A Shot of Reality [Harry Styles]

IX. Threadbare

A/N- Happy update day! Not much to say, except I'm loving your feedback and positive reviews on this story! It means a ton when I see that "so and so has commented." Seriously makes my day. This chapter is dedicated to my one and only Sadie. Love you girl!

March 3rd, 2010

“Harry, Manchester shits on Liverpool. End of.”

“You have got to be kidding me, Manchester plays sloppy and their players are pussies. Liverpool on the other hand, is the complete opposite. They’re skill is unbeatable and unlike your dear Manchester, their balls have dropped.”

Sydney stuck out her tongue at his comment, to which Harry returned by slobbering over her hand jokingly.

“Gross,” Sydney shook her hand free of the spit residue as Harry blinked one of his teal eyes in false flirtation.

Saturday mornings in the Styles household were usually like this. Sydney would be over from 8 in the morning to 8 at night, and sometimes into the next morning. In that duration, they would argue about their opposing views on football, watch endless amounts of John Hughe's movies and bake even more random deserts that seemed like it would be for an animal in hibernation.

(“The perks of Harry working at a bakery,” she would think.)

But sometimes they would just lie on Harry’s bed, while Harry strummed his guitar along to the beat of "Crash into me" by the Dave Matthews Band blaring on his iPod speakers as Sydney would hum along as her dark hair dangled off the front of the mattress as the tips skimmed the oak hardwood floors below. Needless to say, Saturday was Harry’s favorite day.

“Play another song,” she said softly as she gazed at the picture frames in his room. She was in most of them, she noticed.

Harry raised an eyebrow as he shook the curls out of his face. He paused as he turned down the volume dial on the speakers, the only sound in the room now being Sydney’s shallow breathing.

“Like what?”

“Hm, I don’t know,” she questioned as she flipped over on the bed, so now her back was facing the white ceiling.

”Something good, I would think.”

“So anything that doesn’t have to do with Manchester?”

Sydney scoffed at his comment. “Oh piss off! I’m being serious here.”

He smiled inwardly at the sight of her, as he so often found himself doing; the never-ending length of her dark waves, her crystalline eyes that smiled even when she was not, and the faint sun freckles that grazed her nose. She was beautiful; anyone with the slightest amount of vision could see it. But only ones that were close to her could see the true beauty that is Sydney Ronan.

And that’s what he intended the song she demanded to be about.

“Um, okay,” he said as he fumbled for his guitar, now suddenly nervous.

He looked at her one last time before rummaging his hands all over the strings, his mouth slightly open as she furrowed her forehead in confusion.

“Alright, um- one, two, three, four...”

The guitar’s chords were the second sound in the room and soon after Harry’s voice became the third.

“Am I sleep am I awake or somewhere in between? I can’t believe that you are here and lying next to me…”

Sydney smiled at this line, to which Harry returned back.