H A R R Y

"OH, COME ON!" I muttered under my breath as I tried Ben's number again, only to be sent straight to voicemail.

It has been days since I saw Luella- or Faith- or whatever the fuck she calls herself now. I felt frustrated, of all things I could feel. Maybe it was all the hurt was translating itself into anger. And I didn't know what to do with myself after she left. She just fucking turned her back on me, again, and left.

It was overwhelming for me, but for her? She seemed to be extremely underwhelmed. Like she can't tolerate the fact that she saw me again. Except for the moment when I sputtered out that it all wasn't a dream.

Here's my great lovers' reunion story. Fucking hell.

After she'd just passed out in my arm, I felt paralyzed. I could only act so quickly to carry her and walk past Ben, who looked out of it when he saw her. In my paralyzed arms. Who am I kidding, I looked out of it. He was just frowning, followed me silently outside. Since we drove by his car, he dropped me -and Luella- at my flat. Without a single word.

I think we were both too shocked to say anything, or think of anything to say. I barely even realized the car ride was silent because all I could hear was the noise my pounding heart was making. Pumping loud and clear and fast into my ears. My eyes couldn't drink her in enough. It was like I had to make up for eighteen months of not seeing her. And now, seeing her...completely different.

I'm not even sure Ben said anything or not. Maybe he did and I couldn't hear him. But all I could remember was the prominent crease he had between his eyebrows. Other than that, I only remember the curve of her chin down to her neck, the thick coat of lipstick on her full lips, the flair of her colored hair, her painted eyelids shut peacefully.

I dialed Ben again, and again, and again, until he picked up. I sighed in relief at the sound of the line picking up.

"Fucking finally," I breathed. "Do I really have to beg? Where the hell have you been?"

"What's up?" Ben mumbled through the phone and I pictured his grumpy face as he does. I rubbed my face in frustration and scoffed.

"Please don't tell me you want to fucking pretend, too."

"What are you on about?"

"Are we not going to talk about her? You know... Her."

"You can say her fucking name, Harry. She's not Lord Voldemort!"

"Okay, Harry Potter is seriously scarring you." I rolled my eyes as I picked on the frail rips on the knees of my jeans, palms sweating as I try to distract him. Or myself. "But I would say her name if I knew which one it was."

I almost wanted to rip my hair out.

"What the fuck are you talking about?"

"Faith, she said. She's dyed her hair fucking blue and now she's calling herself Faith."

"What?" Ben sputtered. "Seriously?"

"Look who's interested in my tragedies now." I sourly remarked, not letting it slide that he hasn't picked up any of my phone calls for the past three days.

My best friend sighed. "I know. I'm sorry, mate... I've just been busy."

"Busy?" I furrowed my brows.

"And I assumed you were back with Luell- Faith, I mean? Whatever. When you didn't call that night, or after."

"I'm not...back with her." I sunk my teeth into the inside of my lips harshly.

"You still sound fucking miserable, so I figured that out on my own." Ben scoffed, making me chuckle, almost sardonically. "But you sound miserable and angry now. So, do tell what went down."

I let out a dramatic sigh. "I was flabbergasted...I still am! I took the day off from work, too. I'm just too fucked up in the head right now. I'm telling you, this Faith I just met is not Luella. Maybe it's the universe laughing in my fucking face."

"Woah. This needs a sit down, doesn't it?" Ben said.

"No, actually, I'm pacing around the flat talking to you about it. I need to punch a wall or something."

"Uh-oh."

"Do you know any gyms I can go to in the city?"

"Dude, you are not okay. What the fuck did she do to you?"

"She didn't do anything, and maybe that's the problem," I stopped pacing, dead in my tracks. "She still has it." I come to the great realization of all. My heart pounding in my chest, fast and hard, as I remember the way she looked at me.

She built her defenses up pretty easily. She had her time. Luella, or Faith, or The Girl I Love still cares about me. She's in there somewhere, she's in that blue-haired cold woman I met at the pub and let crash in my bed. I can't know how my brain and heart are dealing with the situation, all I know is that I feel like every single one of my senses is all fogged up and hazy, and all I can do is decide that I'm not going to pretend I didn't just see The Love of my of life after I'd broken both our hearts a year and a half ago.

The Girl I Love is still in there somewhere, and I'm not giving up on her now. I know I can't. I'm breaking down her walls that she built up so high, so thick, and I'm going to do everything I can to fix it. Fix what I had with the The Girl I Love who I know is hiding in there in a corner, waiting for the sun to peak in through the blinds.

Because The Girl I Love still has it.

"What?" Ben's confused. "What does she still have?"

"My fucking heart."

L U E L L A

"Alex,"

"Hmm?"

"I'm going out, okay?"

"Mhm,"

"So don't freak out when you wake up and don't find me."

"M'kay."

"Getting groceries, you want anything?"

"Nah."

"Alright. Bye,"

"Mmm."

...is how a conversation goes on with Alex when he's asleep. I continue talking, pretending-more like hoping-he'd remember where I'm at when he wakes up and finds my side of the bed empty. He'd, as usual, assume I got up and left him. Escaped. Just like I had my old life. Run away from it.

Alex didn't know anything about me -or Luella. He didn't know why I left, why I'm here, how I ended up sobbing my eyes out in that alleyway the afternoon he found me. Life had been harsh, I'd tell him. And he'd listen, understand and not press it any longer, seeing I was never really up for it.

It was easy, with Alex. He didn't ask many questions, and when he did, he wasn't that curious. He wasn't curious about Luella, her interests, her dislikes. He kind of helped create the Faith I am now. He put me in a bar, secured me a stable income-plus the generous tips I'd get every now and then-and gave me a home. Gave me a chance to buy my own groceries and spoil myself with my own earnings. He helped me find the independence I was searching for my whole life.

I think I think about all that too much, like I'm trying to pressure my gratitude into my heart. It's true, though. And it makes me anxious and uncomfortable at times. As if Alex would decided one day that I owe him back, for everything that he did for me. And I don't think I have anything that could possibly repay Alex.

Except maybe your virginity? My subconscious was being a bitch with her crude remarks lately. I shut her out, shaking my head at the thought. I wasn't going to blind myself, Alex had begun getting quite persuasive with the issue. I tried to explain to him many times that, "Alex, I can't right now. I told you, I want to take it slow. Please." He'd sigh and nod and let it go. But the sighing and nodding and letting it go was slowly turning into frowning and huffing and casually storming off.

"Hello," A squeaky female voice brought me out of my thoughts as I was in the middle of strolling through the fruits isle. "How may I help you?"

My smile comes out sour. The helper girl in front of me is one I've encountered too many times, nearly every time I come here. She'd have the same peachy smile, the same cheery self. She reminds me too much of a time I don't want to be reminded of.

"No," I say.

"No?"

"I mean," I sighed, already turning the other way. "Thanks, but I don't need any help."

"Okay. Have a nice day."

A nice day.

A nice day, I'm having, worrying about the hospitable guy I was staying with and the heartbreaking guy I couldn't get out of my mind regardless of how hard I tried. It's nearly impossible after seeing him for the first time in a really, really long time.

It's been days, though it feels like months, since I woke up in Harry's bed. I still couldn't wrap my head around it, around him and his out-of-nowhere presence. It's like every time I blink or close my eyes for sleep, I can see him-feel him even-behind my eyelids. The look on his face, the relief in his eyes, the breath escaping his pale pink-tinted pillow-like lips as he mumbled in his groggy morning voice, "So it wasn't a dream," and "You're real." The way his arms held me as I clung onto him at the pub-the memory so fresh as if it had just happened a minute ago. I remember feeling helpless, hopeless and...home.

But he was Luella's home. And she is gone.

I had been on watching duty, subconsciously, whenever I worked the following nights at the bar. Feeling like a trapped animal terrified of being hunt down. Frightened at that image in my head, I shake out of it and bag a couple kilos of fresh green apples, put them in my cart and carry on.

Carrying on, I wish I hadn't.

Harry Non-disposable Styles stood tall in front of me. Well, he wasn't really in front of me. I don't even think he'd seen me. I froze and all I could think of was, so it wasn't a dream, he's real.

Thinking quickly, I acted so. As he was so into that pile of kiwis, I moved my cart around so that my back was facing him. I'd started to think how sweet of an escape that was, until he spoke up, with a tone of obvious amusement and almost sounded a little bittersweet.

"Nice to see you again-" He paused with an air of dramatic sarcasm as he added, "-Faith."

My eyes rolled by themselves, but I could hear my-Luella's- heart react irrationally to that voice of his, that aura, that presence. Those memories. I scoffed, shaking my head as I continued on with my stroll along the fruit isle. Still pretty confused as I rounded to the junk food isle-where the chips and dips I want lie- and was still hearing his footsteps somewhere close behind me.

Stopping abruptly, I turned around, face flushing red as I found him inspecting the chocolate bars lined along one of the shelves. Groaning in frustration, I decided to turn around and continue my way along the isle.

"Okay, what are you doing, Harry?" I give up after a while of hearing the soles of his Nike's pad behind me and never getting to catch him red-handed.

His head snapped at me coolly when he heard his name, leaving another shelf and taking slow steps towards me. I'm hoping the guy watching the security cameras is having fun today.

"Well, Faith," he emphasized and I narrowed my eyes at his act. "I was only shopping for groceries. What are you doing?"

"Stop following me," I glared at him in annoyance. "Or haven't you had enough of that already?"

My last words seem to rattle him. His face falls, his act dropping with it. His eyelids twitch a little as he switches glances between my pair of hardened eyes. I raise an eyebrow in triumph and wait a second for a response. When silence greets me and the impeccable green of his eyes start making their way to a hammer to knock my walls down, I'm quick to turn around.

"Wait,"

"Come on, Harry!" I almost whimper, but turning back around, I lower my voice so we don't attract shoppers around. His eyes are pleading me as I look into them to prove a point. "Forget it, forget that you even saw me. Let us just go our own separate ways."

"Luella- Faith. I'm not letting you go knowing you hate my guts." He holds eye contact, his tone of voice questioning as if he's waiting for me to confirm his suspicions.

"God," I said in exasperation. "If you have one decent bone in your fucking body, let me live."

"Let me just say something," he tries again. "I fucked up, okay? But everything was real, Luella, I swear, and-"

"I can't believe I'm listening to this," I turn around and hurry my way to the cashier, almost stomping. I really don't want to make a scene in front of so many people. I really don't want to make a scene at all, but he is pushing my buttons and I might just lose it. Harry grabs a bag of chips off the rack and hurries to follow me in the line to the register.

"I've gone fucking mad without you," Harry whispers from behind me and I can't prevent the chill that runs down my spine. "Driven myself crazy trying to find you." The air feels so charged with countless volts of dangerous electricity but I break through it.

The guy who broke my heart. The heart I worked hard to piece back together, running out of glue and getting more till it was somewhat held together, barely stable, but never completed. Because a part of it is missing, because a part of it was stolen... And he's the filthy thief. The worst part about it? I let him. I handed it to him on a silver platter.

"Good for you," I deadpanned.

"I will do anything for you to forgive me, Luella. I've been looking for you ever since that night, just hear me out, I-"

"It's Faith."

Silence. A sigh. Then, "Why are you being like this?"

At his question, I turned around and let my mouth hang open, eyes hard as stones. "Why? You really want me to answer that?"

My voice came out louder and harsher than I intended it to be and I was aware of multiple pairs of eyes now looking at us, including the saucer-eyed cashier. I bagged the rest of my unsuccessful shopping purchases hurriedly, thinking my ears must be having smoke coming out of them right now. I paid for my stuff and stomped outside the store, away from people's eyes and Harry's.

But of course, how would he give up that easily?

"I'm sorry," he says. "I'm so fucking sorry. And I know sorry is such a stupid thing to say now and I can't depend on a five-lettered word to make you forgive me, but I am sorry. Everything we had was r-"

"Forgive you for what, Harry?" I turned around abruptly for the fourth time this morning, if you're counting. "For what, exactly? The fact that you ruined my life? Or, the fact that you destroyed any potential good future I had for myself?"

Like every time I speak with more than two sentences, Harry seems to hold his breath to drink it all in. He stares, and listens, and it fuels me up to say more.

"I had planned everything in my life before I even had it. Every single little thing," I can't help the tears that are accumulating at the bottom of my vision. I wish them away as I bite down on the inside of my bottom lip. "But I hadn't planned you. I didn't see you barging in, and you ruined everything! Everything I worked so hard for, you ruined. You, Cecilia, and whoever the fuck else knew about the twisted game you were orchestrating."

Harry looks like a fish. He's opening his mouth and closing it, searching for words to say, until he comes up with a quiet response I strain to hear it. Or maybe I can't hear it over the sound of ringing in my ears or the sound of my heart beating so loudly inside my chest against my ribcage that imprisoned it.

"It wasn't a game. I only took part in it to help you. I-I tried to help you, I did. Maybe not in the most ideal way, maybe it could have been done in front of you, instead of behind your back, I know all that, but..." He pauses and I have so much to say, to spit in his face, but I have to calm myself down. I have to find my voice because if I open my mouth again, I will scream. "Luel- Faith- Fuck, it was only for your good in the end. You... You were doing so good. You had an internship, you were just going to start college, you-"

"I had you... I had friends... I had a life, right?" My lips involuntarily curled in disgust. "All things were made up. Fake. Fabricated. Such lies. I was your puppet! I was the charity case, Harry! I was the fucking charity case and everyone knew it but me. But oh, you helped me. Great, thanks for that! Look how nicely it turned out!"

"Don't say that," Harry frowned and stretched his hand to touch me, but I flinched away as if I'd been burned by his touch. "You were never like that. It's true, I didn't know you at first. I hadn't even seen your face yet when I...when Josie brought it up. But when I knew you, when I really got to know you, I couldn't say no to helping you-"

"Helping me!" I scoffed, sniffling in the process. "Stop saying that anything any of you were doing was helping me. Stop feeding me that bullshit as if I'm still your puppy and you can lure me back to that toxic way you were making me live my life! All you did was destroy my life. Ruin it. So, congratulations. All for what, because you didn't think I was capable of surviving on my own?"

"N-"

"But look at me now, Harry. Watch me. Watch me live a life that's really my own. A life I built. Sure, I had a little help, a lot of help. But at least I wasn't blindsided to find out that the people closest to me..." Our eyes lock and my eyelids twitch. I wipe away any fallen tears and say my last words to him, "The people closest to me were the ones who, even though they knew it would ruin me, they still did it anyway."

"Luella," Harry shook his head as I turned around and started walking again. "Wait, Luella, wait!"

I ignored him, my back facing him as he tried to catch up to me as we both maneuvered our way through the busy London streets. My heart was filled when I glimpsed Alex in the entrance of our building, my heart swelled. I needed reassurance, from him. From somebody in Faith's life. I almost ran to him, and when he saw me, his eyes lit up and I sighed before kissing him.

But I wasn't really kissing him, I was burying my secrets into him. I was thanking him, I was... I was running away from Luella and her feelings and her past and her Harry.

Faith doesn't have a past, she only has a future.

note:
i'm not crying, you are.
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i have finished outlining this story and i can assure you that the ending will make your brains e x p l o d e. exciting things ahead! comment your thoughts?

love, ness. x