I wake with stupid smile on my face and a ticklish, fuzzy feeling in my stomach. I feel light and bursting with happiness. I also feel like a complete utter idiot. Harry Styles, Mia? I ask myself,really?
Really.
Saturday night was probably one of the most amazing nights of my life. Who'd ever think that he'd be the cause of it?
I roll over in my sheets and draw my knees up to my chest, my arms wrapping around them tight. I try to stifle hysterical giggles, oh my god. My mouth stretches in a wide grin, smiling into my pillow.
I remember yesterday night that we talked for hours in my bed, lying side by side, my head resting on his shoulder. His long fingers played with my small hands as we laughed. We kissed lots too, so much that my lips were swollen by the end of it.
They tingle now as I think about it.
Towards the end of the night, I drifted off next to Harry. He held me for a while, stroking my hair and holding my hand. I felt him kiss me on the cheek and whisper goodnight before he dragged his warm body out of my bed and closed the door softly behind him.
I sit up and puff out a long breath of disbelief. I spent the day at Emma's yesterday, I told her everything- leaving out the whole gangs and Sam part. Her expression was the funniest thing, wide eyed and gaping. She was happy for me though, more happier for me than she was when I was together with Sam. I wonder why.
She urged me to tell Jack about Harry but something tells me that I don't think he'll be too interested or pleased when he hears.
I flick the sheets off my legs and slide out of bed. I cross over to my wardrobe where I pull on my dreaded school uniform. I head downstairs, eat, go back upstairs, do my hair and brush my teeth.
I don't care that Harry was a massive dick to me before, that was probably me overreacting. I also find myself not really caring that he's probably in a gang. All I care about is the way he held me that Friday night after Sam assaulted me. How he kissed me and treated me afterwards. He cared for me, truly cared.
Am I being stupid? Liking Harry only because he acting like my knight in shining armour? Saving me from the twisted, sick rapist?
Probably.
The only thing I'm not so sure about Harry is his lie about how I received my scar on my temple. What's up with that? It's not like he's got anything to hide, I fell over onto a rock in my backyard. I don't see how that could have effected him badly at all. So why would he lie about that?
There's a knock on the door and after I slip on my shoes I go to open the front door.
Harry looks up and greets me with a wide, dimple-popping, heart-lurching-stomach-dropping, boyish grin. All my thoughts and worries seem to melt away.
"Hey."
"Hey," I reply breathlessly. I can feel my face burning, memories rising in my head. Harry's in his school uniform, same as me.
I almost miss why he's here on my porch this morning but then I remember that he has been taking me to school every morning for about a week now. I lean back inside the house to pick up my school bag from beside the door before closing it behind me and heading down the stairs with Harry.
It's a true winter day today, heavy fog settling in the distance, a cool breeze ruffling my skirt. I climb into the black Lamborghini and move my bag on the floor in between my legs. Harry swings in beside me and starts the engine. The car purrs to life and we shoot out of my driveway.
The drive to school is silent. Not an awkward silence, thank God, but a comfortable one. One of his hands finds one of mine and he squeezes it gently. He brings it to his lips and kisses my skin softly. My heart skips a beat and my face flushes. His eyes meet mine for a split second before returning to the road.
My hand stays in his for the rest of the trip.

~~~

Harry and Niall sat with us at our table for lunch. No one seemed to mind but Jack who had returned to school, back from his mysterious holiday. He seemed a bit baffled and a tad shocked. I supposed a lot had changed since his disappearance. I almost felt sorry for him.
Almost. He had yet to tell me what was going on with him.
Emma on the other hand was more then pleased, she was ecstatic. Exclaiming loudly how very happy she was for Harry and I. She also gave the table a hint that she too was dating someone. After the look I gave her she told me that I would meet the guy 'all in good time.'
When the bell sounded we all pulled on our blazers for whole school assembly.
At my locker, I stab my arms through the sleeves of the jacket. Jack comes up to me.
"Hey, where were you this morning? I drove by to pick you up?" I blink up at him in confusion then my mind clears.
"Oh, right! Harry's been taking me to school all of last week because you weren't here. He offered again this morning and since I wasn't sure if you we're going to school or not today I said yes." I'm lying about the last part, I may have kinda forgotten all about Jack routinely taking me to school in the morning.
"What made you think think that I wasn't going to be here?"
I look at him funny because he's just asked the most stupidest question.
"I dunno, Jack. The fact that maybe you haven't been to school in the last five days?" I reply in a low, condescending voice. "Where have you been?"
"I just didn't feel like coming to school. I've had things going on at home." He frowns at the ground, his shoes scuffing the floor.
"Oh yeah?" I frown now, "tell me about that."
He shakes his sandy blonde head and replies, "doesn't matter. Just, you should have told me so I didn't have to waste petrol driving to your house to wait for someone who's not even home."
I flinch back, surprised by his cold tone. I watch him carefully as he looks up from the ground and meets my gaze angrily.
"Why haven't you been at school, Jack?" I ask again. Now I'm worried. Seriously, what was so bad that he couldn't come to school, so bad that wouldn't want to even tell me, his supposedly best friend?
"If you don't want me to pick you up anymore that's fine. I get that my car's not as cool as Harry's but at least I earned it all on my own, with my own fucking money unlike that prick." His jaw is set at an angle, popping out in display of his irritation.
What, the, hell. Where did all that come from?
"What does that even mean? What's he ever done to you?" Shock laces through my voice, this is not the Jack I know, the Jack that's always happy and friendly, ready for anything. Now I really want to know what happened between him and Sam, and the stuff that's been going on at his home.
"It's not what he's done to me, it's what he's done to others. He's a fucking criminal, Mia. You should be staying away from him, not dating him." Jack looks at me like he's so disappointed, all I can do is stare right back at him in disbelief.
He turns away from me and heads to the hall amongst the crowd of students also making their way towards assembly.
I numbly close my locker before sliding into the throng of bodies. When I enter, I spot Emma, Shelby and Molly sitting towards the back of the audience, I awkwardly shuffle towards them and smile when they wave at me. I take my spot next to Emma. At the look of my face she asks, "what's wrong?"
I open my mouth to answer, not sure exactly what is going to come out, but our principle taps the microphone and the audience falls silent. I smile at Emma and shake my head, don't worry, I mouth.
Just as the principle speaks someone kicks the back of my chair, I turn around to meet the charming smiles of Patrick, Will and Jordan all sitting directly behind me. I notice that Jack isn't sitting with them. I return their smiles and spin around to muse over my thoughts.

~~~

I turn up the speakers on my laptop to allow my music to blast through. School's over and I'm home at my desk.
I've decided that I'm sick and tired of boys accusing other boys of being involved in gangs and criminal activity. My dad's killing people apparently, Harry's in a gang or some shit, and so is Sam. I'm being told to stay away from him, to not go near him, and heaven forbid i have anything to do with him. I apparently can't even trust my own father.
The thing is, I don't really know much about gangs so I suppose it's time to educate myself.
Wikipedia has been very helpful with the actual definition of gangs. The site said that some gangs tattoo themselves so that they can be recognised by their own or other gangs. Harry isn't tattooed as far as I know, I also don't know as much about Sam.
The site also spoke about gang leaders that have absolute power over their gang. They direct the activity and all illegal behaviour. The illegal behaviour being theft and extortion, drugs smuggling and sales, murder, kidnapping and human trafficking.
So far this is making me sick.
I google Deltern City gang history next. I remember Sam telling me that the city's not known for its gangs but then again it's Sam and he was probably lying seeing as he is in a gang.
I'm not sure what I felt more strongly when I saw the results, shock, relief or disappointment.
There's nothing.
Well there's something, a bunch of links about famous gangs, a list of gangs in the US and Deltern's weakly weather report, but nothing relevant. I researched, changed my entry a couple of times and still nothing.
Okay, so I didn't know exactly what I was going to expect. But this, this is hopeless. Deltern's not the biggest city the country but it's probably the wealthiest. Surely, there has to become something.
But there isn't. With an angry sigh, I turn off my computer. I rub my eyes behind my eyelids with my fists. I'm fighting exhaustion at the moment, the time's about 1am and still I feel like I shouldn't be going to bed yet. I've studied and finished all my homework, mum's sleeping in her room downstairs and the house is dark and silent.
I sigh again and remove myself from my desk, heading over to bed, admitting defeat.
I'll try again tomorrow night.
And I do. For the past three nights I tried to dig into my city's gang history but I get nowhere. It was like Sam said, Deltern isn't known for it's gangs. But I still don't want to let this go.
Friday at school both Harry's and my class are in gym together. P.E at this school is compulsory in all year levels, the principle who condemned this rule being a sick bastard. But today I thought of him in a more thankful manner.
Watching Harry run around the gym in a pair of blue shorts that hugged his ass has to be one of the best views of my life.
"Okay, you thought Sam's butt was good..." Emma trails off beside me, her gaze where mine is. I laugh and shove her with my elbow.
"Avert the eyes, Em," I scold and she just grins.
"You guys officially going out yet?"
"I dunno." I shake my head, "We haven't put a label on it yet." I smile at him from across the gym. He shakes his hair out of the way of his eyes and blows me a kiss. But it's pretty obvious, I haven't been able to get enough of Harry this past week. We've been all over each other, kissing, hugging, touching. But I haven't really seen much of him outside of school.
I see him when he picks me up in the morning and occasionally at lunch but whenever I propose us to do something together he's always busy.
"Well if you're gonna do it, do it soon. I want us all to go out on Saturday for dinner," Emma says. We're supposed to be doing warm ups for volleyball but at the moment we're just passing the ball simply to each other.
"Us all? This including the boyfriend?" I raise an eyebrow at her. She hasn't told me yet who it is, wanting it to be a surprise. I don't know why, Emma's mind works differently to others. "Why won't you tell me who it is?"
"You know him." She bucket throws the ball high and the air and I watch it slowly descend.
"I do? Are you dating Ben?" I catch it just as she makes a face.
"Ew, no," she laughs and I throw the ball hard and straight into her chest.
"Don't be rude." I grin as she winces.
Mr Black, our sports teacher, yells at Emma and I to pay attention and to stop talking. Because of the heavy rain outside there wasn't enough room to actually play volleyball with our class when Harry's class is doing something entirely different. We didn't have enough room to set up the courts so Mr Black decides dodgeball will be a sufficient substitute.
Two teams are devised quickly, luckily not class on class because we would be smashed by the more older students.
Harry gives me a wink as he walks over to my team. My stomach flips and I grin at him. He stands close to me and intertwines our fingers.
"Hello," he says lowly in my ear, his warm breath on my skin. Some of the other kids on our team see us and roll their eyes. We all head over to our side of the court and then the game begins.
I'm not very good at any sport (except soccer) so I tend to stay at the back and pick up all the missed balls and hand them to someone who can throw. I dawdle behind people and narrowly avoid the balls, never trying to catch any of course because that only ends in embarrassment.
I watch Harry play though, my position at the back gives me quite a view. He seems bored, lazily tossing the ball into the fray of bodies on the other side. Of course he's fantastic at the game, he doesn't even look like he's trying. Every time he throws he always hits someone.
I walk up and down behind the lines, occasionally awkwardly throwing a ball at the other side, my shoulders slump in dismay when I watch it weakly bounce and roll to stop at someone's feet before they pick it up and throw it back harder. Every time I do this I catch Harry laughing or looking at me with deep amusement.
I waddle after a ball as it rebounds off the wall. I pursue the rolling object as it makes its way to the front of our side of the court. Dangerous territory for me. As I follow it another ball comes flying past my head, missing me by an inch. A squeak of surprise works up my throat and I quickly scoop up my own ball and hug it to my chest, retreating backwards behind the wall of people.
I trip backwards into a warm body, my back hitting chest. I squeak again when warm, big hands capture my hips and hold me tight.
"Mmm." Harry leans forward so that his curls tickle my neck, his hands squeezing gently. He kisses my cheek and I blush, "you're so cute." He nuzzles the side of my face and I giggle and bat him away.
"Stop." I step away from him and I turn to face his smug, amused expression. I hand him the ball with outstretched hands. Offering it up to him like a gift. His eyes move from me to the ball and back up to me. I watch him as he tries to control a grin, hiding it behind hand.
"Thank you," he says with mock deep gratitude.
He turns to launch the ball powerfully at the other team. I don't see if it hits anyone, my eyes are on him alone.

~~~

Dad's home. A day early.
Fear jumps my bones as I step into the house to see dad at the kitchen table. Mum isn't home, it's just me and him.
"Hey, dad," I greet him wearily, setting my bag aside the door. He looks up from his papers, spread out covering the kitchen island's surface. He smiles charmingly at me, his teeth straight and white.
"Hey, honey."
I walk slowly towards him, cautiously. I feel my legs shake slightly, my heart rate spiking. This is the most nervous I've ever felt around my father. Ever. I feel sick.
"You're home early." I hear my voice dip under stress. I imagine families dead on the floor of their own homes, blood pooling, seeping into the carpet. I imagine my dad's face, his tall frame standing over the cold bodies.
"Yeah, I wanted to see you and your mum. Work was slow, so I thought I'd come down, spend an extra day with my girls."
"Huh," is all I say. I blink a couple times, stupidly standing there on the spot. I nod and turn from the kitchen to head up the stairs to my room, but just as I place for foot on the first stair dad clears his throat.
"Mia," he calls, his voice powerful and full with demand, "that boy, Harry. Do talk to him? Does he hang around with you?"
My blood freezes and I don't move. Do I lie? Do I be honest?
"Y-yes," I reply hesitantly. There's a long silence and I can hear my heart pound against my rib cage.
I hear my father make a sound of consideration and then a, "that's all."
My breath leaves me in a rush and I flee up the stairs.

Notes

All story credit goes to the user doily



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