sign {h.s.}

capítol trenta-set

HARRY CAN BE fun when he wants to. It was a realization that shocked me from the second that he let Elijah into the apartment and led the both of us over to where he stows all of his alcohol. Not the bottles of wine that I've dipped into several times, but the harder stuff. Bottles of tequilas, rums, whiskeys, and vodkas line the shelves of his liquor cabinet. Without reserve, he instructed us each to pick a bottle of whatever we liked. 

Drinks flow freely between the three of us upon Harry's insistence that the best way to learn a language is while perfectly tipsy. Not entirely drunk, yet not entirely sober either. It is at this point that your tongue is loose and you've grown in confidence. 

So, ceremoniously, my boyfriend produces three shot glasses for each of our handles. The two of us sharing a handle of tequila while Elijah opts for a large handle of vodka instead. He pours each of our shots with a stead hand, handing them to each of us as we move back towards the couch where we can spread out all of our materials. Harry sits down on the couch next to me, his arm automatically draping over the back of the cushion, wrapping around me. Elijah sits in the chair across from us, studying the scene carefully. 

Before he has the chance to say anything about it, Harry is leaning forward and pouring us each a shot. "Arriba, abajo, al centro y adentro," Harry says, tilting his glass up, down, towards him, and then sending it down in time with his words. Barely flinching as the alcohol burns down his throat, he sends us a charming smile before beckoning us to do the same. "Up, down, to the center, and down the hatch," he translates for us, sending me a wink as he watches me repeat the words.

"Arriba, abajo, al centro y adentro." 

❁❁❁

"WAIT, WAIT, WAIT," Elijah slurs, looking at Harry completely and utterly lost. There's a slight vacancy in his eyes, but I can tell that he is still more sober than me.

We'd started working before the alcohol kicked in. In that time, I'd mastered the content that we needed to know for our assessment tomorrow. Elijah is still stumbling through, but by this point, the alcohol already has taken full effect. 

When Harry first introduced the idea of drinking, he had done it under the context that we should be tipsy. He insisted that he had the art down to a science. Though, as it turns out, his science is a bit different than mine. In the sense that drinking for him to get tipsy is drinking to get me drunk.

I'm sprawled out on the couch, my head in Harry's lap as he soothingly combs back my hair while continuing to patiently explain the difference between the two tenses to Elijah. "Ayer, comí queso," Harry says patiently, immediately translating, "Yesterday, I ate cheese." Elijah nods his head as he tries to understand the difference. "Why comí?" 

Elijah considers for a moment, "Because it was a completed action that happened yesterday?" 

"Perfect," Harry smiles genuinely, the sight making me feel soft and mushy on the inside. Giggling, I sit up enough to press a kiss to the underside of his chin, Harry jerking back in shock, not having expected the gesture, "hi, chérie," he softly says, bending down to press a kiss to my forehead, "do you want to lay down?" He offers quietly, not seeming to mind that Elijah is in the room as well.

I shake my head in denial. Mostly, in this moment, I am just enjoying my proximity to Harry. The second that he lays me down, though I know I would feel the better for it, I know he would come back out to help Elijah study. As much as I enjoy this nicer side of him, I find myself being selfish and vying for his time and company. "No."

Sending me one more, full blown smile—so much so that his dimples pop—he returns his attention back to Elijah, "Okay. On the other end of it: Cuando tenía veinte años, tuve una novia. You see you use tenía when talking about age, but I am going to say tuve because it is a completed action. Do you see?"