salvia. [h.s. AU]

Chapter Twenty Four

Harry Styles

I don't know what made me want to bring Maria to my room, but the thing is, suddenly I had this urgent feeling to show her.

This room is - or at least, used to be - the closest picture of my most intimate feelings and thoughts. My granny says it's not healthy, and Chloe used to hate stepping inside here so much, for the past 2 years I've decided to not let anyone else see it. So even though I've always had housekeepers and friends over, this room is off-limits. I do the cleaning myself, and I never wanted anyone to do it for me.

It has always felt like the most intimate, raw representation of my feelings, and for years it made all the sense in the world to keep it the way I do. Even with Niall coming here once a week and telling me it's sickening, that I should change it, that it's not healthy. I've never listened to anybody, and never wanted to change anything about it.

Until I met Maria.

Always, Maria.

I can't understand this feeling I have when she's around - I've always hated to show my emotions, hell, I didn't even want to feel them for so long, but with her, I want to open up. I wanna show her the good, the bad and the ugly I have inside, because I know she would never judge me. Maybe it's simply 'cause she's a comprehensive girl, but honestly I know it's more than that. When she's around, there's this invisible pull in my stomach, it feels like gravity itself - something impossible to fight against, it's simply so natural, almost like the universe is trying to tell me it's time.

Time to open up. Time to let someone in. To let her in.

They say it's wrong to rely on another person to fill the emptiness of your heart. They say it's impossible for someone else to do something only you should, that it's impossible to ever truthfully love someone before you're complete when alone. When I was younger, I believed that too. But then, I lost Meredith, and she left an open hole in my heart that I've never thought I could fill someday.

However, lately I've been wondering if this empty space has a shape, somehow perfectly built for someone else to fill. It doesn't matter I've just met her, I feel it in my heart, at the end of the day, Maria is the one I want, the only one I can think about when I'm alone at night. I need her to hug me when I'm crying, to hold me when I'm asleep. It's not only our bodies that seem to fit like two pieces of a puzzle - our hearts do it too.

She's perfectly shaped to fill my heart.

I don't think I've ever been so nervous in my life, as I'm in this moment, the both of us standing right in front of the closed door to my room. Maria is looking at me with doubtful eyes, and I can tell she's doing her best not to look surprised that I brought her in. Honestly, I'm a little surprised too, I wasn't planning to do it tonight, or ever for that matter... At least not before I would clean up and change a few things.

But for some reason, seeing her in such a vulnerable place made me want to be vulnerable too. I want to show her she's not the only one left broken because of an ex, even though the situations are completely opposite. I want to show her that there's a way out of a broken heart, even if I myself am still trying to understand it, after so many years not believing it could be done. .

Now, I have a reason to believe it - Maria.

Guess I just want to be her reason as well.

My hand shakes softly as I raise it and hold the round door knob to my room, and with a deep breath, I open the door, holding it wide enough for Maria to enter the room.

She throws me a reassuring gaze, her big turquoise eyes gluing on mine for a second, as if waiting for me to give her the permission. I nod, softly, not needing words to tell her how importantly big is this moment, for me anyways. She nods too, reaching for my hand with hers and intertwining our fingers. And then, she enters.