a mess – hold on,” she reaches out, waves her hand in front of the paper towel dispenser, and rips one off, “What, were you going to tell them you were just eating me out in the bathroom?” She wipes his face, roughly around his mouth, “You really are hopeless sometimes. I’m going to start charging you for making me use my brain too often.”
It seems like it may be just fine, after all.
As he walks behind her back to the event, Harry smiles.
…in which Y/N and Harry share a flat but he cannot see her.
Warning: DEATH, MENTAL ILLNESS, MENTION OF SU1C1DE AND SELF-HARM (inexplicit). There’s a happy ending tho 😬
Inspired by Tim Burton’s Corpse Bride and this song.
Word count: 3.9k
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“Oh, you’re home!” she said as he shut the door and kicked off his shoes. His hair was a mess, his eyes dark and weary. He leaned against the wall and released a long heavy sigh.
“Trouble at work?” she asked. He didn’t answer. He never did. But it was okay. She was used to it.
She watched him trudge toward the couch and slump into it with his head buried in his hands. It was so quiet. It was always quiet here, and most of the time, she enjoyed the silence. After all, it was all she ever knew. But she also liked his laugh and his voice when he talked on the phone. He never talked to her. He was a great listener though, and she liked to talk anyway, so she had nothing to complain about. He never interrupted her, never commented; he only listened.
“I think you should take a walk,” Niall said over a video call, the horror written on his face from her internal monologue is humbling, “Touch some grass, think about how nasty you two are gonna fuck later instead of all these ifs, ands, or whatever the hell else you’re coming up with. Back to your delusions,” he forms a gun with his fingers, and pretends to shoot, “He’s obsessed with you and thinks you’re so sexy that you haunt his every waking thought. He’d rather not do his fifty-step meat prepping process and have an uninspired, unflavorful taste palate for a dish than spend even a second not being at your side – the love of his life. The tenderizer to his meat, the steak to his wine sauce, the omega to his alpha.”
“Whoa,” Y/N blinked at him, “That’s like. . .a new level of delusion. I think you broke some sort of hallucinogenic time-space continuum with that one.”
“And it’s time for you to join me. Off you go, I need to stroke one out before I go out for lunch, it’s scheduled on my calendar.”
“Ew, Ni, on your calendar?”
or
Harry is obsessed, and Y/N gets in her head too much
part 1
part 2
part 3
part 4
(15k+ words)
v.
“Oh my god, you’ve been mauled.”
That’s precisely what Y/N had thought when she saw her reflection. In the moment, when it was happening, Y/N could tell that it was a lot, but she didn’t fully understand how many hickies Harry had left littered on her skin. Not until she could stand in front of her bathroom mirror, eyes wide, visualizing everything he’d left behind. In some areas, she looked mottled by paint, like someone had splashed their brush in the container and it splattered out onto her skin, staining it.
There were three pretty big ones on her neck, two right below her collarbone, several along the swell of her breasts, two on her belly, and multiple that sort of started merging into one on her thighs as they healed. Harry had spent thirty minutes of their night merely marking up her skin, dragging his teeth along them, tracing the jagged edges of the spots with his tongue as they formed. Y/N had never had someone so dutifully work on her skin this way, somehow seeming precise with his movements, despite them being all over the place. Like he knew exactly where he wanted them on her body.
She’s unsure what might have sparked such a display from him. The “no-hickey” policy was one of his most heavily enforced rules, which is why Y/N presumed that he’d never left any on her. Plus, she’d always seen hickies as a clear, visual indicator of possessiveness, which she’d never thought Harry would have over her. Even now, she isn’t sure, but she is skeptical. . .especially after remembering Niall telling her Harry was jealous after Youngjae invited her to his restaurant to learn from him. She’d brushed that off at first, certain that Harry had no reason to feel jealous over her, but this. . .definitely made her think a little more about it. Y/N goes with Youngjae, Harry finds out over the call, and subsequently does something he’s never done – marking her up all over her body. Like little warnings; an “I was here first” that should probably make her feel objectified but she just feels squirmy and horny over it.
And maybe it was coincidental. Maybe Harry had just felt like sucking and biting at her skin that night, before splitting her thighs and getting her off with his tongue twice. Maybe him stuffing her full with his fingers, with a thumb hooked in her mouth, and the phrase, “Yeah, you’re my little fuck puppy, aren’t you? Made for me,” dripping off his lips – was just a random thought that had invaded his brain (his filter always sort of disappeared when he was inside of her).
But also. . .like, maybe it wasn’t.
Niall had somehow managed to convince Y/N she needed to come to his flat and watch him play a tournament, which usually just amounts to her rotting and rolling around in his bed and playing on her phone. It wasn’t the worst thing in the world, actually – Niall’s bed is disproportionately big for only one person to be sleeping in it most nights, and is soft as a cloud. Plus, his sheets always smell like a discontinued Febreze scent that she used to love, so she liked pressing her face into them (Niall and Harry are probably the only two men she would willingly press her face into their bedding).
Y/N had been covering the hickies on her neck following a step-by-step tutorial Niall had sent her after Harry left that night, because she knew she needed to have them covered for work. Even if Harry was the one to give them to her, it would have caused mass outrage if she had hickies all over her throat and wasn’t getting a tongue lashing over it. Or forced to wear a thin, black scarf around her neck – like the one Niall had to endure the rest of his shift with the time he’d gotten yelled at for them.
So this was the first time Niall had seen her without the makeup covering them, because she’d gone home to shower after work and was not about to reapply all of it again, just to wipe it off a couple of hours later. When she lets herself in, he’s in the middle of folding his laundry, and gasps the most dramatic sound he could when he sees her. Which, of course, follows a thorough inspection – he looks at her throat, the ones on her collarbone, Y/N lowers the neckline of her shirt so he could see the ones on her boob, lifts the hem so he could see her stomach, and the ones on her thighs are out any way because of the shorts she wore.
“Christ, I knew he would throw a fit about Youngjae, but I didn’t realize it was this big of a fit,” Niall gaped at all of them, brows knitted as he counted, “This is like crash-out level behavior.”
“You really think so?” Y/N had inquired, flopping onto Niall’s bed and then rolling herself into a burrito using the extra blanket he had lying out for her, “Because I also was a little suspicious of how he acted. Like. . .the timing just wouldn’t make sense, otherwise, right?”
Niall rolled his eyes, “Duh,” he rounded the corner of his bed, dropping into his gaming seat and leaning it back at an angle, “You seriously don’t listen, how many times am I g’na have to repeat myself that he’s obsessed. When you came in after Youngjae complimented you, he had that murderous intent gaze that I haven’t seen since Oliver broke the dishwasher.” He rested his hands on his stomach, fingers slotted into each other, “So, when he wants to come and see you and can’t right away because you’re with a cutie pie like Youngjae, who basically asked you out in front of Harry – of course he’s going to go crazy. I’d be more shocked if he didn’t.”
The night had been nice, after all the horny stuff. That’s what confused her, she thinks, is because when Rowan was jealous – even if they had sex to fuck it out, and for him to play into whatever possessive fantasy he was holding – the subsequent night was still pretty tense. He was still annoyed, kind of taking it out on her that someone was flirting when it wasn’t her fault. They might not even sleep beside each other that night – Rowan would go home, and leave Y/N wondering if they were still together or not. He was always a huge fucking baby about it.
Harry was not the same at all. Harry came from his hand stroking over himself after she’d cum, the splattered remains of it all over her belly as they eased from the high. He made quick work of cleaning it up before it could cool and dry on her skin, using whatever shirt he’d picked up first, before sliding down into bed beside her. Harry doesn’t have to tell her to come to him, she just does automatically now. Twisted her body so that she was halfway on top of him, as much skin-to-skin contact as possible, and nestling close to his neck. He laughed, stroking her arm, down her shoulder, toward her back, and looped dozens of intricate designs into her skin. They felt good, coupled with his murmuring about how well she did, and she thinks he was resting his cheek on her head.
“Did you have a good time today?” He’d finally inquired, she’d assumed about Youngjae, and Y/N nodded, “Learned a lot?”
“Mhm,” she searched for words that were increasingly harder to find the more sleepy she felt, “He said. . .said I’m like a sponge, ‘cos my – the food tasted just how it tastes when you make it, from before, at the restaurant. Wanted to add more things to my repertoire. He’s nice.”
Harry hummed, low, gentle, “That was nice of him.”
Y/N had been pleasantly fuzzy around the edges, like looping around on clouds, feeling tender on all the spots he’d left his mark. Especially because he kept pressing on them, murmuring a soft apology when she jumped from it. However, he doesn’t really mean it since he just goes on to press another one. “These are pretty,” he told her, caressing the skin, like another little apology after pushing them to see her react, “A pretty color.”
“Thank you,” she answered, a little hazy, “Will need. . .will need a lot of concealer for these.”
Harry only hummed in response. She thought maybe he’d not been paying attention, really, but she gets an Amazon package the next day filled with the brand and shade that she has in her bathroom. When she messaged him, demanding that he let her pay him back (because it wasn’t like it was cheap, especially that many bottles of it), he thumbed down the message, and that was that.
Y/N is reliving it when Niall, who had now fully turned away from her and was clicking around on his computer, shook his head, “Like, sugar daddy vibes too? He could not be more whipped for you. He’s lucky you aren’t evil like me, because I’d be taking full advantage of this.”
Y/N twisted to face the computer fully, looking over his shoulder and not fully understanding what she’s looking at exactly, “How was your dick appointment? You never updated me.” She changes the subject, which she hopes was smooth, but knows Niall could probably see right through her. While she would love to get down to the nitty gritty of her feelings and Harry’s, and what the hell their dynamic was morphing into, she also definitely didn’t. It was confusing, and her most recent relationship with Rowan has skewed her perception of a lot of things, like what could be Harry’s interest in her, and what could be just him being a decent guy. Of course, Niall does often shed light on the situation from a man’s perspective, but as always, there’s at least a slight delusional element to it. The one where Harry is madly in love with her but doesn’t know how to express himself outside of sex – or something like that. It’s his underlying narrative.
“Oh, it was not worth an update. He was like – eh. I thought we’d get along better, but he didn’t think this one vampire was sexy in Baldur’s Gate 3, and that just didn’t sit right with me.”
Her mouth fell open, “Wait, the one with the white hair? He didn’t find him sexy?” Y/N sat up halfway, “I started reading fic about him after I watched you play that one time.”
“See, and that’s you with a limited understanding of him! Stop, don’t get me pissed off again,” he grumbled, shaking his head, “And then, to make it worse, I asked him what omegaverse subgender he’d be, and he had no idea what I was talking about. So boring – I gave him head and sent him off, 2/10 dick appointment. He only gets the 2 points because he brought me sweets from a bakery – speaking of, have one of the apple fritters, they’re crazy.”
Y/N lulls her tongue over her teeth, saying, mostly as a joke, “Maybe you should just start sleeping with Adam or something, so you don’t keep wasting your time with these losers.”
“Oh, babe, Adam and I have slept together like a couple of times.”
Y/N’s eyes stretch open wide, she shoves herself even further up, “Wait, what? What the fuck! Since when, why didn’t I –”
“Didn’t I mention it? I thought I did – it’s been a while though, like at least a year – fuck! Where the fuck did these guys come from?” There is a rapid clicking of his mouth and keyboard, “Okay, table this lore for later, I need to focus.”
Still reeling from this revelation, Y/N almost doesn’t realize her phone buzzes beside her. A message from Harry – a series of pictures, actually, and Y/N is surprised. Harry is barely a texter to begin with, let alone someone who sends photos – to her, no less. It was pictures of food, clearly taken in Harry’s kitchen (she recognizes his countertops), one of which Y/N recognizes to be a lobster dish of some kind, the next photo is mille-feuille, a delicious pastry that Harry had made once a year ago and brought in for everyone to try (it was so fucking good, she remembers, and just looking at the photo makes her mouth water), and the last image is pasta dish that she doesn’t recognize but looks delicious all the same.
I’ll teach you how to make these, Miss Sponge.
If you do well, I’ll give you a treat after.
. . .
Y/N is irritated.
Like, actually so irritated.
The reason why wasn’t simple at all. What led her to this moment was the most convoluted, twisted set of events that must have resulted from her disturbing some cosmic being. And said cosmic being, in an act of pure outrage and unadulterated resentment, twisted the strings of fate in such a way that tangled Y/N up from her typical day-to-day and threw her into such an obnoxious situation. When she thought of it that way – as something out of her hands – that made it just a little more bearable.
The day started like normal. She was off, so she’d slept in a little later than usual. Y/N had taken full advantage of the night before and stayed up relatively late, rolling around in her bed, reading smut, getting secondhand embarrassment from a scene in said smut that she then recounted to Hazelnut like she understood a word of what she was saying. She messaged Niall (about the smut at first), and went back and forth about stupid shit for two hours, because she caught him post-game when he was doing his skincare and getting distracted between each step. Y/N fell asleep on the sofa for two hours, woke up to Hazelnut pawing at her head for a snack, so she gave her a churro treat, and then headed to bed.
So Y/N slept in, she stretched out similar to the sleepy cat beside her, and woke to three messages. Two from Niall, and one from Harry. Anytime Harry’s name pops up on her screen, her heart always kicks up a little quicker, a little obnoxiously – plus, if he’s sending her a message, it’s usually because he’s trying to coordinate something between them. Before Y/N fell asleep, Niall was sending brain rot videos, and links to smut that has “made him give up on the average man”, so she skipped his messages to read Harry’s.
I’ll come over tonight if you’re available. To teach you the recipes.
Y/N replied with yeah, I’m available! as chill as she possibly could be when really she wanted to respond with YES, YES PLEASE, I WANT TO SEE YOU!! I WANT TO HAVE SEX!! AND CUDDLE AFTER WHICH IS THE BEST PART !!!!!!!. She doesn’t respond with that because she’s super good at pretending to be normal, simply put. If Harry actually had access to her thoughts, he probably would avoid her at all costs, honestly.
Okay. I’ll see you at 6.
There’s entirely too much time between Harry’s message and 6 PM. Y/N knows herself and she knows if given the chance, she will spend a day’s worth of time ruminating over what their interaction might be tonight. She’ll spend too much time overthinking them, their dynamic, what he means to her, what she means to him, if Harry thinks about her when they weren’t together, if he’s using teaching her recipes as a ploy to get over to her flat or if he genuinely just wants to teach her and the sex is a pleasant inclusion to that. Y/N has a new spring-y tank top and short set she’s wearing – would he like it? Would he notice? Was he only interested in pulling it off of her so he wouldn’t have time to care about it? Or should she dress in something more alluring – sexier? Does Harry even find her sexy, or does he just see her as cute? Is it sustainable to just be cute in the fuck buddies economy, or would this push him into someone else’s arms? Would he give her any more love bites? The ones he’d given her before had faded in the week and a half that had passed since he’d given them to her. Is that like an exclusively ‘I’m maybe jealous, maybe just in a mood because you were hanging out with a chef that wasn’t me’ kind of situation? Or are those an all of the time thing now? Should she –
“I think you should take a walk,” Niall said over a video call, the horror written on his face from her internal monologue is humbling, “Touch some grass, think about how nasty you two are gonna fuck later instead of all these ifs, ands, or whatever the hell else you’re coming up with. Back to your delusions,” he forms a gun with his fingers, and pretends to shoot, “He’s obsessed with you and thinks you’re so sexy that you haunt his every waking thought. He’d rather not do his fifty-step meat prepping process and have an uninspired, unflavorful taste palate for a dish than spend even a second not being at your side – the love of his life. The tenderizer to his meat, the steak to his wine sauce, the omega to his alpha.”
“Whoa,” Y/N blinked at him, “That’s like. . .a new level of delusion. I think you broke some sort of hallucinogenic time-space continuum with that one.”
“And it’s time for you to join me. Off you go, I need to stroke one out before I go out for lunch, it’s scheduled on my calendar.”
“Ew, Ni, on your calendar?”
It was a good day for a walk. There were finally more nice days than there were cold, and the sun would sit high and pretty in the sky by noon. The breeze brushes past her skin is warm, like fluttering kisses to each of her cells, and insects buzz, fly, and crawl between blades of grass and cavern into the soil. She smells flowers and dewy grass when she opens her windows in the morning, and the pressing urge to start a garden is ever present and borderline suffocating. She would, if she had more time to take care of it – a little windowsill garden that would coax birds and bugs for Hazelnut’s viewing pleasure.
Y/N went to the park near her flat. She ordered a fruit tea to pick up on the way, and reluctantly had to admit that Niall was right – a walk did do her some good. The flowers were gorgeous this year, brighter than they’ve ever been, but she’s pretty sure she thinks that every year. This year, especially, though, they look extra vibrant, and the bees look extra fuzzy and fat as they hover over their yellow centers, and Y/N lets her mind soften into something malleable and stretchy. Maybe she really was the omega to Harry’s alpha after all. Again, maybe Niall was righ–
The universe snatches that thought away before she could even finish it. Even it knew that giving him too much credit in a couple of minutes would have been too powerful for him not to be annoying about. Because just as she throws away her cup, she hears her name called, and the familiarity of the voice makes the hair at her nape stand on end.
Like a roach, Rowan always seems to come back; if she’s seen or heard from him once, then she could count on being aware of his existence for several more occasions in the near future. It was something that had been prevalent ever since they broke up, a horrible pattern that she’d hoped to break one day, but apparently, today hadn’t been the one.
She twisted on her heel, her face twitching in a way to protest her trying to give him a polite smile, “Hi,” she nodded her head, and couldn’t help but notice his dog, Frankie, a little brown bernedoodle that’s eyes were a little too life like for Y/N to be comfortable. Despite her scary, potential underground government experiment eyes, Frankie and Y/N used to bond a lot when Rowan and she were together. They had their girl time; she’d sit in Y/N’s lap as opposed to his when she was visiting, and she always nestled up close to her in bed. Her personality was cuter than she was, if Y/N was completely honest – she’d never told Rowan that, though.
Frankie, tail wagging fast enough to kick up a small breeze, instantly invaded Y/N’s space, and she was not going to ignore a dog, so she reached down to pet her, “Can’t believe we’re running into each other again!” Rowan chirped, a little too brightly, and Y/N bit her tongue not to snap at him for acting so fake around her. Like nothing had happened. Like he was actually excited to see her, and not ask her about there stupid fucking wedding reception, ugh –
“Yeah, that is kind of crazy,” are you stalking me, you fucking dick? “Well, it was good to see y–”
“Ah! You know what? We need to get together soon,” he grinned at her, a smile that she assumed was supposed to be good-natured, but came off as something close to something that causes dread. “You’re seeing someone, right? The guy who interrupted us last time?”
Maybe Y/N should have been smarter about that. There was no shame in admitting that she wasn’t seeing anyone, technically, right now, unless he counted her mentor/boss whom she had an incredibly intense dynamic in the bedroom with. And like, it kind of felt like a relationship sometimes, but most of the time, she’s resigned herself to being the woman he gets his rocks off with, with no strings attached. Except maybe Y/N might have been making some strings from her end, like webbings from a spider, shooting out of her in an attempt to cling to the only man in a very long time that didn’t make her feel weird, or insecure, or uncomfortable when she was ass naked in front of him and ready to bark like a dog.
But it’s not like she was going to go into that with Rowan of all people. So she should have just said no.
“Yep,” she answered, because she didn't think at all before she said it. Niall would both commend and shame her for her stupidity later, she knew that.
Rowan’s face does a weird little twitch before his smile, seedy, stretches back over his mouth, “Then we could do a double date or something! Remi has always wanted to meet you.”
God, it’s just weird – so fucking weird. He must be making that up, right? Nobody wants to meet their current partner’s ex unless it was to find out how sleezy they were before they were in their lives. To talk shit about the past and to see what they’ve been lying about. Hell, Y/N had even been itching to contact Rowan’s high school ex when they first broke up to see if he was as huge a dick as he was then, now (because his high school ex was “crazy” and “blew things out of proportion all of the time), but she knew better than to get caught up in all of that.
Then it finally registered that Remi probably only wants to meet her so they could guilt her into having their reception at Harry’s restaurant, and something inside of her soured. Her face nearly twisted in a frown, but Rowan kept speaking, “It must be pretty new, between you and that guy, hm? You still seem all like. . .flirty and shy,” he noted, and Y/N’s brows furrowed, “I watched you guys for a second when you left the cafe.” Then, a sly look met his gaze, “I hope he didn’t mind that we were together. Does he know about me?”
Y/N should have really shut her mouth, but – “No, he didn’t mind it. He owns the cafe, so he’s grateful for any business.”
Rowan’s eyes go wide, “He owns it?”
And like. . .Y/N doesn’t know how the conversation would have progressed, had Frankie not slipped from her collar and bolted.
The thing is, Y/N had told Rowan time and time again to make the collar just a little tighter on the dog. I’m not telling you to strangle her, just make it snug or she’s going to slip out of it again – she’d said it so many times that the sentence didn’t even feel like real words anymore. Frankie had a nasty habit of wiggling from her collar, and as a very sweet, but very untrained pup, she’d take off running in whatever direction there seemed to be the most danger.
It seems as though Rowan had decided to never take her advice, because Frankie had decided she’d had enough of Y/N’s lying. She slipped from the collar, chasing down a squirrel, and when Y/N’s wide eyes watched her, then flicked to Rowan, who was already looking at her with the same shocked expression. There’s one reason Y/N had always fussed about the collar, not just for the dog’s general safety, but because Rowan got some weird ass sports injury when he was in high school and it isn’t good for him to run on pavement without these special shoes. This meant that Y/N was always the one chasing after Frankie, calling her name, looking like an idiot who doesn’t fit the collar to her dog’s neck correctly, even though she wasn’t her dog.
There were two options that Y/N could have followed through with in that moment: she could roll her eyes, tell Rowan that he was a stupid dumb ass who never listened to a thing Y/N ever fucking said, and he better figure out how to get her back. . .or, she could run after Frankie. And like, she may think her owner is a stupid douchebag, but Frankie had never done anything to her, and she was kind of running straight for a busy road, and Y/N didn’t necessarily want to see her get run over because if that was living on her psyche then she’d probably need someone to smother her with a pillow.
So she ran. Her feet slam against the pavement in a way that Rowan’s definitely should be right now, and her heart is hammering in her chest, and for a moment, she considered maybe just picking Frankie up and then running away with her instead of bringing her back to him. She shuffles between people in the park, takes the windy pathway until Frankie twists off course and starts running through the grass instead of something easy to trek through. Y/N followed her, stupidly and uncoordinated, a mess because it’d been a very long time since she’d had to do something like this. Such a long time in fact, that she forgets that she’s someone who needs to watch her feet when she runs sometimes, because there’s an uneven shift in the ground, and Y/N goes from running after this dog, to dropping with a squawk.
Y/N is discombobulated for a couple of seconds, unsure of what just happened. She’d tripped, she knew that much, but a sharp twist in her ankle suggested that she’d injured herself beyond just a couple of bumps and bruises. The joint throbs, a burning pain that radiates outward, and the severity of the situation hits her like a dog in the side. Or maybe it was really just a dog that ran into her side – Frankie, who, despite having poor training, always kind of knew when it was time to quit playing around (i.e., when your owner’s ex-girlfriend chased you down and then injured herself). The bernedoodle looks down at her with very sad, very human-like eyes, like the human trapped inside of her body had succumbed to animal instincts momentarily and now was feeling guilty about it.
“S’okay,” Y/N petted the dog behind her ear, “I’m sorry they put your consciousness in the body of a dog.”
“Holy fuck!” Rowan had finally made it to them, and in a rare moment of concern, he dropped down to his knees beside her. There was a look that Rowan got when he was pretending to be a good person, but she saw it nowhere. His reaction is genuine, the way his reaction is steeped in panic is also genuine, and Y/N is kind of scared to look down at her feet because she’s worried she’s about to see her bone protruding out or something equally horrible.
Instead, when she chanced it, all she saw was her ankle intact, but the skin around it was angry and swollen.
Y/N let her head fall back into the grass, Frankie nosed at her cheek, “Ah, fuck,” she huffed, already knowing that this would be a situation. An all-day thing, probably, as Rowan looked unsure of what to do other than apologize profusely.
“Shit, I’m sorry, I didn’t – she just slips out of it all of the time but usually she doesn’t head for a street,” he scrambled for his phone, “I’ll call an ambulance.”
Y/N had not touched Rowan in a very long time. As far as she was concerned, she never needed to touch him again in her life, and she’d be at ease with that. But she reached out and grabbed his wrist before he could properly dial a number on his phone, “We are not getting an ambulance for this,” she told him, “They would be so annoyed. It’s probably just a sprain anyway, I honestly might not even need to go get it checked out.”
“Bullshit,” he shook his head, then clips Frankie back to her collar, and for once, tightens it a little around her neck, “I’m taking you to get it looked at. What if your bone splintered and stabbed into a blood vessel, and now you’re slowly bleeding out internally? Or if you need to be rushed into surgery and have pins placed?”
She blinked at him, “I highly doubt that–”
“Well, better safe than sorry,” Rowan slid his arm around her back to help her stand. It’s a good thing, even though Y/N would rather roll around in a lava pit than be this close with him, because as soon as she tried to bear any sort of weight on her ankle, pain shot up her leg. She squawked a humiliating sound before leaning against him for support, and he managed her easily, “S’fine, I got you, I got you. My car is just a little way away. Can Youngjae come to the hospital?”
Y/N flushed at the lie, but hopefully Rowan just thinks it’s from the pain, “Ah, no, he’s – he’s working. I don’t want to bother him.”
This is how she ended up here, in an ER bed with her foot elevated on a pillow and a sour expression on her face. Rowan had stayed the whole time, and had even had someone come pick Frankie up from where he left her, windows down in his car, for some reason – probably out of guilt. Especially when she called Niall so he could tag him out and help her home, but Niall all but screams like he was the one who got hurt, “Oh fuck! Your ankle? How did you do that? Shit, babe, I’m with my parents for dinner like an hour away! Hold on, let me call Adam.”
She never really got a follow-up on whether he was able to reach Adam or not. Y/N could only assume that he had, and hopefully Adam was on his way; that’d be ideal. Adam would dote on her a little, pout his mouth at her, click his tongue, and call her clumsy, and wouldn’t bring it up if she cried because it hurt, and she’s frustrated by the day. He’d probably cook her something too, because she’s hungry as hell, and even though she’s eating animal crackers so that she didn’t take the meds they gave her here on an empty tummy, her stomach grumbles, angry with being forgotten.
“You really don’t have to stay,” Y/N tried again, after Rowan’s third look at his watch, “If you have somewhere to be. I’ll survive.”
Rowan shook his head, “No, it's okay. I’m actually getting out of lunch with my future in-laws right now, so this isn’t a horrible alternative,” he shrugged, but he looked off to the left after saying it – maybe he’s changed since they were together, but that had always been a tell that he was lying. Especially when he made such intense eye contact otherwise. His gaze does flicker back to her when he says the last bit, though, “Plus you’re scared of hospitals so. . .I wouldn’t leave you alone.”
Y/N wouldn’t say she’s scared of hospitals, necessarily, but she definitely didn’t like them. Rowan always thought she was scared, though, and back then, she’d play it up a bit so he would dote on her a little more. She’s surprised he even remembered that, though, but she guesses she shouldn’t be. For as much as she likes to villainize him and their entire relationship, there had been parts of him that were sweet. Parts of him that convinced her that he loved her, that their feelings were deeply rooted, that everyone had flaws, and you just had to learn to love every aspect of them. . .even the parts that made you feel shitty.
It was nice. . unwanted, but nice of him to stay with her for that reason. To even probably lie about avoiding an in-law lunch, so it didn’t seem like he was being too sweet. Because the Rowan that she knew had never been so loud about how he cares for her, in stark contrast with how loud he is about Remi. Love languages mold into something different for different people, though, Y/N had always assumed.
The door to their room is clear glass, so Y/N should have been able to see who was coming into her room, but instead, she was staring up at the ceiling and feeling the achy throb of her ankle, pulsing, radiating to her calf, a little bit of her heel. She’d imagined it was just the doctor, finally there to tell her the results of her X-ray, but instead, when she looked down, she saw Harry. His gaze dances across her, down to her ankle, then darts to the side for a moment to Rowan with a confused furrow in his brow.
“Harry?” Y/N sat up a little more, startled, but he raised his hand to encourage her to lean back. Rowan stared at him agape, starstruck, “What are you – what are you doing here?”
“I was with Adam when Niall called,” he replied, and his tone is cool. . .almost too cool. It's not his typical impassiveness, but something like he was trying to keep it steady. Y/N feels pinned beneath his sharp gaze, “Adam wants to come in too, but they said only two at the bedside.”
This seems to yank Rowan out of whatever spell he’d been put under, “Oh! Yeah, yes, right, well – well, since you’ve got someone. . .someone(s), then I’ll head out,” he looked like he’s close to bowing to Harry, “I, um – it’s a pleasure to meet you, Mr. Styles. Take care of her!”
For all that he acts like he would ask Harry himself if he could have his wedding reception in his restaurant, he sure does scurry out quickly. Harry is more intimidating than some people seem to think at first. The way he carries himself is like a kingpin in the mafia or something. An air around him suggested that he shouldn’t be tried or messed with, no matter how big or small the problem.
He waits until Rowan is out of the room before he huffs at her, “Why didn’t you call me?”
Y/N tilts her head, “Huh?”
“You called Niall,” he reminded her, like she might have forgotten, “Then gave up and let him call Adam after that. You should have called me.”
“I didn’t even —“ she readjusts, her hips resting against the pillow, taking some weight off her sore, bruised side, with, “I just assumed you were busy?”
Harry peers at her, still frowning, as he steps closer to the bed and observes her foot. It’s wrapped for now, though her foot still looks a bit swollen, and his fingers are gentle when they caress the skin on top of it. Harry only ever touches her gently after they’ve had sex, so she was unused to it, even if it was just her foot. His eyes drag up the rest of her body, the scrapes on her legs from rock and pebble, a little scratch on her forehead that she hadn’t noticed until blood had dripped over her eyebrow, in front of her eye. Harry skates his fingers up her leg, along her thigh, over her arms, and then dragging his thumb just barely beneath the cut, now covered in a little bandage, smothered in antibiotic ointment.
“Clumsy little thing,” his murmur is low, “What did they say about it? Your ankle?”
“Ah, they-they didn’t say anything yet,” it’s hard to focus when he’s being so careful with her, his touch feels good, she wants to melt, and the look in his eyes kind of makes her want to cry for some reason, “Think it’s just a sprain, but they don’t know what grade. The doctor hasn’t come in to read the X-ray yet.”
Harry hums low, his fingers carding through her hair, “Poor baby,” he dragged the chair Rowan had been sitting in over, closer to her bed, and plopping down, “Are you cold? You’re covered in goosebumps.”
The goosebumps were definitely from him touching, but she nodded anyway, “Yeah, s’always cold in hospitals, right?.”
Despite having just sat down, he stood right back up, and before Y/N could question him, he was back out the door. He must have passed Adam, who peeks in, worry wrought on his face, “God, you get in more trouble than any person I know. Tripped chasing a dog?”
“My ex’s dog.”
“You’re ex’s dog? Oh my god –”
As if he knew the chair closest to her was meant for Harry, Adam sat in the rolling chair that was definitely meant for the physician, and scooted closer to her foot, “Christ, it looks swollen. You know the RICE method?”
Harry appears again, the sliding glass door opening, then slipping shut. In his arms is a blanket, and when he gets closer to the bed, he shoves Adam over by pressing the bottom of his foot and rolling him away from the bed. He fans the blanket out over her, and it’s warm. Y/N shivers as the heat seeps into her skin.
“I think I can still come to work tomorrow for –”
“You aren’t,” Harry cut her off instantly, “Shut up.”
Y/N’s brows raised, “Oh - I mean like even if it was just for a half day I could –”
“Babe, I know Harry runs a tight ship, but you are not about to work on that ankle.”
Harry tucked the blanket around her legs, leaving the swollen one out. “You’ll have the week, and then we’ll check back in. You’ll take as much time as it takes to heal,” he sat back down, leaning back into his chair, “If your strength gives out and you take out a platter, I’ll have Adam mentor you instead.”
“Why are you saying that like it’s a bad thing?”
The doctor comes in around 20 minutes later and explains it's just a grade 1 tear, but it was on the side closer to a grade 2. There were a ton of printouts, she said the nurse would go through with them, and she’d prescribe her pain medicine for the next couple of days until the worst of it’s over, and she’d have to wear a boot for about a week. It wasn’t necessarily needed for a grade 1, but since it was so close to a 2, she wanted to work on the side of caution.
“It’d be ideal to have someone with you at least for tonight. As far as driving, I wouldn’t do it for a little while – the repetitive motion of hitting the pedals could worsen the injury. Plus, you shouldn’t be driving with the medicines I’m prescribing. Does all of this sound okay?”
Honestly, Y/N’s stressed the whole time. Both through the physician and nurse talking to her, her signing her discharge papers, and the initial shot of pain that shoots up her calf when she tries to bear any amount of weight on her now booted ankle. She’s thankful that both Adam and Harry are there, because while Harry busies himself with gathering her belongings and speaking to her nurse, Adam catches her when she instantly wobbles on her feet. She leans up against him, most of her weight, and she forgets how sturdy and solid a presence he is. Briefly, she remembers that he and Niall had sex, and her eyes go wide, which he perceives as her being in more pain.
“Do you need to sit back down?”
“Oh, haha, no, I’m okay,” her face feels hot, “I just – um, was startled. I’m good.”
The drive home is okay – Y/N is a little worried about how she’ll maneuver at first, especially with Hazelnut trying to twirl and twist between her ankles. The doctor had said it’d be beneficial to have someone with her for the night, but she worried about being a burden on anyone. Niall was busy, and if she was honest, he wasn’t the best caretaker in the world. Adam would do it, but tonight is his off night too, and they weren’t particularly close enough for her to have him shack up in her flat for the night. Plus, in the case of both of them, she doesn’t have an adequate PC set-up for them to play League, and she’s pretty sure that campaign is still going on, or whatever.
Her best case scenario would be if Harry stayed with her, but. . .well, she doesn’t know. If Harry isn’t showing her how to make a dish, then they’re doing something filthy, and there is no in between. To ask him to take time out of his busy schedule for what? Watch her grimace in pain and then sleep off a pain pill? What does he get out of that? She’s too tired to do anything tonight, too, so it isn’t like she could offer something worthwhile to him. Nothing annoys Harry more than pointless wastes of time and. . .what else is this but a waste of time? Taking care of someone who chased after her ex’s dog? Tripped? It was like instant karma for lying about dating Youngjae. . .Niall was going to eat that up.
They drop Adam off because he lives closest to where they were. When Y/N inquired what they’d been doing before they came to get her, they brushed it off, murmuring something about a potential deal with another restaurant bigwig, and Y/N instantly felt horrific. She pressed her hands into her face, “Guys, what? You should have just let me stay there!”
Adam leaned forward between the driver and passenger seat, “Babe, seriously, we’re more of an asset to them than they are to us. They were happy to reschedule!” He squeezed her shoulder, “Not that Harry gave them much of a chance. He –”
“Enough, Adam,” Harry cut him off from his side, and once they slowed to a stoplight, he turned to face her. “Don’t be stupid. Why wouldn’t we come to get you?”
Y/N frowned, “Because I’m just a trainee, and you seriously do not have to worry about me like that! I – never stop what you’re doing to come get me, when you showed up, I just figured you guys had been eating or something!”
With brows furrowing deeper, Harry looks. . .like, actually pissed. He hasn’t made a face at her like this in a very long time – she thinks the last time she’d seen this particular, displeased glare had been when he thought it was her hair in that man’s dish. Otherwise, she thinks he’s made a conscious effort not to look at her like this.
“Seriously, if you keep saying dumb shit like this I’ll think you knocked something loose in your head,” he answered, “You think a stupid ass deal with old fuckers who stare at Adam and I with thoughts of money dripping from their ears, is more important than you needing help? Your sense of self-worth is concerning,” Y/N blinked at him, but his gaze shifted back to the road when the light turned green.
Adam cleared his throat, “What Harry is trying and failing to say in a non-volatile way is that you’re important to us! You’re not just a trainee, you’re our friend.” They turned into his flat building’s parking lot, “We care about you, so never hesitate to contact us if you need help. Not me, and especially not Harry.”
Y/N is a little stressed when Adam hops out of the car, telling her to message him if she needs anything. Harry seems like he’s seething beside her, and she really isn’t sure why. Had she known the reaction would have been visceral, then she would have phrased it a little differently. At least to get her point across without sounding like she was being self-deprecating. That hadn’t been her intent!
Her skin feels tight from the blast of the air conditioner, goosebumps pop up all along her skin. She isn’t sure if she should break the silence or if she should just let him stew. Harry has seemed on edge since he showed up at the hospital. Had it been because he saw Rowan? Was this another fit? No. . .no, Y/N doesn’t believe that. She tries to dig into her brain to think like Niall when he’s deluded and having real, actual, well-formed analyses of people.
He wasn’t even rude or angry when Youngjae practically asked to dry hump you in front of his very eyes, so why would he give a shit about Rowan? The ex you hate.
He’d say something like that, she thinks. And it’s true – even when he was irritated about Youngjae, he still asked her what she’d learned that day, if it’d been a lot, if she’d had fun. Harry’s unlike the men that have been in her life in the past; he’s an adult, sure in himself, confident without being shitty, incredibly capable and a good sense of self. Honestly, Y/N feels like her own self-realization pales in comparison by leaps and bounds. Harry is someone who knows exactly who he is, what he’s worth, and even if he does get jealous, he doesn’t take it out on her.
The mood is soured and tense between them. Y/N thinks Harry is just too hard to figure out sometimes. She wishes she could crawl into his brain and sift through the files so she’d understand without having to ask.
“I’m sorry?” She tried, wiggling in the passenger side, biting on her bottom lip at the twinge she felt beneath her boot, “I didn’t – I didn’t mean to make you angry with me.”
Harry glances at her momentarily, and Y/N swallows thickly. He slips his hand off his thigh, where it had been resting, and instead, places it on her thigh. His hand is warm, his palm is soft, even as he dips his fingers into the flesh of her thigh, just below where her shorts end. It’s a reassuring squeeze he gives her, at least it feels that way, and almost imperceptibly, the pad of his thumb strokes against her skin. Y/N’s kind of embarrassed because she skimped on shaving her thighs that well since the hair is thinner, so he’s definitely feeling that, but she’s more hyper fixated on the fact that he’s doing this than that at the moment.
“What are you apologizing for, hm?” His tone of voice had shifted, something softer, dipped in clouds of honey. “I’m the one who should be apologizing. I shouldn’t have said it like that,” he shook his head to himself, “When Niall called, he hadn’t specified what injury you had, he just said that you were at the hospital at first, and I’ve just. . been tense, since then, is all. Even once Adam clarified, it was just a lot, yeah? I was worried about you,” he squeezed her thigh again, “I am allowed to feel that way, aren’t I? Whether you think you’re just a trainee or not, you’re someone close to me.”
Y/N’s insides feel melty soft. “Really?” She can’t help from asking, though she knows it’s redundant, and adds nothing more, it spills from her mouth before she can stop. Y/N stares at the side of his face, the curve of his nose, his lips wet from his tongue, a pink coloring slipping from his cheek to his ear.
“Yes,” he answers without hesitation, “I know I’m not the best at showing it, and that puts a lot of people off besides Adam, maybe. But you are my friend – I care about you very much.”
Part of her thinks she should be focused on how she’d been relegated to friend, but she’s sort of swimming in his admission of caring about her instead. Y/N hadn’t expected to even be considered his friend, so this was. . this wasn’t bad. It should feel bad, but it doesn’t. And how could it feel bad when his fingers are this soft on her thigh?
The rest of the drive isn’t bad. Y/N does chance slipping her hand over his, where it rests on his thigh, and he lifts a couple of his fingers for her to curl around them. It was nice, and made her heart flutter, all the way to the grocery store where he pulled into a parking space close to the front. Apparently, he had clarified with the nurse where her pharmacy was when Adam was helping her stand. He promises to be quick, and he’s true to his word. Though Y/N had only expected him to return with a little white paper bag with a pamphlet stapled to it, he came out with a cart full of bags.
She twists around and cranes her neck to face him when he opens the door, “What is all of this? Did you need to shop for home groceries?”
“Don’t worry about it.”
So, Y/N doesn’t. She guesses it would make sense for him to just get that out of the way while he was already out and at a grocery store. The drive to her flat is pretty close from here, so it’s only five more minutes – they don’t hold hands again, but they had for long enough that Y/N was going to be delusional about it for at least a fortnight.
Harry has her lean against him while they walk up to her flat. He wraps one arm around her body, ducking underneath her armpit while she hobbles her way through the doors, toward the elevator. Harry has her stay like this with him at her flat, all the way to her sofa, where he sets her down gently. Hazelnut had toddled after them, and he picked her up from beneath the coffee table, plopping her down on the cushion beside Y/N, “Watch her,” he ordered Hazelnut, “Don’t let her stand. I’ll be right back.”
Y/N tilted her head, “Oh? Did I forget something in the car?”
He stared at her for a moment, then sighed a little, “Are you purposefully a little dense sometimes?”
“Huh?”
“I overheard Niall say you were once, but it was when you were talking about your omegaverse thing, so I only partially listened,” he sighed again, “I’m going to go get the groceries that I bought, so that I can make you the meal I planned on. Then you’ll take one of the pain meds and go to bed, yeah?”
“Oh, you don’t have to cook me –”
“I know what I do and don’t have to do,” Harry cuts her off, “Now, I’ll be back.”
. . .
Harry is diligent in her kitchen.
To be sitting on her sofa and watching Harry Styles move around her kitchen is such an insane experience, she can barely comprehend it. She messaged Niall about it, who sent a ton of obnoxiously horny looking emojis. Y/N didn’t know what he was cooking until it was presented in front of her: potato curry. It’s one of her favorites – how Harry knew that, she didn’t know, but what she did know was that it was delicious. Everything Harry prepares is delicious, but it’s extra tasty when he’s made it with her in mind.
Y/N eats two bowls of it to start, and in between the first and second, Harry gives her the pain medicine with a cup of water. He encouraged her to drink half the cup, leaving two of his fingers on the bottom of the glass as she tilted it up to her mouth, until he pulled them away when he’d deemed she had enough. He had propped her foot up on two pillows and wrapped a blanket around her shoulders with a gentle, “Your flat is always too cold,” before he finally sat down beside her.
“Aren’t you going to eat some?” She’d inquired, and Harry hummed.
“In a little,” he replied, “What do you want to watch? Aren’t you finishing a cult documentary?”
Y/N tilted her head again, and – once more – not fighting the puppy allegations at all, “Yeah? When did I tell you about that?”
“When we slept with each other last,” he told her, “You were in subspace – sometimes you ramble.”
Embarrassment flushes through her, but Harry isn’t paying attention, clicking onto Netflix and finding the documentary by name, proving he really did listen to her useless, subspace-riddled rambles. She just hopes she doesn’t say anything too humiliating, since it seems like she doesn’t always remember what she’s said. What else had she said to him? Oh god. . .did she like – what if she brought up something stupid? Like the omegaverse? Only Niall would think half of the shit she says about that is funny!
Eventually, her embarrassment gives way to exhaustion. Her bones feel heavy, her muscles achy, like they had also just realized that she took off into a sprint and then tumbled when she really hasn’t run since. . .well, since maybe the last time Frankie had zoomed off. As she has that realization, though, she also thinks about how Harry hadn’t asked her what happened. Had simply shown up, called her clumsy, then immediately started taking care of her.
“You aren’t g’na ask?” She murmured, the meds tickling at the outside of her brain.
Harry’s attention pulls from the telly, “I mean, I think I can piece together why they kicked her out of the cult without watching the first part.”
“No, what –” she laughed a little, not even thinking he’d been paying much attention, “I mean about what happened? Like, how I hurt my ankle?”
“Oh,” he shifted, scooting back further on the sofa with a shrug, only bothering Hazelnut enough for her to peek an eye open then slip it back shut, “I figured you were embarrassed and didn’t want to talk about it.”
Y/N scratched at her thigh, remembering the feel of his hand there, kind of wishing he’d put it back. He was giving her an out, not to expose herself, but she felt the need to anyway. Curling her toes on the foot not booted, she shoves her foot into the dip between cushions, “My ex – that was who was in the room with me before you guys got there. He like. . .caught me off guard while I was out,” she explained, “His dog, Frankie, slipped out of her collar and ran off – she was headed like right toward the street and he can’t run on pavement without these special shoes or whatever so I ran to go get her. I used to do it a lot so. . .I dunno. I lost my footing this time, though, and wiped out, and – yeah.”
Harry stared at her quietly, like he was giving her a chance to add more, but when she didn’t, he rested his hand on her non-injured ankle, wrapping his cool fingers around it delicately, “You’re too kind of a person,” he murmured, “You’re very sweet and loving, and way too nice.”
He squeezed her again, then turned back to the telly. There was no calling her an idiot, no questioning why she would do something so dumb, why she even got caught up talking to her ex to begin with, for the second time in only a few short weeks. None of that. Just something sweet, actually – something that made her insides feel so soft, she thinks her organs might be replaced with clouds. Or maybe the meds were just really kicking in.
Harry doesn’t remove his hand from her. Y/N falls asleep on her sofa.
. . .
There are a lot of things that Y/N has rambled on about when she’s in subspace.
Harry finds it cute. He’s always found subspace kind of cute, if he’s honest; the thought that he’d made someone so comfortable, and so content – so mindless and overwhelmed with pleasure that they just float off into such a nice spot – has been something he liked. Strives for even. But he would have to admit that Y/N might be the cutest.
He isn’t sure why. Maybe it’s how easy she melts into him. How she’ll cum, shiver through her orgasm then immediately go boneless. Easy to maneuver, where he can coax her into his body without her overthinking, or worrying, or questioning every second of every interaction, like he can see her do behind her eyes when they’re together. Actually, there’s usually not a thought behind her eyes when she’s like that – just sweet, and soft, and it makes Harry feel fond. He likes taking care of her like that, even if it means she might ramble for thirty minutes, in and out, getting quiet every five or so minutes so he thinks she’s fallen asleep, only to start right back up.
She tells him a lot of things when she’s like that. She had potato curry at this place twice two years ago, and she’d loved it, but they relocated a town over, so she wasn’t able to get it as often, even though it was one of her favorite meals. Niall once told her she would probably be good at taking a knot in the omegaverse, but not as good as him, and it offended her, but she also sort of understood. Hazelnut used to steal her underwear and hide them underneath the sofa, but Y/N, honest to god, thought someone was coming into her flat and stealing them. She has more than 20 candles stored somewhere in her room because if Niall found out how many she had, he wouldn’t keep telling her when the sales were and going to the store with her. She hoped Harry saw her as someone he was friends with.
. . . The last one had made his heart ache a little.
He isn’t sure why. Maybe a couple of reasons, the first being that this was such a tenderhearted and unassuming want. How she had phrased it to him, with her mouth halfway mushed against his chest, was soft and careful. “I like – think that our dynamic is like, good right? It’s good, but sometimes I worry that we’re only ever mentor and mentee, like I want to be friends. Are we friends? I think I’d like to be considered your friend, one day, if that’s allowed.”
Had Harry not made it obvious that he considered her a friend? He guesses not. He guessed that most of their dynamic outside of the sexual stuff had been overshadowed by that aspect, so he could understand why she didn’t think so. But Harry had fun when he was with her, even when they weren’t sleeping with each other. She was fun to tease; it was fun to hear her talk, theorize, complain, and whine. Harry would come up with more excuses to see her if he could, but he worried about coming off a little desperate and needy. Part of him thought that maybe she didn’t want to see him outside of the sex. He sees her every day, for the most part, for hours at a time, and he’s her boss, technically. Not a lot of people want to be friends with their boss.
Then part of him was wondering if he should be concerned that he was relegated to a friend right off the bat. Not that he minded – he isn’t sure where he had expected this thing between them to go, but he didn’t have his heart set on any which way it went. Harry’s thinly veiled obsession with her had only been proliferating by the week, the day, the hour, the minute, the very second – and it had only been more ridiculous after she was with Youngjae. After he’d littered her neck with marks and spots, down her body, biting into her thighs like she was his to claim. Harry was possessive, he couldn’t help it. And again, with Youngjae, he could barely stand that – a man with twinkles in his eyes, and dimples that she has a thing for, who came to save her from her evil ex, then took her to his restaurant and taught her Korean cuisine to expand her repertoire. Then there was Harry, her grumpy mentor, whom it took her over a year to even feel remotely comfortable asking him questions, whom she at one point would rather pass out in front of than tell him she hadn’t eaten.
So like. . .Harry’s a little possessive. Because if she was going to fuck a chef, then he thinks it should be him, and not Youngjae, who has big brown eyes and even has Harry swooning sometimes, annoyingly enough. Like when he sent Harry a message telling him how amazing Y/N was, how he’s very impressed by her, and in turn, impressed by Harry’s ability to create a chef somehow in his image without taking away from her being her own person. How this filled Harry with pride, because he obviously wanted people to respect her as a chef and be impressed by her, but also immense displeasure because. . .well, did Youngjae have a crush on her too? Or was this just pure infatuation with her ability to learn and duplicate? Harry didn’t know, and it stressed him out, a little, more than he’d like to admit.
Still, disregarding all of that, Harry thinks it’s a shame that Y/N didn’t think they were friends before. It’s why he’d made a point to say it today, even though sometimes it felt like maybe his feelings were a little more than something platonic, and even more than something only sexual. Harry is unsure of most of them; they’re a confusing webbed mess that he has tried crawling through, but he lacks the setae spiders have on their legs to keep from getting stuck. So he usually packs it away for later, instead just enjoying the time that they spend together, no matter what they’re doing. Whether he’s calling her puppy and making a space for himself inside of her, or she’s falling asleep beside him on the sofa, with a sprained ankle from chasing her ex’s dog at the park. Every moment he appreciates.
Harry hates that she doesn’t think of herself as someone important to him. Enough that he could break himself from his typically emotionally constipated stupor to tell her that she was. The response he’d had to her being in the hospital had been something a little too dramatic for just a sprain, the fact that she hadn’t called him because she didn’t want to bother him, and the thought that she didn’t assume he’d be staying with her the first night while she healed. Clearly, he wasn’t doing a good enough job at showing her that she was someone he cared for, so he vowed to try a little harder. To be better for her.
And that. . those feelings probably weren’t platonic either, but again – he’s no spider. That’s something to dig through later.
For now, Harry switches positions on the sofa. Carefully lifts her head from where she’d slumped against the cushion, places a pillow in his lap, and then rests her head atop it. He cards his fingers through her hair, traces around her hairline, and traces imaginary lines along her ear. Y/N shivers in her sleep, then melts deeper, and Harry thinks it’s cute.
She really is like a puppy – he thinks her tail would be wagging if she had one.
. . .
Y/N knows she’s being unreasonable.
She’s only out for a week because of her ankle, and by the end of the week, she feels pretty good. Well enough that she knew she could return to work without it being an issue, so she was excited. Not only because she missed cooking, but because she was starting to feel bad, Harry kept going out of his way to come check on her periodically. He’d call her around lunch, he’d pop in after the dinner rush to bring her food, then head back; she’d get a message to take her medicine when it was time and to practice the stretches the nurse had told them about.
Don’t get her wrong, she loved a little extra attention from him, but she did feel like a burden, which was not great. Niall was stopping by too, but that’s because he needed his Hazelnut fix, and he did so under the guise of coming to check on her healing ankle. Then he’d take pictures of him with her foot and send them to Adam, who in turn would send a thumbs up and a heart eye emoji (an odd response but somehow makes perfect sense coming from him). When she told him everything that Harry was doing, Niall could barely contain himself.
“I’m always right,” he shook his head, “God, he likes you so much it’s almost embarrassing. This is good though, there’s been this lady all over his shit lately.”
Y/N’s ears had perked at that, head tilted, “Elaborate.”
Niall leaned back against the sofa where he sat on the floor, Hazelnut curled up in his lap, “Well, Adam said she’s an old chef friend from, like – maybe it was college? She’s come by every. single. day. which like I don’t mind her, but she’s all over your man, it’s making me mad.” He waved his hand around, “Like she’s clearly flirting and it’s bugging me.”
Y/N thinks her eye twitched, “Ah,” she gave a curt nod, “That’s – I hate that.”
“I knew you would,” Niall told her, “So did Adam, he said she’s been trying to get back with Harry ever since they fucked the first time,” Y/N’s mouth fell open, “I know, I was also shocked! Then I was mad at Harry for ever looking at a woman before you and I realized I was getting a little crazy, so I went on break and had some crackers and sent you all those memes,” he shook his head, “Still, I’m glad you don’t have to see it. If it makes you feel any better, Harry doesn’t play into it at all! He actually looks pissed off.”
That did make Y/N feel better. She knew she had really no reason to be upset that someone was flirting with him. Now that Y/N thinks about it, Harry probably has people flirting with him all of the time, she just isn’t around to see it. Harry is hot; he’s a confident, clearly wealthy man who just comes off like he knows what he wants and how he wants it, and that’s attractive to people. She saw the eyes he would get when they all went out. He was just so aloof and impassive that he didn’t typically play into it, even if they were paying customers; she’d heard stories of him snatching his hand out from people feeling touchy-feely with him.
For some reason, the fact that he’d slept with her before just wasn’t sitting right with her, but whatever. Y/N was jealous, she would admit that – and she wasn’t above being jealous either. She’s only human, a woman with feelings that are a little too big (and only growing) for her boss. It’s a perfectly normal reaction to have, in this case.
Perhaps her crash-out following it was not the most normal.
But let her explain! When she went back to work she’d been so excited, and Harry seemed delighted to see her even though it was the ass crack of dawn and it was a truck unloading day. Even though he refused her help carrying any of the boxes into the storage room, he encouraged and listened to her rambling, even if it was just to fill up the empty air. Usually Harry prefers silence, but part of her likes to think that maybe he’d missed her in her week away from work, even though he still saw her. It might have been weird not having a shadow beside him all day, who progressively has gotten more and more talkative as their dynamic progressed.
Everything was fine and normal, people welcomed her back, a lot of people were checking in with her to make sure she wasn’t doing too much, and Adam was looming in a sort of scary mama bear way that she was trying her best to ignore. Harry was pretty good about leaving her be, but she could still tell he was watching her from the corner of his eye. Making sure she was okay, that she wasn’t overworking herself, or putting too much pressure or force on it.
Y/N had forgotten all about this random college friend that had sprouted up, until a woman she’d never seen before all of a sudden appeared, and with one brief moment of eye contact with Niall, she knew exactly who it was. Even without the locked gazes, she thinks she would have known, though, because she was instantly at Harry’s side. Speaking softly and sweet, laughing at what he said a little too loudly, muttering inside jokes that only she, Harry, and Adam would understand. Harry introduced Y/N to her briefly, and Y/N instantly felt like she was being sized up.
“I’m Maren,” she didn’t hold out her hand, and her smile seemed a little fake, but Y/N thinks that maybe she just already didn’t like her, so she was making things up in her head. “What school did you go to?” And when Y/N muttered to her, her measly school, a random one that everyone was confused Harry had even gone to to begin with, she chuckles and says, “Cute.”
Cute?
“Oh, fuck her,” Niall said over lunch, mouth seconds from a croissant, “What a dickhead.”
The first couple of days, it was just obnoxious, but it seemed like the more time passed, the more Maren became familiar with Y/N and Harry’s relatively close dynamic in the kitchen, the more she inserted herself. Y/N still isn’t even fucking sure why she’s there! She didn’t cook that much, she mostly spent her time looping between Adam and Harry and pissing Y/N off with every comment and breath she made. Again, Y/N knew most of her response to Maren was a deep-rooted jealousy, but she couldn’t help it! She’s human, she might remind everyone once more. And she’d started touching him too, laying her hand on his shoulder, squeezing his elbow, one time she pushed one of Harry’s hairs from his face when Y/N had been the only one in the hallway to see it.
The flirting isn’t the worst of it, though. The worst of it is that Harry isn’t doing anything to stop it.
Not that he has to – it isn’t like they were in a relationship, but like. . .what the fuck! He never plays into anyone's flirting ever, yet Maren, whom he’s slept with before, it’s just fine? It’s sort of driving her crazy! Plus the fact that he never brings it up to her, never explains the situation, and Y/N for sure was not going to be inquiring about it. She’s already worried about seeming like a crazy ex enough that she’s relatively nice to Rowan, so there was no way in hell she was going to coin the title of ‘crazy FWB’.
Maren doesn’t talk to Y/N much, and when she does, it seems like it’s only to make her feel small in comparison. At the very least, Harry doesn’t hear these conversations – she makes good to have them when he’s out of sight, out of mind. Like when Y/N was sauteing vegetables, something she could do in her sleep, when she’d appeared at her side out of nowhere, “Hm,” she clicked her tongue, then reached out with a fork, stabbing into a piece of asparagus, “It’s hard to cut these in even ratios. Have Harry show you the proper math for it.”
The proper math? Who gives a flying fuck! Someone is going to put this in their mouth, and they’re going to eat it, and it’s going to be delicious whether it’s 1/8th of the stalk or 1/6th. Also, Y/N wasn’t even the one to cut the damn asparagus, Niall did, and she did not tolerate any sort of talk against her delusional partner in crime. But Y/N knew that she had to bite her tongue. This was Harry’s friend, someone – and she grits her teeth when she thinks about it – close to him. Close enough to have seen him in a way that Y/N has. It was either cordial or crazy, and she didn’t want to choose the latter.
So what if Harry hasn’t been as doting with her as he had been last week? Her ankle was healed, and there was no reason for it. So what if it had been a stupid amount of time since she’s had his fingers in her mouth? She wasn’t a succubus, she could survive without sex for a little while. So what if every smile seems sweet and a little sad for her, like he thought she was pitiful? Maybe she was.
What really does it though?
Adam asks Y/N to fetch more pepper from the storage room. There are very few tasks Adam will give her out of sheer worry and mother henning alone, so she knew if he was requesting something of her, it was necessary, and he couldn’t leave his spot. Y/N didn’t know what he was preparing, but it looked serious and so she scurried out of the kitchen to go get it. Her ankle was a little sore today, but nothing horrible – they’d just been relatively busy this week, and Y/N spent a lot of her time trying to avoid Maren at all costs, so she was constantly on the move. It wasn’t something she couldn’t bear.
When she stepped into the storage room, she wished she had told Adam to have someone else do it.
Because Maren and Harry are close – closer than you should be in a storage room. Their heads whip to the door, but Y/N darts her gaze before she can make out either of their faces, or if Maren’s lipstick was smudged, or if Harry had a poorly concealed hickey at the collar of his shirt, “Sorry for interrupting,” she murmured, ducking to the left to grab the pepper, and then run out of there. Something twists in her gut, jealousy crawls at the back of her eyelids, wraps its fingers around her lacrimal glands, and squeezes. How fucked up of them to do it in her official crying spot? She didn’t even have anywhere to go to crash out in peace.
Niall knew something was up immediately, but he knew not to hound her for information yet. Their day was almost done anyway, only a couple of hours left to go – Y/N could bite her tongue and bear through it, just how she does the gnawing in her ankle that says she needs to rest it for a while when she gets home. She’s so irritated that she kind of wants to scream, because what the fuck? And she’s irritated that she’s irritated, because she really shouldn’t be but. . .well, she can’t fucking help it!
Y/N likes him – that’s obvious. Maybe she’d jumped through convoluted loops to convince herself that what she felt was just admiration for her boss, and her heart raced because she was scared of him – both true – but now? After weeks of being around him, sleeping with him, finding out that there’s a sweet, tender, ooey-gooey spot of him that not many people were privy to, but he showed her? How was she going to not like him in a way that’s more than friends with benefits? Y/N had never been suited for no-strings-attached. She’s far too delusional and sensitive to even be remotely a good candidate for it.
So this feels like a slap in the face when it shouldn’t. She’s clenching her jaw tightly when she shouldn’t be. And she’s in a shit mood, when she shouldn’t be.
“Y/N,” Harry’s voice startled her when she was in the break room, gathering her purse. “Can I have a word with you?”
She didn’t even look at him when she replied.
“I’m actually pretty busy tonight, so it’ll have to wait. I’ll see you tomorrow.”
Y/N all but runs out of there, and she probably looks stupid because she’s limping, but she needed to get out of there. Needed to be somewhere safe where she could tear up and not feel like an idiot. Needed to press her face into a pillow and scream for hours. Niall calls her when she gets home, and she almost doesn’t answer, because she doesn’t want him to hear her all torn up over it, but she does anyway. If she didn’t answer, then he would just show up at her doorstep in a little while. When she explains to him what she saw, he gasps so loudly that Y/N realizes it wasn’t just him to gasp – there were two gasps.
“Wait, Adam’s hear baby, let me put you on speaker,” she hears him click it over, the sounds of the air around them suddenly becoming louder, “What a dickhole!”
“Wait, I think –” Adam tries to start, but Niall cuts him off immediately.
“Listen, I know he’s your friend, but how is he going to clearly be obsessed with Y/N then kiss another fucking woman in the supply closet!”
Y/N cleared her throat, “I mean, I don’t – like I don’t know if they were kissing, it just seemed like that. He wanted to talk to me after work, but I told him I was busy.”
“Good, make him suffer,” Niall agrees, which gives Y/N some pause, because sometimes, if Niall’s agreeing with her, then she knows what she did is a little wild. “Send him a video of you blowing someone else. You can use my prick as a stand-in.”
Adam squawks a sound, “You’re filthy! Shut up Ni, you aren’t helping the situation,” there’s a struggle for the phone, Niall making an affronted sound, and then Adam’s voice getting clearer, “This isn’t me defending him baby,” she knows she must really sound pitiful if both Adam and Niall are dropping the pet name, “But Maren isn’t just like – a buddy from college. She is, sure, but she and her family work closely with Harry’s grandfather. There’s a lot tied up in their company, so Harry has to play nice with her a little, which might be why she’s getting away with the flirting. But I’M NOT saying that he’s going about this the right way with you! He definitely should have warned you.”
“It’s not – I mean, he didn’t need to warn me or anything,” Y/N explained, sighing, “I’m more upset with myself being upset than I am with him. He’s allowed to do what he wants. He only just told me he sees me as a friend, so it’s not like I thought we were together or something, but I’m still a little jealous, is all.”
“Rightfully so!” Niall calls from the background.
“I get it, I do, but can I just say one more thing? I’ve known Harry for a very, very long time, and there’s a way he treats his friends. Honestly, the way he treats them, you’d sometimes wonder why people even stay friends with him, he’s a little bit of a dick,” Adam explains, “But how he treats you? That’s beyond just a friendship, I’d reckon. Take that as you will.”
There’s another small struggle, and Y/N hears Niall puff a breath onto the phone, “Do you want me to come over, or do you want to be alone?”
Y/N swallows hard, “I think alone for now,” she tells him, “My ankle kind of hurts, so I’m going to take a paracetamol and go to bed.”
“Okay, call me if you need anything,” then, when he lowers his voice, “I’m serious about the dick thing though, if you want to make him jealous.”
It does make Y/N laugh, despite herself, and it’s a little watery, but she hopes Niall doesn’t hear that.
Y/N does exactly what she said for the night. She takes a pain med, she showers, she props up her ankle, and ices it, then eats a sad cup of ramen. Harry messages her, but she ignores it – she just needs to stew for a little while, because she’s embarrassed. If what Adam was saying was true, then she looked like she was overreacting big time, and part of her is worried that Harry’s messages were clarification on Y/N and Harry’s relationship. Like she’d swipe open his message thread, and there’d be a message like There is no you and me in the context that you believe there is. I’d appreciate it if you didn’t bring personal matters into work.
So she’s embarrassed when she goes to bed that night, and when she wakes up, she’s downright humiliated. There’s something much worse about the thought of facing Harry today and seeing Maren all smug in the kitchen. Plus, her ankle kind of still hurts, and when she asks Niall what she should do, he says, “Call off, baby, you deserve a day to yourself.”
She calls off (she tells Adam, who in turn, tells Harry), stays home with her foot propped and her face in a permanent pout. She knows Hazelnut is probably sick of her moping around, but she still nestles close in Y/N’s lap, whether that be her saving herself from the glacial temperatures or trying to be emotionally supportive, Y/N doesn’t know. But she enjoys the snuggles all the same.
It was a Sunday, so both Monday and Tuesday she’ll have off. Which means she could collect herself before they go back in on Wednesday. And hopefully face Harry with a brave face when he tells her that she’s acting unprofessionally or something.
Niall messages her after work and tells her that Maren didn’t show her face once, but it does little to make her happy.
She ignores all of Harry’s messages.
. . .
Tuesday evening, Y/N finally breaks.
She’d ignored all of his attempts to contact her, and while she was still sort of upset with the situation, she was still mostly just feeling stupid and embarrassed. Y/N wasn’t ignoring him to be a dick, she was ignoring him because she was scared as hell to face the consequences of her actions. What he might say, what he might have said, if he was telling her that she’d need to study under someone else, if he was scolding her for getting her heart tied up in it. Maybe Maren had taken his phone and in Niall style, sent a picture of them fucking or something to drive her crazy – she doesn’t know. Y/N just ignores it to avoid any of that.
But when Niall sends her a message that says Code alert 248, which means ‘pitiful man alert’, and a screenshot of Harry sending a message to Niall, asking if he’s heard from her at all.
Should I send the middle finger emoji?
Y/N finally goes to look at them then, because if he’s asking Niall, then maybe he was more concerned than angry with her. That was her hope, at least, when she’d set down her third cup of ramen noodles in three days on the coffee table and finally swiped to Harry’s message thread with her.
Her eyes widen.
Saturday, 4:52 PM
Y/N, I know what you think you saw, and I know how cliche this sounds, but this truly isn’t what it looks like
She’s a friend, sure, but I use that term loosely. More of a family friend than my own. We slept together once in the past, and she always wants to flirt.
I AM NOT FLIRTING BACK, but I can’t be as blunt and harsh as I want to with her. I can explain more in person if you’re willing to talk to me.
And are you okay? You were limping when you left.
Sunday, 6:00 AM
Good morning. I know you’re upset, but I just want to talk to you.
What you walked in on wasn’t anything, I can promise you that. Please trust me.
Is your ankle okay? Adam said it was sore, and that’s why you didn’t come in. Please, go to the doctor if you’re worried.
Sunday, 2:40 PM
I’m sorry that I didn’t warn you about all of this beforehand. I should have.
Adam told me how she was speaking to you when I wasn’t around. This morning, I told her she wasn’t invited back.
Okay, I know you want space, so I will leave you alone. Please contact me if/when you are ready to speak with me.
Monday, 9:22 PM
Please, talk to me, Sweetheart.
Y/N feels horrible. After reading his messages, she realized that had the roles been reversed for whatever reason, and Harry had completely removed all contact from her, she would be losing her mind. Harry’s story lined up with what Adam had told her, and she knew that Harry had zero reason to lie. If he wanted to be with Maren, then he would be, and he would do it without any concern for his little trainee, who's always clinging to him. But that wasn’t the case; he just wanted to explain himself, and he was worried about her ankle, and he told Maren she wasn’t welcome anymore after how she’d been treating Y/N.
This is so out of character for Harry, these messages, the desperation – she must really be stressing him out and Y/N doesn’t want that.
I’m sorry for ignoring you, Harry, I was embarrassed and like
I thought because you’d been sort of not messaging me as much this week that you may have been trying to like set a boundary or something, or like send a hint?? idk it seems stupid now
I just got in my head
And then i got really embarrassed bc i overreacted so. . .yeah. . .
And my ankle is okay, I think I just overdid it last week.
Y/N barely has to wait two minutes for him to reply.
Can I come over?
Y/N agrees. Maybe a little too quickly, but she’d figured they had both suffered enough, and she missed him horribly for some reason. Even if they’ve gone a couple of days without talking in the past, it feels different now, especially because she was ignoring him out of anger rather than just not messaging each other. Something twists in her chest hard how quickly he wanted to come over. While she feels bad for ignoring him, she does have to say she is glad to know they were both upset over it.
Niall always says it just takes a little bit of a cold shoulder to make a man desperate and yearning, and he really hadn’t been joking. Harry’s messages testify to it, same with the way he knocks on her door, urgently, where usually, it’s just a leisure tap of his knuckles. Y/N presses herself up from the sofa, Hazelnut already beating her to the door, rubbing up against the frame like she already knew who was outside. She feels nervous to see him, even though she’d read his messages, in her head the tangible, physical Harry is about to chew her out for being clingy and misinterpreting their dynamic together.
But when she opens the door, Harry immediately crowds her space.
Y/N squeaks when she steps back and Harry shuts the door behind her. His hands cradle her face, palm to each cheek, “Can I kiss you?” He inquires and Y/N is blinking fast, barely nods before his mouth is on hers. It’s a long press, followed by multiple pecks. Harry kisses her lips, her nose, her cheeks, her chin, her forehead – they’re sweet and short, needy, the kind of kisses you might press into your cats fur when you think they got out and were in the freezing ice storm instead of under your bed in a box where they were hiding (Hazelnut loves stressing her out, and then getting rapid fire kisses in return). Then, when he’s had his fill of pecking them all over, her kisses her mouth again. It’s full, and intense, and he’s holding her face so earnestly, that it takes her a second to catch up. For her brain and mouth to connect, for her lips to move against his.
He’s not turning it into anything dirty. Usually, Harry kisses and licks into her mouth in something filthy, but this wasn’t like that. This was something else entirely – something that made Y/N’s heart beat a billion times faster.
When Harry pulls away from her mouth, he doesn’t pull away far. His eyes are closed, he rubs their noses together, and she knows if she felt his ears they’d be warm; if she saw them, they would be bright red. Y/N wonders if this intense display of affection is a lot for him to show, for someone who doesn’t do things like this often. She wonders what’s going on in his head. Why is he acting like she’s his long lost lover that he finally found after years of no communication. Could she be delusional for a bit? Had this. . .maybe this had opened him up to some of his feelings. Maybe he’d realized something when they weren’t talking? Maybe Niall’s been right this whole time and Harry is so obsessed with her that she takes up his every waking moment?
“My boundary I set with you, is that I have no boundaries. All of them are eradicated,” he murmurs, and he’s so close she can feel his lips skim across her nose, as he tilts his chin up, pushes another kiss to the tip, “Never do that to me again. Please.”
This is so different. So new, from what she usually sees of Harry. It makes her giddy. It makes her want to melt into his body like a second skin. It makes her want to bite him out of sheer cuteness aggression alone.
It makes her feel like maybe. . .maybe Niall isn’t always delusional.
prompt: YN is learning she has no self-preservation. It’s why she keeps running into her stranger. A man who won’t tell her anything, gives her instructions, and occasionally isn’t downright awful.
word count: 9.5k+
warnings: h is obviously not a good person, violence, blood, medical stuff, mean H, dark H
author's note:
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———
YN was too kind.
She knew that.
It’s why she became a nurse, to help others in their time of need, and that’s exactly what she did in the emergency department of her local hospital.
When she was walking down a back alley one night (she knew it wasn’t safe but it was such a quicker shortcut after a thirteen hour shift she couldn’t ignore it even if it was one in the morning).
YN’s half-asleep on her feet when she runs into quite the scene, a man who has to be around her age was dressed in dark jeans and a black tee shirt.
There was blood dripping from his jaw and his bottom lip was swollen up, already bruising under the drying blood.
He had just tossed something into the dumpster before slamming the lid shut with a deafening echo and despite the warning signals, YN can’t ignore him.
“Oh my goodness. You’re bleeding, sir,” YN jumps into nurse mode, hurrying up to him and without permission, tilting his head gently to the side.
The man narrows his eyes at her, clearly taken aback, and takes three big steps away from her reach towards the opposite building.
He makes a show of spitting out a mouthful of blood onto the pavement before wiping his mouth crudely with the back of his hand.
His voice was deep and scratchy, it matched his appearance, his accent thick and rough, “M’fucking fine. Back off and mind your own god damn business.”
YN is used to fiesty patients, it doesn’t phase her much as she examines him from afar now, “I’m a nurse.”
The man sneers at her, “Surprisingly, I’m not fucking blind. I don’t want your help. Run the fuck along now, little miss hero.”
YN glances down, still in her scrubs, of course he would see she’s a nurse, and distraught at this man refusing help.
She’s tired, she’s overworked, and the fact that she knows she’ll perseverate on this if he doesn’t let her help makes her choke out a frustrated sniffle.
The brunette man, with a scowl of impatience scoffs of disbelief, “Are you really about to fuckin’ cry?”
“I jus-just want to help. I lost tw-two patients today and couldn’t-couldn’t save them,” YN begins to tear up now, wiping her eyes, it was always a hard day when she lost patients.
Two today.
An older woman with a heart attack.
A teen in a car accident.
“Fucks sake,” The bloody man groans under his breath, his eyes darting up and down the alleyway, “You’re going to cause a scene over this, aren’t you? I don’t have bloody time for this.”
He stomps towards her which makes her freeze but he stands in front of her with a agitated flick of his hand, “If you’re going to do your nurse shit, do it! I don’t have god damn time for your cry baby act. Of course, I get my plans ruined.”
YN obviously doesn’t know what he’s talking about but he seems like he has places to be and she’s holding him up.
Where on earth could he go with his face looking like that anyways?
“I-I don’t have anything with me,” YN stutters after a moment, this man was intimidating as he had major height advantage, he appeared lean but his muscle definition proved he was strong.
“Okay, then see ya’,” He grunts lowly, moving to turn on his heel but YN grabs his wrist without thinking to stop him.
“My-uh, my apartment,” YN’s throat is dry, what the fuck is she doing, “I have the stuff at my apartment up the street.”
“Did your parents never teach you stranger danger? Inviting a man you’ve never met, bleeding, up to your apartment?” He asks with an eyebrow raise, wiping his continuous bleeding wound with his shirt, flashing a sliver of his carved abdominal muscles.
“You need help,” YN replies unsurely, her behaviors are so uncharacteristic but she felt drawn to help this stranger.
A small group of people pass the corridor of the alleyway, with laughs and drunk words, and the man she’s standing with perks up at high alert.
“Fuck,” He hisses angrily, that seemed to be his favorite word, yanking his hand out of her grip and muttering so softly YN doesn’t know whether she heard him right, “gonna get me caught.”
“Stand over there and turn around,” The man demands sharply, YN wasn’t used to being talked to that way but she finds herself walking towards the edge of the alley and turning away.
YN hears rustling, the dumpster being open and closed again, and a few unidentifiable noises before she hears his footsteps approaching.
His hand on her shoulder is tight as he spins her around, “If I let you fix me up, will you leave me the fuck alone and more importantly, never mention this to anyone?”
YN’s brow furrows, “Why can’t I tell-“
The man hisses in agitation, fingers digging into her skin more has harshly, “Answer me.”
It’s the first time that chills are sent down her spine at his gritted words, everything in her is screaming to run, her fight or flight triggered.
“I-I won’t tell,” YN agrees breathlessly, skin tingling when he lets go and pushes her forward, not aggressively but enough that she stumbles.
“Then move already,” He orders and when she tries to turn around to look at him, his hand comes to her neck, keeping her facing forward.
Whatever he was doing in that alley, he really didn’t want her to see, and he didn’t seem like he was open to answering questions.
YN keeps trying to justify why she’s letting a bleeding, angry man into her home as she shakily unlocks the door.
There’s no justification.
She’s putting herself in so much danger.
It had to be something about how attractive he was that made her trusting that he wouldn’t hurt her, like he was too pretty to be deadly.
A trick of the eye, maybe.
He stands in the entry hall, unmoving, and uncomfortable as he doesn’t look around, keeping his gaze on her.
“I want you to know that I’m only allowing you to do this so that you don’t run around and squeal, alright?” He reminds her, voice a bit louder to scare her.
YN nods.
“I also know where you live now, stupid girl,” He shakes his head, like he’s in disbelief YN was such an idiot, “I won’t hesitate to come back.”
She was.
Stupid.
Now her fingers were trembling as she accidentally drops her keys.
“Bat-bathroom,” YN whispers as she pokes her thumb in that direction, “Uh, my supplies.”
“I’ll stay here. I’m not coming in any further,” He crosses his arms, akin to a cornered animal who’s about to be trapped.
YN hopes he doesn’t see when she nearly trips over her own feet as she makes her way to her small bathroom, her nursing/first aid kit was under the sink.
He’s standing in the exact same place he was before, he hadn’t moved an inch, and fuck, he’s scary.
“Um, can you please sit there?” YN points nervously to the entryway bench, not coming closer until he begrudgingly sits on the edge.
“Hurry the fuck up,” He snaps at her suddenly, shaking his leg impatiently and the abruptness makes her jump, “I haven’t got all day, miss lil’ hero.”
It doesn’t sound like an compliment rolling off his tongue.
YN pulls out a cotton pad, soaking it with antiseptic fluid, and shakily says, “This is going to sting a bit. I’m just cleaning it first.”
He doesn’t acknowledge her but he does flinch when she puts her fingertips on his jaw to move his head more to the side.
When she applies the pad, if it hurts, he doesn’t give anything away, his eyes don’t even blink as he sits with his hands on his knees.
After get a fresh cotton pad and drenching it again, she moves onto his lip, and she’s so on-edge, she stumbles over his foot and falls forward.
The man grips her hips hard, pushing her back upright, and appears even more agitated as he huffs, “Chill the fuck out, alright? M’not going to do shit to you. I don’t even want to be here. You’re the one who dragged me to your apartment. Stop being so fuckin’ dramatic.”
YN’s not going to cry despite her bottom lip quivering.
YN’s father was a calm quiet man
She didn’t grow up with brothers.
She wasn’t used to being treated so bluntly, so rudely by anyone, let alone a stranger she was trying to help.
“Are you about to cry?” He asks in surprise, a cruel laugh leaving his throat as he smiles widely, he has dimples, “You’re such a delicate little flower.”
Again, it was definitely an insult.
YN’s throat contracts as she pushes down tears and it wasn’t just because of him, today was hard and she was tired.
“You don’t need stiches. The cut on your jaw is superficial, just a lot bleeding ,” YN determines as she uses a butterfly bandage to close the wound tightly.
YN tilts his chin towards her, his eyes were striking in how green they were as they blinked up at her from under dark lashes.
They were just as frightening as they were beautiful because there was something about meeting his gaze that was like staring at a hungry lion.
YN starts to dab at it with the pad again as it slowly oozes.
She can feel his gaze on her face, it’s making the hair stand up on her arms.
“Skin is just uh, irritated. Nothing major,” YN tells him, holding pressure to stop the bleeding, “How did you get this banged up anyways?”
That triggers him.
He stands up suddenly, making her stumble backwards, and he steps into her space until her back is up against the wall and he’s cornering her.
“I don’t know what bad luck I was dealt to have to deal with such a nosey bitch in my business but you better stop asking questions,” He warns as she can feels his breath, he smelled surprisingly good like citrus and sage.
“I’m sorry,” YN chokes out, it was feeling harder to breathe now.
What the fuck did she get herself into?
“For fucks sake, calm your ass down,” He grunts as he directs her to sit on the bench he was just on, “Stop being a god damn drama queen.”
YN can’t reply, simply nods and stares at the ground.
Why did she let this man in her home?
She needed her head examined, clearly.
He squats in front of her, eyes deadly intent, “I’m going to leave right now. You’re going to keep your mouth shut. If you talk about anything that you saw tonight, I’ll have no problem visiting here again.”
YN nods again, watching him stand and he’s still looking at her as he sighs, hand on the doorknob and says, “Do not ever invite a stranger into your house again, you stupid girl.”
+
YN wishes that she didn’t think about that man again.
But she does.
Over and over.
Every time she walks past an alley.
When she walks home at one in the morning.
But months pass.
No signs of him.
It was a big city.
She didn’t know whether he lived here or not, hell, she didn’t even get his first name during the interaction.
Six months and no signs.
YN dreams about him three separate times.
One of which make her question her sanity.
+
“Be quiet f’me,” He whispers against her lips, hand wrapped around her throat, “Don’t want to hear you unless you’re moaning pretty.”
YN’s staring wide eyed at him, trying to beg with her eyes as he brings her lips to his by the grip on her neck.zzz
“Gonna show me what a nice lil’ pet you can be?” His dimple is popping as he licks her lips before squeezing a bit tighter, “Can’t wait to feel your cun-“
YN wakes up by her alarm, heart pounding, and a hand coming up to touch her throat, the ghost of where she felt his fingertips.
She takes a very cold shower that morning before work.
++
Matthew was nice enough.
He was an emergency medicine doctor which is how they met in the unit.
They rarely worked the same shift but in passing, he had managed to pull YN aside and ask if she’d be interested in going on a date.
YN wasn’t necessarily jumping for joy but she was bored, life was pretty mundane at the moment, and her romantic life was nonexistent.
He was overly cocky, the type of doctor who liked to wear his scrubs into the grocery store so everyone knew his title, corrected people when they didn’t address him with Doctor first.
She didn’t realize that this is how she would meet her stranger once again.
++
The first date was in the afternoon, at a coffee shop in midtown and he had picked the spot.
“I come here atleast once a day,” He laughs as he orders a large black coffee and a bran muffin of all things, “Same ole’ routine.”
“I’ve only been here a handful of times-“ YN pauses when she catches a familiar flash of green, knowing the color distinctly.
She’s been dreaming of it.
Her stranger.
He was sitting in a booth, in the furtherest spot back in the corner with a coffee and a pastry that hadn’t even been taken out of the wax paper.
YN’s heart seizes, blinking twice to make sure that she is not imaging this, that it isn’t just a look alike man.
His unsettlingly intense stare, the scowl etched on his face, it was no doubt the man who had been invading her thoughts for the last six months.
He doesn’t break eye contact first, YN glances back to her steaming chai tea first, lying easily, “Sorry, thought I saw an old friend.”
“Yeah, I run in to quite a few here too,” Matthew agrees without notices her slight shift in demeanor as she forces herself to focus on their conversation.
YN gives herself permission about three minutes later to let her eyes flit across the room, back to that corner.
He was gone.
His coffee and pastry gone.
There was already a new couple sitting there.
YN is half-convinced that she imagined it in the first place, how did she not see him get up and walk past her?
Had that couple been sitting there the whole time?
“I’m so sorry, Matthew. I have to run to the restroom, excuse me a minute?” YN smiles, hoping it doesn’t come off as forced as she stands up and heads towards the back.
YN goes into one of the stalls, sitting down for a moment and just taking a deep breathe because she can’t figure herself out right now.
YN can’t sit in her forever which she wishes she hadn’t even agreed to this date.
When YN unlocks the stall door, she begins to let out a scream when there’s a figure leaning up against the sink, waiting for her.
The person rushes forward, clamping a hand over her mouth as citrus and sage overwhelm her senses .
“Shut the fuck up, right now.”
Why does YN almost slump in relief at the harsh words?
Maybe because this proves that she didn’t conjure him up in her head.
To confirm that he was as startlingly handsome as she has been remembering him to be in the last months.
Even more so actually.
“Are you going scream when I take my hand off?” He asks pointedly, his lips were near her ear, whispering but seeming so loud.
YN shakes her head vehemently that she won’t.
She should scream.
She’s not going to though.
He takes a few steps back, no longer even close to touching her, and once again, he looks angry at her as complains, “Lil’ fucking drama queen.”
This is definitely her stranger.
YN just stares at him, eyes as wide as saucers.
“Why are you here with him?” He asks with the same agitation, his fists were clenched against his sides tightly.
“Do you know Matthew?” YN was confused by his question or why he would care.
“What did I tell you?” He snaps at her, taking a step forward again like he wants to grab her, “Don’t ask me questions.”
“Why can you ask me then?” YN doesn’t know where the confidence is coming from, puffing up her chest.
It gets finished quickly when he brings his hand up to hold her chin, “It’s different. Now answer me.”
YN’s blood pressure must be through the roof right now as she manages to find her voice, “I’m on a date with him.”
The stranger doesn’t like that answer.
His fingertips tighten on her skin before releasing, his tongue peeks out to run over his bottom lip, “I recommend you stay the fuck away from him.”
“Why?”
“You clearly have no sense of self-preservation so I’m trying to save you a lot of trouble in the future. End the date, make an excuse, and don’t go out with him again.”
“I want to know one thing,” YN request as she chews on her bottom lip.
“No.”
“What’s your name?”
“Harry.”
They stare at each other.
YN can’t decipher if he’s being truthful or not.
As he did the night they first met, her puts a firm hand on her shoulder, and guides her towards the bathroom exit.
With his lips touching the shell of her ear, he reminds her with a hiss, “Go do exactly as I say. Leave and go the fuck home.”
He pushes her forward, she puts her arms up to avoid smashing her face off the door, and pushes it open, tripping out into the hallway.
YN legs are wobbly as she makes her way back the table, “Matthew, I am so sorry. I’m really not feeling well.”
“You look as if you’ve seen a ghost,” He teases as he stands up and pushes his chair in.
No, I just saw my stranger.
“Would you like me to walk you home?”
“Nope. I’m good, don’t want you coming down with whatever bug I have,” She replies with a dismisses wave of her hand, willing herself not to look back towards the bathrooms.
“I’ll text you to reschedule. I hope you start to feel better soon. Please text me if you need anything,” Matt smiles genuinely, a concerned expression on his face.
Why didn’t Harry want her to be around him?
How did he have the right to order her around when he wouldn’t answer simple questions?
YN’s mind is reeling as she walks home.
It’s like she expects to see her stranger, watching her walk home but there’s no sign of him, and just like that he disappeared into thin air.
++
YN visits the coffee shop multiple more times.
He’s never there.
Matthew texts her multiple times checking on her, offering to bring her soup or medication, and telling her what a good time he had.
In an act of defiance, against her stranger who has only come into her life twice but has occupied her mind ten-fold, she agrees to another date.
It’s not as if Harry will find out but it still felt freeing to actively disobey his warning.
And so when Matthew asks…
Matthew: If you’re feeling better, I would love to take you out this weekend.
YN feels a sense of guilt that she’s thinking more of her stranger than Matthew when she replies.
YN: I would absolutely love that. Just let me know how to dress. :)
+
That is how she finds herself inside of a nice restaurant on Saturday night, dressed in a satin dress and strappy heels that she hadn’t worn in ages.
Matthew had picked her up in his run of the mill, base model sports car, that was flashy but in quite an unimpressive way.
He was dressed in a nice suit and managed to get reservations at an exclusive, small restaurant in the heart of the city.
Matthew and her were sitting at a two person table toward the back.
Next to them was a round table with place settings for six that was yet to be occupied, the notecard only specifying, ‘Styles, Party of Six.’
They are being poured their first very expensive glass of Pinot Noir when a group of men, somewhat boisterous and rowdy for the setting, are seated at the round table next to them.
“And so Doctor Flint told me that the cadaver ligament we were to use was lost. How on earth do you misplace a body part?” Matthew laughs whilst he tells her this story from the old hospital he worked at.
YN was trying to focus but she hears a voice that is eerily familiar.
“Settle down. This isn’t a fucking bar.”
The hair on the back of her neck stands straight up.
Her stranger.
This isn’t a coincidence.
It can’t be.
YN refuses to look up, past Matthew’s head because she’s terrified of what she might see or more like what she knows she’ll see.
“He put it in the employee fridge! Can you believe that?” Matthew honks out a laugh, slapping the table like he just told the world's funniest jokes.
“That’s insane,” YN agrees, forcing a fake laugh out of her suddenly dry throat, “Sounds like it could be a scene from a movie.”
YN knows that he’s watching her.
It’s the untold feeling that’s inkling up her spine.
She feels in danger for the first time.
Real danger.
How on earth is he sitting across from her?
Is he following her?
That had to be the only answer.
Had she acquired a stalker by helping him all those months ago and the coffee shop just sparked it again?
But that does equate to what he warned about Matthew?
YN convinces herself that she didn’t hear his voice, that it’s all in her head, and she’s going to look up to confirm that she was in fact going insane.
After a deep breath, YN tilts her chin up and gazes directly into the eyes of the man she was praying wasn’t staring back.
Her stranger was positively fuming, he was leveling her with a downright murderous glare that actually made her concerned for her safety.
YN darts her eyes back towards Matthew and ignores Harry for as long as humanly possible as he chats on with his friends.
Everything is working out until her date excuses himself to the restroom, before the main course comes out.
Fuck.
YN anxiously pulls out her phone to distract herself.
Until someone is plucking her mobile right out her hands, a thumb pressing into the nape of her neck as a warning to keep looking forward.
“Bathroom. Five minutes after he gets back,” Her stranger leans down to speak into her ear, he moves so sleekly that she’s never even been alerted he got up.
“My pho-“
“You’ll get it back when you meet me in the bathroom,” Harry tells her before he’s standing up and walking back to his table, slipping her cell into his suit jacket pocket.
Did he really just steal her phone?
YN digs her nails into her palm, keeping an eye on the clock after Matthew sits down, waiting until the five minute mark before excusing herself.
There’s only a single bathroom which when she pushes through the already cracked open door, her stranger is leaning against the counter like last time.
YN takes the initiative to lock it behind her.
She shouldn’t but she does.
“Give me my phone back,” YN demands, unsure of where the bravado is coming from as she steps further into the room.
Harry doesn’t give her a wicked smile, his lips are tight, and his jaw is clenched.
He is absolutely pissed.
“What the fuck did I tell you last time, stupid girl?” Harry’s volume is louder than she anticipated, making her jump in surprise.
YN doesn’t respond, the heart palpitations that were now the norm for her interaction with this man are in full effect.
“Come here,” Harry orders furiously, moving away from the counter.
YN stands her ground.
“I said come the fuck here or I’ll smash your phone right off this god damn floor,” He threatens as he watches her, lip twitching in displeasure at her not listening the first time.
YN really would rather not pay for a new cell phone at the moment and slowly, she drags her feet towards him.
”Yeah, I don’t have time for your lil’ drama queen bullshit tonight, darling,” Harry sneers as he grabs her by the waist, moving her forcefully until he can pick her up and sit her on the sink counter.
YN readjusts her dress, she’d heard a slight rip but she wasn’t going to point that out at the moment.
Harry’s hand comes to her jaw, gripping it and forcing their eyes level, “Are you trying to get yourself killed? Is that what this is? Or do you lack any semblance of common sense?”
It’s hard for YN to talk with his hand holding her jaw, her words jumbled when she garbles out, “Why are you following me?”
His brows furrow in confusion, “You think I’m following you?”
”What are the chances that you show up in two places that I’ve been? While I’m on a date? Unless you’re following Matt….” YN trails off because that would make no sense, it was much more likely that he was following her around.
It was clear Matt had no idea who Harry was because he hadn’t recognized or acknowledge him at the coffee shop or at dinner when Matt would have definetly seen him when he was returning from his bathroom break.
Harry grip tightens enough that she squeaks, trying to pull away, and he hadn’t even seemed to realize he was using much force because it instantly loosens again.
Oddly, he reaches his thumb out to run along her jawbone, and it’s half comforting, half annoyed when he mutters, “You’re fine. Stop.”
She was pretty far from fine at this point.
”Are you that desperate for a lay?” Harry asks bluntly, he was standing in between her thighs and if anyone would have walked into this room, they would be under a much different impression than what’s actually going on.
”Excuse me?” YN gasps, affronted at his questioning.
Harry rolls his eyes at he reaction, his thumb was still rubbing against her skin but his grip had him in control, “I specifically told you to never associate with that guy. Here you are a week later, dressed up all pretty f’him, and what…you gonna let him take you home?”
If YN didn’t know any better, there sounded like some jealously in his tone.
”I don’t know what was going to happen after dinner,” YN bites out, trying to exercise her jaw muscle against his fingertips, “Maybe I would have let him take me home and fuck me.”
Harry’s eyes darken, his pupils dialating further in his anger, and his hand moves from her jaw to the side of her neck, thumb ghosting over her pressure point as a silent threat.
”Can I tell you what I think?” Harry murmurs, with the smallest hint of a smile like he’s cracked the code to something.
”You’re going to anyways,” YN mumbles, her own annoyance flooding her body.
”You’re not even into him. I think you agreed to this date just to spite my warning, huh? Tell me I’m wrong,” Harry’s voice is deeper, smoother, and downright dangerous.
”I do-“
”Tell. Me. I’m. Wrong,” He recites each word distinctly, his teeth gritted as his eyes dart from her eyes to his grip on her throat to her lips back to her eyes in a vicious cycle.
YN bites at her bottom lip, worrying it between her teeth as she doesn’t know why Harry is so good at figuring her out but now she doesn’t feel like she’s in a position to lie either.
She avoids it by saying, “I don’t know you. You won’t let me ask questions. Why should I trust you? There was no reason not to go on another date. Why because of your ominous warning?”
”Yes because of my fucking warning,” He snaps back at her, stepping further between her thighs until their chests are nearly bumping and his familiar scent is lingering against her, “I know what I’m talking about. Stay the fuck away from him.”
YN shouldn’t push his buttons.
She should oblige, agree, and then avoid him for the rest of her life.
But as always, she goes against all those natural instincts and eggs him on further.
”Well then who would I go home with tonight?”
Harry doesn’t appreciate that comment.
Not by the way he’s moving to wraps his fingers around her wrist and tug her off the counter, “I’m taking you home now.”
“Wait, I-“ YN responds in surprise, not resisting his hold as he helps her onto her feet, her high heels were not made for this type of activity.
”No, you want to keep playing with me? You’re going to lose, every fucking time,” Harry retorts as he begins to lead her towards the door, “You’re going to go home to your own apartment, by yourself. Use your fingers, a toy, I don’t really care but you’re not going home with that guy.”
YN feels awful that Matthew is sitting out there, their main courses about to be served, and it will be the second time that she is ditching him when neither had been her intention.
“My dress,” YN stops moving, right as his hand is on the doorknob, “You fucking ripped it. I cannot go outside like this.”
It was true, from the stretch of the countertop, the already high-cut slit on the right side of her dress was now up to her hip, flashing the obnoxiously red lace she had on underneath.
Harry’s eyes move down with a cluck of his tongue, “Really fuckin’ desperate, huh?”
But before YN can defend herself, he’s shrugging out of his suit jacket and wrapping it around her waist, tying it in the front, and it hangs enough to cover at least where her underwear is flashing.
”There, now come the fuck on. I have shit to do,” Harry retakes her hand, tight and firm as he opens the bathroom door, and instead of going towards the dining hall, he’s going further back into the hallway.
He’s letting them out of an emergency exit into an alleyway.
She expects him to dismiss her, to tell her to get home, and to not contact Matt again.
Instead, what actually happens is that he continues walking with her, out of the alleyway and towards the streets that will lead to her apartment, seeing as he definetly didn’t forget where she lived.
YN was cold, goosebumps breaking out along her arms as her bare arms hit the windchill, her jacket left at the restaurant.
“My jacket,” YN points out, pauses quick enough that Harry nearly bumps into her from where he was following closely behind.
His hands come to her shoulders, encouraging her with a bit of force to keep walking, “I’ll have one of my friends grab it.”
YN hated walking in these heels, it’s why she had spent the money on the Uber.
“It’s cold,” YN complains as they’re about halfway there, he’s only a step behind her, ready to grab her at any moment.
“Walk faster then,” Harry replies in a bored tone, his hands once again moving to her shoulder to give her a light shove forward.
YN wants to scream, maybe unstrap her heel, and hit him with it because he was truly the most incorrigible person that she has ever met in her life.
Her stranger stays silent until they make it to her door, he easily ignores the unflattering comments YN makes under her breath, only receiving a shove or push as a response.
When YN fumbles for her keys, Harry waits like he’s invited in, and YN doesn’t have the will right now to fight.
As soon as they get in, Harry shuts the door behind them and she plops on her couch to start unstrapping the heels.
Her hands are shaking.
She wants to blame the cold but she knows it’s her nerves.
“Pathetic, shaking like a leaf,” Harry huffs as he watches, kneeling down and smacking her hands away, heavy rings stinging her skin, and he begins to undo them himself, “Can’t even get your own shoes off and you want to act like you're tough with me.”
YN watches, heart in her throat at the sight of her stranger kneeling in front of her, his hand wrapped tightly around her ankle as the other fusses with the straps.
Why does she get this deep pitted urge to rile him up, just when he starts to act calm?
“I’m going to see Matthew again,” YN wishes her words had come out with a bit more confidence even though they were a downright lie.
Harry stops his actions, blinking up at her with an unreadable expression, “No.”
“You can’t-“
Harry lunges upward, eye level and angry once again, his teeth were gritted as he went to his usual means of control.
A firm grip of her chin.
“I can. I am telling you I can. Leave it the fuck alone and move on. You don’t even like the bloke,” Harry calls her out, it’s a statement, not a question.
“I haven’t even got to know him-“
“Nor do you need to. Stop fuckin’ around because you’re making my life harder by doing this. And I really don’t like when people make my life harder. Especially spoiled lil’ drama queens,” He’s getting agitated enough that his grip gets harsh, painful, and she flinches in response.
Just like last time, he loosens his hold and his frown deepens, “M’not going to hurt you. Don’t have to act like that.”
“Yes, as you squeeze me. I don’t even know who the fuck you are,” YN pulls out of his grip, he allows it but his other hand is still on her ankle.
“It doesn’t matter who I am,” Her stranger argues, “Bottom line. Stop. Fucking. Up. My. Plans.”
”I don’t even know what they are,” YN shots back, she felt like they were talking in riddles at this point.
”Go to work, do your cute little nurse shit, and come home,” Harry repeats through clenched teeth, he finally moves to take off her other high heel.
”Forever?” YN snorts sarcastically, wriggling until she can untie his suit jacket from around her waist, making it a point to toss it next to him on the floor.
She felt even more satisfaction when she realized it was a Gucci piece.
Harry’s eyes stay directly staring into hers.
”Until I tell you elsewise,” He replies cryptically, “You’ve ruined enough things f’me. I need you to stop or m’going to have to do something to make you. Don’t try to think you’re smart and defy me. I’ll know.”
YN’s head is spinning, “You’re telling me I’m not supposed to date or have a social life until you say so? A stranger I don’t even know?”
”If you want to stay out of danger. Yes,” He replies like it’s that simple, he’d taken off both of her heels by this point and didn’t seem to realize that he was still holding her foot, thumb pressing into the arch on the bottom.
”This isn’t fair,” YN feels her throat tighten.
Fuck, she was not going to cry.
”It doesn’t have to be fair. Life isn’t fuckin’ fair, darling,” Harry’s voice is venomous as he speaks, his accent was distinct and each word was enounciated harshly.
”Maybe I should just risk it,” YN slouches back into the couch, kicking his hand off of her.
”No, you won’t fuckin’ risk it,” Harry leans up, his hands on either side of her knees, and it would be an intimate position giving any other circumstance, “You need a date that bad? Having a dry spell, pet?”
There’s a roughness in his voice that makes her want to close her thighs.
God, what the fuck is wrong with her?
She is quiet literally being threatened by a stranger and she feels arousal pooling in her belly?
She’s going to fucking die at this rate.
”You said I can’t go out. It doesn’t mean that I can’t have someone come back to my place,” YN is fucking with him at this point, to rile him up even further when she should be doing the exact opposite, “My sex life counldn’t possible interfere with your ‘plans’.”
Harry’s jaw flexes under his skin, if looks could fucking kill.
”Do you need a lesson?” Harry sits up, his hand shifting to her hip and it sends a shockwave through her.
His fingertips were ghosting over the exposed red lace, lightly, curiously.
”A le-lesson?” YN stutters, eyes wide and god, she wanted to spread her legs further.
”Yes, a lesson. To keep you in this god damn house,” Harry reiterates as his fingers slip underneath the thin fabric near the waistband, snapping the elastic against her hips and making her jump, “Do I need to show you how to use your fingers? Buy you a god damn toy? Something because I need you to stay in this fuckin’ house and I don’t know how many different ways to emphasize it.”
YN knows how to use her fingers but there’s something about the texture, calloused roughness of her stranger’s that make her want his instead.
She wasn’t some sex-hungry feign.
Her currently dry spell had been lasting over the past year.
It was something in particular about her stranger that made her realize just how long it had been.
She wasn’t made uncomfortable by his finger wandering by her hip.
Despite how threatening, how out of line this man was, for some reason she felt like she could trust him not to hurt or take advantage of her.
She had never been this risk-taking in her entire life.
And this isn’t normal risk-taking.
”I know how to use them,” YN bleats back, heart jumping when his thumb rubs over the thin skin of her hip, his hand slipping just underneath the fabric of her dress, “Just don’t like to.”
“Then you’re not doing it right,” Harry shakes his head, a bit more solemn and quiet for the moment as he watches his hand.
There’s a pause.
A long enough moment of silence that it reels Harry right back into reality.
He straightens up before standing, kicking her shoes aggressively out of his way as he storms towards the door, “You better fuckin’ listen to me. It really won’t end well for you if you don’t.”
“When will I -“
When will I see you again?
When can I not be a prisoner in my own house?
Why am I going to be a prisoner in my own house?
What the fuck is he trying to protect me from?
What plans am I fucking up?
There’s all those questions and more on the tip of her tongue but she can’t even get the first one out before Harry is cutting her off.
”You’ll know. Now lock your fuckin’ doors and go the fuck to sleep.”
YN also doesn’t know anyone who used the word ‘fuck’ as much as her stranger.
But she finds herself listening as he slams the door on his way out, trembling on it’s rusty hinges, and locking it behind him like he couldn’t manage a way in if he really want.
YN didn’t know exactly what he was up to, but it wasn’t good.
++
It was six days until YN had to face Matthew.
YN had been surprised that she hadn’t received any text or calls.
Then she goes into her settings, realizing that while Harry had stolen her phone that he’d manage to block his number, delete their conversation, and delete his contact information on top of it.
Fucking dick.
YN can’t avoid Matthew in the cafeteria.
As she’s waiting in line for her salad to be made and he strides right up to her with a displeased expression she’d never seen on his normally smile-laden face.
”If you didn’t like me, you could have just said so before standing me up twice,” Matthew tells her, he’s trying to keep his tone casual as he acts like he’s reading the nutritional facts on the back of his energy drink.
”I am so sorry,” YN doesn’t look at him, looking directly at the woman making their food instead as she works, “It’s…this isn’t like me. It has nothing to do with you, I promise. I’ve just had some….issues that had unexpectantly popped up.”
Matthew scoffs, slamming his tray down a bit too aggressively, “If you’re going to lie, at least make it beleiveable. Do you know how lucky you were that I gave you a chance? I’m a fucking doctor. You’re a nurse. You should be chasing me, not elsewise.”
YN squeezes her eyes shut because it’s not worth starting a fight in the middle of their workplace, “Matt, I’m really just trying to enjoy my lunch break on my fourteen hour shift. Please, just leave me alone. Like I said, I’m sorry about what transpired. It’s on me.”
Matthew surprises her by ducking to whisper in her ear, “You are a no one, YN.”
++
None of this would have happened if it wasn’t for her stranger.
She wouldn’t be feeling so useless.
Alone.
It had been four months since she’d seen her stranger.
Not one trace of him.
Despite the fact that she had been listening, she didn’t go out on dates, and she didn’t bring anyone home.
A nice nurse anesthetist named Paul had wanted to take her out on a date, YN was somewhat interested but turned him down gently, stating that she wasn’t ready for a relationship.
It made her angrier as the months went on.
She hated her stranger.
She missed her stranger.
++
It’s takes four and a half excruciatingly isolating months until something changes.
YN had a ten hour shift tonight which wouldn’t have been bad but she hasn’t had a day off in nearly two weeks and she was run ragged.
YN had the next three off to recuperate which would start by passing out immediately in her bed after showering.
When YN unlocks her front door, her eyes are heavily lidded as she locks it behind her, flipping on the switch, and kicking off her black tennis shoes.
”It’s ‘bout fuckin’ time.”
YN drops her water bottle, her phone, and her purse - causing all the contents to start to spill and roll out.
”Jesus Christ, so jumpy, m’little drama queen,” He laughs meanly as his voice doesn’t come any closer.
YN hasn’t looked at him yet but has a sneaking suspicion that her stranger is sitting comfortably on her couch after breaking in.
She should be worried as to why he’s here.
Instead she feels a flair of anger bubble up in her chest, “Four and half fucking months. You let me be alone with nothing and no one for four and a half months, Harry.”
When she turns to face him, her anger quickly dissipates when she realizes that he’s injured.
He’s shirtless, which YN doesn’t have time to let herself look over his tattoos, his rippled muscles, any of it because he’s currently holding his balled up white shirt to his eyebrow.
There was barely any white fabric to be seen, sodden with dark red blood.
“Oh my god,” YN gasps as she steps over her spilled items, rushing towards the couch.
There were streaks of blood trailing down the side of his face, leaving a trace all the way down to his pecs where it finally dried.
“I’m fine. I just need you to do your lil’ hero act on me, okay?” His teeth are stained red from where his bloody lip has poured into his mouth.
YN feels awake suddenly, rushing to her bathroom to retrieve her kit, and running back to her living room just as fast.
“Harry, I don’t-“ YN fumbles, nearly dropping her supplies, going completely scatter-brained in panic and the shock of seeing her stranger after so long.
”Hey,” Harry replies, loud enough to make her jump, and with his free hand, he does what he always does, grips her chin and levels their eye contact, “Stop freaking out. Isn’t this what your fuckin’ job is? Do you do this at the hospital?”
YN shakes her head, “This is different.”
“Well then act like it’s not,” Harry’s hold on her isn’t as rough as it normally is and she has a creeping suspicion that he’s smeared his blood on her face but that was the least of her concerns.
YN goes to her kitchen sink, scrubbing her hand thoroughly before tucking her hands into a pair of latex gloves before she’s removing his destroyed shirt to examine the actual injury.
It wasn’t the worst that she had ever seen but it was far more serious than the injuries that he had the first time that she saw him.
”I’m going to do the same thing as last time. I’m going to clean it first,” YN informs him through shaky breath as she soaks a cotton pad to begin to swipe over the split skin gently.
Harry, once again, doesn’t show any type of reaction that it’s painful.
He only continues to stare at her face as she does her job.
When the cut is completely cleaned up, YN’s able to examine it better, and realizes that he definitely needs stitches.
”You need at least five or six stitches,” YN tells him after taking a step back, peeling off the gloves, “Do you want me to drive you to the hospital?”
Harry doesn’t move, his chest is moving steadily, calm as ever.
”No, I want you to stitch me up,” Harry replies like that’s a normal request.
”I don’t have numbing medication or pain medication, I-“
”I don’t need it. Will you come the fuck on?” He pushes, sitting up a bit straighter, and he has no right to get annoyed at her right now when he’s the one causing all of this.
YN knows she shouldn’t do what he’s asking.
Shouldn’t give in to another one of his demands.
But she does.
”Fine,” YN lets out a long exhale, digging through her kit for another pair of gloves and the material for sutures.
”Wait f’a minute,” Her stranger interrupts her, hand coming to grip her hip, and bring her attention back to him, “I don’t want you fuckin’ shaking while you do it. I need you to calm down, okay? Everything is fine, right? You know that.”
”I don’t know that,” YN frowns as she rummages through her kit, ignoring that he wants her eyes on him, “I don’t know anything anymore. I don’t even know you but I’ve listened to you for the past five months.”
“I know you have,” He replies simply.
Was he watching her?
”And nothing bad happened to you, did it?” Harry prompts, squeezing her hip encouraging her to look at him.
YN begrudgingly does, surprised by the softness on his face, his normal harsh frown lines had dissipated.
”No,” YN agrees honestly, “I have just been lonel- never mind.”
She finds herself choking up on the word, tears threatening to spill because she’s tired, confused, and fucking lonely.
Harry’s eyes are unreadable like the usually are, they’re concerned and his squeezing turns almost into a gentle massage of her plush right there.
”I’ll fix it, okay?” Harry sighs as YN tugs on another pair of gloves, “I need you to continue to listen to me, follow my instructions, and I’ll make sure you’re not lonely, okay?”
YN doesn’t believe him for a moment but doesn’t have the energy to argue, “Okay.”
Harry knows that she isn’t buying it, “I mean it. I stick by my fucking word. I’ll fix it if you continue to listen.”
YN nods in agreement, carefully taking the curved needle from the sterilized packaging and threading it through the suture material, “You’ll need to come back here or go to the doctor in about a week and a half to get these remove. They don’t dissolve.”
”Okay,” Harry acknowledges but he’s more subdued, like something about YN complaining about her loneliness had stuck with him.
”Sit back,” YN orders as she’s ready to start work and when she leans over, she not only realizes it’s a shitty angle but her lower back is screaming at her from being on her feet for an unreasonable amount of hours today.
Harry must recognize it, surprisingly perceptive for how cold and disconnected he can be, “C’mere.”
YN should put up a fight.
YN should do a lot of things that she doesn’t.
Harry pulls her in until she’s sitting in his lap, thighs straddling over his closed ones, and she rests her bum on the thick of his quad muscle.
It actually was a much easier angle to do what she needed to do.
Her strangers hands come up to steady her hips, resting in the dip above her hip, and his hands were massive, his fingertips nearly reaching her bellybutton from the way that they were splayed.
”It’s going to hurt. Try not to flinch or anything,” YN mumbles, ignoring the butterflies that were starting to go crazy in her belly.
The roles are reversed when YN grips his chin to keep his head at the angle she needed it as she decided how to go about this.
She can with one hundred percent certainty say that she’s never sat on a patient’s lap while giving them stitches.
Harry doesn’t so much as flinch as she begins, his eyes were studying her face the whole time, hands firm around her waist, and unrelenting in their grip to keep her steady.
The only noise in the room is their breathing, more so YN’s, and a sharper intake from Harry when she has to pierce the needle through his sensitive, bruised skin to pull it shut.
”D-done,” YN replies after she ties the thread of neatly, snipping it with a small pair of scissors before sitting back, her back was still aching.
Harry hadn’t said anything during the whole thing, he doesn’t smile but he isn’t frowning either as he moves to hold her chin, his favorite thing apparently, and his thumb swipes over her bottom lip.
It was oddly intimate.
”Thank you,” Her stranger tells her sincerely, no teasing or harshness.
YN nods, swallowing because she should get off of his lap but she feels planted where she’s at.
Until she can’t help the massive yawn that has her eyes watering, bringing her hand to cover her mouth.
”S’time to get you to sleep,” Harry decides as he stands up and positions her on her feet, “You need to stop workin’ so much. You’re going to die of exhaustion.”
How does he know how much she works?
YN’s too tired to question it further.
”Need t’shower,” YN mumbles back, rubbing at her eye.
”It can wait, you’re ‘bout dead on your feet. Hold on,” Harry disappears down her hallway, she can hear him going into her bathroom like he just has full permission to explore her house.
He comes out a moment later with a damp washcloth, without asking, he begins to wipe at her face, and when the white fabric starts to stain red - she’s alarmed before she realize that it wasn’t her own blood that had dried on her face.
”You can…um, you can shower before you leave if you want,” YN offers as she allows him to wipe her off, moving down her jawline and throat.
She expects him to turn it down.
”I might actually take you up on that. This…this wasn’t part of my plan for the night and I still have things to do. I’ll lock up on the way out?” Her stranger tosses the washcloth on her kitchen counter.
”Yeah, m’going to go to sleep,” YN waves her hand at him, her eyes were starting to close without her permission as she drug her feet towards her bedroom.
”Jesus Christ, I’m fucked.”
YN hears him mutter that under his breath, not meant for her to hear, and she doesn’t know what it means anyways, it was probaly about his plans that didn’t go his way.
After she changes into her pajamas, YN realizes that Harry doesn’t have a shirt on, and she rifles through her drawers until she finds a shirt from an old boyfriend that would fit him.
She folds it, leaves it right in front of the bathroom door, and goes back into her bedroom.
Underneath the covers, she tries to sleep but instead finds herself listening to her stranger.
He must drop a bottle in the shower at some point.
Then the water’s being shut off after awhile.
A bit of shuffling and the door opening.
What she doesn’t expect is when he steps into her doorway, leaning against her doorframe, in the shirt that she had left for him.
”Bye,” He replies simply, no ‘thank you’ or anything.
YN sits up, “No, not ‘bye’. When…when is this going to end? I can’t keep living like this, Harry. I -“
”I said I would fix it, didn’t I? So stop bitching,” Harry snaps, the calmness that had settled between them had disappeared, all the softness that he’d shown just a bit ago had been lost now.
YN frowns at him, “I’m so nice to you. I don’t understand why you treat me so poorly.”
”If you think I’m treating you poorly, you don’t want to know how I treat others,” Harry laughs, the cruelty seeping back into each syllable, “You’re just a sensitive lil’ drama queen.”
”Fuck you,” YN shoots back for the first time because she had been overly nice and accommodating for a man she didn’t know anything about.
The frown lines are back, his scowl set where it normally was.
”Goodnight, my queen,” Harry smirks as the insult rolls off his tongue.
”Get the fuck out,” YN’s voice is quivering but not from fear or upset, from rage.
”My pleasure,” He agrees easily, stepping away from the doorframe and disappearing down the hall.
YN’s too tired to have anymore thoughts after she hears the front door click closed.
What. The. Fuck
++
The next morning, she’s awoken to an obnxious pounding on her front door.
There’s no way that it would be her stranger, right?
He would have let himself in if it was anything like last night.
She had never even questioned where he got the injury from.
When she makes it to the front door, there’s no one in front of her peephole which confuses her, and makes her unlock it to open it up.
There’s a massive cardboard box on her front mat, with small holes poked into the sides, and her name scrawled on the top of it in what looked to be boyish handwriting in marker.
YN hears rustling of all things.
Which makes her kneel down to open the loosely shut box.
When she hears the most feisty mewl of her life.
After opening the flaps, there’s two black kittens inside with a blanket surrounding them.
They were jet black with sleek, shiny coats and bright green eyes- looking up at her expectantly.
Two kittens on her doorstep.
YN is confused but she brings them inside.
When she looks in the box for any explanation, there’s a small note that is in the same handwriting as the scribbles on the cardboard.
Niall groans when she rejects another idea, this one involving her biting her lip or something after saying some lust-filled, naughty pick-up line that would only work if she were too hot for anyone to care if she said something stupid. “You’re delusional, and not the fun kind,” Niall says it like an insult, rolling his eyes, “Anything you do or say will be hot, he’ll be drooling over himself trying to get at you. Honestly, what’s stopping you from just looking at him and saying you want to fuck?”
“Humility,” she replies quickly, “Shame. A general sense of insecurity that’s hovered over me since I hit puberty.”
“Well, fuck all of that,” he answers just as easy, “Tell him to come over and hang paintings for you or something. Or – wait! Wait, say that you want him to teach you how to make those custard tarts I had in Portugal last year. Adam had mentioned something about Harry knowing how.”
or
Harry is jealous, and Y/N is delusional (derogatory)
part 1
part 2
part 3
(19k+ words)
iv.
When Harry first met Y/N, he didn’t think much of her.
Not necessarily in a negative way; he’d been introduced to the class she was in, and nobody stuck out to him. There was no aura of greatness, none of them looked confident, and every single face staring back at him looked scared shitless, and unsettled. From the moment their chef instructor established why Harry was there, he had a feeling he would leave unimpressed, uninspired, and maybe slightly annoyed from the waste of time. He watched them all scramble around for a little while to plate their food, and glanced over most of them a couple of times, except this one woman on the far right, middle station, preparing a lobster dish. Harry had thought that was pretty ballsy, making seafood as the first impression, though they didn’t know it was him who was coming when their instructor said they had a visitor that day.
Then Harry carefully tried all the food. It wasn’t that anything was outright bad, just not spectacular. Nothing that made him want to go in for another bite, nothing that he wanted to chew thoroughly just to pick out the different ingredients they used. Almost robotically, he cut, chewed, swallowed, and went to the next. He doesn’t hum his approval, doesn’t grumble his disapproval, just continues on.
And then he gets to Y/N’s station. He didn’t know it was hers at the time. They were all sitting at the sides of the cooking stations, gawking at him as he tried their dishes, so at first, he had no clue who had chosen to make Shepherd's Pie as their first impression. Still, he sighed a little bit, cutting into it, ready to be slightly disappointed by a lack of flavor profile.
Then he bites into it.
Harry’s Nan, in her prime, used to make Shepherd's pie a lot, one she found in a cookbook from the '60s. She told him the recipe several times, cooked it with him, and even wrote down step-by-step how she prepared it, but from the moment he started finding interest in cooking, he could not make it quite like her. It never tasted bad, per se, just wrong – it was never as good, as flavorful, as warm as when she made it for him. Eventually, Harry had just accepted that it wasn't something that could be replicated. He’d come to terms with the fact that half of what he was tasting was nostalgia; she’d still make it for him if he asked, but she’s older now and has arthritis in her fingers, so he would feel too guilty suggesting it.
Yet here he is, chewing a piece of this random culinary student’s Shepherd's pie, and it’s like his Nan had slipped her version of it right in front of him and he hadn’t noticed. He feels his face pull up (he doesn’t know why he looks so angry when he enjoys food, but that’s just his thinking face), he swallows, and it sits warm in his belly, better than anything that he’d tasted today. The same amount of spices, the perfect ratio of meat and vegetables, the same texture against his tongue, and the roof of his mouth. It’s amazing, and for once, Harry wants to take a second bite.
“Who made this?” He asked aloud, and he remembered how nervous she looked. How she raised her hand, the slight tremble of it, how she blinked probably a thousand times in the span of three seconds, “Come here.” Harry was left wondering if he was really that scary when she came up to him and looked like she was seconds from passing out. He sliced into the side of it, the insides spilling out in the way they would if this were commercial, revealing the steaming insides, “Where’d you learn to make this?” Because he had to know. Something Harry had never been able to replicate in his 15 years spent cooking, this woman had been able to accomplish in what? The hour or two they had to prepare this for him? Did she know his Nan?
“Um – a cookbook, Sir.” Her voice shook a little bit.
Harry laughed through his nose – what a small world, right? His Nan hadn’t been able to find that cookbook for decades, yet this random woman had probably plucked it off a secondhand shelf and decided to try cooking this specific dish. All for it to lead to this moment, when Harry is looking for someone to mentor. Harry had never been one to believe in fate; he thought all of that was very silly. But for the first time, he thought that maybe there might be something in the universe working in his favor.
Did Harry want to mentor someone? Yes and no. He believed that he had a lot to teach other chefs, a wealth of knowledge that he’d like to share and use to cultivate stronger chefs, but in the same breath, Harry knew who he was. He knew the type of person he was and the kind of mentor he was; there was no room for mistakes, no room for bad dishes, no room for complaining, whining, or fussing. He expected them to work the same hours he does, to give their life over to the craft just as he had, and he wouldn’t accept anything less than the intense passion and strive for success. Adam was much more personable than Harry, he knew that, so it was easy for him to find people to mentor and get along with. He was much less picky and much more amicable, and people didn’t run off from him as often as they did from Harry.
In the past couple of years, Harry had 10 different apprenticeships, and only 3 of them had made it past the 5-month mark, and only 1 of them stuck it out with him to the very end (his name was Franklin). Harry never asked them to leave or to quit; they did it of their own volition, and Harry always thought that maybe that was for the best. If they couldn’t handle Harry when he was being relatively nice, then there’s no way they could handle a food critic having a shit day.
So he chose Y/N but his hope was low for how long she might last. The way she looked seconds from dropping right to the ground as soon as he asked who’d made the dish worried him, but with the Shepherd's pie – well, he couldn’t just let her disappear into the abyss of culinary students. Harry hoped, in the back of his mind, that one day he could convince her to make it for him again. To show him exactly how she does it.
To be honest. . he was shocked by her. Y/N was a strong chef – stronger than he’d given her credit for, not only in her cooking skills but in her mental fortitude. To be in Harry’s kitchen, and to be studying beneath him, is not for someone with a weak constitution, he could admit that. Yet she took every critique, every scoff, every scold, and every yell (Harry isn’t proud of those) in stride. Even if she looked a little taken aback, or like she might piss herself, she always nodded firmly, said something cheesy like, “Yes chef, yes sir,” and then corrected the problem. That’s what Harry had always appreciated the most from her was that she corrected the issues he brought to her attention and she never made them again.
He’d been angry when he saw the hair. Even madder when Y/N did not explain herself, merely tipped her head down and let the customer berate her, then when Harry had taken her to the side and given her what he’d thought was the chance to explain herself, she said nothing. Saying nothing is an admission of guilt in Harry’s eyes, so he scolded her and told her not to embarrass him – but there was something a little different this time. This time, the look that stared back at him was filled with something he’d not seen from her before. Something that, if she’d ever felt it when he spoke to her, she was typically good at schooling.
It wasn’t until he’d rounded the corner to the storage room and heard Adam ask if she was crying, hearing her blame it on allergies that just suddenly sprouted after he’d yelled at her – he realized the look was hurt. Harry yelling at her had hurt her that time, and that. . .that definitely gave him some pause. It was the only reason why he decided to investigate it, the only reason why he found out that this guy was a repeat offender. The only reason that he realized Y/N would rather take the lashing he’d given her for something that she’d not even done than to argue with him.
He definitely did some reflecting. Harry had always thought people feared him because they respected him, but he didn’t want anyone to actually be scared of him. Enough that she would hold her tongue when it would benefit her. Harry doesn’t like excuses, sure, but he wouldn’t have seen that as an excuse. And if he’d allowed her to get closer to him, then maybe she would realize that defending yourself from a lying prick wasn’t making an excuse in Harry’s eyes.
Harry was always watching her closely and listening, but he turned his attention to her with up to 150% focus. He already knew that she had a close relationship with Niall, Adam’s apprentice, but he hadn’t realized how close to Adam Y/N was. He wasn’t even her mentor, yet she typically went to him with a lot of the problems that she had, whether they were related to what she was cooking right then, or just a random question she thought of that had to do with a dish from a week ago. Things that she should be comfortable asking him but she wasn’t. He saw how the three of them bounced off one another, how playful they were, how comfortable she seemed when Adam called her name versus how nervous she looked when Harry even glanced in her direction.
Then she nearly passed out, too scared to tell him she hadn’t eaten, too worried that he’d be annoyed with her because she needed to fulfill a basic human need. And Harry felt like shit. Even without the slight, verbal lashing that only Adam could get away with giving him.
“You need to be a little nicer if you’re going in place of me,” he told him, speaking just above a whisper, only so that he could hear him as Harry carefully made peanut butter and jelly, “You look pissed off, and that isn’t what she needs right now.”
“I just don’t understand why she felt the need to lie.”
Adam sighs, “Because you’re scary and you don’t make yourself approachable. Why would she be honest?” He cracked open the jar of jelly for him, sliding it over and shaking his head, “She’s sweet and just wants to do well. Why can’t you see that?”
Harry can see that. He does – he knows that she wants to do well because she does do well. She puts her heart and soul into this just as he does. Maybe he should have spoken to her earlier about what she needed from him. Maybe Harry should have given her the opportunity before that day to tell him that she liked verbal praise, that she wanted to know he thought she was doing well, that he was proud of her. That might have saved them a whole lot of trouble.
So that’s what he does. He isn’t kissing her feet or anything, but he makes an effort to tell her when she does good, and Y/N always looks so pleased with herself afterward. . he feels even more guilty for keeping it from her. Harry hadn’t realized she needed it – she always just did well without him flattering her and continued to do well without it, so he figured it wasn’t a necessity. But Harry remembers how important it is to be told you’re doing well; how nice a tender stroke to the ego could be when you’re trying to find yourself in an industry as competitive as this one. So he tells her when things are good, he utilizes the compliment sandwich technique (he had to look it up), and he tries to become a better mentor for her. And when he notices she’s asking him more questions rather than scouting Adam out, or she doesn’t look as frightened when she asks him to repeat a step in the process of cooking, it feels good.
At some point, his feelings twisted into something a little more...unrefined, as far as mentor/pupil relationships go. He thinks something tickled in the back of his head when he saw the reaction she had to his praise. The soft smiles, the murmured “thank-yous”, how she seemed to have a little more of a skip in her step afterward. When she’d call him over to show him her dish, even if it was something he didn’t necessarily need to see, it was like a bird preening its feathers to show off. Or a puppy wagging its tail when their owner told it it did well.
The feeling only mushroomed into something unignorable when he went out to eat with them. Once Adam had initially asked, Harry planned on saying no – he was pissed off about the boiler and needed to spend some time calculating how this would affect this month's earnings. Plus, he desperately needed a night to himself, to take a bath, do a face mask, maybe fuck his fist and relieve some of the tension that is always residing in his shoulders.
But when Adam mentioned that Y/N and Niall would be attending, he was. . .intrigued. He knew in brief glimpses what they might act like outside of work, just from the conversations that he’d accidentally stumbled upon between the two of them. Harry had a feeling that Y/N was far more exuberant than she acted in the kitchen, maybe much more silly, calmer, relaxed, and settled – he was interested to see it. To see if this tickle in the back of his head is just a tickle and nothing more.
The tickle was more of a gnawing by the end of the night. After feeding her, watching as she ate everything that he gave her and ate it well, he learned that she had a cat and that in her time spent free of work because of the boiler, she planned to hang out with said cat. There was a satisfaction that rang deep in his bones when he fed someone, especially someone he’d felt that he’d stolen a meal or two away from in the past. Harry hoped his carefully crafted wraps were enough to make up for any time that she felt she needed to starve to continue working and please him. And she looked cute, too, with her cheeks full as she chewed. Even cuter when she was drunk, dancing, and grinding on her friend. Even cuter, all panicked, flustered, begging him to let her wash his shirt after knocking his drink all over it.
By the end of the night, it wasn’t even just a gnawing.
He wanted to chew on her.
Y/N was fun. She was fun to tease, fun in her responses, how she stumbled over her words and so clearly was reading into things correctly, only for him to watch on her face as she tried to talk herself out of what she’d very correctly read into. Told him it depended on the context whether or not she liked to be out of control of her body, and god, it took everything in him not to pull the car over and suck on her tongue right there.
She’d always been cute – his cute little apprentice, always dutiful in her job, showing up on time, trying to impress him. Call it cuteness-aggression or Harry’s general dominant tendencies, but he needed to dig his teeth into her. Into her lips, into her neck, into her hips, the soft of her belly, the flesh of her thighs. He wanted to lick her all over, make her sweat, stretch her out, have her beg – everything, all of it. He felt a little bit like he was in heat.
It’d been a long time since he’d gotten to explore kink with someone. Harry knew that she was interested in him, because he’s always listening, and she and Niall are not as quiet or sneaky as they think they are. Maybe to people who aren’t paying such intense attention to them, but Harry might as well be Y/N’s shadow for as deeply as he keeps tabs on her in the kitchen. He hadn’t been sure that she was interested in the dynamics he’s interested in until he took the chance one night, while they were making the cake, and he had her suck the icing off his thumb.
Harry had never met someone so receptive to him before. When she whined because he took his thumb away, Harry could have sunk to his knees for her right there and stuffed his face anywhere she wanted him to. Despite outer appearances, Harry truly isn’t a complex man. The way she let him poke and prod around in her mouth, just because he could, just because she was letting him – he knew then and there he would be obsessed with her.
The build-up is the best part. The waiting, watching her try to figure it out, the realization that overcomes her when she understands what he wants, how easily she plays with him. Y/N doesn’t mind playing the part of his filthy, greedy little puppy so long as he takes care of her, tells her how good she’s doing, lets her fill her mouth up with his fingers, and plays with her pussy. Even when he stops, even when he edges her, even when he’s mean and makes her want and want and want, she’s still so good for him, so cute, so precious, he’s just too delighted.
There’s a trust there that Harry loves. She trusts him to see her like that. Trusts him to decide when she cums and when she doesn’t. Trust him to take care of her afterward, even if she doesn’t know she needs to be taken care of. Harry won’t ever leave her alone directly after they play, no matter how often she offers to get a ride – he could tell it was just a courtesy. She didn’t want to leave his side yet, and he didn’t want her to leave. He’s found recently that he thrives off taking care of her, in little ways. Feeding her and fucking her are the big ones.
Though as he holds her in his arms right now, sleeping soundly with her cheek pushed up against his chest after he fucked her, Harry thinks cuddling might be a big one too.
Initially, Harry had planned on edging them both for nearly a month. The anticipation was one of the best parts for him, and he could tell that Y/N enjoyed it too; gluttons for the swelling desire had begun swallowing them both whole. He had it all planned out, by the week, by the day, by the hour – how long he would play with her pussy until he felt it tighten around his fingers (it was so easy to tell when she was about to cum, her walls squeezing, like it was begging him to stay inside, begging him to keep her full, fuck her until she spasms and twitches and whines, drenching them). He’d decided on a day he’d invite her over to his flat and finally make her cum, and then he’d feed her well, take care of her, let her spend the night if she wanted to, or make sure she got home safely if she wanted that instead.
He had not accounted for Youngjae to come to his restaurant before this happened. He hadn’t accounted for Youngjae to ask to speak with the chef who made his meal, to compliment Y/N so genuinely, to invite her to his restaurant. He hadn’t accounted for the shy, giggly look Y/N was giving someone who wasn’t Harry. And he sure as fuck hadn’t accounted for the thick, oozy glob of something inky and consuming to slip down his throat, acrid and pungent, unavoidable. A feeling Harry hadn’t experienced properly in quite a while.
He was jealous.
On one hand, he feels pride in the compliments she received. To be so enamored by a plate as a chef that you need to speak to the person who prepared it is one of the highest forms of praise in the cooking world. For his pupil to be praised for how well she’s done, he couldn’t be more proud of her, and how far she’s come as a chef.
And on the other hand, he cannot stand it. At this point, Harry knows Y/N. He knows how much she likes to be praised, like a bird preening its pretty feathers. He wasn’t blind to see that Youngjae was gorgeous, so to be complimented by a well-renowned chef, looking like him, and praise already makes you all wiggly and giggly? He wondered if her heart had skipped a beat when Youngjae smiled at her. If her palms got clammy from the nerves of it. If she was thinking about taking him up on the offer, getting pressed over the side of his desk, her face buried into the side of his neck.
The thought was like an invasive plant; the seedling stuffed itself in the soil, an image of Y/N as pretty and cute as she looks, begging to be filled up, and it was someone who wasn’t him making it happen. The plants take root in the grooves of his brain, winding, tangled vines, growing unmanageable and wild. He had to remove himself from the kitchen, stew in his office, and wonder if his ears were as red as they felt, but he was too ashamed to check. What a petulant response to an interaction that was relatively mild. Harry has had her drooling around his fingers, yet he’s irate by the smile she gives another chef when they compliment her? He needed to grow up.
His problem lies in the fact that he is not someone who gets jealous. Feelings of envy have never swayed him – if Harry wanted something or someone, then he’d get them eventually, through dedication and hard work. Nothing in this life drops at your feet; you must put forth an effort for the things you want, and that’s what he does. So there was never a need to be jealous of anyone, for anything.
Yet there he was, his teeth gritted, his mind a frenzied swirl. Weeks and weeks of build-up that Harry would snuff out in a night, and surprisingly, he doesn’t regret even a second of it. Especially not when she begged so pretty for him. When she whimpered out Puppy can handle more – and almost made Harry cum completely untouched. Not when she snores on his chest now, deep in her dreams, limbs twisted around him like a koala. He replays the night over a dozen times in his head, and finds himself content. It’s odd, whatever feeling stirs in his chest – he definitely wouldn’t call it love, and he doesn’t think he’d necessarily even call it a crush. What he feels is something equal parts fond and possessive. As he plays with her limp fingers, slotting their fingers together, Harry is able to come to one conclusion, though.
Y/N was his, Harry had decided. His and his alone.
. . .
Y/N’s warm.
Typically, she wakes up pretty cold. Not just because she has a sketchy furnace or she fell asleep with the fan whipping above her head – she just generally wakes up shivering, most of the time, with Hazelnut huddled against some part of her body for warmth (Y/N likes to pretend that it’s because Hazelnut loves her but deep down she knew it was for survival purposes only). For whatever reason, her room is always a little icier than the rest of her flat, so the cold seeps beneath her skin and leaves her whole body shivering.
Today is different, though – this morning is odd. Y/N starts to come to but doesn’t open her eyes immediately; she lets her consciousness ease in rather than forcing it abruptly. She isn’t waking up to an alarm so she imagines that this is an off day, which means she could be a little lazier in starting her day. Plus, she’s so nice and warm, she’s almost certain it was a dream and she’s hesitant to leave the beauty of it.
Y/N isn’t sure what eventually clues her in that she isn’t asleep anymore. Maybe it’s the way her neck is a little sore, like she’d been in the same position for most of the night. Or maybe it’s the fact that her cheek is not pressed up against her pillow, or Hazelnut’s fur, or even her mattress, how it sometimes is when she wiggles down in the middle of the night. Instead, she’s on something more solid, a different feeling – like skin – and there’s a momentary panic because what the fuck, there shouldn’t be anybody else in bed with her!
Her eyes peel open, and just as soon as they do, the memories of last night flood back into her head. Harry taking her home, Harry splitting her apart piece-by-piece, him finally letting her cum, all of the embarrassing things she said, when he’d offered for her to stay for the come down. Then she fell asleep, and that – he hadn’t offered her to spend the night. He told her she could stay for a little while, sure, he might have said as long as she needed to be polite, but to fall asleep? On him, no less – she just manages to make herself more of a nuisance every day!
Y/N stiffened, nervous to move. Was he asleep or was he awake? Y/N doesn’t know what’s worse: Harry being asleep and her waking him up, trying to sneak out of here and not disturb him, or Harry already being awake and annoyed that she took up space in his bed and stayed glued to his side all night. She was nice and warm, and it was pleasant to her, but what if Harry liked to sleep cold? What if he kept shoving her off of him last night, and she just kept rolling back into his space? The thought makes her want to crawl under a rock. Plus, she’s still stark naked, and like – she is fine with him seeing her like that in the moment, but she didn’t necessarily want her bits out in the light of day. Where were her clothes? Did she take them off in here or had he been peeling them off on the way to his room?
Oh my god, this is the worst! Why didn’t she just stay awake long enough to make it home last night?
If there was one thing about Y/N, it was that she never wanted to overstay her welcome, no matter the circumstances. She likes to be invited directly, or she doesn’t normally do it, too overcome with fear that whoever she’s with thinks she’s trying to make it something that it isn’t. The last thing she wants to be is the sad, desperate girl begging for more in a relationship than there is. Especially with someone like Harry – she does not doubt he’ll be blunt with her, and while that’s nice in the long run, she doesn’t need him to put into words that this isn’t a relationship, that she’s just fun to play with, that if he actually wanted someone seriously it wouldn’t be her. Because Harry needs someone like – well-established, probably? Someone successful already, driven, with more goals than her (she has goals, but most of them are related to things he’s already accomplished, so there’s probably no fun in watching her try to obtain them – like a been there, done that kind of thing). They’d be cool too, to catch Harry’s attention. Could probably hold their own in banter with him, make him laugh, and. . .she needs to stop. Now she’s just stressed out and making herself sad so –
“I can hear you thinking,” Harry’s voice startles her. It’s warm, a little rough from just waking up, her cheek vibrates with it from where she’s lying on his chest still, and it makes her insides twist in something giddy that she’ll have to stuff her face into her pillow and giggle about later, “Enough.”
“Sorry,” she pushes herself up slowly, taking the blankets with her and covering her upper half, and trying not to look so obviously panicked. Y/N attempts to school her face, twisting so that she could look at him – she hadn’t realized how unready she was to see this version of Harry until right now. In the mornings, while she’s sure it looks like she just woke up five minutes before walking into the kitchen, Harry always looks like he’s been up for a couple of hours. Refreshed, his skin is always glowy, his eyes are always bright (for him at least) without a dark circle in sight. Most days, he kind of looks model-ready, and when she started, she’d always wonder if he was about to get interviewed or something, but was too nervous to ask him. She knew now that the answer was no – Harry just took very good care of himself.
(“Fucking prick, I come in and I look like I haven’t slept in days.” Niall complained once.
“That’s because you stay up all night playing Roblox or whatever the hell.”
“It’s League and you know I have a self-imposed 11 PM monitors off policy on work nights!)
This Harry, however, was different. Still pretty, of course, because the universe is out to get her, but a different kind of pretty. His eyes are swollen and puffy, noting that he’d clearly just woken up as well. His cheeks were flushed a little bit, pink just slightly coloring his skin, and his hair was a mess on top of his head. He must have just run his tongue over his lips to wet them, because they glisten in the sunlight (or maybe his lips are just naturally glossy too, because why wouldn’t they be at this point?).
Her strong, intimidating, slightly mean sometimes mentor – looked so incredibly soft. Y/N wanted to press on his belly and stuff her face in his throat, and melt over him like a second skin. If they were together like actually, then she thinks she would. Maybe Harry would even like that. . .she thinks. Or maybe he wouldn’t want that in a partner. But in a fuck buddy, he does like her a little needy, so there’s a chance she could get away with that now, right?
“I’m – I’m sorry, I didn’t realize I fell asleep.” She finally speaks, suddenly needing to avoid eye contact at all costs. Instead, she stares at his hand, where it’s resting on his chest, where her head had been just a few moments prior, “I – um. . .” she feels awkward, and sore, and doesn’t know what to do with herself. Should she act casual about it? It’s still kind of blowing her mind that they had sex – that it felt as good as it did. She doesn’t think her hand or any of her toys could ever compare to whatever all of that was.
Harry stares at her for a while. She thought maybe he was just trying to wake up, or maybe he was crafting the perfect way to tell her to leave without scorching her feelings too painfully (who is she kidding? He’d just tell her to go home because he had shit to do or something). Or he could be waiting to see if she was going to finish whatever the second half of her sentence was, though what it was didn’t exist to her either.
A quiet sigh leaves his mouth, “Do you regret it?” He inquired plainly.
Eyes wide, Y/N doesn’t think she’s ever shaken her head so fast in her life. It kind of jostles her brain a little bit, even, “No! No, not at all, oh my god – I could – how could I ever regret something like that?” She twisted to face him more, only one hand holding the blanket up now, loosely, “I mean like – I regret some of the things I said ‘cos I think I may have come off a bit pathetic, but everything you did – everything we’ve done – oh, it’s great. I don’t regret that, I just – feel bad about. . .about imposing my presence on you all night. We have work today, and I didn’t ask to spend the night.”
Harry pushes himself up now too, leaning back on his mountains of pillows, “I told you we could stay like that as long as you needed,” he reminded her, “If that meant all night, then so be it. I don’t mind. Though I think Hazelnut might have.”
(Hazelnut would have something to say about her absence, but since her food releases on a timer, she got dinner last night, and her middle-of-the-night snack so it isn’t like she was going hungry. Honestly, Y/N thinks Hazelnut likes to have the night to herself sometimes, but missing out on her human heater is probably why she yells at her when she walks in after being gone.)
She worries her bottom lip between her teeth, assessing his face for any inkling that he might be lying. Y/N doesn’t expect him to lie, of course, and she does expect him to be blunt with her, and honest – but sometimes he does unexpected things too. Like secretly being tenderhearted enough to make her a big slice of cake and call her ex a dick. Giving her his hoodie when she was freezing in a movie theater, also unexpected. Then there was the whole putting his fingers in her mouth thing, and the subsequent edging to follow.
So, maybe he would lie to make her feel better. But if someone doesn’t lie often, then she would figure he’d have a massive tell to suggest that he was. Instead, she finds nothing – his same impassive face that he’s always making, except for the amusement hidden beneath his gaze when he’s looking at her in particular.
“Oh, puppy,” he clicks his tongue, patting her thigh, “Let me feed you, then I’ll send you on your way, so you can get ready for work, hm?”
A clear plan is nice. Harry's offering to feed her is even nicer.
“Okay, that – that-that sounds good.” Y/N nods, “Could I – could you find me my clothes? I’m not really sure where they landed.”
Harry kicks his blankets off, “I’ll just give you something of mine.”
. . .
“Oh my fucking – wait – what are you telling me right now? You spent the night?”
It was the first proper Spring day; the weather was balmy, the breeze was warm, and with the sun hanging high in the sky and beaming pleasant rays like sweet kisses, it coaxed all the bunnies, birds, and squirrels out of their nests, warm in the grass. Niall, for all his ‘curtains-closed-so-it-doesn’t-glare-on-my-computer-screen’ gamer tendencies, does appreciate a warm day. So he made up a little picnic for them to enjoy, with homemade blackberry jam and fresh bread from the French bakery beside his flat. They had cheese and crackers too, which was interesting, the spring time critters in their area of the park. That, or they were nosy and wanted to hear Y/N update Niall.
And Niall was just as floored as she was, about all of it.
Y/N’s face feels hot recounting the events, because Niall wants to know everything. Every minute detail, from positions to an advanced description of Harry’s prick (equipped with a crude drawing Y/N tried on his iPad, which he always carted around in his satchel) – Y/N was giving Niall the nitty gritty.
“I know,” she held her face in her hands, “I’m still so embarrassed about it, and I’m still like – like I keep convincing myself that he only lied and said it was okay so I didn’t cry in front of him or something stupid.”
“Okay, first and foremost, if sex isn’t putting your ass to sleep, then it isn’t good sex. Harry is well aware of that,” Niall has one finger up, then dramatically pulls the second finger – his middle – up with the fingers of his other hand. “Secondly, he was so fucking clearly jealous! Remember when you were blowing me off before? When I suggested it in the kitchen.”
Y/N shook her head, “And I’m blowing you off now too–” she rumpled her lips, “What would he have even been jealous of?”
Niall, who has given up the theatrics of marking each point with his finger, now busies himself with the jam and stares at her like she’s an idiot, “I’m sorry, did you black out and forget a very sexy young chef coming to the restaurant, bringing you out to compliment you, then writing his number on the back of a card offering you to come his kitchen right in front of your CILF?”
“My who?”
“Chef I like to fuck,” Niall continued, “Like, you’re a little dense sometimes but this is crazy. Even Adam noticed Harry was jealous! His ears were bright red, he snapped at everyone for asking you about Youngjae, and then suddenly you broke the weeks of edging the very same night. Like, he might as well have tattooed ‘I’m jealous’ right across his forehead.”
Y/N’s heart is racing at the possibility of it, equal parts giddy at the thought and reluctant to get her hopes up. It’d be kind of fun if he were jealous, she thinks – to evoke any emotion from him is exciting, she’s found, and that would be a new one. But when speaking to a fellow partner in delusion, she’s learned to take most things with a grain of salt – even if Adam seemed to notice as well. Adam and Niall share a singular brain cell on most days, so it wouldn’t surprise her if they started thinking the same, too.
“I don’t know, like besides all of that, he didn’t really act jealous or anything. He didn’t say he was.”
Niall tears into his bread, dips it into the jam, and then stuffs it in his mouth. Though he pushes his bite into his cheek so he could speak around it, “Harry’s a bit too prideful to just admit that, I reckon. The one thing he’s not gonna be honest about is being jealous over another chef.” Y/N rubs the plastic of the cracker package between her fingers, staring at a bunny that has gotten suspiciously closer with each glance she made at it. If she didn’t know any better, she would think it was about to trot on over and snatch the food on the blanket, “Okay, now roll it back to what we were talking about – he offered a chew toy? I’m getting on Amazon immediately and getting you a collar and leash set, he’ll go crazy.”
“Okay, but like what if he doesn’t want to?” Y/N pushes her thumb against her knee, “Like…maybe he got it out of his system and now he won’t want to.”
Niall groans, rolls his eyes, already pulling out his phone, “Shut the hell up,” he shakes his head, “I’m sorry, but everything you’ve described to me does not sound like a man who is planning on one and done. Calling you puppy, edging himself with you, ‘It’s seriously so cute to see a puppy behaving so well?’ That man is obsessed. And he’s possessive too, which is kind of cute,” he sighs, “Okay, I need to go to an actual kink site, Amazon is showing me actual dog collars.”
Y/N plucks a manchego cube from the container that Niall had carefully packaged, laying it carefully on her cracker, “He hasn’t said anything though, and we haven’t like – y’know. . done our thing lately.”
“Maybe he’s waiting for you to come to him?” Niall answered instantly, making a grabby hand at the bottle he filled to the top with pineapple juice, “Like, wasn’t he all nervous that you regretted it? He’s probably waiting for you to give a sign that you still want it. Right?”
She guesses she hadn’t considered that. Y/N wasn’t the one to spearhead most of their situations together; she usually let Harry come to her, but if he’d been worried still that she didn’t like what happened, then that might give him some pause. And had the scenario been different, if this dynamic was different, then she might not care about telling him she wanted to fuck him still, and keep his fingers in her mouth, and hear him say all those filthy things again. But it was Harry, and she’s like. . predisposed to being nervous no matter what it is involving him.
“How would – I mean, how might I go about that? You’ve got more experience in this department.”
Niall peered up at her, “Interesting way to subtly call me a little slutty, but yeah, you’re right,” Y/N reached out and slapped his leg, “And lucky for you, I love an operation title. So, operation: seduce Harry into fucking you again so that he knows you aren’t regretting it after the last time – commences today.”
“God, that’s a mouthful,” Y/N complained.
“And hopefully your mouth will be full of Harry by the end of the week.”
Niall and Y/N spend the remainder of the picnic deciding what she should do. Niall has always had an intense, vivid imagination, so the plans he makes always come with plenty of detail and every potential scenario that may arise from them. Which is why, instead of having the cute, one-hour lunch they had planned, they spent 3 hours finding different positions on the blanket, attempting to get comfortable on the lumpy ground, snacking until the food he packed was gone, and going over what she should do. The tentative title of “operation: seduce Harry into fucking you again so that he knows you aren’t regretting it after the last time” gets shortened to Operation: Seduce Harry and she spends 10 minutes convincing him he does not need to make it a notes app bullet pointed list.
They go through a variety of different ideas. Y/N cornering him in his office after everyone leaves, popping a button on her shirt, and revealing something lacy and sheer underneath them. Adam convincing Harry to go out with them again, Y/N asking if he wants to dance together, grinding and gyrating on him in a way that could only mean she was looking to get him hard. Stumbling into his lap, hand landing on his prick, giving him a soft squeeze and a wink. Y/N sending him a photo of her neck with a collar fixed around it that’s heart pendant says yours, fingers twisted around a leash, also in the photo.
All of the ideas Y/N would rather walk the plank out at sea than actually do. The fact of the matter is, Y/N is not good at seducing, or flirting, really, for that matter – so each one of these ideas is shoving her out of her comfort zone. And when Y/N is shoved out of her comfort zone instead of gently nudged, the outcome is not something spectacular; she just ends up making a fool of herself. So she refuses each idea that Niall, who – had he been in this situation, would have just messaged something out of pocket like are we going to fuck again or what? – came up with.
Niall groans when she rejects another idea, this one involving her biting her lip or something after saying some lust-filled, naughty pick-up line that would only work if she were too hot for anyone to care if she said something stupid. “You’re delusional, and not the fun kind,” Niall says it like an insult, rolling his eyes, “Anything you do or say will be hot, he’ll be drooling over himself trying to get at you. Honestly, what’s stopping you from just looking at him and saying you want to fuck?”
“Humility,” she replies quickly, “Shame. A general sense of insecurity that’s hovered over me since I hit puberty.”
“Well, fuck all of that,” he answers just as easy, “Tell him to come over and hang paintings for you or something. Or – wait! Wait, say that you want him to teach you how to make those custard tarts I had in Portugal last year. Adam had mentioned something about Harry knowing how.”
That. . wasn’t a bad idea. Of all his ideas so far, this had been the one most like her. One that would be the least likely to spark any warning flags in Harry’s brain – especially if she could just send him a message, that he’d hopefully just respond to, then not bring up when she saw him later. Niall encourages her to message him while he’s sitting there so that he can help her draft it up, but there’s not much to draft so she suspects he’s just being nosy. Making sure that she goes through with it, instead of going home, chickening out, pretending that their conversation never happened.
Hi Harry!
Would you be able to come to my place sometime soon? There’s something I want to learn how to make.
There isn’t an immediate answer, but Y/N doesn’t expect one. Most of the time, Y/N wonders if Harry even remembers he has her number, let alone a phone, so she’d expect a response hours from now. Hell, maybe even tomorrow morning. If it extends beyond that, however, she’ll assume that he hates her and never wants to touch her again, so she hopes he doesn’t wait that long. Unless that was his version of letting her down easy.
Y/N sets her phone face down on the blanket, puts her face in her hands, and does a little yell. Niall’s hand is warm on her shoulder when he reaches out and squeezes.
“Please, he’s g’na trip over himself to get to your place,” Niall assures her. “Do you have another sundress like this one? If not, wash this one and wear it again if he doesn’t reply tonight – your tits look great in it.”
. . .
Approximately 16 hours later, Y/N’s ringtone stirs her awake.
She’s confused, of course, because at first she thinks it’s her alarm and she knew for a fact that the color of the sky did not equate to the time her off-day alarm would be ringing. Then, as she further drags herself into consciousness, she recognizes that she’s getting a call, and that Hazelnut was using her thighs as a launchpad to jump off the bed, nails digging in faintly through the blanket. Y/N pats around for her phone on the mattress, blinking blearily at the screen and seeing the contact name Harry Styles.
Her eyes widen, and she sits up so fast that black spots dot her vision. Was she not off today? Fuck! Did she oversleep her real alarms? Oh, god, he was going to kill her –
“I’m so sorry, Harry, I must have overslept, but I’m going to literally run out of here and –”
“Slow down,” Harry cuts her off, clicking his tongue, “You’re off today.”
The relief flushes through her fast, her adrenaline spike halting almost instantly, “Oh,” her heart is hammering – doesn’t he know calling her stresses her out? She swears she had mentioned that to him one day, or maybe she had just told him it was when he messaged her. Whenever Harry contacts her in general, she thinks her heart rate goes from a resting beat to a post-marathon speed in three seconds flat. “Is everything okay?” She settles for resting her face into her palm, trying to un-dizzy herself. Y/N had no business sitting up as quickly as she did, and she’s almost 80% sure she is walking around an undiagnosed anemic (at least undiagnosed by a medical professional; Niall diagnosed her himself when he caught a glimpse of her soft palate and said it looked relatively pale).
“You tell me,” Harry answered and continued in response to Y/N’s confused sound, “There’s a message from you yesterday.”
The memory of it floods back into her head instantaneously, her face feels hot, and she fumbles and stumbles around her thoughts and then her words, because what the fuck! He was supposed to message her back, not call her, is he crazy? The act alone suggests that he has no consideration for the social intricacies of someone as nervous as Y/N.
“Oh, yeah, I – um, was wondering if you could help me hang some paintings that are. . .that are too high up for me to reach.”
Harry is quiet for a second, besides a soft hum on the other end. Y/N takes it as a hum like he’s thinking about it, maybe, but then learns that it might be more a confused sound sparking from his throat because, “I thought you said you wanted to learn how to make something?”
Fuck.
Fuck! How the hell did she screw that up? Harry definitely set this up somehow. She isn’t sure how, exactly, but she knew this was a carefully orchestrated plan to make her look like a big, stupid idiot. Embarrassment flares hot in her chest, warping its way down her belly, curling in a not fun, and horny way. No, this is pure, white hot shame, as she clears her throat, almost sputtering over her own spit, “Oh, yes! That too – two for one, kind of deal, if you’re. . .if you’re willing to help?”
This time, when Harry hums, it sounds amused. Her shoulders sink – he’s onto her. Lying about the reason she wants him to come over feels more desperate than if she had just emptied all of her thoughts into a message and sent it to him. At least then he might see her as bold, opposed to cowardly. Something she and Niall forgot to consider was how bad she was at lying, especially to Harry, who always seems to be able to see right through her. Even a phone call away.
“Sure, I suppose we could make that happen,” he finally replies; Y/N swallows thickly, suddenly reminded of her morning breath and how soaked in sleep she feels still, after the abrupt yank from her dreams, “What did you want to learn how to make?”
“Um, these one custard tarts from Portugal.” Y/N at least remembered that, “Adam said you knew how to make them.”
A delighted sound filters through the phone now, and she wonders if his face is as expressive as his voice seems to be through her speaker. What kind of face was he making now? Was it his same impassive glare, or was it softer? Was it how soft his gaze looks right after he wakes up? It’s crazy that this is something Y/N knows now – that she’s aware of how puffy his face gets from sleep, and how soft he looks because of it. She’d like to see it again, honestly, and to properly enjoy a morning cuddle without second-guessing every decision she’d ever made in the world.
“The one Niall liked?” He inquired, but before Y/N could investigate how he would know that, Harry continued, “Yes, I can make them. I’ll show you how. Are you free this evening?”
“Yes!” She agreed, nodding her head though he couldn’t see it, “Yes, I am, you can come whenever.”
Niall would have rolled his eyes at how eager she sounded, but Harry merely puffs a laugh, “I’ll come around 5 then. Does that sound okay?”
“Yes,” she nodded again, to nobody in particular – maybe Hazelnut who is showing off her flexibility and licking the fur over her calf, “That’s great.”
“Good, I’ll see you then.”
He hangs up the phone and Y/N takes a moment to put her face into a pillow and scream. That. . .could have gone worse. Almost went completely south because she’s stupid, but at least she was getting him over here. The first part of the operation, while clunky, meant that she could shift into the second part, which was an everything shower and to wear one of the five different outfit choices that Niall had given her. Y/N thought it’d be odd if he came over and she was just hanging out in a sundress, because she knew for a fact she did not give the vibes of someone who still dressed nice when they were at home alone. If Y/N digs through the memories of the last few months and her inevitable info dumps she drops on Harry now and then, she’s certain that she told him she immediately switches into comfortable clothes when she gets home from any outing. And while that piece of information about her was inconsequential, and most anybody would probably forget about it, Harry has a habit of holding onto things that other people would throw out of their heads.
The shower experience was long and intense, as it always is when she has to exfoliate, shave everything, oil down, steam open her pores, etc. At first, she’s sweating in the hot water, pelting her skin, then she’s shivering because her water heater might only hold three gallons. That’s how it acts anyway, when ten minutes into the shower the water goes lukewarm and Y/N has goosebumps pimpled all over her body. By the time she comes out, she feels like she’s shed a layer of skin reptile-style, raw and new and soft. She didn’t shave her private bits, only because Niall had made an offhand comment about how Harry seems like a guy who enjoys the hair – and with things like kinks and interests, Niall is spot on in his reads. They’d only been friends all of one week before he correctly guessed that Y/N had a thing for being praised. Only a month before, he narrowed his eyes across the table at her and said, “You like being humiliated, don’t you? Seem like the type.”
Y/N chooses something simple to wear – just a shirt and some soft, linen shorts. Beneath them both, she wore one of her prettier sets; something she’d bought after her ex when she had the intentions to get back out there, fuck her way through the town, forget about that emotionally cheating prick. Of course, that didn’t necessarily happen. Instead, she cried on Niall’s sofa into a bowl of coddle he’d made for her, watching a romance anime, and wishing she could wipe that bastard from her memory (while Niall, simultaneously, offered to wipe him from the face of the earth).
Maybe Harry would think she looked cozy and cute – those were the vibes she was hoping to achieve, rather than unkempt and rumpled, which is how she usually looked on her off days at home. Hazelnut had been following her with her eyes all day, a judgmental gleam cased in the narrowed, snake-like pupils. Something that said: Who are you trying to fool right now? He’s going to take one look at you and know that this isn't normal for you. To that, she ignores her because what the fuck Hazelnut? What a grumpy thought, you’re cat-ness is really showing today.
Y/N started getting ready too early, so she finishes getting ready too early, which means the rest of the day is spent agonizing over every detail of this plan. The truth is, she did have some pictures she wanted hung up relatively high, but was too scared to get on her step stool and do it herself. So at least she wasn’t like. . totally lying to him. And maybe she had no interest in learning how to make these tarts, but it’d be a good skill to have in her back pocket. She’s still delighted by the fact that Harry is good at making pastries as well as savory foods; a true all-arounder in the chef world.
Hazelnut is sleeping in Y/N’s lap while she chews away at her nails, forcing herself not to look at the clock, only to be startled out of her skin when there’s a knock at the door. Her kitty, who has absolutely had it with her over-anxious energy today, jumps out of her lap and trots into the hallway, toward Y/N’s bedroom, no doubt. Y/N peels the blankets off of her and wonders if she’s going to black out as she opens the door, revealing Harry, his hair slightly mussed from the wind, in a soft, worn-looking shirt with a band Y/N didn’t know on the front, and jeans. Had she seen him in jeans before? Probably. Definitely not these jeans though, tight around his thighs in a way that makes her swallow hard; spit dragging down her dry throat.
He smiles at her, gentle and small, “Hello,” he greets her, shuffling the bags in his right hand to his left, then raising them, “I brought the ingredients.”
Good, because I didn’t even think to buy anything at all, and pretend that this was real, “Yay,” Y/N grinned, ushering him in, “Um, come on in – is the weather nice?”
“Mm,” Harry hums, “Very.”
Ideally, Y/N would have started to strip or whatever the hell Niall’s next step in the operation was, but at the first sight of Harry, any hope of following the plan had gone out her cracked window. Billowed between her curtains first, got all messed up, then slipped out into the evening air. Her heart rate is already picking up a little too quickly for her liking.
Instead of enacting the rest of the plan, Y/N somehow ends up learning how to make these Portuguese tarts (Pasteis de Nata is what Harry tells her they’re called). It’s a more intricate process than she had imagined, which is both good and bad for her situation at hand. The benefits lie in the fact that it would make sense she’d need help learning how to make this, from forming the dough, to making the syrup without overcooking or undercooking it (the temperature had to be precise – 100 degrees C, and thank god Harry brought a thermometer with him). Harry is a little less stern when he’s teaching her this – she doesn’t know if it’s because it isn’t something that they’re making for the restaurant, or if it’s the change of scenery.
Y/N would have thought she’d be more self-conscious about Harry in her kitchen. It’s a small thing, nowhere near the size of his own, and with ten times fewer supplies than he had, but Harry adapts to it easily. Even handles Hazelnut worming and weaving between his ankles well, clicking his tongue sweetly at her. For a moment, Y/N forgets that she had ulterior motives altogether, focusing on the complex process, making the custard, cutting the set dough, filling the muffin tin carefully.
By the time Harry slid the tin into the oven, he turned to face her, “Alright, while those bake,” he began, then looked into her living room, “Where is it that you want these paintings hung?”
“Oh,” she tries to busy herself filling one of the many mixing bowls with hot water and soap, “You – we don’t have to do that! Sorry, I can just ask Ni later and –”
“I don’t mind,” Harry cut her off, looping around her counter, “Come on, show me.”
Honestly, it feels a little surreal for Harry – critically acclaimed, Michelin star having Harry Styles – to be carefully balancing on a step stool and asking if her tiger painting looks level from where she stood. A couple of times she digs her nails into the meat of her palm, considering that this may be a dream of some kind, but the bite of pain reminds her that this is very much reality. Even more so when the oven beeps and Y/N goes to remove the pastries, the heat when she opens the door flushes over her face and upper body. They smell good as she sets them carefully on the stove, her mouth watering.
She expected Harry to still be in her living room, but instead she turns around and he’s standing in the kitchen behind her. “Ah!” Y/N’s yelp echoes against her walls, then she cringes at her voice – the neighbors heard, probably, because the walls are paper thin. They were a little crabby too, so she’ll probably get a passive-aggressive mention on it next time they share an elevator ride, “Are you – be honest, did you go to ballet school or something? You move quietly as a ballerina.”
“Do you know a lot of ballerinas?” Harry tilted his head, his eyes dragging down her body in a way that wasn’t very secretive at all. Y/N isn’t sure if the warmth that flushes through her is still from the oven or not, but it feels just the same, and her heart, that had settled some at this point, kicks up again.
“A few,” she answered, though she doesn’t know if he cares or not, “I met them like. . .forever ago. They were my ex’s friends, so I don’t see them much anymore, but they used to walk around like they were floating.” Harry’s eyes are still dragging over her, and Y/N stupidly keeps talking, feeling more and more flustered by the second, when his gaze lingers on her legs, “They were nice, but I always got the feeling they didn’t really like me? But maybe they just knew I wasn’t – um – going to be around for long or something. I dunno.”
Harry steps closer to her, his hand propped on the counter, “I’m going to ask you something, and I want you to be honest with me. Okay?” Y/N feels pinned under his gaze, breath feeling heavy in her chest when she holds it. She nods, slowly, only twice, and Harry continues, “Why did you really invite me over?”
Ah. Of course, Y/N had suspected Harry knew she was lying from the moment she fucked up on the phone call but he’d just given her a little bit of grace. Played into her ploy for the hell of it, maybe to be nice, but had done both of the things she’d asked of him. Though he knew there was something more, Y/N did not doubt that if she kept the lie up for appearances, and told him this was all she’d wanted, then he’d leave with no questions asked and no hard feelings.
She swallows again, thicker, and wonders if he can hear it when she does. Her mouth opens, but she can’t figure out what to say – if only she’d taken up Niall on his offer to speak into an earpiece for her.
Harry fills in the quiet space, “Unless that was all,” he offers, “Then I can leave.”
“No!” Y/N snaps from whatever embarrassed daze she’d been relegated to at the question, explosive in her answer, taking a step closer to him, “No, I don’t – I don’t want you to leave, I’m just. . .bad, at this,” she exhales, shoulders slumping, “I’m so bad at this.”
Concern dribbles over his features, “At what?”
Y/N motions between them, “This – seducing you, or whatever,” now that the can of worms had been opened, Y/N pours them out, a conglomerate, slimy, wiggly mess of words that she has no hope policing, “I can only do it when I’m like, horny beyond sensible thought. Like a – y’know. . .”
Harry finishes for her, “A dumb little puppy?”
Something in the air changes, heavy, inviting. She blinks at him, then answers a breathy, “Yeah,” because how could she disagree?
Harry hums low in his chest, that contemplative sound he makes sometimes (Y/N could probably make a soundboard of all Harry’s different hums and meanings – something that only months upon months of studying under someone could provide you the ability of). At the same time, he takes another small step further. They’re less than an arm's length apart – maybe a forearm? There’s a low clicking of his tongue, how he was doing it for Hazelnut earlier, and Y/N feels herself shudder; she liked when he treated her like she was just a little pet. Something he just keeps around to keep him company sometimes; one he thinks is cute, and honorary – a bratty little thing that he can’t help but be fond of when they nuzzle up against him. At least that’s how she hopes he sees it, rather than a pet someone dumped on him and feels more like a pest. Y/N likes to pretend that the latter isn’t an option for now.
“I’ve had my face buried in your cunt,” he begins, “My fingers and my cock, both have been inside of you. I made you squirt last week, and yet you’re still nervous about telling me what you want?” His fingers smooth the hair from her face, a soft exhale leaves her lips at the feeling of it, he skims his nails across her forehead, before he flicks them there. Y/N pouts at him, reaching up and batting his hand away, “Bet you think I’m mean, hm?” Harry goads and Y/N falls for it, nodding, still frowning, “I reckon it’s time I show you what mean really is, yeah?”
She watches as he reaches into his pocket for something, “What–what do you mean?”
“I mean,” he reveals a thin, silky sliver of fabric. . .oh my god, “That good puppies don’t lie to their owners, don’t you know that? Only bad puppies do that. I need to correct the behavior.”
Something hot sizzles under her skin; his mouth is just filthy. Does he practice saying this shit or does it just come to him at the moment? It’s crazy, how all he’s done is flick her in the forehead and speak, and she’s ready to fall to the floor in front of him, take his pants with her, mouth at his cock. Is this how everyone who has been with Harry feels? She’d be hard pressed to believe otherwise.
“Okay,” she breathes out again, eyes leaving the dark blindfold, “I get it.”
“Yeah?” He smiles, “Good. Why don’t you show me to your room?”
If Y/N wasn’t so horny that she was dizzy, then she might be embarrassed about him being in her room. The only men who have been in her room are Niall and her ex. Niall doesn’t count because he’s Niall, and her ex used to make fun of her decorations because he’s a huge dickhead, so she kind of overthinks it when people come inside.
But Harry doesn’t give her much time to think, actually. He peels her top off before Y/N even realizes, and comes face-to-face with the pretty pink bralette she wore. It was sheer, with a lace trim around the cups that was kind of itchy but easy to ignore. There’s a flower lying over where her nipple is, hiding the top of it, but her areola peeks through, and Harry is staring. He bites at his bottom lip for a second, another contemplative look, before he hooks his fingers into her shorts, “This is a pretty little set,” he murmurs when he wiggles her bottoms down, seeing the matching underwear, “Did you wear it for me?”
“Yes,” she replies, shy about it, looking away.
Harry reaches up, runs his thumb over her bottom lip, and dips into it but never fully tips inside of her mouth. Instead, his other hand finds her shoulder, giving her a small press, and Y/N gets the picture – he wants her on her knees. After she’s set on them, hands in her lap, heart roaring in her ears, the loudest thumps it could possibly give, Harry takes the blindfold and carefully twists it around her eyes. Her vision is cut off instantly, nothing but the dark material in front of her, obscuring any chance she had of seeing what’s next.
Y/N is kind of confused about what’s going to happen, until Harry jobs her memory, “I warned you about this, a little while ago,” he murmured, “What I do to bad puppies. How I show them how mean I can be.”
The realization dawns on her, an intense wave slams through her of both arousal and dread, and it must show on her face, because Harry puffs a laugh that sounds all too sinister with her eyes covered, “But wait I –”
“Uh-uh,” she hears him undo his zipper, listens as the fabric shuffles and drops, and she can only imagine what his cock must look like. If he was fully hard already, or if he was still a little soft. The color of his prick – if it was that pretty, flushed pink that it got last time she was able to see it. Does he leak a lot? Y/N feels more desperate now than ever to know, “You don’t lie to me, ever, okay? You should know by now that I’ll give you what you want when you want it. You just have to ask me.” He sighed, and she didn’t know if it was because he’d finally twisted a hand around himself or because he was exasperated with her – she can’t see, to be able to tell, “And if it takes this to teach you that, then so be it.”
Y/N’s mouth waters when she hears a cap pop open, the squeeze of a bottle, the wet sounds that follow it, and her fingers dig into her thighs. This is already more cruel than anything Harry has ever done to her, and it’s been approximately ten seconds, so she assumes it’s only going to get worse.
“Y’know,” Harry starts, because seriously, his vocabulary ranges from intellectual musings on the art of cuisine and the filthiest, smuttiest thoughts Y/N has ever heard come out of someone’s mouth, second only to Niall on one of his tirades, “This isn’t too new, for me – touching myself to you. The only thing different is that you’re right in front of me.” His voice is awfully measured for someone touching themselves and Y/N isn’t sure if she’s supposed to respond or not. He didn’t tell her she couldn’t.
“Did you. . .would you, before we started this?”
Harry clears his throat a little, “Mm, no, not before,” he admits to her, “After though – the first time you let me poke around in that pretty mouth, I went home and fucked my hand. As soon as I walked through the door,” Y/N’s breath feels sticky in her lungs, she wonders how close he is to her face – he sounds close, but she could just be imagining things, “Dropped my pants, spit into my hand, then humped into it – haven’t done something like that since my early 20s. Felt all buzzy and good, like something was sizzling beneath my skin,” the next sigh is clearly more of a moan and Y/N wiggles in her spot, readjusting her hips. Her knees are already a bit achy from the position, but that is the least of her concerns right now.
“That’s – wow,” she breathes, “I started having wet dreams again, about you, when – after – it was like every night. I thought I was g’na go crazy. You were haunting me like an incubus or something.”
He chuckles, low in his chest, “Poor baby,” he murmurs, “Couldn’t get me out of your head, hm?”
“No,” she answered honestly, which is surprisingly a lot easier to do when she can’t see him, “You’re all I could think about, some days. All I can think about.” Was that too much? Maybe not – Harry moans after she says it, and she can hear the slick sound of his hand speeding up, getting wetter, “Could you tell me what you think about me? When you’re touching yourself, I wanna know what turns you on. What fantasies do you have?”
“Naughty little thing,” he practically purrs, and it sounds like the start of a tease – like he’s going to tell her that’s classified information, or how puppies don’t need to worry their dumb little brains about things like that – but he surprises her, “I have a lot of them. Too many to go through – some of them filthier than others – ahh,” he groans, and she can imagine him tilting his head up, squeezing around the tip – it’s probably leaking by now, if he was a leaky person. She’d do anything to taste it. “Do you want me to be honest, honey? It might be a lot.”
“Please,” she begs, “Anything, I – I don’t think you could say anything that’s too much, ‘cos I want so much, I want anything – I want everything, you could. . .could do whatever to me. And I’d like it – even if it's gross.”
Harry coos, “So cute,” before he finally tells her, “The puppy thing isn’t just a nickname for me,” he admits, the sound of his hand slows down, like he’s wringing himself out, knows that he’s going to be too worked up not to cum while he talks about it. Y/N’s toes curl in anticipation, her fingernails bite into her thighs – from the introduction alone, she has a feeling that Niall has probably been right about something, “I think you’d be so cute with a leash and collar – maybe with a pendant that has my name on it, so if you get lost they know who to return you to. Would reserve a whole day for it – wake you up and have you cockwarm me but not let you cum, so you’re needy all day. Have you follow me around on all fours? The couch is a reward, but I’d let you curl up all pretty near my feet, and when you’d start whining because you’re needy, I’d – fuck –” his hand speeds up again, “I’d let you hump my leg. Let you pant and drool all over me, but if you get too loud I’ll give your mouth something to do – whether it’s my fingers, my cock or a chew toy. Jesus – and all you’d have to do is be pretty all day. Don’t need to think, just need to. . .need to let me decide for you.”
Y/N feels like she might combust, the blood in her veins roaring through her body, her arousal clinging to her underwear. It’s too much in the way that Y/N wants it – needs it. Had never considered actually being a puppy for him until then, but it sounds. . .it sounds nice, being out of her head. Cock drunk and stupid with something in her mouth. A whole day of just letting Harry decide for her. Maybe he’d let her crawl into his lap. Maybe he’d pet her, rub her back, scratch her scalp, coo and murmur at her like she really was just his little, sweet pet and. . .
“Yeah,” she nods, sitting up a little higher, a little straighter, “Yeah, that, that sounds good, I’d like that. Wanna be a dumb puppy for you, don’t want to think.”
Harry groans, and it reverberates through her even from this distance; it feels as if he were pressed right up against her. “I’d get you a tail plug,” he keeps going, encouraged, “Fuck it into you. Let it stretch you out all day. If you were a naughty thing, then I’d take it out and only fuck your other little hole while you whined and cried about it. Oh, and sometimes I just want to. . want to tie you up and see how much you can take. How many orgasms can I wring out of you, until you’re spent, so exhausted that you can’t stay awake.”
“I’d let you fuck me after I fell asleep,” she tells him, “You could keep going, I wouldn’t mind, I’d like knowing that you were doing it – that you did it – when I woke up the next morning.”
This little tidbit is rewarded by Harry giving her his fingers. His thumb finds her bottom lip again, only this time he does dip it in toward her tongue, lets her nip and suck at it, “Yeah? You want me to fuck that messy pussy while you sleep?” She moans around his thumb, nodding, “What am I going to do with a filthy puppy like you?”
“I want it,” she murmurs around his thumb, feeling the way he moves her around with the fingers of the same hand cradling her jaw, “Please, let me taste, I wanna taste –”
“This is a punishment, Pup,” he reminds her, but she can sense him stepping closer, hear his hand clearer, feel the warmth emanating from his body, “Only good girls get to taste my cock.”
Something twists in her chest, a whine leaves her mouth as she moves forward, closer, “Please,” her mouth is still full of his thumb, “Please, I need it, I’ve been dreaming about it, don’t be – don’t be mean –”
“Aish, shhhh,” he says between a mix of a chuckle and a moan, “Take what you’re given, baby. Take what daddy gives you.”
But Y/N needs it – she needs it so bad. Especially after he says something like that – when he calls himself that – when it’s something Y/N didn’t even know she was into until right then. It makes things 10x more serious for her – she feels more desperate than she thinks she ever has. Her underwear is so wet that it’s uncomfortable at this point, and she’s so worked up she thinks all it would take is for him to barely press a knuckle to her clit and she’d cum. Her hands, that had been good, sitting in her lap, now reach out and blindly grab for him. She finds his legs, the skin of his thighs, she thinks, a little fuzzy from the hair. The muscle is thick and begging for her teeth to dig into it, it tenses under her grip, but he doesn’t make her take her hands off of him.
“So needy,” his tone is placating, as he tickles under her chin, “Silly thing –” whatever else he was going to say is clipped off by another sound, a rasped, “G’na cum for you,” falling from his mouth. Y/N feels so worked up and so incensed that she isn’t actually seeing it, that she could scream. She wants it – would he let her taste that at least? Or was that considered a treat too? Y/N sticks out her tongue just in case, wishing she were feeling it against her tongue, stroking the inside of her cheek, filling her mouth up too full so that her jaw aches as badly as her knees.
A reedy sound leaves him, “Look at you,” she wonders what debauched version of her he’s seeing right now, and if she needs to be concerned or not. Suddenly, she feels his index finger swipe against her cheek, “You’re crying, Puppy. Do you need it that badly? Want daddy’s cock?”
Y/N hadn’t realized she was crying until he said it. Now she feels the sticky, wet on her cheeks, the salty taste of it when they drip down to her lips, onto her tongue. It’s like. . .so serious right now, for her. Niall had told her once about how he cried during sex, and how afterward he felt silly, but in the moment, everything seemed so intense and he just wanted so much, that all he could think to do was cry. How, in the moment, it felt so serious, his desperation, and she finally understands it.
Then, she feels it, the very tip of his cock resting against her tongue, “Don’t close your lips around it,” he warns her, “Just let me – fuck, fuck, just let me –”
Let him what, she doesn’t know, but Y/N fights every urge to close her lips around the head and suck him into her mouth. Still, she drools at the taste of him, the precum salty on her tongue, the tacky feel of the lube, her whole body vibrates when he groans long and drawn out, the tip throbbing once against her tongue before he starts to cum. It’s warm, there’s a lot of it – it’s not as bitter as some that she’s tasted before. Harry eats so cleanly, it makes sense, but it carries that musk and headiness that only he could have. It pools on her tongue, drips down her lips, probably over his thumb that he uses to hook around her bottom lip and keep her jaw open, and Y/N is rueful of any of it not savored. But he didn’t tell her to swallow it, and she’s exercising immense self-restraint right now.
Once Harry finishes, breathless, inhaling and exhaling loudly, “Swallow for me,” he orders, and Y/N wastes no time, bringing her lips together and swallowing it down, warm in her belly.
The thing was, Y/N had been so good at exercising her self-restraint when her eyes were covered, but she was not prepared for the sight before her when Harry removed the blindfold. It slips away, off of her face, and it takes her a second to readjust to the lighting in the room. She blinks several times, working the bleariness from her gaze, and then Harry comes into focus. His cock, softening, wet at the tip with precum and cum and the lube he’d been using to make it wet and messy from the jump. His skin is flushed pink, and looks soft, and Y/N is like. . she’s only a human, okay? She can only tell herself no so many times before she has to give in.
She leans in without thinking, takes the tip of his cock into her mouth, then swallows him down to the root. Harry seems omnipotent about a lot of things regarding her, but he clearly had not been expecting this, if the startled squawk that left his mouth is anything to go by. He stumbles backward a bit, probably sensitive, and when the back of his knees hit her bed, he drops down on top of it. Y/N follows after him, greedy, wanting, mouth open, and taking him back inside.
“Oh fuck,” he cried out, his hips bucking into her mouth, and it’s good – to see him lose it like this. To feel him get harder in her mouth, even though he’s probably overstimulated and sensitive, but he doesn’t yank her off. Doesn’t even scold her yet, just spreads his legs and lets her have her way. Y/N appreciates it, and the noises he makes, the choked off whine that has her buzzing. His hand carefully rests on her head, once again, pushing her hair out of the way, “Just like that, Puppy.”
Harry’s lips look so swollen, like he’d been licking and gnawing at them the whole time her eyes were covered. Y/N wants to stare at him while she has her mouthful of his cock, but cross eyed really isn’t a good look for her, and the thought of Harry seeing her at the angle of her looking up from beneath her eyebrows almost stuns her out of whatever brave daze she’d found herself in. So she just imagined how pretty he must look – she caught a glimpse of it, the way his brow was furrowed, how he almost looked like he was in pain, but the moans were denoting that he felt good.
To make him cum again doesn’t take very long. He twitches in her mouth, against her tongue, then against her cheek when she presses it up against the inside of it, letting him see the bulge of it outside of her mouth. There’s less of it this time, but still a good amount, something for Y/N to swallow down greedily, to lick off her lips after. When she pulls off of him, she fully expects to be chastised for doing that without him telling her to, but Harry doesn’t look mad. More so amused, a little fond – again, like he’s staring at a dog who just doesn’t know any better but still might be cute.
“Come up here,” he offers, and Y/N has sense enough to be a little careful of his cock when she crawls into his lap. Harry flops himself onto his back and brings her with him, laughing when she squeals, “So fucking filthy, aren’t you?” His hand still finds her back – he unclips the bra, but it doesn’t seem like he means to do anything with it. Just get it out of his way as he starts to tickle her back, light caresses along the knobs of her spine, tracing the curves and dips, the point of her shoulder blades. Y/N melts into him, nuzzling her face into his throat. Her cheeks are wet from her tears and her mouth is wet from spit and cum, but he doesn’t seem to mind, only coos a sound and keeps rubbing her back. “You won’t cum tonight, for that little stunt you pulled,” he murmured, and Y/N kind of figured as much. . She’s just pleased that he doesn’t seem upset about it. More humored than anything, “It felt good though, Sweetheart. You’re good with your tongue – can’t wait to feel it when you aren’t trying to overstimulate me.”
Y/N giggles against him, sinks into the feeling – this warmth, the buzz in her bones, the hum across her skin.
“Do you know what subspace is, Pet?” Harry inquires, and Y/N shakes her head, melts further into him, head full of cotton, “Mm, okay. We’ll talk about it later, okay?”
She nods and closes her eyes.
. . .
“I fucking knew it, I’m always right!”
Y/N’s neck is sore from how she has it craned, keeping her phone squished between her ear and her shoulder to talk with Niall, because her hands were full. It’d been a long while since Y/N had done a solo shopping trip, mostly because she knows she talks herself out of getting most things, but if she goes with Niall, he’ll convince her everything is a good idea. And listen, sometimes you just need someone to agree with everything you pick up, so she’d rather go with him.
Today, Niall had a doctor’s appointment at noon, a lunch date with his cousin at 2:30, and a dick appointment at 6 PM because he liked to be on League by 9 to at least get an hour in before bed. They had an extra day off, courtesy of Harry having business to tend to (meetings and the like) today and Niall complaining enough that Adam finally agreed to let him have some time off too. This wasn’t special treatment gifted to them by Y/N’s throat goat antics, however, Harry always gave her a free day if he wouldn’t be in. And Niall always got a free day if he was fussy enough.
It feels like it happened a week ago, despite being last night. Harry reminded her before he left that she’d have the day off, so to take it easy and enjoy her day off. He pressed a kiss to her forehead, then another soft one to her temple – he was always very gentle with her after they did something together, which she thought was nice. Especially when she finds out she’s been going into some version of subspace this whole time, Harry explained to her once she’d been pulled out of it for the most part. It’s why he always makes the effort to stay, why he’s so careful with her. Up until the moment they part from each other.
So she slept in today, but she woke up kind of antsy, and wanting to spend money, so here she was – on a street full of shops that she really didn’t need to be going in and out of, but was anyway. Niall had originally called to tell her that his blood work looked divine, then Y/N promptly info dumped the entire night before to him. The whole time he was gasping and yelling, she wondered if he was in his car or if he was out in public – there was no shame on his end, and she guesses not hers either, if she’s sharing this in public. At least she’s kind of whispering though.
“Good think I already made the purchase and it’s getting sent to your house – collar and leash. I’ll let him pick what chew toy he wants for you, though.”
Y/N’s face feels like it’s going to burn off, “Enough – send me how much I owe you though.”
“It’s on the house, from one kink freak to another,” he answered easily, “Risky move jumping his bones like that though, I’m surprised he even allowed it. Reckon it’s because you look so cute and pitiful when you cry.”
“Thank you?” Y/N says it, unsure, “Anyway, we’re always talking about my shit – who is this dinner time dick appointment you’re meeting up with?”
Niall makes a noise like he just remembered that was happening, “Oh, yeah, he’s nobody special,” he tells her, “His personality reminded me of this character I like in an otome game. Speaking of, I need you to download it – there’s a character who is like a level 1000 yearner. He’s got your name written all over him.”
Y/N snorts, pleasantly surprised that Niall’s request of her isn’t something to do with his balls – but before she can entertain the idea of downloading, someone says her name. The familiarity of the voice makes her spine go ramrod straight, tension immediately builds in her neck, and Niall’s voice fades into murmurs of background noise. Y/N turns to her left, and like a demon that had resurrected from the mud and soil of a swamp, she sees Rowan – her ex – jogging across the street to get to her. Y/N should have pretended like she hadn’t heard a fucking thing and kept trucking it, but of course she full body stopped then completely turned to look at him, so pretending was out of the question.
“Ni,” she cut him off, from whatever tirade he’d started, “Let me call you back, yeah?”
She hangs up before he can question her and Rowan is close enough to hear her, “Hey! Was that Ni on the phone? Tell him I said what’s up!”
If he knew you’d bothered to speak to me, he’d probably teleport here and beat your ass – is what Y/N wanted to say, but instead she forces a smile, “Sure, I will,” before an awkward, “Hey. What-uh-what’re you doing out here?”
Rowan tilts his head – he cut his hair shorter, since she’d seen him last, and dyed it blond – something he used to swear he would never do. Y/N guesses people change, though. It suits him well enough, and seeing someone blond with brown eyes is always pretty rare, so it’s an interesting look, “What you’re doing, I imagine. It’s nice to shop during a weekday, when it isn’t as crowded.” He smiled, “I’m looking for a gift. Remi’s birthday is in a couple of days.”
Y/N knew that already, only because she and Niall had done an extensive deep dive into her socials after she found out about the whole “emotional cheating” situation. What she doesn’t know is if Rowan is legitimately just an idiot and thinks nothing of it when he brings her up, or if he’s trying to get a reaction out of her again. That bitter ex-girlfriend that he craved to have, it seemed, when he used to go out of his way to try and work her up. Get her angry – make it seem like he was something that needed to be sought after, fought for.
“Fun,” she replies as warmly as she could make it, “Give her a happy birthday from me.”
Y/N is about to make an excuse, pivot on her heel, and fuck off out of there, but Rowan is too quick – he always has been. “Ah! I just – can’t believe my luck today. I was just thinking about you this morning. . was going to message you but. . .” You never answer, is left unsaid. “Let me take you for a coffee? I’ll be quick, I promise, I just feel like. . .I feel like I need to talk to you. I don’t like how things ended. Closure and all that.”
She blinked at him – what the fuck? What closure did he need? He fell in love with his coworker after spending three years making Y/N insecure about stupid shit. Y/N, to his face, had been super chill about the whole thing and only requested that he leave the stuff she’d left at his flat in a box at her door. There was no closure to be had, in her opinion.
But if she said that. . .she knew how it would come off. So she sighs, relents, “Okay,” she answers, “But I really don’t have a lot of time.”
Rowan seems relieved, nodding, “I’ll be quick,” he promises again, then nudges his thumb in the direction he came, “I was about to go in there before I saw you. Their lattes are good – you still like caramel, right?”
It was awkward. You would think that after spending three years of your life with someone, seeing them again wouldn’t feel like meeting up with a stranger, but it does. The last time she spoke with Rowan like this, Y/N had barely started culinary school, Harry was someone she knew in name alone, and she still washed her clothes in a big mess of colors rather than separating the blacks, lights, and whites – so it’d been a while. There are huge gaps in time to be filled, and if they had actually ended things on a good note, Y/N wouldn’t mind learning what he’d been doing since they last saw each other like this. Instead, she doesn’t give a fuck, and would rather tell Harry that sometimes she pretends he’s holding her when she’s trying to fall asleep alone.
If Rowan senses the tension, he doesn’t act like it. His fingers run along the rim of the mug he has, “I – honestly? I just wanted to apologize,” he starts, hitting the ground running like he always did, “How I – what I did and how I did it were unfair. How I told you – I look back and kind of cringe at it. I probably sounded like a huge dick.”
You are a huge dick.
“That’s alright,” Y/N replied, “It was a long time ago. We were younger.”
He grimaces, “Still, sometimes I think about you and I just wish we could’ve kept in touch properly. But I know it’s my fault that we didn’t.” Rowan licks over his lips, then pulls the mug to his mouth, taking a small sip and wincing when the heat of it hits his tongue, “I’m not asking for you to forgive me, or anything. First and foremost, I just wanted you to know that I’m sorry for that. And I’m sorry for. . .well, I was never the best partner to you. Being with Remi has made me realize this.”
If Y/N were more spiteful, she’d probably say something like, “Pray tell how being with your new girlfriend has opened your eyes to your poor, lowly ex, whom you ridiculed, and made feel silly and gross and unimportant, and unloved. Explain why I feel more of a connection with my boss who calls me puppy and has me suck on his fingers, than I ever did with you, in the three years wer were together. Why stay with me so long, if it was only going to take six months to upend it?”
But she didn’t do that, because she’s a cool ex. Not the crazy ex guys they are always talking about, just normal, and that’s all. Not at all annoyed by him, or his presence. An apology is nice, sure, but he’s about three years too late, and she isn’t interested in patching anything up or being invited to the wedding. Especially when she has the feeling that this is an elaborate ploy to something greater – something that will benefit him.
“It’s all good,” she tells him instead, nodding her head, “I’ve moved past it.” Harry would probably click his tongue and call her a liar if he were here. Feed her bottom lip into her mouth and click his tongue at her. Silly puppy, what reason is there to lie for?
“Ah, well – I’m glad I could say that to you finally. All that being said, how are you? How is working at like, the most fancy restaurant in the world?” He grins at her, “You’ve always been such an amazing cook, you deserve to be at such a good place.”
Y/N nodded, “I’m good. It is really nice, and the people are kinder than I would have expected – the staff, at least. The people coming in can be a bit smarmy sometimes, but they’re just rich, so – you know how that is.”
“Ugh, yeah,” he agrees, like he’s ever been in the service industry his entire life, “It’s pretty busy there, isn’t it?” Y/N hums, nodding, taking a small sip of the latte — it’s overly sweet which means it’s just her type, “Do you guys ever do events?”
Here we go, “Hm? Events?”
“You know, like birthdays…wedding receptions…stuff like that?”
Something sour sits in Y/N’s gut as she looks at him, quietly for a moment. Enough time passes that it’s slightly uncomfortable, but she thinks he deserves it – this had been nothing innocent, as she suspected. Rowan didn’t want to make up with her because guilt had been eating away at him; he wanted to make up with her because he wanted a favor. Events in their restaurant are few and far between, because Harry hand-picks which ones he’s willing to do. During the wedding season last year, they had 5 receptions out of the 95 that requested it. They have an “event coordinators” number listed on the site, but it literally just rings in Harry’s office. He goes through his messages at the end of the day and ignores most of them.
“We have an event coordinator,” she tells him, “Try giving him a call?”
“Ah, that’s the thing,” Rowan gives a slanted smile, one that she used to think was cute way back when, but now she thinks is oily, “I’ve called but can never get through. I was wondering – if it wasn’t too much to ask for – would you be willing to put in a good word for me? Um, the reception would be this summer, sometime – our previous venue accidentally double booked so we’re kind of crunched for time.”
That’s not my problem, “Oh,” she replied lamely, “I see. Well –”
Y/N doesn’t know what excuse she was about to make, because she sure as fuck was not about to be a server at her exes wedding – but she doesn’t have to know. Not when, like an angel cast down from the sky in the form of Youngjae, appears at their table, all dimples, “Y/N!” He says it so cheerily, like they had plenty of history together and not just one successful meal.
“Oh, wow, what perfect timing!” Y/N is quick to get to her feet, “Thank you for meeting me here, I was just finishing up my coffee. Ah, anyway, sorry Rowan, I’ll give it a try, but we’re pretty booked up so it may not work. I’d look into other venues. Thank you for the coffee, have a good rest of your day.”
Y/N doesn’t think before looping her fingers around Youngjae’s wrist and guiding him out of the cafe. He goes with her easily, thankfully, and continues to walk with her until they round a corner, out of sight of the windows and the door of the cafe. “I’m so sorry,” she rushes to say, twisting to face him, “I was in the worst, most awkward conversation ever and needed to leave. Your timing really was perfect.” She grimaces, “But I’m sure you were in there getting a drink or something – um, can I pay you back for it?”
He’s still smiling, shaking his head, “No, that’s fine, I wasn’t ordering,” he motions behind them, “I own this building, so I was just checking in for the day.”
Eyes wide, Y/N gapes, “Oh? You own this one?” He nods, “I guess I didn’t realize you owned multiple – multiple chains?”
“Yes, though this is more of a family endeavor,” he replies, “May I ask what the awkward conversation was? Or is this a secret?”
She snorted, reaching up to knuckle at her eyes now, tired from doing everything in her power not to narrow or squint at everything Rowan said. What a crazy bastard – even if they’d ended things on beautiful terms, it is completely inappropriate to ask your ex something like that. Inappropriate and stupid – it’s one thing if he’d just go behind her back to do it, it’s another thing to try and wrap her up in it. Why the fuck would that have been a good idea?
Y/N explained the situation to a shocked and equally appalled Youngjae. It’s nice to see his reaction, because part of her wondered if she was overreacting, but the way his mouth is pulled into legitimate distress makes her feel a bit better, “That’s horrible,” he replies, “Do you want me to ban him from the cafe?”
This makes her really laugh, this time, startled out of her by the absurdity of it. Youngjae seems happy with her reaction, his dimples reappearing quickly. It makes her think about Harry and how she wishes she got to see his dimples more often, the deep little craters are so cute.
“No, no, that’s okay. He’s always been stupid, I’m just somehow surprised by it still. It’s been a while since I’ve even spoken to him.” She sighs, waving her hand back and forth in the air, batting the interaction away, “I’m sorry for that – for getting you involved and then. . .then telling you about it. I feel very silly.”
“It’s silly to feel silly,” he told her, “Now that we’re together, though, I do have a question? If you’re willing to answer?” Y/N looked at him, waited for him to continue, “You haven’t accepted my invitation yet, to my restaurant. I’m wondering if you’re not interested in Korean cuisine?”
Her eyes go wide again, “Oh my god!” She all but cries out, “Oh my god, I’m the worst – I completely forgot about that,” she hides her face in her hands, “We’ve been so busy and – you know I was wondering why I had a dentist appointment card in my purse but I just kept moving past it.”
Youngjae laughs, good-naturedly, warmly, “Ah, that’s good then! I was worried I may have come off too strong before,” he tells her, “I should have had one of my cards with me, but I hadn’t been planning on enjoying my meal as much as I did. Are you free today? Perhaps you can come with me?” He motions down the street, “It’s close by, just a small walk.”
Y/N looks at her watch and well – what the hell, she didn’t have anything planned for the rest of the day. He did save her bum, and it’s not even like this is her repaying him for it. Y/N’s unsure why he wants to visit his restaurant so badly, but chalks it up to chefs just liking to show other chefs what they can do, and teaching younger chefs what they could become. It only benefits Y/N, in the end, to get additional experience, especially in a type of food she’s never had much experience in, besides barbeques. And even then, somehow she manages to evade grilling most of the time.
“Sure!” She answers, “Why not? That’d be fun.”
. . .
It is a lot of fun.
Youngjae is more like Adam in his approach to teaching; he’s silly and playful, and makes a lot of bad jokes that make Y/N laugh. He shows her the kitchen, their pantry, their cooler, and refrigerators. Introduces her to his staff, who scold him for getting in their way, and he only laughs about it and steps to the side. If any one of Harry’s staff had scolded him for getting in their way, he’d probably put their hand in a boiling pot, so this was an interesting dynamic to witness. Whereas Harry ran things with an iron fist, Youngjae seemed to be more tender-handed – both worked in their own way.
As promised, he does show her a recipe: sundubu-jjigae, a soft-tofu stew. Despite being more relaxed by nature, he is just as methodical as Harry in preparing ingredients, showing her how to cut, where to cut, where you could be more liberal with spices, seasonings, and sauces, and when it pays to be more reserved. He demonstrates how to prepare the anchovies, the pork belly – how he increases or decreases the amount of each ingredient needed based on how big of a serving they’re making. It’s one of their more popular dishes, so they have to make a lot of it every day.
The process takes a little over an hour – it probably would have been shorter, had he not had to stop and explain so many things to Y/N, but he seems delighted to.
“Is this your new student?” One of the chefs inquires, hip leaning against the counter, watching carefully like she was also learning how, “Miss. Y/N?”
Youngjae smiles but shakes his head, “Harry Styles is her mentor,” he tells them, and a steady gasp pulls from the chef’s chest, and a younger man nearby, “And that man is a bit scary, so I’m not looking to steal his virtuoso. I had one of her meals and it was so delicious, I’m still thinking about it,” he tells them, stirring the soup idly, and Y/N’s face feels hot with embarrassment and pride, “It reminds me of when I ate Mr. Styles’ for the first time, which says to me you absorb like a sponge – those are the best people to share skills with. I like to teach, and it is good to have multiple things in your repertoire. I believe so, at least.”
By the time they finished, when Y/N took her first taste, she gasped. It was good – Y/N had had it before, but now she was having the World’s 50 best restaurants version of it, made from the very owner himself. She’s buzzing, because she feels like she learned a lot today, and food is delicious, and she thinks she’s very lucky to be able to learn so many amazing things. Especially when an older woman pulls her to the side, “I’ll show you how to make mandu,” she tells her, “It’s very easy.”
Y/N spends a few uninterrupted hours there, learning, trying to utilize her sponge-like qualities that Youngjae had just said she had. She almost doesn’t realize her phone is buzzing in her back pocket until it’s about to go to voicemail. Then, when she slips it from her pocket, she sees Harry’s contact and is thoroughly surprised. She guesses she has been here for a while – he’s probably finished all of his meetings. Still, she wouldn’t have thought this meant he would contact her at the end of it.
“Hello?” Y/N holds her finger up to the woman she’s speaking with, promising to be right back, “Are you okay?”
“Why wouldn’t I be?” Harry countered.
Y/N shrugs, then realizes he isn’t there to see it, “Oh, I dunno, you never really call me,” she explains, “At least not unprovoked.”
Harry hums, she can hear the jingle of his keys on the other end of the phone, “Are you home? I’ll come over. I’ve finished for the day.”
She’s surprised, really, because if they aren’t working Harry rarely has seen her two days in a row, “Oh!” She’s surprised, looking again at her watch, checking the time, “I’m with Mr. Youngjae right now, but I should be home after that!”
It’s quiet on the other end. More than quiet – silent, actually, eerily so – until Harry speaks again, “I didn’t know you were planning on that today.”
“Yeah, it wasn’t really a plan or anything,” she explained, “It was crazy, but I ran into him at a cafe when my ex tricked me into having a coffee with him so –”
“Your ex?” Harry repeated, cutting her off, “The one who messages you periodically and asks for dinner reservations?”
Y/N snorted – she’d forgotten she told him that, and was thoroughly surprised that he remembered, “The one and only.”
Harry is quiet again, before he hums – this hum, in particular, Y/N doesn’t know if she’s ever heard before. It’s short – a staccato noise. Y/N doesn’t even know if she could classify it as a hum, but she does, “I see,” he finally replies, “You’ve had a busy day.”
She scratches her forearm, “Yeah, a little,” she tells him, “But I’d – I’d like if you still came over. I can message you when I’m home, m’just about done here – I’m learning how to make mandu.”
Another short hum, “Yes, I’d like to see you after.”
“It’s a date then!” Y/N exclaims, then realizes what she says, and backtracks instantly, “Oh, I – um – I mean. . . I mean it’s a plan, then, haha,” she swallows hard, “Okay, I need to get back. I’ll message you!”
She hangs up, heart doing a weird little stutter. How exciting for her – she’d kind of thought the day was going to be ruined once Rowan showed his dumb fucking face to her, but it’s shaping up to be quite nice. Harry sounded a little odd on the phone, but she wondered if he was just feeling awkward about seeing her two days in a row. It’s new for him, for sure – maybe they could eat together, in a couple of hours. Maybe he would make her cum, after withholding it last night. Y/N kind of hopes he does, because then the chances of her going into subspace are greater, and the chances of getting a cuddle out of him are greater too. Harry’s a great cuddler, but she knows she’ll only get that at the end of the night.
The options are endless, really, what they’ll do.
Y/N is smiling as she walks back into the kitchen.
. . .
Harry is crashing out.
He never really understood the phrase when he overheard Niall and Y/N saying it (then Adam, subsequently, who always ended up using whatever weird phrases and lingo the two adopted for the month), if they touched wet food, or if Niall lost a rank in his League game, or if Adam had to sous vide another steak after a group of 10 executives came to eat one day. All of those feelings must have equated to what he feels right now, though, like he’s spinning out of orbit. Like he’s an alien spaceship, careening towards earth, slamming into some random farmland against his will. Sparks flying, pieces of shrapnel everywhere, and there he sat in the middle of it, overwhelmed, and consumed by the feeling.
It was one thing to hear that Y/N had seen her ex today. Harry didn’t care about that much; he cared in the way that he feels bad she had to see him, because he had picked up how difficult the dynamic between the two of them was, and he knew how it ended was shitty. He also knew that he never left her alone, so she must have been annoyed, to some degree. Harry hates that for her, and that for her off day, she had to waste even a little bit of time on him.
But to learn that Youngjae – pretty-eyed, nice teeth, dimpled Youngjae was the one to swoop in and save her? To learn that she had been with him since, learning something under someone else, not within reach of him. . .well, he’s seething, if he’s honest. The thick murk of jealousy sits in his chest and sinks to his stomach, as he imagined it. How sweet Youngjae must be to her right now, how he must be praising her, how Y/N is getting that twinkle in her eye and that sparkle in her veins when someone tells her she’s doing well. He’s well aware of what that praise shifts into, if Y/N’s attracted to someone, and hell, there’s no way she isn’t attracted to him. Even fucking Harry is attracted to him! And they’re probably alone, all snuggled up in a kitchen, giggling between each other, and –
Wow, he seriously can’t even think about it. It’s making his teeth hurt, probably from the way his jaw is set and tensed. He’s already outside of her place – he’d waited all of 30 minutes, but he was just driving around aimlessly and mad, so he thought it’d be safer to just park it somewhere. He doesn’t have to wait for long – he sees her walking to the building and feels like he’s going to faint because no way Youngjae got to see her in that pretty of a fucking sundress before Harry could. It’s a purple-ish pink, and flows in the wind, blowing up, almost high enough for her bum to show but she was too quick for it to actually show anything. Did that happen when she was with Youngjae too? Did he see her bum? Or, worse, did he see that cute, embarrassed look on her face? The one that makes Harry hard?
He waits for 15 minutes so he feels less pathetic about immediately showing up. Y/N messaged him a little bit after he’d seen her, a home! :) – that shows she’s just so painfully unaware of the turmoil he’s going through. He could tell over the phone as well, listening to how excited she sounded to be learning how to make mandu. Harry needs to get it in check before he gets in front of her door, or else. . .or else. . .he’s not sure what would happen, but he doesn’t know if he’ll like it.
Harry knocks on the door and struggles not to immediately crowd her space. She smiles when she sees him, though her brows are raised a bit, “Oh, you’re fast!”
“I was around,” he explained, and conveniently left out that “around” was right outside, in her parking lot. Hazelnut eyeballs him from the couch arm she’s propped on, with a look that says she knows something is up. Y/N always talks about the cat giving her looks, and he could only imagine that this was one of them. He understands more why Y/N is always so shaken by them.
When he steps in, closer to her, he sniffs the air a little. “Are you wearing a new perfume?”
“Hm?” Her head tilted – very puppy-like of her, and his prick does twitch in interest, but he reels himself in for a moment, watching as she tilted into her bicep and sniffed, “No, I’m not?”
“You smell flowery today,” Harry notes.
“Oh, do I? That might be Youngjae then or something – he kind of smells like a garden and we hugged before I left.”
A garden? You’re fucking joking.
Harry closes the door behind him, steps further into the flat, and further into Y/N’s space. He is unable to keep up pretenses for longer than those fifteen seconds, before he’s sliding a hand to the side of her neck, “How do you feel about marks?”
“Like love bites?” She rephrases, and Harry nods.
“Yeah, sure. How do you feel about them?”
Y/N shrugs, “I mean, I don’t mind them but – ah!”
He wastes no time, doesn’t hear her but that lingers in the air afterward. Harry fixes his lips around a tender, sensitive bit of skin where her shoulder and throat meet and bites down. The feeling of it makes Y/N jump, jerking back but Harry holds her still, and she doesn’t complain apart from a little whine. Soon enough, she’s craning her neck to the opposite side, giving him more room to do it. She’s so obedient, it makes him dizzy, or maybe that’s just because he isn’t breathing how he has his nose shoved up against her. He licks over the skin he’d chosen before suckling on it, holding her still, making sure it’s something dark and glowing, a pretty bruise that she’ll wear on her throat until it eventually fades. One he can press into, one she could see in the mirror and remember he gave her.
It’s pretty when Harry looks at it. Even prettier when he runs a thumb over it and she jumps, sucking in a wet gasp.
“You have a no hickey policy,” she finally says, and Harry hums, bemused, “At work. That’s – that’s what I was going to say – I like them but you. . .you remember, you almost ripped Ni a new one when he showed up with one on his neck and he sweated his makeup off.”
Harry vaguely remembers that. He couldn’t be bothered with the full memory, though, as he continues to run his thumb over the bruise.
“Remind me to give him an extra break,” he replies, “How many of these do you think I can give you?”
“Do you like feeling out of control of your body?” Oh, so she had definitely heard him right.
“I mean like. . .like I guess it depends on the context?” Her mind is whirling, spinning wildly, flinging around, knocked off its axis, and careening like a piece of rock flying through space. Why did she say that — why did he ask that?
Harry laughed – it’s a real thing; something she’d only briefly heard a couple of times when they were out with each other last week. This one doesn’t last very long, but it truly is a gleeful sound, as he shakes his head quietly to himself, “Depends on the context, huh?” He repeated, and Y/N didn’t think she’d ever seen him so amused. It makes something twist in her belly, low and deep, that she’d rather ignore.
or
Harry thinks Y/N is cute and Y/N is having horny nightmares
part 1
(18K+ words)
ii.
“He said what?”
Y/N has always believed that there were people who liked sitting on the floor and people who avoided it at all costs. She had always been a floor sitter, for as long as she could remember. When she was younger, she’d play on the floor with all her stuffed animals and dolls. Then she got a little older, and laid on her stomach over the purple faux fur rug she begged her parents for (only for her cousin to spill wine right in the center of it on a summer visit) while she pretended to do homework and study, but listened to music and daydreamed about her crushes. And when she was in college, she’d have her legs spread out on the floor surrounded by notes she actively ignored while stalking her (now ex) boyfriend online. Then she went to culinary school, and there really weren’t a lot of options to sit on the floor in the kitchen, yet somehow she always found herself with her bum on the linoleum after cleaning up, waiting for her food to be finished in the oven.
And now she was sitting on the floor of her bedroom overanalyzing every interaction she’d had with her boss.
The thing is, she knew the whole point of her taking home his shirt to get the stain out was so that her spilling the drink on him didn’t plague her every thought this whole break they had – but that actually did very little to help. It wasn’t just spilling the drink that tormented her, but every waking moment she spent thinking about the whole night. From the second Harry plopped down in the booth across from her, to the moment he’d let her door swing shut behind him. Each memory twists, spins, and dances along the forefront of her brain to the sound of Beethoven's 5th Symphony because she’d recently heard it in a commercial and it’s stuck in her head. The music swells, crescendoing, Harry’s carefully curating a lettuce wrap and making her eat them, then there’s a lull of sweet violins and he’s smiling at her dancing with Niall with his drink in hand, and they start beating on the kettle drum around the time Harry’s pulling his shirt off, saying she flusters easily, calling the side he saw of her cute.
Just a month ago, Y/N would have expected cats to pose a coup against the government and throw the whole country into a state of chaos and fish-flavored treats before believing that Harry would have ever even thought anything about her existence. Apart from annoyance, at least. Despite Harry going out of his way to email her professor and let her know that he wanted Y/N to study under him, she often wondered if he even liked her. Technically, you didn’t have to like someone to work with them or to teach them. He’d seen promise in her and seemed like he wasn’t particularly fond of her as a person, but she’d accepted that with relative grace for the last year. Again, there were moments when she wished for a closer relationship with him but she’d given up that dream about five months in when he still hadn’t referred to her by name and Adam and Niall were already sharing inside jokes.
So to think now that he had smiled at her with dimples and called her cute? It doesn’t even feel real.
The morning after, her head was throbbing and she was convinced that the mushrooms Harry had cooked on the grill were actually psilocybin and she’d had a psychoactive hallucination for the rest of the night (because that had seemed more likely than any of what she was remembering). Then she sees his shirt, soaking in her sink where she’d left it the night before, and it feels a bit more tangible. Her face feels hot because now she’s completely sober and embarrassed over every single word she uttered. Then it feels like her cheeks might melt off when she thinks about how she saw his bare torso, and how she knows his nipples pebble quickly when he’s cold, and how he has laurel tattoos leading down to his dick like it’s a prized possession.
With a face hot enough to melt ice, she diligently works to get the stain out of his shirt. There’s a concoction of many different laundry agents that her mum had to teach her when the grass stains from playing outside turned into the blood stains of an angry uterus. It works well to get the brown liquid out of the shirt, maybe even making it whiter than she started. For a quick, pathetic second she wishes she hadn’t started soaking it last night so she could have pressed her nose to the fabric and seen what it smelled like – but then she wipes that thought from her brain and pretends she never had it.
The rest of the day she forced herself to tidy up, do laundry (that wasn’t Harry’s), and go grocery shopping in preparation for the threatening snowstorm. She prepped a roast that she would throw in her slow cooker the following morning, then snuggled with Hazelnut and a hastily made sandwich. Every couple of minutes an image of Harry from last night doing something flashes through her brain like a strike of lightning that she’s desperate to ignore. It could have been worse though, she decided, that maybe her brain had finally taken mercy on her and stuffed this down into a locked box.
Until Niall called her just before she started to get ready for bed.
“Okay, I think I’ve allotted us both plenty of time to get over the hangover,” he started, “Now what happened when you and Harry left the club?”
So that’s how Y/N found herself stretched out on the floor, phone pressed to her ear, Hazelnut taking it upon herself to sit heavily on Y/N’s chest and make it a little harder to breathe. She’ll blame Niall for prying open the box she’d just tried locking and sealing (even though she did a poor job of locking and sealing it in the first place) because it’s incredibly hard to act like it didn’t happen when she’s recounting it to Niall. Niall, who gasps at everything, from Harry opening the car door for her (a tiny gasp and a murmured, “He totally wants to fuck,”), to him peeling off his shirt, (a louder gasp, another murmur, only this time a question, “Oh my god, did you guys fuck?), to him more or less calling drunk-easy-to-fluster Y/N cute.
“He said what?”
Y/N covers her face with one hand, “That the side he saw of me last night was cute.”
“Oh my god,” she can picture Niall’s face, mouth ajar, his hair pressed from his forehead by the fluffy polka dot headband she forced on him – she’d just heard him spit the toothpaste out of his mouth, so she knew he was washing up for bed, “Y/N he is trying to fuck you. This isn’t even me being delusional.”
She swallows, “I mean, it’s a little delusional, all he did was compliment me,” she plucks at her bottom lip, sighing, readjusting her hips with a grimace because they hate the floor sitting agenda, “If you can even call it that. Now that I repeat it, it sounds like he was making fun of me.”
The faucet turns on, on Niall’s end, “If Harry were any other man, I might believe you and think it was just a compliment,” he sounds like he’s drowning while she speaks, so he must have moved on to washing his face, “But he isn’t just any other man. This is Harry – I don’t think he does or says anything that isn’t deliberate. Taking off his shirt, saying you’re flustered easily, calling the side he’d seen of you cute – this man wants you to slobber on him. Or maybe he wants to slobber on you. A mutual slobbering.”
Y/N laughs and the movement of her chest annoys Hazelnut enough to peek her eyes open at her but not to move off, “I don’t know, I just keep replaying like every moment and hating how I responded and reacted. Like. . okay, let’s say we aren’t being delusional and he does want to sleep with me – I definitely blew it. I was not sultry or seductive and I sounded like a dumbass.”
“Honestly, I don’t think that’s what he wants at all,” she could hear him splash more water on his face, “Not to speculate, but I think he wants someone easy to fluster and cute – both of which you are. I don’t know much about him besides that he scares the fuck out of me, but from how he was last night, he just seems like the type to tease and taunt. He probably went home and got off thinking about your face after he said it.” The water turns off, “What kind of car does he drive? Was it nice?”
She knuckles at her eyes, “It was so nice – some kind of SUV, but it had seat warmers and drink warmers. And he didn’t ask what I wanted to listen to, but he picked a playlist that had a suspicious amount of artists I listen to.”
“He’s probably stalking your socials,” Niall deduces, “Or he’s listening when we think he isn’t. Think about how many times we’ve been talking in the kitchen with him around. He probably knows more about you than you think.” Niall sighs, “Alright, babe, I need to put on this face mask and get ahold of Adam – he called like 3 times while we were talking ‘cos he wants me on League. You should probably start looking for toys around Harry’s size to train, ‘cos how long has it been since you’ve slept with anyone? You’re practically a virgin now.”
“Oh God, goodnight Ni.”
Y/N clicked off the phone, flopped it down on the floor beside her, and made no move to get up. Hazelnut doesn’t either, barely even stirring when Y/N covers her face with her palms again and groans. Delusions aside, it was a little helpful to have spoken it out loud – the thoughts had been vibrating, pushed up against her skull, ready to seep through her ears had she kept it to herself any longer. Niall had put more things to think about in her head though – the possibility that Harry wanted to sleep with her, for one.
There’s no way – she knows there’s no way. . .but. . .but like, was there a way?
No. No there wasn’t – she’s being silly. The other night Harry was just looser than he was when he was in the kitchen, that’s all. Adam had even said he was excited for them to see who Harry was outside of his role as a boss, so maybe this is just what he was like. He’d been kind to Niall too – he certainly hadn’t been feeding Niall as diligently as he was feeding her, and maybe when she would look over she’d catch his gaze more often than Niall did but he was looking at the both of them, right? Just watching his subordinates have fun. No thoughts other than being able to relax and show a side of himself that he doesn’t allow outside of the kitchen. His attitude must have just been softened by good food and his glass of whiskey, or whatever. Or maybe it was all about the vibes – which had been immaculate that night – he might have just been in a good mood too.
He probably just felt guilty because she told him that he was scary and that contributed to her whole passing out thing. And, despite prior interactions and feelings before he’d started being the tiniest bit more gentle – Harry was someone who had a heart and a conscience. There’s a chance that he didn’t necessarily want to come off as scary, but his austerity and desire for structure and success made him come off that way.
So, once again, she tries to carefully pack away the night and the thoughts of him looking at her in any way other than his apprentice that he’s become at least the tiniest bit fond of. Or, at least, one that he cares about even a little.
If she goes and looks at eight-inch, silicone dildos – well, that’s her business.
. . .
Snow blankets the ground by the time she goes back to work.
The weather had been all over the place the last couple of days, so she was happy that they had them off, even if it meant she couldn’t do much with her time but rot away inside. Clouds couldn’t decide whether they wanted to spit out freezing rain, sleet, or snow until they settled for big, fluffy white flakes that refused to melt along her window panes. Sometimes a random, intense gust of wind would rattle the glass and pique Hazelnut’s attention but otherwise, her flat had decided to be kind to her and withstand the intense weather. Her furnace stayed warm and her water heater kept running, and even though a few times her service was a little spotty, things remained in relative working order.
Being stuck inside did very little to soothe her overactive brain but each day that passes, last Friday seems like a distant memory. Something closer to a dream – at least that’s what she’s going to pretend like it was. And after a near treacherous time getting from her flat to the restaurant in the still icy cold weather, all she could think about was how to warm her frostbitten hands. Despite coming in later in the day, the sun did very little to warm anything where it was hidden beneath the clouds. Y/N finds herself wishing hopelessly that she was back in her bed, pressed up against Hazelnut’s warm little body, but no matter how many times she closes her eyes, she opens them to see nothing but practical snowy tundra in front of her.
Because the universe has something against her, the first person she sees when she steps through the door is Harry. He doesn’t drop to the floor and kiss her feet like Niall seems to think he’d do, but he does give pause when he usually wouldn’t. Head tilted, eyes curious, “You seem cold.”
Y/N can barely get a laugh out, her lungs frosted over and stiff, “Yeah,” she agreed, “It’s freezing outside.” He continued to stare at her, and. . .well, yeah, things have changed but haven’t really. The stare he levels her with makes her mouth move while her brain tries to catch up, turning into a fumbled, rambled mess of words, “That’s um – I don’t really like driving when it's snowy and icy like this, so I have to take the subway here. And they haven’t really taken care of the sidewalks well enough, so there’s still a lot of snow to walk through and I don’t have snow boots so my shoes are like. . .like sopping wet, so I’m pretty cold, yeah. I’ll warm up soon though, being here – s’always hot in here.”
Harry looks displeased, brows knitted, “You don’t have boots?”
“Um, no? I’ve never really had boots for the snow since we – it doesn’t get that bad, that often.”
They are quiet for a moment, an awkward tension thick in the air. Y/N was stupid for even considering that Friday night might change their dynamic because this is much of the same. Weird breaks in the conversation, uncomfortable periods of heavy silence, and Y/N feeling stupid after every word she spoke. It must’ve been the shots and the presence of Niall and Adam who very rarely let the mood get unpleasant. It had nothing to do with her, with Harry realizing anything – yeah, maybe he found some aspects of her cute, but she’s also still not entirely sure she didn’t hallucinate that.
“You’ll be with Oliver today,” he changed the subject abruptly, motioning toward their saucier standing at a station she rarely gets time at – it would be good for today, considering all the different, intricate sauces and gravies they have on their seasonal menu around dinner time, “His shift ends soon. When he leaves, I’ll take over with you.”
That’s all he says before pivoting on his heel and disappearing into the kitchen, leaving Y/N to trek to the coat room so she could disrobe her winter garments.
The day goes as a typical day goes – the evening is busy, busy, busy but Oliver is nice and helps remind her of the basic principles Harry had taught her about sauces. How to get the right consistency, the proper flavoring, and what to do if it doesn’t turn out right the first time. He’s not much of a teacher but in this case, Y/N doesn’t need a teacher, just a guide – that’s the only reason why Harry would allow her to be following someone else. The first part of her night goes relatively fast with the number of people desperate to eat their food after being denied it for several days. She thinks the second half of the night slows, but only because Oliver is smiling at her regretfully when he tells her he’s clocking out and Harry will be covering the rest of his shift.
It isn’t bad – it’s the same as before, which should be good, but Y/N can’t help being a little bummed about it. For all she’d convinced herself that Harry didn’t want her like that, there was a sliver of her that still hoped that she was wrong. That Niall had been correct in his interpretations and Harry was actually chomping at the bit to slobber on her, or with her, or mutual slobbering – whatever he’s said. That he pulled off his shirt in front of her because he wanted her to think about it for days and days and days. That he was teasing her because he wanted his dick inside her too.
Alas, this wasn’t a movie. Or a show. Or a book. If it was, then she thinks the setup for them to have a riveting, whirlwind romance is there but sadly, this is real life. Harry was nice to her because she was drunk, had recently called him scary, and she’s pretty sure he knew she was crying when he yelled at her last time.
Being the same as before meant he was still making an effort to encourage her more, which is nice. Y/N guesses she’s most glad that he isn’t trying to prove to her that their dynamic hasn’t changed by being rough with her again. When he tastes the bordelaise sauce she prepared, he nods his head, “It’s good,” he complimented, “Add a bit more pepper and it’ll be better.”
She still feels like she’s glowing when Harry verbally compliments her food, no matter what the compliment is, it’s much better than just a grunt and a pissed-off look on his face. Y/N tries not to show too much that she’s gleaming, but she feels the stretch on her cheeks long after he’d disappeared to answer Adam calling for him. Like being praised by a kitchen deity; or a kiss of favor by a kitchen king.
Harry’s freshly washed, unstained shirt has been folded neatly in her bag all day, waiting for the perfect time to hand it off to him. She knew better than to do it in front of the other staff because gossip runs through this place like a grease fire, difficult to snuff out. Y/N might have been saved for the fact that the number one runner of the rumor mill, in charge of oiling all its gears, is Niall – but he’s a sucker for a good story. If someone got him going, he’d probably reveal his whole theory about Harry wanting to sleep with her.
It’s easy to find the time to give it to him because she and Harry are always the last in the kitchen. Everyone cleans up, but Harry specifically delegates her to help him with storing what’s left, putting in orders for the inventory diminished by their day of work, and tidying after they’ve tidied. A double tidy – to make sure everything is actually clean.
On a normal day, Y/N would be whining about this, but it does allow her to hand him his shirt after they’d finished.
“Harry?” She called to him, still feeling a little weird not referring to him more formally while they were here. Harry hums from where he was tucked away in the office so Y/N ambles her way over. She reaches into her bag and has it set out on her hand before he even turns around from the file cabinet he’s digging in, “I – your shirt,” she says, very intelligibly, of course, “I have it.”
When he turns around, he seems surprised – like he must have forgotten about it, “Oh?” Tentatively, he takes it from her hand, unfolding it. An impressed look twitches at his eyebrows, “You really got the stain out.”
“You didn’t think I would?” Y/N pressed, pulling her bag more firmly over her shoulder.
“I didn’t know if you could,” he countered, carefully folding it back up, “Brown liquor is notoriously difficult to get out of clothes – a white shirt at that. Are you sure you don’t want a career in dry cleaning?”
Y/N huffed a laugh through her nose, eyes rolling as she turned on her heel, “Very funny. Goodnight, Harry.”
“I hope you aren’t planning on taking the subway again,” he mentions before she can get too far. It does make her pause, twisting back to face him, head tilted because. . .well, how else was she supposed to get home? “It’s dark and even colder than when you came in. You’d be lucky to make it home without a cold.”
She tugs at the end of her scarf, “I – well, I don’t really like spending money on Ubers though, and their prices skyrocket in this kind of weather, so –”
“So I’ll take you home,” he answers definitively, “Let me get my coat.”
Harry disappears toward the coat closet before Y/N can even register what he’s suggested. Or rather, what he told her was going to happen. There had been really no room to argue and, honestly? Y/N wouldn’t have argued, to begin with. The thought of trekking through the snow and ice while a thin layer of frost formed over her eyes seemed horrific, and she’s certain her toes almost froze to the point of snapping off on the way here. She couldn’t even find it in herself to do a polite, pretend denial of it. One of those, “Oh no, I couldn’t ask you to do that? Really? Okay, only if you’re sure!” Instead, she just follows Harry out to his car and tries not to eat shit on the pavement when her feet catch on the patches of ice.
He pops the car door open for her and waits until she’s fully seated before shutting it and walking to his side. Y/N realizes that she’s much less suited for a car ride when she isn’t a couple of drinks in, so her blood is sort of roaring in her ears. Harry shivers when he gets in and keys the engine to life.
It’s quiet while they wait for his car to warm up. Y/N wondered if it would be too awkward to ruffle around through her purse and grab her phone, so she could at least look kind of busy, and not seem as socially inept as she did right now. Or maybe Harry just thinks she’s tired – which isn’t a lie. Y/N is sleepy; it weighs heavily on her bones, especially after having so much time off. It’s hard to return to being a productive member of society when she’d lounged around with Hazelnut for the last few days.
“Why didn’t you ask Niall to bring you home?” Harry inquired, finally, piercing through the silence.
Y/N hums, shifting in her seat, pleased by the seat warmer melting heat into her bum, “He and Adam were g’na have one of their League nights, so I didn’t want to make them wait for me.” It’s true – Y/N’s always there earlier than everyone and later than everyone because Harry is her mentor and those are the hours Harry works. That would’ve meant an additional 30 minutes eating into their weird little cult video game thing, and at that point, they’d try to drag her with them to make sure they didn’t lose any more play time. Y/N loves them but she doesn’t need to be involved.
“League?” Harry sounds confused and Y/N sighs – maybe he does hear a lot in the kitchen, but he blocks out a lot too. Y/N wishes that was an option for her, but Niall will just debrief her on everything anyway, so it’s better to listen for the first go around.
“League of Legends,” she replies, “Their game that they go bananas over – don’t ask me to explain it, I don’t understand a thing and Ni will go on about it for hours if you let him. Once we tried ecstasy together and he made me listen to a 40-minute spiel about this show based on it. The show was good though, so I get it.”
Y/N doesn’t realize her slip-up until Harry hums softly, “Ecstasy, huh?”
The blood drains from her body, flushes from her face, down her chest, through her belly, spinning out of her legs, and through the bottoms of her feet. Oh my god – how the fuck did she let that slip? Maybe she could’ve said that when she was drunk and could use that as an excuse, but now? Completely sober? What if Harry gets rid of her on the spot? Pushes her out of the car? No chef training under him is going to have experimented with ecstasy a year ago.
“Oh, I – um – that’s – that was a lie.”
“A lie?” He repeated, “You know how I feel about liars.” Her face pulls into a look of true and utter distraught panic, opening her mouth to explain herself, but she’s cut off, “Just kidding,” his face does not suggest he’s joking at all, apart from the tiniest twitch of his mouth, “I don’t care what you do and try, as long as you don’t come to work impaired by any measure,” he slows to a stop at a light, then briefly turns to face her, “Understand?”
She nods, eyes wide, nervous, “I – yes,” she tells him, “I’m sorry for – still, I didn’t mean to tell you that. And I don’t want you to think I do it regularly! We just wanted to see what it was like – or at least I did, the last time Ni did it was in UNI during a rave, and I definitely get why people do it at raves because – yeah. But I haven’t done it since.” Y/N kind of wishes someone would shove their hand over her mouth to make her stop talking (Harry, preferably, but she thinks that would probably make her moan). She’s just stuck in the perpetual need to impress him, and finding out that she and one of his other learning chefs did ecstasy and then talked about a video game for 40 minutes is like. . .not impressive at all.
Harry’s gaze darts around her face like he’s looking for something. Or maybe he’s just registering that she’s freaking the hell out. Whatever it was he finds, he turns back to the front and slowly eases the car past the light once it turns green, “I won’t judge you,” he finally says, “I’ve done it before.”
Y/N had never once learned anything personal about Harry in their time together. Everything she knew about him was based on old interviews and untested hypotheses because picking his brain was impossible. He was someone who believed that work was for just that. . working; there was no time for gossiping, sharing anecdotes about each other’s lives, discussing interests, and through that somehow decrypting their political ideologies. So Y/N knew nothing about him, except for the amount of salt he thought necessary to add to certain dishes and his preferred method of slicing onions.
So this was – riveting information, actually. A tidbit – a small sliver into Harry’s life that she’d never been granted before. She takes it in, and – greedy as she is – wants more.
“You have?” She turns to face him more, “That’s – that’s crazy! When did you?”
Harry pulls right, driving down a relatively quiet street. For a Thursday night, there wasn’t as much hustle and bustle as usual, but that makes sense with all the snow. Nobody wanted to risk breaking their front teeth on the pavement because of poorly shoveled and salted walkways, “My second year of culinary school,” he replied, “After a particularly grueling semester. Someone in my class offered it to Adam, who then offered it to me.”
“That’s – whoa,” she says, very intelligibly, and she thinks she hears Harry puff through his nose an amused noise, “Did you ever do it again?”
He shook his head, “No. I don’t like feeling out of control of my body.” Then, he tacts on, “Do you?”
Y/N stilled, blinking at him.
Did she hear him right?
“Huh?”
“Do you like feeling out of control of your body?” Oh, so she had definitely heard him right.
“I mean like. . .like I guess it depends on the context?” Her mind is whirling, spinning wildly, flinging around, knocked off its axis, and careening like a piece of rock flying through space. Why did she say that — why did he ask that?
Harry laughed – it’s a real thing; something she’d only briefly heard a couple of times when they were out with each other last week. This one doesn’t last very long, but it truly is a gleeful sound, as he shakes his head quietly to himself, “Depends on the context, huh?” He repeated, and Y/N didn’t think she’d ever seen him so amused. It makes something twist in her belly, low and deep, that she’d rather ignore.
“Why do you – um – why do you ask?” Her face felt hot.
There was a smile on his lips that she’d never seen before – taunting, goading, before he answered simply, “No reason,” with a pleasant-sounding sigh, even though Y/N thought that there was definitely a reason, but there was certainly no way that the reason is the reason that she was thinking about. Because if it was then. . .then that would mean that maybe her and Niall’s grandiose delusions had more accuracy than they originally thought. And if that were true, then that would mean Harry is thinking about doing the naughty, despicable, filthy things that Niall has been prophesying for weeks now.
The rest of the ride is quiet, though it’s not very long – just five minutes of Y/N fidgeting with her fingers in her lap before they pull into her complex. Harry remembered the way from the last time he dropped her off – she’d only realized at the end of the trip that she didn’t have to direct him once. He pushed the car into park, then turned to face her, still seeming humored, his eyes tickled with an emotion she doesn’t see often from him. So infrequently, in fact, that she didn’t know what emotion it was. . .just that it wasn’t the typical, aloof gaze that he normally leveled her with.
“Thank you,” she gathered her purse in her lap and gripped the straps like they’d keep her from saying something stupid, “Have a sweet night, or good dreams, or – have, um – christ,” the grip hadn’t worked, “Have a good night.”
Harry nodded politely toward her, “I’m sure I will,” he replied, “You too.”
As Y/N took the elevator to her floor, walked to her door, ambled her way through her flat while she started shedding layers, and made her way to the bathroom (all while Hazelnut slithers around her ankles), her mind raced. Niall had heard from his friend’s, dog’s, cousin’s, owner’s sister (or whatever) that Harry was a freak, hadn’t he? That he was into different kinky dynamic play, how his dick is huge, he edges people for weeks, he fucks nasty. Did he actually want to do that with her? Why else would he ask a question about her opinion on feeling out of control of her body?
Or – fuck, did he really just want to know if she did other drugs? And then she accidentally made it weird saying it depended on the context. Like, seriously – what other context could there be? Drugs, alcohol, or giving your body to a kinky sadist and letting them make decisions over it? She seriously thought her face could melt off from how much heat it held, despite the way glacial winds battered against her cheeks while she walked to the front door.
Of course, she updated Niall, after her shower, when droplets of water were still clinging to her skin and she avoided stepping out of the bathroom because she knew it would be freezing.
Ten minutes later, she gets a reply (probably in the middle of a snack break, or a piss break – they have one scheduled in every thirty minutes of their gaming).
OH MY FUCKING GOD!!!!!!!
He might as well just tell you he wants to fuck at this point, he’s being so obvi
Should you show up to work in a collar and buttplug or would that be too much?
. . .
The thing is – Harry is a professional.
There are no lingering gazes or suggestive questions during work hours, nor are there references or insinuations that they’d ever spent even a moment together outside this kitchen. Again, unless being scrutinized by the razor-sharp eye of the deluded, their relationship dynamic hasn’t changed by much. However, Harry is much more giving with compliments, or soft praises to encourage her. She roasted a rack of lamb the other day and when Harry tasted it, accompanied with a careful hum and a pissed-off face, he verbalized, “This is good,” with a nod of his head, “It can be even better next time. We’ll work on the seasonings together.”
So that’s nice – because Y/N doesn’t necessarily want to be the source of kitchen gossip. For example, when one of the servers that used to work there started hooking up with Vivian, their saucier, only for Vivian to find out the server had a wife. Then she found out at the beginning of their shift one day, promptly cried about it to the other kitchen staff (the kind of inconsolable sniffles that were hard to stop), and as Y/N recalls, Harry had said something like, “Take the day to compose yourself, we don’t need tears in the sauce.” Which. . .could he have been nicer about it? He sure could have, but the more she grew to know him, the more she realized that this was Harry being nice.
(He’d run the sauce station that day, had Y/N follow him around like the imprinted duckling she acted like, and – mysteriously – the server quit a couple of weeks after that.)
The moral of the story was – if people were fucking at work, they kept quiet about it. As long as nobody brought the drama and theatrics of their relationship into the kitchen, and so long as their meals never paid the price of the emotional toil an argument in the break room could have – Harry didn’t care what anyone did. Though Y/N isn’t sure if he knows who is rendezvousing with who. He doesn’t care to concern himself with petty things like that – or so Y/N thinks. It’s just the vibes he gives off.
Does he give off the vibe of someone who would fuck an employee? Well. . .Y/N and Niall have differing responses to this question. If you ask Niall, Harry is frothing at the mouth to stick his hands down Y/N’s pants in the pantry room and make her beg for him to spit on her tongue. If you ask Y/N – yeah, Harry kind of does seem like he’s into that, but she couldn’t be positive that he wanted it from her. Or, maybe he might, but he’d realize how inexperienced she is in kink and that could be a turn-off. Who wants to have to teach someone how to fuck the way they like it? That’d probably be so aggravating, especially for him. Up until recently, she thinks he barely liked teaching her anything to begin with and that was the basis of their relationship.
“You’ve clearly haven’t read enough corruption kink literature,” Niall flicked her ankle, Y/N’s foot resting on his thigh while he carefully brushed the nail polish over her pinky toenail (Y/N helped him get rid of his calluses and ingrown nails in a very grueling “at-home-spa” day last week, so this was his repayment – he was surprisingly very serious about it and doing a great job), “I’ll send you some recommendations.”
Y/N sighed, dropping her head against the back of her couch, and narrowly avoided landing on Hazelnut (who lifted her head and glared momentarily before going back to sleep), “He’s been – like, you know how he has me come in on off days to practice?” Niall hummed a small nod, “Beyond a few subtle things I’m definitely reading into, he doesn’t mention anything crazy at all. I’m starting to feel like he just wants to fuck with me.”
“Fuck with you, fuck you – it’s the same difference,” he shrugged, pressed the brush back into the bottle and dunked it a few times, “Harry is a serious guy, yeah? He’s not going to interrupt prep or cooking with clear signals that he wants to blow your back out. It’s why he only does or says shit kind of blatant outside of that environment – his personal and work life are separate.” Niall tilted his head to the side, “I’d say you’re one more outing from the work setting away from him having you call him Daddy, but that’s just my hypothesis.”
With her unpainted foot, she nudged his knee and ignored him when he clicked his tongue, scolding her for it, “Shut up,” she sighed again, “Ugh, I want to fuck him.”
“In due time,” he murmured wisely, “Now stop moving your damn foot before I paint the whole toe.”
Niall did have a point and it did stand with Y/N’s – Harry is a professional through and through. There’s no way he would hint anything at work, right? At least definitely not during working hours. She guesses why she’s frustrated, is because there aren’t many opportunities that involve her and Harry outside of the kitchen. So they’re basing all these theories off the whole two times something kind of happened, and it would probably be an outstanding amount of time before they were alone outside of the restaurant again.
Unless Adam could convince him to come out for dinner and drinks again, but – well, Y/N doesn’t see that happening any time soon.
. . .
Y/N was in a bad mood.
It was mostly hormonal, she knew that; this morning she woke up to her period which had been looming over her with threats in the form of symptoms. Her breasts were tender, her lower back ached, and the fatigue was so intense it was hard for her to stay awake for more than a couple hours at a time on her off days. Plus she was horny and hungry, in equal, large, thought-consuming amounts which was the biggest red flag (no pun intended). Still, she could have had an LED sign light up on her ceiling that said YOU’RE PERIOD STARTED!!! and she still would have worn the same shocked, annoyed expression when she wiped after peeing.
Thankfully she’d only bled in her underwear, but still, she was annoyed that it forced her hand to start laundry. And all she wanted to do was eat a breakfast sandwich, take a bath, and crawl back into bed but she needed to be at work in a couple of hours. There were errands she needed to run, Hazelnut had a vet appointment, and she thinks she promised her neighbor she’d change the batteries in their smoke alarm (it was an older couple, who had no business standing on a chair to reach it). A list of things that were daunting on a normal day, but even worse today, and she had to work a busy shift on top of that.
Things have been hectic at work lately – it always is after the holidays, so they’ve been running around like crazy. Even Harry and Adam have had to jump in even more than they already do, preparing dishes, cooking the meat, sauteing vegetables, and the like – because they’ve been getting slammed. Both during the day for lunch and at night – Y/N wonders if the rich were trying to quell their seasonal depression with fancy meals or something. So she knew that having a nice, easy night wasn’t promising, and while she woke up in a foul mood already, that did nothing but worsen it.
Then, to add icing to it, her ex messages her again and she should really just block the dumbass’s number but something in her heart won’t let her. So there was that too.
Still, she goes about her business in the morning and when she gets to work, she puts on that she’s doing just fine. Y/N had always been a firm believer that you shouldn’t make your bad mood other people’s issue, so she tries to keep it to herself as much as she can. And she’s good at it too – only Niall notices that she’s more grumpy than normal, and it wasn’t for anything but the sound of her laugh being just a touch different. Niall is very in tune with the people he considers himself close with, so a tonal shift of any kind has his brain dinging. He seems to know the root of the issue before Y/N could disclose it (sometimes she wonders if he has a tracker on his phone to keep up with her dates) because at lunch there’s a piece of chocolate and two paracetamol waiting for her in the breakroom.
Everyone else doesn’t seem to notice anything wrong either, save for Harry, maybe. It feels like his eyes are more keen on her today than they typically are on her, following her around the kitchen. Or maybe he’s just in super mentor mode and is making sure her dishes are being prepared correctly, even in the fast-paced environment of a dinner rush. Either or, every time she looked up his eyes bore into her with the same apathetic glare he always had and she always darted her gaze away quickly (could he at least look a little happy when he saw her? Why did he always seem so unimpressed?).
For the most part, he leaves her be, too busy with his own shit to have time for any additional hovering than normal. He sticks close by so he can taste or correct a technique, but far enough that Y/N can zone out a bit – fall into the methodical structure of making mass amounts of potage aux legumes and let the rest of the night zip by. He’d barely spoken to her today, but once two hours ago, when he tasted the soup.
“The taste is good,” he told her, “The consistency could be smoother but this isn’t a bad start. Try pureeing less at a time and it will improve.” It does take a knock at her confidence but he rebuilds it rather quickly the next batch she makes when he stirs it and hums approvingly.
By the time the end of the day rolls around, she’s dog-tired. The exhaustion only weighs heavier in her bones when Harry grabs her attention as they are cleaning, “Stay after tonight.” That is all he says, and she immediately wants to flatten her face into a pillow and scream but instead, she nods and replies, “Okay.” with little fuss. Despite how extra fussy she feels.
Soon enough, Niall is squeezing her shoulder and telling her to message him when she gets home, and Adam is threatening Harry to not stay here too late. Really, this is no different than any other day – Harry typically expects her to stay until he tells her to go, but a request like this must mean he’s planning something. She just couldn’t figure out what, considering his normal “teaching her something new” days are the days the kitchen’s closed. Y/N thinks she’d be more annoyed about staying if Harry were anyone else but – well, it’s Harry, after all. Even in a foul mood, she is appreciative of any extra time he wants to give her to instill some of his knowledge.
They finish tidying – or, Y/N finishes tidying. She wasn’t sure what Harry was doing until she turned around to find that he had a variety of ingredients out, some in their respective measuring cups, some still in the packaging. The confusion must show on her face, because without so much of a hum to question him, Harry is explaining what she’s looking at, “We’re going to make a slice of cake.”
Y/N tilts her head, “A slice of cake?”
“A big slice,” Harry nods resolutely, “Do you like chocolate?”
She blinks, his eye contact undeviating, “I – yes? Yes, I do.”
“Good. Let’s begin.”
It’s. . .weird. Y/N’s very confused because Harry has never given any indication that he’s interested in desserts at all. Of course, she knew that he was capable of creating pastry dishes, but he always seemed to prefer savory dishes – his owning a restaurant like the one he does was proof enough of that. A weird fact that she’d picked up about chefs in general is that once they find their flavor they tend to stick there. A chef who prefers searing steaks and curating the perfect plate for dinner typically fumbles through baking a cookie made from scratch. She’s unsure why that is, but it has happened enough times for her to make note of it.
Harry, as always, seems to be perfect at all things. He moves around, showing her what order to add the ingredients, the consistency it should be after mixing, and how to perfectly melt the chocolate – all with the practiced ease of someone who bakes every day. Maybe he does when he gets home, but she hardly believes that.
Harry just belongs in the kitchen. Every aspect of cooking, of baking, of creating something delicious for people to consume and enjoy – seems to be a craft that he’s perfected somehow. Y/N knew that if culinary school hadn’t worked out, she would use her business minor to do. . .something. Having a degree would make it easier to get hired at some random skyscraper building, doing desk work 9-to-5. She would’ve made do with that – it wasn’t her dream by any means, but she could still find happiness somewhere, even if it wasn’t at work. There were still holidays to cook for her family, friends who wouldn’t have survived off more than the fries in her university cafeteria, and neighbors who appreciated her replicating old school dishes from their childhood.
But Harry? No. . .there was nothing else he could do. He didn’t fit anywhere else – or at least, she thinks he is too stubborn to fit anywhere else; his heart, his body, and his spirit all belong near pots and pans. At least that’s what she thinks – she’s honestly quite sure he’d agree.
It doesn’t take too long, and when he slides it into the oven to bake (she’d never seen a tin that was cut into multiple slices before – and they only filled up one of the six), she wonders what they’ll do while they wait.
The answer is clean up, which she should’ve seen coming, but that only takes a little while. As she’s wiping off the soap suds from her hands, Harry is prompt against the counter they’d been working on. The area they’d utilized is wiped down, sparkling, and smelling faintly of the cleaner he orders in large shipments (the boxes are heavy, Y/N knows firsthand). She doesn’t know what they’ll do – hopefully not stare at each other for the remaining 15 minutes of the bake time – so she searches for questions about the baking process to fill in the empty space.
Harry beats her to it.
“How is your mood today?” He inquires, his fingers tapping an uneven rhythm against the counter.
“My mood?” Y/N repeats, and he nods, “Oh. . .well. . .I mean – why do you ask?” The question seemed kind of cryptic to her. Did she have a huge blood stain on the back of her bottoms? It sounded like the kind of thing you ask someone before you potentially tell them something that would put them in a poor mood. How is your mood today? Because just so you know, I’ve been staring at a blood spot the size of a small country on the back of your pants, just so you know – it’s probably been there since about midday.
“You were different today,” he tells her, “You’re typically more bubbly. You seem to be in a poor mood – am I right?”
Y/N is shocked. Like, legitimately – if anyone had told her a couple of months ago – or, arguably, even last week – that Harry would notice any sort of change in her mood, she thinks she would have popped a lung from laughing so hard. Because the very idea of Harry paying enough attention to her to even recognize what her baseline was is hard to believe. So hard to believe that it’s actually kind of hilarious, the thought – like imagining a llama baking a cake.
She stares at him for probably a little too long to be normal, the gears cranking and turning in her head before she finally thinks to reply, “Oh!” Y/N shakes her head, then realizes it looks like she’s disagreeing with him so she fixes it to a nod, and in the end, her head just looks like it’s wobbling and knocking her brain around (it feels like it too), “I mean, yeah I wasn’t in a great mood today? Was it that obvious? I thought I was doing a good job hiding it.”
“You did well,” he countered, “I was just paying close attention today.”
Y/N’s breath catches in her throat, “You were?”
“Mhm,” he nods, “Is there something wrong?”
She sighs, shoulders sinking, “No, not really, just – tired, I guess? It’s like. . .personal or whatever,” she says, but then motions to her uterus and forgets that she’s trying not to be blunt and continues, “My period, so like I’m just tired. And my ex messaged me which was annoying, then I had a busy day so there was just. . .a lot stacked against me today.”
Harry’s mouth opens around an “Ahh, I see,” before the oven beeps. He holds his finger as if telling her to put a pin in the conversation before he goes to retrieve it. Harry brings it to the counter they were at to cool. “And it’s been busy today, so I’m sure that was no help.”
She shrugs, her face feeling hot when she realized she might have been too open, “It’s – that’s life I guess. Sorry for telling you that, by the way,” she wanted to melt into the ground, form a puddle that he mops up then pours down a drain, “You probably didn’t want to know that.”
“I asked you, didn’t I?” He rebuts, “If I ask then I want to know the answer. I appreciate your honesty.” Harry pulls the icing that they made closer to them, “This is my second time hearing about your ex. Why does he keep messaging you?”
“Ugh,” Y/N flops her body further against the workbench, groaning, noting that the pressure of the edge pushing against her lower abdomen is nice – Harry’s big ass hand against it would be nice too, probably, and warm (she would be imagining that later while she was in bed), “It’s stupid because he’s always just asking me for restaurant recommendations, or wondering if I can get him a table and a discount here, like – he’s so annoying about it.”
Harry hums again, thinks for a moment, then replies, “Pardon my language, but why don’t you tell him to fuck off?”
Y/N laughs a little, humorlessly, “I – I’m not sure,” she plucks at her fingernail, “Maybe then because that makes me the bitter ex-girlfriend? We ended things mutually with no hard feelings. . .or, like – he thinks it was no hard feelings at least.”
There were plenty of hard feelings, actually, Y/N was just good at pretending that there weren’t. They had dated for three years, the longest relationship she’d ever been in and the most serious she had ever felt about another person romantically (at least next to her long-standing celebrity crushes – that was an untouchable love that no man in her life could ever come close to). Y/N thought things had been going well, enough that she was starting to wonder if they should talk about moving in together. There had never been any glaring red flags that something was going on, that his eyes were wandering, that when he was with her he was thinking about his new coworker who understands him on a deeper, personal level than their relationship could have ever gone – according to him, at least.
Y/N remembers how it felt with her hands in his, the way he stroked her knuckles, how he made a big deal of looking empathetic like the situation wasn’t his fault, to begin with, “I never physically cheated,” he promised, “But emotionally. . .emotionally I haven’t just been yours for a couple of months now.”
“How long?” She’d inquired, her voice steady as she could have made it. She wanted to cry but she didn’t, because. . .well, Y/N knows how to hold them in, you know? And she’d rather feel them burn behind her waterline than let this stupid fuck see her upset.
“Six.”
She remembers pulling her hands away, slipping them from his grasp, with a soft frown, “Okay,” she wanted to shove him off the chair he was sitting on, “Thanks for letting me know.”
It probably hadn’t been the reaction he was expecting. Part of Y/N thinks that it hadn’t been the reaction he wanted either; who didn’t want their girlfriend to grovel at their feet? Beg to be chosen? Remind him of all their time spent together and why he shouldn’t throw that all away. That’s the reaction he wanted – to be sought after and fought for, but she didn’t give him that. And she thinks, maybe, every time he just pops up and asks her about recipes to impress someone, or to get him a reservation and money off at a high-class restaurant – he thinks he’ll get that big reaction. Almost like he wants to feel justified in what he did – his bitter ex, he had to break up with, it just wouldn’t have ever worked, like see how hostile she got when he just asked a question?
Harry watches her, as she relives the moment, with furrowed brows, “What a prick.”
Y/N laughs, “It’s fine, it’s whatever,” she waves her hand, “This place is way too ritzy for him to afford anyway, so at least I don’t have to worry about him showing up.”
After the cake cools, Harry carefully transfers it to a decorating board. He shows her how to spread the icing so it’s a smooth finish, where to add the slices of strawberry, and the appropriate and classy amount of whipped cream to dollop on top. “Ready to try it?” Y/N nods, probably the most enthusiastic she’s been all night. Harry only grabs one fork, and she’s confused – did he not want to try it himself? Or was he going to indirectly kiss her again so she could think about it like a loser for two weeks nonstop?
Harry slices into the desert, a spot that has the right amount of ganache icing they made, that shows off the fluffiest most moist part of the cake, it gets some of the strawberry and some of the whipped cream too. She’d never witnessed someone so methodically get every aspect of desert into one bite, nor had she ever had them present it to her either. Hovering near her mouth, waiting for her to part her lips – which she does – so that he can slip it inside.
For as careful as he was getting all the right parts of it onto the fork, he was not very careful in the transmission – or maybe Y/N’s coordination is just worse off than she thought because some ended up on her lips and chin.
But the cake is delicious; what she’s chewing and swallowing down is divine. As she looks for a napkin she whines, “That’s so yummy,” with a frown, “It’s a waste to have to wipe any of it from my chin.”
She expected a huff from his nose, maybe. The way he shows he’s a little amused by her before taking to the rest of the cake and having a bite for himself.
Instead, Harry’s hand raises to her face.
Y/N freezes – like a predator has just spotted her in the forest foraging for seeds. She can’t read him (could she ever?) exactly, as his fingers carefully cradle her jaw. Her breath sticks in her throat when the pad of his thumb swipes over the mess on her chin in a way that’s almost too tender for how fast her heart races. Has he ever touched her before? Have Harry’s fingers ever gotten anywhere near her face?
She’s dizzy when he swipes it up, over her bottom lip, resting carefully at the seam of her mouth. It’s his turn to still, waiting quietly, patiently, for her to make a move, but Y/N is seriously frozen! Her brain is not computing a single bit of stimuli right now and she thinks she’s malfunctioning, blinking at him, not pulling away, not getting closer.
Harry wears the tiniest, smallest smile at the corner of his mouth, “Open,” he orders, and Y/N’s lips part automatically – did he plant a chip in her brain or what? His thumb sinks between them and rests on her tongue, sweet from the chocolate, salty from his skin – his skin – that she’s tasting, because his thumb is in her fucking mouth! “Suck.”
Was she really doing this? Yes, absolutely. Somewhere, hardwired in her brain is the desire and need to listen and enact every instruction he’s ever given her. Even if that instruction is to suck on his thumb while the rest of his fingers splay out over her jaw, and her heart was hammering like a rabbit's, and the gleam in his eyes resembled a wolf’s.
Y/N is tentative about it; honestly, it’s probably way less porn-y than it could have been. She wishes she had the wherewithal to bob her head, make it sexy, something for him to remember and dream about later – that would make him want her more. But it isn’t like that. She is shy, the way she curls her tongue around his knuckle, how she pulls him deeper into his mouth with careful each careful suck. The icing is long gone by now, but she doesn’t want to let go or look away from him and how he stares at her mouth.
The only thing that gets her to let go is when Harry starts to pull away, and even then – she grazes her teeth along his knuckle when he withdraws. A whine bubbles in her throat when she swallows thickly, wanting more, but it’s like Harry reads her mind. With one hand, he grabs her wrist as if to keep her still, and with the other, Harry pulls a slice of strawberry from the cake and offers it to her, holding it at her mouth. This time he doesn’t have to instruct her to part her lips, she just does it, and he seems pleased as he feeds it to her. Watches her chew, rubs his thumb along her bottom lip, and once she swallows, urges her mouth open again.
She opens up as wide as he wants her to and lets him carefully prod his fingers inside of her mouth. Harry uses his index and middle fingers, sliding against the ridges of her teeth, petting the inside of her cheek, and sliding down her tongue again. When he does that she tries to close her lips around him again but he clicks his tongue, “Ah ah,” he shakes his head, “I didn’t tell you to do that, did I?” This time she does whine, pitiful and needy. Something wanting curls low in her gut and she thinks she might pass out because she really hasn’t taken a proper breath in like three whole minutes.
But she lets him explore her mouth and feel what he wants to feel, and she isn’t sure what his motive is. Maybe just to prove that he could – perhaps just to see that Y/N would do anything he told her to.
Eventually, he finally pulls his fingers from her mouth. With the ones not wet from her spit, he caresses her cheek with his knuckles, sighing, “Hm, it’s time to go home,” he murmured, “You had a long day.”
What? That was it? Wasn’t he supposed to. . .Y/N doesn’t know, she thinks he was supposed to like –bend her over the table and fuck her or something, right? That’s usually where these things go, don’t they? The hot, sexy mentor throws his sweet little mentee down and stuffs her full. . .or something like that.
Harry must notice her confusion because he laughs – a bright sound from him that’s rare to hear. She’s used to the puffs through his nose and the mild look of amusement, not something so outwardly jovial, “What is it?” He inquired, “Expecting something else?”
She blinked at him.
“Oh, uh….no?”
“Okay then,” he nodded, “I’ll pack up this cake for you.”
. . .
Y/N hasn’t stopped thinking about it.
She doesn’t think anyone in their right mind could stop thinking about it., honestly. The ghost of his fingers still weighs in her mouth, poking and caressing all the spots hidden from his eyes. His gaze, staring at her curiously but knowingly, all in the same glance – like he knew she would let him do it but wondered how far she would let him go. And Y/N isn’t coy; there’s no cat-and-mouse game with her. She would have taken anything he put into her mouth without a second thought, probably, just because Harry was the one telling her to.
Did he like that, or was that a turn-off? This was only one of many questions plaguing her every waking thought, along with her subconscious, that had been unhelpfully supplying scenarios in her dreams, all of which ended with her legs spread and needy. A recurrent theme in every naughty dream is that she can’t see Harry at all, but she knows that it’s him – she could feel him, his aura, the true, honest-to-god vibe that he just emitted from being near. And just as soon as he’s about to come into view, crawl up her body, unzip his trousers, and finally let her see what the hell he’s been hiding in there. . .she wakes up.
It’s a cruel joke, and one she has a feeling would make Harry a little giddy. Honestly, it's more like a nightmare, really. A horny nightmare.
She hadn’t told Niall about this recent development yet because it had suddenly gone from fun, delusional daydreams to horny, lingering nightmares. How was she going to explain to Niall that Harry had poked around in her mouth but then didn’t fuck her? Honestly, she was like. . a little embarrassed about how easily she gave in. How much better would it have been had she trailed her tongue around his knuckles, grazed her teeth against the skin, hummed, and maintained eye contact but with a twinkle that bespoke her playful, confident demeanor? Harry probably would have had no choice but to fuck her then. . .like it might have been a need at that point, had she really pressed forward and been sexier.
The next day, Harry is painfully normal. Not even a glimmer in his gaze would suggest he even made a cake with her yesterday (one that she had already consumed when her belly was aching with cramps and her mind was aching with questions), let alone shoved his fingers in her mouth. Y/N tried her best to act the same: indifferent and calm. But when Harry stands beside her, when he tastes the soup she was preparing and murmurs his praise, when he accidentally touches her arm as he’s reaching for the ladle – goosebumps pimple all over her body. She stiffens, her heart races, she thinks maybe she could pass out, and her mouth feels significantly empty (and she’s significantly upset about it).
But nobody else seems to notice. The person would have been her delusional partner in crime, but when lunch comes around, and all he has to talk about is the Grammys and how he’s been farming for gold in League – well, Y/N knows she’s not being obvious. At least not to anyone but Harry, who could probably smell the tension on her when he was within 400 meters of her, like a shark sniffing out blood in the ocean.
All she received as acknowledgment for the night before was a question right after lunch when Y/N had just left the storage room carrying two large containers of chicken broth. They’re balanced on top of one another, and she keeps them stable with her hands and her chin on the top of the second container.
“Did you enjoy the rest of the cake?” He inquired, appearing out of thin air and taking them from her easily, holding them close to his body “Or are you saving it?”
Y/N’s face felt hot at the memory, especially when she admitted, “I finished it already.”
“Ahhhhh,” he seemed pleased, “Yeah? It must’ve been really good then.”
She nodded, her breaths felt thin in her throat, “Yes,” she agreed, “Thank you again, for that.”
Then Harry tilted his head, “Which part?” Either he’s just a pro at pretending to be aloof in all situations, or this particular situation didn’t leave him as giddy, breathless, or frazzled as it did her. She’s more inclined to believe the latter as his gaze sits still upon her, undeviating, and. . .well, he didn’t look like he cared much what her response would be.
Before she could answer, Adam came barrelling out of the kitchen, “Y/N!” He’d exclaimed, and he seemed so frantic that it had Y/N’s heart kicking in her chest – what could be wrong? “Please settle this between Niall and I. He’s making an absurd claim that my leather club pants are outdated and tacky but –”
“That’s because they are,” Nill emerged after him, “When was the last time you saw someone in leather pants for a night out, and it wasn’t a Groovy 70s-themed event?” He tossed his arms up, “Just buy a fitted trouser if you want to show off your ass! Ask Harry where he gets his.”
Harry had disappeared from her side in the fuss, so Y/N never got to answer – though she didn’t know what her answer would be. Thank you for noticing I was in a bad mood? Thank you for making me a slice of cake under the guise of teaching but you actually just wanted to do something nice for me? Thank you for saying my ex was a prick? Thank you for putting your fingers in my mouth and then implanting what will easily be months worth of wet dreams?
Other than that, he hadn’t brought it up, and it had been a full week. Y/N was going crazy thinking about it over and over and over again, mouth feeling painfully empty. Every time she swallowed, she imagined the weight of Harry’s fingers on her tongue, how much space he’d occupied, how she thought he would’ve kept going even if she started drooling all over him. Y/N hadn’t even thought about actual dick-in-vagina penetration with her ex as much as she was thinking about Harry putting his fingers in her mouth, like – seriously, she’s feeling a little pathetic.
Still, she persists through her days, cooks, cleans up, pretends like she isn’t itching to crawl into his shirt, and refuse to leave. . .let’s Niall talk about his campaign in league with Adam (whatever the fuck that means). Y/N figures that either something will happen or. . .it won’t. She sure as fuck wasn’t going to bring it up – like, what if he regretted it? Maybe he thought about it and decided it wasn’t what he was looking for. Maybe he wanted something different, someone different, someone prettier, who was sexy and didn’t ruminate about a two-minute situation for seven days.
Y/N is kind of abandoning all hope one night when everyone had left the kitchen, and only she and Harry remained. It was quiet, reminiscent of how it was just a month or two ago, with Y/N stuck in a loop, wondering what Harry was thinking when he was silent like this. He made his way around the kitchen, tidying, marking things off on his sheet, carefully storing what could be preserved.
There are so many thoughts roaming around in her head that she’s barely paying attention to what she’s doing, which technically shouldn’t be a problem because she’s just cleaning. But maybe when she’s cleaning the stove she should be just a little extra careful. Even if it’s been a while since it’d been on, a burner that’s been scalding hot all day typically takes quite a while to cool down. The light near the dial warning of its heat was still illuminated, but Y/N wasn’t paying any mind to that. So she isn’t extra careful like she should be and she ends up accidentally burning the side of her finger on the burner grates.
She flinches, cursing low to herself and gripping her finger.
“What happened?” Harry, who had just been across the kitchen, was suddenly at her side when Y/N turned to toss the wash rag in the sink. She’ll admit that it made her yell, startled by his agility and wondering if he should have looked into being a private detective, or a spy even. His eyes widened at the volume of it, echoing through the kitchen.
“Shit!” She breathed out, holding her fingers from the pain, then both of them held to her heart, feeling it slam against her chest, “Harry, you scared me!”
Harry is firm but gentle in the way he reaches out to her; his fingers slide down her forearm to get a grip on her wrist before guiding her to the sink. He twists the faucet on, and a soft, cool stream flows from the nozzle. When Harry can identify which finger she hurt, he carefully pulls it to sit beneath it. At first, Y/N hisses, her body jerking, but Harry’s grip on her is so steady that she barely even budges and that. . .she’s real enough to admit that it does something for her. But what doesn’t do something for her these days – she’s really easy to work up lately, and she knows the man holding her so tightly right now is the one to blame.
“You need to be more careful,” he scolds her after a little while, and when Y/N turns to look at him, she realizes his face is much closer than she thought it’d be. Her gaze darts back down to her finger as she clears her throat, “You aren’t normally clumsy like this. Are you alright?”
She nods quickly, “Yes, yeah, sorry I just – got distracted,” she shrugs, “I’m a little tired.”
Harry stares at her for a moment, holding her finger beneath the water – it really isn’t necessary for him to stand there but she wasn’t going to complain about him holding her hand. Even if this is a little more clinical than how she’d like it, she’d take this – how big his fingers looked compared to hers, the way they swallowed her hands up when they’d move from her forearm, stretching out over her knuckles. They’re warm too, and surprisingly soft. She’d expected more callouses from him, but they were smooth like he’d used a sugar scrub on them. And because her pervy brain couldn’t do anything but haunt her, she tried to remember if they felt that soft in her mouth too.
“You’re always saying that,” he clicked his tongue, “How tired you are.” Yeah, Y/N guesses she says that a lot, but the thing is – she’s never said that to Harry directly before. To complain about being sleepy in front of Harry would have been like trying to piss him off on purpose. It’s just a rule of thumb not to whine or moan about how busy you were or how tired you are to Harry. Honestly, it was a rule of thumb not to speak unless spoken to when it came to him during work hours. The only person to break this regularly was Adam, and Y/N was second to that, only because she had just recently gotten comfortable calling him over to ask questions about the dishes she was preparing.
So how Harry had been hearing her complain about being tired, she wouldn’t know. That’s something she only thinks about or fusses with Niall over. Maybe she’d said it once or twice to the other staff in the kitchen this week because it had been extremely tiring, but she couldn’t imagine speaking loud enough that Harry would have heard her.
“I’m just having trouble falling asleep lately I guess,” because my sexy as fuck mentor is all I can think about, and it’s haunting my dreams – Harry hums again, “Even when it’s busy here and I’ve been running around all day, I just kind of. . .stay awake when I’m home. Hazelnut doesn’t help, she loves playing until late. I have to tire her out.”
Harry smiles a little, at what Y/N believes to be the thought of Hazelnut, but then he opens his mouth, “It seems like you need something to tire you out too, hm?”
It was a loaded statement to make, and Y/N is immediately reading into it.
So she could either stumble over her words, or she could try something – to propel this further. To make him understand that she wanted this too if he did – that it’s all she can think about. That she wants his stupid, dumb, soft fingers filling her mouth again. Pressing at her gums, the back of her teeth, stroking along her tongue, making her feel dumb and needy because she wants it to be his cock so badly, but she’ll take whatever he gives her.
“Are you. . .are you offering?”
It could have come out more confident, for sure, but the message comes across clearly. Harry, once more, allows a smile to twitch at his mouth when he looks at her – a brief thing that makes her insides stir up as he slips his hands from hers.
“That depends,” he answers, turning off the faucet, “Are you a good girl?”
Y/N’s breath feels like it leaves her lungs but she somehow manages to speak, “I – yes,” she pouts her mouth, “You know I am.”
Another hum, “You’d let me fill up your mouth with my fingers again?” It’s his only true mention of it happening, and Y/N thought she wanted him to be direct about it, but her heart slams against her sternum hard enough that it might crack it. Her ribs rattle with each beat, and all the blood in her body is surging this way and that. Every cell in her body shivers and vibrates in anxious excitement.
“Yes.” She agreed urgently.
“What else would you let me put in your mouth?” Harry goads, but Y/N doesn’t mind playing into it. She’s never been one to play hard to get, really, and maybe that makes her look extra desperate and extra pathetic, but she doesn’t care if it gets her what she wants. Right now, she’ll look as pathetic and desperate as she needs to, if that’s what Harry likes – if it’s what finally pushes him.
Y/N wheezes, practically, “Anything.”
That does make Harry chuckle, the smile returning only this time much bigger, and she sees that dimple again – honestly, she might scream if he doesn’t fill her mouth up quickly. Harry’s palm is soft when it cradles her cheek tentatively and slowly before he introduces his thumb to the corner of her lips, “Anything, huh?” He repeats, pressing down into the tender flesh of her mouth, firm enough that it pushes her bottom lip against her teeth, “You’d let me fuck my fingers in your mouth right here again if I wanted, right? You’d drool all over them like the messy, greedy little puppy you are. Open your mouth.”
A sound leaves Y/N, something like a whine and a gust of breath leaving her lungs again, and she’s so worked up she feels herself squeeze around nothing. She parts her lips instantly and feels strings of spit stretch and snap with her mouth as it opens and Harry slips his thumb inside of it. Y/N should wait for him to tell her to suck again, probably, but she can’t help it – she wants to, so badly, and she’s been thinking about it, and his thumb actually feels really good in her mouth. Does she have an oral fixation? Wouldn’t have that arisen at some other point in her life? She isn’t sure and she doesn’t care either, not when Harry’s tender hold turns a little sterner.
“I thought you were good, hm? Who told you to start sucking?” He inquired but he makes no move to make her stop, and only huffs a laugh when she whimpers around the thumb in her mouth, “Looks like you wanted this badly, hm? This is what’s been keeping you up at night.” He doesn’t say the last sentence like a question, more like a statement, and he’d be right so there’s nothing for Y/N to pop off and correct him for. She nips around his knuckle, and pulls his thumb in deeper, and she doesn’t know what to do with her hands – so one of them – the one that isn’t burned – grips onto his wrist to keep him from moving it.
Harry does start to slip his thumb from her mouth, but before she can protest it, Harry slips his index and middle finger into her mouth. Now the sound Y/N makes is a little more gleeful, a content hum, and really, since when is she into this? Y/N has never had the urge for something to fill her mouth up like this before, but she needs it more than anything – maybe it’s just because she’s ovulating. She’s always been a bit ravenous during this part of her cycle, and Sabrina Carpenter’s lyrics have started making a lot of sense over the past couple of days, so that would add up. But she needs this more than anything right now.
Embarrassingly enough, Harry must be able to tell, if the way he murmurs, “You really like this, hm?” is anything to go by, “You’ll need training, won’t you? To be a really good girl for me. I’ll teach you how I like my puppies to act. Do you like the sound of that?”
She nods, her mouth full, her eyes threatening to close, her cunt clenching around absolutely nothing and leaking into the cotton covering her. The whole thing should be extra humiliating, but it only turns her on more. A puppy, huh? That’s what he’s into? Y/N could do that – she could wag her tail and bark too if he wanted, she’s just as big a pervert as he is – she might be an even bigger one.
Harry seems. . .endeared? Fond? Y/N doesn’t know if she’s just seeing things, but she hopes that’s what he’s feeling right now. He doesn’t seem disgusted or annoyed, at least, and that’s reassuring to her.
“You’ll need to let go of me for a second,” he murmurs, “We need to go to my office.”
It’s with a mighty sense of will that she’s able to pull away, ultimately more embarrassed now that she wasn’t actively doing it. Harry looks at her lips for a moment longer than she was expecting before guiding her to his office. Y/N had only been in here a couple of times before, one of which when she first came here, Finley by her side as Harry told them all the things he didn’t like and all the things that they would do. When he outlined their schedule, when he was so scary Y/N was regretting accepting his offer, while she wondered if she had what it took to be a chef studying under him.
And now he’s pulling her in here, pushing the door closed behind them, and offering his fingers back up to her mouth. Maybe Y/N is a greedy puppy, because she takes them back in and this time she does bob her head once, pulling them deeper, down to his second knuckle. Her throat convulses at the intrusion, rejecting it, and it makes her shudder as she withdraws some. The saliva in her mouth is on another level right now, but Harry doesn’t seem to care at all. She wonders what he’s thinking about – wonders what he wants from her. Was he getting off on this too?
Y/N looks down, but her view is obscured by his hand. Even if it wasn’t, he uses his other hand to tilt her chin up, “Ah ah, eyes above the belt, Pup,” and the nickname – wow, is it possible for her to cum untouched? She kind of thought stories like that were bullshit but the curl of arousal in her belly is so intense, it feels like there’s no way that it isn’t a possibility.
Harry’s free hand moves from her chin, down to her top. The black button up she has tucked into her bottoms is carefully pulled up from beneath her trouser band, and the button of her trousers follows shortly after. Harry works with a precision only someone with experience could move with, dragging the zipper down, pulling the fabric out, entirely. The tips of his fingers graze along the delicate waistband of her underwear, before he stretches the elastic and slips his fingers in.
When he feels how wet she is, he cusses.
“Jesus fucking Christ,” it’s the first time he’s sounded truly affected by anything, and Y/N bristles with it, humming around his fingers, “Such a messy pussy. All from sucking on my fingers?” Her hips move without her say, bucking into his touch – his fingers are cold in comparison to her scorching insides and she wants more of them. Wants him to rub her clit, wants him to tuck them inside of her, wants to ride them while he sits there with them still and makes her do all the work. She wants, and wants, and wants so viciously that it feels like she might go crazy.
Harry plays around in her wetness a bit, slipping his fingers through it between her folds before slipping the pad of it up to her clit. It’s swollen, flicking beneath his fingers before looping soft circles over it. Y/N moans, her brain fizzling out for a second, all soap bubbles from the sink filling the grooves. It’s the only thing that’s gotten her to stop sucking this whole time, her mouth falling open around it. She wonders if he could feel her pulsate and squeeze around nothing if he liked it, if he liked how she felt. She wonders if he’s hard, and she wants to touch so badly she doesn’t know what to do with herself.
“There you go,” she shivers, his voice is placating like he really was talking to a greedy dog. It’s humiliating in the best way for her and makes her leak more – could he feel that? “Poor thing, all this worked up over a little treat. How cute.” It’s the first time he’s called her cute since after the Korean barbeque, and Y/N is suddenly reminded of that entire night. How he’d made sure she was fed, how he took care of her after, drove her home, calmed her panicked drunk self about the stain she’d left on his shirt. How soft we were with her led to all of these delusions that might not have been delusions in the first place. He did want her, at least in some way. Maybe not in all the ways Y/N wanted him, but still, something was better than nothing. Maybe she could fuck this out of her system and actually sleep without her subconscious bullying her.
It goes from feeling good to feeling really good in just a couple of spins. How all orgasms do, it’s building, and building, and building, until suddenly things are feeling great, and there’s a point where there’s no turning back. That’s where she was at – her teeth dig into his fingers, which is not helping the puppy allegations in the slightest, but Harry doesn’t seem to mind it. He seems amused, tickled, and a little too joyful for someone who hasn’t even gotten touched yet. This alone should have rang alarm bells in her head, but it didn’t, because her head was full of cotton after her brain finished melting from her ears.
So when Y/N knows it would only take a couple more circles of his fingers before she would cum, and he pulls his fingers away – well, she’s shocked. Shocked and horrified and appalled. The look must be written all over her face because Harry’s biting down on a huge smile then, dimples and all, slipping his fingers from her mouth too.
“Wh-why?” She asks, and the distress is palpable – enough that Harry even gives a small, pitied laugh while he thumbs at her bottom lip, “I was almost – I almost –”
“Mm, I wasn’t ready for you to do that yet.” He tells her, and Y/N frowns – nobody had ever snatched an orgasm away from her before. Honestly, her ex just seemed stoked that he could get her there every once in a while. Y/N hasn’t even done that to herself.
“But I was!” It sounds whiny, even to her own ears, and Harry still seems pleased with himself.
“I thought you were a good girl, yeah?” He rubs his fingers, wet from her spit, on his shirt. The fingers wet from her, he merely drags his tongue across right in front of her because he hates her guts and he wants her to suffer before continuing to speak, “Good girls wait for their treats. Are you going to be a well-behaved puppy or not?”
Y/N feels frazzled and overwhelmed and so needy she could scream. She’s starting to think that maybe she was right from the start – maybe he was just fucking with her.
Still, she relents, “You hate me,” she accuses him, but Harry just laughs again, like she’s just the most amusing thing in the world. Probably like when you’re watching your dog look at its reflection for the first time or when you put them in socks and they walk funny. Harry takes it upon himself to rebutton and zip her pants while she pouts, her arms crossed over her chest, “You really do, I knew it.”
Harry doesn’t bother to tuck her shirt in, “You’re fussy when you’ve been edged,” he murmurs, “Poor thing.” He calls her again and plucks at her bottom lip again, only pushing on it until she sucks the pout back into her mouth, “Alright, let’s put some cream on your burn and bandage it.”
The contrast between what they were doing five minutes ago and what was happening now – honestly, was kind of funny. If Y/N was in the mood to find humor in anything, then she’d be laughing, but she’s still feeling a bit huffy over it. She rubs the cream on her little burn while Harry cuts a sliver from the bandage, then helps her loop it around her finger carefully, “Take it off in the morning and air it out,” he murmurs, but then slips the cream and the rest of the bandage in her pocket, “If you do this for three days then it should heal up nicely, and barely scar.”
“Okay,” she nods, “Thank you.”
Harry looks like he’s thinking about something when he’s staring at her, watching as she tucks her shirt back in at least a little bit and addresses her hair that had been smashed between her head and the wall, so her bun was all fucked. When she’s finally halfway righted herself, she finally looks back at him, blinking, waiting for him to speak.
“Be careful on your way home, Puppy,” is what he decides on, and Y/N feels her face get hot all over again, “I’ll see you tomorrow.”
. . .
“Why in the f-u-c-k am I just now hearing about his fingers in your mouth?” Niall is staring at her across the table at a Greek restaurant where she should definitely not be explaining this story. She couldn’t help it, though, because her brain-to-mouth filter is nonexistent when it comes to being with Niall, even when they’re in public. And all Niall had to do was say, Any new Harry stories, I need something to preoccupy my time with – and she was explaining everything.
She did cower beneath his glare, a little, “Because I kind of felt pathetic and stupid because he wasn’t doing anything about it afterward, and he wasn’t bringing it up so I was like – well, guess he decided that I was ugly and – ow!”
Niall, who had kicked her from underneath the table, is staring at her with crossed arms, “Call yourself ugly again and I’ll kick you harder.”
Pouting, she reaches down and rubs at her shin, “--and I was like. . .licking my wounds a bit. But then he did it again so –”
“He did it again?” Niall exclaimed.
“So I was like – well, I better tell Ni,” she finished, then nodded, “It was – Niall, it was crazy! I’ve never been so horny in my life, which is insane, because it was after I burned myself so –”
“Okay, hold the fuck on,” Niall’s pretenses of keeping his language somewhat appropriate for a dine-out setting are lost almost immediately, “Start from the beginning of the night, after I left with Adam.”
Y/N does – she explains it all. From he burning her finger, to Harry sending her off with soaked panties and stuff to treat her wound, and everything that happened in between. Niall is good to tell stories to, even if they aren’t very interesting ones because he’s a very active listener. He gasps, he asks questions, his eyes widen, his brows furrow, his mouth falls agape in shock and he scoffs at the right moments too. By the time Y/N finishes the story, you would’ve thought Niall had gone through it as well, with how flustered he seemed.
“Oh my god,” he’s holding his head in his hands, “I can’t believe you were getting felt up while I was begging Adam to wax my ass for me.”
“Please, Ni, nobody wants to see your balls from that angle when they aren’t planning on fucking you.”
“Oh my god, he is a fucking freak, my sources were correct.” He ignores her, then his head darts up, “Wait, so showing up to work in a collar and a buttplug wouldn’t have been too much! God I understand kinky fuckers so well, it’s like my brain is hardwired for it.”
“Your brain is hardwired for it, because you’re also a kinky fuck. Did you forget?”
He ignores her again, “Wait, so how do you feel about the puppy thing? Is it a turn on or do you actually hate it?”
Y/N had been mulling over this for a couple of days now, “I think if anyone else did it, I wouldn’t like it,” she explained the conclusion she’d come to at 9PM one night, when Hazelnut was lying on her belly, purring, her eyes shut but her right paw kneading her nails just below Y/N’s breast, “But with him it just like. . .feels right? Like I couldn’t imagine him treating me any other way.”
“You’re so right, this is like – this makes perfect sense for him,” he nods.
“What do you think I should do though?” Y/N asks, her hands squeezing around the glass of water she’d been preoccupying them with, “Like – how should I be sexier? What would make it hard for him to keep his hands off me?”
Niall is good to ask, not only because he knows how a guy’s brain might work but because he is sexy. He’s coy and flirty, and every person that he sets his sights on to date ends up obsessed with him. When he’s dating someone, or even when he just has a fuck buddy, he’s always covered in love bites and hickeys, and they’re messaging him nonstop while he ignores them in favor of snapping those medieval torture hair ties with the balls attached to them on Y/N’s head (when she wanted to try a ‘cyberpunk’ hairstyle that didn’t even work out). If anyone knew how to lure Harry, it would be him.
“Don’t do anything differently,” Niall tells her instead, shaking his head, “Clearly, whatever you’re doing does have him worked up.”
Her brows dip, “But I feel like I just come off like a. . .like a. . .”
“Big virgin dummy?”
“Hey!”
“Maybe Harry likes big virgin dummies,” he teases, pulling his straw to his mouth, taking a sip of whatever fruity lemonade he’d ordered, “Listen, Harry is like. . .at the risk of sounding cliche, not like other men. I don’t think the same tactics would work for him. If he wants a “dumb little puppy” to train, then you fit the bill, Sweetheart.” He slides his drink away, “Not to say that you’re dumb or that you even come off as dumb. But you clearly space out when he’s trying to talk to you, listen to what he says, and have this cute deer-in-the-headlights look about you. Plus, you’re good at your job and followed his lead when he acted like nothing happened between you two.” Niall leaned on his hand, “You’re probably pretty interesting to him.”
Y/N runs her thumb over her brows to relax them, “Okay, if you’re sure,” she replies, "I'm like, worried I’ll make the wrong move and he’ll snap out of whatever spell I accidentally cast on him – hey!” He kicks her again.
“You’re cute and funny, there was no spell involved,” Niall scolds her, before a smile pulls at his cheeks, “I can’t believe he’s going to edge you! I’m so giddy right now, I could squeal.”
She hides her face in her palms and shakes her head, “Stop! I’m so – not giddy about that! I know he’s going to be mean.”
“That’s the fun part isn’t it?” Niall pulls at her wrist, “No stop hiding, we need to look up collars and measure your neck when we get back to your place.”
. . .
Another week of nothing passes. The air outside is still cold for the most part, but they’ve come to the part of winter where there’s a fake promise of spring for a week or two. Just before the area plunges back into the icy tundra that torments them until the actual solstice. Still, Y/N enjoys it while she can – opens her windows, and accepts the fresh, warm-ish breeze, and the sun that blares through the glass.
So she starts her day in a pretty good mood. She and Niall are back on the mornings now, but this day in particular Harry isn’t coming in at 5 AM so he relieves her of her 5 AM duties as well. He will be seeing her promptly at 6 AM, however, which. . .okay, yeah, it’s only an hour but an hour is still an hour! Plus the sun was so pretty the day before, Y/N sat outside and soaked it up so she’s high on vitamin D and vibes.
It must show on her face when she walks in, and Harry instructs her to start preparing the vegetables for the day (they’re already washed and waiting for her on the cutting board).
“You’re awfully cheery this morning,” he made note, and Y/N shrugged.
“Is that a bad thing?” She asked.
Harry looked like he was considering it, before shaking his head, “Carry on then. Be in a cheery mood.”
So she does. She even kind of hums a little until Harry side-eyes her, and then she stops humming. Even with the new development in their dynamic, Harry is still intimidating as hell and kind of scary, so she doesn’t want to annoy him or bother him. By no means did she believe that him having his fingers in her mouth and his hand down her pants gave her any special treatment. If Mora gets a glare when she starts singing and cooking the steaks, then Y/N sees herself as no different.
They move harmoniously, as they always do. Adam and Niall come in loud and bright like they always do. Everyone else filters in; the mood is light and airy, and Y/N is excited to start cooking.
The good vibes continue until around 2 PM when there’s a complaint about Y/N’s plate. And the vibes diminish entirely when she walks out to speak to the customer to see what’s wrong, and she sees the same annoying prick that is always there bothering everyone. She hadn’t seen him since the last time he’d come and stirred a fuss. When Harry initially yelled at her, and then she went and cried in the food storage closet. Y/N still remembers how horrible it felt to be accused and scolded for something that she hadn’t even done, and she has a feeling that the same thing is going to happen again today. Because no amount of being a cute, dumb puppy is going to stop Harry from being upset when the state of his business is questioned.
“Oh, what a surprise,” the man says, this time with a different woman sitting across from him, “It’s you again. You think they’d have put some sense into you since the last time.” He raises his hand, this time another piece of hair, another color so far from her own that she could have screamed over it. The only thing that is a little confusing is she doesn’t remember plating this. Y/N was supposed to prepare the seared salmon, but Harry had told her she was needed in the sauces to help Niall. She’d been a little confused but didn’t question it, because any chance to hang out with Niall in the actual kitchen was pretty fun but they’re always at different stations.
So Y/N didn’t make this one, because she hadn’t made salmon today, but it must have come from her station for the waitress to come get her.
The manager is at her side, opening his mouth to apologize again but another presence emerges to the left of them. Y/N turns to see Harry, her heart hammering – was he going to remember that she hadn’t prepared that dish? Or would he have forgotten? This is. . .not a good look, being in the same position as she had been before, even if this time it definitely, without a shadow of a doubt, could not have been her fault. The piece of hair was long in length – longer than Harry’s, and the wrong color too. But he hadn’t noticed the color last time – he’d probably been so mad at her that he was blinded by it.
“Thank god you’re here,” the man shook his head, looking disturbed, “Another piece of hair. You should really look into monitoring the women who –”
“You planted that.” Harry cut him off.
The man stops, blinking.
“Wh-what? That’s absurd?” He exclaimed, “Why would I have done that?”
Harry has the same, impassive look on his face that he did the last time they were in this position, but this time he shrugs, “You tell me. Why would you plant your date’s hair into a dish that I prepared?”
The color drains from the man’s face, “What?” His eyes darted between Harry to Y/N, “When I asked the waitress she said –”
“She said that chef Y/N made it,” Harry filled in the blanks, “But the thing is, Sir, I’ve been hearing a lot about you since you’ve been here last. How you’re always bothering the female staff, how you seemingly only enjoy the food and leave a good tip if it was a male chef, or if you had a waiter as opposed to a waitress. How you’re always here with different women who look uncomfortable in your presence. So I imagine that you saw your food, asked who cooked it – as you always do – heard it was a woman’s name, and thought that you could get a free meal again, correct?”
“Excuse me –” The man was red now, bright red, looking enraged, but Harry continued.
“But I had the hostess alert me when you came in, and I made sure that I was the one to prepare your plate. This –” he plucks the hair from the hands, holding it between his fingers, then holds it up to his head, “Is not my hair. It’s not the same length or the same color, and I was the one to cook the fish, plate the dish, and have it sent out to you. It’s not the same color as your waitress; hers is bright pink, and Chef Y/N has never come into contact with your plate. This does, however, look very similar to your date’s,” Harry holds it out now toward the woman who looks embarrassed to be sitting across from him now, and it is a perfect match – if he dropped it onto her shoulder, nobody would have questioned where it came from, “You planted it.”
“I – I did not –”
“I don’t like liars,” Harry takes another step closer, withdraws the plate from the table, “And I won’t stand for you harassing my staff anymore. Get the fuck out of my restaurant.”
It was so quiet you could hear a pin drop, which is unusual for this time of day, with this amount of people seated and eating. Y/N is staring, wide-eyed, and flustered by the whole situation when Harry pivots from the table, “Y/N.” He says her name and it startles her from her trance. She’s worked with him long enough to know that this means he wants to speak to her, so she trails after him, her heart slamming against her chest.
Harry drops the plate onto the kitchen counter and directs Y/N into his office. Adam catches her gaze, looking distressed – he must think she’s about to get yelled at again. Honestly, maybe she was – Y/N doesn’t know.
He closes the door behind them and Y/N tentatively sits in the chair across from his own at the desk. Harry doesn’t sit though, instead standing beside her, his arms crossed – oh she was definitely getting yelled at –
“I’m sorry.”
Y/N is confused instantly.
“Wait, what?”
Harry takes a deep breath, “I don’t want you thinking that the only reason I did all of this is because of the change in our dynamic,” he explained carefully, “And I want you to know, going forward, how I treat you will not change no matter if we are friendly outside of the kitchen or not. I know you understand this, yes?” Y/N nods, eye gaze locked onto his own, “But after last time, I inquired about this particular customer and heard a lot of stories that I wish would have been shared with me before. Then you cried – and for all I’ve yelled at you, you’ve never looked like that afterward. Never seemed so distressed or sad either, it’s when I first got a feeling that something was off. So I wanted to apologize to you because you deserve it. I should have heard you out and asked you what happened instead of assuming the worst and berating you.” His gaze is softer than she’s ever seen before, despite how angry he just was – it melts her insides and makes her insides swirl with an emotion different than the usual, horny demon that tries to overtake her, “So I’m sorry.”
“Oh – it’s,” she raised her hands, “It’s okay, I –”
“It isn’t,” he replied, “It isn’t okay at all. I’m sorry.”
Y/N swallows thickly, nodding, “I – okay,” she replies, “That’s – I accept? Honestly, I forgot about it like a couple of weeks ago, so I promise I’m not holding onto it or anything! So I accept your apology.” She answers, and she doesn't necessarily know what to do with her hands so she holds out one of hers for him to shake. Y/N isn’t sure why – she’s just a loser, and panicking, and her boss was just really fucking hot out there, so she isn’t sure what to do with herself.
Harry entertains her at least, and meets her hand with his own, shaking it once, “Alright,” he agreed that it was settled on, “Are you okay? I know the situation was uncomfortable.”
She smiles, nodding, “Yeah, it was – it was kind of uncomfortable, but you were really cool out there,” she told him, “Like, badass and cool. That dick has had it coming for a long time, and you told him off so it was. . .it was pretty cool.”
This makes Harry laugh, and he doesn’t let go of her hand. Instead he squeezes hers, warm against his palm.
“You’re cute,” and even if he’s said it before, it still makes her shiver, that he thinks her bumbling and fumbling through her words and sounding stupid was in any way endearing, “Do you have plans tonight?”
Y/N shook her head, “Nothing besides – well, Hazelnut and I may watch a movie.”
“Tell Hazelnut you’ll need a raincheck,” Harry told her, “You’re coming to my flat.”
