Twice Shy {h.s. au}

VII.

The next day Harry was sitting at the coffee shop's bay window and reading Dracula. It didn't seem totally fitting as Spring had finally come, but he enjoyed the story; not so much the misogyny and backward social beliefs, but that would all be discussed in class. He made little notes in the margins and on post-it notes on what he thought certain things meant or why he thought characters were written a certain way. With his headphones in and his back only partially facing the rest of the coffee house, Harry was in his own little world, a world of vampires running around England.

He mindlessly picked at the M&Ms he brought with him and sipped on his tea, his eyes blinking slower and slower with each page that he turned. The sun was beginning to set, which told Harry he'd been there a lot longer than he'd anticipated. Closing the book, he put it back in his backpack and took off his glasses, rubbing his eyes tiredly. When he opened his eyes, he nearly closed them again, thinking he'd summoned an image before him with his drowsy mind.

"Hey," she said.

She was really there, standing in front of him in a dark red v-neck shirt tucked into a pair of black jeans. Her hair was up in a ponytail, a few strands of her dark hair framing her face. She looked pretty, but that wasn't surprising to Harry; he always thought she looked pretty.

"Hi." He felt frozen in place again, just like he did yesterday. She seemed to have that effect on him, now more than she did before he started talking to her at the end of last semester. Looking into her eyes, he saw that she wasn't just looking at him, but the spot he was occupying at the bay window. "Oh, did you want to sit here? I was just leaving," he said, gathering up the rest of his things so he could leave her alone.

"No, don't go," she said, holding out a hand to stop him. "I actually wanted to talk to you. If you don't mind?"

Harry was surprised that she was asking to talk, the last time he properly had a conversation with Maggie, she told him to leave her alone, so that's what he'd been doing. It wasn't easy, but he was doing it. He'd be lying if he said his heart didn't flutter with hope, though. "No, of course not."

Maggie sat down next to him at the bay window. She said she wanted to talk, but nothing came out of her mouth, she just kept sitting next to him and looking down at the notebook in her hands.

"How—How are you?" he asked, wishing he hadn't put all his things away. His fingers were itching to play with something while he had this conversation, but he would settle for the frayed ends of his hoodie.

A small smile flickered on Maggie's lips at his question. "I'm alright. How are you?"

"I'm fine, I guess," he said with a shrug. "Just really busy with work and school."

Maggie's smile grew just a tiny bit more, but she didn't say anything after that. It was like she didn't really know what to say. Harry wanted to help her somehow, but he didn't really know what to say, either, or why she asked to sit down with him. The anticipation started to form a knot at the base of his stomach. He didn't think that Maggie was going to yell at him again, but that didn't mean she wasn't still angry or didn't hate him anymore. The longer Harry sat there with her, the more nervous he became; his fingers weren't fidgeting anymore so much as trembling, and his heartbeat started to get just a little bit faster.

"I'm making you nervous," Maggie said, her eyes widening a little. "Don't be, I—I just came over to apologize. I tried to see you last night, but your roommate, your old roommate I guess, said you moved."

"Yeah, I...I moved at the start of the semester. I didn't really...get along with him."

Apologize? She came to apologize? What for? Harry didn't know why Maggie felt like she needed to apologize, he was the one who had ignored her the entirety of Winter Break.