Part 1 here
Part 2 here
Part 4 here
Part 5 here
Part 6 here
Harry arrived at the Burrow as he always did, ten minutes late and cursing. He’d meant to be early this time, meant to already be there, laughing with his (adopted) family before Malfoy arrived, but his chronic optimism about time had tripped him up once again. He barely made it through the Floo before stumbling straight into someone solid.
“Ouch, Potter, what on earth—”
Harry caught himself on Malfoy’s forearms, which were, annoyingly, solid. Surprisingly so. What the fuck. Was he hiding a great body beneath all those layers of money and entitlement? Was that really necessary? It felt like the final insult in the already frankly unreasonable package that was Draco Malfoy.
Harry straightened hastily and looked up, but Malfoy was already turning away, muttering something that sounded suspiciously like, “honest to God.”
“Sorry,” Harry managed, half to Malfoy, half to the room at large. “Sorry I’m late, Violet–”
A collective look was exchanged.
Violet, the most vicious cat to ever exist, spent most of her time outdoors constructing what Harry strongly suspected was a shrine to Satan, and used the rest of her time preaching his gospel. She was not a cat that needed any attention, in fact, she was better left alone to her evil scheming. It was not fooling anyone.
“–she just…alright fine. I just lost track of time, sorry.”
“Here,” Ron said, holding a bottle of beer out to him. “No worries mate, we all know you.”
Harry accepted it gratefully. He’d already had two before he left, which was how he lost track of the time, and a third was just the right amount to be that fucking cool, but still hot, side dish. Preferably a roasted potato, but he’d settled for some glazed carrots or parmesan asparagus.
“Now that we’re all here, let’s go and sit down,” Molly said over the general noise in the room, and they all started to move slowly towards the dining room.
The Weasleys weren’t a family much occupied with tradition, or, in this case, fixed seating. Which always turned out to be a complicated game of musical chairs, where you grabbed the first seat you could find and held on for dear life. With nine core Weasleys, their various partners and the occasional child, the numbers usually hovered somewhere between twelve and fifteen. Today, however, they’d reached a new high, with Hermione and Malfoy added to the mix.
In the confusion, Harry lost Ron, who’d walked in with him into the dining room, and ended up grabbing the nearest chair he could find. To his relief, he found himself sitting next to Bill, who always was good company. But when he turned to his left, the unmistakable, and annoyingly solid, presence of Malfoy was standing there, stiff as a board, looking down at him. He wasn’t quite meeting Harry’s eyes, gripping a yellow chair hard enough for his knuckles to go white with a pained expression on his face.
“Malfoy,” Harry said, for lack of anything better.
“Potter,” Malfoy echoed, before turning to Charlie and saying something Harry couldn’t make out over the noise. Charlie shook his head. With a sinking feeling, Harry realised Malfoy must have asked to switch seats. He wondered why Charlie had denied him.
Well, fuck it. Fuck Malfoy, the beef-eating twat. He could endure being seated next to Harry for one meal. Harry took a large swig of his beer as the dishes began to appear on the table. He nearly choked when the rosemary roast potatoes popped in front of him, and looked up just in time to catch Ron grinning at him from the other side.
Well. Why the fuck not. He helped himself generously. They were the main event, after all. Only once he’d built a respectable pile did he add some roast and vegetables off to the side. He wasted no time and dug into the potatoes, which was to be fair, bloody delicious. Crisp on the outside, soft in the middle, heavy with salt and rosemary.
When he glanced sideways, he saw Malfoy cutting his meat into neat, bite-sized pieces, accompanied only by vegetables and sausages. His plate was entirely free of potatoes. Something odd curled in Harry’s gut. An almost overwhelming urge rose up to shovel potatoes onto Malfoy’s plate, whether he liked it or not, to make him eat them in front of everyone. The anger came hot and sharp, a low-burning iron lodged deep in his stomach, as he stared at Malfoy’s potato-free plate.
“So, how’s work?” Bill’s voice pulled Harry out of his thoughts. He turned back to him and summoned the sunniest smile he could manage, though he suspected it came out a little strained and faintly manic as he struggled to hold it there.
“Oh, you know. Same as ever. How’s…” God, he’d forgotten the name of their youngest, and newest, addition to the Weasley clan.
“Louis is fine,” Bill supplied easily, entirely unfazed by Harry’s frankly shitty memory.
“Right,” Harry said. “How old is he now?”
“Five months,” Fleur said, leaning in beside Bill with the baby in her arms. “Almost six.”
Harry had no further questions. How did people do this? He tried to keep the smile in check while scrambling for something, anything, to ask.
“And France?”
“Ah, it’s alright. Quiet, luckily,” Bill said, gesturing vaguely at the table and the general noise of the dinner party. “I don’t miss having to shout every day.”
Harry remembered they’d moved to a small town on the west coast of France, though for the life of him he couldn’t recall the name.
“I should visit sometime,” he said. “I’ve never actually been to France.”
“That is a crime,” Fleur said lightly, with her usual thick accent and a bright, unapologetic smile. He really had to learn how to do that. “You have to come. Soon.”
“Yeah, sure,” Harry said. “Just send me an invite and I’ll be there.”
Fleur’s answering smile was warm and radiant, like a pocket-sized sun. Harry made a mental note to go straight home and practise. There was something open and disarming about it and it was definitely something Malfoy was already doing. He glanced sideways at Malfoy, who was in the middle of a conversation with Charlie, George, and Hermione across the table. Malfoy’s laugh came out easy and unguarded, as though he were genuinely enjoying dinner with people he’d once openly despised. Even Ginny was leaning in, her hand briefly touching Malfoy’s arm, as though a murder attempt barely registered in the grand scheme of things. Harry found himself wanting to ask Fleur whether she could smell Veela on Malfoy, if he had any.
He tried to tune back into the conversation, to work out what it was about Malfoy that had everyone so thoroughly occupied with him. As though Harry weren’t sitting right there, their longtime friend, who had never tried to lock any of them in a basement or had evil branded into his left arm.
“Molly, I have to compliment you. This is perhaps the best dinner I’ve ever had,” Malfoy said, his voice dripping with false and entirely unnecessary sweetness.
It was impossible not to let the words escape. “What do you mean? You didn’t even touch the potatoes.”
For the first time in forever, Draco looked at him, actually looked, straight into his eyes. His heart did something strange and fluttery as Draco’s pale, light-blue eyes fixed on him, stunned, as though he couldn’t quite believe what Harry had just said. Which, in fairness, wasn’t that strange at all.
“I’m allergic to rosemary,” Malfoy said slowly, as if this were information Harry ought to have known.
“The fuck? Who’s even allergic to… never mind.” Harry wrenched his gaze away from the weird, uncomfortable stare-off and turned to Molly. “It was really delicious. All of it. Especially the potatoes, they were really the star of the show.”
Ron snickered from across the table. “Yeah, Mum. The potato was the best.”
Harry couldn’t help it and turned back to Malfoy, his best sunshine smile on his lips. “You’re really missing out, Malfoy. They’re the sort of thing people don’t expect much from, and then they turn out to be the best part. You think you’re here for the steak, yeah? But it’s the potatoes that actually make you happy. They’re the ones that stay with you after the meal’s done. They’re not flashy, just solid and reliable, and yeah, maybe a bit too hot at first, but, once you bite through the crisp outside…”
Somewhere across the table, Ron cleared his throat. Loudly.
Malfoy had turned properly towards him now, though he still didn’t quite meet Harry’s eyes. It only made Harry more irritated, and he felt the smile slip at the edges.
“Right,” Malfoy said mildly. “I see. Well, I’m terribly sorry that my unfortunate allergy deprived me of such a transcendent experience, but I’m perfectly content to take your word for it.” His mouth curved into something polite and infuriatingly pleasant. “From the sound of it, those potatoes are quite exceptional.”
“Yes, they really are something else,” Harry grunted. The smile slipped completely, and he took a large swig of his beer to hide it. He glanced over at Ron, who appeared to be engaged in an internal battle of his own, his lips pressed into a thin line and his shoulders shaking. It looked suspiciously like he was choking on suppressed laughter.
“Thank you, Harry. And Draco. It was my pleasure,” Molly said, a little too brightly.
It was only then Harry realised how quiet it had gone around them, because the noise rushed back in and swallowed the room. Voices overlapping, cutlery clinking, chairs scraping as people shifted and turned back to one another.
“You really like those potatoes, huh?” Charlie said.
Malfoy leaned back slightly as Charlie leaned forward. “I also think of them as the best part of the meal,” he added, then winked at Harry, as if Harry had been talking about something other than potatoes. Which he hadn’t. Mostly. It just felt unfair to the potatoes.
“Right. Yeah. Thanks?” Harry said, not entirely sure what he was thanking him for. Charlie had already turned back to his sister, leaving Harry facing Malfoy, who was staring straight ahead. Seemingly determined not to look at him at all.
“So,” he said a bit hesitantly, “how’s, uhm, work?”
“Absolutly splendid Potter, and yourself?” Without waiting for an answer, he ploughed straight on. “I imagine it must be terribly interesting up in Strategic Magical Security, all the assessments, risk briefings, interdepartmental reviews, yes?”
Malfoy still faced straight ahead as if reading from a script.
“Yeah, I guess, it’s…” Harry began, but Malfoy simply waved a hand and tipped his head in a brief, dismissive sort of nod, his gaze still fixed somewhere on the other side of the table.
“Good, good,” he said, cutting him off neatly, and immediately redirected. “Hermione, how did your bill fare? It was up for hearing on Friday, wasn’t it? I heard the rumours. Splendid work. Invoking Caldwell and Ashcroft to frame the argument was very sharp. Absolutely textbook. Well played.”
“You think?” Hermione beamed, beamed, at Malfoy from across the table. “I wasn’t really going to, but when they started with the standard stalling tactics, I thought it was time to remind them they’d already lost that argument once.”
“You are one of the sharpest legal minds of our generation,” Malfoy replied, entirely without sarcasm. Which, frankly, made Harry immediately suspicious. He had a sudden, overwhelming urge to slap someone, preferably Malfoy, though he’d settle for a particularly ugly child or an especially smug peacock.
There was far too little alcohol in his veins to handle this situation properly. Harry stood up abruptly, realised no one was paying him any attention at all, and promptly stalked into the living room to pour himself a generous glass of Firewhisky. He downed it. Then he filled the glass again.
From the dining room, he could hear Malfoy’s light, infuriating laugh. It rolled over him like a wave of nausea.
He took another large sip as he heard George bellow “Draco! You’re an absolute legend”, and decided this had gone on long enough. It was time to dazzle them with his charm. To be the centre of attention. The point of gravity. Never mind that he’d never wanted that role before, Malfoy’s presence made it abundantly clear that drastic measures were now required.
It was bad enough that Malfoy had apparently plucked his entire friend group like a string of ripe fruit, one by one. It was worse that he was now the undisputed star attraction of the dinner, drawing the room towards him as a black hole.
Well. Harry could be the fucking supernova if need be. He took a large sip, topped his glass up again, then squared his shoulders and headed back into the dining room.
“Tea and apple pie, everyone?” Molly called over the noise and her eyes landed on him. “Oh, there you are.”
At least someone had noticed. Harry seized the moment to deploy that radiant smile he was fairly certain he could pull off with the right amount of delusion. Without overthinking it, he leaned in and gave Molly a brief, affectionate pat on the back. “Thanks again for… this lovely dinner.”
Molly blinked at him, momentarily puzzled, and then her expression softened into a smile. “No trouble, no trouble at all. I’m just glad you came. It’s always so nice to have you around.”
See that, Malfoy? One–nil to me, Harry thought with quiet glee. He let his hand linger just long enough to draw a small, absent-minded circle against Molly’s back before he caught himself and pulled away. He couldn’t quite remember the last time he’d done that. Or if he ever had.
“Everything alright, Harry?” Molly asked, her gaze dropping briefly to the glass he was holding.
“Yeah. All good,” Harry said quickly. The general movement of people heading for pie carried them both along into the sitting room, and Harry quickly saw the empty spot next to Ron and headed for it. It seemed, however, he wasn’t the only one and it was just as he was about to sit down he noticed Malfoy by his side.
“Oh, you…” Harry’s mouth said, entirely on its own.
“Yes. Me,” Malfoy replied, with his rubbish posh, polite air, gesturing magnanimously with one arm. “By all means. Do take the seat.”
Harry knew he ought to say “no, of course not, you should take it”, like a normal, well-adjusted person would say to a guest. Instead, he said, “Thanks,” and promptly plopped down beside Ron.
He wasn’t obliged to shine for Malfoy’s benefit anyway, that was reserved for the others. He turned to Ron with what he hoped passed for his best smile, only to be met with a frown.
“What?” He asked.
“Wasn’t that a bit rude?”
“No?”
Ron studied him for a moment. “If you say so,” he said.
What was Harry even supposed to make of that? This was his house, sort of, and he wanted to sit next to his best friend. A best friend who was, frankly, in the process of being rapidly demoted.
“It wasn’t,” he said, nodding towards Malfoy who was standing with Charlie, his long fingers casually hooked around Charlie’s bicep. “See? He’s already feeling up your brother. Worked out for the best.”
Harry threw an arm around Ron’s shoulder and gave it a squeeze. “He’s just a drifter. He’s not going to last here anyway.”
It wasn’t quite what he’d meant to say, but the truth pushed itself out regardless, and he could hear how it sounded the moment it left his mouth. Like an arsehole. “I mean,” he added hastily, “Charlie’s not even around that much, and how long did his last relationship last, anyway?”
“Dunno,” Ron said, giving Harry a strange look. He nodded towards Harry’s half-empty glass. “Have you had many of those?”
“Just this one,” Harry said quickly, withdrawing his arm from Ron’s shoulders. “And that beer.” The lies kept coming, smooth and automatic, like they’d found their own momentum.
He took a large sip of his drink, and out of the corner of his eye he could see Malfoy leaning his weight against Charlie as they talked to George, laughing as if he was at home.
“I’m not even sure he’s actually with Charlie,” Ron said, and Harry’s attention snapped straight back.
“What do you mean? He’s all over him like a…” he gestured vaguely with his glass. “...a leech.”
“Yeah, but Malfoy’s always like that,” Ron said. “I don’t know if it necessarily means they’re here as a couple.”
“Then why would Charlie even bring him here?”
Ron hesitated. “I think it’s got more to do with Draco trying to make amends. He talks about it a fair bit, actually. About owning people. Having stuff to fix. He’s endured some pretty grim conversations, actually, so he really tries. He blames himself for Fred, you know.”
“He’s talked to you about it?”
“Well… yeah. Sort of. We were a bit drunk, and…yeah, you know.”
Harry absolutely did not know, and it was becoming increasingly uncomfortable. He grasped at the vague shape of what was apparently meant to be a reassuring, friendly explanation and managed to push out an, “Alright. Yeah. I get that,” before standing up.
Time to dazzle this room into submission.
***
Okay, so, this part at the Burrow is getting so long I needed to dived it into two parts.
Curious to how many of you are still following this story?
She thinks she’s pretty. Not in an obnoxious, self-obsessed way! She knows she’s not a supermodel, and she definitely has a lot of days where she looks and feels totally dead – but at the end of the day, she’s not hideous. She splurges on pretty makeup products, does her hair in the mornings, spends a decent amount of time planning out cute outfits… you know, little things to make herself feel pretty!
She brushes her teeth twice a day, showers regularly, flosses. Wears pretty perfumes that smell like flowers and lip gloss that tastes like strawberries. There’s a stash of gum in her bag that she’s always chewing on, so she knows she doesn’t have bad breath; and she carries an extra deodorant in her backpack too, so you can’t tell her she’s repulsive or anything like that.
She’s kind. She smiles at strangers and always laughs at people’s jokes (even if they aren’t funny)— holds the elevator door open and says a polite “good morning” or “hello!” with her happy, cheery voice. And even though she’s a bit shy, she tries her best to spread love and kindness in the world. It just makes her happy to make other people happy!
Plus, being nice means that everyone else is nicer to you. So even if she’s in a bad mood, she’ll fake a smile and pretend like she’s happy y/n.
But, she wonders... if she has all of these amazing qualities– if she really is as pretty and kind and wonderful as she makes herself out to be– then why hasn’t she been kissed yet?
She loves her friends, of course she does! But how is she so different from them? Why do all of her friends get asked out on dates and have amazing boyfriends while she’s still a lonely virgin who hasn’t even been kissed yet?
It’s not like she’s this super virginal person who gets grossed out by boys! She wants to be kissed, she wants to get fucked! She’s toyed around with the idea of just downloading tinder and losing it all to some stranger in one night stand, but her romantic heart just can’t stand the thought of it.
Yes, she’s desperate… but she’s also romantic. Love is on her mind 24/7. It’s what she thinks about before she falls asleep, what she daydreams about whenever she gets bored. She could spend hours with a romance novel, hyper fixating on the little things that most people wouldn’t blink an eye at. The way the boy’s hand cupped the girl’s jaw while they kissed, or how their fingers brushed as they walked down the street. Little things like forehead kisses and prolonged glances across a room.
She craves it for herself, desperately aches for the affection that she reads of. She wants to rest her head on someone’s chest and listen to their heartbeat as she falls asleep, feel their fingers playing with her hair, or their lips skimming her cheek. Wants to laugh under the covers and share secrets and be vulnerable and in love. She wants it more than anything in the world!
And yet, she hasn’t even been kissed!
Everyone else seems to do it so easily – find a nice guy, go out on a date, and fall in love. So why is it so hard for her? Her friends tell her that she's the prettiest and sweetest girl out there, and that the right guy simply hasn’t come around yet… but y/n can’t help but think, is any of it true?
They’re loud and stuffy, with way too many people crammed into one room for his liking. The alcohol is cheap, the music is annoying. The entire apartment smells like weed, and there’s not even a secluded corner for him to mope around in without some group of drunk girls completely invading his personal space. Everything about these parties sucks.
If he could, he’d leave. But he’s meant to give a ride home to his roomie Blake, and Blake’s currently hooking up with the host of this party.
So Harry’s stuck here. Great.
He checks his phone, and it’s nearly midnight. Blake should be done soon, right? The blonde girl who’s been talking to him for the past 20 minutes is getting awfully close, her hand trailing on his biceps and migrating towards his chest, and she’s blinking up at him with fluttery bambi eyes.
Any other night and Harry might be into whatever this girl is hinting at, but he’s 100% sober and 100% not in the mood to hook up with a girl who’s taken one too many shots. He grabs the girl's hands and peels them off of his chest gently, muttering something about needing to use the restroom (he doesn’t even need to use the bathroom, he just needs a minute away from the pounding music).
He sends her off in the direction of her friends, who are giggling to each other in a corner across the room and not-so-inconspicuously checking to see if their friend has managed to successfully get with Harry. He’s sure they’ve realized that he rejected her when they all glare at him. Sorry to disappoint, he thinks to himself.
He’s nearly positive that any bathrooms in this shitty college apartment will probably be occupied, either with someone throwing up all the drinks they’ve had or with a couple hooking up. But no harm in trying anyway.
The first door that he tries to open is locked. The second door opens up to reveal a coat closet.
The third door however, opens up to a bedroom.
The walls are decorated with posters and pictures, fairy lights hanging from the ceiling, and tiny pots of succulents placed all over the room… but the one thing that stands out the most is the overwhelming number of books scattered all over the room. There’s a bookshelf on each wall, cluttered with books of all colors and sizes. Stacks of books lie on the nightstand by the bed, a stray book sits on top of a dresser, and a pile of new, untouched books sits pristinely in the far right corner of the room.
Books, books, and more books all over the room. And, a book in the hands of a girl sitting quietly in her bed, staring at Harry.
Dressed in a hoodie and some fuzzy pj pants, the book that she’d once held up closely to her face now rests on her lap as she blinks up at this strange intruder. She sits upright, closing the book but sticking her finger between the pages so that she doesn’t lose her place. “Um… hi?” she says quietly.
He steps into the room, and looks at her blankly. “Hi.” She blinks at him. “S’this room taken?” he asks.
“Um. Well,” she looks at him curiously. “No, I guess not.”
“Okay, good,” he responds, quickly closing the door behind him. He sits on a spinny chair that he pulls out from under a desk and leans his head back, letting out a deep sigh of relief.
The girl, with her finger still lodged between her book, stares at him confused. Who is this guy?
He’s cute, and she’s mildly embarrassed that he’s come into her room when she’s looking so… sleepy. But he also seems kinda grumpy and is obviously not in the mood to talk. He’s leaning back in her chair and closing his eyes, gently rubbing his temples as if he’s meditating.
She observes him with wide eyes. Then after a minute of silence she awkwardly picks her book back up and tries to resume reading.
Kinda hard to do with some random guy sitting in her bedroom, though.
In this secluded bedroom, the sound of the music has decreased dramatically. Harry’s pounding headache starts to fade away, and he feels himself start to relax for the first time since he arrived at this stupid party. He looks around the room that he so luckily stumbled into.
The desk in front of him is, to no surprise, cluttered with more books. A laptop is plugged in in front of him, and there’s a cup full of colorful pens and markers sitting against the wall. Hanging on the wall is a string of pictures starring the same girl with different groups of people.
He looks at the pictures hanging from the walls. Then he looks back at the girl laying in the bed.
“S’this your room?” he asks, finally connecting the dots.
She looks up from the book again and nods.
“Oh,” he hums, surprised. He supposes he should’ve realized it as soon as he walked in. Girl in a room full of books, reading a book. Face clean of all makeup, snuggled up in a blanket, nice and comfy as though she’s just about ready for bed. It’s a bit silly that he only made the connection once he saw her pictures up on the walls. “Why aren’t you out there partying?”
“Um… not really my scene,” she says, closing the book and looking at Harry properly. Her nose scrunches up, “And it smells really bad in there.”
“Jesus, tell me about it,” he groans. “Could hardly breathe in there. In fact–” he says, already standing up, “d’ya mind if we open up a window? Still feels stuffy in here.”
She shows no resistance as he slides the window open, accepting the fact that she’d be sharing her room with this stranger until the party was over. Harry sticks his head out and takes a deep breath of the cool, fresh air. Much better than the sweaty, smoky, sickly smell going on inside the apartment.
When he turns back around, the girl has rearranged herself. She sits criss-crossed on her bed and looks up at Harry, fidgeting nervously with her lip bitten between her teeth.
She’s kind of cute.
Harry breaks the silence again. “I think your roommate is hooking up with my roommate right now.”
“Oh.” She blinks. “Is your roommate Blake?”
He nods.
“Yeah, Maddie’s been saying that she, um… you know,” she looks down at her hands as they play with a loose thread on the hem of her pants. “Wants to hook up with him or whatever.”
He nods his head, leaning back against her wall with his arms crossed in front of his chest. As refreshing as the air is, the night time breeze is cold.
“No offense,” he says, “But you don’t seem like you’d be friends with Maddie.” Maddie (y/n’s roommate) has jet black hair, wears heavy eyeliner and black lipstick everyday, and is at least a little bit high 90% of the time. Y/n, in comparison, has flowery bed sheets, a stuffed bunny tucked in next to her, and is hiding in her bedroom while a party being thrown in her own apartment.
She just smiles softly. “Yeah, we met online. But she’s really nice.”
He raises his eyebrow. “She seems like a bitch.”
She defends her roommate immediately. “She’s not a bitch!” But then she thinks about it for a second. Maddie can definitely come off a bit… harsh at times. “Well… she’s usually really nice to me, at least.”
That makes sense. It would be very hard to be mean to this girl, he imagines. She’s too nice. It would be like being mean to a puppy or something.
Good thing Harry isn’t mean. He’s just… a bit of a grump.
She taps her fingers against the cover of her book awkwardly, staring at Harry as he looks up to her ceiling and closes his eyes. He just wants to be in his bed right now.
After a few more minutes of silence, Harry pushes himself off the wall. “I think Blake should be done,” he says, checking the time on his phone. “I’m going to leave now.”
“Okay,” says the girl quietly. She watches as he leaves with a nod of his head, and shuts the door behind him.
That was weird, she thinks.
Whatever, though. She opens her book and forgets about it.
+++
Don’t people say that drowsy driving is just as bad as drunk driving? What constitutes drowsy driving? Should y/n even be out on the road right now?
She doesn’t know. All she knows is that Maddie woke her up with a phone call at 2 AM, asking if y/n would come pick her up from Blake’s apartment cause she was too high to get back on her own and she doesn’t want to stay the night there.
Y/n, being the sweetheart that she is, obviously wants her roommate to get back safe. So she’s in her car, at 2 AM, yawning every three seconds as she drives to the location Maddie sent her.
She texts Maddie from the car, but Maddie doesn’t respond. She calls her, then sends another text, but still no answer. After 10 minutes of no response, she goes up to the door and knocks.
Maddie doesn’t answer. Instead, it’s Harry.
His eyebrows furrow as recognizes the girl from that party he’d been at two weeks ago. She looks just as comfortable as she did then, in a big pink hoodie and a pair of sweats. “What are you doing here?” he asks, his voice confused and his eyes doubting. Not many people come knocking at his door at 2 AM.
Unlike y/n, who looks like she just rolled out of bed and drove here (that is exactly what she did), Harry looks like he’s been up all night (he’s been playing COD). He’s not wearing a shirt and has a pair of sweats slung low on his hips, showing off a chiseled abdomen that acts as a canvas for a multitude of pretty tattoos. Y/n finds herself staring at the swallows that lie under his collarbones, the butterfly painted above his stomach, and the ferns lining a yummy pair of v-lines that point downwards… she swallows thickly and forces herself to look away.
“Um,” she covers her mouth as she yawns, hiding her cold fingers with the sleeves of her hoodie, “Maddie needed me to drive her home.” She blinks sleepily, and can’t even bring herself to be embarrassed that she looks so dead.
“It’s 2 in the morning,” he scoffs. “Shouldn’t you be asleep?”
She blinks sleepily again. “I was.”
Harry rolls his eyes. If it were him, he would not have gotten up and driven all the way over here. Someone else’s problems are not enough to get him out of bed. But, this girl… she’s too nice.
He leaves her at the door and goes to Blake’s room, pounding on the door rudely. “Hey!” he yells, irritation evident in his tone, “your roommate’s here.”
He hears a bit of shuffling, before Maddie stumbles out of Blake’s room, makeup askew and clothing only half on. She giggles up at Harry and apologizes playfully, but he just glares at her. Her eyes are glazed over and the whites of her eyes bloodshot, very obviously high if the way she couldn’t walk straight wasn’t enough of an indication.
He feels bad for the stupid girl who drove all the way over here in the middle of the night because her roommate wanted to get high.
Maddie trips over her own feet and falls into y/n, who uses all of her strength to keep her roommate upright and walks her slowly down to the car. “Are you feeling okay?” Harry hears her ask quietly. He scoffs to himself.
He doesn’t get it. How the fuck has this girl not lost her shit? Her irresponsible roommate woke her up at 2 am and made her drive all the way to some stranger’s house, and yet she still manages to be so… gentle. So kind, to someone who barely even deserves it. So caring, to someone who seems to care so little.
As y/n helps Maddie get into the car, she looks back up to the apartment and sees Harry watching them from the doorstep. They make eye contact for a few seconds, his eyebrows furrowed as he leans against the doorframe. His gaze makes her heart stutter, a chill running down her spine. He looks… upset. Almost like he’s mad at her.
It makes her frown. She wants to say something to him, apologize for ruining his night… but then Maddie sticks her head out of the car and vomits.
Harry shakes his head and turns away.
That girl is too nice for her own good.
+++
“Hey.” Blake pokes his head into Harry’s room, where Harry’s busy playing a round on his computer, “Do you mind if Maddie and her friend come over?”
“Don’t care,” Harry mumbles, uninterested, not looking away from his game.
“Sick,” he turns around to go back into his own room, but stops when Harry suddenly pauses his game and calls out to him.
“Who’s the friend?” Harry asks, turning around.
“Y/n,” Blake answers. Harry stares at him, his brows furrowed. The name doesn’t ring a bell. “Her roommate.”
“That quiet girl?” Harry clarifies.
“Yeah, that one.”
Oh. So her name was y/n.
Good to know.
+++
It’s dark out when Harry finally turns off his game, sliding his headset off and stretching his back. He lets out a long groan as he feels his spine crack, a delicious feeling after being hunched over his controller for three hours straight.
Standing up, he scratches at his stomach lazily, throwing his headset onto his chair. His arms feel a bit sore, having been to the gym earlier that day, and his hair is still wet from when he showered. He puts on a sweatshirt, finding his apartment too cold to be roaming around shirtless, and heads to the kitchen to find something to eat.
He stops in his tracks when he finds y/n sitting in his living room all alone.
She’s got a book in her hands, a thick, worn-out novel that looks older than herself. She’s sitting comfortably on their couch with her legs tucked underneath her butt, so engulfed in whatever she’s reading that she doesn’t even realize that she’s not alone anymore.
It’s the first time he’s ever seen her outside of her sleep attire. She’s wearing a pair of loose, comfy looking corduroy pants, and a tight top that cuts off just below her ribs. Her chest rises and falls steadily, eyes skimming across the pages of her book so quickly that he wonders if she’s actually absorbing any of the words or not. She chews on her lip as she reads, eyebrows furrowed in concentration.
When Harry finally speaks, it makes her jump in her place. “Where are Blake and Maddie?”
Her book nearly falls out of her hands as she whips her head around. When she sees it’s him, she relaxes. “Oh. Um,” she sits upright, closing her book, “They’re in his room.”
He nods slowly, squinting his eyes. There’s no nice way to ask his next question, so he just spits it out bluntly. “Why’d you come over if you’re just sitting out here while they hook up?”
She tucks her hair behind her ear nervously, feeling a little shy under his intimidating gaze. “Maddie was my ride to campus today. And she wanted to stop by here before we went home.” She shrugs quietly, “So I kinda had no choice.”
He huffs. Of course.
Y/n says that Maddie’s nice, but Harry really doesn’t like her. How weird is it to drag your friend somewhere just to have them sit alone while you go hook up with someone?
“How long have you guys been here?” he asks.
“Like, an hour.”
“So you’ve been sitting around doing nothing for an hour?”
She pouts. “I had my book.”
He blinks. She just sat here reading for an hour, while her roommate abandoned her to go hookup with Blake… and she’s okay with it?
She is too nice for her own good.
“Do y’want some pizza?” he asks, already opening the freezer.
Normally, y/n would say no. She’s kind of an unwelcome guest and she doesn’t want to be a burden on Harry. But… she hasn’t had anything since breakfast. And Maddie still hasn’t come out. She’s kind of starving.
“What kind?” she asks politely.
“Umm… cheese or pepperoni.”
“I don’t like pepperoni,” she confesses shyly. “But also I could just pick it off if you want pepperoni. Whatever you want.”
He rolls his eyes, shoving the pepperoni pizza back into the freezer. He wants to scream at her to stop being so nice! Stop being so considerate and just say what you want!
He puts it in the oven to bake, setting a timer for 15 minutes, then takes a moment to contemplate his next move. He could either go back into his room, where he could lie in bed and nap until the pizza was ready… or he could stay in here and sit awkwardly on the couch so that y/n wouldn’t be all alone.
99% of him wants to just go back into his room where he can be grumpy and alone in peace… but then he looks over at y/n, who’s sitting on the couch all by herself. She looks so uncomfortable and out of place, tracing her thumb over the raised up font on the hardcover in her hands.
The 1% of him that feels bad for her wins. He sits down next to her on the couch.
He nods his head towards the worn out book, which looks thicker than anything he’s ever read. “Are you reading the fuckin’ bible?”
“No,” she shakes her head, laughing to herself quietly. She runs her fingers over the grooves of the title, a feeling so familiar that it comforts her when she’s feeling so out of place. “It’s Wuthering Heights.”
He furrows his brow. “Never heard of it.”
“It’s good,” she says. “Kinda dense, but I’ve already read it a few times. It’s one of my favorites.”
He nods again, tapping his fingers on his thighs as silence overtakes the apartment once more. He looks around the living room, trying to find something else to say.
Y/n’s heart pitter patters in her chest nervously. She can’t help but feel a bit nervous around Harry. She’s pretty shy in general, and Harry’s stoic demeanor certainly doesn’t help her relax. Her voice is quiet as she asks, “Um… what’s your major?” A feeble attempt on her end at a conversation.
“Math.”
“Just math?” she parrots.
“Mhm,” he cracks his knuckles. “Pure math.”
She huffs out a quiet breath, a pout on her lips. “I’m in a math class right now.” Her fingers pick at a piece of fuzz that’s stuck on the couch. “Calc 1. It’s really hard.”
“Mm, yeah.” Harry hums, “Took that during my first year.”
She looks at him with wide eyes, “Did you pass?”
He holds back a smile. It’s amusing, how earnestly she’s asking him – a math major – if he passed Calculus 1. That class was generally easy for him, mostly just beginner stuff compared to the math he does now that he’s in his third year. But he doesn’t say that. “Yeah, I did,” he says simply, not wanting to make her feel bad.
She nods, looking back down at her book. “I’m kinda scared. Our first midterm was really hard.”
He hums sympathetically. Even though it was easy for him, he knows that calc class is infamously hard for others – especially for those who aren’t math inclined like himself. “How about you? What’s your major?”
His legs are spread apart so that he takes up nearly half the couch, whereas y/n sits curled up on the other corner, trying to take up as little space as possible. “Bio,” she readjusts herself so that she’s sitting crisscrossed, her book still clutched to her chest protectively. “With a concentration in ecology.”
Ew. He hates biology. Actually… he hates everything except math. Math is easy for him.
The oven beeps. A rush of relief fills his chest, finally free from this awkward conversation, and he eagerly abandons y/n on the couch to get the pizza out. He’s hungry, starving, and doesn’t bother with a plate or anything before grabbing a slice and shoving it in his mouth.
“Come have some,” he mumbles, mouth full.
She timidly walks over to the kitchen counter that he’s standing at, wiping her sweaty hands on her pants, and takes a slice as well. Blowing on it, she takes a much smaller bite than Harry did since it’s still so hot. She doesn’t know how he managed to already finish a whole slice.
Now that they can focus on eating their food, there’s no need for any more small talk. They eat comfortably in silence, only acknowledging each other when y/n asks for a napkin. He nods towards one of the drawers, asking her to grab him one too, and then they’re back to eating in silence.
Blake and Maddie burst out of his room a few minutes later.
“Harry made dinner!” exclaims Blake, coming over and reaching for a slice of pizza.
Harry yanks the tray out of his reach. “Get your own pizza,” he mumbles, putting the pizza back down in front of y/n. He looks at her, and nods his head towards the pizza, inviting her to take another slice.
Maddie stops her before she can reach for a second slice. “Ready to go?” she asks.
Y/n nods, wiping her hands on a napkin. “Thanks for the pizza,” she whispers to Harry, quiet enough so that only he hears.
“Yeah,” is all he says. He barely looks at her, too busy scarfing down his third (maybe fourth) slice.
She grabs her stuff and follows Maddie out of the boys apartment.
+++
“Hey!” Maddie pushes her way through the stuffed apartment, reaching her hand out towards y/n. “Listen, I’m gonna go home with Blake.”
“W-What?” Y/n’s head is foggy, her brain a little clouded from the few drinks that she’s had. Y/n doesn’t normally drink, so the little bit of alcohol in her system has had its intended effect and gone a bit further as well – her cheeks are warm, and she feels the world sway a little bit as she looks up at Maddie with a pout. “But– but what about me?”
Normally, y/n stays home whenever Maddie wants to go out and party. She prefers the comfort of her own bed and hates the anxiety she feels when she’s drunk and wobbly and surrounded by a bunch of strangers. But Maddie had assured her that they’d be together all night, that she’d take care of her if she got drunk, and that she’d drive them home whenever y/n wanted to leave.
She’s broken all three of those promises.
When they got to the party, Maddie abandoned her as soon as she saw Blake across the room. Luckily, y/n saw some of her own friends that she was able to hang out with, some girls from her ecology class who gave her a yummy strawberry smirnoff. They talked and laughed and y/n was having a good time, slowly but surely getting a little bit tipsy. The drink was so yummy, and Maddie wasn’t there to keep an eye on her, so she didn’t realize that she’d gone a bit over her tolerance.
She’s a bit tipsier than she’d like to be in a public setting, surrounded with people she doesn’t know, and it’s too dark outside for her to get home safely on her own. And now… Maddie wants to abandon her? For Blake?
“Don’t worry!” Maddie exclaims, completely disregarding the worry flickering in y/n’s glazed eyes. “I’ll order you an uber home!”
Y/n bites her lip nervously. An uber? At this time of night, when she’s all drunk and stumbling around like a sad little baby deer?
“Um… can’t you take me home before you go with Blake?”
Maddie rolls her eyes, “come on, really? I’ll pay for the uber. It'll be fine.”
Y/n’s heart beats loudly in her chest, “I-I’m scared of going by myself, Maddie. I think I had too much to drink, I don’t feel safe.”
Her roommate purses her lips in a firm line, as if she’s annoyed. She looks around the apartment, tapping her foot impatiently, then she lights up with an idea. “Stay here,” she tells y/n.
“Harry!” Maddie calls out, making her way back to the other side of the apartment. “Hey, Harry!”
He’s sitting on a couch, next to a pretty girl in a tight black dress who has her legs splayed across his lap comfortably. There’s a furrow in his brow that makes him look pissed off, but his hand rests very comfortably on this girl's thigh and he makes no objections as she plays with the collar of his shirt. His head whips over to Maddie as she tramples her way over to him.
“What is it?” he snaps, voice closed off and irritated.
“Can you drive y/n home?”
He blinks. “Huh?”
“Can you drive y/n home??” she says again, frustrated.
“Why?”
“Cause I’m going over to your apartment with Blake and she needs a ride home.”
He stares at Maddie unbelievingly, and peers over at y/n, who’s sitting all alone on the other side of the apartment. Her lips are pouted sadly, staring down at the floor with a far off look in her eyes.
“Why can’t you take her home?” he grumbles, looking up at Maddie with a glare in his eye.
She huffs, impatiently stomping her foot. “Cause I’m going home with Blake right now! Come on Harry, it’s not that far! Please?”
He shakes his head. “Fuckin’ unbelieveable,” he mutters under his breath, pushing the girl off of him as he stands up.
“Thank you,” she sighs, dragging him behind her. “Y/n,” Maddie says, stopping in front of her. “Harry’s gonna drive you home.”
She looks up, eyes wide and round. “H-Harry?”
“Yes,” she says harshly, “you guys are friends, aren’t you?”
“Um…” y/n doesn’t know what to say. She wouldn’t necessarily consider them friends just because they shared a pizza.
Her night out with Maddie was meant to be fun, but right now, she just feels abandoned and kinda scared. And Harry doesn’t seem too happy about this either, which makes her feel even worse.
“Lets go,” he snaps, jaw clenching tightly as he swings his car keys around his index finger. She flinches at his tone and digs her nails into her palms nervously.
She’s trapped. It’s either Harry takes her home, or she takes an uber all by herself. And she’s too scared to get home alone right now.
With a final look towards Maddie, who stares back at her dismissively and shoos her towards Harry, she stands up shakily and follows Harry out of the crowded apartment.
The air outside is much colder than the apartment, goosebumps immediately rising on y/n’s skin and making her shiver. Harry doesn’t acknowledge the way she stumbles over her feet, walking ahead of her briskly. She’s forced to keep herself composed, wrapping her arms around herself to keep warm and nearly jogging to keep up with Harry’s long strides.
He unlocks his car doors and gets into the driver’s seat. Y/n opens the passenger’s side door for herself and takes a seat, buckling herself in quietly.
Turning on the car, he notices the way her arms are tightly crossed in front of her chest. He turns up the heat, and pulls out of the parking lot.
They play no music and say nothing, driving in silence.
“Sorry you have to drive me home,” she says faintly after a few minutes.
His turn signal blinks softly. “Can’t believe your roommate just left you,” he mutters irritatedly.
She says nothing in response. She stares out the window, a lump in her throat as the drive past the streets of college houses and apartments. The red light they stop at and the name of the streets go blurry from the tears gathering at her waterline. She sniffles softly.
Harry whips his head to her. “Why are you crying?”
Her lower lip wobbles as the first tear falls from her lashes. She wipes it away quickly. “I don’t know,” is all she says with a watery voice.
He stares at her befuddled, brows furrowed and eyes a piercing green, but she refuses to meet his gaze. She just looks outside the window in a melancholy haze, lost in thought, eyes unfocused as tears drip down her face silently.
He sighs deeply and taps his fingers against the steering wheel, praying for the red light to turn green so that he can get this girl home as soon as possible.
+++
When they arrive at her place, he sits in his car and watches as she stumbles up the steps of her apartment. She mumbled out a soft thank you through her tears and managed to climb out of his car smoothly, but the way she wobbles on her feet makes Harry worry that he shouldn’t leave until he’s sure she got in.
She stands in front of her door for a solid two minutes, trying to find her keys, and Harry taps his fingers against his thigh impatiently. When she finally finds them, she struggles to fit the key in the lock, hands shaky and her vision still blurred from the tears. Aaaand then she drops them.
Harry sighs and puts the car in park. By the time she’s picked the keys back up, Harry’s already gotten out of his car and reached the top step. He takes the keys from her and easily unlocks her door. “In,” he mutters, ushering her into her apartment impatiently.
He follows her into her bathroom and turns the light on for her. Their eyes meet in the mirror as he asks, “can you get yourself ready for bed?”
She nods, looking down at the ground sheepishly as he leaves her to take off her makeup and brush her teeth. She opts to skip her skincare routine and doesn’t even bother with putting her jewelry back in her jewelry box, simply just leaving her earrings on her bathroom counter to deal with tomorrow.
Harry’s probably gone back down to his car by now, she thinks. It’s so embarrassing, how he had to drive her home and guide her into her bathroom. He seemed annoyed with her. He probably thought she was so messy – an annoying, overdramatic girl who started crying in his car for no reason.
More tears bubble in her tears as the hot wave of embarrassment washes over her. She was such a mess, of course she’s never been in a relationship. Nobody would want to date someone like her.
She takes off her clothes and whips off her bra, sniffling to herself sadly. Slipping on her favorite sweatshirt, a huge pink one that goes down to her mid thighs and covers her hands, she uses the sleeves to wipe away the excess tears in her eyes. She stumbles over herself a bit and bangs her foot against her dresser as she reaches for a pair of sleep shorts and it only makes her want to cry even harder. Drunk y/n is extra emotional, and every little thing is sending over the edge.
As she’s stepping into her pair of sleep shorts, her bedroom door opens, Harry walking in with a glass of water in one hand and a pill bottle in the other. She trips over herself as she tries to pull her clothes on as soon as possible, but it just makes her lose balance and stumble to the side. His eyes widen and he turns around quickly, muttering a quick fuck to himself.
“Sorry,” he mutters. “Are you decent?”
Y/n regains her composure, cheeks burning as she pulls her shorts over her hips. This night could not be going any worse. “Yeah,” she says quietly. She hopes it’s dark enough in the room so that he doesn’t see her flaming cheeks and puffy eyes.
He turns around and hands her the water, which she immediately starts chugging down. She didn’t realize how thirsty she’d been until she’d seen the glass in Harry’s large, tattooed hand.
“Slow down,” he grunts. He pops open the pill bottle and takes out one Advil for her. “Take this.”
She grabs the pill from him obediently and swallows it down with the rest of her water. Then she looks up at him, as if waiting for his next instructions.
“Bed,” he says, nodding his head towards her daisy printed sheets. She goes to climb in but trips over her shoe that she’d messily discarded on the floor. Harry grabs her waist before she can fall to the floor though.
“Jesus,” he murmurs. This was like the seventh time she’s almost fallen over tonight. Is she always this clumsy or was it the drinks?
He grabs her hand and physically guides her into her bed, making sure she lays down properly and lifting the sheets for her to climb under. Grabbing her ankle, he literally has to guide her under the blanket, then lets the duvet fall over her gracefully.
“All good?” he asks, once she’s tucked nicely into her bed, teeth brushed and medicine taken so that she wouldn’t wake up feeling gross tomorrow.
She looks up at him, eyes no longer tear filled but still clearly sad. “Yeah..” she says quietly, however her eyes flicker around her room as if she’s searching for something.
He furrows his brows, and glances in the direction her eyes have landed. A stuffed bunny lies on the floor next to the shoe that she tripped over. He bends over and picks it up, handing it to her questioningly. She takes the bunny and snuggles it into her neck, eyes fluttering as if she can finally relax. “Thanks,” she whispers.
Harry nods curtly and heads for the door. When he turns around one final, y/n is watching him with sleepy eyes. “Bye, Harry,” she squeaks out.
He stares at her for a second. “Bye.” Then he closes the door behind himself.
+++
Y/n wakes up with a pounding headache and an upset tummy.
That was mortifying.
She’s never gonna be able to face Harry again. He was so annoyed with her, she just knows it! The way she dragged him away from that party, cried in his car, and tripped over herself like a stupid goat with clanky legs… oh, he probably thinks she’s the worst!
She wishes she had more control over her emotions, that she could’ve held in the tears until she was alone in her bed… but she just felt so miserable last night. She had wanted to start crying literally when Maddie first yelled at her at the party, but she tried to stay strong. Kept herself together so that she at least didn’t start crying in the middle of a party.
But then… getting in the car with Harry. God. The deafening silence, the irritation radiating off of him… it made her feel terrible. She felt like a nuisance, like an annoyance and a burden.
And she completely humiliated herself in front of Harry! The cute guy that she maybe sort of had started to have a tiny little crush on, simply because he was cute and mildly nice to her and she has a habit of romanticizing small interactions.
There was no chance he’d ever want to be in a room with her after this. He probably wants nothing to do with her.
She stumbles out of her bed and plants her feet on the ground, her head spinning a little bit as she squints her eyes. Her little stuffed bunny has fallen onto the floor again, and she picks it up and places it onto the bed next to herself. She remembers how Harry had picked the bunny up and given it to her before she fell asleep last night, like she was some little kid that he was stuck babysitting.
Ugh. She’s never going to talk to him again.
+++
Harry stands outside of his lecture hall, leaning against the wall with his arms crossed angrily. His eyebrows are furrowed in classic Grumpy Harry fashion and his lips are pursed in a disgruntled frown.
He’s annoyed.
He stares at y/n, who’s sitting on a bench not too far away. Her tote bag sits on the floor next to her feet and there’s a book in her hand, her finger in between the pages as a temporary bookmark to not lose the page she’s on.
There’s something about her that just… annoys him so much. He can’t quite explain it.
The way her cheeks dimple as she smiles up at the guy talking to her, tucking her hair behind her ear gently when it falls into her face… it makes his jaw clench angrily as he watches her from a distance. She’s so nice. Too nice.
She laughs at something the guy she’s talking to says and it makes his stomach feel sour. He doesn’t like it.
Blake’s hand snaps in front of Harry’s face. “Bro. Stop staring.”
Harry forces his eyes to look away, brows still furrowed grumpily. “Wasn’t staring,” he mumbles, pushing himself off the wall and going into the lecture hall.
“You were,” he responds, following closely behind. “She’s really nice… I dunno why you hate her.”
“Who says I hate her?” Harry scoffs. “I never talk to her.” Especially as of late, she’s quiet as a mouse around him. He was over at her apartment to pick Blake up the other day and she’d only said a quiet “hi” before scurrying back into her room, like a scared little bunny in the presence of a snake or something.
“Well… I mean, you could be nicer.”
Harry furrows his brows. “What do you mean?”
Blake hesitates. “Like… I dunno. Maddie says you made her cry.”
“Huh?” He thinks back to that night… “How was that my fault?” All he’d done was driven her home and tucked her into bed? She just started crying on her own!
“She’s just kind of sensitive,” says Blake. “I know you probably weren’t trying to mean, but you’re definitely not sunshine and rainbows. You’re scary, did y’know that?”
Harry rolls his eyes. Everyone seems to have this preconceived notion that Harry's this huge dick who never smiles… and though it’s true that he rarely smiles in the presence of strangers, he’s not an asshole! He just doesn’t feel like wasting his energy in pretending to like people he doesn’t actually like. Or smile when it’s much more comfortable to furrow his brows and pout grumpily.
And he finds that usually his grumpy demeanor works in his favor – people stay out of his way, and he gets to avoid the headache that comes with interacting with people. But now this girl… this sunshine girl who always has her nose in a little book and always says please and thank you and is nice to everyone and stumbles over herself like a little puppy who's learning how to walk… she’s gone on and made him feel bad about it.
How annoying is that? To have the nicest person on the planet think you’re scary?
“I wasn’t trying to make her cry,” he mutters, irritated. “I didn’t even say anything to her.”
“Well maybe that’s the problem. Like… just try. I think you’ll like her.”
He doesn’t think so. She’s too nice. They probably wouldn’t get along.
+++
There are three things y/n does a lot.
The first is studying. Her grades come first, always. She’ll be at the library for hours at a time, snuggled up in a booth with an iced coffee and her color coded notes, studying until she can barely keep her eyes open. It’s unhealthy, and she really should take breaks more often… but she just gets really nervous about her grades!
She’s used to being at the top of her class, and has always been a straight A student. But recently, she’s been struggling. She’s doing fine in her chemistry class, and absolutely thriving in biology. But calculus… calculus is her worst enemy.
The second thing she does a lot is reading. She’s been a bookworm for as long as she can remember. Her most frequent genre is romance (obviously!), but she’ll dabble a little bit in the popular fantasy series, maybe pick up a thriller every once in a while. And if she’s feeling sophisticated, she’ll try to read one of the classics… something philosophical, like Camus, or maybe something a little heavier, like War and Peace. But those situations are rare. She prefers her little world of romance.
The third thing that y/n does a lot… is cry.
She’ll cry if she watches a sad movie, she’ll cry over a sad book. She cried when Finnick died in The Hunger Games, and she cried when she finished Of Mice and Men. She cries every single time she watches Pride and Prejudice (2005), sobs her eyes out when Mr. Darcy says, “You have bewitched me, body and soul, and I love- I love- I love you.”
She cries if someone yells at her, and she cries if she thinks someone doesn’t like her. She cries almost every time she’s drunk (example: when Harry drove her home), and she cries in the middle of the night when she’s feeling homesick. She cries for no reason when she’s getting close to her period… and sometimes, she cries because she’s just lonely.
Now, you might be thinking… y/n sounds super annoying. But please don’t think that! That would also probably make her cry.
She’s just a tad bit sensitive! She has so many emotions in her little heart, and she’s trying so hard to be responsible and manage life as a young adult but at the end of the day she’s just a girl!!! She’s just a girl, and she’s tired and stressed out and lonely and touch deprived, and sometimes she has a hard time keeping everything together so she just… cries.
If she could control it, she would! Do you really think she wants to be crying in the library? Of course, not! It’s embarrassing, and she’s trying really hard to keep her sniffles quiet and to suck the tears back into her eyeballs… but when she’s sad, she can’t stop the tears.
So now she’s crying in the library. And it’s all because of Issac Newton.
Why did he have to invent calculus? Like, what was even the point? Why did she, as a girl studying ecology, have to take this stupid class?
She buries her face in her arms, the tears unstoppable at this point, and just hopes that anyone walking past will think she’s napping and not crying her eyes out.
She’d studied really hard for that last midterm. Like– she’d literally been in the library for a week straight, just doing calculus problems over and over again. She went to office hours to get help on all the questions she was stuck on, and was watching the Organic Chemistry Tutor’s videos religiously. She did so much math that she was literally having dreams about doing calculus.
And yet, even with all of her studying, she still managed to fail the midterm. Like… she seriously failed it. As in, if she doesn’t get an A on the final, she will literally have to retake the class.
She’s so sad. She’s never gotten a grade this low, ever in her life. And she’d tried so hard!!! The morning of the midterm, she’d actually felt confident! She thought she had it in the bag!
She was so, so wrong.
She feels stupid – not just because she failed the midterm, but because she’s literally having a breakdown about it in the library.
This is stupid. Everything is stupid. School is stupid, Issac Newton is stupid, calculus is stupid–
“Y/n?”
Uh oh. She tries to wipe away her tears discreetly, licking her lips and clearing her throat and desperately hoping that it’s not obvious that she’s been crying.
When she lifts her head, she finds Harry standing in front of her. “Why’re you crying?” he asks bluntly, looking down at her with his brows furrowed.
Ok. So it is obvious.
“Um,” she sniffles, “Hi Harry.” She hopes that maybe if she pretends like everything is fine, then he won’t pry any further.
It doesn’t work.
“Why are you crying?” he asks again. There’s not much compassion or comfort in his voice. Same old grumpy Harry, so blank and impassive.
She shrugs her shoulders, feeling small and embarrassed. “I– it’s silly,” she stammers, looking down at her fingers.
Harry doesn’t say anything, staring at her and waiting for her to continue.
She swallows thickly. “I failed my midterm,” she whispers, her voice catching as a new lump grows in her throat.
“How bad?”
One lone tear falls down her face as she shakes her head disappointedly, which she wipes away quickly. “Really bad,” she whimpers. Her cheeks burn hot as she realizes that she can’t hold back the tears any longer. She quickly averts her eyes from him, staring into her lap and hoping that he can’t see her face.
This is the second time he’s seen her cry, which is two times more than she would like. He probably thinks she’s some silly, over emotional girl… probably thinks she’s so annoying. She just wants to curl up in a ball, hide in a dark hole and cry by herself. She can’t handle Harry’s judgment on top of her shitty midterm grade.
He stands there silently for a moment. Her lower lip has pouted out cutely and he can hear her sniffling quietly. “Was it math?” he asks.
“Yeah,” she grumbles sadly. Stupid math.
He hums. After another tense moment he asks, “Do you want help?”
“Help with what?” She stares down at her fingers, her tone dejected. The happy glimmer that usually sparkles in her eye is gone.
“With math,” he clarifies. “I can help you.”
She looks up at him curiously, still pouting. “You’d help me with math?”
He nods, pulling out the chair next to her. “Let me see your midterm,” he says, nodding his head towards the packet of math problems she’d just been sobbing over. Embarrassingly, the front page is stained with a few tears, but she hands it over nonetheless.
He scans over the first page quickly, reading the question and seeing how she answered it. “Do you know why you got this one wrong?”
She sniffles and shrugs. She hadn’t even tried to look over the questions, too mentally exhausted to even try and understand what mistakes she’d made.
“Look. You tried to cancel out the tan3x, which would make sense in any other case… but since it’s to the power of 4 you could really easily have used integration by parts.”
“Wish I knew that before I took the fucking midterm,” she huffs.
“Hey,” he tsks. “Learn from your mistakes so that you don’t make them again. You need to know this stuff to do integral tests later.”
She shakes her head. “I tried so hard, Harry,” she barely whispers, her voice exhausted. “Like I studied so much, and I really really tried to make it all make sense. But it’s just so hard for me.” She sniffles and wipes away more tears, taking a shaky breath and looking away from Harry.
She doesn’t want to try anymore. She just wants to give up.
He purses his lips, brows furrowed. There’s something about seeing y/n upset that just feels so wrong. She usually brings so much… light into a room. Seeing her cry makes it seem like the entire universe has gotten a little sadder.
“You’ve got the right idea when you’re solving these…” he tries to comfort her (though he’s never really been good at comforting people), “It’s just little things that you’re doing wrong. And it’s probably because you’ve got a shit professor who just has you copy down problems.”
“That’s literally all we do!” she whines, not even caring if she sounds like a baby. “He does the problems so fast and then I have to go home and try and figure out how he did it all by myself!” She sniffles and puts her head in her hands, more tears dropping from her eyelashes. She’s exhausted, her head starting to hurt as she exhales a shuddery breath.
He lets her cry a little bit. “Listen,” he says gently, turning to face her. The normal furrow in his brow is gone, his gaze a little bit softer. “Next time you come over with Maddie, bring your notes and we can go over them together, okay?”
She sniffles. “Seriously?”
“Yes.”
“Like actually?”
“Yes,” he says again exasperatedly, rolling his eyes. He stands up from the table and puts her midterm back down in front of her. “Lighten up, sunshine. One bad score is not the end of the world.”
She feels a bit silly now that Harry’s witnessed her having another breakdown in the library. But, despite how little he said… he actually helped her calm down. This was not the end of the world.
“I’m going out,” Maddie says as she walks into the kitchen, discarding her half full coffee mug on the counter as she grabs her car keys from the hook in front of the door.
“Your mug!” y/n tuts like a mother. Maddie rolls her eyes as she pours the last of her coffee down the sink and puts the mug in the dishwasher. Y/n ignores the dramatic eye roll, knowing that Maddie’s just playing around, and asks, “Where are you going?”
“Over to Blake’s,” she responds with a wink. She’s been telling y/n about how she’s been waiting for Blake to text her all week because she doesn’t want to be the one texting first all the time… weird situation-ship stuff that y/n’s never experienced before. Seems like he finally texted her, with how excited Maddie is to be going over.
Just as Maddie is about to step out the door, y/n remembers Harry’s offer. He’d been serious, right? He hadn’t just said that because she was crying… right? She really hopes not, because she really could use his help. She’d been up for hours last night, trying to do the homework, but ultimately giving up because she got too frustrated with herself. Maybe… maybe he’d be able to help her?
“Wait!” y/n calls out, “Um… can I come with you?”
Maddie raises an eyebrow, “Why do you want to come over to Blake’s apartment?”
Y/n turns a bit shy, “Harry… he’s, um, helping me with math.”
“Harry?” Maddie’s eyes glimmer curiously. “He’s literally such a dick. He’s helping you?”
“He’s not that bad…” y/n mumbles, remembering the ounce of kindness he’d shown to her in the library the other day. He’s just a little bit… reserved, she’s started to realize.
“Please. He literally never smiles. I dunno how you got him to talk to you, he always ignores me when I’m over.”
(Honestly, she doesn’t blame Harry for not talking to Maddie… she sometimes ignores Maddie in her own apartment too…)
“You have two minutes to meet me in the car or I’m leaving without you!”
With her schoolbag in hand, y/n taps lightly on Harry’s door. Blake had told her to just go in, but she feels like that’s rude, so she stands in front of his door nervously and waits patiently for him to open.
“What?” he grunts, opening his bedroom door. “Oh.” The furrow in his brow softens the slightest bit when he sees it’s y/n. He’d thought it was Blake bugging him about something. Y/n is a much… nicer surprise.
“Hi,” she says, chewing on the inside of her lip nervously. “I was wondering if… um, you could help me out with my calc stuff?”
He stares at her for a second, then says, “yeah.”
He opens the door wider and she follows him in. His room is messy, but not gross. The bed is unmade, three half full water bottles on his nightstand, and there’s a pair of sweatpants on the floor… but at least it doesn’t stink!
His computer screen is paused mid-game, and she realizes that he’d still been holding his controller when he’d opened up the door for her. He throws a jacket that had been thrown on the back of his chair onto the bed, and motions for her to sit. Then he pulls up another chair that was sitting in the corner of his room to sit next to her.
“Let’s see it,” he says, shutting down his computer.
“So…” she takes her laptop out of her bag, setting it down on his desk and turning it on so that she can open up her homework assignment. While it loads, she unlocks her ipad to the scratch work she’d done last night. “I was trying to do the homework last night, and I think I’m supposed to be doing integration by parts but honestly I’m not even sure how to do that… so I’m kind of lost.”
Harry leans over her ipad and looks at the work she’d done. It’s… wrong.
“Can I see your notes for integration by parts?” He asks, trying to figure out how she ended up with 1 as her answer when it should be a much larger, much more complicated mix of trig and integrals. She scrolls up until she lands on a page titled Chapter 7, and points to the second example on the problem. Her notes are cute, written in pink with girlish, bubbly handwriting. However, it’s clear that she’d been struggling to keep up with the lecture, some of her work completely scribbled out and replaced with messy numbers and formulas. Next to one of the big portions of scribbled out math, she's written “WHAT???” along with a sad face doodled underneath it.
Clearly she’s a bit confused.
“Okay…” he scrolls down to a new page in her digital notebook and copies down the example problem that had confused her. “Let me show you how you do integration by parts first, and then we’ll look at the homework problem, okay?”
“M’kay,” she hums compliantly, crossing her legs and hiding her hands in her sleeves. She feels a bit… nervous. She doesn’t want Harry to think she’s stupid. But she’d rather have her ego a little bruised than fail the next midterm too.
“So… you do integration by parts when you can’t just do normal integration… usually if there’s e^x in there or a natural log then you know that you have to do integration by parts.”
She nods, following along quietly.
“In this one… you have x times e^x dx… you have to break it up into two parts, U and dV. And then you take the derivative of U and find the integral of dV. And you plug that into the formula. Do you know the formula?”
She blinks at him. “Um…” she shuffles through her notes and finds it. “It’s this.”
“Good… so what you do is you assign x to either U or dV and then e^x(dx) to the other… and then you find dU and V based off of that. Should we make x be U or dV?”
She purses her lips, “Make x=U?”
“Yes…” he nods. “Do you know why?”
She shrugs. “I guessed.”
His lip quirks up in the first smile y/n’s ever seen from him, a slight dimple popping up in his cheek. “S’cos we have to either find the derivative of U, or find the integral of dV. It’s way easier to use the derivative of x, cause it’s just one. If we made x equal to dV… then we’d add a fraction and a power of two to our equation and it’ll just make things ugly.”
“Oh.” She stares at his hands as he writes down what he just said in math terms, scribbling in his boyish handwriting that U=x and dU=1. “Okay.”
“So if U=x, then dV is equal to….”
“e^x?” she answers.
“Good,” he says gently. “And what is V?”
She stays silent for a moment, searching the paper as if it’ll give her an answer. He senses her confusion and helps her out, saying, “IF V is the integral of dV, and dV is e^x…”
“Well Isn’t the integral of e^x still e^x?” Her voice is unconfident, looking up at Harry with wide, round eyes.
“You’re right,” he says encouragingly, a soft smile on his face. “Stop doubting yourself so much.”
A reciprocating smile spreads on her face, feeling a little more confident with Harry’s praise.
“All you do now is put your numbers into the formula. Can you do it?”
He hands the pen over to her, their fingers brushing. Her hair falls in front of her face as she leans over the page to write down her answer, and Harry watches softly as she tucks it back behind her ear. He notices how long and delicate her eyelashes are as he stares at her side profile.
“Is that right?” she asks quietly, trying hard to be confident but still so nervous that she’s done it wrong.
He tears his eyes away from her face. “Almost,” he says, leaning forward. Their arms brush against each other, the space that they initially had set between their chairs having shrunk as they worked on the problem together. She can feel his breath as he quietly murmurs next to her ear, “You just need to add +C at the end.”
She furrows her eyebrows and turns her head towards him, and feels her heart stutter as she realizes how close their faces actually are. “What does the +C mean?”
“It’s just like… it’s supposed to represent any constants that we couldn’t find. Because when you take the derivative of a constant it just ends up being zero, so when you’re given an integral and doing the anti-differential process… you don’t know if there was actually a constant there or what it was. So the +C is just representing any constant value that could’ve been in the answer, even though you don’t know what the number is.”
She blinks at him. “Um… okay. I’ll just pretend like that made sense.”
He chuckles, the first time she’s probably ever heard him laugh. “It’s honestly not that important to get it. Just remember to add +C every time you take an integral.”
“Got it…” she says, adding the +C.
“Think you can do the next one on your own?”
+++
“Harry,” y/n pouts. “It says I’m wrong but I dunno why.”
He pauses his game and slides out of his seat, going over to y/n. She’d relocated to his bed after they did a couple more problems together and felt confident enough to do the rest by herself. His chest brushing against her back softly as he leans over her shoulder, going over her work. “What’s the integral of sin(x)?”
“Cos(x),” she says confidently.
“Not quite…”
She sits there for a second, brows furrowed. “Oh!” she adds a negative in front of the cos(x).
“There you go,” he grins down at her.
She lays down on his bed, her hair splaying out behind her as she throws her ipad on his bed, relieved. “Harry. You’re a genius.”
He laughs, a quiet huff of air that passes out of his nose with an amused smile on his face. “So it makes sense?”
“I think you should be teaching our class. You’re so good. Thank you for helping me.”
He hums, giving her a satisfied smirk, and goes back to his game while she finishes her homework. It's a strange setup, sitting in his bed and doing her homework while he plays, but she doesn’t mind it.
hope u guys loved it!!!!!! part 2 is up on my patreon already, and will come to tumblr next saturday (july 29) pleeeeaaaase lmk what u rhink and give her a rb and a comment i love u guys so so much!!!
sunshine - part 2 (already posted on patreon!) : In which Harry's a little bit nicer, and y/n is very excited to possibly, hopefully, maybe be kissed.
Gina, I think it’s funny how Harry, at first glance—like in pap pics or whatever—can look grumpy or like he doesn’t want to talk to anyone. But then when people actually approach him and start a convo, he turns out to be super kind, fun and patient (based on all the stories from fans and others).
I’m kind of the same way—people say I look grumpy at first, but really it’s just my serious or resting face.
There’s a reason this was the mascot for his HA HA HA collaboration with Alessandro. 😅
Week two is done! I can't believe it. I've been having so much fun, I hope y'all are enjoying it too! |Week one|
Resting Rumors
Rule one as a new Ministry recruit, avoid Harry Potter. He's rude, mean, intimidating and grouchy. Except—wait—why is he smiling? Wait, he's married to who?
Present Meets Past
Harry expects a lot of things. He expects to grade papers in his quarters alone, expects to prepare for a full day of lectures, expects a night of peace and silence. What he doesn’t expect is the arrival of his and Draco’s 14-year-old selves crashing into his quarters and completely destroying it in the process.
The Only Hope (was you)
Join the Dark Lord, they told him. Become a true Malfoy, they said. Only, he didn’t want to. Draco knew he had one shot at escape, one chance to get out of there and it all boiled down to one thing: Potter.
Draco didn’t know where else to go.
Curiosity Killed Everything
Harry was used to getting love letters after the war, but this? This one didn’t quite count.
'I can't stand you.'
Rudeness aside, Harry found it funny. He continued to find it funny as his last year of Hogwarts was filled with more and more hate mail from an anonymous admirer.
One Wish
Harry finds Scorpius’ letter to Santa and he positively melts at the request. Can he make his son’s one wish come true?
Our Voices
Fans wanting to meet the Harry Potter was always an annoying part of owning the Tornadoes Quidditch team for Draco. But when a little boy stands in front of him clutching a Quibbler magazine, eyes wet pleading to meet not Quidditch player Harry Potter but instead the Harry Potter that came out as bisexual, Draco knows that he's about to break his firm no fan meeting policy and allow the kid to meet his husband.
Wouldn’t H be smiling in every pic at this point, why is he still look so grumpy? If he’s got a new album coming, if he’s ‘retired’ for now, he’s not stunting, he’s cruising around Italy with his Dad, if Louis is close by and they’ve had so much time off together, wouldn’t there be a hint of him enjoying the fuck out of his life? I mean, there’s the Liam tragedy…. Maybe H has gone through too much. We’re only seeing MH posts from Gemma and Anne too lately. Just wondering if the beautiful sparkle will genuinely come back, and not just for promotion or on stage.
Hi, anon!
We can speculate as much as we want, we know too little. It can't be Liam's passing, because the grumpiness and being dismissive of fans started way before that.
Maybe it was the citrus fruit bike stunt that finally did him in, or the negativity that's tied to his overexposure. Maybe his album did get scrapped by Sony/Columbia, and he had to start over, maybe he left FSM and they're doing a smear campaign (doubt it), maybe he's in a battle with Sony/Columbia to be able to come out, and they won't have it. Maybe he's realised his so called friends are fake friends (about time if so).
Maybe he's tired of lies, stunting and the ass licking in the industy, and he knows he's in for more of that when he returns. Maybe he haven't seen Louis for a week, because Louis is writing his next album, and H needs a cuddle. Maybe he is having a rough go of it mentally, now that he's had time to really process the things he has experienced. Maybe he's annoyed with his own fandom and fans (harries are the worst, let's be real). Maybe he's fine and has developed a resting grumpy face. Maybe he really is a workaholic and this downtime is making him unhappy. Maybe his acting career isn't going the way he wanted it to.
We can speculate as much as we want to, we have no idea what's going through his head and what's happening behind the scenes. I think he's fine, he's just really tired of people being rude and disrespecful by taking sneaky pics of him when his body language is screaming to leave him alone. I don't think it's deeper than that. He wants a break from being Harry Styles tm, he just wants to be Harry. Whenever he interacts with fans he needs to be Harry Styles tm again. Maybe that's it.
