Illicit [Harry Styles]

Chapter 63

It's safe to say I didn't sleep much after what I'd found. I felt sick thinking about it, but I couldn't stop. One minute I'd be convincing myself there'd be a logical explanation for why Harry had a photograph and a drawing of another girl hidden away under his mattress, and the next I'd be driving myself insane worrying and letting every bad outcome possible overpower my thoughts.

There was always the possibility I was overreacting, too. What if he didn't even know this girl and he had just used her photo as inspiration for his drawing? Maybe the pictures hadn't been tucked away on purpose. Even if he did know her, that didn't mean she meant anything to him.

But Harry used drawing you as an emotional outlet for dealing with his feelings for you my subconscious kept prodding, making things worse.

I was still awake, tossing and turning, when the sun started to rise on Sunday morning. Once the birds had started chirping and the light was shining in through the gaps in the curtains I knew I didn't stand a chance at falling back to sleep. I'd officially spent a whole night dwelling on uncertainty.

A short while later - it must've been around eight AM by now - Harry stirred beside me. I watched with a vacant expression as he came round from his peaceful and oblivious sleep, taking a deep breath, stretching, and then smiling a tiny smile when he saw me already awake.

"How long have you been awake?" His voice was gravelly and rough, usually that would've sent butterflies swarming in my stomach, but not this morning. The happiness on his face and in his voice as he settled again made me píssed off with him for some reason, not that I showed it at all.

"Not long," I lied.

He gave me a hesitant look as his smile faded into a light frown. "You okay?"

"Why wouldn't I be?" I couldn't stop myself from shooting him a somewhat defensive answer, which would obviously only arouse more suspicion.

"I don't know," he pouted cluelessly. "You just seem a bit... off, this morning."

I don't know why, but the last thing I wanted to do was ask him about the photo. Don't get me wrong, all I wanted was an answer, to be told I was overthinking this and that there was a totally innocent explanation, but I think a part of me was scared that I would get the other end of spectrum and everything would go wrong again, and the last thing I wanted was for my life to fall apart when it was just getting good.

This was when I realised that if I didn't want Harry asking about my bad mood, I would need to pretend like everything was fine. At least until I'd thought about my next move.

"I'm fine," I gave him a fake smile, although little effort to make it look convincing was put in.

He gave me this kind of reassuring yet skeptical smile back and threw his arm over my front, pulling me towards him. Despite the uneasy feeling it gave me, I let him draw me in close to him and kiss my shoulder.

I couldn't tell what I was feeling; I'd gone backwards and forwards between worrying and feeling like I was the one in the wrong for assuming, so much so that now I just felt annoyed. I was annoyed that I'd found something he'd more than likely been hiding from me and he was none the wiser, acting as though everything was perfect and he didn't have a drawing of another girl in his bed.

"Don't you think these past few days have gone by really slowly?" he mused, adding, "In a good way. It means we get to spend more time together."

"Yeah," I mumbled back. "I might go back home and sort things out with my family today."

Another on the spot, heat of the moment decision on my part. Was that what I actually wanted to do? Probably not, but at the same time I felt like staying at Harry's would only increase my negative attitude. I needed a day to myself, not to mention the fact that although I didn't agree with Niall and my mum, at the end of the day they were my family and I didn't want any permanent hard feelings.