Artwork [h.s]

thirty-three

I arrived at school and, when I realised that Ella still hadn't arrived, I settled in my usual place, leaning against the small wall, one of my feet on the first step that brought to the main door. I sighed when I spotted a couple curious glances sent my way, taking out my phone to distract myself and make sure I wouldn't have accidentally made an awkward eye contact with anyone.

I was that caught up by scrolling up my mostly irrelevant chat with Ella that I didn't even notice that someone had leant on the wall next to me until they cleared their throat.

I looked up quickly, being more surprised than I probably should've been when I met Harry's mint green eyes. "You came" I said, astonishment that didn't quite belong held in my voice.

He gave me an eloquent glance, but didn't reply. "Let's go inside" he said instead, his hand somehow finding its way to my lower back, his touch light against the fabric of my coat.

I nodded, eager to escape the cold, detaching my body from the freezing wall and allowing myself to walk towards the front door of the building by his side. His feather-like touch stayed on my back as he pushed the door open, not even leaving me as we walked down the hallway in the direction of our first class.

I watched as he sent a sharp glare to the people that glanced our way, pursing my lips not to smile at his reaction, that made me realise he didn't particularly enjoy being in the spotlight as well.

"What's up with everyone?" He said lowly to himself, glancing at the people in the corridor one last time with the corner of his eye as we entered the classroom.

I gave him a little shrug. "It might be because they think you got stabbed at the party."

He sent me a confused glance, making me realise that his question was indeed closer to a personal reflection that I wasn't supposed to hear. He opened his mouth to say something, but he decided against it as soon as some people started to come into the room.

"Will you tell them?" I asked curiously, looking towards the door to see who was coming in.

"Let them think whatever they want to think, I don't care" he said, and I turned around to look at him.

He was leaning against the back of the chair, tapping a pen on the desk to a beat I didn't know, an enigmatic look into his eyes.

I nodded slightly at his words. "I guess that works too" I replied, sighing and taking out my notebook as the teacher came into the room.

Maths went by in silence, as usual, not a word having been heard from Harry since he'd been reprimanded some days before. With all that had happened over the weekend, it really did feel as if it'd been ages since then.

For our free period we went in the cafeteria, sitting together at a table as we'd already done before. I took out my notepad and started sketching, trying to pretend that I wasn't minimally affected by Harry's presence. It was hard to concentrate on what I was doing, to the point that I ended up changing page and starting anew after a while, since the mistakes on my first try had started to become a bit too many for my liking.

After a while I looked up, discovering that Harry was on his phone, doing nobody knows what.

"Harry?" I asked, a question on the tip of my tongue, and he locked the screen, putting the device on the table and looking up.

I debated whether I should've asked or not for a couple of seconds. Harry hardly told me anything about himself, and I didn't want to piss him off, but I knew I was too curious not to ask.

"I met Liam" I said, carefully observing his reaction. He raised an eyebrow, but didn't give me any kind of hint that it would've been better to drop the topic, so I decided to continue. "How do you know him?" It was something that I'd inadvertently been wondering for a couple of days. Liam had seemed really worried on Saturday, which told me they were pretty close, that contradicted everything I knew about Harry. He didn't seem the kind of person to let people get too close to him, so I wondered how he had ended up in a similar friendship.