I Can Change Your Life

I woke up to a fog. I couldn’t hear much and my vision was still dull. I tried to lift my arms up a bit, but I felt a pain in my shoulders. I heard the faint crinkling of paper. I moved my legs and I heard it again. I looked down to see myself in a hospital bed; the crinkling was the sound of the paper-like sheets and bedding. I remembered everything vividly, so that was a good sign, but why on earth would I be in a hospital bed if something serious hadn’t happened to me?

“Harry,” I choked out. My throat was sore and dry, but I still repeated his name, hoping that he would be in the room with me. “Harry,” I said over and over again.

I knew that Harry was injured badly, but I didn’t want to believe it. I continued to say his name to myself. The machine beside me began to beep frantically as my breathing fell into the same rigid pattern as it had at the beach. I could feel the restrictions starting and I didn’t know what to do other than cry. I felt like I was dying, like I had no control over my heart as it beat out of control.

A woman in a suit passing by heard my machine beeping and she quickly rushed in and handed me two pills and a glass of water. Without any objections, I took the pills and drank the entire glass of water. But my breathing was still uncontrollable.

“Give it ten minutes to fully kick in,” she said sweetly. “Follow my breathing.” She took in a short breath followed by a long exhale, then a long inhale followed by a short exhale. After a few more breaths I could feel my heart relaxing and my lungs willingly accepting the oxygen.

“Are you the doctor?” I asked as I noticed that she wasn’t exactly dressed like a nurse or a doctor at a hospital.

“Well, I am a doctor, but not the kind you’re thinking of.” She gave me a warm smile and extended her hand. “I’m Dr. Michelle Kendrick. But you can call me Mickey. I don’t like all that professional crap,” she said with a friendly wink.

“What kind of doctor are you?”

“Well, don’t worry about that right now. I’ll be seeing you really soon, okay? I’ll go get the doctors you’re looking for,” she walked over to the door, but stopped before she could exit. “And Harry is in room 314. He’s going to be just fine.” She gave me another wink before leaving the room.

I stared at the door in sheer confusion. What kind of doctor would want to go by their first name and not want to be called an actual doctor? And not even her full name, a nickname at that? I wanted to try and understand her more, but I couldn’t focus on anything other than Harry.

Not even a minute passed before a doctor in a long, white coat walked into my room with my mom and Louis hot on his trail. My mom rushed to my side and grabbed my hand with both of her hands. Louis placed his hand on my leg.

“Oh, sweetie. How are you feeling?” my mom asked.

“I’m fine. Dr...I mean, Mickey, gave me medicine and helped with my breathing. I just want to see Harry and know what is going on.”

“Well, Harry is fine and I’ll let you go see him in a minute,” the doctor said. “Have you ever had a past of anxiety?”

“No,” I said, still confused.

“Okay, well, it seems that something has triggered you to start having panic attacks. There’s two ways that you can take care of this: medication like Xanax, Ativan, Valium, stuff like that. There’s also psychological treatment: talking about these anxieties and figuring out ways to deal with them that won’t require you to take any medications. Since you have no history of health problems or anxiety issues, I am going to give you a small, non-refillable prescription of Xanax to help deal with these panic attacks while you figure out the best way to work through them with Mickey. She’s a psychiatrist; a real favorite around here. I don’t recommend her to just anybody because she’s a bit different, but I really do believe that you two would be an excellent fit for each other.”

My mom nodded along with every word that the doctor said, and although I heard what he was saying, I just didn’t care.

“Can I see Harry now?” I asked.

My mom squeezed my hand to try and get me to slow down a bit, but I couldn’t. I just wanted to see Harry.

“And can I put some regular clothes on?” I asked as I looked down at the hospital gown that I was in.

The doctor chuckled a bit. “Of course you can. But you’re not free for discharge yet. I’ll need you to come back in here to get your prescription and set up your first two appointments with Mickey. I just want to make sure things are taken care of right away. You had a pretty bad panic attack, Gianna. Scared all of us.”

He went to leave the room, but stopped quickly. “Ah, I almost forgot! You might have some slight pain in your shoulders for a few weeks because of the strain put on them. Just take it easy and take some ibuprofen when the pain starts to bother you. Strains are an easy fix,” he flashed a big, toothy smile before nodding once and exiting the room.

I immediately began to sit up. Louis was holding my clothes already. I grabbed my jeans and pulled them on from under my gown.

“Um,” Louis said softly. “Your shirt was really sandy, so we just threw it away. But here, this is Harry’s flannel that was in the car. You can just button this up.” He handed me a dark grey with black and white patterned flannel.

I pulled the gown over my head and tossed it onto the bed. I pulled the flannel on and immediately felt a bit better. The smell of Harry surrounded me and it almost made it feel like he was holding me.

“Gianna!” My mother said, shocked that I was changing in front of Louis.

“He’s like a brother, mom,” I explained as I quickly buttoned it up. “Lead the way, Lou.”

Louis nodded and walked me down the hall. Room 314 was only a couple doors down. I reached for the handle, but Louis stopped me.

“Gianna, he’s kind of beat up. It looks a lot worse than it is. Just, don’t freak out, okay?”

“Whatever, Louis, just let me see him already.” I pushed on the handle, but he stopped me again.

“Gianna,” he said. “I need you to promise me you’ll keep your cool. This isn’t your fault, and I already know you blame yourself. We can’t control what that bastard does. They’re horrible people and that has nothing to do with you.”

I bit the inside of my cheek and nodded. I couldn’t look Louis in the eyes. He knew me too well. I did blame myself for this, because it was my fault. But Louis did have a point. I didn’t do anything to make Josh this way. I never did anything to Dale or those other guys.

Louis pushed the door open and I walked in very slowly. As soon as I entered the room, I saw Harry’s face smiling up at the TV that was mounted in the corner of the room. He looked over to the door and when he saw me his mouth opened slightly and his eyes lit up.

“Harry…” I said more to myself than to him.

His right eye was bruised mildly; turning a slight yellowish green color right by his cheekbone. His lip had a split in it, and I felt like I was seeing a whole new side of Harry. The vulnerable, human side of him. He always seemed so strong and intimidating, but now, he looked so innocent and normal.

He tried to sit up a bit but stopped and instead held out his hand and cupped my face. I leaned into his touch and closed my eyes.

“You’re wearing my flannel,” he said softly.

“Yeah,” I said without opening my eyes.

“Gianna,” Harry said. I opened my eyes and saw him staring at me with a loopy grin on his face. “I’m so high on pain meds right now. It’s awesome.”

I laughed in between a couple of sniffles. I couldn’t help but get emotional. I wasn’t sad, I was happy. But I think that whatever medication Mickey gave me was starting to make me just a bit loopy, also. I was pretty sure that she had given me some anxiety medication, and thinking back to what I knew about anxiety medication, when you’re starting out you usually only take one pill. But she gave me two. Maybe Mickey was going to be cool after all.

“What are you thinking about?” Harry asked after a few minutes of me trailing off in my head.

I looked back over to him with a smile. “I’m kind of high, too. Anxiety medication.”

“Oh, yeah. Your mom told me that the doctor said you had a pretty scary panic attack.”

“What’s wrong with you?” I asked as I looked over his face again.

“Bruised jaw,” he said while turning his head and moving his hair to reveal a large, purple bruise just by his jaw bone. “I guess it’s supposed to be painful to eat and talk, but I don’t feel shit on whatever they gave me through the IV.” Harry laughed a little bit.

“Is that all?” I asked, a bit hopeful. A bruised jaw was horrible, hell, a split lip was horrible. But only having those injuries would be a blessing after how badly Dale had laid into Harry.

“No,” he said with a slight frown. “Two bruised ribs and one cracked rib.”

I couldn’t help myself. I broke down into tears. I could feel my legs giving out from underneath me, but Louis rushed to my side to make sure I didn’t fall. He pulled me over to the small chair in the corner of the room and pulled me into his lap. He pet my hair and tried to tell me to relax.

I was waiting for my breathing to become restricted, but it didn’t. I could breathe just fine, and the tears that fell from my eyes didn’t even make me feel emotionally distraught. I felt neutral. Like crying was pointless. But I knew that I needed to cry; that I was supposed to cry. I didn’t like the medication that I was on. I didn’t like not being able to feel.

“Don’t cry,” Harry said softly. “Come here,” he opened his arms and looked at my quivering body.

“No,” I said. “I’ve done enough damage to you already.” I said quietly. I thought back to what Louis had said about not freaking out. I was doing just that. Freaking out. I looked at Harry and he did seem perfectly fine. He was going to be just fine, and I was going to be just fine.

I gave Louis a kiss on his cheek and he nodded and let go of me. I walked over to Harry’s hospital bed and slowly climbed up next to him. He did his best to scoot over just a bit so I could have room, but it didn’t matter anyway because I draped my left leg over his legs and wrapped my left arm over his chest very gently. He put his arms around me and bent down to repeatedly kiss my head. My tears were still falling from my eyes, but I felt much better in Harry’s arms.

I looked up at him and licked my lips. He bent down and held our lips together for a prolonged kiss. When he pulled away he kissed my nose and then my forehead before resting his chin on the top of my head. I felt better in his arms. I felt better knowing that Harry was going to be okay. And I felt better knowing that Louis had seen us kiss, and that Louis knew that I was going to be okay because I had Harry.

-

I got my prescription and was discharged from my room since I refused to leave Harry’s side. Mickey met up with us in the room. Niall, Liam and my mom joined me, Louis, and Harry. I sat on the side of Harry’s bed while his left arm was loosely draped around my waist.

“Okay, so, let’s just pick a couple of days and we’ll be done,” Mickey said casually. Her long, brown hair was slightly frizzed, but not crazy. She seemed like a teenager, and around her I instantly felt relaxed and comfortable.

“Um, well. I’m free pretty much any day after like three,” I said. I didn’t know what day to pick. Did it really matter?

“How about Tuesdays at three-thirty?” she suggested while looking at the calendar on her phone. “That way you have time to eat something after school and stuff.”

“Yeah, that sounds fine,” I shrugged.

“Okay, I’ll put you down for this Tuesday and the following Tuesday. We can always change the days if we need to. But this can be the day we start with.”

She handed me her phone that had a new contact page open. “Put your phone number in and I’ll call you on Monday to make sure Tuesday is still okay for you.”

I plugged my name and number into the phone before handing it back to her. Everything felt so surreal. This didn’t feel like real life anymore – when did everything change? Here I was in a hospital, giving my new therapist my phone number while Harry Syles’s arm was wrapped around me. None of these things seemed like something I would have expected for my senior year.

-

When Harry was able to leave the hospital, my mom decided that I needed to come home for a while and spend some time relaxing. I didn’t want to leave Harry, but Louis agreed that we should just take it easy for a while. It was hard to leave Harry, even though I would be seeing him the next day I felt like I wasn’t going to see him for a long time. I didn’t want to be away from Harry or Louis or Niall or Liam. We needed to be together. We all needed each other. And honestly, I was afraid to be without them. I was afraid that Josh would try to come after me while they weren’t with me, or worse, he would go after Harry and I wouldn’t even know.

I woke up from a nap screaming. Tears were falling down my face and my body was quivering. I was curled up in a ball and I felt like I was back at the beach, lying in the sand after being pushed down.

“Gianna, Gianna,” I heard my mom’s voice panicking through the house as she made her way into my bedroom. She rushed to my side and began to gently rub my arms to try and calm me down.

“It’s just a nightmare,” she said as she continued to shush me.

“No,” I said, “it was a memory. I wish it was a nightmare.” I shuddered at my words. I had relived the moment at the beach over and over again in my sleep. With every punch Dale launched into Harry, I felt myself growing weaker and weaker until I eventually broke down in my sleep.

“It’s okay, sweetie. We’re going to take care of this,” she cooed as she wrapped me in her arms. I started to doze off again in her arms. She got up and went to walk back to the door, but I woke up right away.

“Mom?”

“Yeah?”

“Can you stay with me for a while? I-I don’t like being alone,” I stuttered out.

She walked over to my bed and wrapped her arms around my waist as she slipped in behind me. She held me in her arms stronger than I’ve ever felt her embrace me before. I felt shielded from the world and I felt invincible with her support. I knew that this had to be hard on her, but she was still so strong.

“What do you think about joining Niall and Liam on independent study?” she asked quietly.

“Is Harry doing it?” I would only do it if Harry was going to. There was no way I could leave him there without me, and I knew that he would feel the same way if the situation were reversed.

“Well, Louis is actually the one who asked me about it. I guess he asked Harry and he said the only way he would do it was if you were doing it, too.” She let out a small laugh and I couldn’t help but smile. “He’s crazy about you, honey. It scares me, honestly. You’re so young, but the feelings in your relationship are so mature.”

“We’re not in a relationship, mom,” I said softly.

“You can keep telling yourself that, but I know that you know what you have is a relationship. Just because you haven’t made it official between you two doesn’t mean you’re not committed to your feelings. And that’s the most important thing in a relationship.”

She was right, and it scared me, too. Harry and I had this ridiculous bond. A bond that I had never seen before and definitely had never felt before. As lame as it sounded, he completed me. I tried to think back to just a few months before, and I couldn’t even remember what I did with my life while he wasn’t in it. He always seemed so mysterious and withdrawn from us. As horrible as it sounded, his presence used to not matter to me. But not, his presence felt like the only reason for my entire existence. And I don’t know how or why, but I knew that he felt exactly the same about me. I wanted to tell him how I felt and I needed to hug him and hold him and kiss him and tell him about how much I loved him and needed him in my life.

I woke up to the sound of my phone ringing on my nightstand. I didn’t even realize that I was asleep. My mom was no longer in the room. I looked at the clock before checking to see who was calling me. It was four in the morning, and for some reason, I already knew exactly who was calling. I picked up my phone and pressed it to my ear after hitting ‘talk’.

“Hi,” his voice said into the phone before I could even answer.

“Harry,” I said softly. “I was just dreaming about you.”

“Come outside. I…I need to talk to you.”

I rolled out of bed and peeked out the blinds. Harry was standing on the sidewalk looking up at my window a smile spread across his face.

“Okay, I’ll be down in a second,” I said into the phone. I left the window and ran to my closet to throw on some jeans and a sweatshirt. The weather was starting to roll into town, meaning the nights were getting colder. I slipped into my boots and rushed to the bathroom to brush my teeth.

I felt incredibly nervous and excited as I silently pulled open my front door and locked it behind me. I walked down the steps and saw Harry standing there, dressed in tights jeans, black vans, and a flannel buttoned. A beanie rested sloppily on his head, covering only one of his ears. The cut on his lip looked to have reduced in size.

Without any hesitation, Harry pulled me close to him and kissed me. I melted into his arms. I could have kissed him forever.

“Did you walk here?” I asked after we pulled apart.

“Yeah, I needed some fresh air.” He laced his fingers with mine. “Let’s go for a walk.”

I nodded as we continued to walk down the street. It was dark outside, with only the yellow glow of the streetlights illuminating the sidewalk. The air was thin and cold and the sky was clear. It felt right to be out with Harry in that exact moment. I felt like I was exactly where I was supposed to be.

We stopped near the end my neighborhood track where there was nothing but a street and sidewalk that stretched on into the darkness. He turned to face me and gently traced the side of my face with his right hand. I closed my eyes at the feeling.

“I need to tell you something,” he said quietly.

“I do, too,” I responded. I needed to tell him exactly how I felt. I needed to let him know that I loved him and that I wanted to be with him forever and that he was the reason for my entire existence. “You first,” I said nervously. I needed more time to think about what to say.

“Okay, well,” he stuttered a bit. “Um, this is really hard for me, so sorry if I kind of start to ramble because I just I’ve never done this before and…I’m already rambling.”

We each laughed nervously before both of his hands reached out to lace his fingers with each of mine.

“I’ve never really been successful with girls. I would always think I liked them without knowing them and then they’d just go and break my heart. I would basically see any girl that I thought was attractive and think that I knew everything about her and so I would always try to chase after her,” he took in a shaky breath.

“I remember the first time I ever saw you. Louis invited you to his birthday party back when we were in third grade. You were so crazy looking and so loud and you made him laugh really hard. And I knew that you and Louis were going to be best friends when he held onto you crying once the party was over.”

I laughed at the memory. I stayed an hour later than the rest of the kids because he wanted to show me his toys. When my mom came to pick me up he didn’t want me to leave, so he held onto me, crying until our parents had to pry us apart.

“I didn’t really pay much attention to you because I was kind of jealous that Lou would spend so much time with you. Him and I were always close, you know? And then you were there and it was hard for me to see how he treated you like family because I wanted him all to myself. But then years and years went by and I felt like I hardly ever saw you until the end of our sophomore year.

“You changed so much that summer. You dyed your hair and started wearing makeup and you got a tattoo and you got into really great music, and then I felt like I couldn’t ignore you anymore. You were gorgeous, and I felt weird thinking that about my Louis’s best friend. And then I thought that you and him were in love because of how comfortable you guys were. And I felt jealous, but not because he was spending so much time with you. I was jealous because I thought he had gotten the most beautiful girl I had ever seen to fall in love with him.

“I wanted to chase you like all those other girls. I wanted to think I knew you like all those other girls I liked, but I couldn’t. You seemed so untouchable to me, like even if I tried, I could never get you to like me or even think twice about seeing me.

“When Louis had other girls that he would like, I knew that you two weren’t together, but something still kept me away from you. I saw how you changed his life in so many ways and how you made him into such a better person, and I was afraid of getting close to you because of the impact you had on him and Niall and Liam. But you were like this magnet that just, I don’t know, it like pulled me to you, and no matter how much I tried to fight it, we were brought together.

“I knew that I liked you after the first day of school. After being forced to be with you, I knew that I couldn’t fight it anymore. I knew that you were going to change me. And I wanted you to change me, because I wanted you.”

Tears slowly fell down my face. I didn’t know what to say or think or do. I was not expecting him to tell me a really long speech. I smiled and kept our gaze strong. I wanted him to know that I was listening, and that I wanted him to continue.

“That night, when we got high together at that party and then you spent the night in my bed, I was afraid that you didn’t like me the way I liked you. I thought that maybe you were just kissing me and spending time with me because we had to be together. But that day when I didn’t go to school because I was sick and you rushed right up to me after school and kissed me in front of all those people, I knew. I knew that you felt the same way that I did.

“I know you keep saying how you don’t want to confess our feelings or whatever, but I don’t care anymore, Gianna. After all that we’ve been though in the past month and all the problems we’re about to face in the months to come, I can’t keep this in anymore.”

He stepped closer to me. His words were more aggressive and less nervous. His motions were strong and his eyes were burning with passion.

“Gianna, I fucking love you so much that it scares the shit out of me. You make me think about myself and my life and my future, and the scariest part of all is that none of those thoughts come without you. You’re with me in every image I have of myself; every idea of a future that I have, every thought, every idea, every moment in my life that I imagine happening, you’re there.

“Every second you’re not with me, I’m thinking about you. Every second you’re with me, I’m still thinking about you. I want to kiss you, and hug you, and make you laugh, and make you smile, and I want to fucking marry you and have a house with you, and I want you to be with me on tour and I want to have children with you and I want to fucking fall asleep with you in my arms and I want to fucking love you forever. Because I love you so fucking much that it hurts me to think of a life where you’re not in it. And I know that we’re still in high school, and the band is still just starting, and we’ve barely even known each other for a few months, but I don’t give a shit. I love you, Gianna. I love you, I love you, I love you. And I don’t care if you don’t want to hear it because I’m going to fucking tell you all the time. And I don’t care if you ever get sick of it, because I’m still going to tell you every second of every fucking day; I love you.”

He held onto my arms gently, staring down into my eyes. His breath was heavy and his teeth were nervously clenched together. I couldn’t speak, I just stared at him. I looked at the bruises on his face that didn’t matter to him, the bruises that he took for me. I looked at the love that burned in his eyes, the love that was for me. I looked at the beauty in his features, and the passion that poured out of him that was for me.

“Now,” he said quietly. “What did you want to tell me?”

I wrapped my arms around his neck and pressed my lips to his in an aggressive kiss. His arms wrapped around my waist and he pulled me close to him, squeezing me against his chest even though he had bruised and cracked ribs. It felt like I was kissing him for the first time in my entire life. The urgency and the passion we felt was poured into the kiss. I tangled my fingers in the hair that stuck out from under his beanie and he reached his hands down to squeeze onto my bottom as he lifted me up so I was on my tip toes, with our hips pushed up against each other.

We pulled apart for a breath. He leaned his forehead on mine and looked down into my eyes as our breath mingled in the small spaced between our open mouths.

“You stole the words from me before I could say them,” I said quietly. “I love you, Harry.”

He pushed his lips onto mine again, each of our mouths curved into a smile.

“I love you,” I repeated into the kiss.

Notes

This is probably my favorite chapter of this story for obvious reasons. :)

I really hope you guys enjoyed this chapter. I put a lot of thought into it for a long time, I wanted thir confession to be pretty elaborate, so I hope I did a good job.

Let me know what you guys think!

comment, rate, subscribe!

xoxoxo