untitled |h.s|

three

Ariella

The attention is snapped to me as soon as the words leave my mouth. As I look into my brother's rage-filled eyes, I can feel Harry's stare burning into me. Niall doesn't look at me for more than a second before he's lunging toward his roommate.

"What the fu-"

"Niall! Stop," I don't even think about my actions before I step in front of Harry, creating a barrier between him and my brother.

I'm not sure why I decided to protect Harry. Frankly, it probably would've been funny to watch Niall beat the shit out of him. But for some reason, I did. I willingly threw my barely-clothed body in front of the man I had only just met last night. Maybe it was because he was nice and didn't do anything particularly deserving of getting his face pummeled in by his roommate. Maybe it was because I couldn't let my brother inflict that kind of damage on his friendship because of something I did. I mean, technically I wasn't innocent either, I couldn't just let Niall go at Harry without knowing the full story.

"Ari," he glares at me, speaking through gritted teeth, "move."

"No, you need to calm-"

"I said move. Get the fuck out of my-"

"Niall shut the fuck up and listen." Harry finally speaks up. I turn around to look at him, seeing he's finally gotten out of bed, standing behind me in nothing more than a pair of boxers.

I catch my eyes automatically scanning over his body. I blink hard, forcing myself to turn my attention back to Niall. When I look at him again, he still looks angry, but slightly less likely to commit murder.

"Can you tell me why my little sister is half-naked in your bedroom?" Niall looks straight past me as he questions Harry. I have to hold back the urge to laugh at the fact that Harry is quite literally hiding behind me, but I don't trust Niall enough to move from where I stand between them.

"I didn't know she was your sister at first, okay?"

"How could you not know? Did you even bother asking her name or did you just fuck her the second you had the chance?"

"Niall, stop," I step into their conversation, "I told him a fake name. Neither of us had any idea. Can we please just move on and stop talking about who's fucking who?"

I watch Niall physically cringe at my question, but he doesn't say anything. He clenches his fists, blowing out an angry puff of air before he turns and walks out of the room.

He may be gone, but the tension still fills Harry's bedroom as the two of us remain frozen. I finally turn around when I hear soft footsteps in the room behind me. "Look, I'm sorry-" I start, but Harry cuts me off by shaking his head.

"Don't be, I'm not sorry about last night. I hope you aren't either, even if your brother wants to kill me."

I feel my shoulders relax, breathing out a breath I hadn't even realized I was holding as I let out a chuckle at Harry's words. "I don't regret last night at all, I guess maybe I should've just told you my real name though."

"I lied about my name too, you're right. I can't be mad." He speaks as I watch him dig through his dresser drawers, "besides, if I had known your name, we probably wouldn't have ended up hooking up last night, and that would be something I regret."

He slips into a pair of sweatpants before walking back toward me. I raise my eyebrows at his statement, allowing him to close the distance between us yet again, "Oh?"

"Mmhm," he nods, moving his face closer to mine. I can feel his breath fan over my face, yet neither of us makes a move to lean in, no matter how desperately both of us are craving it. With a sigh, I pull away and take a step back, increasing the distance between us.