A long ago piece (Patreon)

Hello! So here is a piece I started writing a long long long time ago. I'm pretty sure I was going for a gang harry but y/n was something sort of supernatural? Either a witch or a nymph of some kind that Liam had come into contact with and was at first borderline begrudgingly taking care of her clueless self and Harry came along but I guess I had just given up on it D: 

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i.

It was simple, really.

Harry Styles doesn’t like most people.

Does he work with them? Yes, course he does that’s how he makes money. Does he enjoy it? Not one fucking bit. It seems like everyone in this world is corrupt in someway – whether it be terrible morals and ethics that they follow, or just a genuinely shitty personality, he figures everybody has that thing. That thing that makes them at least partially horrible, if not entirely (it all depends on what and who they are, how they treat people, how they act), and Harry had come to realize that far too young. Didn’t even get those years of blissful innocence, thanks to his father and what he does and what ultimately was thrown onto Harry to do.

He doesn’t hate his job – it’s not that, really – he would just prefer that it wasn’t illegal. All of it, really, including close ties with shady politicians and businessmen  who’d stumbled on the wrong side of town, people who want retaliation out of bitterness they can’t quite swallow down, drugs, money, absolute filth he deals with. Well, not him directly – he just runs the whole thing, but he never gets his hands dirty he knows better than to do that.

How he got mixed up in all this was easily explained – it was his dad’s thing (what he claimed to be a “family” ordeal) and his dad got to old so now it’s his thing, even if he doesn’t want it.

And it’s not like he’s ungrateful for the money, nor is there ever a spotlight shown on him that would really have the world weighing in on his shoulders. Nobody knows who he is besides the top few colleagues kept close, so it isn’t like his life is in danger or summat, but Harry has a master’s in business burning a hole in his drawer that he’d been wanting to use and this wasn’t how he thought it’d be put to the test. What stinks is that he still had to pay off debt for something he wasn’t even using and if that didn’t just rub salt into the wound every time he got a bill in the mail.

So Harry goes on walks – he goes on walks to clear his head and reflect on the hand he’d been dealt in life and wonder if he should honestly buy that coat at Yves Saint Laurent because it’s still hot out, barely breaching the end of August but god he wanted to get it before it was gone. He goes on walks at night to get away from everybody and everything and every file about a John Doe share holder who breathe cocaine and throws associates under the bus to get where he is in life today. Walks to get away from bad memories and the shopping cart on his amazon (separate things, sure, but he really needs to stop adding things in his cart and buying mass amounts of items at once).

Normally, Harry’s strolls go the same way. He takes the same route everyday, comes across a bunny ushering it’s friend across the road to a grassy park, a moth flies directly in his face when he checks his phone to see the time, he comes across at least two girls and three guys stumbling smelling like vodka cranberries and copious amounts of cosmos, he trips a little over a curb and looks around to see if anybody witnessed it, and he buys a donut from a cute 24 hour diner that he frequents far too much. Then he makes his way home, donut in hand (two in a little white baggy), feeling much better than when he started out, and well, maybe that coat wasn’t too expensive, now was it?

The routine hadn’t changed much over the two years he’d been doing it. Given that note, it’s safe to say when his routine is disrupted when he ambles by a bench inhabiting a girl, who looks far too soft and fresh faced to be out by herself. A phone buzzing besides her face, a sliver of her tummy showing and an arm thrown over her eyes, legs curled but thrown over the back of the bench and easy breaths leaving her mouth.

And Harry finds himself terribly angry.

Who in their right mind would sleep on a god damn bench? At such a late hour, in a spot like this? Outside of clubs and bars full of terrible, god awful people, how could this girl even think for a remote second that this would be a good idea at all?

Harry tells himself it’s because he has a sister, that he walks up to her and bends down – if Gemma were the one sleeping on this bench first he would scold her, then comfort and take care and he already feels an upbraiding rising in his body when he lies his hand on her. “Oi,” he begins and she startles right away, like she hadn’t been asleep at all, and Harry is met with big glossy eyes that come with alcohol and oh christ, she was drunk wasn’t she? This just made it even better, her defenses were down and her coordination was off, it was a dream come true for bastards out there and Harry’s just glad he got to her first.

He doesn’t know why he is so upset about this – she and him have no ties with each other at all…he doesn’t even know the girl’s name, yet he stopped his walk, gearing up to gripe at her for being so dumb. Something pulled him to her, it feels like, because he didn’t think for a second before he’d veered off his path to confront her. Harry knows there are fucked up people in this world, as previously stated (he reluctantly works with quite a few) and fucked up people do fucked up things, especially on dark streets lit barely by dimming, flickering lamps. Unspeakable things have happened to his friends, both guys and girls, who got mixed up with the wrong things at the wrong times, drunk and on streets similar to this one and the thought that somebody would let their guard down like this infuriates him.

“Have you got any sense? You know how dangerous it is to sleep on a bench? Why’re you out here so late?”

The girl looks confused, and he can only assume her mind is muddled terribly as she sits up knuckling at her eyes and he backs off quite a bit but doesn’t stand. Stays so that he isn’t seeming too aggressive, “I – uh,” she starts, scratching the side of her nose, “I wasn’t sleepin’ – just, well I got sleepy but … but I had no bed, y'know? So I just laid down to rest my eyes, a little, I’m sorry. Is this your bench?”

“Did you drink tonight?” He asks next, the scolding in his voice present already and he thinks even in her inebriated state she can feel it.

“A – a little?” She answers, “I think, at least – um, these boys kept buying me things at that new bar thing – or was it a club – and then I lost Liam. Are you friends with Liam? Do you know where he might be?”

“No, I don’t know Liam, but listen, you can’t just be wondering off or taking drinks from people you don’t know, do you not understand how dangerous that is?” He starts, and the girl flinches a bit with how his tone rises, “There’s a number of things that could’ve happened to you there, let alone on a strip like this – and you’re defenses are down? And you leave without your friend? Who taught you how to fucking behave, for fuck sake, if I’d been a murderer or summat there is no telling where you would be! I swear, this is the dumbest thing I’ve seen anybody every do.” The last bit was a lie, but right then it felt like it was. This girl seemed too soft for him to even be yelling at her right now, and his point is further proven when her eyes start welling up with tears and fuck, he hadn’t even taken into consideration she could be an emotional drunk.

So now she’s hiccuping with cries and trying to catch her breath, rubbing at her eyes again and again to swipe away tears and Harry feels like an absolute prick, “Why’re you yelling at me?” She questions through a gasp, “I - I dunno’ who you are, why’re you being so mean? Is this your bench?” She repeats her earlier question and Harry huffs a laugh out of disbelief.

“S'not my bench, Love,” he tells her, before sighing, “C'mon now, stop crying. You shouldn’t be out here all alone is what I’m saying. There’s real creeps out here,” and he figures, he probably should’ve started with that instead of yelling as he’d done. He just knows if this were his friend – if he were Liam – then he’d be livid, and would want to knock some sense into her right then and there, but he guesses a stranger yelling at you when your mind is swimming with fruity shots is too much too soon, “Do you know what club you were at? I’ll take you back to your friend, okay?”

Her body shudders with a breath, calming some but not much, “I – I don’t know the name of it. Dunno if he’s still there or not either, but um, um I could make it home I think. Thank you for waking me.” And she’s about to stand but his hand moves to press down on her thigh, shaking his head with his brows furrowed deep.

“Darling, I don’t mean to be rude, but you’re in now shape to walk home,” he tells her, trying to be gentler this time as to avoid tears that still brim at her eyes, “Do you live close by? I’ll walk you.”

The girl looks both ways on the street, before questioning, “Well, how do I know if I’m s'pposed to trust you or not? If you wan’ me to be smart, shouldn’t I leave you here or something?”

She has a good point, Harry thinks, and for a moment he isn’t sure what to say. Staring at her, trying not to get distracted by her eyes that are just so mesmerizing from where he stands, though it’s dark it’s her gaze that really gets him. It’s strong but meek, stony but sweet, stubborn but submissive all in one blink and he doesn’t understand how she’s conveying so many very opposite emotions with them, he’s taken aback by it.

“Smart thinking, sure, but if I were planning on doing something to you I already would have.”  He tells her, standing up and taking a few steps away from her, “Or you could stay here, in the dark street, with terrible people, all by yourself and I’ll just be on my way.”

Harry has dealt with drunk people enough to know how to work them – which explains why the girl cries out, “No, no, no!” Before scrambling to stand, the sweater she wore pooling off her shoulders, “Fine, fine, you can take me home, but you have to be nice to me.” She tells him, “I live this way.” She points to the right and Harry nods, beginning to walk and noticing she falls in step quickly besides him.

After a little while of silence, she peers at him, “How come you’re out so late?” she asks, seeming genuinely curious and Harry shrugs his shoulders.

“Needed some air,” he answers, standing a little nearer to her when they pass by a man smoking a cigarette, “What’s your name?”

“I’m Y/N!” Her voice – Y/N’s voice – is bright, “You know you’re the only one who’s asked for my name all night? Nobody else cared to.”

Harry doesn’t understand how that could’ve happened. If he were in a bar with a girl like this – in a sweater a pale yellow, a face to warm and seemingly gentle, an anklet that jingles with each step, and eyes as captivating as the one’s in her sockets – he’d want to know her name first. He’d want to know it so he could make passing mention of it in his journal, maybe write it down a few times to see how it looks in his handwriting, say it aloud to taste it on his tongue, think about it more than he should, then scold himself for thinking about it so much, but ultimately continue thinking of her until he presses his face into the pillow and grumbling at himself.

“That’s – that’s a good name,” and his brows furrow at himself, shaking in his head and he feels dumb…why would you say that? “I’m Harry.”

“Well that name is even better,” she hums, twisting to look at him again, “Are you the prince?”

With a snort, Harry rolls his eyes, “You could say that.”

“I’ve always wanted to meet the prince,” she continues, pressing the hair from her face and Harry nearly coos, thinks that maybe he wants to push the strands from her face instead of her doing it, “Think he might be fun, and also I’ve seen his penis already, so I feel like he owes me dinner or something.”

“Is that so?” Harry smiles, and he feels so wonderfully normal it’s almost too much. It’d been far too long since Harry had a normal conversation like this one, with a girl like this no less, and it’s nice. Really, really, fucking nice as she drunkenly babbles about this and that and everything in between. Such an overwhelming, sugary presence that if anybody else had it, it’d be too much, but it suits her just perfectly.

Maybe he is just infatuated or something, perhaps that could explain why his feelings for her seem to be a bit strong, but again, Harry works with a lot of terrible, dangerous men and women alike, so to have someone like her besides him. Well, it was a pleasant change to say the least. She looked god damn cute, smiling and chattering besides him, arms swinging because she has nothing to do with her hands and an ease with him that nobody usually possesses, drunk or not.

“I like your hair,” Y/N admits suddenly, and Harry reaches up to feel it, realizing he hadn’t been wearing a beanie, “Suits you nicely.”

And that just really does him in, he thinks. Rather insecure about it lately, actually it’d just begun to grow out more since he’d gotten it cut and it were these little wisps that he had when he was younger. Hadn’t known if his face still suited it or not, but she reaches up and runs her hand over the top, “Ooh, and it’s soft too! Tha’s great, I’m so proud of you.”

“Proud of me?” He questions, grinning.

She nods, “Yeah, tha’s mad cool, if you think about it. I put argon oil in mine.” They turn into a complex, nice enough but he almost doesn’t want to leave her here, though he figures there really isn’t another choice, unless he makes them turn around and trek back to his place. He isn’t sure if this is friendship that they’re creating or just a bit of small talk on the walk home that he forced her to share with him, so he doesn’t suggest it. Only looks to her, trying to hide the worry in his eyes.

“Y/N,” he begins, stopping her tirade about socks that he’d stopped listening to half way through, “Are you sure you’ll be okay getting upstairs?”

There’s a second or two that she doesn’t answer and he would be concerned if not for realizing she wasn’t because she’d been preoccupied with the bracelets around her ankle, fiddling with the chain and he assumes they’re too tight, “Yeah, I’ll be fine! Thank you for walking me home, very chivalrous of you,” she tells him and holds out a hand for him to shake, which he takes, huffing out a laugh, “You’re now my new knight in shining armor! Oh Liam is g'na be soooo mad, I bet, I’ve replaced him.”

Harry doesn’t have time to question hers and Liam’s dynamic before she leans in, pecks a kiss on his cheek, then she’s off towards the door, scurrying up the stairs.

He’s still standing there long after she’d left line of sight, with his cheek tingling pleasantly and his heart doing moves that it hadn’t in a long while.

                                                                                                 +

Harry was drowning in files, pissed at countless people, and his stomach kept growling and growling, but he felt far too lazy to do something about it.

So it’s safe to say that today wasn’t the best day.

Usually his big chair – the maroon one that sits in his office at a desk larger than he needed – makes him feel better, with memory foam embedded in the cushioning, but not even that was working. There were just bad days sometimes, even if there is no rhyme or reason for it, but they happen despite everything and really take down his mood a few notches. Most the men that work close with him can sense it, he thinks, because when he’s in one of his moods the constant ring of his cell phone dies down considerably.

He’d been scanning over a file – some man wanted a hit on another that’d gotten off on probation because the police fucked up questioning him (Harry’d seen enough law and order SVU to know that certain things in the interrogation room stay in the interrogation room, being unamicable in court no matter how fucked up the information obtained is) and Harry got to decide if what this guy did was death penalty suitable, if the money was enough, and if it was worth it to send one of his men to do it. Most days this felt like more of a business deal than a gang, which Harry presumes is why his father had been so supportive of his master’s degree.

Heaving a sigh, he tossed the manila envelope off to the side, covering his face with his hands and groaning. Not only was this not how he wanted to spend his time, a certain sweater wearing cutie was still swimming in his head. A little over a week since the encounter is apparently not enough time to get over her calling him her knight, because Harry hadn’t been someone knight since high school. He felt more like an antagonist than a good guy, but she’d kissed him on the cheek and everything, cementing her words. Making it very clear that she wasn’t afraid of him, and it felt nice.

It’s not like many people acted afraid of him – he thinks it’s just how he carries himself that’s a bit intimidating but he doesn’t mean for it. Just how he is, he guesses, but the fact that Y/N didn’t seem to notice really did something to him. Twisted and twirled in his head until he was thinking about it before bed every night, hiding teen girlish smiles into his pillow at the tingle her lips still left on his skin. Why a little peck like that drove him bonkers, he wouldn’t know, though he doesn’t think he cares either. It feels normal, finally, after years of being not so normal, getting giddy over a cute girl he’s just met feels so normal and he loves that.

There’s a perfunctory knock on his door before it swings open and there’s only one person who does that, so he knows Niall’s come along. Niall who was very aware of what Harry did for a living but didn’t seem to really care (“That’s your business, Mate, s'long as I don’t get kidnapped as collateral or summat,” he told him one day and it tore away a weight Harry hadn’t known to be sitting on his chest). Niall who makes him feel normal like Y/N does, only in a different sort, stumbling in, “Honestly, you need to get that knob fixed.” He tells him, like he always tells him, even though it’s never really the knobs fault, Niall is just clumsy as all get out.

“Hi, Ni,” Harry hum, elbows set on the desk before him, “What brings you round?”

“Decided you needed to drink with me,” he tells him, “New club opened up, s'pposed to be loads of cuties men and women alike and I dunno’ bout you but I need to get laid,” though he adds as a second thought, “But we haven’t got to, either. I left a six-y in your fridge last time, we could make them nachos.”

And Harry almost goes for the latter – almost, until the words I think, at least – um, these boys kept buying me things at that new bar thing – or was it a club – and then I lost Liam. Are you friends with Liam? Do you know where he might be? echo in his head like a symphony and well, maybe she was there again? Sure it was a Thursday night, but she’d mentioned not having classes next Friday (which would be this Friday now) and perhaps this could be a bit of a celebratory night for her or something.

Harry doesn’t know, he just wants to see her again, and pretty eyes, soft skin, and a giggle that makes him burn up inside is enough to beat out even his best batch of homemade nachos.

“Fancy me a cosmo, actually,” he grins, sitting up, “Better a fruity drink or two than swallowed up in this all night.”

“That’s the spirit!” Niall cheers, “Also, while you’re in a good mood how’s about we go for breakfast tomorrow morning? I’ll pay.”

He frowns, “You make me sound like I’m normally a monster, when would I ever deny you breakfast?”

Niall rolls his eyes, rubbing his shoulder, “You’d be surprised how grumpy you can get mister. Like a sleep-deprived dragon of some sorts, it’s petrifying and Louis agrees.”

“I resent that.” Harry grunts, “‘sides Louis only thinks I’m grumpy 'cos I won’t let him throw a party here.”

“You’ve got the partying house,” Niall reminds him, “But I respect that. Take ages to clean up, wouldn’t it? And I’d have to help, I know it, but I’ve got a bum knee, so that would just be a wreck.”

                                                                                                    +

Harry tries not to deflate when he doesn’t see her instantly.

So he’s sat at the bar with Niall, downing a round Niall had gotten them and scrunching his face from the burn of it. Listening to Niall rant and rave to him and this man on the other side of him about work and this new comforter he wanted (Harry suggested he steal the one nice one he knows is in Niall’s office but it hadn’t been Niall’s to begin with, and Niall told him to stop being such a gang stereotype) while letting his eyes trail across the mass amounts of sweaty, two left footed people feeling themselves on the dance floor. None catching his eye in particular but even if they had, he wouldn’t take them home. Reasons being one, Niall is with him and is most likely staying the night, and two, Harry’s got his sights set on someone different.

Someone who wasn’t here, but he really, really wished she was.

He was just about to give up, when he hears a voice. A voice achingly familiar and he tunes into it – if he were a dog his ears would’ve perked up at the sound – “Liam, c'mon, I wanna go home, m'sleepy.”

“Just a few more minutes, Love, promise.”  Harry twists around, sees the girl he’d been looking for besides a broad boy he presumes is Liam and she’s frowning at him a pout heavy on her lips.

“You said that forever ago,” she grumps at him, before her eyes flicker off, catching Harry staring and her pout breaks out into a grin, “Harry!”

She remembered his name. It makes him flush, “Hi Y/N,” he hums, spinning in his stool to face her more, “Having a good time?”

Nodding, she leans closer to him, “I wanted to leave ages ago, but Liam didn’t wanna go, but I didn’t leave by myself this time!” She tells him triumphantly, “You proud or what? And you’ll be happy to know I didn’t have any drinks from them boys from last time, so I’m not even that drunk, just a bit stumbly on me feet.”

Harry’s smile widens, rolling his eyes at her, “Good job, Doll. Why do you want to go home? Aren’t you having fun?”

“Well I wasn’t but now you’re here, so it’s fun again,” she concludes, “Say, how’ve you been? I didn’t get your number when you dropped me off, I wanted to thank you properly for bringing me home.” Then she leans in even closer, bending close to his ear, “I’m gonna slide my phone into your pocket and then you gotta take it real inconspicuously then put your number back in and I’ll retrieve it. Told a boy just down the way that I didn’t have my phone and I had no clue what my number is, but truth is he just seemed super mean.”

And just like that she’s sliding her phone onto his lap, hand stopping a little too close to his cock (though he didn’t particularly mind it) before she draws back and Harry’s laughing a bit, “You’re a trip.” He tells her, unlocking her phone and going straight for the dial, calling his number for a few seconds until it got to ringing and he hung up.

Then Y/N does a very over exasperated outing of her arms, before wrapping him up in a hug and whispering, “Slide it in my pocket, hurry!”

It’s overwhelming, a little, with her overloading his senses and he takes the phone and slides it into her pocket, though she loses her footing and stumbles into him, and his hand is caught in her pocket and he was pressing tight into her bum. Full on cupping her cheek and she squeaks, Harry accidentally squeezes a bit more, pulling her even close as he tries not to let her fall off too far to the side and she giggles, “Oh!” Fingers digging into his biceps as she begins steadying herself and Harry doesn’t mean to keep his hand in her pocket, but it stays all the while and she doesn’t seem to mind. Even going so far as to pout when he slips it out, though she doesn’t comment on it, “Perfect, we could be spies I bet!”

“I’d second that,” he hums, “Do you need a ride home later?”

“Are you sure?” Y/N asks him, brows furrowed, “I don’t want you to feel obligated or anythin’, I only came to say –”

“I don’t feel obligated Moppet,” he tells her, “Was just wondering. Have my car this time.”

Y/N waits a moment, lulling around the idea in her head before her lips turn up into a smile and she nods, grinning, “Well, okay! But only if you lemme make this up to you.”

Harry agrees, not really minding, because that’s just more time spent with her.

                                                                                                     +

As the night progressed, Y/N got just a little more wobbly on her feet and Harry had switched to water. Niall had gone off with a cute person he’d met, promising Harry he’d find his way back to his house (which he didn’t need to say, because Harry knows he will, he always does) before he’d nodded his head towards Y/N, who was knuckling at her eyes with one hand and takes a sip of Harry’s drink with the other. “She’s cute…this the one you’ve been gushing 'bout?”

“I –” Harry’s face scrunches, “I haven’t even told you about her?” Then adding, “'Sides, M'not gushing…barely know her.”

Niall rolls his eyes, “Can see love in your eyes from kilometers away.”

                                                                                                          +

“You can come in my house,” Y/N shifts in the passenger side, facing towards him and laying her head against the seat, “I’ve got chocolate hazel nut spread and waffles and soooo many juice boxes. Oh, and I’ve got milk too!”

Harry smiles, “Button, I think it might be best for you to just sleep.” He tells her, thumbing at the wheel and wondering if he should invest in a fuzzy covering for the winter. He’s still got a little while before it gets too cold, but Y/N reminds him of warm cozy nights snuggled in blankets, candles lit, and Criminal Minds a marathon. Holding her close to him, ear pressed to his chest, and never wanting to leave that spot. Harry likes the idea of it, but tells himself to keep that thought to himself.

“No!” Y/N exclaims, “You promised to let me thank you, so I’m making you food.”

And, well, was he really going to say no?

It’d be in his best interest to, yes, because he needs to get back to one last file that was imperative to fax over but it’s this girl who he couldn’t stop thinking about since he’d met her, and – well, for being the leader of a gang he isn’t very spontaneous. Decides that this will be his fun thing of the month, or year, or something or other, he’s just trying to convince himself that going into her house and letting her cook for him when he’s barely known her for a total of 5 hours was a good idea.

“Alright, but you need to sleep at some point okay?”

“Yeah, yeah, yeah, we’ll get to that.”

                                                                                                +

When the night ends, Harry is full of waffles and juice, with an equally full Y/N – head to his chest with Criminal Minds on the screen. He’d tried to fight it, telling her she needs to sleep or she’ll regret it in the morning but she told him that they needed to eat and watch to get the full experience. Then effectively snuggled into his side after she’d finished eating, pressing her fingers to his mouth when he begins to scold her, “Just shh, lemme cuddle for a minute.”

Again, it’s very hard to say no to someone with such a cute face and soft skin and he just lets it happen. Pats her hip, which only invites her to lift a leg up and crosses it over his thigh, sighing sleepily. “S'good, you being here” she had hummed, half asleep, and a little slurred, “Alone a lot. Feels like I’ve known you forever, I hope that isn’t weird.”

“It isn’t,” he assured her, because he felt the same, and he rubs her arm until she’d resorted to soft little snores and these little whimper-y sleep noises that send him into a puddle of mush. Harry finds himself overwrought with want – aching to know all her favorite things, all her quirks, all her go to songs – just to be a boy, who has a normal job, and a normal relationship with his father, and a pretty girl he barely knows tucked into his side.