Awkward Beat [H.S]

Chapter 8

In which Fitz makes contact and considers it a raging success.

Chapter 8

Louis really was a hazard with a writing utensil. On the night of the pub crawl, I first spotted him as I left my bedroom with bills tucked into my bra and copious amounts of black eyeliner to make my grey eyes pop.

"What are you doing?" I asked. He had his wrist in the air and the pen was poised over Harry's door.

Louis put a finger to his lips to shush me. With a secretive smile, he turned back to the door.

He'd just touched pen to wood when I crossed the hallway to yank away his wrist. "No!" I reprimanded him the way I would a five year old.

Shocked by my scolding, Louis frowned. "It'll be funny!" he argued in a whisper.

"Maybe so, but I promised Harry the surfaces of this flat would be penis free by the end of the night."

With our frantic whispering, Harry's door flew open and he stepped out into the hall, arms folded across his chest.

"No penises," he said, grabbing the pen from Louis' hand.

"All right, Haz," Louis agreed. "No penises if you come out tonight."

"No penises and I stay in."

Louis was incredulous. "Nobody wins!"

Harry sighed. "Look, I'd come out if I could, but I have this huge project due Monday and I'm probably pulling an all nighter tonight and tomorrow as it is. I need an eighty six at minimum to raise my mark three percent, and even that won't be good enough. It's the last week of classes – I have to be serious if I ever want to go out on a Saturday night again."

With a shrug, Louis said, "Last month I wrote an essay on the French Revolution at four in the morning piss drunk. I got a ninety."

"Fantastic. Thanks for sharing." Harry's voice was monotonous and dry, so I knew it was time to pull away.

"All right." I clapped my hands together and began to tug on Louis' arm. "Harry, back in your room. Work hard. We'll all be gone in thirty minutes and there'll be no penises anywhere, just as I promised."

He groaned. "Remember that time you promised me no more parties?"

"This isn't a party, it's a pre-drink. Remember that time I said I'd take care of it?"

Weary, Harry shook his head. "Remember that time that you promised the same thing and then got so drunk to impress my mate that you passed out and left me to deal with the penises?"

Louis placed a hand on Harry's shoulder. "You lost me."

With a dreary sigh, Harry retreated to his room with one last pointed glance in my direction. I followed Louis down the hallway just in time to meet Macy as she was coming through the front door.

"Thank God you're here," I breathed with relief as I threw an arm around her waist.

"Harry's officially not coming, so if you ditched me, too, then it would just be me and Niall all night—"

"Harry's not coming?" Macy interrupted, her eyes darting to mine filled with nerves and irritation.

I stopped myself from continuing. "Um... what?" I asked, if only to stall her and give myself more time to think. It may have been that a pulling factor for Macy's attendance was an opportunity to spend time with Harry, but if I hadn't promised her that he'd be here, she never would have come. If I was going to put myself out there with Zayn, then having only Niall and his stupid camera for comfort was, in fact, no comfort at all.