Dreaming Of You // If I'm Still Dreaming

Harry’s POV

British summers don’t even qualify as such. That crazy shower that caught me while parking had me drenched, and now I’m freezing. It’s been at least five minutes I’m trembling at Jeanne’s door, hands on both sides of the frame, forehead on the cold wood, trying to collect myself. A convenient shrub blocks the view from the street. I don’t even know what I’m going to say, but I can’t prolong this anymore.

“Harry…” She whispers in a concerned tone as she opens the door. I can’t find the courage to face her. “I was hoping you’d managed to avoid that…” She pulls me inside at my lack of reaction. I force myself to glance at her… It’s like seeing her for the first time. She’s the same Jeanne whose appearance I know down to the last detail, but there’s something completely new to her. “Let me get you a towel.” Before I can even think of anything she turns away. I watch her go, unable to articulate a single sentence to say to her. I always knew she was caring. She is, and with everyone, but now I can’t help but see every gesture towards me under a different light. “Here.” She hands me the fluffy fabric, returning a moment later. I grab it. I don’t even know what to do with it. To dry my hair, I guess. Jeanne doesn’t seem to acknowledge my paralysis. She’s too pragmatic for it. She points at my feet for me to take off my boots, and pulls at my shirt. Fuck… I shiver at the contact of her knuckles against my skin. She yanks it over my head absentmindedly, while I comply. “You should take these off too.” She leads her fingers to my waist and starts undoing the belt. My stomach clenches. “I’ll bring you something…”

“I love it when you undress me…” I mutter in a cheeky grin, as I hold her hands to gain her attention. Jeanne looks up, confused. I could just keep it to myself and fool her the same way she’s fooled me. But the urge has become too big. “Aren’t you tired, Jeanne, of being strong all the time?” She frowns as I stare into her eyes, those expressive eyes I’ve failed to read so many times. They suddenly widen. She never fails to read me.

“Anne…?” She stumbles back, withdrawing her hands, the look of terror installed in her face. I try to keep my grip on her but she slips out of my reach.

“My mum just confirmed it–––I explain. She would have kept your secret forever if I hadn’t pressured her.” Jeanne frowns even harder, and it feels like something inside of me is about to explode. The cold is gone. It is real… It’s all real. “Louis did… Apparently he gets you better than I do. Well, he read your thesis. That’s an extra point for him.”

“What?–––she snaps, taking a small step towards me. The published version or the academic…?”

“I don’t know,” I shake my head. “Is there such thing as an uncensored version? He just told me everything…”

“Everything?” Her arms fall to her sides.

“You weren’t there to stop him as you did with your examiner.” I shrug, falling into silence. I watch her as she keeps her gaze fixed on the floor for what seems like an eternity. Her shoulders contort, a hand moving to cover her mouth. A spasm, another one; a muted gasp. I’m shaking at my spot. I’ve seen her mad, upset and exhausted, but never crying. There’s something so pure and simple about this vision… Jeanne revealed in all her splendour. Clothes were never the issue. She’s finally without her mask.

“I’m sorry–––she mumbles through her fingers, still not looking at me. I should have imagined it could come to your knowledge when I wrote it…” I want to run to her, to tell her that I don’t blame her, but I’m caught in the morbid pleasure of seeing her vulnerable like this.

“Yeah, you tend to make poor choices regarding me,” I ironise, and Jeanne turns to glance at me, her eyes all red. Big tears roll down her cheeks without control. This is how it’d look if a statue could cry. Glossy, composed… Unattainably beautiful. “Now riddle me this, Jeanne, because I don’t seem capable of wrapping my head around it. Why did you lie to me…? Why did you let me go if you felt what you felt…?”

“It’s… complicated…” She glances away.

“I can only imagine.” I cross my arms over my chest, her eyes back on me. “I’ll let you try to explain yourself.” She’ll need the best she has.

“The timing was wrong…” She begins to speak after breathing in deeply. Timing… I always discarded that possibility. “Everyone was inclined to forget about it, but you were just a boy… so young and full of life…” And she had to be the only one to acknowledge that. “At the pinnacle of your fame…” I scrunch my face. I don’t like where this is heading. In fact I hate it… “Your fans needed you, and you needed them. It was the perfect symbiosis, and I couldn’t get in the way.” I can’t believe my ears… What is this mental wank?

“Are you telling me you did it not to distress my fans?” I inquire, absolutely baffled. This is how they changed her life, not because she got a diploma out of them… She used to worry so much about them finding out. But… But she knows everything… “The fans that grabbed me and Louis and treated us as if we were their private dolls? That humiliated us in every possible way and in every possible public platform?”

“You can’t blame all of them for the mistakes of a few. It’s unfair,” she claims sternly. She has the nerves to defend them to my face…

“Unfair?–––I retort. And going after every person I was linked to was fair?”

“What could you expect being in the public eye?–––she retorts herself, as if it was an obvious matter. Jealousy is a human emotion. You are a human being… You know what that feeling is. Can’t you empathise with them?”

“Don’t patronise me, Jeanne,” I gesture to my side, dead serious. She drives me crazy when she does that. I had forgotten how infuriating she could be. “I know not all of them were possessive like that. I loved to make them happy… They’d come and tell me about things I said I didn’t even remember, but I had to be there for them, because I was there because of them–––I explain. Dealing with the possibility of breaking their hearts was hard, but I couldn’t give up everything and retire to a nunnery in order to please them… There’s a limit.” Jeanne shuts her eyes, and my heart narrows inside my chest. “I didn’t know exactly where it was but we could have sought it together…”

“I wouldn’t have been able…” She murmurs. My blood boils through my veins.

“So you didn’t do it because of them, but because you wanted to spare yourself the hard time. That’s how you loved me…”

“No!–––she exclaims. I loved you so much I wouldn’t have been able to put that pressure on you, to make you choose, to make you worry.” I’m mad as hell, but can’t help but tingle from head to toe. She loved me… It’s not a dream. “You needed all your energy to grow up and honour your job… I am older than you, and I couldn’t bear the thought of holding you back in any way…”

“How do you know for sure…” I step towards her. I’m fucking soaring. “That you were in love with me?” Jeanne’s lashes flutter. Please, Harry. Don’t succumb so easily.

“One day I was making tzatziki…” Tzatziki? “Squeezing grated cucumber in a cotton cloth over a white porcelain bowl.” I frown. What is she talking about? “I looked down and the liquid was the exact same colour of your eyes…” Her gaze flicks down.

“And?” I ask.

“I drank it…” She shrugs one shoulder, a minimal pout on the lips. She can be adorable too, and I can’t handle it. How can someone be this freaking cute and hot at the same time?

“And how was it?” I fight to keep myself from grinning.

“Tangy…”

“And?”

“I got a tummy ache…” She peeps at me and we both chuckle. I inwardly grunt. What does she do to me…? I’m supposed to be mad at her.

“Do you know what I got?–––I turn serious again. I got a heart ache, and there were days I thought it would kill me…” I clutch my naked chest.

“It isn’t a competition…” She shakes her head, speaking ever so softly.

“You’ll have to try harder,” I assert in defiance. Jeanne bites her tongue in that way I worship, and after crossing her arms she walks away, leaving me startled. Why is she going upstairs? Do I have to follow her? When I’m about to do so she comes back, her summer dress floating around her as she steps down the staircase, a familiar wooden box on her hands.

“Here.” She grabs some items and drops them on the massive Ottoman at my side. “Is it enough?” I bend over, trying to determine its nature. Something stirs inside of me. Is this…? “Your camera roll at ‘La biguine’?” Her voice cracks, and I glimpse at her, though I return my attention to the photos. I never thought I’d see any of them. “I developed them expecting pictures of the house…” There’re at least thirty candids I took of her. But then one in particular stands out, that I pick up. “It’s photo you made me take with you–––she mumbles. I wrote on the back every time I felt I needed to tell you…” I glance at Jeanne before I turn it over. My legs almost fail me and I struggle to stay standing. My heart has never felt this.

Je t’aime Je t’aime Je t’aime Je t’aime Je t’aime Je t’aime Je t’aime Je t’aime Je t’aime Je t’aime Je t’aime Je t’aime Je t’aime Je t’aime Je t’aime Je t’aime…

“How’s this, when you moved on so quickly?–––I manage to mutter, fixed on her handwriting in different colours. As soon as you made it to Moscow…”

“That’s not how it happened…” I just stare at her, the photo tightly gripped between my fingers. “I moved on because I needed to, not because I had stopped loving you–––she whispers in a husky tone. I was never in love with Hans-Peter. I decided to have a baby with him because after you I craved real love, and I knew it wouldn’t come in the figure of a partner…” My heart breaks into a million pieces. This is not what I expected when I thought of reaching the bottom of things. She never loved him…

“Why didn’t you call me when One Direction split?” I murmur, turning the picture around to look at us, those that once were and no longer are.

“It wasn’t right…” I close my eyes tightly, as tears begin to prick.

“And this is what you thought was right?–––I claim, my voice rather loud, rather shaky. Lying to me? Having a daughter with someone you didn’t love?” I glance at her, and I must derange her, because she shuts her eyes. “Was that better than making amends?”

“It’s doesn’t matter now–––Jeanne states. This is how things are.” Impotence explodes on my chest.

“You denied love because you are too proud…” I tell her off, pointing at her direction emphatically and startling her. “Why is it so hard for you to admit you were wrong?”

“It doesn’t matter–––she repeats, eyes wide shut. Lara is here, and she’s the only love I know.” I shake my head, dropping the picture, as I need to calm myself down. I don’t want to be reminded. I don’t want to remember anything.

“What I can’t understand is why you decided to come clean after all this time… Why, Jeanne?” She just shudders. “To torment me?” I insist.

“I tried to tell you when we met at the beach, but you didn’t let me talk,” she complains. The beach… “And after losing that moment it wasn’t easy to find the words… I tried. After Jimmy… At the bookshop.” But something got in the way every single time. Mostly me, as I’m my own worst enemy. “When you told me how you struggled and how I ruined your life and your relationship with Abigail, I thought it was better left unsaid, that I was doing you a favour…” I shake my head, rubbing my forehead. It wouldn’t have changed the fact that things are how they are anyway. “But things progressed in a way I didn’t expect… And it’s become so difficult to be dishonest to you. I thought…”

“You thought I’d be your fool all over again and accept all this–––I cut her off, staring into her eyes–––because you take me for granted.” Jeanne draws near, hands clenching at her sides.

“I thought at this point it wouldn’t necessarily change anything, because it really felt we were friends–––she mutters, lifting her chin up. And I was OK with it. We deserved a chance to get to know each other without the rush of passion or the drama and the sense of imminent ending.” Her tone rises, the right hand gesturing determinedly. “No matter how strong my feelings for you are, I appreciate this time. I appreciate you, and I treasure your friendship. I don’t take you for granted, and I think there’s a living proof of it…” My frustration reaches its peak, so I can’t do other than turn around. “Be careful with what you are going to say, or…” She senses it and threatens.

“Or what?–––I cut her off another time, coming to face her. Or I might lose you forever?” I blurt, my lips an inch away from hers, but she doesn’t even twitch, back at her old collected self. I want to make her rage. I want her to get as crossed as I am. “Guess what, Jeanne? I lost you once and survived… I can lose you again.” She frowns at me, and I start walking forward, forcing her to pull back. “You lied to me and gaslighted me… You manipulated me to keep me in the dark. You decided for the both of us and you hurt me. You had a daughter with someone else when you were supposed to be in love with me…” I abruptly stop, leaning even closer. “How am I supposed to feel? All of this is nothing but a huge mistake!”

“No, Lara is not a mistake!” She finally loses her temper. We stare at each other, but I can’t help but glimpse down, the crease of her cleavage rising and falling hard because of the anger. “If that’s what you feel then I don’t know what you are doing in my house…” She speaks straight at me.

“I don’t know either,” I retort, backing off at the statement.

“Then you have nothing to do here…” Jeanne points towards the door without hesitation.

“Are you kicking me out…?”

“What do you think?” She defies me.

“I think it’s me leaving,” I argue, grabbing my damped t-shirt.

“Fine by me…–––she mutters, as she bends over. Here, don’t forget your shoes.” She smashes them on my chest and puts me out on the street before I can even react. When I turn around I sense the cold doorstep beneath my soles. The door slams at my back. The same feeling of emptiness that overcame me in Paris when I left after her defence creeps up on me all over again. I quickly turn back, but the lights turn off.

What the hell did I do?

–.–.–

Notes

Kudos to me for writing this chapter in less than 3000 words. How's that tachycardia?

Your feedback inspire me to write faster and wilder. More soon. Love you all <3