as always, dedicating this chapter to a comment that i like. inline comments are appreciated *wink wink nudge nudge*

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mia

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  Before we could even start heading toward the pet shop, we were stopped by a group of Harry's fans. I tried to stay back as much as I could and let them have time to talk with him as they took turns taking pictures with him.

  "Harry, I love you so much." One girl said, wrapping her arms around him. I smiled but then notice her very obviously take in a huge whiff of Harry's scent, trying her hardest to maybe smell his cologne. I fought the urge to laugh as they took their picture and the next girl stepped up to him.

  "Oh my God, you're real." The girl blubbered. Her voice quivered as she spoke, but he just smiled and gave her a hug. "Never cut your hair, please."

  "I won't." He laughed. "It was very nice to meet you."

  "If you cut your hair, just like, mail it to me or something." She went on. "Also, can you follow me on twitter? My username is larryshipper492." This time I couldn't help it as I laughed.

  "I'm sorry." I said as I covered my hands over my mouth.

  "Who's she, Harry?" Another girl asked. I froze in my spot next to Harry and glanced over at him briefly as my mind worked to come up with something believable. Neither of us were prepared to give an answer. Hello, I'm a runaway bride that Harry rescued and now we're going on an adventurous road trip together? That sounded like a cheesy fanfiction. 

  "I'm his second cousin." I smiled.

  "Oh." Larryshipper492 said. "So, why are you American then? Shouldn't you have a British accent?"

  "She, uh, she's lived here since she was young." Harry lied swiftly. "I'm just visiting some family, doing some sightseeing." I bit my lip as I watched their reactions. They seemed like they believed what we were saying, but these were also the people that believed that Louis had actually got a girl pregnant. 

  "Oh, that makes sense." A girl said. "So, are you two like into incest stuff?"

  My face turned tomato red. I didn't even have to look in a mirror to see, I could literally feel the heat rising in my face and I hoped that they didn't take it as an answer. Harry laughed and denied it immediately while I kept my mouth shut. He then tried to steer the conversation into something else to try and lessen my embarrassment.

  "Well, it was nice talking to you all. We've got to go now!" Harry waved.

  "All the love." I muttered as we turned around and began walking toward the pet shop. 

  Harry burst out laughing as soon as we began walking away. I had to admit, the incest thing was actually funny. I found myself laughing along with him as we passed stores with bright lights and provocative t-shirt designs.

  "Incest? Do these girls have any filter?" I asked.

  "No, they really don't." He shook his head. "Some of the European girls actually even press their breasts up against our car. The last time that happened was when I was eighteen, so of course I was totally fine with it." I smacked his chest.

  "I'm not like that anymore!" He defended himself. "I respect women. All the love, remember?"

  "Lord, please no." I groaned.

  "All the fucking love."

  "Fooking?"

  "What?"

  "You literally said fooking." I giggled.

  "Shut up." He laughed.

  We passed a few more people that seemed interested in Harry, but instead of coming up and taking to us they just took pictures from afar. Harry didn't seem to mind it, though, he just carried on with what he was doing as if everything was normal.

  "It should be up here somewhere." Harry said in concentration. 

  "There." I shouted, pointing at the bright store lights. Harry quickened his pace and I tried my hardest to keep up, but his legs were exceptionally long and mine struggled to maintain his pace. 

  We walked into the pet store with a loud ding of a bell. Harry's face instantly lit up at the sound of a loud bird's screech as I jumped in fright at it. Harry instantly grabbed my hand and drug me to the left, where there were rodents and snakes and birds all along the wall.

  "Look at that snake." He said in awe. "I think if I had a snake I would make him vegan."

  "And feed him kale?" 

  "Yes." Harry smiled. "I would make him a kale shake."

  "Good luck with that." I snorted. I watched as a hamster burrowed himself down under some wooden chip bedding and close it's eyes for a nap. That hamster was literally my spirit animal. I felt one with the hamster.

  "Look, it's you." Harry teased.

  "It is me." I agreed. 

  Harry smiled as his eyes darted around, trying to observe every single animal. It was incredibly adorable, and instead of watching the cute animals, I found myself watching the cute human. It was truly odd how one minute he could be this kid at heart and the other moment he was this hot rocker boy.

  Harry wandered towards the back of the shop and I followed. I heard a loud gasp escape his lips and he quickened his pace, disappearing behind a shelf. When I finally caught up to him, I found him staring down at a pen of kittens.

  "Look." He gaped. 

  "They're really cute." I smiled. I watched as several ginger kittens ran around and played together. There was also a kitten with grey fur, but it stood off alone as it tried to reach up at a cat toy that was suspended in the air.

  "I have a cat named Dusty back at home." Harry reminisced. "I haven't seen him in a long time, though. He's an old cat." I didn't respond as I tried to find out what Harry was looking at so intensely. When I followed his gaze, I could see him watching the cat with the grey fur exceptionally close. "That cat reminds me of Dusty."

  "I had a cat once." I spoke up. "I was two years old and I used to pull it's tail and it would get angry at me. We had to give her a way." (a/n: this is actually true about me. her name was gizmo. carry on.)

  "Good going." Harry smirked. 

  "All the fooking love." I said back. He shot me a glare before watching the cats again.

  "I feel so bad for the grey one." I mumbled. "Look at that! The ginger ones are ganging up on the poor thing!" The orange cats were all taking turns pouncing on the grey cat as she turned in circles, unsure of where to look.

  "If she was mine, I would call her Cat." Harry said. I snorted. 

  "Let me guess, if you had a pet hamster you would call it Hamster, too." I said sarcastically.

  "No." Harry blushed.

  "All of our kittens are only thirty dollars today." A voice said from behind us. I turned around to see a middle-aged Mexican man with a parakeet hanging out on his shoulder. He wore a bright red polo and a bright smile to match. "I'm Mark, the store owner."

  "We're just looking around." I said quickly. 

  "What about the grey one? Where are it's siblings?" Harry asked, eyebrows furrowed in concentration, his eyes never leaving the cat. 

  "Oh, she was a rescue." Mark the store owner said. "We usually would've taken her to a shelter, but the one in this area is closing down. She's been here for a long time now."

  "Where did you find her?" Harry pressed on, genuinely concerned.

  "I was walking down Main street and she was on the run from a bunch of big dogs. She looked like she was trying to escape them, but they were obviously a bit faster. By the time I caught up, she had a few scratches here and there, but nothing serious."

  In a way, this reminded me of myself. A runaway- trying to escape the clutches of the vicious creatures in our lives. I could tell by the look in Harry's eyes that he was hooked on this animal, and I had to admit- she was starting to grow on me, too.

  Suddenly, Harry turned to me with wide eyes and I knew exactly what was coming next. 

  "Please, Mia." He begged. "Please, please, can we get her? She was a rescue and she has no family and if she stays here she's going to keep getting picked on. We can make sure she's litter trained and I'll stock up on Febreeze so our RV won't smell like cat piss. I promise I'll take really good care of her and-"

  "Harry." I interrupted him, laughing. "We can get her."

  "Yes!" Harry said, giving me a tight hug and spinning me around. "We'll take the grey cat, please. And we're also going to be picking up some supplies for her here, as well. Mia, can you help me find some supplies? We have to get her lots of things she'll like."

  "Sure." I chuckled, amused by his overwhelming excitement caused by this small feline. I was never a huge fan of cats myself, but seeing Harry happy made me happy, too.

  We went to the front desk for a while with Mark to fill out some paperwork. I let Harry sign everything, since it was technically going to be his cat. Mark gave us a box and a bag of litter, cat food, and Harry diverted into a different section of the store to pick out a bed and some toys for her. I stayed at the front with Mark as he gave me information on pet care (not that I was really listening, because let's be honest, I have the attention span of a goldfish.)

  "And you should be set after that. Now, I want to make sure that she'll be in good hands." He said seriously. "I know who that young man is and I know that he has a very busy schedule. Can you make sure that she gets properly taken care of?"

  "Of course." I nodded. "Trust me when I say this, Harry will definitely take the best care of this cat."

  "Fantastic!" He smiled. "So, how long have the two of you been together?"

  I blushed for probably the millionth time this night, but in the back of my mind, I was just glad that we hadn't told him that we were cousins. I was over the incest comments from the night.

  "We're, uh, not together." I awkwardly said. "Just friends." 

  "Just friends?" He laughed. "No! You can't be!"

  "We are." I assured him. "Definitely nothing going on here. Ever."

  "Oh, please!" Mark laughed, clapping his hands together. "I see how bad you want to hop on that."

  "What?"

  "What?" He blinked. "Oh, here he is now!"

  I turned around to see Harry. He was holding a pink bed that carried a bunch of different cat toys. A few of them were little decorative mice, which was exactly the thing that our cat had been trying to attack back in the pen. Some of them were just little colorful feathery things that looked like garbage to me, but I guess Harry knew how those things worked.

  "I will go get her and put her in a crate for you to take home." Mark said. He disappeared to the back of the store and half of me wanted to blurt out the thing he told me only moments before, but I decided against it. I had had more than my fair share of awkward times tonight.

  "I'm so excited." Harry beamed. "Thank you for letting me do this, Mia."

  "It's no problem." I reassured him. "It'll be fine to have a pet around the bus. As long as our place doesn't smell like cat pee, then we'll have a problem."

  "I promise it won't. Scout's honor." Harry grinned.

  "I'm holding you up to that one." I warned him.

  Mark the store owner returned with a small box. The one end was fence wiring, and we could see our cat rolling around playfully inside. He handed Harry the box while I held the small amount of pet necessities that we had bought as he rung us up at the front desk. No doubt, as soon as we left the store doors, people would be snapping pictures and posting them places twice as much as before. 

  "She's all yours." Mark smiled. "Your total is 100.47." I gaped at Harry.

  "How much did you spend on these supplies!?" I asked.

  Harry shrugged. "Cat deserves the best, Mia."

  "You're calling her Cat?" Mark asked. Harry nodded. "Well then, Cat, say hello to your new parents. They are going to take very good care of you."

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a/n: yay for harry being cute with a cats

  comment/vote/fan

  -delilah