Gemma Styles on growing up with her brother before she had to share him with the world.
Itâs a strange experience having your baby brother run off and become a pop star. One thing Harryâs ascent has taught me is that suddenly youâre not seen as a normal person any more, but some famous âthingâ who simply came into being when a camera was first pointed at you. People scurry to gather tidbits of information about his life, wether theyâre readily shared or not, to try and understand where this creature with the hair and silver boots came from.
I was three when Harry was born. As such, the first memories I have of him are typically hazy mix. The little things are what stick with me the most: our old house and garden, climbing frame, family dog. Max war a border collie/lurcher cross, the only grey speckled puppy with a curly tail and multicoloured eyes, from a litter of pure black. I chose him out of affection for his weirdness and we adored him. When Harry was probably only one year old heâd be laying on the floor with Max, or join him in his basket, all blond hair and giant blue eyes, then would suddenly take his dummy out and pointedly shove it in the dogâs mouth instead, like something of The Simpsons. Max looked somewhat puzzled but sort of let him get on with it. Harry has that way about him.
He was very loud. I think the first time I got in serious trouble is when I pushed him off a chair because he wouldnât stop crying. Then there was the time Harry actually tried to get me in trouble, when I told him WWF wrestling was all staged - he took it as a personal insult and as revenge told Mum that I was the worst thing he could think of⌠a drug dealer.
âNo she isnât, Harry⌠sheâs nineâ
When I started school in Holmes Chapel, on hot days when the school-run cars were lined up outside and the parents were passing the time, Harry - never scared of attracting attention - would be stood up in the back of the car, entertaining everyone through the open window. Even then he had that sort of magnetism that made people just want to watch him. He made people laugh. Babies still tend to stare at him now - itâs kind of weird.
Harry the little boy was boisterous. He didnât find it difficult to make friend and had his first girlfriend at the age of four or five. he would do that he wanted but often it seemed that what he wanted was to make other people happy. From a young age, I had dreams of being a teacher and Harry would pretend to be my only pupil, dutifully filling out my homemade worksheets and answering all of the names on the register with different voices. Sometimes an imaginary pupil wouldnât answer so iâd have the undiluted joy of calling out again and asking my âclassâ where they were. Heâd tell me they were on a holiday or at the dentist so I could officially mark the absences. There was one birthday, or Motherâs Day, where we were sat giving Mum her present. Harry was beside himself, for the first time he had managed to not blow a surprise early. Sheâd opened her card and was just about to tear into the wrapping paper when he couldnât hold it anymore and exploded: âItâs a handbag!â So close.
On a family holiday to Cyprus, when Harry must have been about seven, he particularly excelled in the schmoozing game. While I, the introvert, spent mornings stockpiling ham from the breakfast buffet to distribute to the stray cats outside the hotel, he was holding court around the pool with people three times his age. When we left on a shuttle bus back to the airport at the end of our trip there was a crowd of young, adult women gathered on the pavement waving him off through the window, shouting their goodbyes. Sometimes I look at him and wonder how he manages to entrance people, skipping about just being himself, but actually heâs always done it - only now more people get to watch.
Over the first few months of him joining me at secondary school, Holmes Chapel Comprehensive, a few times I had teachers say to me: âSo⌠I met your brother.â For most of my time there I felt painfully shy - speaking in front of the class was my worst nightmare. I was geeky, quiet and, I guess, pretty easy to have in class. When I later trained as a teacher and speaking in front of a class was still a nightmare, I could imagine how Harry may have been a little difficult. I could never picture him being deliberately rude or even particularly disobedient (perhaps rose-tinted glasses), but heâs a joker, talkative and very distracting - not idea for a productive lesson. Often they wouldnât instantly realise we were related.
Harry didnât struggle especially but, three years ahead of him, academics was the one area I was excelling in. He thought he was supposed to match me grade for grade. I think he would get frustrated at times, and Mum would gently push me to help him with science homework and English coursework, to build up his confidence for looming exams. I could never fathom how he had a confidence problems, he was popular, decent at sports and not a bad student either. I would have trade my Aâs for his Bâs and charisma in a heartbeat. I donât say this to point out his flaws but to try and offer some perspective. Everything he does seemed to be effortless, even now; watching him leap around a stage in front of thousands of people, he seems untroubled and free from self-doubt. Itâs easy to be jealous - heâs one of those people who are just good at things, we all know one - but to assume this means he takes it all for granted, or doesnât worry, or try, would be oversimplifying him unfairly. His bundles of talent are a mixture of natural ability and intense heart.
Mum taught us to be independent. As teenagers she raised us both in what was generally a happy little house. âLatch key kidsâ, as she called us, we came home from school before she was done with work. While it sometimes caused her maternal guilt, it was never a band thing, and we learned to coexist as a pair for that daily window, boiling pasta and arguing over the TV remote. When sheâd had a bad day, as we all do sometimes, we tried to step up where we could. Harryâs attempts at cheering her up were all the better for their youthful earnestness. a 12-year-old has seen enough romcoms to know that a thoughtful close is one who runs a bath, so thats what sheâd get from time to time, with a mismatch of house-gathered candles place around the bathroom.
As a âcoolâ kid, Harry stood out but also fitted in. He was always interested in clothes and spent all of his birthday money and wages on getting the trains to Manchester to expand his wardrobe. He had a paper round and then worked in a bakery in the village for a while. Iâd barely be eating my cereal by the time he got home from these absurdly early jobs - the pull of new trainers obviously outweighing time in bed. As a wave of emo teenagers took over Holmes Chapel, we both caught the bug with our floppy fringes and studded belts. To get the look he tried stealing my straighteners to attack his curls â and failed, enlisting my help to smooth his hair into submission. Later he let me cut it as well: I had no idea what I was doing and heâd always hate it for the first 20 minutes before admitting I was right and it did look better. Uh-huh. The skinny jeans never went away.. but the chequered pumps did.
When I went to university and moved out of home for the first time, none of us had any idea that a 16-year-old Harry would be following following suit a few months later. he was talking about choosing his A Levels and had plans to be a physiotherapist. We mostly got on but, at that time, we werenât hugely close; he had his friends and I had mine, our interests were very different, except for music - he would often ask me what I was listening to and Iâd give him emo and chart indie stuff to try. It was surreal, years later, sat in a Leicester Square cinema watching the premiere of the One Direction film, listening to him speak about the music that drifted down from my attic bedroom. It was only after Iâd left home that I realised he would actually miss me. um said he slept in my bedroom for about a week after I left. I donât think it was just because I had the bigger room.
When we found out he had got through to the televised auditions of The X Factor it suddenly felt real. Thereâs a list of songs that contestants select from and we pored over it to choose ones that he already knew, ones he liked and ones he couldnât imagine singing. When he had to practice, he suddenly became shy and wouldnât let us listen. He was constantly singing before and, at first, I didnât understand why this was any different. After a lot of persuasion, he would stand in the bathroom with the door shut and sing Isnât She Lovely and Hey, Soul Sister, while Mum and I sat on the landing outside. Iâd never experienced a shy Harry, and never honestly appreciated that he could really sing - it was usually hidden behind humour or sarcasm or some silly voice; Iâd heard him sing Handbags and Gladrags a million times in his room on a karaoke machine but it was always a performance mixed with swagger and bravado as he pretended to be someone else. When he was little he sang in a primary school play as an Elvis version of the Pharaoh in Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat. It was ridiculous. He was funny. As soon as it was serious, and he was being himself, it was like heâd had his shield snatched away.
And he was great.
As the weeks rolled on, we kept waiting for the ride to end. It didnât. Eventually he was summoned down to London, to Wembley, for infamous âboot campâ stage of The X Factor competition. Heâd never been to London before. I was enjoying the summer after my first year at university and, as Mum was working, I said Iâd take him on the journey. We arranged to stay with a friend of our Dadâs and decided to go a couple of days early to make the most of sightseeing in the capital. I dragged him to the Natural History Museum, trying and failing to get him more interested in the sloths than sandwiches; I gave up halfway through and we wanted around window-shopping and boggling at how expensive chocolate is in Harrods food hall.
Soon enough the day arrived. We got the Tube all the way to Wembley and walked to the arena, where a small crowd was gathering outside. Everyone looked so much older than him and people were dotted around in small groups, posturing and harmonising, and generally sussing out the competition. he spotted a young guy heâd chatted to at a previous audition and I realised it was time to leave him, 16 years old and in the shadows of a building weâve only seen on TV. I stayed nearby so that when the call came and he was out of the competition, I could go and commiserate, take him home to Cheshire and school, and back to his normal life. None of us wanted him to fail but we never dreamed things would go the way they did. That call never came. He has just kept on winning and winning - maybe not The X Factor, but thereâs no denying heâs golden. My baby brother never came home again. He grew up, and all of our memories became his origin story.
