Harry's POV

I remained sat in the same position for what felt like seconds but in reality was almost an hour till I could look away from the drawing. She remembered me. All this time she had been acting, playing a part, so no one could guess about our previous connection. That glassy look in her eyes was temporary, that fire that burned inside her was still alight, and Phoenix was still in there.

The Phoenix I had fell in love with.

"Who's watching us?" I whispered to myself as the cogs in my brain began to move again, and I tried to understand her words.

Of course. The surveillance camera. Probably a harmless security feature, but it meant that we couldn't show affection in case the tapes were ever seen. She was still so much cleverer than me, she noticed things I never would have. The smile of my face felt like it would never fade.

My plan was working. Now all I needed to do was find to a way to help Phoenix get out of that place that would turn anyone weaker insane. Happiness brewed inside me, and all I could think about was finally being able to hold her in my arms and tell her how much I'd missed her. How she had been on my mind everyday since we departed, and how everything I had done had been for her.

With a few hours left of darkness, I fell into a deep slumber which was haunted by Phoenix's face but for the first time this wasn't painful. With this new discovery came a responsibility almost to save her, or at least that's how I felt.

***

The centre had never look so cheerful as that morning that I walked inside it, and I wanted to just run to Phoenix and tell her that I had received her message. But I had to remain neutral when it came to dealing with her as to not give myself away.

I had my session with other patients, all with terribly sad backgrounds, and a few meetings with my boss. At the end of the second meeting, the director of the institute took me aside and panic filled me as I believed maybe I was already being fired.

"How's Phoenix doing? I'm worried about her, no one can ever get a word out of her," she said quietly, and I breathed out a sigh of relief which made her raise her eyebrow at me.

"She's... Very much like her file suggests. I'm not sure how to get her to speak, I don't want to traumatise her by reminding her of the past but something needs to jolt her memory," I replied back in the most formal, doctor-like voice I could muster up and she nodded her head at me.

"She's been here for years and we've made no progress, I'm beginning to feel like she's a lost cause. Apparently she wasn't always like this, at least that's what her therapist at her previous treatment centre told me," she rolled her eyes, and picked at her nails showing how little she cared for Phoenix which ignited anger in me that I was forced to suppress.

"Maybe she needs a large shock to 'wake her' up," I replied, trying to replicate her nonchalance on the subject.

"But what sort of shock?"

"Maybe take her back to a place she experienced something as a child, or just a place where she has visited in the past," there was a bubbling sense of excitement in my mind as my plan began to form, and I tried to stop a smile spreading across my face.

"I'll discuss it with the other doctors. We've tried everything else, that couldn't hurt," and the director left like that, leaving me to wallow in my own happiness and intelligence.

If I could get Phoenix alone, away from the institute I could run away with her. I could take her someone better, a place where she could have a future. An actual life.

Telling myself to not get my hopes up, I kept a straight face and walked out the meeting room. This was my chance, my chance to do what I had set out to do all those years before. I could save Phoenix Waters. There was no way should escape that place by herself, regardless of how intelligent and quick-witted she was.

I could almost feel her in my arms already, and I fantasised about finally having her back with me. No longer did I blame myself for running away from the fire because what good did that do? I had done what I had done, and all I could do was resolve the effects of that decision. I was just a scared teenage boy when it had happened, and I wasn't thinking straight.

If I could keep my facade up for just one more day, if I could convince them to let me take her away from that dump, we could be free. I had no idea how she felt about me, and her message had been ambiguous. Did she love me romantically? No. She never had, although I'm sure there had been times where maybe she had convinced herself that she could love me like that.

But she could never love anyone like that. She was too hurt, she was too defensive to let anyone past her walls. The fact that my undying love was unrequited did not sadden me as it would have done years before, because I had learnt that it would always be that way. I would never love anyone as much as I did her, but that didn't mean she had to love me.

It was my duty to save her as a friend, not for the hopes of getting something from her in return.

Will Harry's plan work? There are only a few chapters left to go but anything could happen!

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