The Short Stories of Harry Styles

The Assignment: Part 9

The hours ticked by slowly as Harry and Don murmured to one another in his living room, the hard drive linked up to a laptop as they tried to find what they were looking for.

A code.

I had been perched on top of the kitchen counter, legs crossed underneath me, thinking over what the dead sparrow had said to me.

It's all up here...in your mind....

You'll know it when you see it....

I was stuck on his words.

What we needed to find the code was already there in our memories. How could I distinguish what was a real memory and what was a facade?

"Harry?" My voice breaks through their hushed tones and both sets of eyes snap up to mine as if they just realized I was still there.

"What are your memories like?" His dark brown eye brow lifts just enough to let me know that he is both confused and intrigued by my train of thought.

For the first time in hours, Harry stood up from the couch and made his way over to where I sat on the counter top.

The languid motion of his hips as he walked towards me were annoyingly fascinating.

If I knew what arousal was....I'd think that the sensual display of masculinity through his movements would in fact arouse me.

But I did not feel such things.

Pleasure was something unknown to me.

Once the brown haired menace was stood in front of me with his long arms crossed in front of his taut chest, my focus was directed from his waist up to his glowing eyes.

"Like what you see little bird?" A sensation I am not privy too runs through my body and I force my heart rate to deescalate.

This is strange.

He is strange.

"What's your earliest memory?" My tone is clipped and by the way his muscles clench and then relax give him away.

He is uncomfortable.

He is defiant.

"What would that have to do with anything? They're all fail safes. I've told you this already." I roll my eyes and scoff. The attitude is really not my favorite thing about the beauty with the strawberry lips.

I have a favorite thing?

.....What is it?

"Just tell me what your earliest memory is. It's not a difficult question to answer." Harry eyed me warily, reaching a pointer finger up to his ear to scratch behind it.

He is nervous.

"Well...the one where I am holding someone's hand when I was little but it's the same one you have so I know it isn't real. It's just one of those blocks the Agency created." He shrugged like what he'd just said was a simple fact but something about it was nagging at my mind.

"Harry...do others have that memory? The exact same one?" I looked to Don who was glancing between the two of us. When he saw that I was looking to him to answer he shook his head.

"I've tried to tell him...we don't all have the same memories. I have a voice in my head that sounds like the one he has, raspy, older, but....I don't have any memories of myself as a child." Harry pressed the palms of his hands into his eyes in complete frustration. His body was rigid with tension and looked like he could burst at any moment.