Catching Red Eyes

I turned my back to him and pushed back the doors, pushing past the cameras and the people. It felt like everything was slow motion as I ran down that familiar street. Then I heard him.

“ROWAN! Wait!”

I pretended I didn’t hear him and pushed up the sidewalk, faster but he was much taller then I with his longer legs and I felt him grab my arm. There it was. The piece I was missing. The hot electric spark running through my fingers, to my toes, to the top of my head. I turned to look up at him. I wanted to scream at him and tell him to leave me alone but nothing could make me form those words. All I really wanted was to mold my body against his and kiss him and touch him but he beat me to it.

He pulled me in and kissed me. Nothing mattered in that moment. He was here. Kissing me. I was kissing him back. Everything was blurry and the world spilled away.
I don’t remember who broke the kiss first but I was brought back to reality by Harry’s bodyguards pulling us out of the way of the stampede of cameras. Well, there goes my face out of the press. Wait, this wasn’t right. I couldn’t stand here and kiss him back when he disappeared for over a month. I pulled away from the guards and stood my ground.

“Harry Styles, you tell me what the fuck that was right now,” I tried saying without shouting.

“Rowan, love, please get in and we can talk.”

“Don’t you dare ‘love’ me. I am not going anywhere with you. Ever. That…kiss was just…well you took me by surprise.”

He looked at me then back at the cameras closing in, he looked at his bodyguards ushering him back into the SUV, then back at me.

“The things I do for you, I swear.”

I wasn’t sure what that meant but the next second, Harry was hauling a cab and pulling me with him inside. He screamed some address to the driver and we sped off. The windows were down and my hair was whipping back and forth in the wind and I couldn’t help but laugh at my insane situation. I spent hours and days forcing myself to get over this fantastic human and it took one second for me to be spun completely around him. He started laughing too.

We laughed for a good few minutes before my stomach started hurting.

“What was so funny?” he asked, still laughing which made me laugh again because if only he knew what I was thinking.

“This whole situation. I don’t even…I don’t know what to say. You disappear and then turn back up so randomly. I was really, really hurt, Harry, like I cried and I never cry,” I said, still chuckling which helped because if I wasn’t laughing, I would be crying. “Like, I even started dating Pryce because I wanted to forget you.”

There is was, I admitted it to myself out loud…in front of Harry. I didn’t really want Pryce. I wanted Harry.

I finally looked over at Harry and his eyes were wild but calm with what I just confessed.

“Rowan…I didn’t disappear.”

“Uh, have you been in a time warp the past month? Harry, you’ve been gone, you left me a note after that night and then you just never called or contacted me again…are we on the same page here, because I’ve been trying to figure out what I could have possibly done to deserve you never talking to me until now…I mean…what did I do…,” I trailed off. Now the tears were surfacing again and I looked out the window to blink them away. We were still sitting in the taxi, speeding off to somewhere but the wind and the drive was nice for a distraction so I didn’t have to look directly at him. He wasn’t saying anything. “Please, say something…anything.”

“Rowan, I didn’t want to disappear but I had to…this business, it has strict rules and guidelines and contracts. When those pictures of us were printed outside the restaurant, my label went mad because as a musician, we must all appear single.”

“That makes no sense…aren’t the other guys in your group, they have girlfriends. Isn’t the one even engaged? Why are you supposed to follow those rules and they don’t have to?”

“It’s…complicated.”

“Well, I need some answers because this whole ‘I’m not allowed to have a girlfriend thing’ isn’t really cutting it. Do they track your phone or something?”

“Look, I want to explain but I can’t right now. It’s just too complicated.”

“Harry, if you don’t explain to me what is going on, I will have the driver stop this car and I’ll go home.”

He stared at me for a few minutes then looked down at his hands.

“This is going to sound completely insane to you, love, but you have to believe me, ok? And I really shouldn’t even be telling you any of this because, I am sure somewhere it is a breach of contract.”

I waited for him to continue. He bit his lip. I immediately had dirty thoughts enter my head but shook them out to focus on what he was saying.

“We, well I, have to appear available…that’s what draws the fans to us, well me…I am legally bound to appear…single.”

What. This was crazy but at the same time, I sort of understood but I didn’t want to be kept a secret if that was what he was implying.

“Harry, I won’t be a secret to you or to anyone. This is…this is too much. I get it but I can’t be with someone who is in a contract to be…single.”

His haunting green eyes never left mine as I said those words.

“I know and I can’t let you do that because you deserved to be shown off to the world.”

“So that’s it…you aren’t even going to try to talk to your label? You gave up before you even
tried? I know we aren’t standing on much ground here but Harry…”

“Please don’t cry, love. I haven’t stopped thinking about you since I first laid eyes on you. I talked to them but since I am in contract it is impossible. All they care about is how I look to the world, not how I look at the world…and right now I feel like you are my world…”

He grabbed my hand and pulled me into his chest. I rested my head on his shoulder and my tears soaked his shirt.

My heart physically hurt. I never wanted someone or something so much in my life that was so incredibly close but so incredibly far.

Notes