The smell of Harry remained on his jacket as Lori sat on the bus, waiting for her stop to come. Not many people were on the bus, just an old man, a mom with three small kids, a young lady who was in exercise clothes, and a middle-aged man in a business suit. Immediately Lori put in her headphones so she could relax. Whenever Harry's voice poured out of her headphones Lori would smile and remember the few days she got to spend with him. Eventually she got home and when she did she stripped to just her undergarments and slept in Harry's jacket even though it was barely past seven. In the morning she woke up to find a text from Harry.
Goodmorning beautiful x.
That's usually how their conversations would start, and then they would end with Goodnight gorgeous. They would text from morning to midnight and they didn't just text. Harry made a special Skype account so they could videochat and they would call each other out of the blue. At first Paul wasn't too happy with Harry for giving Lori his phone number, but Harry told Paul he trusted Lori and Paul soon did as well. Being away from Lori distracted Harry all of the time. Questions about her or what she was doing or who she was with zoomed around in his mind, but a simple text or a quick phone call always seemed to fix him. One Direction interviews suddenly became interesting to Lori and she had gotten a nickname: The Girl with the Purple Streaked Hair. Whenever Harry was asked about her he didn't give out any specific details. General words such as “wonderful,” and “amazing,” were always in his discriptions of her and if he were asked who his celebrity crush was he'd say “the girl with the purple streaked hair.” Purple began to appear in every girl's hair. Lori would sometimes feel a little hurt when he'd say that they were only friends, but deep down she knew they weren't anything official. Long phone calls, nightly video chats, and constant texting became part of their routine. Though it was hard work they made it work because they wanted it to. It was as simple as that.
After about a week since Harry had left Lori called up Christine to see if she was in the mood to catch up. Before long they were both sitting outside of Starbucks drinking coffee, eating brownies, and enjoying the warm, July day. Lori had found them a nice, black table right outside the coffee store.
“So how are you?” Lori asked before biting into her gooey chocolate brownie.
“I'm doing totally fine now that Dan and I are over. There's actually this new guy I met at a party, his name is Vic. He's a good one, I can tell. Is that jacket new?”
Lori looked down and realized she was wearing Harry's jacket over her dark blue shirt. She had to quickly come up with a lie. “Oh, um, yeah. A friend of mine lent it to me.”
“Oh, do I know him? It looks really familiar.”
“I don't think so, he travels a lot and plus he's not from around here.”
“Are you sure? I swear I've seen that jacket before. Anyway it looks cute on you.”
“Thanks,” Lori said right as her phone buzzed. She picked it up and saw that it was a text from Harry. He had sent her a picture of him and the boys on stage from the concert the night before. A smile spreads on her face and Christine couldn't help, but feel a little curious and jealous of that smile.
“Who's that from?” Christine asked as she leaned over the table to see.
“No one,” Lori said as she locked her phone.
“Lori, stop lying. Who is it?”
“It's nobody, promise.”
“Let's see, the friend's jacket, how you were busy all Friday, Saturday, AND Sunday like two weeks ago, and now the mysterious texter who makes you smile. Lori, do you have a boyfriend?!”
“What?!” Lori asked shockingly. “Christine, you're insane. You're the boy crazy one, not me, remember? I'm not really looking for a boyfriend right now.”
“But-”
“Oh crap!” To get Christine to shut up Lori had “accidently” dropped her brownie and began picking it up. “What a shame, a perfectly good brownie gone to waste.” She threw it away and looked over at Christine. “Want to walk around for a little bit and then go see movie? Maybe they're showing something good tonight.”
Christine shrugged and picked up her bag to walk beside Lori. They looked into the familiar windows, seeing if anything was new. While leaving one of Christine's favorite clothes stores Lori headed to one of the few book stores around. Books were one of her best friends, but she didn't have many because her parents weren't exactly fond of reading. Christine followed her and immediately headed to the magazines. Lori went to the counter to see if her friend Martha was there, but it was only one of her employees. After some time Lori went to the magazines to see if Christine was done looking when she saw her picture on the cover of a magazine. It wasn't a real picture of her, it didn't show her face, just her hair. The headline said “Harry Styles and the Girl with the Purple streaked Hair.” Pictures of Harry and Lori from over that weekend were plastered on the cover and Lori could feel a mixture of fear and anxiety crawl up her throat. Miraciously, the reporters didn't know Lori was the girl with the purple streaked hair, they didn't think an average girl from Pennslyvania could be Harry Styles' new lover, but they were wrong; about everything. To Harry, Lori could never be called average because she was by far the most mesmerizing person he knew and even though she wasn't his public lover she was his lover, not the world's or the media's; his. Someone clearing their throat caught Lori's attention and she saw Christine holding the same magazine in her hand. Her free hand was on her hip, her foot was tapping rapidly, her eyebrows were raised, and her face demanded an explanation.
“Sorry,” Lori squeaked as she braced herself for some intense screaming.
“Go on,” Christine urged, “say what you're sorry for.”
“Sorry I didn't tell you about me and Harry,” Lori began quickly, “I'm pretty sure there isn't even a 'me and Harry,' it's just everything happened so fast. At one moment I was bored in the store and then the next I was at a diner with Harry at midnight. We hung out over the weekend and I guess he was interested in me, but he's on tour and we haven't even been on a real date so I can't even say that we're romantically involved or whatever. I'm sorry I didn't tell you, I just didn't want to complicate things if nothing was going to happen. It would be hard for both me and Harry and I really do like him so I didn't want to cause him any trouble.”
Lori caught her breath and waited for Christine's reply. She couldn't read her expression, but to Lori it seemed angry.
“You know, it'd be nice if my so called best friend would tell me if she was dating Harry fucking Styles,” Christine said coldly.
“But we're not dating, we're just friends! Please, Christine, don't tell anybody. So far no one knows it's me and I'd like to keep it like that.”
Finally Christine loosened up and let out an exasperated breath. “Okay, I won't tell anyone, I just wish you had told me. Give me the details! It's Harry fucking Styles for God's sake! Do you have pictures? Have you guys kissed yet?”
Lori laughed as relief placed itself inside her. As they headed to the movie theater she gave Christine the outline of what had happened that weekend. Every time she mentioned Harry or one of the boys Christine got a ridiculous smile on her face that made Lori pause and laugh. By the time they were seated Christine knew just about everything.
“So now you're waiting for him? That's so cute! How much do you like him, Lor?”
“A lot,” Lori said sheepishly as she smile down at the floor, “he's a really great guy. He makes me laugh and smile and when I'm with him it's like there isn't any other place I should be. I know its only been two days, but I dunno, he just makes me feel different.”
“I'm glad he makes you happy,” Christine said. This time she meant it and Lori could tell. The two girls watched the movie in silence and once it was over Christine drove Lori home. As she walked through the door she instantly regretted not using the window instead.
“What the hell is this?” Her father said to her as he pointed to an empty plate.
“A plate,” Lori said without trying to sound sarcastic.
“It's my plate, the one I had to put my dinner on. See how it's empty?”
“Yes, I see.” I see the empty beer bottles around the room too.
“It's empty because I had to make my own dinner. Do you want to explain why you didn't make dinner?”
“Sorry, I was busy. I'll make it tomorrow, but I have to go, I have practice tonight.” Lori tried walking past her dad so she could get to her room, but he didn't move.
“You need to learn some respect, you little smart ass. I work and put a roof over your head and you don't even have the decency to make dinner? That is ungreatful.”
He was so close that Lori could smell the familiar scent of beer on his breath. This wasn't a new encounter, just one repeated thousands of times; the only thing that made it different was the reason why he was yelling at her. Lori remembered when she used to be scared of her parents, but as time went on she realized this was never going to go away so she became strong and built walls that would protect her because she thought no one else could. Her father's hand squeezed her shoulder extremely hard and Lori pulled away. She winced as she touched it, knowing it'd probably bruise over night.
“Where's Mom?”
The question seemed to daze him. It was like he was in a strange place and had no idea what he was doing there or why he was there. Maybe it was the first time he noticed she wasn't around, but then his eyes focused back on Lori.
“She's out with a friend from work. Mom's not important, we're discussing your attitude. If I ever come home again and dinner isn't ready, you're going to be very sorry young lady, do you understand?”
“I'm already sorry,” Lori mumbled under her breath.
“What?” Her dad asked angrily.
“Nothing,” Lori said and then turned away. As she walked towards her door she heard her father smash the plate on something and she could only imagine the mess she was going to have to clean up later. She knew the “friend,” her mom was out with was probably a guy and they probably had a thing going on, but Lori could care less; she knew they had stopped loving each other a long time ago.