narry storan one shots.

"there's blood on your hands."

CREDIT TO :MISSINGHEADACHE ON AO3

Harry has been in love with his roommate for approximately six months and seventeen days. Before then he had a crush on the barista that works in his favourite off-campus coffee shop for four months and eleven days. They're both the same person, and aside from the intensity of Harry's pining and the number of traits that he has discovered and grown attached to, their relationship has remained oddly unchanged. A glacier moving through the lapses of getting comfortable with each other over a counter four times a week, making minimal progress as the months have passed and they've passed each other by daily in hallway and living room; in kitchen and upon sofa cushions that cheer along with them when they come together for Sunday night football catch-up every week.

Niall is a friend. Someone Harry has depended on since the friendly sidenotes along with his tea turned into frequent talks about life during dull afternoons without caffeine addicts breathing down Harry's neck in line behind him. He's also a vital part, now. Feels like a tiny bone that no one knows the name of but that still keeps an entire skeleton together. Harry can feel it when he walks. Talks. Sits still. Knows the name of it the same way he knows that the things protecting his heart from splintering entirely are called ribs.

Ribs and Niall and him. It's all longing. It's all him being in love.

"You're a dick," Harry concludes. "You're supposed to be helping me."

His beer is unaffected in its bottle, showing its indifference regarding Harry's love life through froth and a barely-there crackling of bubbles in the kitchen. Dimly lit, with white cupboards lining up in a march of inanimate objects against human pining. His appliances used to be far more concerned before Niall moved in and charmed them, too.

"Harry?" the flat asks. The silence interrupted by Niall's voice; the cadence of it warm and slow, familiar and encompassing. Something soft and full to keep the noises of Harry's mind from echoing in-between walls.

Niall's slim, but muscular. Feet that stay on the ground whenever his head's in the clouds; ankles chained by kindness that he refuses to kick off and away no matter the situations he's been in that might have required it. His calves and thighs are pale, inviting where they run up to boxer-covered hips. Faint outlines of abs and ribs. Chest hair and stubble. Concern in winter-blue eyes when they cut through the room and find Harry in the early hour.

"Talking to yourself again?" he adds on, voice torn up by sleep. "What're you doing?"

"Went to the bathroom," Harry explains. "Accidentally started drinking."

Niall falters in a lot of ways; his knee bending slightly under the weight of surprise that lands upon him; his eyes trembling with the added concern; his lips cracking open under a smile, a snort of astonished amusement.

"Accidentally?" he repeats. "Without me?"

"Didn't want to wake you up."

Niall looks at him for a moment, seems to be searching for something, debating something else, before saying, "You can always wake me up."

Harry breathes, in and out. Leans, back and forward, grabbing a bottle from the fridge behind him before he's settling back on his stool, back at their breakfast bar. He offers the beer and a bad smile – wishes he were better so that Niall could want him back like that.

"Don't say that," he warns, with self-deprecation lining his skin, a fresh dose misted in his senses since midnight. "I might believe you. Take you up on that offer."

Niall cracks the beer cap off against the counter, says, "Do. Is something bothering you?"

"What? No," Harry denies, in that way that always makes his mum roll her eyes. "Just tired. Miss my mum."