Always.

“Oh, Kelly. I’m really glad you’re here. It’s been so long since we’ve seen you.” Anne smiles at me while putting two pieces of her stuffed French toast on my plate.

I mumble a thanks and smile at her. “I know, I’ve missed you.”

“Here.” Harry puts a glass of milk on my place mat and sits beside me.

He seems very tense compared to when we were in his room. We were sitting close enough so I could grab his hand under the table. When I did he looked at me and smiled. I still wasn’t used to this, to being with him in a deeper way than we were before but it feels so good.

When Anne and Des sat down, I let go of his hand so he could eat. Our forks clink against the plates, and as soon as I take my first bit, my eyes want to roll to the back of my head. These were so good.

“So, Kelly. Are you alright? About last week?” Des asks me. I cough a bit on my piece of food before clearing my throat.

“Uh, you know what? I’m actually doing fine.”

“Harry was absolutely torn up about it. He barely left his room while he was home and then now.” She looks at the marks and bruises on his face. She doesn’t say anything aloud, but I know she’s worried about it. I take some more bites of my bread, finishing the first one and chasing it with milk.

Harry slumps into his chair and stairs at his plate as he quickly cuts a piece of the breakfast and swallows.

Anne smiles at me. “I think this is the most he’s talked to us in weeks.”

“And the most we’ve seen of him.” Des adds.

In weeks? But it only happened last week. I look at Harry again, now I’m really worried about him.

“Why are you guys doing this?” he asks, not meeting eye contact with anyone.

“Dear, what are you-”

“Mum, stop. Just stop!” I jumped a little in my seat as Harry raised his voice at his parents. He’s never done that, he’s usually so respectful.

“Harold, do not raise your voice at your mother!” His dad says, pointing a finger at him. Anne sits next to him with a weighty expression as she watches the scene before us.

“Like you care, dad!” he screams. “Are you gonna act like it because Kelly is here? She deserves to know don’t you think?” he gets up from his chair and yells one more terrible thing before he leaves the dining room. “She should know about how fucked up our family is.”

I’ve never seen Des stand up so quickly like he did when his son left like that.

“Let him go.” Anne stops him, and he sighs sitting down in his seat once again.

I’m suddenly very uncomfortable as I look at them and both of their eyes are on me. “What’s going on?” I finally said, after a quick internal debate.

“Kelly, love. We are… We’re getting divorced.” She says and motions between the two of them.

My jaw drops as I gape at them. I guess I thought about it happening but I never actually thought it would.

“He’s not taking it too well.” Anne looks sadly down at her hands.

“He just needs some time.” The words come out steadier than planned. They nod in agreement. “I should go, go talk to him.” I push my chair back and stand. “Thanks for breakfast.” Anne nods and says anytime.

I walk back to Harry’s room and open his closed door.

“Hey.” I say while shutting the door. He’s sitting on the edge of his bed facing the window.

I slowly make my way towards him, climbing over the bed to sit by him. I pull my knees up and into my chest.

“Is that, uh, one of the things you wanted to talk about?” It was rhetorical really, I just didn’t know what else to say.

With a dramatic exhale he falls back onto his bed and rubs his eyes with his hands. With his eyes closed, he reaches his right hand (I’m on his left side.) and reaches for my arm.

He grabs the air a couple times before switching arms and grabbing mine. He groans and pulls me onto the bed so my head is close to his armpit. His arms both wrap around me and my frame. My arm falls over his waist, and my still bent knees are resting lightly on his side.

I kept my eyes opened as his arms seemed to tighten around me after every three breaths. I watched his chest move up and down before I heard a sniffle. Just I was about to look up at him he spoke.

“I really needed you.” His voice cracks, and it absolutely broke my heart.

“I realize that now.” I whisper, running my thumb in circles on his shirt. “I’m so sorry, Harry.”

“I was so pissed when you wouldn’t let me in.” I buried my face deeper into his side as he progressed. I knew he’d been holding this in for a while, and I knew this was going to have to happen soon. “When I needed you most, you weren’t even there for me.” He sighs and loosens his grip around me. “I shouldn’t have even let you in last night, any other person wouldn’t have.” Great, he regrets is. He’s probably going to kick me out. It’s always calm before the storm, isn’t it? “But I’d fucking do it again. I’d do it a thousand times over if it meant getting to have you here. Getting to talk to you, to touch you, or just simply knowing that you’re in the same room as me and we’re on good terms.” He moves to his side and pulls my face up to meet his. His eyes are slightly watery, and so are mine. “I love you, but you’re still my best friend. I need to tell you all this stuff.”

“I’m sorry I didn’t let you in.” I apologize again, just so he knows I don’t think I’m off the hook.

“I can’t believe they’re splitting.” He rubs his thumb on my cheek and smiles as my breath falters for a moment. “I just thought they’d always be together. I thought they were so in love that not even fighting could come between them. They wanted to wait for Gemma, but I had finally confronted them about their fighting. For two weeks they were yelling at each other. So I sat them down and asked them to tell me if something was wrong, actually I told them I knew something was wrong.” He kissed my forehead before continuing. “Mum started crying. I guess I knew before they actually told me.” He looked at smiles again. “I love you.”

“I love you.” I reply before he continues.

“She looked at me and said, “Dear, your father and I have something to tell you.” Everything else was really a blur until I heard the word divorce. I left and you know.” He shrugged.

I take a deep breath before wiping a tear from his face, and he laughs wiping one of mine. “We’re a mess.” I giggle.

“A beautiful mess.” He corrects.

“The kind you love to love.” I grin up at him.

“Don’t do that. That thing where you find a song out of everything I say.” He says, rubbing my bottom lip and then leaving a small peck on them.

“I thought it was fit for our current situation.” He smiles at me, and I move my hand through his long, messy hair. “I think… That you should talk to them. They’re not happy, doesn’t mean you should be unhappy too. You deserve all the happiness in the world and I think they would agree. Sometimes people just fall out of love, I guess.” I meet eye contact with him, for my gaze was on the strands between my fingers. “What?”

“I don’t like the idea of falling out of love. I don’t even understand it. Hell, I don’t even understand love, but I don’t understand how you could just not love someone anymore.” He admits.

“Maybe it’s not that they don’t love one and other, it’s just that they aren’t in love with each other anymore. Ignoring them isn’t going to help anything, and OMG, wow this situation sounds so familiar. How didn’t I notice that before?” I ask myself more than him. I shake my head. “Anyway, not the point. You should have a conversation with them before you do anything you’ll regret. They care about you, you know that. And I know you want to talk to them both.” I giggle. “Oh my God, I can’t talk about this anymore, it’s freaking me out.”

“Yea, you’re not a big fan of ‘practice what you preach’ are you, love?” he laughs.

“Again, Harry. Not the point. . . Quit laughing at me, you dickhead!” But despite my attempts to get him to stop, he continues to laugh. I roll my eyes at him and climb off the bed.

“What, no Kel please don’t go.” He begs through laughter.

“Stop laughing at me, it was not that funny, you egocentric. . .” I try to rack my brain for more words.

“Alright, alright.” I calms himself down and smiles at me. I’m very unamused actually, standing with my arms crossed. “I know to stop when you go all Oxford on me.”

“Whatever.” I walk towards the window and slide my shoes on.

Harry’s arms wrap around my waist and turn me toward him. A small, cute little pout plays on his lips and his brows furrow together. “I’m gonna talk to them.” He whispers. “Just not today.” He adds. “I want to spend today with you, I’ll talk to them tomorrow.”

I sigh and wrap my arms around his neck. “What do you want to do then? I’m always good with junk food and reruns of Boy Meets World.” I shrug, it’s true.

“I don’t know, but not tv. No electronics. Just me and you.” He stops for a moment. “I’m really the trite and whipped human on the planets. The worst part is, I don’t even fucking care.” He pecked my lips and grinned.

“Alright, we’ll go for a walk or something. You can come up with the idea, I’m going to go take a shower.”

He sighs, “Alright.” But he pulls me closer to him, staring as if taking in every detail of my face.

“Harry, you have to let me go.” I whisper, inching closer to his face and not letting go of him.

“You have to, too.” He mutters, putting his nose on mine and winking at me before he kisses me. I’m never going to get used to this, this feeling. Every single time he kisses me, I feel like I’m going to burst into flames or that I’m going to fall over from lack of oxygen. I don’t know why, all I know it that I love him.

“Alright,” I attempt to chuckle but I’m too out of breath. “I’m going to go shower.” I move my arms and bring them to his cheeks and place a platonic kiss on his lips. I grab his hands and pull them off my waist.

“No.” he says, trying to get ahold of me once again.

“Harry, just come over when you’re done. I’ll be quick I promise.”

He dropped his hand unwillingly, muttering a ‘fine’ to me. I smiled at him and stepped toward the window.

But as I was about to step out I thought of something. Anne and Des are divorcing. “Harry?” I turn towards him.

“Yea?”

“What are they going to do? I mean, are you still gonna live here?” I’m terrified of his answer.

He sighs and put his head down before running a hand through his hair. “Mum and Dad are going to move into separate places in England.”

“England?” He’s going to England?

Notes